Angel Hunt (30 page)

So that was it. That was why Tony had been so keen to see Lara before he left. She'd somehow talked him into borrowing the training films on explosives for her and he'd wanted them back. That's when she'd noticed one was missing and my card – as the only person from outside the cell to have access – had been marked from then on.

‘Goodbye, Geoffrey. It's not going to be how we planned it, but I'm going through with it and you can't stop me.'

I watched her climb the stairs and close the door at the top behind her. She didn't look round and neither did Bell. He stood with his arms limp at his sides, head bowed. He could have been praying.

When I heard the front door slam, and I was more or less sure she'd gone, I exhaled loudly.

‘You can come out from behind there if you wish,' said Bell. ‘I won't hurt you unless you attempt to leave.'

‘I don't think I can,' I said truthfully.

Most of the muscles I had left without bruises on them seemed to have knotted with the tension. My buttocks ached and my right leg had decided against adopting the vertical ever again.

Bell took hold of the desk by its edges and eased it back; I howled as one of the legs caught my right foot slightly, but by curling my left leg under the right one, I was able at least to shuffle into a sitting position facing him. He backed away and sat on the bottom stair, elbows on knees, chin resting on his clasped hands.

‘I'm sorry about Lara,' he said.

‘Not half as sorry as I am,' I said wearily. ‘You know what she's up to, don't you?'

‘Yes,' he said, averting his eyes.

‘She's got a bomb, hasn't she?'

‘Yes.'

‘Semtex, plastic explosives. The stuff they had on that video.'

‘Yes.' Quieter now.

‘Where did she get it?'

No answer.

‘Was it her brother, Peter?'

‘I can't say.'

‘Where is this Peter, Geoffrey?'

‘I can't say.'

‘Is Lara going to meet him?'

He snickered at that. ‘Oh no. She's doing this all by herself.'

‘Doing what, Geoffrey?'

‘I can't say.'

‘Stop playing the broken record, Geoffrey. She's gone after Professor Bamforth, hasn't she?'

His head snapped up and his eyes glowed.

‘How did you know that?'

‘Billy left notes. Not much. The name, Brian Bamforth –' I tried to remember exactly what I'd found at Billy's, but the old brain wasn't exactly speeding into action ‘– and the word “transgenic” and a date: New Year's Eve. She's just brought things forward, that's all, isn't it?'

‘I can't say any more,' he said.

‘You haven't said anything yet, Geoffrey. And you might as well, because tonight – one way or another – it's all over. It can't have been easy, playing at urban commandos. You're not cut out for it. Billy certainly wasn't.'

He sat in silence for a minute. Then he said: ‘Are you really here because of Billy?'

‘That's why I came originally, yes.'

‘Was he a close friend?'

‘Not particularly. Hadn't seen him for years, then suddenly he's dead right in front of me. I didn't like that.'

‘Why not?' He seemed genuinely curious.

‘Damned if I know for sure. It just seemed such a waste. The whole thing does. You'll never get anywhere hurting people to stop them hurting animals.'

He nodded his head.

‘I know that. I think I always have known it. But much of the time, there simply seems to be no other way. Have you ever felt really angry about something? Not jealous, or shocked, or annoyed, but really
angry
?'

‘I try not to, Geoffrey. Life's too short.'

I don't think he heard me.

‘Even when you're in the right, anger is a terrible thing: a destroyer of relationships, of happiness.'

He was either getting maudlin or rehearsing his next sermon. At least he didn't look dangerous.

‘Is Lara that angry with the world, Geoffrey? Angry enough to kill someone?'

‘She already has,' he said softly. ‘Indirectly. But God knows she was responsible.'

I licked my lips. I had to be careful. The guy was so guilt-ridden I could turn it to my advantage. Alternatively, he could react the other way and blow a fuse.

‘It was her at the Dwyer Street school, wasn't it? Lara and Billy.' I said it softly. ‘She was the one Billy was running from when he fell. That's what happened, wasn't it?'

‘Yes,' he said with relief, ‘it was Lara. She'd suspected Billy for some time – suspected him of possibly betraying the cell. When we got to the school and we found the animals had gone, she thought it was Billy setting us up.'

‘So she took him aside for a few choice words; the sort of conversation she had with me earlier this evening, eh? But Billy knew about the Kateda. Knew what she could do. And what? He tried to jump her, get in first?'

‘I think so. He was very frightened. I saw him going across the roof. Lara was chasing him.' He looked at me, and there was a flash of fear across his face. ‘She didn't get to him. He fell – he just disappeared – while she was still yards away. You've got to believe that.'

‘That's okay, Geoffrey, I do.'

I tried to change position, because I was cramping up and he was suddenly alert again. I showed him the palms of my hands to indicate I wasn't going anywhere.

‘Did you teach her the Kateda?' I asked for the sake of getting him talking again.

‘No, she taught me.'

I wasn't sure whether that made me feel better or worse.

‘Was Peter with you that night at Dwyer Street?'

‘Yes, he was driving.'

‘Where is Peter?'

‘In prison.'

‘Prison?'

‘He was arrested just a few days ago, at a demonstration. He was sentenced to a month in prison because he refused to say anything.'

This was rich. If only Prentice knew. His fearsome Action Against Animal Abuse cell was already at half-strength. One dead, one inside.

But Lara was the one at large.

‘You've got to stop her, Geoffrey.'

‘I can't.'

‘I lied to her, Geoffrey. I have been talking to the police. They know I'm here and they know Professor Bamforth is a target and they know you've been playing with explosives.'

‘Then they'll stop her,' he said, more to himself than me. Then, looking up again: ‘Can you forgive her, Roy?'

I made a play of looking at my foot and checking my cuts and bruises.

‘Of course I can,' I said, because I felt it the right thing to say. ‘I'll live.'

‘I'm sorry she's taken your taxi,' said Bell.

What? The lousy bitch. I'll see her in hell.

Now it was war.

 

‘You've got to let me out of here, Geoffrey. I think I can stop her.'

‘I can't,' he said simply.

‘Why not?'

‘I promised her I would keep you here.'

‘That's it? You'll let her go after this Bamforth guy and stick a bomb through his letter-box when I could –'

Something in his face gave me an awful thought.

‘The bomb's in Armstrong, isn't it?'

He said nothing, which was like speaking volumes.

I twisted round to try and get a grip on the wall and pull myself up. I don't know how I did it myself. My side hurt as I twisted, my left arm hurt as I tried to tension myself against the brickwork, and I was trying to keep my right leg away from anything.

‘You'll hurt yourself,' said Bell.

I'd heard that before as well.

‘Please don't hurt yourself any more, Roy. There's nothing you can do. I'm going now, and I'll lock the door, so there's no point in struggling.'

He started up the stairs. He was right, and I almost cried in frustration. All he had to do was leave and lock the door. It would take me a day and a night to climb those stairs alone.

Okay, then. No more Mister Nice Guy.

‘It won't be just you, Geoffrey. They'll get you, but it won't be just you. They're after Lucy as well. Lucy Scarrott, Geoffrey, remember her?'

That had stopped him in his tracks, halfway up.

‘The police think there's a connection between her and Billy, and they've been looking for her. I could tell them where she is.'

I was almost upright now and sweating fit for a Turkish bath. Each time I tried to put my right foot down, it was pure agony.

‘What?' He'd said something I'd missed.

‘You've seen Lucy?'

‘Oh yes, I've seen her. She wasn't involved with Billy at all, except as a friend, though he probably loved her madly. I'll bet he went for Lara as well, just like you did.'

I'd lost him again. He wasn't listening any more. I had to find another chink in him, but without it rebounding in violence, against me.

‘I met Lucy's daughter as well, Geoffrey. Lovely little kid.'

A guess, but a good one.

‘What's her name?' he asked quietly.

‘Of course, she'd be taken into care if anything happened to Lucy ...'

‘What's her name?' he shouted.

Bullseye.

‘Cleo. She's a beautiful little girl. Really.'

He stayed where he was; frozen on the stairs. I tried an experimental hop, overbalanced and touched the floor with my right foot. I almost fainted and went into a one-legged crouch a bit like a Cossack dancer after a heavy night.

He was talking again.

‘I promised. I can't let you out.'

There was a definite emphasis on the last ‘I,' but before I could plead again, he had gone. Five steps up and then the door slammed and I heard a bolt shoot home.

More in despair than anything, I threw myself at the stairs, and to my surprise I got my arms onto the bottom one. If I could haul myself up them, all I would have to deal with was a bolted door, a 60-mile jog to London and a black belt female psychopath with a car bomb.

Should do it by midnight; no problem.

I was two steps from the top when the bolt was drawn back. Exposed, unarmed and helpless, I cowered down behind the step so at least he couldn't get a straight shot at my head.

The door opened and a female voice said: ‘Bloody hell, you look like the pits, man.'

I risked a glance over the step. Bright yellow high heels, black fishnet tights, gold lurex figure-hugging strapless dress and a brown leather bomber jacket hung dead casual over one shoulder.

‘Hello, Stephie,' I smiled. ‘Boy, am I glad to see you.'

 

‘I still think we should have called the police,' she said for the tenth time.

‘Where's your spirit of adventure? Light me another cigarette, will you?'

I should have listened more closely to the Reverend Bell. He'd said
he
couldn't let me out, because he'd promised Lara, and some weird and wonderful bond, which I couldn't fathom, had held him to that. So he'd gone over to the disco at The Five Bells and told Stephie to come and do it. When I'd asked where he was, she'd said she'd last seen him heading for the church and the lights coming on there.

I hoped for his sake that God had left the answering machine on over the holiday.

‘Who gave you the black eye?' she'd asked.

‘Nobody gave it to me, I had to fight for it,' I'd said, and made her help me out of the rectory.

With great presence of mind, she'd left me sitting on a flower tub while she went back inside, to emerge with my anorak (and wallet) and a walking stick she'd purloined from the hat-stand in the hall. It appeared that all rectories of that age came with a hat-stand full of walking sticks. It must be in the contract somewhere.

I had to admit it helped, but it was still comforting to have a lean on her as well. When she'd said ‘What now?' I had taken 20 pounds out of my wallet and told her to go over to the pub and buy a bottle of whisky, some cigarettes – to hell with good intentions – and find someone willing to drive me to London. And to offer however much cash, paid on arrival, they wanted.

She'd come back after no more than ten minutes, unscrewing the cap on the whisky bottle as she click-clacked her high heels up the path. I'd taken a pull on the bottle as she'd unwrapped the cigarettes.

‘I got matches too,' she'd said.

‘Initiative,' I'd replied, between drinks.