Finding Davey (34 page)

Ben Maker frantically moved his crew forward. Lottie didn’t stop him, and walked with them. All coherence was gone now. She saw Bray slip the loop of his work apron over his head and walk down, slowly moving among the children, who now were in utter disorder, standing and clapping and talking together. He stood by Davey.

Davey stood looking up at him, slowly reached out, delving into the pouch of the apron. He brought out a figure, turned it once in his hand, and then beamed up.

“Kevvy!” he said, looking, turning round, holding up the wooden figure to show Carlson and the others. “My Kevvy Vol!”

The two teachers were with them, the head calling for order in the pandemonium, Donna standing there looking from Davey to Bray, her face now pale as death.

Bray knelt down, smiling, and looked into the eyes of his grandson. The hall quietened. Lottie saw Ben Maker’s frantic gestures to his cameraman to get it, get it, the only movement in the hall. The children fell silent.

“Hello, Davey,” Bray said.

The boy looked down at the wooden figure in his hands, gazed back at Bray, made two attempts to speak and said, “Grampa?”

“Yes, Davey.” Bray tried to keep smiling. “See? I came.” He took his grandson’s hand. “I’ll not let go.” He swung Davey onto his shoulders.

White-faced, Mrs Daley croaked, “The school is not involved in any way…”

Donna said, distraught, “I’m not quite sure what —”

A secretary entered at a run and whispered urgently to the head teacher, whose hand went to her throat. Donna Curme stayed silent, her eyes on Davey and Bray. She looked once at Lottie, saw resolve there and slumped in resignation.

“Right, children!” Mrs Daley called, glassy-eyed. “It’s time to play. Hasn’t it been exciting?”

They were shepherded noisily out of the french windows into the playground, Davey on Bray’s shoulders holding the wooden carving.

“Where’s our dough?” Carlson yelled, going dancing ahead.

“It’s a cupboard, stupid,” a little bespectacled girl with them said scornfully.

“You’re Carlson?” Bray asked. They moved among the children leaving the hall.

“We won, didn’t we?”

“It’s furniture,” Bray explained. “It’s still worth a million.”

“This is Leeta and Consuela and Elgin.” Carlson gave a jerk of his thumb. “My team won, okay?”

“Okay,” Bray said.

By the gate a cluster of people argued, a camera crew circling, sound boom aloft.

“It’s your mom and pop,” Carlson told Davey.

“Not really,” Bray said.

He waved to a figure standing motionless in the distance, standing alone at the far end of the sports field, watching. Davey looked against the sun, squinting to see. The figure waved back, one laconic gesture, then stooped.

“Clint!”

Mom was being restrained by Jim Stazio and two others. Pop was arguing vehemently, trying to shove into the playing field but was unable to get past. The television crew circled.

Bray lowered Davey to the ground in a sea of children and crouched down. He pointed.

“Who’s that, Davey?”

Davey let go and began to walk towards the distant figure, shielding his eyes against the sun. The children called out, some whistling to the dog, all going along with Davey.

For a moment the dog stood, circled uncertainly, looked back once at the girl who had just released its lead, then stood gazing in Bray’s direction. It made a sudden jerk as if to start towards him, then it froze, tongue out, ears pricked. It seemed to watch as if in complete doubt, then began to lope forward to the children.

Davey looked back at Bray, still moving towards the
dog. Bray nodded, smiling, waving him on, walking after as Davey began to run, calling, “Here, Buzzie! Here, Buster!”

The dog hurtled, leaping through the mass of shouting children, dodging and swerving in its headlong dash towards the approaching boy. Bray walked after, smiling, explaining to Leeta and Consuela. Elgin and Carlson and the others ran after Davey whooping and waving.

Davey was almost knocked off his feet as Buster leapt on him. The golden retriever fell, wriggled round in midair and almost smothered him again, leaping and licking Davey’s face, surrounded by the children as they gathered shouting to touch the delirious pet.

Bray looked across at the cluster by the gate as he passed. The man Carlson had called Davey’s pop was explaining to Jim Stazio and his two guards something about cutting a deal. “See,” he was saying, “we got ourselves conned. We’ve done nothing illegal. I’ll give you the addresses right now…”

The woman next to him was weeping. The blond couple were standing by in a state of bafflement.

Jim Stazio nodded to Bray and indicated Buster and Davey in the centre of the hubbub.

“Enough proof now,” he called, grinning. “Trust me?”

Bray made no reply. He joined Kylee who was watching Davey kneeling while Buster frantically jumped and barked, the children delirious with excitement.

“See?” she said.

“Thank you, Kylee. You did it.”

“QED,” she said. “Wish I could spell it.”

Police sirens sounded in the distance. He put his arm round her.

“We’ll manage without spelling.”

He beckoned Lottie. “I’ll need help. The authorities
seem to be on their way.”

“Phone Geoff and Shirley now, Bray.” Lottie said.

“Not me, Lottie.” He couldn’t take his eyes off Davey, the dog and the children. “I want Kylee to tell them. Let them get used to her. They’ll be seeing a lot more of her in the future.”

Doctor replaced the receiver. Always the true professional, he acknowledged the nurse’s signal with a smile.

“I’ll be with you in just a moment.”

Even now, he took especial pleasure in the timbre of his voice. It had served him so well, from
viva voce
examinations in medical school and interviews with child buyers, to admonitory sessions with members of staff.

He walked the length of the Special Rehabilitation Unit and into his office, ignoring his secretary’s bid for his attention. He closed the study door and approached the window. Without disturbing the slats, he looked through the louvered blinds. Sure enough, there they were, as he’d expected after that impertinent phone call. Two distant police cars parked, almost but not quite, out of sight. A third approached as he watched. No sirens, no spinning lights. Was this the best they could do when stealth was called for? His lip curled in disdain.

The office seemed strangely silent, remote sounds from the Unit’s incessant activities even more muted, as if before a coming tragedy. Well, it was exactly that, Doctor thought. It had finally come.

Strange how little sadness he felt at this final moment. He’d planned for it, of course, for how could such a formidable brain fail to ignore a consequence, however unlikely? Over the years, his acquisition team had saved sixty-three children from undeserving breeders – at airports, theme parks, beach sites, bus depots. And every one had been an enormous success, each stolen child
re-programmed
into a new affluent existence with new parents able to afford such a wondrous gift.

It was an achievement of genius, carried out against all the opposing forces society could bring.

Of course, it was totally beneath a professional medical man of his exalted status to prepare a means of escape. That would have implied that he doubted the perfection of his scheme. No, the loss was society’s. And, make no mistake, when he was gone society would realise how grievous its loss actually was. It would also spell disaster for every single staff member in the Unit, cleaners to nurses, clerks to the four slick members of his abduction team. All would now end their days incarcerated in unspeakable prison conditions, and the fate of the child abductors in penitentiaries was worse than death. Without me, Doctor thought with a curious contentment, you all go down. Such is the penalty. The treachery of one of your number spells disaster for you all. It was even gratifying.

Idly, he wondered what could possibly have gone wrong with Clint H. Rappaporter, once Davey J. Charleston. Surely there couldn’t have been a slip in his planning for the boy? Doctor’s scheme had been cast-iron, foolproof. His track record was sufficient testimony, was it not? His care, his methods were the guarantees of successful transference of a child into any purchaser’s possession. The phone call had come from Tain.

What could it have been? It was beneath him to ask questions of the buffoon who had phoned.

There couldn’t possibly have been anything Out There, from the child’s past life, could there? Surely, most certainly, not. Nobody could have followed and hunted the boy down. Nobody. Doctor had planned for every eventuality, every possible chance however remote, in every one of his cases. He was simply incapable of letting a single flaw mar the enterprise. Not even a fluke could have done this.

That media man who had just called was nothing other than a worm. The newscaster’s smug assumption that he, Doctor, would be deceived by the apparent request for an interview about “the excellent work your clinic is doing, Doctor…” was nothing less than insulting. A mere reader of TV idiot boards, hoping to pull the wool over the eyes of someone of Doctor’s intellect. It simply proved the worthlessness of people nowadays. Calling from Tain, some broadcasting station there, while children shouted a weird chant in the background, two words he’d never heard before. There was only one conclusion: the police, or some element in the media, had learnt of his clinic, and what it did.

Applying his impeccable logic, he realised there could only be one explanation. There was a spy in his camp, a traitor who had betrayed him and this marvellous enterprise. And, in doing so, had destroyed his entire scheme that had done so much good and been so marvellously helpful to deprived couples.

There would be only one way out. With dignity.

Logic called for it. His vast intellect could not demur now the moment had come. To quibble would be to deny his quality. That was for lesser people.

One last check at the window, and he became absolutely certain. Four more police cars were on the approach road from the sea, and non-uniformed officers, as transparent as if they wore flak jackets with POLICE insignia, were ambling with studied casualness across the grass towards his clinic. He was being surrounded.

Doctor’s logic was faultless; the clinic’s scheme was faultless; therefore he had been betrayed. Because he had been betrayed, the traitor and every single one of the traitor’s associates must suffer. The only person they could shield behind was Doctor himself; they would claim the odiously repellent Defence of Superior Orders, maybe even wriggle out and escape. Therefore (consider that predicate structure!) Doctor himself must see to the chastisement of every member of his staff and every person who had been a customer, contributor, or company servant.

Only one way to stop them hiding behind Doctor’s coat-tails, and it had to be taken.

One method.

His beautiful operation had ended. The traitor would triumph, smug in his – her? – betrayal. They were probably even now glorying in their vile expectations, of giving evidence before cameras, writing autobiographies to sell as a feature movie, while he, Doctor, stewed in prison for life, quivering in terror while appeal after appeal was decided by lawyers, those brainless carrion.

Conclusion: he must remove the resource with which they wished to nourish their betrayal.

He heard somebody heavy footed in the outer office. The intercom buzzed.

The automatic was cold and heavy in his hand. He was vaguely surprised by its weight, for he had not handled it
in years, in fact had quite forgotten how to hold it. Pedantically he tested its mass, guessing two, three pounds? He took it more firmly in his right palm.

“Yes?” he answered.

“There are two police officers to see you, Doctor.”

“Ask them to wait a moment, please.”

“Yes, Doctor.”

There was only this final refutation of such treachery left. Logic, that queen of sciences, determined so. No other course would suffice.

Arranging his ledgers meticulously on his desk, he gazed at the diplomas on his wall. He had had them framed and placed opposite his desk, from where he could see them each time he raised his eyes, unlike most of his former colleagues who insisted on having them hung behind the desk where they would impress patients.

The gun felt cold in his mouth. He remembered the anatomy of the buccal cavity, the innervation of the tongue, and dwelt for a random second on the course of the trigeminal branch of the facial nerve. With a brief feeling of immense satisfaction at such a perfect martyrdom, he pulled the trigger.

J
ONATHAN
G
ASH
is the author of a number of crime novels. A qualified doctor specialising in tropical medicine, he is married with three daughters and four grandchildren. He lists his hobbies as antique collecting and his family.

The Lovejoy Series

The Ten Word Game

Faces in the Pool

The Dr Clare Burtonall Series

Bone Dancing

Blood Dancing

Other Crime Fiction

The Year of the Woman

Finding Davey

Bad Girl Magdalene