In the Flesh (12 page)

  'Yes.'

  'Mr Garvey is waiting for you inside.'

 'Who are you?'

  'Chandaman,' the man replied. 'Go right in.'

  There was a light at the far end of the corridor. Jerry pushed open the glass-paneled vestibule doors and walked down towards it.

  Behind him, he heard the front door snap closed, and then the echoing tread of Garvey's lieutenant.

  Garvey was talking with another man, shorter than Chandaman, who was holding a sizeable torch. When the pair heard Jerry approach they looked his way; their conversation abruptly ceased. Garvey offered no welcoming comment or hand, but merely said: 'About time.'

  'The rain...' Jerry began, then thought better of offering a self-evident explanation.

  'You'll catch your death,' the man with the torch said. Jerry immediately recognized the dulcet tones of:

'Fryer.'

  'The same,' the man returned.

'Pleased to meet you.'

  They shook hands, and as they did so Jerry caught sight of Garvey, who was staring at him as though in search of a second head. The man didn't say anything for what seemed like half a minute, but simply studied the growing discomfort on Jerry's face.

  'I'm not a stupid man,' Garvey said, eventually.

  The statement, coming out of nowhere, begged response.

  'I don't even believe you're the main man in all of this,' Garvey went on. 'I'm prepared to be charitable.'

  'What's this about?'

  'Charitable -' Garvey repeated, '-. because I think you're out of your depth. Isn't that tight?'

  Jerry just frowned.

  'I think that's tight,' Fryer replied.

  'I don't think you understand how much trouble you're in even now, do you?' Garvey said.

  Jerry was suddenly uncomfortably aware of Chandaman standing behind him, and of his own utter vulnerability.

  'But I don't think ignorance should ever be bliss,' Garvey was saying. 'I mean, even if you don't understand, that doesn't make you exempt, does it?'

  'I haven't a clue what you're talking about,' Jerry protested mildly. Garvey's face, by the light of the torch, was drawn and pale; he looked in need of a holiday.

 'This place,' Garvey returned. 'I'm talking about this place. The women you put in here ... for my benefit. What's it all about, Coloqhoun? That's all I want to know. What's it all about?'

  Jerry shrugged lightly. Each word Garvey uttered merely perplexed him more; but the man had already told him ignorance would not be considered a legitimate excuse. Perhaps a question was the wisest reply.

  'You saw women here?' he said.

  Whores, more like,' Garvey responded. His breath smelt of last week's cigar ash. 'Who are you working for, Coloqhoun?'

'For myself. The deal I offered-'

  'Forget your fucking deal,' Garvey said. 'I'm not interested in deals.'

  'I see,' Jerry replied. 'Then I don't see any point in this conversation.' He took a half-step away from

Garvey, but the man's arm shot out and caught hold of his rain-sodden coat.

  'I didn't tell you to go,' Garvey said.

  'I've got business

  'Then it'll have to wait,' the other replied, scarcely relaxing his grip. Jerry knew that if he tried to shrug off Garvey and make a dash for the front door he'd be stopped by Chandaman before he made three paces; if, on the other hand, he didn't try to escape -

  'I don't much like your sort,' Garvey said, removing his hand. 'Smart brats with an eye to the main chance. Think you're so damn clever, just because you've got a fancy accent and a silk tie. Let me tell you something -' He jabbed his finger at Jerry's throat, '- I don't give a shit about you. I just want to know who you work for. Understand?'

  'I already told you-'

  'Who do you work for?' Garvey insisted, punctuating each word with a fresh jab. 'Or you're going to feel very sick.'

  'For Christ's sake - I'm not working for anybody. And I don't know anything about any women.'

  'Don't make it worse than it already is,' Fryer advised, with feigned concern.

  'I'm telling the truth.'

  'I think the man wants to be hurt,' Fryer said. Chandaman gave a joyless laugh. 'Is that what you want?'

  'Just name some names,' Garvey said. 'Or we're going to break your legs.' The threat, unequivocal as it was, did nothing for Jerry's clarity of mind. He could think of no way out of this but to continue to insist upon his innocence. If he named some fictitious overlord the lie would be uncovered in moments, and the consequences could only be worse for the attempted deception.

  'Check my credentials,' he pleaded. 'You've got the resources. Dig around. I'm not a company man, Garvey; I never have been.'

  Garvey's eye left Jerry's face for a moment and moved to his shoulder. Jerry grasped the significance of the sign a heartbeat too late to prepare himself for the blow to his kidneys from the man at his back. He pitched forward, but before he could collide with Garvey, Chandaman had snatched at his collar and was throwing him against the wall. He doubled up, the pain blinding him to all other thoughts. Vaguely, he heard Garvey asking him again who his boss was. He shook his head. His skull was full of ball-bearings; they rattled between his ears.

  'Jesus... Jesus...' he said, groping for some word of defence to keep another beating at bay, but he was hauled upright before any presented itself. The torch-beam was turned on him. He was ashamed of the tears that were rolling down his cheeks.

 'Names,' said Garvey.

  The ball-bearings rattled on.

  'Again,' said Garvey, and Chandaman was moving in to give his fists further exercise. Garvey called him off as Jerry came close to passing out. The leather face withdrew.

  'Stand up when I'm talking to you,' Garvey said.

  Jerry attempted to oblige, but his body was less than willing to comply. It trembled, it felt fit to die.

  'Stand up,' Fryer reiterated, moving between Jerry and his tormentor to prod the point home. Now, in close proximity, Jerry smelt that acidic scent Carole had caught on the stairs: it was Fryer's cologne.

  'Stand up!' the man insisted.

  Jerry raised a feeble hand to shield his face from the blinding beam. He could not see any of the trio's faces, but he was dimly aware that Fryer was blocking Chandaman's access to him. To Jerry's right, Garvey struck a match, and applied the flame to a cigar. A moment presented itself: Garvey occupied, the thug stymied. Jerry took it.

  Ducking down beneath the torch-beam he broke from his place against the wall, contriving to knock the torch from Fryer's hand as he did so. The light-source clattered across the tiles and went out.

  In the sudden darkness, Jerry made a stumbling bid for freedom. Behind him, he heard Garvey curse; heard Chandaman and Fryer collide as they scrabbled for the fallen torch. He began to edge his way along the wall to the end of the corridor. There was evidently no safe route past his tormentors to the front door; his only hope lay in losing himself in the networks of corridors that lay ahead.

  He reached a corner, and made a right, vaguely remembering that this led him off the main thoroughfares and into the service corridors. The beating that he'd taken, though interrupted before it could incapacitate, had rendered him breathless and bruised. He felt every step he took as a sharp pain in his lower abdomen and back. When he slipped on the slimy tiles, the impact almost made him cry out.

  At his back, Garvey was shouting again. The torch had been located. Its light bounced down the labyrinth to find him. Jerry hurried on, glad of the murky illumination, but not of its source. They would follow, and quickly. If, as Carole had said, the place was a simple spiral, the corridors describing a relentless loop with no way out of the configuration, he was lost. But he was committed. Head giddied by the mounting heat, he moved on, praying to find a fire-exit that would give him passage out of this trap.

  'He went this way,' Fryer said. 'He must have done.'

  Garvey nodded; it was indeed the likeliest route for Coloqhoun to have taken. Away from the light and into the labyrinth.

  'Shall we go after him?' Chandaman said. The man was fairly salivating to finish the beating he'd started.

'He can't have got far.'

  'No,' said Garvey. Nothing, not even the promise of the knighthood, would have induced him to follow.

  Fryer had already advanced down the passageway a few yards, shining the torch-beam on the glistening walls.

  'It's warm,' he said.

 Garvey knew all too well how warm it was. Such heat wasn't natural, not for England. This was a temperate isle; that was why he had never set foot off it. The sweltering heat of other continents bred grotesqueries he wanted no sight of.

  'What do we do?' Chandaman demanded. 'Wait for him to come out?'

  Garvey pondered this. The smell from the corridor was beginning to distress him. His innards were churning, his skin was crawling. Instinctively, he put his hand to his groin. His manhood had shrunk in trepidation.

  'No,' he said suddenly.

  'No?'

  We're not waiting.'

  'He can't stay in there forever.'

  'I said no!' He hadn't anticipated how profoundly the sweat of the place would upset him. Irritating as it was to let Coloqhoun slip away like this, he knew that if he stayed here much longer he risked losing his self-control.

  'You two can wait for him at his flat,' he told Chandaman. 'He'll have to come home sooner or later.'

  'Damn shame,' Fryer muttered as he emerged from the passageway. 'I like a chase.'

  Perhaps they weren't following. It was several minutes now since Jerry had heard the voices behind him. His heart had stopped its furious pumping. Now, with the adrenalin no longer giving speed to his heels, and distracting his muscles from their bruising, his pace slowed to a crawl. His body protested at even that.

  When the agonies of taking another step became too much he slid down the wall and sat slumped across the passageway. His rain-drenched clothes clung to his body and about his throat; he felt both chilled and suffocated by them. He pulled at the knot of his tie, and then unbuttoned his waistcoat and his shirt. The air in the labyrinth was warm on his skin. Its touch was welcome.

  He closed his eyes and made a studied attempt to mesmerise himself out of this pain. What was feeling but a trick of the nerve-endings?; there were techniques for dislocating the mind from the body, and leaving agonies behind. But no sooner had his lids closed than he heard muted sounds somewhere nearby. Footsteps; the lull of voices. It wasn't Garvey and his associates: the voices were female. Jerry raised his leaden head and opened his eyes. Either he had become used to the darkness in his few moments of meditation or else a light had crept into the passageway; it was surely the latter.

  He got to his feet. His jacket was dead weight, and he sloughed it off, leaving it to lie where he'd been squatting. Then he started in the direction of the light. The heat seemed to have risen considerably in the last few minutes: it gave him mild hallucinations. The walls seemed to have forsaken verticality, the air to have traded transparency for a shimmering aurora.

  He turned a corner. The light brightened. Another corner, and he was delivered into a small tiled chamber, the heat of which took his breath away. He gasped like a stranded fish, and peered across the chamber - the air thickening with every pulse-beat - at the door on the far side. The yellowish light through it was brighter still, but he could not summon the will to follow it a yard further; the heat here had defeated him. Sensing that he was within an ace of unconsciousness, he put his hand out to support

himself, but his palm slid on the slick tiles, and he fell, landing on his side. He could not prevent a shout spilling from him.

  Groaning his misery, be tucked his legs up close to his body, and lay where he'd fallen. If Garvey had heard his yell, and sent his lieutenants in pursuit, then so be it. He was past caring.

  The sound of movement reached him from across the chamber. Raising his head an inch from the floor he opened his eyes to a slit. A naked girl had appeared in the doorway opposite, or so his reeling senses informed him. Her skin shone as if oiled; here and there, on her breasts and thighs, were smudges of what might have been old blood. Not her blood, however. There was no wound to spoil her gleaming body.

  The girl had begun to laugh at him, a light, easy laugh that made him feel foolish. Its musicality entranced him however, and he made an effort to get a better look at her. She had started to move across the chamber towards him, still laughing; and now he saw that there were others behind her. These were the women Garvey had babbled about; this the trap he had accused Jerry of setting.