The Fire Baby

French windows extended the length of the verandah at the back of the house. Lyndon Koskinski sat inside, unmoving, on a cheap white sofa. In one hand he held a mobile phone, in the other his GI Zippo lighter. Both hands rested on his lap and his eyes appeared to be closed. The rest of the room was sparsely furnished. A three-shelf bookcase held some cheap volumes, a coffee table a single mug. To one side of the French windows a door stood open. Dryden slipped through and into the kitchen, and closed the door behind him. He gulped the relatively clean air but a layer of dust already covered the MFI fittings and the lino felt gritty under his feet. As soon as he closed the door the hissing stopped, the dust soundlessly pounding the double-glazed window.

The next door was glazed and opened easily into the room with the white sofa. Lyndon didn’t turn his head but Dryden saw that a curtain of sweat gave his lean face an oddly reflective sheen. But his eyes were open now, although they were empty of light.

‘Lyndon,’ said Dryden, and nothing moved.

He took a step forward and caught the smell. He guessed it was petrol – but aircraft fuel was possible. The fumes were rising and billowing out from the sofa. Dryden could see now that it was soaked, the damp dark stain only lightening at the armrests and behind Lyndon’s head. Dryden breathed in deeply and felt a wave of fume-induced nausea which almost knocked him down.

‘Things have changed,’ he said, trying to control his voice.

Lyndon blinked again, slowly like a lizard, but did not turn from the view from the window. ‘I know. Estelle told me everything.’ He held up the mobile and let it drop in his lap. An empty spirit bottle lay in the folds of the sofa.

‘It changes things,’ Dryden said again.

‘For Johnnie Roe? He’s still dead.’ He laughed then, and made a frighteningly good job of it. ‘The only thing that’s changed is that he died for nothing.’

‘And you killed him.’ As Dryden said it he knew it must be true. The motives were compelling and multiple. Johnnie Roe was the father who had denied him a life, a mother, and finally a wife.

Lyndon smiled then, and Dryden knew the end was near. He fingered the Zippo lighter expertly at his chest. ‘Yes. I suppose I did. I never planned to. At first I just wanted to hurt him. You know?’ Dryden nodded stupidly. He didn’t know. He didn’t want to know.

‘Hurt him bad. My life – everything, was down to him. Losing Mum was down to him. Al Rasheid was down to him. So I thought I’d recreate it for him. The prison. My cell. I enjoyed that.’

‘What did you want?’

‘At the beginning I wanted him to confess. We’d listened to the tapes. Maggie told us why she’d given me away. But I wanted to hear him say it. Tell me what he’d done to make her do it.’

‘You used the knife,’ said Dryden, recalling the intricately decorated Arab dagger.

Lyndon nodded, almost distracted by the memory. ‘I got it in Aden – in the Souk, with Freeman.’

Dryden nodded. ‘And the manacles? The chain you used?’

‘Mine. The jailer at Al Rasheid gave me the key when the invasion of Baghdad began. They let all the prisoners free. He was scared, I guess. It was a final gesture. I walked out.’

‘So did he confess?’

‘No. But then, I think now, he didn’t know his crime. Or hadn’t guessed. I wanted him to know. I wanted to punish him for making Mum do it. Telling the lie that’s done all this, brought us here. He was dying from the thirst. I could see that. So I watched.’

‘Why don’t you give me the lighter?’ asked Dryden.

Lyndon smiled again. ‘Then I just found that guy’s body – his head stoved in. Sutton? I read it in the paper – the name. I cried… You know? I cried for that guy. I’d seen worse in the Gulf. But he looked kinda innocent. I guess he was.’

He heaved in a breath and choked on the monoxide. ‘And then I thought he must have told someone he’d gone to the pillbox. He had a family, people who cared. They’d come looking. And someone had killed him. So someone else knew Johnnie was there. They’d find out what I’d done to him. How I dragged him there, through the dust, and chained him up.

‘I had to get rid of Sutton’s body.’ He looked out at the drifting smoke and dust, untroubled by anything outside his own head.

Dryden tried to stem the fear that was constricting his throat. ‘And Freeman White took care of that. He’s on the fire crew at the base – it says it on his door. Your door.’

Lyndon tipped his head by way of assent. ‘Then Johnnie died. That was the Sunday. I just found him. Taut, like that, and reaching out for the glass.’

‘I presume we met at the pillbox,’ said Dryden, fingering the blue-black eye.

‘Another five minutes and I’d have had the body out… I was shocked, you know – shocked that he’d died so suddenly. I didn’t expect that.’