Jason McLoud for taking the time to meet with him and asked if he could use the toilet before he left.
‘This whole thing is doing my head in,’ James moaned.
‘At least we’ve got each other,’ Dana said, as she stroked James’ hand.
35. MOUSE
By the time Ewart left Jason McLoud’s house, the morning rush was over and the roads were quiet. Following the Lexus through suburban turnings was tricky: Dana had to keep Ewart’s car in view, but couldn’t get close in case he suspected that he was being followed.
‘Should have brought a tracking device ourselves,’ James observed.
Dana shook her head. ‘They work through the control room on campus, so it would have blown our cover.’
James wondered if their disappearance from campus had been noticed yet, as Ewart pulled on to a stretch of dual carriageway and squeezed the gas, accelerating past eighty miles an hour. The road was ideal for following, with enough traffic to be inconspicuous but not so much that you risked getting boxed in. Even so, a single car pursuit is never easy and there were a few hairy moments when they thought they’d lost the Lexus.
After a forty-minute cruise, they took a horn blast from a white van as they swerved into the nearside lane and followed Ewart on to a slip road. Even worse, the road ended at a set of lights, giving Dana no option but to pull up directly behind Ewart. The Golf’s side windows had a slight tint, but the front screen was clear glass. James and Dana spent a full minute staring into their laps, hoping Ewart didn’t look back in his mirror and recognise them. It felt like much longer.
They lucked out, but Dana and James knew it was only a matter of time before Ewart rumbled them. She stayed as far back as she could, while they wound down a country lane with frosty grass and cows with steamy breath on either side of them.
As they approached a small market town, Ewart took a sharp left turn. Dana was being tailgated by a truck and realised that she’d get crunched if she broke sharply and attempted the turn.
‘You’ve lost him,’ James complained.
‘I couldn’t brake with that thing up my arse,’ Dana said, as James looked over his shoulder and saw what she meant.
Dana indicated left and turned into the gravel parking lot of a country pub. She swung around in a full circle and edged the nose of the car out past a hedge, attempting to turn back and catch up with Ewart.
‘Get a move on,’ Dana moaned, as traffic streamed by in both directions.
Half a minute drained away before she jabbed the accelerator, causing an oncoming car to brake sharply as she threw the steering wheel around to avoid a metal gate on the opposite side of the road.
Dana turned off the main road into a curving street more than two minutes after Ewart had done so. There was a riverbank off to one side, with willow trees overhanging the water and a sign advertising boat trips – service resumes summer 2007. The opposite side had a row of mock-Tudor tourist traps selling antiques, cream teas and Union Jack souvenirs.
‘Can’t stand places like this,’ James said, as he scanned the coachloads of pensioners dawdling along the narrow pavements, hoping to spot Ewart. ‘Do you reckon he got out around here?’
Dana glanced at the map on the sat-nav screen. ‘Well it’s not on the way to anywhere else, so I guess we’d better park up somewhere and take a look.’
‘I just hope we see him before he sees us,’ James said warily. Then he spotted the nose of a large silver Audi, poking out of a narrow lane fifty metres ahead of them. ‘Hello, old friend,’ he grinned.
‘Result,’ Dana nodded. ‘We might not know where Ewart is, but they sure do.’
The traffic was light, so Dana flashed her headlamps and let the big Audi pull out ahead of them. Dana followed it through a couple of tight turns and quickly realised that the driver was following the blue parking arrows. They ended up in a tarmac space the size of a couple of football pitches. There were barriers and ticket booths, but there were less than two dozen cars in the whole space. The gates were locked open and bright yellow signs told them that winter parking was free.
‘There’s Ewart’s Lexus,’ James said, relieved, as the silver Audi pulled up alongside it.