He waited until they were airborne before issuing the scant instructions that were necessary.
‘Creag Innis is an islet on the western edge of the Shetlands, without a civilian population. Approximately one kilometre by two in area. Mainly rock, but with some woodland.’
He’d gleaned the information on the way to the airfield.
‘The number of hostiles is unknown,’ he continued. ‘As is the nature of their training. We have to assume it’s military. The primary target is this man, Richard Rossiter.’
He held up his phone. The four men studied the image in turn.
‘Capture where possible, but it’s not essential. That goes for everyone there.’
And that was the extent of their interaction.
They dropped into the darkness, the suddenness of finding himself suspended thousands of feet above the ground profoundly disorientating to Purkiss.
At first, the cluster of islets below was bewildering, and Purkiss was concerned that they’d miss their target and be stranded on some obscure rock. But as his eyes adjusted to the dark, he saw the tiny lights below.
The helicopter took shape, far beneath them. Purkiss used it as an anchor point.
His landing was rough, the jolt as he made contact with the earth shaking though his hips and his spine. He wrestled with the ’chute and collapsed it before the wind could start to tug it away. He stowed it and dropped the pack on the ground.
The four other men were already on the move.
They’d landed on a slope of scrubland, near the edge of the water. As they reached the ridge at the top of the slope, they flattened themselves.
Over to the right, a hundred yards distant, the helicopter’s rotor blades had started to sweep in a slow arc. Ahead, and slightly to the left, a hillock rose to some kind of ancient structure at the summit. In the base of the hillock there appeared to be some kind of door, a light shining dimly above it.
Beyond the hillock, the spikes of pine woodland formed a ragged skyline.
Purkiss had to assume Rossiter was on board the chopper.
He signalled silently to the other men. The one nearest nodded.
Rising from their bellies, the five of them began to advance on the helicopter at a crouch.
Purkiss saw the glint of movement at the same time as the others and flattened himself once more as the explosion of light along the helicopter’s side was followed by the staccato crash of automatic fire and the air around them teemed with the whine of projectiles. The rock and soil chipped and spattered and Purkiss curled into a ball, minimising his exposed surface area.
From their prone position, the four men began to return fire, the hammering of their weapons as relentless and methodical as a drill. The helicopter’s machine gun started up again, its roar louder than the assault rifles.
One of the men gasped and rolled and jerked.
Purkiss crawled so that he could keep the hillock in his line of vision. The door remained closed.
He saw two of the men scramble for cover behind a cluster of boulders. They pressed themselves on either side of it and loosed off bursts at the helicopter.
The remaining man raised a hand, looking at Purkiss, and gestured towards the hillock.
Purkiss nodded.
At a stoop, they ran towards the door in its base.
The other man was ahead. He was almost at the door when it was flung open.
He didn’t hesitate, opening fire in a short burst. Purkiss saw a figure lurch backwards.
He reached the door.
And heard a sound, off to the left. Distant but unmistakable.
The noise of an outboard motor starting up.
Twenty-eight
Purkiss ran, stooping again, the SIG held low and in both hands.
Behind him, the chatter of submachine gun fire echoed inside whatever chambers or tunnels were in the base of the hillock. Further back, the helicopter’s gun had fallen silent.
He followed the rasp of the motor, its sound like a chainsaw. Heard it growing louder as he approached the tip of the islet.
He reached the lip of a shallow cliff and looked down.
A narrow cove with a patch of rocky beach lay below, a twenty-foot drop. A single boat was just beginning its turn away from the shore.
The figure at the tiller was indistinct. But Purkiss knew.
He looked down. He could scramble to the beach without difficulty, but it would cost him time.
Bracing his gun arm by gripping his wrist in his left fist, Purkiss took aim with the SIG P226.
He fired. Twice. Three times.
Four.
The boat continued on its path out to sea.
Purkiss slid down the rock face on his backside, the SIG as level as he could hold it. As he hit the ground at the bottom, he fired again.
Three more shots. Four.
He ran down the short length of beach, slowed, took aim.
Fired the last two rounds.
For a moment he thought he’d made a hit, because the boat listed a little to one side. But it corrected itself, and went on its way.
Purkiss slammed the spare magazine in and began advancing into the water, feeling its freeze rising up his legs.
He pulled the trigger as he waded through the black water.
Six shots, in groups of two.
Two more.
The boat was becoming smaller, the darkness swallowing it up.
Purkiss drew breath.
He had two shots left.
If he used them, and succeeded, he’d be effectively unarmed.
If the man in the boat had a gun, he’d turn it on Purkiss.
But at least Purkiss would have achieved his main goal, which was to stop him from getting away.
He sighted down his arm and along the smooth length of the pistol.
Felt himself become one with the gun.
He squeezed back on the trigger.
The boat veered wildly, its nose arrowing upwards and sideways, its motor roaring as if in protest.
Then the sound cut out, and momentum carried the boat sideways and forwards a few feet before it ebbed to a standstill.
He saw the figure in the boat twist to face him.
The waves lapped and churned against his torso. He’d waded far enough that he was in up to his waist. Any deeper and his footing would be compromised.
Purkiss watched the man place both hands on the edge of the boat as it bobbed, adrift, on the surface of the sea.
The man swung his legs over the side, and sank into the water.
He struck out towards Purkiss, swimming strongly. Purkiss backed off a little, feeling the suck of the tide and compensating for it.
When the man was twenty feet away, he rose from the water, the level at the height of his chest.
He tipped his head back, gazing at Purkiss, his face pale in the dim glinting light from the surface.
‘So here it ends,’ he said.
It was the first time Purkiss had heard Rossiter’s voice since he’d visited him in the one-man prison, the Box, two summers ago. Then, their conversation had been almost urbane.
Distantly, far behind, the sounds of gunfire punctuated the night.
‘In the water,’ said Rossiter. ‘Just like before.’
Yes. Just like that October morning on the Baltic Sea.
Like two sparring partners sizing one another up in the ring, they began to move towards each other.
Purkiss had the advantage, he knew. He wasn’t as deep in the water as Rossiter, which afforded him more mobility, more control over his actions.
He was more than a decade younger than the other man.
And he’d been active in the field continuously, while Rossiter had been a prisoner for more than two years, permitted exercise but hardly subject to the kind of physical challenges Purkiss had faced and overcome.