Captives

SIX

14 MARCH 1977

The room was small.

Less than fifteen feet square, its full extent was slowly revealed as lights were turned on one by one. Puddles of light filled the gloom, each one scarcely strong enough to fight off the blackness that shrouded the six occupants.

Doctor Robert Dexter stroked his chin thoughtfully as the light above him came on, bathing him in its cold white glow. He scanned the faces of the others in the room, listening to the soft click as each successive spot lamp was illuminated.

He was joined a moment later by a slightly older man who cleared his throat self-consciously, aware of the silence and apparently anxious not to disturb it. He pulled a chair closer to Dexter, wincing when it scraped the wooden floor noisily. He sat down and pulled nervously at the sleeve of his jacket.

The room was windowless, the only brightness inside provided by the spotlamps set in the high ceiling. Each one was aimed at the four other occupants of the room who sat in a line facing Dexter and his companion.

He looked along the line, pausing for a moment on each face as if trying to commit it to memory. In fact he knew each one well. Like a painter trying to decide on a subject, he moved his glance carefully from face to face, met only once by eyes that held his gaze.

And it was always those eyes.

Every day during the session they would begin the same way, in darkness. Then Doctor Andrew Colston would switch the lights on one by one and Dexter would look at those same four faces.

And, always, he would be met by those eyes.

Dexter held the gaze for a moment longer, then glanced down at the clipboard on his lap. He matched each name to the four faces before him.

Colston shuffled his feet, as if anxious to begin. He too was eyeing the other occupants of the room but it wasn't their faces he was looking at.

It was the stout leather restraining straps that kept each of them firmly secured to the heavy wooden chairs.

Dexter glanced once more at the line of faces, aware, again, of the last of them and the incessant stare that seemed to bore into him. Once more he met those eyes and found himself unable to hold the stare.

Was that a sign of weakness?

Or fear?

'Who's going to start today?' he asked, his voice muted and flat inside the small room.

Silence.

There was no response from any of them.

Just that unflinching stare.

Dexter shuffled in his seat and smiled. His practised smile. His comforting smile. His reassuring smile.

'I'm sure one of you has something to say,' he continued, looking at the first of the four seated before him. 'Charles. Will you start today?'

The man looked at him, his eyes rheumy and red-rimmed. He looked as if he'd been crying. He held Dexter's gaze for a moment, then shook his head crisply.

The doctor sighed with exaggerated weariness. He raised his hands as if in surrender then looked at each face once more.

Those eyes still watched him.

Leave me alone. I don't want to talk.

It looked like a puddle of vomit.

James Scott looked at the remains of the pizza, now cold in the bottom of the box, and shook his head. His stomach rumbled noisily. He'd managed to force down half the pizza but that was all he'd eaten since eight o'clock in the morning. He glanced at his watch and saw that the time was nearly nine-thirty P.M.

'If you won't speak to me voluntarily then I'll have to ask you questions,' he told them all.

There was a thud and Colston looked across in alarm.

One of them had brought a fist thudding down on the arm of the chair.

Colston was grateful for the restraining straps.

'Silence is bad,' Dexter said. 'You shouldn't bottle up your feelings. Let them out. Imagine they're a river. Let your thoughts flow out. Speak.'

The rivers have dried up, thought Colston, using one hand to hide the slight smile which flickered on his lips. It vanished as he saw those eyes gazing momentarily at him.

'Very well,' said Dexter, turning over a sheet on the clipboard. 'We'll begin with Jonathan.' He sat forward in his chair. 'Tell us why you cut off your mother's head.'