“He’s a great shot. Like a magician.”
“But what are you doing?”
“A bit of fun. You like a bit of fun, don’t you?”
“No, please don’t do that—”
Lucas couldn’t see what was happening.
“—no please don’t, you’re hurting me—”
“Of course we’re not.”
Her scream was cut short.
When the men moved away, he could see that they’d fastened her to the struts of the target with belts, and had stuffed a handkerchief into her mouth. As soon as they were clear she threw herself to the ground, taking the target with her, trapping herself like a tortoise. Most of the men laughed. One returned and lifted her to her feet, set her so she was leaning against the target once more. Lucas couldn’t hear what he said: just a word or two, carried upwards with the cigar smoke.
Careful . . . very still.
When he backed away, the girl remained upright.
Her short dress shimmered in the spotlight’s glare.
One of the men had disappeared into the dark, in the direction of the house, and for a moment Lucas thought he’d gone for help, to fetch a grown-up, but when he reappeared he was holding, what, a fucking pumpkin? A pumpkin, pilfered from the kitchen. While the others watched, laughing, he put it on the girl’s head.
It fell off.
“Tell her to stop shaking!”
Lucas couldn’t hear what he said to the girl, but whatever it was, he said it with a hand on her chin, looking straight into her eyes.
When he replaced the pumpkin on her head, it fell off.
Someone left the group, wandered into the shadows of the barn. He re-emerged with a roll of tape in his hands, holding it like a trophy. There were cheers, and more laughter, which continued as the pumpkin was strapped onto the girl’s head. She was shaking, and it slipped to one side, and when the nearest of the men returned and set it straight again, he tapped her on the cheek with three fingers—not a slap exactly; more a warning.
“I should have done something,” Lucas said.
Louisa said, “It wouldn’t have gone well. There were five of them. And they were drunk.”
But Emma had said nothing.
In the darkness of the shed, with some night-creature rustling around outside, the boy had continued his story.
Lars, as instructed, had headed down to the estuary. Snow was falling, and as he crossed the main road through town he saw no one. Twenty minutes earlier he’d passed the woman’s car, which he’d disabled the other night, and while kicked-up snow showed someone had been checking it out, there was no Police Aware sticker on the windscreen. Right now, nobody was aware of anything much. People were sticking to their firesides, their TV screens. The shops were shuttered, and schools were closed. He’d heard that on the radio, which had also advised him to remain indoors unless his journey was absolutely necessary.
Which it kind of was.
It should have been an in-and-out job; had been sold to him as such. He hadn’t been given background, which was fine: if that stuff mattered, it wouldn’t be in the background, and besides, all stories were the same in the end. This particular version, someone had seen something he shouldn’t, and wanted paying to keep quiet about it. Fine if what he’d seen had been the neighbour kissing the milkman, and what he’d wanted was a little of the same; less fine if the mark was in the arms business, and the tag was fifty grand. Because there was a strict policy in that line of work: you did not allow anybody to take one bite from your apple. Because one bite led to two, and two bites later the whole fucking tree was gone. No, some orchards were best left alone, because they were owned by people who knew people like Frank Harkness, who in turn knew people like Lars. And people like Lars, he’d be first to admit, didn’t care whose apples they were safeguarding, as long as the money was right.
Add to that the bruised cheek from where the woman had headbutted him that first night, and what you had was what the movies called a situation. One which, if it hadn’t been for the fucking snow, would be over already.
Instead, another woman had turned up: a blonde in a long dark coat who was also handy, apparently. The whole thing was beyond a joke.
He reached the bottom of the road that bisected what passed for a High Street and it became a tree-shrouded dirt lane, a wooden gate effecting a boundary between the two, next to a signpost suggesting occasional flooding. Trees covered the track towards the estuary, so the snow became a whisper rather than a shout, a series of grace notes nestled in tree joints. The ground was muddy, offering a smorgasbord of prints, both boot and animal. Maybe a boy scout would have studied this longer. Lars just walked on, eyes peeled.
The first woman had been wearing a white ski jacket, which would have little camo-value here. The blonde, though, was dressed in black, and if she knew what she was doing, might get close.
But this was farming country. Gunshots wouldn’t startle the locals; especially gunshots muffled by snow-covered trees.
He walked on, sticking to the track.
Somewhere up ahead, he heard voices.
It could have been worse. The girl could have been killed.
The bolt had sliced flesh from her arm, spraying a theatrical gout of blood into the air—Lucas had stumbled telling this part, as if the description were beyond him, though the memory was fixed; the blood black in the spotlight’s gleam, the pattering as it hit the ground. Girl and target collapsed, the girl screaming through the gag. The pumpkin came loose, and rolled into shadow. And the excited buzz the men had been sharing climaxed in a two-second silence, while drunken coked-up brains assessed damage and formed contingency plans.
Then the man who’d fired the bow laughed, a werewolf bark, and the others joined in.
Five minutes later, the weeping girl had been led away.
His story over, Lucas had subsided into silence.
And here, now, in the morning, Emma said, “Any normal kid would have gone to the police.”
“Think about the people he saw,” said Louisa. “A royal, for god’s sake. And Judd used to be Home Secretary. In charge of the police, remember? And—what was that?”
Both became still.
The noise had come from down the track; a soft padding on a path littered with twigs and dead leaves.
Emma put her hand on Louisa’s elbow, but Louisa shook her head. Two short jabs of the finger: one towards Emma, the other to the shed. Stay here. Watch the boy.
Then she stepped off through the trees.
The door opened.
He’d been lying on the floor in Shirley Dander’s room, into which grey light fizzled from a sky with the clarity of a stained tablecloth. The carpet smelled of dust and ancient spillage. It was Slough House in close-up, worn and mouldy, and if he lay long enough he’d seep into its fabric; become another spore in its culture of damaged mediocrity. Thoughts he put on hold as the opening of the door was followed by a heavy incoming tread.
Lamb said, “You still alive?”
Lech said nothing.
Lamb kicked him, not gently.
“Fuck you!”
“I’ll take that as a yes.”
Lamb threw himself into a chair, as if the chair had done him some great disservice in the past, and was suddenly smoking. Had a bottle too, which must have been in his overcoat pocket. Two glasses appeared from another pocket, and he poured a small measure into one and pushed it in Lech’s direction.
The other, he filled halfway to the brim.
“That’s quite the barcode you’ve been given.”
Lech said nothing.
Lamb sighed. “If I have to kick you every time I want a reply, my foot’ll be black and fucking blue before we’re done. Now get off the floor and drink that.”