The Double Tap (Stephen Leather Thrillers) (8 page)

       
Lynch studied the dog’s form as the greyhounds rounded the first bend. It had finished unplaced in its last three races, but he knew better than to question McCormack’s advice. McCormack owned a string of greyhounds and on at least two nights a week he could be found at Dublin’s Shelbourne Park dog track.

       
Lynch looked up as the favourite crossed the finishing line and was engulfed in the waiting arms of a girl. She was a pretty young thing, shoulder length hair the colour of copper, and a figure that even the blue overalls couldn’t conceal. On any other day Lynch would have been tempted to strike up a conversation with her, but the visit to the dog track wasn’t a social event. He’d been summoned there by McCormack.

       
Lynch looked up at the results board at the far end of the stadium. The short odds on the favourite meant that no one would get rich on the race, but the dog McCormack had tipped would be running at twelve to one. The two men walked back inside to the betting hall and stood in a queue, waiting to place their bets.

       
McCormack gave the cashier a handful of notes and asked for it to be placed on number six, to win. Lynch took out his wallet. He dithered for a second or two and then took out all the banknotes it contained. He considered an each-way bet, but McCormack was standing at his shoulder, watching. Lynch handed over all the notes. ‘Number six, to win,’ he said. McCormack smiled and nodded.

       
They went outside to watch the dogs being walked. Number six looked good, its coat glossy, its hindquarters strong and well developed, holding its head up high as if it knew it was due for a win. ‘Have you got a dog running in this race?’ Lynch asked.

       
McCormack nodded at a brown dog at the far end of the line, sniffing listlessly at the shoes of its handler. ‘He’s coming on but it’ll be a few months yet before he peaks.’ They left the showing area and headed towards the track. ‘So, Dermott, what happened?’

       
‘A helicopter came from nowhere. Bloody nowhere. Lifted him off and flew away with him.’

       
‘Army?’

       
‘No. Not army. Red, white and blue it was. Not a soldier in sight. It’s a mystery all right, and if there’s one thing I can’t stand it’s a mystery.’

       
McCormack took off his horn-rimmed spectacles and polished them with his handkerchief. ‘What do you think he was up to?’

       
‘I don’t know. Whatever it was, I think there was a change of plan. I don’t think he was expecting the helicopter. Or the man who appeared on the sea wall.’

       
‘This man, any idea who he was?’

       
Lynch shook his head. ‘Military, I think. He walked like a soldier. Carried a stick.’

       
‘Armed?’

       
‘Couldn’t tell.’

       
‘What about the helicopter? Did the crew have guns?’ McCormack put his spectacles back on and peered over the top of them.

       
Lynch thought for a second and then shook his head. ‘No. I only saw one of the crew, he pulled Cramer in, but he wasn’t armed, I’m sure of that.’

       
McCormack tapped the programme against his leg as he walked, his head down in thought. He didn’t speak for almost a minute. ‘I think we’re going to have to let this one go, Dermott.’

       
‘I want the bastard,’ said Lynch fiercely.

       
‘Connolly wasn’t over happy about us going after Cramer in the first place, you know. Let sleeping dogs lie, he said. He took some persuading.’

       
‘Yeah?’ Lynch scratched his beard as if it itched.

       
‘Yes. I had to take sole responsibility for it. If it had gone wrong, I’d have been the one explaining to the Army Council. And it damn near did go wrong. We were lucky it wasn’t a trap, right?’

       
‘I wouldn’t say that, Thomas. We had Howth pretty well sewn up. If the SAS had been there, we’d have known about it.’

       
‘That’s as may be. But whatever Cramer was doing, it’s over now.’

       
‘I want him,’ said Lynch.

       
‘I know you do. But you’ve got a personal interest, Dermott, let’s not forget that.’

       
‘Let me go after him. Please. I’m asking as a friend.’

       
McCormack snorted softly. ‘You can’t ask me that as a friend, and you know it. You can only make a request like that to me as a member of the Army Executive.’

       
The next race was about to start and the spectators began to pour out of the betting hall and cluster around the track. The on-course bookmakers were frantically chalking up new odds. Lynch could see that the odds on number six were already shortening. ‘And if I do ask you as a member of the Army Executive?’

       
‘Then I’d have to refuse your request. If you’re adamant then I could put it before the Army Council, but I know what their answer would be. And so do you. They’ve too much to gain from the peace process, they’re not going to jeopardise it over one man.’

       
‘Not even a man like Cramer?’

       
‘Not even for Cramer. Look, Dermott, if it was up to me, of course I’d say yes. Hell, I’d even help pull the trigger. But you know what we were told in 1994. No mavericks. No splinter groups. We speak and act with one voice.’

       
The handlers began walking the dogs towards the starting gate. ‘We were so bloody close,’ hissed Lynch. ‘A minute earlier and we’d have got him.’

       
‘But you didn’t,’ said McCormack softly. ‘So now it’s over.’

       
Lynch wanted to argue but he knew it would be futile. ‘Whatever you say, Thomas.’

       
‘Good man.’ The race was about to start, but McCormack was already perusing the programme as if the outcome was a foregone conclusion. ‘Number two in the race after this. Guaranteed.’ He looked up and smiled. ‘You’ll be able to use your winnings from this race.’

       
‘Thanks. Thanks for the tip.’

       
‘When are you going back to Belfast?’

       
‘Tomorrow morning. I’ll catch the first train.’

       
‘Good. There’s a wee job I want you to do for me when you get back.’

       
‘Sure, Thomas. Whatever you say.’

       
McCormack studied the programme as the traps sprang open and the greyhounds burst out, like shells from a mortar.

Mike Cramer lay on his back and listened to the blackbirds, a pleasant contrast to the savage cries of seagulls he’d heard the last time he’d woken up. He opened his eyes and squinted at his wristwatch. It was just before five o’clock though it was already light outside. He rolled out of the single bed, padded across the bare floorboards to the window and pulled open the thin curtains. A thickset man in a grey sports jacket stood in the middle of the lawn, a walkie-talkie pressed to his mouth. He looked up and gave Cramer a half-wave. Cramer waved back.

       
To the right, beyond the lawns but still inside the wall that surrounded the property, were three tennis courts, lined up like playing cards in a game of Find The Lady, and beyond them a croquet lawn, the hoops still in place. Cramer ran his hands through his hair. He smelled his armpits and wrinkled his nose. He needed a shower, badly. By the bed stood a three-quarters empty bottle of Famous Grouse. The Colonel had brought it up after darkness had fallen and had sat on the bed keeping Cramer company, drinking the whisky and toasting the old days, the days before Cramer had been shot and tortured and before the cancer had started to grow. Cramer unscrewed the cap off the bottle, swilling it around like a mouthwash before swallowing and grimacing as it went down his throat.

       
He tossed the bottle on the bed and went into the bathroom, which was tiled from floor to ceiling. The grouting was black and stained and a mouldy smell was coming from the bathtub. The showerhead was as large as a saucepan lid and Cramer turned it on. To his surprise the water came out steaming hot almost immediately.

       
On a shelf above the sink stood a can of menthol shaving foam, a pack of disposable razors, a toothbrush still in its plastic wrapping and a tube of Colgate tartar control toothpaste. Cramer picked up the toothpaste and smiled, wondering who had done the shopping and why they’d chosen the tartar control formula. He cleaned his teeth and shaved and then climbed into the bathtub and stood under the shower. There was no shower curtain and water cascaded off his body and onto the tiled floor. He noticed a fresh bar of soap in a shell-shaped soap dish and he used it to wash himself thoroughly. He hadn’t realised how long it was since he’d felt truly clean.

       
He wrapped himself in clean towels and sat on the bed and read another of the files as he dried himself. It was an American killing; the victim had been a Chicago lawyer. The lawyer had several Mob figures as clients and the Chicago newspapers had suggested that the killing was one of a series of tit-for-tat murders, as two crime families fought for control of lucrative concrete-pouring contracts. The police file was never closed, though, and the latest addition, a memo from the Marseilles field office of the Sûreté – in response to an official Chicago Police Department enquiry – pointed out that the lawyer’s widow had remarried within the year and that she and her new husband were now living in the South of France. The new man in her life was twenty years younger and a good deal poorer than her husband had been. The file also contained a photograph of them together, she with the over-tight cheeks and slightly too-open eyes that indicated a face lift, he with a weightlifter’s chest, slick-backed hair and movie star looks. She’d been questioned several times but there was no evidence linking her to the assassin. It looked like the perfect crime, but Cramer wasn’t concerned about who’d financed the murder, it was the killer he was interested in.

       
The fact that it was the same man in both shootings wasn’t in question. Two shots, one to the face, a second to the chest: that appeared to be the killer’s trademark. When Cramer had attended the SAS’s Killing House in Hereford, he too had been trained in the ‘double tap’ – two shots fired in quick succession. However, the SAS instructors had stressed the importance of aiming at the torso so that there was less chance of missing – head shots were deemed too risky.

       
The killer had walked into the lawyer’s office and shot him dead in front of his secretary. The secretary’s description of the killer was detailed, but unhelpful: brown hair, brown eyes, just under six feet tall, lightly tanned skin. Any or all of those characteristics could be altered, Cramer knew. Hair dye, coloured contact lenses, lifts in the shoes, sunbeds or tanning cream. There was an artist’s impression based on the secretary’s description, and a computer-generated photo-fit, and while they did resemble each other, they had little in common with the pictures in the other files Cramer had read.

       
All the files on killings which had taken place in America contained FBI Facial Identification Fact Sheets, which had been filled in by investigating agents prior to the photo-fits being generated. They contained a list of facial features, and witnesses were asked to tick the pertinent boxes. Cramer took the sheets from the various files and compared them. They were just as disparate as the photo-fit pictures. The shape of the head could be categorised as oval, round, triangular, long or rectangular. All of the boxes had been ticked by at least one of the witnesses. The mouth could be classed as average, both lips thick, both lips thin, lips unequal, large or small. Most of the witness reports ticked the lips as average, but there was at least one witness who ticked each of the other categories. The consensus seemed to be that the man’s eyebrows were average, his ears were average, his chin was average and his nose was average, but there was no consistency. Two witnesses said the man had a double chin, one said his eyebrows met in the middle, another said he had protruding ears. Cramer was beginning to understand what the Colonel had meant when he’d said that they had plenty of descriptions but no real idea what the assassin looked like.

       
He finished drying himself and then looked around for clean clothes. There was none, the chests of drawers and the wardrobes were empty. Cramer shrugged and pulled on the clothes he’d arrived in. It seemed that the Colonel hadn’t thought of everything.

       
As he went down the main staircase he smelled bacon and when he walked into the dining hall the Colonel was already there, sitting at one of the long refectory tables and tucking into a fried breakfast. The Colonel picked up his coffee mug and nodded at the stainless steel serving trays which were lined up on a table by the door. ‘Help yourself,’ he said. ‘If there’s anything else you want, Mrs Elliott will get it for you. She’s quite a cook.’

       
Cramer walked along the row of trays. There were fried eggs, scrambled eggs, crisp bacon, sausages, tomatoes, fried bread, even kippers, enough to feed a battalion. Cramer wasn’t hungry but he knew that he’d have to eat. He spooned some scrambled eggs onto a plate and went over to sit opposite the Colonel. Mrs Elliott bustled out of the kitchen carrying two steaming jugs. ‘Coffee or tea?’ she asked. She sniffed and Cramer had the distinct impression that she could smell the whisky on his breath.

       
Cramer asked for tea. The Colonel waited until she’d gone back into the kitchen before asking Cramer how he’d slept. Cramer shrugged. ‘Same as usual,’ he said. The Colonel didn’t have to point out the bags under his eyes, Cramer had seen them staring back at him as he’d shaved.