Drummond became embarrassed. 'Certainly not, Miss O'Neill,’ he stammered, 'I'm just sorry that… well you know…’ His voice trailed off.
'I appreciate your doing this, Liam,’ said O'Neill.
Drummond became even more embarrassed and looked down at his feet before saying, 'You were always a gentleman, Mr O'Neill. The lads always had respect for you.’
O'Neill hit Drummond hard on the back of the neck and the man fell to the floor. O'Neill chopped him again to make sure.
Avedissian had seen it coming. 'What now?' he asked.
O'Neill searched the unconscious man with his one hand and then repeated the operation before saying, There's poetic justice for you. He trusted me so much that he didn't bring his gun with him this time. We've no gun and there's three of them between us and the door.’
'Where will they be?' asked Avedissian.
'In the duty room at the end of the passage. We have to pass it to get to the stairs.’
'Couldn't we sneak past?' asked Avedissian.
'Not a chance. The door at the head of the stairs has an electronic lock on it. It's controlled from inside the duty room.’
'What about guns?'
‘The armoury is kept locked. The key is in the duty room.’
Avedissian looked at the medical boxes which seemed to be their only resource and asked after some thought, 'Do they drink tea?'
'I suppose so. Why?'
'Where do they make it?'
'In the duty room. They have a stove.’
'Pity,’ said Avedissian.
O'Neill suddenly realised what Avedissian had been considering and added, 'But they have to get the water from the room across the way.’
‘Then there's a chance,’ said Avedissian. 'If I can get this lot..’ he held up a bottle of pills '… into their tea, we can put them out for a week.’
O'Neill filled Avedissian in on the details of the room layout in the passage and of the inside of the room where the men would get water. He wanted to know exactly where the sink was and where the kettle would be, for he would not be able to turn on the light.
'It should be OK,’ said O'Neill. 'People don't usually have to turn the light on in that room anyway when they fill the kettle. There's enough light from the corridor.’
Avedissian crushed up the number of pills he thought would be necessary to achieve the desired effect and poured the powder into an empty pill box for the time being. 'I hope to God they all take milk and sugar,’ he said as he prepared to move out into the corridor. He checked on Kathleen and saw that she was sleeping comfortably before listening at the door prior to opening it. The corridor outside seemed quiet.
'Good luck,’ said O'Neill.
Avedissian thought the corridor was never ending as he tiptoed along it, scarcely daring to breathe. He was convinced that, at any second, someone would come out from the duty room at the end and start shooting. He passed the halfway mark and could now see the room that he was making for. He kept his eyes fixed on it as he steeled himself for the final few metres. He was inside it.
As O'Neill had predicted, there was enough light from the corridor to see things inside the room but he was uncomfortable with the fact that the door was wide open and gave it a little push. It made a noise like a giant redwood about to fall. Avedissian froze in fear but, after a few seconds, he could hear that the muted sound of voices coming from the duty room had not changed. He exhaled slowly and left the door as it was.
The kettle was on the shelf above the sink where O'Neill had said it would be. Avedissian took it down slowly and carefully, avoiding any action that could give rise to noise, and poured the contents of the pill box into it. He swirled the powder around in the little water that lay in the bottom and put the kettle back on the shelf with pained slowness.
Avedissian turned to leave the room but stopped when he heard the level of sound from across the corridor increase suddenly. Someone was coming out and he would be trapped! He stepped quickly back into the shadow behind the room door and prayed. If someone came in and switched on the light he was a dead man.
A short, broad man with a bull neck came into the room, still engaged in conversation with those across the corridor. He did not touch the light switch but took the kettle down from the shelf and filled it under the tap. He was so close to Avedissian that Avedissian thought he must smell his fear but the man appeared to notice nothing amiss. He rattled the lid on to the kettle at the second attempt and left the room.
Avedissian remained motionless for a few moments, still partially paralysed by nightmare thoughts of how close he had come to dying but the fact that he had apparently got away with it filtered through to him and restored his courage. He ventured out into the corridor again and returned to O'Neill and Kathleen.
O'Neill greeted him with an anxious look.
'It's done,' said Avedissian. 'Now we wait.'
'How long?'
Avedissian tried to guess how long it would take for the kettle to boil, how long it would take the man to make and drink the tea, assuming they drank it at all for there was a chance that they would be put off by the taste, and how long it would take for the drugs to act. He said, 'Better give them thirty minutes to be on the safe side.' He suddenly had an awful thought. He looked down at the man on the floor and said, 'Won't they miss him?'
As if in answer to Avedissian's question, the door at the end of the passage opened and a voice called out, 'Liam! Tea's ready!'
Avedissian and O'Neill were turned to stone. They waited for the door to close again but it did not. Someone was waiting for an answer! O'Neill stood up and faced the opposite direction from the source of the shout. He called out, 'Just comin' and then stopped breathing as he waited for a reaction. The door at the end of the passage closed.
Avedissian examined Kathleen. She was still sleeping peacefully and mercifully free of pain after her ordeal thanks to the analgesics. He lifted one of her eyelids and saw that she was not too deeply sedated for her to be brought round when they had to leave. She groaned and moved her face away in response to him touching her eyes. Avedissian looked at Drummond lying on the floor and said, 'I think I'll give him a shot to make sure he stays out for the next few hours.' He gave the unconscious man an injection.
O'Neill said, 'I think it's time. Shall we risk it?'
Avedissian felt his stomach go into knots again but he nodded and said, 'Let's check it out.'
They left Kathleen in the cell, while they crept along the passage towards the duty room, their hopes increasing with the fact that they could hear no sound at all coming from within. O'Neill found it difficult to put his faith in the power of drugs so it was Avedissian who finally put his hand on the handle of the duty room door and turned it slowly open.
Two men lay slumped over the table, a third lay on the floor where he had fallen off his seat. O'Neill unlocked the door to the head of the stairs but still continued to rummage around. Avedissian asked him what he was doing.
'I'm looking for some clue to what the little bastard is up to,' replied O'Neill. 'He could still start a civil war.'
Avedissian helped O'Neill in the search but when, after five minutes, they had drawn a blank he suggested that they stop.
'Let's try Kell's room,' said O'Neill. He looked down at the unconscious men and said, 'I take it they will be out for some time?'
'A long time,’ replied Avedissian.
'Look at this,’ said O'Neill, handing Avedissian a piece of paper. It was a photocopy of a map. Ordnance Survey, thought Avedissian, and said so to O'Neill.. He had recognised the style but not the area. There was a circle round a village called Valham. 'Mean anything?' asked O'Neill.
'Nothing, but let's take it.'
O'Neill asked Avedissian to help him put back the medical boxes in the sick room and drag the unconscious
