‘Don’t.’
But he was too late.
Sa had the bamboo stave out, shoulder high, arm pulled back.
Her face glowed with hate.
Gilchrist stiff-armed Patterson to the ground and dived at Sa as she struck. His right shoulder thudded into her stomach in a heavy-hitting rugby tackle that would have made his gym teacher proud.
They hit the damp lawn with a force that brought back the pain in his ribs with a hard grunt. He rolled to the side, searching for the hand with the stave, found it, and held on.
But Sa was strong. Fast. And smart.
Instead of resisting, she pulled Gilchrist toward her, causing him to roll over. Then with a rush of strength and a move as acrobatic as a gymnast’s, twisted her body, so that in the time it took Gilchrist to realize she had thrown him, he found himself beneath her.
Instinct told him to pull to the side.
With a wet thud, the stave drove into the grass next to his ear.
Sa pulled it out and up, but he managed to catch her arm as the stave powered down at him again, the dirt-smeared point only inches from his eyes.
Her agility stunned him. He gritted his teeth and gasped at her strength, too.
She raised her buttocks, pressed down with all her body weight. Gilchrist turned his head, felt the tip of the stave dig into his cheek, fought to pull his head away. His breath exploded from his mouth. ‘Christ.’
Sa’s face twisted with hatred.
‘It’s over,’ gasped Gilchrist.
‘Bastards,’ she hissed. ‘Bastards.’
Gilchrist’s chest burned. Without the prescription painkillers, the pain from his ribs would have been too much for him. But even doped up, he knew he could not hold Sa off for long. He pushed to the side and almost cried with relief as the stave thudded into the lawn again.
Sa freed it from the ground, rolled away from him, readied to pull herself to her feet.
Gilchrist could not allow her to stand. She was too fast, too strong.
He scrambled forward, stumbled as he dived at her, and with a frightening flash of fear realized his fatal misjudgement as he saw her body twist, her hand juggle with the stave and turn it toward him.
He could do nothing to stop himself.
He slammed into her.
Together they hit the ground.
They landed hard, Gilchrist on top. He felt the stab of the bamboo as it punched into his chest with the force of a steel rod, and he waited for the explosion of pain as its whittled point pierced his heart. He took two gasping breaths before he became aware of the limp stillness of Sa’s body beneath him.
He pushed himself to his knees.
Sa lay still, save for the puzzled blinking of her eyes and the silent movement of her mouth. Gilchrist felt his hand on the stave and saw it protruding from a point high in Sa’s chest, near the base of her throat.
‘No, Sa,’ he gasped.
He wrapped his fingers around the bamboo ridges, felt her body’s reluctance to release the stave from its fleshy grip, and tightened his hold. The stave pulled free with a damp sucking sound and he threw it into the darkness.
Blood bubbled and foamed from the hole in Sa’s chest.
Gilchrist tore off his jacket and ripped out the lining, pressed it to her throat. ‘Don’t talk,’ he said, and dabbed at her wound, trying to staunch the flow of blood that pulsed through his fingers like a living thing. He pressed harder and realized he had never felt such helplessness. He glanced over his shoulder.
Patterson was pulling himself to his feet.
‘Call for an ambulance,’ Gilchrist shouted. ‘Now.’
Without answering, Patterson stumbled along the path to his house.
Gilchrist heard the sound of a door cracking open, then the unmistakable barking of orders. He turned his attention back to Sa, tore off another strip of lining and pressed it against her wound. The stave must have sliced an artery. His fingers felt warm and wet. He looked into Sa’s eyes, thought he caught the glimmer of a smile, then noticed tiny flakes falling around them and melting in the damp grass. He stared up into a swirling darkness that fell toward them in blurring flurries.
Sa’s throat gurgled. Her lips parted, and he thought he heard her whisper, ‘Timmy.’
He pressed his ear to her lips. ‘What about Timmy?’
‘It’s ... snowing.’ Her voice was as hushed as the wind.
‘Yes,’ he whispered. ‘It’s snowing.’
‘Snowing ...’ She coughed, choked, then tried to smile. ‘Snowing ... for Timmy.’
‘For Timmy,’ he said, and watched the light die behind her eyes. He turned away then, felt the burn of tears and thought back to the times they had argued, to the bitterness in her voice, the feistiness in her spirit, and wished she had told him of her pain, her troubles, her loneliness. He could have helped her. If she had only told him.
When he opened his eyes, the snow flurries had thickened. Flakes were landing on Sa’s face, the tiniest of white feathers settling on the corneas of her eyes and melting into tears. He lifted his hand to her eyelids and closed them.
He stumbled to his feet and staggered onto the path that ran along the side of the house, feet crunching and slipping on the tiny pebbles. He reached the back door and stepped inside.
Patterson’s wife let out a short scream.
‘For God’s sake, woman. Shut up.’ Patterson turned his glare to Gilchrist. ‘Where is she?’ he asked.
Gilchrist shook his head, too exhausted to be troubled talking.
‘Good God, man. Did you let her get away?’ Patterson opened a kitchen drawer and pulled out a long-bladed knife.
‘She’s dead,’ said Gilchrist.
‘Dead?’ Patterson’s chest seemed to inflate, and his back straightened. ‘Did you kill her?’
‘She killed herself.’
‘Well, then,’ said Patterson, and laid the knife on the work surface.
It was only then that Gilchrist noticed a tear in Patterson’s uniform. ‘You’re bleeding,’ he said.
‘It’s just a scratch. Lucky for you.’ Patterson turned to face his wife. ‘Why don’t you make yourself useful for a change? Get me a whisky.’
She turned to obey.
‘Mrs Patterson?’
She stopped in the doorway, her face tense with uncertainty.
‘I’m sorry to have given you a fright,’ Gilchrist said, ‘when I barged in like that. I must look a sight.’
She shook her head, then returned to the sink, ignoring her husband. She grabbed a cloth and wet it under the tap. ‘Here you go,’ she said, and dabbed the side of his face, close to the ear with the stitches. ‘You’ve got yourself in a right old mess. And you’ve cut yourself. Oh, dear. Quite badly.’
‘Do you mind if I use your phone?’ he asked her.
‘For God’s sake, Gilchrist. I’ve already called for an ambulance.’
Gilchrist ignored the outburst. ‘May I?’
‘What in heaven’s name for, man?’
‘Oh, for goodness sake. Can’t you see he’s bleeding?’ And with that, she removed a cordless phone from a cradle on the wall.
It felt so heavy that for one dizzying moment Gilchrist thought he was going to have to lay it down. He felt a surge of relief when he heard a booming voice say, ‘McVicar.’
‘Sir,’ he whispered. ‘It’s Andrew Gilchrist.’
‘Andy? You sound ...’ A pause, then, ‘Is it ...?’
‘No, sir. It’s the Stabber.’ The words seemed to come at him from a distance, as if they had been spoken by someone else. His peripheral vision was darkening and he knew he was running out of time. ‘You need to get over here,’ he said.
‘Where are you?’
But McVicar’s voice was already fading and Gilchrist had time only to pass the phone back to Patterson’s wife before his legs gave out and he sank to the floor.