The Long Kill

by Reginald Hill

  He nodded again. Jacob frowned again.

  ‘You knew this when we met in London,’ he stated. ‘I remember thinking then you were curiously curious about Bryant, but I put it down to the nostalgia of retirement. Why did you not speak out openly then as you’re doing now?’

  ‘I hoped time was of the essence, that with the target deadline passed, the job would be aborted,’ said Jaysmith.

  ‘Yes, that makes sense. But it’s not all, is it?’

  ‘No,’ said Jaysmith with a sigh. ‘Of course it’s not. I wanted if possible to avoid the …’

  He sought for a word.

  ‘Contamination,’ suggested Jacob softly, almost sympathetically.

  ‘Contamination,’ accepted Jaysmith. ‘Yes; the contamination of telling you.’

  ‘And what was it you feared would be contaminated? Your desire for this woman?’

  ‘I love her,’ said Jaysmith assertively. Then he repeated much more quietly as if for his own benefit, ‘I love her.’

  There was a silence after this, deep enough, it felt, to last forever, and certainly deep enough to make Jaysmith start like a nervous horse when Phil Parker’s voice said, ‘Anything you require, gents, while I’m here?’

  He had re-entered the bar and was opening a bottle of wine.

  Jaysmith said, ‘I’ll have another Scotch. A large one.’

  He ought to keep a clear head, but he needed a drink. He glanced enquiringly at Jacob who said, ‘A half a bitter would be nice, wouldn’t it?’

  Parker poured the drinks. Jaysmith collected them and paid and the hotel owner left the bar with the wine.

  Jaysmith resumed his seat and took a long pull at his Scotch, but Jacob just stared thoughtfully at his beer.

  ‘You love her,’ he said finally. ‘And you’d like to marry her. She’s a widow, is she not? Of how long standing?’

  ‘Ten months.’

  ‘Not very long. And there’s a child. You’d like to marry her, but what of the child? Dump him on Bryant, perhaps? Is that why you want to keep him alive?’

  There was a note of scorn in his voice which stung Jaysmith.

  ‘Don’t be offensive!’ he rasped. ‘I love the boy too, but even if I didn’t, I wouldn’t expect a woman like Anya to agree to being separated from him more than the length of a honeymoon.’

  ‘Honeymoon!’ said Jacob, his squashed-up face almost straightening out in amazement. ‘You’re a man of unsuspected fantasy, Jay. Marriage! Honeymoon! Aren’t you forgetting something, Jay? Aren’t you forgetting what you are? What makes you think that after a career like yours, you’re fit for any close human relationship, let alone something so impossibly intimate as marriage? Have you told this woman about yourself? Will you tell her about yourself? What do you imagine she will say, Jay, when you tell her about the men you’ve killed? What do you imagine she will say?’

  The savagery of the attack reduced Jaysmith to silence for a moment. He felt great anger, and also the beginnings of despair as one part of his mind acknowledged the justice of what Jacob had said. Yet he knew that the road of introspective analysis was a dangerous diversion at this time and place.

  ‘That’s between me and her,’ he said harshly. ‘But one thing’s certain. Feeling for her the way I do, I can’t stand by and see her father killed.’

  After his outburst, Jacob had immediately relapsed into his customary mask of puzzled enquiry.

  ‘Of course not,’ he said softly. ‘And the purpose of this meeting is to persuade me and my masters to change our minds, is it?’

  ‘To persuade you, Jacob,’ said Jaysmith wearily. ‘I’m sure you are quite capable of taking care of your masters, whoever they are. Listen to me, Jacob. I know it sounds absurd, the way you put it. But I’m not just asking a favour; and I’m not just offering a threat, though I’ve got a threat to offer, believe me. But what I genuinely believe is that you’ve got the wrong man!’

  ‘You said that before,’ said Jacob. ‘Then you asked me to tell you why Bryant was targeted. If you don’t know why, then you can’t know he’s the wrong man, can you?’

  ‘I think I do know why,’ said Jaysmith. ‘But I’d like to hear it from the horse’s mouth.’

  At last Jacob reached for his glass, raised it and slowly sipped the bitter.

  ‘The beer’s different up here, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘It’s earthier somehow. More straightforwardly beery. I’m not sure if I prefer it. But some things should be plain and straightforward, shouldn’t they? Perhaps our relationship is one of those things. I’ve no right to tell you anything about Bryant, and you’ve no right to ask. Incidentally it’s odd, isn’t it? You didn’t need to know anything about him when you set out to kill, only that he was guilty and a foreigner! It’s only since you’ve decided to save his life that you’ve become curious. Still, despite all this, I’m going to tell you as much as I can.’

  He paused as if to consider and approve his own assertion, then resumed.

  ‘Bryant is intermittently and in a small way one of our Iron Curtain couriers. He had got himself established as a regular visitor to Poland before we started using him and though that doesn’t make him perfectly safe, it increases his chance of success. Anyway, he’s not really very important, one of a dozen like him. Unfortunately he has got himself into a relationship with someone who is important, a Polish woman who’s a fairly key figure in subversive circles in the Krakow district. UBEK, their secret police who are KGB trained and eager to outshine their masters, have discovered the situation and used it rather nicely, I think. Because the woman loves Bryant, she talks freely to him; and because Bryant loves the woman he talks freely to UBEK. Now isn’t that a nice economic bit of organization!’

  ‘But this is crazy!’ interrupted Jaysmith. ‘Even if it’s true, it doesn’t justify him as a target. He can be stopped, simply by arresting him! Or used, by feeding him false information! Why kill him, for God’s sake?’

  ‘I think you underestimate the damage he has caused,’ said Jacob gravely. ‘People have died and disappeared because of Bryant. Not just Solidarity people either. What he has told UBEK together with what they suspect already has pointed them towards some of our own people. One was killed just recently. They tried to make it look accidental. There’s an unwritten rule which says you don’t kill agents. Politicians, generals, public figures of importance, they’re all fair game, but not agents. That’s why Bryant has to go, and go with a bang, so to speak. It’s an unambiguous statement that we know what’s been going on, that we know what happened to our man was not an accident, and that it had better stop here if they don’t want a general escalation.’

  ‘And for this you’ll kill him? As a gesture?’

  Jaysmith sucked at the melted ice which was all that remained of his second Scotch. He desperately wanted another one, but there was no time.

  Jacob said, ‘Don’t sound so horrified, Jay. Retirement doesn’t rub out the last twenty years, you know.’

  He didn’t rise to the gibe, but said, ‘I still think you’ve got the wrong man.’

  ‘Do you now? But then who is the right one? I presume you have a candidate?’

  ‘Anton Ford,’ he said. It was curious but now he came to state the man’s name, this too felt like a betrayal. He’d only met the man twice, he found that he quite liked him, and now it seemed to him that his accusation was based on little more than a flimsy web of circumstantial evidence, interpreted with extreme bias.

  Nor was Jacob impressed.

  ‘Anton Ford, is it?’ he said. ‘Well, it would have to be, wouldn’t it? Who else do you know to put on your shortlist, Jay? But go on. Explain your thinking.’

  He argued his case as best he could. Oddly, though it sounded weaker on Ford’s guilt than he’d hoped, it sounded stronger on Bryant’s innocence than he’d expected.

  ‘So you’ve got to admit there’s a reasonable doubt,’ he concluded. ‘Ford’s just as strong a candidate as Bryant. Stronger, I’d say. As I say, Bryant’s
only been in contact with Urszula by mail for a good year now, so how the hell can he be responsible for anything that’s happened recently?’

  ‘As you know, Jay, we’re not in the reasonable doubt business,’ said Jacob. ‘That’s for lawyers. As for Bryant’s communications with Poland, there have been other channels.’

  The bar door opened and a group of people came in, but Jaysmith ignored them.

  ‘What the hell do you mean, other channels?’ he demanded, his voice rising so that heads turned his way.

  Jacob said disapprovingly, ‘Please, Jay, we don’t want to look like a pair of quarrelling queens, do we? What you’ve told me about Ford has made me think, I must admit. We’ve got him of course. We picked him up on his way from Naddle Foot yesterday. He’s quite close. That’s why I came up here, actually, to have a chat to him. Your own little invitation just fell quite fortunately, and I diverted here as soon as I heard about it. So why don’t we go and see Ford together? I’m not unsympathetic to your dilemma, believe me. If I can be even half persuaded, well, a gesture which kills the wrong man would have them laughing from here to the Urals, and I don’t care to be laughed at. Will you join me? Clearly we mustn’t go on talking here. Bored British holidaymakers are the best eavesdroppers in the world.’

  It was said most naturally and Jaysmith’s instinctive reaction was to rise and accompany the other without question.

  Instead he shook his head.

  ‘First, there’s something you should know,’ he said. ‘Just to make sure that I don’t end up staying with Ford.’

  ‘Ah yes. The threat. I’d really begun to believe it was simply that you would use your own talents to remove anyone who tried to remove Bryant. Like poor Adam. But it’s more than that, is it?’

  From his pocket Jaysmith took one of the sheets he had photocopied that morning. He passed it over.

  Jacob read it without changing expression.

  ‘Very impressive,’ he said. ‘I’d forgotten some of these. And I see we have an anniversary too. Many happy returns. With a curriculum vitae like this one you could easily get a job in South America, I should think. Mind you, they would probably want to take up your references. After all, anyone could compile such a list and claim to have carried out all these assassinations under the auspices of any government he cared to nominate.’

  ‘I’m not applying for a job, Jacob,’ said Jaysmith.’ ‘I’ve arranged for a copy of this curriculum vitae, confession, call it what you will, to be sent to the authorities in every country concerned and to newspapers also. As for references, that was easy. One thing I’ve always left behind me is a single bullet. Accompanying each of these sheets will be a bullet fired this morning from my M21. I’ve used that rifle on more than half of my kills. A simple forensic check will confirm the bullets are from the same weapon. The earlier ones will just have to take it on trust, or cross check with a friendly country later on the list. I think this should cause a lot more embarrassment than your masters would be able to tolerate, don’t you?’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Jacob, showing little concern. ‘And when does this get sent out?’

  ‘Oh, in a couple of days, unless my distributor hears from me in a very specific way.’

  ‘Very ingenious,’ approved Jacob, returning the sheet. ‘But totally unnecessary. Shall we go now?’

  He led the way out of the bar. Outside the air was gloomy despite the earliness of the hour. The sun was buried deep beneath a turbulent sea of cloud.

  ‘Is it far?’ asked Jaysmith as they reached the BMW.

  ‘Not far. Pointless taking two cars, I think. Will you drive?’

  ‘I don’t mind,’ said Jaysmith, unlocking the passenger door and letting Jacob in.

  As he walked round to the driver’s door, a voice called to him.

  He turned. Approaching with a look of angry determination on her face was Miss Wilson. In her hand she clutched a piece of paper which she waved in his face.

  ‘I’ve just stood an age in a queue in that bank and when I got to the counter they wouldn’t accept your cheque,’ she said wrathfully.

  ‘I’m sorry, but why not?’

  ‘Well, look at it! You’ve put the wrong date. It’s not 1963, is it? You’re twenty years out.’

  He examined the cheque. She was right.

  He said, ‘I’m sorry, I don’t know what I was thinking of,’ as he altered and initialled it.

  But he knew very well what he had been thinking of. That date was carved on his mind like many other dates. He had written it only this morning on the sheet which he had just shown to Jacob.

  Twenty years before, on this day in 1963, he had shot Colonel Tai.

  He returned the cheque to Miss Wilson whose attention seemed to have been diverted. She had spotted Jacob in the front seat of the car and was looking at him with puzzlement. He opened the door and got out, glancing towards a black Metro parked along by the exit from the car park. Its door opened. A man got out and began walking rapidly towards them. He wore an anorak with the hood up and his head was bowed against the wind but there was something familiar about him. Jaysmith, however, found his attention diverted by a puzzling turn in Miss Wilson’s conversation.

  ‘So this is where you got to,’ she said accusingly. ‘And what are you up to, I wonder?’

  She was not, he realized, addressing him.

  ‘Just a friendly chat, isn’t that right, Mr Hutton,’ replied Jacob.

  Full of bewildered suspicion, Jaysmith rasped, ‘What’s going on, Jacob?’

  ‘Jacob!’ exclaimed Miss Wilson. ‘Well, I’ve not heard anyone call him that since our father died. Muriel, he’d say, you’re a rough tough lass and if you’d been a lad, I should have called you Esau. But as for this other smooth young thing, I just about got him right. James; which they used to call Jacobus; my second born, Jacob, the smooth man!’

  The man from the Metro was close now, his familiarity confirmed. Under the monklike hood was the beard-shadowed face of Davey, Adam’s glue-sniffing companion and lover. His right hand in his anorak pocket was bulkier than a hand ought to be. But Jaysmith had no mental capacity to spare for such minor matters as this.

  ‘What the hell’s going on?’ he repeated.

  Jacob smiled at him and said, ‘You are, of course, already acquainted with my dear old sister, aren’t you, Mr Hutton?’

  ‘Of course he is,’ said Miss Wilson contemptuously. ‘He’s buying my house, isn’t he? And he knows just whose house he is buying, James; and he knows it’s nowt to do with you. Nowt at all. I don’t know what he’s been saying to you, but it’s mine to sell, and the deal’s settled.’

  Jaysmith was too dumbfounded by this turn of events to do more than nod, but this seemed to satisfy the old lady.

  ‘Right then,’ she said. ‘Now I’ll be off and see if they’ll take this cheque this time. But I’m not standing in a queue again. I made that clear. I know where he’s at, I said, and I’ll be back when I get this sorted, but I’ll not stand in any queue again!’

  She turned on her heel and stumped away.

  Davey was standing close behind Jaysmith now and he felt an unmistakable hardness against his spine but his mind was still racing too fast for him to concern himself with the trivia of here and now.

  ‘I hope you haven’t changed your mind,’ said James Wilson. ‘But just in case you have, let Davey here persuade you to change it back.’

  ‘No need for Davey,’ said Jaysmith. ‘No need at all. You and I have a lot of talking to do, Mr Wilson.’

  He got into the car. Jacob nodded at Davey who with some reluctance retreated towards the Metro.

  ‘Let’s go,’ said Jacob, resuming his seat and slamming the door.

  Chapter 29

  He drove slowly and with great care out of Grasmere. There was deep in his mind a turbulence of question, revelation, doubt and accusation, but he felt no desperate need to uncap the well and relieve the pressure. It was as if his will had been suspended and his own sense o
f personality reduced to a dancing atom in the inconceivable unity of the heavy fells and the roaring wind and the surging sky.

  He asked and received no directions. Jacob, as he must still think of him, seemed as little inclined to speech as he was, but sat staring gloomily out of the window as though understanding but not approving the desolate scene. Occasionally the wind would tear open a gap in the cloud and a pillar of sunlight would tremble momentarily on a peak or in a valley before collapsing under the weight of the sky. One such pillar lasted longer than the other, focusing like a spotlight beam on the dramatic bulk of the Castle Rock of Triermain, and this brought Jaysmith to his first awareness that he had driven nearly ten miles in this trancelike state and was now heading into St-John’s-in-the-Vale on the road which would take him back to Naddle Foot.

  The realization was enough to break the paralysing spell. Naddle Foot was no place he wanted to be in the company of the man by his side. And not just Jacob. A glance in the rear-view mirror confirmed what he had already subconsciously known, that the black Metro was matching the BMW’S pace a couple of hundred yards behind.

  Things were falling into place in his mind which made a long, intimate conversation with Jacob very desirable. But a conversation without witnesses. Probably when he revealed to Jacob what he now guessed, the other man wouldn’t want witnesses either. But he wasn’t about to consult him.

  He slammed down the accelerator of the BMW. The car surged forward and in a few seconds on the twisting road was out of sight of the Metro. It was probably possible simply to outrun the smaller car, though there was no guarantee what kind of engine might be hidden beneath its bonnet. In any case, Jaysmith did not fancy a high-speed car chase along this narrow road. But he kept his foot hard down till ahead on the right he saw the angled track which led up to the disused quarry he had visited four days earlier. He had replaced the rusty iron bar which blocked the entry, but knew it rested lightly on rotten posts.