Tempus: The Phoenix Man Read online

  ‘Will you need me to interview her?’ Ox asked sourly.

  ‘Why bother? We know from the evidence outside his cellar what Warren Frome had been up to. Cannibalism carries a death penalty, we don’t need to add rape and torture to validate his sentence.’

  Even beyond the blank mask of his visor and breathing apparatus, Ox looked pleased. Almost illiterate, recording of interviews wasn’t his strong suit.

  ‘Yeah, you already put your stamp on that sick fuck, Chief.’

  James Rembrandt shook his head at Ox’s sorry excuse for a quip. He thought back to how he’d crushed Frome’s trachea with his boot heel, and after a moment snorted in good humour. ‘Remember to scrub up after you drop her off, Ox. Your uniform stinks.’

  ‘Chief.’ Oxford shambled away, hitching Laura on his shoulder, muttering in disgust while checking where one of her sores had dribbled pus on his coverall.

  The other four members of Rembrandt’s team clumped down the metal stairs. They’d already been through the blowers and disinfectant showers, and their coveralls glistened under the lights.

  Jamal Dhand had doffed his re-breather and helmet, allowing his unshorn hair to fall about his shoulders in a blue-black fan. He was busy unclipping the buckles on his ballistic vest. It was top of the range, an experimental military Kevlar rig, unlike the older ceramic-plated vests that Rembrandt and the others wore.

  ‘Is that it done for the day, Chief?’ Jamal asked, as he shucked out of the vest he’d brought with him from his previous life in the British Army.

  ‘That’s it.’ Rembrandt replied loudly enough so that the others heard too. He pulled off his breathing apparatus and hung it up. His jumpsuit glistened with the chemical wash he’d previously come through.

  Brent Walker and Harry Bowlam bumped shoulders, celebrating the end of a long and crappy shift in their usual crude manner. Crystal Kwolek stood to one side of the men, smirking at their boyish behavior.

  Once Ox returned from the infirmary bay, the five of them would check their armament with the “Base Sergeant” before they caught the red bus home, but Rembrandt still had a job to do before retiring.

  He left them with a nod for their good work, and headed downstairs to the vault, to report to his Guvnor, Terence Semple.

  Beneath the squad rooms was a large industrial space, separated into individual offices by four feet tall partition walls, and at the far end stood the imposing airlock-style doors beyond which the most dangerous criminals were held prior to sentencing. Even through the heavy steel, Rembrandt could hear the ever-present shouting and cursing – though it came only as a faint trickle like the Musak once played in posh office block lifts.

  Guvnor Semple’s office stood apart from the big room, so he was spared the constant background buzz. Rembrandt walked through the office area, nodding at other cops who beavered away at the reports Semple demanded. Rembrandt thought they wasted their time. If humanity lasted another generation he’d be surprised: who the fuck was going to be around to read the historical reports that Semple archived with the same due diligence that he ran the rest of The Castle?

  Semple’s office stood behind a large door, backed by green leather cushioning. Rembrandt knocked, and waited for instruction to enter. As far as policing the new world went, Semple was the most important man in the Old City. No one entered the Guvnor’s office without invitation.

  The Metropolitan Police HQ at Scotland Yard was flattened when the first bombs fell, as were all the other police stations in the capital city and surrounding countryside. These days, thirteen years after almost total annihilation, what served as the only working station in London was actually an old basement/bunker beneath a Lloyds Bank branch on Oxford Street. Those who’d sought protection from the missiles in the bank vault had been killed by the scorching heat, or later through sickness or starvation, but surprisingly the subterranean superstructure had largely survived. Nine years earlier, when a semblance of government had crawled from hiding, they’d concentrated on first bringing back some form of ‘rule of law’ and deemed a center of activity necessary in the anarchic wastelands of the Old City. Men and women in rubber suits and gas masks had toiled at removing the ash and human remains from the bank, before those with construction skills set to the rebuilding of the blown out structure. Now, in the place where customers once queued to pay bills, a turreted formation stood guard over the reclaimed vaults. The new police station was known as “The Castle”, because the imposing structure looked as if it should exist in medieval times rather than the final quarter of the twentieth century. It was apt that Guvnor Semple ruled his castle with the same iron hand as a medieval robber baron.

  ‘Enter.’ The command was abrupt, spoken with a note of anger at the inconvenient intrusion into Semple’s day. Then again, the Guvnor always spoke that way.

  Rembrandt entered the room, directing barely a flicker of interest towards the two guards who flanked the doors. They were stern-faced men, giants, large in the chest and shoulders. They shadowed Semple everywhere. Rembrandt knew they were there, and knew that wasting a greeting on them was pointless. They ignored him mostly, but other times their looks told him they were planning violence and eager for Guvnor Semple to unleash them on him. Rembrandt had no idea why he’d earned their enmity. He instead looked at the Guvnor, who sat in his usual place behind a huge walnut desk that glowed dully under the overhead lights.

  The walls were hung with paintings salvaged from various museums and stately homes. Semple said he was protecting them for future generations: left where they were discovered they’d end up as fuel in an oil drum fire somewhere. Rembrandt knew that the Guvnor’s reason for appropriating the paintings had less to do with preserving the works of art as much as his need to surround himself with the trappings of power. He wallowed in his role of “most important man” in Old City, and the paintings added validity to his station. Behind Semple hung a dour painting, showing a thirty-four year old man who liked dressing up in floppy black hat and coat – apparently a style popular a century before oil was laid to canvas. It was, Semple had informed him, a self-portrait of the seventeenth century Dutch painter and etcher Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn. It was after this artist that Semple had nicknamed the feral young man he’d discovered barely alive in the ruins of the National Gallery while foraging for treasures six years earlier. The young man was injured after skirmishing with other survivors and had crawled into the ruins of the gallery to avoid the chill and ice of the prolonged nuclear winter. He’d surrounded himself with what he could, sheltering beneath the priceless work of art as a roof to his humble squat. Semple had rescued both painting and man, and had kept both treasures since. James “Rembrandt” had accepted, and then adopted the name given to him by Semple, having no recollection of the family name he’d been born to. Now when he looked at the picture, it was with wry amusement. He was only happy he hadn’t chosen to take shelter beneath a Toulouse-Lautrec. That nickname he might have rebelled against.

  Semple didn’t return his gaze. He had a sheaf of papers before him, and he ran his fingers across them, almost as if he was blind and reading in Braille. He was shortsighted, and the spectacles pushed up on his forehead no good for close up work. He ran his fingertips under each word in turn, mouthing them silently. Then he grunted, and scowled up from beneath his tangled grey brows. On recognising his visitor, his hard, pale gaze softened momentarily.

  ‘Ha!’ he said, pushing back in his sumptuous chair, a high-backed, Victorian treasure, complete with embossed leather on seat, back rest and arms. ‘You’re back, James. I take it your mission was successful?’

  Rembrandt knew that the guvnor was being coy. News that he had returned to The Castle would have preceded him. And no way would he have returned without first bringing down the person responsible for murdering and eating his fellow survivors.

  ‘It was, Guvnor.’

  Semple flicked a smile. ‘There’s no need for such formality, James. Please, call me Terrence when we’r
e alone like this.’

  ‘Of course, Guvnor.’ Rembrandt smiled faintly. So did Semple. It wasn’t as if they were actually alone in the room. Not with Semple’s ever present body detail standing guard. But Rembrandt knew what he meant: the two huge guys were fixtures of Semple’s position and were within yards of him day or night without fail. Sometimes Semple forgot the silent giants were there, but it was hard for anyone else to do so when the threat of violence emanating from them was palpable.

  Semple held out a palm, indicating a chair opposite him. ‘Take a seat, James. Tell me all about this cannibal.’

  Rembrandt sat, perching himself on the edge of the chair, uncomfortable as hell. He wanted to lean forward, brace his elbows on the desk and clasp his hands, but didn’t. He placed his palms flat on his thighs, could feel the muscles ticking under his fingers. He related the details of the mission to capture Warren Frome.

  ‘And you chose to dispense justice in your normal forthright manner?’ Semple asked when Rembrandt had finished.

  ‘Bringing him back to The Castle would have been pointless. His crimes were punishable by death; I simply got on with it.’

  ‘But you have proof of his crimes, should questions ever be raised?’

  ‘I’ve a sack full of bones with his teeth marks in them if anyone would like to take a look. Also, there’s a female witness, a captive that Frome was holding for his next meal. She will attest to his crimes should the need arise.’

  Semple turned down his mouth. ‘We are living in desperate times, James, and we both know what cliché that gives rise to. But we are also subject to the laws of the land, and are answerable for our actions.’

  ‘Frome would’ve been hanged on his return to the castle. He’d have choked to death. I only pushed the agenda forward a few days.’

  ‘Saving us time and manpower we cannot spare. You are right, James. But there could be questions asked further down the line.’ He waved off any further concern about Frome. ‘I will ensure that the reports reflect your judicious and complimentary actions in saving the woman from a beast intent on her immediate murder. Brief your team as to the matter. The woman…’

  ‘Laura Charles. She didn’t witness Frome’s death. Jamal…uh, Officer Dhand sedated her so that she didn’t panic and warn Frome of our presence. She is unaware of his fate.’

  Semple nodded. ‘Good enough.’

  He ran his fingers over the sheaf of papers in front of him. He wasn’t interested in Frome, or Laura Charles. Covering for Rembrandt’s uncompromising form of justice was simply a matter of course. He had asked that Rembrandt report to him on fulfilling his mission for something more important to him. He was about to get to the point now that the preliminaries were over with.

  Semple pushed one of the sheets of paper across the desk.

  Rembrandt studied it for only a second or two.

  ‘The British Museum?’ he said.

  ‘Indeed.’ Semple leaned forward and tapped the piece of paper. ‘Have your patrols taken you that way recently?’

  Rembrandt had led his team along Great Russell Street only a few days earlier. Where the magnificent edifice of the British Museum once stood, now only mounds of rubble and ash remained. The huge building had been flattened by the initial soviet missiles to strike London, and since then the stone had been further scattered by looters and scavengers seeking buried treasures. As Rembrandt recalled, the only structures to survive the blasts were a terrace row of shops and offices on the left as he’d entered Great Russell Street from Bloomsbury Street. All of the Victorian townhouses on the opposite side from the Museum had been scoured to ground level.

  ‘It’s a wasteland, the same as everything between The Castle and Euston Road,’ Rembrandt said.

  ‘But what of the vaults beneath?’

  ‘Guvnor, are you telling me that none of your personal forays –’ Rembrandt glanced back at the silent bodyguards, but caught no reaction ‘- have taken you to the British Museum yet?’

  ‘It was never one of my priorities. I have no interest in fossils, or musty old books.’

  ‘So what’s your interest in the place now?’

  Semple picked up another sheet of paper. It looked as if it had been torn from a ledger of some kind. ‘As I said, I’ve no interest in most of the items exhibited in the British Museum, but this does take my fancy.’

  The ledger page was pushed towards Rembrandt. Lists of items were recorded upon it in neat black ink. Around one particular entry had been scrawled a ragged circle in red – no doubt an addition made by Semple.

  ‘Lady Layard?’ Rembrandt wondered aloud.

  ‘Indeed,’ Semple said, a faint smile touching his lips. ‘The portrait was painted by Vincente Palmaroli y Gonzales in Madrid in eighteen-seventy, where Lady Layard was British ambassador to Spain. I would like you to search the vaults beneath the museum, and acquire this portrait for my collection.’

  Semple passed over another sheet of paper, this one bearing a photograph of the painting in question. Rembrandt saw a pretty woman, with black-hair piled high, and a set of expensive jewels at her throat. The painting was framed in heavy gilt.

  ‘Must be worth a lot of money,’ Rembrandt said.

  Semple shrugged. ‘Even money has no value these days, James. To another collector the painting of Lady Layard would not be of much importance. Anyway, it is not through any form of avarice that I wish to add the portrait to my collection. I want it purely for personal reasons.’

  When Rembrandt didn’t ask, Semple sat back in his throne-like chair, folding his hands on his belly. ‘Lady Layard is a distant ancestor of mine. Prior to marrying Austen Henry Layard, she was named Enid Guest, a daughter of Sir Josiah Guest and his wife, Charlotte. Enid was a cousin of my great, great grandmother, Harriet Guest.’

  Rembrandt shook his head. He could see no familial traits shared between Enid Layard and Semple. ‘It never fails to amaze me how you can name your distant predecessors, Guvnor. Christ, I can’t even name my parents.’

  ‘I have the benefit of having access to family records. You have nothing. Not even a memory of what went before the bombs.’ Semple squinted at him. ‘If ever you recall your original surname, I might be able to help find your parents. Has anything come back? Anything at all?’

  ‘You keep asking me the same question. The answer’s still the same. Nothing. I have no recollection of who I am or where I came from prior to waking up in agony from my burns.’

  ‘And your scars: they continue to heal?’

  Rembrandt shrugged. ‘They no longer trouble me if that’s what you’re asking?’

  ‘Good. Good. Now…will you accept the task I’ve set?’

  The question was academic. If Rembrandt refused, then the Guvnor would simply order him to seek the portrait of Lady Layard.

  ‘I’ll go and catch my team before they go off duty.’

  ‘Thank you, James. I knew I could rely on you.’ Another sheet of paper came across the desk. ‘The portrait, as you can see from the ledger, was placed in storage having been returned from an exhibition in Switzerland. You will find it in the catacombs beneath the museum…if it’s still there.’

  ‘If it’s there, I’ll find it.’

  ‘Yes.’ Semple’s tone was noncommittal. To anyone else it might have sounded sinister, a veiled threat.

  Standing, Rembrandt offered a half-hearted salute. Semple had already returned to studying the piles of paperwork before him.

  Rembrandt walked towards the door, and noticed that the two guards were watching him closely, both appearing amused. They thought it funny that Rembrandt was so easily manipulated by the man, probably gave them a measure of self-satisfaction that they were not the only ones the Guvnor treated like slaves. Rembrandt lifted the corner of his mouth in a sneer, but there was no malice behind it, and he even caught an exhalation of laughter from the giant on the left. It was an odd sound from the man: usually he could expect nothing but scorn from them. Perhaps the laughter was because Semple
’s blue-eyed boy had just been handed a pile of crap to contend with.

  ‘James?’

  Caught mid-step by Semple’s call, Rembrandt turned back to the Guvnor.

  Semple didn’t lift his head from his studies.

  ‘Be careful out there,’ Semple said. ‘I hear there are some dangerous people who have laid claim to the museum grounds. I would not wish to have my ancestor’s portrait damaged during any fighting.’ This time there was nothing veiled about his warning.

  Chapter 3

  Bloomsbury, London – Old City

  July 12th 2002

  The van was a large Ford Transit, adapted for police use with the addition of a steel cage in the rear quarter for the transportation of unruly prisoners, bench seats for the team, plus space to store their equipment. Over the widows had been fixed steel mesh, and a sturdier riot-cage barrier could be slid into place over the windshield by use of a lever above the driver’s head. The barrier was now in its lowered position. Out on New Oxford Street it wasn’t unknown for patrols to come under attack by missiles thrown by the disgruntled denizens of Old City. Jamal Dhand was in the driving seat, dressed in full battle fatigues and helmet with respirator. Rembrandt was sitting alongside him while the rest of the team was scrunched on the seats in the back. Harry Bowlam and Brent Walker sat to the left, while the giant Benny Oxford shared a bench with the more diminutive Crystal Kwolek. The woman was squashed into one corner by her friend’s imposing bulk. They were all seated in silence, pissed that their downtime had been snatched away from them at the final moment just as they’d been heading for the Red Bus home. Rembrandt wasn’t much happier about the arrangement than they were, but he’d accepted that their day was not yet done. Jamal was the only one that looked happy enough to be back in uniform, and Rembrandt wondered if the man even wore his fatigues at home. When the others grouched about the shitty jobs with which they were tasked, Jamal embraced each with a smile and boundless enthusiasm. He drove the van, bouncing with ill restrained excitement as he took the turn onto Bloomsbury Street, approaching the ruins of the once plush Radisson Marlboro Hotel, now reduced to a landfill site where the rubble had been cleared from the street. On the opposite side was the entrance to Great Russell Street.