One Fine Day in the Middle of the Night (39 page)

‘But it’s not exactly runnin’ like a dream so far. One of them, somebody called Jackson, switched sides and freed all the hostages while the others were away searchin’ for Gavin. Not the kind of development your average bad guy generally has a contingency against. They’re dug in somewhere, ready to make a stand.’

‘The Carlton,’ Vale stated, getting up from the dead gunman. ‘There’s a siege getting underway there at the moment. Potentially rather messy.’

‘Right. Also, someone called Dawson has buggered off on a motor‐
boat. I got the impression he was a main player. From what was said, he took off because he clocked which way the wind was blowin’. The leader, name of Connor, didnae sound too pleased aboot it. On top of that, they’ve suffered a few casualties: as well as laughin’ boy in the corner there and the guy I lit up, they’ve lost two to this Jackson punter, one to electrocution, and there’s another one MIA.’

‘Electrocution?’

‘Somebody wired a door handle to the mains. Gavin, presumably. That’s who they were lookin’ for at the time. Impressive bit of improv, if you ask me. He’s still on the lam, far as I know.’

‘Yes, he’s downstairs in the laundry, where I’ve just come from. The mains trick doesn’t sound much like him, though. Perhaps the other chap.’

‘What other chap?’

‘Murdoch, I think he said his name was.

‘
Davie
Murdoch?’

‘Yes, that was it. He struck me as rather more practical‐
minded than Mr Hutchison.’

‘That would be one way of puttin’ it, aye. Anyway, Simone and I reckoned our best bet was to try to get ashore an’ raise the alarm. We were makin’ our way down to look for a boat when we ran into your man, here. That’s the story so far: now we go over live.’

‘Very well,’ Vale said. ‘Here’s the plan. I want you to fire down the corridor at two‐
or three‐
second intervals, in short, controlled bursts, aiming high, to keep our man distracted while I go around the other side. When I give you the shout, you cease firing. Think you can handle that?’

‘Short, controlled bursts. Two or three seconds. Aim high.’

‘Good. You ready?’

Matt took a breath and nodded, lying. He felt about as ready as King Ethelred. ‘I don’t tend to get a lot of this in, you know, in the average week,’ he explained.

Vale grinned and slapped him on the shoulder.

‘By the way,’ he said, pulling the double doors open for Matt, ‘how did you two manage to evade the hijackers in the first place?’

‘We weren’t in the ballroom when it all went down. We were over in the Majestic.’

He nodded, a little too sagely for Matt’s liking.

‘I know it’s none of my business,’ Vale said quietly, ‘but I’m rather fond of Simone. So if you don’t treat her as she eminently deserves, you’ll have me to answer to.’

Matt swallowed. ‘Got it,’ he said.

He crawled through the gap and knelt just outside the doorway once again. Noticing movement across the hall, he looked up. Simone was staring back at him from inside the shop opposite, pulling spare shells from her sanitary disposal bag and feeding them into the shotgun. She had cuts on her forehead and down the left side of her face, and her dress was ripped at the left shoulder.

‘You all right?’ he mouthed.

Simone rolled her eyes and shrugged, as though to say ‘You mean apart from this?’ Matt signalled to her to get down and stay put, then commenced firing, ducking in and out from his covered position to do so.

He glanced back across at Simone during each of the prescribed two‐
or three‐
second intervals.

‘What’s going on?’ she mouthed.

Matt leaned out and fired again. ‘Vale,’ he mouthed back.

‘Wha?’

Another burst.

‘Vale,’ he mouthed again.

She shook her head, a look of frustration on her face.

After the next volley, Vale’s voice sounded loudly from down the corridor. ‘That’ll be all, Mr Black, thank you.’

Simone furrowed her brow upon hearing it. ‘Tim Vale?’ she said in apparent disbelief. Matt nodded with a wry smile. He hadn’t been the only one in for a surprise, and he suspected Simone wouldn’t be the last.

‘Sir,’ Vale called out. ‘Man in the pyjamas, are you listening?’

Matt and Simone exchanged gestures of bewilderment.

‘We know you’re not one of the hijackers,’ he continued. ‘We’d like you to know that neither are we, so it would be a dreadful shame if we shot each other, don’t you think? Now, we have you in our sights from two directions, and in light of that advantage, I’d advise you to throw your weapon through the front of the shop and come out with your hands raised. You’ll get the gun back as soon as we’ve all become sufficiently acquainted as to be sure you’re not going to kill any of us, at least not intentionally.’

Matt couldn’t see where Vale was, neither could he see the man he was alleging to have in his sights. He assumed that at least Vale knew what he was doing, then assumed that he’d find himself assuming that a few times more before this horrible night was over.

There was a few seconds of silence, then: ‘Get tae fuck. D’you think I’m an eejit? If you can fuckin’ see me, fuckin’ shoot me.’

Matt heard Vale fire two rounds from his handgun. It was met by a yelp of ‘Jesus fuck!’, then followed immediately after that by the sight of an Uzi flying through the air and skidding along the hall amidst the squillion pieces of glass.

‘Close enough?’ Vale asked rhetorically. ‘Now, come on out, and quickly, before the balaclava brigade get down here
en masse
.’

‘I cannae.’

‘Why not? Are you stuck?’

‘Naw, but I’ve got nae shoes on, an’ I’m up tae my fuckin’ arse in glass.’

Vale appeared at the end of the hall and picked up the machine gun, then summoned Matt and Simone forward. They climbed through the shop’s ruined frontage together, guns raised, and found themselves standing over some old punter on his knees, wearing a camouflage‐
vest and, true enough, tartan pyjama trousers, which were wet through. Matt hoped this wasn’t because the bloke had peed himself, as they were clearly going to have to carry him over the debris until it was safe for him to put his bare feet down.

‘I’m Tim Vale, security consultant,’ Vale said, offering the man a helping hand. ‘This is Mr Matthew Black and Mrs Simone Hutchison.’

‘Hector McGregor. Lothian and Borders Police. Retired.’

‘How long?’ Vale enquired.

‘One day. Don’t ask.’

Vale returned the discarded Uzi and gestured to Simone to take the vanguard. He and Matt then picked McGregor up in a sitting position, one hand each under his thighs.

‘Left, Simone, then first right,’ Vale directed. Simone held open what was left of the shop’s front door until they were through it, then resumed her position in the lead, shotgun held at shoulder level each time she approached a corner.

‘How did you get here?’ Vale asked McGregor.

‘Rowin’ boat. They blew it up wi’ a rocket launcher. I had to swim the rest.’

‘A rocket launcher? Oh dear. Can’t say I like the sound of that. Do the authorities know about the situation, then? Someone must have seen the explosion.’

‘Not that I know of, I’m afraid. I live just over the water, but mine’s one of only three hooses in a five‐
mile radius. The only thing likely tae be payin’ any attention roon here is coos, sheep an’ fish. I was investigatin’ off my own back, based on a couple o’ suspicious incidents earlier in the day.’

‘In your pyjamas?’ Matt was compelled to ask.

The man just glared.

‘So what’s the score?’ he asked Vale.

‘Ehm, in short, hijackers. Not particularly competent, but extremely enthusiastic and very heavily armed. After money, we believe.
Quelle surprise.
Fifty or so civilians dispersed variously about the resort, at their mercy if not exactly under their control.’

‘Give us some money or we kill you?’ McGregor summarised.

‘Something like that.’

‘We were plannin’ to sneak ashore in one of their boats when we ran into you,’ Matt added. ‘Good job we didnae make it, I suppose, if that’s what they did to yours.’

‘There’s nae boats doon there,’ McGregor informed him. ‘Well, there were dinghies, but somebody’s knackered them.’

‘Somebody’s sabotaged
their
dinghies?’ Simone asked.

‘Well, whatever dinghies were doon there, aye. And the wan that was guardin’ the jetty’s deid, as well. That’s where I got this machine gun. He’d been shot right through the foreheid.’

‘Jackson’s work?’ Vale asked Matt.

‘Nah. Jackson’s been with the hostages the whole time. Wait a minute, though. This Dawson bloke left in a motorboat – I heard the look‐
outs tellin’ Connor. But why would he sabotage the remainin’ dinghies? And why would he kill one of his own men?’

‘Never mind aw that shite,’ McGregor interrupted, putting his feet down again at last. ‘Whit aboot the bomb?’

Matt and Vale stopped dead and stared at each other.

‘What bomb?’ they both asked.

Vale and McGregor made it back to the laundry room less than five minutes behind the rest of them, both breathless and the former about as ruffled as Matt ever expected to see him, which was nonetheless not very. During the intervening time, the tight little room had played host to another reunion event that, in Matt’s opinion, more genuinely reflected the true spirit of such affairs than its grander predecessor. He and Davie Murdoch accounted for a frugally ameliorating dose of awkward but genuine amity amidst an oceanic deluge of bitterness and recrimination, all of which was ebbing and flowing around Gavin.

‘Long time no see, Davie, fancy meetin’ you here.’

‘Well, you know me, Matt, wouldnae miss a good barney.’ He looked down at the Uzi. ‘How’s the pacifism hangin’ these days?’

‘Ach, it’s more of a hobby than a lifestyle, you know?’

‘And where the bloody hell have you been?’ Gavin was meanwhile demanding of Simone.

‘Where does it look like I’ve been?’ she fired back, indicating the shotgun, the cuts and the rip in her dress. The presence of armed hijackers and mortal danger had been about the only thing capable of stopping Matt trying to kiss the area of shoulder that the rip had tantalisingly exposed. He was already starting to resent his earlier good conscience.

‘The party got a wee bit out of control,’ Simone continued. ‘A few gatecrashers. Black attire, not quite dinner dress. Don’t know whether you caught any of that.’

‘I mean, where were you that you weren’t in the ballroom when the terrorists appeared?’

‘Would you rather I
had
been? Don’t answer that. And where, I might ask, were you? Again, don’t answer that. Hi, Catherine.’

‘Hi, Simone,’ Catherine mumbled, looking like she’d rather be facing the hijackers. Her eye kept straying to the shotgun.

‘And as for you, Mr Comedian,’ Gavin challenged, ‘what the hell do you think you’re doing with my wife?’

‘Ehm, tryin’ not to get shot, mainly.’

‘I saw you kissing her.’ He pointed to the laptop computer nearby, which was displaying surveillance images on its LCD screen. Very cute. Presumably secret agent Vale’s. It probably turned into a motorbike if you pressed the right button.

‘Well, that’s a sight more than
you
’ve done for a long time,’ Simone butted in. ‘Which is not a complaint I’d imagine
she
could level at you.’

‘What on earth are you talking about?’

‘Oh for Christ’s sake, Gavin,’ Catherine chided. ‘Act your age. She knows. Probably always has. Sorry, Simone, I really am. It was just one of those—’

‘Oh, give us a break. You want him? Fine. You should just have asked. He was going spare anyway. Or at least he is now. Gavin, darling, I know this is not the best time, what with everything falling down around us, but … actually, on second thoughts, I’d say this actually
is
the best time. I’m leaving you. If we get out of this ridiculous, hellish bloody place alive, I’m leaving you, and I’m taking the girls. Do you remember them at all? Short, dark hair, passing resemblance to me, striking resemblance to each other!’

‘You’re … you … I …’

‘And, Catherine, if you’ve any regard for me or my children at all, I’ll be expecting your full cooperation when I name you in the divorce.’

‘You got it,’ she said, her eyes still hypnotised by the pump‐
action mistress‐
dispatcher.

‘God, Catherine, have you no loyalty?’ Gavin growled. ‘But then, of course, I now know you’ve been sneaking around behind my back, carrying on with Mr Psychopath there.’

Matt was momentarily impressed with Gavin. Not only was he ignoring his wife’s firepower, but he was now noising up Davie Murdoch. This was either bravery worthy of a VC or recklessness worthy of Ford Prefect. Matt was ‘Mr Comedian’. Davie was ‘Mr Psychopath’. Another thirty seconds of this and Gavin could easily be ‘Mr Bleedingslowlytodeath’.

It was a fortunate time for the two stragglers to make their appearance. During a hasty round of introductions, Vale tapped intently at his computer, then maximised one of the windows so that it took up the whole screen.

‘So what is it?’ Matt asked, though he knew the range of plausible answers was depressingly limited. The image on the screen was of a corridor in the shopping mall, one evidently not visited by himself and Simone as it didn’t look like a bomb had hit it. Yet.

‘It,’ Vale said gravely, ‘is approximately eighty to a hundred pounds of C4 plastic explosive, plus timer, detonators, the works. Our gratitude to Inspector McGregor here for discovering it. It’s sitting in a shop doorway on sub‐
level two, and it’s going to be making things very interesting for anyone in its vicinity in about seventy‐
two minutes from now.’

The collective intake of breath must have reduced the room’s atmospheric pressure enough to threaten implosion. Vale didn’t need to repeat himself. ‘Explosive’ was the only word in the English language not witheringly diminished when you preceded it with ‘plastic’.

‘Can you defuse it?’ Gavin asked him.

‘No. Can you?’

‘Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ. Well, I mean, what constitutes the vicinity? Can we get to a safe distance?’