‘ The Chevy? Yeah — hung up in the kitchen.’
‘ Right — I’ll get Tracey into the van while you talk to Begin. When she’s there I’ll come and get you and we’ll make a run for it. How does that sound?’
‘ Like shit, Danny — but it’s better than anything I can think of at this moment in time. Can you use a gun, Danny?’
The English detective nodded unsurely as Myrna told her where Steve Kruger kept the firearms in his bedroom.
‘ This was supposed to be a jolly,’ Danny said to herself as she sneaked quietly upstairs and went into Steve Kruger’s bedroom. ‘Not a fucking Wild West show.’ She opened the drawer in the bedside cabinet as instructed and found Kruger’s snub-nosed. 38 special. She tucked it very carefully into the waistband of her jeans at the small of her back.
Next she went to the wardrobe where she found two more weapons, shaking her head in astonishment on seeing them. ‘Just what sort of a country have I come to?’ she asked herself.
One of the guns was a pistol, the other a Heckler amp; Kock sub-machine pistol, very light, accurate and deadly. It looked thoroughly evil to Danny. She put the small pistol down her waistband next to the revolver and dropped the HK into her holdall.
Then she went to collect Tracey.
‘ I want the originals in my hand before I give up the girl,’ Myrna bluffed to Begin.
‘ That will not be possible,’ he said. ‘I am a man of honour; as I said, you will have the originals delivered to you within an hour of me taking possession of the girl. Trust me.’
Myrna leaned back, pretending to consider this. In reality she was straining to hear outside the dining-room door, trying to judge where Danny was up to with Tracey.
‘ You keep very, very quiet,’ Danny hissed. ‘Believe me, your life depends on it, so does mine and so does Myrna’s.’
The girl was compliant, terrified.
Danny crept downstairs ahead of her, into the hallway and to the front door, passing the dining room on the way.
From the front door it was less than twelve feet to the Chevrolet. Danny looked at the keys in her hand and her heart sank when she saw the remote-control locking fob. She pointed it at the car and held her breath, hoping it would not make too much of a noise.
There was a loud squeak as the alarm was deactivated and the doors unlocked.
Danny paused, expecting a reaction. Nothing happened.
She walked confidently to the car, her eyes taking in everything there was to be seen up and down the cul-de-sac — including the two sedans parked a hundred yards away, each packed with muscle. Danny swallowed. She opened the rear door and beckoned Tracey to get in.
‘ Lie down across the seat and don’t move,’ Danny instructed her harshly. She jumped into the driver’s seat, threw her holdall into the passenger footwell and started the engine.
Once she was happy it was ticking over nicely, she ran back to the house.
Myrna winced when she heard Kruger’s car squawk like a parrot, and eyed Begin in readiness for a reaction.
He simply sat staring at Myrna, not in the least suspecting what was going on.
‘ Okay,’ Myrna said with a sigh, apparently reaching a decision. She leaned forwards. ‘I’ll do it.’
Begin beamed the smile of the modest victor. ‘You’ve seen sense,’ he patronised.
The door crashed open and Danny came into the room like a whirlwind, snub-nosed revolver in her right hand, pistol in her left.
‘ Here — catch!’ she shouted and tossed the pistol across to Myrna who caught it expertly, rising from her chair, pivoting round and pointing it at Begin.
‘ Actually I’m not interested in your fucking deal,’ she said. ‘It stinks.’
‘ You fool,’ Begin said calmly, sitting back.
‘ No, I don’t think so. Now you sit there like a good boy, otherwise I’ll blast your fucking head off.’
The women backed slowly out of the room, their guns aimed dangerously at Begin. He did not move, other than to shake his head deprecatingly.
Once out of the door, Danny shouted, ‘You drive!’
They turned and ran out to the Chevrolet which
Myrna slammed into reverse. She stood on the gas and released the parking brake. The wheels spun and the car lurched backwards.
Begin appeared at the front door, beckoning towards the two cars parked down the road, wildly flapping his hands to get his message across.
‘ Scrotes ahead,’ Danny yelled.
‘ Seen ‘em,’ Myrna retorted, gritting her teeth.
As the car swerved out of the driveway, Myrna yanked the gear-stick into Drive and gunned the gearbox into ‘kick-down’. It surged forwards.
Up ahead, both cars moved away from the kerb and stopped side by side, effectively blocking the road. Men jumped out, took cover behind open doors and aimed weapons at the Chevrolet.
‘ Get down!’ Myrna screamed. ‘And hold on tight!’ In the back seat, Tracey whimpered pathetically.
The first bullet crashed through the windshield. Danny felt it whizz inches away from her head. The next one embedded itself in her headrest. She ducked. Myrna grappled with the wheel. She pulled it down to the left, mounted the kerb with a thud, putting the Chevrolet at an angle to the shooters. Bullets slammed into the side. Danny’s window shattered into a million pieces and the bullet passed right in front of Myrna’s eyes, exiting through her side window which also shattered.
A second later Myrna powered the Chevrolet through a low, perfectly manicured and cultivated hedge, into a front garden. This was the only way past Bussola’s men.
Whether it was braveness or stupidity, Danny wasn’t sure — probably a combination of both — but she sat up, having pulled the HK out of her holdall. She rested it on the doorframe where the window had once been, aimed it in the general direction of the men and pulled back the trigger. Even though there was hardly any recoil, her shooting was wild and inaccurate but it had the desired effect of making Bussola’s men dive for better cover as the Chevrolet roared past.
Myrna pulled back onto the road, unable to stop a smile cracking on her face.
Danny slumped, feeling the crumbs of the broken glass all down her back. She looked at the bullet-holes in the windshield, the remnants of the two side windows, twisted to see the bullet-hole in the headrest and then looked at the weapon in her hands which was literally smoking. Unbelievably a sensation of pure exhilaration went through her.
‘ That was amazing,’ she said to Myrna. ‘Fucking amazing.’
Chapter Twenty-four
It was a thick, buff, legal envelope. On the front of it were written two names — Henry Christie and Danny Furness. It had been lying, still sealed, on Henry’s dining-room table ever since the Constable investigating the suicide of Maurice Stanway had dropped it off at his home address.
There had been no obvious suicide note amongst Stanway’s papers at his office, the Constable told Henry. Just this envelope with the two names on it. It could well be the suicide note, but the PC was handing it over to Henry for him to do whatever he wanted to do with it that evening, so long as he returned it the following day.
The police were actually under strict instructions from the Coroner not to open and read suicide notes if they were sealed; only the Coroner was allowed to do that.
Henry tore the envelope open.
A neatly bound file of papers slithered out. Handwritten, probably by Stanway.
Henry began to read: This is for the two detectives investigating the case of Charles Gilbert. By the time you read this, I, Maurice Alan Stanway, will be dead, having taken my own life. I decided to end my life, simply because I could no longer bear to live with myself having consigned two other people to death. I will tell you about that in a while. But I detest myself utterly. I am a weak, pathetic individual, easily led and influenced. And the main influence in my life has been Charles Gilbert. I know everything there is to know about Charles Gilbert and the last thing I want to do is die without revealing these details to other people.