The Hunted, page 19
He got up and went to the bathroom, washed the blood off his hand and opened the cabinet to find a sticking plaster. There weren’t any. But there was a nail file. He wrapped his hand in some of the clean paper from the toilet roll, took the nail file and returned to the bedroom.
He lay down on the floor and started to file at the base of the door.
A few grains of sawdust at a time fell away from the wood. The blood went on flowing from his skinned fingers, turning the paper bandage red. Perspiration formed on his forehead; he felt it trickle under his arms and down his back. He went on filing. It was like grating rock-hard cheese.
After half an hour, a small indentation could be seen in the base of the door, like the top arch of a mouse hole. He could get his little finger through it. He could touch the key now, but the hole wasn’t big enough for him to pull the key inside. He went on filing. His arm, hand and fingers ached, but at least the bleeding had stopped. He went on filing. Another fifteen, twenty minutes. Then he tried again.
He had it. He had it with his little finger, and he carefully and deliberately drew it in towards him, through the little mouse hole he had made. Here it was. He had the key.
Tarrin stood up, stiff and sore, his hands trembling slightly. He steadied them and then reached to put the key into the lock.
It wouldn’t turn.
He felt that flush again, of coldness and fear. It had to turn, had to, had to turn, had to – why wouldn’t it turn? He tried it again, again, again, with all his force, harder and harder, and then he realized.
He was turning it the wrong way. Fear, urgency and panic had made him blind to the obvious. He tried the other way. The bolt inside the lock slid away from the frame. Then he turned the handle and opened the door and stepped out, on to the landing.
He stood listening, afraid that he had heard Deet’s car pulling up outside. But it was someone else. He hurried down the stairs, ran to the kitchen, then to the other rooms, looking to see if Deet had left any money. He found some change lying on the sofa, which had maybe fallen from Deet’s pocket.
He ran to the front door, but there was a double lock on it, which meant that even to open it from the inside you needed a key. He went back to the kitchen and tried the side door – same thing again. He tried to open a window, but the windows were screw-locked into their frames, and again a key was needed.
He stood there in the kitchen, looking around, like a trapped animal. He made himself breathe deeply, forced himself to think. OK. He needed something heavy . . . heavy, heavy, heavy . . . he saw a solid cast-iron pot hanging above the cooker. He took it down and carried it over to the window by the sink. He swung the pot with both hands.
The smash seemed terrifically loud to him. Had anyone heard? If so, they didn’t come running. He found some oven gloves and used them to pick the shards of glass from the window frame so that he would not be cut as he climbed through.
Just as he was about to go, he noticed the baseball cap which Deet had made him wear the night before. He stuffed it into his coat pocket. Then he was carefully climbing out through the window and then he had dropped down to the path. Then he was gone.
He’d been gone exactly four and a quarter minutes when a car turned the corner and stopped outside the house. There were three people in it – Deet, Miss Lindy Rae and a man who sat in the back seat, with a doctor’s medical case upon his knee, while beside him was a leather bag, containing a selection of drugs and surgical instruments.
‘Here it is, Doc,’ Deet said. ‘You get your money when it’s done.’
The man in the back nodded and reached for the door handle. The three of them got out of the car and walked up to the house.
14
Dainty Town
If nobody knew where the boy was, then maybe somebody would know where Deet was, and when he found where Deet was, he would find the boy too. That was Kinane’s way of thinking. He was in no mood to give up yet, not by a long way.
You couldn’t hide a child indefinitely. Not if you wanted to make money out of him, which Deet undoubtedly did. So Kinane put the word around that good information was something he’d be willing to pay for, then he sat in a bar, with his mobe beside him, waiting for it to ring.
Someone would spot him, sooner or later. You couldn’t hide a child in this city, not for long. People would come to him. Like bees to the flower. Like jackals to a carcass.
Tarrin pulled the baseball cap down and hurried on through the night. He neither knew where he was, nor where he was going, but he moved swiftly and with the appearance of certainty just the same. If he acted self-assured and confident, people might leave him alone.
As he walked, some lines from the Gideon Bible – those bibles left in every motel room – came into his head.
The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests;
But the son of man hath not where to lay his head.
That was him all right – a son of man, with no one to turn to.
Where to go? Where to hide? Where to shelter? He was the most conspicuous thing in the world – a child, alone in the night.
It was like money walking the streets, like a gold bar left out for the taking.
Tarrin squared his shoulders, increased the length of his stride, plunged his hands deep into his coat pockets, even swaggered a little, the way he had seen Deet do.
Maybe people would think he was grown up, an adult, as long as they didn’t see his face – yes, a young man, a small one, on the slim and the slender side, but an adult just the same, and they would leave him alone.
‘Was that a kid?’
‘No. I don’t know. Was it?’
A man and a woman stopped to look back at him. He felt their eyes staring and he hurried on around the corner. They’d only sounded curious, they hadn’t sounded as if they’d meant him any harm, but you never knew, never knew at all.
Where to go? There had to be somewhere. The Hartingers? Back to the Hartingers? They’d be looking for him, wanting him back, if only because he had cost them so much money. And the police had to be looking for him too, and possibly for Deet. He’d surely be on the list of suspects.
Only where did the Hartingers live, in relation to where he was now? The city was immense, it was a panorama of streets and houses, high-rises and office blocks; it went on to every horizon.
There’s a green land far away,
Going to get there one fine day.
Only where was it, that green land, and why did he feel he belonged there?
No, Tarrin didn’t want to go back to the Hartingers. He didn’t want to be a possession any more, a trophy, a pet. He didn’t want to belong to anyone, not to Deet, not to the Hartingers, not to some stranger who had hired him by the hour. He wanted somebody who belonged to him.
‘Was that a boy?’
It was a woman’s voice, a good, kind, nice voice, a voice of concern.
‘No. It couldn’t be. Not out on his own. Not in the night.’
Tarrin ducked down an alleyway. It was long and dark and dangerous-looking, but then the open streets were hardly safe. He wondered if Deet would be back yet, and his absence discovered. He’d come after him, he knew it.
He had to go to the police then. If it was Deet or the Hartingers, it had to be the Hartingers, the lesser of the evils.
And yet.
Yet what?
Still he walked on. He saw a police car cruising along past the end of the alley. He could have run after it, waved, shouted, ‘Stop! Stop! I’m the boy! The one who was kiddernapped! From the rich people’s house!’
But he didn’t.
He walked on, telling himself, repeating over and over, that, yes . . .
There’s a green land far away.
Going to get there . . .
He left the alley and walked on along a wide, empty street. Behind the curtains of a hundred houses there was the flickering of television screens.
They’ll have my picture up, he thought. The Hartingers will have my picture, up on a lamp post. Just like I was a cat gone missing. It’ll be my picture and underneath it will say: ‘Reward. Have you seen this boy? Reward for any information leading to his recovery. Contact . . .’
Just like a little lost cat.
I want to go home. Mum, Dad, somebody. Come and take me home. I must have had a home once. I want to go home.
‘Cheez! Did you see that?’
‘What? What you talking about?’
Tarrin looked up and saw trouble. Two men standing under a street lamp. Two chancers in search of an opportunity. And one had just walked by.
He put his head down and kept going. One of the men turned to the other.
‘Didn’t you see that?’
‘What? What?’
‘Kid, wasn’t it?’
‘Who was?’
‘Him there, that there.’
‘Nah!’
‘It was, I’m telling ya.’
‘Kid on his own?’
‘I’m telling ya!’
‘Let’s go get him then!’
‘Let’s go!’
‘Money walking the streets!’
The two men took to their heels and came after him, but Tarrin was already running. He fled down another alleyway and cut across some back gardens and then he hid, as quiet as a sleeping bird, hunched by the side of a conservatory, where the shadows were long and deep.
The men looked for him a long time, but gave up in the end. They walked away, cursing their luck, but somehow finding it amusing too.
‘Could have sold him for a bundle.’
‘Easy street!’
‘Or kept him and set him working.’
‘People’ll pay anything for a kid.’
‘Come on. Let’s get a beer.’
Tarrin waited another ten minutes, just in case they were shamming and hadn’t really gone, then he crept out from his hiding place and climbed over the wall to drop down into the alleyway at the back.
He took out the money he had found on the sofa and counted it. It wasn’t much. Enough for a drink and something to eat, but that was all.
What’m I going to do?
The bleak reality hit him. He had to return to the Hartingers. There was nowhere else for him to go that wasn’t somewhere worse. It was his only choice – to find a police station, to explain who he was, to turn himself in.
I was free. I was free. For a few brief hours I was free, Tarrin thought, both proud and sad. I was me, and I didn’t belong to anyone. And I didn’t have to pretend to be a child – because I was a child. I didn’t have to be a child for an hour or a morning or an afternoon – I was me. Just me. For a little while, I was me. To be who you really were, it was the best thing in the world. Even when it meant being alone.
Tarrin moved on into the night. Attracted by a haze of light, he hurried towards it. He found himself in a warren of cobbled streets and small, picturesque squares, lit up with the neon glare of clubs, bars and restaurants. There was bustle and movement and people of all colours and nationalities mingling together. And for once nobody seemed interested in the small, childish figure. They were preoccupied with themselves and their companions.
He stopped, looked around, tilted the baseball cap back on his head, then took it off. Nobody remarked on anything. Nobody cared. They barely gave him a second glance. They weren’t interested in him. He was nothing unusual to them.
He didn’t understand it. Why weren’t they staring at him, hassling him, whispering to each other about him, saying, ‘Look – it’s a child, it’s a boy!’
They let him be.
‘Excuse me . . .’
The man looked at him. ‘Yes?’
‘Is there a police station around here?’
The man pointed. ‘Down there, left, left again, keep going. Ten minutes’ walk. You can’t miss it.’
‘Thank you.’
‘No problem.’
The man smiled, nodded, walked on.
Tarrin had been braced for all the expected questions as to what a child like him was doing out on his own. But they hadn’t come. He felt surprised and puzzled, even strangely disappointed.
Tarrin followed the man’s directions and went along the street he had pointed to. This street was also cobbled, with narrow pavements, and it was lined with bars and cafes. He came to the end of it and turned left. This street was darker. No bars or cafes here, save for one, halfway along, a small beacon of light in the darkness. As Tarrin passed it, he looked in, down through a street-level metal grille and into a basement room.
He saw the most amazing, the most wonderful sight. He stopped and he stared, his heart pounding with excitement, with disbelief.
The room was full of children. There must have been forty or maybe even fifty of them. They were sitting at tables playing card games, or sipping from drinks and talking, or they were playing table football or computer games.
But they were children, all of them, even the people working there, the waiter and the waitress and the boy behind the bar.
Children. They were all children.
Children . . . I’ve found children.
Tarrin moved closer to the grille. He had to be mistaken. But no, they were children, right enough. Only what were they all doing there? What was going on? A celebration? A party? A birthday, perhaps?
He went to the steps and walked down them to the entry door. A sign above it read Dainty Town.
A security man stood there in the shadows. He was no child. He was big and mean and meant business.
But when he saw Tarrin he just nodded and smiled and said, ‘Evening, sir.’
And he held the door open.
Tarrin looked at him, shocked, surprised, but trying not to show it.
‘Evening.’
‘Please, go right in, sir.’
‘Thank you.’
Tarrin entered and the door closed behind him. He looked around him with a sense of delight mingled with disbelief. This wasn’t possible, was it? But it was. The adult world had gone and was forgotten. They were all children here, every one.
As he stood, looking around him, a hand touched his shoulder and he turned to find himself looking at the prettiest girl in the world. Or if she wasn’t the prettiest in the whole world, she was the prettiest girl he had ever seen. Her hair was brown and her teeth were white and straight and her smile could have melted chocolate, and although she was a stranger to him he had the feeling that he knew her from somewhere. She wore small heart-shaped glasses with rose-tinted lenses, perched on the tip of her nose.
‘Hello, stranger,’ she said. ‘I’ve not seen you here before.’
‘N-no,’ Tarrin stuttered. ‘N-never . . . I’ve never been . . . that is . . . I never knew . . .’
To help him out of his difficulties, she held up the glass she had been drinking from and let him see that it was empty.
‘What say you buy a girl a drink?’ she said.
‘Y-yes,’ Tarrin said. ‘Of course.’
She beckoned to the bartender.
‘What can I get you, folks?’ the barman said.
Well, he was the bar-child really. He looked about ten, with stick-em-up hair and a freckled face. ‘Name your poison,’ he said, in a squeaky voice.
‘A juice, please,’ Tarrin said. ‘Orange.’
‘And the lady?’ the barman asked.
‘The usual, Jim,’ the girl said.
‘Coming up.’
Tarrin watched with some astonishment as the barman picked a glass up, took it to a bottle labelled Finest Malt Whisky and pressed it against the optic. He put it down in front of the girl and got Tarrin an orange juice. Tarrin handed money over and waited for change – but it didn’t come. He realized with dismay that he’d just spent all his money on two small drinks. He looked warily around the room and saw, to his amazement, that everything in the bar was child-sized. The tables, the chairs, the lot. The signs for the toilets read ‘Little Girls’ Room’ and ‘Little Boys’.
‘Well, cheers,’ the girl said. ‘Good luck. Here’s mud in your eye.’
She put the glass to her lips and took a sip from it. ‘My, my!’ she said. ‘That hits the spot every time.’
Then she made herself comfortable on a bar stool, invited Tarrin to do the same on the stool next to her, curled one leg around the other and said, ‘So tell me about yourself. What do you do?’
Tarrin looked perplexed. ‘Do?’
‘Yes. Do. You sing? Dance? Tell fortunes? Play an instrument? What do you do?’
He stared at the little girl. She really was so, so pretty. In a way, quite unbelievably pretty. In fact, the more he looked at her, the more he had the feeling that he had seen her before.
‘I . . . I . . . don’t really do anything.’
The girl laughed. ‘You have to do something, mister. And how come I’ve not seen you here before? You new here? You on tour?’
‘Tour?’
‘Yes, tour. Are you touring a show?’
‘A show?’
‘Aren’t you in show business? You’re either in show business or you’re in the wrong bar.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘You’re sorry? What’re you sorry for?’ And she giggled, though he couldn’t see what was funny. His eyes drifted over the other people in the dimly lit room. He had never seen so many children, never.
‘What’s your name, mister?’
The word sounded strange, in the mouth of a child. ‘Mister!’ It seemed harsh, world-weary, a little cynical. He was more and more convinced that he had seen her before, but where?
‘Tarrin,’ he said. ‘My name’s Tarrin.’
‘That’s nice. Unusual, but nice.’
The little girl sipped her whisky. Was it real whisky? Surely not. Yet it smelt like whisky, and Tarrin knew what that smelt like. Sometimes Deet used to drink it. He kept a bottle in his suitcase ‘for emergencies.’ And the other children in the bar, they were drinking spirits too, and beer, and some had bottles of wine at their tables.
