‘A bit of each one of them. But mostly I was alerted by the fact that he was always several vehicles behind us, never following us close enough to be recognized or falling back far enough to risk being cut off and losing us. When he turned onto the same road that we did – and I know that road, it doesn’t go anywhere, except that it becomes a dirt track across the moors and comes out somewhere around here – it all seemed too much of a coincidence.’
‘Well, here comes another one. Would you say that he’s had time to replace his windscreen and hand-paint the van?’
‘Hellfire! Yes, I think he has.’ Douglas frowned at each of his mirrors in turn but they only showed him a tourist coach following. ‘I don’t see anything.’
‘He’s behind the bus, which is keeping well back. A cream coloured van. It doesn’t have the smooth shine of a proper paint job. He could have painted over the windows. He’s been ducking back behind the coach so that you only get to see him on bends. A bit late in the year for tourist coaches, isn’t it?’
‘Not if they’re looking for the blue grouse. Very smart if he’s got back on our trail already.’
‘I may be quite wrong.’
‘I hope you are, this time. I don’t want a repeat of yesterday’s fun and games.’
‘I’d rather that we were wrong on the safe side. We only have Honeypot’s word for it that he blames us for his downfall and wants blood. But don’t forget that he has his sources of information and he was living under the same roof for yonks and we were all more or less swapping CVs. He must know our intentions.’
The car’s steering was so slack that Douglas dared not even shrug. ‘He could have bribed somebody to phone him if we showed up at the sheltered housing complex. Or he could have got his friend in the garage to fit a what-d’you-call-it device before handing over the car. Tracker, that’s the name.’
‘There’s another sign for Straloch Moor,’ Tash said.
‘It’s the other end of the road we were on yesterday. Phone Honeypot and give her our position by the Satnav.’
TWENTY-FOUR
The side-road arrived before Douglas was quite ready for it – a tarred B-road looking as though it would be passable to the far end. But Douglas had seen the far end and he was doubtful. However, he did not feel that there would be much protection or deterrence in passing traffic or a busload of twitchers. Better perhaps to get off the main road to where he could try to stall things until official help arrived. At a pinch he could ram the coach, immobilize it and drive the car, however damaged, somewhere else before abandoning it.
The one manoeuvre of which the car was still capable was rounding a corner – it was following a straight line that had become difficult. A twitch of the wheel, a yelp from the tyres and they were round and away.
Douglas watched his mirrors. He expected the coach to travel on and the cream caravan to turn in pursuit of them. The caravan driver thought the same and followed patiently. Only when the coach signalled a turn did the caravan suddenly spurt forward, lights flashing and the horn attempting to blare but only managing a dispirited beep. He was too late. The coach was beginning its turn and the caravan had to go on, stop and back up, to the dismay of other traffic. Douglas returned his full attention to his own road just in time to avoid leaving it for the ditch. He put on what speed he could but the road was narrow, single-track with passing places and running through mixed heather that was losing its colour and patches of reedy grass that suggested boggy ground.
‘Surely this car should be faster than a camper van?’ Tash said. ‘Couldn’t we just run away and leave them behind?’
‘You’re right, it should. But you’re wrong, it isn’t – if only because it has less ground clearance. I haven’t been over this road for many years, and nor by the look of it has anybody else, but it doesn’t seem to have changed. It’s only surfaced for a kilometre or two at each end to give access. The middle bit is only fit for a tractor. There are obstructions that aren’t signposted until you get to them. There are boulders that could knock our sump off.’
He put his foot down, ignored the bumps and rattles. He could understand why the last owner had traded in the car and he cursed himself for choosing it unseen from a list. Seymour McLeish would have committed an offence if the car had been resold without an extensive overhaul. The steering had a great deal of play, the suspension was shot and the brakes would have been inadequate on a kiddie’s tricycle. In the mirror he saw that the bus had turned to follow him and the camper van, leaving its overtaking manoeuvre too late, had turned behind it.
‘It must be a coachload of twitchers,’ Tash said. ‘He’s trying to get by but he doesn’t have a hope.’
While he drove and thought and struggled with a road that seemed to have been designed by a deranged goat, he could hear occasional snatches of Tash’s voice as she spoke again on the phone. ‘Cream motor caravan, registration … can’t make out the … flashing his lights at the coach driver … doesn’t want to know.’ Call finished, she left the phone, still connected, above the dashboard. ‘She says to look out for ourselves.’
‘I would guess,’ Douglas said huskily, ‘that that’s a hint to defend ourselves as best we can and she’ll support a plea of self-defence if it goes that far. My two shotguns are behind the cases. They’re already out of their bags but they’re open for safety’s sake. And they’re loaded so don’t put your fingers near the triggers; and keep the muzzles down or the cartridges will fall out. Prepare to hand me the over-under. And take a few cartridges out of my left hand pocket and put them into your own.’
‘I don’t know anything about—’
‘Yes you do. You loaded for me at the clay pigeons when we went to Strathbogie. Do the same again. Don’t touch the triggers or the safety catches unless you desperately need to shoot.’
‘I’ll try.’ Her voice was shaking but she was still game. He heard the clunk as each gun was closed. His own voice had seemed to be coming from his throat.
There was a change ahead and as a practiced surveyor Douglas took it in in the blink of an eye. Their road was running with a steep escarpment of loose rocks rising on the right. The history was written in the stones. An old road had run straight along the bottom of the escarpment. There had been a rock fall and traffic, mostly of sheep, had become diverted around it through the heather. When the road had been surfaced the new route was followed. Later, the road had gained importance or a roads surveyor had been left with money in his budget that would be lost if it remained unspent, so the original route had been rescued from under the fallen rocks. As a result there was now a D-shape of roads with a rock pile in the middle. Local authorities being ever opportunistic, the place was now adorned with a large P-sign and a picnic symbol. There was even a timber structure forming a table and two cramped double benches.
Sometimes thought can freeze, sometimes it moves with the speed of light. This thankfully was one of the latter occasions. Douglas growled, ‘Hang on!’ He spurted between the rock walls, stamped on the brakes and hauled the steering round. A dab at the accelerator and the still vigorous engine kicked the tail round. The car stalled to a halt where the roads rejoined. He found himself looking past a shoulder of the rock pile.
The coach driver saw the chance of a respite. His sandwiches were calling and his passengers had as much chance of seeing a blue grouse there as further on. He swung into the opening of the D, perhaps two cricket pitches from Douglas, but the bend was too tight for his big vehicle and there was a patch of green bog right in front of him. His tail end was blocking the junction. He would have reversed but the camper van had come up close behind, lights flashing and horn sounding. The coach driver opened his door, probably intending to try the use of sweet reason, but the camper driver was not in reasonable mood. A figure roughly conforming to that of George Eastwick jumped out of the camper, carrying a deer rifle complete with telescopic sight, and threw itself down in the shelter of one of the coach’s wheels. The coach driver closed his door ag
ain and was seen no more.
The car was dangerously exposed. ‘Come on!’ Douglas snapped. He grabbed his choice of the shotguns, threw open his door, jumped out and ran the three or four paces into the shelter of the rocks. Out of the corner of his eye he saw a slim figure which could only be that of Tash leaping out of the car. He peered through a dip between two boulders and ducked hurriedly, much too late, as a bullet smacked off the stone and whined off into the sky. Chips of stone stung his face. He reckoned to have a second and possibly more while the rifle was reloaded. He raised himself and took a snap shot but he was only shooting at a wheel. If the tyre had suddenly deflated the man might have been pinned down by the weight of the coach; but the resilience of the inflated tyre bounced the small shot off.
At the moment when the world went mad, Douglas was computing the balance of power between himself and George Eastwick. A rifle can kill at a far greater range but it has to be aimed and then reloaded. Only a skilled rifleman can hold his aim while reloading. A shotgun need only be pointed by reflex. It is fitted to the user so that it shoots where he is looking and its pattern has some spread so that if aimed within a very few degrees it should score a hit. Douglas’s guns each had twin barrels, allowing an immediate second shot, but a shotgun’s range is limited. With ordinary shot, the limit of useful range would be about forty yards. With the heavier SSK shot, which he had only kept in his cupboard in case roe deer came looking for an easy meal among the carnations, the range would be greater, but how much greater he could only hope and guess. He thought that George Eastwick was just within range of a damaging but probably not lethal shot.
He was just arriving at that hasty but comforting conclusion when he was jerked back to the here and now. He had raised his head just enough to see over a ridge of rock. George Eastwick had wriggled sideways to have a clear shot and he was taking aim. Douglas ducked as a second bullet whined off the rock and peppered him with splinters of stone. He snapped off a shot in reply but had no way of knowing whether he had scored. He reloaded. He was relieved that he was holding his over-under clay pigeon gun which had had its safety catch removed. That made for speedier reloading but he would not have wanted to let Tash loose with it.
The scene had settled into a semblance of peace. Douglas used this interval to resume his calculations. One rifle against two shotguns. The rifle would be slower to aim after reloading. In George’s shoes, assuming that the open sights were still in place beneath, he would rip off the telescopic sight which would only be an embarrassment at such close range. But Tash had never … Douglas suddenly realized that Tash had vanished. This was another new factor in the equation. Had she run for it? Is so, which way?
The passenger door of the bus opened and figures began to pour out. Figures with binoculars and cameras and notebooks and pencils.
Twitchers.
Japanese twitchers.
At the time he could only assume that either he was hallucinating or these twitchers were insane. Later he learned that an Aberdeen firm had seized the chance to advertise trips to see the blue grouse, starting from Dyce Airport, and had come to an arrangement with a travel firm to assemble a complete package of flights, hotels and meals. He also learned that opinion among the twitchers had been divided, some assuming that they had happened on a film in the making, others believing that they had stumbled on a paintball contest.
They began to take photographs, of the scenery and of Douglas and George. One keen photographer crouched down in front of George in order to get a head-on shot, in the photographic sense of the word, of a rifleman taking aim. George was shouting something, inaudible in the babble of Oriental language. This shot was later syndicated worldwide.
Douglas’s imaginary scenarios were now scrambled. George, he thought, was in no mood to be deterred from shooting merely by the risk of an innocent Japanese bystander being in the way, but the photographer was mirroring his every move. If Douglas had had the rifle there were moments when he could have fired, but the spread of shot from a shotgun was far too great to be risked in such a crowd. His thinking was becoming disjointed. A moving target is very difficult to hit with a rifle bullet. If Tash came into danger he would jump up and charge.
The photographer had satisfied his urge to capture the dramatic scene. He rose and stepped aside. Again Douglas had to snatch his head out of the way; for a moment he saw George against a background of heather and sky. He had the chance of a shot in reply. The sound of the ricochet and the spatter of shot rebounding into the throng conveyed at last the message that something real was happening in which it might be unwise to become involved.
An unhurried, sheep-like drift towards the door of the coach resulted. George’s chance of a clear shot came and went too quickly to be grasped. Douglas got up and darted to one side, to where a ditch and two large stones offered better cover and a better chance of a shot. One snap shot from the rifle missed, high overhead. George felt exposed for an instant and was then safe in cover.
A small cluster of twitchers remained, drifting between George and Douglas. George raised the rifle. He seemed to have turned his head to one side. Douglas assumed that he was looking at Tash. He made his decision, right or wrong. He jumped up again, hurdled the rock and began a desperate charge. Tash, for her part, guessed that George was aiming another shot at Douglas. She had crept round the other side of the coach and was coming up behind George. She changed her grip on Douglas’s much prized game gun and arrived behind George already swinging it like a golf club. It was her intention to knock George’s head clean off his shoulders and possibly over the crest of the escarpment.
All this Douglas saw. He also saw the muzzle of the rifle settle between his eyes. The barrels of the shotgun caught George across the head and with the jolt of it the shotgun fired. The slam of the shotgun blast coincided with the sharper crack of the rifle so that they could have been mistaken for a single shot.
Douglas saw the quick flicker of flame at the muzzle but he only knew half of the monstrous blow on his head.
The barrels of the gun were damaged beyond repair. So also was George.
Over the brow of the hill came a police car in livery with a coat of arms on the door. Inside were a stout male officer and a young female one, each a constable, each in uniform and neither of them armed. It was, Douglas said later, typically British underkill.
From atop the pile of rocks a single blue grouse looked over the scene and took flight, wondering what was going on. It was not used to being ignored.
TWENTY-FIVE
Pain. Sickness. Smell of disinfectant.
Open eyes but can’t see. Kisses on the uncovered part of face and a faint perfume. Cold. Too tired to move. Drumbeat. A familiar voice talking, giving the latest news.
Travelling head first face up. Light and dark. Voices. Needles. Face uncovered, ring of faces, one of them remarkably like Honeypot’s and one like Tash. Covered up again. Echoes. Left the road. Rocks among the heather. Head hurts but hallucinations drown the pain. Driving the Ford but too fast to control. Own little BMW much better.
Pipe, tube, hose.
Unwrapping again. Light hurts. Visitors. Yoo who? Mustn’t laugh. Hurts. Clay pigeons blowing to dust, gets in your eyes. Pudding club. Shall I be Daddy? Smile when I’m shouting at you.
One second Douglas was wandering in the distant recesses of his mind, the next he was in a hospital bed, desperately cold, being leaned over. The male figure was the surgeon. He didn’t know how he knew that; in fact he didn’t even know how he knew that it was male. It asked him how many fingers it was holding up. He said that he was too tired to count but that he wasn’t seeing double, which seemed to satisfy the figure. Astonishingly, although his memory was patchy his thinking processes were almost too clear.
‘He seems to be coming round at long last,’ it said. ‘It’s probably down to you. Keep talking to him. I’ll look in again later. I’ll send a nurse.’
The figure moved away and was replaced by Tash. She settled in the
bedside chair. ‘You’ve done something different with your hair,’ he said.
The effect was immediate. Tash emitted a low wail, tears hopped onto her cheeks and she searched in vain for a handkerchief before grabbing a corner of the sheet to mop her nose. ‘Are you all right?’ she asked in a muffled voice. ‘No, that was silly. I know you’re not all right but you’re going to be. We’ve been waiting for you to come out of it.’
‘I’m cold. Awfully, terribly cold. I’m not dead, am I?’
Tash was trying to laugh and cry at the same time. ‘No, you’re not dead. But you’re still on a transfusion. You lost a terrible lot of blood.’
‘But are you all right? How’s the baby?’
‘He’s doing very well.’
‘He? How do you know that?’
‘They gave me a scan here when they were doing yours. We could see his little spout. I’m calling him Teapot for the moment.’
‘Be careful; that kind of nickname can stick.’ His head did not seem able to move but by forcing his eyes as high as they would go he saw that there were several bags hanging on a stand and tubes coming down to him. ‘Do they take the blood straight out of the fridge and shoot it into you? Tell them to warm it first.’ He tried not to sound peevish but without success.
‘I’ll tell them but I don’t suppose they’ll listen. It probably gets too thick to flow or something, I’ll ask them to give you more blankets. Do you remember what happened?’
‘Bits. But I’ve been dreaming all sorts of dreams and I don’t know where they take over. I remember visiting my mother. That was real?’
‘Yes. She wrote me a sweet letter.’
Mrs Young was inclined to put off letter writing. And then the post …
‘How long have I been in here?’
With My Little Eye Page 14