by Tom Bullough
– I think it’s alright… he said.
Fay was still in a state of total amazement, kissing Angus, her arms around his back, the hardness of his crotch pressed against her. She was amazed by his excitement; she was amazed by the fact that it was happening at all.
She kept grinning uncontrollably.
Half the night she’d been walking round fields, trying not to think about him. Angus’s hand was travelling down her back, settling on the curve at its base: she glowed where he touched her. She’d pictured herself going back down to Kingston, getting on with the course, maybe seeing him socially in another three months’ time.
Neither of them heard the others till they were halfway across the lawn: Pete coughing smokily, Belle protesting about something to do with hygiene. They sprang apart immediately, Angus’s face flushed as he stumbled against a chair, his pectorals prominent through his T-shirt, unsure quite where to look.
– Er… Alright? he said, as the door swung open. Nice… walk?
Pete looked from one of them to the other, opening his mouth but hesitating to say anything. Belle pushed past him, aiming for a stray packet of cigarettes on the table. She glanced up at Angus, then she looked at Fay.
A line appeared on her forehead.
Her eyes were big and mascaraed, her hair loose down the sides of her face, her lips slightly open. It made Fay turn cold.
– Fine, said Pete hurriedly. How are yous?
– Angus?! said Belle.
Tim wandered obliviously in from the garden, peering among empty tea cups and scattered cassettes on the sideboard before heading towards the stairwell.
– You’re not even going to say anything?! Belle wrapped her pink cardigan tight around herself. Her voice was cracking. I… Angus? I… I can’t believe you!
For a moment she was staring at them; then she spun and stormed outside, slamming the door behind her.
– Okay, said a voice to the left. Open the door, step back and throw me the keys…
Paolo was standing beside the driver’s door of the ambulance, the keys in his hand. Suddenly he felt sick, his throat had shrunk so his breathing rasped, but he did as he was told; he couldn’t think of any alternative.
Steve was standing by the rear doors, a small black gun in his hand, his bulging watery eyes watching them dispassionately. By the right headlight, Mac was huge, crop-headed and sunken-eyed, an elbow resting on the bonnet.
Both of the men were wearing shirts and jackets; their faces were expressionless. Stubble picked out the scar tissue running down Steve’s neck, vanishing into his shirt collar.
– Now, said Steve. Here’s what we’re going to do. You, I assume, were planning to move this vehicle to somewhere discreet, yet… handy for your cottage. Am I right?
Nick was staring at the wall of the ambulance in front of him.
Paolo nodded spasmically.
– Good, said Steve, signalling to Mac to search them. Then, you’ll have something for us, I think?
Mac stopped, his hands open, inches from Paolo’s shoulders.
– Steve… he started.
– Mac, said Steve, a venomous edge to his voice. I pay you! Alright? I pay you… I am in charge here, and we do not come all the way out to Wales without making a profit. Okay? Now, listen to me. Alkalai?
– Yes, said Paolo weakly. We have.
– Good, said Steve, without smiling. Then, you two, get in the front. Put your hands on the dashboard. Do not move them till I tell you… Mac. In the back. Let’s go.
Pete had been about to go after Belle when the smashing started. The squirrels were bounding across the attic, joist to joist, as Angus had once said they did. Except, on this occasion, something seemed to get in their way.
A cracking noise came down through the ceiling, the sound of something ripping, something else shattering; and a moment later some kind of glass receptacle dropped from the top of the stairwell and exploded halfway down it, showering droplets out into the room.
No-one moved. A squirrel crossed the last part of the attic and squeezed onto the climbing rose. Pete looked from Fay, to Angus, to Tim, who was a foot from the mouth of the stairwell – about to go up – inspecting his hands and forearms, dabbing at them suspiciously with the hem of his T-shirt.
– Wha…? Tim croaked. What the fuck?!
Pete started across the room, weaving among the chairs.
– I’ve no idea, said Angus. I swear to God.
The stairs were spread with a mess of tinfoil, broken glass and a transparent liquid that was trickling into a puddle on the third step. Pete arrived beside Fay, squinting at it, taking in the tinfoil, trying to alter the course of his thoughts.
– Pete… said Angus. He put an arm round Fay’s waist. Pete. You don’t think…?
– Has it gone on yous? he said.
– I… said Angus. It might have done. Pete, you don’t think?
Pete inhaled carefully, rubbing his temples.
– Tim, he said. If I told you, that was… acid, yeah? What would you say?
Tim glanced at the smoke-browned plaster of the ceiling, then bent down, peered at the wreckage on the stairs and chuckled.
– Tim, I’m serious!
– Okay, okay, Tim sniffed at it. Like… Well, like, acid’s light-sensitive, yeah? I mean, tinfoil’s what people use to protect it. But, I mean, this smells of alcohol. So – I don’t know – I guess it might be, like… impure d-LSD tartrate solution or something.
– Fuck! said Pete. Fuck! Get some water!
Fay and Angus were running towards the utility room already, turning on the tap.
– I mean, it would be quite interesting, though, Tim went on. Like, as an experiment or whatever. That’s how Albert Hoffman discovered what it did in the first place. You know? Getting it on his skin… I mean, it was only fifty micrograms or something – like, millionths of a gram – and he was completely off his face!
The ambulance lurched over the potholes in the gateway, roaring as it started up the hill. Paolo was driving, both hands shakily on the steering-wheel, the hedges seven feet tall to either side of him, blotting out everything beyond.
After the first incline the track levelled off, following the hillside as far as the farmyard. Paolo hadn’t driven anything in months and he was struggling, slowing for another cluster of potholes. Nick was fretting on the seat beside him. Steve was watching them round a corner of the curtain.
– Right, he said, as a barn appeared ahead of them. This is how it’s going to be. Nick. You are going to go and fetch the acid. A hundred million micrograms of it, as we agreed… Okay?
There was the dull click of metal as he screwed a silencer onto his gun. Nick nodded violently. They were passing between barns, arriving in the empty, weed-specked yard.
– Steve, said Paolo. Steve, you know we didn’t set you up!
– It hardly matters, though, does it? Steve was checking round the yard, looking for signs of life. The fact is, they know who you are… When – or if – they find you, they will screw you till they get their confession. So we wouldn’t be happy till there was a very convincing reason why you’d keep your mouth shut.
– We would, though! said Paolo.
He stopped the engine on the uphill side of the gate, still feeling sick.
– So, said Steve. Can you see anyone else here?
– N… No, said Paolo.
– No, said Steve. Neither can I.
He pulled the trigger abruptly; the gun was quiet as a blowpipe. The bullet passed straight through Paolo’s calf and buried itself in the floor. Paolo sucked in air as Steve clamped a T-shirt across his face. He screamed, but the T-shirt pressed tighter so the noise became something like the distant call of an animal.
Steve turned the barrel slowly and pointed it at Nick’s temple, pulling Paolo’s head back against his shoulder.
– Nick, he enunciated. I am going to give you… eight minutes to retrieve my property.
He removed the T-shirt
and Paolo sucked in air again, doubling forwards, blood appearing from the bottom of his flare and running down a groove in the rubber mat.
– S… Steve, said Nick. Steve, it takes fifteen, at least! It’s right over the fields. You’ve got to cross a stream…
– Eight! said Steve. His face was thin and intent. His eyes were fishlike. And if you are not back within eight minutes, I will put a bullet through this fucker’s head… Okay?
Inspector Hooey separated the last bits of egg and cress from the crust of his ageing sandwich, eating what he could of it and depositing the rest in its triangular packaging. He looked around him for a bin – peering through his aviator-style sunglasses – but nothing seemed suitable so he pushed it discreetly down the side of his seat.
Beyond the thick, eye-like glass in front of him, the Malverns were approaching: a wall at the end of Worcestershire, green, yellow and red in the morning sunshine. The helicopter climbed to pass above them, its shadow receding as they ascended, flickering over the streets that lined the hillside, rising onto trees, quarries, walkers and concrete footpaths, closing again for a moment on the ridge before plummeting away into Herefordshire.
Hooey was in the observers’ seat, a sandy-haired pilot beside him muttering occasionally into his headset. He had a map open on his lap and was checking the grid reference that they had received from the phone that morning. The computer had shown a location close beside a deciduous wood – near the edge of a field – but he was hoping further detail might reveal a barn or a cottage of some sort: anything that could be used as a hide-out.
But the new map showed no more than the old one, so Hooey refurled it and passed it back to Teather, who was working on a laptop in the seat normally occupied by a paramedic. The remaining two seats contained surly-looking men in body armour, rifles between their legs.
Hooey faced the brown-green quilt of Herefordshire nervously. He fiddled with his moustache, his eyes on the distant line of the Welsh mountains.
When Nick was scared, he did as he was told. It had always been the same with him. It was like his mind and his body would separate, his body moving mechanically while his thoughts panicked, repeating whatever had scared him in the first place mantra-like till he just couldn’t focus at all.
He arrived outside the door, sweating and muddy, about two minutes after leaving the yard. For a moment he hesitated, trying to think of an excuse to tell the others; but all he could think of was Steve shooting Paolo – the intake of breath, the stifled screaming.
Nick pressed the latch, and pushed open the door.
Pete pulled himself up from the table immediately, his dreadlocks piled on the top of his head and the veins standing out on his forehead. Tim was rolling a joint beside the woodburner. Fay was sitting on Angus’s lap at the other end. The flagstones had water all over them, and everyone but Pete had wet hair and clothes.
– You fucking bastard! said Pete, grabbing Nick by the shoulders and propelling him towards the stairwell. Look what you’ve done! Look!
On the stairs, the puddles were starting to evaporate. The flask was lying on the third step, part of it drooping from the edge. Nick stared at it, frozen. He managed a few noises – part defence and part incomprehension – then his body took over and he sprang into the stairwell, vaulting the acid and heading for the spare bedroom.
– Listen to me! he shouted, as he dragged the naval trunk back beneath the trapdoor, standing the stool on top of it. Listen to me! There’s two men up in the ambulance, in the yard, they were waiting for us in the layby… They’ve shot Paolo! I’m fucking serious! They’ve fucking shot Paolo! He’s up there with blood fucking everywhere, and if I’m not back in, like, five minutes, they’re going to fucking kill him!
Nick scrambled up to the hole as quickly as he could, shoving the chipboard to one side and pushing his head through the picture frame. The roofspace was scattered with the remnants of the tent and the chromatography column. Light spread from a space in the floor above the stairwell where a section of plasterboard was hanging from a nail.
The cool-box was still where he’d left it: on a joint between joists. He pulled on the rubber gloves lying on its lid, his flick-knife pressing awkwardly against his stomach as he disconnected the battery, picked it up and lowered himself back into the bedroom.
– Don’t try and stop me! he shouted. Please! They might just kill us anyway, but if I don’t get back – I swear to God – they’ll come down here and they’ll fucking kill you too! You’ve got to believe me – get out the fucking house!
Belle was climbing the gate on the left-hand side of the field below the yard when Nick appeared over the gate at the top of it. His head was bare, shiny in the sunlight; his feet were sliding on the muddy grass. He was running like someone was chasing him, his mouth wide open, his chin pulled back into his neck.
For a moment Belle paused, perched on the top bar. But if Nick were alone then Paolo would still be up in the ambulance, and she really didn’t feel up to seeing anyone, even if it did mean fetching her cigarettes.
She jumped down into the next field, stepping carefully over the ruts and setting off diagonally up the hill, her cheeks streaked with mascara and her hands pushed deep in her pockets. She just couldn’t work out why she was so upset. It wasn’t as if she cared about Angus that much, and Fay – well, it was absurd. But whenever she thought of them – embarrassed, but so obviously radiant – it always seemed to make her start crying.
At the top of the field, Belle climbed another gate and set off left along the track. The hedges were tall, thick and browning. Between them, the clouds flowed sideways, shrinking steadily, the sky itself pale and autumnal.
She’d been walking for some minutes when she heard an engine and a Land Rover appeared around a corner in the track ahead of her, bouncing on the potholes, a red-faced grey-haired man in the driver’s seat and a sheepdog peering round the canvas at the back. She pressed herself back against the hedge, lowering her eyes, shaking her head so a few strands of hair swung across her face.
– Hello, said the man, stopping beside her. You alright?
– I’m fine, said Belle quickly, her eyes still pointing downwards.
The man paused.
– You do look a bit upset, he said.
Belle pushed her hands deeper into her pockets. She waited a second, then glanced up at him, and saw only a paternal kind of concern. There wasn’t a whiff of salaciousness about him.
– I… she said haltingly. It’s nothing. I… I just had a bit of an argument. That’s all…
– You’re one of Angus’s friends, are you?
– I’m his… ex-girlfriend, said Belle, and started crying again.
– Ah, said the man understandingly. Well, I’m Philip Lloyd… You’ll have met my wife. Last night?
– Yeah, Belle nodded.
She wiped her eyes with her cardigan.
– Look, he said. If you want to get out of that cottage for a few minutes, come back for a cup of tea if you like… I’m going for one now anyway, and Mary’ll be back in a few minutes. I’m sure she’d like to see you.
– Oh… said Belle.
– Don’t worry if you don’t feel like it.
– Oh… said Belle. Thankyou!
– Here you are, then. He leant to his left and pushed open the passenger door. Climb in round here… There’s an old wing mirror down by your feet there, if you want to clean your face up a bit.
In the kitchen the mood had moved on from vengeful. The look on Nick’s face had shaken Fay worse than she knew what to do about, and now there were these other two men to be accounted for: two men, a gun and Paolo with a bullet-wound. Any hope Fay had had of coming up calmly had pretty well deserted her. She wrapped her hands around her neck, desperately trying to make sense of it all.
– We’ve got to do something! she said, looking at Pete, then down at Angus. Like… We could go through the roof any moment now. If Nick’s telling the truth and we haven’t even tri
ed to do anything, we’ll… we’ll be crucified! You know? We’ll be fucked on! At least we should ring the police…
Something fell over upstairs and Nick’s footsteps resumed on the kitchen ceiling.
– No phone, said Pete. We should just get the fuck out of here before yous lot come up.
– There’s one on the main road, said Angus. By the layby.
Nick appeared abruptly at the bottom of the stairwell, stepping over the puddle, a small white cool-box in his arms and his hands in rubber gloves. His trousers were covered in mud. His face had the same, shocked, vacant expression it had had before.
– Is that…? said Tim, gawping at him. Acid?!
Nick said nothing. He set off quickly round the edge of the kitchen.
– Nick! said Fay.
– Don’t try and stop me!
– Nick, listen! said Fay. Listen to me! Why don’t… You could spike them! She tore a strip from the curtain on the table. You could dip some of this in the acid, and… wipe it on the cool-box or something!
Nick paused in the doorway. He blinked a few times, and frowned. Then he took the length of white cloth Fay was offering and hurried back towards the stairwell, dunking it several times in the puddle. He rolled it up carefully, sat it on the lid of the cool-box, and vanished back into the garden.
When he arrived at the top of the field, Nick paused again. He felt like he was about to collapse and start palpitating. Checking round the gatepost, the ambulance was still in its corner: a barn beside it and Paolo slumped in the passenger seat, his eyes half-closed and his head against the window. Nick unwrapped the length of curtain and wrung it quickly over the lid, rubbing the liquid evenly across the top, sides, and the middle of the handle. He threw the cloth into the hedge behind the water trough, swung the cool-box into the yard, then – meticulously – removed his gloves.
The gate rattled as he climbed over it.