Trouble on the Heath (5 page)

When Grigori Koslov read the note his first reaction was cold, white fury. His second reaction was panic.

Eva watched her husband read the note with interest. She had handed it to him, having already read it herself. She smiled as she saw the waves of emotion passing through him.

She thought: I can read him like a book! No! Like a barometer!

She watched the storms of panic give way to fairer weather, as a glint of resolve entered his eyes.

The note had read: ‘We have your man, Anton Molotov. We will only release him, when we hear that you have withdrawn the planning application for numbers 26 and 27 Highgrove Park.'

And there was a photo of Anton tied up and looking very unhappy.

They had Anton! Boris Zolkin had kidnapped his son! Well Anton was virtually his son, wasn't he? At that moment, it was as if a vast floodlight had suddenly been switched on. Grigori saw the world and himself clearly for the first time, and he knew, in that moment, that Anton Molotov was the only person in the whole world that he really cared about.

His wife read all this in his face, and she turned away.

If she, Eva, had been kidnapped, Grigori would have shrugged and gone on as usual. It hurt her to the quick to know that she was not as important to her husband as that … that oaf, Anton.

“Who do they think they are dealing with?” muttered Grigori. “Has Boris taken leave of his senses?”

“Perhaps it's not Boris?” said his wife.

“Of course it is! Who else would try to stop my plans?”

Eva knew there was no point in arguing. Grigori had marked his enemy. No force on earth could stop him. Only death itself.

Trevor Williams was heart-broken after he heard he'd won the lottery. Not even Cynthia could cheer him up.

“God has really got it in for me!” he kept saying angrily, stabbing at his lobster.

“But it's wonderful that you won!” said Cynthia, laying her hand on his arm.

“One digit! I ask you!” He glowered at Cynthia's hand. “And I'd have scooped the lot! I can't bear it!”

“But you won £20,000,” said Cynthia. “That's not bad.”

“One digit!” repeated Trevor. “£3 million!”

There was a silence for some moments. Then Cynthia said, “You could buy a nice car with £20,000.”

“Huh!” replied Trevor. “I could buy a lot of nice cars for £3 million.”

Cynthia gave up after that, and they ate their meal in a gloomy silence, punctuated by Trevor's groans and occasional murmurs of “three million” under his breath.

When he asked for the bill, the waiter returned with the manager. The two of them approached the table full of smiles. The manager bowed.

“Sir and madam, your meal this evening is on the house,” he said, hardly able to contain his pleasure in giving this information.

“What?” Trevor's eyes narrowed. There was something fishy about this.

“You are our 10,000th customer, and we wish you to celebrate the fact with us! Congratulations!”

The waiter produced a bottle of champagne.

“On the house, sir and madam, of course!” said the manager, as the waiter let the cork hit the ceiling and everybody in the restaurant applauded.

As they sipped their champagne, Trevor was furious. Cynthia tried to comfort him, but it was no use. They had become the talk of the other tables.

“I hate being used for publicity like this!” he said. “I'm going to the bathroom.”

As he got up he pulled his handkerchief from his pocket and blew his nose noisily. Just to show that he accepted the free meal and the champagne under protest. As he hurried off, a scrap of paper fell out of his pocket.

Cynthia picked it up. It was torn from an exercise book and it had some words written on it in capital letters. Cynthia read ‘DROP THE OPPOSITION OR ELSE'.

When Trevor returned, Cynthia asked him, “Who on earth sent you this?”

The way Trevor stared at the scrap of paper and then tried to grab it out of her hand, told Cynthia all she needed to know. He hadn't received it, he had written it.

Glenys brought Anton his tea in bed. It had become a habit since he had become a lodger in the house.

Malcolm had argued strongly against untying his son's assailant, but both Angela and Glenys pointed out that unless Malcolm was prepared to go to the lavatory every time Anton needed to go, they would have to at least untie his hands.

But it had been Freddie who finally persuaded his father. “He's OK,” said Freddie. “I like him.”

Anton for his part had sworn that he would not try to escape.

“I like it here,” he had explained. “I don't want to go back to my life of crime. Anyway, it was just meant to be a holiday job.”

The truth is that Anton had been suffering for several years. He had been suffering from the stress of his tasks. He had been suffering from the constant fear of reprisals, and he had been suffering from knowing that he wasn't really cut out to be a villain. When he was honest with himself he had to admit he was hopeless at it.

Why couldn't Grigori Koslov see he was hopeless? Anton had seen others who had bungled a single job, and who – as a result – had ended up at the bottom of the river or fallen under an express train ‘by accident'.

Why didn't that happen to
him
? Why was
he
allowed to make mistake after mistake? It wasn't fair! It put him under such strain. Was Grigori playing cat and mouse with him? Was he saving up some specially nasty end for him?

He had now been staying with Glenys for more than a month, and he hoped against hope that Grigori would forget about him.

He knew all about the demand that Malcolm had sent Grigori, because he had supplied Grigori's address. But he secretly hoped his boss would refuse to drop his planning application, so that his hosts would not have to hand him over. He wanted to go on like he was, living with Glenys and Malcolm and Angela and Freddie for the rest of his life.

He knew that was not really possible, but it was what he secretly hoped.

This morning Glenys drew the curtains for him.

“Good morning, Glenys,” said Anton.

“Good morning, Anton,” said Glenys. “It's another beautiful day!”

The sun streamed into the small bedroom, making the rose-covered wallpaper throw a pink glow over everything.

“I've brought you a biscuit with your tea,” said Glenys.

“You're very kind,” smiled Anton. “You're very kind indeed to me.”

The truth was Anton had never met many people who were kind to him. His mother had been kind to him. The village butcher had been kind to him, and given him kidneys when he thought the other customers weren't looking. The village priest had been kind to him. But then Anton had realised what the village priest wanted from him in return and had run away.

That was about it, until he met Glenys.

Glenys sat at the end of Anton's bed, while he dipped his biscuit in his tea. “I thought we could motor over to Melton Mowbray and look at the pies,” she said. “We could even buy one.”

“A pork pie would be nice,” replied Anton. “Yes, I was thinking that too,” said Glenys. She sat there for a few moments lost in thought, and then she added, “It's funny how sometimes two people can think exactly the same thoughts at exactly the same time.” “I was just thinking that too,” said Anton.

“Isn't that odd?” “Yes, it is,” said Glenys. Suddenly Angela appeared at the door of

the bedroom. She was as white as the china cup

Anton was drinking his tea out of. “Where's Malcolm?” she said. “He went for a run,” said Glenys. “Something terrible's happened!”

When Cynthia heard the news her heart seemed to freeze over. She had been hoping against hope that she would not have to go to the police, but now she knew she had to. She knew her duty and she refused to shirk it, even when it meant destroying her own future.

Ever since she had picked up the scrap of paper that had fallen out of Trevor's trouser pocket in the restaurant, her world had started to fall apart. Or rather the world she had hoped for had started to fall apart even before she possessed it.

She had never actually spoken to Trevor about getting married or even about how much she loved him, but every minute of every day at work had been filled by those thoughts. Every piece of filing she did was guided by whether or not she would catch a glimpse of Trevor, or whether it would involve asking Trevor a question or not.

She and Trevor had had sex, of course, but that was what you would expect in an office, wasn't it? Cynthia really didn't know, but Trevor seemed to assume that's what you did and that was good enough for her.

Somehow the sex had made it more difficult to bring up the question of how much she loved him. Nevertheless, she had seen her future as Trevor's wife and as the mother of Trevor's children. Now she was going to have to destroy that dream.

It was all the fault of those wretched Highgrove Residents. They'd started it, by objecting to some planning application. She knew how worried Trevor had been by them poking their noses into council business, and stirring up trouble. It was enough to drive anyone insane.

And that, it seemed, was what had happened to Trevor. It was the only explanation.

When she'd found the threatening note in the restaurant, she knew he had been intending to send it, but she had persuaded herself it was just a one-off. It was probably of no importance. But then she had searched the wastepaper basket after office hours, and even looked in Trevor's desk.

She had found a dozen similar notes, all threatening someone with something if they didn't stop protesting or objecting.

She felt sad that Trevor had been driven to such desperation, but she could understand how he felt. Perhaps he was just getting something off his chest. She was sure he didn't really mean any of those threats.

But now she knew he did. It was all over the newspapers and the TV.

“A wave of violence erupted last night in a quiet area of Hampstead,” the newsreader had said. “During 10 minutes of mayhem, two people were killed, many wounded and one house was blown up. Police have cordoned off the area, and are appealing for witnesses to come forward.”

Cynthia's heart had sunk lower with every word the newsreader spoke. How could she ignore the appeal for witnesses? She could not.

She would have to step forward and hand over all Trevor's notes. Trevor would be arrested. He would be tried and sent to prison and her future would be destroyed.

Perhaps she should ask Trevor first? Perhaps she should check if he had done all those things last night? Perhaps he hadn't? Perhaps it was just a coincidence?

But Trevor was not at work that morning. He was missing. She rang his home, but there was no answer. No one knew where he was.

If she had had any reason for excusing him, she would have held back, but she could not delude herself. She had to hand over to the police all the evidence she had.

“They what?” said Malcolm.

“They've blown up our house,” repeated Angela.

“Our house?” said Malcolm.

“I keep telling you. Yes!”

“Who? The Council?”

“No. They don't know who. Somebody.” Angela suddenly felt weary. Thank God they'd decided to stay with Glenys in Leicester. Malcolm had been talking about going back, because he was fed up with commuting from Leicester. It was an hour and a half's train ride.

“That's three hours a day!” he'd complained.

But they'd stayed on another week. Lucky them.

“Apparently a car drove down the street about 6.00 pm last night, shooting at passersby.” Angela was reading from the newspaper. “Paul Edgar was wounded in the leg. Mr Clarkson received a chest wound, and several people walking their dogs received multiple injuries. Lady Chesney was killed outright, and so was Mr Kendrick. The car drove off at high speed, and then our house exploded.”

“What?! Over a planning application?!”

Malcolm sank into a chair, which had a load of dirty dishes and mugs on it. He didn't notice.

Then he muttered, “The bastards!” A blinding rage suddenly overwhelmed him.

Three days later, Malcolm found himself on a plane heading for St Petersburg.

Malcolm was not one for heroics, and normally he would have avoided any confrontation, but this was different. His wife and son were being threatened. He had to confront the man or men who were threatening them.

Nobody knew what he was up to. He didn't even know himself at first. He had cooked up an excuse about a manuscript he needed to look at in Edinburgh, and secretly booked the plane. He already had Grigori Koslov's address from Anton. All he had to do was find the man and … and then what? Reason with him? Buy him a pair of slippers? Give him a good talking to? No.

As he sat sipping a gin and tonic, a calm came over him. He suddenly understood why he was on this plane, why he was heading for St Petersburg. He knew what his errand was.

He was going to kill Grigori Koslov.

When he first saw the house where Grigori lived, he nearly turned around and went straight back home again.

“Well, I guess I knew the guy must have enemies, but there must be some way to get in.”

The house itself would have been very attractive had it not resembled a concentration camp. It was a light blue colour and built mainly from wood, with pretty pillars at the front. Around it, however, was a five-metrehigh electrified fence, complete with guards who were, at that very moment, staring at him. They didn't look as if they were going to invite him in for a cup of tea.

“Think!” Malcolm told himself. “What examples from history do we have? Siege of Syracuse 214 BC? The Romans got in during some feast when the citizens were all drunk. But how will I be able to tell when Koslov is drunk? No. I know! Siege of Alexandria 1366!

Someone managed to crawl into the city through the sewage pipes, and then opened the gates at night.”

But a quick tour of the drains around the house soon convinced him that that was not a practical solution. The guards were getting more and more interested in him as he circled the house. Malcolm was forced to walk away from the scene of his intended crime.

A little further down the road was a small line of shops with a run-down café. He sat himself at a table by the window, from where he could just see the main gate, if he leant forward. He ordered a black tea and sat there trying to think.

There's something obvious I'm missing, he thought. After a short while the gate opened and a car slid out and disappeared down the road.

“Maybe that's it?” he muttered. “I should let
him
come to
me
.” But how could he do that? Write Koslov a letter? Say “Come and meet me or …” Or what? “Or I'll blow your house up like you did mine? Or I'll come and shoot everyone in your street?” That would hardly encourage Grigori Koslov to agree to a meeting. Even if he did meet him, he'd have tough guys hanging around, ready to pounce.

As Malcolm was thinking these things a van pulled up in front of the café, blocking his view of the gate. The side of the van bore a crude picture of a bunch of flowers and writing in Russian which read ‘Courtesy Flowers, Kolpino'.

The driver came into the café and nodded at the samovar of tea. “One,” he muttered.

The owner of the café poured some liquid into a cup and pushed it towards the driver along with a jug of hot water. The driver poured a tiny amount of water into the tea and leaned forward.

“I'm looking for the Koslov place,” he said, as if he were proposing a drugs deal.

The proprietor of the café grunted and stuck his thumb in the direction of the blue mansion surrounded by the fence.

“Uh!” replied the driver. “Somebody's birthday,” he added.

Malcolm, who had been listening to this, nearly jumped up out of his seat and ran to hug the van driver. “Of course! That's it!” he almost shouted out, but managed to restrain himself. “The Siege of Troy! The Trojan Horse!” Why hadn't he thought of it? “That's how I get in.”

He put his cup down and sauntered over to the counter.

“Hi!” he said to the van driver. His Russian wasn't bad, but they would know he was foreign. “Could you give me a lift to Pushkin?”

The driver shook his head. “I only go as far as Kolpino,” he said.

“That's half way,” said Malcolm generously. “It'll do.”

“And we're not allowed to give lifts,” added the driver.

“It would save me the train fare,” said Malcolm, taking out his wallet. “I'd be really grateful.” He held out a few notes.

The van driver stared at them. Malcolm added a few more, and the van driver took them, paid for the tea with one of them and strode out without saying another word.

Malcolm grabbed his haversack and followed the van driver out.

“You'll have to get in the back,” said the van driver. “I can't let anyone see you.”

“Good idea!” said Malcolm. And he really thought it was.

As the van driver closed the doors on him, Malcolm sneezed a couple of times. The pollen count in the back of the van was so high that, if he'd been a bee, Malcolm would have thought he'd arrived in heaven. But he wasn't a bee. He suffered from chronic hayfever, and, as the van bounced over the pot-holes in the road, Malcolm started sneezing again.

Between sneezes, he felt the van stop and heard the driver explaining his mission to the guard at the main gate. Malcolm was once again overcome with sneezes, and the next thing he knew the van had stopped again, and the driver had opened the doors.

“Shh!” he hissed. “People will hear you!”

“I can't help it!” Malcolm tried to say between sneezes.

“Then you can get out here!” snapped the van driver, and he pulled Malcolm out of the back of the van. Malcolm stood there in a haze of pollen, still sneezing, as the van drove off round the corner of the house. Malcolm found he had been dropped outside a side door, out of sight of the main gate and the front door.

There was an open window beside the side door. There was also an American pit bull glaring at him from under a lean-to shed across the lawn.

Malcolm sneezed again. The pit bull hesitated for a moment, as if it didn't recognise such a command. Malcolm took his chance and ran. The pit bull ran. Curiously it didn't bark, but it ran extremely fast. However, Malcolm was at the window in half a dozen steps and, before the dog could sink its teeth into the flesh and bone of his leg, he had dived head-first through the window. He landed with a crash amongst a pile of empty jam jars.

Malcolm lay perfectly still for some minutes. The pit bull had now started barking, as it jumped up at the window, and Malcolm could hear running feet outside. It was one of the guards.

“You stupid mutt!” he heard the guard say. “You're always trying to get that pork! You can't have it!” Malcolm saw the guard's face at the window.

He lay quite still. The guard glanced in, and then slammed the window shut. “Just forget it, Fido!” he heard the guard say. “You aren't eating them joints!” Then he moved off, pulling the dog with him.

Malcolm looked around. He had, indeed, landed in some sort of pantry. There were hams and dried fish hanging from hooks. The shelves were filled with baskets of fruit ready for jam-making.

Malcolm inched himself off the empty jam jars, trying to make as little noise as possible. There was a knot hole in the pantry door, through which Malcolm peered into a large old-fashioned kitchen. There seemed to be no one around, although a large pan of fruit and sugar was bubbling on the stove. So Malcolm opened the door of the pantry and slipped quickly across the kitchen. He could feel his heart pounding, as he peered through the open kitchen door into a sort of hallway.

He could hear raised voices coming from one of the rooms. Somebody was having an argument, and suddenly the stupidity of what he was doing hit him.

A strong urge to run back to the pantry and hide seized him. What did he think he was doing? He didn't even have a plan! But running back to the pantry wouldn't solve anything.

There was what looked like a cupboard under the stairs. That would give him a few moments to think. He dashed across to it and squeezed in, closing the door quietly after him. The voices were louder and sounded angrier from here. They seemed to be coming from the room across the hall.

He tried to calm himself down. OK. Think. Think calmly.

He was in the middle of some Russian gangster's house, whom he'd vowed to kill. How? He'd strangle him with his bare hands. How do you strangle someone? Wasn't there some special trick to it? He'd never even thought about strangling anyone, apart from one or two of the historians who got their work published in
History Now!

Calm down! Think. Maybe forget about the killing bit. Maybe he'd just come here to reason with the man, but how could you reason with someone who'd shot most of your neighbours and blown up your house, just because you'd objected to their planning application?

Then the silliness of it all hit him. The man he had to deal with was clearly insane.

“I can deal with that!” said Malcolm to himself, and suddenly he became master of the situation.

He opened the cupboard door and strode into the room where the voices were coming from.

“Good morning,” Malcolm said, in Russian.

A man and a woman were standing by the window, clearly in the middle of a row. The woman was holding a bunch of flowers.

“Who is it?” she was saying, as Malcolm walked in.

“I tell you I don't know!” the man replied.

The couple turned and stared at him in surprise.

“My name is Malcolm Thomas. I am the chairman of the Highgrove Park Residents' Association. Am I addressing Mr Grigori Koslov?” he asked in his politest Russian.

“What the fuck?!” exclaimed Grigori, in less polite Russian.

“Get lost!” snapped the woman.

“It's you?!” said the gangster.

Then something happened that Malcolm had not expected. The gangster sprang across the room and seized him by the throat.

Malcolm tumbled back onto the carpet, and the gangster was still on top of him with his fingers round his windpipe.

So that's the knack of strangling people, Malcolm found himself thinking, but Grigori was shouting at him in Russian. What was he saying?

“Where is he? You bastard! Where is he?” That's what the gangster was yelling.

“Who?” Malcolm wanted to say, but he couldn't because of the pressure on his throat.

Suddenly Malcolm found himself flailing out. He was punching Koslov in the face, and then he had his hands round his head, and his thumbs were digging into his eyes, just as he'd found himself doing with Anton.

Grigori tried to get his face away from Malcolm's fingers. Eventually he had to let go of his windpipe so that he could grab his hands to stop Malcolm poking his eyes out.

He flattened Malcolm's arms onto the floor and held them there, panting for breath.

“Who is this?” asked the woman.

“This is the bastard who's got Anton!” replied Grigori. Then he shouted at Malcolm again. “Where is he? If you've harmed one hair of his head you'll be sorry!”

“He's fine!” Malcolm could only croak his reply. His windpipe was still sore.

“I'll kill you!” screamed the gangster. “I'll kill you if you've done him any harm!”

And suddenly he was holding a gun. “I'm going to kill you anyway! But first tell me where Anton is!”

Malcolm wanted to point out the lack of logic in this demand but, in the stress of the moment, he couldn't think of the right words in Russian.

“Ahh! I'll find out anyway!” said Grigori. “Goodbye, Mr Malcolm Thomas! I'm sorry we didn't get to know each other!”

“Why?” screamed Malcolm. “Why are you doing this? All over a planning application!”

“I know you work for Zolkin!” said Grigori. “I know he is planning to muscle in on my UK operation. Well, he'll learn the hard way!” And the gangster stuck the pistol into Malcolm's mouth.

“What are you talking about?” cried Malcolm, as clearly as he could with a .44 magnum in his mouth.

“You work for Boris Zolkin! Don't deny it!”

“I've never heard of him!”

“Don't lie to me!” For a moment Grigori took the gun out of Malcolm's mouth, allowing him to say, “I represent the residents of Highgrove Park. We're simply objecting to your plans to build a monstrous house in our road and block the view of the Heath! That's all!”

Grigori stopped in his tracks. For just the slightest fraction of a second he found himself believing what this man was telling him, but it was impossible! Of course Zolkin was behind it all! Probably that creep Ivan Morozov as well! He might as well shoot the bastard at once.