The Alchemist

46

Sixteen minutes later, police tactical response units were massing outside the Hotel Royal. Breaking up into groups, black-clad paramilitary officers heavily armed with submachine guns, short-barrelled shotguns and tear gas grenade launchers surrounded the building. The bewildered guests and staff were herded out and made to assemble at a safe distance in the grounds. Word spread, and soon everyone knew about the dangerous armed criminal the police were looking for. Was he a terrorist? A psychopath? Everyone had their own version of the story.

The man’s trail was soon found at the back of the hotel. Behind the staff car-park was an unmown field of grass leading off in the direction of neighbouring farms. A sharp-eyed police officer found the track where the long grass had been bent over. Someone had recently run through it. The police German Shepherd dogs picked up the scent immediately. Barking furiously and straining on their leashes they led their handlers across the field as armed officers followed close behind. The trail cut across the field and into a clump of woodland. The fugitive couldn’t have got far.

But the trail led nowhere. It stopped at the edge of the woods. The officers looked up the trees but there was no sign of him. It was as though he’d vanished into thin air.

It took a few minutes for the pursuers to realize that their quarry had tricked them. He’d doubled back on himself to leave a false trail.

Muzzles to the ground, the German Shepherds led them back to the hotel. The scent led them round the back, through an entrance into the kitchens. The officers drew their pistols. More joined them with shotguns.

Suddenly the dogs stopped, disorientated, sneezing, pawing at their noses. Someone had spilled a catering-sized container of ground pepper all over the floor.

On the signal, the helmeted, black-clad tactical squad swept through every room of the hotel. Exchanging hand signals, covering one another with their weapons, they moved slickly from corridor to stairway and took one floor at a time, one room at a time, checking every possible corner for the fugitive.

They found a man in the honeymoon suite, but not the one they’d expected to find. He was a fifty-two-year-old Frenchman in his underwear, fastened with his own cuffs to one of the bedposts. His face was red and eyes bulged as the police shooters burst in and pointed their guns at him. Someone had stuffed a hotel hand-towel in his mouth. His name was Sergeant Emile Dupont.

The tactical police uniform was a little baggy for Ben, and the trousers were a couple of inches too short. But nobody noticed as he strode confidently out of the hotel, shouting stern orders at some junior officers. Nobody noticed the non-issue green military bag he was carrying.

And nobody noticed when he made his way through the crowds of chattering guests, slipped into one of the police cars parked out front and quietly drove away.

The witness had said the black Porsche had turned left. He’d been hesitant. Ben took a right. Once clear of the hotel he nailed the throttle, glancing in the rear-view mirror to check he’d got away clean. Messages were coming over his radio. He couldn’t stay with this car for long.

She’d only come downstairs to look at the little clothes boutique off the hotel lobby. Ben had been fast asleep over a bunch of notes and papers in the ante-room. She hadn’t wanted to disturb him. She’d be back in five minutes anyway, with something clean and fresh to wear at last.

The boutique didn’t open until 8.45. She gazed in the window, decided on a jumper she liked the look of, and a pair of black jeans. A few minutes to kill, and the morning air was cool and fresh. She took a walk out front, admiring some of the plants, still trying not to think about yesterday.

She hadn’t noticed the man come up behind her. His approach was silent and fast. Next thing, a black-gloved hand was over her mouth and a prickly cold knife point was pressing against her throat. ‘Start walking, bitch,’ said a hoarse whispering voice in her ear. The accent was thickly foreign.

Across the car-park, half hidden behind a broad ornamental shrub, sat a black Porsche with the doors open. The man was big and powerful. She couldn’t struggle free from his grip on her arm, or scream out with that strong hand clamped over her face. He bundled her into the car and punched her in the face, hard. She tasted blood before she passed out.

There was no telling how far they’d come down the road before she came to her senses. Her mind cleared quickly as the adrenaline pumped through her. Beside her in the cramped cockpit of the sports car, her kidnapper’s face looked like granite. He held the blade against her stomach, driving with one hand. The Porsche was racing down the country road with 150 on the clock, open countryside and the occasional tree flashing by.

It would be madness to do anything. Kill us both. Or else he’ll put the knife in me.

But she did it anyway.

The car was coming into a series of tight S bends, slowing down to 85. For an instant he was distracted. She punched out with all her strength and caught him on the ear. The knife clattered to the floor. He roared. The Porsche swerved. Roberta sprang up in her seat and grabbed the wheel, wrenching it towards her. The car veered crazily to the right, skidded onto the rocky bank and smashed into a tree sideways. Roberta was cannoned against the passenger door, and the force of the impact threw her kidnapper on top of her. His heavy body knocked the wind out of her momentarily.

The Porsche sat still in a haze of dust. Inside, he was pressing hard down on top of her. He picked the knife up and pressed the blade against her neck. He could imagine how, with just a little more pressure, the razor edge of the carefully whetted steel would break through the layers of skin and begin its slow, deliberate journey inwards through the flesh, deeper and deeper as the blood began to spill out. It would come slowly at first. Then in pulsing jets as he held her down and felt her body wriggling against his grip.

But through the red haze of his lust he remembered his phone call to the archbishop the night before. ‘The Englishman has got the manuscript,’ he’d told Usberti, without giving away how he’d let it slip through his fingers.

‘I want them kept alive, Franco’, Usberti’s voice had ordered him. ‘If you cannot retrieve the manuscript, we will have to think of a way to force Hope to give it to us.’

Bozza loved his work for Gladius Domini, but politics and intrigue held no interest for him. He looked angrily down at Roberta Ryder’s struggling form, pinning her to the car seat as she squirmed and spat in his face. It was frustrating to be denied the pleasure of killing her. He put down his knife, punched her again and drove on.

The stolen police car threw up clouds of dust as Ben pushed it hard down the empty roads. He was beginning to wonder if he should have gone the other way when he came to the S-bends and saw the fresh black skidmarks leading off to the right, up the rocky bank. At the top of the bank, an old tree had been damaged, bark ripped away from the trunk and a branch left dangling like a broken arm.

He stopped the car and crouched by the side of the road. On the ground and embedded in the torn bark of the damaged tree, he found flakes of black paint.

Something dark and glistening on the roadside caught his eye. He dabbed it with his finger. A blob of motor-oil, still warm to the touch. Judging by their width the skidmarks were made by fat, grippy sports tyres. A black performance car, going somewhere in a hurry. It had to be the Porsche.

He found more oil a little way further down the road, regular spots and dribbles leading away in the direction he was going. The driver must have hit a rock and damaged the sump. Why had the car crashed? How badly damaged was it? There might be a chance of finding it broken down further along the road, if it continued losing a lot of oil. But even though the police car was fast and powerful, it was highly conspicuous and he was a sitting duck in it.

He followed the oil trail for a few more kilometres, keeping an ear open for the crackling messages on the police radio. As he’d expected, it wasn’t long before they noticed that the car was missing and were sending more out to find it. He was going to have to switch vehicles, and lose his chance of catching up with the damaged Porsche.

On the edge of a sleepy rural hamlet was a small garage with a single petrol pump and a sign that flapped creaking in the breeze. Just beyond it was a rutted mud track leading off to the side. He swung the car over into it, sighing with frustration. He followed the track for about half a kilometre before it ended in a rock-strewn field of yellowed brush and thorn-bushes. He took off the police uniform and changed back into his own clothes, wiped down everything he’d touched inside the car, then tossed the keys down a ditch and started running back up towards the garage.

The mechanic looked up as the tall blond man walked through the opening in the metal shutter and into the workshop. He rubbed his bristled chin with coarse, blackened fingers, came away from the battered van he was fixing and lit a smoke. Yes, he’d seen a black Porsche come by. It had been a bit less than an hour ago. Nice car, shame about the damage. Seemed like it’d been in a crash, rear wheel-arch all dented in. Something rubbing on the wheel, sounded like.

‘Yeah, Italian plates? Crazy bastard smacked into me,’ Ben said. ‘Ran me off the road some way back. I’ve had to walk miles.’

‘Need a tow?’ The mechanic jerked his chin in the direction of the rusty tow-truck sitting on the forecourt.

Ben shook his head. ‘I’ve got a special deal through my insurance. I’ll give them a call. Thanks anyway.’ As they talked, he cast his eye around the place. There was a little showroom attached to the garage, selling mostly used small cars and pick-ups. His eye lit on something. ‘Tell you what, though. Is that for sale?’

He hadn’t been on a motorcycle for over ten years. The last one he’d ridden was an ancient military despatch bike that vibrated like a pneumatic drill and leaked oil and petrol. The sleek Triumph Daytona 900 triple he was riding now was a different order of machine, brutally powerful and faster than most things on four wheels. He followed the road, keeping a sharp watch for more oil spots. If he was lucky, those small round splashes would be the trail of breadcrumbs that could lead him all the way to wherever the Porsche had gone.

A few kilometres up the road, his heart sank as the oil trail suddenly petered out. He rode on a mile or so, peering down carefully as he backed off the throttle and the Triumph rumbled along at walking-pace. Nothing. He cursed. Either the leak had magically repaired itself, or else the driver had been trailered away somewhere. Roadside service, with a kidnap victim sitting in the car? It seemed unlikely. He must have called a local contact to come and tow him away. And now he was gone.

Ben stopped the bike and sat staring up the empty road.

He’d lost her.