Redhead Read online

  THE AUTHOR

  A redhead himself, Ian Cook was born in Devon, grew up in Hertfordshire and took a degree in crop science at the University of Reading. During his subsequent worldwide travels, he became intrigued by the universal mythology associated with red hair and acquired more knowledge about the subject than is strictly necessary for everyday social purposes. He lives in West London with his wife, Maggie.

  Redhead

  IAN COOK

  Copyright © 2012 Ian Cook

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

  In this work of fiction, the characters, places and events are either the product of the author's imagination or they are used entirely fictitiously.

  Matador

  9 Priory Business Park

  Wistow Road

  Kibworth Beauchamp

  Leicester LE8 0RX, UK

  Tel: (+44) 116 279 2299

  Fax: (+44) 116 279 2277

  Email: [email protected]

  Web: www.troubador.co.uk/matador

  ISBN 978 1780889 771

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Typeset in 10.5pt Minion Pro by Troubador Publishing Ltd, Leicester, UK

  Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

  Printed and bound in the UK by TJ International, Padstow, Cornwall

  Contents

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 33

  CHAPTER 34

  CHAPTER 35

  CHAPTER 36

  CHAPTER 37

  CHAPTER 38

  CHAPTER 39

  CHAPTER 40

  CHAPTER 41

  CHAPTER 42

  CHAPTER 43

  CHAPTER 44

  CHAPTER 45

  CHAPTER 46

  CHAPTER 47

  CHAPTER 48

  CHAPTER 49

  CHAPTER 50

  CHAPTER 51

  CHAPTER 52

  CHAPTER 53

  CHAPTER 54

  CHAPTER 55

  CHAPTER 56

  CHAPTER 57

  CHAPTER 58

  CHAPTER 59

  CHAPTER 60

  CHAPTER 61

  CHAPTER 62

  CHAPTER 63

  CHAPTER 64

  CHAPTER 65

  CHAPTER 66

  CHAPTER 67

  CHAPTER 68

  CHAPTER 69

  CHAPTER 70

  CHAPTER 71

  CHAPTER 72

  CHAPTER 73

  CHAPTER 74

  CHAPTER 75

  CHAPTER 76

  CHAPTER 77

  CHAPTER 78

  CHAPTER 79

  CHAPTER 80

  CHAPTER 81

  CHAPTER 82

  CHAPTER 83

  CHAPTER 84

  CHAPTER 85

  CHAPTER 86

  To Maggie,

  with love

  and thanks.

  “…there is something Pagan in me that I cannot shake off. In short, I deny nothing, but doubt everything.”

  Lord Byron

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  This book would not have been written without the generosity of those who read various drafts and gave invaluable help and advice, namely: Jane Alexander, Frances Banyard, Jo Bull, Christopher Clarke, Sandra Clarke, Christopher Cook, Matthew Cook, Yolanda Fernández Caliani, Mary Flannery, Janet Foster, Keith Foster, Paul Freeman, Peter Hawkins, Celia Hinton, Oliver Hinton, Pat Holt, Pete Holt, Michael Hosier, Rosalind Laurie, Heidi Mannan, Vivienne Osborne, Fred Raveney, Colin Rix, Eric Sargeant, Gill Seward, Fiona Stewart, James Stewart, Tom Stewart and Ivan Stipala.

  My deepest thanks go to my wife, Maggie, who has been unstinting in her support, whether through constant editing or as a sounding board.

  Much of the action in the story relates to real places such as the Standing Stones of Stenness, Ring of Brodgar and Unstan Chambered Tomb in Orkney. I should mention that the Newton Stones also exist, but they are in private grounds.

  Whilst researching the book, I visited the Orkney island of Sanday and found everybody I met there both kind and helpful. In that unpleasant, although purely fictitious, events occur in the story on what is recognisably the island of Sanday, out of respect to the inhabitants, I have changed the name to Norstray.

  CHAPTER 1

  Tunisia, 1921

  It was Christmas Eve in Carthage. Two middle-aged men were making their way down Byrsa Hill, trying to keep to the shadows of the ancient streets. Reaching a crossroad, they stopped to draw breath.

  A full moon broke through the clouds, bathing the age-old ruins in a cold light. Warm sounds of laughter, snatches of excited conversation and carols sung in French drifted over in waves from the surrounding villas. A child protested as he was put to bed against his will.

  In truth, both men would rather have been relaxing and enjoying the festivities than facing the task in hand.

  Unnoticed by either of them, a large hawk dived down and landed on top of one of the pillars that stood scattered around the site. It watched the two men intently.

  One of the men, Paul Durand, was a minor public official in the French administration service. He shivered, half with cold but half in anticipation of the events ahead. His fingers fumbled as he fastened the top button of his well-cut wool jacket.

  His companion, François Attali, wore the uniform of a Tunis police inspector.

  Both were amateur archaeologists in their spare time and had rapidly established themselves as experts on Punic Carthage. Together, they had initiated excavations at the necropolis and had established a small museum to display their finds. It was this shared passion that had brought them together on the cold December night. When a number of ancient Carthaginian stelae – carved commemorative stone slabs – had appeared on the black market in the Tunis Medina, their combined amateur and professional interests had propelled them into action to try and track down the source. An informer had put it about that an unauthorised dig was going on near the old harbour in Salammbô. On Christmas Eve, there was a good possibility that the culprits would not expect to be disturbed.

  As they passed under a low archway, Attali slipped and stumbled. “Merde,” he muttered under his breath. Durand ignored him. Trying to regain his balance, Attali stood up and banged his head on the arch, knocking his képi sideways. “Fait chier,” he cursed. For just a moment, his dishevelled hair gli
nted in the moonlight.

  They moved more carefully now, dodging from cover to cover. As they neared the bottom of the hill, they both caught sight of movement that caused them to freeze simultaneously. Quietly, they shrank back, crouching into the shadows. There below, two unkempt-looking men were digging vigorously with spades in a substantial pit.

  As Attali and Durand watched, bracing themselves for their next move, one of the men stopped digging and reached down to free something from the soil. He held up a two-handled urn, studied it and put it to one side. Then he immediately picked up another. Attali nudged his colleague, and they slowly stood up together.

  “Allons-y!” Attali shouted, like a cry to battle, as they sprang from their cover.

  The diggers swung round, startled. In a panic, they scrambled up the side of the pit, one clawing his way up with a single hand, his other hand clutching an urn. Faced with a choice between hanging on to the urn or escaping, he looked back defiantly and threw it back into the pit. The crack as the urn smashed echoed into the night.

  The Frenchmen reached the pit, gasping for breath.

  “Let them go,” said Attali. “This is more important.” They watched as the thieves vanished into the darkness. Durand anxiously looked down into the pit for the broken urn. He slithered down the side of the hole and started gathering up the shards. At that moment, he noticed the contents that had spilt out. He picked up a blackened object and rubbed it with his hands to reveal a small skull. Expressions of shock, then disbelief, and finally fascination played over his face. He held the skull up for Attali to see.

  “Can’t be human, can it?” he said. “Too small. A monkey perhaps?”

  “Or a small child,” the inspector replied.

  Durand instinctively rejected this suggestion, the implications being too great to contemplate. Instead, he looked around the pit. More urns could be seen in the bottom and sides; it was as if someone had methodically stacked them there. He reached down, prised another from the soil and gently lifted it above his head to inspect it in the moonlight. The glaze lit up a glowing red and faded as the moon disappeared behind clouds.

  Durand lowered the urn, turned it upside down and apprehensively shook out the contents. There was a soft thud as another small skull hit the ground and rolled a short distance.

  Excitedly, Durand started brushing the soil away from the side of the pit to reveal more and more urns. He turned round to beckon Attali, but his friend was absorbed in brushing the dirt away from a newly-excavated stone stele.

  After clearing the last clump of soil away from the stone, Attali studied it carefully. In the dim light, the scene displayed in the carving on the stele was disturbing. It showed a man wearing what seemed to be a long robe, perhaps translucent, as his legs could plainly be seen, and a hat shaped like a modern fez. His right hand was raised in a gesture of worship, but in the crook of his left arm he was holding the unmistakable figure of an infant child.

  Attali looked down and confirmed what Durand already suspected.

  “There’s something a bit nasty about all this,” he said. “This man – he’s not the father. He’s a kohanim – a priest. And what we’ve got here must be the tophet, the place where they used to sacrifice babies.”

  Attali’s mind was now racing. Tophet was the place outside Jerusalem, mentioned in the Old Testament, where child sacrifices had regularly been performed – a custom found throughout the ancient Middle East. Aware now of the importance of the moment, he instinctively seized the chance to dramatise.

  “I wonder if they used Moloch?” he said, realising that this terrible form of sacrifice by fire could well have been carried out in this very place.

  As if in response, the moon broke from the clouds again, illuminating the urns so that the men seemed to be surrounded by red lights. They both looked around, alarmed.

  “Quite bright out here tonight,” Durand said, trying to maintain a professional cool.

  Attali took off his képi and smoothed down his hair as he gazed upwards. “Well, it’s full moon,” he said, attempting to match his friend’s composure.

  “Even so, I don’t remember seeing moonlight this strong before,” replied Durand, as he watched the glow behind the fleeting clouds. Refocusing his attention on their historic discoveries, Durand shook the urn again to make sure it was empty.

  High above them, still keeping guard from the pillar, the hawk leaned forwards in their direction, shifting its weight from claw to claw and silently flapping its wings.

  It was Attali who heard the sound of children crying, at first only faintly. As it grew louder, he started and stared around him. Durand was absorbed in sifting through the ashes shaken from the urn. The crying grew louder; almost unbearable now, so that Attali clapped his hands over his ears. He was about to shout out when it abruptly stopped. “Did you hear that?” he said quietly.

  Durand looked up. “What? Did I hear what?”

  Attali tried to keep his voice under control. “Babies – crying.”

  Durand glanced at his companion, shrugged his shoulders, and turned back to the contents of the urn. “I heard nothing. Probably a cat.”

  “That was not a cat,” Attali muttered to himself. He listened hard, hands ready near his ears, seeking some sort of explanation. But the noise had gone, and he gradually lowered his arms.

  Without warning, Attali’s képi was sent flying, as the silent hawk swooped down on the two Frenchmen, talons outstretched. It landed with a thump on Attali’s head, tearing out tufts of his hair. He screamed in pain, his arms flailing as he tried to beat it off, but already the bird’s cruel beak was gouging deeply into his face.

  CHAPTER 2

  London, present

  The Tower at Canary Wharf stood out brightly against a cold, miserable winter sky, the beacon on its pinnacle blinking defiantly at the gathering darkness.

  On the twelfth floor, the newsroom of the Metropolitan was engaged in its usual frantic early evening activity.

  Rebecca Burns jumped up from a desk and waved to a girl who walked through the main door. All male eyes instantly looked over towards Rebecca, as if drawn to a magnet. She knew that she attracted attention. It was difficult to miss her flame-coloured, wavy, shoulder-length hair, artfully highlighted by her lime green jacket and black pencil-tight skirt.

  Now twenty-three, Rebecca had decided to abandon the security of a salaried position on a Scottish newspaper and take her chances as a freelance feature-writer based in London. To her delight, the Metropolitan had liked her portfolio and now took regular pieces from her.

  Syreeta Dasgupta walked over to her. If Rebecca aspired to the image of a single, smartly-dressed female professional, Syreeta could not be more different. A young reporter of Indian origin, who had been on the paper for nearly three years, Syreeta exuded flamboyance with her long legs, short denim skirt, gamine hairstyle and broad Birmingham accent.

  Syreeta flopped down in a chair, turning her back on senior reporter Geoff Evans, who was sitting nearby typing into his laptop and clearly irritated by the two women about to start chatting.

  Rebecca and Syreeta had soon become friends, and it was to Syreeta alone that Rebecca had confided the main reason which had brought her to London. Six months previously, Rebecca’s parents had been killed in an air crash while on holiday in Peru. She was their only child and had therefore borne the sole responsibility of dealing with the aftermath of their deaths.

  Rebecca had had the undeniable urge to start afresh; to seek a new life in a busy city, which had also led to her breaking up with her boyfriend, a reporter on the same Scottish newspaper.

  Once settled into her own studio flat, Rebecca found her new freedom brought with it a strong desire to travel, to get away for a while. She hoped that Syreeta would like to join her.

  Syreeta listened to Rebecca chatter away before replying. “I’m really sorry, Becky. I love the idea, but I just don’t have any holiday left. Isn’t there anybody else who’d like to go?”


  “I can’t find anybody,” replied Rebecca, in her soft Scottish accent. “Nobody’s up for North Africa at this time of year. Miserable lot. These last few months have all been a bit too much – and now finishing with Hamish, on top of it all.”

  As Syreeta put her arm around her, Geoff Evans glanced over at them.

  “It’s all been a bit stressful,” Rebecca said quietly. “I really need to get away somewhere different. Maybe only for a few days. Just to get some sunshine and sort my mind out.”

  “I know!” said Syreeta. “Why don’t you see if anyone wants a story doing there? At least you’d get to meet some locals. And you wouldn’t have to be on your own all the time.”

  Rebecca brightened. “Any ideas?”

  “You could try Charles. He covers North Africa.”

  Geoff Evans had been eavesdropping as usual. “Why don’t you just go to the Costa Brava like anybody else?” he said, in his strong Welsh accent.

  Syreeta turned around slowly to face him. “You never did manage to crawl out of your valley did you, Evans? Why don’t you get a life?”

  They glared at each other while Rebecca raised her hands to avoid becoming involved. The stand-off was interrupted by Mike, a computer engineer, attempting to push past Rebecca with a trolley laden with equipment.

  “’Scuse me, Ginge,” he said cheerfully.

  Rebecca was about to answer back, when her mobile rang. Glancing at the number, she flushed slightly, and went over to the window for privacy.

  “I wish you wouldn’t keep phoning me,” she whispered tersely into the phone. She listened for a while. “Look. It’s over, Hamish. Finished. It just didn’t work out for us, did it? Now I’m in London. I’ve got a new job and a new life. Sorry.” She listened again. “No, I can’t. Please stop phoning me here. Look, I’ve got to go. Got a meeting. Bye.”

  Her eyes were moist with tears as she gazed out of the window over the myriad lights of Docklands. A small bird landed on the windowsill and fluttered away. Then, for some reason, it turned back and, to her dismay, flew straight into the window with a muffled thump. She looked anxiously out of the window to see if it was all right. Seconds later, she saw a dark speck fly away and disappear into the blackness.