He continued for several minutes in this vein, his voice rising to a rapid whine. The adjutant began to look unhappy and shuffled his feet, while the Colonel sat impassively, grunting occasionally but making no attempt to interrupt.
Then Spartacus seemed to waver. ‘I don’t have to tell you any of this,’ he muttered. ‘And you’ll cook up charges against me, anyway. I personally am finished – I know I shan’t see my family again. But it is for them that I am doing this.’
The Colonel placed both hands on the table, palms down, as if he wished to push himself away from his victim. His voice was level but with an edge of menace. ‘I am not a racist, Captain. But I need you to grasp this, and quickly. If you don’t assist us now, in this relatively civilised setting – not just with details to fill in a few gaps, but with your pledge to help put behind bars the leader you call Moses – then other methods are at our disposal.’ He tapped the swagger stick on the table, once, twice.
‘You do not frighten me. And I will not betray my friends and comrades.’
Colonel Thompson sighed. ‘You will. I tell you, MI5 used to calculate that a captive had done his duty if he could hold out against torture for forty-eight hours. Then he would break – any man, or woman. But by then other operatives had been warned and gone into hiding. You, my friend, should not assume that you are any different.’
‘You torture prisoners. Yes, I should have expected that,’ Spartacus said bitterly. ‘But if you make too good a job of it, I wouldn’t be able to speak for you as a witness anyway. So I am ready. I would prefer to die.’
The door banged open. On the threshold stood two of the rottweilers, their faces shiny with liquor. One held a bottle of whisky in one hand and a thonged bull-whip in the other. Their wrists were strapped with studded leather bracelets; their upper arms bulged with muscle. Tattoos festooned every square inch of revealed flesh, replete with fanged dogs and bloodcurdling epithets.
Behind shuffled Finkelstein, who peered over their shoulders then slipped away. Kowalsky was nowhere to be seen.
‘You’ve had him long enough, Colonel,’ one of the guards growled. ‘It’s our turn now. Give him here.’
‘I haven’t quite finished.’ The Colonel’s voice was calm but his mouth was hard. He had remained seated and motioned to Spartacus to do the same. Under the table his right hand slid to his holster. ‘Five minutes.’
The guards grumbled, argued with each other, handed round the bottle then reluctantly slouched out. But they left the door wide open.
Thompson leaned forward. ‘You see?’ he hissed. ‘I can’t save you if you won’t help me. If this is to go to open trial, I must put together a court case. You are our prize witness. You must do this.’
‘No.’ The Sikh’s face was set.
The corridor had gone quiet; a commotion outside in the yard heralded the arrival of more detainees who were providing sport for the drunken guards. Spartacus’s eyes darted past his captors to the open doorway. All in a flash he seemed to make up his mind. With a yelp he jumped up, knocking over his chair. Then he put his handcuffed hands under the table, and with a desperate heave threw it over. The edge caught Thompson in the gut and winded him; he staggered and nearly fell. As the adjutant, uncertain who to attend to, knelt to the Colonel’s aid, Spartacus seized his opportunity. He hurdled over the fallen chair and ran.
‘Stop him!’ the Colonel yelled, and pulled out his laser gun. But the prisoner was already at the doorway and, without a backward glance, sprinting into the corridor.
‘No!’ Thompson staggered after him, holding his left side. It felt as if a rib might be broken, but his thoughts were with his quarry. What had Vesirov called him jocularly, not half an hour before? A bunny? Some rabbit – trying to escape, and running straight towards the waiting pack.
The Colonel held himself upright, the weapon in his hand, and took a bead at the flying Sikh’s back. ‘Colonel?’ came the troubled voice of his adjutant, who scrambled out behind him.
At the far end, silhouetted in the dim light of a dirty window, the two Rottweilers reappeared. Broad grins broke out on both sweaty faces. They took their stance, legs planted
wide apart, rocking on their heels. One passed the bottle to the other, then flexed the
bull-whip
. The fugitive skittered to a halt, handcuffed arms flailing.
‘Captain,’ Thompson called out. ‘Captain. This way.’
As Spartacus spun about in panic and faced him, the Colonel took aim. It was hardly necessary. The man was no more than ten metres away.
Careful aim. And fired, twice.
A flash of deadly light blazed from the muzzle of the gun and blasted a scorched hole in the Sikh’s shirt, just over his heart. A dark red mark appeared and oozed slowly for several seconds as his legs crumpled. His eyes widened, a rattle sounded in his throat.
He was dead before his body hit the ground.
The Rottweilers ran up, but were kept at bay by the weapon. The acrid smell of singed flesh filled the air. ‘Whatcha do that for?’ one demanded angrily and prodded the Colonel’s arm with the bull-whip. ‘We were going to have some sport.’
‘Sorry to disappoint you.’ The Colonel did not holster his gun but nudged the limp corpse with his toe. ‘Get rid of it. Preferably in one piece. And no reports, d’you hear?’
It was twenty minutes later, back in the restored interrogation room as the Colonel submitted to a pressure bandage administered by his nervous adjutant, that the Azeri at last ventured a low comment.
‘You should have aimed at one of those guards. Sir.’
Thompson snorted. ‘Plenty more where they came from, Lieutenant. There are hard choices in this life.’
‘Sir? You meant to…?’
‘Think about it. One was an escapee. The others are in His Majesty’s service.’ The adjutant’s anxious face became a bronze mask. Thompson brooded in silence, then spoke in a low voice, as if to himself. ‘They can’t hurt him now. And we got out of him everything – legitimate.’
He rose and lifted his left arm, gingerly, then patted his side.
‘Believe me. I had to make a decision. I shot the man I wanted.’
Strether took the white towel, wrung it out in the tepid water and placed it, folded, on her forehead. Then he sat, hands loose between his knees, and looked at her.
They had cleaned her up as well as possible and, at the Ambassador’s insistence, taken her to the spare bed in his room, upstairs in the little-used private quarters. Were she to be rushed to hospital, he reasoned, he could not guarantee her safety.
The bedside lamp hid the extent of her injuries. A cursory examination had revealed two broken fingers and a great deal of hideous bruising. She had been beaten up with a brutal thoroughness. The lovely face was swollen, purple in places, with one eye closed into a slit. One temple had been sliced open with a razor; the cut was now firmly taped. It would heal, with a scar needing plastic surgery. The platinum hair was matted, some torn out at the roots. Her pulse was shallow and fast but her blood pressure was close to normal. That suggested, unless he were mistaken, that there was no major internal damage. What she needed most was protection, and rest.
The eyelids flickered. One blackened eye stayed firmly shut, but the other opened a
fraction.
He pressed forward. ‘Marty?’ he said. ‘Can you hear me?’
She shrank back from him, fearful. He grabbed the light and twisted the stem so that it shone on his own face. ‘It’s me, Bill. Bill Strether.’
A slow hiss came from between the cracked lips. ‘Bill?’
‘Yes, sweetheart. You’re safe. In the embassy. Nobody can get you here.’
‘I’m thirsty. So thirsty.’
He offered the straw of the water bottle and she drank greedily. Tenderly he wiped the dribble from her chin.
‘Bill? What time is it?’
‘Time? Nearly twenty-two hours. We found you this afternoon. You’ve been asleep almost since then.’
‘Oh, yeah. I remember.’ She seemed to smile a little. Her hand emerged jerkily from under the bedclothes and he let it lie in his. The splints on the broken fingers were unfamiliar and ghostly in the dim light. ‘Found the back door to your garage. Knew you wouldn’t mind.’
‘Stay as long as you like. Who’s been doing this to you?’
‘Dunno exactly. They didn’t give their names. And I didn’t ask.’
‘But you must have some idea.’
She paused and seemed to be dozing. Then her voice came again, a mumble so low he had to bend to hear it. ‘Something to do with the bomb. I’d seen one of them with the Prime Minister. A bodyguard. And some of his pals. Wanted to know about you.’
‘Me?’
‘Yeah. They figured, since you were a customer, I might have something incriminating. Don’t worry, I couldn’t have given them anything useful if I’d tried. The girls helped me get away. The other Marilyns.’
He touched her strapped fingers with infinite gentleness. ‘I can’t believe they did this to you. What did they want to know?’
She lifted the hand and waved away the inquiry. ‘Later. Maybe. After midnight.’
‘Why? What’s going to happen at midnight?’
‘Uh-huh.’
She had closed her eyes again and would say no more.
At midnight, however, he armed himself with a stiff bourbon and went back into her room. The bedside light was on and her eyes were fixed on the clock on the dresser. As it pinged for the hour, she smiled again, and tiredly patted the side of the bed. ‘It’s done. I hope.’
He seated himself and helped her with the water flask. ‘What’s done? What kinda mystery is this?’
Marty snickered softly. ‘That Prime Minister. He went to the Toy Shop tonight. Another snuff party was booked. They wanted me to join in but I refused. But the toys had had enough. Him and his monsters.’
She lifted her head, gazed at the clock, then let herself fall back on the pillows. ‘Yes, it’s done. I can feel it. At the midnight hour.’
‘What is it? You can tell me now,’ Strether urged.
It took her an age to reply.
‘When he gets drunk, and starts yelling for more. If he was into S&M for himself he could have as much as he liked. No shortage of volunteers to knock
him
about. But no, he wants to watch while other people get torn. Stark naked, tied up with straps and chains. Bleeding from every orifice. Not tonight. Not tonight.’
‘My God, Marty. What do you mean?’
‘I mean that we toys, we clones, we worthless drones, we did something good for once. We finished a job that your Solidarity friends bungled. Been planning it for weeks – we’d had our fill, up to here. After all, nobody knew who was going to be next for the snuff box. Especially the older ones – it could have been anybody.’
Her face suddenly hardened, in a manner he had never seen before and never wished to see again.
‘Sir Lyndon, Sir bloody Lyndon. He’s the one hanging by the skin of his shoulder blades from the ceiling with his balls stuffed in his mouth. He’s dead meat right now, Bill. He’s the victim tonight.’
She sighed, restless in the bed. ‘Oh, Bill. It’s finished here. It’s finished.’
It was dark. Strether awoke with a jump from his self-imposed vigil in the armchair by Marty’s bed. She was sleeping peacefully, mouth slightly open. The swellings were slightly worse but the bleeding had stopped. He could see a chipped tooth; they must have smashed her full in that alabaster face, tried to destroy her glorious beauty.
His neck was painfully stiff and he stretched gingerly. Then he realised what had woken him and leaped to his feet.
The girl staffer was standing hesitantly at the door, her hand on the outside knob, silhouetted against the landing light. She was dressed in a pink towelling robe and, he noted with vague surprise, fluffy mules on her feet. Her hair was tousled and piled in a topknot. Phrases came into his mind, bland reassurances, but one glance at her stricken expression stopped him in his tracks.
‘I’m sorry to bother you, sir. You should be getting some rest. But we’ve just found another woman, this time on the front doorstep. I’ve taken the liberty of bringing her indoors. I believe it’s someone you know.’
‘Yes? Who is it?’ Strether shook his fuddled head to clear it of sleep.
‘We think it’s Dr Pasteur, sir. She’s in a hysterical state. And she’s alone.’
It was four a.m. The night was dark, a reminder that the winter solstice and the shortest day were not far off. In the courtyard slumbering figures huddled together under blankets. The silence was punctured by men muttering in their sleep; others wailed or snored. The sentry in his blue box on the far side of the compound had his feet up on a chair, arms folded loosely across his chest and his head lolling slightly. Somewhere a lone bird began to sing, then thought better of it and settled back in its nest to sleep on.
Prince Marius Vronsky sat slumped at the table in the interrogation room. In deference to his status he had not been handcuffed and had been brought in via a back door. His tunic was dishevelled and stained, and a lock of hair fell across his forehead. He seemed dazed, though there were no marks on him. He also posed, as far as Colonel Mike Thompson was concerned, the biggest problem of his career.
The Colonel nudged his adjutant; the two moved to leave the room and shut the door behind them. Mike Thompson’s face was grey with fatigue. The savage pain in his side had been controlled with an injection but he wheezed noticeably as he breathed. There would be no more running after fugitives for a while. Nor was he in any shape to resist the Rottweilers, should they choose to come for this prisoner. Not that they were much threat, at least before daybreak.
‘Colonel, you should rest.’ Vesirov touched his arm anxiously.
‘It’s not important. And I don’t want any more blood on my carpet. You’re a fine officer, Neimat, but I don’t think that bunch of murderous lunatics would take much notice of you.’
The Lieutenant bit his lip and refrained from observing that the most recent murder he had witnessed had been carried out by the Colonel himself. He glanced down at his feet and wished he hadn’t. A thin black trail led from the doorway into the darkness – evidence that a body, still bleeding, had been dragged away.
‘Where did you say the Prince was picked up?’
‘At the airport, sir. They were trying to leave. They’d been spotted on the high-speed rail link – everyone was being scrutinised. But we wanted to know where they were headed, so we waited.’
‘And where did they try to go?’
The adjutant shrugged. ‘They didn’t seem to have any particular destination in mind, sir. Miami was what they asked for, but it also happened to be the next flight outside Europe on the board. My guess is they would have gone anywhere, just to get out.’
‘It comes to something,’ the Colonel mused, ‘when a peer of the realm, a man of princely blood, wants to flee the Union by the fastest means possible.’
‘Sir.’ The young Azeri’s face was a studied blank.
‘She got away – the woman companion?’
‘It is unclear – she’s not in custody. She wasn’t the key person. The warrant was out for him.’
‘We have to be careful what we say, I think.’ The Colonel walked away down the corridor, slowly, then looked down and tapped his foot. The Lieutenant saw that he too had noticed the blood trail, with much the same reaction of shame and revulsion.
Thompson walked back and eyed his young assistant. ‘We are elite corps, you and I,’ he said softly. ‘We are not thugs, but we are brought to this. Your family, Neimat. What sort of people are they?’
‘I’m told my great-grandfather was First Secretary of the Azerbaijani Communist Party a century ago, sir,’ the young man answered. ‘When Gorbachev was still alive. The family joke is that he was also the last Secretary, since the Party collapsed soon after. But I don’t have the details.’
‘I trace my ancestry back to the Wellesleys, to Wellington himself,’ the Colonel murmured. ‘He would have taken a dim view of such disorder. Though in his day as Prime Minister, the mob’s fury was frequently directed at him. I gather our own esteemed Prime Minister was on television?’
‘Yes, sir. He looked – ah – a bit battered.’ The two men laughed.
‘Serve the bugger right. He’s been up to no good, of that I am quite sure.’ The Colonel absent-mindedly patted his breast pocket where the folded sheet of paper nestled. ‘When everything has calmed down, I intend to get to the bottom of this. Several of my superiors will be interested. Apart from any other considerations, we can’t sit twiddling our thumbs while those – those
mutants
down the corridor take over. Or none of us will sleep soundly in our beds.’
‘Some of the younger Eurocorps officers …’ The adjutant hesitated.
‘Go on, Lieutenant. I am listening.’
‘We have been disturbed at – at the turn of events, sir. Naturally we have all taken the pledge to uphold the Union, its laws and codes.’ Vesirov paused, as if searching for words. His accent had become more clipped and formal. ‘But there is deep concern at recent – distortions. I did not entirely believe it before, but after what I’ve witnessed I do now.
Power-hungry
men are misusing their positions. For their own ends.’
‘Is that why you requested a transfer?’
‘Partly. I could do nothing in the back of beyond in Kashi. But also, sir – because of you.’
‘I’m flattered. And duly grateful. Only you’d probably be safer on the frontier at the moment than here.’ The Colonel half smiled ruefully and pressed the adjutant’s arm.
‘No, sir, you don’t understand. If there is to be change – if we are to find a better way forward – you are one of those who can initiate it, and insist it be carried through.’
‘Me? Good Lord. No, no. I’m nowhere near senior enough.’
‘Maybe not. But it’s a practical question – who is the most suitable? You’re one of the most experienced and respected commanders, sir. You can carry the Army with you. And if you’re convinced, you can convince others. You have that talent.’
Colonel Mike Thompson stared hard into the face of his young assistant, but the Azeri did not flinch. Then the Colonel turned away and studied the flaky paint of the closed door, as if the answers were written on it in invisible ink. The muscles in his cheek clenched and did not relax. It was a full minute before he spoke again.
‘Well, Lieutenant, what are we to do with him?’
The Azeri’s hand slipped to his holster and he adjusted his laser gun to sit more easily. ‘He was armed when he was caught, sir. But he’s an NT, so it would be difficult.’
‘Ah, yes. We can dispose of one type of corpse but not another. Not so readily,
anyway. But the Prince is also a well-placed person, is he not? Elected to Parliament, a kinsman of the King. The highest caste of NT, a friend of the famous. So I return to this question. What was he doing, getting mixed up with Solidarity and protesters and conspiracies to blow up the government?’
‘Maybe he thought it was the only course of action, sir,’ the adjutant said stubbornly.
The Colonel swore under his breath. ‘Don’t go putting ideas into my head, sonny,’ he said brusquely. Then he grasped the doorknob and went inside.
The adjutant made to follow but was politely but firmly left in the corridor, with instructions to keep any intruders well away.
Inside, for what seemed an age, the interrogation continued. Vesirov could not make out what was being said, except that for much of the time it was conducted in low urgent tones, the words and phrases indistinguishable. He could hear the Colonel moving about – or, at least, he assumed it was the Colonel; the prisoner had seemed almost moribund in his defeat. After the first hour the Colonel emerged and disappeared, to return with a jug of water and two cups in his hands, chewing painkillers. The door banged closed after him. Only once were voices raised, when the Azeri heard the name ‘Spartacus’ and a furious altercation ensued, which continued several minutes. It was succeeded by a heavy silence, punctuated by the sound of the Colonel’s footfalls as he paced, up and down, in the tiny room.
Down the corridor, light was beginning to filter through the grimy window. In the courtyard, bodies were stirring. A dog barked. A bell rang somewhere, and was greeted with a sleepy oath. The Lieutenant checked his watch and tapped softly at the door.
It opened a crack and the Colonel’s bleary eye above unshaven jowls peered out.
‘What is it, Lieutenant?’
‘Sir, it’s five forty. The new shift will be coming on soon.’
The Colonel’s head dropped on to his chest in thought. Behind him Vesirov could glimpse the prisoner, slumped in his chair in much the same position as he had been hours earlier. The jug was empty, and so was the brandy bottle at its side. ‘Thank you. Could you please find out whether anyone is on duty at the moment – down there?’
Vesirov trotted off and returned quickly.
‘No, sir. Not yet.’
‘Right. Then bring my Jeep round the back.’ He rubbed his chin tiredly. ‘And I could do with my razor. Though I don’t suppose anyone will notice, not at present.’
Shortly after, the Colonel, shaved and in a fresh shirt, with his adjutant, laser weapon at the ready, might have been observed walking purposefully out of an unlit back entrance of the Ministry of Defence into a waiting military vehicle. Its cover was up and a colonel’s flag had been attached to the bonnet. Its dipped headlights barely broke through the winter gloom. Between them, hands cuffed behind his back, was a scruffy individual in what might once have been a designer suit. The prisoner’s head was down and he seemed demoralised to the point of stupor. He had to be shoved into the back of the Jeep and fastened into his seat-belt. The Colonel slid cautiously into the passenger seat in front. He winced and touched his side. The vehicle moved swiftly away from the kerb. ‘Where to, sir?’ Vesirov asked.
The Colonel waited till they were out of sight of the ministry. The journey would not be straightforward; the streets near the Palace of Westminster were littered with broken glass, as if further demonstrations had taken place, yet the city was eerily empty, as though a
self-imposed
curfew was in place. A drain had burst on one corner and was gushing spouts of brown water into the air; it was unattended. Street lamps were out down several thoroughfares, cameras smashed. A minibus, the kind used for transporting Rottweilers, was on its side in New Parliament Square, unoccupied, its tyres and interior scorched and still faintly smouldering. There was nobody to be seen.
‘Turn left and follow this road for about five kilometres,’ Thompson ordered. ‘Steady. We don’t want to attract any attention.’
The figure in the back stirred. ‘Where are you taking me?’ he asked hoarsely. ‘If you’re going to dispose of me, I’d rather it be somewhere – public. Not some quiet spot where you can dump the body and no more said.’
‘We don’t go in for summary executions in the Union, Prince.’ The Colonel twisted round to address his captive direct, but could manage only half-way. ‘It’s six o’clock. Can we get the news on the radio?’
The adjutant spoke clearly, ‘Radio, channel fourteen. News, please,’ and the machine switched itself on.
The funereal dirge did not surprise them; it had been playing monotonously in continuity gaps since the explosion. What came next made them all sit up with a jerk. The Jeep skittered across the road until Vesirov regained control and slowed.
‘Good morning. Here is the news. Prime Minister Sir Lyndon Everidge and two of his bodyguards have been found dead in London. It is believed they may have been victims of a further assassination attempt following the blast at Westminster which killed the Permanent Secretary of the civil service, Sir Robin Butler-Armstrong and two others on Monday. Tributes have been paid …’
‘Take a right here,’ Thompson ordered. Vesirov drove the Jeep at a crawl and they listened carefully to the broadcast, the Colonel with his teeth gritted, half snorting in discomfort. He addressed the grey-faced Prince roughly. ‘Your mob again, was it?’
‘Not as far as I’m aware. But then, as I kept telling you, I know hardly anything.’
The Colonel grunted. He squinted out of the windscreen. ‘Okay, left, then to the end of the block. Stop.’ Three minutes later, the Jeep disappeared rapidly round the corner, squealing on two wheels. It contained only two men, both in Army uniforms, and with stony expressions on their faces. It headed in the direction of Eurocorps headquarters, out of town near Bracknell.
And Marius, alone and shabby on the sidewalk, gazed up into the pale dawn light and rubbed his sunken cheeks with his free hands in disbelief. It took him a long time to grasp where he was, but eventually, somewhat timidly, he climbed the steps and pressed the intercom buzzer.
A female voice answered.
‘American embassy. Good morning. Can I help you?’