Honour Bound (26 page)

-44-

The
lift door opened with barely a sound. Norton stepped out, glanced left and
right then looked over the balcony at the deserted dock area over fifty feet
below. The channel cut from the river into the warehouse was empty. A thin oily
film shimmered colourfully on the surface of the murky water lapping gently on
the concrete walls of the dock. Four huge metal legs supporting a gantry crane
rose from the corners of the dock like a huge yellow spider awaiting its next
waterborne victim. The cab of the crane was in a recess at the end of the
gantry and was in darkness except for a flashing red light on what was
presumably the control panel.

The
floor of the dock was set out in a simple one-way system with white painted
arrows indicating the direction of travel in each lane. Dotted around the area
were a dozen or more stationary forklifts. One of them, parked at the rear of
three articulated trucks still had its amber warning lights flashing. Opposite
the trucks, four stacks of wooden packing crates waited patiently beside a wide
conveyor belt that rumbled on its endless journey, as though the last person to
leave had forgotten to turn it off.

“Where
the hell is everybody?” Norton asked himself, “It’s like the Marie Celeste in
here.”

According
to Sarah, a skeleton crew worked each night, mainly for maintenance and urgent
deliveries. She thought there were normally seven or eight, not including the security
guards. There were four of them unless Holmes was using the penthouse then
there were eight.

I
can account for one of them, he thought, but where the
hell
are
the rest.

He
walked along the balcony to a fire door and stepped through into a small, carpeted
foyer. A lift door stood invitingly open, the shiny aluminium interior
reflecting his movements as he passed to the only other door leading off the
foyer. It opened with a gentle push from the shotgun. A cleaner’s cupboard, a
small army of brooms, mops and vacuum cleaners were stored neatly in wall
racks, ready for use. Closing the door, he stepped into the lift. A quick
glance at the control panel and he pressed the top button marked 'P'.

The
penthouse suite certainly lived up to its name. The lift opened onto a room of
gigantic proportions. A marble floor, that a Roman emperor would have been
proud of, sparkled in the light from the many scattered lamps. Persian and
Afghan rugs were dotted around the area like a small chain of islands. Tucked
into a large alcove at one end of the room was a king sized bed separated from
the living and working area by intricately decorated Japanese silk screens. At
the far end of the room the huge triangular window looked out over the car park
he’d crossed to enter the warehouse. Another window ran the full length of the
adjoining wall and offered a magnificent view of Tower Bridge. Resplendent in
its floodlit majesty, the illuminated stonework stood out like a polished jewel
on the black velvet band of the river.

Norton
turned his attention back to the penthouse. He crossed the room, bypassing a
huge comfortable looking sofa, and laid the shotgun on the blotter of a desk by
the triangular window. He took the skeleton keys from his pocket and sat in the
chair. A large centre drawer was the only one that needed a key, and it opened
at the first attempt. A Browning 9mm, the same as he had taken from the guard,
lay on top of a pile of documents. He moved it to one side and picked up the
papers, quickly reading the contents. It was the paperwork relating to the
servicing costs of a Lear jet. Not interested in that, he laid it on the desk
while he searched through the rest of the drawers. Finding nothing to hold his
attention, he was about to return the papers when he noticed a single folded
sheet at the back of the drawer. He picked it up and unfolded it.

His
blood ran cold, anger rose in him like a black, unseen cloud as he read the
contents.

Peter,

The man you
require to sort out your troubles.

Sam Norton.

38 Marlborough Court.

Weston Road. W12

He drives a
Silver Alfa Romeo
Spyder
reg. no. 7355SN

Yours,

RL.

"Reginald fucking Langdon.
So Vance was
right and you had him killed you worthless piece of shit." A mental image
of Langdon appeared in Norton's mind. "You're mine you bastard, dead but
not buried."

He
remained seated in the chair for a few moments controlling his anger, then,
after replacing the papers and the gun as he had found them, re-locked the
drawer. Picking up the shotgun, he walked back to the lift.

The
door slid open and he stepped into the foyer. He had considered leaving the
warehouse after finding the note but he still needed to know the whereabouts of
Peter Holmes, and this was the best place for that, as long as he could find
somebody to ask. The guard in the lobby would be out for at least another half
hour, so he decided to find someone else to chat with.

He
pulled on the fire door, stopped, and gently closed it again when he heard
voices. He stepped to one side and looked through a six inch wide reinforced
glass panel that ran almost the full length of the door. Two men, casually
dressed, stepped out of the lift and looked over the balcony into the warehouse
below, just as he himself had done a quarter of an hour earlier. Both men would
be armed, though only one weapon was in evidence. The shorter of the two
carried an MP5 sub machine gun at an angle across his chest, supported around
his neck by a thick green sling. His left hand held the stock of the gun while
his right was in his trouser pocket, fingers moving against the cloth. The
jingle of coins was plain as the man absently toyed with them.

Norton
switched on the shotgun's laser sight and pushed the door open with his foot.
Both men turned towards him at the same time. The same look of disbelief crossing
their faces.

"Stand
still!" he ordered, "or someone will die."

The
two men looked at him. Both appeared to be weighing up their chances of getting
a shot in first. Norton moved the red dot, projected from the laser sight, onto
the chest of the man holding the sub machine gun. "Don't even think about
it," he said. "The dot marks the spot." The man with the sub
machine gun, his hand still in his pocket, looked at the unwavering dot on his
chest and then at Norton.

"What
do you want?" he asked.

"I
want to know where Peter Holmes is. I have some unfinished business."

"We
don't know where he is, we're only security," he said quickly, the other
man nodded in confirmation, "he doesn't confide in us."

The
second man, probably because the shotgun was not trained on him, went for his
gun. The man with the sub machine gun died instantly when Norton pulled the
trigger, sending five ball bearings smashing into his heart. The force of the
impact slammed him into the balcony railings. His lifeless body, with too much
momentum to be stopped, flipped over the topmost railing and crashed in a
bloody heap on the concrete far below.

The
remaining guard froze with his hand still inside his jacket. Norton pumped the gun's
action, ejecting the spent cartridge, reloading the next.

"Now
that was a really stupid thing to do." Norton said, “Your mate will really
thank you for that.”

He
lowered the red dot to the man's groin. "Perhaps you ought to take your
hand out of your jacket."

The
man began to move his hand but was stopped by Norton's voice, "If I see
anything other than your fingers, I'll amputate your jewels. Now, take your
hand out."

The
man complied as if he were immersed in treacle, as if slowness was the order of
the day. As soon as his hand was clear of his jacket, Norton ordered him to
turn around and lie face down on the balcony.

"Okay,"
Norton said, "now your mate is no longer with us, I'll ask you again.
Where is Peter Holmes?"

"You've
missed him. He was here, but he left about ten minutes ago."

"That's
unfortunate. I really did want to see him. Supposing that he has gone, where
would he be now?"

"Fuck knows, I don't."

Norton
rammed the barrel of the shotgun, as hard as he could, onto the man's ankle. He
screamed with the sudden pain and attempted to roll over onto his back. Norton
stamped his foot on the back of his knee, preventing him from turning and
placed the barrel of the shotgun against the side of his head.

"The
next time I get a stupid fucking answer, I'll blow your stupid fucking head
off. Now where the fuck is he?"

"All
right, all right, Jesus Christ you fucking maniac. He's gone to some big
nobs
fucking mansion near the Devil's Punch Bowl. I don't
know whose it is or if it's got a name. And that's all I do fucking
know."   

Langdon,
Norton thought. He remembered reading the file on Vance's computer. Langdon had
a large house near
Thursley
bird sanctuary. It
couldn't be more than a dozen miles from the Punch Bowl. That would be his next
port of call.

"That's
better," he said. "Now, what's he involved with, what's he up to in
the next few days?"

"I
don't know. I only work for him. He doesn't tell me what his plans are."

Norton
tried a long shot, a wild guess, hoping to hit an unseen target. "What about
the robbery he's got planned?"

"If
you know all about it, what the fuck are you asking me for?"

Bingo,
he thought. Aloud he said, "There are one or two points I want you to
clear up for me. The first is where and the second is when?"

Before
the man could answer a voice started shouting from the floor of the warehouse
below, presumably as someone found the corpse of the other guard. 

"You'd
may as well give yourself up pal," the man on the floor said, "
you
haven't got a cat in hells chance of getting out of
here."                    

"Fortunately,"
Norton said, "I have an asbestos cat."

Norton
cracked the man on the side of the head with the barrel of the shotgun slipping
him silently into unconsciousness.

There
was more shouting as the fire door closed behind him, it was getting closer,
but now gradually receding as the lift glided upwards to the penthouse. As soon
as the lift doors opened, he wedged a small table between them to stop them
closing. He looked
around,
thankful the suite was
still empty then ran to the end of the room by the triangular window.

Sarah
had said the fire exit was the only other way in, or out, but it was alarmed,
not that that was going to matter now. He went to the corner of the room where
he had seen the spiral staircase on the outside of the wall, and threw back a
thick wall carpet. He breathed a sigh of relief. The fire door was of the
normal type with a simple push bar to open it. From the top hinge, a wire ran
into an electrical junction box linked to the alarm system. Ignoring this he
pushed the bar and the door opened letting in a chilly draft of night air. The
sound of the alarm followed him down the staircase and into a small section of
car park at the side of the building.

Two
Transit vans stood side by side against the wall. He tried the door of the
first one, locked. “Bugger this”, he said, “no time for niceties.”

He
ran around the front of the van to put it between himself and the fire
escape,
raised the shotgun and smashed it through the
passenger window. He pulled the door open and scrambled across to the drivers
seat. Using the shotgun again, he smashed the plastic surrounding the steering
column and pulled away the larger fragments. With the same delicacy, he smashed
the light aluminium casing holding the ignition barrel. The barrel dropped into
the darkness of the
footwell
causing him to scrabble
around for several seconds before his fingers closed around it. He slid it into
the remains of the casing, pushed down hard and at the same time twisted it
sharply to the right. The engine started first time.

He
selected drive and pulled slowly away from the wall. At the press of a button,
the window disappeared into the doorframe. With the shotgun held at arms
length, he fired once into the front tyre of the second van. It deflated with a
bang as the ball bearings ripped through the rubber wall.

Norton
stamped his foot hard down on the accelerator. The passenger door slammed shut
as van shot forward, bumping over the kerb onto the footpath along the side of the
warehouse. He swerved violently in the half-light to avoid a large concrete
flowerpot. The rear wheels spun frantically as they lost their grip on silky
smooth grass. Clods of earth and stones rattled like machine gun fire in the
wheel arches as the tyres fought for a grip. Rubber once again bit into
concrete and the van shot forward, bouncing down a kerb and on into the main
car park.

From
the corner of his eye, he saw a group of men running out of the reception area,
all with guns drawn. He aimed the speeding van at the gate. As he approached,
he slowed down, knowing it would be impossible to crash through eighteen inches
of raised steel. In the glow cast by the car park lights, he could see the
barrier slowly lowering itself into the ground.