Dead Heat

by Dick Francis

  He taped the white sausage to the chair between my legs. Oh God. Not my legs. MaryLou’s legs, and the awful lack of them, haunted me still. Now, it seemed, I was to live my nightmare. Next, Gary delicately took a cigarette-sized metal tube from the bag and very carefully pushed it deep into the soft white explosive, like pushing a chocolate chip into an ice-cream cone. The tube had two short wires coming out of the top that were connected to a small black box. The remote-detonator system, I concluded. I sweated more, and Komarov clearly enjoyed it. For the first time, I became really terrified, absolutely certain that I would die, hopeful that it would be quick and easy and frightened to the point of despair that it would not. Would I be able to not tell him where the balls were? Would I be able to die without giving up that information? Would I be able to keep those I loved safe no matter what was done to me? The same questions that every Gestapo-tortured spy or resistance fighter had asked themselves more than fifty years ago. Neither I, nor they, would know the answer, not until the unthinkable actually happened.

  “Where is it?” Komarov asked.

  “Where is what?” I replied.

  “Mr. Moreton,” he said, as if addressing me in a company board meeting, “let us not play games. We both know what I am talking about.”

  “I left it with Mrs. Schumann,” I said.

  George appeared slightly uneasy.

  “I am informed,” said Komarov, “that that is not the case. Mrs. Schumann gave two of the items to you. One has been recovered, but the other has not.” He walked around behind me. “Mrs. Schumann should not have had any of the items in the first place. They have all now been recovered, other than the one you still possess.” He came around in front of me again. “You will tell me where it is, sooner or later.” He smiled again. He was obviously enjoying himself. I wasn’t.

  There was a noise from the kitchen. It wasn’t particularly loud, but it was clear, like a metal spoon falling onto the tile floor. It must be Caroline, I thought.

  “Can’t you do anything right?” Komarov said, cuttingly, to George Kealy. He was irritated. “Watch him.” He pointed at me. “If he moves, shoot him in the foot. But don’t hit the explosive or we might all end up dead. You”-he gestured towards Gary-“come with me.”

  Komarov and Gary went from the dining room into the kitchen through the swinging door that was more often used by my waitstaff than by a gun-toting murderer. I prayed that Caroline would stay hidden.

  George stood nervously in front of me.

  “How on earth did you get involved in this?” I asked him.

  “Shut up,” he said in reply. I ignored him.

  “Why did you poison the gala dinner?” I asked him.

  “Shut up,” he said again. I ignored him again.

  “Was it so you didn’t have to go to the Guineas?” I asked.

  “I told you to shut up,” he said.

  “Did Gary add the kidney beans to the sauce?” I asked him. He didn’t say anything. “Now, that was really stupid,” I said. “Without that, I wouldn’t have worried. I wouldn’t have asked any questions.” And, I thought, I wouldn’t be here, tied up and waiting to die.

  “Don’t you start,” George said. I must have touched a raw nerve.

  “In trouble, are you? With the boss man?” I said, rubbing salt in the wound. He was silent, so I taunted him more. “Messed up, did you? Was George not such a clever boy after all?”

  “Shut up,” he said, waving the gun towards me. “Shut up!”

  “What does Emma think?” I said. “Does she know what you’re up to?”

  He turned and looked towards the door through which the other two had disappeared. He was hoping for reinforcements, and I was obviously beginning to get to him.

  “Was it Emma who prepared the poisonous kidney beans for you?” I asked.

  “Don’t be bloody stupid,” he said, turning back to me. “The beans were only there to make her ill.”

  “To make Emma ill?” I said, astounded.

  “Emma was insistent that we go to that bloody box at the races,” he said. “I couldn’t talk her out of it. She and Elizabeth Jennings had been planning it for weeks, ever since we were first invited. I couldn’t exactly tell her why she shouldn’t go, now, could I?”

  “So you poisoned the dinner to stop her going to the races?”

  “Yes,” he said. “That damn Gary was only meant to poison Emma’s dinner and those of the Jenningses. Stupid idiot poisoned the whole bloody lot, didn’t he? He even made me ill, the bastard.”

  “Serves you right,” I said to him, just as Caroline had said to me.

  I supposed it was easier for Gary to poison the whole dinner rather than just three plates and then somehow ensure they went to the correct people. That would have involved a conspiracy with one of the waiters. The mass poisoning also gave him the excuse he needed for not being in the kitchen himself at the racetrack on the Saturday.

  “But Elizabeth Jennings went to the races anyway,” I said to George. “How come?”

  “I didn’t realize she was allergic to mushrooms,” he said. Elizabeth would have eaten the chicken without the truffle and chanterelle sauce. “I was sorry about that.”

  Not so sorry, I thought, to have kept him away from Elizabeth’s funeral. Not so sorry to prevent him offering Neil Jennings his bloodied hand in comfort at the church door.

  “You should have just left it,” he said to me, looking at me in the eye for the first time.

  “Should have left what?” I said.

  “You seemed so bloody determined to find out who had poisoned the dinner.”

  “Well, of course I was,” I said.

  “But I couldn’t let that happen,” said George.

  I stared at him. “You mean it was you who tried to kill me?”

  “I arranged it,” he said rather arrogantly. There was no remorse in his voice.

  I had liked George. I had always considered him to be a friend, and yet he had apparently twice arranged to have me killed. He had caused my car to be written off, he had burned my home and all my possessions and here he was standing in front of me with a gun in his hand and murder on his mind. Last week, I had told Dorothy Schumann that lots of people were murdered by their friends. I hadn’t expected that fact to be so manifestly demonstrated quite so soon.

  “But you weren’t very good at it, were you?” I said, again goading him. “I bet Komarov wasn’t too pleased with that either, was he? You couldn’t even bump off a country chef, could you? Can’t you do anything right?” I echoed Komarov.

  “Shut up,” he shouted again. He was becoming very agitated. “Bloody Gary couldn’t organize a proverbial bloody piss-up in a brewery.”

  “So it was Gary who tried to kill me?” I said.

  He ignored me and walked over to look through the circular window in the door to the kitchen.

  “Why did Komarov bomb the box?” I asked him, changing direction.

  “I told you to shut up,” said George, waving his gun at me.

  “Was Rolf Schumann the target?” I asked, ignoring him.

  “I said shut up,” he shouted, walking right up to me and pointing the gun at my head from about twelve inches away.

  I ignored him again. If I made him angry enough, then perhaps he would do me a favor by killing me quickly. “Why bomb the box?” I said. “Surely that was out of all proportion. Why not just shoot Schumann, if he wanted to kill him? Nice and quiet, down some dark alley in Wisconsin?”

  “Komarov doesn’t do things quietly,” said George. “Make a statement, that’s what he said. Show everyone he meant business. Schumann was stealing from him, and Komarov doesn’t like thieves. An example had to be set.” George was clearly repeating to me exactly what Komarov had said to him.

  Strange logic, I thought. Schumann was a thief, so Komarov tried to murder him, and killed nineteen innocents instead, including the lovely Louisa and the conscientious MaryLou, and all in such horrific circumstances. Komarov was truly evil.r />
  There was a shout from the kitchen. Then a shot. I was frantic. Please, God, I prayed, let it not be Caroline who was shot.

  George backed away from me and again looked through the circular window in the swinging door and beyond into the kitchen. There was another shot, then another, followed by more shouts. Pity we had no near neighbors, I thought. Someone might have heard the shots and called the police.

  Komarov came back quickly through the door.

  “There’s someone outside the back,” he said to George. “I think I hit them. Go out and finish them off. I’ve sent that Gary out as well, so don’t shoot him.” George seemed to hesitate. “Now, George.” George moved through the door, his body language screaming that he didn’t want to go. Messing about in the dark with guns was not really his scene. But he should have thought of that before he became involved with a man like Komarov.

  “Now, Mr. Moreton,” said Komarov, coming right up to me, “where is my ball?”

  I almost laughed. If my legs hadn’t been taped to the chair legs, I would have kicked him in his balls. Then he’d have known where they were. He seemed to spot my amusement and his anger rose. He clearly expected me to be frightened into submission. Little did he realize that I was.

  “I will give you one last chance to tell me, then I will shoot your left foot,” he said. “Then I will shoot your right foot, then your knees, your wrists and your elbows.” As he spoke, he ejected the partially used magazine from his gun and snapped in another from his pocket. I assumed it was fully loaded. “Now, time is passing. For the last time, where is it?” He leaned down towards my face. I wondered if it would help if I spat at him. Perhaps he would become so angry that he would kill me quickly. I tried it. He just laughed and wiped his face with his sleeve. “That won’t help you,” he said. “You will tell me what I want, I promise you. Then I will detonate the bomb and blow you and your restaurant to smithereens.” His Russian accent made it sound like “smisereens,” but I understood his meaning. Another example to be set, no doubt.

  He stepped back and raised the gun. I wondered how much it would hurt. I wondered if I could stand it, and whether I would be able to stand the pain of both feet, my knees, my wrists and my elbows. I just couldn’t tell him to go to East Hendred, to Toby and Sally’s house, with their three lovely children. Whatever happened, I kept telling myself, I must not talk. I must not rain death and destruction down on my brother.

  Komarov aimed his gun at my right foot.

  “Wait,” I cried. His arm dropped a fraction.

  “Yes?” he said.

  “Why do you need it back anyway?” I asked. “You must have more, hundreds more.”

  “Why would I have hundreds?” he asked, clearly curious to learn how much I knew. What should I tell him? Did it matter?

  “To put inside the horses,” I said. “Full of drugs.”

  The effect was quite startling. He went very pale, and his hand shook a little.

  “Who knows this?” he said in a higher pitch than usual.

  “Everyone,” I said. “I told the police.” I didn’t expect this comment to save me; quite the reverse. But I hoped it might now be a quicker, less painful death.

  “That was very careless of you,” he said, returning somewhat to his normal voice. “For that, you will die.” I was going to die anyway. No change.

  He started to walk around behind me. Good, I thought, he is going to shoot me in the back of the head. Much cleaner, and much better not to see it coming. I would just be…gone.

  As Komarov passed my shoulder, Caroline stepped through the open doorway and hit him squarely in the face with her viola. She swung the instrument through the air with both hands, using the neck and fingerboard as a handle. Such was the force of the blow that poor dear Viola was damaged beyond repair. Her neck was broken and her body shattered, but, more important for me, Komarov went down to the ground semiconscious. Caroline herself was both hyperventilating and crying at the same time.

  “Quick,” I shouted at her, “get a knife.” She looked at me. “From the sideboard,” I shouted. “Top drawer, on the left.” She went straight to the sideboard and came back with a nice sharp, serrated steak knife. I didn’t usually give my customers steak knives, as I thought it was an admission that my steaks were tough, but we kept a few just in case. Thank goodness we did. Even so, Caroline had difficulty cutting through the tape around my wrist. But she managed out of sheer desperation, hurried along by the imminent reawakening of the terror at our feet.

  Finally, she freed my left hand.

  “Quick,” I said again. “Grab his gun and give it to me.”

  Komarov had fallen, but he had not let go of his pistol completely. Caroline went down and grabbed it out of his hand just as he was beginning to recover. She gave it to me, smiled wanly and went on trying to free me from the chair. Suddenly, I remembered the explosive. Where was the remote-detonator switch? Was it in Komarov’s pocket?

  Caroline sawed away at the tape around my legs, but she was too slow. Komarov was fully awake and watching, a line of blood running down from his nose, across his mouth and on down his neck. He put his hand up to his face and winced. I think Caroline must have broken his nose.

  “Stay where you are,” I said, pointing the gun at him.

  He leaned on the floor with his left elbow and put his right hand in his pocket.

  “Keep your hands where I can see them,” I said.

  He pulled his hand out again, but I could see that he now held a small, flat black box with a red button in the center of it. Oh God, I thought, my legs. Would he push the switch? But he would surely kill himself as well. Should I shoot him? If I did, would he detonate the bomb? Would he detonate it if I didn’t?

  I watched him, and I could sense that he was weighing up his options. If I had indeed told the police, his empire was about to come crashing down. Perhaps he could escape back to Russia or to South America, but maybe the escape routes had already been closed. Life imprisonment in a British jail would almost certainly mean just that, the rest of his life behind bars. There would be no parole for such an act of terrorism as the Newmarket bombing.

  I quite suddenly sensed that he was going to do it. He was going to blow us all up and end it here.

  I leaned down between my legs, grabbed the wires and pulled the cigarette-sized detonator out of the explosive. I threw it across the dining room. Komarov pushed the red button, but he was too late. The detonator exploded in midair with a harmless pop, like a very loud champagne cork exploding from the bottle.

  Komarov looked cheated, and he was in a rage. He began to stand up.

  “Stay where you are,” I repeated. He ignored me and rose to his knees. “I’ll shoot you,” I said. But he continued to rise.

  So I shot him.

  I was surprised how easy it was. I pointed the gun in his direction and squeezed the trigger. It wasn’t even as loud as I had expected, since the dining room was less confined than the lobby where Komarov had shot Richard.

  The bullet caught him in the right leg, just above the knee. I hadn’t been aiming for his leg particularly. I was right-handed, but the cast had forced me to shoot with my left. I had simply pointed the gun at the middle of the target and fired. If I’d aimed at his leg, I would probably have missed. Komarov dropped the detonator switch, grabbed the wound with both his hands and fell back to the floor. Blood poured out of his leg, and I wondered if I had hit an artery. I didn’t particularly care about him, but he was ruining my dining-room carpet. I thought about shooting him again, in the head, to stop the bleeding. There had been so much blood-bright red, oxygenated blood. I decided to just let him bleed. At least the blood spilt here would not be from the innocent, and my carpet could be replaced.

  Caroline was down on her knees behind me. She had finally cut through all the tape and I was free of the chair, so I went to her, keeping half an eye on Komarov and another half on the door from the kitchen. There were still George Kealy and Gary to contend
with. Caroline cradled Viola in her arms and sobbed. It was only the four strings that were keeping the pegbox and the scroll attached to what remained of the body of the instrument. The neck and fingerboard had broken through completely, and the soundbox was cracked apart along its full length. The damage reflected the ferocity of the attack Caroline had made on Komarov. I was actually surprised that he had recovered from it as quickly as he had.

  “Be careful, my darling,” I said. “There are still two of them about. I’m going to find them. Go to the office and call the police.”

  “What shall I tell them?” she said, visibly in shock.

  “Tell them there’s been a murder,” I said. “And the murderer is still here. That should bring them quickly.”

  Caroline went through the lobby and into the bar beyond, gently carrying Viola’s remains in her arms.

  Komarov was struggling to his feet. The bleeding from his leg had eased to a trickle, and I wondered if I should shoot him again. Instead, I grabbed him by the collar and thrust him ahead of me through the swinging door into the kitchen with the gun in the small of his back. If George Kealy was going to shoot me, he would have to miss his boss to do it. But the kitchen was empty. George and Gary must still be searching outside.

  I pushed Komarov right across the kitchen and banged him up against the wall next to the stainless steel door of the cold-room. I bashed the back of his wounded leg with my knee, and he groaned. It felt good, so I did it again.

  I used the lever handle to pull open the cold-room door and then I thrust Komarov in and sent him sprawling across the slatted wooden floor. The room was about ten feet square and seven feet high, with four food-filled wide stainless steel shelves running all around the walls, with a space about seven by four feet down the middle to walk. It had cost a fortune to install, but it had been worth every penny. I slammed the door shut. There was a push rod to open the door from the inside, to stop people getting trapped, and there was a place on the outside to affix a padlock, if desired. I didn’t have a padlock handy, so I slipped a foot-long metal kebab skewer through the hole, thereby imprisoning Komarov.