Forty
Hollis led the way, Hartwell behind him, Abel bringing up the rear. Stony Hill Wood was less forbidding at night than it had been during daylight hours when he’d cut through it with Mary. This was partly because he couldn’t see anything—barely the overgrown trail at his feet, even with the aid of Hartwell’s flashlight—but mainly because Abel was clearly far more frightened than himself.
‘Maybe he’s just a guy with a sick sense of humor.’
‘Who?’ asked Hollis.
‘Labarde,’ said Abel. ‘He’s probably sitting at home with his feet up having a good old laugh.’
Hartwell snorted, amused by the notion.
‘Hey, slow down,’ said Abel. ‘Wait for me.’
‘Are you scared?’ asked Hartwell.
‘Damn right I am. I’ve been in enough woods at night to know there’s better places for a man to be.’
Now Hollis felt bad. He had seen Abel’s photos of Hürtgen Forest and it hadn’t even occurred to him.
‘We’re almost there.’
‘You said that half a mile back.’
Hollis stopped. Ahead of him, the ground dipped steeply away. He trained the flashlight on the paper, his scrawled instructions from Labarde.
‘Correction,’ he said. ‘We are there.’
They skirted the rim of the depression. It looked like some kind of quarry scooped out of the hillside, long since abandoned and reclaimed by nature. The sides were thick with vegetation, impossible to descend through to the area of clear ground at its heart. The only way to enter was via a dirt track that approached through the trees from the south.
On spotting the track, Abel wondered aloud why they’d just spent twenty minutes pushing their way through the undergrowth from the north. He got his answer a few moments later with the sound of a vehicle. It was moving along in a low gear, the sweep of its headlights plucking the forest out of the night.
‘Over here,’ said Hollis, leading them to a thick screen of bushes. ‘Stay low.’
‘What are we going to do?’ hissed Abel.
‘You’re not going to do anything. That was the deal, remember?’
‘Okay, what are you going to do?’
‘He didn’t say.’
Labarde had been very specific in every other regard: about where exactly to park the car, where to walk and when to arrive. His timing was a little off, though. According to Hollis’ watch they still had fifteen minutes in hand before anyone showed up.
Hollis recognized the car the moment it crept into the quarry. He’d taken a shaving of paintwork off its rear fender earlier in the week.
It wasn’t possible to make out the faces of the two people inside, but he figured one to be Manfred Wallace. Wondering if he had brought a goon along with him, Hollis found himself unholstering his gun.
The car pulled to a halt, its engine idling, and Hollis shifted his position to get a better view through the undergrowth. Manfred Wallace was the first person to get out of the car. He was followed closely by Richard Wakeley.
The two men huddled together in discussion, then Wakeley got back behind the wheel and turned the car round so that it faced towards the mouth of the quarry.
Hollis, Abel and Hartwell screwed their faces into the dirt, the light raking their hiding place, pinning them down. And that’s how they remained, anticipating their discovery at any moment, until Labarde arrived.
Only one of the headlights on his truck was working, but it was enough to illuminate the two men waiting for him, to get them squinting.
Hollis crawled to his left, edging closer. He needed to hear what was said.
Labarde took a few steps into the no-man’s land between the vehicles. He had a large buff envelope in his hand.
‘How do we know you’re alone?’ demanded Wakeley.
‘I could ask you the same thing.’
‘Are you armed?’
‘Are you?’
‘No.’
‘And him?’
‘No,’ said Manfred Wallace.
‘Me neither,’ said Labarde as if that settled it. ‘Where’s the money?’
It was some kind of exchange, but what exactly? What was in the envelope?
‘We need to know you’re not armed,’ said Wakeley.
‘The man you sent to kill me made me strip, just to be sure. It didn’t help him, so why don’t we just drop it?’
‘What man?’ asked Wakeley.
Hollis asked himself the same question, his head reeling. Was he really so far behind the field?
‘Think straight,’ said Labarde. ‘If I wanted you dead, you’d be dead by now. I just want my money. Where is it?’
Wakeley removed an attaché case from the rear seat of the car. He handed it to Manfred, who didn’t look too pleased at the prospect of having to draw any closer to Labarde.
‘Open it first.’
Manfred opened the case. From where he was lying on his belly, Hollis couldn’t make out the contents, but Labarde seemed satisfied.
The two men met each other halfway, eyes almost at a level, one dressed in torn twill pants and a cotton shirt, the other in a tuxedo.
‘Don’t be bitter,’ said Labarde. ‘I earned it.’
‘Oh really? How do you figure that?’
‘Manfred…’ It was Wakeley again, a note of caution in his voice.
‘You don’t want to be here,’ said Labarde, ‘but you are. You don’t want me to have it, but I’m going to walk away a rich man.’ He paused. ‘I must have done something right.’
Manfred Wallace’s face twisted into a rictus of pure hatred. ‘Here.’ He thrust the case at Labarde.
‘You mind if I count it?’
‘It’s all there.’
‘You’ll understand if I don’t trust the word of a murderer.’
He placed the case on the ground and began to count the bundles of bills.
Hollis turned to look at Hartwell beside him and only saw then that Abel was gone. He gesticulated. Hartwell shrugged. Shit, thought Hollis. Shit.
‘This is ridiculous,’ said Manfred. ‘Give me the envelope.’
‘Just wait, Manfred.’
‘Tell me something,’ said Labarde. ‘What’s it like to kill your own sister?’
‘Don’t answer that,’ said Wakeley.
‘She loved you, you know that, don’t you?’
‘Just do what you have to do, and we can all go,’ said Wakeley.
‘What the hell.’ Labarde snapped the case shut and got to his feet. ‘If it’s short, I’ll drop by some time for the rest.’
He handed over the envelope. Manfred ripped it open, feeling inside, then peering inside.
‘There’s nothing in here.’ He turned to Wakeley. ‘It’s empty.’
Wakeley stepped forward and examined the envelope. ‘Where’s the document?’
‘What document?’ said Labarde.
‘The one you went to the lawyer about.’
‘The one we talked about on the phone,’ said Wakeley.
Labarde tossed the attaché case to Manfred. ‘There never was one,’ he said.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Just that—it never existed.’
‘I don’t—’ sputtered Manfred.
‘It’s simple. I just thought we should meet. Face to face. That way there’ll be no misunderstanding.’
He took a couple of steps towards Manfred.
‘I want you to know that I’m not going away, not ever, that I’ll dog you for the rest of your life. You better keep one eye over your shoulder, ‘cos that’s where I’ll be. What I do and when I do it, who knows? But I’ll tell you this—it won’t be quick and it won’t be painless.’
‘Come away,’ said Wakeley, taking Manfred by the arm.
Manfred pulled free.
‘Who the hell do you think you are?’ he spat.
‘Get one thing straight, I don’t care what you think of me. You’re not in charge here.’
That’s when Manfred pulled out the handgun. And that’s when Hollis began to understand.
‘Manfred, put that away.’
‘You heard him, put it away.’
Labarde was clearly provoking him; taunting a man just wasn’t his style. Hollis was aware of Hartwell unholstering his gun, about to break cover, and he held him back.
‘No,’ he whispered, his mind racing, the pieces falling into place.
Manfred Wallace had to pull the trigger. That was the point. If he didn’t, nothing had been gained. They hadn’t heard anything that a good defense attorney—and the Wallaces would hire the very best—couldn’t tear apart in a court of law, twisting their testimony into any number of shapes.
Manfred Wallace had to pull the trigger and Labarde had understood it from the very beginning. He had figured that no amount of circumstantial evidence would lead to the downfall of Manfred Wallace, but if he could only get him to commit another crime, another murder…
‘Manfred—’ Wakeley took a step towards Manfred and found himself staring into the barrel of the gun.
‘I can end this now. It’s over. Gone.’
‘You don’t have it in you,’ grinned Labarde.
Manfred spun back, on the point of firing.
‘Tom,’ hissed Hartwell.
‘No.’
They had all been summoned here for a reason, steered and cajoled towards this stage, this amphitheater in the woods, each with his role to play: Labarde to lay down a life he no longer valued; Manfred Wallace to bring about his own ruin; Hollis to bear witness to the killing, no more.
‘Manfred—’ said Wakeley again. And that’s when Manfred fired.
Labarde was jerked to the right by the impact of the bullet. Manfred fired a second time, and the moment he did so, the scene was lit by a blinding white light, the tableau frozen for a split second: Wakeley recoiling, the muzzle flash from the handgun, Labarde seemingly suspended in time and space, but in reality buckling towards the ground.
Manfred Wallace was turning to the source of the flash of light when Hollis and Hartwell burst from the bushes.
‘Police,’ yelled Hollis. ‘Drop the gun. I said, drop the gun!’
It was the shock more than anything that forced the gun from Manfred Wallace’s fingers.
‘On the ground. Now. Both of you!’
As he recovered the weapon, Hollis glanced over at Labarde. He lay face down in the dirt, inert, an arm twisted behind his back.
In a fit of fury, Hollis found himself kicking Manfred Wallace in the side of the chest.
‘Spread your arms and legs.’
‘I—’
‘Shut up!’ snapped Hollis, kicking him again.
The moment was trapped for posterity by Abel as he emerged from his hiding place.