Hennessy took the tumbler of salt water and, with a smile that was almost canine, threw it onto the new wound. Joker screamed and passed out.
Cole Howard was reading through the file on Carlos the Jackal when his phone rang. It was Kelly Armstrong.
“Hiya, Kelly, how’s LA?” he asked.
“Actually, Cole, I’m calling from Dulles Airport. The credit card was a dead end, so Jake Sheldon said I should give you a hand in Washington. That seems to be the focus of the investigation, right?” Howard closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair. He’d hoped that he’d seen the last of Kelly Armstrong for a while. At least until he’d wrapped up the investigation. “Hasn’t he spoken to you yet?” she asked.
“No, he hasn’t,” said Howard, unable to keep the bitterness out of his voice.
“Well, never mind,” said Kelly. “He filled me in on the investigation so far and agrees that I’d be of more use working with you. Could you arrange clearance for me at the White House? I should be there within the hour.”
“Okay,” said Howard. “You know that we’ve identified the people in the desert?”
“Sheldon’s already briefed me,” she said, with maddening cheerfulness. “Ilich Ramirez Sanchez and the IRA. It’s a strange combination. How’s the computer simulation going?”
“Slowly,” admitted Howard. “And now we know of the IRA involvement, we’re going to have to widen our search. I’ll explain when you get here.”
“I’m on my way,” she said brightly and hung up, leaving Howard with a dead phone pressed against his ear. Helen came up to his desk and handed him a handwritten note. While he was on the line, Jake Sheldon had phoned and he wanted Howard to return his call. Howard went over to the office coffee machine and poured himself a black coffee. What he wanted more than anything was a real drink.
Joker knew it was a dream, he knew that Mick Newmarch was dead and buried in the graveyard in Hereford, but that didn’t stop the horror of what he saw. He was handcuffed to a radiator, his wrists sore from pulling against them, his arms aching from the wrenching. He was throwing himself from side to side, trying to slip out his bleeding wrists, trying to pull the hot pipe away from the wall, trying anything so that he could help Newmarch and stop the gut-wrenching screams. He kept trying to avert his eyes from what was happening in the centre of the room but the cries and the screams kept pulling him back.
His head slowly turned as if it was being forced around against his will. The lights were on in the farmhouse kitchen, the drapes drawn and shutters closed. Mick Newmarch was sprawled naked on a heavy oak table, his wrists shackled to the table legs at one end, his feet bound with hemp ropes at the other. His white skin was flecked with blood. Newmarch’s head was thrashing from side to side and he kept trying to raise his shoulders off the table like a wrestler resisting being held down for the count. Standing over him, wearing a bloodstained apron like some demented butcher, was Mary Hennessy, her blonde hair tied back with a piece of black ribbon. That was wrong, Joker knew, her hair back then wasn’t blonde, she was a brunette.
Hennessy had a pitcher in her hands and she poured water over Newmarch’s face as he struggled. The water slopped off the table, carrying with it the blood from his wounds, and they pooled together on the tiled floor in pink rivers. The procedure had been the same for more than four hours. The verbal threats, the torture, the wounding, and then, once her victim had slid into unconsciousness, the water. “Come on Sass-man, look at your friend,” she said to Joker. “Look at him. You’re next.”
She carried the empty jug back to the sink and refilled it from the cold tap. On the table, Newmarch sobbed like a baby, the cries wracking his whole body like spasms. Joker wanted to help with all his heart, but there was nothing he could do. After the first three hours she hadn’t been interrogating Newmarch: there had been no need for that because he’d told her everything. The two SAS men had been undercover, working as labourers on a farm close to the border during the day and hanging around the local pubs at night, trying to pick up any intelligence which would help the Army in its fight against the IRA. Newmarch had slipped up, his room had been searched and he’d been caught with a Smith amp; Wesson automatic under his mattress. They’d come for them at night, put black hoods over their heads and thrown them in the back of a Land-Rover. When the hoods had been removed they’d found themselves handcuffed in the farmhouse with Mary Hennessy.
She’d started on Newmarch first, for no other reason than that he’d sworn at her when she asked them for their names and rank. She’d told him in minute detail what she planned to do, and her words had chilled Joker. Not what she’d said, but the way she’d said it, as if she was relishing the experience. She’d used the bolt-cutters first, removing Newmarch’s fingers one at a time, waiting between amputations for him to regain consciousness and using a poker heated on the farmhouse range to cauterise the wounds so that he wouldn’t die from loss of blood. Newmarch had told her everything as he begged her to stop. He told her what he and Joker were doing, where they were based, previous operations they’d worked on, and the names of six other SAS men who were working undercover in the border country.
Hennessy took a large, shiny knife and held it up so that Joker could see it. “Watch, Sass-man,” she said. She held his gaze almost hypnotically, and try as he might he couldn’t look away. She reached down to Newmarch’s groin and with her left hand she cupped the man’s scrotum like a greengrocer weighing plums. She edged the blade under the testicles, keeping it horizontal. Newmarch screamed, a blood-chilling yell that echoed around the white-walled kitchen, and then slowly, almost sensually, Hennessy sliced the knife upwards, severing the scrotum. Newmarch passed out, but the silence was worse than the screaming. Joker had never seen so much blood, it poured like a waterfall over the table and splashed onto the tiles. Hennessy walked over to Joker, the ruptured tissue in her hand, and slapped him across his face, left then right. That was wrong, thought Joker, she hadn’t slapped him until later, until he was shackled to the table. He knew that he was dreaming, but the slaps kept coming, burning his cheeks. It was only a nightmare, one he’d had many times before, but the pain in his wrists was excruciating.
Slap, slap, slap. Joker opened his eyes. It was no dream, he was still hanging from the pipe and Mary Hennessy, blonde and three years older than when she’d tortured and killed Mick Newmarch, stood before him. “Wake up, Cramer,” she said. She drew back her hand and slapped him again. He blinked and felt tears sting his eyes. “Are you crying, Sass-man?” she asked.
Joker shook his head. “No,” he said. The inside of his mouth felt red raw as if the lining had been stripped away.
“How did you know Bailey was here?” she asked.
“Followed him,” said Joker. He had to keep her talking, he knew, because when he stopped talking she’d hurt him again. It was almost a game. If he kept silent, she’d hurt him. If he told her everything, she’d kill him. His only chance of survival was to extend the middle period as long as possible.
Hennessy smiled and ran her finger down the scar on his stomach. “From where?” she asked.
Joker coughed and tasted blood. Her nails scratched the thatch of hair around his stomach and slowly travelled down to his groin. “From where?” she repeated.
“The airfield,” he said.
Her hand burrowed between his legs and he felt her nails tighten around his scrotum. The movement would have been almost sexual if Joker hadn’t been so terrified and if Hennessy hadn’t had such a murderous gleam in her eyes. “How did you know he’d be there?” she said. The fingers tightened.