'Who… are you?' The gamekeeper didn't know if he actually managed to get the words out.
'Too late.' The other spoke with a guttural accent, slowly as though the language was unfamiliar to him and he had to dwell on each word. 'I have waited patiently all these years in vain.'
'What are you talking about?'
'Just as the Russian winter defeated us so the elements have again risen to help the enemy. The mist has shrouded and hidden this place, the bogs made an invasion impossible. Elsewhere the German army had triumphed. Except here. Only I represent the Fatherland here and I will defend it to the last.'
Bertie Hass spoke grimly, his fingers feeling for a holster belt that was no longer around his waist.
You're mad, Bean thought, swallowed and felt slime slithering down the back of his throat. This couldn't be happening, it was all in the mind like that guy being sucked down in that deep bog. Or else it was somebody playing a bloody stupid trick. ' 'The war's over,' he said. 'A long time ago.'
'You lie, just as the others did, a trick to lure me from my stronghold. This wood shall not be surrendered. Consider yourself my prisoner, a prisoner of war.'
'I… look. the searchers can't be far away,' he stammered, looking blindly about him for somewhere to flee but there was nowhere, just mud that was becoming more liquid by the second. 'Hurry, we have no time to waste!' Roy Bean did not want to go, was resisting every movement his limbs made against his will, feet squelching in and out of the foul stinking morass that could no longer be termed mud, aware that somehow this man who claimed to be a Nazi was driving him on. Through the murk, along waterlogged footpaths, zig-zagging and unerringly finding and following one track after another. Not talking because there was nothing to talk about, aware of the other's presence right behind him, hearing again those words 'Hurry, we have no time to waste'. A huge shape loomed up before them, a turreted building that might have been a mediaeval castle, sinister in the gloom as though it had been deliberately lurking there waiting for them. You felt its coldness, its hate, a monster that was dying a lingering death and sought to vent its malevolence on somebody before it was too late. Those windows seemed to gleam for a second or two as if a shaft of wan sunlight had broken through the fog. But that was impossible, the sun would never shine here again.
It has to be Droy House, Roy Bean tried to convince himself. But so much older, the way it might have looked once. Frightening, a sadistic illustrator of children's books inflicting subtle horror on his readers; they wanted to slam the book shut, throw it away, but instead they were forced to stare at it, and during the nocturnal hours it would return to haunt their dreams, so much more real.
Perhaps the German pushed him, Roy Bean could not be sure. He stumbled forward, felt stonework beneath his feet, solid steps that were treacherous with a coating of slime, harbour steps with a polluted tide lapping at them. The bare walls of the hallway streamed with foul condensation, the floor slippery. An open trap door in the far corner; he wanted to back away, to flee outside, but something held him there, drew him towards it. He tried to scream but no sound came from his lips, clutching at the waft' as he descended the uneven steps into the cold blackness below, this can't be happening! It is. Icy water, thick with slime, came up to his ankles. This underground place was flooding, we'll be drowned. Yet his protests were mute, his movements jerky. Don't touch me, please, I'll do as you say.
Pinioned against the wall, something hard snapped on his wrists and ankles; hanging there. He didn't know whether his captor was still here or not, just listening to the smooth swilling of thick liquid. The dungeon was filling up, like melting slush, mentally measuring its progress as it crept up his body, obscenely exploring inside his saturated clothing; numbing him. Voices, indistinguishable whispers, people moving about but seemingly unaware of his presence, trying to call out to them but his vocal chords had long ceased to function.
The scum lapped at his navel, submerged it.
Somebody was weeping somewhere, it sounded like a girl or a young boy, he could not be sure which, sobs which eventually died away. And then he saw the duai red pin-points of dozens of pairs of eyes, knew that they belonged to rodents. Rats, swimming, trying to escape but in the end they would drown too. Suddenly one bit him, sharp teeth gouging his thigh, and he writhed to the full extent of his manacles, jerked and strained, instinctively tried to pull away. They were all coming at him now; he could only see their eyes but he knew only too well what the repulsive bodies looked like, brown furry creatures that scavenged, lived on filth, and attacked helpless humans. Just one rat bite was capable of… God, he knew only too well what dangers rats presented. On the game preserves they were one of his main enemies. They ate eggs, young chicks, bit their way into feed bags and spoiled what they didn't eat. Left their turds everywhere and even when you poisoned them they managed to crawl into their holes beneath the out-buildings and you had to live with the stench of decomposing rats for weeks during the summer. Just one rat bite could. his skin crawled and he sensed that thigh wound bleeding, tinging the slime pink. Rat bite fever, the wound would fill with fluid; it already was, with contaminated sludge. Or Weil's disease. Or ringworm. Or…
But he wouldn't get any of those because he would drown first. Christ, he hated rats. In the past he had killed thousands of them; poison, traps, an air-rifle on the banks of the stream when he had half an hour to spare. Shooting rats gave him more pleasure than killing any other creature because he despised the little fuckers. You heard the soft 'phut' of the pellet as it struck the hairy body, sent it kicking and writhing into the current, turning the water crimson. Looking up at you and you read the agony in its eyes. Die you bastard and don't be too quick about it because I want you to suffer. Now the tables were turned, the rats had him in the water at their mercy. We know you, Roy Bean, what you've been doing to us for years and now it's our turn. You're the one who's going to suffer this time. We're all going to drown but not just yet. Not until.
They were ripping his clothes below the surface, gripping the material with their teeth, pulling until they tore it into shreds, bared his flesh. No, not there!
He tried to close his thighs but the leg-irons prevented him. Rough hairy bodies rubbed against his skin and suddenly he was able to scream again. Yells of sheer pain and terror as needle-like teeth found their mark, shooting the agony right up into his stomach, knotting it. He was spewing again, throwing up the filth that he had swallowed, helpless to throw off his attackers as they began their feast of living human flesh, chewing on the tenderest portions first.
Once Roy Bean almost fainted but even that was denied him. The stinking muddy water was up to his chest now and the rats were running up his chest and on to his shoulders, nipping at his neck, squatting there, gloating. Time had stopped, only the agony went on.
He cricked his neck as he strained to keep his head above the level of the rising floodwater; the end would not be long now. The rats were all climbing up on him, almost smothering him with their wet coarse fur as they jostled for places, began to fight among themselves.
He couldn't keep the liquid filth out of his mouth much longer, felt its sliminess against his lips, tried to spit it out. It was slipping down his throat, a sensation like melting ice cream that was contaminated. Coughing, spewing.
And only at the very end did the rats go for his jugular vein.
Fifteen
Detective-Sergeant Jim Fillery was becoming increasingly aware that they were going to have to abandon the search before very long. He cursed, took it as a personal affront by the elements. They had combined to thwart him, evil hiding evil. Foster was in here, all right, he knew it. Hunches were an experienced policeman's finest asset; when you were a rookie you were inclined to jump to conclusions, but after a few years you sorted out the possibilities and got a feeling for them. Which was why Jim Fillery knew that Foster had not left Droy Wood.
The ground was flooding fast. Somewhere the tide was flowing in, might even reach as far up as the road. The mist was thickening, too, rising up out of the boggy ground in typical autumnal style except that now it did so with a vengeance,
Men to his right and left were floundering, having to make detours, leaving large patches of thick reeds untouched. It was destroying any scent which the dogs might have picked up, too. In all, a bloody waste of time. Except for that nagging hunch; keep going, you're on the right track. Nevertheless, the search would have to be called off soon, the detective could not avoid that. If anybody got drowned or lost the media would flay the police; there were times when you couldn't win and this was one of them. And then he saw the house, a tumbledown ruin
