So far.
He was still on the blanket, watching us, with his big hands dangling from his knees, scabbed and bruised. The low yellow light from the lantern made the indentation in his forehead into a shadowed pit. Squatting there, he could have been a throwback to a more primitive age, a pale, hairless ape hunched in its cave.
But he seemed even more ill than I'd thought. The massive shoulders were slumped with exhaustion, and the skin was drawn tight across the heavy bones of his face, tinged with a sickly, jaundiced cast. His mouth hung open as he breathed, a sibilant wheeze sounding with every rise and fall of his chest. He obviously had a serious respiratory infection, maybe even pneumonia, and living in these conditions wouldn't have helped. Monk looked like a man at the end of his physical limits.
Except that Monk wasn't a normal man. And ill or not, the dark eyes watching us were bright and unblinking.
I made myself look back: it was like staring down an attack dog. 'You don't need two hostages. Let her go.'
'I don't want a hostage,' he said, his voice sounding raw. His mouth twitched in a sneer. 'Think I don't remember you from before? Not so fucking smart now, are you?'
No, not so smart at all. 'So why've you brought us here?'
'I brought her. You just followed.'
'Then why did you come to find me?'
Monk turned his head to hawk into the corner of the chamber, then sank back against the rock. His breathing had steadied, but still sounded like air escaping from a broken bellows.
'Ask her.'
I turned to Sophie. I could feel her trembling against me. 'I
… We heard you shouting. Sound carries down here. When it went quiet, I thought… I thought…' She gave me a desperate look. Again I felt a sudden disquiet that had nothing to do with Monk, but her next words drowned it out. 'I told him… I – I said you'd be able to help.'
'I don't understand.'
Sophie glanced nervously across at him. 'He… he says he can't-'
'No, he doesn't say, I don't fucking say, I can't His shout reverberated in the small chamber. 'I try but I can't!’ There's nothing there! It didn't matter before, but it does now!'
Monk ran his scabbed hands over his skull, rasping them on the stubble that had started to grow there. His mouth worked, as though the next words were being torn from him.
'I want to know what I did.'
Time didn't seem to exist in the cramped chamber. I'd broken my watch at some point, shattering the face so that the glass had turned crystalline. Beneath it the hands were motionless, frozen at between two and three o'clock. Not that it made much difference down here. The light from the lantern gave the small chamber an otherworldly quality, intensified by the soporific warmth from the hissing gas heater. The fumes wouldn't help Monk's breathing, but there was enough air current down here to stop the build-up from becoming toxic.
I sat on a wadded-up plastic sheet, my back against the rock, with Sophie curled against me. Monk had subsided after his outburst. He seemed exhausted, slumped forward with his head hung between his raised knees, hands wrapped protectively around it. The posture made him look oddly vulnerable. He hadn't moved in a while, and the steady whistle of his breathing made me think he was asleep. But I still watched him carefully as I lowered my head to Sophie's.
'What did he mean?' I whispered.
'I – I don't know…'
I pitched my voice low, not taking my eyes from Monk. 'He must have said something. Why does he want help? Help for what?'
'I don't know! I – I feel so sick, and the fight's too bright.'
I shifted so my body shielded her from the lantern. 'Sophie, this is important. You need to tell me.'
She massaged her temples, glancing fearfully across at Monk. 'He… he says he can't remember killing those girls. Not just burying them, any of it! He wants… he thinks I can help, because I said I could help him find the graves, even if he'd forgotten where they were. But I didn't mean I could help him get his memory back! Oh, God, this can't be happening!'
I could feel her shaking. I hugged her to me. 'Go on.'
Sophie wiped her eyes. 'That's why he was digging round Tina Williams' grave. He thought… he thought if he found the graves, saw the bodies again, it'd make him remember. That's why he came after us when he saw us out there, he knew it had to be me. But I – I can't do anything like that, that's not what I meant!'
'Shh. I know.' I stroked her back, warily watching Monk. 'What did he mean when he said it didn't matter before, but it does now?'
'I – I don't know. But I told him… I said you could help. When I heard you shouting, it was the only thing I could think of. God, I'm so sorry, this is all my fault!'
I held her as she cried herself into an exhausted sleep. I was shattered myself, bone-weary and aching, but I had to stay awake. I stared across at Monk's unmoving form, desperately trying to think what to do. Everyone had always assumed he'd been lying when he'd said he couldn't remember where the Bennett sisters were buried. Now… I didn't know.
Not that it made any difference. Even if Monk really was suffering from some sort of amnesia there was nothing Sophie could do about it. She'd been a BIA, not a psychiatrist. She was no more able to help him recover his memories than I was. Sooner or later he was going to realize that, and when he did…
I had to get her out of here.
Monk still hadn't moved, and if the deep, wheezing rhythm of his breathing was anything to go by, his sleep was deeper than ever. But I doubted it was deep enough for us to slip out without disturbing him. So what, then? Club him while he's asleep? Even assuming I could do something so cold-blooded – and that he didn't wake and tear me apart – I'd no idea how to get back to the surface.
I looked around the chamber, hoping to see something that might help. The floor was piled with empty water bottles and food wrappers, discarded gas canisters and batteries. Some of them were years old, probably dating to the last time Monk had hidden out here. Near me was a tattered phone directory and a more recent pile of boxes, ripped open to spill cough linctus, foil packets of antibiotics and small brown bottles I recognized as smelling salts, clearly raided from some chemist's. The smelling salts puzzled me, until I made the connection with the police dog that had tried to track him a few days earlier.
Smelling salts contained ammonia.
The only other thing nearby was a plastic bag filled with foul- smelling earth. The musky odour was somehow familiar, but I couldn't place it. Still watching Monk, I tried to see what else was hidden among the debris. I gently moved a box aside and stiffened when I saw what lay behind it.
The black cylinder of a torch.
It was just out of reach. For all I knew it could be broken, and even if it wasn't we'd still have to get past Monk before we could use it. But at least it offered a small hope, and right now I needed every little I could get. Careful not to disturb Sophie, I leaned towards the torch, stretching as far as I could. My fingers were only inches away from it when I felt a change in the chamber. The hairs on my arms prickled, as though the air had suddenly become charged. I looked up.
Monk was staring at me.
Except he wasn't, not quite. His eyes were fixed on a spot just off to one side. I moistened my mouth, trying to think of something to say. Before I could he jerked his head spastically to his right, mouth curling in a one-sided sneer.
Then he began to laugh.
It was an eerie, phlegm-filled chuckle. It grew louder, rising in pitch until his shoulders were shaking with the force of it. I flinched as he suddenly lashed out with a scabbed fist, smacking it sideways into the rough wall beside him. If it hurt he gave no sign. Still laughing, he thumped his fist into the rock again. And again.