Jack Higgins - Brought in Dead

Someone moved out of a doorway behind him, he was aware of that, and then the pain as a sharp point sliced through his raincoat and jacket to touch bare flesh.

“Keep walking,” Billy Stratton said calmly. “Just keep walking or I’ll shove this right through your kidneys.”

They turned into a narrow alley a few yards further along, Craig walking at the same even pace, hands thrust deep into his pockets. A lamp was bracketed to the wall at the far end and beyond, the river roared over a weir, drowning every other sound.

“A good thing I came along, wasn’t it?” Stratton said. “But then I have an instinct for these things. I knew something would go wrong just as I knew you were trouble from the first moment I clapped eyes on you. But not any more, you bastard. Not any more.”

Craig took to his heels and ran and Stratton cried out in fury and went after him. The cobbles at the end of the alley were black and shiny in the light of the old gas lamp and beyond the low wall that blocked the end, the river rushed through the darkness.

As Craig turned, Stratton paused, the knife held ready, a terrible grin splitting the white face, and then he moved with incredible speed, the blade streaking up. To Duncan Craig, it might have been a branch swaying in the breeze. He pivoted cleanly to one side, secured the wrist in a terrible aikido grip and twisted the hand back in the one way nature had never intended it should go, snapping the wrist instantly.

Stratton screamed soundlessly, his agony drowned by the roaring of the river. He staggered back clutching his broken wrist, mouthing obscenities, and as Craig picked up the knife and moved towards him, turned and stumbled away.

Craig went after him, but Stratton thundered along the alley as if all the devils in hell were at his heels, emerged into the main road and ran headlong into the path of a late-night bus.

There was a squeal of brakes as the bus skidded, a sudden cry and then silence. A moment later voices were raised and when Craig reached the end of the alley, passengers were already beginning to dismount, men crouching down to peer under the wheels.

“Oh, my God, look at him!” A woman sobbed suddenly and Craig turned up his collar and walked away quickly through the heavy rain.

The disk shot high into the air, poised for one split second at the high point of its trajectory and disintegrated, the sound of the gunshot reverberating through the quiet morning.

The rooks lifted into the air from their nests in the beech trees at the end of the garden, crying in alarm, and Duncan Craig laughed and lowered the automatic shotgun.

“I’m not too popular, it would seem. Let’s have another.”

As Harriet leaned over the firer to insert another disk, Jenny came out through the French windows. “There’s a gentleman to see you, Colonel Craig. A Mr. Vernon.”

Craig paused in the act of reloading the Gower and turned to Harriet, who straightened slowly. “Does he now?” he said softly. “All right, Jenny, show him out here.”

Harriet came to him quickly, anxiety on her face, and he slipped an arm about her shoulders. “Don’t get alarmed. There’s nothing to worry about. Not a damned thing. Let’s have another one.”

The disk soared into the air and this time he caught it on the way down, a difficult feat at the best of times, snap-shooting from the shoulder, scattering the fragments across the lawn.

“Am I supposed to be impressed?” Vernon said and Craig turned to find him standing in the French windows, Ben Carver at his shoulder.

“Well, well, if it isn’t Mr. Vernon,” Craig said. “And to what do we owe the honour?”

Vernon nodded towards Harriet. “What about her?”

Craig smiled faintly. “Anything you say to me, you say to Harriet. She’s my right arm.”

Vernon took a cigarette from a platinum case and Carver gave him a light. “All right, colonel, I’ll put my cards on the table. I made a mistake about you, that I freely admit, but I know when I’m beaten.”

“I wish I knew what you were talking about,” Craig said.

Vernon obviously had difficulty in restraining himself. “Let’s stop beating about the bush. I’ve lost the Flamingo and my place up the York Road and then Billy Stratton meets with a nasty accident. You aren’t going to tell me I’m just experiencing a run of bad luck?”

“It can happen to the best of us.”

“All right — I’ll lay it on the line. You’ve had your fun — you’ve broken me, so I’m getting out just as soon as I can find a buyer for what’s left. I’m asking you to leave it alone from now on — all right?”

“Oh, no, Mr. Vernon,” Craig said softly. “Not in a thousand years. I’ll see you in hell first and that’s a very definite promise.”

“That’s all I wanted to know.” Far from being angry Vernon now smiled amiably. “You’re being very silly, old man. I mean it isn’t as if you’ve only got yourself to consider, is it? There’s Harriet here…”

He got no further. There was an ominous click and the barrel of the shotgun swung round to touch his chest. Craig’s eyes seemed to look right through him and the voice was cold and hard.

“If you even try, Vernon, I’ll shoot you down like a dog. In your own home, in the street — you’ll never know when it’s coming — never feel safe again.”

For a long moment Vernon held his gaze and then quite suddenly he nodded to Carver. “Let’s go.”

They walked across the lawn and disappeared round the side of the house. Harriet moved to her father’s side. “Why did he come?”

“For another look at the opposition I think. Nothing like knowing the enemy — a cardinal rule of war and Vernon was a good officer, make no mistake about that.”

“But what was the point of all that business about selling out and asking you to lay off?”

“Who knows? It might have worked — perhaps that’s what he was hoping. He may even be up to something.” Duncan Craig smiled. “We’ll have to find out, won’t we?”

“What now, Mr. Vernon?” Ben Carver said as he turned the Rolls into the main road.

“We’ll go back to the club,” Vernon told him. “After lunch I want you to drive down to Doncaster to pick up Joe Morgan. I told him to leave the London train there just in case.”

“Do I bring him back to the Flamingo?”

Vernon shook his head. “No more indoor meetings — too risky. I’ll be waiting on one of those benches next to the fountain in Park Place.”

“Thinking of Craig?”

Vernon nodded. “There’s always the odd chance that he has more of those gadgets of his planted around the place.”

“When are we going to do something about him?”

“Thursday morning,” Vernon said. “Right after the job and just before we leave.” He leaned forward and his voice was cold. “And you can forget about the we part right now. I settle with Craig personally — understand?”

It was cold in the mortuary and when Jack Brady lifted the sheet to reveal Billy Stratton’s face it was pale and bloodless.

“But there isn’t a mark on him,” Grant said.

“I wouldn’t look any lower if I were you,” Miller told him.

“What a way to go. You’re satisfied with the circumstances?”

“Oh, yes, the driver of that bus didn’t stand a chance. It was raining heavily at the time and Stratton simply plunged across the road, head-down. He’d been drinking, by the way.”

“Much?”

“Five or six whiskies according to the blood sample.”

Grant nodded to Brady, who replaced the sheet. “Who did the formal identification?”

“Ben Carver — reluctantly, I might add.”

Brady chuckled. “I had to twist his arm a little. He wasn’t too pleased.”