Lost Souls

by Michael Knaggs

  It opened; someone stepped through it; Tom gasped.

  At that moment, he felt the slightest pin-prick on the back of his neck. He rose to his feet, eyes wide and mouth open. The figure in the doorway seemed to sway; the edges of his field of vision glowed brightly with a light which spread to engulf everything in front of him. He barely had time to speak the person’s name before the light dimmed and he felt himself lurching into blackness.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Tuesday; 3 November

  Tom opened his eyes. He was on a bed, lying on his back, his head propped up on a pillow. His limbs seemed heavy when he tried to move them and his neck barely responded to his attempt at taking in his surroundings, limiting his field of vision to how far he could move his eyes. The ceiling above him was white, as were the plain blank walls around the room. Six spotlights, set into the ceiling, cast a cheerful yellowish light. He felt calm and relaxed.

  Then he felt the room rocking gently, and his recent memory began to assert itself through the soft barrier of his apathy. He looked ahead of him past the end of the bed and saw that the apparition had returned. The same figure, framed in a doorway as before, but this time the image was clear and steady.

  “Grace,” he said. His voice was hoarse and it was an effort to speak. “Is that you?”

  She walked to the side of the room, picked up a chair and placed it beside the bed. She was wearing DPM fatigues and her hair was pulled back in a tight bun behind her head. She had on her thick-rimmed glasses. She leant on the back of the chair to look down at him before easing herself onto it.

  “Yes, it’s me.”

  Tom gave a painful chuckle. “I always seem to be waking up in your bedroom.”

  Grace looked at him but did not reply. Tom could feel himself coming round and the inertia of his limbs and neck suddenly mattered. He felt a point of soreness on the left side of his chest. He bent his arm to touch it – a raised lump, like local bruising or an insect bite; but harder, and it seemed to move under his skin. He strained his neck to look down at it and noticed he was wearing the same clothes as when he had met Mike on Hampstead Heath.

  “What’s happened to me?” It was as much of a demand as he could manage. “Help me sit up.”

  “You don’t need to sit up, Tom. You’re fine where you are.”

  “Where’s Jason?” he snapped.

  “He’s fine where he is, as well. Recovering from a minor op he had yesterday to remove something from his chest.”

  Tom was breathing heavily now from the effort of being angry. He lay still and silent for a while, gathering his thoughts. “Where are we?”

  “We’re on HMS Jura; River-class patrol vessel, converted into a hospital ship, specifically for covert operations. Right now we are about fifty-seven degrees north and seven degrees west, anchored in the lee of Beinn Mhor off South Uist. And to save you asking when, it’s zero-two–hundred hours; Tuesday; 3rd November.”

  “And why are you here?”

  “Because you’re here, Tom, and I wouldn’t want you to go without my saying goodbye.”

  “Goodbye? Am I under arrest? Jason said the police think I killed people. Is that right?”

  “No and yes.” Grace’s voice was flat and neutral. “No, you’re not under arrest, although…” she glanced at her watch, “…you’re supposed to be in court in around eight hours’ time. And yes, it’s true the police think you killed people.”

  Tom screwed up his face in a frown and made another attempt to move, this time managing to raise himself up a little further on the pillow.

  “Which people? Who would I want to kill?”

  Grace opened her eyes wide and shrugged.

  “You should know. You’d been threatening to kill them for some time.”

  “Who? Tell me who.”

  “Quote – ‘I promise that the people involved are going to pay for what happened to Jack and Jason. Not one single person is going to get away with what they did’ – unquote. Possibly not verbatim, but clear enough. You set out to avenge your son and Katey’s boyfriend.”

  “I don’t recall ever saying that…”

  “Oh, but you did. On many occasions. Almost as many times as you threatened to rescue Jason. It seems you keep your promises, Mr Brown.”

  “If I did say those things, it was just words, angry words…”

  “So who is that young man in the next cabin, and how did he get there?”

  “I mean about the killing. I didn’t…”

  Grace raised a hand to silence him. “It’s alright, Tom. As it happens, I know you didn’t kill anyone. But the fact is, they died. Eight of them – nine including Kadawe – all people who helped, directly or indirectly, to convict Jack and Jason. Died in the sort of rampage that would be well within the capability of an ex-Special Forces hero, with all his skills and connections, bent on revenge. So you can understand why the police came to that conclusion.”

  “So how come you know I didn’t kill them?”

  “Because I know who did, and why.”

  Tom closed his eyes. He breathed deeply and felt himself drifting off before rallying in an attempt to concentrate.

  “You’re talking in riddles. Are you going to explain?”

  “Let me ask you something first. Do you believe Jack was guilty of dealing?”

  “No, of course not, I never…”

  “Well, I’m glad to hear it, because at one point I really wondered. You see, I never doubted his innocence for a second. Not a fraction of one. They were set up; must have been. Collateral victims – to use one of your favourite phrases – lost souls in a cruel world.”

  “So what has that got to do with my being here right now?”

  “Just about everything.”

  She paused; Tom closed his eyes again and sighed.

  “More riddles.”

  “When you changed the rules for expulsion, Tom – when you made it mandatory for drug dealers to be banished into exile – you introduced – for the first time – the possibility of innocent people being sent away for ever. Before then it was nice and neat – people with a known record of repeatedly and cynically rejecting this society get to experience a different one, more suited to their attitudes.”

  “You sound like Sylvie Hanker – when she interviewed me…”

  “Ah, yes, the lovely, flirtatious Ms Hanker. How you used to enjoy her… probing – if I can put it that way.”

  “Not on that occasion, if you remember.”

  “I do remember, because she was right. She got you to admit what everyone was thinking and worrying about; that there really could be ‘innocents caught in the crossfire’ – I think were your exact words – and that this was an acceptable risk. And when I say ‘everyone’, that included me, Andrew, Jonathan and any number of front and back benchers on both sides of the House. It was a testament to your popularity and the trust you had earned that the drug dealer thing was accepted. And – wouldn’t you know – just two months after the Hanker interview we had two of those very innocents convicted of a crime which would send them into exile.”

  “I still don’t follow. Look I’m tired. Can we leave it for now?”

  “There isn’t time, Tom. I want you to understand this before it’s too late.”

  “Too late for what?”

  Grace ignored the question. “Right now, for most people, it’s a done deal. As far as they’re concerned, Jack and Jason were guilty; Jack, sadly, died and Jason has gone to where he deserves to go. Nobody cares any more; it’s water under the bridge. Except… for one very tenacious little madam who was determined to join all the dots. Detective Inspector Jo Cottrell would not leave this alone. I can’t criticise her for that – she believes exactly what I believe – that somebody set them up. The big difference between Cottrell and me is
that she was hell-bent on uncovering the miscarriage of justice and I was just as determined to cover it up.”

  Tom struggled up further on his pillow.

  “Think of the bigger picture, Tom,” Grace went on. “Something you were never any good at. Our party was elected for one reason. It promised people a New Justice Regime, where we would be harder on criminals and, particularly, on the indiscriminating little bastards who set out to disrupt ordinary people’s everyday lives. And expulsion to Alpha was the cornerstone – king-pin, flagship, call it what you like – of the NJR. The bold, decisive, uncompromising means of separating the tormentors from their serial victims. The symbol of a new beginning.

  “But so much of our credibility rides on the success and integrity of the NJR that if people start to think we screwed up by going too far, there’s a real possibility that this government will implode. And that will happen if it gets out that we really have put innocent people – or an innocent person – onto Alpha. From where there is no return – at least that’s what they think, and must go on thinking. So I will do everything I can to ensure that doesn’t happen – that it doesn’t get out. And ‘everything’ includes making certain that there is no-one around to reverse – or even cast any doubt on – the jury’s decision to convict Jack and Jason.”

  Tom pushed himself up on one elbow and turned towards her. “Am I hearing things? You’re fucking mad!”

  From his elevated position, he noticed that the room was like a small operating theatre, with a stainless steel worktop at one side and a metal trolley next to it with several surgical instruments laid out neatly on its two shelves. He flopped down again onto his back, breathing heavily from the exertion.

  “Right from the beginning, I thought it had to be Kadawe,” Grace said. “He was the only player in the picture with the wit and nerve to do anything as big as that – set up all those people to lie, with the confidence that they were so shit-scared of him they wouldn’t give him away; then actually plant some goods in both houses. I mean, you have to say, it was brilliant what that guy did. So when Cottrell – actually, it was her ex-boss – established the link between him and one of the guys who’d approached Jack on Delaware, it sealed it for me.

  “I figured Kadawe himself wasn’t a risk. He wasn’t the type to fold. Much more likely that one or more of these other toe-tags would make a mistake. It helped that Mackay and Waters had their pride and reputations to think about. Denial was a better option for them than doubt. How would they look if they’d got it wrong and a rather special – and innocent – young man had died because of their mistake, and another one was lost forever? Mackay managed to reign in Cottrell at first, but he was never going to hold her off for long.”

  Grace shrugged and got to her feet, moving to stand at the foot of the bed, leaning on the end frame and looking directly into his eyes.

  “So who had to die, Grace? Who do the police think I killed – and why would I get rid of people who might have proved Jack wasn’t guilty?”

  “As I said before, Tom, revenge – for their conspiring to convict him – or at least playing a part. But you asked who. Well, four of the guys who approached Jack on Delaware. David Gerrard – Cottrell’s pet rottweiler – found out that at least one of them was instructed by his regular trader to ask Jack for drugs. It was quite possible, then, that others were put up to it by the same person – that would look very suspicious if it ever came to light. So they had to go.”

  “Jesus Christ. And who…?”

  “Who killed them? Well it seems this same trader – Sammo Sampson – wasn’t making such a great profit that twenty grand in used fifties for discharging four bullets was unattractive to him. We even lent him the gun, which we got back – along with the money – when he died suddenly of unnatural causes. The same gun, in fact, that was found in your apartment in SW1.”

  “What?”

  “But the list is longer than that. There were the guys who phoned the police complaining about the stuff they claimed Jack and Jason were supplying. Seven of them. So far, three down – out of the four who came in for questioning – blown to bits in a so-called safe house in Dorking using the same type of explosive as the police have just found in your car. It should have been all four – in fact, with a bit of luck, it could have been six if Cottrell and her colleague hadn’t got delayed in traffic.

  “And then there was Mr Kadawe himself, of course. As I said, he was the one I didn’t think would be an issue until Little Bo-bloody-Peep put her delicate oar in and revealed he’d been at Jack’s party with a rucksack and an unlikely story about looking for drugs. And that let Cottrell back in with a vengeance, so he had to go. It’s obvious you didn’t kill him – you were right there when he died – but it would have been easy for you to arrange for one of your ex-buddies to do it. Or so people will be encouraged to believe. Shame about Kadawe; I was thinking of offering him a job…”

  “How far?” Tom interrupted.

  “Sorry?”

  “How far do you go? Who’s next? Jo Cottrell?”

  “Very astute question. We had the perfect opportunity to do just that along with Kadawe. It would have looked like an unfortunate accident – a stray bullet – until you stepped in like double-o-seven and took her down out of the line of fire. Still I can hardly complain, you’ve made life very simple for us in terms of wrapping everything up. People will find it easy to believe the revenge scenario. Ex-Special Forces guy goes off the rails – riddled with guilt because of his involvement in his son’s death – lashing out by taking down everybody who helped convict him.”

  Tom managed a sneer.

  “You’re out of your tiny mind, Grace. There is no way a court will believe that. It’s my word against yours. You wouldn’t even dare…”

  “A court, you say? And you think I’m out of my mind. It won’t go to court. Waste of taxpayers’ money. If you add up the gun, the explosives, the threats you’ve made in public, the fact that you’ve been caught on CCTV several times near where the shootings took place – albeit a fortunate coincidence – there’s more than enough to convince people even without the circumstantial evidence of your training with the Special Forces. Motive; opportunity; means – fait accompli. No point in confusing the issue by giving you the chance to deny it.”

  “What do you…?”

  “So, in the spirit of the NJR – taking out of the system all time-wasting admin – this is an easy decision. You will be one of those collateral victims you said were an acceptable risk in achieving our ends. Think of it as setting an example.”

  Tom stared at her wide-eyed, searching for a softening in her look; a change of tone in her voice; anything to indicate that he was wrong in what he had shockingly concluded from her words. There was nothing to cast a particle of doubt.

  “So, what happens, Grace?” He could feel his voice trembling. “I disappear, leaving my blood on your hands. Is that it? Not that you’re not up to your elbows in the stuff already.”

  Grace held up her palms towards him.

  “Look, squeaky clean. No need to mess them up when you have a trained psychopath straining on a leash. Friend of yours, I believe. A freelance sadist called Jamie Walcott – a.k.a. Oscar Strange; long time associate of Andrew Donald and eager to please him at all times – even before he was in office. Remember Andrew wanting to get rid of Hewlett from the shadow cabinet and the NJR project team, and you did your Boy Scout impersonation – let’s all be friends and work together, ging-gang-goolie-goolie. It was Walcott who snatched Lucy and made mummy see the light. But you know that, don’t you? Hewlett phoned you and said she’d seen him at Balmaha, and you asked John Mackay to check him out.”

  “That little shit! And how do you know that?”

  “Hey, he’s not so little – anywhere as it happens – and he did you a few favours. Stopped you choking on your vomit a couple of times. And h
e returned your lost phone, remember. Well, I say ‘lost’ – what I really mean is ‘stolen’. And before he returned it, he did make one little modification. The smallest transmitter-receiver in the world, inserted next to the SIM card; so from that moment on we were able to hear every word you spoke or heard within five metres of the phone and disable the phone if necessary. Talk about multi-skilled; our Jamie’s got the lot.”

  “The fucking slimy bastard!”

  “Well, I’m right with you there. If things were different I’d give you the co-ordinates of his unmarked grave so you could dance on it. But I’m afraid your dancing days are over.”

  Tom watched Grace as she turned away from the bed and began to pace the room. Eventually she sat down again.

  “This thing with Jason,” Tom said. “What was all that about? I assume the raid was your idea – or at least you authorised it.”

  “No, it was your idea. Well, in the sense that you told a lot of people you were going to do it – though I’m not sure what you had in mind until Needham came along. But it got me thinking. During the few short weeks he’d been on Alpha, Jason had become a fucking nuisance. A brilliant fucking nuisance, but a fucking nuisance all the same. Interfering with systems and programs, hacking into files, talking with God knows who – possibly God himself – on his DIY transmitter. So getting him off the platform did seem like a good idea – a necessity, in fact. If he could do so much in such a short time – what would he be like after he’d really got to know his way around the software?

  “And after all I’d done for him, that’s how he repays me. Andrew wanted him shipped out straight after the trial. That’s why I had him lifted at Kirmington and taken straight to Lochshore – so Andrew would think that’s what was happening. But I’d already decided to delay his exile to Alpha for as long as I could – to make sure he’d be out of the news – and to change his name in case anyone recognised it. At least then he’d have a chance out there.