There were two Craigs, Grierson thought. There was the genial extrovert, strong, secure in his own strength, witty, gentle with women, cautious not to hurt—that was Jekyll Craig. Then there was the killer. Hyde Craig. The massive physical power, the fury of nervous energy, all concentrated into a terrible patience, ready for the moment to destroy. Good with guns, good with a knife, terrifyingly good with hands and feet. Grierson remembered what Craig had said about karate. "You've got to believe it'll do what you want it to do. You have to know that everything is inevitable. It has to happen in your head first. When my hands were right I could break bricks with them—because I never doubted. If I had, even for a minute, I'd have ended up with a broken hand."
That was the way Craig felt now. Loomis had given them an edge, and Craig believed he must win, with the same terrifying certainty as when they'd gone to France and killed a renegade colonel. The killer Craig never doubted, and if he ever did, he'd lose. Grierson thought how clever Loomis was to harness all that lethal certainty, and use it so sparingly, and to such effect, then he took off the pinstripe suit, folded it carefully, and put on the fireman's uniform, rammed his feet into the boots, slid the riot gun down one of them. Craig put a Smith and Wesson into each of his side pockets, picked up a smoke mask, then grinned at Grierson.
"Make sure the safety catch is on. You might do yourself a mischief," he said.
He had an ax in a sling at his side, a knife in the top of one boot. On him, Grierson thought, a fireman's helmet looked like a gladiator's. He wished he wasn't so fond of Craig.
"Time for phase two," he said.
A group of policemen came up. None of them appeared to rank higher than sergeant, but they were Special Branch men, led by Detective Inspector Linton. Loomis had briefed them personally. They tried, without much enthusiasm, to regulate the stream of traffic. The rockers used them as an extra hazard, and zigzagged happily round them. Craig watched with the same terrible patience as the motorbikes stopped at last in a circle round the block of houses, and Lonesome, Jigger, and "O Level Edward" lined up behind Harry, and marched up to the door, each carrying a petition. Jigger leaned on the bell, Lonesome swung the door knocker like a hammer, and no one answered. Grierson murmured into the walkie-talkie, then slowly, reluctantly, a scuffle evolved as the police moved in closer.
"I'd better get down there," said Craig. Grierson
nodded. The two men looked at each other for a moment, then Craig was gone. Grierson watched Harry yell through the letterbox, then, as he pushed his petition through, Grierson opened the window, lowered the Venetian blind, and waited for action.
Inside the petition were incendiary leaves of a kind first used in World War II, but these had a triggering device Loomis's scientific staff had had fun with. Grierson hoped Harry had remembered to press on the sealing wax before he posted it. The police were moving in more closely now, and one of them had drawn a truncheon. He wore a constable's uniform, but it was Linton. He aimed a clumsy blow at Jigger, missed, and with the follow-through he smashed a window. Jigger dropped another petition through the hole he'd made, and almost at once a steel grille slammed down. Farther up the road, Lonesome threw a brick, and another window smashed, broken glass splashed out. But there the steel shutters were already in place. "O Level Edward" laid his petition on the window ledge. There was movement at the top of the house. Grierson picked up the Armalite and waited. He noticed, appalled, that his hands were shaking, and that he had to struggle to control them. A puff of smoke appeared from the letterbox, then from Jigger's window. Then Edward's window ledge glowed, crackled, roared into fire. Grierson turned to the walkie-talkie again.
"Now," he said.
Almost at once he heard the clatter of a fire-engine bell, and a fleet of apphances roared up, manned by Special Branch men. Two vast tenders blocked off both ends of the street, a fire escape swung into position near Grierson's office, another appliance swung round by the AZ offices, reversed, and crashed into the blazing window, smashing the grille, scattering flame, then pulled forward again as a masked fireman dashed from the office block to the shelter of the fire engine. Grierson saw a flutter of curtains from a window opposite, then picked up the Armalite, aimed, and waited. The fireman, now with a gun in his hand, darted for the gaping hole the engine had made, and the curtains parted. Grierson fired three quick shots, and the dark bulk at the window pitched forward and was still. Then he raised the Venetian blinds as the ladder extended slowly toward his window. His hands were shaking once more, but at least Craig was inside. The next part was up to him.
Craig went in in a smacking dive, feeling the heat sigh like wind as he moved, and even in the spht second of contact, singeing his eyebrows, pulling his skin tight. He was in a conference room with a long, heavy table and leather chairs. The carpet and one of the chairs were burning. Craig went to the door and opened it from the wrong side, hugging the shelter of the wall. At once someone fired a shot into the empty space he should have filled. Craig took a smoke bomb from one pocket and lobbed it into the corridor. It dissolved on impact into a greasy cloud of lung-choking, gaseous ooze. Craig counted three, swerved into the corridor, and dropped flat. From the shelter of the stairs, an Arab with a machine pistol tried to stop coughing and aim at him. Craig fired, hit him in the arm and the Arab pulled the trigger, squirting bullets in a flailing circle as the smoke made him cough and weep. Craig fired again and killed him.
He raced up the corridor then, but the other rooms facing the street were empty. He went past the staircase to the back of the house—empty storerooms, butler's pantry, stairs leading to the cellars. He hesitated, but there was another ground-floor room. He jammed a metal table against the cellar door, then approached the last ground-floor room, kicked its door open, and swung back against the wall. Cooking knives thrashed like hail through the air. The room was the main kitchen and in it were two very angry chefs. From the window behind them Craig had caught a glimpse of another fire engine, its vast, scarlet bulk sealing off the mews. He lobbed another smoke bomb into the kitchen, locked it, and raced back to the stairs. The cellar would have to wait. Fhp would almost certainly be in the cell-like room Sehna had described to him. As he reached the foot of the stairs he heard the sound of water under pressure smashing into the conference room. The fire would be well under control by now, but the bombs he had thrown created more smoke than ever.
The stairway was empty of hfe. Craig moved more slowly now, conscious of the taste of rubber from the mask, the wet taste of the air he breathed. He reached the dead Arab, and took the machine pistol from his hands. The magazine was empty. He let it fall, and moved on upwards.
At the top of the stairs a door swung open slowly, and Craig dropped. What felt like a blow from a sledgehammer smashed at the side of his helmet, and he fired the last four shots from the Smith and Wesson on reflex alone. There was one answering shot from inside, but Craig heard nothing, not even the crack of his own gun. His four shots had hit the door in a diamond shape, its lowest point the height of a man's chest, its highest that of his head, and all had gone through. Craig waited till the booming noise in his head modulated to a steady hum, then reloaded the Smith and Wesson and summoned up the energy to dart for the door, push it open. Something inside jammed it. Craig shoved the thing aside with his foot, let the door swing open again. The temptation to pass on was almost overwhelming, but he had to be sure.