(1998) Denial

  The download was interminably slow and he wondered if the machine had hung or the line had dropped. Then, finally, the image began to fill out the screen. He clicked on the icon, which was marked DIRECTOR’S BIOGS. After another interminable delay, Brian Trussler’s colour photograph appeared, above a long list of his television credits.

  Although he had already memorised the man’s face, he studied it hard again now. Trussler seemed fairly distinctive-looking, and ought to be easy enough to spot. Short-cropped, thinning hair with a few pathetic vanity strands across his dome; collarless black shirt fastened at the neck with a jewelled stud. He looked like a flash, smug, middle-aged criminal. Amanda, what did you see in him?

  And he knew she would never be able to answer that question, because the truth was that humans seldom understood the forces of attraction that ensnared them. You could make informed guesses, sure, in her case an element of father-figure, but that was only one part of a massive composite.

  The door was opening. A woman strode out, brown hair cut in a chic but dated style, silk scarf draped around her shoulders, clothes that were smart but sensible. The kind of woman who might run Brian Trussler’s life and secretly yearn for him, who’d be adept at fielding unwanted phone calls from psychiatrists, but less so at finding love.

  She checked that the door was locked. Then she adjusted her scarf, glanced at her reflection in the glass, and walked away in fast, neat, sensibly spaced steps.

  He jerked the modem cable out of his mobile phone, switched it off then back on again to clear it, and dialled Trussler’s direct-line number again. This time there was no intervention by the secretary. Instead, after six rings, the voice-mail kicked in. The secretary’s voice.

  ‘You have reached Brian Trussler’s phone. Please leave your name and number and we’ll call you back.’

  Michael pressed END. SO, almost certainly, that woman had been the secretary. Did that mean the meeting had now ended, or was she simply leaving the office for the day?

  He was trying to decide whether to go over to the door and try to bluff his way in, or whether to continue waiting here, when the door opened: three men and a woman came out. One man had a pony-tail, one a shaven head, one had gelled black hair. The woman, thirtyish, raggedly attractive, held the door and a fourth man came out, dressed in a cream suit. Short, thinning hair with a few strands straddling his almost bald dome, he was talking and gesturing with his hands. He had a commanding air about him; this was his call, this was his meeting, these were his minions.

  This was Brian Trussler.

  Chapter Sixty-one

  In the privacy of his den, Thomas opened the box that had been mailed by UPS carriers to Dr Terence Goel’s PO Box in Cheltenham. Inside, it was beautifully packed, each component nestling in its own polystyrene compartment. Two lenses stared up at him through the shredded paper wadding, like some fat, creepy bug.

  ‘Beautiful,’ he whispered.

  He laid his face against the wadding. Beautiful. It felt like straw. Today felt like Christmas. Beautiful. The cold plastic rims of the lenses touched his cheek like two kisses.

  This is for you, Mummy, I’m doing this for you. Is this making you happy? I hope so.

  A copy of Dr Goel’s Midland Gold MasterCard credit slip, in an envelope, was attached to the invoice. A payment for one thousand, nine hundred and forty pounds to the CyberSurveillance Mail Order Company Ltd.

  Thomas tucked this proof of purchase into his black crocodile-skin wallet, sliding it down behind the lining, just in case the apparatus had a fault and he needed to send it back. Then, in the grate of the disused fireplace, Thomas carefully lit the label addressed to Dr Terence Goel that had been on the outside of the package and burned it. The Ford Mondeo parked in the garage alongside Amanda Capstick’s Alfa Romeo was unavoidable but, other than that, he tried to ensure that nothing in this house could connect him with Dr Terence Goel of Cheltenham. The white van was secure on a long-term contract in a multi-storey car park.

  Fetching the vacuum cleaner from downstairs he hoovered all the ashes out of the grate. No dirty fireplace in this room, thank you. He wanted it clean, spotless, sterile, like a hospital operating theatre. That was the way he liked it. Carpet, desk, computer, chair, armchair, books, pictures of his mother. No bugs. No bacteria. Behind closed curtains, double-glazed windows were sealed against the shitty London air. Better to be hot than poisoned. No dirt, none, no thank you.

  Now this room wasn’t clean any more, there was shredded paper all over the floor around the box and this angered him. Bitch Amanda Capstick. This was her fault. If she hadn’t allowed herself to be penetrated by Dr Michael Tennent he wouldn’t have had to order this piece of kit, and if he hadn’t ordered it, then he wouldn’t have this shredded paper as messy as straw over his grey carpet.

  He could vacuum it up soon, but not yet, not until he was finished.

  He had to read the instruction book. He removed it from its Cellophane wrapper. On the outside was printed AN/PVS NIGHT VISION GOGGLES MODEL F5001.

  This was the model he had ordered. Good.

  He read carefully, memorising the diagrams. Then he lifted the goggles out of the box and held them up. They were beautiful to look at, beautiful to hold, he pulled them to his eyes, smelt the rubber cushioning. So comfortable, such a snug fit. He could see nothing through them yet, of course: the lithium battery wasn’t installed.

  He checked out all the features. The IR-on switch. The low-battery indicator. The IR illuminator. The F/1.2 objective lens. The momentary IR-on indicator.

  Beautiful!

  He couldn’t wait to use them. This was going to be something else altogether!

  He lifted out the head mount, a complex arrangement of straps. Now the excitement was really growing. He attached it to the goggles and, from the diagram he had memorised, put it on. One strap went around the rim of his skull, like a headband, clamping the goggles to his forehead. Another bracing strap went beneath his chin; a third went around his neck, and a fourth went from the headband in front of his ears to the neck strap.

  Wonderful! He stood up, unable to see yet, but entranced. This strapping device was comfortable, so snug, he could wear these goggles for ever!

  I wish you could see me now, Mummy!

  He raised his hands to remove them and winced as his right arm twinged. Anger at Amanda flared up inside him again. You hurt my arm, you bitch.

  She was so heavy! Why was someone so small and so thin so damned heavy when they were unconscious? Getting her out of the hallway of her building and into her Alfa Romeo while trying to make it look like they were two lovers entwined hadn’t been easy! He’d wrenched his arm getting her into that damned car.

  But the pleasure that lay ahead helped him forget the pain. Oh, yes. This was going to be good. He removed the goggles, knelt down on the floor, took out the lithium battery and the charger, inserted the battery in the small compartment at the base of the goggles, then plugged in the charger. He pressed the switch and the indicator light came on. He smiled.

  Thunderbirds are go!

  Amanda heard the click of a door.

  Movement.

  Someone was sharing this darkness with her. Stifling her first instinct to call out for help, she lay still, held her breath. A muscle plucked at the base of her throat. She tracked the darkness with her ears.

  Beyond the drumroll of her heartbeat, silence.

  Then a sudden movement, like one single footstep. A thud close by. Then the unmistakable sound of sloshing water. The squeak of a rubber-soled shoe.

  Thomas nearly kicked over the bucket. He cursed his clumsiness. He had almost tripped, dammit. Jesus! You stupid bitch woman, do you realise all the trouble you’re putting me to?

  She was so close he could reach out and touch her, but he didn’t want to do that. He didn’t want to touch anything that Dr Michael Tennent had had sex with, not yet, not until he was ready. And she stank of body odour and urine; she’d only been down here two days a
nd she was turning this place into a pigsty. He could smell her even over the reek of formalin. And why was the stupid bitch lying on the floor and not on the mattress?

  Should have brought her the food and water yesterday, he knew, and something for her to do her latrine stuff into. Somehow it had slipped his mind.

  He looked at her in the green night-vision light. The tiny red glow of the battery indicator showed he had ten minutes left. The batteries had needed a twenty-four-hour charge but that was an impossible length of time. They’d had to make do with four hours, and that had been a hard enough wait.

  But now, the main thing was, the goggles worked! Clear enough to see the fear on her face.

  No, not her face, he corrected himself. Its face.

  This was the mistake he had made with the editor, Tina Mackay, and the reporter, Justin Flowering. He had thought of them as people and in the end he had been distressed by what he had done to them. Keep this one at a distance. It’s an animal. Just an animal.

  And, just like an animal in its lair hearing a sound, it lifted its head, staring around in the darkness, eyes open so wide in terror he could see the whites all the way round.

  Not taking care of itself; there was a bad bruise on its forehead. Its hair was a mess, all tangled up, it needed combing or brushing, or both, he was tempted to tell it to make itself more presentable but it was better just to watch it in silence. It even had its T-shirt on back to front.

  He thought how slovenly this animal looked compared to his mother. His mother liked to sit in front of the mirror, with him standing beside her, combing and brushing and caressing those long blonde tresses. Sometimes she would sit naked and he would stand beside her, also naked, combing and brushing, and she would reward him afterwards by doing something good with his choo-choo.

  He made another noise now as he put down the second bucket, this time scraping his foot deliberately. It was looking straight at him now, and for a moment he wondered if it could make out his shape in the darkness, but, of course, that was impossible. These goggles gave off nothing. Military specification. They were fabulous! He was invisible.

  Could it hear him breathing? Was that what it was focusing on now? He stepped silently in his Nike Air trainers several paces to his right. It was still staring ahead, staring at where he had been.

  In the land of the blind . . .

  ‘Hallo?’ it called. ‘Hallo, who’s there?’

  Pitiful, croaky little voice.

  ‘Hallo, please, hallo? Who’s there? Please help me.’

  He retreated silently back through the darkness, into the outer chamber, past the bodies of Tina Mackay and the reporter, Justin Flowering. Then he stopped again and looked back.

  The dirty thing on the floor stiffened, turned its head in short, jerky, startled movements.

  It called out again, ‘Hallo?’

  A door clanged shut. The echo rumbled around the chamber until it was blotted up by the darkness.

  Then, suddenly, an explosion of light.

  Amanda threw her hands against her eyes in pain and let out a gasp of shock, her eye muscles straining inside their sockets. A clear red glow now through her hands.

  Slowly, fearfully, she removed them, blinking, still dazzled, her headache making it hard to think clearly, but as she began to adjust to the light, she looked around. She was in a square, windowless room, about twenty feet by twenty feet, and about ten feet high. Four downlighters flush with the ceiling lit the room. Otherwise it was solid concrete, with no hatch. She looked at the duct vent, directly above where the mattress lay against the wall. Other than the door that was the only possibility. It was big enough to get into – if she could find a way to unscrew the grille cover.

  She pressed her hands to her head to try to squeeze away the pain, but as she touched her forehead, it was so bad she nearly cried out. Over to her right was the open door through into the room where she had found the bodies, which was in darkness. Then her eyes swung down to the two plastic buckets and the tray on the floor just short of the doorway.

  One bucket looked empty. The other contained a soapy froth and had a flannel draped over the edge. A beige towel was folded neatly beside it, and a brand new roll of lavatory paper. On the tray was a large plastic jug of water, a plastic beaker, a paper plate on which were several chunks of wholemeal bread, and another on which were thick slices of cheese. A handful of cherry tomatoes and an apple lay loose on the tray. No knife. Nothing that she could try to use as a screwdriver.

  She fell on the water jug, grasped it in both hands and began to gulp it down gratefully, greedily, so fast it spilled out of her mouth, running over the sides of her lips and down her chin.

  When she did stop, she’d already drunk three-quarters of the contents and was desperate for more, she could drain it right now and it still wouldn’t be enough. But she did not know how long would be before she was given any more. She needed to ration herself, needed to –

  The time.

  I can read my watch now.

  Time and date.

  7.55. Tue. Jul 28.

  One more swig of water, just a small one. She kept it in her mouth, swilling the delicious moist substance around, savouring it, treasuring every drop. Two days.

  Oh, sweet Jesus. Two days.

  A swirl of panic tore through her. Two days. Two days. Seven fifty-five in the morning or the evening?

  Why isn’t anyone looking for me? Why hasn’t anyone found me? She stared at the food, grabbed a piece of cheese and some bread and crammed them in her mouth, chewing savagely, tears rolling down her cheeks.

  Michael, do you even know I’m not at home or at work? Lulu, are you wondering where I am?

  Oh, Christ, who the hell is going to miss me?

  She drank another precious mouthful of water, then ate more bread and cheese and a tomato, a ripe, delicious, incredibly sweet, beautiful tomato. Even this little bit of food going down was making her feel stronger. Think.

  It’s Tuesday. Maybe Tuesday morning or Tuesday bloody night. Two days. Forty-eight hours. Lulu, you must be wondering where the hell I am. What are you doing about it? What have you told Michael? Do you think I’m just lying at home with a bloody migraine or something?

  What the hell are you all doing?

  Anything? Are you doing anything at all?

  The light went out.

  For a moment she stared into the darkness in anger, not fear.

  Chapter Sixty-two

  Michael watched Brian Trussler shake hands with the other three men on the pavement outside the offices of Mezzanine Productions. Positive body language: they’d had a good meeting.

  The one with the pony-tail clamped his mobile phone to his ear, and stepped away. Brian Trussler pulled his phone out also, dialled and strutted a few yards down the street, looking pleased as hell with himself. In his cream linen suit, purple collarless shirt and white loafers, he had an even flashier air than the mental image Michael had already formed of him, and he was filled with a sudden intense loathing for and mistrust of this man.

  Michael opened his door and was half-way out of his car, when Trussler broke into a sprint, one arm raised in a frantic signal, flagging down a cab at the intersection a short distance down the road.

  He debated whether to run after him, then decided instead it might be more useful to see where he was going. He slammed the door and started the engine. To his relief he could see that the cab, in a distinctive bottle-green, was stopped at traffic lights at the T-junction with the Strand. He swung the Volvo out, deliberately cutting up a van, forcing it to brake hard, accelerated down to the end of the road and pulled up hard on the tail of Trussler’s cab, which had its right-turn signal on.

  Grabbing his phone off the driver’s seat, he dialled Lulu’s home number. The lights changed as it was ringing, and he steered one-handed, trailing the cab into the heavy evening traffic of the Strand.

  Lulu’s answering-machine kicked in after four rings. The cab crossed a traffic light
on orange and Michael, a split second later, on red. They stopped again at the next lights, in front of Charing Cross station. He dialled Lulu’s mobile. Three rings, and then to his relief he heard her, against a hubbub of voices, a clattering of cutlery or glasses, and background music that was numbingly loud.

  The lights were changing. The cab was entering Trafalgar Square and a chauffeured Mercedes was trying to cut into the gap between them. Driving recklessly close to the cab’s bumper, ready to change direction whenever it did, Michael froze out the Mercedes. ‘Hi, Lulu, it’s Michael.’

  She couldn’t hear him.

  Under Admiralty Arch and into the Mall. The cab was accelerating and Michael eased back a short distance in case the driver was observant. Raising his voice he said, ‘It’s Michael! I need Brian Trussler’s home address.’

  ‘Umm, it’s – oh, God, number four, West Crescent, NW1,’ she shouted back. ‘Regent’s Park – do you know Albany Street?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘It’s somewhere off that, I think.’

  ‘Thanks. No news?’

  ‘Nothing – you?’

  She was too breezy tonight. No one had a right to be happy, not until Amanda had been safely found.

  ‘No,’ he said.

  They were stopping at the lights by St James’s Palace. Buckingham Palace dead ahead. No flag, the Queen was out – having a nice time somewhere? Everyone else in the whole bloody city was having a nice time tonight.

  A convertible BMW pulled up on his right, a blonde driving, hair all tangled from the wind, and he looked at her with a sharp pang, reminded of Amanda. There was another attractive girl in the passenger seat and one in the back, all laughing, sharing a joke, having a good time. Now a guy and a girl in a grey Jaguar pulled up on his left, impossibly beautiful, as if they had stepped out of a chocolate commercial. The girl was nuzzled up against the guy’s face, kissing him. Michael wanted to scream at them all to stop having fun, fun was on hold, everyone had to concentrate.