The Network (3 page)

I lie down on my back under one of them and wait for the heaving of my chest to subside. Then I turn in the direction of the airfield buildings to look for any sign of life. There is none. Nothing stirs by the big hangar a hundred yards away. The control tower, which looks more like a shed perched on a twelve-foot-high platform, is empty. In my imagination I see Tom explaining his encounter to the dog handlers, who are probably in the pro-cess of making a succession of phone calls. My close observation lasts only ten minutes but I can’t wait any longer.

There are about a dozen single-engined aircraft parked on the grass alongside the runway, pointing down it. The majority have blue winter covers draped over their canopies like horse blankets, but several are uncovered. Concrete weights or ten-gallon plastic drums are tied to the undersides of the wings as anchors. I can still hear nothing but my own breathing. It’s now or never. I walk with as much confidence as possible from my hiding place and try the doors of the uncovered aircraft in turn. The Piper and the Cessna 172 are locked. The third, a 152 and the aircraft I first learned to fly, is open. Nothing moves by the buildings, and the possibility of success is now making my hands tremble.

I check the fuel in the nearest wing: enough for my purposes. I won’t fly much more than fifty miles. I’ll stay in class G airspace, keep the transponder off, hope there aren’t too many low-flying military fighters on exercise, and head west until I hit the coast and put down in a remote field. Then I’ll find a way to call H, who will get me out of the shit I’m in. A moment later I’m in the cockpit. The ignition switch lacks a key but after some groping under the cowling I have worked free the P-wires to the two magnetos, and bypassed the ignition circuit. I turn the fuel to rich and the carburettor heat to cold. I prime. I open the throttle half an inch. The master switch is on, the brakes off. I need only prop the aircraft manually and remove the tie-downs.

I have to prop the aircraft by hand because I have effectively removed the ignition. It’s the wrong order in which to do things, but I want more than anything to get the engine going first. There is no time for the usual checks. I get out and heave down on the propeller with all my effort: there is a thud and a hiss from the engine.

‘Bitch,’ I hear myself shout.

I heave again. Another thud. And another. On my fifth try there’s a miraculous succession of thuds and muted explosions and the engine bursts into glorious life. The airframe begins to strain forward like a dog at its leash. All that remains is the tie-downs. With a sharp knife I might have cut them off within seconds and been airborne within a minute. There are no tie-downs in films about aircraft theft, much less tie-downs with stiff ropes tied too tightly to undo with cold and trembling hands.

I try my best, but the ropes won’t budge. The forward motion of the aircraft is putting tension on them and making the task even harder. I am contemplating shutting down the engine when through the perspex of the cockpit doors I see the vehicles hurtling through the gate beyond the hangar. Two Range Rovers with lots of bodies inside. I will not give up. One skids to a halt in front, and the other behind the aircraft. Reason suggests that at this point I concede defeat because I cannot possibly take off, but I’m reluctant to part from my closeness to success and climb back into the cockpit. H has said I must
never
give up. I pull the throttle to its maximum extent and let the handbrake off. The plane is creeping forward and vibrating like a spin drier and men in jackets and fleeces are tumbling out of the vehicles. A mustachioed face appears at the door to my left and tries the handle. I kick it open towards him and the face disappears but the other door is open now and hands are tearing at my arm. A fist reaches my head. Two bodies now occupy the left door frame and are grabbing at my flailing legs. They do not shout, which impresses me. Now I am being prised from the cockpit like a worm from its hole and someone is pounding on my arms to make me let go of the seat. As I fall to the ground a knee connects with my left eye, and little flashes of light tumble across my vision against a dark background. This is not supposed to happen.

The engine revs subside and I realise someone has found the throttle and pushed it in. I hear the air go out of my lungs with another blow, and a cracking sound spreads from my ribs. I wonder how much force it really takes to break a rib. I feel no pain. Someone is jamming my face into the ground, and I smell the grass and the mud. There are two sets of knees on my back and another two on my legs. A plastic tie tightens over my wrists.

As I am dragged to one of the cars I notice that at the far end of the runway the sun has broken through the clouds, and a vast and slanting beam of golden sunshine is spreading downwards in a mockery of benediction.

2

I am not sure how much time passes, whether I’ve lost consciousness, or whether I’ve been drugged. My right eye, because my left has swollen shut by now, opens as if into a tunnel running beneath a long row of lights with metal shades, some of which are unlit. The floor on which I’m lying on my side is concrete and the walls are wooden. I have the impression it’s dark outside but I can’t say why. Remembering the long structures I passed earlier, I eliminate tunnel and barn and decide on chicken farm, disused. A rank smell supports my guess. Turning my head slowly, because it hurts too much when I try to move my eyes, I now see the man whose face appeared at the door of the aircraft during my ill-fated attempt at flight, which has imprinted itself on my memory with extra clarity. He’s squatting beside me in scuffed Timberlands, black denim jeans and a brown leather jacket with a belt which he’s had the presence of mind to keep off the floor.

‘Wakey wakey,’ says the Face in a tone of perverse intimacy. South London accent, I’m guessing. He’s watching me closely for any reaction, which is perhaps his training and suggests the shrewd observational skills of the streetwise. ‘Looks like our stunt pilot here is in need of a bit of refreshment,’ he says. Then, more loudly, and without taking his eyes from mine, ‘Billy, get the man some refreshment.’ There is a scraping noise behind me from a second face which I’ve not yet seen. ‘Do you fancy that, Mr Stunt Pilot? A nice bit of tucker to warm you up after all your recreational activities?’

Food would be good, but I say nothing. This is a dance in which I and my captors will make our chosen moves. The sing-song in the Face’s voice is calculated to provoke.

‘Cat’s got his tongue,’ says the Face. ‘Shame about your flight plan being denied. Who’s that actor who’s a pilot? You look a bit like him. Is it John Travolta? Billy,’ he calls to whoever is behind me, ‘who’s that actor who’s always flying around in his own private jet? Isn’t it John Travolta?’ He stands and takes a few steps backwards.

‘Fuck knows,’ mutters Billy, who at the moment of replying is preparing to throw a bucket of cold water over me, which he now does. His heavy northern accent registers simultaneously with the shock of the water.

‘Sorry about that,’ says the Face, squatting down again. ‘Ran out of hot.’

My hands are tied behind my back and I cannot wipe the water from my eyes. I want to tell him this. I’m just able to tilt my head to allow a few drops to fall from my eyebrows onto my tongue, which is enough to moisten the inside of my mouth, but not more. He sees me shivering.

‘Chilly, isn’t it? Catch your death lying on a cold floor like that. Shall we get you up? Stretch your legs a bit?’ He studies my face with an exaggerated look of enquiry. ‘You can even have a go at me and Billy if you want. Get your blood going a bit. Fancy your chances?’

He raises his fists in a pantomime boxer’s stance.

‘Because we’re going to get you up now, and if you do fancy your chances,’ he says, opening the left side of his jacket to show me the paddle holster on his belt with the SIG Sauer pistol in it, ‘if you really do, we’ll shoot you. You alright with that?’

He looks up and nods towards Billy, who is behind me cutting through the plastic cable tie on my wrists. The relief is indescribable. I bring one arm over my body and the other from under me and squeeze my hands together to ease the pain in them.

‘Get up, cunt,’ says Billy in a matter-of-fact tone. I feel two strong hands pulling me up. The Face stands and steps back while Billy, who’s the larger of them, does the lifting. As I come to my feet, I lean on him more than I need to, partly to get the measure of his strength and partly to appear weaker than I am. The Face spots this ploy in an instant, and circles round me like a hyena whose prey isn’t quite dead yet.

‘Oh look, he’s feeling faint. Shall we put him back on the floor and tie him up again? Maybe something in his mouth this time? Billy? See if you can find a dead rat, can you?’ A sudden lethality enters his voice. ‘Don’t fuck around with us, soldier boy.’

So he knows I was in the army, I register, which means that my identity is known. It’s a mistake on his part, I can’t help thinking, and this error, however small, gives me a feeling akin to hope. It means these people are fallible, human. Billy is manhandling me meanwhile, spreading my arms against the wall and kicking my ankles away from it, so that I’m leaning forward like a man about to be frisked.

‘Now give the man his nice hat,’ says the Face.

Billy obliges by putting a white pillowcase over my head. I am thus deprived of any chance to observe my surroundings, but the warmth of my own breath on my face is a comfort which they can’t guess at. I’m also able to move my face without being observed. To flex my eyebrows, gauging thereby the extent of the wound to my eye, brings a feeling of secret victory. It doesn’t last. The stress position is an innocent-looking technique designed to reduce to nothing what little reserves are left to an exhausted man. After lying on the cold ground with my hands tied, the first few minutes are a relief. But soon I feel the strain on my wrists and ankles, especially where they’ve been kicked, and the pain begins to spread.

The urge to move my limbs becomes irresistible. I want first to let my head drop and relax my neck. Billy has evidently been left in the room to make sure I don’t do this. Whenever my head begins to fall, I hear his northern charm from behind me.

‘Fucking head up, cunt.’

I comply, not from fear of him but so as not to give any impression of defiance. If I show no reaction, I am winning, because I am overcoming my wishes, which requires a measure of control. I cannot change the world, but I have a tiny degree of control over my reactions, which, however infinitesimally, does have an influence on events. I must guard this control. I have been taught that in small choices great consequences are often hidden.

My second wish is to bring my legs closer together to reduce the feeling that I’m sinking into the ground, like a sagging beam which is beginning to split under its own weight. Billy is trained to notice this too.

‘Fucking legs apart,’ is his way of putting it. The third time I shift my legs he comes over and kicks my ankles to increase the distance between them, and then slaps the back of my head down for good measure.

‘Fucking head up, I said. You fucking deaf, or what?’

And before too long, after what is commonly called an eternity, not only am I unable to keep my head up for more than a few seconds at a time, but my legs are beginning to tremble with fatigue. Only slightly at first, but visibly later on. Twice my legs simply buckle under me as I fall asleep before righting myself by reflex, and it is perhaps this indication I won’t last much longer that prompts the arrival of a third and unfamiliar voice to enter my deprived world. I cannot hear it distinctly, but I think the words are ‘Take that off, for God’s sake,’ and the tone is more smoothly modulated and unexpectedly deep.

I hear the calculated cheeriness of the Face near my ear.

‘You still in there, Captain?’ The pillowcase is pulled off my head. ‘Nice bit of fresh air for you. All the comforts of home. Don’t say we don’t look after you. Have a seat, there’s a good fellow, and say hello to the CO.’

The Face leads me by the arm towards a folding chair with a torn plastic seat placed several feet from a table where a man in uniform is sitting. He does not look up as I am steadied into the chair but with my good eye I can make out his jumper, the three pips on each shoulder that identify him as a captain, and the rose and laurel cap badge on his distinctively coloured beret that identifies the regiment to which he belongs.

‘Get this over with quickly and you can have that eye seen to,’ he says in a quiet but firm tone. I cannot help but feel, after my treatment by the Face and his friend Billy from up north, a kind of kinship with this fellow officer, but dare not let my hopes rise. I must bring myself to a state of indifference, of greyness, as H would call it. Each breath brings a sharp pain into my side and I am at the edge of total exhaustion. My head falls forward.

‘Head UP,’ screams Billy from behind me at the top of his voice. My head jerks up in reflex, and this is when I notice that the three pips on the officer’s rank slides are not identical. One is a crown. He is not a captain but a full colonel. My mind is struggling to understand the significance of this. Military protocol dictates that only an officer of equal or senior rank may interrogate another officer, but the sight of such a senior officer is disturbing me.

He unscrews the cup of a Thermos, fills the cup, drinks from it and puts it down beside a trio of files. I can smell the coffee. Perhaps the visual metaphor is a deliberate one, calculated to weaken me.

‘Can you confirm that you are Captain Anthony Hugh Taverner, 1st Battalion, Scots Guards, latterly SO3/E2 in Kuwait City serving under the Joint Services Interrogation Wing?’