Стивен Бут - Drowned Lives

In the darkness, I became very conscious that nature was still in control of most of the site. The reclaimed section was only a tiny portion of the expanse of flourishing birches and sycamores, and the dense undergrowth of brambles and bracken hadn’t been touched for nearly fifty years.

‘Yes, this will do fine,’ I said. ‘I hope you don’t have to wait long.’

‘Don’t worry about me,’ said Andrew with a grin, as he switched off his torch and slipped back into the shadows. Within a couple of seconds, I couldn’t see him at all.

I walked back to the gateway and got into my car. For several minutes I sat alone, watching the clock tick round, until I was startled by a sudden knock on the window. Laura’s pale face peered in at me.

I wound the window down to speak to her, but she hushed me and gestured at me to get out of the car. Common sense almost got the better of me then. Why should I trust her after all that had happened? But one glimpse of her face close to mine, and I’d weakened. I knew I would follow her, even if it was into more danger.

‘Are you alone?’ I asked.

‘Of course.’

‘This way then.’

‘Where are we going?’ she whispered.

‘We need to get away from the road.’

As we passed the lock and left the towpath to enter the wharf, she slipped on the mud, and I automatically put out an arm to support her. She leaned against me, but I pulled instinctively away.

‘You need to trust me, Chris. Please.’

‘Tell me why I should,’ I said.

‘We’re on the same side. You’ve got to trust someone some time.’

We were close to the spot where the skeleton had been found by the excavator. I could see the remains of the heap of lime, gleaming white in the darkness, reflecting the small amount of light from the night sky. My eyes were adjusting to the gloom, and I could see the vehicles crouching in their compound like giant insects.

Between us and the compound was a wide, dark expanse of earth and rubble, with the distorted shapes of foundations and fragments of wall here and there. To the left of us was the steep drop into the basin. But it was impossible in the dark to make out where the edge of the wharf ended and the void began. I led Laura forward a bit more until the remains of the bridge appeared, and then the edge of the warehouse ruins.

‘Right. This is fine. Now tell me. And make sure it’s the truth.’

‘This is crazy. What are we doing in this place?’

‘It’ll do for me,’ I said, the alcohol still carrying me through so far. ‘First of all, I want to know who killed Samuel.’

‘I need to explain properly—’ she began.

‘Just tell me!’

She pulled her hand away and hugged her arms miserably round her body. ‘I was there,’ she said. ‘When he was killed, I was there. I saw it.’

‘So you were the witness. The car park attendant told me there was someone.’

‘I saw what happened, but I didn’t know who was in the car. Not then.’

‘But you do now.’

‘Yes. And there’s proof.’

We were interrupted by a clumsy crashing in the undergrowth back near the gateway, on the other side of the lock. It was the sound of a heavy body floundering in the brambles and trampling dead wood underfoot.

‘I thought you said you’d come alone?’ I said angrily.

‘I did. I don’t know who that is.’

‘You’ve tricked me again.’

‘No!’ She listened, trying to peer into the darkness. ‘But, Chris — did you bring someone with you?’

‘Hello! Where are you?’ called a voice out of the darkness. A shiver ran up my back. It was the voice of Simon Monks.

‘It’s him.’

‘I don’t know what he’s doing here,’ said Laura unsteadily.

‘Liar!’

‘No!’

I scrambled away from the direction of the voice, abandoning Laura in the darkness before she could cling on to me and prevent my escape. I could hear Monks thrashing about, but he seemed to be going in the wrong direction. From the amount of noise and the breathless mutter of subdued voices, it sounded like he wasn’t alone either. There were at least two or three of them, and I was badly outnumbered.

I ran along the edge of the wharf towards the vehicle compound, painfully conscious that I was heading deeper into the derelict wharf and further away from the road and my only escape route. I peered anxiously into the shadows of the ruined buildings, but saw nothing that reassured me.

‘Andrew!’ I hissed. ‘Where are you?’

My urgent whisper was almost swallowed by the darkness, but he must have heard me.

‘Here.’

There was a strange tone to his voice. I looked around for him and saw his outline close to one of the giant six-tonne dumper trucks. The gate of the compound stood open, and it went through my mind that he was intending for us to escape in the dumper. For a moment, I had a mental picture of ploughing through Monks and his friends, crushing them under the huge wheels.

But my fantasy was very short-lived, as Andrew stepped towards me and I saw his face. I could see he had no intention of helping me to escape.

‘This is where it ends, Chris,’ he said. ‘You’ve done enough.’

And then he did something that turned my mind upside down in bewilderment. He raised his hand, covered his mouth, and coughed. It was a deep, racking cough, a sound I’d heard twice before. One of those times was at the scene of Samuel Longden’s death.

‘Andrew?’ I said again.

But he didn’t answer. He moved in close to my body, laying his hand flat on my chest and leaning his face towards mine as if to whisper some secret. I smelt his breath and saw his teeth gleam white for a moment before he gave a sudden jerk. Then the ground went from underneath me and the horizon disappeared as the world tilted.

Before I had time to realise what was happening, I’d tumbled off the crumbling edge of the wharf and hit the mud in the bottom of the basin, landing so hard on my back that the air was driven out of my lungs. With a great squelch, my shoulders and back disappeared three inches into stinking ooze.

The fall could have injured me badly, if it hadn’t been for the steady rain that had turned the ground into a quagmire. The mud sucked at my limbs and spilled over onto my face and chest as I lay there, dazed and winded.

I struggled to get my eyes open. When I lifted a hand to wipe my face, I found I was only transferring more mud. Through smeared lids, I gazed up at the edge of the wharf, where a tall silhouette stood against the sky. Though I couldn’t see his face, I could tell from his posture that he was listening, cocking an ear at the sound of Simon Monks across the basin.

As I floundered to get a purchase on the mud, spitting out gobbets of the foul-smelling stuff from my teeth, the figure disappeared. I redoubled my efforts to push myself upright. Illogically, I was still thinking that my priority was to get back on my feet and get away from Monks, although the crashing in the undergrowth was far away and the real danger was very close.

And then there was a throaty rumble as an engine burst into life, and I looked up again. I could only watch as the monstrous black shape of the excavator appeared, outlined against the stars. It was inching out of the compound and towards the edge of the basin, its jaws swivelling to dig viciously into a heap of spoil and debris until its bucket overflowed. It bucked and lifted its load, spinning on its tracks. I caught a brief glimpse of Andrew bent over the controls in the cab, like an animal crouched over its prey.

Still I scrabbled in the mud, sinking further into the mess every time I tried to move my feet. Panic was only making my predicament worse, and I was becoming exhausted.