Avedissian took the boy from Kathleen while Jarvis opened both inner and outer fly-screen doors. Jarvis looked out both ways before saying, 'It's all clear.'
They hurried towards an illuminated sign that told them where the exit from the underground garage was and stopped at the head of the ramp. Jarvis said, 'Wait here with the boy. I'll bring up the car.'
As they waited in quiet limbo, Avedissian looked up. The air was still and warm and the sky laden with stars. A faint smell of blossom made him think of Cambridge in England. He was trying to recall the name of a piece of music coming faintly from an upper floor of the hotel when a sudden violent, but muffled, explosion rocked the building and shattered the peace of the night.
Black smoke billowed up from the garage and hung indecisively round the entrance like a great cloud in search of a breeze. Avedissian and Kathleen stared at the sight in disbelief, both unwilling to believe what they feared must have happened. But there was no escaping it: Jarvis must be dead. There had been a bomb in the car.
'What do we do?' asked Kathleen, her eyes filled with fear.
'We get away from here,' said Avedissian, unable to think beyond the moment.
They hurried along the lane and paused briefly to look back at the scene. The smoke was thinning. It drifted past the neon sign at the garage like a cloud across the moon. A group of people had now congregated at the head of the ramp and the sound of approaching sirens was becoming insistent.
As they watched, a long black saloon car entered the lane and three men got out. They seemed more interested in the sight of the man carrying the child at the far end of the lane than in what had happened in the garage below.
They're NORAID!' said Avedissian. 'Let's move!'
'Where are we going?' gasped Kathleen as they raced down the side-street at the end of the lane.
'To find a cab!' answered Avedissian, his arms aching with the weight of the boy.
Kathleen risked a glance back and said in a voice courting Panic, They're gaining!'
'Keep going!' urged Avedissian. He could see the lights of the main thoroughfare fifty metres ahead but knew that they were being rapidly caught. 'When we turn the corner, you take the boy! '
They turned the corner and Avedissian bundled the boy over to Kathleen and said, 'Go and find a cab! I'll hold them off!'
Kathleen did as she was bid and Avedissian drew out the pistol that had been taken from the dead American. He waited with his cheek pressed up against the cold stone of the wall until he could hear the sound of running footsteps grow louder. For an instant he was back in Belfast, a long time ago. The fear in his stomach had a strange sexuality about it, danger, excitement, heightened awareness, a feeling only to be experienced on the very edge of disaster.
Holding the pistol in both hands and at arm's length, Avedissian stepped out smartly and dropped to one knee to fire at the approaching figures.
With the first bullet one of the running men pitched forward and fell to the ground. Avedissian heard a gun clatter from his grasp. The other man took panic in mid-flight and tried to stop too quickly. His arms and legs flailed in unsynchronised action as he sought cover from the totally unexpected. He loosed off a couple of wild shots in Avedissian's direction but was hopelessly off-balance. Avedissian held the gun on him and squeezed the trigger twice.
The street was silent. There were two bodies lying in it and no sign of the third man who had been in the black saloon.
Avedissian waited for a few moments, holding the gun in front of him, ready to fire at the slightest movement, but all was quiet. He put the gun away and hurried off to find Kathleen. He found her sitting in a yellow cab by the kerb, some two hundred metres from where he had left her. She was having a discussion with the driver about payment for waiting time.
‘The Rainbow Inn,' said Avedissian, getting in the cab and putting an end to the conversation. Kathleen almost fainted with relief at the sight of him. 'Are you all right?' she whispered. Avedissian nodded in reply.
'You folks are English?' said the driver.
'We're visiting relations,' said Avedissian.
'And you are staying in the Rainbow Inn?' said the driver. 'Guess your relations ain't got much room.'
Avedissian silently cursed nosey cab drivers.
'Is the kid sick?' asked the driver.
'Just tired.'
'Well, it's late,’ said the driver. 'Maybe too late for a little kid like that
'You know how it is, all the relations want to see him. It won't do him any harm.'
'Guess not.'
Avedissian was relieved to see the illuminated 'Rainbow Inn' sign come up on their right-hand side. 'Just drop us here,' he said to the driver.
'I can take you right into the parking lot.'
This is fine.'
Avedissian gave the man the fare and a big tip and was glad to see the back of him. He looked around for inspiration and saw the sign of a fast food restaurant. 'In there,' he said to Kathleen. 'We have to talk.'
It was late and there was only a handful of people in the restaurant. They found a booth well away from the others and settled the boy in the corner. Avedissian checked the child's pulse surreptitiously and said, 'He's all right.' He bought coffee at the counter and returned to join Kathleen.
'We're in big trouble,' he said. 'I thought we might be able to check in at the Rainbow for the night but I've changed my mind. All NORAID have to do is ask the local taxi drivers about a couple with a child and they would find us. They're already going to find out about our 'English' accents.'
'So what can we do?' asked Kathleen.
'I'll pick up the car from the car park and we'll drive somewhere.'
'What about the boy? Doesn't he need proper care at a hospital?'
'We can't risk it. We can't answer all the questions they would ask. They would call the police. I can look after him if I can get what I need.'
Avedissian left Kathleen and the boy in the restaurant and went to pick up their car. The parking lot seemed free of people when he got there but he stood for a few moments in the shadows to make sure. The fewer people who saw him the better. Satisfied that he was alone, he crossed quickly to the BMW and unlocked the door. The interior smelled of newness and leather. Outside, the lights of the Inn were reflected in the paintwork of the bonnet.
He inserted the ignition key and froze, sitting motionless for a moment, cold with fear as he recalled the pall of black smoke outside the Plaza Hotel. Surely the IRA could not have known about this car? he reasoned. It was conceivable that Innes had found out about Jarvis being at the same hotel but surely not about the other car he’d parked at the Rainbow?
Avedissian could not turn the key. He let it go and pulled the bonnet release instead.
What was to be a reassuring look under the hood turned out to be the inspiration of a nightmare for there, strapped to the engine cover with bright yellow sticky tape, was a rectangular lump of something that looked like Plasticine.
The muscles in Avedissian's throat contracted and he held his breath as he traced the path of the two wires emanating from one end of the lump. One went to the ignition coil, the other to an earth point on the body. He saw the simple logic of it. If he had turned the key, power would have flowed from the battery to the coil and from the coil to the detonator in the plastic. He lowered the bonnet and walked away from the car.
Avedissian's mind reeled with the realisation that it had not been the IRA who had blown up Jarvis at all. It must have been Bryant's doing! It had been Bryant clearing up after a particularly dirty operation. No witnesses were to be left alive. He, Kathleen and the boy had been meant to die in whatever car they had chosen to use.
Avedissian heard the doors to the hotel open and, from the shadows, saw some men spill out onto the street.
'I could do with some fun,' said one of them loudly. These conventions bore me stiff.'
'Let's see what Kansas City has to offer,' said another. Both men had English accents.
'You're talking tomorrow, Miller,' said the first man. 'Better not get too well oiled. Still, if you're giving your
