Framed (19 page)

The first car swept past the bike, then the second. The third was some way behind, traveling at a good observational distance.

"Five," Steve counted, "four, three . . ." He realized he had mistimed, the second car was too far from the road end. "No! No!" he yelled. "Hold it . . . Two, one . . . Go!"

Steve dropped his
A to
Z, flipped down his visor and kick-started the bike. At that moment McKinnes was telling his driver to take a look at the motorcycle ahead. It was off and accelerating before they could reach it .As Von Joel was explaining about the loss of muzzle velocity caused by conventional silencing devices, Larry glanced out the window to his right and saw a blue Transit van come screeching out of a side road straight toward them. Shrapnel saw it at the same time and nearly swerved but there was no room, he was too near the river.

"On the floor!" Von Joel yelled in Larry's ear. "Move!"

The Transit van loomed to their right, seconds from impact, the driver's face gaunt behind the wheel. Von Joel tried to open the door on his left. Larry brought up both hands to protect himself, automatically jerking Von Joel across him. The van hit the side of the car with a bang and a jolt that lifted the right wheels clear of the road. Panels tore and glass smashed. The folded metal of the mangled door drew inward and hit the top of Von Joel's skull. Blood spurted and gushed down over his neck and onto Larry's chest where he lay pinned underneath.

Shrapnel slammed the gas pedal to the floor. The car surged forward with the noise of metal grinding on metal, but the damage was done, the rear right side was caved in. The Transit van remained locked against the Granada, shunting with its reinforced bumper. Up ahead, Steve had his motorcycle directly across the road, revving, waiting for Jack to make a run for it.

The third police car with McKinnes inside came screeching to a halt five yards ahead of the crippled Granada. McKinnes dived out and ran toward the Transit van, which was relentlessly grinding forward, dragging the Granada.

Jack was pulling open the Transit van's door, estimating his distance from the bike. He inched into the gap, ready to jump, watching McKinnes as he got nearer. He jumped. His body went forward toward the road, feet spread for the landing, then he abruptly changed direction as his sleeve caught on the door handle. His knees slammed the side of the still-moving van, his hands went up and the sleeve ripped with the tension. Jack went down, his back hitting the road a second before his head. The rear wheel ran over his chest and face with a sound like bursting fruit.

McKinnes jumped into the van and pulled on the brake. Five seconds more and the Transit van would have sent the Granada through the wall and into the river.

Up ahead Steve had seen what happened. For one horrified second he stood frozen, seeing the blood and brain smeared on the asphalt.

"Jesus Christ almighty . . ."

He jerked the bike around and screamed off, his head level with the handlebars, the tires leaving a skin of rubber on the road.

"They got him!" Shrapnel was screaming, clawing at the Granada's twisted metal. "They got Von Joel! Oh, shit! They got him! Larry! Larry!"

Von Joel's skull seemed to be cracked open, the blood was in a congealed nightmare mass over the top of his head, running in rivulets down his face and obliterating his features.

Larry, in a state of shock, fumbled to feel for the pulse at Von Joel's neck. His finger sticky with blood, he started crying, partly in shock, partly in genuine grief as he could find no pulse.

"Oh, God!" He looked up at Shrapnel. "I think he's dead."

The handcuffs were unlocked, two ambulance attendants carefully eased the unconscious man onto a stretcher, and Larry was assisted out of the crushed car, staring stupified at the ambulance as Von Joel was gently carried aboard.

"He's dead, isn't he? I couldn't feel any pulse. Is he dead?"

Shrapnel seemed not to hear, his own face had deep lacerations from the smashed windshield, and an attendant was checking him over, encouraging him to accompany him to the second ambulance. The body of the driver was still crushed beneath the patrol car surrounded by a group of officers and attendants. They were ascertaining exactly how they should lift the car up and off him, as his body seemed to be ingrained into the wheels and front of the vehicle. He was obviously very dead, the blood was like dark, heavy pools, running like a river toward the water's edge.

Larry leaned against the car and his body began to shake with delayed shock. Again, as if replaying a video, he saw the Transit van coming for him, heard himself screaming, heard Eddie telling him to get down, and then, like a punch to his heart, he felt, as if it were happening again, the weight of Von Joel's body covering him, protecting him, saving him.

McKinnes walked slowly over to Jackson. The boy was ashen, his body shaking badly, and McKinnes put a fatherly arm around his shoulders.

"Let's get you to hospital, son, come on, get into the ambulance. There's a good lad!"

"He saved my life, Mac, he . . . saved me."

McKinnes made no reply, guiding Larry to the ambulance, stepping aside as an assistant took over. As he turned away, Larry asked if Von Joel was dead. "He's dead, isn't he, Mac?"

McKinnes still made no reply. He joined Shrapnel and looked back to see his sergeant, seated in the ambulance, holding his head in his hands, sobbing his heart out.

"Well, this is a major fuck-up, isn't it?" McKinnes said flatly.

Shrapnel nodded, and refusing to go into the ambulance went with McKinnes to the patrol car. They sped off to the hospital in silence, because it was, as McKinnes had said, a major fuck-up.

Nobody paid any attention to the man standing on the bridge, nor could they have heard him, but Minton was a very happy man, singing softly.

"Good night, Eddie; good night, Eddie; it's time to call it quits . . ."

14

The Sister in charge of Intensive Care was briefed by Dr. Moore, a registrar from Accident and Emergency who had monitored the one serious surviving casualty of the crash from the time the ambulance got to the scene until its return to the hospital twenty-six minutes later.

"I filled in his name on the sheet, but it's a false name, and there's no address," he told Sister. He leaned across the desk and signed the paper for the transfer of the patient to Intensive Care. "I tried to milk some information about who he really is and what he's supposed to have done, but no dice. You know the police."

Moore was a tall, thin, hunted-looking man who glanced over his shoulder continually while he spoke to Sister. As he pocketed his pen he stepped to the office door, looked both ways along the corridor and came back to the desk. "I'll tell you something—since I started my present tour of duty with the blood wagon, I'll swear I've been on a run of bizarre emergencies."

"How come?"

"On Sunday I'd an attempted suicide by hanging. The rope broke and all he did was put his back out. Then yesterday a woman accidentally Super-Glued her knees to a window ledge, and later I got a bloke who'd swallowed two cubes of billiard-cue chalk. Now this."

Sister watched the paramedics transfer the unconscious patient to the bed in the cubicle on the other side of the window. A nurse carried the drip bag and hooked it to a stand by the side of the bed. Other nurses came forward and busied themselves around the bed, setting up system-support lines and monitoring equipment.

"What's bizarre about this one, then?" Sister said. "Not the fact that he's in police custody, surely?"

"No, it's not that . . ."

Dr. Moore scratched his chin, gazing intently at the floor as if he had been asked to give a verdict on something crucial and was choosing his words with the greatest care.

"There's a strange feel to the whole clinical picture," he said finally, "but if I had to pin it down, I'd say he's got deeply creepy physiology. I mean, he took a crack on the head that would have fractured any ordinary skull—which says a lot for his anatomy, too, of course. But that blow would definitely have produced a big hematoma on my brain or yours, even if it hadn't caved in the skull, and it could certainly be expected to crush a few cervical vertebrae. What I'm saying is, normal individuals don't get a bash on the head like that and come out of it without serious complications."

"Actually, he doesn't look too good to me," Sister said, peering through the glass. "And I notice he's wearing a neck harness."

"The harness is a precaution, I couldn't find any cervical damage. As for the grim evidence elsewhere on his person, I think you'll find most of it will wash off."

"No major damage at all, then?"

"None that I was able to trace. I did a swift neuro-obs, but it didn't turn up any aberrant brain activity and there's no evidence of diminished response to stimuli. When they do a CAT scan they might turn up something I missed, but frankly I doubt it."

"What's the clinical picture, overall?" Sister asked, picking up a pen and notebook.

"Starting at the top, there's a cluster of lacerations to the scalp, frontal and parietal. Substantial blood loss, as there usually is with scalp injuries. Nothing complicated there, the tissue parted cleanly, it should unite again with only basic surgical help. There's a minor dislocation of the right shoulder with probable tearing of the teres minor and infraspinatus muscles—he was handcuffed to a policeman at the moment of impact, so the shoulder came under some uncommon traction in the hurly-burly of the crash."

"The handcuff explains the tissue injury on the right wrist, I suppose."

"Right. There's also some damage to the deeper structures—a dislocation of the wrist with possible bruising of the scaphoid and triquetral bones. Moving down, the chest and abdomen appear to be sound. Both legs are badly bruised, again with probable tearing of muscle fiber."

"Systemic shock?"

"At first, Sister, it seemed pretty extensive. When we got there the carotid pulse was weak, and my first thought was that we'd lose him if we didn't act fast. I checked there was no hidden bleeding and got an airway in place double quick. But just about then his vital signs started to improve. All of them, and without any further help."

Behind them in the office doorway DCI McKinnes shuffled his feet and cleared his throat. Dr. Moore spun around, startled.

"Pardon me, Doctor, Sister. I was eavesdropping; it's an occupational vice and I'm too old to fight it. Am I to understand, from what you just said, that our man here is in the clear?"

"His head took a hell of a thumping," Moore said, "but it seems to be an uncommonly strong head. He's also got excellent neurological and biochemical backup. So, barring unforeseen relapses, I wouldn't expect his condition to get any worse. He really does seem to have a marvelous constitution."

McKinnes narrowed his eyes as he peered through the tinted glass into his cubicle. "The devil hardens his own. What's that going in through the back of his hand?"

"Gelofusin," Dr. Moore said. "It's a plasma expander."

McKinnes frowned at him.

"Nothing serious," Moore assured him. "Where there's the chance of shock due to a loss of blood volume, a plasma expander is used to put back some bulk. It improves cardiovascular function and helps the transport of oxygen."

"Does that mean he might regain consciousness soon?"

"It's likely. There's no reason—none that I'm aware of —why he should stay unconscious for long."

"Good, good." McKinnes nodded absently for a few seconds, then he stepped out into the corridor. "It could all have been a lot worse," he murmured, taking his leave with a tight smile and an abbreviated wave.

In another part of the hospital, sitting on the edge of a cot in the emergency cubicle, Larry Jackson sipped hot tea and examined his bandaged hand. He was pale, his skin yellowish and waxy under the fluorescent light. The hand holding the tea mug was trembling. A nurse had told him the pallor and the shakes were normal after an accident: she said he wasn't to worry. He did not think he was particularly worried, but he was certainly depressed: the sleeves and front of his new jacket were streaked and stained with dark dried blood. It was a write-off.