Death on the Pont Noir

CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

‘Put the gun down.’ Rocco’s voice didn’t need to be loud; sound travelled well in this cold, thin air. But it carried authority.

He and Claude had burst out of the trees and run across the field in time to see the fugitive coming at an angle towards them. If he saw them or the other men waiting by the road, he made no move to change direction, but staggered on, slipping and sliding on the icy ground. He was dragging one leg badly, his breathing laboured and hoarse.

The man looked beaten and hopelessly unsteady on his feet, like a prizefighter at the end of a long, brutal bout. His shoes were clogged with mud and bits of vegetation and the cloth around his injured leg was badly torn, the flesh beneath showing bright red. His shoulders were dusted with snow and muddy, and his face was pinched and near blue with cold.

Biggs, thought Rocco. The other one had been Jarvis.

Then the runner seemed to realise where he was. He stopped, breathing heavily, and glanced back as if he thought the boar might still be after him. When he looked round, he shook his head with something approaching despair and looked at Rocco.

‘No way,’ he muttered, and coughed. ‘Too late, anyway.’ He clutched his stomach and spat on the ground. The spittle was bright red.

Claude said, ‘She hurt him.’

The end of the man’s gun barrel was wavering slightly. Rocco wasn’t sure, but he didn’t think enlisted men in the British army used pistols. Most had rifles, a few used machine guns. This one was carrying a revolver, probably army issue. He was holding the gun low, like a cowboy in a western.

Rocco stepped sideways, keeping on the move. No point in giving the man a standing target, even a lucky one. He said, ‘Put it down and lie on the ground, Mr Biggs. We will not harm you.’

The man’s face twisted in surprise on hearing his own name. He looked around wildly, instinctively seeking a way out. When he realised there was none, he said, ‘Piss off, copper.’ And pulled the trigger.

The shot zipped by Rocco’s right leg, hitting the ground three metres behind him.

‘I’ll kill you with the next one!’

Rocco moved sideways, but kept his distance. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Claude and, beyond him, a group comprising Desmoulins and Godard and his men. The man with a rifle was standing off to one side, the gun into his shoulder, waiting for a signal.

‘Last warning,’ Rocco said quietly, just enough for the man to hear. ‘You do not want to do this. The man back there will not miss.’

The second round came closer, the sound of the shot making a tearing noise as it went past his head. The gunman pulled the trigger again, but this time there was just a click. Frantically he scrabbled in his jacket pocket and produced a fistful of shells, shards of gold light flashing as some tumbled to the ground from frozen fingers. Grunting with pain and emotion, Biggs began tugging out the empties and feeding fresh ones into the cylinder. Then his face twisted in pain and he grabbed his injured thigh.

He peeled back the torn cloth. Blood was running down his leg and across his shoe, forming a puddle on the ground, bright red against the thin covering of snow.

Rocco didn’t bother asking who was behind this. He knew Biggs wasn’t going to give up. The man was operating on instincts alone, a form of bravado that would carry him until he could go no further. He’d seen it before in Indochina and elsewhere, where men on battlefields with nothing else to give simply surrendered to the last-ditch ethos drummed into them in endless exercises and training.

It was just a pity that it was being misused here.

He turned and walked towards the man. He couldn’t let this go on. He waited until the gun came up again, then planted his feet and lifted the Walther, the walnut grip warm and comfortable in his hand.

He fired once.

The shot took Biggs in the left shoulder, lifting the fabric of his jacket. He staggered and looked at Rocco in shock. But he wasn’t finished yet. He swore softly and lifted the pistol again, finger tightening on the trigger. Before Rocco could shoot again, another shot sounded, this time from the rifleman on the road, and Biggs was hit in the chest, flipping him onto his back.

In the silence that followed, a whistle came from the road, carrying eerily across the cold field. Rocco looked round. Desmoulins was making the sign of a telephone call and pointing at Godard’s blue van.

Rocco picked up the dead man’s revolver and walked towards the road, his shoes heavy with mud, and wondered if he was going to have to buy new ones. This job was getting far too heavy on clothing.

‘Sorry, Inspector,’ said the driver of the van, as if he’d interrupted something. He was half inside the vehicle. ‘A black DS driven by an Englishman named Calloway has been stopped coming out of Poissons.’

‘Anyone else inside?’ But Rocco already knew the answer to that one.

‘No. Calloway said the man named Tasker is in the village.’ He frowned and added, ‘He said Tasker has gone crazy and is going to kill you.’