Adam thanked God when he got back to the lodge that Kate and the kids were in the car, apprehensively packed and waiting, ready to go. He was a mess. He knew it. He had horrible news to impart, but it all had to wait. They had to leave immediately. There was once again no time to explain anything to anyone.
Kate was speechless. He looked like he’d been fed through a shredder. His hands and his face were covered in blood. He was limping, soaked in sweat and mud, thoroughly out of breath. Little Billy saw him and instantly started crying. His daughter felt his pain all over her own body. It was the worst sight any of them had ever seen. It had taken all of the dark, scary, miserably horrible moments of the last days and made them all seem like picnic memories. He stumbled to the car, fell into the backseat, and screamed at Kate to start driving—immediately.
“Where’s my father? What’s happened?”
“He’s fine,” he lied. He had to. There wasn’t time to let her grieve; it wasn’t fair to tell the truth.
“Where’s Poppa?” The kids were in a raw form of shock, also afraid to speak, afraid to ask anything they instinctively knew they didn’t want the answer to.
“He’s back there. Just drive. He’s gonna meet up with us later. It’s fine. I was attacked by the dogs.”
Kate looked into the rearview mirror as she pulled past the main house onto the long drive out to the road. She saw only her young son, leaning over the far backseat to look down sadly on his blood-soaked father, who struggled for air, struggled to form words.
“Keep driving, Kate, whatever you do, whatever happens. Don’t stop. You hear me? Don’t stop.” He knew the badges on the chains around the necks would be there in large numbers any minute. He knew they had to be long gone from Heaton’s farm, was sure there weren’t even seconds to spare. He tried not to picture his father-in-law’s broken dead body in a tuft of dirty grass, but it’s all he kept seeing as he shut his eyes—that and the dogs.
At the main drive he had Kate take a left onto the road leading to the highway. He could hear sirens in the distance, coming on like locusts.
“Left? I thought we were going—”
“Change of plans. Head left to London. Get on the highway.”
She did what she was told, pulled onto the road, merged over to the highway heading south.
“You don’t stop, Kate. No matter what. You get to London.”
“What about my father? Tell me what’s happened.”
“It’s fine. Keep driving.” He was fighting to stay conscious. “Go to London. I need to get to London.”
“What are we going to do in London, baby? What’s happened? Talk to me, please, I beg you.”
“I have to see Georgia Turnbull.”
“Georgia Turnbull?… The chancellor? What could you possibly have to see her about? Adam? Talk to me. Please? I am so frightened. Look at the kids. We’re all petrified, darling. Talk to me. Please, I’m begging you.”
Adam gathered enough breath to answer.
“Go faster. Don’t stop until we get to London.”
“Why Georgia Turnbull, Adam?”
“I need to see her.”
“See her for what? How do you expect to see her?”
“Just drive.” Each word was labored; they were fewer and farther between. Each breath was harder to manufacture, harder for the children to hear, and harder for a terrified and unnerved Kate to comprehend.
“What are you going to do when you see her, Adam? What are you going to do when you see her?” He didn’t answer for the longest time. No one said another word as the finely tuned engine of the German marvel purred perfectly along the road at eighty miles an hour. Billy’s teeth clattered as he shivered in fear, Trudy’s soul quietly ached as she finally knew what real pain of the heart felt like, and Kate could only silently whimper. Whimper and drive.
Out of nowhere, Adam spoke. With one last burst of semi-cohesion, he made an odd, incongruous, final statement.
“I need to see the chancellor of the exchequer.”