10/11/2021
THE BLOOD RED TRILOGY
BOOK ONE: THE HONDUS FACTOR
CHAPTER ONE
Thursday 20th January 2011
Shoulders back, head held high, Janus Fabius Pictor exited Her Majesty’s Welford Road Prison with a strong and determined stride but froze when a flash-bulb went off in his face and a mob of men and women converged on him yelling and waving mikes.
`Jay! Over here!’
Janus turned in the direction of the voice and spotted Doctor Ted Caplin standing at a distance beside a black Rolls Royce, waving frenziedly.
Using his satchel as a battering-ram, Janus plunged through the howling mob and dived onto the back seat of the Rolls.
Ted Caplin slammed the door, the two cousins of the first-blood closed in a brief, hard embrace, the chauffeur gunned the engine and the vehicle took off toward Tigers Way.
`I didn’t expect them to be waiting outside,’ Janus groaned, fastening his seatbelt and slumping into the seat. `After four years, I thought they’d have forgotten about me.’
`Not bloody likely.’ Ted Caplin pointed to a pile of newspapers on the seat. `For three days the sons of bi***es have been regurgitating every gory detail of the trial.’
Janus stared at an eye-popping, deranged image of himself splashed across page one of The Sun with the headline:
PICTOR FREE
JANUS PICTOR CEO OF PICTOR AERONAUTICS
OUT ON PAROLE AFTER ONLY FOUR YEARS
`That’s just the tip of the iceberg;’ Ted muttered, `the European and Asian press picked up the story on Tuesday and yesterday it made headlines in The New York Times and The Washington Post. You will always be fair game to them, Jay, so you might as well get used to it again.’
Janus glanced out of the window and blinked rapidly to adjust his eyesight to the uncustomary intensity of light. `Do you think she will consider four years behind bars a long enough sentence?’
Realizing the necessity of taking a hard line, Ted Caplin splashed Chivas Regal into two crystal glasses, topped each up with ice and Evian Water and passed one to Janus. `Who cares what the bitch thinks. That chapter of your life is over, pal. Done. Finished. Finito. Your legal team worked their butts off to win this early parole, and now you are free, it is time to move on with your life. Cheers.’
Janus took a gulp of the peaty smoothness. `How the hell can I move on with my life when the only person who actually knows what happened between us on that last night has vanished into thin air? I don’t understand her attitude at all. Given the blanket coverage by the media, she must be aware that I’m out on parole, yet still she remains silent. I can dismiss as grief getting the quickie divorce in Scotland and becoming chief witness for the prosecution, but why the vendetta of silence since? If the situation were reversed - if she had been charged instead of me - I would have moved heaven and earth to keep her out of prison. You are telling me the truth, Ted? She definitely hasn’t tried to contact me in four years?’
`Not you, me, Reese, your legal team, your business associates or any of your friends— Look, Jay, she made it crystal clear during the trial that she blamed you for everything that happened and wanted nothing more to do with you. At the moment, you’re depressed, which is understandable, given what you’ve been through, so Reese and I are going to start you on a course of Ziropax, a new antidepressant on the market--´
Janus shook his head. `Not happening, pal. I’ve swallowed enough damned pills to last ten lifetimes. Getting back to work will be my best form of therapy.’
`No, Jay, for once in your life you are going to adhere strictly to the medical regimen being prescribed for you. I will start you on a low dose of Ziropax immediately and next week Reese will begin a course of deep probe hypnosis aimed at dealing with your memory loss … ´
While Ted detailed the treatment he and his partner, Doctor Geoff Reese, were proposing, they left Leicester City and with a convoy of media vehicles now in hot pursuit, sped across the frozen Leicestershire countryside, past villages and hamlets sunk deep in snow, until they reached the vast walled estate of Janiculum, whereupon five-meter high, electronically controlled gates swung open, and the forest of beech trees closed in around them like clutching fingers.
*
Janus entered the Library, strode to the line of windows overlooking the North Fountain Terrace, and stood massaging upwards from his left eyebrow to his temple, through to the back of his skull, continuously, round and round, until the needle-sharp clusters of pain subsided, the fog clogging his brain lifted, and he was able to think clearly again.
Six feet four inches tall, with broad-shoulders and narrow hips, he was a man who drew the gaze like a magnet, a man who exuded masculinity, sexuality, and physical strength. However, the legacy of the four years spent in Leicester Prison showed starkly in the down-lines at the corners of his mouth and the streaks of grey in his hair, which was otherwise dark and wavy.
His facial features were dominated by dark, hypnotic eyes, dark brows and a mouth denoting power of will. His normally olive complexion wore a prison pallor, the skin was stretched gauntly over his cheekbones, and an ugly, jagged scar ascended from the arch of his left eyebrow to his hairline and penetrated five centimetres into his skull on the left side of his temple.
But there were invisible scars also; and these caused bitter thoughts to flood Janus’s mind as he stood in the dying moments of that January afternoon, staring at the statue of his Roman namesake, Janus Deus Decorum, double-headed god of doors, gates and passageways, enthroned on a diadem of twelve water-spiralling altars - holding in his right hand the key that opened the gates of Heaven and Hell, and in his left hand, the sceptre proclaiming his dominion over all things past, present, and future.
No water-spirals today, though, the pipes of the North Fountain were as frozen solid as Janus’s life - which his neurosurgeons, psychiatrists, physiotherapists, occupational therapists, legal team, and lifelong friends, Ted Caplin and Geoff Reese, had advised him to move on with. But how could he move on when thoughts of her haunted every crevice and corner of his mind?
Where had she vanished to?
Should he respect her silence?
Was silence what she truly wanted?
No more communication between them ever?
Tears ran out of Janus’s eyes, trickled down his cheeks and dripped from his chin, yet he was no more aware of them than his Roman namesake was of the frozen, empty fountain he held dominion over.
Janus groaned, the groan transmuted into a sob and suddenly he was weeping as he never had before - great gasping cries of grief echoing around that silent, shadowy chamber in a manner that mirrored the darkness and despair consuming his heart.
The last clear memory he had of her was during their honeymoon at Col de Pictorius, high in the Apennine Mountains of Italy. As he stared through blinding tears at the fountain, an image of her materialized before him, standing on top of the steps leading down to the tomb of Hondus Jovius, waving at him and blowing kisses, with the wind whipping her beautiful blonde hair around her face in masses of waves and curls. Then a moment later, or so it seemed, he had woken up in Leicester Prison with his mind scrolling blanks.
`Stop putting it off,’ he muttered. `Man the hell up and get the thing over with.’ Exiting the Library, he ascended the staircase two steps at a time, strode along the first floor balcony past suits of armour, circles of daggers, pistols and swords, until he reached the entrance of the Raphael Wing, and there, at the end of a long corridor hung with portraits of his ancestors were the doors of the Queen Suite, gilded in gold.
Breathing heavily, he turned the key in the lock, shoved his shoulder against the resisting wood, moved swiftly through the two outer chambers, entered the master bedroom, strode to the windows, and with a violent gesture yanked back the purple velvet drapes edged in gold.
Massaging the scar above his left eyebrow, he stared with gaping intensity at the Roman courtyard, the terracotta terraces, the winter-bare rose gardens, and the vast expanse of snow-covered lawn that stretched for five hundred meters to a row of oak trees clad now in the blood-red haze of dusk.
Through a gap in the trees he could just distinguish the marble steps descending to the Roman Grotto beside the lake where, five years ago, on 17th day of March 2006, in the fullness of spring, he had married her. On that glorious day she had personified the sun, moon and stars to him and the future had stretched before them like an endless beacon of light. Had it all been a fiendish curse conjured by some manic god bent on destroying his life and sanity? Was there nothing left of the dreams and quenchless passion they had shared?
He sat down on the bed and moved his hand backwards and forwards over the mattress.
Gone, her hangings of French lace.
Gone, her hand-embroidered sheets and pillowcases.
Gone, her beauty, her fragrance, her wit and her laughter.
She had stripped their bedroom bare.
But that was five years ago.
How did she feel about him now?
Surely, she remembered the nights they had spent in this bed? The excitement of their foreplay, his whispered commands, her begging entreaties turning into moans of pleasure as he took her rough and hard the way she liked it; and afterwards, passion spent, how they would lay together in this bed with their limbs entwined, breathing as one.
`Christabel!’ As the word exploded out of his mouth, a shaft of agony stabbed into his left eye socket.
Groaning, `No God, no,’ he collapsed backwards across the bed and his torso, legs and arms began to jerk grotesquely as wave after wave of agony shot up through his skull and drilled into his brain causing clumps of chemical connections and axons in his frontal, occipital and temporal lobes to misfire.
Losing all sense of time, he rolled around on the bed heaving with nausea and gnashing his teeth, until the sounds of banging on the outer doors penetrated the clusters of agony.
After several attempts, he managed to struggle upright, grab one of the bedposts for support, and with a supreme effort of will, compose his mental faculties sufficiently to call: `Yes, who’s there?’
Moments later a plump, middle-aged woman of Jamaican, Negroid descent entered the bedroom wringing her hands. She possessed a kind face, wore her silvery hair in a roll around her head like a halo, and when she spoke, her voice quivered with concern. `Forgive the intrusion, sir, but I-I heard you call out … and had to make sure you are all right.’
Vision obscured by black specks floating in front of his eyes, Janus acknowledged the housekeeper’s concern with a nod. `A headache, Mrs. Jordan … … which I have medication for. Has my luggage arrived from the prison yet?
`Yes, sir, half an hour ago. I took the liberty of sending everything to the master suite in the Michael Wing, and came looking for you because-- It’s your mobile phone, sir. When you didn’t answer it, Doctor Caplin’s secretary called on the house line to let you know Doctor Caplin and Doctor Reese have an emergency in London and cannot join you until tomorrow evening.’
`Thank you, Mrs. Jordan. The Michael Wing will do me for now but I’ll be moving back here to the Queen Suite at the first opportunity. Please contact painters and decorators tomorrow. I want the same colour-scheme, drapery and décor. Nothing is to be changed, just refreshed. Is that clearly understood?’
`Yes, sir,’ the housekeeper replied, deeply concerned by the pallor and demeanour of her employer.
`Also, something needs to be done about the Library,’ Janus continued. `The stench of decay in there almost suffocated me.’
`I had the Library repainted and fumigated only a month ago, sir, but nothing seems to get rid of the smell. I’m afraid that short of major work like pulling up the floorboards—’
`Then have the floorboards pulled up, Mrs. Jordan. The Library is a pivotal gathering place of this establishment. Whatever needs to be done, must be done-— No, don’t leave yet.’
As the housekeeper began retreating, Janus held up his hand. `If you would cast your mind back to November 2006, I want to know if you or any member of the domestic staff saw me strike my wife, either on that last night or on any occasion prior to that last night.'
Although Florence Jordan had been employed for thirty-nine years at Janiculum and had cared for her employer since the day of his birth, theirs was not an intimate relationship. Consequently, the question flustered her.
`No, sir,’ she responded gravely.
`What about the day Mrs. Pictor brought …´ Janus struggled to form the word, `Joshua into this house for the first time?'
Mrs. Jordan’s expression changed from concern to alarm. `No, sir, the day he arrived, Mrs. Pictor, well she instructed me to have a hospital apartment prepared for you in the old Romulus Wing, then she hired two nursing sisters and a home-care worker to attend to all of your needs, after which you became so cut off from the rest of the household, neither myself nor any member of the domestic staff even laid eyes on you.’
A ruthless expression transformed Janus’s features.
`Look here, Mrs. Jordan, I’m not seeking a show of loyalty from you, I want the truth and nothing but the damned truth.'
The housekeeper drew herself up with dignity. `That is the truth, sir, as we all testified at your trial. Not a single member of staff ever saw you raise a hand in violence to Mrs. Pictor. Quite the contrary.'
*
Feeling blocked, restricted and frustrated, Janus trudged through the house to the master bedroom in the Michael Wing, inserted some Lidocaine nasal drops for the headache, sipped some promethazine syrup for the nausea, retrieved his mobile phone from his satchel and returned through the darkened corridors to his study in the Raphael Wing where he plugged the phone into a charger.
Neither the trial transcripts, print media reports, numerous courses of hypnosis, nor returning to the so-called scene of his crime in the Queen Suite had triggered the memory-spike he needed to shine a light into the black hole encompassing a large portion of his brain.
`What the hell am I supposed to do now?’ he muttered. `Accept her silence as irrevocable and spend the rest of my life plagued by headaches, memory gaps and questions only she can answer?’
He sat down at the desk, logged into his computer and stared at the Pictor Aeronautics home page.
He had accomplished next to nothing in the way of rehabilitation during the four years spent in Leicester Prison. In between visits from Ted, Reese, members of the Pictor executive board and his legal team, he had drifted through the years like a ship without a rudder.
When not debilitated by cluster headaches, he had thought about her incessantly. Reminiscing over the scintillating days and sensual nights they had had spent together. Brooding over her reasons for divorcing him. Agonizing over her vindictiveness during his trial. Puzzling over her vanishing act. Pondering over her present whereabouts. Constructing scenarios in his mind about who she might be sleeping with —-
`No! Dammit!’
Jolting forward in the chair, Janus slammed his fists down on the desk. `Mulling over the dead past is an act of fu***ng futility! Something essential has gone out of me, a vital piece is missing from my core. Only by resuming total control of my life will I have any chance of recovering its infinitesimality.’
Sweeping the mouse down the list of one hundred and eighty-four Pictor Aeronautics subsidiaries to the block of sixty companies comprising his North American Division, Janus punched a sequence of numbers into the telephone-consul and drummed his fingers on the desk while ET sounds jingle-jangled across two continents.
`International Investigative Bureau, Phoenix, Arizona.’
Female voice: authoritative, crisp, superior.
Adrenaline shot through Janus’s body like lightning bolts.
`Hello, patch me through to Colonel Campbell, please … … I don’t give a damn if he’s lying on a fu***ng operating table in a fu***ng coma, patch me through to him anyway. This is Janus Pictor.'
Chapter one ends [2794 words]
