There was a roundabout a mile ahead. A left turn would take the Mondeo down towards the A23 with then a choice of routes north towards London or south towards Brighton. If another car was close enough, perhaps they could take control of that road, he contemplated, but he only had seconds to make that decision. If the Mondeo continued straight over the roundabout it would enter a narrow, winding three-mile-long road over the Devil’s Dyke leading towards the outskirts of Brighton, with only two turn-off options. They should be able to get a Brighton car to position itself at the far end and, with luck, another one at the other end near Small Dole.
He gave Ops-1 the two requests. The Mondeo was approaching the roundabout, and they were now again less than a hundred yards behind it.
‘What about the paraffin parrot?’ Edwards said.
‘I think we can get him without the helicopter,’ Trundle replied, watching the car entering the small roundabout. Into his radio he said, ‘Subject vehicle going off at not one — not two — not three — Oh shit! Off at four! Back the way we’ve just come from!’
The one exit he had not anticipated, effectively a U-turn.
Trundle gripped the grab handle as Edwards kept the Audi in a controlled power slide round the roundabout, and accelerated out of it.
‘You could be on Top Gear with that one, Pip,’ Trundle said.
Edwards grinned.
‘Nooooooo!’ Trundle yelled. ‘Stop, get back, you idiot!’
An articulated lorry was pulling out of the entrance to a garden centre, a short distance ahead. The car they were chasing shot past it but, seemingly blind to their blue lights and deaf to their siren, the lorry continued pulling out, turning right, completely blocking their path.
All Trundle and Edwards could do was sit tight.
‘Comms, we have momentarily lost visual contact — due to a lorry turning across us.’
Finally, as the lorry completed its turn, there was enough of a gap to get by it. Edwards started to pull out then immediately braked and pulled in again, as a Range Rover came past from the opposite direction. Then Edwards pulled out again and the road was clear.
Too clear.
Just a long black ribbon with dark woodland on either side.
The subject vehicle was no longer in sight.
105
Saturday 30 April
Need to get to the city.
I’ve just got to get there. Got to, got to, GOT TO.
Out here in the countryside, if he ran out of fuel they’d find the car quickly, he knew. Then they’d put up the helicopter with its heat-source night vision and they’d pick him out. He’d be better off in the city, invisible there, plenty of hiding places, and it would make it harder for a dog handler to find him.
He just had to get there.
Ten miles.
There has to be ten miles more in the tank.
He looked in his mirror.
Just darkness.
He was hurtling up towards a three-way junction that he knew well. The Ginger Fox restaurant, where he’d sometimes come with Lena for Sunday lunch, was on the right. A sharp right in front of it would be the fastest way to the city from here. It would take him to the A23. But that’s where they’d be expecting him.
Turning off the main road — more or less straight on into another lane — would take him back out into the countryside. Where he did not want to be.
Had to carry on along the main road. That was his best option. Nothing showed in his mirror, to his relief. They still weren’t in sight.
He drove too fast round the sharp left-hand bend, feeling the car twitching and sliding on the wet, greasy road, then a right-hander was coming up. He braked hard and turned sharp left just on the apex, down a narrow road he’d cycled along many times in the past, Clappers Lane. It would take him on a back route into Brighton that hopefully they wouldn’t be expecting him to go for. Via Shoreham, to the west of the city.
If his fuel lasted.
If they didn’t find him again.
He looked at the fuel gauge. There was always a couple of gallons in the tank when it showed empty. There had to be. He gripped the wheel, looked in the mirror, the road ahead, the mirror, the road ahead.
I don’t know what I’m doing.
Just got to keep going. Keep going. All the time I’m going I’m alive.
When I stop, I’m dead.
106
Saturday 30 April
‘Shit!’ PC Trundle said. ‘Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!’
They had stopped, momentarily, outside the Ginger Fox, staring at the road signs — although they knew this area like the back of their hands.
Trundle was trying to guess which way the car had gone. Which road would he have taken, he wondered? And every second that they wasted here meant the Mondeo was getting further and further away.
‘A23?’ Pip Edwards suggested. ‘That’s where I’d head.’
‘If that’s where he wanted to get to, he’d have hit it sooner.’ Trundle shook his head. ‘He’s been keeping to the back roads and obviously has local knowledge.’
‘Right, so let’s think for a moment,’ Edwards said. ‘Where’s he actually going?’
‘I’ve no idea.’
‘You’ve nicked a car, the police are on to you. You need to ditch it — but preferably somewhere else you can nick another car to shake them off.’
‘A pub car park?’
Edwards shrugged. ‘If he had the presence of mind, maybe. Not sure I’d think that if I was in a red-mist panic, I’d just keep driving, in the hope of getting away — as he has done. Perhaps losing us in a town. Crawley? Haywards Heath? Burgess Hill? Brighton? Could be any of those. So, straight on or one of the rights?’
The two officers stared ahead.
‘I don’t think he’s turned off — I think he’s carried on towards Henfield,’ said Trundle.
‘Do we toss a coin?’
Trundle pressed his radio button. ‘Ops-1, we have lost Golf Yankee One Four Golf Romeo X-ray. He could have gone one of three ways. We are terminating the pursuit.’ He gave the road numbers.
‘OK, Hotel Tango Two Eight One, stand down and stay where you are. We’ll see if he’s spotted on any of those routes. You’re in a good position if he doubles back, so stay put.’
‘Stay put,’ he repeated, flatly, sensing from the tone of Kim Sherwood’s voice that she felt they’d fucked up. ‘Yes, yes.’
Moments later Inspector Sherwood’s voice came through the radio again, sounding much more animated. ‘Subject vehicle has just been sighted! Single male occupant.’
107
Saturday 30 April
Roy Grace had returned to his office and, patched into Ops-1 on his radio, was following the pursuit. Ray Packham, at the spare desk in front of him, was going through the contents from Lorna Belling’s laptop.
Grace had spoken to both the duty Gold and Silver Commanders about the POLACC — police accident — with the possibility of a case of potential murder committed by a member of his team, and he had also alerted Professional Standards.
Batchelor’s Ford Mondeo had been put on the ANPR hot list, and police vehicles heading towards the area to attempt to contain and stop the car had been ordered to minimalize their use of blue lights and sirens, where safe, in order to avoid alerting him.
‘Some very angry emails to Lorna Belling from Seymour Darling, Roy,’ Packham said, suddenly.
‘Yes?’
‘Get this one, from Darling: Oh right, Mrs Belling. If you call screwing someone behind your husband’s back “honest”, then I’m a banana. SD.’