Rebus - Naughts And Crosses Part 12

'I can help you to remember, John.'

'How?'

'Like this.' Michael was holding, between thumb and forefinger, a silver coin. 'You remember what I told you, John. I take my patients back into past lives every day. It should be easy enough to take you back into your real past.'

112 4 It was John Rebus's turn to sit up. He shook away the whisky fumes.

'Come on then,' he said. 'What do I do?' But inside part of him was saying: you don't want this, you don't want to know.

He wanted to know.

Michael came over to his chair.

'Lie back in the chair. Get comfortable. Don't touch any more of.that whisky. But remember, not everyone is susceptible to hypnotism. Don't force yourself. Don't try too hard. If it's going to come, it'll come whether you will it or not. Just relax, John, relax.'

The doorbell rang.

'Ignore it,' said Rebus, but Michael had already left the room. There were voices in the hall, and when Michael reappeared he was followed into the room by Gill.

'The telephone caller, it seems,' said Michael.

'How are you, John?' Her face was angled into a portrait of concern.

'Fine, Gill. Listen, this is my brother Michael. The hypnotist. He's going to put me under-that's what you called it, wasn't it, Mickey?-to remove whatever block there might be in my memory. Maybe you should be ready to take some notes or something.'

Gill looked from one brother to the other, feeling a little out of things. An interesting pair of brothers. That's what Jim Stevens had said. She had been working for sixteen hours, and now this. But she smiled and shrugged her shoulders.

'Can a girl get a drink first?'

It was John Rebus's turn to smile. 'Help yourself,' he said. 'There's whisky or whisky and water or water. Come on, Mickey. Let's get on with this. Sammy's out there somewhere. There might still be time.'

Michael spread his legs a little, leaning down over Rebus. He seemed to be about to consume his brother, his eyes close to Rebus's eyes, his mouth working in a mirror-image. That's what it looked like to Gill, pouring whisky into a tumbler. Michael held up the coin, trying to find the angle of the room's single low-wattage bulb. Finally, the glint was reflected in John's retina, the pupils expanding and contracting. Michael "3 felt sure that his brother would be amenable. He certainly hoped so.

'Listen carefully, John. Listen to my voice. Watch the coin, John. Watch it s.h.i.+ne and spin. See it spinning. Can you see it spinning, John? Now relax, just listen to me. And watch the spin, watch it glow.'

For a moment it seemed that Rebus would not go under. Perhaps it was the familial tie that was making him immune to the voice, to its suggestive power. But then Michael saw the eyes change a little, imperceptibly to the uninitiated. But he was initiated. His father had taught him well. His brother was in the limbo world now, caught in the coin's light, transported to wherever Michael wanted him to go. Under his power. As ever, Michael felt a little s.h.i.+ver run through him: this was power, power total and irreducible. He could do anything with his patients, anything.

'Michael,' whispered Gill, 'ask him why he left the Army.'

Michael swallowed, lining his throat with saliva. Yes, that was a good question. One he had wanted to ask John himself.

'John?' he said. 'John? Why did you leave the Army, John? What happened, John? Why did you leave the Army? Tell us.'

And slowly, as though learning to use words strange or unknown to him, Rebus began to tell his story. Gill rushed to her bag for a pen and a notepad. Michael sipped his whisky.

They listened. x~xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxox~x o 0 x x o 0 x0 Part Four x0 x x o 0 x x o THECROSS 0 x x o 0 xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxox XXII.

I had been in the Parachute Regiment since the age of eighteen. But then I decided to try for the Special Air Service. Why did I do that? Why will any soldier take a cut in pay to join the SAS? I can't answer that. All I know now is that I found myself in Herefords.h.i.+re, at the SAS's training camp. I called it The Cross because I'd been told that they would try to crucify me, and there, along with the other volunteers, I went through h.e.l.l, marching, training, testing, pus.h.i.+ng. They took us to the breaking point. They taught us to be lethal.

At that time there were rumours of an imminent civil war in Ulster, of the SAS being used to root out insurrectionists. The day came for us to be badged. We were given new berets and cap-badges. We were in the SAS. But there was more. Gordon Reeve and myself were called into the Boss's office and told that we had been judged the two best trainees of the batch. There was a two-year training period in front of us before we could become regulars, but great things were predicted for us.

Later, Reeve spoke to me as we left the building.

'Listen,' he said, 'I've heard a few of the rumours. I've heard the officers talking. They've got plans for us, Johnny. Plans. Mark my words.'

Weeks later, we were put on a survival course, hunted by other regiments, who if they captured us would stop at nothing to prise from us information about our mission. We had to trap and hunt our food, lying low and travelling across bleak moorland by night. We seemed destined to go through these tests together, though on this occasion we were working with two others.

'They've got something special lined up for us,' Reeve kept saying. 'I can feel it in my bones.'

I's Lying in our bivouac, we had just slipped into our sleeping- bags for a two-hour nap when our guard put his nose into the shelter.

'I don't know how to tell you this,' he said, and then there were lights and guns everywhere, and we were half-beaten into unconsciousness as the shelter was ripped open. Foreign tongues clacked at us, their faces masked behind the torches. A rifle-b.u.t.t to the kidneys told me that this was for real. For real.

The cell into which I was thrown was real enough, too. The cell into which I was thrown was smeared with blood, faeces, and other things. It contained a stinking mattress and a c.o.c.k- roach. That was all. I lay down on the damp mattress and tried to sleep, for I knew that sleep would be the first thing to be stripped from us all.

The bright lights of the cell came on suddenly and stayed on, burning into my skull. Then the noises started, noises of a beating and a questioning taking place in the cell next to me.

'Leave him alone, you b.a.s.t.a.r.ds! I'll tear your f.u.c.king heads off!'

I slammed at the wall with fists and boots, and the noises stopped. A cell door slammed shut, a body was dragged past my metal door, there was silence. I knew my time would come.

I waited there, waited for hours and days, hungry, thirsty, and every time I closed my eyes a sound like that of a blaring radio caught between stations would sound from the walls and the ceiling. I lay with my hands over my ears.

f.u.c.k you, f.u.c.k you, f.u.c.k you.

I was supposed to crack now, and if I cracked I would have failed everything, all the months of training. So I sang tunes loudly to myself. I sc.r.a.ped my nails across the walls of the cell, walls wet with fungus, and scratched my name there as an anagram: BRUSE. I played games in my head, thought up crossword-puzzle clues and little linguistic tricks. I turned survival into a game. A game, a game, a game. I had to keep reminding myself that, no matter how bad things seemed to be getting, this was all a game.

And I thought of Reeve, who had warned me of this. Big plans indeed. Reeve was the nearest thing I had to a friend in the unit. I wondered if it had been his body dragged across,the floor outside my cell. I prayed for him.

Lying in our bivouac, we had just slipped into our sleeping- bags for a two-hour nap when our guard put his nose into the shelter.

'I don't know how to tell you this,' he said, and then there were lights and guns everywhere, and we were half-beaten into unconsciousness as the shelter was ripped open. Foreign tongues clacked at us, their faces masked behind the torches. A rifle-b.u.t.t to the kidneys told me that this was for real. For real.

The cell into which I was thrown was real enough, too. The cell into which I was thrown was smeared with blood, faeces, and other things. It contained a stinking mattress and a c.o.c.kroach. That was all. I lay down on the damp mattress and tried to sleep, for I knew that sleep would be the first thing to be stripped from us all.

The bright lights of the cell came on suddenly and stayed on, burning into my skull. Then the noises started, noises of a beating and a questioning taking place in the cell next to me.

'Leave him alone, you b.a.s.t.a.r.ds! I'll tear your f.u.c.king heads off!'

I slammed at the wall with fists and boots, and the noises stopped. A cell door slammed shut, a body was dragged past my metal door, there was silence. I knew my time would come.

I waited there, waited for hours and days, hungry, thirsty, and every time I closed my eyes a sound like that of a blaring radio caught between stations would sound from the walls and the ceiling. I lay with my hands over my ears.

f.u.c.k you, f.u.c.k you, f.u.c.k you.

I was supposed to crack now, and if I cracked I would have failed everything, all the months of training. So I sang tunes loudly to myself. I sc.r.a.ped my nails across the walls of the cell, walls wet with fungus, and scratched my name there as an anagram: BRUSE. I played games in my head, thought up crossword-puzzle clues and little linguistic tricks. I turned survival into a game. A game, a game, a game. I had to keep reminding myself that, no matter how bad things seemed to be getting, this was all a game.

And I thought of Reeve, who had warned me of this. Big plans indeed. Reeve was the nearest thing I had to a friend in the unit. I wondered if it had been his body dragged across the floor outside my cell. I prayed for him.

ii6 And one day they sent me food and a mug of brown water. The food looked as though it had been scooped straight from the mud-crawl and pushed through the little hole which had suddenly appeared in my door and just as suddenly vanished. I willed this cold swill into becoming a steak with two veg, and then placed a spoonful of it in my mouth. Immediately, I spat it out again. The water tasted of iron. I made a show of wiping my chin on my sleeve. I felt sure I was being watched.

'My compliments to the chef,' I called.

Next thing I knew, I was falling over into sleep.

I was in the air. There could be no doubt of that. I was in a helicopter, the air blowing into my face. I came round slowly, and opened my eyes on darkness. My head was in some kind of sack, and my arms were tied behind my back. I felt the helicopter swoop and rise and swoop again.

'Awake are you?' A b.u.t.t prodded me.

'Yes.'

'Good. Now give me the name of your Tegiment and the details of your mission. We're not going to f.u.c.k around with you, sonny. So you better do it now.'

'Get stuffed.'

'I hope you can swim, sonny. I hope you get the chance to swim. We're about two-hundred feet above the Irish Sea, and we're about to push you out of this f.u.c.king chopper with your hands still tied. You'll hit that water as though it was f.u.c.king concrete, do you know that? It may kill you or it may stun you. The fish will eat you alive, sonny. And your corpse will never be found, flot out here. Do you understand what I'm saying?'

It was an official and businesslike voice.

'Yes.'

'Good. Now, the name of your regiment, and the details of your mission.'

'Get stuffed.' I tried to sound calm. I'd be another accident statistic, killed on training, no questions asked. I'd hit that sea like a light-bulb hitting a wall.

'Get stuffed,' I said again, intoning to myself: it's only a game, it's only a game.

'This isn't a game, you know. Not anymore. Your friends have already spilled their guts, Rebus. One of them, Reeve I "7 think it was, spilled his guts quite literally. Okay, men, give him the heave.'

'Wait 'Enjoy your swim, Rebus.'

Hands gripped my legs and torso. In the darkness of the sack, with the wind blowing fiercely against me, I began to feel that it had all been a grave mistake.

'Wait I could feel myself hanging in s.p.a.ce, two-hundred feet up above the sea, with the gulls shrieking for me to be let go.

'Wait!'

'Yes, Rebus?'

'Take the f.u.c.king sack off my head at least!' I was shrieking now, desperate.

'Let the b.a.s.t.a.r.d drop.'

And with that they let me go. I hung in the air for a second, then I dropped, dropped like a brick. I was falling through s.p.a.ce, trussed up like a Christmas turkey. I screamed for one second, maybe two, and then I hit the ground.

I hit solid ground.

And lay there while the helicopter landed. People were laughing all around me. The foreign voices were back. They lifted me up and dragged me along to the cell. I was glad of the sack over my head. It disguised the fact that I was crying. Inside I was a ma.s.s of quivering coils, tiny serpents of fear and adrenalin and relief which bounced through my liver, my lungs, my heart.

The door slammed behind me. Then I heard a shuffling sound at my back. Hands fumbled at the knots of my bonds. With the hood off, it took me a few seconds to regain my sight.

I stared into a face that seemed to be my own. Another twist to the game. Then I recognised Gordon Reeve, at the same time as he recognised me.

'Rebus?' he said. 'They told me you'd. .

'They told me the same thing about you. How are you?'

'Fine, fine. Jesus, though, I'm glad to see you.'

We hugged one another, feeling the other's weakened but still human embrace, the smells of suffering and of endurance. There were tears in his eyes.

ii8 'It is you,' he said. 'I'm not dreaming.'

'Let's sit down,' I said. 'My legs aren't too steady.'

What I meant was that his legs weren't too steady. He was leaning into me as if I were a crutch. He sat down thankfully.

'How has it been?' I asked.

'I kept in shape for a while.' He slapped one of his legs. 'Doing push-ups and stuff. But I soon grew too tired. They've tried feeding me with hallucinogens. I keep seeing things when I'm awake.'

'They've tried me with knockout drops.'

'Those drugs, they're something else. Then there's the power-hose. I get sprayed about once a day I suppose. Freezing cold. Can never seem to get dry.'

'How long do you suppose we've been here?' Did I look as bad to him as he looked to me? I hoped not. He hadn't mentioned the chopper drop. I decided to keep quiet about that one.

'Too long,' he was saying. 'This is f.u.c.king ridiculous.'

'You were always saying that they had soinething special in store for us. I didn't believe you, G.o.d forgive me.'

'This wasn't exactly what I had in mind.'

'It is us they're interested in though.'

'What do you mean?'

It had been only half a thought until now, but now I was sure.

'Well, when our sentry put his nose into the tent that night, there was no surprise in his eyes, and even less fear. I think they were both in on it from the start.'

'So what's this all about?'

I l6oked at him, sitting with his chin on his knees. We were frail creatures on the outside. Piles biting like the hungered jaws of vampire bats, mouths aching with sores and ulcers. Hair falling out, teeth loose. But there was strength in numbers. And that was what I could not understand: why had they put us together when, apart, we were both on the edge of breaking?

'So what's this all about?'

Perhaps they were trying to lull us into a false sense of security before really tightening the screws. The worst is not, so long as we can say 'this is the worst'. Shakespeare, King Lear. I wouldn't have known that at the time, but I know it now. Let it stand.