The Walking Dead

The man ran in full flight, approaching the car. Suddenly its doors opened fast. Boniface and Clydesdale came out of the car. Their view would have been blocked by the shelter and they would not have known that he was down, and Hegner, would have known nothing until they saw the man charge on the esplanade towards them with Naylor and the American in hobbling pursuit: but they'd reacted. The man swerved to avoid the near side door, and lost his footing as it smacked against him. He fell against the little brick wall that held ornamental shrubs. Boniface and Clydesdale were on him; one at the upper body and one at the knees. The cluster of them dropped. He saw the fight. Arms, legs, buttocks heaved up, down, and writhed, as if it was a haphazard playground scrap. Naylor could not tell whose body was uppermost, but he saw punches flail. He pulled Hegner after him, gripping his arm. Far beyond the pier, two young women pushed prams and talked, never looked ahead. And then it was over. He saw the pinions go on to lifted arms and on to the ankles. They knelt on him, and the man's bag lay discarded.

Naylor took Hegner close. He looked down into the face and thought it that of a wild creature. The eyes, burning, stared back, raged. There was discolouration already in the centre of the throat, near the chin. The mouth was open and the breath rasped. The plastic binding was tight on the wrists and ankles, and the two men's weight was squatted down on him…yet Naylor could not believe, not completely, that the man no longer represented a danger to him. It filtered into his mind: it was an old poem from school, and a grievously wounded naval captain — an Elizabethan hero — was on the deck of a Spanish galleon, helpless, but his captors would not go close to him, still feared him. He told Hegner what he saw, what was in his mind. But Hegner broke the grip restraining his sleeve, and reached out. It was Boniface who took Hegner's wrist, seemed to know what he wanted, and guided the hand down. Clydesdale had his fist in the man's hair, ensured his head could not move. Hegner's fingers were taken down, so gently, by Boniface, and came to rest on the man's forehead. The fingers slid on the skin from the forehead to the eye sockets, from the eyes across the cheeks and over the shape of the nose. They skirted the mouth and rambled over the stubble on the chin. Naylor understood. Hegner learned the man, as if his fingers on the features made a photograph for him.

Hegner rocked back, and Naylor pulled him upright.

Not to Naylor, Hegner said, 'I want his bag and his documents, and I want him weighted.'

It was done. Boniface searched pockets, produced a ticket, a passport and a slim wallet, then threw the bag at Naylor's feet. Clydesdale did not loose the hair, but kicked hard and backwards with heavy boots and broke the side of the shrub bed to loosen the bricks.

To Naylor, Hegner said, 'Don't you countermand what I ask of them.'

Naylor said, vomit in his mouth, 'I'll not describe it, damn well won't.'

To Boniface and Clydesdale, Hegner said, 'Weight him well and put him over, where it's deep.'

He saw whole bricks and broken bricks shoved into pockets and down the trouser waist, knew they would be held in place by the ankle pinions. He wondered whether the man would cry out, beg, plead, at the last. He gazed into the face of an enemy, at the features over which Hegner's fingers had moved. Saw contempt and defiance. It struck him then, worse than any kick or knee blow or punch, the power of that enemy. Could it ever be bloody beaten? They had him up. One on each arm, in a shuffling run, they dragged him on to the pier. Naylor turned away.

He watched the approach of the young women. He held a handkerchief over his face and hoped to hide the split lips, the blood and the bruising. They never looked at him, did not break step, or their conversation. He heard the babble of their talk as they passed him. Was it done in their name, to keep them safe, and the babies they pushed? He listened for a splash but heard only the waves, above deep, dark water, pounding the pillars.

Naylor said, 'Joe, if it is for vengeance, then that is a shaming motive. It does no credit…'

Hegner said, 'Put him in the legal chain and he has a lawyer, and he doesn't speak during human-rights-controlled interrogation, and he becomes an icon of resistance, and kids all over speak his name. My way, he disappears. He's gone from view, from sight — where to? Confusion is created. Men move, men make calls, men hit the email. They have to know where he is. And if they don't? Then it's disruption and chaos. It hurts them, hurts them so bad, because they don't know. I live off mistakes made. Do they change codes, change safe-houses, change the membership of cells? They're in ignorance and they flounder…Think about it. Now, can we go find some coffee, Dickie?'