As the dogs dragged the lead ARU at a pace behind Barry, Ridley prayed that he didn’t divert up the embankment at any point and into populated areas. As Laura ran, she just managed to text Jack to give him an update. Jack immediately turned off the A134 and got on to a dirt road running parallel to and above the train tracks. As soon as he heard the police dogs, he pulled over, jumped out and followed the sound of the sniffer dog choking itself with excitement at the end of its own lead. Jack was a good fifteen feet above the tracks on a dirt road and he very quickly realised that there was no way down. The embankment was almost sheer, loosely fenced off with barbed wire tied to staggered fenceposts. He resigned himself. Ridley was probably going to boil over if Jack ended up watching events unfold from above.
Barry was tiring. He kept slipping in the deep layer of small stones that ran along the side of the railway track; each time he stumbled to his hands and knees, he’d take longer to get back up. He could feel the stones through the soles of his trainers, whereas the dog handlers were wearing boots. The dogs, with no protection for their feet, opted to run higher on the embankment in the wet and muddy grass, the steep gradient being no problem for them.
As Barry ran, he tried to remember what was ahead of him in order to plan an escape. He needed to think of a way to explain the five million pounds on his back, while also thinking of a way to explain his decision to set fire to Mike’s dead body. But he had no answers to anything.
Barry looked down at Mike’s body and watched the blood slowly stop pouring out of the gaping head wound. After a moment, the pain from his broken left forearm hit him and Barry slumped onto the small horsehair sofa. He controlled his instinct to scream, swallowing again and again to stop the sound from coming out.
He scanned the room, desperate to find something he could use as a sling. Using his knife, he managed to cut off Mike’s T-shirt and tie the ends together, before slipping the improvised sling over his head and under the broken bone. He quickly stepped into the back garden to get some fresh air so he didn’t pass out, and to try to straighten out his head. The stars looked amazing above the undulating horizon and Barry was soon in control of the pain and calm in his mind. Although he’d seen and done worse in wartime, the only way to think straight now was to distance himself from the fact that he’d just killed one of his best friends. From this second on, Mikey was just another corpse and Barry knew how they burned.
Barry took his time. If he made one mistake, he’d be caught. He stood on the garden hose, feet apart, holding it firmly on the ground, and used his knife to cut clean through it, before making a second cut to give himself a decent length of hose. He put the hose into a bucket, popped back inside to retrieve Mike’s Range Rover keys from his pocket and set off into the pitch-black night. Walking to the Range Rover, siphoning the petrol and walking back took Barry less than twenty minutes.
By the time he was ready to move the body, the blood in Mike’s hair had congealed, sticking his head and the side of his face to the carpet like red glue. Barry grabbed a handful of hair from the top of Mike’s head and peeled his face clear. Then he used all his strength to drag Mike’s body one-handed across the carpet and up onto the short, two-seater sofa, finally curling his legs up into the foetal position. Barry then used anything flammable to create a bonfire around him.
He poured the siphoned petrol all over the sofa and splashed the remains onto the stacks of £5 and £10 notes in the hearth. He then picked up the green garden waste bag, stepped outside into the front garden and lit himself a cigarette. The roses were doing well against the cold nights and, although they’d been left to their own devices, they still bloomed. Barry took in the silence and, once content that there was no one for miles around, he flicked his cigarette into Rose Cottage, picked up his green bag and headed back over the hills, on foot, the way he’d arrived.
Barry knew that, if he dared to look around, he’d see the dogs and the armed police hot on his tail. The weight of his small rucksack was slowing him down, but there was no way he was leaving it behind. As he ran, his Glock was clearly visible in his hand, although his dad’s Webley was hidden beneath his jumper.
With Barry actually in sight ahead of them, the dog handler pulled back and the ARU took the lead. The dog strained at the end of its leash and barked loudly in protest at being taken off the job before he’d caught his prey.
‘Barry Cooper! Armed police! Stop running!’
Barry ran on as he cycled through his options. There were only two... live or die.
‘Stop and throw down your weapon!’
And then, from up ahead, the sound of a train approaching.
For the lead Armed Response Officer, time slowed as he processed all of the possibilities in a split second. Barry Cooper was so desperate to escape, he reckoned he’d definitely attempt to cross in front of the train. And he’d not think twice about firing his weapon to make the situation even more dangerous. The lead officer instructed two of his men to cross the track and shouted out again.
‘Barry Cooper! Throw down your weapon!’
The last thing he wanted was for some poor train driver to be faced with a shoot-out and then kill a civilian with his engine.
Barry, knowing the parameters in which ARUs worked, threw his Glock up onto the embankment. As far as his pursuers were aware, they were now chasing an unarmed man and would be far more reluctant to use deadly force.
From further behind, the lead officer heard Ridley shout, ‘Gun safe!’, scooping up the discarded Glock as he ran past. Ahead of them, the train’s headlights were getting closer.
‘Barry, do not attempt to cross the tracks! We have armed officers on both sides! Stop running!’
When the train came round the bend and into view, the headlights were blinding — which was exactly what Barry was hoping for.
He left everything to the very last second. As he turned ninety degrees and darted across the track, he pulled the Webley from his waistband and shot one of the Armed Response officers who’d crossed the track. Before he could shoot the second officer, five bullets from five weapons entered Barry’s torso, hurling him backwards, straight into the path of the oncoming train.
It took forever for the train to pass. Once it had gone, the lead officer ran to his man down and radioed for help. Ridley, Laura and Anik didn’t move; they just watched and prayed that the only dead person on this railway track was Barry Cooper.
The man down was alive, releasing Ridley and his team to find whatever was left of Barry. They looked up the track in the same direction as the train... and there he was. As Ridley led the way, he forced his eyes to focus in the darkness. What was lying there was definitely too small to be all of Barry, but looked like it could be a significant portion. Laura and Anik silently followed. And along the top of the embankment, a shadowy figure walked with them. Jack had had a bird’s-eye view of Barry’s death — it was a vision that was now burnt into his brain and would stay with him for as long as he lived.
Both of Barry Cooper’s lower legs had gone with a relatively clean cut, but his left arm had been ripped out of the shoulder joint high up, next to the ear; the rest of his body had been tossed and turned a dozen times as it passed underneath the length of the train and was now a broken pile of bones and bloody flesh. Ridley got out his mobile and turned on the torch. Laura and Anik followed suit.