the glass repeatedly. “Malfunc—?” Before he’d even finished the word he realized how stupid it would sound. “Probably not.”
“Where’s that camera?” asked Horn quietly. His absolute focus gave McKendrick a glimpse of how someone whose idea of fun was playing Russian roulette with a mountaintop dealt with stress. By moving onto a separate level where there’s no room for panic because doing the right things in the right order is what keeps death at bay. A man whose mind worked like that could believe he was capable of anything.
“At the gateway into the courtyard,” said McKendrick. “That’s where he is.”
Horn shook his head. “That’s where he was twenty seconds ago. He’ll be somewhere else now.”
“Why didn’t we see him?”
“Because he doesn’t want to be seen.” McKendrick might be playing catch-up with the crisis, but at least Horn no longer suspected him of orchestrating it. He’d been genuinely taken aback by the turn events had taken. No one is that good an actor. McKendrick had thought they couldn’t be found right up to the moment that they were, and possibly a little longer.
Horn had known they could be found, and would be found, and the only question was how quickly. He wasn’t shocked at the development. He was sickened to find himself doing this again so soon. And he was tired, tired to the marrow of his bones, with running and running and only taking his problems with him. And he felt guilty that someone who’d tried to help him, whatever his reasons, however selfish his motives, was going to pay a price he could never have guessed for his intervention. Horn hadn’t sought his help, had tried to warn him what it would mean, had tried to be somewhere else when the pursuit caught up with him. None of this stopped him from feeling like a murderer.
“You think I’m good at this? I’m an amateur. The guy out there’s the professional. He does it again and again, and he always wins in the end. He wouldn’t stay in business if he didn’t.”
“But…” McKendrick was still struggling with the evidence of his eyes. “This isn’t right…”
Horn barked a grim little laugh. “Well, no. I guess contract killings are frowned on in polite society. I wouldn’t know—more to the point, neither would Tommy Hanratty. He thinks it’s right enough if it’s what he wants.”
Movement behind them made both of them start. But it was Beth. Her face was expressionless but her voice was as taut as a steel hawser. “The landline’s dead.”
McKendrick sucked in a sharp breath. Horn gave a shrug that was a brave attempt at fatalism. “He’s cut it. Of course he has.”
“And the mobiles?” asked McKendrick.
“Couldn’t get a signal on either of them. But there’s nothing unusual about that.”
Horn stared at her. “You have mobile phones that can’t get a signal?”
“At home we use the landline,” she retorted. “Or walk as far as the ha-ha.” She offered him her phone. “Give it a try.”
“Ha ha,” said Horn coldly, and it might have been a question or a comment, but he didn’t take up her invitation.
There was half a minute’s silence while they all considered the situation. McKendrick broke it. “So, essentially, we can’t get help, we can’t tell anybody we’re in trouble, you don’t reckon the vastly expensive security system I installed will keep him out forever, and you reckon that when he gets in he’ll kill us all. Is that a fair assessment?”
The shock was dissipating. Horn was impressed by McKendrick’s businesslike tone. “Pretty much.” Something occurred to him. “With all these shutters and things, didn’t you get one of those alarms that ring in the nearest police station?”
McKendrick had the grace to look embarrassed. “Well, yes and no. I installed one. It went off so often when it wasn’t meant to that they said they wouldn’t answer it anymore.”
Horn’s expression froze on his face. “So twenty minutes away there’s a policeman looking at a flashing light saying, ‘Not them again!’ and sending out for a cup of tea?”
“’Fraid so.”
Beth was eyeing her father with a mixture of exasperation and almost enough affection to eclipse the fear. “Go on—tell him the rest.”
McKendrick dropped his eyes and mumbled something.
“Sorry?”
“I said,” he repeated forcefully, “I kept playing with it! All right? This is my fault. You can die with a clear conscience, and Beth with a satisfied smile, because this is all my fault. Or, and this is just a thought, we can try to find some way of not