The Lost Testament

97

‘It’s a pretty road this,’ Angela said, as Bronson began easing to the left to overtake the white van that they’d been following. ‘It’s just a shame there’s so much traffic on it.’

Bronson nodded and glanced in his mirror. Almost immediately, he depressed the brake pedal to slow down the car and moved back into the right-hand lane.

‘What’s wrong?’ Angela asked.

‘Nothing,’ Bronson replied. ‘But there’s a Porsche 911 on Barcelona plates coming up fast from behind us, and I’d rather he was in front. The English community in Catalonia call the locals “Barceloonies”, I gather, because of the way most of them drive.’

Then everything happened very quickly.

There was a loud bang from the white van Bronson had been planning on overtaking, and the entire rear of the vehicle lurched over to the left as the back tyre blew. There was a squeal of brakes from behind them as the driver of the Porsche 911 saw the unexpected shape of the van suddenly starting to fill the lane he was driving along. Bronson reacted instantly, steering the Renault over to the right, towards the hard shoulder and out of any danger.

The van driver hit his brakes as well, and steered the vehicle back into the right-hand lane and then over onto the hard shoulder. The driver of the Porsche gave a short blast on his horn, and, as Bronson waved, he accelerated past the disabled van. Then Bronson pulled out again, the car quickly picking up speed.

On the hill on the opposite side of the autovia, Miguel cursed and worked the bolt of the Remington to chamber another round. The unexpected action of the Renault driver in pulling back in after he’d started to overtake had meant he’d hit the tyre on the wrong vehicle.

But that shouldn’t matter. There was another straight stretch of road in front of the Renault, and now that the Porsche had almost vanished from sight, there were no other vehicles around to spoil his next shot.

Again, he tracked the front of the car through his telescopic sight, waiting for the vehicle’s speed to build up enough to make the ‘accident’ he had planned look like a viable outcome.

‘Oh, shit,’ Bronson muttered, as he accelerated past the white van, which had now come to a stop on the hard shoulder. The left-hand door had opened and the driver was climbing out to inspect the damage, damage that was also obvious to Bronson. The bullet hole through the rear wheel arch was impossible to miss, and he knew that the jagged hole hadn’t been there just seconds before.

‘What?’

‘We’ve got problems. That wasn’t just a blow-out on that tyre. There’s a sniper somewhere on that hill over to our left, and I’m guessing we’re his target. Now he’s got a clear shot at us and there’s nowhere we can go.’

Angela stared at him.

‘Dear God,’ she murmured. ‘What are we going to do?’

‘Hold on and hope for the best,’ Bronson snapped.

Bronson hit the brakes hard, dropping the speed of the car dramatically, then floored the accelerator pedal again.

‘What are you doing?’ Angela asked, her voice high with tension.

‘If I keep going at a steady speed, that’ll make us an easy target. If I’m erratic, he won’t know how much lead to allow.’

He braked again, and at the moment he did so there was a crack from directly in front of the car, and a small spray of disturbed tarmac rose into the air as a bullet impacted with the road surface a short distance over to their right.

Immediately Bronson accelerated hard.

‘That was another bullet,’ he said.

He braked again, and swerved from side to side, swinging the car into the centre lane before diving back over towards the hard shoulder and accelerating.

In his concealed perch on the hillside to the west of the autovia, Miguel cursed again as he watched the Renault saloon dance and jiggle around through the magnified optics of his telescopic sight. Obviously the driver had realized what was going on, and was doing his best to make the car as difficult a target as possible. And he was, the Spaniard had to concede, making a pretty good job of it.

One of the most difficult shots for any sniper is a fast moving target crossing at right angles to the line of fire, and the degree of difficulty is enormously magnified if that target isn’t moving at a steady speed.

Miguel picked his moment and fired again, but even as he squeezed the trigger he knew the bullet would miss, because again the car braked unexpectedly. He worked the bolt again, chambering the last cartridge from the four-round magazine, and adjusted his aim once more.

As the weaving Renault loomed in his telescopic sight again, Miguel came to a decision. His chances of hitting one of the tyres while the driver was actively trying to avoid proceeding at anything approaching a steady speed were almost nil. It was time to forget about the ‘accident’ scenario and simply take out the two occupants of the car. His people would just have to sort out the resulting mess as best they could.

He shifted his aim, lifting the barrel of the rifle slightly so that the graticule of his telescopic sight was pointing directly at the middle of the driver’s side window, and at the shadowy figure behind the glass. Miguel allowed what he thought was the right lead, and squeezed the trigger.

And that shot, he knew, was a good one.