Sure Fire (3 page)

It was dark by the time they reached Chance's flat. It was on the second floor of a Victorian terraced house. The outside looked grim and dilapidated. Paint was peeling from the window frames by the door, and the stone steps were chipped and stained.

But once inside it was very different. There was a small lift at the end of a wide hallway and a staircase wound up round the lift shaft. Chance heaved open the heavy metal grille door across the lift.

“Leave that open and the lift won't move,” he explained. “Gives us time to put all your luggage inside.”

They piled the boxes and bags inside, almost filling the floor space in the small lift. Chance
reached in through the door to press the button for the second floor, then he heaved the grill across again – leaving the three of them outside. The lift started to move.

“We could have squeezed inside,” Rich protested.

“But Jade wants us to keep fit,” Chance said. “Come on – we have to get there before the lift.” He took the stairs two at a time with practised ease.

“He'll be wheezing before he gets there,” Jade said, running up the stairs. Rich sighed and followed at a more leisurely pace.

They dumped the last load of stuff into the hallway of Chance's flat. Chance himself had disappeared inside already. “Was he wheezing?” Rich asked.

“Expect so,” Jade said. “Didn't notice.”

“That's a ‘no' then,” Rich said.

There were three doors from the hallway. The first door led into the kitchen, the next into a living room. At the end of the hall was a toilet. Chance appeared from the kitchen and led the twins through to the living room. It looked like a show home – hardly any furniture, just a sofa and a low coffee table. A television and DVD player stood against one wall,
beside an old fireplace, but there were no magazines or books or ornaments. The room was painted a uniform white that made it seem even more impersonal. The only sign of life was the ashtray on the coffee table – full of butt ends of smoked cigarettes. It gave the room a stale, unpleasant smell. A single picture hung on the wall opposite the door. It showed a steam train speeding through the countryside – a sleek, blue engine with a sloping front. In the foreground was a pond with ducks swimming on it.

“That's clever,” Rich told Jade, pointing at the picture.

“Why?”

“Because the engine is called Mallard.”

She shook her head, none the wiser.

“Mallard is a sort of duck,” Chance said, joining them.

“Where's my room?” Jade asked.

He pointed. “Through there, on the right.”

“And mine?” Rich asked.

“Same place. Same room.”

“You're kidding,” Jade said.

“We don't share. We're fifteen,” Rich added.

“There are only two bedrooms,” Chance told him.

“Why can't Rich share with you?” Jade asked. “Boys together?”

Chance shook his head. “Because I'm sleeping on the sofa in here and there's only room on it for one. There are a couple of single beds in there.”

“You said there were two bedrooms,” Rich reminded him.

“I'm using the other one as a study. I have to work. You get a bedroom and beds; I get a study and the sofa. That's the best deal I can give you.”

“That's no deal,” Jade said.

“A deal is something that's agreed between two or more parties,” Rich said.

“And do you know what a pedant is?” Chance asked.

“Yes, I do actually. It's—”

“I know what it is,” Chance told him.

“Then why did you ask?” Rich asked.

“Dad's little joke,” Jade told him. She shot a glance at Chance. “Very little joke. Come on.” She led Rich through to the bedroom.

The room was bare apart from two single beds,
two bedside cabinets and a mirror on one wall.

“No place like home,” Jade said.

“And this is certainly no place like home,” Rich agreed. “Let's get our stuff. Must have some posters or something to liven the place up.”

The room that Chance was using as a study was opposite their bedroom door. Jade pushed it open and they looked inside. It was a contrast to the rest of the flat.

There was a single desk with a chair beside it. On the desk was an open laptop computer and a telephone. The rest of the desk was covered in piles of paper that extended to the floor and against the walls – piles of magazines and books. A bookshelf strained under the weight of files and heavy books.

“Oil industry stuff,” Rich said, glancing at some of the titles. “Did he tell us he worked in the oil industry?”

“He's hardly told us anything,” Jade said. She walked over to the desk.

“We shouldn't really be here,” Rich said, following hesitantly.

“You're telling me.” She pointed to a small box
attached to the telephone wire. It was about the size of a cigarette packet, plain grey plastic with several buttons on one side. “What's that? A modem?”

“Don't think so,” Rich said. “Weird-looking thing.”

“I know what this is though,” Jade announced, grabbing a sheet of paper from beside the phone. “Look – a list of schools. Boarding schools I bet. He's been crossing them off. God, he's already trying to get rid of us.”

“What are you doing in here?” Chance asked. He was standing at the door to the study.

“Just having a look around,” Jade said.

“Look – I think we have to have certain rules around here, and one of them is that you never come into my study.”

“But we're your kids!”

“I'm sorry, but those are the rules,” he said. He put his arm out, gesturing for them to leave the room.

“Come on,” Rich said. He took the sheet of paper from his sister and put it back on the desk. He glanced down the two columns of names – some of the schools he recognised. “There are two lists here,” he said.

“What do you mean?” Jade asked.

“Come on now,” Chance said.

“Two lists,” Rich repeated. “As in two sets of boarding schools. As in boys' schools and girls' schools.”

“No way. Oh, no way on earth,” Jade said.

“You're not splitting us up,” Rich agreed. He turned angrily to face his father. “Jade and me – we've got nothing except each other. You're not taking that from us too.”

Rich was slumped on the sofa, watching the telly. It was a cartoon and he wasn't interested, but it was better than listening to Chance, who was sitting on the floor talking to him.

“I tried mixed schools first. Of course I did. But none of them had two spaces in the same year group.”

“So you just thought you'd split us up,” Rich said.

“What was I supposed to do?” Chance asked.

Rich said nothing. He turned up the volume of the television.

But he still heard Jade's shout from the kitchen, where she'd gone to empty the ashtray into the bin: “What is this? You are one seriously weird guy.”

Rich clicked off the telly and followed Chance to
the kitchen. Jade had the fridge door open and was unloading its contents on to the side. Bottles of beer.

“Is that all there is?” Rich asked.

“No. There's this too.” She pulled out two bigger bottles and put those with the beer. Champagne. “I mean, where's the butter? Milk? Eggs? Food of any sort? Anything at all really?”

“It's down the road,” Chance said. He gently eased Jade to one side and started to repack the fridge.

“What do you mean, down the road?”

“I get a takeaway or I eat at the pub. They're down the road.”

“And that's how you
live
?” Jade was aghast. “No wonder the kitchen's so clean. At least you do the washing up.”

“Eat out of the cartons usually,” Chance said casually. He turned and winked at Rich, who stifled a smile.

“You are so gross,” Jade told him. “Just don't expect us to sink to your level.”

Chance shrugged.

“What about a Chinese?” Rich asked.

They ate Chinese with the telly on. It meant they didn't have to talk to one another. Jade took herself off to bed almost as soon as she'd finished her egg-fried rice and spring roll. Rich pushed his sweet and sour chicken around the plate, not really hungry.

“I'm tired,” he said awkwardly. “I think I'll get to bed too.”

“That's OK,” Chance said. “I've got work to do anyway. Some calls to make. Don't worry – I'll tidy away. And wash up.”

Rich gave a weak smile and headed for the bedroom.

Jade was already in bed. She hadn't turned the light out and she was just staring at the ceiling. She frowned at Rich as he came in.

“Hey,” he said.

She turned over, facing away.

“What's the matter?” he asked. “I haven't done anything.”

She pulled the pillow over her head.

Not listening.

So Rich pulled her duvet away instead.

“Give that back!” she said.

Jade was out of bed and grabbing back the duvet.
Rich let it go and went for her pillow instead. They faced one another, each brandishing bedding.

“Peace?” Rich suggested.

“If you give me my pillow back.”

“Fair enough.” He threw it to her.

Jade dropped the duvet and caught the pillow. Then she started hitting Rich with it, driving him back on to his bed.

“Hey, hey, hey!” He tried to fend her off.

“That's for ganging up on me.”

“We're not – I wasn't. When?”

“In the kitchen. Getting a Chinese.”

“Yeah, as opposed to what?” Rich wanted to know. “There's no food in this house. Just beer, champagne and cigarettes. Which did
you
want for dinner? At least now we've been and got some milk.”

Jade flopped down on her bed, dragging the duvet back up over herself. “I'm sorry. It's all just so… sudden. So unfair.”

She started crying again. Rich sat beside her on the bed.

“It is a nightmare,” Rich agreed. He looked over at the bedroom door. “
He
's a nightmare. Maybe boarding school will be better.”

“Oh, look,” Jade said, sniffing between her tears. “Out the window.”

The curtains were drawn and Rich frowned. “What?”

“Thought I saw a flying pig,” Jade said.

“Maybe you did,” Rich told her. He grabbed his pyjamas from under his pillow and headed for the bathroom.

In Krejikistan, the cut glass of a chandelier glittered as the light reflected off its facets. Electric bulbs had replaced the candles that once provided the light, but the ceiling above it still retained an original mural – a pale blue sky with delicate clouds drifting across.

The room below was enormous, with a floor made up of black-and-white marble squares. The space was made to seem even bigger by large mirrors that hung on the walls. The furniture – a highly-polished wooden table that had been made for Louis XIV of France, high-backed chairs patterned in gold leaf that had been a gift to a tsar, and a series of seventeenth-century side tables – were almost lost in the huge space.

Viktor Vishinsky sat in one of the antique chairs.
In front of him was a single place setting for dinner – heavy silver cutlery, an ornate bowl filled with stuffed olives and a glass of white wine. He was looking intently at a large screen that his technicians had set up at the other end of the table. The image was grainy and unclear.

“Is that the best you can do?” he asked. He took one of the olives from the bowl in front of him and rolled it between his finger and thumb.

“We have enhanced it as much as possible,” Pavlov, the chief technician, assured him.

Vishinsky settled back in his chair and let them explain. To him, the images still looked crude and fuzzy. He pushed the olive into his mouth.

“You can see where the man at the back of the laboratory is opening the canister,” Pavlov said. He froze the image. It was projected from a laptop computer on to the large screen. The hi-tech set-up looked out of place in the tsarist splendour of the huge room.

Two other technicians were standing nervously at the side of the room. Whether they were there in case Pavlov needed their own specialist expertise, or simply to give him moral support, Vishinsky did not
know or care. His whole attention was focused on the speckled images on the screen.

Pavlov used a laser pointer and ran the red dot of light round the figure just visible by the shadowy shape of the canisters. “If we had images from an infra-red camera—” he began.

But Vishinsky cut him off. “We do not. We must work with what we have. What can you tell me, apart from the obvious?”

Pavlov let the video run on. “As you can see, just, he is reaching inside the canister. As his hand comes out – there.” He froze the video again and indicated the man's hand with the pointer. “He is holding something. Something which we must assume he dipped into the fluid and filled. It is not very big. We can tell from his hand that it is about the size of an eggcup.” Pavlov paused for a moment, before adding, “It is not an eggcup, I should point out.”

“I said omit the obvious. Is it something he found in the lab?” Vishinsky asked, taking another olive. “Or is it something he brought with him?”

“We can find no indication that any container of that size was in the lab. Unfortunately, there is nothing left of the lab, so it is impossible to be sure if
anything was taken. But earlier in the sequence we see the man looking round, we think for a container. He finds nothing useful, so uses whatever he brought with him. See, here…” He wound the footage back at high speed before letting it play again. “He seems to take something from his pocket.”

“Something that he had in his pocket,” Vishinsky said.

“He may have come prepared, and then looked to see if there was a more suitable or larger container to be found in the lab.”