The Infirmary (DCI Ryan Mysteries prequel)(78)

There was a taut silence, and then he heard soft laughter echoing down the tunnel, circling around his head.

*

“We were too late getting the helicopter in,” MacKenzie told the superintendent, as they stood around a map of the city Ryan had pinned to the wall.

“Where is he now?”

“He’s gone into the Victoria Tunnel, sir,” she replied. “It runs beneath the city from east to west, built to transport coal from the colliery to the river in the Victorian era.”

“How the hell did he get down there?”

“Phillips seems to think the route was unplanned, but we can’t be sure. If he’d planned several murders in detail, it isn’t outside the realms of possibility that he would have considered an escape route, if the time came.”

“Get Ryan on the phone,” he ordered.

“That’s not possible, sir. Ryan went down into the tunnel in pursuit and the scaffolding collapsed behind him, probably orchestrated by Edwards. He hasn’t made contact via radio yet and there’s no telephone signal down there,” she explained. “Phillips has a team working to dig out the rubble and go in after him.”

Gregson swore.

“Show me the access points,” he said.

“We haven’t been able to find a map of the tunnel,” she said, not bothering to hide her concern. “I’ve got Lowerson looking into it now. He’s speaking to Northumbrian Water and Newcastle City Council to see what they have because there’s nothing online.”

Gregson thought of one of his best detectives trapped underground with a killer and felt something he hadn’t experienced in a long time.

He felt frightened.

*

The rain continued to fall as Phillips stood with a team of police personnel outside the Hancock Museum entrance on Claremont Road, watching and helping as a crew from the renovation works team dug furiously to clear a safe pathway through the rubble.

Phillips tried the radio again.

“Ryan? Ryan, come in. Over.”

Nothing.

Phillips gnawed at his lip, wondering what to do for the best, then rang MacKenzie’s number.

She answered immediately.

“Frank, tell me some good news.”

“I wish I could, love,” he said unthinkingly, and immediately suffered a coughing fit.

“You alright?” she asked.

“Aye, sorry. I had some dust caught in my throat. Listen, it’s been nearly twenty minutes and we still haven’t got through the worst of it—and I haven’t heard from Ryan. I’m worried.”

“We’ve heard nothing here, either,” she said. “We’ve got a team watching Edwards’ house, in case he finds another exit and tries to go home.”

“He can’t hope to get out of the tunnel without being caught,” Phillips said, then felt his stomach dip. “Unless he doesn’t plan to escape.”

“What do you mean?”

“Ryan’s down there with him, alone.”

Back at CID Headquarters, MacKenzie looked across at the photograph of their friend, Sharon Cooper, and felt her heart tighten.

“Get in there after him, Frank, as quick as you can.”

“Yes, ma’am.”





CHAPTER 35


Ryan continued onward, heading along the tunnel as it passed beneath St Thomas’s church, a quarter of a mile further east of where Phillips worked hard to clear the entrance beside the museum.

“There’s no way out of this! Turn yourself in!”

His voice ricocheted around the walls, spiralling until it was lost somewhere in the darkness.

There was no reply.

His feet continued their careful progress and he was grateful to find that the floor had been laid with rough concrete at some stage or another, which made the going easier underfoot.

He raised his phone torch again to shine a miserable white light a few paces ahead, then heard the ominous ‘beep’ that signalled his battery was running low.

“Uh-oh,” a voice called out, sounding closer this time.

Ryan held the torch aloft and peered into the darkness, but he could see no further than the end of his own arm.

“You want to know why, don’t you, Ryan?”

Edwards’ voice whispered along the scaly edges of the wall, reaching into Ryan’s mind and toying with what he found there.

“You’re desperate to know, aren’t you?”

“You’re desperate to tell me,” Ryan called out. “Why don’t you?”

Why don’t you…why don’t you…

More soft laughter.

“I’ve watched you, Ryan. I watched your face when the woman died and wondered what it would be like to feel the way you do for all the miserable nobodies in the world.”

Ryan followed the voice, edging closer while Edwards spoke.

“Come now, this is very one-sided,” Edwards said, and his voice sounded further off again. “Tell me, how did a man of your breeding and education come to be a murder detective? Surely, your future was mapped in a very different way.”

Ryan stopped again, unnerved to know that Edwards had looked into his background.

“You like playing the hero, don’t you, Maxwell? The name suits you, by the way. Can’t imagine why you’d want to change it.”