We Are Death (28 page)

He paused, looked out the window at the flat calm of the North Sea thousands of feet below.

‘For that matter, I’ve no idea how they do it now.’

Jericho made a small acknowledgement and settled back into staring straight ahead. Happy to sit for long periods without diversion.

The cabin staff were approaching slowly, handing out drinks and salted snacks. The plane was so still it might hot have been moving. All around were people on phones and laptops and iPads. Haynes alone was reading a book, Jericho alone was doing nothing.

‘Whoa,’ said Haynes, his voice low, and without the exclamation that the word might have suggested. ‘Did you know this?’

Jericho glanced over at the book, at a double page with just text and no photographs, and waited for Haynes to share what he’d read.

‘Local legend suggests that there is a valley of immortality concealed on the slopes of the mountain. A valley of immortality?’

He looked round at Jericho, starting to smile. For a moment, and it would be just that, the gnawing worry of what had become of Leighton was gone.

Jericho looked down, thought back to everything he’d read about Kangchenjunga all those years ago. He couldn’t recall if he’d known that, but in all likelihood, if he’d read that information when searching for Amanda, he would have dismissed it as being of little interest.

‘So our guy goes off into the mountains in northern India, then reappears thirty years later seeming not to have aged. He then lives way longer than anyone else was living at the time.’

‘Yet hardly immortal.’

‘Well, he didn’t stay in the valley of immortality, did he?’ said Haynes.

Jericho nodded, then exhaled slowly, shaking his head.

‘It fits, Sergeant, I’ll give you that. But Jesus... I’d prefer, as much as possible, if we can keep this on some sort of level playing field of existence. Let’s leave the wacky ancient myths out of it if we can.’

Haynes nodded.

‘I know. But... we should keep it in mind, that’s all.’

Jericho nodded. His look drifted away, and this time he didn’t stare at the seat in front of him. His eyes dropped to the floor, and a strange, nervous feeling squirmed through his stomach.

A hidden valley of immortality. Seriously? Utterly, stupidly, preposterously ridiculous, and how ludicrous would it be for him to take this to Dylan? Or anyone else for that matter?

And then there was the other thing. The other person. The dead person who seemed not to be dead, who was plaguing his life. What of him? Had he too been through the hidden valley of immortality?

Jericho closed his eyes, lowered his head slightly, and hoped that Haynes was not going to say anything further.

––––––––

L
eighton sat blindfolded in the back of the car. Her hands were not tied, and she could have whipped off the blindfold at any moment, but these people held her in their thrall and she dared not do anything unexpected.

She was trying to cling to the idea she was in an episode of
Ripping Yarns
, but it was no longer working. She’d been kidnapped, quite possibly by the same people who had engineered the disappearance of Jericho’s wife. The same fate might well await her.

This wasn’t just about whether or not she’d get to see Haynes again. This was about her parents and her sister. Her niece. Her home. The inside of her office.

Her mind had started running all over the place and she couldn’t stop it. The ways in which they could kill her, and all those things that would be even worse. Brutal incarceration, rape, torture. Maybe they would sell her. Maybe they would do nothing violent, but would demand something of her. Something completely unpalatable which would be accompanied by a threat to her family.

She had always thought herself something of a Mitty character. The slightest thing could bring it out in her, cause her to drift off into brief fantasy. Now that imagination had been given full wing and was flying to every dark and gruesome corner, into every conceivable horror.

The car stopped again, as it had been doing intermittently. She presumed they were driving through Oslo town centre, stopping at lights. This time, while the engine kept running, the driver door opened and closed again. She could feel there was still someone else in the car, however.

‘Take off the blindfold.’

She didn’t recognise the voice. Took a deep breath, brought her nerves under control. Getting on with it, however, was so much better than being allowed to stew in her imagination, and she could feel her determination harden as she removed the blindfold and opened her eyes gingerly against the brightness of the day. As it was, the late August day had turned grey and muggy.

The side windows were dark and she couldn’t see out, but looking through the windscreen, she could see they had driven into a large park. Trees and paths and a large open grassy area stretched out ahead of them for several hundred yards.

The man in the front passenger seat might have been glancing at her in the rear-view mirror, but it was hard to tell. He was wearing expensive sunglasses against the dullness of the day.

The door opened and another man, an identical man it seemed, stood over her, holding the door, waiting for her to get out. She unbuckled the seatbelt and eased herself warily out of the car.

Standing up, she felt an immediate sense of relief. She knew where she was. Not only that, it was in one of Oslo’s most popular tourist destinations. You didn’t bring someone to a place like this in order to do them harm, surely.

They had driven adjacent to the bridge in Vigeland Park. There were several people on the bridge and a few workmen nearby. A couple of them were looking warily at the car, but no one was approaching them to question what they were doing.

She looked around, wondering if it was time to make a run for it. Her fear had gone, however. Something of the sense of adventure had returned.

‘You need to go and speak to Mr Develin.’

She looked at the guy in the sunglasses, the words seeming to have come without him opening his mouth, then she turned and looked along the bridge, her eyes falling on Develin straight away, even though his position hadn’t been indicated. It wasn’t much, but just enough to have her feeling wary again.

She walked away, muttering under her breath.

‘They’re still in charge, Margot.’

Develin was standing beneath a statue of a woman fighting a dragon, the great beast wrapped around her in an ambiguously sexual embrace. Leighton had been here before. She was very familiar with the sculptures and did not look at them.

She approached him, stopped a couple of yards short, turned and looked around. Still plenty of people on the bridge and in the park, the car still sitting with its engine running, fifty yards away.

‘You’re familiar with this place?’ asked Develin.

‘Vigeland Park,’ said Leighton.

‘The most popular park in all of Scandinavia,’ said Develin.

‘That’s what they say.’

‘I brought you here to show you some level of trust. You don’t necessarily need to fear us, Professor Leighton.’

‘Necessarily?’

‘You have options.’

His voice was cold and level. She hadn’t seen him since he’d left her in the hands of the others at the airport the previous evening. At least now he was talking.

‘Tell me,’ she said.

Develin was staring straight ahead at the small lake beyond the bridge, and the trees beyond that.

‘We have a very large organisation,’ he said. ‘People don’t really know about us. We like it that way. We don’t like it when someone starts to pry. People – police officers, academics, insurance investigators – really ought to learn to not stick their noses in where they’re not wanted.’

‘You consider yourselves above the law?’

‘We are the law, Professor,’ he answered pragmatically. ‘This is how it is, and it’s not for anyone else to judge.’

She kept her eyes on him for a while, then looked away when it was obvious he wasn’t going to look at her.

‘So what are my options?’ she said.

‘You have two,’ said Develin, his voice barely changing in pitch or tone. ‘I brought you here to ask you if you would care to join us. It’s not our normal mode of recruitment. Similarly, we would not usually welcome in someone who has already begun an unwelcome investigation, even one that has barely scraped the surface. Nevertheless, if you would like to join us, I’m in a position now to make that offer. As a history professor, it could be of the utmost interest to you. Of course, you would never learn anything that you could share or publish. Nevertheless, you appear to be a woman of some quality, and you would be welcome. The benefits to you, in terms of your own personal knowledge and career advancement, would be extraordinary.’

Leighton glanced at him, but Develin was still staring across the bridge, across the park.

‘I don’t think that could be over-emphasised.’

‘What’s the downside?’ she asked.

‘I don’t believe there is one, considering the advantages to you. You may see things differently.’

‘Go on.’

‘You will work for us, therefore you will answer to us. You will occasionally have to do things you don’t understand, albeit rarely will they be things of which you don’t approve.’

‘You kill people,’ she said.

‘You won’t have to kill anyone.’

‘Well, that’s a relief.’

‘You will have to discontinue your association with Sergeant Haynes.’

She lowered her eyes. That one had been coming. Not that she was even remotely considering his offer.

‘You could bring him into the fold too,’ she said.

‘We have no need for Sergeant Haynes.’

‘And you’d expect me to suddenly disappear in the way I already have, then later today just go home, walk back into my office, and what...? What would I say when he calls?’

‘I believe you can say what you want. Honestly, the lie with which you are most comfortable.’

‘
Honestly, the lie with which you are most comfortable
? That’s a beautiful incongruity.’

Develin did not reply and did not meet her gaze.

‘I don’t want to lie to him,’ said Leighton. ‘Or anyone else.’

‘You have a decision to make then,’ said Develin. ‘I get the feeling you’re not even thinking about it. I understand, the first flush of new romance.’

‘It’s not–’

‘You should look at the bigger picture, Professor. This is a chance for you to play a part in how the world is run. In how things happen. Knowledge will open up to you that will make your library seem like a telephone box in a small Dorset town with a few discarded Jeffrey Archer paperbacks on poorly constructed shelves.’

She looked at him again, but he still wasn’t engaging her. She wondered if he was on some sort of spectrum, but then remembered that he had quite happily looked her in the eye when he’d walked into her office the previous day.

‘It’s hard to compete with love,’ said Develin, ‘but you need to consider your alternatives. This is an opportunity presented to only the very few.’

Finally he moved his head slightly, held her gaze for a moment and then nodded curtly.

‘We’ll be in touch.’

He walked past her towards the car. She watched him for a moment and then realised that she was being abandoned on the Vigeland Bridge.

‘What happens now?’ she said to his back. ‘You’re just leaving me here?’

He didn’t turn, didn’t answer.

She watched him all the way to the car, watched him get into the back seat. He never turned. The car’s engine had never been switched off. She wondered if the window was about to be wound down and she would be asked what she was waiting for, but as soon as the rear door closed, the car moved off, turned and headed out the park, pedestrians, on pedestrian paths, clearing out of its way.

‘I guess you are,’ she said to the disappearing car.

She watched it until it was out of sight, then looked around. It wasn’t as though she had been deposited in the middle of the jungle or the desert. She was in a European capital which she knew and where most people spoke English, and she had money in her pocket and a credit card.

All she had to do was make a choice. A love, that like any love might not last, or access to an incredibly powerful and old secret society. One that murdered people when it suited them.

There wasn’t really a choice to be made.

––––––––

J
ericho stood on the harbour front in Oslo. He had checked into his hotel, then he and Haynes had briefly, and uncomfortably, visited the British Embassy – which had basically not cared to know about their presence – and then they’d gone their separate ways.

He was looking out on the water, without really seeing what was in front of him. Behind him the trams passed by, and the ferry passengers, disgorged from the other side of the fjord. On the other side of the tram tracks, Nobel House.

Third country in a few days. Fourth if he included England. The culture filter had long since descended, of course, possibly even before he reached Switzerland. So, he wasn’t going to embrace Oslo. He wasn’t going to try to see behind the façade, to really look at the people. He would breathe the air, but not taste it. His eyes would be open, but they were focused on this curious case, this wild goose chase. He seemed to have so much trouble concentrating, he didn’t need the further discombobulation of culture shock.

Oslo looked affluent and new, spread out along the coast, between the hills and the sea, immigrants on street corners the familiar juxtaposition. The harbour was busy, the seafront an eclectic mix of ferries and cargo vessels and private boats. The air was clear but still with the heat of late summer. No sign of autumn.

Oslo was the kind of place where, in another moment, Jericho could have imagined himself sitting on the decking of a café down by the sea, watching the world go by for the afternoon. Now, however, it was just another stop on the route, perhaps the final one, but potentially no different from Grindelwald and Marrakech.

And what had he achieved by going to either of them? If this investigation was ever probed by an internal police team looking into the use of public funds, what would their findings be? Were they likely to condone the trips?