No Cooperation from the Cat (27 page)

“You’re not really going to do this, are you?” Mick appealed directly to Banquo, who would not meet his eyes.

“It will be much the best thing for him,” Edytha said. “He needs time to heal … to restore himself … to—”

“To make a lot of money,” Isolde cut in. “It’s going to be very lucrative, we can’t afford to miss the opportunity.”

“And the lecture bureau is sure that there’ll be television opportunities, too.” Edytha was lost in dreams. “Chat shows, at first, and then perhaps, even his own—”

“That sounds,” Mick spoke in slow measured tones, “like we may be gone for some time.”

Banquo blinked uncertainly, not sure whether that was a quotation or just accidentally phrased.

Any nuances in the conversation left the harpies blissfully oblivious. They had their own concerns and pointed glances flew among them.

“Actually—” It seemed to have been decided that Valeria should act as spokeswoman. “Actually,
we
—” She emphasised the word, leaving no doubt as to whom it included. “
We
may quite possibly be gone for an indefinite period. It all depends on how things work out.”

“We’ll call you as soon as we get back,” Edytha cooed soothingly. “Don’t worry.”

And don’t call us—we’ll call you
. Even Mick knew how that one went.

“I see.” Mick barely inclined his head. “That’s just about what I was figuring.”

An unpleasant silence hung in the room. The harpies moved closer together and I found that Evangeline, Martha, and I had edged nearer to Nigel and Jocasta. The groups were polarising and it was not up to us to intrude on this little confrontation. In fact, I wished we weren’t there at all.

Tom stood alone in the corner with his camera. I began to lose any faint hope that he might intervene as peacemaker.

“What about you?” Mick turned to challenge Tom. “They’re taking you with them, I suppose, to get their precious pictures.”

“I’m not going anywhere. This is the first I’ve heard about this scheme.” Tom drew a deep breath. “But I’ve made other plans, anyway. I’m staying in London.”

“Oh, but we told the lecture bureau we had our own photographer,” Edytha protested.

“No, thanks.” For a moment, Tom’s smile was as unpleasant as Mick’s. “I have better plans already in place.”

“You—you can’t
do
this!” Isolde was outraged. All the crew were jumping ship. Except the one she really wanted to get rid of—he seemed determined to put up a fight.

“
You
knew!” Mick accused Banquo.

“No. No…” Banquo squirmed, still unwilling to meet his eyes. “It … it was just … a vague idea … of Melisande’s. I didn’t think it would come to anything. It was all up in the air. Melisande wanted—”

“Damn Melisande!” Mick snarled. “She was nothing but trouble from the beginning. The bitch got what she deserved! I’m glad—” He broke off, but too late.

I’m glad I killed her!
hung in the air, as distinctly as though it had been said. Even Banquo got it.

“
You!
You killed Melisande!” Banquo launched himself forward, propelled by fury. “I’ll kill
you
!”

“Hold it right there!” How long had Mick been carrying that gun? We stared at it disbelievingly.

“Where did you get that gun?” Evangeline trumpeted in a voice that reverberated from the high ceiling.

If she had been trying to startle him into dropping it, she nearly succeeded.

“Don’t move—any of you!” He had twitched, but recovered himself, gripping the gun tighter than ever.

“I suppose you killed Teddy, too,” the voice of doom announced. I wish he’d included mouths in that command not to move. Evangeline couldn’t keep hers shut.

“Shut up!”
Now
he said it. The gun veered towards her dangerously.

“Why?” She got the word out just ahead of his order.

“He had it coming,” Mick snapped. “He got on my nerves.”

“Also,” Tom spoke slowly and thoughtfully, as though some things were just beginning to make sense to him, “Mick drank more than his share of that wine you sent down to us when we were stuck in the lift. It was a long night. He began talking too much … rambling … ranting. I dozed off. I’d heard it all before—or thought I had. When I woke, he was still talking … hinting at I don’t know what. I dozed again. I guess Teddy kept listening—and he wasn’t as dumb as Mick thought he was.”

“You can shut up, too!” The gun moved to point at Tom. “None of you move. None of you talk.” He muttered, almost to himself: “I’ve got to think.”

Chapter Twenty-nine

He had a lot to think about. And so did we.

One mad sociopath who’d finally snapped, holding ten civilised people at bay.

He’d clearly killed twice already—he had nothing to lose.

It looked as though we were destined to be tomorrow morning’s headlines. London’s own massacre. Another crazed gunman mowing down everyone in sight.

Evangeline and I exchanged looks. We’d been in this situation—or one similar to it—often enough before, in practically every B picture we’d ever made. But we’d always had a script behind us and a director waiting to call: “Cut!”

This time we were on our own.

Except that there were all these other people around. If we banded together … if they weren’t too traumatised … how many would be taken out before—

“I should have known—” Isolde had been thinking along her own lines. “
You
were in charge of supplies, you were always in and out of the storeroom where Melisande kept her demonstration equipment.” She glared at Mick. “You contaminated her supplies.”

“Ground almonds in the flour and walnut oil in the olive oil,” Evangeline clarified helpfully—and loudly.

“Beast!” Isolde was equally loud. “Monster!” She looked as though she might rush him.

“Shut up!” Mick turned the gun on her. “All of you!”

I became aware of a stealthy movement from Tom’s corner and my hopes rose. Until I heard the telltale
click
.

Oh, great! We might all be slaughtered, but there’d be some prizewinning photos left behind recording the event. Too bad Tom wasn’t going to live to claim the credit—and all the syndication payments for them.

Another stealthy movement beside us. Nigel had unobtrusively stepped in front of Jocasta to try to shield her.

I wished I didn’t know that one bullet could take out two people standing that close to each other.

Meanwhile, Banquo was trying to shuffle behind Valeria, the largest of his cousins. My hero!

“Stop! Stop right there!” Mick shouted hysterically. “You’re moving! Nobody move!”

Click
. The sound was covered by Mick’s ragged breathing. He stared around wildly, beginning to realise the situation he’d got himself into.

He was as trapped as the rest of us.

Stalemate.

“You’ll never get away with this.” Isolde ignored the no-talking ban. “Give up and go away!”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you? That was what you all wanted—me to go away.”

“Really, dear.” Edytha seemed determined to be the voice of sweet reason—or else she had a death wish. “You’re being very silly, you know. You’re hugely outnumbered and—” She inched forward.

“Get out of the way! Yes, you!” This time the
click
was from the gun and it sounded ominous. He waved Valeria aside, leaving Banquo exposed.

“The first one who moves, I’ll shoot Banquo!”

The cousins froze.

“You wouldn’t—” The threat stunned Banquo. “Mick, you couldn’t—”

“Oh, couldn’t I?” With a victim so blatantly terrorised, Mick felt more in control. “Try me!”

No one took him up on his offer. Nervously, I saw that Martha was scanning the kitchen for likely objects to hurl at him the moment an opportunity arose. I tried to sidle in front of Martha and, at that moment, I realised I was still clasping Cho-Cho to my bosom. This wouldn’t do. No point in an innocent cat intercepting a bullet. She was the least real danger to Mick of us all.
She
couldn’t testify.

Bidding her a silent sad farewell, I relaxed my hold and let her slip to the floor. All other doors closed, she scampered in the direction of the drawing room.

“Where’s that cat going?” Mick demanded.

“To call the police, of course!” Evangeline snapped.

For a split second, he almost believed her. Then his face darkened, but not as much as the sky. Rain was close now. If only we could have a full-fledged thunderstorm with lots of lightning and thunderclaps, perhaps Mick might be distracted—

Too much to hope for. His suspicious gaze kept sweeping over us. That was when he noticed that Martha was inches away from a large pottery casserole with a heavy lid.

“That does it!” He’d already experienced her throwing arm. “Move in closer together. All of you—” He waved the gun at us. It looked awfully businesslike and not like any I had seen before. I wondered if it was one of those semiautomatic ones, where you could forget about counting six shots and know they’d run out of ammunition. This looked like the sort that just kept spraying bursts of bullets until no one was left standing.

“Turn around—” Mick ordered. “We’re moving into the front room.” Where there weren’t so many small heavy objects that could be used as weapons.

“You three—” He gestured with his gun at the harpies. “Lead the way. Tom, behind them. Then you … and you…”

Martha, Jocasta, and Nigel fell into line. Evangeline and I brought up the rear, where he could keep a mistrustful eye on her.

At first, I thought it was my heart thudding, then saw that the rain had started. Not the hoped-for thunderstorm, but a steady tropical downpour without pyrotechnics, just flooding.

“What about me!” Banquo obviously had visions of being left behind—slumped on the floor.

“You’re my insurance policy. You walk with me. Remember,” he warned us, “any funny business and Banquo gets the first bullet.”

There was a flutter of consternation from his cousins. The rest of us took the news stolidly. I swear Evangeline was biting back a smile at the thought.

“Okay—move!
Mush
!” Mick gave a grotesque laugh as he shouted out the command traditionally given to sled dogs to start them running. “
Mush, you bitches! Mush!
”

With much stumbling and backwards glances, the harpies moved forward slowly, reluctantly leading our parade. The rain had settled down to a steady drumming. I tried not to think of funeral marches.

Evangeline and I locked glances. I knew that, like me, she must be frantically reviewing every film she had ever starred in to find some clue as to how to get out of this situation.

Unfortunately, most of our scripts had involved seducing the gunman who, naturally, had cherished a mad passion for us from the first reel. These days, even more unfortunately, we were a decade or three beyond the seducing ploy. Apart from which, I somehow doubted that Mick had ever fallen for such a trick.

The enormous floor-to-ceiling windows in the drawing room usually provided a glorious panorama of the Thames. Right now, however, all they revealed was gloom beyond the blinding sheet of rain curtaining the windows.

“Right.” Mick looked around with satisfaction: no small objects that could be thrown. Only piles of paper—no threat there. “Now sit.” He waved the gun towards the twin sofas.

“Sit!” We weren’t obeying fast enough to suit him. His temper was fraying again.

“Not you!” Banquo was starting forward hopefully. “You stay with me. The rest of you—SIT!”

The rest of us moved to the sofas and lowered ourselves gingerly to sit on the edge. Nigel steered Jocasta to a corner seat, then perched on the armrest by her side. He was obviously planning to throw himself across her to shield her when the shooting started. Jocasta smiled tremulously and reached for his hand, clasping it tightly.

“You, too—” Mick snarled at Nigel. “On the seat. Everybody sit back—all the way back. Lean against the back of it.” His mouth twisted in a terrible mirthless rictus. “Make yourselves comfortable.”

He might be mad—but he wasn’t stupid. Packed in like sardines and as far back as we could go, there was no way any of us could launch a sudden attack now. We’d be shot down before we could even struggle to our feet.

Click
. I sent Tom a sour look. Too bad he wouldn’t be around to caption the resulting photo. Something like:
Last few minutes of their lives,
perhaps. The police photographer would get the aftermath, showing all the blood and sprawled bodies.

On the sofa opposite, Isolde moved her feet uneasily.

“Don’t try anything!” Mick aimed at her, then swung the gun back as Banquo twitched and froze.

From where I sat I could see the reason for Isolde’s sudden unwise movement. A pair of small bright eyes looked back at me from behind her ankles. That cold wet inquisitive nose thrust against her ankles had been the reason for her convulsive movement.

Go back
 … I implored Cho-Cho with all the concentration I could muster.
Don’t let him see you
.
He doesn’t like you anyway
.
He’ll hurt you
 …
kill you
 …

The little head moved back and disappeared. Had she received my message? Did she understand?

After that, the silence seemed to go on forever. Evangeline began sneaking impatient peeks at her watch. That made me even more nervous. If she ran true to form, at any moment she would snap out “
Oh, hurry up!
” or “
Get on with it!
” or something equally fatal. I tried to concentrate on willing her to keep her mouth shut.

“Mick, old boy…” But it was Banquo who broke the threatening silence. “Be reasonable, old chap. Put that gun away and we’ll forget all this and never mention it again.”

Some hope! Mick’s harsh bark of laughter said he didn’t believe it, either. How could he? Now that all of us knew that he’d committed two murders. No one was going to keep quiet about that if he was fool enough to let us go.

“Liar! You were going to let them dump me!” In a sudden explosive burst of rage, Mick raised the gun and struck Banquo a savage blow in the face. Banquo staggered back, but not fast enough to escape a second blow. Blood spurted from what might have been a broken nose or tooth. What difference did it make? Now that Mick had been provoked into once shedding blood, we were all doomed.