The Bullet Trick

'Don’t worry. It’ll still be here when you come back.'

I tried to see what Blunt was doing from my position up at the bar, but we’d chosen our spot well and he was hidden from view. When I returned with the drinks he’d lit another cigarette, this time he offered me one.

'Where did you say this woman disappeared from?'

'Essex, it’s near London.'

'I know where it is, and you presumably know it’s not in my jurisdiction; there’s nothing I could do with this except pass it on.'

'Aye, but at least then there would be a record. They’d be forced to investigate.'

Blunt took the head off his pint.

'Maybe so, maybe no.' He sighed. 'What your contact said about me being straight was right. I don’t take bribes and I don’t take bungs.' I looked towards the bar and he took another drag of his fag. 'I’ve got a tab, paid up every Friday on the dot. I do my best. Some people like it, some people don’t, fuck them. But I don’t go out of my way to make enemies.

Accusing a well-respected officer in the largest force in the country of being an accessory to the murder of his sister-in-law is a sure-fire way to get yourself into trouble.' He turned, looked me full in the face and pushed the envelope back at me with the edge of a beer mat.

'I can’t do anything, not on that.'

'But you’re saying you think it looks dodgy?'

'I’m saying nothing.'

'But if I get more evidence you might be able to do something?'

Blunt drained the last of his pint.

'Gathering evidence is the job of the police.' He took a notebook and pen out of his pocket. 'What did you say the missing woman’s name was?'

'Gloria Noon.'

Blunt wrote the name down and replaced the notebook. 'And the name of the inquisitive officer in the Met?'

'Montgomery, James Montgomery.'

I waited for him to jot it down and when he didn’t asked, 'Aren’t you going to put his name in your book?'

'I’m sure I can remember it.' Blunt shook his head wearily. 'This used to be a nice quiet pub.' He took out his wallet and rifled through it until he found a card. He checked to see there was nothing written on its back then passed it to me. 'Call if you have anything useful, don’t bother otherwise. I’m not a sociable drinker, remember that in future.'

Berlin

IT WAS TWO o’clock in the morning. Dix had looked at his watch so often in the rental car during our journey that I’d grown nervous about his driving. Now he glanced at it again while he fiddled with the heavy padlock to the door of the warehouse.

I could smell the odour of damp earth brought forth by the night. Close your eyes and you could be miles from the city in a freshly planted country garden, a new tilled field, or a cemetery ready for custom.

I asked, 'Who are these people?'

Sylvie pulled her long coat closer and stamped her red shoes against the ground, shivering. Dix threw her an impatient look, then turned the key and prised back the hasp.

'Would it make any difference if you knew?'

'Maybe.'

'It’s too late for questions, William, just do as we discussed and it’ll be payday.'

Sylvie wasn’t the only one who was dressed up. Dix had revealed an unexpected showmanship, finding an outfit for me that would add a macabre touch to the proceedings.

A black costume decorated front and back with a white glow-in-the-dark skeleton. There was a mask to go with it too, a grinning skull. The mask did a good job of hiding my bruises, but I’d been worried that my gut distorted the bones. Sylvie had reassured me.

'You look yummy, William. Death come to carry off my fresh young flesh.'

I’d pulled the skull over my face and stalked her round the lounge, arms outstretched till Sylvie had let me scoop her, giggling and wriggling, onto the couch. I’d affected an aristocratic accent, Christopher Lee as Count Dracula.

'Your funeral bower, my dear.'

She’d mocked a faint and Dix had watched us with the indulgent smile of a miser reckoning money due.

The joke didn’t seem so good now and the Halloween costume had lost its carnival air.

Sylvie was as white as my fake bones. I put an arm around her but she pulled away impatiently.

'Let’s just get this over with.'

'You don’t have to go through with it if you don’t want to.'

Her laugh was harsh against the night.

Dix said, 'It’ll be over soon. Less than an hour and we’ll all walk away safely with cash in our pockets.'

Glasgow

BLUNT NEEDED MORE evidence before he could act and I had an idea of how I might get it. Like all the best tricks, it relied on a good grasp of psychology and a lot of finesse, but with the right assistance it could be simple.

I went back to the Internet café and checked up on flights from London. Then it was time to step into character and make a phone call. After that there was nothing much to do except hope and wait. I went back to my bedsit, poured myself a drink, lay down on the bed and started working through the moves over and over again, until the homeward screech of buses drifted into the diesel growl of taxis and shouts of late-night drinkers. Eventually even they died away and I was left in silence, looking at the splash of light thrown by the streetlamp outside my window, wondering if Blunt would buy my scheme and if he did, whether it had any real chance of success.

Berlin

SYLVIE WAS SOMEWHERE on the other edge of darkness. Dix and I stood side by side waiting for the signal. I sensed a movement and floodlights clicked on, searing white in the centre of the empty warehouse. A voice came from out of the firmament.

'OK, proceed.'

I’d expected German, but the words were English and the accents that came from the dark had an American twang. I looked at Dix.

'American?'

His voice held a hard edge of contempt.

'They still think Berlin is a place where they can get something they can’t at home.'

I grinned and pulled the skull over my face, the whole thing making more sense now that I realised it was all the whim of a rich Yank with a taste for the exotic.

'Then let’s oblige him.'

Dix put his hand on my arm.

'These are not holidaymakers who have wandered off the tourist trail.'

'What are you trying to tell me?'

'Sylvie knows her role. This is for her sake as much as mine. Just play your part and everything will be fine.'

I started to speak, but Dix put a finger over his lips and I heard the slow hollow sound of high heels striking against the wooden floor. Sylvie stepped out of the darkness into the floodlit centre of the warehouse. My poor victim looked magnificent. She wore a long silver robe that shimmered against the light; sparkles flashed from hair dark as coffin wood and her lips were painted a blood-red black that invited no kisses.

We waited for a beat of ten then Dix wrapped a black silk scarf across his face, nodded to me and strode forth, his footsteps brisk and full of business. He halted a foot away from Sylvie. She looked beyond him, ignoring his presence, and then dropped her robe, arching her back as if daring him to lay a finger on her, her naked body pale and magical against the pitch black. Dix stood frozen in place for a beat of ten while Sylvie stalked a full circle around him, like a half-tamed predator, not hungry but a killer by nature. I held my breath, wondering if they’d choreographed this earlier, or if Sylvie really was making her mind up about whether to go on. Then she stretched her spine like a show lion deciding to let its trainer live another day, and placed herself against the board. Dix immediately stepped forward and started to secure her, his fingers nimble and efficient, buckling the leather straps around her wrists and ankles, tugging at them to show they were firmly fastened.

I tried to push all other thoughts from my mind, whispering a mantra over and over in my head, concentrate, concentrate, concentrate… and then it was my turn to walk into the light.