No Mercy (5 page)

'Thanks again,' Tweed called back.

It was bitterly cold, Siberian. Tweed saw Paula clapping
her gloved hands together. She was thanking heaven she was
wearing leather boots and her fur-lined overcoat. Michael was a silhouette ahead of her, striding out like a soldier,
keeping to the wide track.

Soon they had left Post Lacey behind. The loneliness of
the moor was sinister as the track climbed and climbed.

Paula looked all round as she strode briskly to keep up
with Michael. He never once looked back and she had the
impression he no longer cared whether they were with him
or not. By the light of the moon she saw that the track they
were following mounted steadily. Dartmoor seemed to incline from south to north. The wilderness on both sides
was covered with gorse and clumps of heather, partially draped in snow. Tweed caught up with her.

'I think the snow is melting,' she remarked. 'It doesn't
seem so Arctic now. I think the temperature went up.'

'My impression, too. No sigh of Volkanian's Abbey
Grange yet.'

'You think that's where Michael's making for?'

'Old Garner said it was at the end of this track.'

'You said Drago Volkanian was an Armenian. So,
according to Mrs Ashton, is that wretch Dr Saxon. Could there be a connection?'

'No idea. We're nearly coming to the end of the part of
Dartmoor I used to walk over with my wife when I was with
the Yard. I told you she'd run off with a millionaire, a Greek
shipping magnate. Time goes by.'

'Haven't you ever thought of divorcing her?' Paula asked
gently.

'Too much fuss. No idea where she is now. Haven't heard
of her for years. Originally they sailed off in one of the Greek's motor yachts to Buenos Aires. End of story.'

They crested a high ridge. Beyond, the track sloped down
before climbing again in the distance. Tweed pointed to their
right.

'There's a valley down there. Valleys are called combes,
old Devonian word.'

'Look, there's a snowman by the side of the track. And
Michael walked past it without a glance. I wouldn't have
thought children came as far as this.'

As they reached the large snowman Tweed flicked at the head with the walking stick. A large slab of snow fell from
the head, exposing a skull.

'Oh, my Lord!' Paula gasped, horrified.

The skull was attached to the neck. The ground trembled
under their feet. The skull appeared to sit up higher,
grinning at them. What increased its hideousness was that
on the right side sodden brown hair was clinging to it. Tweed took a torch from his pocket, beamed it on the
macabre sight.

Tweed tapped again at the figure, dislodging more snow
to reveal the torso. Frozen flesh clung to one side of the
breast, which struck Tweed as very odd. He leaned forward,
pursed his lips, then stood up.

'What is it?' asked Paula.

'Some instrument has been used to hack halfway through
to the spine. That's why the skull remained attached. It
needs a pathologist to confirm my impression. That means
it's . . .'

'Murder,' whispered Paula.

'I need to use your mobile phone urgently.'

'Here you are,' she said impatiently.

'We need a bright marker that can be seen from the air.'

Paula unwrapped her long red scarf, almost the size of a
flag. Tweed tucked the mobile in his pocket, spread the scarf
across the track, anchoring it with rocks he collected from
the' track's edge. He looked at Paula before pressing
numbers.

'I'm calling Buchanan. Getting him to fly down with a
team. You keep after Michael, otherwise we'll lose him. Are
you armed?' he asked suddenly. 'Yes. Of course you are.'

She withdrew her right hand from her shoulder bag. It was
gripping her .32 Browning she kept in a special pocket for
easy access. Returning the automatic to its pocket, she took
out a camera.

'One more thing to do. This horror may have collapsed by
the time Buchanan makes it here.'

She clicked the special non-flash camera invented by the
boffins in the basement of Park Crescent. Clicking it ten times, not liking what she saw through the viewfinder, she
returned the
camera to her shoulder bag as Tweed started
making the call. She hurried after Michael, now no more
than a tiny figure climbing a slope.

Before she caught up with him she checked the photos,
her pocket torch clenched between her teeth. One print
made her feel sick. She had placed a hand over one side so
she saw only the side of the head. The side where frozen
flesh fell over the skull with a glimpse of grinning teeth. She
slipped them back into an evidence envelope, took a deep
breath and began running after Michael.

The atmosphere of the moor seemed unnerving as snow
melted rapidly, revealing its menacing sweeps, which she felt
were closing in round her. Rocks appeared, jutting up like
dragons' teeth. It was almost a relief to have company when
she slowed to a swift walk ten yards or so behind Michael.
She knew he must have heard the thud of her approaching
feet. He never looked round once, continuing his erect
march like a soldier.

She looked back, saw Tweed approaching, running at
quite a pace. Separately and recently, both of them had
travelled down to the training mansion in remote Surrey. A
younger head of training called Nick had taken over from the
older Sarge, who had gone on holiday.

'I'm going to kill you,' he had yelled at her as his first
greeting.

He hadn't been joking. She'd been hauled out of bed at
seven, hustled along to the showers, allowed five minutes to
get dressed and permitted ten minutes for breakfast. With a fresh training outfit he'd led her out to the acres of training
area.

'You have one hour to complete the course with me on your heels all the way,' Nick had announced. 'Now run a mile and then keep moving on the obstacle course.'

It had been a diabolical experience but she'd returned to
Park Crescent feeling much fitter. The extraordinary sequel to this event was Tweed, travelling down a week later,
completing the same.

No wonder he was hurtling up behind her. She looked
down a steep slope, saw a wide stream at the bottom
crossed by a three-span bridge built of large stone slabs
perched on granite pillars. She paused as Tweed stood
beside her.

'What they call a clapper bridge,' he said. 'Constructed
ages ago of enormous granite blocks.'

Michael had walked swiftly across the bridge despite the
fact that the slabs looked slippery in the moonlight. It did
not fill her with confidence. She glanced to her right,
pointed.

'There's that aircraft again. It's still following us.'

'I told you this part of the world is full of that type of
plane.'

'Tweed!' she snapped. 'I'm sure I saw the same plane
cruising in the distance well before Exeter - and after we'd
left that place behind.' She gripped Tweed's arm. 'My God!
It's going to hit the huge rock perched on that ridge.'

They paused, standing very still.

'He's going to crash,' Paula whispered.

'Looks rather dicey,' Tweed agreed. 'I hope the pilot
isn't. . .'

The plane flew on, disappeared behind the massive rock. He had obviously seen it from his height. Paula walked on,
gazing at the clapper bridge. Don't like that, she was
thinking. Gritting her teeth, she walked on to the first slab.

She crossed the bridge, turned to watch Tweed, her heart in
her mouth. He crossed it calmly. He
talked as they followed
Michael, who had slowed down.

'Buchanan's flying down in a chopper with a technical team. He's bringing the pathologist Professor Saafeld with
him. Said there's something he forgot to give me, so he's bringing that too.'

'He's talking as though you're in charge of this case. And
now it's murder.'

'I'm becoming intrigued. And I suspect that's Abbey
Grange.'

He pointed into the near distance, where a final ridge was
silhouetted in the moonlight. Perched on top of it, Paula could vaguely make out a large, long, two-storey house
which was very old and had a mansard roof. Volkanian's
retreat. Tweed pointed to their right.

'Hook-Nose Tor. Eighteen hundred feet high. The view from the summit must be magnificent.'

Well,
you
can climb that, Paula said to herself. She didn't
like it. -Glancing round across the endless sweeps of
moorland, rolling, dipping, then rising again, she shivered
inwardly.

The further they went, the more Dartmoor seemed to
close round them. Nor could she get out of her mind the
skeleton, the photo of the poor man at the edge of the track.
She was pretty sure it was a man.

Abbey Grange was built of granite, probably using some
of the original monastery walls. Lights shone behind the
leaded panes. A wide flight of steps led up to a terrace, which ran the length of the Grange. From what she could
see, the mansion was well maintained and above them, at the
top of the steps, tubs stood on either side, each containing a trim evergreen shrub shaped like an exclamation mark.

Michael had run up the steps and was hammering an iron
ring on the massive front door. Tweed hurried after him,
Paula by his side. From below she had seen to the left of the
mansion the silhouette of a tall church bell tower. The
massive door opened inwards.

Framed against a blaze of lights from ancient wall lamps
inside stood the figure of a tall young man. He had neatly
brushed dark hair and was smiling. Paula liked the look of
him at first sight. The smile vanished and was replaced by a
look of astonishment.

'Michael,' he said, 'what the devil happened to you? Been
away over three months this time.'

6

Tweed stood stock still. He gazed intently into the spacious
hall with an oak-beamed ceiling and wall-to-wall fitted
carpet. Michael walked straight past the man who had
opened the door and headed for a wide straight staircase
with wooden steps which climbed up to a landing.

At the foot of the stairs Michael paused. He placed his right hand on the top of a wooden upright carved with a
man's head. After standing still for a short time he
marched up the
stairs, reached the top, turned right and
vanished. They heard the sound of a key turning in a lock,
the creak of a door opening, closing, being relocked. The
younger man - younger-looking than Michael — shrugged, smiled.