The Raven's Eye

by Barry Maitland

  Brock wondered what market-ready products Paddington Security Services and Penney Solutions had developed that would have interested Suzy Russell.

  28

  Bennie the boxer brought the car to a halt on the drive at an acute angle to the front door of the clinic and they got out, Bragg leading, then Kathy, with the two men behind her, the hard muzzle of a gun pressed into the small of her back. She tried to see an opportunity to get away or warn the people inside, but at the same time she felt irresistibly drawn to the disaster that was about to happen, the angry psychopath exploding inside the secretive clinic.

  One of the clinic’s security men answered the door. ‘Why, Mr Bragg . . .’ he began, then choked as Bragg grabbed his throat, propelling him backwards into the deserted hallway.

  ‘Where’s the boss?’ Bragg demanded.

  ‘Mr Montague?’ The man croaked, his eyes slipping sideways towards a door marked Director’s Office.

  They marched towards the door and burst through into a secretary’s office, where Bragg gathered up the shocked woman behind the desk and continued towards the inner door bearing the nameplate Vernon Montague, Director, which he kicked open.

  Montague was sitting behind his large oak desk, holding up a colour brochure which Dr Partridge, standing by his side, was explaining to him. They simultaneously lifted their eyes to the intrusion as the six people burst in and crowded forward onto the large Indian carpet in front of the desk.

  ‘Phones,’ Bragg barked, and his two helpers moved quickly around the room, removing mobile phones and making the guard and the secretary sit on the floor, while Bragg locked the doors they had come through. Kathy watched the reactions of the two men behind the desk, Dr Partridge wide-eyed and shocked, while Montague, after initial outrage, seeming to recover more quickly. There was a moment, as Bennie began to search him, when the two men exchanged a brief look, some kind of acknowledgement that Kathy couldn’t quite interpret.

  Then Montague’s eyes met hers. ‘Inspector Kolla,’ he said coldly, ‘would you mind explaining what’s going on here?’

  Before she could answer, Bragg stepped between them, reaching across the desk and grabbing the director’s tie and hauling him forward. ‘Montague, you piece of shit!’ he roared. ‘What have you done to me?’

  Montague made a choking sound and Bragg released him, slapping him hard, twice, across the face as he rebounded back into his chair. Bragg turned to Dr Partridge. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘I’m . . .’ Partridge swallowed, coughed, glancing with alarm at his boss, whose face had turned purple. ‘I’m a doctor, Partridge is my—’

  ‘Well, look at these, Doctor!’ Bragg bellowed, and drew a rolled envelope from inside his jacket and emptied its contents, the MRI scans, onto the desk in front of him. ‘What do you make of them, eh? A professional opinion?’

  Partridge fumbled with them hesitantly. ‘Um . . . medical scans?’

  ‘Yes, yes!’ Bragg said impatiently.

  ‘Upper body scans. I . . .’ He stopped, his eyes focusing on something on one of the sheets.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘That looks like . . .’ He glanced at Montague, then at Bragg.

  ‘What? A pacemaker? A baby? A fucking flying saucer?’

  The room was utterly silent for a long moment, and then Partridge whispered, ‘An implant.’

  Bragg gave out a manic scream. ‘YES!’ He was breathing heavily, bouncing from foot to foot, and both men behind the desk cringed back in alarm. ‘AND WHO PUT IT THERE, DOCTOR? YOU?’

  Partridge shook his head wildly. ‘No, no. That’s not my field.’

  Bragg drew back, straightening, breathing in, becoming still, his sudden immobility more frightening than his previous manic agitation. Then he reached under his jacket to the waistband of his jeans and drew out a very large handgun. He cocked it slowly, leaned forward across the desk and pressed its nose into Montague’s forehead. ‘Who put it there, Montague?’

  Montague licked his swollen lip. ‘Our senior surgeon, Carl . . .’ The second name was lost in a hoarse choking cough.

  Bragg pointed to the phone on the desk. ‘Get him in here.’

  ‘He’s not at the clinic. He’s probably at his rooms in Harley Street, or—’

  ‘Phone him. Get him here NOW.’

  Montague picked up the phone with a shaking hand.

  ‘On loudspeaker,’ Bragg demanded, and they listened to the buzzing notes as Montague dialled.

  ‘Vernon!’ A suave voice, discordantly oblivious and relaxed, filled the room. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Carl. Something of a panic, actually.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘On my way over to the clinic. The new trial, remember? What’s the problem?’

  ‘The . . . implants. A spot of bother.’

  ‘You don’t sound yourself, old fellow. What kind of bother?’

  ‘Can’t explain over the phone. Be as quick as you can, okay?’

  ‘Be there in ten. And take it easy. I’m sure we can sort it out.’

  ‘Good,’ Bragg said as the line went dead, easing back on his heels. ‘That answers my first question. Now the second. Who did you do it for?’

  ‘What?’ Montague gazed up at him blankly, an angry red mark on his forehead where the gun muzzle had been pressed.

  ‘You heard. Who did you do it for? Who was your client? Who paid your expensive fees?’

  Montague’s eyes flicked momentarily towards Kathy, and Bragg gave a nasty laugh. ‘Come on, Montague, I want documentation—files, contracts, letters of instruction, invoices, records of payment. It’s all here somewhere, isn’t it?’ He looked around the room. ‘Or is it outside in the office? Do I have to tear the place apart? No, I’ve got a better idea—you’ll tell me where it is.’

  This was a new Bragg, horribly jocular. He fixed Montague with a leery grin for a moment, then turned and began wandering around the room, his gaze roaming over the bookcases, the oil painting of an Alpine scene above the fireplace, the carriage clock on the mantelpiece, as if he were playing a children’s party game. Finally he settled on the secretary kneeling on the floor. He lifted his gun and pointed it vertically down at the crown of her head. ‘So where is it, Vernon?’

  Montague’s mouth opened, then shut, then opened again. ‘There’s nothing here,’ he croaked. ‘Our confidential papers are kept elsewhere.’

  ‘This will make a terrible mess of your carpet. Inspector Kolla, tell them how many people I’ve killed in my long and illustrious career.’

  Kathy had been easing herself into a position where she might throw herself at Bragg, but now she froze as all eyes turned to her. ‘I’ve no idea. A dozen?’

  ‘Oh.’ Bragg looked mortified. ‘A few more than that.’

  The secretary was staring up at the gun. Bragg smiled down at her. ‘I’ll count to five. One . . .’

  ‘Please!’ Montague cried.

  ‘Two . . .’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Three . . .’

  Montague gave a final strangled cry: ‘But I can’t!’

  ‘Four . . .’

  There was a moment of stillness, and then the secretary said in an unnaturally calm voice, ‘There’s a safe behind the bookcase in the corner over there. I know the combination.’

  Bragg beamed down at her. ‘Good girl.’

  He walked back to the desk and, as he passed, lashed out suddenly with his fist holding the gun. Montague screamed and toppled backwards, clutching his face. Bragg continued to the corner and followed the secretary’s halting directions to swing back the bookcase and open the safe. ‘Switch more lights on, Bennie,’ he barked. ‘I can’t see a fucking thing over here.’ He began rifling inside, pulling out folders, examining them and tossing them to the floor until he found what he was after. He held up a blue file. ‘Project Raven,’ he said with a snarl.

  Something distracted him through the tall windows facing out to the drive, and Kathy turned and s
aw the headlights of a car approaching.

  ‘Bennie,’ Bragg said, ‘we’ve got a visitor. If it’s Carl bring him in. If it’s anybody else tell them the place is closed down for quarantine.’

  ‘Right.’ The boxer hurried out and returned a few minutes later escorting a tall, lean man whose hairless head gleamed pink. Kathy had a sudden vivid recollection of him standing over her, touching her broken shoulder with the tips of his fingers. He was staring now at Vernon Montague standing behind the desk, clutching a handkerchief to his nose, his white shirt splashed with blood. Then he turned his attention to Jack Bragg, his eyes pausing for a moment at the file in his hand.

  Bragg put down the file, picked up the MRI scan from the desktop and walked over to the surgeon. ‘Hello, Carl. You remember me, don’t you?’

  ‘Oh yes.’

  ‘You stuck an implant in my heart, didn’t you?’ He waved the scan in Carl’s face.

  Carl glanced at the image and said calmly, ‘Not actually in your heart, Mr Bragg. Close by.’

  ‘What’s in it?’

  ‘Didn’t they tell you? It’s nothing to worry about.’

  Kathy saw a red gleam grow in Bragg’s eye. Carl saw it too, and added quickly, ‘A microchip, that’s all. Something to tell us where you are.’

  ‘A time bomb, more like.’

  ‘No, no, nothing like that.’ The surgeon’s attempt to shrug off the idea with a careless smile, as if it were absurd, didn’t sound entirely convincing.

  ‘Well, now you can take it out again.’

  ‘No, that’s not possible.’

  ‘NOT POSSIBLE?’ Bragg roared, and his free hand went for the man’s throat. ‘You’d better make it possible, Carl, or I’ll put an implant in you, a nine-millimetre implant.’

  ‘It would be difficult,’ Carl gasped. ‘That’s the point, you see, to make it difficult to remove. Didn’t they explain all this to you? It would be a . . . life-threatening operation.’

  Bragg stared at him, nostrils flaring. ‘But you’ve done it before, haven’t you?’

  Carl gave a nervous shake of his head. ‘No.’

  They were all staring at Bragg, waiting for his reaction as he pondered. ‘Then you’d better have a practice run.’ He nodded at Kathy. ‘On her.’

  ‘I really wouldn’t advise it . . .’

  But Bragg wasn’t listening to him any more. He turned to the secretary sitting on the carpet. She looked pale and stared back up at him with frightened eyes. ‘Who else is in the building tonight?’ he demanded, and she told him. It was a quiet night at the clinic, with just four patients and two nurses on duty. Evening meals had already been served and the kitchen staff had gone.

  He snapped orders to his two men, who went out, returning soon after with the nurses and several mobile phones.

  ‘Right,’ Bragg said. ‘Time to get to work, Carl.’

  ‘Neither of these nurses has adequate theatre experience,’ Carl protested, but Bragg waved him away.

  ‘You and the doc over there will do it. Bennie will go with you, and watch every move you make.’

  ‘I think this is a bad idea,’ Kathy said.

  ‘Who cares what you think?’ Bragg waved at the boxer to get on with it.

  ‘No, really. We should wait and get this done by a proper heart specialist. Someone who doesn’t have an interest in you and me ending up dead on the operating table.’

  Bragg stared bleakly at her. ‘We don’t have time for that. But don’t worry, if you end up dead on the operating table I’ll kill Carl here and take your advice.’

  Bennie gripped her good arm and waved his pistol at Partridge and Carl. ‘Lead the way, doctors.’

  As they walked down the deserted corridor Kathy heard the two men in front arguing quietly.

  ‘We can’t do this, Carl,’ Partridge was saying.

  ‘Shut up and let me think.’

  ‘But at the very least you’ll need an anaesthetist!’

  ‘Looks like that’s your job, John. I think you’ll discover all kinds of unexpected talents when there’s a gun pointed at your head.’

  They reached the doors to the secure area. Carl swiped with his pass and they moved on through. Something—a different smell perhaps—awakened a memory in Kathy’s mind. It came back to her now, entering this corridor, the room on the left from which she’d watched Bennie and the other man helping Bragg to leave, the four mortuary cabinets in that room, in one of which she was probably going to end up.

  They reached the operating theatre and Bennie waved them inside. When the door closed behind them, Carl turned to him and said, ‘Well? What do you want us to do?’

  He said it in a respectful tone, as one might speak to a manager rather than a threatening thug, and for the second time, Kathy felt she had completely misunderstood the relationship between the rest of them and Bragg’s two bodyguards.

  ‘Just wait,’ Bennie said. He took his mobile phone from his pocket and stepped back out into the corridor.

  Kathy looked at the two doctors, trying to decipher their expressions. ‘What’s going on?’ she said.

  ‘We have a slight probleem,’ Carl replied, drawing out the Afrikaans word, and turned away with a look of disgust.

  After several minutes asking questions that the other two refused to answer, Kathy fell silent as the door opened again and Bennie looked in, pocketing his phone, and waved to Carl to join him outside. Dr Partridge was left looking deeply troubled, and Kathy tried again.

  ‘John, you’re my doctor, for God’s sake,’ she said softly.

  ‘I don’t need to be reminded of that,’ he snapped.

  ‘Well, act like it. Bragg is a psychopathic killer and we need help. Get out of my way.’

  He shifted, refusing to meet her eyes, and Kathy stepped quickly forward to the phone fixed to the wall. She fumbled it clumsily with her one good hand, and began pressing the buttons. Then another hand, much bigger than her own, closed around hers and tugged the phone away.

  ‘Don’t be stupid,’ Bennie murmured in her ear. ‘Go and sit down over there and do what you’re told.’

  Kathy did so, aware of Carl whispering urgently to John Partridge. Finally Partridge said, ‘You’re sure?’ He sounded frightened.

  Carl nodded, patted the other man’s arm and said, ‘Pre-op, John.’

  Partridge hesitated a moment, then disappeared into another room that opened off the theatre. When he returned he was carrying a needle. Kathy felt Bennie close his fist on her broken shoulder and she froze as Partridge came towards her.

  ‘You’re a doctor,’ she said. ‘I don’t agree to this. You can’t go ahead with it.’

  Partridge, looking sick, shook his head, avoiding her eyes. She felt the sharp stab of the needle in her arm.

  29

  Brock’s phone purred on the desk at his elbow. He picked it up and immediately recognised Desmond Kite’s voice. He checked his watch; it was after seven, almost three hours since he’d left the professor at the canal.

  ‘David!’ Kite sounded slightly breathless.

  ‘Are you all right, Desmond? How did you get on?’

  ‘I’m fine, very well, yes, excellent.’ Not just breathless but excited, almost elated, Brock thought, trying to interpret the tremors and unexpected changes of pitch in the other man’s voice.

  ‘Was Ollie Kovacs any help?’

  ‘Oh yes, oh indeed. I was doubtful at first, profoundly sceptical in fact, but he showed me evidence, chronologies, scientific data, correspondence even—much of it illegally obtained, I regret to say, but convincing, oh yes, very convincing.’

  He drew a deep breath before continuing in a rush. ‘In the end I was completely convinced. I only wish that Freyja and Gudrun could have told me. I might surely have been able to help them, talk to the right people. But they probably thought that I’d be taken for a crank, one of those stupid old men who bore their colleagues to death at high table with their pet theories. No, that wasn’t their way. They didn’t want to
whisper to people of influence, they wanted to shout to the world, to tell everyone what was going on.’

  Brock was becoming alarmed at the rising note of what sounded like hysteria in the old man’s voice. ‘Desmond, why don’t I pick you up and you can tell me all about it over a spot of dinner?’

  ‘No, no time for that now. I have Superintendent Russell with me. I am anxious to persuade her to go on the record, but she is understandably reluctant. I would like you to speak to someone more senior—the commissioner or chief constable or whatever he’s called. I want them to order her to talk, or else speak on her behalf. It has to be someone in authority, David. If they want to save her, they must tell the world the truth.’

  ‘Superintendent Russell is with you now?’ Brock frowned. ‘Let me speak to her, will you, Desmond?’

  ‘Very well.’

  There was a scuffling sound, then Suzy Russell’s voice, tense. ‘Brock? He’s got a bomb—’

  She was cut off abruptly and Kite spoke again. ‘I’m completely serious, David. Perhaps for the first time in my life.’

  ‘Desmond, where are you?’ But before he’d finished the sentence the line went dead.

  He grabbed the internal directory and found the number he wanted, asking for a trace on Kite’s phone. Almost immediately the answer came back that it was switched off and couldn’t be located. He checked who was still in the office and found that Bren Gurney and Pip Gallagher were in the lobby, on the point of going home. He told them to hang on, then grabbed his coat and went out to Dot’s office. She too was about to leave. ‘Sorry,’ she said, ‘they won’t let me have Lynch’s private number.’

  Brock swore and took the stairs at a run. In the lobby Bren was phoning his wife Deanne, cancelling dinner, while Pip was asking if she should draw a gun. Brock told her that wouldn’t be necessary, thinking that a Viking battleaxe might be more appropriate.

  Pip drove them to the canal basin in record time while Brock explained the background.

  ‘It’s a bluff,’ Bren said in his imperturbable Cornish burr. ‘Where would he have got hold of a bomb?’