"I wouldn't bank on it, Mr. Mackie," Lawson said. "I'm a senior police officer and threatening me is a serious offense. Away you go and lead a prayer meeting. You do your job and I'll do mine."
Carlton Way looked like a backstreet in a ghost town. Nothing stirred. It was always quiet during the day, but today it was preternaturally hushed. The night-shift worker at number seven had been rousted from his bed by a hammering at the back door. Befuddled, he'd been persuaded to get dressed and to accompany the two police officers on his doorstep over the fence at the bottom of his garden and through the playing fields to the main road, where he'd been told of events so unlikely that he'd have thought it was a wind-up if not for the overwhelming presence of the police and the roadblock that cut off Carlton Way from the rest of the world.
"Is that all the houses empty now?" Lawson asked DI McIntyre.
"Yes, sir. And the sole communication into Macfadyen's house is a dedicated phone line for our use only. All the armed response team officers are deployed round the house now."
"Right. Let's do it."
Two marked police cars and a van drove single-file into Carlton Way. They parked in a line outside Macfadyen's house. Lawson got out of the lead vehicle and joined the hostage negotiator, John Duncan, behind the van, out of sight of the house. "We're sure he's in there?" Duncan said.
"So the techies say. Thermal-imaging, or something. He's in there with the baby. They're both still alive."
Duncan handed Lawson a set of headphones and picked up the phone handset that would give him a line into the house. The phone was answered on the third ring. Silence. "Graham? Is that you?" Duncan said, his voice firm but warm.
"My name's John Duncan. I'm here to see what we can do to resolve this situation without anyone getting hurt."
"I've nothing to say to you. I want to speak to Lawson."
"He's not here right now. But anything you say to me, I'll pass on to him."
"It's Lawson or nobody." Macfadyen's tone was pleasant and casual, as if they were talking about the weather or the football.
"Like I said, Mr. Lawson isn't here right now."
"I don't believe you, Mr. Duncan. But let's pretend you're telling me the truth. I'm in no hurry. I can wait till you find him." The line went dead. Duncan looked at Lawson. "End of round one," he said. "We'll give him five minutes then I'll try him again. He'll start talking eventually."
"You think so? He sounded pretty cool to me. Don't you think I should maybe talk to him? That way, he might feel that he's going to get what he's asking for."
"It's too early for concessions, sir. He has to give us something before we give him anything in return."
Lawson sighed deeply and turned away. He hated the feeling of being out of control. This was going to be a media circus and the potential for an atrocious outcome was far, far greater than the alternative. He knew about sieges. They almost always ended badly for someone.
Alex contemplated his options. In any other set of circumstances, the sensible course of action would be to walk away now and go to the police. They could send in their forensic team and take the place apart in search of the single drop of blood or the teardrop of paint that would make the inevitable connection between this caravan and Rosie Duff's death.
But how could he do that when the caravan in question belonged to the Assistant Chief Constable? Lawson would stop any investigation in its tracks, kill it dead before it even got started. The caravan would doubtless go up in flames, laid at the door of vandals. And then what would there be? Nothing more than coincidence. Lawson's presence so close to the place where Alex had stumbled over her body. At the time, nobody had thought twice about it. Back in the late seventies in Fife, the police were still above suspicion, the good guys keeping the bad things at bay. Nobody had even questioned why Lawson hadn't seen the killer driving Rosie's body to Hallow Hill, even though he was parked facing the most obvious route. But this was a new world, a world where it was possible to question the integrity of men like James Lawson.