Tom Knox - The Marks of Cain

'So what do I do now? What can I do? Come home?'

'No.'

'Then what?

'Hide.'

Simon pressed the phone closer to his ear, to make sure he was hearing correctly. 'Hide? You just want me to…hide out?'

'Just for now. Yes.' Sanderson's voice dropped a few tones. 'I'm sorry but there it is. You chose to do what you did. You're out there now. I don't blame you for that. But…haring across France. Not telling us. Less than brilliant. But you've made your decision. And now you're probably facing a bigger risk if you come back to London. You might be spotted en route, they will expect you to try and find your family. Your friends out there said we can't trust the police in France, right? So it's very bleeding tricky. Who knows where they will have people.' He sighed, fiercely. 'Main thing is — your wife and son are safe: I can vouch for that. My men are good. And there's nothing you can do to help us find Tim.'

'So I stay here?'

'Stay there, for now, until we work this out. Stay quiet in France or Germany, you can cross the border unseen thanks to Schengen. Lie low. Very very bloody low. You know to use payphones only.'

'Yes.'

'Don't even use the same payphone twice. Call me direct as before…Call Suzie on this special number.'

Simon patted his pockets and found a pen. He wrote the number.

The DCI sighed.

'Simon…I'm sorry about this. But you should…prepare yourself for the worst. And don't watch the video. You know how ruthless these bastards are. Speak soon.'

The phone clicked and brrrd. Simon thought of his brother.

I made a dog hope you like it.

The morning was bright and unutterably dazzling. David was woken by a knock on the door. Another employee, explaining:

'Mistah Kellerman want you to join him on the terrace.'

David glanced across. He must have fallen asleep again, and the exhausted sleep had been profound: they hadn't noticed the sun rising behind the flimsy curtains.

He tried not to think about the nightmare as they showered.

But Amy sensed something.

'Are you OK?'

'Yes. Yes of course…Thank God we made it.'

She looked at him.

'Let's go and find Eloise.'

They changed into clean clothes, sourced from a wardrobe, then they exited into the corridor. Immediately the assistant appeared, and guided them out onto a sunlit terrace, overlooking the sea.

The wind had dropped. The view was austere but pristine: an entirely empty beach, a couple of small rocky islands in the bay. The barking of distant seals. South and north stretched rocky wilderness, echoing coves and cliffs. Only the hulking metal shape of a diamond mine interrupted the abject desolation, far in the distance.

A table was set up on the terrace. Angus was there, drinking coffee. Kellerman was beside him, dressed in a cream linen suit, and a discreet silk tie.

And Eloise was sitting across the table.

Amy ran over, and hugged the young Cagot girl.

Nathan gestured in David's direction.

'Please sit.'

They sat. They talked animatedly with Eloise. She seemed relaxed, even happy. Or at least, not afraid.

Someone served a basket of pastries, and more fresh coffee, freshly squeezed juice, and cold meats and bread. The luxury was sumptuous and startling: like they had just checked into a surprisingly good hotel in Hell.

David and Amy both fell upon the food: instantly realizing how hungry they were. But then David stopped, and paused, and shuddered — and slid the glistening pink ham off his plate back onto the serving dish. He chose more fruit and bread. Not meat. He didn't want meat.

Kellerman watched them, sipping his coffee from a china cup. Silent and aloof. His slender cellphone resting on the table. David had never seen such an anorexic cellphone.

Angus spoke first: 'Guys. We're safe here for the moment. I've been talking with Nathan. They won't dare to come into the Sperrgebiet. Not past the guards.'

'Are you sure?'

Angus flashed a glance at Nathan. Who nodded, rather casually; he was checking something on his phone.

Angus turned back.

'So we can relax. For a day or two.'

David nearly laughed, with open and outright contempt, at the word relax.

Relax?

The image of Alphonse was cut into his thoughts, tattooed on his neocortex. A man burnt to cinders, screaming his death agony: Miguel inhaling the scent of the meat. The Cannibalistic Cagot…

He suppressed his shudder and finished breakfast. Bread and fruit and cheese. No meat. They talked about the penguins and the seals on the islands offshore. Eloise said she had found a sandrose on the beach the previous day, a beautiful sandrose.

'And there are agates too!'

Her enthusiasm was touching, and teenage, and winning, but David couldn't cope. It was all too much. He just couldn't make small talk. Just couldn't. He pushed back his chair, and stretched and apologized — he needed to be alone. Amy looked his way and he tried to smile and failed, but he didn't say anything. He didn't want to talk about anything.

David walked across the terrace, down some concrete steps onto the empty beach. A big factory ship was way offshore, beyond the islands. The sands were grey and shining in the hot sun. The coastline, as far as he could see, was lunar in its sterility. The coastline of the Forbidden Zone. Last refuge of the Cagots.

'Hey?'

He swivelled. It was Angus, joining him.

'David. You OK?'

A brief and piercing pause.

'I'm fine.'

The Scotsman's answering smile was sad, and sceptical. He said nothing. David could bear it no longer. He had to confess; he needed to confess.

'Angus…do you think it is possible…' He had to force the words out of himself. 'That I am a Cagot? Of Cagot decent, at least. I've been thinking about my grandfather. His guilt and shame. The only thing that makes sense is…that he was a Cagot too. Maybe he found out at Gurs, like Jose Garovillo.'

The scientist tilted his head, his pale white face even paler in the harsh Sperrgebiet sun.

'I had wondered if you would reach that conclusion.'

'So? What do you think?'

'To my mind, you do not present any of the obvious Cagot syndromes, but you do have, maybe, the colouration.'

'S'what I thought. Jesus.'

'It doesn't mean you will go mad. Not definitely. You may be fine, like Eloise. And then again you may not be.'

'Christ.'

'The only way we can know for sure is genetic testing. If you want. If you want I can do that here, in the labs. Do you really want to know?'

The truth was close, yet utterly unbearable. Like an HIV test, but infinitely worse. David stared out to sea. A smaller boat was floating there, closer than the great factory boat. Maybe a skiff, belonging to local fishermen.

David exhaled.

'I don't know, Angus. It's…so fucking difficult. I'm frightened, if I'm honest. I don't want to know that…I am like Miguel. How could I tolerate knowing that?'

'Of course.'

The two men kicked stones, and walked further down the beach, talking quietly. Angus was in pensive, discursive mood: speaking of the Serpent Seed, the Biblical tales of separate races of men. Then the scientist stopped, and stared at the virulent blue sea, the little islands offshore; he was speaking of earlier forms of hominid, Homo antecessor, Homo habilis, and then Homo floresiensis, a dwarf-like relative of man.

'You know they may have lived into recorded history,' Angus surveyed the rocky islets. 'How creepy is that? Lost on the islands of Indonesia: an elf, a hobbit, a goblin…'

David barely listened. Silent and brooding.

Angus pointed out to the waters.

'Sea nettles.'

A few metres out, the coastal seawater was patched and dotted with dozens of diaphanous scarlet jellyfish, some of them a metre across, their fronds and tentacles pulsing organically.