Ю Несбё - Macbeth

‘We don’t have much time. I’m going in.’

‘How do you know?’

Macbeth moved back from the balustrade and tucked the telescope inside his uniform. ‘His pupils. He’s high and he’s going to shoot.’ He pressed a button on his walkie-talkie. ‘Code Four Six. Now. Take command, Banquo. Over.’

‘Banquo in command. Over.’

‘I’ll go with you,’ Lady said, following Macbeth.

‘I don’t think—’

‘This is my the casino. My Jack.’

‘Listen, ma’am—’

‘Collum knows me, and women calm him down.’

‘This is a police matter,’ Macbeth said and ran down the stairs.

‘I’m coming,’ Lady said and ran after him.

Macbeth came to a halt and stood in front of her.

‘Look at me,’ he said.

‘No, you look at me,’ she said. ‘Do I look as if I’m not going with you? He’s expecting me to bring the money.’

He looked at her. He had a good look. Looked at her in a way other men had looked at her. But also in a way no men or women had looked at her. They looked at her with fear or admiration, respect or desire, hatred, love or subservience, measured her with their eyes, judged her, misjudged her. But this young man looked at her as though he had finally found something. Which he recognised. Which he had been looking for.

‘Come on then,’ he said. ‘But keep your mouth shut, ma’am.’

The thick carpet muffled the sound of their feet as they entered the room.

The table where the two men were sitting was less well illuminated than usual because of the smashed chandelier. Jack’s face, stiffened into a mask of transfixed shock, didn’t change when he saw Lady and Macbeth coming towards him. Lady noticed the hammer of the gun rise.

‘Who are you?’ Collum’s voice was thick.

‘I’m Inspector Macbeth from SWAT,’ said the policeman, pulling out a chair and taking a seat. Laying both palms on the table so that they were visible. ‘My job is to negotiate with you.’

‘There’s nothing to negotiate, Inspector. I’ve been cheated by this bloody casino for years. It has ruined me. They fix the cards. She fixes the cards.’

‘And you’ve arrived at that conclusion after taking brew?’ Macbeth asked, tapping his fingers soundlessly on the felt. ‘It distorts reality, you know.’

‘The reality, Inspector, is that I have a gun and I see better than ever, and if you don’t give me the money I’ll first shoot Jack here, then you, as you’ll try to draw a gun, and then Lady, so-called, who will at that point either try to flee or overpower me, but it will be too late for both. Then possibly myself, but we’ll have to see whether I’m in a better mood after dispatching you three to hell and blowing this place sky-high.’ He chuckled. ‘I don’t see any money, and these negotiations are thereby called off. So let’s get started...’

The hammer rose higher. Lady automatically grimaced and waited for the bang.

‘Double or quits,’ Macbeth said.

‘I beg your pardon?’ Collum said. Immaculate pronunciation. Immaculate shave and immaculate dinner suit with a pressed white shirt. Lady guessed his underclothes were clean too. He had known this was unlikely to finish with him leaving the casino holding a suitcase full of money. He would be carried out as bankrupt as when he came in. But, well, immaculate.

‘You and I play a round of blackjack. If you win, you get all the money you’ve lost here, times two. If I win, I get your gun with all the bullets and you drop all your demands.’

Collum laughed. ‘You’re bluffing!’

‘The suitcase with the money you asked for has arrived and is in the police vehicle outside. The owner has said she’s willing to double up if we agree. Because we know there’s been some jiggery-pokery with the cards, and fair’s fair. What do you say, Ernest?’

Lady looked at Collum, at his left eye, which was all that was visible behind Jack’s head. Ernest Collum was not a stupid man; quite the opposite. He didn’t believe the story about the suitcase. And yet. Sometimes it seemed as if it was the most intelligent customers who refused to see the inevitability of chance. Given enough time everyone was doomed to lose against the casino.

‘Why would you do this?’ Collum said.

‘Well?’ Macbeth said.

Collum blinked twice. ‘I’m the dealer and you’re a player,’ he said. ‘She deals.’

Lady looked at Macbeth, who nodded. She took the pack, shuffled and laid two cards in front of Macbeth face up.

A six. And the king of hearts.

‘Sweet sixteen.’ Collum grinned.

Lady laid two cards in front of Collum, one face up. Ace of clubs.

‘One more,’ Macbeth said, stretching out a hand.

Lady gave him the top card from the pack. Macbeth held it to his chest, sneaked a look. Glanced up at Collum.

‘Looks like you’ve bust, sweet sixteen,’ Collum said. ‘Let’s see.’

‘Oh, I’m pretty happy with my hand,’ Macbeth said. Smiling at Collum. Then he threw the card to the right, where the table was in part-shadow. Collum automatically leaned across a fraction to see the card better.

The rest happened so fast Lady remembered it as a flash. A flash of a hand in motion, a flash of steel that caught the light as it flew across the table, a flash of Collum’s one eye staring at her, wide open in aggrieved protest, light glistening in a cascade of blood streaming out both sides of the blade that sliced his carotid artery. Then the sounds. The muffled sound of the gun hitting the thick, much-too-expensive carpet. The splash of blood landing on the table. Collum’s deep gurgle as his left eye extinguished. Jack’s one quavering sob.

And she remembered the cards. Not the ace, not the six. But the king of hearts. And, half in shadow, the queen of spades. Both sprayed with Ernest Collum’s blood.

They came in wearing their black uniforms, quick, soundless, obeying his every sign. They didn’t touch Collum; they led out a sobbing Jack. She pushed away an offer of help. Sat looking at the young head of SWAT, who leaned back in his chair looking content. Like someone thinking he had taken the last trick.

‘Collum will take the last trick,’ she said.

‘What?’

‘Unless we find it.’

‘Find what?’

‘Didn’t you hear what he said? After dispatching you three to hell and blowing this place sky-high. ’

He stared at her for a couple of seconds, first with surprise, then with something else. Acknowledgement. Respect. Then shouted, ‘Ricardo! There’s a bomb!’

Ricardo was a SWAT guy with calm self-assurance in his gaze, his movements and the softly spoken orders he gave. His skin was so black Lady thought she could see her reflection. It took Ricardo and his men four minutes to find what they were searching for, inside a locked toilet cubicle. A zebra-striped suitcase Collum had brought in after the doorman had checked the contents. Collum had explained it was four gold bars. He intended to use them as a stake at the exclusive poker table where, until the Gambling and Casino Committee had forbidden it, they had accepted cash, watches, wedding rings, mortgage deeds, car keys and anything else, provided that the players agreed. Behind the gold-painted iron bars engineer and numbers genius Collum had placed a home-made time bomb, which the SWAT bomb expert later praised for its craftsmanship. Exactly how many minutes were left on the timer Lady couldn’t remember. But she remembered the cards.

The king of hearts and the queen of spades. That evening they met under an evil moon.

Lady invited him over for dinner at the casino the next evening. He accepted the invitation but refused the aperitif. No to wine, but yes to water. She had the table on the mezzanine laid with a view of Workers’ Square, where the rain was trickling down and running quietly over the cobblestones from the railway station to the Inverness. The architects had built the station a few metres higher up because they thought the weight of all the marble and trains like Bertha would over time cause the floor to sink in the town’s constantly waterlogged, marshy terrain.