Knife Edge

8.31 A.M.

'They're going to kill you, Bob.'

Robert Neville turned from the window and looked at his wife.

Julie Neville brushed some strands of blonde hair from her face and shifted uncomfortably on the sofa, her eyes never leaving her husband.

He pulled the. 459 Smith and Wesson automatic from his belt and worked the slide, chambering a round.

Julie swallowed hard as she saw him advancing towards her and, for fleeting seconds, she thought he might strike her.

Neville leaned close, his face only inches from hers.

'They're going to kill me, are they?' he said quietly and, as he spoke, she could smell the whisky on his breath.

She lowered her gaze slightly.

Neville reached out with his free hand and gently stroked her cheek with his finger.

God, how smooth her skin felt. Like a marble statue.

'Do you want them to kill me?' he whispered.

She shook her head almost imperceptibly.

'Do you?' he said, more insistently.

'No,' she snapped, glaring at him. Her expression gradually softened. 'I just want you to let us go,' she finally breathed. 'If not me, then at least let Lisa go, she didn't ask to be a part of all this.'

'She's happy enough, I haven't harmed her, I'd never harm her,' Neville said. 'I'd rather die first. You and Lisa are all I've got.'

'Then why are you holding us prisoner here?' Julie asked, attempting to mask the anger in her voice. But it was anger tinged with anxiety.

And fear?

'You were the one who wanted to leave,' Neville reminded her. 'You were the one who was going to take Lisa away from me.'

'It was for her own good, Bob.'

'Bollocks. I'm her father.'

'Then why do you hurt her?'

Neville gripped Julie's jaw in one firm hand, his forehead pressed almost against hers.

'You tell me when I've ever hurt her,' he rasped. 'I've never laid a fucking finger on her.'

Julie tried to pull free of his grip, away from the smell of whisky.

'What about your drinking?' she snapped. 'Or are you too pissed now to remember it?'

He stepped back.

'Every time you were home on leave you spent all day and night drunk,' Julie continued. 'Since you left the army it's all you've done. How many bottles a day is it now, Bob?'

'What the fuck do you expect?'

She regarded him warily.

'You talk as if I'm the only one,' he said angrily.

'You're the only one I'm married to. I don't care how other soldiers cope with it. I don't care how many of them get pissed, fuck other women, get into fights. I only care about you.'

'Is that why you were going to leave me?' he said softly. 'Leave me and take Lisa with you. Don't tell me you care about me, Julie. Not when you were going to take away the only thing in this miserable, useless fucking life that I ever cared about, that I ever loved.'

He held her in that unrelenting gaze.

'Do you still love me?'

She swallowed hard. 'Yes.'

'Liar,' Neville rasped, the knot of muscles at the side of his jaw pulsing angrily.

'You've changed,' she told him. 'You're not-'

'Not the man you married?' he hissed. 'Are you surprised I'm different? After what I've seen, is it any wonder? I've risked my fucking life for this country, for the army, for people who'd spit in my fucking face one day and laugh with me the next. And I was supposed to take it. And I did, because that was what I was ordered to do. That's what we were all ordered to do. We were in Northern Ireland to keep the peace. Jesus, that's a fucking laugh. What a great job we did. How many thousands have been killed out there since 1969? And what about here? How many have died in car bombs or pub bombings? How many men, women and children?'

He sat on the sofa beside her. 'Do you know how many friends I lost out there? How many other men who were just doing their jobs? Ten, fifteen? I can't even fucking remember myself. Not all of them. But some things you never forget. Like holding a bloke's hand while you're waiting for him to die, waiting for the fucking medics to come and try and put his head back together because some fucking sniper's bullet has blown most of it apart.'

Julie could see tears in his eyes.

'There was one lad,' he continued, his voice low. 'He was about twenty-two, Tony Lane. That's one name I can remember. Our unit was called to some ruck that was going on near the Divis flats. It was his first tour, he was nervous. We pulled in four guys we'd been told were PIRA. We searched them. Tony found a box of matches on one and he opened it to see if there was any ammunition inside. They'd do that, hide a couple of rounds in there. The matchbox had a charge inside it. No bigger than my thumbnail. But there were sewing needles in there too. When it went off, Tony caught most of them in his face. The needles went through both his eyes. He survived. The doctors said he was lucky.' Neville snorted. 'Blind, but lucky. I held his head in my lap while we waited for help and all the time he was crying. Trying to cry with needles stuck in his fucking eyes and there was so much blood you couldn't see the tears. He just kept saying that he didn't want to die and he kept calling for his mum. That's the curious thing, you know, when guys get shot, when they're dying, they don't call out for their wives or their girlfriends; they call for their mums. And do you know, while I knelt there talking to him, staring at him, the only thing I could think of? Thank Christ it was him and not me.'

Neville got to his feet and began pacing the room, slowly.

'He got a commendation, I think they gave him some kind of medal. I bet that really made up for losing his sight. A medal and some poxy fucking pension if he was lucky. And all the politicians crowed about how brave we all were and the army told us what a good job we were doing, but now it's all over no fucker wants to know. They don't want to know about us now. We did our job and that job's over. Now we should all get on with our lives. As simple as that. They don't realise we've got no lives any more. I hated being in Northern Ireland but at least I was doing what I'd been trained for. They train you, shape you, indoctrinate you and then, when it's over, they expect you to switch off. Like some kind of fucking machine.'

He crossed to the window and peered out, noticing the policemen moving around outside.

'Well, not this time,' Neville hissed. 'This is one machine they're not going to switch off.'