Faulds screamed:'TRACTOR! TRACTOR! TRACTOR!' A huge blue and white monstrosity was coming straight at them. Logan slammed on the brakes and screeched the car back to their own side of the road in a cloud of swearing and burning rubber. The thing trundled past and he accelerated out and round the digger. Up ahead, Wiseman threw the Range Rover hard right, leaving the main road for a little side one. Logan followed, the pool car's back end kicking out as they slid round the corner. A loud CLUNK! and a fencepost went flying. Faulds had one hand dug into the dashboard, the other wrapped around the handle above the passenger-side door. Teeth gritted, eyes wide. 'Who the hell taught you to drive?' 'I haven't done the pursuit training course, OK? I'm doing my best!' A hump in the road and the car left the tarmac for a second. 'Oh God!' 'Call the station! Tell them we're after Wiseman!' Alec's voice came from the back of the car. 'This is bloody brilliant!' Faulds released his death-grip on the dashboard and scrabbled in the footwell for the radio handset as Logan wrenched the manky Vauxhall through a succession of snaking bends. Insch's Range Rover was getting closer and closer ... they were right behind it, siren blaring, lights flashing, completely unable to get past and cut Wiseman off. 'Single-track bastards ...' 'Alpha Charlie Seven from Control, when do you --' 'This is Chief Constable Faulds, we are in pursuit of--' A sharp bend and the pool car brushed a drystane dyke on the passenger side - a squeal of metal and a shower of sparks as Logan struggled to get them back on the road. '--Ken Wiseman. Will you watch where you're bloody going!' 'Do you want to drive?' '--repeat that? Wiseman? Are you serious? ' Faulds went back to the handset. 'We need back-up, now!' And then Wiseman slammed on his brakes. Logan was fast, but not fast enough; they clipped the back bumper. The pool car's nose jerked left and buried itself in a beech hedge, sending orange leaves flying. Faulds dropped the handset again. 'Are you trying to get us all killed?' 'What the hell was that? ' The Range Rover pulled a hard left, through an open gate and into a field of brown stubble. Logan cranked the key in the ignition. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing ... 'Come on you bastard!' The engine roared into life. He reversed out of the hedge and put his foot to the floor, the tyres squealing as the car fishtailed into the field after Wiseman. But the Range Rover was built for this kind of thing, their scabrous Vauxhall wasn't. It slithered and slid, churning up the mud, snaking after the four-by-four as it rumbled straight across the field and out the gate on the other side.
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