‘His soul, Detective,’ she said, checking her watch. ‘Faustian or what?’
‘Faustian?’ asked Edmunds, trying to remember where else he had heard the term used.
‘As in the stories: Robert Johnson goes down to a dusty crossroads with nothing but the clothes on his back and a battered old guitar …’
Edmunds nodded, now understanding the reference. He knew his mind was playing tricks on him, but several of the faded crosses now looked darker than when he had entered.
‘Would it be possible to see William Fawkes’ old room while I’m here?’ he asked casually, already heading for the door in his haste to leave.
The doctor was clearly surprised by the request: ‘I don’t see how—’
‘It will only take a minute,’ Edmunds insisted.
‘Very well,’ she huffed irately, before leading him along the corridor and opening the door to another whitewashed room. Clothing and personal possessions were littered over the basic furniture. ‘As I said, we’re at capacity.’
Edmunds paced across the room, his eyes scanning the featureless floor, before lying on his front to peer under the metal bed. He then walked over to the bare wall and began systematically running his hands over the fresh white paint.
The doctor looked uneasy: ‘May I ask what you’re looking for?’
‘The things you can’t just scrub away,’ mumbled Edmunds. He climbed up onto the bed to inspect the back wall.
‘We conduct an extensive damage report whenever a room is vacated. If anything had been left behind, we would have known.’
Edmunds dragged the bed noisily across the floor and crouched down to search the blank space behind for some invisible trace of Wolf. His fingers paused over a series of indents that had been obscured by the bed frame.
‘Pen?’ he called, refusing to look away for fear of losing them.
The doctor hurried over and handed him the stubby pencil from her shirt pocket. Edmunds snatched it off her and started scribbling frantically over the area.
‘Excuse me Detective!’
Dark shapes slowly appeared from nowhere: letters, words. Finally, he dropped the pencil, sat down on the edge of the bed and took out his phone.
‘What is it?’ asked the concerned woman.
‘You’re going to need to find somewhere else for this patient to go.’
‘As I already explained—’
Edmunds spoke over her:
‘I’ll then need you to lock this door behind you and ensure that it isn’t opened for anyone, or anything, until the forensic team arrive. Is that clear?’
Wolf and Ashley were into the final mile of their four-hundred-mile journey. They had only stopped once since swapping the Ford Escort for the inconspicuous van that Wolf had left there overnight. It had been a noisy and uncomfortable way to ascend the country, but for just three hundred pounds it had gotten them to where they needed to be with twenty minutes to spare. They pulled up in a ‘drop-off only’ bay outside the terminal and rushed in through the main entrance to Glasgow Airport.
The radio had prattled incessantly in the background for seven hours straight. There had been a lot of discussion about Ashley’s imminent murder, and a high street betting shop had been forced to apologise after it had been revealed that they were distastefully taking bets on which hour her heart would stop.
‘Bastards,’ Ashley had laughed, surprising Wolf again with her plucky attitude.
The same sound bite had been played repeatedly and Wolf winced every time he was forced to relive the moment that Andrew Ford made contact with the earth below. An exclusive interview with one of Ashley’s ‘closest friends’ had come as a surprise to her, mainly because she had no idea who the woman being interviewed was. Wolf was glad to hear the news programmes struggling to fill airtime. It meant that the police had not yet publicised the fact that he had absconded with their next victim.
Gambling that his colleagues had not yet put out an All Ports Warning on them, he had spoken to the airport’s head of security just ten minutes earlier and, as requested, the man was awaiting their arrival when they entered the terminal at 8.20 p.m.
He was a handsome black man in his mid-forties and was wearing a flattering suit with a security badge swinging from the pocket like a carefully chosen accessory. Wolf noted that he had sensibly posted two armed police officers close by following the unusual phone call.
‘Ah, Detective Fawkes, it actually is you. I wasn’t sure,’ said the man, shaking Wolf’s hand firmly. ‘Karlus DeCosta, head of security.’
DeCosta turned to Ashley and held out his hand.
‘And Ms Lochlan, of course.’ He pulled a face intended to convey sympathy for her current predicament. ‘How may I be of service to you both?’
‘There’s a plane leaving for Dubai in seventeen minutes,’ said Wolf bluntly. ‘I need her to be on it.’
If DeCosta was surprised by the request, he did not show it.
‘You have a passport?’ he asked Ashley.
She took it out of her bag and handed it to him. Professionally, he carefully inspected it despite the time constraints.
‘Come with me,’ he said.
They passed through security and commandeered one of the electric shuttle carts to expedite their journey to the gate. A robotic female voice announced the final call for the flight over the public address system.
DeCosta, who was apparently accustomed to such harried requests, swung suddenly to the right and drove the cart down an empty travelator. This struck Wolf as unnecessary because he had already radioed the gate and instructed them not to close it until he got there. He appeared to be enjoying himself though.
‘There’s a plane leaving for Melbourne two hours after you land in Dubai,’ Wolf told Ashley quietly.
‘Melbourne?’ she asked in shock. ‘That’s your plan? Go on holiday? No. I can’t. What about Jordan? And my mum? You wouldn’t let me phone them and they’ll be hearing all this stuff on the news and …’
‘You’ve got to keep moving.’
Ashley looked distraught, but after a moment she nodded:
‘Shouldn’t we tell Karlus?’ she asked, gesturing to their escort, who was now leaning out of the vehicle like an action hero as they trundled along the carpeted floor.
‘No. I’ll make the call myself just before you land. I don’t want anyone but us knowing where you’re going,’ said Wolf. ‘By the time you step off the plane in Melbourne it’ll be 5.25 a.m. Sunday morning. You’ll be safe.’
‘Thank you.’
‘When you get there, head straight to the Consulate-General and tell them who you are.’ Wolf took her delicate hand in his and scrawled a mobile phone number across the back of it. ‘Just let me know you made it.’
They arrived at the gate a few minutes before take-off. DeCosta went to speak to the staff while Wolf and Ashley climbed off the back of the cart and looked at one another.
‘Come with me,’ she said.
Wolf shook his head: ‘I can’t.’
Ashley had anticipated the answer. She took a step closer, pushing herself up against him, and closed her eyes.