The Balance of Guilt (4 page)

‘OK, fine.’

Adam took a step towards the ambulance doors, then another. The flickering eyes shifted with him.

‘If I leave now, I’ll make sure no one gets to come in here. Not for ages. Not until it’s way too late for you.’

‘I’m not saying anything else. You have to help me.’

Adam paced around to behind the table and flicked at the drip running into the boy’s arm. He tried to follow the movement, but couldn’t twist his head. His T-shirt was ripped in patches and melted in others, the soft material melded into the raw, weeping wounds of the flesh.

The doctor had said some of the burns were third degree. Oddly enough, they wouldn’t be hurting as all the nerve endings were gone. But the others would.

‘Burns – a really nasty way to die,’ the detective said softly. ‘Painful – agonising in fact. And that’s only talking about now. Do you know one of the biggest dangers of burns?’

The boy swallowed hard. ‘Leave me alone.’

‘It’s infection. It sets in so fast – frighteningly quickly – if you’re not treated properly. And if you think it hurts now … wait until the infection starts creeping through you. Eating away at your body …’

Someone was pulling at the ambulance’s doors. ‘Just a sec,’ Adam called. ‘We’re almost done.’

The boy looked up. Glimpsed the white coat of the doctor. ‘Help me,’ he groaned.

Adam eased the doors shut. He tapped a foot against a couple of oxygen cylinders. They clanked dully. The gloom of the cramped space closed in.

‘Last chance. Who were you working with?’

‘Leave me alone. The doctor’s here now. He’ll look after me.’

‘OK. If that’s how you want it.’

Adam lifted his notebook to write some words and carelessly let it slip through his fingers.

It landed in the small of the boy’s back. He screamed. And gasped, and moaned, and began sobbing to himself.

But started talking.

A team of detectives was at his home within minutes. And straight away they had more information. On a suspected accomplice.

And a tip. An ominous one.

A word that he too was in Exeter.

Every cop they could gather was on the beat in the city, plus special constables, police community support officers, even traffic and parks wardens. Bouncers, shop, store and security guards, bus and taxi drivers were also looking out for him.

And they had been fortunate. Got their break. Danny had found him. And was watching him, just as he had been told.

But then came the bad luck. One of the press photographers decided to start taking some shots of the crowd. Their man had seen him coming, turned away, and noticed the young cop, looking at him.

And he’d begun walking, fast, away from the Minster. Towards the High Street. Where hundreds of people were still gathered. Some carrying on with the everyday business of life, despite the attack; shopping, walking and talking, looking in windows, eating sandwiches, drinking coffees, waiting for buses. Others trying to compose themselves, ready for a journey to the safety of home.

So many people. An invitation for more carnage, if the man had another bomb.

The armed cops were almost there, but still a few seconds behind. Too far to stop him.

Danny was following. Providing his reports. Breathlessly.

And now the man was jogging. Continually looking behind him.

And now running.

Towards the busiest part of Exeter, the heart of the city, and its men and women, office workers and shoppers, strollers and passers-by, children and their mothers and fathers.

And Danny was running fast too. Sprinting now. And the armed teams, and Adam. As fast as they could.

But the man was in the High Street. Amongst the crowd.

And he was carrying a rucksack.

A
DAM CAREERED AROUND THE
corner of Minster Green, saw the man ahead. He’d run out into the middle of the High Street and was looking quickly back and forth. Lines of shops, banks, building societies. A queue of people at a coffee stand. Children and parents watching a clown, tottering on stilts. Buses packed with shoppers. A crowd milling around the stalls of a farmers market. Hundreds of people. Hundreds of targets.

Each shopfront shone with thick plate glass. If that rucksack contained a bomb – if he exploded it here – thousands of splinters of screaming shrapnel would fire through the air, a lethal complement to the nails they already knew had been used in the Minster bomb.

The man ran forwards, into the Exehall Shopping Centre. Modern, low ceiling, narrow walkways, also packed with people. A perfect terrorist target. Adam swore to himself. If a bomb went off there, in the confined space, the destruction would be horribly magnified.

The two firearms teams caught up. The young probationer too. Five cops and himself, that was all he had.

No time to debate. Just to decide. His best bet. With terrifying stakes.

‘Get after him,’ Adam snapped. ‘Armed teams first. He calls himself Ahmed, if you need a name. But you’re cleared to shoot if he so much as hints at posing a threat.’

They lurched into the Exehall. Fleeting faces twisted with alarm. Children pointed. Adults stared. A woman started screaming. It found an echo, then another. The shopping centre was fast filling with fear.

They ran past a jeweller’s, feet pounding on the tiled floor, then a sports shop, a book store, came to an intersection, scanned back and forth. People were walking past quickly, some stumbling, others running from the arcade. More screams and cries resounded from the shopfronts.

‘Danny, get as many people out as you can,’ Adam panted. ‘Shout, long and loud, shove them even, just get them clear. Where is he? Where the hell is he?’

The four armed officers spread out, their guns trained ahead. People were still running past, some sobbing, others breathing fast and ragged. Danny was ushering the crowds away. He was scared, but he’d pulled off the sacred trick of looking calm.

Good lad. He was going to do just fine as a cop.

Adam would tell him so later. If they got out of this alive.

If.

More police officers were arriving now, joining the effort to clear the shopping centre.

There was no sign of Ahmed. The armed cops formed a line, walked forward, pace by careful pace, their guns sweeping back and forth.

There were too many hiding places. In a shop. In a doorway. Behind the large tubs filled with trees and plants.

If he had a bomb in that rucksack he could set it off in a second. There’d be no chance to stop him.

Adam braced himself for the blast. He noticed he was treading softly, silently. At any instant the arcade could explode in blinding light and shattering sound.

He thought of Annie, at work, totting up rows of figures, that picture of him and Tom on her desk. And his son too, probably in an after-school sports club. What was Monday’s? Football, wasn’t it? Tom’s favourite. They were planning to go to the Plymouth Argyle match on Saturday.

Adam patted a hand on his wallet where the picture of his family lay.

‘Sir,’ hissed one of the armed officers. ‘There’s no sign of him. What do we do?’

‘He’s here somewhere. There are more cops blocking the other entrances. He can’t have got out. Keep going. Keep searching.’

They stepped slowly on. A pigeon fluttered past. Adam could have sworn one of the marksmen tracked its path with his gun.

An elderly woman blinked up at them from a bench. ‘I’m too old for this running around,’ she rasped. ‘And why should I run for a damned terrorist anyway? I never did for the Nazis.’ Danny helped her up and walked her outside. ‘I think he went that way,’ she added over her shoulder, pointing straight down the arcade.

It was mostly clear now, just the odd person emerging from the shops, seeing the police officers and scuttling past. None resembled Ahmed. The arcade was quiet, the only sound their measured footfall.

They passed a grocer’s and its colourful display of fruit and veg, an optician’s, then a second-hand shop, the window full of cameras and mobile phones. Ahead was a small supermarket, outside a couple of fake trees, some benches, and a corner.

Adam held up a hand and they paused. A strip light buzzed and clicked. But there was nothing else.

No noise. No movement.

Nothing.

They paced on.

Dan and Nigel got to the shopping centre just in time to see Adam and the armed officers run inside. Nigel lifted the camera to his shoulder and began filming. People were stumbling out, some screaming. One man dropped a bag of groceries. A couple of oranges rolled across the pavement. Dan stood beside Nigel and took the brief opportunity to think.

Ah, the angst of an instant dilemma. And he was faced with two, and both absolute award-winners.

They could be on the track of a fantastic story; film exclusive pictures of the arrest of another terrorist. And equally, they could get themselves killed as the man set off his bomb, or shot it out with the police.

If it was him alone, Dan thought he wouldn’t have hesitated. He wasn’t the bravest of men, but the bitter fact was that, of late, he’d spent many a night lying awake wondering what he had to live for.

But standing next to him was this kind, thoughtful, optimist of a friend and cameraman who also happened to have two young sons. And who was bringing them up alone since the death of his wife. But who Dan knew would go in there and film if he was asked to.

Dilemma one resolved.

Which happily also helped with Dilemma Two. Because if they both went in there, and got caught in a siege, or worse, then one of the biggest live broadcasts
Wessex Tonight
had produced for many years would be missing an indispensable element – a cameraman.

Dan hastily explained his thoughts, and wasn’t in the least surprised by the reaction.

‘But we could get a world exclusive. It’d be the scoop of our careers. And anyway …’

‘Yes?’

‘I want to be a part of it.’

‘I know.’

‘And you need me there. What if something happens? Say you’re hurt? You could get blown to bits.’

‘Yeah, I know. But that’s it. Decision made. There’s no time to argue. Get back to the satellite van.’

The cops were moving on into the shopping centre. But Nigel wasn’t giving up.

‘Surely we can’t risk missing the pictures.’

‘We won’t.’ Dan held up his mobile phone. ‘I’ll use the camera on this. Nothing like as good as yours I know, but plenty to get us a decent sense of what’s going on.’

Dan gently shoved Nigel away, and before his friend could argue further, turned and jogged into the arcade. He had to dodge, left and right, weave his way through the people streaming out. The marksmen were just ahead, the tall outline of Adam in the centre of their line. Even in this panic and confusion, his navy blue suit and dark hair looked impeccable.

How very like his friend. Even when facing a terrorist, a dishevelled state just wouldn’t do.

A young policeman stood in Dan’s way, his arms outstretched. He was sweating hard and looked flushed, but determined.

‘Turn around, sir, please. We need you to get out of here.’

Dan prayed the constable wasn’t a
Wessex Tonight
fan and au fait with its on air team. He slipped his finger over the part of his press pass which said “Reporter”, held it out and barked, ‘Security service, sonny. Out of the way please.’

They held a stare. The policeman faded away. Dan breathed out his relief and ran on.

It had been a mantra since the golden discovery in the early days of his career; the secret of a successful bluff is to make it big.

The marksmen had paused, were just about to round a corner in the arcade. Dan turned on the phone’s camera and held it up. It was an effort to stop his hand from shaking.

He wondered how it felt to be close to an exploding bomb. Nothing like in the films when the hero gets knocked over, lies there for a few seconds, hums a little tune, then hops backs up, dusts himself off and carries on.

Dan suffered a strange image of working through one of the tedious Hazard Assessment forms that
Wessex Tonight
reporters were given for any assignments containing an element of danger. Explosives, firearms, violence, unpredictable situation, noise, bright light, there were few boxes he wouldn’t tick. To save time, he could just write – ‘Insane risk, but doing it anyway. So there.’

It felt good to tweak the nose of the modern behemoth of health and safety.

Or perhaps it was just the momentary distraction from the suffocating threat of imminent death.

He edged forwards, following the marksmen. They were inching around the corner, step by tentative step, guns trained unerringly ahead.

Dan noticed his breathing was fast and shallow. His back prickled with sweat.

They were passing a travel agent’s, its windows filled with the delights of cruises and winter sunshine in the Mediterranean and Canary Islands. The beat of summer, disco sounds slipped through the doors.

Now a charity shop, one that helps animals who need vets. Dan wondered what would happen to Rutherford if he were killed. He hoped the dog was lucky enough to find a new owner who loved him. He thought about whether Rutherford would remember the oddball master who kept strange hours and suffered vertiginous mood swings, but who always meant well, took him for good walks and runs and who sometimes cuddled him and confided his myriad demons.

They were almost around the corner. Dan gulped hard. He steadied his hand on the phone and held it as far forwards as his arm could stretch. The imaged flared and blurred, then steadied.

A packet of half-eaten fish and chips was lying open on a low wall. The smell of salt and vinegar tingled through the arcade.

A shout pierced the silence.

‘Armed police! Put your hands where I can see them! Do it now! Do it and you won’t be harmed!’

Dan forced himself to take another step, then one more. He shuffled past a bin, filled with cans and paper wrappings and rounded the corner.

Ahead, silhouetted in the streaming sunlight, Adam was standing still, his hands raised in a calming manner. All the marksmen had their guns at their shoulders. No one was moving.

Another command, loud in the quiet. ‘Stay still! Keep your hands where I can see them!’

Still no one shifted. A breath of breeze made the plastic plants twitch. The long black barrels of the guns gleamed in the light.

The phone was trembling badly, the image dancing. Dan gripped it tighter, forced himself to keep still.

Sitting on a bench, his legs crossed, but his arms held up in the air, was a slight man with dark hair and olive skin. He wasn’t moving, didn’t look frightened, or angry, just sat and watched.

The marksmen converged on him, pace by wary pace, their guns trained on his chest the whole while. Red dots on the white cotton of his shirt. Each hovering over his heart.

An old and tatty rucksack lay on the ground next to the man’s feet. It was black and silver, frayed in patches, marked with a “Surf Time” motif, and zipped back and wide open.

Dan craned his neck. He strained his eyes to see the trigger, the wires and batteries, the canisters of chemicals and scores of shining nails.

He blinked hard, frowned.

The rucksack contained a newspaper, a baseball cap and some sandwiches and crisps.