Tania Carver - Cage of Bones

‘And look what happened to that.’

‘Let’s go.’

They got out of the car. Seeing the rain start, they had both dressed practically. Jeans and boots. Waterproof jackets. Phil took a torch out of the boot of the car. ‘This way.’

They walked off behind the back of the hotel, started down the bank towards the river. Phil swung the torch around. Picked up marks on the ground.

‘Someone’s been here,’ he said.

‘There was a murder here,’ said Marina. ‘I should think there have been a lot of people tramping around.’

‘No,’ said Phil, pointing to the path they were following. ‘Look. There are fresh footprints. Fresh tracks. Someone’s been down here recently.’

‘Is that good?’ asked Marina.

‘If it’s Paul,’ said Phil, ‘yes.’

‘And if not?’

‘Let’s hope it’s Paul,’ he said.

They walked along the route as Phil remembered it. It was harder going in the dark, harder still in the rain. Secure footholds crumbled away to muddy nothing. Branches and trees used night as camouflage to entrap them. The two of them had to hold on to each other, help each other down and along.

‘Here it is,’ said Phil at last as they reached the river’s edge. ‘At least I think so.’

He swung the torch round. Listened. There was no sound except the rain hitting the water, the leaves. Like hot, sizzling fat or incessant machine-gun fire.

Along the muddy bank the torch picked out a larger area of darkness.

‘There.’

They began to walk towards the cave mouth.

‘This is it?’ said Marina, stopping in front of it. ‘The man who started the Garden. This is where he lives?’

‘Yep. When he’s not in one of his other properties dotted around town. All connected to the Garden, all derelict.’

She nodded. ‘I could get a PhD out of him alone.’ She peered into the cave mouth. ‘Well, that looks inviting. What do we do, call to him? Leave food outside?’

‘Or whisky,’ said Phil. He swung the torch into the cave, stepped inside.

‘Careful.’

‘I am.’ He walked on. ‘I think someone’s been here,’ he called back.

Marina heard his voice echoing round the stone mouth.

‘I think-’

Phil screamed. There was a clattering, smashing sound. Silence.

‘Phil? Phil?’ Marina ran into the cave mouth, still shouting. Panic rising inside her. ‘Phil… Phil… ’

‘It’s… all right… ’ His voice, distant, distorted. Echoing.

‘Where are you? Phil?’

‘I’m… Don’t come any closer. You’ll do the same.’

‘What?’

‘There’s a… an entranceway here. A slope. I didn’t see it and I’ve just slid down it.’

She saw the faint glow of torchlight against the darkness, went towards it. She reached the lip of the shaft Phil had fallen down. Knelt before it. It was just big enough for one person to go down, as long as they weren’t too wide. She could see him at the bottom, looking up. The sides, where the torchlight hit them, looked smooth. Too smooth to climb up again.

‘How are you going to get out?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘Maybe Paul’s down here. I’ll ask him.’

‘And maybe he isn’t.’ She sighed. ‘Have you still got that tow rope in the boot?’

‘Yeah, I think so.’

‘I’ll go and get it. Don’t wander off.’

‘Yeah, thanks. I’ll bear that in mind.’

Marina stood up, made her way back out of the cave. She looked around, tried to get her bearings. The woods seemed scarier without Phil. Bigger, wilder. Things unseen lurking behind trees.

Trying to swallow down the panic that was threatening to rise within her, and telling herself there was nothing to be scared of, she set off in what she hoped was the direction they had come from. Back to the hotel, back to the car.

As quickly as she could.

The circus was on the move. Under cover of darkness and with the Super’s reluctant, angry blessing. Mickey sat in the first van of the convoy, up front with Fennell and Clemens. Body armour on over his day clothes, the two SOCA officers doing the same.

The Super hadn’t been happy when Fennell had called him. Engaging in a clandestine operation on his turf without his consent was exactly the kind of thing to make him angry. But Fennell, displaying great political skill, had won him round. Reminded him what a feather in his cap it would be for a people-trafficking operation to be halted on his manor. That the covert joint operation (he had stressed the word joint ) would result in the rooting out and successful capture of a corrupt police officer. How such a superintendent would be looked on by the Home Office in the next round of budget cuts. When all this was pointed out, whatever misgivings the Super had were kept to himself.

Fennell had hung up, clearly happy with himself.

Yeah, thought Mickey, now we just have to carry all of that out. Because if we don’t, it won’t be the SOCA glory boys who’ll take the blame. Not once they’ve involved the locals.

The convoy drove along the A120 towards Harwich. There were two ports on the mouth of the River Stour. Felixstowe and Harwich. Most of the heavy cargo, Fennell had informed them all at the briefing, came through Felixstowe. And as a result it was the more carefully guarded of the two. Weaver and Balchunas’ cargo was coming in the Harwich side, where it would be less likely to be stopped and searched.

They would get in place for the shipment, identify it, follow it to the lock-up.

And then take them down.

The firearms unit was in the van behind. Mickey felt uncomfortable with them around. The cowboy outfit, Phil always called them. The shoot-first-fill-in-compliance-forms-later brigade. He must have caught Phil’s allergy to them, Mickey thought, smiling to himself.

They were approaching Harwich, going round the roundabouts, heading down to the port itself.

Mickey always found Harwich a strange place. Away from the front, there were rabbit-warren streets of old Georgian houses, interesting local pubs and even a converted lighthouse. But the front, and the port, was different.

They drove along the front and round to the side, the convoy coming to a halt in a car park by the edge of the water.

Mickey got out, walked down to the sea.

It was raining fully now, and dark. The only sound was the tide lapping against the shore, rough waves crashing in, fizzing out as they withdrew. Mickey pulled his coat around him. He could feel the cold, the damp penetrate.

Felixstowe on the opposite side was lit up against the night. Etched against the darkness, it was all looming boxlike cranes and blinking lights. It looked sinister, alien. The port itself resembled a grounded alien spacecraft, no longer needing to cloak itself, wounded but still dangerous. The cranes along the shoreline, dark and top-heavy on foursquare legs, looked like the walkers from the old Star Wars films. Like they were the advance guard from the ship, about to come stomping across the estuary, all blackened and rusting, guns blazing.

Mickey shivered. Hoped it was just the cold.

Clemens got out of the van, came and stood beside him. He shook out a cigarette, lit up. Offered the pack to Mickey as an afterthought. Mickey refused.

Clemens had been silent on the journey. Mickey didn’t know the man well enough to ask why.

‘Just heard,’ said Clemens, blowing smoke towards the other side of the estuary. ‘My partner. Slipped into a coma.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Mickey. Then thought. ‘But isn’t Fennell your partner?’

‘Just drafted in. We know each other, have worked together before. But my other partner was sliced up a couple of days ago. He’s been fighting for his life since then.’