Chris Ryan - Osama

‘OK, champ?’ he asked.

Conor nodded mutely.

Charlie’s mum – Caitlin had reminded him that her name was Elaine – greeted them at the front door with a wide, bubbly smile and a hug for Conor that wasn’t really reciprocated. ‘It’s so lovely to see you again… Charlie’s been dying to have you round…’

Charlie, who was waiting for them in the front room, didn’t look like that was true. He’d grown in the last year, both upwards and outwards. Conor looked tiny next to him, and when Elaine encouraged them to go upstairs to play, neither boy looked very enthusiastic.

‘Bless,’ Elaine observed. ‘Would you like a cup of tea, Joe?’

‘The man doesn’t want tea,’ came a voice from the next room. Two seconds later Charlie’s dad, Reg, appeared carrying two cans of Carling. He wore camouflage trousers that were several sizes too small for his considerable waist, and a Parachute Regiment T-shirt. ‘How do, mate.’ He nodded gruffly and handed Joe the warm beer. ‘What happened to your face, eh? Bit of bother with Terry Taliban?’

Joe had a vague memory of telling Reg that he was off to the Stan, though of course he hadn’t mentioned the Regiment.

‘Something like that, Reg,’ he said, taking a sip of beer.

‘Sit down, then.’ Reg plonked himself in an armchair that was already indented with the shape of his arse. Next to it there was an occasional table on which lay a copy of Jane’s Defence Weekly .

‘I should go…’

‘So we’ve given those fuckin’ Al-Wotsit bastards a good seeing-to, eh?’ Reg spoke proudly, as if he’d nailed the Pacer himself. Then he belched.

‘Right,’ Joe muttered. Elaine had already rolled her eyes and left the room.

Reg leaned forward. ‘You want to know what I think, though?’ Joe didn’t, but knew he was about to find out. ‘That bin Laden – something fishy about him. Our Charlie, always on the fuckin’ computer, he is. Always on that fuckin’…’ He clicked his fingers three times and shouted, ?‘Elaine! What’s that You-Wotsit he’s always on?’

‘YouTube,’ came the reply.

‘Always on it, lookin’ at dancing cats and shit like that.’ He lowered his voice. ‘Probably lookin’ at all sorts of mucky stuff an’ all. Anyhow…’ he tapped himself proudly on the chest ?‘… I’ve been looking on it myself. Wouldn’t believe the stuff I’ve found, you wouldn’t.’

‘Right.’

Reg leaned forward. ‘You know 9/11?’

‘Yeah,’ said Joe. ‘I know.’

‘Well, did you know that there was a third building went down that day? Just near the Twin Towers, it was. And did you know it was reported on the news before it happened?’

Reg sat back and took a triumphant swig of his beer.

Joe put his down on the mantelpiece. ‘Look, mate,’ he said. ‘Really, I’ve got to—’

‘So if it were on the news before it happened, how come they knew about it?’ He leaned forward again, as though he was about to reveal a great secret. ‘Mark my words: that Bin Laden, he was a double agent’ – he almost spat it out – ‘working for the Americans…’

‘Reg, I’m sorry, mate. I’ve really got to be off.’

‘None as blind as them that can’t see,’ said Reg, ‘but you answer me this: what was he doing living where he was, eh? Right under everyone’s noses? You think the Americans didn’t know?’

Fortunately, Joe didn’t have to say what he thought, because just then Elaine walked back into the room. She put an affectionate hand on Joe’s shoulder.

‘Never mind Reg, love,’ she said quietly. ‘He’s always looking for someone to listen to his loony ideas.’ Reg shrugged, and belched again. ‘Now don’t you worry about Conor. They’ll have a lovely time. I’ve got fish fingers for their tea, and I’ll make sure they’re not too late… Oh, and I’ll bring him back round first thing after breakfast. We pass your place on our way to school. Now then, Reg, say bye-bye to Joe.’

Reg just raised his beer in Joe’s direction.

Joe couldn’t get away quickly enough. Guys like Reg were fucking everywhere, keeping the army surplus stores in business and boring everyone shitless about their knowledge of modern combat from the comfort of their armchair. Put a fat fuck like him within sniffing distance of a contact situation and he’d be browning his boxers before you could say RPG. But he was harmless enough, and Elaine would look after Conor.

He looked through the windscreen. Conor was at a window on the first floor. His pale face looked almost ghostly. Joe gave him the thumbs up, and the boy smiled unconvincingly back.

Joe checked the time: 1710 hours. With a nagging sense of guilt he reversed the car, drove away from the house and headed back to JJ’s.

It was growing dark when he got there. The sheep had moved from the hillside and a flock of noisy geese, silhouetted against the sky, were flying north-westerly in an arrowhead formation as he stepped out of the car. Their croaking echoed across the landscape. Once they had gone, everything was silent.

Joe looked at the house. There were no lights on.

Why the hell not?

Something was wrong.

He checked the long grass at the front of the house. He counted three sets of tyre tracks: arrival of the Mondeo yesterday, departure to Charlie’s, arrival just now. He located the indentation of Conor’s footprints from this morning. And nothing else.

But still, no lights.

He circled the house. The back garden was just as overgrown as the front. There was a modern, two-storey annexe here. On the ground floor was a kind of boot room, with a spiral iron staircase that led up to the landing on the first floor of the main house. But the rear door to the annexe was locked. Windows closed. No light. No sign of access.

A gust of wind picked up, carrying with it the bleating of a distant sheep.

Nobody knows you’re here, Joe told himself. He walked round the other side of the house, past the coal shed. The rickety wooden door was closed, the loose chain tied round its bolt in a figure of eight, just as he had left it. When he reached the front door again, the evening had grown a shade darker. And still there were no lights from the house.

He opened the door and slipped inside.

He was about to call Caitlin’s name, but something stopped him. The chill darkness of the hallway, perhaps. Or the silence, broken only by the ticking of the grandfather clock that Joe had wound that morning.

The kitchen: empty and dark, the remnants of their lunch still unwashed by the sink. The sitting room on the other side of the hallway: ditto. Joe headed silently up the stairs. The steps were nearly two metres wide, with a winding, burnished-wood banister. Joe walked lightly along the left-hand edge of the treads, to minimize the creaking. The staircase turned back on itself. The banister continued horizontally for two metres along the landing, overlooking the staircase.

At the top of the steps, he stopped and listened.

Silence.

He was on the verge of calling Caitlin’s name again. And again, something stopped him.

The landing was ten metres long and covered with a musty grey carpet. To his left, there was a closed door that led back to the annexe, with its spiral staircase down to the ground floor. At one end of the landing was a door leading to the bathroom. This too was shut. The room Conor slept in was at the far end on the right. His door was fully open but no light was on inside. Opposite this was the room he shared with Caitlin. The door was a couple of inches ajar, and from it emerged a faint, flickering glow.

A glow he hadn’t seen from the window that looked out onto the front.

He approached with care, treading lightly, the tip of his shoe checking for any looseness in the floor that might make a noise before the heel went down. It took him twenty seconds to approach like this. When he was just inches from the doorway, he stopped and breathed deeply.