Catacombs of Terror! by Stanley Donwood Page B

whatever?”
    “I would think so. Barry says there is, but again, it’s one of the things that he doesn’t get told.”
    “However many specimen jars he fills.”
    Stonehenge looked uncomfortable. He took another sip of whiskey. Suddenly I remembered Kafka’s message on the answerphone. Call him. Urgently. My watch said 10:15 P.M . Okay. I picked up the phone and dialled his mobile number.
    “Colin? Yeah, it’s me. Yeah. I got your message. That’s why I’m phoning, you dope. Yes, I have been busy. I’ve been very fucking busy. Can you get over to my office? Look, just come over here. I’ll tell you when you get here, okay? I’m not talking about any of this over the phone. Well, if ‘paranoid’ means feeling that people are out to get me, then yes, I fucking well am. You’ll be here in ten minutes? Okay.” I slammed the phone down. I turned back to Stonehenge.
    “My contact is coming over. You cool about that?”
    “Who is your contact?”
    “A guy called Kafka. Colin Kafka. He’s a hack on the local rag, but he’s kosher. I know him from way back. He knows something’s going on and he knows that it’s dodgy. He arranged my meeting with ScryTech. I told him about Charlcombe, too. We can trust him. Well, I’m pretty sure we can. It’s not like we have a choice, anyway.”
    Stonehenge closed his eyes for a second or two.
    “You’re right. I’ll stay for a while. But I have to go soon. Barry and I have work to do. There isn’t much time . . . .”
    He was damn right about that. My liberty was dripping away in front of me. I wondered what the hell I was going to do. This line of thought was becoming a habit. And it hadn’t ever done me any good. Some more time passed. There was a knock at the door. I went over and let Kafka in.
    He wasn’t wet. “Has it stopped raining?” I asked him.
    “Uh-huh. Stopped an hour ago. Maybe more.”
    I furrowed my brow. Anyway. The weather was the least of my worries.
    “This is Colin Kafka,” I said to Stonehenge. “Colin, this is . . . call him Stonehenge. He won’t tell me his name. But he told me a whole lot of other stuff. Stonehenge, tell Colin what’s going on. Colin? Sit down. I’ll get you a drink.”
    Stonehenge talked to Kafka for a little while. I used the time to smoke some more cigarettes. I also paid attention to the way the hands moved on my watch. They moved forward. I couldn’t do anything about that, but it wasn’t good. I looked out of the window. It was raining.
    Kafka made some surprised noises while Stonehenge filled him in. He didn’t break anything though. Maybe that was just me. I put all my cocaine on the desk and split it into four piles. I scooped up each into a separate wrap. At one stage in his lecture, Colin held his hand out, holding his empty glass. I filled it for him. Stonehenge reached the end of his spiel.
    “So it’s true,” said Kafka. “You’re going to be arrested. Someone else is going to be murdered. Hey, Valpolicella. You get off lightly.”
    “It had occurred to me. Not as lightly as I’d like, though. What I’d prefer is that I get off. End of story.” Then I told him about my day. My fun day, with all the great stuff in it. About the CCTV control room and more particularly about being followed, kidnapped, beaten up, and dumped in a field. He looked a little concerned about that, but I told him it was all in the past. I’d put it behind me. Then I told him that I’d got an idea.
    “It’s not very well thought out or anything, but it’s all I’ve got. You don’t get claustrophobia, do you?”
    Kafka looked hard at me. “What do you want?”
    “I want to go back down that hole at Charlcombe. And you’re coming with me.”
    Kafka started to shake his head, but I wasn’t standing for that kind of crap. I wasn’t in the mood to argue.
    “You want your fucking story? Come and get it. This isn’t local. It’s national. It’s international. It’s syndication.
Understand?
”
    Kafka nodded,