Chapter Eleven

‘What was that?’ Carl said.

‘I didn’t hear nothing.’

‘I did, there’s someone outside. Maybe it’s just kids.’

Carl checked the window, looking for a gold car. There was the usual assortment of bangers up and down the road, and a black Mercedes farther up, its nose just sticking out from a side road. It was a new version of his car, someone here must be doing OK, Carl thought, as the back door burst open. The big man slammed into him before he managed to turn. Carl saw something blur in his hand, heard Julie scream, then nothing else.

Angelo followed and he slapped Julie hard.

‘You must stop that noise,’ he said.

Angelo raised his hand again but Julie stuck hers in her mouth and managed to control herself, despite tasting her blood. Carl had crumpled to the floor, with a huge man standing over him. She tried to go to him but Angelo held her.

‘Leave him. His worries are over.’

‘You haven’t killed him?’

Angelo shrugged and half carried her to a chair. He forced her down on it with his hand.

‘Where is your son?’

He asked for Mark but Julie saw Shane. Her last image of him, as she left him in the garden with a reluctant Mark, to go shopping. He was playing on a mound of sand the council had left. His own private beach. The only one he’d ever seen. This was her final punishment for losing him and it came through Mark. Again.

Carl didn’t seem to be moving. He was curled up on the floor like a large baby. Like Shane. A brute in an expensive suit stood over him, and winked at her. The suit didn’t fit, his body wanted to escape from it, muscles and hard flesh pushed against its seams. There was something in his hand, that thing they used to change car wheels, and she saw a thin trickle of blood seeping from Carl’s skull.

‘I see your son has told you about us,’ Angelo said. ‘You are frightened, but not surprised.’

‘He hasn’t told me nothing.’

‘Maybe this man then. No matter. It’s a pity though, a pity for you. Where’s Mark?’

‘He’s gone away. To Spain.’

‘Really? But he doesn’t fly. He can’t fly.’

Julie just about stopped herself asking how this bastard knew that but she could answer it herself. That bitch Lena. She must have told them everything she knew about Mark. Angelo put his hand over her face. It enveloped her and she thought she was going to choke. She tried to kick out at him, but the man was like a tree. He let her breathe again.

‘Where’s Mark?’

‘Look, you can fuckin’ kill me but I still won’t know. I’ve never known where he is, not for years I haven’t.’

‘He’s close. Let’s phone him. I think he’d like to know we are here, with you.’

Angelo changed languages and told the big man to get the car and bring it to the front door. He dialled a number and handed Julie the phone. The bastards even knew Marks mobile number, she realised. Angelo’s ear pressed close to her mouth as she spoke and she felt his breath on her face. It was sweet, and smelt of mints, and behind that, old garlic. Julie was not sure what words came out. She wanted to tell Mark to get away. She wanted to curse and blame him; she wanted him to live. That came to her as clear as Angelo’s lousy breath. Despite all the shit, blind alleys and despair, she wanted Mark to live. She wanted Carl to live and she wanted to live herself.

Julie glanced down at Carl. He’d had no chance and might be dead already. The other man, even bigger than the one that held her, stood over him like a hunter showing off his kill. How could Mark have got mixed up with people like these?

‘Tell him we’ll meet with him,’ Angelo said.

Julie did what she was told. The numbness she felt was the same as when Shane vanished, but that had come without any warning. She’d had time to think about this. She wished that they’d all kept together. Maybe they would have had a chance then; she knew Mark’s capabilities. But he didn’t tell her, he couldn’t tell her, that had always been their problem. Just the two of them for so long, but their thoughts miles apart, and their tongues locked with the distance. Maybe if Carl hadn’t been there Mark might have blurted it all out. Maybe.

The men were talking in another language again. The big one prodded Carl with his foot but got no response.

‘My friend wants to take your man with us,’ Angelo said, but we’ll come back for him later. He’s not going anywhere.’

‘You bastard!’ As she shouted, Julie tried to strike up at Angelo’s face but he caught her hand and twisted it.

‘So, a little spirit. Like your son. What is your name?’

He twisted harder when she didn’t answer. Another millimetre and her wrist would snap.

‘Didn’t that slut tell you? I thought you knew everything.’

‘You mean Lena? She just called you the mother. Don’t make me ask again.’

‘Julie.’

‘So.’

Angelo repeated it to himself, but had trouble with the ‘J’.

‘You will be our guide. You will be a good guide, then we can talk to your son, work things out.’

‘Like you worked things out with Carl.’

‘That was necessary, he would have caused a fuss. He’s not important.’

Julie wanted to launch herself at Angelo again, to try to give back a little pain, but she controlled herself. She felt sick to the pit of her stomach. Carl lay a few feet away from her and looked dead, but she had to choke this down – concentrate on staying alive herself.

‘Get what you need,’ Angelo said, ‘but don’t shut any doors.’

‘I need the toilet.’

‘If I don’t see you, even for a second, I’ll break one of those pretty wrists.’

Angelo looked at Carl’s body.

‘He must have had a thin skull,’ he muttered, and, to the big man, ‘I could hit you all day like that and nothing much would happen. When we kill this Richards we’ll come back for the one here. We’ll take them with us.’

‘And the woman?’

‘Her too, what choice do we have? Then it will be over, and we can get back to business. There’ll be no need for Stellachi and Amsterdam will like that.’

‘Let me kill this Mark,’ the big man said.

‘Hah, you still feel his boot on your face, eh? Sure, if you want.’

Julie came back into the living room. Angelo’s eyes hadn’t left her, and she felt dirty, and helpless.

‘You should have a coat,’ Angelo said. ‘The sun is out but the wind is quite cold. Summer is over here, what summer you have. We will walk calmly to the car. If anyone sees us, you will also look calm. This makes sense, doesn’t it, Shulie?’

They went out the back way, through the flimsy door the big man had demolished. As Julie glanced back at Carl, tears came again to her eyes, despite her best efforts to keep them out.

Carl waited until the footsteps outside faded. Everything he’d learnt in the army had kept him still when he’d come around. That big bugger hit hard, and it had knocked him out before he knew what was happening. All he’d seen was a blur of metal in the man’s hand. He hadn’t been much help to Julie and he cursed himself for it now, but at least he was alive. Those two bastards thought he was dead, that was a mistake and he had to make it count.

Carl got up unsteadily, his head crushing him with pain. He got to the bathroom, threw up what he’d eaten then doused himself with cold water. He washed the blood from his short hair and felt better. He’d always taken a good shot, and that bastard had connected with the thickest part of his skull. It was not easy to focus, and he felt weak, but thought he could function.

Carl had been conscious for the last few minutes. He didn’t know where that church was but he knew how to get to Julie’s old estate; he’d worked up that valley, on and off. The church must be on the mountain road on the hillside above.

Carl took the largest kitchen knife he had, not much good against guns, but it was better than nothing. His old assault rifle would be useful now. He’d pick those two off on that hillside no trouble, they’d be dead before they knew what was happening. It would be a pleasure, but it was wishful thinking. If any of them got out of this it would be a miracle. There was always the police, but it was too late for them now. This was hardly a usual occurrence down here. Ex-local now London private eye shooting it out with Albanian gangsters on a Welsh hillside. They’d just think he was barking and would faff around until it was too late.

Carl drank some water, found his car keys and went out the front door of the house. Getting to his car was harder than he thought and his left arm seemed to be stiffening up. These guys were not so clever. They should have done more than just prod him with a foot, even the greenest kids in the army knew that. They were too cocky by half and perhaps he could make them pay. They were only a few miles in front, and this time it would be their turn to be surprised.

The sun was well up now and Mark was hot and sweaty by the time he reached the church. He sat on a fallen headstone and drank from his bottle of water. There was no one about, and the pub further down the road was not open yet. That kid would be cleaning out the bar, and counting down the days. If there was shooting it would carry for miles here, but it was not uncommon on the hillside. He doubted if anyone around these parts could tell the difference between a shotgun and a hand-gun.

The hawk was still out, wheeling above him, checking out this figure in the churchyard. It was looking for food and Mark knew how prey felt now. Creatures always on the look out for danger, and death the penalty for missing it. He’d always been the strong one, the hunter, now he too had become furtive, seeing danger everywhere. The hawk’s outspread wings caught the light, and looked like a gold fan for a moment. Mark raised a hand to it and it veered away.

Carl was out of the picture, and they had Julie. Angelo and his big friend would think they were home and dry, but that might make them over-confident. They’ll want to get me into their car, Mark thought, try to avoid any action out in the open. They’ll try to make me think they’ll let Julie go, give me a snippet of hope, but that’s something I abandoned four days ago.

Mark looked around for the best place to stash the automatic. He placed it in a gap of the grave of a woman who’d died before she was forty. He read her headstone. A teacher. Watch over that for me, he murmured. Then he went to the middle of the graveyard. Let them come out here for me, he thought, let them disarm me, and search the bag. It was a gamble. He might not be able to get at the other gun, they might shoot him and Julie out of hand. If the kid came running up from the pub he might get it too, they weren’t particular. But at least a plan had formed, such as it was.

Mark opened his sack and found an apple. He was surprisingly calm. It was very quiet here, just the faintest of road noises from down below, and the hawk above calling a few times, a thin-pitched cry, wanting him to be gone from its domain. It was very still, as if nature knew what was about to unfold, and had stopped to watch. He thought of Lena and Paris, when it had came upon him that he was happy, for the first time in his life. Such a strange sensation that he didn’t know what it was at first. Something seemed to grow inside, that put a cloak over all the bad times, and drew him out into a world he’d glimpsed before, but had never thought his.

Mark ate the apple and threw the stump over the church wall, attracting the attention of a pair of magpies. As he watched their display of blue-black and white he saw a car climbing the hill road, just for a second before it was out of sight again. Something large and black, not a gold Lexus, but he knew it was them. He felt inside his coat for the Smith and Wesson. Julie was alive, but he had just minutes to keep her that way.

The car was getting nearer now, then it was out in the open, a few hundred yards from the church. Mark had positioned himself so that the church blocked out any view from the pub. If anyone else appeared, maybe someone deciding to visit the long dead, it would be too bad.

The first thing Carl did was drive into the kerb. His vision was not too good. He reached the motorway, and sped along it, flashed by more than one speed camera. I’ll lose my licence, he thought, ha ha. He’d almost lost his life, and was about to gamble it again. He did drop his speed to seventy though, it wouldn’t do to be chased by the police now.

He was on the road to the valley in thirty minutes, but there was no sign of the black Merc. The back of his head pulsated with pain and each beat clouded his eyes. His vision was clear for a few moments then blurred again, as if the car’s wipers were working on his eyes, and his arm was getting worse. A few cars beeped him as he swung too far to their side of the road, and he was bleeding again. He felt it drip onto his neck, then down his shirt.

Carl was climbing into forestry. The sun was out but the landscape was still bleak, every tree mimicked the next, in dull, dark green. He’d never been a man for the great outdoors, there’d been enough fresh air in the Falklands to last him a lifetime. More than once down there he’d felt stuff whizz past his head and wondered if the next round had his name on it. He’d been glad to get away from that bloody cove, to feel a fresh wind in his face rather than the smell of diesel burning that settled into his guts. Better to be shot clean than burnt to a crisp, like some of the boys, he’d thought. Until he was actually shot at. He’d got through that but here he was again, in another crazy situation not of his own making. Julie said that Mark attracted trouble like shit-flies and maybe that was true about him too. It was usually his patrol that had been in the thick of it in Belfast, but he’d been protected by his age then. Not quite twenty and thinking he’d live for ever, and playing at soldiers was still exciting, a natural progression from the games on the estate he played with his mates. Some of them had got into serious troubles over the years, some had sorted themselves and escaped, some, like him, went into the army. A sort of halfway house towards respectability. So he wasn’t that different to Mark, just a bit luckier.

After a few minutes Carl skirted Mark’s estate and headed for the hill road. He slowed down, taking the old Merc down to third and just gliding it to the edge of the trees which fringed each side of the road. Ahead was a few hundred yards of open road, and the church. The Mercedes was parked outside, but he couldn’t see into the churchyard. From this angle its surrounding wall blocked any view. Carl stopped the car and let it idle. He was barely conscious and there was a numbing sensation spreading up through his arm to his face. It was in his cheek now, which felt like he’d had a shot off the dentist. He tried to flex his arm but it wouldn’t obey him.

Carl waited. Surely nothing would happen in such an open place, Christ, there was a pub not far down the road. This was all so unreal, but then everything had been, since Julie’s son knocked on the bloody door.

The Mercedes had the sun behind it when it came into the open. It stopped on the brow of the hill above the church, then left the cover of the trees and came on slowly towards the church.

Mark wanted to scream, to let everything out, as if it might give him a solution. It was a ridiculous thought but the need came on him strongly. He’d seen a film with Lena once. He remembered it because it was the first time he’d ever gone to the cinema, as an adult. It had always been video crap in the house when he was a kid. Julie took him to see Snow White once, but even at the age of seven that was something from another world, and it had bored him rigid. Lena liked old stuff, classics, she called them. With her, he’d sat through something about Germany before the war, lots of dancing, singing, and poofs prancing about in nightclubs. There was a woman in that, who liked to scream under railway bridges when a train passed overhead. He hadn’t understood that scene then, but he did now. All that woman’s rage and frustration was being pumped out. She felt better afterwards. Something bad was gone from her. That was just a film, but this sudden urge was shaping up his jaw as the black car stopped outside the church.

Angelo and the big man got out of the car. They were dressed in city overcoats, which meant they couldn’t move very fast. Not that they had to. They had Julie. They’d killed Carl. All the power was theirs. The big man had his arm around his mother, it was almost an affectionate hold, but Julie squirmed like a kid. She looked tiny and ashen-faced. Mark had done it to her again. Perhaps they’d both been slowly dying since that day Shane vanished. Perhaps that was what the need to scream was all about. All that lay within exposed to the world in one, long, desperate shout.

Angelo pushed open the iron gate of the churchyard. It creaked, emphasising the still quiet that was around them. Mark saw the hawk head swiftly away down the valley. You’re not dull, mate, he thought. Mark stood up by the tall headstone of the dead teacher and Angelo saw him. He approached Mark, the big man staying back with Julie.

‘So, Mr Mark Richards. Here we are again.’

Mark didn’t answer at first. Each man studied the other. Mark saw Kelly, hurtling through space, a lifetime’s booze washed out of him in a second. Hitting concrete. His hand tightened on the Smith and Wesson in his right-hand pocket. Angelo glanced towards it.

‘That would be stupid.’

‘Let my mother go.’

‘Can I come closer? We can talk.’

Angelo shouted something to the big man.

‘I tell him to keep your mother safe, not to harm her. Unless, of course, you are stupid.’

‘That’s close enough,’ Mark said.

‘Okay, I’ll sit here.’

Angelo brushed leaves from an elaborate marble gravestone, long since fallen to the ground.

‘What is this language?’ he murmured. ‘Not English.’

‘What have you done to Carl?’ Mark said.

‘It was unfortunate. Sometimes people get in the way. If he hadn’t tried to take your mother away it might have been different.’

‘No, it wouldn’t have.’

Angelo smiled. The same thin smile Agani had used, one which didn’t reveal any teeth.

‘Maybe not. It’s business, no? I’ve said this to you before. Such a pity you shot Agani. You should have accepted things. Got on with your life.’

Mark nodded towards Julie. ‘Let her go.’

‘Maybe, maybe.’ Angelo patted his pocket. ‘Can I get a cigarette?’

Mark nodded. Better for Angelo to occupy his hands this way.

‘There was no need for that bastard to kill Lena. He didn’t gain anything from it. That’s not business.

‘You have me there, Mark. I agree. But Stellachi is Stellachi. How do you say it in English   a law to himself.’ Angelo sighed. ‘My English is good now. My mother would be so proud. She’s still alive, you know. Eighty-three. I send her things.’

‘Let her go and I’ll come with you. Let her walk down to that pub.’

‘Mark, Mark. How can I? What I say to you is, give me your weapon and get into the car with us. We can talk there, not out in the open like this, in this place of the dead.’

‘I thought it was the perfect spot.’

‘I like your style, man. We could use someone like you. You’d fit in well. Agani was annoying too many people, his death might be forgiven. You have balls, Mark.’

He was being fed a crock of shit but Mark decided to go with it. Angelo was used to dealing with stupid people, with stupid values and stupid lives.

‘Come on, Mark. Give me your gun. Give me both your guns.’

‘I only have one. I gave the other to Carl.’

Angelo pulled hard on his smoke.

‘Oh, I am forgetting my manners. Do you want one?’

Mark shook his head.

‘Which gun do you have, you say?’

‘The 38.’

‘Put it down then   there.’

Angelo pointed to a spot between them. ‘That gun behaves, it is from the old days. Automatics are unpredictable.’

Angelo shouted something else to the big man, who put a pistol to the back of Julie’s head. It was dull black but the sun still caught it, and displayed it to Mark. Anyone out for a walk on the old hill road would get the sight of their life. And the fright.

‘No tricks now, Mark. Just place it on the ground.’

The gun did not want to leave Mark’s hand. He felt it declaring an ownership. If this was Hollywood he’d drill the big man between the eyes before he could react then down Angelo as he struggled to free his own gun from his coat. Then wrap up Julie in his arms and get her away. Carl wouldn’t be dead, and Shane would come back, a clean-cut teenager who’d escaped to a better life. If this was Hollywood. Mark wasn’t sure if he could even hit Angelo and he was just feet away from him.

Mark put the gun down.

‘Now kick it away.’

Mark did. It slid into the long grass like a snake.

‘Good, good.’

The big man put his own gun away but kept a brawny arm around Julie’s neck. Anyone passing would think it was an awkward embrace.

‘Lean against that headstone,’ Angelo said. ‘Come on, Mark, we’re almost there. You are still alive, and so is Shulie. Angelo kicked Mark’s legs further apart, police style, and searched him for the other gun. Mark sensed his wariness. Angelo knows Carl never had that automatic, but he can’t find it on me, he thought. He’s worried about that.

‘So,’ Angelo said, ‘you are clean. If your friend did have the other gun it didn’t help him much, did it? Guns are overrated. They cause too much trouble, you know that now, eh?’

‘I always knew it.’

Angelo looked around quickly, then hit Mark hard into his rib cage. He didn’t see it coming and was badly winded, dropping onto one knee for a moment.

‘You take a pretty good shot,’ Angelo said. ‘That’s for what happened in London.’

Mark heard Julie shout out something but her voice was smothered by the big man’s hand.

‘Come on,’ Angelo said, ‘let’s go to the car.’

The big man moved farther back with Julie, they were just outside the church gates now, by the side of the car. Mark knew he had to walk as close to the other gun as possible, grab it, stick it in Angelo’s ear without him resisting, and pray he could get the big man to swap Julie for Angelo. Easy, Mark. A piece of piss. The big man might snap Julie’s neck in a second and let Angelo sink or swim, but it was the only plan he had.

‘Don’ come, Mark,’ Julie shouted, her voice thin, and almost lost in the wind, but loud enough to startle a few birds. They replied to her nervously, chattering from the trees that fringed the churchyard. They’d been quiet up until now, sensing that something very strange was going down, even by human standards.

‘Save yourself,’ Julie added, rather forlornly.

‘Too late, Mam.’

As Mark said this he pushed Angelo over as hard as he could, dropped to the floor and fished for the automatic. He got it at the second attempt, but was still too quick for Angelo. His size was no advantage here. Mark had the gun against the man’s temple as Angelo was trying to scrabble up with his own gun. Angelo shouted something short to the big man that Mark knew must be kill her in their language. The big man’s fingers tensed on the trigger but nothing happened. He shouted something back but did not increase his grip on Julie’s neck.

‘Stupid,’ Angelo shouted, ‘stupid, Claudan.’

‘Tell him to let her go,’ Mark said, ‘tell him to get in the car, then you can join him.’

‘I told him to kill her,’ Angelo murmured.

‘I know you did, you bastard. Why hasn’t he?’

‘Because we are brothers and Claudan is a fool. He still thinks he looks after me. He still believes in family, and blood, and he doesn’t think the woman is worth it. Any woman.’

‘Are any of us? Do you really want to die that much?’

‘No more than you, but if we let you go, we are dead anyway. That’s how it works. Is it not a lovely world, my friend?’

Mark stood behind Angelo, and it was the Albanian’s turn to be searched. He took back his Smith and Wesson, and another automatic, the twin of the one he held, and a small notebook. He was now the three-gun kid but Angelo seemed more concerned about the notebook.

‘You are only stretching things out,’ Angelo said. ‘Even if you get away now, where will you go? What will you do?’

‘Why can’t it be over? No one has to know about this. Agani’s dead but you’ve killed Lena, Tony, Kelly and Carl. Four for one. Four eyes for one.’

‘Maybe it would be, if it was up to me. I agree, Agani was not worth all this fuss, but if you take an eye from us, and if it is an important eye, we demand both yours, and the eyes of your loved ones and anyone else who gets in the way. That is how it is. Everyone will know about Agani, in all the countries we operate in. How do you say it   the grapevine. They are not interested in why he died, but they are interested in you now, and how you die, and how soon you die. And who kills you. A lot of them will like this. It’s like the old days, before we were rich, and behaved like whores.’

‘Yeah, I know   it’s business.’

‘More tradition, but you are learning.’

‘Why my mother?’

‘As I said, because she’s part of you, and she knows too much now. This is your fault, if you wanted to protect her you should not have come back. You should have put a gun to your head.’

Angelo’s words sunk home. Mark changed guns. He did not trust the trigger of the automatic, the Smith and Wesson felt more solid, a gun for outdoors, and he could see the barrel start to revolve as it prepared to go to work.

‘Don’t say anything else that isn’t English,’ Mark said.

‘Or what? You think Claudan won’t snap your mother’s neck like a twig if you shoot me?’

Mark stuck his head close to Angelo’s, and pushed the gun’s barrel hard against the back of his neck. He smelt peppermint.

‘I think I’m past caring. We’ll all go together, you and your brother, me and Mam.’

He wasn’t past caring, but this had an effect on Angelo. Mark pushed him forward until they were close to Julie and the big man. He talked to Angelo’s brother himself.

‘Let her go, if you want Angelo to live. Then get in your car. Keep your hands on the wheel and Angelo can join you. Then you go.’

The big man nodded and pushed Julie forward.

‘Get behind me, Mam,’ Mark said, ‘but keep to the side.’

He was aware of Julie passing him, heard her racked sobs as she stumbled over the cracked-up ground of the graveyard but he did not look around. He didn’t take his eyes off the big man, or relax his grip on his brother. The big man did what he was told, and held the Mercedes wheel with his bear-like hands, heavy gold glinting from his fingers. Mark dared a glance around to check on Julie.

‘Get behind that large headstone, and stay there.’

‘I’m not leaving you.’

‘Mam, for Christsake, just go. I’ll be with you now.’

Mark pushed Angelo through the church gate to the car. He realised he could probably shoot the pair of them. For the second time.

‘Get in the car and go,’ Mark shouted. ‘Just fuck off.’

Why couldn’t he shoot? He had before, but he was not like these men, not by a long chalk. Ripping up women, throwing old men out of windows, it was all far removed from anything he’d done. These were creatures from his darkest fantasies, but they were real, they were here and they put his petty felonies into perspective. Mark doubted if either man had a heart any more; what ticked within was just a machine, any humanity had been brutalised out of it a long time ago, like it had almost been with him. Almost. Mark knew now, at this most extreme moment, that almost was a very important word and it gave him strength. He had to take this chance to get Julie away. Extra time was the only prize on offer here, Mark knew it, and so did the brothers.

Angelo got into the car, shut the door, and pointed a two fingered gun at him. His thin smile came back as he leant forward in the car and came up with the real thing, a short-barrelled shotgun. Angelo pushed the door back open and levelled up the gun. At this range it would take anything out. The man was calm, sure of his actions and did not rush, making his movements look like a slow-motion replay. Mark had plenty of time to shoot but his finger locked on the trigger and did not press. In his mind Agani’s head was separating again.

The shotgun fired but it did not hit him. It did not hit anything, apart from sky. The Mercedes spun out on to the road, as an older one smashed into it.