Outside Chance (34 page)

‘Tell you what. Why don't we take Mouse for a little walk? Have you got time?'

‘Yeah.' Mikey was plainly delighted. ‘I'll show you where the badgers are, if you like?'

‘That'd be good.'

Taking a moment to stow his sketchpad out of sight of prying eyes, Mikey joined Ben outside and together they trudged off across the fields, skirting the yard and heading for the copse that was adjacent to the proposed stud site. The wind was whipping across the high ground next to the trees and, having duly inspected the badger set, an activity in which Mouse took great interest, Ben suggested they move down to the cluster of tumbledown brick buildings on the slope below.

Here, a range of mainly roofless outbuildings formed three sides of what had once been a sizeable farmyard, with a large barn making up the fourth. It was into the shelter of this that they made their way, finding a thick carpet of rotting hay and straw underfoot, and various rusty implements standing about. Above them, a section of rusty tin roof flapped endlessly in the wind.

Ben took his miniature cassette-recorder from his inside pocket and showed his half-brother.

‘There's something I want you to listen to – don't ask why, just listen.'

He switched the device on and waited, watching Mikey's face intently.

It didn't take long. As soon as Jakob's soft, lilting tones sounded in the frosty air, telling Ben about his homeland, the youngster's eyes narrowed. He
listened obediently for another ten seconds or so, then looked up at Ben in puzzled enquiry.

He switched the recorder off.

‘Well?'

‘That's like the voice I heard when I was hiding in the horsebox the day they took King!'

‘Are you sure?'

‘Yes. Have you found them? Is King coming back?'

‘Soon, I hope. I think I've found who took him, but I haven't found the horse yet. Listen, I can't say any more at the moment, and I've got to ask you not to either. No one must know about this, OK?'

‘Not even the Guvnor?'

‘Especially not the Guvnor! Not Ricey, not a soul, because you could get me in big trouble if anyone found out. D'you understand? This is really important.'

Mikey nodded earnestly.

‘I won't tell anyone. I promise.'

Ben called in at the house before leaving, as Truman had asked, but whatever had prompted him to request this had apparently slipped his mind, for he didn't really have anything in particular to say to him.

The atmosphere in the house had lightened a little; Stephen had been temporarily removed by his great aunt to a nearby B&B, and Helen and her husband had withdrawn to their bungalow. This much Truman told Ben, but his anger was still visibly simmering, and Ben began to seriously worry for the boy's ongoing health.

This train of thought naturally led back to Lenny Salter, lying in his hospital bed, hooked up to drips and God knows what else. He'd have liked to mention it to Truman, just to note his reaction, but could see no way of doing so without betraying the fact that he'd returned to Salter's home the previous evening, so he held his tongue.

Not wanting to spend any longer listening to Truman's family problems and mindful of the fact that Lisa was expected sometime that afternoon or evening, Ben took his leave, driving fast and arriving back at Dairy Cottage, via the local mini-mart, just as the cold, frosty day was giving way to even colder dusk. Swinging into the small courtyard he saw with relief that Lisa's Beetle was not yet there. Now, at least, he would be able to tidy up and run the Dyson round before she came.

Laden with carrier bags full of shopping, Ben dropped his key and had to put half his load down to retrieve it, which at least meant he had a hand free to wave when he caught sight of his landlord passing the courtyard entrance.

He swore under his breath as two of the bags he'd deposited at his feet fell sideways, spilling their contents on his doorstep, and then decided to take the bags he still held through to the kitchen before returning to fetch the others. He'd have to come back out anyway, because Mouse was still curled up in the back of the four-wheel-drive. Light from the ornate, Victorian-style streetlamp outside lent the hall a soft glow, and Ben went straight through to the kitchen before turning a light on.

There he stopped short in shock.

The kitchen looked as if an earthquake had hit it. Every cupboard door was open and their erstwhile contents were strewn across the flagstones and granite worktops. All Ben's food containers had been emptied: flour decorated the window and sink where a bag had been thrown and split; sugar was sprinkled liberally across every surface and crunched underfoot, as did pasta, coffee granules and cornflakes. Crockery had been swept from shelves and smashed on the stone floor; all the drawers had been pulled out and upturned, and so had the table and chairs. There was, Ben realised despairingly, nothing that had been left untouched.

‘Shit!' he breathed, rooted to the spot. It occurred to him to thank God that Lisa hadn't walked in on whoever had trashed the place, but before the thought had time to develop further, his world went suddenly and terrifyingly black.

FOR AN INSTANT,
Ben froze.

Thick, rough material was pulled suffocatingly tight over his nose and mouth and his first panicky breath felt hot on his face. The hood didn't completely block the light – his own instinctive reaction of closing his eyes had done that, and as he opened them a hazy glow seeped through the fibres.

He found he was still holding the bags of shopping and had to consciously release his grasp, at the same time stamping backwards to where he hoped his assailant's feet might be.

They weren't.

His right elbow, applied vigorously behind him at rib-height, met with more success but his satisfaction was short-lived. Instead of loosening, the hood tightened and he was swung in a stumbling semicircle, which was only halted by the left side of his body and head impacting with something unforgivingly solid. His fingers touched smooth, cold stone: the kitchen wall.

Almost before he had time to properly register
the discomfort of the collision, his head snapped back as the hood was used to pull him away from the wall and pain exploded in his midriff as a fist hit him with wicked force, just below the ribs. He doubled forward, his hands clutching at the epicentre of the agony, and fell, gagging, to his knees.

He was still a long way from wanting to straighten out when once again his head was pulled back. This time as he tensed, waiting for the next blow, someone spoke in a semi-whisper, close to his left ear.

‘We've been waiting for you, Mr Copperfield. Or may I call you Ben?'

With these words, any lingering hope that he had simply been unfortunate enough to walk in on a burglary in progress was banished. These men had business with him and, thinking of the fate of Lenny Salter – just twenty-four hours previously – it would be naïve to imagine there was no connection; equally naïve to suppose they didn't have something similar in mind. Ben thought of the ex-jockey's useless, shattered knees and was seized by a sudden wild panic that brought him surging to his feet, from where he drove his bodyweight backwards, carrying his first attacker with him until they both fetched up against one of the kitchen units.

This time the man behind took the brunt of the collision and, judging by the grunt and accompanying obscenity, he wasn't too happy about it. He didn't seem inclined to release his grip on the smothering hood though, so Ben tried a little extra persuasion in the form of a head-butt, throwing his head back hard into the man's face.

It just seemed to make him madder.

With the hood still firmly in place, Ben found himself dragged sideways and flung against the granite worktop, after which his head and upper body was forced down on to the work surface. Then, bent over the right angle of the units, Ben was slid sideways for six feet or so, carrying the mess of crockery, spilt food and empty canisters with him to crash to the floor at the end. Feeling like a rag doll in the hands of a spiteful child, Ben managed to get his hands beneath him before he hit the flagstones, but he hadn't even begun to get his act together when the breath was knocked out of him by what felt like a medium-sized elephant landing on the small of his back. Various unidentifiable objects were trapped beneath him and pressed, extremely uncomfortably, into his chest and stomach.

‘You little shit!' the voice sounded close to his ear once more. ‘You'll pay for that!'

Ben was under the impression that he already had, but even had he been able to make himself heard from under the stifling hood, he didn't think the comment would further his cause.

‘Here, use this.' Another voice, presumably the owner of the powerful fist. From their accents, both men hailed from the Midlands.

Ben tensed, anticipating another blow, but instead his arms were wrenched awkwardly behind him and his wrists bound tightly together. He was unable to offer any shred of resistance; his body busy trying to cope on the minimal lung capacity the crushing weight allowed. Just as he felt he was losing the fight to stay conscious the pressure
eased, the hood was repositioned, and he was again hauled to his feet, this time by his arms.

He spread his feet, hearing the crackle of debris under the soles of his shoes, and half hung in the grasp of the man behind him, trying to decide if their use of a hood was a good or a bad thing. If they were using it to protect their identities then it had to be a plus point, indicating that they intended to let him go. If, however, it was being used as an interrogation tool, to disorientate and frighten him – as he'd seen on TV documentaries about the Special Forces and terrorists – then it was definitely not good news. What was more – it was working.

‘You're making this very hard on yourself,' the second voice remarked. ‘We only wanted to ask you a question.'

Ben waited, his breath coming in shallow, painful gasps, as he concentrated on preventing his fear of constraint from sliding into panic.

‘A little bird told us you had a certain tape,' the voice continued. ‘But we've looked everywhere and we can't find it, so we thought: let's wait for Ben, he can tell us where it is.'

‘What tape?'

The question escaped almost involuntarily, and the next moment Ben's knees buckled as a fist slammed into his solar plexus for the second time. The hands gripping his arms stopped him from falling, pulling him upright whilst his muscles were still a cramping morass of agony. He groaned, tasting bile, and the voice close to his ear said softly, ‘Wrong answer,' in a singsong tone, as if reciting a nursery rhyme to a child.

The hood tightened round his face once more, forcing his head back and making breathing even harder. He tried to think rationally. What tape were they talking about? The tape of Jakob talking, that he'd played to Mikey just that afternoon? How could they know about that? Or the tape he'd made the day before, when Lenny had told his tale? Whichever one it was, it didn't take a rocket scientist to guess who was behind the attack. Having heard so much about Truman's methods of exacting retribution, it seemed he was now experiencing them at first hand.

‘Search him.'

Hands patted him down from chest to hips, pausing to remove his car keys, phone and spare cash, and toss them on to the floor. Questing fingers found his wallet inside his jacket and a fold of bank notes in the back pocket of his jeans.

‘It's not there,' came the report.

‘OK. I'll ask again. Where's the tape, Mr Copperfield?'

Ben shook his head dumbly.

His reward was an open-handed slap across the face, which, because of the hood, he didn't see coming. It rocked him, bringing tears to his eyes and a warm trickle of blood from his nose. He shook his head muzzily.

‘I took the tape to the cops on my way home,' he tried to say, but the thick material distorted his efforts.

The hood loosened a fraction.

‘Say again.'

‘The cops have it. I took it on my way home. You're too late.'

There was a pause, during which Ben gratefully drank in the cooler air that had seeped in around his face. Then, with no warning, he was slapped again.

‘We don't believe you.' The voice said conversationally. ‘Try again.'

Ben shook his head.

‘There's nothing else to say. It's the truth.'

There followed a murmured exchange between his captors, during which Ben waited, his head still spinning from the blows, not daring to hope he'd be believed.

His pessimism was borne out.

The third slap was harder and the voice that followed it was plainly losing patience.

‘You're a reporter. If you uncovered a story you wouldn't run to the pigs, you'd take it to your editor. Now, if you don't start to co-operate, Mr Copperfield, we're going to have to get rough. You've met little Lenny Salter, I believe. We were talking to him ourselves, just last night. Ain't it a small world?'

From behind Ben there came a low chuckle.

‘Ain't it just?'

Suddenly, strong fingers grasped Ben's face through the fabric.

‘Tell us where the fucking tape is! We ain't going till we've got it, you know, and by the time we've taken out both your knees and started on your fingers, you'll sell your granny to save yourself, so why not be sensible and tell us now, huh? That way we're happy, the boss is happy, and you get to keep the use of your legs. Sounds like a good deal to me.'

It was starting to sound like a good deal to Ben, too, but it had also occurred to him that if he told the men where Salter's tape was, they'd almost certainly take the other tape, too. Once Truman had recognised Jakob's accent as identical to that of Stefan Varga, it wouldn't take any great powers of deduction to make the link between his ex-jockey and the Csikós, especially given the content of the recording. From there, surely, his thoughts would run along the same lines as Ben's had and, whatever crime they might have committed, he couldn't wish Truman's kind of trouble on Jakob and his troupe.