The detective slips on his shades and for once they are necessary, the midday sun is high and bright. ‘Mr de Wale, if you make this work then we are both going to finish the day as heroes.’
‘Of course it will work,’ says de Wale, confidently. ‘Have faith.’
Jimmy helps him lift the back of a wire cage big enough to restrain two grown Alsatians. They put it on the ground. Wings extended, the birds’ full span is over six feet. They grunt and hiss at the intrusion.
De Wale slips a customised muzzle on the birds’ white beaks, then attaches GPS tracking bands to their legs so he can pinpoint the exact spot if they find anything. ‘You said you had something belonging to the missing man?’
Jimmy hands over Tony Naylor’s silver dog tag and de Wale holds it in front of the striking bald red heads of the two birds. ‘If he is out there, even if he’s buried, these two will find him. Even without this little trinket.’ He hands it back.
The exotic animal breeder walks to the front of the Range Rover to set up the electronic equipment in the passenger seat of the vehicle. After a few moments, he returns with a wide smile and eyes full of childish excitement. ‘Ready, old chap?’
Jimmy raises an eyebrow behind his shades. ‘About as much as I will ever be.’
94
The hour-long journey feels the longest and loneliest drive of Gideon’s life.
He spent most of last night lying awake, worrying about this day. And now it’s here. He sits in the car with the engine turned off, staring out of the window, hoping to halt time.
West Wiltshire Crematorium is set in ten acres of tranquil Semington countryside. But none of the beauty of the landscaping distracts from the fact that they are about to burn his father’s body. Incinerate it. Blast it in an oven until all that is left is a featureless grey powder. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. He’s heard the phrase a thousand times, but only now does he really understand what it means. From nothing to nothing.
Every emotional connection to his father will be gone. He will be left solely with memories. Mixed ones. Sure, there are Nathaniel’s books and tapes, but they’re purely factual artefacts. Archaeological reminders of the father he didn’t know rather than the one he did.
The morning sun is hot on his face as he gets out of the car and walks along the immaculately clean path. Up ahead, he sees the crematorium, a distinguished and understated building that looks modern with lots of hardwood beams and doors, bright stained-glass windows and a smart red-tiled roof.
Gideon hears footsteps and turns to see Megan hurrying to catch him up. He hadn’t expected her to come and is touched that she has. She’s wearing a mid-length black dress and black flat shoes, with a black raincoat over her arm. ‘Hello,’ she manages, slightly out of breath, ‘I hope you don’t mind me coming?’
‘Not at all. It’s very kind of you to bother.’
She affectionately touches the sleeve of his new black suit as they walk towards the front doors. ‘I guessed you wouldn’t know many people down here and thought you might appreciate some moral support.’
He takes a deep breath. ‘I do. Thanks.’
Megan misses out the fact that she’s also interested to see who else might turn up. What their relationship to Nathaniel Chase might be and how Gideon behaves during what’s bound to be a testing ordeal.
An usher shows them through to the chapel, where the coffin is already in place. He had declined the offer of following the hearse from Shaftesbury. Too slow. Too painful. And also rejected the idea of having any kind of eulogy.
Only Gideon and Megan are in the congregation as the casket slips out of public view. He bows his head and she squeezes his hand reassuringly. He tries not to think about his father’s corpse slipping into the retort, the special area of the furnace, where it will be exposed to savage temperatures of more than a thousand degrees. His archaeological training means he knows that cremation vaporises soft tissues and organs. Only hard bones will be left behind. Staff will use some kind of cremulator to pulverise what’s left, reduce it to dust, to powder.
Ashes to ashes.
He tries not to think of the man he has lost. The things he wishes he’d said. The words he regrets uttering.
Dust to dust.
He is here to get things done. That’s all. To fulfil his father’s request that he should be cremated and his ashes scattered at Stonehenge.
The service is over in less than fifteen minutes. No fanfare. No wailing. Nothing but silence and emptiness.
On the way out, a staff member tells him he can collect his father’s remains in a couple of hours or in the morning if he prefers. He chooses to come back later. He wants to end the day knowing that it’s over. That he never has to return here.
The two of them walk to their cars. Gideon stands at the door of his Audi looking lost.
‘Pub,’ she says, surprisingly. ‘We can’t go away from here without having a drink to give your dad a proper send-off.’
95
Caitlyn hears a terrible rumbling.
Cool air wafts into the fetid hole. Hands reach in through the wall and pull at her.
Her body is so stiff and heavy that she feels as though she’s been nailed to the hard stone slab. They pull her urgently out of the cavity and stumble her down a narrow dark corridor into a circular room lit by candles. Caitlyn tries to shield her eyes. Rings of small flickering flames burn painfully bright. Behind closed lids, circles are seared into the chemical screens of her retinas. She panics for a second, struggles for breath.
Two men loop ropes around her wrists. They walk her like a seaside donkey. Drag her clockwise. Always clockwise. Twenty circuits of the cold and featureless stone room. Caitlyn is dizzy by the time they stop and let her drink tepid water. Her stomach rumbles. Hunger pains stab and cramp her.
When they are done exercising and watering her, they take off the donkey ropes and retreat to the outer circles of the wall.
Now she can do anything she wants. Only there isn’t anything to do. There is nothing but space around her. Space in which she is trapped by the people on the outside of the space. She understands that this is some kind of mindfuck. First they brick her up in a wall so she can’t move. Then they give her as much room as she wants. And she still can’t move.
Free will. They are messing with her free will.
Caitlyn sits. Crosses her legs. Shuts her eyes and shuts out her world of horror. She tries to find herself. Tries to connect to some iron thread that can’t be broken, some invincible strand that she can always hold on to.
Gradually, she forgets the people around her, the smell and light of the candles, the cold of the stone floor, the cramps in her stomach and the burn of the gastric juices in her windpipe. The space. More than anything she shuts out the space. She is nowhere. She is in the safe darkness of her dreams.
Caitlyn feels her legs aching. She is growing weak. She feels herself falling. Tumbling backwards. The hooded men snap at her like a pack of dogs. They pick her up and half-drag half-walk her to the cleansing area. They push her into the steaming water. Watch her wash and re-dress. Walk her back to her cell.
Back to the place with no space.
Back to her nightmare.
96
In a black fluttering flash the birds lever themselves into the pale sky above the empty fields. They’re gone within seconds. Not even distant specks on the horizon. Tarquin de Wale looks at the sat-nav app on his laptop. He can see their flight lines tracking high into the wild-blue yonder. ‘Jolly fast, eh?’