The Mercy Seat Page 6

  ‘Right. D’you know what you want, then?’

  A simple question. Accorded almost unreal, legendary status by memory.

  David’s smile: the same smile every time.

  ‘Ghost,’ he says. His voice rings and echoes away down a time tunnel.

  The perfume department, a hall of chrome and mirrors, sales assistants painted to perfection. Professionally warm smiles greet them. Donovan matches them to his mood, responds. Six-year-old David looks around in awe, clutching his first wallet, lips moving, attempting to pronounce the words he sees. Givenchy. Issey Miyake. Versace. Donovan sees them both in a mirror, smiles.

  He hears himself say those words again:

  ‘My son would like to buy some perfume for his mother. Her birthday.’

  A simple statement. No foreshadowing of tragedy.

  The sales assistant smiles, looks to the shelves behind her then back to the counter. And the response again:

  ‘Did you have in mind …?’

  The question trailing off. Ordinary. So ordinary.

  Donovan waits to hear the word. Ghost. It doesn’t come. He turns.

  David is gone.

  He starts to look for him. Angry at first that he has run away, preparing admonishments for his return, words to disguise his relief. He walks round pillars scowling, calling:

  ‘David?’

  Nothing.

  Panic swells. His body feels hot and cold, prickly and clammy.

  ‘David!’

  Nothing. Just chrome and mirrors.

  Back to the counter, hoping to find him there.

  No sign.

  Asking the assistant, his heart thudding, breath beginning to catch:

  ‘Have you seen him? Have you seen my son?’

  The assistant frowning, shaking her head, cracking her perfect visage.

  Then frantically looking around. First wading then diving into that ebbing sea of humanity, pushing out, swimming against the tide, ignoring the elbows, the shouts, his own voice fraying with worry, topping them.

  ‘David! David!’

  Then standing still, looking.

  Nothing.

  His behaviour alerts the security guards. They rush over, two of them, pleased to have something to do. He speaks; they listen. His words are self-deprecating, self-deluding:

  ‘I’m sure he’s all right. He’ll have probably just wandered off. I shouldn’t waste your time …’

  His tone betrays himself. The security men move off, looking.

  He stands impotent, willing his son to appear. People stare. The bright lights expose too much, reveal not enough.

  And then he sees it, on the floor.

  David’s wallet, spilled open, coins scattered.

  Ghost.

  Emotion builds; a huge, wooden battering ram seeks release from his body. Tempest-tossed and marooned, trying to catch a glimpse of his son before he is borne away on the tide.

  Then the figure of Donovan recedes. Becomes smaller and smaller as darkness encroaches, blocking out all sight, sound, activity.

  Ghost.

  Fading to black.

  He opened his eyes, shivered.

  Back in the cottage in Northumberland, weak light spilling into his bedroom, another harsh, chromatic sunrise, he presumed. He yawned, stretched, rubbed his eyes. The dream again. Always with him. He reached for the whisky, his habitual cure for night-time unrest. Located it, intending to neck straight from the bottle, then opened his eyes.

  He was on the sofa. Laptop, mobile phone, disks, CDs and paper piled next to it. He looked around. Still light. And remembered. He must have dozed off while working.

  ‘I’ll need to see everything Gary Myers was working on,’ he had said on his ex-editor’s second visit, the day after the first, the day she had come alone.

  ‘Of course,’ she had said. ‘Come down to the office.’

  Donovan paused before answering. ‘I don’t think I’m quite ready for that yet.’

  Maria reddened, averted her gaze. ‘Of course not. Sorry.’

  The weather had changed, brightened slightly. Maria had left off her waterproof. In jeans, boots and a fleece top she looked casual, relaxed. A city girl having a weekend off in the country. She looked good, too. Donovan couldn’t help but notice how well her jeans fitted her. How flatteringly they accentuated her.

  ‘What?’ she said.

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘You were staring.’

  It was Donovan’s turn to blush. ‘Sorry. I didn’t … I was, er, miles away.’

  ‘Right.’

  Silence hung between them. Neither looked into the other’s eyes.

  ‘I could get it sent to you,’ Maria said eventually. ‘The contents of Gary Myers’ computer. I’ll get a couple of techies to strip it down, get the disks and print-outs sent to you.’

  ‘I don’t have a computer. Not any more.’

  Maria sighed. ‘Then I’ll get one sent to you.’

  Donovan smiled. ‘Ambassador, you are spoiling us.’

  Maria laughed. ‘You have been out of circulation a long time.’

  The silence returned. And with it the awkwardness. He noticed her looking around the room. Probably looking for the gun, he thought. She wouldn’t find it. He had hidden it away.

  ‘Have you … seen Annie recently?’ Maria asked eventually, her voice hushed and sombre, riding the awkwardness.

  ‘No. I … not for a while. I used to, but …’ He sighed. ‘Abigail. It was uncomfortable. Rowing, sulking, practising to be a teenager … In the end Annie told me to just stay away. Better for both of them.’

  ‘Until they’ve worked it out?’

  Donovan shrugged. ‘Whatever. Whenever.’ He stood up, crossed the room, looked out of the window, his back to Maria. ‘Annie and me just couldn’t stay together after … afterwards. And Abigail, poor soul. It wasn’t her fault. I mean, he was her brother …’

  Donovan broke off, allowed his eyes to follow the seagulls. Swooping. Cawing. Scavenging for scraps. Not giving up hope of finding something.

  Maria sat in silence.

  ‘I can’t blame her for what she thinks of me,’ said Donovan. ‘If I was in her position I’d be exactly the same. I still love her, though. I doubt she realizes it or believes me, but I do. She probably thinks I care more for him than I do for her, but I don’t. Course I don’t. And I suppose she thinks I should have stayed with them, looked after her, but …’ He sighed. ‘I can’t explain. It’s … you can’t let go. You can’t stay either. And the longer you stay away, the harder it is to go back.’

  He turned to face her.

  ‘I’m sorry. You don’t want to hear this.’

  ‘No, no …’ Maria stood up, crossed to him.

  ‘It’s ages since I’ve … It’s not fair on you to …’

  ‘It’s all right.’ Maria stood right next to him.

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘You’ve nothing to be sorry for.’ Maria looked at his face, into his eyes. The emotion there was naked and raw, vulnerable.

  Donovan looked back at her.

  Each could feel the other’s breath lightly stroke their cheeks. Naked. Raw. Vulnerable.

  Donovan turned away.

  ‘Anyway,’ he said, voice too loud, ‘this isn’t getting Gary Myers found.’

  ‘No,’ said Maria, her voice tightly modulated. ‘We’ve got work to do.’

  She had been as good as her word. One phone call to the Herald’s IT department had resulted in Gary Myers’ hard drive being stripped and the contents being sent to Donovan along with a laptop to play them on and anything they could find on paper.

  ‘His diary would be handy, too,’ said Donovan.

  ‘On his laptop, I think,’ said Maria.

  ‘Which, of course, he had with him.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘I don’t hold out much hope. Reckon he probably had most of his stuff on his laptop.’ Donovan ran his hands through his hair. ‘When’s the kid phoning back?’ />
  ‘Tomorrow. We’ll get a mobile to you, give him that number so he can talk directly with you.’

  ‘How much am I authorized to go up to?’

  ‘Five grand. If he’s got what he says he has. But try not to. And, of course, there’s your payment. To come.’

  ‘Did Sharkey OK that?’

  Maria shook her head. ‘John Greene.’

  Donovan laughed. ‘John Greene? I thought he’d retired.’

  ‘Executive editor.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘A weekly column and boring the arse off the staff with old Fleet Street war stories.’

  Donovan smiled, taken back in time for a second or two. A happier, simpler time. ‘So,’ he said, pulling himself back into the present, ‘Sharkey. What’s the deal with him?’

  ‘He’s the company’s lawyer. Very good at his job, one of the best, but …’ Maria shrugged.

  ‘A twat.’

  She laughed. ‘I was going to be a little more diplomatic than that, but the gist would have been the same. If he says he can do something, believe him. But don’t trust him.’

  ‘Interesting distinction.’

  ‘I’m sure you’ll see what I mean.’

  Donovan nodded. ‘So the police haven’t been called yet?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  Maria remembered the phone call with Sharkey before she had arrived at Donovan’s house that day. Where she had told him she was calling the police in.

  ‘The police?’ he had said. ‘I say not. Not yet. I mean, this boy. Who is he? Does he know where Myers is? Is he holding him? Is this a prank? A hoax? We don’t know. Gary Myers could be away working, and this boy has seen a chance to make some easy money. We just don’t know. And we won’t until your man has talked to him face to face.’

  She had tried to speak, but Sharkey had overridden her.

  ‘If we go to the police and Gary Myers turns up, we’ll end up looking foolish. Our competitors will have a field day. No police. For now.’

  She relayed all that to Donovan, who nodded.

  ‘Well, let’s hope he’s OK. Spoke to his wife?’

  ‘Same thing with her. We didn’t want to alarm her unnecessarily.’

  Maria had left out one part of the conversation with Sharkey.

  ‘You promised to help him find his son,’ she had said to the lawyer. ‘I’d like to know how you propose to do that.’

  Sharkey had sighed. ‘We’ll have to postpone this conversation until another time, I’m afraid. I’m late for an appointment.’

  ‘Francis,’ she had found herself almost bellowing into the phone. ‘Joe is a very desperate and damaged man. If you have no intention of backing up your words with actions, then he’ll be a very angry man. And you know what that’s like.’

  She heard him involuntarily clear his throat.

  ‘So are you stringing him along? Or is there something concrete you can do for him?’

  Sharkey had sighed again. ‘We’ll talk later. I really must go.’

  And the line had gone dead.

  ‘What?’ said Donovan.

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘You were staring.’

  Maria reddened again. ‘Miles away. Listen, I’d better go.’

  And she had left. Donovan had watched her leave. Then, finding he couldn’t settle in the house, had gone for a walk along the shore.

  First thing the next morning a heavily laden courier had arrived at the door. Donovan had started work immediately. Time passed without him realizing, he was so engrossed in the work. He was looking for clues, triggers, anything that would bring back a memory, start the ball rolling again.

  Nothing.

  He rubbed his eyes again, checked his watch. Ten to five. He had worked the whole day up to his nodding off. He had missed lunch.

  He stood up, stretched, looked around the room. Torn from his work on the computer, it was like seeing it anew. The place was a tip. Did he really live like this? He ran a hand over his face, felt the stubble growing like an untended garden. Felt his hair: greasy, long hanks. Looked down at his clothes: filthy sweatshirt and boxer shorts. And felt, for the first time in years, shame in his appearance.

  Had he really sunk so low? Was he really living with so little pride?

  He looked again at the computer screen, tidied the papers up beside it. His stomach rumbled. Time for dinner, he thought, and walked towards the kitchen.

  He thought of Gary Myers. A hoax? An opportunistic prank? Maybe. He hoped the journalist was OK, even if it was just for the sake of the man’s wife, ultimately. Donovan knew only too well what it was like to carry the burden of worry over someone you love going missing.

  He thought of Maria, too, felt a curious sensation inside. What must she have thought of him looking the way he did?

  He diverted his route to the bathroom instead.

  Time for a bath and a shave and a change of clothes.

  Time to sort himself out.

  Gary Myers opened his eyes yet still saw blackness. A clammy, claustrophobic, itchy blackness.

  The hood was still in place.

  Using his free left hand, he moved it slowly up his face, stopping every quarter of an inch, expecting a harsh voice to bark at him, order him to pull it down again.

  His heart was beating fast, fear pumping blood round his body … push a little further … he could hear his breath hitting the fabric before his mouth and nose, feel sweat along his forehead and neck … further, further … his mouth free, his nose … they had forced him to keep the hood on … a good sign … meant they intended him to live … further … meant there would be an end to all this, that they wouldn’t keep him for long … a push, then stop … checking for the voice … then more … further … stop for another few seconds, waiting, expecting that voice … a punch even … then a little more …

  But the voice never came. No one touched him. Gary continued pulling and rolling until the hood came free.

  He quickly closed his eyes, blinked away the sudden light, the attendant hurt. He tried again, opening them slowly this time.

  The place was dimly lit but seemed overpoweringly bright compared with his view inside the hood. He waited a few minutes, allowed himself to acclimatize, his vision to come into focus.

  It looked like a disused garage. Small, no longer operational. And for some time. Wooden double doors to the front were chained up, access granted by a small, rectangular door inset in the right-hand door. That, Gary knew, was bolted and double-locked from the outside.

  An ancient Granada sat on a ramp in the centre of the garage. Body flaking rust like dead, leprous skin, tyres flattened and sagging like flabby, middle-aged beer guts. Behind the car a workbench holding a collection of rusting, blunted tools. Tools that looked solid enough to hurt. Tools that, judging by the deposits left on them, hadn’t just been used to mend cars. Piles of decaying engine parts dotted the corners. The walls and floor were dark with accumulated dirt and dust, the stickiness and stink of old, rancid motor oil.

  Behind the workshop, glimpsed through a filthy half-glass door and wall, was the office. An old, scarred metal desk, a swivel chair that had long since ceased to offer comfort and now haemorrhaged its innards, a ransacked filing cabinet and a calendar of naked young women who must now have been of pensionable age.

  And in the centre of the room, the chair.

  The mercy seat.

  His first memory of captivity, before they had handcuffed him to the heavy iron radiator on the wall of the old garage. It scared him to look at it, had scared him even more to sit in it.

  He had woken up bound to it. The hood had stopped him seeing his captors’ faces, but he had heard their voices; barking questions at him, hurting him when he didn’t give the answer they wanted to hear.

  His companion had fared even worse. He had known his captors, tried to talk to them using first names, engage with them on a human level. That had resulted in an even more savage and severe beating th
an Gary had been given.

  Gary looked at his companion lying uncomfortably next to him, handcuffed to the other end of the radiator. Two old blankets and a stinking slop bucket between them. It was all right at present, but when it filled up the place would stink. That, he thought, was the least of his troubles.

  Poor Colin, he thought. Tried to do what he thought was right and honourable and look where it had got him. A broken arm, possibly several broken ribs, severe bruising and, from the pain he had described, internal damage. He wasn’t a young man either. He wondered whether Colin could cope with whatever their captives had in mind.

  Gary wondered if he himself could.

  He knew why they had been taken. They both did. After the blue-toothed skinhead had burst into the hotel room in King’s Cross it had been obvious. Apparently his minidisc player had been stolen, and this seemed to annoy them most. They had stripped and destroyed his laptop, but the loss of the minidisc had left them very, very unhappy. And although Gary knew nothing about that, he had paid the price for it. After heavy persuading, they had reluctantly agreed with him.

  So he waited. He looked at Colin. Sleeping. A fitful, uneasy sleep. His stomach turned over yet again. He winced at the pain, a combination of heartburn from the cheap fast food their captives provided, the beatings and fear.

  Gary sighed. The air left his body in shuddering gasps.

  Fear. He had never truly understood the meaning of the word until this moment. Fear. Just sitting.

  Meant they intended him to live.

  And waiting.

  Meant there would be an end to all this.

  And not knowing.

  That they wouldn’t keep him for long.

  Fear.

  Gary sighed again, felt more than air bubbling up.

  Quickly he grabbed the bucket and, eyes closed and nose blocked, threw up into the mess.

  He kept vomiting until there was nothing left inside him.

  Except fear.

  5

  ‘Seventy-seven … seventy-eight … seventy-nine … eighty …’

  With the air exploding from her lungs, Peta Knight flopped back on the floor, sweating. She felt the familiar trembling ache around her lower stomach and down the fronts of her thighs, felt the sweat bead and prickle her hot skin. She breathed deep, her lungs red and raw. Her muscles felt worked, her body burning; she flexed and unflexed, the second skin of black Lycra moving with her.