North was sitting on the bed, examining her wallet again, when she heard something, a faint metallic clang, from outside the room. The metal door of louvres, she thought, and imagined someone making their way slowly along the connecting corridor to the door of this room. Please let it be Brock, not Sharon, she thought, staring transfixed at the door handle as it began to turn.
She glanced at North, still preoccupied with her wallet, then back at the door. It opened a few inches, then a few more, and she recognised Harry’s profile in the gap. She wanted desperately to call out to him, tell him to run, get help, but she guessed that North would start blazing away indiscriminately if she startled him, so she bit her lip and watched Harry in silence as he slowly took in the scene in the room, his eyes widening at the sight of Orr stretched out on the floor, Kathy against the wall. Run! she silently urged him, as he stood staring at her, then at North, seemingly unable to decide what to do.
Finally she couldn’t stand it any more. Terrified that he’d say something, she gave a little sharp warning shake of her head. But the movement registered with North, who looked up suddenly, first at Kathy, then at the doorway, and took in Harry.
‘Run, Harry!’ she finally blurted. ‘Get help!’
But instead of running, he began to walk slowly into the room.
Incredulously, Kathy watched him crouch beside Orr. Then she was aware of North picking up his gun at last. He waved it in the general direction of Harry and said simply, ‘He’s dead.’
Harry looked up, face grim, then got to his feet and stared at Kathy. He took in the livid mark on her forehead, the dishevelled clothes, bare legs. ‘Christ, Greg,’ he said. ‘You didn’t have to-’
‘What? You think I screwed her?’ North gave a short laugh. ‘I was looking for a wire. She’s clean. She doesn’t even have a gun.’
Jackson looked over at the contents of her pockets spread out on the bed at North’s feet, then in puzzlement at Kathy. ‘No radio? No phone? What do they teach you kids these days?’
Kathy felt a wave of panic and despair rise inside her as she finally understood. She saw that he was holding in his hand the note with Brock’s phone number that she had given Sharon, and wondered desperately if she had made the call.
She took a deep breath, trying to make her voice sound strong, in control. ‘We’ve got an operation going, Harry, searching for hidden rooms. It’s only a matter of time before the others move down here. I left my phone upstairs. I should have checked in ten minutes ago.’
He studied her thoughtfully, then shook his head. ‘That wasn’t what you told Sharon, Kathy. And it doesn’t make any sense to me. An operation? With this old geezer? And not even a can of capsicum spray on you?’
He turned back to North. ‘You been checking the radio traffic?’
‘Earlier, yeah. Nothing special.’ He reached down from the bed and switched on the radio on the floor nearby.
After a moment the unmistakable sound of a police radio exchange came through: ‘Oscar Lima, receiving seven one five,’ and the reply, ‘Seven one five, go ahead.’ The voices were flat and untroubled. ‘All quiet on Nelson Road, Oscar Lima…’
Harry Jackson turned back to Kathy. ‘Sounds more like you had one of your little brainstorms, Kathy. What, decide to crack the case single-handed, did you? Christ…’ He shook his head sadly. ‘Haven’t you got anything better to do on Christmas Eve?’
‘She’s one of Brock’s,’ North said.
‘I know.’
‘So she’s not good to have around.’ He said this pointedly.
Kathy looked up at Jackson’s face, trying to read his reaction. He met her eye briefly, then turned away.
‘Let’s think about it.’
‘What’s to think about?’ North said. ‘Don’t worry, Harry. I’ll do it. My pleasure.’
‘We don’t know for sure what’s going on out there.’
Jackson went over to North and began speaking to him urgently in a low voice that Kathy couldn’t hear. She watched their expressions as the discussion went backwards and forwards. At the end of it, when Jackson got up from the bed and walked away, head lowered, hands in pockets, she couldn’t tell for sure which way it had gone, but it didn’t look encouraging.
‘I’m hungry,’ North said, casually picking up a magazine. ‘Get us something, will you, Harry? Nothing spicy; my gut’s playing up, stuck down here in this hole. Something with chips-fish or burger or something. And a decent bottle of plonk. It is Christmas Eve, after all.’
‘Sure,’ Jackson muttered. He turned to the door without looking in Kathy’s direction.
‘Don’t I get a last meal?’ she said.
North smiled, but said nothing.
Harry looked back reluctantly over his shoulder. ‘What do you want?’
‘I want you to get help for Orr,’ Kathy said. ‘Please, Harry. You can’t just let him die. Take him out of here and leave him somewhere and call an ambulance. If he survives he won’t be able to talk for days. Come on, Harry. It’s no risk to you.’
He smiled uncomfortably at her. ‘Nice try, Kathy.’ The tone of his voice chilled her. It was sympathetic, regretful, as if he didn’t expect to be talking to her again.
North said, ‘There’s some car keys in her bag, Harry. Maybe you’d better get rid of it.’
Jackson came back over to the bed and picked up her keys. ‘Yeah, I’ll bring it down beside mine, then I’ll close the service road for the night. Where is it?’ he asked her. ‘I know what you drive.’
‘Go fuck yourself, Harry,’ she said.
‘Suit yourself.’ He turned and made for the door.
As his footsteps faded away, North got to his feet and stretched, and for the second time Kathy braced herself, feeling sick in the pit of her stomach.
‘So, Kathy, is it?’ he said. ‘Your name?’ He began to stroll towards her, a little smile playing on his lips.
‘Yes, that’s right. A bit like Mandy.’
‘Eh?’ He stopped dead. ‘What did you say?’
‘I said my name is a bit like Mandy-two syllables, five letters-’
‘What do you know about Mandy?’
‘Which Mandy are we talking about? Mandy Rice-Davies? Or Mandy Bryant of twenty-three Tulip Court?’
‘Don’t get fucking smart with me, bitch. How do you know about Mandy?’
‘And Sophie. Well, how would we know? I mean, who do we know that knows about Mandy and Sophie? Now Sophie is two syllables and six letters. Like Connie. That’s a coincidence too, isn’t it?’
He was standing right over her now, glaring down, and Kathy smiled sweetly back up at him, feeling like a swimmer floundering through crocodile-infested waters. She watched him raise his hand and bring it down across her face once, twice. He seemed to like to work in twos, she thought: two bullets, two blows. One just wasn’t enough for Upper North. She heard his voice talking angrily, to her presumably, but she couldn’t make it out, what with the roaring in her ears and the shock of the pain where his rings had split her mouth.
He squatted down beside her and gripped her by the hair and spoke distinctly into her ear. ‘Tell me, you fucking bitch, or I’ll cut your fucking tits off. Who’s Connie?’
So he didn’t know about Connie. She wondered where the knife was. She hadn’t noticed one so far.
‘She’s Harry’s girlfriend, of course,’ she mumbled through lips that seemed to be inflating as she spoke. ‘Who also happens to be DS Lowry’s wife.’
‘And she told you about Sophie and Mandy?’ he hissed.
‘That’s what DS Lowry said.’
He pushed her head away so hard that she sprawled sideways onto the floor, arms trapped painfully behind her. From this position she watched his trainers stride away, then begin pacing backwards and forwards across the room. As they passed Orr, the prostrate figure groaned feebly and tried to raise a hand. North stopped, launched two vicious kicks at the old man, then continued on his way.