“You have his address?”
“I’ve actually been to his house. I know where he goes to school. I’ve written it all down for you. I can tell you everything you want to know.” Bulman didn’t want to push his luck, but he couldn’t resist asking a few questions of his own. It was too good an opportunity to miss. He began innocently. “What is this place? You’re building a hostel?”
“It’s a dreadful thing, the number of young homeless people there are in London,” he said —and to Bulman’s surprise, he actually had to brush away a tear. “Out on the streets with no food or shelter!
First Aid was given this land by one of the city’s most prominent developers, and I’m happy to say that we have raised enough cash to build somewhere they can be looked after with food and warm clothes.”
“You do a lot of charity.”
“I have made it my life’s work.”
It was the moment to ask what Bulman really wanted to know. “So why are you interested in Alex, Mr.
McCain?” he continued casually. “I have to tell you, whatever you do with that kid is fine with me. But I would be interested to know—”
“I’m sure you would, Mr. Bulman.” The round white eyes settled on him, and for a moment he shuddered. “You are a journalist, I understand.”
“That’s right.”
“I would hate to think that you might be tempted to write about this meeting today.”
“That depends how much you’re going to pay me.”
“We’ve already agreed on the price,” Straik muttered. “Twenty thousand dollars, in cash.” Bulman licked his lips. He could taste the mint from the chewing gum. “I agreed to that price before I realized that Mr. McCain was involved,” he said. “But I thought, under the circumstances, that we might renegotiate.”
“I agree with you,” McCain said. “That’s exactly what I’ve decided to do.” He took out a gun and shot the journalist three times; once in the head, once in the throat, and once in the chest. Bulman’s last gesture was one of surprise. His eyes widened even as his hands flew up and his body jerked in the chair. Then he slumped back. Blood trickled down from the three bullet holes, spreading across his shirt.
“Was that completely wise?” Straik asked.
“It was unavoidable,” McCain replied. He slipped the gun back into his pocket. “He wasn’t going to keep quiet. He was greedy. A week from now or a year from now, he would have made himself a nuisance.”
“I’m sure. But are we safe?”
“I would doubt very much that he told anyone he was coming here. There’s nothing to connect him with you or me. He was a journalist. Now he’s a dead journalist. Who really cares about the difference?”
“And what about Alex Rider?” Straik got up and went over to the window. He made a signal and a moment later there was the sound of an engine starting up. “We can’t go ahead, Desmond. Poison Dawn is finished.”
“No.” McCain hadn’t raised his voice, but the single word was dark and thunderous. The two of them had known each other for years, but at that moment Straik wondered if he fully understood what went on inside the other man’s head. There was a sort of madness there. He wouldn’t listen to any argument.
“We have been planning this too long,” McCain said. “We’ve spent too much time and too much money. Everything is in place.”
“But if MI6 knows what we’re doing . . .”
“They can’t know. It’s impossible.”
“They sent the boy. First to Scotland and then to Greenfields.”
“I’m not so sure.” McCain glanced at Bulman as if he’d forgotten that he’d just shot him and was expecting him to make some comment. “When Alex Rider came to Kilmore Castle, he was a guest of another journalist, Edward Pleasure. There was a teenage girl too. When he came to Greenfields, he was with a school party. It was quite different. I don’t quite know what’s going on here, but it may not be quite as cut and dried as it seems.”
“Even so . . .”
McCain held a hand up for silence. “We are not canceling Poison Dawn,” he said. “And certainly not yet. It seems to me that we have to meet with this Alex Rider and have a little talk.”
“You think he’ll just walk in here?”
“I have something else in mind.” McCain stood up. “We are about to make an unimaginable amount of money,” he said. “Two hundred million dollars. Maybe more. But that means we have to take risks.
More than that, we have to make sure that we move one step ahead of the opposition. And that’s exactly what we’re going to do.”
He reached forward and grabbed Harry Bulman by the front of his shirt. The journalist had never been a small man, and now he had become, in every sense, a dead weight. Even so, McCain pulled him effortlessly to his feet and dragged him over to the door. Still holding him, he stepped outside. A mechanical digger had started up while he was talking with Straik and it was waiting for him on the other side of the door with its metal arm raised. There was a driver sitting behind the window, smoking.
McCain threw down the body and the driver revved up the engine and trundled forward. There was a crunch of machinery as the arm was lowered and the dead man was picked up. Then the digger reversed, carrying Bulman toward the muddy excavation that would soon be his grave.
McCain watched him go. “Well, it looks as if Mr. Bulman finally got what every journalist wants,” he said.
Straik glanced at him.
“A scoop.”
