Philian Gregory

by Simon J. Stephens

  “Victims.”, Carrington spoke slowly between sips of beer, “You know pal, Dexter’s approach to Daniels has more to it than you credit. Focus on the victims and they bring about the justice. That’s what we’ve been missing.”

  “Explain.”, Gregory knew that Carrington’s insight was their best weapon.

  “For our part, we’ve pretty much exhausted all the leads that we have. In fact, if it hadn’t been for us tracking your man here, we wouldn’t even have picked him up. Where else can we get new names? Truthfully, I don’t know.”

  He paused and drew on the vape stick that had replaced his cigarettes, letting the thick, swirling vapour rise high above the table.

  “We do know,”, he continued, “that we haven’t made the progress we need to make. Ours has been a mopping up operation of the lower levels. Our targets have been, for the most part, historic. Those who were a part of The Circle in the past, but who had left it all behind. There’s some comfort in that, but it doesn’t get away from the fact that The Circle is still active. And it’s active at a high level. Falstaff could have helped us, but circumstances got in our way. We need to move higher up the pyramid, but we don’t know how. I can’t rest until the true perpetrators, the ringleaders, have been made to pay. And I’m worried that their invisibility means that they continue to wield power in some way or other.”

  Dexter listened carefully, reflecting on the conversation that he’d had with Falstaff and recalling the dread that it had stirred in him as the man talked in the present tense and made it clear that this was not all a long-forgotten shadow from the past.

  “So,”, Carrington continued, “without any targets to go for just now, I think we take a leaf out of your colleagues’ book and take the approach that led to Daniels. We need to start looking for victims. We find the victims, we find the perpetrators. That’s my view anyway.”

  “I’m not sure.”, Gregory was comfortable enough with Carrington to query him, “I don’t see how it moves us forward as you think it will. Sure, we can track some down, but how do we isolate the ones used by The Circle from others? It’s too big a task.”

  “Besides,”, Dexter intervened, “we had something of a start with Daniels. Without a target in mind, I agree with our friend here, the task’s too big. If they’re not already in prison, lost in the sub-culture of drugs and depression, or dead, those who have survived won’t want the past dragged back up. I don’t think it’s fair on them.”

  “I agree.”, Carrington’s voice was calm and sure as he replied, “But that isn’t what I had in mind. Give me a moment to clear my thoughts while you nip to the bar and get us refills.”

  Obediently, Dexter followed his orders. He was longer at the bar than he’d expected to be, since the landlord felt it his civic duty to explain how Leicester was pronounced. That in turn led to a potted history of past visits to the States and some shared places they were both familiar with.

  “Sorry about that.”, he returned with the drinks, “And next time, we’ll order the Shropshire Star rather than the Leicester’s Pride. Unless you want to inform me that I’ve pronounced Shropshire wrong?”

  “Vive la difference, hey.”, Philian raised his pint to his friend, a wry smile on his face as he thought about Dexter’s next trip to the bar, “You’ll get used to it.”

  “You sure you’re okay with another.”, Dexter felt somewhat duty bound to ask of Carrington.

  “Mate,”, he replied with a laugh, “when you’ve battled with the tiger of two bottles of vodka a day, believe me, it’s not difficult to tame the pussycat of a few pints. Now, where were we?”

  “Your new idea.”, Gregory prompted him.

  “Yes, of course. Looking for victims. Maybe I didn’t explain myself properly. I agree with you both, that there’s very little leverage in going after the passive victims. They’ll have their own lives and there are just too many of them. No, my thinking is based on The Circle still being active at a high level. If you think about it, they won’t do all the dirty work themselves. They’ll have teams to support them. Falstaff alluded to the same and those thugs he sent along to kill you, they weren’t part of societies elite. They had to be drawn from a pool of willing supporters. Supporters who can also be trusted to be loyal. The sort of people who took a different route from the majority of The Circle’s victims. Those who chose to go native and be a part of it. Those who were given a second-chance, even a reward, you might say, for their past. Given a part in whatever The Circle is now involved in.”

  He let his words hang in the air.

  “It might make sense.”, Gregory spoke slowly as he continued to ponder the notion, “We think that victims are just that, the rejected cast-offs. But, you’re right, there must be some who see their abusers as their saviours. They get to stay on in that exclusive club, but they have to act as supporters. They become the Praetorian Guard around their masters. You may be right.”

  “I think you are.”, Dexter spoke next, “I’ve seen it myself. And it makes sense. Who can they trust more than somebody that they’ve groomed and nurtured in their own ways. And the process would be self-selective. You comply and prove your loyalty, you are given more responsibility. You let them down, they terminate you. These are lost people. They disappear and nobody notices. They play the game, they get back the family they’ve lost. Albeit, not the sort of family you’d want to be a part of. And, I don’t know how this fits in with your understanding, but we shouldn’t forget that The Circle isn’t a kiddy-messer ring anymore. What they’re offering their followers is rumoured to be something more. Something less crude but with higher rewards.”

  “Which leads us to the question of how we pursue this angle.”, Carrington continued, “Which, for my part, presents something of a challenge, but which I think I have an idea about.”

  “And the twins?”, Philian Gregory shocked Dexter with the question.

  “What about them?”

  “They can be trusted?”

  “Implicitly. But what do you know about them?”

  “Come on.”, Gregory leant across to Dexter as he replied, “We’ve not kept you completely out of our sights. We know it was the twins who worked their magic in finding Daniels’ victims. Can we ask them to help us this time?”

  That was the point at which Dexter knew he had reached the ultimate crossroads. His decision as to how to progress into the future had to be made, but if it involved others, then that decision had to be the right one. He was already too far down the rabbit-hole to back up. That much he had reconciled himself to. The twins, on the other hand, were younger and had more potential for the future. Was it fair to ask them to get involved? How much of this whole thing did they understand? And, most importantly, if given the choice, the real choice, what would they decide to do? This couldn’t just be about a loyalty to him. He needed it to be their decision.

  “I’m not sure.”, he replied, “Let me think about it.”

  One of the deciding factors, and something that they hadn’t clarified for him yet, was what exactly had happened to Saunders. The Circle had felt Dexter to be enough of a threat to send their own man in. In itself, that weighed in favour of his giving up everything to join Gregory and Carrington. Added to which was the fact that they had used Saunders to track him and set up his death. All good reasons for his making one choice. However, he needed to know what had happened to the man in order to be comfortable in that choice, which was becoming less and less inevitable as he dwelt on it.

  They gave him the full details. Once they’d established the threat that he posed and had, in their own words, ‘convicted him’ of his sin, they moved quickly to eliminate him. Carrington dominated the conversation at this point, making it very clear to Dexter that he was a lot more comfortable with terminating threats than Gregory. Not surprising really, given all that he had been through and the way he’d been let down by the mainstream criminal justice system
. It wasn’t about revenge though. It was all about self-preservation in the face of genuine threats. It was a game that was being played out in a realm that was totally unfamiliar to Dexter and still, vaguely unfamiliar to Gregory, despite his being drawn into it.

  The accident happened on a snowy night. Snow in London was rare. Always had been. When it fell, the already strained public service structures began to fail and that worked well for the plan that they’d come up with. The apartments that were the primary focus of Saunders’ role in Dexter’s business, were at the deconstruction stage, prior to their being transformed into luxury flats. Walls had been removed, interiors stripped out and most of the material infrastructure inside had been trashed or sold off, pending more modern replacements.

  “They still had an alarm system in place.”, Carrington explained, “One that was linked to a monitoring company. There had been some threats from vocal locals who were sick of the gentrification of their neighbourhood, so the alarms stayed active, even though there was little of value to steal. We activated the alarms at midnight. The company called Saunders who, by rights, should have thanked them and left it for the morning. If he’d taken that approach, we’d have kept going until he responded. As it was, we caught him at just the right moment and he chose to follow up. He’d been drinking, as we knew he would have been, so he took a cab there. Remember, at that stage, he still thought that his guys had been successful at Falstaff’s. He was off guard. He didn’t know what he’d find or how long he’d have to stay, so he let the cab leave. We followed as he entered the site, kept watch on him as he moved from room to room looking for the problem, then we struck. It would have been over in an instant for him. The drop from the third floor through the empty lift shaft wasn’t something you survived. We checked on him, confirmed his death, then left as quietly as we’d arrived.”

  “And nobody raised any suspicions?”, Dexter asked.

  “Oh, the Health and Safety guys are checking it out, as are the police, but it will resolve itself as something all too simple. Drunken man, dangerous site, terrible weather. Just a tragic accident. I’m sorry it was linked to your properties, but it was the best option we had.”

  “And the alarm activation?”

  “Simple. We fried a rat against one of the cables. No other sign of entry, no other reason to suspect that this wasn’t just another angle to the tragedy. It’s what I’m good at. You’ve seen the other victims. Accidents happen.”

  “But why brand them with the ‘C’, if you’re being so cautious?”

  “Because I need The Circle to know. They report those that they have to, but there are plenty more that haven’t been made public. All accidents. Tragic accidents.”

  Dexter moved on to whisky as the evening drew in. He asked them to leave him alone for a while, which they were happy to do. Whilst Carrington and Gregory returned to the boat, he settled over his refreshed drink and considered his options. He didn’t matter. The twins did. Right did. Morality did. This was the turning point in his life. One way led to a continuance of the day-to-day which, he had to admit to himself, he enjoyed. Sure, there was a slight hint of a threat around him, but that was true about all things. He didn’t feel that The Circle were as passionate as pursuing him as they were the other two, nor was their knowledge of his involvement anything more than a mild suspicion. The other way, led to uncertainty, violence, death and who knows what else. It was something that didn’t offer him an easy answer, so he chose to return to the boat, still undecided.

  As he entered, feeling the blast of warm air that the on-board stove generated, and declining the food that the others were enjoying, he peeled off his outdoor clothes and felt that deep tiredness he’d first experienced earlier in the day wash over him.

  “Just one last thought.”, he yawned as he spoke to his two friends, “Something that might help me decide. You want to target the victims, yes? Specifically, the victims who haven’t followed the expected path. So, how do you decide on what they look like? And how do you find them?”

  “Nathan?”, Gregory encouraged Carrington to respond.

  “I can do it.”, Carrington spoke slowly and confidently, “How I do it, well, it’s not necessarily the time now. But trust me, if we want to go along that route, I have certain gifts to bear. What we do, brooks no uncertainty and no ambiguity. I’m a man of black and white deep down. I can find the right people. Although, I do need to give it a little of my time.”

  With that reassurance, Dexter shed the last of his clothes and clambered into the small bed at the bow of the boat. He had to make a decision. He had enough facts now. A night of processing them would work wonders. He’d tell them in the morning just what he’d decided on.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  The twins put together the press release that made it to near-front pages of a number of industry specific publications, and which gave the business writers of the mainstream press a nice filler article. He’d never been a particularly high-profile businessman. His company was often lauded as a success, but the man behind it eschewed publicity and didn’t really feel he had much to offer, other than the properties that he helped bring to the market. The details were sparse, but sufficient to justify his reasons for leaving the country and returning to the US for a period of recovery and reflection following Saunders’ death. There were no pending investigations and the authorities put no blame at the feet of Dexter.

  Their conclusion was simply that Saunders, a little the worse for alcohol, had unwisely chosen to investigate the alarm activation on a dangerous site and had, subsequently fallen to his death. Despite his vindication, Dexter wanted the world to know that he, as CEO of the business, felt a personal responsibility for what had happened. He’d chosen to hand the business over to the twins, return to the States and take some time out to purge himself of the feelings that Saunders’ death had stirred in him.

  Whilst records indicated that he had indeed headed back to his homeland, departing on a flight to Boston in early February, those records weren’t necessarily accurate. Bob Dexter had flown out. He had booked into a Holiday Inn, from whence, he had taken a long-term lease on a Winnebago RV and headed out on something of a road trip. However, the Bob Dexter that did all of this wasn’t actually Bob Dexter. Instead, under a new name and thoroughly enjoying the fun and games of living in a motorhome more suited to the English road network, the real Bob Dexter was touring the country whilst waiting to hear from Gregory and Carrington. It had been a fairly straightforward process, aided by Dexter’s frequent-flyer status, his lines of credit and his joint citizenship. Dave had put him in touch with an Englishman in similar circumstances to himself, totally creditable but feeling threatened by unjust forces, and the two had swapped identities. Roughly the same age, neither ever having been on the authorities’ radar and equally wealthy, the swap had been seamless. Had they fingerprinted ‘Dexter’ as he left the UK or as he arrived in the US, then things might have gone wrong. Status helped him avoid that. As did his waving his UK passport at Heathrow, substituting this for his US passport at Boston. Threats were always the others, the foreigners. Nothing about the Dexter that arrived in America raised any suspicions at all.

  He’d had the option to have a completely new identity if he’d wanted it. But that was too permanent a thing for Dexter. He dreamed of one day reverting back to his old self and putting all of this cloak-and-dagger stuff behind. Besides, with established banking, credit card and other identity histories, it was just easier this way. The cover story that he’d left with his old identity was solid enough and believable enough that The Circle wouldn’t pursue him over the Atlantic. And the cover story that his trading partner had concocted was strong enough to allay any prior threats that he’d lived under. By which process, Bob Dexter became Luke Parker, retired hedge-fund manager and childless widower.

  The twins were gifted the UK business and freed from any further ties to Dexter at an emotional final meeti
ng where most of the talk was of the past and their shared experiences over the years. The future was very clearly down to the twins. They’d make a success of it, Dexter was certain of that. By giving them the freedom to plan their own futures, he was almost certain that they’d make it even more successful than he ever could have. And they’d do it conscientiously, responsibly and morally. He left them with a vague promise to keep in touch, but neither parties held much store by that. This was one of those farewells that would likely stand as a last goodbye.

  With the pressures of urgent action having eased for Carrington and Gregory, they took some time out for themselves and enjoyed the solitude of the Winter-empty canals. It was the best time to be out and about. Few people used the towpaths, those who did were friendly and shared a pleasant greeting, and there were periods when the ice surrounding the boat prevented their moving, forcing them to rest, relax and consider the way forward.

  Finances might have been a problem, given that it was tricky at this time of year to find the races, or places to bet on those races within easy access to the water, but Dexter had helped them out with that one. They had ample cash to see them through, cash which they had no qualms about receiving, given the wealth of the donor. Long gone were the days when pride prevented them taking a handout. Some of that money was invested in the latest computer equipment for Carrington to use for the next stage of their mission. Gregory didn’t touch much of it. Just enough to stock up with books to occupy him. Most were works of fiction. Some were text books. He wasn’t simply going to rely on Carrington’s gifts to deliver them their next targets. He could contribute as much by studying the official take on the whole abuse-victim thing. If they were comfortable with that, they could dismiss a lot of names at an early stage; names that fitted too closely with the stereotype. They were seeking the elusive anomalies. The people who existed in an invisible void and who could only be discovered by finding where that void lay.