The Last Witness

THIRTY-SIX

Faint flicker of the eyes. Just for a second.

Ryall leant in closer. ‘Are you awake, Lorena?’

After a second, uncertainly. ‘…No.’ The eyes perfectly still again, no movement.

But Ryall wasn’t totally satisfied. Her answers had started to become evasive, weren’t really telling him anything, and as he straightened up from leaning over and let out a sigh, he was sure her eyes had flickered open momentarily. And she’d had to think for a second about her answer now.

But her eyes hadn’t opened to look at him, more at something over the far end of the room. He turned, following where she’d been looking: the Mountie bear from Canada.

He studied it for a moment perched on a dressing table at the far end of the room, then started moving closer towards it: obscured in heavy shadow, it was difficult to pick out much of its detail.

At the other end, Bell tensed as he watched Ryall peer towards him, moving closer. ‘Oh, shit!’

He glanced again towards the phone, wondering whether to call and abort. But he felt rooted to the screen, afraid to move even for a second in case he missed something. Ryall came to within two yards, then suddenly turned back again.

Ryall was sure he’d seen Lorena’s eyes flicker back shut again as he turned; as if she was curious where he was heading, what he was looking at.

‘What’s the game, Lorena?’ he asked, moving back towards her. No response. Her body and her eyelids suddenly frozen, deathly still. ‘I know you’re awake, so we can stop playing now, Lorena…’

Bell leapt for the phone, punched out the numbers. It rang once, twice. ‘For God’s sake…Come on!’ He banged his fist against the phone table.

‘…All that’s left now is for you to tell me.’ Ryall leant over Lorena’s inert body. He trailed a finger gently up her neck and moved close until he was only inches away, could feel her soft breath against his face. And for a second it would have been easy to believe she really was under his control, like every other night. His voice lowered to a chilling whisper. ‘Tell me… tell me. What’s the game?’

Lorena’s closed eyelids pulsed, a moment’s trembling uncertainty which Ryall could feel too through her body; then he watched in satisfaction as her eyes finally snapped open.

‘It wasn’t my idea… wasn’t my idea.’

The phone answered halfway through the third ring, and Bell was immediately passed on to a duty Sergeant. He frantically outlined the problem, his eyes still fixed on the screen six feet away: Lorena now sitting up, eyes wide, her head shaking as she pointed straight ahead at the camera lens.

The Sergeant said that Crowley had gone off duty over two hours ago. ‘…But we’ll phone him at home straightaway and mobilise at the same time.’

Ryall was now joining her in staring at the camera, this time with undisguised hostility. Then his voice came over strongly as he gripped Lorena by the shoulders, shaking her. ‘What have you done… What have you done?’

‘But for God’s sake hurry! There’s probably not much time left.’

‘We should have a squad car there in no more than six or seven minutes.’

Bell leapt back in front of the screen the second he hung up, his hand trembling uncontrollably as he reached out towards the screen again. ‘Hold on, angel. Hold on! We’ll be there soon.’

But he felt totally out of control. It was strange: able to watch every small movement, but unable to do anything. Like watching a sepia horror film which had suddenly spun in the wrong direction, and he’d had to phone someone else to stop the reels.

And as he saw Ryall throw Lorena back against the bed and move towards the camera, his face a mask of fury, he realized they’d probably be too late. He knew what was coming next: Ryall would rip the bear apart and destroy the camera, and it would be lights out: he wouldn’t see what happened when Ryall turned his rage back towards Lorena.

But two paces away from the camera with Ryall’s hand distorted as he reached out, Ryall suddenly stopped, turning towards the side.

‘What?… What the hell are you doing.’

‘What have you done… What have you done?’

The first sound that Nicola Ryall heard as she reached for the door handle. As she swung it open, he was moving rapidly away from the bed, seemed to be interested in something at the far end of the room — then stopped as he noticed her by the open door, eyes falling quickly to the gun as he asked her what the hell she was doing. A condescending, indignant sneer.

She raised the gun a fraction higher and pointed it at him. ‘Just don’t move!’ It sounded good on the movies, but coming from her, particularly with the tremor in her voice, it sounded lame, pathetic.

Ryall gave it the derision it deserved. ‘What, are you going to shoot me? You?’ One eyebrow raised, his mouth curled into a smile. ‘Anyway, that thing doesn’t even work.’

She hesitated only for a second; she was sure it was a bluff. ‘Yes it does. I tried it out only a few months back,’ she lied. And as she saw his face drop, she knew that it did work. She decided to pile it on. ‘I’m getting quite good with it now.’

Now he looked seriously worried, and raised his hands a bit. She relished the moment, the unfamiliar sense of power over him making her slightly giddy. She should have tried this earlier. She’d hardly ever been able to take control over her own life, let alone anyone else’s.

Ryall met her gaze stonily and shifted a foot back towards Lorena before Nicola waggled the gun at him. ‘I said don’t move.’ A frozen moment between them, then: ‘The phone ringing just then. It was about Mikaya. She tried to take her own life.’

‘What?’ His eyebrows knitted. ‘Is she okay?’

‘She is now.’ Heavy sigh that quickly turned to a sneer. ‘As if you should care. You’re the cause of it.’ She shook her head, her hand tensing on the gun. ‘I let you get away with it with Mikaya for all those years. But not now with Lorena. Not any longer.’

His eyes fixed back on the gun. He leered nervously. ‘You don’t have the guts.’

‘I wouldn’t bank on it.’ She moved a step closer.

Ryall could still pick up the tremor in her voice. He was sure that when it came to the crunch, she’d bottle out; but he wasn’t sure enough to take the risk. He desperately needed a distraction. His eyes darted uncertainly, sweat beads raising on his forehead. The bear!

He forced a strained smile. ‘Anyhow, you shoot me — they’ll get it all on film. They’ll know it wasn’t self-defence.’ He pointed. ‘They’ve got a camera in the bear.’

‘What?’ Nicola glanced towards it incredulously. Camera in the bear? She was the one meant to be on pills and alcohol. ‘Can’t you think of a better bluff than that.’ But as soon as she said it, she realized it was almost too ridiculous to be a bluff.

‘No, no — really. What do you think I was doing when you walked in? I was going to rip the bear apart and smash the camera.’

He was insistent, sounded convincing, and Nicola glanced towards Lorena for confirmation. Lorena just numbly nodded, and looking at her wide-eyed and fearful at this drama being played out, Nicola suddenly had something else to give her pause for thought. As much as he might be a monster, Lorena seeing her stepfather shot in front of her was quite another thing.

‘…So why don’t I just finish the job now and destroy the camera,’ he said. ‘Or better still, since you’re such a good shot — why don’t you shoot it out.’

Nicola looked between him and the bear. He was leering challengingly, as if this was some kind of test between them. If she backed down, once again he’d have the edge.

‘Go on,’ he taunted. ‘You’re the crack shot after all.’

She levelled the gun at the bear; but as the shaking of her gun hand became more pronounced, almost out of control, the game was all but over. He could see through the bluff in that second, see her for the sham she was; the pathetic, quivering wreck she’d become. Fifteen seconds of control in fifteen years: in the end all he’d allowed her.

His leer became wider. ‘You haven’t even got the stomach to shoot a toy bear, let alone me.’

She gritted her teeth hard, struggling to control her trembling, determined to prove him wrong.

As Ryall saw her focus her aim and tense to squeeze the trigger, he made his move, lunging towards Lorena.

The gun swung sharply around, the shot zipping above him and smashing through the window behind. He’d jumped down low, most of his body shielded by the bed as he scrambled on the floor and grappled his arms around Lorena from behind.

As he raised again, he had her pinned tight against him: a complete body shield. His eyes jousted with Nicola’s for a second, as if pressing home who was in control now.

‘Move away from the door or I’ll snap her neck.’ He pulled his forearm tighter around Lorena’s throat to demonstrate.

At the other end of the camera, Bell was on a knife’s edge, his heart like a jackhammer as he watched events unfold. As the gun had pointed at the camera, he’d been screaming, ‘No, no! It’s a trick, a trick! If you’re going to shoot anything, shoot him!’ Now he was muttering under his breath. ‘Be careful… be careful. Just hold him off — don’t try anything. The cavalry will be there any minute.’

Bell watched Nicola hesitate for a second, then finally move aside a couple of feet as Ryall edged towards her and backed half a step at a time towards the door with Lorena gripped tight to him. As Nicola followed, they were gone from camera vision; all Bell was left with was the sound.

Nicola had moved aside almost mechanically. Afraid that he might harm Lorena, or just following his command the way she’d become programmed to all these years? Only as he edged towards the top of the stairs did the thought hit her.

‘Where are you going with her?’

‘I don’t know yet. I’ll decide that once I’m in the car.’ Ryall’s eyes shifted nervously downstairs. They’d know about the hypnosis from the tape, but had he touched Lorena anywhere he shouldn’t? He’d got so used to touching Lorena where he liked when she was under that he just couldn’t recall. ‘They’ll be here soon.’

‘Here? Who?’ She squinted as if she was having trouble focusing.

He nodded towards Lorena’s bedroom. ‘The bear. They’ve been taping.’ Tired tone: tedium of the long years of having to explain every last detail to cut through her drink and pills stupor.

For Nicola, everything suddenly gelled in that instant. All she had to do was hold him up a couple of minutes. She raised the gun more confidently. ‘Then you’re not leaving.’

That condescending sneer again. ‘You hardly had the stomach to shoot the bear… and both you and I know that you’re not a good enough shot to get me without also hitting Lorena.’ His eyes focused on her gun hand, which started to shake more under his stare.

She found his confidence infuriating: a few words and she felt her own confidence blow to the wind like dandelion seeds. Exactly why he’d got away with everything for so long with Mikaya, and now Lorena. She’d let them down; and now even with a gun in her hand there was nothing she could do to stop him.

She put her other arm up, trying to steady the gun with both hands. But still it shook and wavered wildly.

‘You’re pathetic!’ Ryall grinned at the spectacle. ‘Go back and practice shooting at the bear — then when you’re ready in a couple of years, let me know.’

She tried to face him off a moment longer, but finally crumbled, lowering the gun. He was right: she was pathetic. A hopeless wreck of a woman on the edge. She’d been crazy to even think she had the strength to -

But as he turned to the stairs with a last indignant ‘Pathetic’ and she caught the pleading look in Lorena’s eyes — a fresh spark suddenly rose. A red raw anger that made her eyes sting. Anger and disgust at the shell of a woman she’d become, at what he’d made her. She’d done nothing to help Mikaya — but she couldn’t let him go off now with Lorena! If she didn’t do something now, she never would: one last chance of redemption! And in that moment, there was a window of opportunity: he turned slightly to take the first step on the stairs, his guard down fleetingly as he thought she’d given up the ghost.

She raised the gun and fired in the same motion, before his eyes could settle on her and steal her confidence away again.

But at the last second he’d half-turned towards her — perhaps catching the gun raising in the corner of his eye — and as she saw the splay of red on his side and at the same time on Lorena’s night-dress, it looked like she’d caught Lorena as well.

Then watched in horror as they were thrown down the stairs, Lorena almost directly under him as they tumbled down. They landed with a sickening thud at the bottom, and Nicola closed her eyes for a second, hardly daring to look, before finally rushing down.

She knelt a yard away from the tangle of their bodies: Lorena blood-soaked, half-trapped under his chest. No movement from either of them.

She tentatively reached out, then retracted halfway. Her nerve had suddenly gone again. And so she just stayed in the same position, chewing at the knuckles of her gun hand and rocking back and forth on her haunches as she looked on at their bodies.

At Bell’s end, he’d been keened sharply to every small sound after the gunshot, praying that he might hear Lorena’s voice. Nothing but silence for a full minute; then, as he honed in closer, his ear less than an inch from the speaker, he finally picked up something: Nicola Ryall muttering ‘What have I done… What have I done?’ Punctuated by gentle weeping.

The search-beam of the helicopter raced across the landscape ahead of them.

‘How far now?’ Michel asked. They knew from Mundy that the exact location was halfway between Cochrane and a place called Fraserdale.

‘Two or three miles, no more.’

Trees, lakes. Trees, lakes. They knew the house was on the edge of a lake, but Michel couldn’t tell one from another. Hundreds of miles of the same vista stretching out across Northern Quebec and Ontario.

‘I think that’s it,’ the pilot said after a moment, nodding to one side. He tilted the helicopter, starting to circle in.

And then as they straightened, the search-beam hit the house: no signs of life at first, not even any lights on. Michel’s hands clenched tight. Again the image hit of picking through the bodies.

Then Michel spotted a figure in front of the house and another running along the lakeside. ‘There! Something there!’ He pointed.

The man by the house looked up at them anxiously as he was caught in the beam, but the man at the lakeside seemed to have half his attention on something deeper out in the lake.

‘Where was he heading?’ Michel pondered aloud.

‘Don’t know. Let’s look see.’ The pilot swung back and pointed the beam towards the lake.

At first they didn’t see anything, and he had to tilt the beam to reach further out before it finally picked up the two figures facing each other at the centre of the frozen lake.

‘So what now?’ Georges gasped for breath.

‘I think you know.’ Roman smiled as he levelled the gun. ‘Oh, but one thing just before you go. I had nothing to do with that abduction and attempted hit on you. That’s not to say I didn’t plan to kill you — but I think your friend and mine Chenouda knew that, and decided to try and get you into the programme.’

Georges shook his head. His first reaction was to disbelieve Roman, but then why would he bother to lie at this moment? So many side-games that he’d never been aware of; but there was one that did now prey on his mind.

‘I can’t believe that Jean-Paul is responsible for this now, has ordered you to kill me. It goes against everything he believes in.’

‘Yep, you’re right there. His idea was to get you away to Cuba. Soft fool that he is.’

Georges glared hard. ‘He’ll have you for breakfast when you get back.’

‘I don’t think so. As we speak now, he’s being taken out. He won’t be having any more breakfasts.’

‘What, I… I don’t-’ But as he saw the gloating satisfaction on Roman’s face, he knew that it wasn’t a bluff. His stomach dipped sickeningly, but his first thought was for Simone. Jean-Paul dead, and now him. She’d never be able to face it. He closed his eyes for a second and shuddered. Maybe they’d been wrong all along, wasting their time. In the end, Roman’s ways held sway.

But if he was going to die, he might at least have one last swipe back. ‘Jean-Paul was right about you all along. No fucking brain! The bullet the answer to everything.’ Roman glared back intensely, his jaw set tight, but Georges met his stare evenly. ‘So if you’re going to shoot me, shoot me! Prove us all right what an absolute no-brainer you are.’

Roman’s smile rose slowly, remembering Venegas. ‘That’s where you got it wrong, college boy. I ain’t going to shoot you.’ Roman wallowed in the quizzical surprise on Georges’ face for a moment before lowering the gun to Georges’ feet. ‘Sometimes I’m a little more subtle than you might appreciate. Or for that matter Jean-Paul’

He fired and the ice cracked a foot to Georges’ side, but the block didn’t sever. And as the echo of the shot died, they suddenly heard the whirl of the helicopter.

Roman looked over his shoulder, momentarily distracted. But it was hovering over the house — one shot more and the block would break off. He fired again, but Georges had anticipated and leapt a yard to one side as the ice block severed and sailed free.

Roman aimed again at the ice, then suddenly his eyes shifted uncertainly. The engine tone of the helicopter had changed. It was moving towards them, baring down fast.

Roman raised the gun towards Georges. Brief apologetic smile. ‘Sometimes subtleties have to be thrown to the wind.’

In the helicopter, Michel had put a sniper called Gilles on alert by the open side door as soon as they started moving towards the two figures. Within a short distance, Michel could make out that the far figure was Georges, but with the other wearing night goggles he couldn’t make him out clearly. But they could see the gun, and they were close enough by then for the sound of the second shot to reach them.

‘Oh God! Are we too late?’ Michel shouted. ‘Try a shot! Try a shot!’

‘He’s shooting at the ice for some reason.’ Gilles tried to steady the rifle against the movement of the helicopter, get the figure centre in his night-sight. ‘But we’re still too distant.’

Then, as Gilles saw the gun raise, he realized there was little choice. The figure moved wildly in his cross-hairs with the vibrations: it would be pot luck. But if he didn’t try, it would be too late anyway!

Gilles squeezed off the shot, saw the figure jolt from his sights; not sure if it had fallen away or it was the kick of the rifle.

‘You’ve got him!’ Michel announced excitedly, seeing the figure sprawl a second before Gilles could pick it up again in his sights.

But as Gilles trailed the cross-hairs back across the figure, he could see that he’d only clipped him, a shoulder wound: the hand was rising again with the gun. Though this time they were closer, the shot cleaner. He pumped two bullets in quick succession through the back.

Clenched fist ‘Yes!’ from Michel, but the elation was short-lived.

A high-powered.308 calibre, the bullets had gone straight through the body, shattering the ice beneath. A large ice-block had broken free, the body sliding into the water as it tilted. But at the far end of the block was Georges. He tottered unsteadily for a second before falling on his side, and Michel watched in horror as he slid in too with the tilt of the ice-block.

‘Get us down. Fast!’ he screamed.

‘We can’t land on the ice. It won’t take us,’ the pilot shouted back. He pointed with his thumb. ‘Someone will have to go down on the winch.’

Michel assessed for only a second before moving forward. ‘Okay.’

Gilles leaned back from the open side door as a colleague hooked in Michel and they started to wind him down.

The winch rope swayed and spun wildly with the wind from the rotors, and Michel’s view of Georges below came and went. A third of the way down he caught a glimpse of Georges thrashing around in the dark water, trying to grab on to a solid ice-edge. He was still there halfway down, but as Michel straightened from a half spin close to the ground, Georges had completely disappeared. His stomach sank. No. No! He hadn’t come all this way for it to end like this.

He frantically waved to the helicopter to bring him down closer. There was still a good five yards between the end of the rope and the ground. As more winch rope was fed out, its swing became even wider. Michel had to be careful where he landed in case he hit the broken ice and fell in as well.

And in the last few feet, just before he finally made contact with a jolt, he was sure he saw the brief bob of a head and part of an arm appear above the water.

He quickly unhooked, ran breathlessly towards it. But by the time he got to the edge of the broken ice, Georges had gone again. He scanned frantically for movement, bubbles. Anything. But there was nothing but still black water.

‘No. No!’ he screamed, falling to his knees. Knowing in that moment that if Georges died, he’d never be able to forgive himself for what he’d done. He started hurriedly brushing away the snow to see through the ice. Still only blackness: too dark to see through! He waved to the helicopter to bring the search-light in closer.

Colleagues would pat him on the back, console him that he’d done his best. But all the time he’d know the dark truth; know that if it wasn’t for his obsession, this would never have happened. He might as well have pushed Georges under with his own hands!

He clawed desperately at the snow, his hands red-raw and numb. ‘Can’t end like this… can’t — ’ And suddenly he thought he saw something, a couple of feet to his right. He clawed away more snow, shrinking back slightly in shock as it finally became clear: Georges’ face only inches beneath the ice, ghostly in the search-light beam.

Michel let out a gasp of relief. Though he wondered whether he was already too late: Georges had probably been under almost two minutes. He banged on the ice, but it didn’t break. He tried again, but still it didn’t budge.

‘Oh, Jesus, no… No!’ Salt tears stung his eyes as he realized he couldn’t get to Georges. Getting so close but still not able to save him! Having to watch from only inches away as Georges drowned before his eyes: maybe that was his punishment!

And he noticed something else then: Georges’ body was shifting beneath the ice with a slight current. He tried another smash with his fist with no luck, then he had to clear more snow to see Georges clearly again.

Three more strikes in rapid succession, Michel grunting and screaming with each, putting all his strength into it. And with the last with still no ice-break, Michel felt the last of his strength go with it, was about to roll over onto his back and give up, give one last cry of frustration and — then suddenly he remembered the sniper’s bullets.

Michel took out his gun, measuring. He’d have to be careful with Georges’ body shifting with the current. A few inches out and he’d hit him. But no time to clear away more snow!

He fired once, twice, just ahead of where he thought Georges would be. A crack appeared, and he fired a third shot to break the block free.

He scrambled down, reaching into the icy water. Nothing, nothing! He was frantic. Try another shot or clear some snow to see where Georges was? He started to clear with his other hand — a glimpse of something, though not very clear, and a second later Georges’ body connected. He grappled on and yanked up hard, pulling Georges’ head and shoulders above the water. A quick breath, and then he yanked again, putting all his weight into it until he had most of Georges’ body solidly on the ice.

His breath vapour billowed hard in the freezing air as he leant over to resuscitate Georges — but at that moment he could see the ice-block they were on cracking with the weight. He had to desperately grapple and slide the body again, this time almost a full two yards — before collapsing in a heap at Georges’ side, exhausted, as only a foot away the ice-block gave way.

He was almost too out of breath to give mouth-to-mouth, he had to furiously pull in every breath he gave out, muttering repeatedly ‘Don’t die on me now… Don’t die on me!’ as he intermittently lifted off and pressed against Georges’ stomach.

And as the first coughs and splutters finally came from Georges’ mouth, Michel rolled onto his back and let out a great whooping victory cry towards the night sky and the swaying beam of the helicopter above.