The Crocodile Hunter by Gerald Seymour (best summer reads of all time txt) 📕

was of revenge. A promise repeated, and strengthened. Loaded with the kit, they turned their backs on the stream and the crater and the broken jeep, and the flowers.

It was Cammy’s style, his defiance, that after they had gone perhaps a mile he started quietly to sing. Something from Henry Francis Lyte. Gave them Praise my soul, the King of Heaven; To his feet thy tribute bring. They trudged away.

All the lights on the ground floor were off.

The baby slept. Cammy saw Vicky’s shadow go up the stairs.

A light came on above, peeked between the drawn curtains. The rain fell remorseless and heavy on him.

His mum could by now have been home from work – if it were the same work, same hours, same journey home on the same bus schedule.

He had no doubt as to how it would be when Vicky saw him, when he stood on the step and Vicky faced him from the open doorway.

Where he would go in the morning, alone, it would be as if she came with him, ran by his side, matching him step by step. The light upstairs went off.

Down the street, a porch light lit a forecourt and he imagined that in a moment a door would open and a dog would be pushed out or be coaxed on to grass . . . He had not seen the cat again. There were no tanks here.

He stepped forward, his finger found the button. He felt the shiver in his hand. He pressed the bell.

Jonas had wedged himself again on the back seat, was hard up against the now emptied weapons box. Slept or dozed or dreamed, eyes closed.

“Didn’t answer us, did he? Never gave us an answer.”

“Did not, Dominic. And what was all that about a cage?”

“Not a clue. You’d have thought that Five could have done better than him.”

“A bit pathetic, but I’ll not have him getting in our way.”

Might have dreamed it, have imagined it. Saw himself and Vera, side by side, heading west towards a Devon site, their Norwegian friend in the wicker cat basket and the caravan bumping along behind them. Filling each mirror, showing the A303’s hills and bends, was the build-up of traffic that had no chance of passing, and they would be the source of annoyance, even anger, because the queues had no prospect of getting beyond them, not on the A303 and not the way that Jonas drove . . . Might get away by lunch-time the next day – if all went well. Might be there by dusk tomorrow.

“You heard all that, Babs, about dangerous and serious and he called him ‘motivated’. We’re not talking about a guy thumping his wife with a knife at her throat.”

“Too right, Dom. We’re talking about an experienced killer. So I don’t understand why this is not a mob-handed job. The place should be flooded, and we have no risk assessment and no mission statement, and old Merrick seems to make it all up as he goes along.”

“Weird.”

“Worse than weird – except you can look on the bright side.”

What had changed in Jonas Merrick’s life since he had shared a bench, briefly, with Winston Gunn, was that he now commanded an audience. Reflected that he had the same insights now as before, just that none of his colleagues or superiors had bothered to listen to him. They did now, led by the AssDepDG. Had made his bed, had to lie on it, or was “hoist” as Lily might have put it down in the Archive. Could not yet step back. Would have been entitled, hours earlier to catch his normal train that evening, and eat the cottage pie that Vera had made, but was the victim of a compulsion . . . Had once sat next to a chap, same sort of age and from the Russian monitoring section, in the café outside the side door and the chap had been needing to babble: his son had sent them a photo from New Zealand, and the boy was hanging upside down by the ankle at the end of a bungee jump, had done 140 feet and a few inches. The chap had quoted his boy as saying that he knew he had to do the jump from the moment he had landed on that island, had to – could not evade it. Laid his lofty reputation on the line and could not have backed away. But Jonas felt nearly confident of the outcome: had to, or by first light tomorrow he might be face down and breathing, heavily, his last gasps.

“What’s the ‘bright side’, Babs?”

“You’d say ‘breaking a duck’, I’d say ‘losing’ what it is that we’ll never get back. Cop on, like a first shag. Easy once you’ve done it, big deal when you haven’t. Might get to shoot, Dom.”

“Take him down – dangerous and serious and motivated – actually pull the trigger. Myself – and you know it – I’ve never actually been close to pulling the trigger.”

“Actually do it. I was as far down the line as having the red dot on some sod in Margate, with an axe and his missus in an armlock – shouted top of my voice. He did it, dropped the axe, lay down good as gold, closest I’ve been . . . But for real, see him drop – better, I’ll bet, than any shag.”

Which was not as Jonas intended and not as he planned it. He did not move, did not break his breathing.

“What he asked for . . .?”

“Asked for a dog lead.”

“What does he want a dog lead for?”

“Not a clue. Suppose I’d better go and get one. What do I say, that I want it for?”

“Suppose you had. You . . . think of something – good luck.”

He did not think it would be difficult, finding a dog lead. Didn’t matter if it could restrain a Rottweiler or a toy poodle. On an estate like this, there would be dogs two a penny. He felt rested. Very soon he would play-act his waking and then would start, in earnest,