Jerry hadn’t had time to read about last night’s football in the back of the Daily Mail before Dr Gupta came into the waiting room and said, ‘Good morning to you, officers. You will be pleased to know that Mr Elliot is now conscious.’
Jamila stood up and Jerry folded his newspaper. ‘How is his general condition?’ asked Jamila.
‘Considering the physical trauma that he has suffered, as well as the psychological trauma of discovering that he is now blind, he is bearing up far better than I would have expected. He is still in some delayed shock, of course, and I doubt if he has yet fully grasped the enormity of what has happened to him.’
Dr Gupta took off his glasses and frowned at them short-sightedly. ‘As I said yesterday though, it still appears to me that whoever injured him went to some lengths to ensure that he survived. I find it very strange. It is almost as if they were operating on him, rather than deliberately mutilating him, no matter how crudely. But why they should have amputated his legs and taken out his eyes, and yet taken every precaution not to kill him, I have no idea.’
‘He’s talking?’ asked Jerry.
‘Yes, he is. A little deliriously, I have to say, but I think it may be cathartic for him to go back in his mind and relive what was done to him. And of course it may be useful for you in your investigation, although that is not my prime consideration, as I am sure you appreciate.’
‘Yes, of course, doc, but we don’t want it done to nobody else,’ said Jerry. ‘I mean, you wouldn’t want your whole hospital crowded out with blind legless blokes, would you? Bloody hell – that would be nearly as bad as the Queen’s Arms on a Saturday night.’
Dr Gupta gave him a tight little smile that showed he didn’t understand the joke but still appreciated that Jerry was having a dig at the priority he always gave to his patients. ‘Come with me,’ he said. ‘We have now installed him in a private room. It is quieter, and also, the sight of his condition was causing some distress to the visitors of other patients.’
‘Has he had any visitors himself?’
‘We have received several phone calls enquiring about him from his relatives and his workplace, but we will not be permitting visits until we are confident of his continuing survival – or unless it becomes apparent that he does not have very much longer to live.’
‘So it’s still a bit touch-and-go?’
‘Come and see for yourself.’
He took them up in the lift and along the second-floor corridor. Before he opened the door to Martin Elliot’s room, he lifted his hand and said, ‘He is calm at the moment. But I will have to ask you, if he becomes distressed, to leave the room immediately. His mental state is very important to his recovery.’
‘Gotcha,’ said Jerry.
Inside, Martin Elliot was lying propped up on his bed. He was still on a drip, but no longer being given a blood transfusion, and the stumps of his legs were protected by a metal cradle with a loose-woven blanket draped over it. A pretty young Filipino nurse was sitting at a small table in the corner, making notes in Martin’s folder.
Dr Gupta went up to him and touched his shoulder. ‘Martin… I have brought the two police officers I told you about. They are standing next to me now. If you feel able, and if you are willing, they would like to have a few words with you.’
‘Yes, yes, of course,’ said Martin, in a slurred voice.
Jamila stepped close to the bed and laid her hand on his arm. ‘Mr Elliot… may I call you Martin? My name is Detective Sergeant Jamila Patel, and I have with me Detective Constable Jerry Pardoe. We are both extremely sorry to see the terrible injuries that you have suffered.’
‘Just as well that I can’t see them,’ Martin told her. ‘Never will, either.’
‘Do you feel up to answering some questions? We have already talked to your colleagues Gemma Bright and Jim Feather and Newton Akamba. They’ve given us quite a good description of what happened in the sewer tunnel before your disappearance. What we really need to know is what happened after that.’
‘Did they tell you that it all went dark?’
‘Yes, they did. But then they said that some figures appeared. Luminous figures.’
‘They were like children – and, yes, they were shining, although God knows how. I say children, but only because they were the same size as children. But they had all kinds of things wrong with them. Hunchbacked, one of them, and another had all her insides hanging out. It was unreal. It was… ugh, I can’t describe it.’
‘Yes, Martin, your colleagues described them in some detail. They even drew pictures of them for us. They said they attacked you – tried to pull off your helmets.’
Martin lifted one arm and flapped it as if he were still trying to beat the creatures off. ‘They were so strong. All right, they weren’t any bigger than children, but they grabbed hold of my sleeves and they pulled at my belt, and I couldn’t get away from them. I heard the others shouting at me – Gemma and Jim – and I kicked and I struggled to get myself free, but I couldn’t.’
Jerry had come around the other side of Martin’s bed and pulled a chair across, so that he could sit close to him. ‘What happened then, mate?’ he asked him. ‘Can you remember, or is it all still a bit of a blur?’
Martin turned his face toward him, even though his eyes were thickly bandaged with white gauze.
‘I heard Gemma calling me again, but she sounded like she was further away. Then it all went dark again. I mean like pitch-dark. Totally black. Even the glow from the children died out, but they were still there, pulling me. I can’t tell you how many there were, because I couldn’t see them, but it felt as if there were dozens, all tugging at my suit and my belt and my boots and my hair. I’d lost my helmet by then – I don’t know what happened to that.’
Martin was talking in a soft, hoarse monotone, strangely unemotional, as if he were reading a report on sewage flow to a meeting of Crane’s board members. It seemed to Jerry that he was almost exploding to get to the point of what he was saying, yet was too technically minded to leave out any details, or to describe what happened out of sequence.
‘They must have pulled me through the fatberg, because I could feel myself sliding against the grease and the rag. To begin with, my shoulder was scraping against the brickwork on the roof of the sewer. I began to get the feeling though, that there must be a whole network of different tunnels running through the fat, because sometimes I was sliding downward at quite a steep angle and other times they were dragging me upward. Some of those tunnels were okay to start with, reasonably wide, but after a while, we came to a long stretch of tunnel that was really tight and claustrophobic, and the children were struggling to pull me through it feet first. I could hardly breathe, and of course, the air stank, and I was sure that I was going to get jammed down there in the middle of that fatberg and suffocate.’
‘How long did this go on for, Martin? Have you any idea?’
‘I couldn’t tell you for sure. It seemed to last for hours. It was totally dark, like I say, and I lost all sense of direction. I knew that the fatberg runs approximately south to north, but more than once, I felt that they were pulling me off sharply to the right or the left, and at times there was no fat at all, and they were pulling me through liquid sewage right up to my chin, so that I nearly swallowed it.’
Martin tried to sit up straighter, but when he did, he gritted his teeth in silent agony for a few seconds before letting himself drop back on to the pillows.
‘Are you all right?’ Jamila asked him. ‘Shall I call the nurse for you?’
Martin shook his head. ‘It’s all right. I just forget sometimes that I haven’t got legs any more.’
Jerry and Jamila stayed silent for a while to let Martin recover. There was no sound except for the endless beeping of his vital-signs monitor and the squeaking of trolley wheels in the corridor outside. The rain pattered soft and cold against the window, as if long-dead spirits were trying to get in, or at least trying to remind the living that they too, had once been alive.
Jerry held out a glass of water and guided Martin’s hand toward it. Once Martin had taken a drink and cleared his throat, he said, ‘At last they stopped dragging me along, and I was able to sit up, even though I was up to my arse in sewage. It was still dark at first, although I could hear the children all around me, splashing and talking to each other.’
‘Could you hear what they were saying?’
‘No, not really. They were whispering very quietly, like kids do when they don’t want adults to overhear them. I did pick up a couple of snatches, but they were speaking in a very strange accent.’
‘Any idea what kind of an accent? Can you describe it?’
‘I don’t know. I’m trying to hear it again in my head. If anything, I’d say it was American, or West Country. Lots of rolling of “r”s. You know, almost like the way that pirates were supposed to speak.’
‘Okay,’ said Jamila. ‘And then what?’
Martin paused and licked his lips. ‘Then…’ he said. ‘Then…’
They waited. Jerry looked across the bed at Jamila, because it was obvious that Martin was finding it hard to explain to them what he had encountered next. His hands jumped two or three times on the blanket as if he had been given a mild electric shock, and his head jerked too.
Standing by the window, Dr Gupta said quietly, ‘I’m sorry, officers… I think it may be necessary for you to bring this questioning to a conclusion.’
Jerry stood up and pushed back his chair. At that moment though, Martin started to pant – faster and faster, as if he couldn’t get enough oxygen.
‘There’s a light… it’s off to the left… it’s in that sewer that comes in from the left. It’s dancing… jumping around… and it’s green. It’s like somebody’s walking this way along the sewer, and they’re carrying a green lamp. And I can see now… I can see that I’m sitting in this sewer chamber where two sewers join. It looks… it looks like the sewer chamber under New Cross Road… I’m sure of it…’
Jerry pulled back his chair and sat down. Martin groped frantically across the blanket until he found Jerry’s hand, and he clenched it tight. He was still panting, and now and then, he gave a convulsive shudder. Jerry realised that behind the gauze bandages that covered his empty eye sockets, he was visualising whatever it was that he had encountered down in that sewer chamber, just as clearly as when it had first appeared in front of him. His fingers were icy cold, but perspiration was trickling down the sides of his cheeks.
‘It’s coming out… it’s coming out of the sewer… and there’s green light shining all around it… this bright green light, so that everything’s green. The walls are green, the sewage is green. My hands are green. Everything’s green.’
‘What is it, Martin?’ asked Jamila gently. ‘What can you see?’
‘Officers, please—’ Dr Gupta repeated, stepping forward, but Jamila held out her arm to keep him back.
‘It’s… it’s a woman, I think,’ said Martin, so quietly that Jerry almost had to lip-read to follow what he was saying. ‘A tall, tall woman. I can’t see her face because she’s wearing a hood… a hood and a cloak that’s so long it’s dragging through the sewage. She’s coming up closer, but I still can’t see her face…’
Martin’s head dropped forward, and for almost half a minute, he said nothing, although he continued to breathe in quick, erratic snatches through his nose.
‘I think that is all he has to tell you for now,’ said Dr Gupta. ‘Perhaps when he is stronger he will be able to tell you more. So, really, if you don’t mind…’
Jerry tried to stand up again, but Martin wouldn’t let go of his hand. Jerry tried two or three times to tug himself free, but before he could manage it, Martin abruptly lifted up his head again and whispered, ‘She has a saw.’
‘Go on, Martin,’ Jamila coaxed him. ‘What kind of a saw?’
‘It’s like… it’s like a tenon saw… but the end of it… the end is more pointed. She’s taken it out from underneath her cloak, and she’s holding it up like this.’
With that, he suddenly let go of Jerry’s hand and lifted his right arm like a starter at a racetrack.
‘She’s coming nearer, and she’s speaking to me… but I can’t understand what she’s saying. It doesn’t make any sense. I’m freezing cold and the sewage is freezing cold and I feel numb all over and I can’t move… why can’t I move?’
Now, with his arm still raised, he turned his head slowly from side to side. ‘They’re coming up behind her… the children… the things that look like children… there’s so many of them… they’re crawling through the sewage, some of them… and some of them hopping like big toads… oh, my God!’
Martin began to shake violently, clonking the back of his head against the bed frame. The whole bed rattled and shook, and he waved his arms around so wildly that he ripped out the cannula for his intravenous drip. Jamila and Jerry backed away while Dr Gupta and the nurse bustled forward to restrain him. The nurse pinned his wrists down to the mattress, while Dr Gupta quickly opened the medicine cabinet beside the bed and took out a hypodermic syringe. He filled it from a small clear glass bottle and gave Martin an injection.
‘Fosphenytoin,’ Dr Gupta explained. ‘This will relax his muscles.’
Martin shook three or four times more, but then he stopped shaking, his head tilted sideways, and he started to snore.
Dr Gupta looked across at Jerry and Jamila and pulled a face, as if to say, Sorry, but this is the condition he’s in. He’s lucky to be alive at all, let alone alive and telling you what was done to him.
‘Perhaps we can come back later,’ said Jamila. ‘There’s a lot more we need to ask him.’
‘Well, perhaps. But I would prefer it if you were to wait until tomorrow. I want to see how he manages to get through the night – even though, for him, from now on, it will always be night.’
*
As they went down in the lift, Jerry said, ‘Well, sarge? What did you think?’
‘I really don’t know, Jerry. I really don’t know what to think.’
‘Let’s put it this way: if those three others hadn’t sworn that they saw luminous children too, I would have put him down as delirious. Or a full-blown nutter.’
‘Well, me too, I have to admit. But look what’s been done to him, and the doctor definitely believes that it was done deliberately. You have to ask yourself why – why would anybody want to amputate a man’s legs and put out both of his eyes? As a punishment? As a warning?’
‘Could be. Or maybe it was a freak who gets a sexual kick out of mutilating people. When you see some of the things those S & M-ists get up to. A couple of months ago we had this schoolteacher in Streatham – Billings, his name was. He paid his dominatrix to cut off one of his fingers so that he could—’
‘Jerry, I don’t want to know. I don’t think that what was done to Martin Elliot was anything to do with sadomasochism. Perhaps he was hallucinating. He said himself that for a long time he was being pulled through a very confined tunnel and that the air was polluted. The chances are that it contained a high percentage of methane. Then again, perhaps he was making it all up about the woman in the hood, with her saw, although I can’t think of any logical reason why he should lie to us. He lost his legs somehow, even if this woman didn’t do it. As you know, I can usually tell if somebody is lying. I can see their eyes turning black. But Martin Elliot no longer has eyes, so I couldn’t say for sure.’
They left the lift and walked across the reception area. An old white-haired man in a shabby brown tweed coat watched them as they passed, as if he recognised them, which Jerry found strangely disturbing. He turned around when they reached the front doors, and the old man gave him a gap-toothed grin.
Jamila hadn’t noticed him. As she buttoned up her coat, she said, ‘What he was saying about that green light though – that rings true, doesn’t it? That sounds almost the same as the green lights that we saw, and he couldn’t have known about that, could he?’
‘That’s right. And he also said that once this spooky woman appeared and the sewer was lit up, he knew where he was… or at least, he thought he knew where he was. An inspection chamber under New Cross Road, where two sewers join together. That Gemma must know where he was talking about. We can send forensics down there to check it out.’
‘I was thinking exactly that,’ said Jamila. ‘The doctor said that the stumps of his legs were cauterised, probably with some kind of red-hot iron. There might well be evidence of what was actually used to do it, or how it was heated. Scorch marks on the brickwork perhaps, or the remains of some combustible material, or ash. And there could well be some DNA from Martin Elliot’s legs – blood, or bone fragments. Who knows? Perhaps even the severed legs themselves.’
‘I don’t know. Maybe. But I have the feeling that his legs were cut off because this woman wanted them. His eyes too.’
‘Really? What for?’
‘Don’t ask me. It’s a feeling, that’s all. Maybe she’s putting a monster together, like Doctor Frankenstein.’
He held open the door so that Jamila could step out into the rain. She turned up the collar of her raincoat and said, ‘You know, Jerry, sometimes I can’t believe the things that people do to each other in this world. Sometimes I want to quit this job and stay home by the fire and read a good book with my cat sitting on my lap and purring.’
‘I didn’t know you had a cat.’
‘I don’t.’
Jerry checked his watch. ‘Listen, we’ve got plenty of time. Let’s go across to the Warren BirthWell Centre, shall we? And check out this weird foetus that Walters is so worried about.’
‘I don’t really want to be taking on another case, Jerry. As if we don’t have enough to do.’
‘You saw the picture.’
‘Yes, of course. But I found it very hard to believe that it was real. Even if it is, I don’t see why it should be a matter for you and me. There are many deformed children born in Pakistan, for various reasons, but their doctors don’t call the police.’
‘Fair enough. But it wouldn’t hurt just to take a butcher’s, would it?’
‘You are such a voyeur.’
‘I thought that was part of our job. That, and sticking our noses in where they’re not wanted.’