The Last Plague Read online

  Joel collapsed onto the armchair, stared at the ceiling. He groaned. “I suppose the stripper was your idea?”

  Ralph chuckled. “Someone had to liven up your stag weekend.”

  “Yeah, cheers for that,” Joel said sourly.

  “My pleasure. You’ve still got squirty cream around your mouth.”

  Joel went to wipe his mouth but then realised Ralph was messing with him.

  “Don’t be cruel,” Frank said. “Give him a break.”

  “Fair enough. He’s been through enough.”

  “Please don’t put any photos or video on Facebook,” Joel said.

  “Oh, come on,” Ralph complained.

  “Please, Ralph. Anya will kill me.”

  “No, she won’t. Polish girls are very open-minded.”

  “I’m begging you.”

  “Don’t guilt trip me.”

  “Please…”

  Ralph stroked his chin. He shook his head. “Okay then. You spoil all the fun.”

  “Where’s Magnus?” asked Joel.

  Frank sucked on his inhaler, grimaced. “Out in the kitchen.”

  “Is he okay? Has Debbie been calling him again?”

  “No,” said Ralph. “It’s something else.”

  “Like what?”

  Ralph said, “I found him outside, asleep on the grass.”

  “What was he doing out there? Is he back on the weed?”

  Ralph hesitated. “I don’t think so. He said he had a nightmare…but then said it wasn’t a nightmare. His nose had been bleeding.”

  “Is he doing coke?”

  “Magnus wouldn’t do that shit,” Frank said.

  Joel frowned. “Hope he’s alright.”

  “I think so,” Ralph said. “He’s a bit shaken up, that’s all.”

  Magnus appeared in the doorway, steam rising from a cup of coffee in his hand. A muscle twitched in his face. “I can hear you all from the kitchen.”

  The other men said nothing.

  Magnus eyed the three of them in turn. He took a mouthful of coffee and swallowed. “I went outside to have a cigarette. You were all asleep. I was looking at the sky. Then something else was above me. I fell down and it felt like I was being crushed. I don’t know what it was.”

  “Are you sure?” asked Ralph.

  Joel looked at Magnus’s nostrils for signs of white powder.

  Magnus noticed him. “I haven’t been doing drugs, okay?”

  Joel looked at him. “Sorry, mate.”

  Magnus returned to the kitchen.

  The room stayed silent behind him.

  * * *

  There was no more thunder. No rain.

  The men spent the rest of the morning recovering from hangovers. Frank and Joel cooked fried breakfasts for everyone. Sausages, fried eggs, fried bread, mushrooms, baked beans and bacon. Ralph asked for black pudding and was told to go and buy it himself if he wanted some. Joel didn’t finish his breakfast, so he gave the rest to Ralph, apart from the mushrooms, which Ralph gave to Magnus.

  In the afternoon Ralph played Frank at darts. They drank coffee between turns. Ralph had once played for their county. He beat Frank without trying too hard and he let Frank know it.

  “You’ve got a dart player’s physique,” Frank told him.

  Ralph smiled and threw a double-top. “I think that’s five games to nil.”

  Frank put down his darts.

  Ralph took the five pound note from Frank’s hand, folded it into his wallet.

  “Well played,” said Frank.

  “Don’t forget you still owe me for the stripper.”

  “I’ll pay you when we get home.”

  “No probs.”

  Outside, the day grew darker. But rain still did not come.

  * * *

  Magnus turned off his mobile and put it his pocket. He gritted his teeth, rested his forehead against the kitchen table.

  Debbie wouldn’t stop calling.

  Magnus went outside. The clouds were like concrete. Summer was in its death-throes, although it had been a dreary summer anyway. Autumn was almost here.

  “Ah, fuck it,” he said.

  He took out his mobile and switched it on. He waited.

  The mobile rang, vibrating in his hand. His ringtone was a Johnny Cash song.

  Debbie was calling. He sighed, ran a hand over his shaven head.

  He put the phone to one ear. “Hello?”

  Debbie’s voice, pleading and pathetic: “Are you coming home?”

  * * *

  Joel needed to stretch his legs. The lukewarm shower hadn’t refreshed him. The water had seemed greasy. He had brushed his teeth twice to remove the taste of alcohol from his mouth.

  The grass was damp. The hems of his jeans were wet. He walked the fields around the house. He wore a jacket to keep out the creeping cold. The breeze ruffled his hair.

  He remembered parts of last night; the stripper dancing around him, her groin writhing in front of his face. She had touched his face, and her fingertips had been too warm and yellowed from nicotine. He remembered the others laughing. He didn’t want to think about what would happen if Anya found out.

  But he hadn’t done anything wrong, had he? Why should he feel guilty when he had no control over what had happened?

  Still, he felt like he had betrayed Anya, even though all he had done was lick sickly-sweet squirty cream from the stripper’s bellybutton. But that was enough for him. He was wracked with anxiety and the hot panic-fever of guilt. He was jittery.

  He huffed air out of his mouth and frowned.

  There was nobody out here. The fields opened out before him. Low hedgerows and oak trees. A family of deer were grazing in a field. The chirp and twitter of songbirds. A crow flashed overhead, squawking like it was mocking him.

  Joel glanced back at the house. He halted and looked down the footpath, the way he had been heading.

  “Oh well,” he muttered. “Here goes…”

  He had his mobile in his hand. It shook a little. Too much adrenaline flooding his veins. Fast heart rate. His guts squirmed. He wanted to take a dump. He dialled Anya’s number. Part of him hoped she would answer; another part of him prayed she wouldn’t so he could put this off a bit longer.

  She answered almost immediately.

  “Hello, love,” he said. “How’re you?”

  Anya coughed, cleared her throat. “Hi, Joel. How is my future husband this morning? Still drunk?” He loved her accent. Fucking loved it. Her English was excellent. Ever since he’d been a young lad he’d been captivated by women with Eastern European accents. Russian, Slovakian, Polish, it didn’t matter.

  “No, just a bit hung-over,” he replied.

  “This is a surprise. I thought you still be in bed. You have good night?”

  “I have to admit something.”

  A pause on the other end of the line. He pictured her looking worried, waiting for him to say he had cheated on her.

  “Admit?”

  “There was a stripper last night.”

  A pause. He heard her breathing. He waited. Closed his eyes.

  “I know,” she said.

  He opened his eyes one at a time. “What? You know?”

  “I know what happened.”

  “I’m sorry. Please forgive me. The others were jeering me, goading me. I thought that if I wimped out of it I’d look like a fool. I didn’t do anything with the stripper, I promise. She was old and skanky.”

  “Skanky, Joel?”

  “Yes. It means dirty, unclean.”

  “Oh.”

  He listened to her tone of voice. His heart pounded against his ribcage. He felt woozy and panicky.

  “Are you still there, Anya?”

  “It is okay, Joel. You did nothing wrong.”

  “Really?”

  She was giggling. “I knew you would have stripper. Ralph and Magnus told me before you left. They asked for my…uh, permission.”

  “So you really don’t mind?”


  “Joel, what you think me and my friends did on my hen party?”

  “You had a stripper?”

  “Yes. I had to lick cream from his abs. Was fun. I was drunk.”

  A stab of jealousy in his chest. “I did that as well.”

  “Lick cream from man’s abs?”

  “No,” he said. “I had to lick squirty cream from her bellybutton.”

  She laughed. He laughed along with her, relieved. The anxiety faded.

  “You realise how much I love you?” Joel asked her.

  “Tell me.”

  “I’ll show you when I get home tomorrow.”

  “I look forward to that.”

  “I’ll bring the squirty cream.”

  She laughed again. Always easy to make her laugh, even with his bad jokes. He adored her for it. Other women had been mere infatuations that ended badly, as most did. It didn’t matter. He only wanted her.

  “I love you too, Joel. My husband.”

  “Not yet.”

  “Soon.”

  “I’ve got to go now,” he said. “I think it’s going to rain.”

  They said their goodbyes. Joel returned the mobile to his pocket.

  He saw three dots in the sky, approaching from the east.

  He heard the muffled stutter of helicopter rotors slicing the air.

  Joel whistled.

  The Chinook helicopters headed towards him. Tandem rotors. Grey-green fuselage. The distinctive RAF low-visibility roundel: two concentric circles; a red circle inside a larger blue circle. Moving fast and flying low. Their roar was deafening. He covered his ears, opened his mouth.

  They passed directly over him. He ducked instinctively and watched them until they faded away into the distance, heading west.

  He headed back to the house.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Monday morning. Dark clouds filled the sky. The previous evening had been spent slumped in the living room watching old Hammer films eating various unhealthy snacks.

  The Corsa was idling on the driveway, Frank waiting behind the wheel while Magnus and Ralph got in the back of the car. Joel had triple-checked that the cottage’s lights and electrical switches were turned off and the back door had been locked. Now he was re-checking the front door, testing the doorknob to see if it would turn and the door would open.

  “It’s locked,” Ralph called through the open window. “You just locked it, you OCD freak.”

  Joel glanced back, glared, and then tried the door again. He put the keys in his jacket pocket and got into the car.

  “Don’t think I’ll be drinking again for a while,” said Magnus.

  “Nor me,” Joel said, slumped in his seat.

  “Wimps,” Ralph said.

  Frank put the car in gear, started down the track. He guided the car around the same potholes that had annoyed him on the way to the cottage.

  Frank glanced towards the western horizon. A plume of smoke was climbing the sky. Maybe a house on fire. The direction they would be heading.

  Magnus had noticed it too. “It looks pretty.”

  * * *

  Frank slowed the Corsa to a crawl. The four men stared ahead.

  A red Toyota Yaris was on the grass verge, its back end sticking out onto the road. The driver’s door was open. The engine was still running. The exhaust coughed petrol fumes.

  Frank edged the car forward until it was parallel to the Toyota. Joel wound down the window and peered out. The open-door alarm was beeping. The headlights were on.

  No driver and no passengers.

  “Maybe they’ve gone for a piss in the bushes,” said Ralph.

  Joel glanced up and down the road. “Maybe it’s an ambush.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Frank.

  “Maybe they’re waiting for us to get out of the car and rob us.”

  Ralph chuckled. “You think Dick Turpin’s gonna steal our wallets?”

  “Shut up,” said Joel.

  “Should we wait in case the driver returns?” asked Magnus. “Feels weird leaving the car parked there with its door wide open.”

  “It hasn’t been parked,” said Frank. “It’s been abandoned.”

  Joel’s voice was low. “Why?”

  “Let’s find out.” Frank parked the Corsa by the side of the road. He got out. Ralph and Magnus followed him to the Toyota.

  Joel hesitated behind them. “Are you sure this is the right thing to do?”

  Frank went to the driver’s side. The car was gleaming, seemingly fresh from the dealer’s showroom. A long scratch ran along the side of the car, etched into the chassis. Something glistened within the scratch-mark. Some kind of fluid.

  Frank looked inside. A strawberry-scented air-freshener hung from the rear-view mirror. Static hissed from the radio. The faint garble of distant voices. Frank turned off the lights and the engine.

  “What if the driver comes back?” said Joel.

  “What if he doesn’t? Check the boot.”

  “Why?” asked Ralph.

  “For a body.”

  Ralph looked at Frank.

  “I’m not joking.”

  Ralph opened the boot. Frank joined him.

  “Just a spare tyre, a foot pump and a bottle of water,” Ralph said.

  Joel peered over their shoulders. “Why would someone just leave their car here with its engine running?”

  Ralph closed the boot. “Maybe they were injured and couldn’t drive.”

  Joel put his hands in his pockets. “But if they were injured, why would they leave the car?”

  “Should we call the police?” Magnus suggested.

  “If we can’t find the driver, then yes,” said Frank.

  Magnus was looking downwards. “I’ve found some drops of blood on the road, heading away from the car.”

  “I’m calling the police,” said Joel. He took out his mobile and dialled. Put the mobile to his ear. He waited, frowning.

  Frank looked at him. “What’s wrong?”

  “I can’t get through.”

  “What?”

  “The network’s down. Try your phones.”

  “I’ve got nothing. No signal. No fucking network.” Ralph tapped his phone as if doing so would solve the problem.

  “Same here,” said Magnus. “I was wondering why Debbie hadn’t called me in a while.”

  Frank couldn’t even get a ringtone when he dialled.

  “Bollocks,” said Ralph.

  “What do we do?” Joel was glancing up and down the road again.

  There was thunder in the distance.

  “This is fucking weird,” said Magnus. “I think we should head to Wishford, or even that farmhouse we passed on the way to the cottage. Tell someone about this.”

  “Tell them what?” said Ralph. “That we found an abandoned car? What’s a bloody farmer gonna do about it?”

  “We have to tell someone,” said Frank. “Maybe they’ll have a landline telephone we can use. And if the driver is walking the road, we’ll catch up with him.”

  Joel nodded eagerly. “That sounds good. I don’t want to stay here.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Nobody was walking the road.

  “Maybe they travelled across the fields instead,” said Joel.

  They approached the farm, a dark house at the top of a slope of gravel and dirt. There was a mud-streaked Land Rover and a rusting transit van with flat tyres and missing windows. A tractor was parked by a barn. Crows lined the roof of the barn, pecking at one another and cawing insults.

  Frank stopped the car in front of the house. He got out. The others stayed inside. He turned back to them. They looked at him, hesitant to leave the car. He shrugged.

  Ralph was first to relent. Joel and Magnus followed him.

  They walked to the house.

  The house was in poor condition, with scarred walls with paint peeling off in small flakes. The smell of dampness and wood-rot. Cracked roof tiles. The front door was open. A leering brass face for a knocker. Fran
k was reluctant to touch it.

  Scattered boot prints in the dirt.

  There were two downstairs windows at the front of the house. The curtains were drawn.

  “Think anyone’s home?” Joel glanced around nervously. “Looks like the house is empty.”

  “Why would they leave the door open?” asked Frank.

  Magnus wiped his glasses with his sleeve. “Maybe they’re at the back of the house.”

  “Looks haunted,” said Ralph with a little grin.

  “That’s helpful.” Joel said, and then looked over his shoulder, as if someone was standing behind him.

  Frank rapped his knuckles three times on the door. Three dull thuds. Too loud in the silence. He waited, listening for movement inside the house.

  No response.

  Frank knocked again.

  Ralph stepped back and looked up at the upstairs windows. “Maybe the farmer’s on the toilet squeezing one out.”

  “Let’s just go to the village,” said Joel.

  Frank ignored him. He took a step towards the doorway and hesitated.

  “What’re you doing, Frank?” Joel asked.

  “Taking a look.” He slowly stepped inside. “Hello? Anyone home?”

  Joel was right behind him. “Farmers have shotguns. He might think we’re burglars...”

  “Calm down,” Frank whispered. “And lower your voice.”

  “This isn’t right. We can’t just walk into someone’s house, even if the front door’s left open.”

  “We already have.”

  They stopped in the middle of the hallway. Joel stood close to Frank. Magnus and Ralph paused at the doorway.

  Frank looked around. The hallway had shadowed corners. Muddy wellington boots were left by the front door. Coats and jackets hung from a rack on the wall. Umbrellas and walking sticks collected in a stand. Two doorways led to a living room and a kitchen. A wooden staircase ascended into darkness. Wooden beams supported the ceiling, draped in cobwebs. Frank had a phobia of spiders ever since he’d left a glass of water by his bed overnight when he was a kid, and had woken in the morning, taken a sip of the water and realised too late that a spider had fallen into the glass and drowned. The spider’s legs had brushed his lips as he went to drink.