Danny shrugged. ‘Don’t know where I’ll end up,’ he said. ‘Mum won’t come home. Dad is acting strange, like he doesn’t belong at the farm any more. You know what I wish? I wish they’d just sell the lot, set up somewhere else and just … I don’t know, make their minds up. It’s crap this idea of staying together for the kids. Mam said a couple of years ago that they wouldn’t split up ’cos of me. I mean, like that makes me feel better or something.’
Patrick nodded. ‘Maybe you need to tell them that,’ he said.
Kinnear had found his entry point. It was off towards the road end of the meadow and far too distant from the house for his liking, but there was a place where a stretch of dilapidated-looking fence met the wall. He tested the fence nervously. He was no lightweight. It creaked ominously, but held. Panting with the effort, Kinnear hauled himself up on to the wall and rolled, keeping his body low, then dropped, lowering himself the length of his arms, down on the other side.
Pausing only to check his weapon, Kinnear raced across the lawn and towards the house. He entered through the kitchen door.
Harry and Marcus were clearing away the breakfast things. Marcus was still nervous, still jumpy. He planned, he told Harry, to close the shop for a while and go away. Far away. He had friends in Scotland, surely that was distance enough.
‘Depends what you’re running from.’
Marcus froze. Harry, turning from the sink found himself facing Sam Kinnear, gun in hand.
Dimly, Harry recognized it as an automatic and some odd bit of his mind suggested that Patrick would know the make and model. It was the sort of oddity that Patrick always knew when they watched films together. But this was not a film.
Marcus had begun to panic. Gibbering wordlessly. Harry shushed him impatiently. ‘What do you want?’ he asked Kinnear.
‘What do you think I want?’
‘I wouldn’t know.’
‘Don’t try to be smart,’ Kinnear told him. ‘Give me what I came for and I’ll be out of here. I want the numbers, the accounts. I want the lot, everything he owed me.’
‘I don’t have them,’ Harry said, oddly relieved that he could tell the truth. Harry was never very good with lies. ‘The police have everything we found.’
Kinnear laughed out loud. ‘Like I believe you.’
‘Harry, give him what he wants.’
Harry glanced sideways at Marcus. ‘You know I can’t do that. Sergeant Fine took the books away last night. You were here, you saw it.’
‘But your notes, you must have kept notes. I know you kept notes.’ Marcus started to run, he leapt for the kitchen door. Kinnear fired and Marcus went down. Blood poured from his torn calf.
Harry grabbed a towel and made to move towards the fallen man. He could hear footsteps, running down the uncarpeted hall. ‘Alec, stay back.’
‘And you bloody well stay there.’ Kinnear had crossed the space between them and the muzzle of his gun pressed hard against Harry’s side.
Alec appeared in the doorway and Kinnear motioned him through. Harry could see Alec cursing himself for running in like a green fool.
The boys and Naomi were still upstairs, Harry thought. He prayed they had heard the shot but would have the sense to stay put.
‘You. Who else is here. I know about Danny and there’s another one, I saw him. Anyone else?’
‘No,’ Harry said firmly.
Alec shot him a look, nodded almost imperceptibly.
He hoped fervently that Marcus would not contradict but the man was lying on the floor clutching at his injured leg and seemed not to have even heard.
‘You.’ Kinnear prodded Harry in the side. ‘Tie them up.’
‘Marcus is hurt, at least let me help him first.’
‘Just do as you’re told.’
Having nothing else to hand, Harry tore the tea towels into strips and used them to bind Alec and Marcus’s hands and feet to the kitchen chairs. He dare not tie them too loosely, knowing Kinnear would check. He tied another strip around Marcus’s bleeding calf, padding it with a towel and hoping that the bleeding would stop. It looked very red, Harry thought. Very red and very painful. He tried to think if there were any major arteries Kinnear might have hit, but he really didn’t know. He found himself thinking that Patrick would know that too. Patrick or Naomi.
Harry took a deep breath. He was oddly calm in the face of the gun; less so having witnessed the sheer unpredictability of Kinnear. Last year he and Patrick and Naomi had found themselves caught up in a hostage situation, Harry’s first encounter with weapons. He had seen then just what a gun in the hands of a madman could do, but he had faced his fear back then and somehow that fear had diminished.
He was wary, certainly, but as he set about the practical task of binding Marcus’s wound and tying his friend’s hands and feet he found that his mind was oddly calm. Out of sight of Kinnear, he slid his hand into his trouser pocket and withdrew a small penknife, the twin to the one Patrick had given Alec last Christmas. He managed to open the knife, slid it into Alec’s hand.
So far no sound of running feet on the stairs, no indication that Naomi and the boys were coming down. Harry held his breath, released it slowly. He straightened.
‘What now?’
‘You come with me.’
Harry went.
‘That was a shot.’
‘A what?’ Danny stared at her. ‘Didn’t sound like no shotgun.’
‘That’s because it wasn’t,’ she told him. Of course, Danny would be familiar with the sound of shotguns and maybe even rifles. ‘That was a pistol, Danny.’
‘Kinnear,’ Patrick said. Then: ‘Dad.’
He was making for the door. Naomi threw herself in the direction of the sound and grabbed at him. ‘No, stay up here. In the study. Danny, do you have your phone?’
‘Yes, but there’s not much credit on it.’
‘You don’t need it for the nines. Quick now. We’ve got to contact Fine.’
Patrick led the way and they piled into the study. Naomi locked the door.
‘What if he shoots the lock?’ Patrick said.
‘The desk. Do you think you could move it between you? I can help if you tell me where I’m going.’
‘Give it a try.’
The desk was heavy, antique oak, They struggled between them to drag it across the rugs and bare floorboards, hating the noise it made, though Naomi guessed that Kinnear would know where they were anyway. They shoved it hard against the door and then Naomi called the police, telling the controller where she was and what was wrong and to patch her through to Sergeant Fine.
It wasn’t easy persuading the woman but Naomi persevered. To her profound relief, Fine’s voice was soon on the phone.
‘He’s here. Downstairs and he’s armed. One shot fired. I’m in the study with Patrick and Danny. I don’t know what’s happening with the others.’
‘Hang tight,’ Fine said. ‘The cavalry’s on its way.’
Kinnear forced Harry upstairs. ‘Where are they?’
‘In the study, I think,’ Harry said. ‘The door locks, none of the others do.’
‘Come on out,’ Kinnear yelled through the door.
‘Danny, Patrick? Are the two of you all right in there?’
‘Two of us,’ Danny whispered. Patrick shrugged.
‘Don’t know what he has in mind but … Yes, dad, we’re both fine. What’s going on?’
‘Marcus is hurt.’
‘Enough. Your notes, Marcus said you kept notes.’
‘And Marcus was wrong,’ Harry said patiently. ‘The police took everything away with them last night.’
‘He’s telling you the truth,’ Patrick shouted through the door. ‘The police said it was evidence and they had to have everything. Sergeant Fine has it all.’
‘Then we’d better talk to bloody Sergeant Fine,’ Kinnear snapped. ‘Downstairs. You know his number?’
‘I know his number,’ Harry agreed.
From inside the room they heard two sets of footsteps retreating down the stairs.
‘So,’ Naomi said, ‘the gunshot was probably Marcus. Alec must be out of action in some way and Harry’s lied about how many of us there are.’ She relayed this to Fine. Below, they could hear the murmur of voices as Harry spoke on the phone.