Siege of Stone (24 page)

"We've got a right special cell for you, Mister John Doe, terrorist extraordinaire," the more talkative of the pair said, giving "extraordinaire" an outrageously phony French accent. "'Cause of all this fuss your goddamn pals made, we can't put you in with the general population, so we're gonna put you in Longneck Peter's cell. Not a soul down in that wing, not in years. You'll be all by your goddamn self, just you and Peter."

"And who's Peter?" Joseph asked in his impeccable accent.

"Peter's the little Irish pansy who hanged himself in there eighty years back with his two shoelaces. Stretched the bastard's neck somethin' awful, it did. Finally had to quit puttin' prisoners in there."

"Why's that?" Joseph said, anxious to move the story along and ingratiate himself in the hopes that the two prison officers wouldn't kick him to sleep.

"'Cause they kept hangin' themselves. Peter would come to 'em at night, y'see, and tell 'em to. Leastways, that's what one of the poor bastards said who we found before he'd choked. He was the only one as survived. So say your prayers before you shut your eyes, you poncy shite."

The wing was damp and chilly and smelled of bad drains, and Joseph saw no other prisoners in the darkened cells. Longneck Peter's cell was all the way at the end, down a steep incline, and Joseph had to step through several puddles of water before they arrived at the cell door.

It was not a solid steel door, as were on the cells in the other parts of the prison, but thick iron bars. The distance between them was scarcely wide enough to slip a hand through. The silent officer unlocked the cell, and the other one pushed Joseph inside. There was a wooden stool, a toilet and sink, and a cot with a stained and mildewed mattress.

"Sorry about the accommodations, but you know how things are." The officer pointed toward the ceiling, where a large black timber ran the width of the cell. "That's where they generally hang themselves from. Pretty handy, isn't it?" The officer looked down at Joseph's prison issue slippers. "Too bad, no laces. You could always tear your clothes into strips, though. A lot of them did that."

"I don't think I'll bother," Joseph said. The last thing he planned to worry about was some moldy ghost story. "I'm sure I'll sleep very well indeed." He spread his blanket on the cot. Fortunately it was big enough so that he could lie on it and fold the rest over to cover him. He wouldn't be warm, but he probably wouldn't freeze.

"Well, we hope you enjoy your stay," said the officer. "And if you yell, yell loud—you're a long way away."

They shut and locked the cell door behind him, and the light from the hall diminished. There was no bulb in the cell. Joseph sat on the cot and listened as the officers' footsteps receded up the hall. When he could no longer hear them, he got up and looked around his cell in the semi-darkness.

There wasn't much to look at. The cell was below ground level, and there were no windows, only a wall of heavy stone.

Despite its age, the mortar was secure, as Joseph found when he attempted to dig some away with his fingernails. There would certainly be no escaping from Hixton for him, not unless, he thought bitterly, the Prisoner returned and walked him through the stone wall.

Try as he might, Joseph couldn't imagine himself in a worse situation. If he revealed himself as a CIA agent, their entire cover would be blown, and he would return to the States in disgrace,
if
the Company and Skye confirmed his story in the first place. If he kept silent, he was a terrorist, and Hixton might turn out to be the most hospitable prison in which he was kept.

At least they wouldn't be able to trace him through the car. It was Company, and was spotless. It didn't even exist. That in itself might lend credence to his story if he decided to go the "I'm a spy" route. But the success of that might be decided for him. He was sure that his photograph was already winging its way toward the CIA and FBI for possible identification. For the time being, there wasn't anything he could do except sit in the cell and think about which lie to tell next.

T
he next day he was given two dreadful meals, and went through seven hours of questioning. He held to the story that he was a resident of Carlisle who had been looking for a prostitute when he had found himself in the middle of the breakout.
Then why don't you tell us who you are?
they asked him.
Why does your car have a false registration and serial number?
Don't you think it's better that your wife knows you've been catting about than that she sees your picture in the paper as a terrorist?

He knew they knew he was lying, and by the end of the day their frustration had led them to minor physical assaults, the kind that would leave no marks. They clapped their hands over his ears from behind, and twisted his ears, along with a number of other minor tortures in their repertoire. Still, Joseph did nothing but howl his innocence, as any wrongly accused burgher would. They threw him back in his cell and gave him his second meal, a piece of unidentifiable meat and a boiled potato. At least they were hot.

He pushed the metal plate into the hall under the narrow bottom of the cell door, and lay down on the cot. He had been remanded just before dawn, had not slept in all that time, and now was exhausted. There was nothing to do but sleep. Maybe he would dream of someplace much nicer than Longneck Peter's cell in Hixton Prison.

So Joseph closed his eyes and breathed deeply, trying to center his thoughts on rest. He fell asleep and dreamed of himself in Hixton Prison, and of Longneck Peter hanging from the black beam across his cell, his face in shadow.

Sometime after midnight he awoke, his eyelids fluttering open. And there, a yard above him, was a figure dangling in the air, twisting and turning slowly, its face coming around to look into his with open and knowing eyes.

F
BI deputy director Quentin McIntyre was working later than usual. He usually liked to leave the building before seven o'clock, since he always came in at six in the morning, but there had been more things to take care of than usual, and too many damned meetings for his liking. Things never got done in meetings, they got done by people painstakingly working one or two at a time the way he and his assistant, Alan Phillips, did.

McIntyre had just put some files in his briefcase to read before he went to bed when Phillips entered his office with some papers. "I know it's late," he said, "but this is something you're going to want to see."

It was a request from the counterterrorism division of MI5, asking the FBI to cross-check their photograph and fingerprint files for an ID on a terrorism suspect. McIntyre recognized the man in the enclosed photograph immediately.

It was Joseph Stein, one of the three CIA agents who had been working inside the United States against the CIA charter. McIntyre had been unable to find out what exactly they had been up to, but he knew that they were being run by Richard Skye, a petty bureaucrat who, to McIntyre, demonstrated the seediest aspects of the Company. From earlier run-ins, he had good reason to dislike Skye, and this new team he was running didn't further endear him to McIntyre, who thought that the three had been responsible in some way for the disappearance of Agent Brian Foster, who had found them in Arizona.

And now here was one of them, out of McIntyre's jurisdiction, admittedly, but still at his mercy. What was that bastard Skye up to now, over in England?

McIntyre considered the situation. If he informed MI5 that their suspect was CIA, they would let him go with a caution to the U.S. government to keep their nose out of Great Britain's internal affairs. It would certainly do Skye no good, but it would also be an embarrassment for the country.

Better perhaps to stay silent for the time being. That way Stein and the other agents would stew, as would Skye, not knowing if his whole operation was going to fall. And if Skye had to cut Stein loose, it would serve him right. He'd have a lot of explaining to do to his superiors, and depending on what the other two members of the team reported when they came in . . . well, it could be a real mess for Richard Skye, and that was something that Quentin McIntyre would dearly love to see happen.

"Let's run it through our files," McIntyre said, handing the photograph and copy of fingerprints back to Phillips, and looking at him knowingly from under furrowed brows. Phillips smiled, getting the message. They both knew that Stein, having no criminal record, would not be in their files. The search would turn up blank, and Stein would remain in a British prison, a wonderful liability for Richard Skye.

A
nd it was Richard Skye at the CIA to whom MI5 had sent the photograph in a sealed envelope. When he saw it, he came as close as he ever did to panic. But then he made himself relax, and tried to see how this situation might be worked to his advantage.

When he found no way, he considered his options. Claiming Stein as one of his agents was out of the question. Apparently Stein had not revealed his CIA connections to his captors, so that made things easier. He could simply leave Stein out to dry and work with the other agents, or possibly they might find a way to help Stein escape, unlikely as that was.

At any rate, he need do nothing for now except draft a message to MI5 disavowing any knowledge of their mysterious prisoner. That would at least give him time to consider what to do next.

J
oseph's heart felt as if it had leapt into his throat. He remained pinned by the gaze of the apparition as it stopped turning and looked down at him. This wasn't at all like the vision they had seen on the road. It had form and detail, and an expression on its face, from the gaping mouth to the mad eyes to the long, gaunt neck that seemed to be stretched by an invisible rope. Joseph could even see the whiskers on the man's face.

Then that face seemed to shift, and the figure slowly descended from where it hung in the air, sinking until its feet were on the floor of the cell. The body was changing too, from the filthy rags of a prisoner to a spotless white shirt and a pair of neatly pressed trousers. The neck contracted to normality, and the face, instead of grimacing in a rictus of pain, now smiled at him beatifically. It was the face of the Prisoner, the man he had seen in his dreams.

And I'm still dreaming
, Joseph thought.
My nightmare of Longneck Peter became the Prisoner, who has shared my dreams before. I'm just dreaming
.

"No. You're awake, Joseph. And I'm really here."

Joseph gasped, sat up on the cot, and grabbed his left hand with his right, digging the nails into his palm to drive himself into wakefulness. The Prisoner shook his head. "No. You can't wake up from this. I'm really here. Sorry about the Longneck Peter thing, but he'd been in your dream so strongly, and I can't resist a little touch of theatricality."

"How did you get in here?" was the first thing that Joseph could think of to say.

"Through the wall, of course. It's quite easy for me, just as it would be easy for you, were you to accompany me out of here. I hope you'll wish to do that."

"You're the one . . ." Joseph said slowly. Christ, his mind felt as though it were operating underwater, or under molasses. He didn't understand any of this. "You've been freeing the terrorists, haven't you? I saw you . . . go through the wall."

"I know you did. I felt you as I entered. And of course I saw you as we made our desperate escape. And I summed up matters very quickly. The soldiers were after you, and once they captured you, they would most certainly put you into this prison."

"But how did you know . . . did you find out where I was here?"

"I simply reached out for you, Joseph. The connection between the two of us is remarkably strong, more so than any other I've felt, either while I was in captivity or now that I am free. Ironic, isn't it? I entered your dreams trying to bring you to me so that you could free me, and here I find you a prisoner." He looked around the cell. "And in a very unpleasant jail, too. I don't think you'll be getting out by yourself very soon. Even if you should admit to them that you're a member of the Central Intelligence Agency, I doubt they'll believe you."

"You know I'm CIA?"

"Of course. I know nearly everything about you, Joseph. And I know that what you want the most right now, the single most important thing in your life, is your freedom, and that you would do just about anything to get it back. Am I correct?"

"Yes. Of course you are."

"Would that include aiding me—granting me a boon, shall we say?"

"A 'boon'? What kind of boon?" The descent to practicality was bringing Joseph back to his distrustful, cynical self. "I mean, I don't even know who you are. I know you were kept prisoner for . . . a long time. And I know that you can do things that other people can't." He gave a dry laugh. "That much is obvious. But rumor has it that you're not quite Casper the Friendly Ghost, whatever else you may be. If I'm not mistaken, the Catholic Church has called you the Antichrist for over a thousand years."