The Horse at the Gates (41 page)

At the top of the stairs daylight beckoned outside the security door. Bryce waited in the stairwell, studying the door itself. There was no obvious lock, just a swipe card reader and a hand plate. The windows on the door were impregnated with wire, but that was the extent of the security measures. He climbed the last step, turned to his left and fished for the swipe in his pocket. It was nurse Orla’s. A buzzer sounded and Bryce pushed the door open and stepped outside the building for the first time since he’d arrived. As he walked, he filled his lungs with fresh air, tilting his chin towards the sky as a fine drizzle cooled his face. It was a wonderful feeling, to be free from the prison behind him, to feel the cleansing elements of nature, the rain on his skin, the cold air that cleared his head and fogged his breath. The urge to run was almost overwhelming, but he kept his pace deliberately casual, following the path towards the main gate. He noticed others around him, medical staff and hospital workers in white, blue and green uniforms, all wrapped up against the weather, all converging towards the main entrance. A jam of cars inched towards the gatehouse, brake lights pulsing, the red and white barrier raised and lowered as they passed out of the facility. He joined a queue that shuffled towards the cage, a short corridor of steel fencing that ran alongside the gatehouse. He watched the people in front of him carefully, using their swipes on the reader one at a time, entering the cage and swiping the other reader to exit the facility. The man in front, a large, shaven-headed orderly, swiped his access card and pushed the gate as it buzzed. Bryce held nurse Orla’s swipe in his hand as his eyes flicked towards the gatehouse, to the computer screen that glowed behind the smoke-glassed windows. He saw the orderly’s face flash up on the screen, his name and personal details. Bryce’s heart hammered as he quickly dropped Orla’s swipe back into his pocket and fished inside his coat for Sully’s. He found the cell first and pulled it out.

‘Come on, come on,’ muttered an impatient voice behind him. Then his fingers found the card and he swiped the reader. The inner gate buzzed loudly and then Bryce was inside the cage, his head turned away from the control room, nodding as he faked a conversation on the cell. He swiped again and the outer gate unlocked. He pushed it open then walked through, out onto the grass-lined footpath that led to the main road. The hairs on his neck stood on end as he felt every eye on the facility watching him, the confused look of the guard inside the gatehouse, his hand poised above the large red button that would trigger the wail of the sirens and send the facility into lockdown. But nothing happened. Cars passed him in a steady procession, pausing at the junction ahead and turning out into the country lane.

Across the road a bus waited in a cutaway, the destination glowing digitally above the driver’s window: BAGSHOT. Bryce followed those ahead of him, crowding onto the bus. He used Orla’s travel card and wedged himself in by the window. After a minute or so, the doors hissed closed and the bus moved off. The illuminated sign announced ALTON GRANGE. Bryce had never heard of the facility, at the same time realising he would never forget it. He watched the gatehouse slip by, the bus accelerating past the wire-topped fences that ran along the treeline until they disappeared and all he could see were grey slate roofs in the distance. After a while, they were gone too, swallowed up by the mist. He’d made it.

His legs began to shake and so he moved further down the bus. He found a seat by the window, his face pressed against the glass. The mixture of diesel fumes and damp clothes made Bryce feel ill, but he daren’t reach up for the sliding window. Instead, he took several deep breaths and concentrated on the world outside, the passing fields, the trees and hedgerows. Escaping the facility was just the first hurdle.
Don’t pat yourself on the back just yet, Gabriel.
There was still a long way to go, a leap into the unknown that could end with him being back behind bars before the day’s end. Or worse.

Looming ahead through the windshield and the rhythmic swish of the wipers, Bryce saw the neon glow of a hypermarket. People got out of their seats and joined the throng at the doors as the bus slowed, then drew to a stop. Bryce kept his head down as he allowed himself to be swept along by the crowd and onto the pavement. He moved with them towards the hypermarket, lost inside their protective cordon, sheltered from the fine rain by a covered walkway that led to the store’s wide entrance. He slowed his pace, allowing the others to pass, then turned and watched the bus disappear to the north, heading towards its final destination at Bagshot, the cell phones, swipes and travel card stuffed in the crack of the seat. He would be untraceable now, the eventual manhunt hopefully focussed in the wrong direction. He was kidding himself, of course; once they discovered his escape, no stone would be left unturned until Bryce was back in protective custody. No, killed while escaping, that was a more likely outcome. So Bryce had to think out of the box.

Inside the hypermarket he found the DIY section and purchased a pair of cheap navy overalls with some of Orla’s money, spending some more on a prepaid cell phone and a local ordinance survey map. He used the public toilets to change, stuffing Sully’s white uniform into the waste bin and covering it with wet paper towels. Then he left the store, heading south to the other side of the town.

He found a coffee shop with
‘Season’s Greetings’
sprayed in fake snow across the windows and wandered in, taking a seat near the counter. There were several patrons, women with toddlers and small groups of labourers and Bryce relaxed, knowing he didn’t look out of place in his overalls, winter hat and coat. No-one would recognise him, either, not forty pounds lighter with a broken nose and shaven head. Feeling reasonably relaxed, he ordered a roast chicken salad sandwich – made with fresh farm produce, the menu promised – and a glass of freshly-squeezed orange juice. He picked up the media tablet from its receptacle and flicked through the news items with his finger. Sully was right, the world had indeed moved on. There was no mention of him and he daren’t use the search option, knowing that all public searches were tracked and logged. Instead, he read about the tensions on the Iran-Iraq border and the peace march held in London by Sunni Muslim groups that ended with the firebombing of the Iranian embassy. A Catholic priest had been arrested in Leicester for displaying a nativity scene outside his church and a car bomb had been detonated outside Glasgow Rangers’ Ibrox stadium prior to their British Premiership fixture against Manchester United. Fourteen people had been killed. Bryce clicked the depressing tablet back into its base unit.

The food arrived, the middle-aged waitress all smiles as she proudly laid the plate before him. Bryce thanked her and ate, the sandwich probably the finest he’d ever tasted in his life. He wasted not a single crumb, savouring every delicious mouthful and washing it down with the orange juice. He couldn’t remember the last time he felt so satisfied after such a simple meal, and he sipped at a coffee while he digested his food and pondered his next move. He needed to get far away from Alton, but it was too early, too light, to start trudging along the side of a busy main road. He needed somewhere to hole up for a while, somewhere where he could idle away a couple of hours before he made the call. Then he would know, either way, how all this would turn out. He bought another sandwich and a small bottle of water to go, stuffing them into his pockets.

The Windmill pub was set back off the road a few hundred yards south of the coffee shop, an old building with a thick thatched roof, a Tudor frontage and small framed windows, behind which a warm glow beckoned. The building marked the southern boundary of Alton, the road beyond carving through green fields and gently sloping hillsides. Still the rain fell, vehicles hissing past, headlights on, wipers frantic. Bryce cut across the empty car park and ducked inside the pub. It was dark and cosy, with low beamed ceilings, and a fire burnt in the open hearth opposite the small bar. It wasn’t busy, just a few locals scattered around the tables, all in working clothes. Again, Bryce congratulated himself on his choice of attire. He strode confidently across the red patterned carpet to the bar.

‘Orange juice, please.’ The barman, a spotty youth with shoulder-length hair, cracked open a bottle and dumped it in a glass over ice. Bryce handed over some cash and found a table in a dark corner near the fire. He slipped out of his coat and settled down, stretching his legs out before him. The clock above the bar read three fifteen and the world outside had turned a darker shade of grey. He wondered if they’d found the bodies yet, but thought it unlikely. No-one ever came up to his ward except Sully and Orla. But still, Bryce kept a wary eye on the road outside, watching for police cars or any other unusual traffic, listening for the wail of distant sirens. So far there was nothing to worry him unduly, but that wouldn’t last. He spent the next hour carefully studying the local map until the streetlight across the road blinked into life. He got to his feet, pulling on his coat. It was time.

He approached the bar, making a show of patting his pockets. ‘Is there a phone I can use?’ he explained to the barman. ‘I think I’ve left mine on the job.’

Without looking up from the game on his phone, the youth pointed to a dark corridor that led towards the toilets. ‘There’s a web terminal down there. Takes pre-pay cards. You want one?’

‘Please.’

‘Five, ten or twenty quid?’

Bryce fingered the slim wad of notes in his pocket. ‘Five will do.’ He took the card and headed along the corridor. The booth was on the left, just before the men’s toilet. Bryce slid the door open and settled down on the seat inside. It was snug, almost soundproofed, a single touch screen terminal shielded from prying eyes by the frosted glass of the booth. Bryce searched inside his coat and produced the card, now worn and dog-eared, but still readable. He pulled the prepaid cell from his pocket and dialled the mobile number on the card. His heart began to beat faster as the calling tone reverberated in his ears. Then a click on the line, the connection successfully made.

‘Hello.’

The voice was the same, that confident tone that Bryce remembered so well. He closed his eyes, the memories flooding back, the heat of the flames, the strong hands that never stopped working, tearing at the timbers that held him, setting him free.

‘It’s good to hear your voice again,’ Bryce began, hoping, praying, Mac would recognise his own.

There was a pause on the line. ‘Excuse me?’

Bryce willed himself to think and act carefully. He knew the level of sophistication of the government’s monitoring programmes, the constantly shifting flag words that initiated remote recording, the men and women who worked in the shadows, listening, tracing...

‘I was hoping you might remember me. You helped me out a while back in London. I was trapped. My leg was injured. You sent me a book, in hospital.’
Come on, Mac, think!

‘A book? I don’t–’ Then he stopped talking. Bryce could hear other voices in the background, men’s voices, laughter echoing in a large empty space. ‘Is that you, Prime–?’

‘Yes,’ Bryce confirmed, cutting Mac off. He closed his eyes briefly, the phone clamped to his chest, relief flooding through him. ‘Yes, it’s me. Contrary to popular belief, I’m still in reasonable shape.’

‘I don’t understand,’ Mac whispered. ‘I thought you were–’

‘Don’t speak. Just listen, let me talk for a moment, ok?’

In the background someone hammered away at something, the sound echoing down the line. Eventually Mac replied. ‘Sure.’

Bryce took a deep breath. ‘Good. Thank you.’ He cleared his throat. ‘The truth is, I’m in serious trouble. My life is in danger and I need your help. Before you ask, there’s no-one else, no-one I can trust. I can’t go into any detail, only that I need to disappear for a while.’ Bryce paused for a response, but all he could hear were voices in the background. ‘Hello?’

‘I’m still here.’

‘I’m sorry, I–’

‘Go on.’

Bryce shifted the phone to his other ear and reached into his pocket. ‘I have a plan, sort of. Right now I’m in a town called Alton. You know it?’

‘Yes.’

‘After I end this call I’m going to head south, towards the next town. It’s called Four Marks.’ He smoothed the carefully folded map out on his thigh. ‘There’s a bus stop to the south of the town, just after the dual carriageway ends. I’ll wait there for, well, I don’t know – until midnight. If I don’t see you before then, I’ll assume you’re not coming and move on. Sometime after that I’ll probably be dead. I don’t know how the story will break, but whatever it is it won’t be the truth, you can believe that. I’m not ill. There was never any stroke.’ Bryce paused for a moment. ‘That’s it, that’s all I can say right now, but I want you to know something. If you decide to have nothing to do with this, I will respect your decision and never contact you again. You have my word.’

Bryce sat in silence, his eyes closed, fingers pressed against his temple. He could hear the chatter in the background, the sounds of industry echoing around those distant walls. In the corridor, the toilet door creaked and slammed. A shadow lingered outside the frosted glass, then moved away. Bryce held his breath, the phone clamped to his ear.

‘Start walking,’ Mac said. ‘I’ll be there in two hours.’

The line went dead. Bryce sat quietly in the booth for several moments, his body shaking, using the cuff of his sweatshirt to wipe away the tears.