Seven Days to a Killing

by Clive Egleton

  He checked the time, and then signalling to Drew and Vincent to get their men on board the waiting helicopter, he walked over to have one last word with the pilot and navigator. He said, ‘I want to make one thing absolutely clear—a boy’s life is at risk, and if we make a mistake, he will be the one to pay for it. The whole object of this mission is to pinpoint the target, and there is every chance that the enemy will be monitoring our frequency and may—and I only say may—contact us by voice. As soon as we are riding on the beacon and you have sighted the recognition panels, I want you to come up with a May Day call and make a forced landing away from the pick-up point. If possible, I would like you to select a place which is in dead ground. Can you do that and make it appear convincing?’

  The pilot said, ‘I think so. I’ll report a power failure as we veer away from the target and shut off one of the engines. We’ll come down with a bump but we should get away with it.’

  ‘I hope you’re a good actor.’

  ‘Don’t worry about that, I’ll be scared enough to convince anyone.’

  Harper looked at his wrist-watch again. ‘I think we ought to make a move,’ he said.

  He followed the crewman into the passenger compartment, sat down in one of the canvas seats to the right of the door and fastened his seat belt. A few seconds later, the turbines whined into life, the rotor blades thrashed the air above his head and the Wessex shuddered briefly and then lifted off. The landscape flashed by beneath them.

  For a brief moment he envied Wray, even if he was off on a wild-goose chase. A weekend in Luxembourg had its compensations.

  *

  The map indicated that Hillglade Farm lay in undulating ground, shielded by a copse on one side and with only a narrow lane affording access to it. Tarrant pulled over on to the grass verge bordering the minor road and stopped just short of the milestone which said Melton Basset—1% miles. He had no clear idea of what he proposed to do except that there was a vague notion that somehow, if he could get close enough to the man, he would try to talk Drabble into releasing David, and failing that, providing the opportunity arose, he would kill him.

  He locked the Volkswagen, and jumping a small ditch, entered the copse. He moved warily, like a cat, keeping to the shadows and pausing frequently to watch and listen, but apart from the occasional car moving along the road behind him, the wood was quiet and still under the hot sun. The trees gradually thinned out and finally stopped just short of a post-and-rail fence some fifteen yards to his front.

  The house was Georgian in style, and judging by the number of windows upstairs, he estimated that there were four or five bedrooms. To the left of a solid-looking door there was, in keeping with the character of the house, an imposing mullioned window, while on the right, partially visible behind the green Mini-Cooper parked outside, there was a large expanse of plain glass which he thought might be the kitchen. Some ten to fifteen yards beyond the post-and-rail fence, a Dutch barn obscured most of the stable block on the far side of the yard. The property appeared to be well cared for and expensive, and nothing he had seen so far indicated that this was the place he was looking for. Wanting to get a different view of the house, he decided that he would check out the stables, and since he did not wish to be seen, there was only one way to approach it. He backed into the copse and moved to his left.

  The wood narrowed to become a thin belt and then finally it petered out just beyond the post-and-rail fence at the bottom of the yard where there was a shallow ditch. Nettles grew on either bank amongst the tall grass but the bottom of the ditch was dry and stony. He lowered himself into it and started crawling on his belly. The earth was hard and unyielding and the sweat stung his eyes and ran down his cheeks in rivulets. Somewhere off to his right, a dog barked excitedly, and then he could hear it running about in the yard, and he assumed that it had just been let out of the house. High above his head, a Vulcan bomber from RAF Waddington left white vapour trails in the blue sky.

  It was slow, grinding work and the nettles raised white lumps on his hands and face, and his heart was thumping against his ribs. He covered nearly thirty yards and then, satisfied that he was opposite the stable block, he ventured to poke his head above the ditch. The yard was deserted except for the Alsatian which lay facing the house in the shade of the Dutch barn. From his position, Tarrant could see that the stables were oblong in shape, and in line with the gate at the far end of the fence, there was a side door which was ajar. He stepped up out of the ditch, vaulted the fence and ran. The dog, turning its head, caught a fleeting glimpse of him as he disappeared into the stables and started barking.

  Tarrant slammed the door behind him and paused long enough to let his eyes get accustomed to the gloom. A horse snorted, another moved restlessly in its stall, but he was hardly aware of them, for beyond the row of stalls in a large open space surrounded by bales of straw, he saw his Zephyr. It was facing a set of double doors and it looked more than a little worse for wear. He supposed that the offside window had been smashed when they pinched the car, and the boot, which had been locked, had obviously been sprung open with a crowbar. He opened the offside door, leaned across the seats and checked the glove compartment, but as he had half-expected, the Browning 9-mm automatic was no longer there. The dog pawing at the door worried him and he looked round for a suitable weapon. He found one in a rusty pitchfork.

  Julyan sat in the kitchen listening to the transistor radio. He was no fan of pop music but this was the one occasion when he could not bear to sit in a silent room. The music faded to give way to the news bulletin and it suddenly came home to him that this could well be the last time he would listen to the BBC except for its overseas service. He wondered idly if they broadcast the news in English to Brazil, but even if they didn’t, it was a small price to pay for half a million pounds.

  And then the bottom fell out of his world as, in a daze, he heard the item which Harper had planted.

  The impersonal voice on the radio said, ‘Mrs Melissa Julyan, wife of Resistance hero, Colonel Edward Julyan, was killed yesterday evening in a traffic accident near Lyon in France. Mrs Julyan, who was on holiday with her two children…’ His hand reached out and switched off the radio, and then his body started to shake and he began to moan. In utter despair, he flung the rifle away and buried his head on his arms. His cry of grief reached their ears and Ruth, McKee and Burroughs came running.

  As they entered the room, he looked up and pounded the table with a clenched fist. ‘My wife is dead,’ he screamed, ‘you hear me? Melissa is dead.’ The tears coursed down his cheeks. ‘Oh, Christ above, what am I to do?’

  McKee glanced at the silent transistor. ‘The radio,’ he shouted, ‘you heard it on the radio.’ He hit Julyan across the face. ‘It was a trick. Get that into your head—it was just a lousy trick of Harper’s.’

  ‘But it was on the news,’ Julyan said dully, as if there was no disputing its veracity.

  ‘Do you suppose it could be true?’ Burroughs said anxiously. His face was the colour of chalk and his voice was unsteady.

  Fear was beginning to take hold of everyone except McKee. ‘You fucking idiot,’ he snarled, ‘if you haven’t got anything better to do, get out into the yard and shut that bloody dog up.’ He caught his breath, and then in a calmer voice said, ‘Take the beacon and the panels with you; it’s about time they were in position.’ He spared a glance for Ruth. ‘You look after our friend,’ he said, ‘I’m wanted upstairs.’

  *

  Tarrant could see the man through the crack between the doors. He was tall, thin and balding and he carried a roll of canvas under one arm and the Sarbe beacon in his left hand. He stopped opposite the stables, placed the load on the ground and then walked towards the dog, who was now whining and scratching at the double doors. His suspicions aroused, he slipped his right hand into his pocket and when he took it out again there was a Colt automatic in it. Instinctively, Tarrant backed away into a corner and crouched down behind the bales of straw. He heard the m
an fumbling with the latch and then both doors swung open and in that instant, he knew he was irrevocably committed to but one course of action.

  Tarrant came out of his hiding-place holding the pitchfork as if it were a rifle and bayonet. He was moving fast and when the twelve-inch prongs went into the chest and stomach of the thin, balding man, there was a thrust of one hundred and ninety pounds behind them. The impact lifted the older man off his feet, and as the blood gushed out of his open mouth, he hung there on the end of the fork until his dead weight, acting as a counter balance, brought Tarrant down. They hit the floor together and the sudden jolt broke the shaft of the pitchfork in two.

  The Alsatian flew at the tangle of legs on the floor, and as Tarrant rolled to one side and jerked his right leg out of the way, the flashing jaws ripped his trouser leg to shreds. The dog came in for a second try and Tarrant kicked out and caught him flush on the muzzle. It gave him just enough time to come up into the crouch with his left arm extended and bent at the elbow to guard his face. The dog sank its teeth into his forearm, and the blood seeping through the cloth sent it into a frenzy. As it moved its jaws to find a fresh hold, Tarrant hit it between the eyes. Stunned by the blow, the dog backed off shaking its head, and Tarrant swooping, picked up the.38 Colt automatic, turned and emptied three rounds into the dog as it sprang for his throat. The first bullet shattered a leg, the second hit it in the chest and the third entered its mouth. Carried forward by its own momentum, the dog hit Tarrant in the chest, knocked him back a pace and then fell dead at his feet.

  The open yard was a death trap and he knew they would kill him before he was halfway across it unless he used the Zephyr. He scrambled in behind the wheel and his anxious fingers fumbled with the ignition key until at last they found the switch and fired the engine into life. Shifting into first gear, he slipped the handbrake, raced the engine and then let the clutch in fast. The wheels spun, found purchase and then the Zephyr came out of the stables like a bullet. Swinging through a right-angle turn, he pointed it at the house, grated up into second and pushed down on the accelerator until it was flattened out. The engine snarled angrily.

  *

  Calvert had retreated into a dream world. Curled up in an armchair, a cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth, he watched the boy through half-closed eyes while his thoughts wandered elsewhere. More than anything else he wanted to believe McKee, but he couldn’t shake off a feeling that the tide was now running against them. He had no idea why the stranger had cracked up but he sensed that some item of bad news had been the cause of it. He knew that if things went really sour, he was expected to fight it out to the end, and the end was death, and he had no wish to die. He thought about the girl he had met last summer in Villefranche, and in a mood of defeatism, wished that he could see her once again. He recalled that her body was soft and brown, and although there was nothing beautiful about the.30-calibre Springfield carbine which rested on his lap, his right hand caressed the exposed barrel from foresight to breech as lovingly as if it was the body of a woman in heat.

  The sound of gunfire and then the noise of the approaching car jerked him sharply back to reality. He leapt to his feet, ran to the window and smashed a pane of glass. Whipping the carbine up into his shoulder, he thumbed off the safety and squeezed off one shot after another. His aim was wild and erratic, and realising that he had failed to hit the driver, he ran to the bedroom door and locked it.

  A bullet whunked into the bonnet, a second pierced the roof behind his head and a third clipped the tail and then the car smashed into the door. The windscreen became a huge spider’s web as a million fine lines traced a crazy pattern across the zone toughened glass. The bonnet sprang upon and reared up like a shying horse, and the coolant spewed out of the shattered radiator, but Tarrant saw none of this. At the moment of impact, he threw the door open and rolled out of the car. He landed on his left shoulder, went into a forward somersault and ended up on his hands and knees, and miraculously he was still holding the automatic. The door, wrenched off its hinges, was hanging drunkenly askew, and scrambling to his feet, Tarrant hurled himself through the narrow gap into the hall.

  Ruth was waiting for him, and in her eagerness to be sure of hitting him, she dwelt too long in the aim and he got in with three shots while the index finger of her right hand was still taking up the first pressure on the trigger. Only one found its mark but it was more than enough. Catching her in the chest, it knocked Ruth over and she lay there on her back, her heels drumming on the floor while she stared up at the fast-withdrawing ceiling, and then the sight left her eyes and the nervous tattoo stopped.

  Julyan, coming out of a state of shock, looked round the kitchen as if seeing it for the first time, and still in a daze, noticed that the Lee Enfield rifle was lying on the floor near the sink unit. The brain knew what had to be done, but he could not move fast enough. His limbs felt as though he had just got out of bed for the first time in months, and he lurched across the room like a drunk. He heard the door burst open and turning in that direction, he saw Tarrant framed in the entrance, and the Colt.38 in his hands was like an accusing finger pointed at his head. He bent down, his right arm stretching forward to claim the rifle and suddenly he found that it was not within his reach, and because he knew then that he never would be able to make one foot move in front of the other, he waited for death and almost welcomed it. He felt something punch him on the side of the jaw, and for one wild, brief millisecond, his face seemed to be expanding until he was quite sure that it was bigger than a medicine ball, and then everything broke apart.

  Tarrant had seen the dead man before, but his mind jibbed, and it was some moments before he connected him with the Intelligence Committee, and then the whole thing became clear. But he had no time to ponder about it for, now that the magazine was empty, the Colt.38 automatic was just a useless piece of junk. Stepping across Julyan’s body, Tarrant, now reduced to being a battlefield scavenger, picked up the Number 5 Lee Enfield rifle. The old habits acquired in training die hard; he opened the bolt a fraction, saw that there was a.303 round in the breach, and then closed it again. Still not satisfied, he removed the magazine, angled it to the light and counted the number of rounds. He had ten to play with; ten to take him through the rest of the house, and he doubted if it was enough.

  He crossed the hall, went into the dining-room and saw the stairs leading to the rooms above where, unknown to him, Silk and McKee waited in ambush on the landing. Cautiously, he edged his way forward and placed one foot on the bottom step of the L- shaped staircase. A sten gun chattered briefly and a few inches above his head, slivers of wood and bits of plaster were gouged out of the wall and the banister rail. An automatic pistol added to the cacophony of noise and the ricochets buzzed like angry bees about him and he jumped back into the dining room and took cover behind the dividing wall.

  In the ensuing lull, his ears picked up the distant sound of a helicopter.

  McKee shouted, ‘You down there, do you hear that? We’re home and dry. Nothing can stop us now.’

  Tarrant swallowed hard and then found his voice. ‘You’re wrong,’ he yelled, ‘we’ve both lost—Julyan is dead and they won’t make a deal with you.’

  ‘I’ve still got your son, Tarrant. Either Harper backs off or I kill him. You tell him that.’

  ‘You tell him, he wouldn’t believe me.’

  Tarrant edged round the wall, pointed the rifle upwards and fired once. The Sten coughed in reply and then stopped abruptly. Costing just thirty shillings when it was first produced early in World War II, the Sten gun was the cheapest machine carbine ever to have been manufactured. Simply designed but crudely finished, it was an effective weapon if the ammunition was loaded into the magazine correctly, otherwise it was prone to jamming. Silk had failed to ensure that all the rounds were seated rim on rim, and as the heavy breech block slammed forward it failed to take the seventh round cleanly into the chamber. Tarrant, hearing the dull clunk, realised that the firer had a stoppag
e in the breech and made a dash for the stairs. He took them two at a time and fired one round blindly from the hip as he came on.

  Silk knew the immediate action drill backwards, and it was simple enough; the firer was required to recock, cant the Sten to the right and shake out the damaged round which was obstructing the breech. He carried this out with the sort of textbook perfection which would have gladdened the heart of any weapon training instructor, but it was just his bad luck that, by the time he was ready to fire, he was in full view of Tarrant who had turned the corner of the L-shaped staircase.

  The blood, oozing from the wound in his arm where the dog had bitten him, had made the palm of his left hand slippery and Tarrant found it difficult to keep a firm grip on the rifle. He pulled the butt up into his shoulder but there was no time to take a deliberate aim. He fired rapidly, shotgun style with both eyes open, his right hand opening and closing the bolt and squeezing the trigger in one single co-ordinated motion, and the rifle bucked and the boom of each round mingled with the next to produce a thundering drumbeat.

  Silk was hit repeatedly and his body jerked and danced like an animated puppet as both legs, abdominal cavity and chest were rent apart. The Contractor had never been one to pay much attention to the Geneva Convention, and one round of ammunition was pretty much like another as far as he was concerned. The fact that someone at some time in the past had gone to the trouble of flattening out the needle head on each bullet had passed unnoticed. The entry wounds were small but where the dumdum rounds exited, the holes they left were as big as a saucer.