Like Father (14 page)

“Did he mention anyone else?”

Danny looked at the officer, confused. “Who?” he asked. “Why would he mention anyone else?”

“There were reports from the prison,” said the officer. “That when he escaped there may have been another individual involved. A small man. Very old. Wearing an odd hat.”

Hodeken
.

No wonder Danny’s head had been relatively quiet today. His tormentor had been busy elsewhere.

22 A dark and stormy night

They all sat in the living room. The TV was on. Celebrities doing something dumb for Bank Holiday entertainment. Danny wasn’t really following it.

Val sat on the sofa, her feet tucked up under her, a gin and tonic cradled in both hands. Josh sat on the floor, scribbling in a colouring-in book. He hadn’t quite grasped the idea of colouring in the right places yet. He should have been in bed by now, but Val seemed content to let him play.

By the window, Oma Schmidt stood, as she had stood for the past two hours. She stared out through the glass, peering into the gathering dusk.

Waiting.

What had Hodeken told her, Danny wondered.

There was a clatter of crockery from the kitchen. No household sprite, this was Detective Constable Fox making herself useful and keeping herself out of the way.

“We have no reason to expect him to come here,” Fox’s superior, Detective Inspector Lever had assured Val earlier. “It’s far more likely with cases like this – “ not that there
were
cases like this “ – that the absconder would return to somewhere familiar. His childhood haunts in Eastbourne, maybe, or back to your old home in Loughton, or maybe to where ... to the scene of his crimes. No, there’s nothing to indicate that he would want to come here.”

Nothing, that is, apart from the phone call he had made at lunchtime, two hours after he had escaped. That, and Oma Schmidt standing by the window, watching and waiting.

The other possibility, Lever had told them, was that Danny’s father might just try to vanish, sleeping rough, living in homeless shelters where no-one need know who he was. That was a possibility they might have to learn to live with: the knowledge that he may be out there, somewhere, hiding. No-one would know where he was. No-one would know when he might, finally, decide to pay them a visit...

~

Rain blasted the window in a sudden, furious flurry. Still, Oma stood there, watching.

The room was lit by a tall lamp standing in the corner, and the flickering, dancing colours of the television. Danny stood, and went over to turn on the main light.

“Daddy,” said Josh, looking up.

Danny, standing in the doorway, turned sharply.

The landing was empty. Josh hadn’t seen anything. He might just have said “Danny”, after all.

“No,” said Danny, walking over to him and squatting by the boy. “Your daddy is dead, Josh. Your daddy died three years ago.”

He was killed by
my
Daddy in a jealous rage, fuelled by the taunting voices that filled his head.

He looked up at Val. She hadn’t reacted. She wasn’t going to deny it. It was the first time this unspoken truth had been brought out into the open. Josh was Chris Waller’s son, from the affair Val had been having with the man who was her husband’s best friend.

Josh was scribbling again. He had been on that page for hours.

“Have you got homework, Danny?” asked Val.

“I’ll look.” He had no idea. School seemed so far away, right now. He went out to the landing, went to peer down into the stairwell. The door at the bottom was locked now, and there were policemen in a car out in the car park.

He went to his bedroom and switched on the light. The room was empty.

He kneeled by the bed and pulled the box out. He emptied the envelope onto his duvet. The photos, the newspaper cuttings.

He stared at them without picking them up.

He didn’t need reminding of anything.

He gathered them up and stuffed them into the envelope, which he then folded in two and twisted tightly. He dropped it in his bin.

He went back into the living room and stood by Oma.

It was dark now, and the window was streaked with rain. Lightning flickered and rumbled in the distance. There was a light in one of the cars, the faint orange glow of a cigarette. It flared bright as its owner inhaled, and then faded. A few seconds later it glowed bright again.

“Is he out there, Oma?” asked Danny.

She looked at him. “How should I know?” she asked him. “I am only an old woman. All I see is rain and the dark.”

But she was smiling as she spoke.

~

The phone buzzed in his pocket. He took it out and looked at the small screen. He had a message.

U sed youd call but hvnt. WHY?! RU OK? ...C

What to tell her? His psychopathic father had nearly killed a guard, escaped from prison and might just be outside now. Oh yes, and he has the help of a mad, obsessive creature from German legend.

No. Best to keep it simple, he thought.

Sorry. Forgot. All ok. You ok? DS

Just then, there was a crackle of someone’s voice from DC Fox’s radio in the kitchen. Danny stood, and arched his back, to get rid of some of the stiffness.

Oma had retreated from the window to an armchair where she sat quietly, eyes still open, watching. Val sat on the sofa with Josh’s head in her lap, the little boy stretched out full length on the sofa, fast asleep.

Outside, lightning still danced in the distance.

Danny went through to the landing, paused to peer down the stairs at the locked front door, and then went to stand in the kitchen doorway.

DS Fox sat at the table with a mug of tea, looking at one of Val’s alternative lifestyle magazines. She looked up at Danny.

“All quiet in there?” she said, through a professional smile.

Danny nodded. “Any news?” he asked her.

“No, nothing. Sorry.”

Danny’s phone buzzed, but he ignored it for now.

“He’ll come here,” he said. “Why else would he have phoned after he’d got out? He’ll hitch a lift, or he’ll sneak a free ride on a train, or if it comes to it, he’ll just walk, but however he does it he’ll come here.”

“Go to sleep, Danny. It’s late. We’re here to protect you, and to catch him.”

“The prison guards were there to keep him in prison, but they couldn’t stop him, could they?”

He turned and went back to the living room. He went to the window, where Oma had stood for much of the evening. He checked his phone.

Fine here. Nite nite Danny Schmidt ...C xx

~

The day broke, bright and hot. Danny sat in his room’s window seat and watched the steam rising from puddles in the car park below.

He had slept little, but he felt strangely rested. Sharmila’s breathing exercises helped – there were benefits to living in a place like Hope Springs.

Two plain clothes officers were in a car below. Danny couldn’t quite work out whether their strategy was to be visible in order to scare his father off, or to be hiding so that they could pounce on him when he marched up to the front door.

He surveyed the trees.

His father was used to hiding and watching.

Nothing.

As the sun rose, the ground dried. Soon you would be hard put to tell it had rained at all last night.

Danny took his phone out and re-read Cassie’s last message. He keyed out a new one for her.

Things happening. U should stay away from here 2day. CU tomorrow. DS.

He looked at his watch. Six-thirty in the morning. It was going to be a long day.

~

It was the church bells that set her off, ringing in the hour at ten in the morning.

“But you haven’t been to church in years,” said Val, exasperated by her mother-in-law’s sudden, odd request.

Oma stood on the landing, her arms folded. “My boy is in trouble,” she said. “I want to pray for him.”

Pray to whom, Danny wondered. Or to what ancient god?

“The church will probably be locked,” said Val, stubbornly. “They do that these days. How are we going to get you there? You can hardly walk all that way. Can’t you just pray here?”

“I want to go to church.”

“There’s the school chapel,” said Danny.

Val glanced at him. He wasn’t sure if she was irritated or grateful at his intervention. The school chapel was attached to the east wing of Wishbourne Hall. It had been locked up and unused for years, but more recently, as HoST had started to offer more courses for its weekend visitors, the pews had been removed and the chapel had been used as a hall for yoga and meditation sessions.

A short time later, Danny stood with DC Fox at the top of the stairs. “Give us five minutes,” he told his mother. “I’ll call to let you know it’s okay.”

She nodded, and he went down the stairs after the officer.

Outside, the air had that freshness of heat after rain, as if the world had been reborn. Danny waited while DC Fox spoke to her colleagues in the car.

Danny rubbed at his tired eyes and waited.

Then he turned and she was there, standing right in front of him. Cassie. Her dark hair was almost purple in the morning’s harsh sunlight.

“I said–”

“I know,” she interrupted. “So what is it? What’s so awful that you tell me to stay away, and that there’s a police car parked down at the entrance to the Hall and them here?” She nodded at the unmarked police car as she spoke.

“My dad,” said Danny. “He’s escaped from prison.” He glanced at the police officers, and then added, “Hodeken helped him.”

“Oh god, Danny. I knew something was happening. Something bad. I could feel it.”

“Who’s this?” said DC Fox, joining them.

“A friend,” said Danny. “Cassie. Let’s go.”

The three threaded their way through the parked cars and then followed the path across in front of the Hall to the far wing. As they walked, Danny explained to Cassie about Oma’s sudden insistence that she should be allowed to pray.

Around the corner, they could look out across the lawn to the lake. Someone was down there, riding the mower back and forth across the grass.

Danny produced the heavy key Val had given him and unlocked the wooden door into the chapel. Light flooded in, through the doorway and through the tall windows. The walls had been whitewashed and in this light they shone a glaring white.

Chairs were stacked against one wall, but otherwise the main area was empty. DC Fox went through to the annexe, where there was a small kitchen and some storage space.

“Nothing,” she said, coming out moments later. “I think we can safely give the all-clear.”

Cassie went to get some of the chairs down. “Might as well have somewhere to sit,” she said brightly.

Danny took his phone from his pocket and fast-dialled the flat’s number. “Val? Danny. It’s okay. You can come over now.” Then he added, “I’ve got a friend with me. Cassie. It’s okay. She knows about all this.”

DC Fox was in the doorway. “Back in a minute,” she said.

Danny went to the door, and watched her head back around the building. He looked down across the lawn again. The mower was still riding from side to side of the wide green area. The air shimmered with heat haze.

He heard a voice. Rick. Laughing and talking. Danny sighed. The last thing they wanted was Rick interfering right now.

More voices, to his right. Danny looked, and saw DC Fox leading Val, Josh and the shuffling Oma around the side of the Hall.

Danny leaned against the door-frame, suddenly dizzy. The voices, approaching from all sides... He struggled to piece it all together.

Who was Rick talking to?

He looked along the paved path that led through a narrow rose bed to the steps at the top of the lawn.

Rick was approaching, looking back down the steps. He was still laughing and talking. He was a popular man, after all. People
liked
Little Rick.

To the right, DC Fox, Val and Oma approached, Josh toddling around merrily at their feet.

“Val? Yes. You know, I’m really lucky there. She’s a fine woman. I couldn’t be luckier, could I, Danny? Danny? Isn’t that right? Me and your mum?”

But Danny was staring at the man who followed Rick up the steps and now across the path through the roses. The man was smiling, nodding, agreeing with Rick, one hand on his companion’s arm the other behind his own back.

As the man half-turned, Danny saw that something part wood and part metal was hooked into the back of his trousers.

“Hey, Danny, what are you doing in the chapel?” said Rick. Just at that instant, he seemed to sense something. A hint of strangeness. A tension. A suggestion that, even though the day was sunny and the woman he loved was now standing in a small group by the east wing of the Hall ... despite all this, just the faintest suggestion that all was not, in fact, right with the world.

Danny saw this crossing his teacher’s mind, in the briefest flicker of confusion.

“This chap,” Rick said, faltering, trying to pick up his momentum again. “He says he knows you, Danny. He...”

“He’s my father.”

Rick stopped, turned his head, stared.

Danny’s father smiled and nodded. “You were saying?”

And with his free hand, he pulled something from the back of his trousers. It was the hand-axe Rick had been using to split logs the previous day.

The blade was a dull grey, all apart from the cutting edge which glinted now in the sunlight. These tools have to be kept sharp if they are to be any good. Rick was very careful about such things. Blunt tools are dangerous.

But then, sharp tools can be dangerous, too.

A sudden movement.

So fast! Like a snake striking.

The hand that had been on Rick’s arm shot upwards and grabbed him by the pony-tail. It yanked down, so that his neck was exposed to the sunlight.

“I think you were telling me about my wife,” said Danny’s father, still in that slow, lazy tone he had used on the phone the previous lunchtime. He held the axe poised at about shoulder-height. Ready to swing it down onto Little Rick’s neck.

Danny stepped towards the two of them. “Let him go, Dad,” he said softly. He could see the tendons stretched tight in Rick’s neck, his adam’s apple bobbing as he tried to swallow.

“Danny?” His father stared at him, squinting a little.

“Yes, Dad. It’s me. Let Rick go. We can talk.”

DC Fox was at Danny’s elbow now. “Mr Smith,” she said. “Drop the axe and release this man. I’m a police officer and I’m not alone. Give yourself up now. It’s all over.”

Danny’s father still smiled. “I can do what I want,” he said. “I can walk right through your lot and you won’t bat an eyelid.”