Kilgore smiled. It was the kind of smile that reminded Hegarty of the jaws of a predatory fish frozen inside a block of ice. ‘Is that right? Well, the choice is yours, Mr Hegarty.’ He pocketed the gun and then the bolt-cutters, raised Natalie’s arms and harshly prised two of her fingers apart. ‘I’m a very fair man, Mr Hegarty. So I’m going to give you the choice of which two of your wife’s fingers I cut off first.’
A terrible, plaintive sound came from his wife’s gagged mouth. It tore Hegarty’s heart to shreds. ‘No, please, cut mine off, not hers.’
‘Well, I’d sure like to, but as I explained, Mr Hegarty, that really would not be forward thinking.’
‘You seriously think I’m ever going to work for you bastards again?’
Kilgore nodded then frowned, as if he was suddenly deep in thought. ‘Oh, I think you will, Mr Hegarty. Because when word gets around the art world about what you’ve done, no one else is going to touch you with a goddamn ten-foot barge pole.’
‘Please,’ Hegarty said. ‘Please tell me just what the hell I’m supposed to have done? You brought me photographs of a Fragonard painting of Summer and you asked me to make a copy of it, which I did. I just kept another copy for myself. What the hell is your problem?’
‘It’s not my problem, Mr Hegarty. It’s your problem.’ He pulled out the bolt-cutters again and held them in front of Natalie’s terrified face. ‘You thought you could cheat me, and more importantly my employer. I think at some time you’ve had the original painting in your possession. So, if you want your pretty little lady to retain all her fingers, it’s very simple. Give me the original that you’ve stolen, I’ll take it back to my employer, and we’ll all be friends again.’
‘You have this all wrong, and you’ve a very weird idea of friendship, Mr Kilgore.’
The American lowered his head and looked directly at Hegarty. ‘Any more weird than your idea of honesty? Integrity? Do you know the definition of integrity, Mr Hegarty?’
The forger stared back at him without replying for some moments. ‘And you think you know it, do you?’ he retorted acidly.
‘Integrity is doing the right thing, even when no one is watching.’ Kilgore smiled. ‘True?’
‘And your point is?’
‘You have that Watteau which you claim is the original, and that one of your undetectable fakes is the version hanging in the Uffizi in Florence. You were given that original painting in good faith. No one was watching you make a fine copy. No one could challenge you when you duped the gallery into thinking you had given them back the original, as you’ve proudly boasted to me.’
‘I was just joking,’ Hegarty said, nervousness raising the pitch of his voice.
A sharp noise startled them all. It came from behind them.
Kilgore turned and looked in horror at the huge picture-window. Hegarty turned his head, along with the two henchmen. They saw a squeegee on a wooden pole rubbing up and down the glass.
‘The window cleaner,’ Hegarty explained, unnecessarily.
‘Get him the hell out of—’
A moment later a reedy-thin man in his fifties, in dungarees, gave them a happy smile and a wave.
‘You have curtains? Blinds?’ Kilgore demanded, with panic in his voice now.
‘Afraid not.’
‘Tell him to go get the hell out of here,’ Kilgore said.
‘You tell him yourself, I’m a bit tied up right now.’
The American instinctively slipped his hand inside his jacket pocket and gripped his gun.
‘Shoot him, why don’t you?’ Hegarty suggested. Then, gathering confidence, he added, ‘He’s seen your face and your two gorillas. You’re going to have to shoot him. POW! POW!’
‘Shut it. Make one signal to him and you’re all dead, you both and him. Understand?’
‘Actually, Kilgore, I don’t understand. You’re not in the Wild West of the nineteenth century. You are in twenty-first-century England. Saltdean has one murder every ten years. Three in one day isn’t going to look good on your CV.’
‘I said shut it.’ Kilgore ushered the twins to stand behind the table and, by joining them, the three of them blocked the window cleaner’s view.
‘He’s a Jehovah’s Witness,’ Hegarty said. ‘Very nice man. He could save your soul, and your mates’.’
‘Don’t push me.’
‘I don’t need to push you, you’re already on the edge of the cliff. That nervous twitch in your eyes is a dead giveaway. Oh, and further bad news, he and his son, who is probably around the front at the moment, will be coming inside in a few minutes, using the key we leave in the shed.’
‘You tell them both to go away and come back some other time.’
‘I’m not doing that,’ Hegarty said, emboldened now as he saw the menace in Kilgore’s face turn to concern. ‘They are very busy and I need clear windows. We get a lot of salt off the sea — hence the name of this place, Saltdean.’
‘You are starting to really piss me off, Mr Hegarty.’
‘Not half as much as you are pissing my wife and me off.’
An instant later the doorbell rang.
‘You do not answer it,’ Kilgore said.
Hegarty smiled. ‘Not a problem, I don’t need to.’
A young male voice called out from upstairs. ‘Mr Hegarty, Mrs Hegarty, it’s Charlie and Joey, just come in to do the windows!’
73
Monday, 4 November
‘I’d advise you untie us pretty quickly, Mr Kilgore,’ Hegarty said quietly. ‘It won’t look too good. And I’d also advise you to put your piece away. Charlie up there is a black-belt mixed martial arts fighter, and if I ask him nicely, he’ll shove that gun so far down your throat you’ll need an enema to get it back.’
‘You’re not in any position to threaten me, Mr Hegarty.’
‘Actually, I am, and you know that.’
‘Shall I start upstairs, Mr and Mrs Hegarty?’ the window cleaner called down.
Kilgore, momentarily panic-stricken, told his two heavies not to react.
‘Great, thanks, Charlie,’ Hegarty called out. ‘Tea with three lumps?’
‘Top man!’ the reply came.
‘Tell him to get lost,’ Kilgore demanded, but his voice had lost its authority. He stepped back, blocking the view of the window cleaner outside.
‘You tell him,’ Hegarty retorted.
Kilgore frowned, looking thrown and uncertain what to do next, the gun jigging up and down. Then he said quietly to the twins, ‘Untie them.’ Levelling the gun first at Hegarty then Natalie, he retreated to the bottom of the staircase.
As the twins removed the bonds around the couple, and the gag from Natalie’s mouth, Kilgore announced quietly, ‘Here’s what we’re gonna do, Mr and Mrs Hegarty. We’re all going to sit calmly around your kitchen table, like we’re having a real friendly meeting, until these two jokers have done their stuff and gone away.’
Still covered by the gun, both Hegartys shook some blood back into their arms, then complied. Natalie exchanged a nervous glance with her husband, sitting next to her. The hired muscle perched opposite and Kilgore took the head of the table, holding his gun low, out of sight. Addressing the couple, Kilgore said, ‘If either of you attempt to call for help, I’ll shoot you both and the window cleaners, I promise.’
‘I don’t think so,’ Hegarty said.
‘Darling,’ Natalie cautioned her husband.
Hegarty grinned at Kilgore. ‘Four dead bodies? Really? You and these apes don’t want to spend the rest of your lives in prison, do you?’
‘I mean what I said, Hegarty.’
‘You do, so go ahead, shoot me.’ He stared at the American hard in the eyes. ‘Might be wiser to talk, don’t you think?’ He stood up.