I did as I was told and stripped. We might have been in a cold store when I stood naked before Pakeshi. With cold but expert fingers, he began prodding at me. He started on the fleshy areas under my arms. He moved slowly down, prodding and poking with steady urgency. I heard him mutter over and again that he was mad—mad, utterly mad. But still he continued.
With a yelp of joy, he reached my left buttock. I let out my own little yelp of pain as he pressed hard with his fingers.
“Well, well, Dr Markham,” he asked with a relieved gloat, “how did it get in there?” On his knees behind me, he jammed a fingernail into what I’d thought must be a boil.
“It may have been on the railway train from Chicago,” I babbled without caring what I might reveal. “I—I fell asleep, and….” I pulled myself together. “It isn’t what you may think it is,” I added lamely.
“And as you fell, I suppose your dressing gown swung open?” he tittered. I felt him rummage through one of his breast pockets. I turned and looked down at a small leather case, about twice the size of a cigarette case. He opened it and looked at the neat row of surgical instruments, each of them gleaming in the suffused light of where we were. “Get your fingers into those meshes and hold on,” he commanded. “If it hurts—and it will—just think of England.”
I don’t know what instrument he chose for thrusting into me—a nail file, a pocket knife, a cold chisel? All I can say is that, as I tried to hold back the screams of agony from an operation that seemed to go on and on, I lost control of my bladder.
“Dry yourself with this and get dressed,” Pakeshi said finally. He unwound his scarf and dropped it onto my back. As the hideous probing had ceased, I’d fallen down and was now sobbing uncontrollably on my hands and knees. I could hear the splatter of urine as it continued running off the inclined floor of the lift into the shaft.
“Did you get it?” I gasped. Pakeshi’s answer was a sharp kick to my stomach and a pointed finger to the one dry area of the floor where, mercifully, I’d piled all my clothes. I got up and dabbed at myself with his scarf. I reach for my underpants. As I put them on, I looked at the very small sliver of metal he held in the palm of its hand. About a quarter of an inch long, it had the shape and appearance of a cut down matchstick. The little bulb at its end even had the red colour of a Swan Vesta. I thought it was glowing gently, but couldn’t tell for sure. Pakeshi passed me my shirt and bent to pick up my trousers.
“It must have required just a little prick to get that thing into you,” he sneered softly. “I’ve no doubt you’d just had a much larger one. Mrs Dale did bet ten shillings you’d not be able to contain yourself for a whole month in America. I said you’d never dare. But she was firm that even the risk of public castration wouldn’t keep you to the straight and narrow!” He laughed and wiped his bloodied instrument on the lining of my jacket.
I said nothing, but hurried about my dressing. There were quiet voices on one of the lower floors. Their owners might have been arguing. They might have been discussing how most effectively to search this immense space. Taking care to make as little noise as possible, Pakeshi turned to sliding the lift door open an inch at a time. The crash of getting it open had echoed round the empty building. Now, it was a few barely perceptible grinding noises. He picked up his soaked scarf and rolled it into a tight ball. He pushed the transmitter into it and dropped both into the shaft. Below us, there was a sudden shout of “I’ve got a reading—he’s below us!” I heard a crunch of shoe leather on the stairs. They were going down into the basement.
CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN
We rushed as noiselessly as we could down the stairs to the ground floor, and back across the crumbling boards. Below us, I could hear a rising babble of argument. As we reached the window, I heard another shout from below, this time of rage. Now, there was a renewed scraping of shoes on the stairs. I saw that Pakeshi had his gun out and was looking round with an intense and rapid calm.
“Help me up,” he whispered, pointing at the window. The floor within was about a foot higher than the ground outside. Here, though, we had nothing to put against the wall. The window was at the height of my nose, which meant the top of Pakeshi’s head barely reached it. “Come on,” he hissed. “help me up. I need to see what’s outside. I’ll then pull you up behind me.” I got down on all fours and took the whole of Pakeshi’s sixteen or seventeen stone between my shoulder blades. I was about to moan something up at him, when I heard a shout from far across the floor:
“Remember, we take the white one alive!” This was followed by a shouted challenge. I jumped up and looked across the floor. About fifty yards away, there were two men in the doorway that led to the main stairs. Both were armed. I heard an immensely loud crash from overhead as Pakeshi took a shot at them. Another stone or so was added to the already immense weight on my shoulders as he braced himself against the recoil. When I was able to look round again, the men had dodged back within the safety of the stair well.
“Come on, Anthony,” Pakeshi gasped, holding down a hand. Gun still in hand, his right arm hooked round the metal frame, he pulled me straight up beside him and swung me onto the crate on the outside of the building.
“Put the gun down!” another man said. Hat pulled down against the drizzle, he was standing in the yard. Gun in hand, he stood between us and the gate back into the street. As he took a step towards us, Pakeshi jumped heavily down beside me and pulled me to the ground. Just as he had with Michael Foot, he got himself behind me, his gun pushed against my temple.
“Shoot at me if you dare,” the man jeered. “If I don’t get you, it’ll be the acid bath for you!” I tried for a strangled protest as Pakeshi pushed me rapidly across the yard. All of a sudden, he spun round, and I was now looking back at the window. The other two men were now climbing out. One of them stood on the crate and took careful aim at us. Pakeshi dragged me up so that I covered about as much of him as he could manage. He took a shot at the man who was aiming, and I watched him spin round and fall. Pakeshi laughed maniacally and continued backing out into the street. He jabbed a knee into my left buttock and relaxed his grip on my throat so I could scream at the sudden flash of agony that, but for the continued hold on me, would have had me rolling about on the ground.
Fifty yards away on our right, a man was walking a dog. Pakeshi laughed again at the two men who remained. As they darted for cover within the loading yard, we turned and raced across the road towards where our own car was still hidden. We were no sooner in when the men were now aiming at us from the cover of either side of the gate.
Pakeshi pushed the gun into my hand and started the car.
“Shoot at them!” he shouted. I fiddled ineffectually with the side window handle. “Shoot through the windscreen!” he shouted again. “Just shoot at them!” I pulled the trigger and saw the windscreen explode outwards. The recoil pushed me deep into the upholstery of the chair. As we sped through the gate and into the street, I fired through my side window. I didn’t hit the man, who shrank back only six feet from me. But, with a squeal of rubber on cobblestones, Pakeshi turned the car and pressed like a lunatic on the accelerator pedal. By the time I was able to twist myself round, the men were vanishing into the distance. Their van was nowhere to be seen. His dog jumping about uncontrollably on its lead, the one other man in the street had frozen where he stood.
“That was a close run thing,” I said, trying to sound nonchalant, though my words came out as a dry croak. Now I had time to register the pain, my left buttock seemed to be on fire. Pakeshi screamed something back at me in Hindi and raised his foot from the pedal.