Angrily he forced himself to look upward and forward, finding the line of St John’s Beck and following its twists until, incredibly hazy, impossibly distant, he discovered the monopoly-chip red roof he had become so familiar with those few short weeks ago.
He sat down and with nerveless fingers scrabbled at the buckles and straps of his rucksack. At last he got it open and pulled out the A.R.T. Raising it to his right eye, he discovered he could see nothing at all. He’d forgotten about his eye. Had it been damaged in the fight? Gingerly he touched it. It was caked with a solid patch of blood. He began to pick at it and it came away easily. He recalled that it was in fact the cut on his temple which had released the flow.
Absurdly cheered by this discovery, he cleaned the scabbed blood away and picked up the sight once more.
Naddle Foot leapt across the valley towards him. But from a marksman’s viewpoint, the magnification only revealed difficulties. It was distant and it was a side view, obliquely angled to the front of the house and partially obscured by trees. But he could see the front porch. And before it, partially masked to his view by a rowan tree at the edge of the garden, was the black Metro.
A cry of despair rose in his blood-tainted throat. But what had he expected? Jacob was in there. Perhaps even now it was too late. Perhaps whatever he did, it was too late. What had he hoped to do anyway? His will had concentrated all its force on bringing him to this point which was the closest contact he could hope to gain with the house. So, what now? What was there to do?
There was only one thing he could do, and that was give what warning he could. He must pump bullets at random through the side windows, against the porch, taking a chance on hitting those within, and hoping that Jacob would be thrown off balance when he realized what was happening. Off balance? That’s where he was already! How would Jacob react when he realized that Jaysmith was out there, alive and apparently functioning normally?
There was no way of predicting, but when there was only one choice, there was no point in debating it.
He tried to force his mind to an estimate of the range and flexed his fingers in preparation for the assembly of the M21. But the sky seemed to be darkening, and Naddle Foot even through the scope was fading into the surrounding fields, and his pain-wracked, blood-starved body was being summoned to meet some last mocking challenge in that dismal amphitheatre below.
Then suddenly everything snapped back into sharp-edged focus. Out of the porchway of Naddle Foot stumbled Anya. She fell on one knee at the foot of the two steps down to the drive, recovered and dashed towards the parked car.
After her came Jacob, moving fast for a man of his age. In his hand was Adam’s Heckler Koch. He caught Anya by the car, seized her, spun her round to face him and pressed the pistol against her breast.
They were partially obscured by the rowan, its branches heavy with the blood-pearls of its fruit. But Jaysmith knew from his glimpse of Anya’s ravaged face what must have taken place, what her desperate lips were saying.
Jacob had carried out his plan. Bryant was dead. What resistance could a man in a wheelchair offer? And Anya, seeing her father dead, had turned her thoughts wholly towards her living son, soon to return home from school, and set off running to try to reach him.
And now Jacob had her, was doubtless telling her the rest of his plans, describing how he proposed to bring up Jimmy, and making sure that she understood that any hope she had of rescue from Jaysmith was vain. A killer, a long-distant assassin; perhaps in his sadistic lust for revenge, Jacob was even implying that all of Jaysmith’s relations with her had been a mere masquerade.
There was no time for further speculation, in any sense. He put down the ranging telescope and sent his fingers diving into the rucksack in search of the disassembled rifle. Out it came, piece by dull metallic piece. In full health and without the pressure of the most urgent need of his life, he was able to assemble it in under twenty seconds. But now his fingers were clammy with fear and fatigue, his muscles found it hard to obey the screaming commands of his will, and the familiar shapes and contours of the weapon seemed strange and awkward. All the time he desperately wanted to stop and pick up the scope and look once more to see what was happening so far below. But to look was to waste precious seconds which might be of the essence. He forced thought out of his mind and let his instincts deal with the familiar sequence. Install bolt assembly and operating rod; engage connector lock; install and engage connector assembly; install custom-made shoulder stock to main stock; install stock with butt-plate assembly; install firing mechanism; install A.R.T.; install magazine.
It was done. He hadn’t bothered with the noise suppressor. What did noise mean to him any more? He raised the M21 to his shoulder and squinted down the scope, cold with fear that Jacob would already have forced Anya back into the house.
They were still in view, but just. They had reached the top of the steps with Jacob thrusting Anya ahead of him through the doorway. Obviously he didn’t want to shoot her outside. His plans required that she die inside, with her clothes ripped off perhaps to give the impression of sexual assault.
And Anya was aware of this reluctance, for she was struggling still, desperate not to be pushed back into the house where she had to die.
It was tempting to take an instant snap shot at Jacob’s back, but that would accomplish nothing. With Bryant dead, he was going to kill Anya now no matter what he guessed about the situation with Davey at the car. This had to be sure shot, a shot to the head, a long kill.
There was wind to take into account, gusting hard, perhaps up to forty miles an hour. And the light was failing again as this same wind brought up the next wave of cloud over the western fells. And the distance was different here from his original stand, perhaps another two hundred yards of carry.
Carefully he made his checks and adjustments. Anya and Jacob might disappear at any moment, but that must not affect his judgement any more than the growing insistence of the destructive pain in his back.
And now he was ready. All those years of pseudo-life to be reclaimed by a single shot. Anya was out of sight in the porch now and all that was visible of Jacob was a fraction of his back. Another second and he would be out of sight.
But Jaysmith waited. In him was no more fear; just a calm assurance that all he must do was wait for the moment.
And now it came.
Anya must have turned in one last desperate effort to escape and pushed Jacob away from her. He staggered back, the gun came up in his hand, he had decided the hallway would do for his killing.
Jaysmith let out a shallow breath and squeezed the trigger.
For a moment which stopped all things like a hair-crack in time, he thought that he had once more missed.
Jacob did not stagger or twist or indicate by any violence of movement that he had been hit. On the contrary he seemed to stand quite still. Then, though it was quite impossible, it seemed to Jaysmith that he saw the back of Jacob’s head collapse slowly inwards, and now the man crumpled to the ground as straight as the demands of gravity on human physiognomy could take him.
It had been the perfect head-shot, the perfect long kill.
Slowly Anya advanced out of the porch. The clouds had not yet quite obscured the westering sun and she did not stop her advance till she was out of the shadow of the house and stood in the sun’s sallow radiance. And now she slowly raised her face to the fellside on which Jaysmith was sitting.
He looked into that dear, dear face, quartered by the cross-hairs of his scope. Jacob had told her about him. She knew he was up there, looking down at her. Her face was grave and pensive.
She’s wondering what I really am, he thought. She’s wondering how all this has come to pass, how it can possibly end. She’s on her own with Jimmy now. What will she do? Where will she go? Will she turn in on herself once more? Will she run like a wild fox for the cover of the high hills and crouch in her earth, fearful now beyond taming of the world of men?
Be strong, he urged h
er. Be curious. Stay with the police as they track me back through all those wasted years, milestoned in marble slabs, till at last they reach Harry Collins, 23, who still blushed in company; rather fancied himself as a tennis player; wrote fair Romantic poetry; enjoyed very hot curries, Hollywood musicals and historical fiction; wept with joy at his first inhalation of the sounds and the scents of the Orient; and loved a woman till her loss meant more to him than the sum total of everything else in his existence.
Find him, he urged. Find him and understand.
His strength was failing fast, draining out through the hole in his back, and the rifle was growing unbearably heavy in his hands. But still he held it steady, still he kept her fixed in his unwavering sight.
She was his last and best target. It was life and hope he was firing at her and he dared not doubt his aim.
So they remained, looking at each other across the peaceful valley, till the wind drove the curtain of cloud full across the sun and her face was shaded, and darkness drifted across his face too. The rifle slipped from his hands and fell like a challenge into the dismal amphitheatre below. A sheep grazing on the safe side of the steep fence looked up in alarm, but after a moment it decided there was nothing to fear from either the length of metal which had caused the noise or the still figure slumped on the ledge above. It began to rain. The sheep scrambled nimbly down the fellside in search of shelter.
Soon nothing stirred except the falling rain.
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About the Author
Reginald Hill, who died in 2012, was a native of Cumbria and former resident of Yorkshire, the setting for his novels featuring detectives Andy Dalziel and Peter Pascoe. Their appearances won him numerous awards including a CWA Gold Dagger, the Diamond Dagger for Lifetime Achievement and the Theakstons Old Peculier Outstanding Contribution to Crime Fiction Award. The Dalziel and Pascoe novels have also been adapted into a hugely popular BBC TV series.
By Reginald Hill
Dalziel and Pascoe novels
A CLUBBABLE WOMAN
AN ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING
RULING PASSION
AN APRIL SHROUD
A PINCH OF SNUFF
A KILLING KINDNESS
DEADHEADS
EXIT LINES
CHILD’S PLAY
UNDER WORLD
BONES AND SILENCE
RECALLED TO LIFE
PICTURES OF PERFECTION
THE WOOD BEYOND
ASKING FOR THE MOON: A DALZIEL AND PASCOE COLLECTION
ON BEULAH HEIGHT
ARMS AND THE WOMEN
DIALOGUES OF THE DEAD
DEATH’S JEST BOOK
GOOD MORNING, MIDNIGHT
THE DEATH OF DALZIEL
A CURE FOR ALL DISEASES
MIDNIGHT FUGUE
Joe Sixsmith novels
BLOOD SYMPATHY
BORN GUILTY
KILLING THE LAWYERS
SINGING THE SADNESS
THE ROAR OF THE BUTTERFLIES
Other
FELL OF DARK
THE LONG KILL
THE COLLABORATORS
DEATH OF A DORMOUSE
DREAM OF DARKNESS
THE ONLY GAME
THE STRANGER HOUSE
THE WOODCUTTER
About the Publisher
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