The Doll’s House (34 page)

‘I'm ready,' Jan said. ‘I packed a holdall, I left everything else.'

‘Good man,' Oakham grinned reassuringly at him, but there was no smile in his eyes. ‘We can treat ourselves when we get there. Money no object. I've booked us on the ten o'clock flight to Geneva.' He checked his watch. ‘It's pushing it, but if we leave in the next fifteen minutes, we should get there in good time. You wait here. I've got something to do before I go.'

‘Your lady?' Jan asked him.

‘Yes.'

‘She'll be questioned,' he pointed out. ‘What are you going to say?'

‘I'm not,' Harry answered. He had a note in his hand. A sealed envelope. ‘I'm going to leave this for her. Here,' he picked up the little straw doll. ‘Stick this in a bag for me will you. I'll take it with me. I won't be long.'

Jan saw the change of expression; the glimpse of pain was very brief. But very real. He loves her, Jan thought. The first woman to break Judith's spell. He said, ‘Sorry, Harry.'

‘Me too, but that's life,' Oakham answered. He said again, ‘I won't be long.' He hurried down the stairs to the main hall.

It was warm and well lit, a huge arrangement of autumn foliage made a splash of vivid colour by the entrance. For a moment he paused, feeling a pang of regret as he saw his favourite, Jane, back on duty for the evening shift, smiling up at him as he approached. He was going to miss it all …

She was a nice kid; he wished her well for the future. He wondered what she'd think when the truth came out. He closed his mind to that. ‘Jane,' he said and made his voice cheerful. ‘Take this note up to Mrs Bennet will you?'

She took the note from him. ‘Yes of course, Mr Oakham.' Then she frowned slightly. ‘But I haven't seen her come back,' she said.

‘Back from where?' Harry had turned to go; he stopped and came back to her. They were due to meet in the bar. It was dark outside. Where had she gone?

‘She went to the car park. Oh … quite a while ago. Mr Zarubin told us she'd left her lights on and I rang up to let her know. It must be nearly an hour now. I haven't seen her come in.'

Harry's old boss used to say there were people born with an instinct for danger. It was the best life insurance he knew. And Harry, a young protégé in those days, was one of the lucky ones. Zarubin. Rosa had gone to the car park because of his message nearly an hour ago and not come back. ‘I'd better go and see; maybe she's trying to start the car.'

Jane watched him swing round and was surprised how quickly he crossed to the door and flew down the steps. She looked at the envelope addressed to Mrs Bennet. It was a real love affair between those two. She would have given a month's salary to know what was in that note.

12

She couldn't move. The small sallow man had strapped her in, frowning, the leather tight over her arms and across her chest. He had sour breath that sickened her as he leaned over her. The Russian stood with his back to the wall. He was leaning against it, smoking.

They'd brought her upstairs into this nightmare chamber and bound her into the dentist's chair. She'd begun to struggle wildly, and the small man had hit her across the face so hard that her senses blurred for a few moments, and her resistance ceased. Tears ran down her cheeks from the pain of the blow, and a trickle of blood joined them from her nostrils.

When it was done, the small man stepped back. He regarded her in complete silence for some time. A long, long time, it seemed to Rosa. When he spoke she jerked in nervous terror.

‘You are spying on us,' he said. ‘Who are you working for?' Interrogation hadn't been touched on in any depth during her training. She would never be involved in high-risk work where it was likely to occur. She was a civilized spy, listening, evaluating, passing information for analysis. Nothing frightening or dangerous. Eyes and ears open on the diplomatic circuit. Nothing like the assignment James Parker had given her.

She was so terrified she couldn't even think beyond a whispered denial. ‘I'm not … Let me go … Oh, please …' The words died away, mocking her in the futility of their appeal.

‘My friend found the camera,' Hermann Rilke spoke in his rasping high-pitched voice. ‘I know you took pictures of people who came to the hotel. I want you to tell me why, and who sent you here.'

She couldn't answer. She tried to shake her head and speak but nothing came.

‘You're wasting time,' Zarubin said. He could see that Rilke was enjoying the woman's distress. Sadism didn't arouse him. It didn't disgust him either. Indulging in it at the expense of getting information did.

‘Get on with it,' he snapped. ‘She'll break very quickly. Stop playing with her.' He turned and went to the door.

Rilke hesitated. He calmed his excitement. Zarubin was right. The woman wasn't capable of long resistance. There was no point in prolonging the process.

He spoke to Rosa. ‘Very well. We're going to leave you. When I come back, I think you'll be ready to answer.' He walked to the door. Zarubin left first and he followed.

Rosa was alone. Then the room dissolved into blackness and the blackness began to spin.

Harry Oakham knew where Rosa parked her car. The area was quite full, with guests staying and restaurant bookings for dinner.

He found the BMW, with an empty space beside it. No light, no sign of Rosa. Nothing. He moved and then stood very still. He had stepped on something. Something that crunched under his foot. He bent down, flicked his lighter.

The pearls were scattered on the ground. The broken rope lay like a silvery snake in the lighter flame. Rosa's pearls. He'd seen her wear them so often, and admired them. He remembered saying that pearls suited her skin, and then reached up to unfasten them and kiss her throat.

Zarubin had sent a false message and brought her down to the deserted car park. Her necklace had broken. A struggle … He went cold and rigid at what came into his mind.

Rosa, and the Russian coming on her in the darkness.

Zarubin's warning shouted in his head. ‘She's hostile … She lied about the Adventure Trail …'

He'd seized her, Oakham was certain of it in those few seconds.

He didn't question, he didn't think beyond the surge of horror that swept up and over him in the chilly darkness.

Rosa … He was running, threading his way through the cars, out of the gravel on to the tarmac of the drive. He ran as he hadn't run since he left Bremen, with the Vopo patrol on his heels in 1982.

He ran down between the avenue of handsome beech trees, picked out by a car's headlights coming up to the hotel, swerving on to the grass to avoid it, and then back, pounding on the hard surface towards Croft Lodge.

Zarubin had taken her to Rilke.

Jan was worrying about the time. Fifteen minutes, Harry had said. Even then, they were cutting it fine to get to the airport and check in.

He tried to control his agitation. Harry knew what he was doing. Perhaps he'd met the woman, they must be together while he said goodbye … What a pity he had to lose her – he deserved to be happy, to put the past to rest with the dead girl in the churchyard at Dedham.

He sat down on the bed. The two holdalls were zipped up and ready. Harry was a fast driver, too fast for Jan's comfort, but even he wouldn't have a chance of getting to Heathrow unless he came back in the next few minutes.

Jan went to the tray in the sitting room and poured a drink. His nerves were playing up; his pulse rate was too fast, his breathing short.

Panic lurked in the corner of his mind, threatening to take over. He grabbed the phone and dialled reception. ‘Put me through to Mrs Bennet,' he said.

What was Harry doing? Was he crazy, wasting time, losing the flight … He began to sweat and shake as he waited.

‘I'm sorry, Mr Pollock, but there's no reply. She hasn't been in her room since about six o'clock. Mr Oakham was asking after her and I think he went to the car park to see if she was having trouble with her car.'

‘Thanks,' Jan put the phone down. Something was wrong. He had never possessed Harry's magic gift for sensing danger before it materialized, but he had learned to anticipate it even if it never happened. That was part of the legacy of Cracow Special Unit.

At any hour, or any moment of the day or night, they came for you and it started all over again. You lived with fear.

Harry hadn't come. Ten o'clock was the last direct flight. He sat with the empty glass in his hand and gave way to a numb resignation. He couldn't run without Harry. He didn't even want to.

The blackness spun into a vortex. A cry that didn't sound human was torn from Rosa, without her knowing that she screamed. Long and agonizingly, as her body whirled against the force of gravity and her senses dissolved in panic, she screamed and screamed in the empty space till she lost consciousness.

Harry saw the lights on in the windows. He didn't try the front door. He flung himself at it, and burst the lock. He saw Zarubin come to the landing above him, and he heard the thin screaming like a sea bird's cry in the distance.

‘Stay where you are,' the Russian said. He stood square blocking the way. Harry gathered himself. ‘She's a spy,' Zarubin shouted at him. ‘I found this in her room!' He threw something and instinctively Harry caught it. ‘It's a camera … She was photographing everything. Don't make a bigger fool of yourself, Oakham. Leave it to Rilke!'

Harry looked down at the little oblong. He'd seen its like often before. He threw it aside. ‘I'm coming up,' he said. ‘Try and stop me and I'll kill you.' He moved slowly now, balancing himself, ready for Zarubin to move. He had the advantage of Oakham because he was on the landing.

Zarubin slid his hand into his pocket and produced the Swiss Army knife. The blade gleamed in the overhead light. He heard Oakham laugh; it was a savage chuckle.

‘That little toy doesn't frighten me. You're a desk man. Chess is your game. You know what mine is.' He was within two steps of Zarubin.

He was watching his eyes. They always signalled a move before the body acted. The sound of the cry was louder. It rose and then died suddenly. Zarubin held the knife in his right hand. He was watching Oakham's eyes.

He was fit and years younger and he had the advantage of level ground. But if he missed the first blow, he'd never live to strike a second one. He hadn't come there to die. He lowered the knife and stepped aside.

‘Please yourself if you want to interfere,' he said. He shrugged in contempt. ‘She's a plant,' he said. Oakham came level with him. ‘They were right to retire you. You've gone soft in your old age.'

He never saw the blow. It caught him in the groin with all Oakham's weight behind it. He gasped and jack-knifed in agony, and as he bent double clutching his genitals, Harry Oakham smashed two hands down on his neck and snapped it at the base where the vertebrae ran into the spinal column. He died instantly and fell forward, his long body rolling down the stairs, the legs entangling in the banisters so that he didn't fall to the bottom. He lay caught up like a dead spider.

Rilke had stopped the chair. She'd passed out. It was time to go in and revive her. He heard the thud and bump as Zarubin crashed down the stairs and he called out sharply.

‘Vassily? What are you doing?' He came down to look and met Harry Oakham face to face.

‘He's dying,' Harry said softly. Rilke started back. He gasped and backed away. ‘Open that door, you little bastard.' The voice was quiet, but there was a tremor in it. He looked crazy, Rilke thought, the eyes were bloodshot, mad. Rilke was not a coward but he had no chance of survival if Oakham attacked him. He kept his nerve and answered calmly.

‘Zarubin was right. She was sent here to spy on you. I haven't hurt her. She's in there. See for yourself.' He pressed a knob in the wall and there was a loud click in the silence. ‘It's unlocked,' he said.

Harry didn't move. ‘Open it,' he ordered. Rilke moved forward and pushed the door aside. It was pitch dark inside. ‘Light?' Harry came up very close to him. He said gently, ‘Turn the light on, Hermann. I don't like the dark.' There was another switch.

There was a harsh fluorescent light in the ceiling. For a second or two it flared fitfully and then came fully alight.

‘A spy,' Rilke's voice was close beside Oakham; he could smell the sweat off him and the acrid breath. ‘She lied to you and made a fool of you, Harry. They sent her down here to watch you. It was a very old trick. There she is, if you want her … She's only fainted. Why don't you question her yourself?'

All he had to do was get Oakham through the door. His hand was on the panel of buttons, resting on the one that controlled the light. The locking mechanism was below it. Below that, the button that would send the chair spinning.

Rilke waited, willing Oakham to move forward, to see her tied in the chair, collapsed like a rag doll. He'd go when he saw that. He wouldn't be able to help himself.

When the telephone rang, Jan sprang up so quickly that he knocked his empty glass off the table. He gasped out ‘Harry?' but it was the restaurant manager who spoke.

‘Sorry to disturb you, but is Mr Oakham with you?'

‘No,' Jan's lethargy lifted; the drink had worn off.

‘Have you any idea where he is? He reserved a table for himself and Mrs Bennet for eight o'clock. I've been keeping it for him, but I'd like to let it go if he's not coming. I tried his house and Mrs Bennet's room but there's no reply from either. Have they gone out, do you know?'

Before Jan could answer, he went on, ‘I do apologize for ringing, but I even tried Croft Lodge in case he was with Mr Brandt, but there was no-one at home.'

No-one at home
. Rilke wasn't there. Rilke was always there. He never left the house to go anywhere in the evenings.