Chapter Eighteen
Although he woke well before dawn Teller felt fresh and alert, and the adrenalin racing through his body sent messages resulting in a tingling sensation. It was a pleasant feeling except the muscles in his legs also reacted by trembling, on occasion uncontrolled almost, which resembled the slight visible affliction of a degenerative disease. He had to tense and grasp his thighs with strong fingers to quell the urgency.
As it subsided he lay on the top of the bed while the air-conditioning silently broke in waves over his body and the downpour outside drummed like the whir of a fan. The recycled air in the room was dry, too dry. And he wished he could switch the artificial acclimatiser off. Already he had rotated the control to the low position and flicked the adjacent switch off but there was no change and light breeze from the vents in the ceiling continued.
He had always hated air-conditioning that could not be turned off. Hotel rooms soon became health hazards for him. The first sign was in his nose which became arid and itchy. Then his eyes became gritty which was a prelude to a persistent dry cough and rasping throat. It happened every time. Within forty-eight hours of staying in a hotel room he caught an unpleasant cold. He had read somewhere that there were only one hundred or so cold viruses and that they attacked only once each in a lifetime. If that was so he was a suitable subject for test tube examination. Certainly he had temporarily resided in more than that number of hotels over the years of his travelling and invariably they had provided him with the itch, cough and throat tickle that soon culminated in a full blown bout of sneezing and nasal embarrassment.
Oddly enough though, he could romp freely in a storm in any climate and escape with little more than a drenching. As a lad he had done that often on a friend’s farm. He had come down with ringworms in the hair but never a cold. Put him in a luxury hotel room however, and with every warm dry modern convenience and a dreadful virus would strike without mercy. So far he had warned off the attack so maybe the medical experts were right. There might after all be a finite number of cold viruses and he just might have caught them all. Suddenly he sneezed. Then again, maybe not.
Teller pushed himself off the bed and moved to the bathroom. He shaved slowly and then stood in the bath while the hot water pummelled his body and the steam fogged the mirror. His muscles relaxed, his head cleared. He snapped off the water and brushed the droplets from his skin, noting his stomach was flat and there was a co-ordinated response from his calves to his shoulders as he stepped onto the beige mat and began briskly drying himself. He again went over his plan of action for the morning, running the stages through his mind and pausing to question each before moving to the next. He could not afford to make a mistake.
*
Brigit was standing by the side of the road, part of an excited expectant crowd. Hundreds, or thousands, of people had gathered to watch the procession and they had dressed for the occasion.
The men all seemed to be wearing mourning suits and outsized top hats. The women were resplendent in period gowns, colourful but shapeless and out of place. Many had brought their children who had also been painstakingly dressed in their best. Her own mother stood silent, unmoving as she stared into the distance, her head craning to see over and past those pressing beside her. Between them was her brother, nearly six years her elder. He was smiling at the lines of people on the opposite side of the road and occasionally jostling with those who pushed from behind.
The noise was already painful to her ears but as she observed the wildly gesticulating throng it seemed suddenly to rise in a crescendo and she leaned forward to peer down the highway in the direction the shouts were being aimed. Coming towards them was a prancing grey horse, its forelegs high kicking and its maned head thrust high and snorting defiantly. As it brought each hoof down onto the cobbles it clacked and signalled a shower of flowers and a roaring cheer from the onlookers. All there was was the beautiful performing beast dancing its way through the weaving hoards of watchers, but as it neared Brigit could see the garlands were not hurled at the horse but at the rider.
He was attired completely in white and seemed to be part of the animal rather than an addition to it. He sat erect, his back straight as a rod, his boots fixed into the stirrups and his knees hugging the rippling flanks of the beast beneath him.
The roar rose and Brigit looked at her mother. She was still silent but her cheeks were pink, glistening from the tears that rolled down them. There was a radiance in her face. Her brother ignored the passing procession and continued to watch the crowds, his broad smile beaming. Brigit turned to look at the horse and the man. The animal’s head nodded sharply and a cloud of moisture shot out from its nostrils. Its hoofs clacked on the stones. The rider was striking in his white regalia, glued to the shiny leather saddle which was also white. His legs were strong, the hands firm in their control of the reins, the back ramrod straight, the shoulders broad and at perfect right angles to his torso.
Brigit lifted her gaze and started in horror. The horse turned its head to her and the huge watery eyes glared with fire. Its front legs struck the road surface with a thunderous whack and Brigit shrieked as the rider dressed in white turned towards her and she saw he was without a head.
Brigit went on screaming until the Chinese man sprang across the dark room and clamped his hand over her mouth.
“Quiet,” he hissed, then as she continued her muffled scream, “Enough. Be quiet. What’s wrong with you?”
Brigit ceased her screaming as suddenly as she had started and sat awkwardly, her hands behind her back and her streaming eyes wide as she started at her captor. Then she bent her head and was racked with sobs.
She slumped to the floor and pulled herself as best she could into a foetal position as the man repeated: “No noise. Be quiet.” He stood up. “No-one can hear you,” he said sternly. “There’s no-one here. And with that rain and wind they wouldn’t hear you anyway.”
The Catskinner looked away from her to the doorway of the building. The old wooden door was being blown in and out, slamming against the doorframe, the useless rusty bolt at the bottom rattling against the concrete floor. He turned back to Brigit lying huddled, crying silently at his feet. Without another word he returned to the corner where he squatted and listened to the beating rain and the flapping door.
*
Hong Kong slept at this hour.
The rural areas of the New Territories did not stir as the downpour swept across the fields and filled irrigation troughs to overflowing. Low crops wilted under the onslaught and trees swayed in the wind, smaller branches cracking, tearing loose and spearing to the ground.
In the suburbs and inner city every building was grey, giant drab monoliths withstanding the storm but shedding the attractions they held in sunlight. Victoria Peak on the island was invisible to the mainland, and from the island only the outline of the Ocean Terminal and the Star Ferry piers sticking into the flattened harbour water like two floating pontoons, could be seen. The sky too was a ghostly grey which had unfolded a waving silver shroud over the territory.
The rain had begun around midnight, fierce and unpredicted. For five hours it pelted down accompanied by strong north-easterly winds which drove the sterns of waiting cargo ships away from the Kowloon coastline. Between five and seven o’clock the storm had eased slightly and when workers emerged onto the streets they found them littered and the gutters choked. In some of the low lying areas flooding had occurred and residents in squatter areas were already sweeping out the muddy smelly waters. Taxis and buses swished and squelched their way along the black road surfaces and lights began to appear behind windows, returning the drenched city to life. By eight o’clock the wind had dropped altogether and the driving rain had settled into an annoying constant drizzle.
Jason Teller would normally have felt depressed looking at the bleak world outside, the unyielding low clouds, the monotonous rain, the somehow dirty cloak that wrapped itself around everything. Only when it cleared would the crisp sparkle and cleanliness return. This morning though he welcomed the inclement weather and he was impatient to plunge into it.
So for the last three hours he had busied himself with his preparations. He had dressed in a brown corduroy slacks and brown T-shirt over which he wore a fawn windcheater. Like the scene on the other side of his room window he looked dull, flat. Shoved down into trousers was the unsheathed kukri, snug against his thigh with the handle angled but hidden by the windcheater zipped right around his hips. He had tried a number of ways of concealing the Ghurkha knife, watching himself in the mirror as he walked around the room, until finally choosing the method he now did. Inside the inner breast pocket of the jacket were six .38 calibre bullets wrapped in a handkerchief to prevent their rattling or more importantly jogging loose.
Another six were in the chamber of the revolver which Teller had toyed with almost constantly. It felt alien to him at first but gradually it had become more familiar with handling, and he now could feel the warmth of the handgrip, and a confidence in the power and danger he possessed. He checked the magazine again and thrust the hand with the gun into his jacket pocket. It was not bulky enough to draw curious looks. Picking up the room key from the dressing table he let himself into the corridor and along to the lift lobby. He shared the lift to the ground floor with a talkative American woman and her agreeable companion and four unsmiling Japanese who had probably come to Hong Kong to escape the damp September and October weather in their homeland. Teller felt momentary pity for them but he did not wish for sunshine for their sake. For his own sake he hoped the uninviting rain and cloud cover would persist a while longer.
Dropping his room key into the brass slot at the reception desk he strode to the hotel entrance where a dozen vehicles fought with pedestrians for the limited road space. A pinstriped suit, a hand clutching an overcoat and a briefcase, leapt from a taxi by the curb and before anyone else reacted Teller ducked in and pulled the door closed behind him.
The driver moved off before he knew the destination. At the bottom of Canton Road where the traffic lights beamed red, Teller handed him a piece of paper with the address written on it in Chinese characters. The driver nodded, passed the slip back over his shoulder and inserted a new cassette into the dashboard of the diesel powered Datsun Bluebird. As the voice of local pop idol Roman Tam burst into the cabin, the driver spun the wheels and spurted into Salisbury Road anxious to drop his fare in the New Territories as quickly as possible so he could return to the busy short hires of Tsimshatsui.
The ride away from the high-rises was quicker than Teller would have wished. Despite his eagerness to carry out his plan there was a natural human reluctance made more anxious by the sweeping splashes of rain on the windows of the sedan which seemed to presage an ill omen. Buildings and people appeared and passed out of sight quickly as indistinct flashes of unreality. The interior of the car with the loud music booming from the front was real but the world outside was like a film played fast forward.
Ninety minutes later Teller recognised the Outward Bound School sign as the taxi slowed to take the corner and head off the main road into the hills. He leaned forward and asked: “How much further?”
The driver slowed even more. “Ah?”
“How much longer?” repeated Teller stabbing a finger at the piece of paper with the address on it. “Long way?”
“Not far,” the driver answered. “Three kilometres.”
“OK,” Teller instructed. “Keep going. Go past and I will tell you when to stop.”
The taxi picked up speed until it approached a concrete weir on the road. “Here. You want stop here?”
“No,” Teller ordered. “Check hoi.”
A further five hundred meters straight ahead he called out: “Ni do. Ting che hai ni do, m’goi.”
The taxi pulled off the side of the bitumen and the driver flipped up the red meter disc. Teller paid him off and stepped out. As the silver and red sedan did a U turn and sped back down the road Teller hunched his shoulders and began the walk back to the dip in the road where the village was set off to the side. His hand gripped the gun in his pocket and the knife down the side of his trousers pricked his leg but he ignored it. The road was fringed on both sides by thick scrub which extended a good distance to the foot of hills which rose perhaps two hundred meters. Behind them higher peaks could just be discerned.
The road was almost a boundary for one of the twenty-one country parks that had been designated throughout the territory. Hong Kong is one of the most densely populated communities in the world, but what is not generally recognised is that forty per cent of its eleven hundred square kilometres of land area is country park. The verdant unspoiled parkland protects a host of mammals, reptiles and birds, though few larger animals.
Literally hundreds of thousands of residents launch themselves on the reserves on weekends and public holidays and it is remarkable that despite their fires which ravage so much each year through carelessness, the growth is so thick and green. Too frequently groups of hikers are lost in the wilderness and have to be airlifted off hilltops by helicopters after severe exposure to the elements.
During his many years in Hong Kong Teller had not once ventured into the bush with a pack on his back. The nearest he had come was a picnic by a rock pool easily accessible by car. He now studied the terrain with care. His actions he hoped would necessitate his going no further into the scrub than the village which was hidden by the roadside bush, but which he guessed to be no more than a hundred meters or so.
He had to stand on the edge of the weir before he could see the huts and the incongruous pink church at the end of the narrow dirt track that led off to his right. Through the drizzle he counted the low structures as he watched for any movement. There was none. He waited another two minutes and then gingerly stepped down to the verge of the still stream and carefully made his way twenty meters into the bushes where they began to thin out. Again he halted and watched. A further twenty-five meters the scrub cleared and he waded knee deep across the pebble strewn bed of the stream to the other side where the cover was thicker. He crouched behind a clump of thorny bushes and wiped the water from his brow. He was soaked and his windcheater clung to him, his trousers pinching his crotch uncomfortably. The point of the large knife cut into the material. Pulling it free he gripped it is his left hand as he stood and pressed on further up the side of the stream.
Another twenty meters and he stopped a third time checking the terrain and the layout of the settlement. The twelve huts were in rows on either side of a concrete courtyard. Nearest him were four terraced with a gap and then two more. Opposite were six more in the same configuration and abutting the furthest two was the church, Beyond that he could see nothing. Everything appeared shut and the entire village uninhabited. There was a stillness about it, lifeless, rejected, abandoned. Teller grew concerned that he had been mistaken and had wasted valuable time. Possibly much more.
Out of the corner of his eyes he caught sight of movement and he dropped to the soggy ground. As he peered through the foliage a yellow dog stood up in the doorway of one of the huts and sniffed the air. It twitched its ears and flicked his tail and sauntered slowly into the square where it stood again sniffing in jerky movements. Then it turned its head to the far end of the compound and bounded out of sight, hopping rather than running as it hitched an injured back leg off the ground. Teller waited until he was sure the dog had not sensed him and then stood and readied to head further into the bushes behind the nearest row of huts.
But after a step he stopped suddenly and dropped again to the ground. Something was wrong. Something was missing. Laying the kukri on the grass he tugged the piece of paper from his pocket and studied it closely. He could not read all the characters but he had learned to write the numbers one to ninety-nine so he could recognise two figures written. The first was the address of the village and the second was the house or hut number thirteen. But he had counted only twelve structures and the church and he doubted the church had been allocated an official number. Carefully he counted the buildings once more to make sure he had not been mistaken. He craned to see if he had overlooked anything and satisfied himself he had not. The possibility, looking as a probability, was that he was wasting his time, that he had indeed made some mistake.
However, he had come this far and he would continue his checking until he had examined the whole immediate area. If that proved fruitless he would start over again. If he had the time. If Brigit had any time left.
His head throbbed at the thought and he began to move quickly through the scrub behind the buildings. Where the stream coursed to the north away from the settlement he paused. He knelt in the grass concealed by the trunk of a tree and listened. He could hear the low growls of the dog, or two dogs, not far to his right and he supposed they were just on the other side of the end of the two huts.
Crawling up the bank, avoiding fallen branches which might crack loudly he came to a cleared border about a meter and a half wide. He paused, then stepped briskly across and flattened his back against the wall of one of the houses, the knife dangling by his side, the other hand gripping the gun in the pocket of his jacket. The growls continued, low but not urgent.
Between the first four huts and the last two in the row there was a gap of two meters which opened onto the concrete square at the front of the houses. Once there, he would be able to see clearly the compound and anything that he may have missed from the angled distance where he was ten minutes before. Teller stepped sideways through the space and slowly peered around the corner. Two dogs, one the lame yellow one he had seen earlier, were rolling around on the concrete in a playful fight. Quietly he pulled back. Returning to the rear of the buildings he crept along to the end of the last hut and stopped. Without warning there was an uproar as a tumultuous barking clamour erupted and the yellow dog raced into the bushes a few meters from him. As it did so, it caught sight of him and in wheeling to face him it toppled over on to its side. Teller thrust his fist holding the knife into the air and gave a shout, at the same time jumping into the open past the house.
He spun to face the other dog he reckoned was behind him ready to slash with the kukri if necessary, but stopped with the shout still in his throat.
Fifteen meters from him walking past the corner of the church and looking directly at him was the Catskinner. As their eyes met the killer froze. He shot a glance back the way he had come but before he could move Teller leapt forward two steps, unconsciously but effectively cutting off his retreat. The Catskinner hesitated. He looked at the brandished weapon in Teller’s upraised hand and then dived into the gap between the huts on the opposite side of the open square. Teller instinctively sprinted after him.
As the Catskinner disappeared Teller tightened his grip on the revolver and followed him between the houses. Halfway through the gap he stopped and edged his way along carefully. At the end where the scrub on the surrounding hillside brushed almost flush with the buildings he peered around the corner. There was nobody. The killer could have fled towards the main road or around the back of the church where an extension protruded with the one window he could make out boarded up.
Teller retraced his steps to the open square. The two dogs had been joined by three more smaller ones, all of them barking furiously. He waved his arms and the animals backed away but continued their ear shattering noise. Cautiously, with the revolver and the knife held straight in front of him, he moved to the corner of the church and looked around.
The Catskinner was standing in the doorway of the low structure at the rear. His left arm was around the shoulders of Brigit whose hands were behind her back and her ankles bound. The handkerchief was stretched across her mouth and the killer had a small curved blade pressed against her throat, the pale flesh bared as she tilted her head backwards.
“That’s far enough,” called the killer. “You will drop those or I will have no hesitation in killing Miss Rolanne.”
Teller did not move.
“Do not be stupid Mr Teller,” hissed the Chinese. “You know I will do it.”
Teller’s hands trembled and anger and hatred and fear boiled up in him, but when he noticed the trickle of dark liquid appear on Brigit’s throat and the tears spill onto her cheeks as she screwed her eyes shut, his fingers relaxed and the knife and the revolver fell to the concrete with a clatter.
“Alright! Alright!” he shouted and reached forward. “Please. Don’t hurt her.” For what seemed an age the killer held Brigit with the blade across her exposed and terribly vulnerable throat. A single stroke and the aorta would be severed and she would choke on her own blood and die an agonising death. Then the blade was lifted and she opened her eyes and her head sagged forward onto her chest.
“You are very sensible Mr Teller” the Catskinner said calmly. “Believe me, I would have killed her. You would have been responsible.”
“You bastard,” Teller croaked. He glared at the man. “Hurt her and I promise you I will tear you apart. It’s me you want. Let her go.”
A grin creased the man’s face and he drew his hand slowly under Brigit’s chin and stared at the blood smeared thumb. “You continue to amaze me. Here we are. I have your lover an inch from death – see how the blood is a bright healthy red – in a second I can end her life. And you threaten me.” He glared across the space at Teller. “Do not threaten me. I do not like being threatened.”
“Let her go,” Teller repeated.
“First Mr Teller I think we should be sensible about this. You move to that tree over there. Then I will release Miss Rolanne. Of course, you will leave the gun and the knife where they are. Now move.”
He had no alternative. Teller strode across to the tree on the rim of the bush-land at the very edge of the compound perimeter. He stood with clenched fists as the Catskinner slashed the ankle bonds on Brigit and with her still in his grip they crab walked to where the weapons lay. He bent and picked up the gun. He put his own knife in the pocket of his trousers and picked up the kukri, hefting it in his hand.
“Please Miss Rolanne,” he said, “you will also move away,” and he took a step back. Brigit stumbled across the square where Teller caught her in his arms. He held her close without saying a word, and then he gently removed the handkerchief and untied her hands. He tossed the gag to one side and using his own handkerchief dabbed the blood from the small nick in her throat. “It’s OK,” he soothed. “It’s not serious. Are you alright? Did he do anything….did he hurt you?”
“No,” she answered. “I’ve been tied up for days but he didn’t do anything to harm me.” She looked back at her captor. “He’s been the perfect gentleman murderer.” Brigit averted her gaze and went on in a whisper. “Jason, he’s going to kill us. I know it.”
“Shh,” was all he said before the Catskinner spoke.
“Now,” he ordered sharply. “You will both come over here and we’ll go inside out of this rain. We don’t want to die of pneumonia do we?”
Teller sneered. “Very funny. That would ruin the pleasure of your murdering us yourself I suppose.”
The Chinese stepped to the side and motioned them towards the dark interior of the hut with the barrel of the revolver.
Teller kissed Brigit lightly on the lips and putting his arm around her shoulder said: “Don’t be frightened. Just do exactly as I say.” Together they walked towards the church extension.
When they were a few meters from the man and the doorway one of the dogs that had continued barking made a lunge. The Catskinner glanced towards it and Teller lashed out with his left leg. The kick was an upward manoeuvre that caught the man’s wrist. The force of the snap kick sent the gun flying and it bounced across the concrete towards the startled animals.
“Run,” shouted Teller and pushed Brigit towards the bushy hillside. He wheeled to face the killer but he was running towards the revolver. The three legged yellow dog tried to get out of his way but again toppled onto its side. As it struggled to stand, it snarled and in self defence buried its teeth into the killer’s calf. He let out a scream and tried to shake the terrified animal free. Then Teller watched the Catskinner raise the kukri over his head and bring it down in a hacking curve. As blood spurted from the dog’s almost severed neck, he turned and ran after Brigit.
Grabbing her roughly by the hand he tugged her behind him and plunged into the scrub. There was a nearly hidden path and they crashed their way through the vines and branches, Teller shouldering his way with his head down.
The thick growth stung their faces and Brigit winced and cried out but heeded Teller’s urgent warning: “Run. Run for your life.”
They raced on, welts rising on their cheeks and forearms, until they came to a small clearing where three paths led in different directions. Without thinking Teller dived to his left and puller Brigit behind him up the path which steadily climbed the hill in a random zigzagging fashion.
“Jason….” she exclaimed.
“Don’t talk,” he snapped. “Keep running as fast as you can. Don’t look back. Just run.”
They could not hear if the killer was following or if he had taken one of the other two paths. And even if he had they had no way of knowing whether all three again met further up the hillside, or if the wooded area would clear and their own position be clearly observed. All they did know was they had to keep running if they wanted to stay alive.
Soon Teller had to release Brigit’s hand to scramble his way through the bushes and prevent himself slipping on the wet and rutted clay path. Many times she lost her footing and had difficulty keeping up, so they reversed positions and Teller tried pushing her from behind. Fifty meters along the path they came to another fork and again they chose the left, this time in the belief, or with the hope that it would take them further away from the others they had passed earlier. They pressed on, battering the branches out of their way, Brigit accepting the worst of it for the sake of haste until she had to stop.
“I can’t,” she gasped. Sinking to her knees, her hands limp in her lap and with sweat, rain and tears of frustration mingling in rivulets running down her cheeks, she sobbed. “I can’t go on. Jason please. Please.”
“No,” he said firmly. “We must keep going. I don’t know where he is. We can’t rest yet.” He grasped her shoulders to lift her but she was a dead weight.
“Please Jason,” she pleaded. “Five minutes. Please.”
He let her arms drop. “Alright. But two minutes. No more. We have to keep moving. If he catches us he’ll kill us.”
He sank down beside her and all sounds were blotted out by their exhausted breathing and the heavy silence of the saturated bush. He tried listening for the cracking of branches or the dull disturbance of rocks but there was nothing. Behind them was the scarred path, easy to follow signs of their mad flight, and the dripping leaves and vines which had closed behind them leaving only a tunnel through which was visible no more than ten meters of covered hillside.
Teller strained his ears and a host of bush sounds interrupted the close beating of his own heart and their joint sharp breaths. “Brigit,” he insisted. “We have to go on. We have to get further away. If we stay here we’re dead. We must keep moving. It’s our only chance.
“You go first,” she begged. “I can’t. Please. I’ll follow.”
He pushed himself up into a crouch and began crawling. Behind him Brigit did the same and they slowly made their way up the hillside. Another forty meters on the terrain levelled out as the path veered away to the left and they were able to stand and stumble ahead as the scrub gave way to woods. Suddenly they found themselves in a cleared picnic area where there were two barbecue pits and half a dozen log benches. A carved sign in Chinese indicated two directions which pointed to destinations which meant nothing to either Brigit or Teller, though the information they were somewhere on the Maclehose Trail in the Sai Kung Country Park was at least familiar. Teller reached out to take Brigit’s arm. As he did there was a crack and a thunk sound a few paces in front of them. Teller jerked his head in the direction of the crack, to his right. Standing chest high in bushes about fifty meters away was the killer pointing the gun at them.
“Down,” he screamed and pushed her backwards so that she fell awkwardly to the ground. “It’s him,” he said. “Over that way. He’s shooting at us. Keep your head down and crawl ahead to where the clearing ends,” and he pushed her ahead of him. Another shot rang out and Brigit exclaimed: “God, oh my god. What are we going to do?”
“Just go. Quick…now run.” They stood and as they again disappeared into the thick bush Teller saw the Catskinner trying to fight his way through the tangled growth to the cleared area. In a moment he would be swallowed by the scrub, unsighted.
“This way,” he called and took a narrow rocky opening slightly to the right side of the more obviously used main track leading straight ahead. Brigit mentally quizzed the decision but said nothing and followed as fast as she could. The path ran parallel with a trickling stream of water and was more the rocky fringe of the waterway than an actual path. But it was reasonably clear and easy going.