Richard Wiseman - To Kill Or Be Killed

Else sat in Jack Fulton’s office.

“Nothing to be overly worried about, he’s coped well, but the stress has brought a certain protective anger to the surface. His father was in the army and as the only child at home, he got to be man of the house. He’s been well loved. His mother died some years back and he’s grieved well, but… well he feels the need to see justice done. He has a problem, not with the assassins, that’s a black and white issue, but he’s got good solid working class anger against the uncaring attitude of those higher up that chain.”

“That’s not so bad. Idealism is good if you’re going to be heroic.”

“If anger against injustice is what drives that idealism it can turn to zeal and zeal can lead to ill considered actions.”

“Should I send him home?”

“No you brought him her, best use him, he’s a good man, best for this job by what I can see, just watch him when Stanton's in the bag or dead. He may want to crusade against the evil doers behind it.”

“Okay thanks Else.”

Else left and Fulton sat back. He felt the same way though. He’d lost a good friend, Cobb was dead, but he didn’t feel better. He felt in his bones that Sternway was behind it and he felt anger and zeal at the thought of getting justice for Wally’s death, especially if it meant Sternway’s downfall. He applied Else’s warning to his own situation.

Lord North Street London

3-15 p.m.

April 19th

It was straight forward really and Stanton knew it. Hood up and woolly hat on, but coat open, he held the silenced nine millimetre Browning pistol under his coat, arms held in front of him, as if waiting in a queue. He knew it was the right house and he didn’t need the white satellite dish to tell him that this time. He rang the bell.

There was a tense five minute wait as Bill Hutchings came to the door of what used to be the original DIC centre. Back in nineteen forty it had simply been a central office, packed with radio equipment and cine film viewing room. Now it was a stipend residence for a DIC operative. The radio listening and gathering centre was gone and the house didn’t have the high tech equipment in the loft.

Bill Hutchings was in his sixties, slow on his arthritic feet; a bald portly man with a gentle nature. He had his DIC technical equipment in what would have been the back ground floor room as climbing to the loft was beyond him in his advancing years.

When Bill opened the door he was just what Stanton was expecting. Stanton pushed him back into the hall, shut the door behind him, put the case down and pulled out the pistol.

“Hands on your head Bill.”

Bill looked back at him. He knew the face he’d been keeping up with all the alerts and doing the CCTV scans for his area. Now faced unarmed with the killer he was unnervingly brave.

“You’ll have to shoot me you scumbag.”

Stanton did, he shot him through the calf. Bill crumpled to the floor in agony. Stanton grabbed him and dragged him into the lounge and threw him into an armchair and pointed the weapon at his face, within an inch. Bill looked back with now steady eyes.

“I’m telling you nothing. You’ll have to kill me, which no doubt you will, but you don’t scare me.”

Stanton put the gun on a nearby table, Bill tried to rise, but his leg gave way. Stanton grabbed his arm, pulled him up and punched him across the jaw. Bill slumped into the chair unconscious. Stanton needed him alive in case there was information he needed. He took Bill’s tie off and used it as a tourniquet on his leg, took a curtain cord and tied Bill up.

He went to the kitchen got a tea towel and wrapped it around Bill’s wound. He looked down at the old man. He thought him brave and he made sure of the knots, a man like that would crawl out of the house and get help. They didn’t make them like that any more.

His first call was the upstairs of the house, there was no-one else there and the loft was empty. He found the equipment in the back room. The computer was on, but was pass word protected. He’d suspected as much. After McKie he knew they’d tighten security. He didn’t need the computer anyway, but would have liked to have got the updates, see what was going on. He thought of waking Bill and getting the answer out of him, but he felt sure Bill would die first. He found Bill’s DIC pass in the drawer of the desk. He examined it. He switched the computer off, logged on to the guest profile. He found a lot of Paint pictures with the name Stacey on them, a grand child no doubt, by the look of the badly drawn princesses and horses with odd legs. He found the scanner controls, a Lexmark, and set to work, he checked the time. It was three forty five. He was sure he’d be done in half an hour. Then he’d head for the target with the perfect ‘access all areas’ security pass. He called a taxi for four twenty.

La Rueda Restaurant London

3-15 p.m.

April 19th

The beautiful glass building was full of light. From his seat in the large restaurant room Sternway could see the tower of London. He looked at his watch and as he did so he saw the rather elegant lady, in her fifties, half size heels, square toed and expensive, Dior original dress and beautifully glossy and pampered hair walk across the room towards him. Sternway found it hard to equate this obviously well heeled and attractive woman with her plump and spineless politician husband.

Sternway rose and pulled out her chair and settled her. He sat down opposite her.

“This is lovely.” She put her small bag on the table.

“Shall we order?” Sternway said and handed her the menu. The waiter arrived.

“I’ll have the Spanish Noodles with mixed seafood and shellfish.” Sternway said in a neat precise tone of voice and the waiter scribbled away.

“I’ll have the Lobster, Clams and Saffron rice.” Mrs Robinson said and added “Shall I choose the wine?”

Sternway smiled. She was surely the driving force behind her husband’s career.

“Please do.”

“I think the pink cava will do don’t you?”

“Yes.” It wouldn’t have been his choice, but he went with the flow.

When the waiter had gone Mrs Robinson opened her small bag and took a piece of paper out. It was an A five sheet, folded.

She slid it across the table to Sternway.

The sheet had three questions. The first was ‘would Stanton be killed when the job was done?’ The second was ‘what did Sternway want in return?’ The third was rather shocking and related to the target.

He took out an expensive, glossy ball point pen, emphatically clicked it once and wrote his answers; one word, a sentence and one word again. She took the sheet and read it.

Across the room a young man and a girl were eating Paella. The man had a medium sized sports bag on the floor beside his chair. Sternway had looked around the room when he arrived. He’d noticed the young couple, obviously engrossed in each other, but hadn’t noticed the bag under the table.

He had been too busy appraising Mrs Robinson as she entered to notice the young man move the bag out from under the table with his foot, reach into it and pull out a pack of tissues, as Mrs Robinson entered. If he’d been watching he’d have seen that the movement looked slightly too long and too complex the simple retrieval of a pocket tissue pack.

When Sternway did look around the room again after he had seated Mrs Robinson and himself and noticed that the girl had put her hand bag on the table, she was doing her make up and looked in the bag a couple of times.

After ten minutes Sternway’s and Mrs Robinson’s food arrived. It was a mini feast. Sternway wasn’t over indulgent with food, often left food on the plate, but ate the very best of what was on the plate, especially if it was good food and he liked La Rueda, for the food, the service and the view of the Tower of London. It was one of four or five of his favourite lunch spots. He avoided patterns as a spy, but he also liked to go places where he knew the staff and layout. His choice of favourite spot was random and he varied his lunch time. DIC had been watching him for some time and knew enough about him to put a team there.