There had been difficulties. He was not asked but told.
There had been. Robbie Cairns did not deny it.
A smooth, gentle voice, but the threat lay in it: there had been failures, twice.
There had been, not disputed.
Money had been paid, and doubts now existed.
He accepted that, but would earn what he had been paid.
The sun had gone and the mood had swung, and there was an edge to the smooth voice, the suggestion that he was rubbish, his reputation built on sand – he should be tested.
Nothing wrong with him.
The voice was not raised: he should be tested to see if he knew how to handle a weapon and how to fire.
He did, honest, not a problem.
And tested to see if he had a killer’s nerve, or if he had it once but had lost it.
His nerve was good, he swore it.
He heard low laughter behind him, turned sharply. He had not known that three men and a woman were in the room, lined against the wall beside the door. The sweat ran down his neck and his back, trapped at the waist by the trousers and belt. The laughter was not with him but at him.
Robbie Cairns understood. He was a toy to them and they made sport of him.
The man said, ‘We must wait. Then you will show us, Mr Cairns, whether the nerve holds or is lost, whether you can still earn what you have been paid.’
The tray was taken out and the room emptied. He was, again, alone.
He wanted a beer, then a shower, and he came into the hotel’s bar. A day used up, a schedule further damaged, and he hankered after the action that had caused him to cancel and rearrange his itinerary. The day had not been wasted. Four hundred metres east of the massacre site, further away from the Ovcara agricultural sheds, they had discovered three more cadavers. Could have been half a dozen reasons why those bodies had not gone into the deep pit dug for the two hundred they’d slaughtered. Always liked a beer after excavating a body and before the shower.
And he saw them. A hippie-type woman, another who was more formal and had her head down, a man in a suit, and the old beggar himself, the Lion of Fo a, who was holding court with bottles and glasses.
The smile split his face. He called across the bar. ‘Heh, Arbuthnot, what brings a has-been spook to these parts? Let me guess, it-’
‘My God, the purveyor of fine meats himself. Still well hung, Anders? I’m guessing you’re going to sign up as a probationer candidate for the Vulture Club that I chair, free membership. Good to see you.’
‘You’re still full of shit, Arbuthnot – and, I assume, are still pulling strings. Wouldn’t be right here without you.’
They hugged. The shower was put on hold, introductions were made and, for new recruits, the Vulture Club would be explained.
The editor told him it was good. The journalist, Ivo, knew that this edition would sell, and that powerful men would find cause to curse his name when they read his copy. The editor slapped his back.
No reason for him to stay longer and wait for the first editions to come off the presses. He preferred to be with his wife, eating at his own table.
He realised the importance of what he had written. His country was a democracy, sought entry into the European Union, and was dogged by the ravage of corruption and organised crime. It was bankrupted by the global downturn and needed – a hole in the head – to be regarded as a haven for gangsters and fraudsters. He sensed the nervousness around him – because of the enmity of influential men: the whole office was aware of the cover, dominated by the single word, Corruption. He rang his wife, told her he was leaving and would be home in half an hour.
Out on the street, under sparse pavement lights, he looked warily in each direction, then stepped out.
He saw the figure first as a shadow. A whistle followed from far down the street. The shadow disintegrated under a light, became a man. Not an old man but young and walking purposefully, not running.
From behind, Robbie Cairns’s arm was squeezed, light steps edged away from him and he was – again – alone.
In front of Robbie was the street that the man would cross, then a parking area for the high-rise block. Behind him, where his guide had stood, had spotted for him and squeezed his arm, was the entrance to the block, the lobby area and the lifts.
He took the Jericho from his inside pocket. They had told him when he had signified his choice that the weapon was considered by many to have an equal only in the Glock, and they had patronised him with congratulations. It was all shit, and he had nowhere to turn.
Nothing had been said of the man who approached, one hand in a pocket and the other holding a cigarette. He had no name, no occupation, and Robbie had not been told why this man was condemned… and he was condemned, or Robbie might as well turn the bloody thing on himself, shove the barrel into his own mouth, feel the gouge of the sight against the ridges above his tongue and pull the fucking trigger – not just squeeze it, as he did when he needed accuracy, but yank it down. No other way, and there hadn’t been since the wasp had gone into his nose. He cocked it.
The man came to the road, hesitated. Predictable – natural to look to the right before stepping off a pavement and to the left. But he did not look either way for traffic, but instead twisted, half turned and glanced behind him. He would have seen a deserted road and thought that danger didn’t exist. The man crossed the road.
The gun was in his hand, cocked, and the safety was off. A 9mm shell was in the breech and he knew nothing of the man who came towards him and maybe would look ahead and try to strip darkness and cover from the angled corners of the entrance into the block and did not. There was a shout. Not a warning. Robbie didn’t understand the words, knew they were a greeting. Who called to him with love? Barbie – he’d forbidden it – never leaned from an open window, showed herself and blew him a kiss. It was a welcome from above and the man no longer looked for movement in dark corners. He thought himself home, secure. Robbie took one step forward and the man hardly seemed to see him.
Robbie fired, did a double tap. It was a killing to perfection. Both shots to the head and life extinguished by the time the body had fallen to the pavement.
He was going away briskly when the screaming started above and behind him. He didn’t run. He thought he ruled again and that the past was gone. Robbie Cairns reckoned he had done well, had proved himself.
Lights came on all around him and men moved slowly, frightened, towards the block’s entrance and he walked as if nothing had happened that involved him. He went to the corner of the block and ahead of him a car’s lights flashed recognition.
He came off the train. There was noise around him and Harvey Gillot heard the garish accent of the north of Ireland – a couple of dozen from the Province were on the platform, yelling their presence, and he saw their football scarves. ‘Power to you,’ he murmured. He heard sirens wailing. He had the strap of his bag over his shoulder and walked well, though stiffly, past the food outlets, then out into the evening and on to Zagreb’s streets.
The football people went another way and he lost them.
Then, it had been raining and there had been sleet in the air. He had walked from the smart hotel, a great cavern from a century before, gone out through the swing door and hitched up his collapsible umbrella – the doorman had been solicitous about its effectiveness against those elements. It was a damn good hotel and had once been home – a sleeping place and an interrogation unit – to the Gestapo. It was to his left and he thought it had been cleaned but the lines hadn’t changed. He struggled to remember what route he had taken that night. There was a straight street with hotels and embassies, boutiques, closed, with subdued lighting on women’s clothing, a restaurant and… He came to the square where a soldier rode a horse and waved a sword, fountains played, trams rumbled and more memories stirred. Twice he looked behind him, and checked for a tail, but didn’t see one… Had there been one, had he been in a box of six men and women, had he been tracked by motorcycles, he wouldn’t have been surprised. There was a dark street at the end of which there was a sculpture of great blackened marble balls, fused, but Harvey Gillot didn’t know that he had walked past the doorway of an intelligence agency and that each step he took was followed. There was a small square, paved with bricks, where a full-size
