The Murder Exchange (38 page)

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off the main road and how he should proceed from
there. 'When you get to the sign that says "No
Tipping", stop and park up the car on the bank.
That whole journey should take you fifteen
minutes. I'll call you then. Let me tell you something
else as well, something very important. Do *
not bring anyone else with you. When you park the
car, you're going to be watched. If anyone else is
with you, the whole thing's off, and that'll be the
last you hear from your boy.'

Holtz started shouting something but I rang off. I
wasn't prepared to listen to threats. J|

'Christ, Max,' said Tugger with a laugh. 'You
were almost scaring me then. You'd make a great
film villain, I tell you.'

'Alan Rickman's got nothing on me, mate.
Anyway, you've got to be harsh, haven't you? I
don't want him thinking he's dealing with
amateurs.'

I called Kalinski back and told him to be at the
rendezvous point at 6.45 sharp, then phoned down to
Joe. Tve made contact,' I told him. Tie's driving a
black Merc and he'll be with you in fifteen minutes.'

'No problem/ said Joe. 'If there's anyone else
with him, I'll let you know. Otherwise I'll follow
him up, then peel off when it's sorted, and meet
you at the rendezvous.'

The call ended. Everyone knew what they were
doing. Now it was simply a matter of waiting.

'It's a long time since I've used one of these,' said
Tugger, stroking the rifle like it was some sort of
cuddly toy. It was one Joe had brought back from
the Gulf War in '91. 'I think Bosnia was probably

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the last time, and, Christ, that was years back. A
good weapon, though. I can see why the Yanks like

it.'

'I think I prefer the AK if I was to be given the
choice. Less prone to jamming.'

'You know, Max/ he said, loading and unloading
the rifle's magazine, 'I do like chefing, and I reckon
I could make a lot of money out of it, especially if I run afford to open up my own place.'

'You make a mean Thai fish curry, I'll give you
that.'

'Aye, I know, but...' He thought about it for a
minute, at the same time putting the stock to his
shoulder and aiming at an imaginary target among
fhp frees. 'But it can never give you quite the same
ooii of buzz as a job of violence does. You know
what I mean? You don't get that sort of excitement
out in the normal world.'

'Yeah,' I said, remembering the mad adrenalin
rush I'd had when I'd been standing in the stairwell
of Heavenly Girls, ripping holes out of Fitz and Big
Mick. 'Maybe you don't.'

At 6.44 my mobile rang. It was Joe, and he was
whispering. 'He's here. Looks like he's alone.'

Thanks.' I rang off, then dialled Holtz's number.
It was answered immediately. 'Stand facing the
"No Tipping" sign, five feet away from it.'

'How do I know what's five feet?' he demanded
angrily.

'Just do it. Now turn ninety degrees to the left
and start walking, keeping in a straight line. You'll
see the outlines of a path in front of you. Follow it.'

Where's my son?'

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'I told you, he's safe and he's well. Are you on the
path?'

Teah, I'm on the path. When am I going to see
my boy?'

'If the money's all there, you'll see him first thing t
tomorrow morning. He'll be dropped off somewhere
in London, reasonably close to a telephone
box.'

'He fucking better be.'

'Keep walking and stop speaking.'

From his vantage point in the undergrowth, Joe watched
as Stefan Holtz turned away and began walking up the
wooded incline in the direction of Max and Tugger. Holtz
had a mobile to his ear and a large holdall slung over his
shoulder. Within a minute he'd disappeared from view,
and the forest was silent once again, except for the steady J| crackle of rain hitting the trees, and the distant hum of
traffic. No-one else had turned up to follow him and the
car he'd been driving, the Merc, was empty.

He kept listening for a few moments, then, satisfied
that Holtz had come alone, he slipped slowly and carefully
out of his hiding place, crossed the track from which
the Merc had appeared, and started up the path after
Holtz, keeping as far back as possible.

Too late, he heard the noise behind him. The rustle of
bushes, the sound of heavy footfalls on muddy ground, and
then the terminal, gut-wrenching sensation of the hard
metal gun barrel being pushed into the back of his head.

I saw Holtz emerge from the trees at the bottom of
the slope, carrying the holdall. He was about a
hundred and fifty yards away. 'All right, keep

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walking/ I told him, and switched off the mobile.

I turned to Tugger. 'Here he comes.' Tugger
nodded, and we both pulled on balaclavas. I
checked the Clock, gave Holtz another thirty
seconds to get nearer, then pushed my way out of
the bushes. Fifty yards now separated us.

Holtz saw me but didn't quicken his pace, and
we closed in on each other as casually as a couple of
,<.irly-evening strollers. When we were ten feet
apart, we both stopped. Holtz looked pissed off.
The rain, which was pouring down now, had
flattened his iron-grey hair and it was running
freely down his grizzled, lined face and onto his
khaki raincoat. I'd never seen a picture of him
before (Holtz senior, like all his close cohorts, was v *.;i y camera shy), but thought that he looked a lot
like Karl Maiden, the veteran actor from seventies
cop show The Streets of San Francisco, even down to
the bulbous round nose.

Tou've made a big fucking mistake doing this to
me/ he growled, making no effort to hand over the
holdall.

'And you made a big fucking mistake trying to
kill me/ I said, unable to resist letting him know
who'd done this to him, even though it effectively
meant exiling myself for life. Sometimes you just
had to show that you hadn't been intimidated.

'I don't even know who the fuck you are behind
that poxy mask, so what makes you think I've been
trying to have you killed? I'll tell you something,
though, you cunt. If I want someone dead, that's
how they end up. Dead. No fucker ever escapes
from me.'

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I thought about lifting my balaclava, but that
really would have been stupid. But then it struck
me that maybe he didn't know who I was. Maybe I
was that insignificant. "That holdall looks very
heavy/ I told him. 'Why don't I take it off your
hands?'

Holtz managed the beginnings of a smile for the
first time. It wasn't a pleasant sight. 'No, mate, it
ain't as easy as that. Before you get this cash, I want
to see my son. So, get on the phone to whichever
cunt's holding him and get him to drive him down
here. Now. Then we'll see if it's worth a trade.'

'I don't want to have to take that bag off you by
force, Mr Holtz, but, believe me, I will.'

'No you won't, son,' said Holtz, shaking his
head. 'No, you fucking won't.'

Tugger had the rifle to his shoulder, the barrel pointing
through a gap in a large evergreen bush towards Stefan
Holtz. He could see him and Max talking, but Max was
making no move to take the holdall. They used to say that
Tugger Lewis had a nose for danger, could sense when
something bad was going to happen. One time, years
back in County Down, five of them had been patrolling
in a Land Rover down remote country back roads when
they'd seen a car parked in a layby up ahead. Afterwards,
he'd said it was just something about the angle it was
parked in, slightly skewed with the bonnet pointed
towards the road, like someone had abandoned it too
quickly, that had caught his attention. But it wasn't that.
He'd just felt it, known that something was going to
happen. He'd told the driver to stop and turn round even
though he'd only been a private and the driver was a

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lance corporal, and the road had been so narrow that any
turn was going to require some serious maneuvering,
but something in his tone - the desperation, the surefire
knowledge that they were driving straight towards their
doom - convinced the driver to do what he said. Ten
seconds later, while they were still turning round, the
IRA man with the remote control, seeing that his targets
were escaping, detonated the bomb in the car's boot. Two
cf the men in the jeep had been slightly injured, but no
one was complaining. If they'd been driving past it, the
impact of the blast would have killed them all.

He had the same feeling now. It had started slowly,
about an hour before, but had accelerated markedly when
Stefan Holtz had appeared out of the woods below.
Something was wrong. There was no escaping the j..l.. Something was definitely wrong. Max and
Holtz were still talking, and Tugger thought he
saw Holtz smile, but he might have been imagining
things. Was this a set-up? His jaw tightened and his
finger stroked the trigger. He was listening now, listening
for any sound that was remotely out of place.

The faint rustle of leaves being trampled underfoot,
could he hear that? Off to his left, not far away, coming
from somewhere in the trees. He listened harder, couldn't
tell for sure, thinking, concentrating ...

Then he swung round ninety degrees, still holding the
rifle at shoulder height, and saw the figure creeping
through the undergrowth, twenty-five feet away, gun in
hand.

Reflexively, he pulled the trigger, firing off five shots
in rapid succession, the angry bark of the weapon echoing
through the undergrowth. Then he hit the deck as
bullets came flying back in the opposite direction.

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The loud crackle of gunfire startled us both. I
clocked the first shots as coming from the M-16,
which had to be lugger's, and then further shots
from at least two other weapons. Holtz might have
thought he had some cards up his sleeve but he
obviously hadn't expected anyone to start shooting.
His eyes widened and he swung round to me with
a look of suspicion mixed with panic. 'What the
fuck's going on?'

These were the last words Stefan Holtz ever
spoke. Before I could even open my mouth to
answer, his left eye seemed to burst out of his face,
and he fell forward, still clutching the holdall. I
dived to the ground and pulled out my gun.
Suddenly, shooting seemed to be coming from
everywhere. I could see a figure armed with a rifle,
kneeling down on the other side of the clearing
about thirty yards away, partially concealed by the
foliage. I knew straight away that he was the one
who'd gunned down the gang leader. The shooter
fired again, and blood sprayed up from one of
Holtz's thighs as the round struck. I scrambled
down behind his body, then, using it as cover, leant
over and clattered off five rounds from the Clock in
the shooter's direction, knowing that my chances of
hitting him were slim but wanting to put him under
pressure. He fired two shots back, both whizzing
close by, then slipped back into the trees.

But now shooting was coming from behind me,
and coming close, too. Clumps of mud flew up
from the ground only feet from where I was lying. I
whirled round and fired three shots in the general

360

direction of their source, unable to see my assailant;
then, knowing that I was a sitting duck as long as I
stayed where I was, I jumped up and pulled the
holdall from Holtz's dead fingers. I hauled it over
my shoulders, surprised at the heavy weight, then
started running for the nearest trees, keeping as low
as possible. From behind me I heard the rifleman
who'd taken out Holtz cracking off shots at my
rvposed back, and in front of me I could make out
the second shooter behind some bushes. He had
what looked like a shotgun balanced over a branch
and he was steadying himself to fire. I didn't give
him a chance. As I charged towards him, I lifted the
Clock and pulled the trigger, bang bang bang. It
was a battle of nerves and he lost it, jumping out of
tuv. way and dropping the weapon.

I zigzagged wildly, teeth clenched in anticipation
of a striking bullet, and at the last second half
dived, half-slid into the treeline and out of sight of
the shooter behind me. The second gunman, only
partly visible through the undergrowth, swung his
shotgun round in my direction, pulling the trigger
at the same time. The weapon kicked and he took a
stumbling step back, the shot passing way over my
head. I fired twice in return and at least one of the
rounds hit him. I heard him yelp in shock and drop
to one knee; then, without even pausing for breath,
I jumped up with the holdall and ran in a crouch in
the direction of the spot where I'd left Tugger, keeping
within the trees. The branches and bushes
battered and scratched me as I charged through
them, every sense and nerve-ending homed in on
my surroundings, knowing we'd been set up and

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that there were bound to be more of them about. As
if to confirm it, an unseen round whistled by a few
feet above my head, letting out an angry crack as it
struck a thick branch and ricocheted off into the
gloom. I couldn't see the shooter and doubted that
the shooter could see me.

Without warning, a figure appeared out of the
trees in front of me, no more than ten feet away,
running and stumbling in my direction. He had a
gun in one hand and was holding an injured leg
with the other. I didn't recognize him, and that
meant he was the enemy. He didn't even see me
until the last second, which was a fatal mistake.
Without dropping my pace, I raised my weapon,
stretched out my arm so the barrel was no more
than three feet from its target, and shot him straight
through his open mouth. He died with an
expression of confused shock on his face and I was
already five yards beyond him by the time the body
hit the ground. A staccato burst of automatic
weapon fire rattled through the trees somewhere
off to my right, but it sounded like there was more
hope in it than judgement, and I kept running,
undeterred, hoping that Tugger was OK and had
followed the instructions should things go wrong,
which were to head straight back to the place where
Kalinski was picking us up from. The last thing I
needed now was for him to hold his ground and
take a potshot at me as I came over the brow of the
hill. Unlike the rest of these blokes, he'd always
been a good shot.
But Tugger wasn't there when I passed the spot,
and there was no sign of blood or anything else to