Carla Banks - The Forest of Souls

Helen worked in one of the small cubicles on the other side of the building. All the research assistants were based down there–one of them might know where she was. Faith went along the corridor, her progress snagging on people who wanted to talk to her, either to set up meetings or to lobby her support for various projects that were being discussed that afternoon. She fielded these as diplomatically as she could, and asked if anyone had seen Helen, but no one had.

Helen’s cubicle was empty. The desk was tidy, the computer shut down. There was no coat on the hook, no bag under the desk. A photograph on the side of the computer made a splash of colour. Faith looked at it. It showed Helen, her eyes screwed up against the light, with her arms round her two children, Hannah, small and dark-haired like her mother, and the taller, more solemn Finn.

There was a pile of books on the desk–presumably in preparation for the meeting. Faith glanced through them; they were all standard texts about the role of women in National Socialism, except for one. The Memorial Book of Mir . Mir?

But no Helen. She checked the time. It was well after nine. She tried calling Helen’s home number but there was no reply. Then she tried Helen’s mobile. It was engaged. Faith let out a breath of frustration. She scribbled a note on a yellow post-it and stuck it on the monitor, then went back downstairs to the secretary’s office. She wanted to check the teaching schedules.

Trish Parry, Antoni Yevanov’s secretary, glanced up when Faith came through her door. ‘Can I help you?’ Her voice was cool. She had been unfriendly and obstructive from the day Faith arrived. Faith assumed it was to do with the fact that she had been given the job, rather than the internal candidate, but Helen had offered an alternative explanation. ‘She’s okay with the men. It’s the women she doesn’t like. She thinks they’re rivals for Yevanov’s affections.’

‘You mean she and Yevanov…?’ It seemed unlikely to Faith, though Trish was certainly attractive in a neat, English rose sort of way.

Helen grinned. ‘In Trish’s dreams,’ she said.

‘Have you seen Helen Kovacs?’ she said to Trish now.

Trish barely looked up. ‘Not this morning. She said she might not be in. Something about an appointment.’

‘Has she phoned?’ It wasn’t like Helen to leave people in the lurch.

Trish shrugged. ‘She mentioned it yesterday afternoon. Before she left. Early.’

Faith couldn’t understand why Helen hadn’t contacted her, unless…maybe she’d been relying on Trish, and Trish hadn’t bothered to pass the message on. ‘Did she ask you to let me know?’

‘Caroline deals with things like that, not me,’ Trish said coolly.

Faith didn’t say anything. Technically, Trish was in the right. There was a procedure for reporting absences. She made a mental note to warn Helen not to give Trish ammunition, and looked at her watch. She might as well start work on the article. If she left at ten thirty, she should get to Grandpapa’s by eleven, just about.

‘Let me know if Helen phones,’ she said. ‘I’ll be in my room.’

‘Just a minute.’ Trish picked up the phone and keyed in a number. ‘Professor Yevanov, I’ve got Faith Lange here.’ She listened, then said, ‘She isn’t in. Again.’ Another pause. ‘Are you sure? Faith can give me the–’ Her eyes narrowed slightly as they moved to Faith. ‘Yes. I’ll tell her.’ She put the phone down abruptly. ‘He wants to see you,’ she said.

‘Now?’ Faith was surprised. Since her arrival, Yevanov had been devoting his time to his ongoing commitments in Europe, and was rarely available. Faith’s contact with him had been minimal.

‘Of course not. He can see you this afternoon at one.’

Faith raised her eyebrows slightly at Trish’s tone. ‘One o’clock then.’

As she headed back to her room, she tried Helen’s mobile again, but this time it was switched off.

The 999 call came in at 8.45 a.m. The operator listened to the crackling line, and repeated her message. ‘Emergency. Which service?’ There was no response, just the hiss that told her the line was open. The call was coming through on a cell phone–probably stuffed in someone’s bag or pocket without the keypad locked. She wished the people who did this knew about the time and the money it cost when…

But now she could hear something. A hitching, gasping sound as though someone was out of breath after running, or…frightened, the panicky sound of someone who couldn’t get their breath but was trying not to be heard. ‘Emergency,’ she said again. She kept her voice calm and level. ‘Can you tell me where you are? I need to know where you are.’

The gasping breath again, then a voice tense with strain. ‘I–’ There was a clatter as though the phone had been dropped.

The line cut out.

Jake Denbigh came out of the shower drying his hair. He wrapped the towel round his waist and headed for the kitchen area, checking the fax as he passed it.

He switched on the coffee machine and put a couple of oranges through the juicer. His head was aching. He’d been up late the night before–Cass had dropped in. They’d shared a bottle of wine, then opened another, and later she’d experimented with the girder that ran up through the centre of the flat–a warehouse conversion on the river–trying out its potential for pole dancing. Evenings with Cass tended to be strenuous.

He turned on the radio, listening with half an ear as he poured out cereal and pressed the button on the espresso, letting an inch of rich, dark coffee trickle into the cup. The news was typical for the times–trouble in the Middle East, renewed terrorist activity–Jake sometimes thought that if the human race had an overwhelming talent, it was the capacity to make an already difficult life even harder, often in the name of some uncertain glory to come. Jake had no problems with the idea of an afterlife–he thought that a universe that contained Jake Denbigh was a better place than a universe that didn’t, but in the meantime, he planned to enjoy the life that he had.

He flicked the switch on the radio to get the local news. A Manchester United story was running as lead, followed by an armed robbery the night before. Nothing that interested him. He took the papers out of the fax and flicked through them–notification that his visa for Belarus was through and his passport was in the post. That was a relief. He’d been worried his plans were going to be held up by the bureaucracy of the last Stalinist state. The rest weren’t urgent–he put them in his in-tray for later. He switched on his computer, and got out his tape recorder and mike. He checked the batteries, spares, tape supply and recording levels. He had an interview later that morning.

Jake made his living as a writer and journalist. He’d lived in Manchester for two years now, brought there by a regular slot on a radio programme that was produced in the city, and a weekly column with the local paper, a current affairs piece with a European slant. These days, his interests were shifting more and more towards writing. Broadcasting was good–it got his name out there and he enjoyed it–but it was sound-bite analysis and he was finding its black-and-white simplicity frustrating. He’d published a book on the Rwandan genocides a year ago, looking at the historical impetus behind the horror. It had done well, and now he was seriously researching a second book, this one focusing on the Nazi occupation of Eastern Europe.

He checked his e-mail. There was a message from Cass–she must have sent it when she got back the night before. He frowned. She’d taken a risk sending that from home. Cass lived with someone, and the last thing Jake wanted was for that relationship to go up in smoke for what was, after all, just a casual fling for both of them.