that the glance back was just too much. His balance went. The rear wheel went out sideways, the bike slewed left across the road and slid in a shower of sparks, hit the kerb and threw the driver off. There was a chorus of horns and brakes, and piercingly, heard even over the traffic, someone screamed. The rider rolled over and over at incredible speed, like a small black log hurtling down a mountainside. A truck, coming briskly round the corner from Goldhawk Road had no chance to brake and nowhere to swerve to. Slider felt his scalp go cold, heard Fathom swear, and saw the bike go under the wheels with a hideous series of sounds.
But the speed the rider had rolled had saved him, taking him just clear as the truck lurched to a stop, scattering a tinkling of small glass and metal from the mangled thing under the wheels. As the traffic came to a standstill, leather-man staggered to his feet, pushing himself against the lorry’s snout to make his balance. Slider caught a glimpse of the lorry driver, white and rigid behind the wheel, eyes and mouth three shocked O’s, as Atherton swerved across to the kerb and stopped at a diagonal in front of all the mess.
They were all out in a second, but leather-man was already on the move. He ran, limping stiffly the first few steps; glanced round, found some adrenaline reserve, and went like the clappers, limp forgotten. They pounded after him.
‘Bloody Mel Gibson,’ Atherton said tersely.
There were pedestrians scattered about, halting and looking round, uncertain what was happening.
‘Police,’ Slider shouted. ‘Stop that man.’
But no-one did. One man put out a feeble foot but leather-man easily avoided it. ‘What’s ’e done?’ Slider heard someone shout. His whole burning attention was fixed on the fleeing black figure. The accident must have hurt him. It would tell against him.
Leather-man’s hands went up to the helmet, dragged it off and dropped it. It bounced like a hand-grenade, plastic splintering. Slider’s heart sang as the long red hair fell loose and flew out behind the runner like a flag. No doubt then – it
Atherton was ahead in the pursuit, and the heavy, less nimble Fathom was falling behind Slider. Strung out in a line they pounded after the black stick-figure with the flying red mane. Atherton almost had him and he dodged again, jinked left and right and then left again – dammit – back into the traffic and across the road. Slider jerked round to throw a diagonal course and cut him off, and Fathom ran into him from behind. Slider shouted something, he didn’t know what, and was off again.
Why didn’t someone try and stop him? Bloody useless civilians! Whatever happened to civic pride? Bates was doubling back towards the cinemas now. Slider’s cut-across had made up a few yards. Bates looked round and for an instant their eyes locked, and Bates grinned – but he might have been gasping for breath. Always kept himself fit, Slider remembered, his own breath catching at him now. No, he
And at last some concerned citizens were acting. Out of the corner of his eye Slider saw a knot gathered about the stalled lorry; and ahead a group of men had formed a nervous-looking but moderately determined line across the pavement.
Slider shouted again, to encourage them. ‘Police! Stop him!’ Two in the middle of the row linked arms.
And there were a lot of people behind them, the usual rubberneckers gathering for a gape, beginning to solidify into a crowd. Bates must have seen there would be no way through, for he dodged right, down the alley between the two cinemas. ‘Gottim!’ he heard Atherton shout. The alley was a dead end. Slider allowed himself to slow just a fraction, so he could catch his breath. He could hear Fathom thundering up behind.
Bates ran, still lightly, damn him, down the alley before them. The larger cinema, on the right, presented a smooth wall with nothing but three sets of fire doors, the sort that can only be opened from the inside. At the end was a high, blank wall, and a clutch of overflowing wheelie bins. The smaller cinema, on the left, had a fire escape down the wall at the far end, and with a sense of inevitability he saw that Bates was making for it. Why didn’t he just give up? Atherton evidently thought the same, because he yelled, ‘You can’t get away. You’re trapped.’
Bates didn’t even look back. He leapt up the fire escape like a salmon, and Slider cursed inside his head – he hadn’t the breath to do it aloud.
It was an old-fashioned, black-painted iron staircase, the short flights zig-zagging between small landings. Slider started up behind Atherton, smelling the metal and a sourness of garbage on the air, feeling the handrail clammy under his hand – it had started drizzling very lightly. Atherton’s nimbleness was matched now against Bates’s fitness, but the accident was telling and Bates was limping again. The two made the turns simultaneously like dancers, one short flight apart. Slider was another flight behind. His breathing went through an agony point and he tasted metal in the back of his throat, and then his second wind kicked in. He reached the roof almost on Atherton’s heels.
Over the parapet and on to the flat concrete. There were ventilation outlets, steaming slightly in the drizzle, a light haar which became visible like a gauze veil as a security light was triggered. It was mounted over the square brick protrusion that housed the fire door back into the cinema. Bates ran to it and tried the door, briefly and hopelessly. It would only open from the inside.
Slider stopped, turned back to where Fathom was just reaching the top of the fire escape. ‘Stay there!’ he shouted. He didn’t want Bates dodging them all in a Dick Van Dyke chase round the chimneys and nipping back down. Atherton had stopped too, facing Bates, who backed now, slowly, away from the fire door, his eyes darting round to assess the situation. The haar was standing on his red hair like jewels. Slider could see his chest rising and falling under the close black leather. The fox was cornered and spent.
Slider walked forward towards him. ‘Give it up,’ he said. ‘There’s nowhere else to go. Come on, you know you’ve had it now.’
‘Come quietly, is that it?’ Bates said. His teeth were bared as he caught his breath, and his voice was higher and harsher than Slider remembered. ‘I don’t think so, Mr Plod. Not for you, that’s for damn sure. If you want me, you’ll have to take me.’
Slider felt a weariness that was nothing to do with his trembling legs come over him. ‘Oh, don’t be so bloody silly,’ he said impatiently. ‘You’re cornered, you’re nabbed, and there’s nobody watching you but us, so you can drop the phoney heroics. This is real life, not a film.’
‘You don’t know the meaning of real life,’ Bates said, backing all the while towards the parapet. ‘You pathetic second-rater, do you really think you can get the better of me? You can’t touch me.’
‘You have friends in high places, I know,’ Slider said. ‘Don’t think they’re going to bale you out this time. You’re going down.’
Bates reached the parapet, a low wall topped with flat stone slabs. He glanced quickly over to see if there was any escape that way, and began to inch along beside it. Atherton and Slider advanced steadily, adjusting to his direction. He reached the corner and glanced over the second side. Slider suddenly wondered if there was another fire escape. Bloody Nora, if he had to start running again . . .! ‘For God’s sake, give it up,’ he said.
Atherton exchanged a glance with him. His look said it all: why didn’t they just grab him? Slider opened his mouth to answer that look when he saw that Fathom, disobeying orders, was creeping up from the right, the direction in which Bates was sidling.
Bates glanced in that direction, scowled horribly, mouthed one short word of anger. He jumped up on the parapet, looking left and right for escape, staring at the next building – far too far away to jump, even for an egotistical athlete.
As one man, Slider and Atherton stepped forward. Bates dodged left, running along the parapet. As if he could read his mind, Slider knew he was going to make for the fire escape. He turned his head back to Fathom, jerked an arm towards it. ‘Get back over there!’
Perhaps Bates looked round too, or reacted to Slider’s arm movement. Slider replayed it afterwards a hundred times in his mind. Perhaps it was nothing but the sheerest accident. The parapet was damp from the mizzle; Bates had been limping, so he must have hurt his leg. Whatever it was, his foot slipped and he rocked off balance. His arms flailed, and his eyes met Slider’s in one awful locked instant of mutual knowledge. Slider and Atherton both leapt forward, arms out, hands reaching. But Bates was gone, and there was only rough concrete under their grasping hands as they leaned over, looking down into the alley. Someone said, ‘Christ!’ and he never knew who it was, Atherton or Fathom. Maybe even himself. And a sound came up to them, a ghastly thud of a sort that Slider
