The Man on Hackpen Hill Read online

  ‘But why lay their bodies in a crop circle in Wiltshire?’ Strover asks. ‘Surrounded by mathematical codes that no one can decipher?’

  Before Silas can answer, a cry of agony rings out in the darkness from behind the main building.

  ‘Jesus, someone’s not happy,’ Silas says.

  A second cry, louder this time. They sign out at the gatehouse and hurry around the outside of the perimeter wall, watched by a member of the security staff.

  ‘That sounded disturbingly familiar,’ Silas says, thinking back to the shout they’d heard outside the Slaughtered Lamb. Not the cry itself, but its tone, the timbre of pain. They reach the back of the main building, where a big, modern extension has been constructed adjacent to the old Victorian house. It looks more like a hospital, purpose-built and floodlit. Silas thinks of Conor again as he tries to see over the wall. And then two gates swing open and a private ambulance sweeps out.

  ‘Tell me that’s not the number plate of the ambulance at Studland – the one that overtook us on our way here.’

  ‘I’ll chase up Dorset now,’ Strover says, pulling out her phone.

  ‘And?’ he asks expectantly, when she hangs up.

  ‘It’s the same,’ she says.

  ‘Oh Christ,’ Silas says, nodding at the modern extension. ‘What the hell’s Jim Matthews doing here?’

  95

  Jim

  ‘What were you thinking? I heard his screams from my office. You are aware we have two police officers on the premises.’

  ‘I’m sorry—’

  The unmistakable slap of someone being hit hard across the face.

  Where are these voices coming from? Inside Jim’s head? He’s heard enough of them in his time.

  ‘Don’t “sorry” me. Now fuck off, the lot of you.’

  Haslam. Dr Haslam. One moment so meek and mild, almost fey with his long hair and round glasses and moist little eyes, the next, he’s smacking you in the mouth and shouting like a demented sergeant major. Christ, he hit Jim enough times when he wasn’t happy with his progress. Jim suddenly feels vulnerable as he hears the footsteps fade. He’s lying on a bed, unable to move, with just Dr Haslam for company. And his left knee is still burning up with pain. Is that what woke him?

  A phone starts to ring. Jim opens his eyes, but all he can see is a blur, edged with crimson. He feels slow, heavy-lidded, as if he’s drunk gallons of treacle and it’s filled every limb of his body, pulling him down through the bed. The phone’s still ringing. Is it his phone? Ringing in his head?

  ‘Haslam speaking.’ A long pause. ‘I know they’re bloody on site, we’ve been tracking them… In the old wing.’

  Jim’s head is hurting too. He manages to lift a hand – so heavy – to touch his forehead. No fresh blood.

  ‘I told her not to show them anything… It’s locked, don’t worry. And everyone’s been moved. I’m also the only one with a key.’

  If Jim strains, he can catch the voice at the other end of the phone. No words, just the accent. American. Maybe Haslam is in his head. The American too. They used to talk like this, the hostile voices that argued day and night, telling him what to do, passing judgement on his life. His persecutors, his only companions.

  Jim tries again to work out what’s happening. Haslam must be somewhere outside, in the corridor. The test chambers are all soundproofed, which means Jim’s door is open. It explains the faint draught on his face. He tries his eyelids again, but they don’t respond. Shut like a pair of heavy garage doors. Why can’t he bloody see? Even without his glasses, he can usually make out something, dim shapes, light and darkness.

  Haslam is talking again, his voice agitated.

  ‘We just need to ring-fence Lando,’ he says. ‘He had a breakdown, commissioned some weirdo, hippy-shit circles in a wheat field and did some shocking things with two dead bodies before tragically dying himself in hospital… We knew nothing of what he was doing. Which is true. We were as surprised and as horrified as everyone else. And there’s no evidence to link the victims to Cranham Hall. Identities unknown – no one knows who they are, the police, the papers. Jed Lando knew but he can’t talk any more… I don’t know if she really knows. I’m trying to find out.’

  Jim’s eyes are opening. He blinks and blinks, forcing his retinas to work as he turns his head. Slowly, the blurred edges of his chamber start to sharpen, not by much but enough. The open door, the empty chair beside him, the diminutive silhouette of Dr Haslam on his phone in the corridor.

  ‘I’ll talk to the two detectives if I have to… No, just Jim Matthews. We’re expecting the woman any minute. When she’s in, we’ll stay in full lockdown… I’m confident the situation can be contained once we have them both under the same roof… Of course I’m not going anywhere.’

  Dr Haslam comes off the phone and enters the room, pulling up the chair to sit in front of Jim. He’s still a blur but Jim knows it’s him because of the sickly sweet aftershave. Dr Haslam never goes anywhere without it. Maybe it’s to mask the smell of other people’s fear.

  96

  Silas

  ‘When did CSI say they’ll be here?’ Silas asks Strover, as they return to the car park at the front of Cranham Hall.

  ‘Twenty minutes,’ Strover says, glancing at her watch.

  ‘You did well,’ Silas says. Even though CSI only has to drive over from the Forensic Investigation Unit in Oxford, it’s a quick response for so late in the day.

  ‘Everyone wants a slice of this case, guv,’ Strover says.

  Did she just call him guv? Finally? They are both buzzing, sensing a major breakthrough, now that they know the key found on Jed Lando’s body fits the lock of a mortuary in the basement of Cranham Hall.

  Silas looks back at the old building again as they get into their car. Once he’s been issued with the warrant, he’ll search the place for Jim Matthews.

  ‘Jim’s somehow central to all this, I’m sure of it,’ he says.

  ‘Aren’t you forgetting Bella?’ Strover says.

  It’s true. Silas is still to be convinced of the journalist’s relevance to the case. He’s about to apologise when Strover’s phone rings. Her face lights up as she switches the call to speakerphone.

  ‘I’m with my boss, would you mind repeating that?’ Strover says. And then she whispers to Silas: ‘The chemistry prof.’

  ‘We’ve finally had a breakthrough,’ the professor says, as Silas leans over to listen. The professor sounds positively animated, a far cry from the world weariness of their last exchange. ‘We’ve continued to reverse-engineer the encoded messages, working on the assumption that it was either the molecular formula for a known chemical warfare agent or a prescribed antipsychotic.’

  ‘And?’ Strover says.

  Silas taps the steering wheel, unable to cope with the tension.

  ‘All three patterns relate to what we believe are antipsychotic medicines.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ Silas asks, unable to resist joining the conversation.

  ‘We’re sure. There’s just one catch: each one is a variant of a readily available second generation neuroleptic, altered at the molecular level to create something that we don’t believe is yet on the market. We’re not talking big variations, but it appears to be about dropping the percentage of blockaded D2 dopamine receptors to below 60 per cent. The goal – and I’m speculating here – would be to eliminate all risk of negative side effects, while allowing for a reduced, possibly selective, treatment of a patient’s more severe psychotic positive symptoms. Dangerous delusions, for example.’

  Silas closes his eyes. He knows all about dopamine. When Conor was diagnosed with schizophrenia a few years back, he and Mel had endless meetings with psychiatrists as they tried to get the right balance of medication for him. Hit the sweet spot. Block 60 per cent of the dopamine receptors and the hallucinations and delusions start to decrease, but once you get up to an 80 per cent blockade, ‘extrapyramidal’ side effects kick in, including muscular spasms, restles
sness and tremors.

  ‘OK, so no brand names,’ Strover says to the professor.

  ‘These are essentially new drugs,’ the professor says. ‘Untried and untested and potentially lethal as a result. Unless they’re the subject of ongoing clinical trials somewhere, but I’ve banged the jungle drums and nobody’s ever heard of them. They usually take years to reach the market. And something like this would be the holy grail of antipsychotic medication – to cure psychosis without any side effects. But, as far as I understand, you can’t really pick and choose which delusions remain and which ones are eliminated.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Strover says. ‘For all your help.’

  Strover signs off and turns to Silas. Her team of boffins has finally come good.

  ‘So not Porton Down,’ she says, sitting back. ‘At least the boss will be happy.’

  ‘Google this for me, will you?’ Silas asks, passing Strover the newspaper cutting he took from Lando’s office. He doesn’t give a damn about the boss.

  ‘Stefan P. Kruszewski, ’ she says, reading the caption as she types it into her phone. ‘A good name to google… He’s a whistle-blower in America. Something of a hero. Exposed malpractice at a psychiatric unit, as well as at two well-known pharmaceutical companies.’

  It’s the confirmation Silas was hoping for. ‘Jed Lando’s target wasn’t Porton Down – it was big pharma,’ he says, thinking of the dramatic crop circles again, the bodies placed inside them. He remembers when he took the call about the first victim, a young man, and thought it might be Conor. An image of him in a wheat field comes and goes. It could so easily have been his son. ‘We need to ring Malcolm, ask him to check the victims’ bodies for these three drugs.’

  Silas pauses. Something else is troubling him. He thinks again of Jim, the young scientist’s insistence on working at Porton Down; the secret base’s connection with Lando and his crop circles; AP Brigham’s apparent interest in him; the low dopamine blockade of untested antipsychotics; the high chance of delusions. And a terrible thought begins to take seed.

  97

  Jim

  ‘So, how was… Porton Down?’ Dr Haslam asks, sitting beside Jim’s bed in the test chamber. ‘The furry little white rabbits?’

  ‘Why am I back here?’ Jim asks, squinting at Dr Haslam, aware of his stomach tightening. His own voice sounds like someone else’s, thin and distant. He wasn’t just working with rabbits.

  ‘Where do you think “here” is?’ Dr Haslam asks.

  ‘Harwell, of course,’ Jim says, puzzled by the question.

  Dr Haslam sits back, shaking his head in disbelief.

  ‘Truly remarkable,’ he says. ‘You’re back here – at Harwell indeed, why not – because someone was trying to cause you harm. Us too. And we couldn’t have that.’

  ‘The harm is already done,’ Jim says. ‘I’ve told her everything. About the experiments you’re doing here. VX, BZ, LSD.’

  Jim desperately wishes he could see Bella, hear how she’s filed her story, share the sense of anticipation as the news presses start to roll.

  ‘And who’s “her”?’ Dr Haslam asks, with almost pantomime curiosity.

  ‘Bella. She’s a journalist.’

  ‘Of course, dear Bella the journalist.’ Dr Haslam glances at his watch. He’s not taking Jim seriously. ‘She should be with us any minute.’

  With us? Jim tries to sit up in bed but the weight of his own body is too much, the pain in his knee too intense. Bella can’t come here. She must be kept away from Dr Haslam.

  ‘Why’s she coming to Harwell?’ Jim asks, his voice cracking in desperation. It’s too dangerous. If her best friend Erin was experimented on, Haslam could do the same to her.

  ‘I imagine she’s a diligent journalist and wants to hear the other side of the story,’ Dr Haslam says. ‘Give us our “right to reply”.’

  Jim somehow needs to get a message to Bella, warn her to stay away.

  ‘It was a cruel thing to do, putting you two in touch,’ Dr Haslam continues. ‘But he was obsessed with folie à deux, you see. How did he do it? Write you a letter?’

  Who was obsessed with folie à deux? And how did he do what? Jim doesn’t understand the questions. His brain is not functioning properly. It’s like there’s a time lag between synaptic connections, an echo on the neurological phone network. Dr Haslam’s right, though. Someone must have put them in touch. It’s the only explanation for their encounter in Wiltshire.

  ‘She found me in a pub,’ Jim says.

  ‘That was lucky.’

  ‘She must have been sent.’

  Dr Haslam sits back and sighs. ‘For once, I fear you’re right.’

  What does he mean, ‘for once’?

  ‘And are you going to tell me who?’ he asks, his tone cold now, dismissive.

  ‘I don’t know who it was,’ Jim says.

  Dr Haslam says nothing. His silences were often the most frightening part of a session with him.

  ‘What are you going to do with me?’ Jim asks quietly.

  Dr Haslam leans forward to peer into Jim’s face. Jim screws up his eyes, recoiling from the warmth of Dr Haslam’s breath on his cheek.

  ‘Tut, tut, I see you’ve been banging your head again,’ he says, touching Jim between the eyebrows. It’s sore from his earlier wound and Jim winces, jolting his head back. ‘I thought we’d put a stop to all that nonsense.’ He unlocks the tether tied to Jim’s hands. ‘Get up.’

  Jim’s eyes open. His response to the familiar barked command is visceral, like a triggered reflex, and he feels his body already trying to move.

  ‘I can’t,’ he says, his muscles straining in vain.

  ‘Get up,’ Dr Haslam repeats, deaf to Jim’s protests.

  ‘I can’t move,’ Jim says, but slowly, very slowly, muscle memory takes over. Jim turns onto his side and lifts himself up on one elbow. Knee throbbing, he slides his legs off the bed and onto the cold tiles. It’s not his old chamber, which had wooden floorboards. He feels a hand on his arm as Dr Haslam helps him to stand.

  ‘This isn’t my room, is it?’ Jim asks, swaying on his feet.

  ‘We’ve upgraded you,’ Dr Haslam says. ‘Given you a few perks – a basin and mirror. Actually, it’s for staff. You shouldn’t be in here at all but we’re full. And you’re an important government scientist. At least, you were. Out there in the real world doing very well for yourself – until someone put you in touch with Bella.’

  Jim can hear the rising anger in Dr Haslam’s voice as he helps him to walk over to the basin. For a moment, the physical contact, one arm around his shoulder, feels almost friendly, but then Dr Haslam moves his hand up to the back of Jim’s head and gathers a clump of hair in his fist.

  ‘Take a good look and tell me who you see,’ he says, pushing Jim’s face close to the mirror.

  Jim’s legs start to buckle. Gripping the sides of the basin to steady himself, he peers into the mirror, close enough for his breath to create a small, pulsing cloud of condensation on the glass. A haunted face stares back at him. Dark eye sockets, a wounded forehead. He barely recognises himself.

  ‘Who is it?’ Dr Haslam repeats. ‘Who do you see?’

  Jim closes his eyes and opens them again. ‘James Matthews,’ he whispers, remembering the routine with a shiver. ‘Important government scientist.’

  ‘Louder,’ Dr Haslam shouts, twisting Jim’s hair in his fingers.

  ‘James M—’ But before he can repeat his name, Dr Haslam smacks Jim’s forehead into the mirror, fracturing the glass into a jigsaw of shards.

  ‘Now who do you see?’ Dr Haslam asks.

  Jim tries to lift a hand to his head, anything to stop the pain coursing through his skull, but he hasn’t got the strength. Instead, he slumps forward over the sink, watching droplets of blood explode against the porcelain. Slowly, he looks up at the multiple images of himself staring back at him.

  ‘James Matthews,’ Jim says.

  ‘The old James Matthews,’ Dr Haslam co
rrects, still holding the back of his head. ‘Psychiatric inpatient, diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. But I made you well, didn’t I? No negative symptoms, and only a few positive ones, the benign delusions that we all experience at some time in our lives. I sent you back out into the world, even found you a job. So the least you can fucking do is tell me who put you and Bella in touch. How did she find you? Was it Jed Lando? Or someone else? Another traitor?’

  Dr Haslam is shouting now, calling for Vincent to remove the remains of the mirror from the wall and clean up the mess, but his words are fading, and Jim is no longer at the basin. He is outside in the corridor, looking in through the observation window on a young volunteer as Dr Haslam smacks his fragile face into the broken mirror again and again, repeating a question that he can never answer.

  98

  Bella

  Bella pulls into the college car park, the same corner slot that her mum had used when she came to pick her up at the end of term. It feels a long time ago now, before the summer, her shifts at the migrant centre, hanging out with her mum at home. Getting to know each other again. Bella was ready to leave uni and face the challenges of the outside world, to pursue a career in journalism. She never imagined that she’d be back at her old Oxford college investigating the death of her best friend.

  She gets out of the car and walks over to the lodge, wondering if the porters will have forgotten her already, or whether they’ve been warned by Dr Haslam to deny her access. It’s strange being back in college, a weird mix of dread and satisfaction. She knows that Dr Haslam was responsible for preparing her for real life, and there was a time when she was grateful to him. That’s all changed now. She’s angry, ready to confront him about Erin. About Harwell too. What the hell was he doing over there?

  The night porter on duty looks up at her as she walks into the lodge, his lips breaking into a faint smile of recognition. Bella had a love-hate relationship with the porters during her three years as an undergraduate. By the end, she had earned their grudging respect, the only way to get on with them. If you showed any weakness, they could make student life a misery, as she discovered in her first year.