Whiteout(72)

"Frank—" She stopped. He had broken the connection. "Frank, you're a dumb bastard," she said into the dead phone, then she hung up.

Had he always been this bad? It seemed to her that when they were living together he was more reasonable. Perhaps she had been a good influence on him. He had certainly been willing to learn from her. She recalled the case of Dick Buchan, a multiple rapist who had refused to tell Frank where the bodies were despite hours of intimidation, shouting, and threats of violence. Toni talked quietly to him about his mother and broke him in twenty minutes. After that, Frank had asked her advice about every major interrogation. But since they split up, he seemed to have regressed.

She frowned at her phone, racking her brains. How was she going to put a bomb under Frank? She had something over him—the Farmer Johnny Kirk story. If the worse came to the worst, she could use that to blackmail him. But first there was one more call she could try. She scrolled through the memory of her mobile and found the home number of Odette Cressy, her friend at Scotland Yard.

The phone was answered after a long wait. "This is Toni," she said. "I'm sorry to wake you."

Odette spoke to someone else. "Sorry, sweetheart, it's work."

Toni was surprised. "I didn't expect you to be with someone."

"It's just Santa Claus. What's new?"

Toni told her.

Odette said, "Jesus Christ, this is what we were afraid of."

"I can't believe I let it happen."

"Is there anything that might give us a hint about when and how they plan to use it?"

"Two things," Toni said. "One: they didn't just steal the stuff—they poured it into a perfume sprayer. It's ready to use. The virus can be released in any crowded place—at a cinema, on a plane, in Harrods. No one would know it was happening."

"A perfume spray?"

"Diablerie."

"Well done—at least we know what we're looking for. What else?"

"A guard heard them talk about meeting the client at ten."

"At ten. They're working fast."

"Exactly. If they deliver the stuff to their customer by ten o'clock this morning, it could be in London tonight. They could release it in the Albert Hall tomorrow."

"Good work, Toni. My God, I wish you'd never left the police."

Toni began to feel more cheerful. "Thanks."

"Anything else?"

"They turned north when they left here—I saw their van. But there's a blizzard, and the roads are becoming impassable. So they probably aren't far from where I'm standing."

"That means we have a chance of catching them before they deliver the goods."

"Yes—but I haven't been able to persuade the local police of the urgency."

"Leave that to me. Terrorism comes under the Cabinet Office. Your hometown boys are about to get a phone call from Number Ten Downing Street. What do you need—helicopters? HMS Gannet is an hour away from you."

"Put them on standby. I don't think helicopters can fly in this blizzard and, if they could, the crew wouldn't be able to see what's on the ground. What I need is a snowplow. They should clear the road from Inverburn to here, and the police should make this their base. Then they can start looking for the fugitives."

"I'll make sure it happens. Keep calling me, okay?"

"Thanks, Odette." Toni hung up.

She turned around. Carl Osborne stood immediately behind her, making notes.





2:30 AM

ELTON drove the Vauxhall Astra station wagon slowly, plowing through more than a foot of soft, fresh snow. Nigel sat beside him, clutching the burgundy leather briefcase with its deadly contents. Kit was in the back with Daisy. He kept glancing over Nigel's shoulder at the briefcase, imagining a car crash in which the briefcase was crushed and the bottle smashed, and the liquid was sprayed into the air like poisoned champagne ro kill them all.

He was maddened with impatience as their speed dropped to bicycle pace. He wanted to get to the airfield as fast as possible and put the briefcase in a safe place. Every minute they spent on the open road was dangerous.

But he was not sure they would get there. After leaving the car park of the Dew Drop Inn, they had not seen another moving vehicle. Every mile or so, they passed an abandoned car or truck, some at the side of the road and some right in the middle. One was a police Range Rover on its side.

Suddenly a man stepped into the headlights, waving frantically. He wore a business suit and tie, and had no coat or hat. Elton glanced at Nigel, who murmured, "Don't even dream of stopping." Elton drove straight at the man, who dived out of the way at the last moment. As they swcpt by, Kit glimpsed a woman in a cocktail dress, hugging a thin shawl around her shoulders, standing beside a big Bentley, looking desperate.

They passed the turning for Steepfall, and Kit wished he were a boy again, lying in bed at his father's house, knowing nothing about viruses or computers or the odds at blackjack.

The snow became so heavy that little was visible through the windshieid but whiteness. Elton was almost blind, steering by guesswork, optimism, and glances out of the side windows. Their speed dropped to the pace of a run, then a brisk walk. Kit longed for a more suitable car. In his father's Toyota Land Cruiser Amazon, parked only a tantalizing couple of miles from where they were right now, they would have had a better chance.