Ratcatcher

Silence again for a few moments. Elle said, ‘Something else. Not new information, but there’s a possible connection.’

Purkiss waited.

‘Five months ago there was a heist just outside Tallinn. Two armoured vans carrying currency from one of the big banks were attacked in the forest by what must have been a heavily armed gang. There were no survivors, every one of the guards was shot dead. But the sides of the vans had been blown open with RPG rounds. It was huge news at the time, one of the biggest hauls in Estonia’s history. Two hundred and fifty million krooni. That’s over sixteen million euros.’

‘Kuznetsov’s crew, you think?’

‘Possibly. The police made no progress, at least none they disclosed publicly. A well-trained team, carrying out a military-style ambush with sophisticated weapons… Kuznetsov’s definitely up there on the board.’

Through the trees was the glimmer of the horizon’s lights.

‘Where are we going now?’ said Elle.

‘To the hotel where our friend was when she got taken. To ask if anyone saw anybody matching Fallon’s description, and to search her room.’

‘It’s what Fallon would expect you to do.’

‘Exactly.’

‘And he’s probably got it under surveillance.’

‘I hope so. From now on I’m putting myself in harm’s way wherever I can. It’s the only way in.’

They crested a hill There was the city in the near distance, its brightness blurred by the rain, the firefly glow of helicopters sparking here and there above it. She skirted the centre, Purkiss assumed to avoid the roadblocks and detours as he had earlier. Still progress was slow once they reached the commercial hub.

Elle’s phone rang in its cradle on the dashboard. She glanced at the display, said, ‘Rossiter,’ and hit the speakerphone button.

A rasp, a wheeze, and a burst of static. Then, harsh but clear, Rossiter’s voice.

‘Elle. It’s… Teague. Chris Teague. He’s the one…’

‘Richard?’ Her voice rose.

‘He’s… I’ve been stabbed…’

Twenty-Four

He sprawled on the living room carpet with his back propped against a sofa, hands clamped to a wad of bloodied cloth against his chest. The room was a riot of disorder. A coffee table sagged in splintered halves, a heavy armchair lay overturned by what could only have been the impact of a human bulk. Glass from smashed ornaments was splashed across the carpet.

Rossiter’s teeth were bared and clenched, the breath hissing through them in rapid jerks, sweat sheening his face and slicking his sparse hair to his brow. The carpet was a Pollock painting of cream fabric and spattered blood, a broader smudge marking his path across the floor to his current position.

Elle had said, ‘Where are you,’ and he replied, ‘At my flat,’ and she said ‘We’re two minutes away. I’ll call an ambulance.’ He said, ‘No. No ambulance, it’s not that serious,’ the sibilants drawn out like air from a tyre. Elle seemed to Purkiss to be debating. Then she hung up and hauled the wheel sideways. The car crossed the corner of a pavement.

The flat was a second-floor one. They took the stairs three at a time, Purkiss and Elle in the lead, Elle holding the pistol from the car low at her thigh, Kendrick in the rear with the rifle, doing what he could to conceal it across the short distance between the car and the entrance to the block. The door to the flat itself was shut but unlocked when Purkiss tried it. They piled in.

Close up, Purkiss could see that Rossiter had been wrong, that it was in fact serious. His face had the hue and texture of lard, except at his lips where a veiny blue was apparent. His eyes rolled like those of a horse after a fall. Purkiss took his hands, prised them away from his chest, bringing the soaked wad of cloth with them. Rossiter was in shirtsleeves. The front of the shirt was wallpapered to his chest, apart from low down on the left hand side where a ragged tear started to weep fresh blood as its covering was removed. Shreds of cloth from his shirt were mingled with the torn flesh.

Purkiss used the tail of Rossiter’s shirt to sponge the wound, feeling the chest flinch under the pressure. He watched the blood well again. No spurting. He put the back of his hand near the wound, felt no air against his skin. Nor, when he put an ear close, was there any tell-tale sucking sound. Rossiter started coughing and there was foam at his lips, but it was clear, not pink or bloody.

Purkiss watched Rossiter’s chest, his throat. His eyelids were fluttering and his breathing was quickening and becoming shallower until it was no more than a rapid sequence of tiny gasps, the breaths barely slipping across the threshold of his blueing lips. Purkiss put three fingers of his hand on his throat, the middle one on the thyroid notch and the ring and index ones on either side. The cartilage was off-centre. He pressed his ear against Rossiter’s ribs, first the right side and then the left, trying to avoid the blood. It was a poor substitute for a stethoscope, but even so Purkiss could detect the difference between the two sides.

On the right, the echo of air throught the pulmonary tubes. On the left, ominous silence.

Purkiss turned his head to Elle. ‘Give me a pen.’

She stared back. ‘What?’

‘Give me a bloody pen, will you? A ball-point.’

She fumbled in her pockets, passed one across, a cheap and basic piece of plastic.

‘Got a knife?’

This time she was quicker and handed him a pen-knife. Purkiss removed the cap from the pen, pulled out the nib with its inky tail, and picked off the round plastic tab at the other end, leaving a hollow tube. Carefully he broke the other end so that the plastic came to a sharp point. He probed Rossiter’s chest just in front of the armpit on the left, feeling for the space between the fourth and fifth ribs. Then he opened the smallest of the blades on the pen- knife and made a shallow slit with the tip. Rossiter gave a tiny cry, as much as he could muster given the minimal quantity of air that was getting into and out of his lungs. With his finger Purkiss enlarged the slit a little before positioning the thin end of the hollow plastic tube against the hole and pressing it in. There was the faintest crackle as the tube slid through the subcutaneous fat and fibres before he felt resistance. He pushed harder and the membrane gave and he was through into the pleural space. The air shot through the tube with a hiss. As it escaped, so did a long, drawn-out groan from Rossiter’s mouth. Purkiss felt the thyroid cartilage again. It had shifted back to the midline.

He took a long breath.

‘What happened?’ Elle’s voice was raised in volume a notch but the pitch was calm.

‘It’s called a tension pneumothorax. Air was getting sucked into the sac around his lung but couldn’t escape, and it was compressing the other side. I’ve relieved it for now, but he needs medical attention urgently.’

Through lips that were pinking up rapidly Rossiter hissed, ‘Impressive.’

‘You pick up a few things here and there.’ Purkiss’s hands were roving, probing at Rossiter’s abdomen. There was no wincing, no involuntary resistance from the muscles. ‘It didn’t get you below the diaphragm, luckily for you.’ To Elle: ‘He needs an ambulance.’

‘No.’ Rossiter spoke perhaps more loudly than he’d been intending, and grimaced. ‘Too many… questions. Slow us down.’

After a moment Purkiss said, ‘He’s right. The ambulance crew would call in a stabbing. We’d have the police to deal with. They’re bound to be on the alert tonight and they might get difficult with us, especially given how messed up Kendrick and I look.’

‘But you said he needed a doctor.’

Kendrick came back from the sideboard with masking tape. He tore off a length of Rossiter’s sleeve and began binding the stab wound. Purkiss said, ‘He does. We take him to the hospital, drop him off and get out of there.’

He used some of the tape Kendrick had brought to secure the shell of the ballpoint pen in place where it