Death on the Rive Nord

CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

The nearest man was Metz, idly swinging the length of steel he’d used on the unfortunate worker in the factory. The other man was further back, indistinct and slight. Then he moved and Rocco recognised the slim figure of Detective Tourrain.

They had deliberately let him think he was free and clear; that he’d fooled them all. Then they had come out here and waited for him to show up.

‘Well, well,’ said Metz. ‘Looks like we’ve found our intruder. Let’s see who you are, shall we?’

Rocco studied the ground the men were standing on. They were on a broad patch of flat grass by the side of the lock basin, too narrow for him to force his way past. The canal lay on the right, the level three to four metres below the edge, the rush of water muffled by the deep stone walls. To Rocco’s left was a thick hedge, then a slope with an indistinct tangle of bushes and undergrowth offering no clear way through.

If the two men came to him, where the ground was narrower, they would eventually hamper each other. Unless they opted for guns. Somehow he didn’t think they would; guns were noisy and they were too close to town, and he was sure they had orders to dispose of any intruders without trace.

He heard a metallic snick from behind Metz. Tourrain, holding a long-bladed knife. It gleamed dully, polished and deadly.

Rocco felt a coldness wash over him. So this was their plan. No attempt to argue against what he had seen, no ducking behind the certificate they had used so far to give them the protection of the Ministry of Defence. He had witnessed too much and there was only one way for this to end.

He studied Metz, the more dangerous of the two men. He was a brawler, with little finesse or style about him, and would rely on strength and brutality to carry him through, just as he had when dealing with the illegal worker. For him, doling out punishment would be a pleasure, as automatic as breathing.

Tourrain, though, was different. He was a policeman caught in a bad situation, but carrying a weapon made purely for killing. And judging by the way his body was moving and flexing excitedly in the gloom, he was desperate to use it. As a cop facing exposure and arrest, he would see only one way out of this situation: to kill the intruder and dispose of the body.

As both men moved towards him, unwittingly giving up the advantage of a flatter, wider ground, the breath hissed between Rocco’s teeth. He reached for his gun… and felt his gut go cold. It wasn’t there. He must have dropped it going over the wire or climbing in and out of the skip. He waited until Metz had moving further ahead of Tourrain, then moved forward to meet him. Metz stopped instantly, on the defensive. Tourrain did the same, although he stayed back slightly instead of drawing level with his colleague.

‘You’re under arrest, Metz,’ said Rocco. ‘And you, Tourrain. There’s no way out of this for you.’

The sound of his voice seemed to throw both men off their stride. They were probably accustomed to their victims pleading with them, he decided, or shouting abuse in desperation or anger. Not talking to them in calm, confident tones. Or, for that matter, walking towards them without the slightest display of anxiety.

‘Jesus… Rocco?’ Tourrain had finally recognised who he was facing. ‘What the fuck-?’ He cast around, looking first at Metz, then turning to check behind him as if help lay out there in the dark. ‘It was you in the factory?’ He didn’t wait for a reply but added, ‘Hey — we can sort this out, right? There’s no need for it to go any higher.’

It was a desperate gamble by a man who should have known he was finished. But Rocco sensed Tourrain hadn’t got the intelligence to realise that whatever game he had been mixed up in with Gondrand and Lambert, it was now over.

For a moment the threat of action from the two men was frozen, suspended by the expectation of a deal. For Tourrain it was a way out. For men like Metz it was the way of the world; one crooked cop meant others had their price, too. All it came down to was how much. He remained immobile, head turning to cast a look at Tourrain, while the detective stepped from foot to foot, undecided on his next move.

Tourrain was the first to break.

‘ Metz… come on…!’ Suddenly he was turning and running along the towpath, leaving the guard to fend for himself.

Metz snarled in disgust and slashed at Rocco’s head, the metal rod hissing through the air. Rocco swayed out of reach, wary of the uneven ground beneath his feet. A detached part of his brain was telling him this was not how he would have chosen to go, given a choice: being felled by a brutal sliver of cold metal in the hands of a murderous thug, followed by blackness.

He stepped forward, shutting out the thought with clinical detachment, and waited for another wild slash before executing a hard snap kick to Metz’s midriff. This was something Metz, in his brutal enthusiasm, had overlooked: Rocco had the leg reach and power. The point of impact was the leather-shod ball of Rocco’s foot against the other man’s diaphragm. It didn’t require great body weight behind it, simply speed and momentum.

The shock of impact clouded Metz’s eyes, draining his face of blood. He stood still for a moment as pain blossomed throughout his body, then slashed again, but with little effect. And Rocco waited, calmly watching the man’s system beginning to shut down.

Metz made a sound — a word, perhaps, maybe a cough — as he fought to regain his breathing. He spat to one side and appeared to stagger, then waved the steel rod in front of him. But it was a token, a show of aggression with no real power or focus.

‘Give it up,’ said Rocco.

But Metz wasn’t finished. He reached into his pocket, groaning with the effort, and dragged out a gun.

Rocco reacted instinctively. He stepped in close and smacked Metz’s gun hand away with his right palm, then half turned away and rammed his elbow backwards into the man’s chest. A split second later he struck again, this time to Metz’s nose, driving his head back under the impact, the cartilage crushed.

And suddenly Metz was gone, tottering briefly on the lip of the lock basin before tumbling into the black water with a muffled splash.

The steel rod was lying on the ground. Rocco put his toe underneath it and flicked it over the edge. He retrieved the gun and did the same thing.

But he didn’t hear the soft rush of footsteps on the grass behind him, or the grunt of someone breathing. All he knew was a sharp pain in the back of his head.

Then darkness.