Troll Page 27

  ‘Yes?’ the man said.

  ‘I need to see Oliver Burridge.’

  The man blinked, said warily, ‘Mr Burridge?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Are you family?’

  ‘Almost,’ said Fortune. ‘We were close.’

  ‘But not family.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why do you want to see him?’

  The man seemed suspicious, on edge, and Fortune thought that getting past him wasn’t going to be as easy as the woman who’d been there last time he came. ‘I’ve got some news for him. Rather distressing news.’

  The man nodded, stood up and walked around the desk, into the reception area. There were chairs lining the walls and he put out an arm, inviting Fortune to sit. Fortune didn’t sit.

  ‘He’s dead, right?’

  The man looked surprised, then nodded to the chairs. ‘Perhaps if we …’

  ‘Is he dead?’

  The man closed his eyes briefly, then bowed slightly and said, ‘I am sorry.’

  ‘How did he die?’

  ‘He had a fall. It was quick.’

  So I killed him, thought Fortune. He didn’t feel much at the news, no great remorse. Maybe it would come later. What he felt was dismay, that he couldn’t speak to Burridge, find out where the Games Room was. Where his daughter was.

  The man was watching him closely, but Fortune didn’t care. He didn’t know what to do or where to go. He had no plan; he was happy to just stand there and think. But nothing came. He could go back to Foster, wake him up and try to get more out of him, but Foster didn’t know anything. Burridge was dead. Bagsy, who the hell was Bagsy? He had the rest of the day, and there wasn’t much of it left. Eight o’clock. Eight o’clock, and tomorrow his daughter would be killed. He had to go back to Foster, try to wake him. What was left?

  Fortune smiled at the receptionist, night manager, whatever he was, and walked back out to the car park. It had started to rain, proper rain, sheeting down, the kind of rain most people would think, no, stay here, wait for it to stop, it’ll drench you in a second. He could see curtains of spiteful water lit up by the nursing home’s high outside lights. He pulled up the collar of his green coat, his nasty green coat. He had to move. Think, he thought, as he walked into the downpour. Think think think. But there was nothing. He had less than a day left, and no good plan. No plan at all.

  Fortune opened the boot of Lee’s mum’s never-to-be-seen-again car, looking at his tools in the weak glow of the boot’s light. This was all he had, the extent of his planning. A torch, a sledgehammer and some bolt-cutters. Who did he think he was? The rain was falling so hard he could feel the impact of the drops through his clothes. He was still bending down when he heard a voice behind him, a question:

  ‘Who the fuck actually are you?’

  Fortune didn’t move. It was the receptionist, and the level of fury in his voice, the level of grief-stricken rage, made Fortune’s back cold. The rain on the roof of the car was loud, and he could imagine the drops bouncing off the metal, a frenetic dance. He concentrated on breathing, took a moment, then said, head still in the boot of the car, ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Reckon you’re here to give him news? Family news? He ain’t got family, and he don’t know you. Definitely don’t. So, again. Question. Who are you?’

  Fortune felt with his hands around the boot of the car, trying to do it carefully, with no obvious movement. The bolt-cutters were within reach, but they weren’t what he wanted. He reached further, trying to hide the motion.

  ‘Weren’t here earlier?’ said the man.

  ‘No,’ said Fortune. His knees were shaking, trembling, against the rear bumper of the car. He couldn’t maintain this, couldn’t stay bent down much longer. The cancer, in his bones. No sleep, no food. He was near the end, his body knew that much, plus he was now wet and cold. He lifted the handle of the sledgehammer, gently, freeing the torch caught beneath.

  ‘I know you were,’ the man said.

  ‘Can’t help you there,’ said Fortune, surprised at the nonchalance in his voice. But then, he was now holding a blunt instrument.

  ‘No,’ said the man. ‘No, that ain’t going to do it.’

  Fortune straightened and spun around with the heavy-duty torch. He connected with the temple of the man behind him, the skinny night guard. There wasn’t a lot of speed behind it, but something that heavy didn’t need a lot. The man went down on one knee on the car park’s tarmac.

  ‘What’s your name?’ said Fortune.

  The man didn’t answer, just shook his head slowly at the ground. He spat, then said, ‘No chance.’

  Fortune tapped him on the head with the torch. ‘Come on. You can do better than that.’

  The man spat again, then said, ‘Paul.’

  ‘Got a surname?’

  ‘Baggot.’

  ‘Paul Baggot?’

  ‘That’s right,’ he said, looking up at Fortune with a contemptuous sneer. Rain had slicked his hair down and made his face seem thinner than before. A spiteful face, hard done by and cruel. ‘You’ve got it. First name Paul, second name Baggot. Paul Baggot.’ He spat again. ‘Well fucking done.’

  Fortune tightened his grip on the torch, his fingernails digging into the heavy rubber casing.

  ‘You couldn’t let him go?’ he said. ‘Had to stay nearby, keep him close? Is that why you work here?’

  ‘No.’ Bagsy tried to stifle a moan, failed. ‘What?’

  ‘Like his pet, is that what you were?’

  ‘I don’t—’

  ‘People call you Bagsy. Is that right?’

  Bagsy looked confused. ‘And?’

  ‘And you knew Burridge.’

  ‘I knew him.’

  ‘What was your relationship?’ said Fortune.

  ‘Relationship? What’s that mean?’

  ‘Like, for example,’ Fortune said, ‘was he your father?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘So?’

  Bagsy didn’t answer, closed his eyes tight in pain.

  ‘Only,’ said Fortune, shaking his head and squatting down with difficulty next to the man, ‘he’s gentry. And you …’ He paused, waited some more, then shrugged apologetically. ‘You’re not.’ He stood back up. ‘You’re a grunt, a lackey. Nobody.’

  ‘I’m his right-hand man,’ said Bagsy, looking up at Fortune with hatred, blinking his eyes against the falling rain.

  ‘I doubt that,’ said Fortune. ‘Anyway, let’s get it right. You were his henchman. Were. He’s dead, remember?’ He took a step back. ‘I know, because I killed him.’

  Bagsy tried to get up, but Fortune hit him on the top of the head, not hard, just enough to remind him that standing up would be a bad idea.

  ‘You worked for him, right?’ he said.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What did you do?’ Bagsy didn’t answer, just glared up at Fortune, as defiant as a wronged child.

  ‘I bet you didn’t teach Latin,’ said Fortune. ‘Or maths. Or, or …’ He stopped, pretended to search for the right subject, came up short. ‘No. No, you painted the white lines on the football field. Right?’

  ‘I was the caretaker, yes.’ Bagsy took a breath, trying to centre himself, to regain some control. ‘But I did more than that. A lot more.’ He seemed proud at this, as if he was in possession of a darker caretaking knowledge than anybody had ever given him credit for. Which was probably right, thought Fortune. ‘Gave me my own place, my own house. Ran the school, me and Mr Burridge.’

  ‘How many little boys did you kill?’ Fortune said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Forget how many you tortured. Forget how many you sodomized, violated, terrified. I don’t care. What I want to know is, how many did you kill?’

  ‘They ran away,’ said Bagsy. ‘It’s true. They ran away.’

  Fortune looked down at the man, and the man looked back up at Fortune, and it was dark and for a moment the night and the rain and his tiredness made it all seem unreal, illusory. B
ut he held the man’s gaze, and after some time, maybe thirty seconds, the man smiled, a wide to-hell-with-you do-what-you-will grin, and it all came back into focus, cold, clear focus. He needed to find his daughter. He needed to find her at all costs, and he couldn’t have Bagsy in the middle of things. He swung the torch again, catching Bagsy in the same place. Not too hard. Just enough to make sure that he’d get a decent start. Fortune got back in the car, hoping he wasn’t too late.

  fifty-four

  THE TROLL HAS JUST LEFT. I KNOW WHAT HE LOOKS LIKE, AND what he wants. Except I don’t. I thought I did, and I kind of do, but I’m still not sure. I don’t know. I just don’t know. Oh please, someone, please. What’s going on?

  Okay. Okay, what happened? Describe it, try to remember it, as it happened. Okay. First off, the troll is tall, and he’s big. And young, he’s younger than me. I never thought he’d be younger than me. Who can do the things he does and be younger than me?

  What else? He definitely isn’t normal. The way he talks, like a calm yet completely deranged minister, explaining some batshit theory to a disciple. He makes me think of those videos of jihadists explaining why the West must be destroyed. Calm, certain. Like, the absolute worst kind of person.

  So anyway, he knocks on the door and comes in. I’m sitting on the bed, I can feel the springs through the crappy little thin mattress he’s given me. He comes in and stands opposite me, leaning against the wall. He smiles, totally relaxed, as if what’s going on between us is fine, unremarkable. I don’t say anything, because I think he’s going to kill me. I think that I must have got the days wrong and this is it, he’s going to do it, he’s going to kill me, I don’t know how. But then he says:

  Are you all right?

  I don’t say anything and he just looks at me, and then he sighs and says it again, slowly.

  Are you all right?

  No, I say. And I start to cry, even though I don’t want to, not in front of this person, but I do, I can’t help it.

  All this … He looks around, shrugs. It isn’t your fault. It’s just what needs to happen.

  What do you mean, needs? I say, trying to stop crying, trying to keep my voice normal.

  It’s part of the Game.

  The way he says the Game. Reverentially, like it’s a religion or something.

  I don’t understand, I say

  I know, he says. Nobody ever did, when they went to the Games Room. But then that’s the point. The absolute essence of it.

  Like, does that make any sense to you? No, me neither.

  So I ask him, I close my eyes and I ask him, I say:

  Are you going to kill me?

  And I keep my eyes closed, because I don’t want to look at him, don’t want to hear what he says, but I have to. I have to know.

  Yes, he says. I don’t want to, but I will. He’s silent and my eyes are closed and I can feel my heart beating, my heart, I don’t want it to stop beating, don’t want this man to stop it from beating. He doesn’t have the right. He does not have the right.

  And then he says:

  Unless your father is dead. Unless he dies.

  I open my eyes and look at him, wondering if I just imagined what he said. Wondering if I heard right, or if I’m losing my mind.

  What?

  He looks at me for a long time, then says:

  But I’m not going to touch him. That’s the rule. That’s the Game. I can’t touch him, but if he doesn’t die, you don’t live.

  I don’t understand, I say.

  And that’s the point, he says.

  He talks to me like he’s explaining something to a slow child, a disappointing daughter. He says, I thought I already explained. You’re not supposed to understand. How could you be scared, how could you know fear, properly know it, if it made sense?

  I don’t answer. What can I say? Nothing makes sense, nothing. What does he know about my father? Who is this man? An ex-employee with a grudge? What did my father do to him to turn him into this monster?

  It’s what they taught us, he says.

  Who?

  But the troll just smiles, and shakes his head.

  Who taught you?

  They did.

  Who’s they?

  That doesn’t matter. I’m better than them. I’ve become better than them.

  Than who?

  He doesn’t answer; just watches me for some time. Then he sighs, pushes himself off the wall and walks towards me. I shuffle back on the bed until I’m up against the other wall.

  Don’t worry, he says. You’ve still got a day left. Most of a day.

  Then you kill me?

  He rubs his eyes and shakes his head again, like he’s disappointed.

  Didn’t I say? Yes. Yes, I kill you. Unless your father’s dead.

  I don’t—

  Understand! He shouts it, the only anger I’ve seen from him, the first proper emotion. He gets himself under control immediately, just a split second of rage. The tiger out of its cage, then immediately locked back in. I wonder what goes on behind that calm facade. What roils beneath.

  I know, he says, more quietly. You’ve already told me. He rubs his head, his short hair, rubs it hard and for a long time. Then he says:

  I’m going now. Just remember, your life, and his, is in his hands.

  He stops on his way to the door and turns, rocks his head as if he’s evaluating what he’s just said.

  Or perhaps in his heart, he says.

  And then he leaves, and locks the door behind him. Dad? Is this all your fault? I barely know you, but I’m locked in a room, and my jailer is some crazed genius loony who can make reality bend and shift and twist, and he knows you. Did you do this? Did you make this happen, create this monster?

  fifty-five

  FORTUNE WOKE UP IN LEE’S MOTHER’S CAR, ITS FRONT WHEELS sunk in a shallow verge at the side of an empty country lane. He didn’t think he could have been driving fast when he fell asleep and crashed, as although the damage to the car was bad, he wasn’t hurt. He looked at the crumpled bonnet, attempting to embrace a stubborn elm tree; it made what Lee had done to the car seem no more than a scratch. Sorry, Fortune thought. I am, honestly.

  The rain had stopped and it was early morning, nearly six, the sky lighting up at the edges, the stars still pinpoint bright in the purple darkness above, the waiting day promising to be glorious and crisp and clear. Fortune looked up and down the lane and made out a dim sign. He walked towards it. It pointed the way to a country park, Teywood Forest. He’d passed it on the way to St Basil’s, on the same road. He couldn’t be far away.

  He took a moment to assess, make sure he’d got his bearings. The way he was feeling, he wasn’t going to be able to walk for long. His chest felt like it had had something forced into it, a cushion, a sequined cushion that stifled and smothered his breathing and at the same time scratched and grated against his lungs, making every short, sharp breath agony. He was going down, down like a sinking ship, getting to the point where the water pouring inside becomes too much and the ship disappears, fast, here one moment, sunk the next, gone. Only the placid, indifferent sea left, as if the ship had never existed. Which was about right, he thought. Who was going to miss him? At least it would save Jean the funeral, the wake afterwards. Here lies a man. Ashes to ashes. Next.

  He was tired and everything hurt. He lit a cigarette and looked at the road. Which way? He couldn’t be walking for half an hour only to have to walk back. He needed to be sure. That way. He’d passed the sign on his right. Definitely. So it must be that way. He finished his cigarette, regarding the packet with gloomy exasperation. Five left. He owned five cigarettes, all he had left in his life. He’d have to make them count.

  This was the day. The last day. Fortune walked along the road; well, staggered, he corrected himself. Lurched. But this was the day and he couldn’t stop. He had to keep going. Sophie was waiting for him, and the thought of seeing her, of seeing the daughter he had believed dead, gave him fresh energy. The kind
of disbelieving excitement a child experiences on Christmas Eve. Is it true? Can it be true? Will it actually, really, truly happen? No matter how tired he was, he’d get there, and when he got there … Stop thinking, he told himself. Don’t think, just act. Or you will never do what needs to be done.

  Fortune couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten, but he didn’t feel hungry. At least there was that. The country lane was narrow and the hedges bordering it were high, so tall that all he could see was tarmac, leaves and sky. By now the sky was blue, the kind of morning sky that causes elation in the hearts of the very young and the very old, the ones in between too distracted by jobs and money and family and lack of success, or too much success, to notice it. Such thoughts occupied Fortune’s head as he slogged on. There was a bend in the road ahead and he couldn’t see past it, but as he neared it he saw, he thought he saw, no, he definitely saw an entrance and a sign that told him that St Basil’s was for sale via Seymour Estates, call this number. He was here, and he knew exactly where to go. He didn’t have a weapon, he didn’t have a plan, he didn’t have anything. Didn’t even have a fully functioning body. But what he had always had, he reminded himself, was the ability to make the right decision when the pressure was on. So. It would be okay. This will work. You will do it. You just don’t know how. Yet.

  The house that he had passed on his way in, red-brick and ruined. It had to be that. The caretaker’s house at the bottom of the drive. Bagsy’s place. Bagsy, always Bagsy. The willing accomplice, the indentured henchman. The biddable sadist. This was where he had lived, and this was where the Games Room must be, whatever that was. And whatever it was, Fortune was sure, his daughter was in it. Plus, the way Foster had described it, whatever it was, it was no good. It was no good at all.