She pushed me out of the car and I fell into the street. Then she dragged me up off the floor and started pulling me along with her. I looked back at the car. The driver’s door was open — he must have grabbed the handle just as he realized what she was going to do to him — and what was left of Pedro was lying, half in and half out, slumped against the kerb. When Karla saw that I was looking back she struck me in the face again and pushed me on.
We reached the main door of Thorn Bird Studios, which she kicked open. I went in ahead of her. It seemed light and warm inside, almost homely. Vincent was sitting behind his desk drinking a cup of tea and reading a Sunday magazine. Seeing me, covered in blood, shaking, barely able to stand, he dropped the magazine and got to his feet. He was about to say something when Karla appeared. They stared at each other for perhaps three or four seconds: it was the first time he had seen her in ten years. Then she said, ‘This is for Sandra. And this is for Claire,’ and fired twice.
Both shots missed.
She lunged at him, then; but with a show of unexpected strength he lifted up the desk and shoved it at her. Thrown off balance, she fell to the ground.
‘Follow him, you bastard, follow him.’
Vincent had made a dash for it down an unlit corridor. I found the time-switch and slammed it on just in time to see him disappear round a corner. Karla pushed past me, nearly knocking me over, and without stopping to ask myself why, I followed her.
The pursuit can’t have lasted more than a couple of minutes. Every few seconds the lights would go off and the corridors would be thrown into darkness, and I’d have to grope frantically for the nearest switch: I knew that Vincent could find his way just as easily in the dark. He took us up and down all those countless little staircases until we were dizzy and hopelessly disorientated. Finally, it seemed as though we had lost him altogether. We stood there, panting in the darkness, straining to hear his footsteps above the muffled noise of bands practising in the adjacent rehearsal rooms.
‘Shit,’ said Karla. ‘SHIT!’
Then I found a light switch and turned it on: and there was Vincent, at the far end of the corridor, struggling to unlock the door of Studio B. Before we could get there he had slipped inside and closed the door behind him.
The lights went out again. I put a restraining hand on Karla’s arm and took a few breaths.
‘We’ve got him,’ I said. ‘He can’t lock the studio door from inside.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes.’
‘What’s in there?’
‘I don’t know.’
She shook free of my hand and stepped back.
‘Then we’ll soon find out.’
But now I did an amazing thing. I said, ‘Hold on’, and blocked her way. Some maniacal form of bravado seemed to have possessed me, and I heard myself saying, ‘I’ll go in first.’ When this suggestion met with incredulous silence, I added: ‘It might be dangerous.’
In one swift, decisive movement, I pulled open the door of Studio B, and charged.
If I had stopped to look down, just for a second, I would have seen that there was a narrow iron ladder fixed to the wall. It led to a little landing-stage from which, sometimes, the shouts of sailors would rise up into the night air as they loaded and unloaded their boats. But I didn’t stop. I caught a sudden glimpse of clouds skimming over the face of a lambent moon, and plunged headlong into the ink-black ice-cold waters of the Thames.
Fade
and everybody’s got to live their life
and God knows I’ve got to live mine
God knows I’ve got to live mine
If you leave the main road as it curves around The Fox House pub, and head downhill, through the woods, you soon come to a wide, fast-moving stream. It can be crossed at various points. There are stepping stones, for the agile, and there are two wooden footbridges; pausing here, you can watch the bubbling water through gaps between the planks. As you walk further down, the terrain becomes wilder. Huge rocks and felled trees lie at the borders of the stream, and just before the path begins to shelve steeply into dense woodland you can turn, and above you is a magnificent ridge; your eye lingers on this bare, sweeping landscape, fixing on the point where the earth gives way to sky and the palest of blues lights up the horizon. There are other walkers about, but it is quiet: you might almost say silent.
‘I love it here,’ said Stacey.
‘It’s beautiful,’ I agreed.
‘Beats London, doesn’t it?’ said Derek.
I squatted down by the edge of the stream, running my fingers through the water. Dew was still thick on the ground and the breeze was heady with the scent of spring.
‘Anything beats London.’
Coming home had been the easiest thing in the world, after all. The first day I felt able to go out again — about a week or two after my return — I had climbed one of Sheffield’s highest hills, watched the whole city as its lights began to spread with the onset of dusk, and it had seemed incredible that I could have lived without the place for so long. It seemed warm and gentle and clean. And I had come to cherish the nearness of the countryside, to spend days retracing all my old walks, finding a new companionship in the dales whose friendship I had once been foolish enough to snub. More often than not, I would take these walks alone; but today I had asked Stacey and Derek to come with me. It was Sunday morning, the first really good Sunday of spring.
I heard her whisper: ‘You don’t have to keep reminding him.’
‘You don’t seem to realize,’ I said, ‘that I’m getting over it.’
‘He’s a tough kid, our William,’ said Derek. He started to climb a tree but got stuck half-way up.
‘Are you going to go down and see Tina soon?’ Stacey asked, taking advantage of his absence.
‘I don’t even have her new address.’
All I knew was that she had moved into a flat somewhere near Wimbledon, sharing with two other women. When Judith had given me this and no other information, I took it to be her way of hinting that I should keep my distance for a while.
‘Don’t feel guilty, William.’
I turned, and she was smiling at me. We stood like that for a while, on opposite sides of the path. Then there was a violent rustle of leaves and Derek jumped down from the tree, landing between us with a strangled cry. Stacey screamed and started laughing.
‘You scared me.’
‘Do you still have nightmares, William?’ Derek asked, as we walked on. He ignored her reproving glances.
‘Now and then.’
‘What would you do,’ he said, ‘if I told you that your worst nightmare was about to come true?’
‘Derek! Shut up!’
I considered: ‘Like what?’
‘They never found them, did they? Either of them.’
‘No.’
‘So Vincent could be… hiding behind that rock. And Karla could be waiting for us at the bottom of the hill.’
‘In theory. What of it?’
He clutched my shoulder with a claw-like hand, and said in a hoarse theatrical whisper: ‘Let me tell you; something worse, something infinitely worse is about to happen.’
I looked blank.
‘Didn’t you read about it in the paper?’
‘What?’
‘There’s a new Andrew Lloyd Webber musical opening in London this month.’
I groaned happily and pushed him away.
‘London’s miles off. I can cope with that.’
Derek took Stacey in his arms. He lifted her into the air and, twirling around, they enjoyed a long and energetic kiss while I studied the lichen formations on a nearby boulder. I suppose in my heart I still hadn’t quite come to terms with it.