The Hoof

by Philip McCutchan

  The plain clothes man bought himself a cup of coffee and waited until The MacSkean had finished his breakfast. When The MacSkean got to his feet and left the buffet, he had a tail though he didn’t know it. At the taxi rank The MacSkean hesitated, fingering his jaw and making an inward calculation of likely costs. His frugal nature won; he turned away from the expense of taking a taxi and went instead to the subway, followed by his tail. The MacSkean bought a ticket from a window, not a machine; the plain clothes man, not having heard where The MacSkean’s destination was, nor how much he had paid, bought a maximum single fare and then followed The MacSkean to the Northern Line and when a southbound train came in entered the same coach as The MacSkean but by a different door. The MacSkean brought out a pipe and began filling it with tobacco; it was a non-smoking compartment and this fact was pointed out to him by a sharp-featured woman. The MacSkean, unwilling to make a fuss and risk a fine, angrily put the pipe away again and turned aside from the woman, muttering to himself.

  He got out at Charing Cross; so did the tail. He was followed, all unknowing still, to the ticket hall where he paid his fare to Greenwich. This, the tail overheard; The MacSkean had found it necessary almost to hoot through the glass screen. At Greenwich he got out and started what proved to be a long, long walk, down past the National Maritime Museum and past the dry-dock where the Cutty Sark rested and dreamed of better days.

  Down in the lift to the tunnel beneath the Thames to the Isle of Dogs.

  Since the tunnel led only to its exit on the north bank, the plain clothes man left the trail for a matter of a couple of minutes or so to run onto Greenwich Pier and use a telephone box. He called the Yard. “A man believed to be the Scot, MacSkean … walking through to the Isle of Dogs. I’ll be in touch.”

  He resumed the tail; when he reached the tunnel The MacSkean had a fair start. Up on the surface, the Met was already going into action; mobiles moved into the area, just on stand-by for the time being, while an unmarked car with more plain clothes men left the nearest nick to hang about by the tunnel exit.

  *

  Through the small window in the boiler house dawn had stolen, grim and grey as ever and with a hint of more snow to come. Even the cat was depressed; it had accepted Shard’s presence and was quite friendly, and warm to hold as Shard got through a cold night. But with the increasing daylight, it had other things to do, and leapt up on the boiler and from thence by a wild leap to the window. It paused for a moment with waving tail, then vanished. Shard heard the slight scrabble as it landed on what sounded like grit or shifting gravel. It was soon back; and it was hungry now. But no food came for either of them; no visitors at all, though sounds from beyond the bolted door had indicated that someone was still in residence. That might be Kries or it might not; whoever it was, he wasn’t opening the back door for the cat, which jumped down beside Shard and mewed. He stroked its ears; it went into an odd twisting motion, lying on its back and offering its stomach. Shard stroked that as well. Later he heard the ring of a bell. After that, footsteps. Then there was argument, followed by the banging of a door and more argument that came for a moment closer before falling off into a silence as another door banged.

  Shard had recognised the voice of The MacSkean, and The MacSkean had sounded threatening. It was the tone of voice: the actual words had not been heard. The same with the other man, now established as Kries from his voice. Kries had sounded angry, perhaps upbraiding the MacSkean for coming down to London so close to the off, when presumably he should have been in Scotland?

  There was no knowing.

  The silence lasted two minutes and then there was the sound of footsteps once again, hurried ones this time that came right past the boiler-house but didn’t stop. Shard heard the side door being opened, then the garage door, then the Cortina was started up. As it did so, another car was heard, coming along the road. This car stopped: Shard heard the sound of hard-applied brakes. There was a shout and hard on its heels came gunfire, rapid, sustained — a sub-machine-gun. Then there was something like an explosion followed by a roaring sound. Petrol tank, was Shard’s thought. He got up on the boiler and tried to get his head out through the window to peer sideways but he couldn’t make it. There was a smell of burning. Then he heard running feet pounding towards the house, two sets of them. One ceased, the other came on. Then there was an oath. Peering again, Shard was able to see a man lying on the ground by the brick wall, looking injured. It wasn’t Kries or The MacSkean. After a while the man got groggily to his feet. Taking a chance, Shard called through the window.

  *

  “Good gracious, Shard, here at last, it’s too bad not to have kept me informed.” Hedge was in his usual tizzy, harassed more than ever by the top brass, and he didn’t like being informed by the Yard as to the movements of his own men. “I suppose you have an explanation —”

  “I was discommoded,” Shard said icily, “by being behind bolted doors. I —”

  “I didn’t mean that. I’ve been told the facts about your capture. I meant you should have told me before you left the Foreign Office. I might have been able to help.”

  “How?”

  Hedge flapped a hand. “Oh, don’t split hairs. Well, now you’re here you’d better put me in the picture. The Yard’s report was somewhat sketchy. What, exactly, happened at the Isle of Dogs?”

  Shard said, “The MacSkean was found with a knife in his chest —”

  “Yes, yes, I know that. Dead, I believe.”

  “That was the diagnosis —”

  “And I know an unmarked car was burned out and all its crew shot dead. It’s you I’m bothered about, Shard. And Kries. What —”

  Shard said, “I was released by the man who’d tailed The MacSkean from Euston. Kries had gone.”

  “Yes! I want to know where.”

  “So do I. But I don’t. Nor does anyone else.”

  “Did absolutely no-one see him go?”

  “The tail did. He went over a wall.”

  “Yes, and then?”

  Shard said heavily, “There was a cat.”

  “A cat?” Hedge sounded desperate.

  “Yes. A cat. It jumped down just as the DC was about to follow over the wall. The DC fell over it and hit his head. Nearly broke his neck. By the time he’d recovered, Kries had vanished. I’m sorry, Hedge. So, I expect, would the cat be if it knew what it had done.”

  “God’s teeth,” Hedge said viciously. “A bloody cat!”

  *

  Once again, Kries had vanished into the unknown; there was a lot of river around the Isle of Dogs and the day had turned out foggy. Not so much of dockland as there used to be, but still enough hiding places where a man could lurk until he was ready to move out. Zero hour was now a little over four hours away. With so little time to go, everything had now to be concentrated on the showdown at Smith Square; if Kries should be found earlier, so much the better, but there could be no waiting around for that to happen. Shard was in no doubt that he would show a little before the appointed time in Smith Square, and that the Hoof would be there as well — always assuming that nothing had leaked, that the Hoof and his cohorts had no suspicions that Shard had overheard anything in the cellar up by Loch Fermin. Shard was convinced that in fact they would have no such suspicions. He spoke of all this to Hedge; Hedge seemed to be pre-occupied and the reason for this soon became clear. Hedge said, “I shall be at Smith Square myself this afternoon, Shard. Not to take charge — not in an executive sense. Just to observe.”

  “Observe what?” Shard raised his eyebrows.

  “Oh, this and that, don’t you know. I feel my presence may be of some value.” Hedge paused, ran a hand over his fleshy jowls. “I think the lower ranks like to see me there. And I feel it to be my simple duty.”

  “Very brave of you, Hedge. Very brave.”

  “Oh, I don’t know … one simply considers one’s job rather than one’s person at a time like this. One puts oneself on one side if you follow. There’s going to b
e some danger to the general public, after all.”

  Shard made a guess that the Head of Security had been the spur. There could even have been a hint of a gong …

  *

  Up in the committee room at Transport House the tension was mounting fast. The bomb squad, covered now with old soot and bird droppings and pieces of birds’ nests, had the device on a knife-edge. Almost literally … the trick was to prevent it falling before it could be gently prised loose and as gently lowered and removed into the open. It was not of the clock variety; the principle was that of acid eating through metal at a predetermined rate, a rate determined by the thickness of the metal itself. But the Major in command believed there was a strong risk of the device blowing prematurely if it should be mishandled. Therefore it was being taken slow. One of the union hierarchy came to ask how it was going. He was urgently waved back to the doorway and all present held their breath as he tiptoed away.

  From the door he asked, his face white, “How long?”

  The officer wiped sweat from his face and gave his answer: “We don’t know yet. On a purely technical basis, I’d cancel the conference — but of course that’s not my decision. Nor yours either, I take it.”

  “I shall offer advice in the proper quarter,” the man said, and left them to it. He went to offer the advice, looking as scared as he felt. The tension, for nothing of this sort could be kept hidden now, was mounting throughout the building. Knots of men and women stood about, office staff, tea ladies, porters and messengers, middle-ranking brass. Soon there could be a panic, though none of them knew the full facts — which was to say they didn’t know the army was currently stumped. The man with the advice to offer was questioned after he had left the committee room, and he parried the questions neatly. It was too early to say much, but the soldiers were getting on with the job. When a girl clerk broke down in tears he summoned all his reserves of calm, talked to her like a dutch uncle, sat her down with a motherly supervisor and a cup of tea. As she quietened he went on his way, entering an office with big windows and a panoramic view of London or such of the metropolis as could be seen between the buildings opposite. A man was looking out of one of the windows, hands behind his broad back, the fingers pulling at each other. As the man from the committee room came in, he turned.

  “Well, Charlie?”

  “It’s very dicey. The military think we should cancel.”

  “We’re not the military, Charlie.” The voice was as firm as the face, which was square, hard, seamed with the lines of a life’s work, not all of it spent behind a union desk. Sid Lofts, currently TUC chairman, had been a miner, down the Yorkshire pits for something over twenty years. That showed in his face and in his personality. There was an air of no surrender. “Think on, Charlie. We have to smash this and t’government says they will smash it. We don’t always support t’government, by heck we don’t, but we do this time. So many o’ t’lads gone! Nay, we stick to it, brother.”

  “You put a lot of faith in the army, Sid.”

  “Aye. I reckon I do. They’re good lads all said an’ done. They’ll do, you mark my words.” As he finished speaking a telephone burred on a big, leather-topped desk and he went over to answer it. He listened; the blood seemed to leave his face. To Charlie he said, “It’s Frankie’s kid. The little girl. They’ve got her.”

  17

  Half an hour earlier there had been an alarm from the children’s home to which little Angela Locci had been taken by WDC Brett from the Foreign Office: the child had been lifted from the playground. Nothing had been known until the other children had rushed in, yelling. Following this an anonymous call had been received at Scotland Yard. The caller had been a man; the assumption was being made that it was the Hoof rather than Kries. There had been no American accent to point the finger at the latter.

  The message was plain enough as to its purport: the weight was being shifted to the girl. “For God’s sake why?” Hedge asked in despair when the word reached him. “What do they mean to do, Shard?”

  Shard said, “I don’t know, but I’ll make a suggestion: whoever rang has been rattled by The MacSkean’s visit to the Isle of Dogs —”

  “Which in turn suggests —”

  “It suggests to me that the Hoof’s boyos realise that something’s blown, Hedge.”

  “Just because of that ridiculous Scotsman? Surely not!”

  “I didn’t mean that. I meant the quick response from the police, the way they showed up at the house just after Kries had killed The MacSkean. And the Hoof isn’t going to have the plan interrupted. It goes ahead — if the bomb squad doesn’t defuse that device, Transport House goes up anyway, we have to face that. Kries and the Hoof have simply taken a hostage, that’s all.”

  “But they’ve not made any particular demands!”

  Shard nodded. “Agreed, they haven’t. Demands may yet come. But I’ve a feeling they won’t come till near the end. They won’t want to be too specific, just in case things haven’t blown after all. In other words, they won’t be mentioning Smith Square just yet.”

  Hedge said, “It’s devilish clever.”

  “Not so,” Shard said with a hard laugh. “It could be that they’ve made their biggest mistake yet.”

  “I fail to see how, I must say, Shard. Surely the thing’s obvious? The plan goes into effect and then they threaten to kill the child if we don’t call off the pursuit. They have us in a cleft stick!”

  “It depends how they go about it,” Shard said enigmatically. He left Hedge to stew in his worries and went down to the security section. He checked his automatic, slid it back into his shoulder holster, then went out into Whitehall. The time was now eleven a.m. Big Ben was striking, deep and challenging across Parliament Square.

  Shard crossed Bridge Street and went into New Palace Yard.

  *

  By now the device had been prised loose and the tremendously risky task of lowering it was under way. Sweat poured from the men of the bomb disposal squad huddling into the big fireplace: they spoke, when they spoke at all, in whispers, as though the vibration of a voice might set something off. Millimetre by millimetre the device was freed, being kept as level as possible. A foot slipped a fraction, there was a savagely muttered oath, but all was well. The men breathed again, and carried on. At three minutes to noon the internal telephone burred in the office Sid Lofts was using.

  He answered tautly, “Yes?”

  “It’s out.”

  Sid noticed the shake in his own hands. “Thank the Lord! Well done, lad.”

  “But it can’t be moved, too risky, much too risky to try to carry it and shift it out by road —”

  “You got it down t’bloody chimney, didn’t you, eh?”

  There was a quiet but edgy laugh. “Yes. Just leave my job to me, will you? Call it a demarcation dispute if you like.”

  Sid Lofts grinned into the mouthpiece. “Right, you win. Just keep in touch if you don’t mind.” He put the handset down on its rest. He went on waiting, biting finger-nails, chain smoking small cigars. At ten minutes to one he went over to a cupboard and poured himself a Scotch, straight. His secretary came in and said the rest of the TUC brass was arriving for the luncheon that had been laid on.

  “Not hungry, Janey. But I’ll need to be there, of course. Thank you, love.” The secretary held the door open for him, and he went down to welcome the lads. He was thinking of Frankie Locci’s kid: there had been no further news and he didn’t expect any, not really. Only, eventually, the worst. You just couldn’t deal with terrorism, they always seemed to hold all the cards. He toyed with his lunch, talking but not listening to Erskine Graham of the metalworkers. He’d got to the entree when he was called out: the army wanted him. The Major was waiting, tired, strained, filthy dirty, smelling of sweat.

  The report was direct: “I don’t think we’re going to get through in time.”

  “Aye, I thought you’d say that, Major.”

  “It’s the truth.”

  Lofts to
ok his arm. “I know that, lad, I know you’d not back out like. What do we do?”

  The Major said, “I’ll make my report to my HQ. They’ll pass it on. After that, it’s up to the real brass. In the meantime, we’ll still be working on it.”

  “Aye, and the best o’ luck, lad.”

  Sid Lofts, his heart thudding, went back to his lunch. But within fifteen minutes he was called away to take a telephone call. The time, he noted, was one-fifty-two. The call was from Downing Street; there was a lot of worry there, and it looked as though the U-turn had started. The Prime Minister was on the line in person, talking about an evacuation of Transport House.

  “Oh, aye, Prime Minister. You’ve left it a little late, I reckon. Can’t do it in the time.” Lofts rang off abruptly. There was a set look, an utterly determined look in his eyes. Bugger evacuating, which as he’d rightly said couldn’t be done in the time, all that staff … well, maybe it could at that but it wasn’t going to be done, there wasn’t going to be a coward’s rush now, not with that little girl at risk. As Sid Lofts sat there at his desk, Hedge was announced. They’d met before and had taken an instant dislike to one another. Now, Sid thought, wasn’t the time to show it. He greeted Hedge and told him the situation. Hedge looked as though he very much wished he was elsewhere.

  “I assume you’ll not reject the Prime Minister’s authority, Mr Lofts?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Sid answered, flat and uncompromising, and told Hedge why. He added that of course, so long as the explosive device was still there, the TUC would not be meeting in the committee room. They would be somewhere safe, or as safe as possible. “I don’t believe t’bloody thing’ll do all that much damage outside t’room,” he said. “In fact, during one of my talks with t’Major, he more or less said as much. It weren’t as big like as they’d expected. Anyone in t’room would have had it, but so long as staff keep clear they shouldn’t get hurt. LenDaly,” he added in reference to the TGWU boss, “has had all the upper floors cleared.”