LITMIR.BIZ

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they drew near Colin whispered, ‘It’s a Paki.’

      ‘Brilliant, Watson. Any more deductions?’

      The man stepped towards them. ‘Can I help you?’

      They were taken aback by his Oxford accent.

      ‘Excuse me, sir, but is this your van?’

      The man turned round as if to check it was still there. ‘Yes,’ he said, then, as an afterthought, ‘May I enquire who’s asking?’

      Remembering procedure and feeling suddenly a bit stupid, Paul fumbled in his jacket pocket and produced his identity card. ‘Police,’ he said.

      The man smiled. ‘Splendid. How can I help you?’

      Becoming impatient, Colin said, ‘Was that a gunshot we heard just now?’

      The man’s eyes widened theatrically. ‘A gunshot? I certainly hope not.’

      ‘Well, what was it then?’

      ‘I really couldn’t say. I didn’t hear anything.’ He turned to the driver, who had got out of the van and joined him. In contrast to the two policemen they were both tall, lean and fit.

      Paul glanced back at the house. ‘Would you come with us, please, sir?’

      The man shrugged. ‘If you insist, officer.’ He said something quickly to the driver in a language that the policemen could not understand.

      Keeping the man in front of him, Paul walked down the driveway towards the house. As the front door was shut they veered towards the side gate. ‘After you, if you don’t mind, sir,’ he said. Again the man shrugged politely, still smiling.

      A window showed into the kitchen and although the room itself was empty they could hear something being smashed elsewhere in the house. Before they could ask any more questions the man turned and explained, ‘We’re doing some construction work, you see. A really wealthy fellow, the owner. He wanted all sorts of alterations done.’

      Colin relaxed, whispering, ‘I thought so. Sodding builders. The boss is going to roast us alive when the heavies turn up and find out. We’ll be the laughing-stock of the whole bloody force.’

      They reached the back of the house and saw a large, well-kept garden stretching down to a tall hedge at the bottom.

      ‘Come on,’ Paul said miserably. ‘Let’s get this over with.’ He turned to the man. ‘We’d better check it out if you don’t mind.’

      For the first time the man’s calm smile faltered and a second later it died altogether. His eyes chilled and narrowed and he sighed heavily. ‘Of course. I understand. I very much regret the inconvenience to you though.’

      Paul chuckled pleasantly. ‘It’s no bother, sir. Just a peek and then we’ll leave you in peace. So as we can say we did our duty.’

      ‘Naturally. Duty,’ the man said, his voice low and matter of fact. He seemed to be searching for something in his pocket and when he pulled out a small automatic pistol Paul and Colin stared at it dumbly, the shock not even registering.

      ‘We all have our duty to perform,’ the man said. He took a single step backwards, widened his stance and shot Colin in the solar plexus with a rapid double tap. Colin staggered against the wall, his mouth opening and shutting like a fish out of water, and then sank to the floor. Paul watched in mesmerized horror as the smoking muzzle flicked on to its new target. Behind it, the man seemed almost apologetic for what he had just done, and, more particularly, for what he was about to do.

      ‘If only you’d stayed in your car and minded your own business. But you know what they say about curiosity and the cat.’

      Paul held out his hand as if ordering a car to stop, as the first of the bullets spat straight through his palm and hammered into his ribcage. He clutched at the wound and his knees gave way.

      ‘You bastard,’ he muttered, his words sounding distant and garbled. He didn’t seem able to get his tongue around the syllables he had used so often in the past. ‘You fucking…’

      He fell on to his back and stared up at the foul grey sky. Rain stung his face but it was strangely refreshing, a counter to the ache he was just beginning to feel. Suddenly the sky filled with the man’s enquiring face looking down at him. Then he saw the muzzle again, lowering, getting monstrously large until he felt its warm metal pushing into his mouth. He tried to speak, to plead, but the cold muzzle was being forced upwards, pressing into the roof of his mouth, the line of the short, hard barrel aiming directly through the slim bone and into the brain.

      There were words in his head, something about being so terribly sorry. Wrong place and wrong time. The man’s voice was calm as if talking about the weather. The weather. It was a shit-awful day to die, Paul thought, as the pistol flinched at the sudden pressure being applied to the trigger.

       2

      By the time Don Headley received the news the phones in the ops room were already buzzing with enquiries from the press. At first he couldn’t believe what had happened. Reality had broken into the middle of his exercise and two men were dead.

      As soon as he could he got away from his desk and drove to Bramley Road. It was mid-morning and the traffic was heavy. On all sides drivers drummed their steering wheels in frustration as the long queues edged slowly forwards. The rain had stopped and a harsh winter light percolated through the thick layers of cloud, muting the colours into one continuous semblance of grey. It was a part of the country Don particularly hated, the dense belt of urban wasteland spread thickly around central London. Successive decades had added to it, pushing it out ever further until towns that had once counted themselves lucky to be outside the city now found themselves being sucked in, not enjoying full membership but rather taken on board as second-class citizens in a dubious club.

      Hounslow, Isleworth, Sunbury, Feltham – the names rolled past, each representing an identical sprawl of little red houses and car-packed residential streets. It wasn’t so long ago that such roads would have boasted hardly a single vehicle parked at the kerbside, but increasing prosperity had combined with thoughtless marketing by the car manufacturers, whose eyes were solely on profit, and it had resulted in nearly every household owning at least one vehicle. Along either side of every road parked cars were jammed in nose to tail. It struck Don as a case of suicide by self-strangulation on a national scale. No one individual was prepared to sacrifice his car, not even with the prospect looming of the next generation gassing itself. Public transport was overcrowded and stank, so what was the incentive?

      For an incentive to work and change a lifestyle it had to produce a more immediate threat. But then with smoking even that hadn’t worked, Don reflected as he waited impatiently behind a lorry that was belching obnoxious blue fumes. It was almost possible to predict to a smoker the year in which his habit would bring about his agonizing death, and yet nine times out of ten he would continue. What was the answer? Don was buggered if he knew. Perhaps the species was on track for extinction and it was as simple as that. Self-destruction had replaced self-preservation as the prime motivation in the human psyche, and no one had even noticed. He grinned sardonically. They had probably been too busy watching Gladiators.

      It was another half hour before he drew up outside the house. A policeman came to his window to wave him on but he produced a pass and was allowed to go in search of a parking space. The curtains in the neighbouring houses twitched as inquisitive eyes followed him out of the car and down the driveway. The couple in the house on the opposite side of the road were less circumspect and stood at their open doorway, mugs of tea in their hands, interested to find their mundane existence disrupted by something as exciting as a murder.

      Chief Inspector Rod Chiltern met Don at the front of the house.

      ‘The SOCO’s round the back with his lads. Be careful not to touch anything.’

      Don scowled at

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