morning, the stuffy heat of the classroom began to have its effect. Some of the students were visibly struggling not to fall asleep.
At one point McKenna nodded so hard that he nearly fell off his chair. He only got away with it by turning the movement into a violent coughing fit. He was a skinny youngster with a pale complexion that seemed to go pink at the slightest provocation. By the time he’d finished he was flushed from his prominent Adam’s apple right up into the roots of his hair.
Gilby paused and momentarily closed his eyes during McKenna’s performance. The show of mild irritation was natural enough, but that wasn’t what bothered me. It was the sudden utter immobility that came over him.
The way he did it made my skin tighten.
I’d come across men before who had that same innate stillness and it always put the fear of God into me. Gilby may have carried off a civilised gloss, but underneath was something dark, that coiled and slithered. And just for a moment his flash of temper had let it show. I’d thought him another out-of-touch officer, a borderline upper- class twit, but I’d been wrong.
I glanced sideways at the others, but the majority of them hadn’t noticed the change that had come over him. The ex-policewoman, Elsa was one of the few that had, I saw. Declan was just looking bored.
“The days of muscle-bound heavies in dark glasses are over,” Gilby continued, as though nothing had happened. “There will always be occasions when you’re called upon to provide a visible deterrent, but most of the time you’ll need to blend in with the rich, the famous, and the powerful.” He cast a critical eye over the disparate bunch of us as we wilted in our chairs. “I imagine for some of you that’s going to take quite some learning.”
He checked his watch, nodded sharply, then swept up his papers and walked out with his back ram-rod straight.
“I wonder how well your man there blends into a crowd,” Declan muttered as we gathered our notebooks. “You’d spot him for army brass even if he was wearing a dress.”
***
We went straight from there into a class for unarmed combat with Blakemore. The instructor must have been using an ice pack on his knee since the morning’s run, because when he sauntered into the room designated as the gym there was no sign of the limp.
After spending more than four years teaching self-defence classes for women, it was interesting to be on the receiving end. Blakemore was showy, I considered, but with the underlying grace that denotes an expert. The coarse construction of his face, the heavy layout of his features, could have fooled you into thinking he was little more than a thug. I hadn’t been expecting such finesse or delicacy of technique, but it would seem my first impression of him had been the right one.
Now, he demonstrated half a dozen moves for restraint and removal of someone who might be approaching your principal in a threatening manner.
I was surprised to see that he was using O’Neill as his guinea pig. The Irishman was clearly unhappy to be put into repeated arm- and head-locks, and then dropped onto the crashmats under foot. A couple of times I caught him passing a hand over his ribs as he got to his feet. The looks he levelled towards the impassive Blakemore should have been enough to make him shiver.
Blakemore, however, absorbed each barbed glance without reaction. When he was done he picked up a pair of big sparring pads and tossed one across to the other man hard enough to almost make him stagger.
“OK,” he said, turning to the rest of us, “that’s the kind of thing we’re going to be showing you over the period of the course. To begin with, though, I want to find out what kind of a punch you can pack. Form two lines and let’s see what you can do.”
I watched the big blond German I’d sat next to the night before line up in front of Blakemore. He had a bodybuilder’s stance, with his arms pushed out away from his sides slightly by the sheer over-development of his upper arms and lats.
I’d learned that the German’s name was Michael Hofmann and he was ex-army, from an elite regiment that was the German equivalent of the Paras. No great surprises there, then.
Now, he squared up to Blakemore, who was holding the pad up across his chest and stomach with his arms tensed through the straps on the back. He was leaning hard into it, feet braced wide apart. Everybody stopped and watched as the big man moved forwards to take his first swing.
Hofmann smiled very slightly, and hit Blakemore with an explosive uppercut that compressed the thick foam pad almost to its fullest extent. It was a testament to the instructor’s upper body strength that he didn’t so much as shift his feet under the onslaught. Even though he rocked back from the force of the blow and let out a grunt of effort.
Hofmann looked vaguely disappointed, a frown creasing his brow as if he couldn’t compute why the other man was still standing. When someone the size of Hofmann hits you, you generally fall over and stay down.
By comparison, Shirley – who was next – barely made a dent in the pad. Blakemore grinned at her.
I turned my attention to the row I was in. Ahead of me, McKenna flailed wildly at the pad O’Neill was holding, to greater noise than effect. When he’d exhausted himself it was Jan’s turn.
She stepped forwards and I noticed O’Neill’s attention was elsewhere, that he was more interested in what was happening to Blakemore. I don’t know if Jan saw this, but she hit the pad low and right, at a point that corresponded almost exactly to the area I’d seen O’Neill favouring when Blakemore had been playing with him. She was only slightly built, but somewhere along the line she’d learned how to punch, keeping her wrist locked straight, putting most of her body weight behind it.
O’Neill wasn’t prepared for the force of the hit. It rocked him. He had to take a step back to counteract it, to regain his balance. I saw the surprise and anger in his face.
As she walked to the back of the line Blakemore called across, “Hey – Jan, isn’t it?”
She paused, turned.
A smile spread across his face as his eyes flicked to his fellow instructor. “Nice punch,” he said.
Jan nodded briefly and as she turned away she was smiling, too. She knew, I realised, that O’Neill was injured and yet she’d deliberately set out to hurt him.
I was still mulling that one over when it was my shot. O’Neill eyed me warily, but I made sure I produced a suitably lacklustre blow.
He treated Jan’s second turn with caution, too. This time she throttled back so that he nearly over- compensated for her unexpectedly feeble fist. That didn’t serve to endear her any more than the harder blow he’d clearly been expecting.
It was only as we finished up the class, when O’Neill handed his pad back to Blakemore, that he touched a hand to his side. He pulled a face as he moved his fingers gently, like he was testing a tender area of skin.
“You all right?” Blakemore asked him, although there was no concern in his voice.
O’Neill let his hand drop away. “I’m fine,” he said shortly. “Just fine. Leave it.”
With a brooding stare, Blakemore watched him walk out of the gym and vanish in the direction of the instructors’ quarters.
As the rest of us milled out into the main hallway Major Gilby put in an appearance. He informed us, to varying shades of dismay, that we’d each have to present a short talk to the rest of the class that afternoon.
“And what would that be about?” Declan asked.
“I would suggest that it has some relevance to the course you’re on,” Gilby clipped, with a fraction of a smile. “Some modern or historical event that illustrates close protection in one form or another. I want to see your take on the job. There have been plenty of assassinations or attempted assassinations to choose from. Look at all the political hits that have taken place over the past fifty years – Sadat, the Kennedys, Earl Mountbatten.”
He dropped the last name in with a flickered glance at Declan, as though the Irishman had been personally responsible for the terrorist bomb attack that had killed the Queen’s distant cousin.
Declan was too laid back to rise to the Major’s little dig. “And just where are we supposed to find out all the gory details at this kind of notice?” he said instead.
Gilby smiled at him, more fully this time. “There’s plenty of information in the library,” he said. “You’ll have an hour after lunch to do your research.”
