Ken McClure - Crisis

‘How?’

‘He overheard me talking to Peter on the phone.’

Bannerman stared at Morag in silence. ‘And now Peter is going to kill us,’ he added.

Morag looked bemused. She turned to van Gelder. ‘Tell him this is nonsense,’ she pleaded.

‘I’m afraid the man has a lot more brains than you, you stupid bitch,’ said van Gelder, matter-of-factly.

Morag looked stunned, as if she couldn’t believe her ears. ‘But we love each other …’ she said distantly.

‘Love?’ mocked van Gelder. ‘What do you think I could possibly see in you, you dried up old bitch? You were useful and now you are not. It’s as simple as that.’

Toxic waste is big business Morag,’ said Bannerman. ‘Governments pay through the nose to get rid of it. It’s an embarrassment and a political liability.’

Morag did not register having heard what Bannerman had said. She was staring wide-eyed and unblinking at van Gelder, the man who had just shattered all her dreams with one viciously unkind outburst. Van Gelder held her stare with an amused smirk on his lips. Bannerman used the opportunity to move his hands slowly along the bench behind him until he felt his fingers wrap round the thin, wire bars of a rat cage. He heard the rat scuttle about inside it and hoped it wouldn’t go for his fingers.

‘And now the end is near, as Mr Sinatra would say,’ smiled van Gelder.

‘I did everything for you,’ said Morag in a low whisper. ‘I lied and cheated. I let you …’

“That was a treat,’ sneered van Gelder.

‘You bastard!’

Van Gelder raised the pistol higher when he thought that Morag was going to rush at him, and she stopped. ‘Relax,’ he said. ‘But then you always did have trouble relaxing …’

Bannerman sensed Morag tense beside him. ‘And how do you plan to dispose of our bodies?’ he asked van Gelder.

‘I’m going to drive you both back up to Achnagelloch. You’ll be buried under a thousand tons of rock on the next blasting day, along with Turnbull.’

‘Why did Turnbull die?’ asked Bannerman.

‘He was doing some stupid little geological survey to impress us. Unfortunately he stumbled on to a cave where that greedy old bastard Sproat had hidden a pile of dead sheep because he was too mean to bury them properly. It was Turnbull’s own fault for ignoring the warning signs to keep out of the area. He must have contaminated himself when he examined the sheep.’

Morag snatched a scalpel up from the bench and started to move towards van Gelder. The look in her eyes said that she was not to be reasoned with.

‘Put it down!’ commanded van Gelder.

Morag kept moving towards him.

‘Drop it, you stupid bitch!’

The latest insult made Morag raise the scalpel above her head and lunge at van Gelder. The Dutchman fired and Morag was jerked backwards by the impact of the bullet. She collapsed like a discarded rag doll, a red stain spreading over the front of her white lab coat and an expression of surprise etched on her face.

‘And now you, Doctor,’ said van Gelder.

Bannerman swung the rat cage round and threw it hard at the Dutchman. It caught him on the face and knocked him over backwards, where he hit his head off the wall and slid to the floor. The cage burst open when it struck him and the rat was now perching on his face, sniffing around his mouth and nostrils.

Bannerman saw that van Gelder still had hold of the gun; he was not totally unconscious. He was groaning and lifted his left hand up lazily to brush the rat off his face as if it were a playful kitten disturbing his sleep on a sunny afternoon. Bannerman gambled on making a bid to get the gun, and failed. He was still a metre away when van Gelder opened his eyes and levelled the gun at him. ‘You’ll pay for that,’ he grunted, his eyes red with anger. ‘I’ll blow your bloody knees off first.’

There were four rat cages on the bench above where van Gelder lay. Bannerman reached up and shoved the one nearest to him so that it pushed the others off the end and down on to van Gelder. The Dutchman cursed and struggled to free his gun arm from the tangle while Bannerman made a lunge for the door. It was locked. He turned to see van Gelder getting to his feet. A rat was attacking his ankles. He kicked it across the room.

There were half a dozen animal watering bottles on the table next to the door. Bannerman started throwing them at van Gelder but the Dutchman avoided them with ease and they smashed harmlessly off the far wall. Van Gelder raised the gun and Bannerman closed his eyes. He opened them again when he heard van Gelder let out a scream.

Morag Napier was on her feet behind him and she had just plunged a full syringe of emulsified sheep brain into van Gelder’s back. Bannerman had never seen such hatred in anyone’s eyes. It was clear that hate was the only thing that was keeping Morag Napier alive. Even as van Gelder hit the floor she kept pushing the plunger of the syringe into his back.

When the entire contents had been injected into the prone Dutchman she looked up briefly at Bannerman and smiled enigmatically. It only lasted a split second before her eyes glazed over and she fell backwards to the floor.

Bannerman approached van Gelder’s body cautiously. He wasn’t quite sure whether he was dead or not. It was possible that Morag had managed to hit something vital with the needle and kill him or it may just have been shock that had caused the Dutchman to pass out. The gun was lying about half a metre from van Gelder’s right hand. He reached down slowly to pick it up. His fingers had almost touched the butt when van Gelder’s hand shot out and clamped Bannerman’s wrist in a grip of iron. One look at van Gelder told Bannerman that he was totally deranged. He deduced that the contents of the syringe must have been injected directly into his spinal canal, giving the agent immediate access to his brain. Van Gelder’s eyes had a quality that filled him with fear. People in this state could sometimes command superhuman strength. Bannerman swung his foot round and thumped it into van Gelder’s chest to provide a firm base to pull his arm free. He did so with difficulty and staggered backwards as he broke away.

Van Gelder’s body jerked in muscle spasm as he tried to get to his feet. He writhed and scratched himself as if plagued by an itch. Bannerman was pleased to see that he no longer had an interest in the gun, but he backed away as van Gelder’s gaze settled on him. He was appalled at the sight of the Dutchman. What had been a handsome man a few minutes before was now a feral monster.

Bannerman’s plan was to circle round the bench keeping van Gelder coming after him. If he kept moving in a clockwise direction, as he was doing, he would come back to the spot where the gun lay on the floor. He reckoned he could pick it up and fire before the Dutchman reached him.

Van Gelder, or whoever the deranged creature in van Gelder’s body was, grew tired of edging forwards and made a lunge at Bannerman. Bannerman moved easily out of range but stumbled over one of the animal cages behind him on the floor. He fell over backwards and lay spreadeagled and helpless. Above him, van Gelder loomed into view. He threw himself at Bannerman.

Bannerman felt his hand touch something metal on the floor. He brought it round between van Gelder and himself. It was the scalpel that Morag Napier had tried to attack van Gelder with earlier. The Dutchman impaled himself on it.

Bannerman had to struggle to free himself from the dead weight lying on top of him. The first thing he did when he had finally got to his feet was to rush to the sink and be sick. He sluiced cold water up into his face again and again until the horrors of the last few minutes stopped threatening his sanity. When he could breathe evenly again he picked up the telephone and called for help.