Oh dear, I thought. He must have spoken to Mrs. Schumann, or perhaps it was Kurt and his polo mallet- wielding chum who had paid her a visit. I didn’t want to think about what they might have done to that dear, devastated lady.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said. I had raised my voice a little. I was very conscious that Caroline was still in the office, and I was trying to somehow warn her of the danger, although she had to have heard the shot and then the crash of the tray and the glasses. I had no doubt whatsoever that Komarov would kill her as easily as he had killed Richard. Or worse, he would use her for leverage to get back the metal ball. I thought about that ball. I didn’t actually have it with me, so I couldn’t have given it back to Komarov even if I had wanted to. It probably was still on Toby’s desk where I had left it, for him to show to his vet. And I had no intention of putting my brother or his family in danger again.
“George,” said Komarov, keeping his gun pointed straight at me, “go check that we are alone.”
George Kealy produced another pistol from his own pocket and went into the dining room. I could hear him going into the kitchen beyond. After a while, he came back. “No one else here,” he said.
“Check in there,” said Komarov, waving the gun towards the bar and the office beyond. The office actually sat between the bar and the kitchen, with a door at each end, and was more like a wide corridor than a proper room.
I went on staring at Komarov but slightly bunched my muscles, ready to try to rush him if George cried out that he had found Caroline. But he didn’t call out. He just came back and reported that we were all alone.
“Where’s your girlfriend?” said Komarov.
“In London,” I said.
“Where in London?” he asked.
“With her sister,” I said. “In Finchley.”
He seemed satisfied with the answer and waved his gun towards the dining room. “In there,” he said.
I had to step around Richard’s body. I looked down at his back. There was no exit wound; the bullet was still in his body. Did it make things better or worse? Neither. It was horrible either way.
I walked ahead of Komarov. Was he going to shoot me in the back? Unlikely. Not that I thought it would make any difference to him. Or, I suppose, to me.
“Stop,” he said. I stopped. “Pull out the chair, the one with arms.” I reached to my left and pulled the armchair away from the table. I realized that it was the Kealys’ usual dining table. I wondered if George noticed. “Sit down facing away from me,” said Komarov. I did as he said.
He and George moved around me so that they were again in front.
I heard someone crunching across the broken glass in the lobby behind me. I thought it must be Caroline, but Komarov looked over my shoulder and he didn’t seem alarmed. The new arrival was obviously his ally, not mine.
“Have you got the stuff?” he asked the newcomer.
“Yeah,” said a male voice. There were more crunching steps as the man moved nearer to my back. “Shame you had to shoot Richard,” he said.
I recognized that voice. Much suddenly became clear.
“Tie him up,” said Komarov.
The man who had been behind me walked around in front. He was carrying a dark blue canvas carryall.
“Hello, Gary,” I said.
“Hi, Chef,” he said in his usual casual style. There was not a chicken pox scab to be seen. But, then, there wouldn’t be. It had been so simple, and I had walked right into the trap. Gary didn’t have chicken pox, and, no doubt, Oscar hadn’t been going through my papers in the office and hadn’t stolen any of the petty cash. Komarov had needed me back at the Hay Net, and the best way to do that was to create a manpower crisis. Get Oscar fired through Gary’s false accusations, then simply get Gary to call in sick. Hey, presto, I came running. Like a lamb to the slaughter.
“Why?” I said to Gary.
“Why what?” he said.
“Why this?” I asked, spreading my arms out.
“Money, of course,” he said, and smiled. He seemed not to realize how deep he was in, or the danger.
“But I pay you good money,” I said to him.
“Not that good,” he said. “And you don’t provide the extras.”
“Extras?” I asked.
“Stuff,” he said. I looked at him quizzically. “Coke.”
I hadn’t figured him as an addict. Drugs and kitchen heat don’t normally go together. I supposed that it did explain some of his mood swings, as well as his current actions. A drug habit can be very demanding; cravings and addiction usually dispel all logic and reason. Given certain circumstances, Gary undoubtedly would do anything for his next fix, and George must have had quite a hold over him.
He took a roll of brown packing tape from the carryall and used some of it to bind my left wrist to the arm of the chair. Komarov moved off to the side, to make sure that Gary never came between me and the gun, but I had no doubt that Komarov would shoot Gary as easily as sneeze if he thought it was necessary to his plans.
Gary moved to my right wrist.
“Hey,” he said, “he’s got a plaster cast under this tunic.”
“Kurt claimed that Walter must have broken his wrist,” said Komarov. He came close to me. “You broke Walter’s arm,” he said into my face. Good, I thought. I wish I’d broken his bloody neck. “You’ll pay for that,” he said. Then he stood up and smiled. “But Walter always was such an impetuous boy. He probably tried to bash your brains in with a polo mallet.” He smiled at me again. “You might wish he had.” I felt cold and clammy, but I smiled back at him nevertheless.
Gary taped the cast to the other arm of the chair. Then he taped my ankles to the chair legs in the same manner. I was trussed up like a turkey waiting for the knife to cut my throat. Then Gary took some more stuff from his bag. It looked like putty-soft, white putty. It was in a long plastic bag and looked like a white salami. If possible, I felt even colder and more clammy. Gary had removed a couple of pounds of plastic explosive from his bag.
He taped the white sausage to the chair between my legs. Oh God. Not my legs. MaryLou’s legs, and the awful lack of them, haunted me still. Now, it seemed, I was to live my nightmare. Next, Gary delicately took a cigarette- sized metal tube from the bag and very carefully pushed it deep into the soft white explosive, like pushing a chocolate chip into an ice-cream cone. The tube had two short wires coming out of the top that were connected to a small black box. The remote-detonator system, I concluded. I sweated more, and Komarov clearly enjoyed it. For the first time, I became really terrified, absolutely certain that I would die, hopeful that it would be quick and easy and frightened to the point of despair that it would not. Would I be able to not tell him where the balls were? Would I be able to die without giving up that information? Would I be able to keep those I loved safe no matter what was done to me? The same questions that every Gestapo-tortured spy or resistance fighter had asked themselves more than fifty years ago. Neither I, nor they, would know the answer, not until the unthinkable actually happened.
“Where is it?” Komarov asked.
“Where is what?” I replied.
“Mr. Moreton,” he said, as if addressing me in a company board meeting, “let us not play games. We both know what I am talking about.”
“I left it with Mrs. Schumann,” I said.
George appeared slightly uneasy.
“I am informed,” said Komarov, “that that is not the case. Mrs. Schumann gave two of the items to you. One has been recovered, but the other has not.” He walked around behind me. “Mrs. Schumann should not have had any of the items in the first place. They have all now been recovered, other than the one you still possess.” He came around in front of me again. “You will tell me where it is, sooner or later.” He smiled again. He was obviously enjoying himself. I wasn’t.
There was a noise from the kitchen. It wasn’t particularly loud, but it was clear, like a metal spoon falling onto the tile floor. It must be Caroline, I thought.
“Can’t you do anything right?” Komarov said, cuttingly, to George Kealy. He was irritated. “Watch him.” He pointed at me. “If he moves, shoot him in the foot. But don’t hit the explosive or we might all end up dead. You”-he
