lamp post stood about twelve feet back from the fence and it was a good twenty feet up to the cross beam. Jones whistled to himself as he shimmied up the post using hands, knees and feet like a south sea islander after coconuts. He reached the cross beam and slung the belt over it. He steadied himself by hanging onto the strap and began to hammer and probe the electrical equipment. Two minutes later he slid down the pole. He was carefully holding a piece of wire in his hand when he hit the ground.
“Always plenty of spare wire up there,” he said cheerfully. “This is all set up. One pull and the lights go out all over Europe, another tug and they go on again. You trip a switch and untrip it, see?”
“I believe him,” I said to Evans who grunted. The other cop spoke for the first time since he’d joined us. “How do we handle it? Do we go through the fence or the gate?” It was a pretty good question. Evans looked at Jones. “You’re the one with all the ideas at the moment, what d’you think?” Jones paused, he was probably thinking of his compound-storming in Malaya and he’d been in on some tough ones.
“The gate’s the easiest. The guard’s going to be as blind as a bat when the lights blow. Should be easy to grab him and keep him quiet. We can get the gates open and drive in. Of course, someone’ll have to stay here and do the pulling.”
“That’ll be you, Ron,” Evans said to the cop, then he waved a hand at us. “Sorry, Hardy, Jones, Tickener — Ron Varson, rough as guts.”
We nodded at him. Varson didn’t look happy with his second fiddle job but he took Evans’ description of him as a compliment and looked grimly determined. Evans was in control of it now. He issued his instructions briskly and authoritatively. We checked our watches and agreed on lights-out time and three of us headed back towards the gate. Varson stood holding the wire and looking up to where it connected with the switches. He still looked a bit unhappy with the job, as though he was about to flush himself down a giant lavatory.
We proceeded in a huddle as close as we could to the main gate without being noticed. We decided to take Tickener’s car because that meant the reporter and photographer could go in with a maximum of cover. Maybe Evans was hedging his bet a little, but no one argued. Jones huddled down in the back of the FB, Tickener hunched over the wheel. We waited. The clinic grounds and the reception booth were almost floodlit, very bright. Evans eased a black automatic out of his holster and checked it. I patted my gun. There was no traffic within earshot and the quiet of Longueville at that moment was just the sort of quiet the residents had paid all that money for.
The clinic blacked out suddenly as if it had been covered by an old-time photographer’s cloth. Evans and I sprinted for the reception booth. By the little moonlight and the street light we could see the guard flailing around pushing buttons. Evans fronted the glass cage and pointed his automatic at the guard’s nose. He reached for a sawn-off shotgun which rested against the wall of the booth but he was too slow. I had the side door open and my gun in his earhole before he could grab the weapon.
“Easy does it friend, you don’t want to die for five hundred a month.”
He saw the wisdom of it and let go the shotgun. Evans came into the booth and prodded the guard out. The guard walked towards the car, moonlight glinted on the barrel of a pistol which one of the detectives held out of the car window trained on his chest.
The light came on again and Grant pushed a couple of buttons on the instrument panel in the box. The wide gates swung open. I grabbed the shotgun and went out and through the gates at a run. Evans took a swipe at the control panel and followed me. Tickener came burning up to the gate and we ran along beside him as the FB roared up to the clinic. He wavered on and off the brick path and the wheels churned furrows up in the smooth green grass on either side. There were three cars parked near the main entrance and I was shouting at Tickener to block them when a red and blue flash came from a window in the main block. Glass shattered in the car and I heard a yelp from Jones. Tickener stalled the motor and we crouched down behind the car. Another flash and a bullet whined off the Holden’s bonnet. I peeked around and snapped two shots at the window. Evans crouched double and ran for the porch. He went up the steps, fired twice into the glass doors and jumped aside. A bullet from inside splintered a panel on the door and I made it to the other side of the porch in six heart-in-the-mouth strides. Footsteps pounded up the path and the gun behind the window opened up and Varson dropped like a stone. I couldn’t tell if he’d been hit or not. Evans kicked the shattered door in and we both went into the lobby, almost on our bellies. It was empty. Then the door at the end of the room opened and Bruno fired a quick shot at Evans before ducking back. He missed and Grant took a chance. He rushed through the door and flattened himself against the wall. I went through and pasted myself against the other side. Bruno was half way down the corridor and his next shot whistled between us. Evans dropped to one knee, sighted quickly and fired. Bruno screeched and went down like the last pin in the lane and his gun skittered crazily along the polished floor.
Two men came out of a door on the right. One of them snapped a shot at me and they jumped over Bruno and rounded the bend at the end of the passage. I was vaguely conscious of movement and sound behind me and took a quick look. Tickener was crouched down near Evans and slightly hampering his attempt to take a shot, his face white and his eyes wide and scared. Jones was standing up behind Evans, snapping and flashing. A man lumbered out of the door the other two had come from. He was big, dark hair spilled through the unbuttoned top of his pyjamas coat and he was groping at the tie of the pants. His face was heavily bandaged and the pistol he carried was pointed nowhere in particular.
Evans shook Tickener away and bellowed. “Costello, police, let go the gun.”
The blind-looking bandaged face turned slowly towards the sound of the voice. Jones stepped forward and snapped. The bulb went off and Grant threw up his hand to ward off the glare. Costello lined him up like an Olympic shooter with 20/20 vision. I swung the shotgun on him and fired. The charge hit him in the chest, lifted him up and slammed him against the white wall. He slid slowly down it, leaving a bloody trail behind him like a wolf shot high up in the snow country coming down the slope to die. Jones walked up and took a careful picture. His hands were as still and steady as Costello’s corpse.
I put the shotgun down. Evans was leaning against the wall. His gun was pointing at the floor and his lips were moving silently. He knew how close he’d come.
“There’s more of them, Grant,” I said quietly.
As I spoke the door behind us opened and Varson came through it sideways, propping it open with his back. He waved a man through with a quick gesture of his enormous, gun-filled right hand. Dr Ian Brave strolled into the passage.
“I got him outside,” said Varson, “he was leaving.”
“He stays,” Evans said.
Brave looked at the crumpled, bloody ruin on the floor. His face had a vacant, other-worldly look — for my money he was floating high and free somewhere a long way off. Along the corridor Bruno groaned and tried to pull himself up against the wall; everyone had forgotten him.
14
The quiet tableau broke up after a minute or two. Jones backed off down the passage and took a quick picture of Brave with Varson looming over his shoulder. Brave was Varson’s prize, all he had to show for the night, and he kept close to him like a nervous spouse at a party. Evans, Tickener and I went into the room which Costello had come out of to die. The window leading out into the shrubbery at the side of the building gaped open.
“He had two goons with him the other day,” I said, “one of them socked me but I guess they weren’t shooters.”
Tickener scribbled on a pad and Evans grunted. “Looks that way.”
“Two hopped it just after I shot the Italian. That makes four on the loose. I hope the boys at the gate got them, but it’s a lot to handle.” He brooded on this for a moment and then shrugged. “You didn’t quite level with me about the strength of the troops, did you Cliff?” I opened my hands apologetically. “Never mind,” he said, “we done OK.” Varson called his name and he went out into the corridor. Tickener looked at me inquiringly but I turned away from him and looked out through the window thinking my own murderous thoughts. Tickener walked out. I rolled a cigarette, lit it and followed him.
Susan Gutteridge was standing in the corridor along with a woman with wild hair and eyes. They both wore severe calico nightdresses. Brave was trying to do his hand-holding act with Susan but Varson was shouldering him aside. Jones had left the scene and Bruno had passed out. The other patient was staring at the body on the floor.
