Prisoner of Fire (13 page)

“Damnably clear.” Roland’s voice was rising, though he tried desperately to remain calm. “What is the scenario? Unknown lovers die in suicide pact—or will you burn the house afterwards and create a temporary local mystery?”

Vanessa had finished dressing. She came to Roland. He held her close, stroked her hair.

“There are several possible scenarios, as you are
pleased to call them, Dr. Badel. But let us talk.”

Roland could not contain his anger. “Is that your private kick, man? Have you sunk so low that you need to see your victims squirm?”

Ingram sighed. It should have been so easy. But it was not going as planned. If only he had burst into the room and killed without thinking. It was a fatal mistake to think too much. He was getting old.

“Tell him, Vanessa. This time I will open to you. Tell him what you find.”

Vanessa closed her eyes momentarily. Then she turned to Roland Badel. “He found us—or you—through my mother. She has been in rapport with me. She had an image of a man with a disfigured face. He had decided to kill my mother and her husband after he had killed me. But now he is not sure what to do. He—he wants to avoid the killing, if he can.”

“Why?” Roland could not understand it.

Vanessa shot a questioning glance at Denzil Ingram.

“Tell him!”

“He saw me on the bed, defenceless. He saw me as a child. It reminded him of his own childhood… He—he, too, was put into a state home because he was unwanted. He had to fight very hard to make his way in the world.”

Denzil Ingram said: “Well, Dr. Badel, are you satisfied? I said that I wanted you to understand my position before we talked. I also said that I was not trying to raise any hope. Now, shall we talk or shall I carry out my task as efficiently and painlessly as possible?”

Somehow, Vanessa had suddenly passed beyond fear. Or perhaps she had locked the fear away so deep that she could no longer feel it consciously. “We will talk, Mr. Ingram,” she said calmly. “I don’t think you want either of us to plead with you. But we will talk.”

Ingram
kept his hand firmly on the laser pistol in his pocket. “I’m glad, Vanessa. It may get us nowhere, but we will talk. If there is any alternative that does not affect my integrity, I will gladly take it. My mission remains unchanged: to ensure that Vanessa Smith never existed. There is no time for any other route.”

“Integrity!” exploded Roland. “You talk of integrity.”

Ingram smiled. “Surely, Dr. Badel, as a psychologist you will agree that anyone who remains true to his own values and avowed function preserves subjective integrity?”

Vanessa said: “Tell me about my mother, Mr. Ingram. I would like to have some knowledge of her, even if second-hand.”

“She is a very attractive woman, Vanessa. I think you would like her. Fairly tall, slim, very sensitive, volatile. She threw a glass at me and cut my head. Yes, you would like her. She is called Jenny Pargetter. She is in her late thirties. She has short, brown hair, very fine, well looked after. She has a longish face, high cheek bones, large brown eyes, expressive lips. Her husband, Simon, is a prosperous city executive. They obviously love each other very much. In other circumstances, I might count myself lucky if they were my friends.”

“Is Simon my father?”

“No. Your father died before you were born. He was, I believe, a young Rhodesian arts graduate. He was killed in a protest brawl near the American Embassy.”

“I see. Thank you. Thank you for giving me some memories to treasure. I can invent the rest, Mr. Ingram. You must know that people like us are good at invention.”

Roland said: “You spoke of alternatives, Ingram. Have you any to suggest?”

Denzil
Ingram shrugged. “I have one. But, from a professional point of view, you may consider the cure to be worse than the disease, so to speak… Have you any whisky?”

“It’s downstairs. I’ll get it.”

Ingram smiled. “Please. I am not in my dotage. We will all go downstairs. You will both go very slowly ahead of me. Let us not have any mistakes. I hate mistakes. They do terrible things to my reflexes.”

In the living room, Denzil Ingram settled in an easy chair with a glass of whisky in his hand just as if he were paying a relaxed social call.

“Thank you for the whisky. You will not join me, Dr. Badel?”

“Forgive me. I do not drink with executioners.”

“Tut-tut. Such social prejudice—especially in a distinguished psychologist… And you, Vanessa? Are you old enough to drink whisky?”

She gave a faint smile. “I had some earlier. Then I was sick.”

“Come to the point, man,” said Roland irritably. “Let us hear what, if anything, you have to offer. You may enjoy the suspense. We do not.” He glanced at Vanessa, who was very pale. “She has had about as much as she can stand.”

Denzil Ingram took a deep breath. “Well, then, let us consider. First, as I have said, it is now necessary that Dr. Roland Badel and Vanessa Smith cease to exist. Second, as Vanessa has discovered, I do not wish to kill you if it can be avoided. Third, imprisonment is out of the question. It carries too many risks. Fourth… Well, Dr. Badel, you at least must realise the alternative.”

Roland nodded slowly. “Surgery, brain-washing, synthetic personalities.”

“It
can be done,” said Ingram calmly. “You will know better than I about the recent techniques in brain surgery and personality implantation. I am told it is entirely possible to create new personalities within six weeks.”

“Zombies,” said Roland. “I have seen case-histories. They live, they function, but what are they?”

Ingram shrugged. “At least they are alive. They can be contented. They can find fulfilment.”

“So can laboratory rats—which is what you propose to turn us into. Even you must appreciate that to destroy the personality while preserving the body is simply another kind of death… And what afterwards? You would have to keep your synthetic Miss X and Mr. Y under surveillance for the rest of their lives in case the shadow personalities emerged.”

“That is true. But Miss X and Mr. Y need know nothing of it.”

Roland Badel gave a bitter laugh. “Miss X and Mr. Y would know nothing about anything that matters. I cannot speak for Vanessa but I can speak for myself. It is not for me, Ingram.”

Vanessa said softly. “You must decide for me, also, Roland. I know it’s a great responsibility. But I need to feel that someone is responsible for me in my life, and even in my death. Forgive me for bringing all this on you. I’m sorry.”

Roland pressed her hand. Then he turned to Denzil Ingram. “There is another solution. The simple one. Let us go, say, to South America—a country of your choosing. Give us passports and new names. Keep us under surveillance if you must. We will not make trouble.”

Ingram shook his head slowly. “I’m sorry. It is tempting. But the risks are too great. The Opposition will do
everything they can to find Vanessa. If they succeed, my head is on the block… Have you any other suggestions, Dr. Badel?”

“There is an induced amnesia technique that—“

“Not on. My department has experimented with it. The effects are unpredictable—as you must know, of course.” Ingram seemed genuinely sad as he spoke.

“I have just thought of something,” said Vanessa, her voice trembling. “It seems that I alone am the real problem, Mr. Ingram. If you kill me and—” her voice faltered, “destroy the evidence, as I am sure you know how, there can be no need to kill Dr. Badel.”

“You would do this for him?” There was a note of respect in Denzil Ingram’s voice.

“I love him, you see. Besides,” she smiled at Roland, “if I had not tried to steal eggs from his hens, you would not now be here. I realise I have to die. I don’t know very much about the political situation that makes my death necessary, and I don’t want to know. But, surely, when I am gone there is no real evidence that I ever lived, you would not need to kill Roland or my mother or her husband… Even if they would not give you their word, I am sure they would give it to me.”

Dr. Roland Badel said nothing. He did not trust himself to speak. There were tears on his face. It was a strange sensation. Inconsequentially, he tried to remember when he had last wept.

Denzil Ingram took the laser pistol out of his pocket. He looked at it for a moment or two, then placed it on the small table by his chair.

“I am getting old, Vanessa. I have lived by my own code for more years than I care to remember. Survival of the fittest.” He smiled. “It seemed a good code. A classic code, in fact. But when a young girl can make me doubt its worth, I realise I have outlived my values.”

He looked
at Roland. “Dr. Badel, you suggested South America.” ‘

“I did,” said Roland evenly.

“Can you arrange passports, money, etcetera?”

“I think so.”

“Good. May I recommend Chile or Peru. We do not have particularly good relations with either country at the moment. I think you could establish new identities there without too much difficulty… I am now going to pour myself a rather large whisky. I am also going to smoke a cigarette. I am getting careless in my dotage. You see my laser pistol. I would be greatly indebted if you do not use it until I put my empty glass down. You will aim a little to the left of my spine and a foot below the shoulder. Is that agreed?”

“It is agreed, Mr. Ingram,” said Roland Badel, amazed. “I still do not drink with executioners; but it would be a great privilege to drink with a brave man. May I pour the whisky?”

“No, Dr. Badel,” said Ingram with a tight smile. “Indulge a foible, please. It is my privilege also not to drink with my executioner.”

Vanessa said fiercely: “Must it end like this? Must somebody die? Is the world entirely mad?”

“Yes, Vanessa,” said Ingram, “the world is entirely mad, and somebody must die.” Then he added fiercely: “Leave me my pride, please. It is all I have left… Now, no more words, please, from either of you. I wish to enjoy my whisky.”

He got up, went to the antique sideboard, lifted the decanter and poured his whisky. He took a sip, rolling the fluid round his mouth, savouring it, trying not to think of anything but memories—the few good times he had known: a toboggan ride down a Derbyshire hillside one Christmas long, long ago, with a man who
seemed to know all about him and might or might not have been his father; his first job, making tea for mysterious men in a secret government department, men who talked nonchalantly of exotic places like Sofia, Belgrade, Lisbon, Istanbul, Bangkok; a woman called Elise who had once taught him much about love in the most squalid circumstances in Marseilles. On the whole, he reflected, it had been an interesting life, if a lonely one. There was some amusement to be derived from the knowledge that he was voluntarily surrendering it, at a point when his career could be greatly advanced, in the English South Downs. Damn Vanessa! She was the daughter he would have liked to have had, if there had been time…

Denzil Ingram never finished his whisky.

Roland Badel never became his executioner.

Vanessa never found peace in South America.

As Ingram took his second sip of the whisky, a pane of glass shattered in the cottage window and a small blue sphere fell upon the carpet.

Vanessa looked at it, Roland looked at it, Denzil Ingram looked at it. He alone knew what it was. But by then it was already too late. The sphere dissolved, and there was an explosive puff of vapour. And then for the three of them there was nothingness.

V
ANESSA OPENED HER
eyes.
At first, she couldn’t focus. But when she did manage to see clearly she found that there were three strangers in the room. No, not entirely strangers because, weak though she was, she managed to flash probe and found two of the thought patterns horribly familiar.

She saw a misshapen boy, a girl with hungry and malignant eyes, a white-haired old man. Superficially, the white-haired old man looked like everyone’s notion of an eccentric grandfather. But there was a coldness about him. A deadly coldness. The coldness of an animal that strikes to kill.

“Welcome, Vanessa,” said Quasimodo. “You are welcome to my thoughts. Soon you will have as many as you can handle.”

“Hello, girlie,” said Janine with malice. “It was not a bad screw, considering your equipment. Why the hell did you have to be sick?”

Professor Raeder said: “You are extraordinarily lucky, Vanessa. You may not believe it at the moment, but we are your friends.” He held out Denzil Ingram’s laser pistol in his hand. “We arrived, it seems, at the right moment. It would have been rather frustrating to find you dead.”

Vanessa said nothing. She set up as strong a mental
block as she could, then she looked at Roland and Denzil Ingram. Both were unconscious, lying on the floor. Each of them had his wrists bound together with what seemed to be fine, strong wire.

Professor Raeder noted her glance. “They are alive, Vanessa. No doubt they will join us presently… But let me reassure you. Your troubles are now over, my dear. You are about to join my sociable little group of paranormals, and together we shall work constructively to overthrow the reactionary government now ruling this country. Together, we few, by our decisive actions, will reassert the ancient tradition of democracy in this land. History will be kind to us, Vanessa. We shall doubtless be compared with that glorious few who withstood the might of Nazi tyranny several decades before you were born. Theirs was a battle of the air. Ours will be a battle of the spirit. But I can assure you it will be no less wonderful.”

“Who are you?” Vanessa managed to say. She suddenly realised that she was sitting in her chair and that her hands were not tied. She felt an impulse to get up and run. But she knew that she would not get very far. She gritted her teeth and prayed that Roland would soon be conscious. Perhaps he would know what to do.

“I am sorry. Forgive me. Marius Raeder. Professor Emeritus of Paranormal Psychology at the University of Cambridge, lately retired. My untimely retirement was brought about by the attentions of Sir Joseph Humboldt’s minions—one of whom, if I am not mistaken, slumbers peacefully by your paramour.”