The Burning Man Read online

  The muffled voice intoned again. It sounded as if it had said ‘one minute’.

  And then two thundering shotgun blasts demolished the door from the inside, the ear-jarring din echoing down the passage. Cowling and Bishop were blown back like rag dolls. The impacts as their bodies struck the facing wall shook the entire building.

  ‘This is Heck inside Fairfax House!’ Heck shouted into his radio as drew his Glock. ‘Shots fired – immediate armed support required on the third floor! We also have two officers down with gunshot wounds. We need an advance trauma team and rapid evac! Get the Air Ambulance if you can, over!’

  A gabble of electronic voices burst in response, but it was Gemma’s that cut through the dirge. ‘Heck, this is DSU Piper … you are to wait for support, I repeat you are to wait for support! Can you acknowledge, over?’

  ‘Affirmative, ma’am,’ Heck replied, but he’d already removed his woolly hat and replaced it with a hi-vis, chequer-banded baseball cap. Climbing the three steps, he advanced warily along the corridor, weapon cocked but dressed down as per the manual. ‘Both shots fired through the door from inside number 36. Sounded like a shotgun. Both Cowling and Bishop are down … by the looks of it, they’ve incurred severe injuries, over.’

  ‘What’s your exact position?’ Gemma asked.

  ‘Approx thirty yards along the corridor … but I’m going to have difficulty reaching the casualties. They’re both still in the line of fire, over.’

  ‘Negative, Heck! You’re to get no closer until you have full firearms support. Am I clear?’

  ‘Affirmative, ma’am.’ More by instinct than design, Heck continued to advance, but ultra-slowly, his right shoulder skating the right-hand wall. At twenty yards, he halted again. Neither of the shotgunned officers was moving; both lay slumped on their backsides against the left-hand wall. The plasterwork behind them was peppered with shot and fragments of wood, but also spattered with trickling blood.

  Heck’s teeth locked. In these circs, hanging back felt like a non-option. These were fellow coppers pumping out their last. He pressed cautiously on. And then heard a sound of breaking glass from inside the flat.

  ‘Crap!’ He dashed forward, only for a door to open behind him. He spun around, gun levelled. The thin-faced Chinese woman who peeked out gaped in horror. ‘Police officer!’ he hissed. ‘Go back inside! Stay there!’ The door slammed and Heck resumed his advance, radio mic to his lips. ‘This is Heck – suspect’s making a break for it through a window. It’s three floors down, so I don’t know how he’s going to manage it. But his flat’s on the building’s northeast side, which overlooks Charlton Court … we’ve got to get some cover down there, over.’

  Even as he said it, Heck knew this would be easier said than done. The surveillance team on Fairfax House was no more than eight strong at any time. Even with Gemma on the plot, that only made it nine – so they were spread widely and thinly. On top of that, though armed and wearing vests, they were geared for close target reconnaissance, not a gun-battle. No doubt, Trojan units would be en route, but how long it would take them in the mid-evening London traffic was anyone’s guess. He slid to another halt as a dark shape appeared at the farthest end of the corridor, about twenty yards past number 36. By its size and breadth, and by the luminous council-worker doublet pulled over its donkey jacket, he recognised it as Gary Quinnell, whose lying-up position was on one of the floors above. The burly Welshman had also drawn his firearm, and was in the process of pulling on the regulation baseball cap.

  They acknowledged each other with a nod. Heck lowered his weapon and proceeded, stopping again about five yards from the shattered doorway.

  ‘Armed police!’ he shouted. ‘John Sagan, we are armed police officers! There’s no point in resisting any further! Stop this bloody nonsense, and throw your weapon out!’

  There was no reply. No further glass crashed or tinkled.

  They waited a couple of yards to either side of the front door. From this close range, it was plain that Reg Cowling was dead. His face had been blown away; in fact, his head had almost detached. However, Bishop, while wounded in the face, which was riddled with gashes and splinters, and the right shoulder, which resembled raw beefsteak through the rents in his smouldering jacket, was vaguely conscious. He was ashen-cheeked, but his eyes, which by some miracle had both survived, were visible beneath fluttering, blood-dabbled lashes.

  ‘Bastard went for head-shots,’ Heck said. ‘Expected them to be wearing body armour.’

  Penny Flint had told them Sagan was a pro. Here was the proof.

  ‘This is Heck,’ he said into his radio. ‘Update on the casualties … both in a collapsed state and suffering extensive gunshot injuries. DS Cowling appears to be dead, DC Bishop is conscious and breathing – how long for, I can’t say. We still can’t reach them.’

  Gemma’s response broke continually and was delivered in a breathless voice, which indicated she was running. Before he could make sense of it, it was blotted out by another explosion of glass from inside the flat.

  ‘He’s going for it!’ Quinnell warned. ‘Must have decided the coast’s clear!’

  ‘I repeat, we are armed police officers!’ Heck shouted. ‘Throw your weapon out!’

  With a third shuddering BOOM!, what remained of the front door was blasted outward. Again, DC Bishop got lucky. The shot was directed above him, so though he was bombarded by wreckage, he was spared further pellet-wounds.

  A loud clunk/clack from inside signified that a fourth shell had been ratcheted into place.

  ‘Pump-action!’ Heck said.

  More glass was struck from its frame. The detectives locked gazes across the open doorway, brows beaded with sweat.

  ‘We can’t just let him run,’ Heck stated flatly.

  Quinnell didn’t argue the point.

  Heck swallowed the apple-sized lump of phlegm in his throat, and wheeled partly around into the doorway, only his left arm, left shoulder and the left side of his head visible as he tried to pinpoint the target. Quinnell did the same from the other side.

  But the immediate area, which was an actual living room, was bare of life.

  There was no sign of the guy. None at all.

  They were vaguely aware of plain, simple furnishings, of bookshelves that were empty, of bland pictures on the walls. But there were also doors to other areas, one on the left and one on the right. On the far side of the room stood three tall sash-windows. The left one had been smashed out.

  ‘Doors first,’ Heck said, running right, but finding only an empty bathroom. ‘Clear!’ he yelled, spinning back.

  Quinnell had gone left. He reappeared from the bedroom. ‘Clear.’

  Heck darted for the left window, which had had to be broken because, by the look of it, Sagan had only been able to lift the lower panel several inches. He flattened himself against the wall, and risked a glance through it. Some twenty feet below, a figure in dark clothing – what looked like a heavy overcoat – and with the shotgun hung from its shoulder by a strap, scampered away across the tops of five flat-roofed garages standing in a terraced row. It was instantly apparent how he’d got down there. Some five feet to the left of the window, about six feet above it, there was a horizontal steel grating – the platform section of an old-fashioned fire escape. The fire escape stair dropped steeply down on the far side of that. There was no possibility of reaching either the stair or the platform by jumping. But the killer had prepared for this in advance by connecting a knotted rope to the underside of the grating, and looping it over a hook alongside his window, where it would hang down the apartment house wall unobtrusively. All he’d had to do when the time came was get a firm grip, unhook it so that it swung away from the window, thus preventing anyone in pursuit using the same method, and slither down to the garage roofs.

  Heck peered dully at the hanging rope a good five feet away. He was vaguely aware of Quinnell appearing alongside him.

  ‘Bastard!’ the Welshman said, spying the dwin
dling form of Sagan as he reached the far end of the garages.

  About sixty yards to the right of these, a uniformed police car swung over the grass into Charlton Court from the cul-de-sac at the front. Unfortunately, it was only a divisional patrol responding to the call that had just gone out, and it wouldn’t be armed, which rendered it next to useless. Besides, Sagan had now jumped from the left side of the garage roofs onto Bellfield Lane, which led away at a much lower level. As well as the rugged, rubbish-strewn slope slanting down to this, there was a high mesh fence along its edge, which formed an impassable barrier for vehicles. Sagan made a rapidly diminishing shape as he raced away along the lower road. Still there was no sign of a Trojan unit.

  ‘Check the casualties,’ Heck said tightly.

  Quinnell nodded, and went back across the flat.

  Heck holstered his Glock and put his mic to his mouth. ‘This is DS Heckenburg … urgent message. Suspect, John Sagan, is at large and on foot … male IC1, mid-forties, fair-haired, wearing glasses and a dark, possibly black overcoat. Currently escaping northeast along Bellfield Lane. Warning, Sagan is armed with a pump shotgun and more than willing to use it. For the cerebrally challenged, that means he’s armed and dangerous. I repeat: John Sagan is armed and very dangerous!’ He bit his lip, and added: ‘In pursuit.’

  ‘Hey, whoa!’ Gary Quinnell shouted, as Heck climbed up into the casement.

  The hanging rope was only five feet away. Heck knew there was a good chance he’d make it, but he also knew that if he stopped to think about this he wouldn’t go any further. So he didn’t think, just launched himself out, diving full-length – and dropping like a stone, maybe ten feet, before managing to catch hold of the rope. Several more feet of cold, greasy hemp slid through his fingers before he brought himself to a halt, ripping both his gloves and the flesh of the palms underneath. Doing his best to ignore the blistering pain, he clambered down and alighted on the garage roof nearest the building.

  ‘Suspect heading northeast along Bellfield Lane!’ he shouted down to the two uniforms who’d spilled onto Charlton Court from their patrol car, faces aghast at what they’d just seen Heck do. ‘Spread the word!’

  Without waiting for a response, Heck ran due north along the flimsy roofs, feet drumming on damp planks covered only in tarpaper, jabbering into his radio again, giving instructions as best he could. At the far end, he dropped onto all fours and swung his body over the parapet. He hung full-length and dropped the last five feet, before careering downhill through grass and clutter onto the road.

  ‘Bellfield Lane heading northeast,’ he shouted, hammering along the tarmac. ‘Any units in that direction to respond, over?’ But the airwaves were jammed with cross-cutting messages. ‘Shit … come on, someone!’

  As he ran, the vast concrete shape of a railway gantry loomed towards him. Above it, stroboscopic lights sped back and forth as trains hurtled between East Dulwich and Peckham Rye. Conversely, the shadows beneath the structure were oil-black. In normal times this would be a muggers’ paradise, but Heck was armed, and besides the night was now alive with sirens – it was just a pity none were in the immediate vicinity.

  Beyond the railway overpass, a sheer brick wall stood on the right, but on the left there was wire fencing, and behind that another slope angling down to a glass-littered car park. The fence’s second section was loose, disconnected along the bottom, giving easy access to the other side. Heck swerved towards it – only to find that his quarry, neatly camouflaged in his all-black garb, had secreted himself flat at the foot of the waiting slope. The first Heck knew of this was the muzzle-flash, and the hail of shot that swept the wire mesh.

  He threw himself to the pavement, rolling away and landing in the gutter – where he lay on his back, gun trained two-handed on the wall of fencing.

  Until he heard feet clattering away again.

  He scrambled to his knees.

  A dark shape was haring across the car park below, at the far side of which a concrete ramp led down onto yet another housing estate, this one comprising rows of near-identical maisonettes. Heck slid under the fence and gave chase, stumbling down the slope until he reached the level tarmac, all the time trying to get through on his radio.

  ‘Is no one fucking listening to me?’ he shouted. ‘For what it’s worth … still in pursuit, suspect still on foot, still armed, opening fire at every opportunity. Heading west onto the Hawkwood estate. Listen, this is a built-up area with lots of civvies. Not many around at present, but someone’s got to get over here fast. Over and fucking out!’

  At the foot of the ramp, he vaulted a railing and ran along a boulevard faced on two sides by front doors and ground-level windows. Sagan was still in sight at the far end – a minuscule figure, which abruptly wheeled around, levelled the shotgun at its waist and fired twice. Heck was out of lethal range – Sagan was using buckshot rather than solid slugs – but instinct still sent him scrambling for cover behind a bench. When he glanced back up Sagan remained visible, but it went against all the rules to open fire in a residential zone like this. You didn’t even need to be a poor shot; ricochets could go anywhere. To make matters worse, several doors had opened as curious householders peeked out.

  Sagan darted left along a side-street. Heck vaulted the bench and gave chase, shouting at the onlookers as he did. ‘Police! Lock your doors! Stay away from the windows!’

  He rounded the corner and descended a flight of steps into a covered area. Sagan was visible again, framed in the exit on the other side. He let off two more rounds. Heck dived sideways, smashing through a decayed wooden hoarding and entangling himself in heaps of musty second-hand furniture. He fought his way out through a rear door and sprinted along an alley, hoping to head the bastard off – only to emerge into another car park.

  Again, Sagan was waiting, shotgun levelled.

  Heck ran low, scuttling behind a row of parked vehicles. Sagan blasted each one of them in turn, bodywork buckling, safety glass flying, before turning, ascending a flight of steps and dashing down a passage between faceless walls. Heck slid over the nearest bonnet and charged up the steps. He entered the passage, which was about fifty yards long; at the far end of it Sagan was rapidly reloading. Before Heck could point his pistol and shout, the bastard fired twice; ear-shattering detonations in the narrow space. This time, as Heck pitched himself down, he pegged off three quick shots of his own, which caromed along the passage, missing their target but sending him ducking out of sight.

  Heck retreated around his corner, sucking in lungfuls of chill air. He risked a second glance. The passage still looked empty, but Sagan could be lying in wait, and once Heck was halfway along he’d be a sitting duck. He ran back down the steps, along a row of caged-off shops, and around the base of a tower block. He’d expected to find open space on the other side, but instead the shell of a derelict industrial building stood there.

  Swearing, Heck panted the new directions into the radio as he set off running again. At the end of the factory wall there was a net fence and on the other side of that a deep canyon through which another railway passed. The London Overground, Heck realised, though at present it was a good twenty feet below him. He glanced right. The nearest route across it was an arched steel walkover about fifty yards off. A figure was already traipsing over this – slowly, tiredly.

  Sagan.

  The killer and torturer was an arch-pro. But he was also in early middle age. His energy reserves were finally flagging.

  Heck took a short cut along a narrow defile between the factory’s north wall and the railway fence. Initially he had to get through barbed wire, and then found himself negotiating thick, leafless scrub entwined with wastepaper and rubbish. Inevitably, cans and bottles clattered, causing such a racket that the figure on the bridge stopped and looked around – and began to run again. By the time Heck got to the bridge, there was no sign of him.

  Exhausted himself, Heck lumbered up the steel staircase and over the top. A train thundered past below, a c
haos of light and sound, illuminating the footway to its far end. There was a possibility Sagan could reappear over there – while Heck was hemmed between neck-high barriers of riveted steel. But that didn’t happen. He made it to the other side, descended the stair to half way and halted, hot breath pluming from his body. Open waste-ground lay ahead, on the far side of which stood a cluster of dingy buildings: workshops, offices and garages, with an old Ford van parked at the front. Sagan was almost over there, moving at a fast but weary trudge – about sixty yards distant.

  Heck raised his pistol and took aim, but he wasn’t a good enough marksman to ensure a clean shot from this distance. Especially not at night. He continued down, and inadvertently kicked a beer bottle on the bottom step. It cartwheeled forward and smashed.

  Sagan twirled around.

  Heck scampered down the last couple of steps and veered sideways. Sagan strode back, shooting from the waist like a character out of a western, working the slide again and again, pumping fire and shot. Heck scuttled and crawled, but found no more cover than bits of rubbish and sprigs of weed.

  At which point a third party intervened.

  ‘Drop it!’ came a fierce female voice. ‘Do it now, or I’ll shoot you, you bastard … I swear!’

  Heck glanced up, to see a short, shapely figure in jeans, trainers, an anorak and a chequer-banded police cap, circling around from behind the van, her Glock trained with both hands on the back of John Sagan’s head. The gunman froze, the shotgun clasped in his right hand, his left held out to his side.

  ‘I mean it, you dickless wonder!’ the girl cop shouted in a ringing northern accent. ‘Drop that weapon now, or I’ll drop you!’

  Heck’s mouth crooked into a smile as he rose to his feet. It was Shawna McCluskey.

  Someone had heard his frantic transmissions after all. And if anyone had, he ought to have realised it would be his old mucker Shawna, who’d started off with him all those years ago in the Greater Manchester Police.