Nick put his hands on her shoulders and lowered his face toward hers as if he intended to kiss her. “Who has stabbed whom?” he asked very quietly. “Who is dying?”
“I... she... Mr T-T-Toomy…”
“Bethany, say teacup.”
She looked at him, eyes shocked and uncomprehending. Brian was looking at Nick as though he had gone insane.
Nick gave the girl’s shoulders a little shake.
“Say teacup. Right now.”
“T-T-Teacup.”
“Teacup and saucer. Say it, Bethany.”
“Teacup and saucer.”
“All right. Better?”
She nodded. “Yes.”
“Good. If you feel yourself losing control again, say teacup at once and you’ll come back. Now — who’s been stabbed?”
“The blind girl. Dinah.”
“Bloody shit. All right, Bethany. Just—” Nick raised his voice sharply as he saw Brian move behind Bethany, headed for the ladder, with Albert right behind him. “No!” he shouted in a bright, hard tone that stopped both of them. “Stay fucking put!”
Brian, who had served two tours in Vietnam and knew the sound of unquestionable command when he heard it, stopped so suddenly that Albert ran face-first into the middle of his back. I knew it, he thought. I knew he’d take over. It was just a matter of time and circumstance.
“Do you know how this happened or where our wretched travelling companion is now?” Nick asked Bethany.
“The guy... the guy in the red shirt said”
“All right. Never mind.” He glanced briefly up at Brian. His eyes were red with anger. “The bloody fools left him alone. I’d wager my pension on it. Well, it won’t happen again. Our Mr Toomy has cut his last caper.”
He looked back at the girl. Her head drooped; her hair hung dejectedly in her face; she was breathing in great, watery swoops of breath.
“Is she alive, Bethany?” he asked gently.
“I... I... I... I…”
“Teacup, Bethany.”
“Teacup!” Bethany shouted, and looked up at him from teary, red-rimmed eyes. “I don’t know. She was alive when I... you know, came for you. She might be dead now. He really got her. Jesus, why did we have to get stuck with a fucking psycho? Weren’t things bad enough without that?”
“And none of you who were supposed to be minding this fellow have the slightest idea where he went following the attack, is that right?”
Bethany put her hands over her face and began to sob. It was all the answer any of them needed.
“Don’t be so hard on her,” Albert said quietly, and slipped an arm around Bethany’s waist. She put her head on his shoulder and began to sob more strenuously.
Nick moved the two of them gently aside. “If I was inclined to be hard on someone, it would be myself, Ace. I should have stayed behind.”
He turned to Brian.
“I’m going back into the terminal. You’re not. Mr Jenkins here is almost certainly right; our time here is short. I don’t like to think just how short. Start the engines but don’t move the aircraft yet. If the girl is alive, we’ll need the stairs to bring her up. Bob, bottom of the stairs. Keep an eye out for that bugger Toomy. Albert, you come with me.”
Then he said something which chilled them all.
“I almost hope she’s dead, God help me. It will save time if she is.”
2
Dinah was not dead, not even unconscious. Laurel had taken off her sunglasses to wipe away the sweat which had sprung up on the girl’s face, and Dinah’s eyes, deep brown and very wide, looked up unseeingly into Laurel’s blue-green ones. Behind her, Don and Rudy stood shoulder to shoulder, looking down anxiously.
“I’m sorry,” Rudy said for the fifth time. “I really thought he was out. Out cold.”
Laurel ignored him. “How are you, Dinah?” she asked softly. She didn’t want to look at the wooden handle growing out of the girl’s dress, but couldn’t take her eyes from it. There was very little blood, at least so far; a circle the size of a demitasse cup around the place where the blade had gone in, and that was all.
So far.
“It hurts,” Dinah said in a faint voice. “It’s hard to breathe. And it’s hot.”
“You’re going to be all right,” Laurel said, but her eyes were drawn relentlessly back to the handle of the knife. The girl was very small, and she couldn’t understand why the blade hadn’t gone all the way through her. Couldn’t understand why she wasn’t dead already.
“... out of here,” Dinah said. She grimaced, and a thick, slow curdle of blood escaped from the corner of her mouth and ran down her cheek.
“Don’t try to talk, honey,” Laurel said, and brushed damp curls back from Dinah’s forehead.
“You have to get out of here,” Dinah insisted. Her voice was little more than a whisper. “And you shouldn’t blame Mr Toomy. He’s... he’s scared, that’s all. Of them.”
Don looked around balefully. “If I find that bastard, I’ll scare him,” he said, and curled both hands into fists. A lodge ring gleamed above one knuckle in the growing gloom. “I’ll make him wish he was born dead.”
Nick came into the restaurant then, followed by Albert. He pushed past Rudy Warwick without a word of apology and knelt next to Dinah. His bright gaze fixed upon the handle of the knife for a moment, then moved to the child’s face.
“Hello, love.” He spoke cheerily, but his eyes had darkened. “I see you’ve been air-conditioned. Not to worry; you’ll be right as a trivet in no time flat.”
Dinah smiled a little. “What’s a trivet?” she whispered. More blood ran out of her mouth as she spoke, and Laurel could see it on her teeth. Her stomach did a slow, lazy roll.
“I don’t know, but I’m sure it’s something nice,” Nick replied. “I’m going to turn your head to one side. Be as still as you can.”
“Okay.”
Nick moved her head, very gently, until her cheek was almost resting on the carpet. “Hurt?”
“Yes,” Dinah whispered. “Hot. Hurts to... breathe.” Her whispery voice had taken on a hoarse, cracked quality. A thin stream of blood ran from her mouth and pooled on the carpet less than ten feet from the place where Craig Toomy’s blood was drying.
From outside came the sudden high-pressure whine of aircraft engines starting. Don, Rudy, and Albert looked in that direction. Nick never looked away from the girl. He spoke gently. “Do you feel like coughing, Dinah?”
“Yes... no... don’t know.”
“It’s better if you don’t,” he said. “If you get that tickly feeling, try to ignore it. And don’t talk anymore, right?”
“Don’t... hurt... Mr Toomy.” Her words, whispered though they were, conveyed great emphasis, great urgency.
“No, love, wouldn’t think of it. Take it from me.”
“... don’t... trust... you...”
He bent, kissed her cheek, and whispered in her ear: “But you can, you know — trust me, I mean. For now, all you’ve got to do is lie still and let us take care of things.”
He looked up at Laurel.
“You didn’t try to remove the knife?”
“I... no.” Laurel swallowed. There was a hot, harsh lump in her throat. The swallow didn’t move it. “Should I have?”
“If you had, there wouldn’t be much chance. Do you have any nursing experience?”
“No.”
“All right, I’m going to tell you what to do... but first I need to know if the sight of blood — quite a bit of it — is going to make you pass out. And I need the truth.”
Laurel said, “I haven’t really seen a lot of blood since my sister ran into a door and knocked out two of her teeth while we were playing hide-and-seek. But I didn’t faint then.”
“Good. And you’re not going to faint now. Mr Warwick, bring me half a dozen tablecloths from that grotty little pub around the corner.” He smiled down at the girl. “Give me a minute or two, Dinah, and I think you’ll feel much better. Young Dr Hopewell is ever so gentle with the ladies — especially the ones who are young and pretty.”