The Ben Hope Collection: 6 BOOK SET (30 page)

Villiers pointed the revolver at Ben’s head. Fairfax closed his eyes and drank greedily from the gold chalice.

‘Before you shoot me, there’s something you should know,’ Ben said. ‘What you’ve just drunk isn’t the elixir of life. It’s tapwater from your own bathroom.’

Fairfax lowered the chalice. A dribble of the water ran down his chin. The look of rapture on his face drained away. ‘What did you say?’ he said slowly.

‘You heard me,’ Ben said. ‘I must admit, you had me fooled. You were right about me–I
was
blind to your lies. It was brilliant, Fairfax. And it almost worked. If it hadn’t been for a punctured tyre and meeting your head of stables, you’d be standing there with the real elixir.’

‘What are you talking about?’ demanded Fairfax in a strangled voice.

Villiers had lowered the gun. His face was twisted in thought.

‘Herbie Greenwood’s been working on your estate for thirty-five years,’ Ben went on. ‘But he’d never
heard of any Ruth. You never even had children, Fairfax, let alone grandchildren. Your wife died childless. There was never any little girl here.’

‘What have you done with the real elixir?’ Fairfax shouted. He threw down the gold chalice. It clanged dully and rolled across the floor.

Ben reached into his pocket and took out the small glass bottle that Antonia Branzanti had given him. ‘Here it is,’ he said. And before they could stop him, he whipped back his hand and hurled the bottle into the fireplace. It smashed into a thousand tiny shards against the iron grate, and the flames flared high for an instant as the alcohol preservative in the mixture burned up.

‘How does
that
grab you, Fairfax?’ Ben asked, looking him in the eye.

Fairfax turned, white-faced, to Villiers. ‘Take him and lock him up,’ he ordered in an icy voice, barely containing his fury. ‘By God, Hope, you will talk.’

Villiers hesitated.

‘Villiers, did you hear me?’ Fairfax thundered, his face turning from white to red.

Then Villiers raised the revolver again. He turned towards his employer and trained the gun on him.

‘Villiers, what are you doing? Have you gone mad?’ Fairfax backed away, cowering.

‘He hasn’t gone mad, Fairfax,’ Ben said. ‘He’s a spy. He works for
Gladius Domini.
Don’t you, Villiers? You’re the mole. You’ve been reporting back every move I’ve made to your boss Usberti.’

Fairfax had backed away as far as the fireplace, the
flames roaring and crackling behind him. His eyes were pleading, and his trousers were wet with urine. ‘I’ll pay you anything,’ he bleated.
‘Anything.
Come on, Villiers–let’s work together. Don’t shoot.’

‘I don’t work for you any more, Fairfax,’ Villiers sneered. ‘I work for God.’ He pulled the trigger. The high bark of the .357 Magnum drowned out Fairfax’s scream. The old man tore at his clothes as a dark-crimson stain began to spread rapidly across his white shirt. He staggered, clutched at a curtain and brought it down.

Villiers shot him again. Fairfax’s head snapped back, a small round hole between his eyes. Blood spattered up the wall. His knees crumpled and he slid lifelessly down to the floor, still clutching the curtain. It fell with him, one end in the fire. The curling flames ate greedily along its length.

Before Ben could leap across the dining-table, Villiers had spun round and was aiming the gun at him from across the room. ‘Stop right there.’

Ben walked around the table and moved steadily towards Villiers, watching his reactions. He could see the man was nervous, sweating and breathing a little harder and faster than usual. He’d probably never shot anyone before, and he was all alone in a tough situation. He hadn’t reckoned on this turn of events, and his organization was in tatters with no back-up to offer him. But a nervous man could be as deadly as a confident one. Perhaps even deadlier.

He tensed the gun and aimed it at Ben’s face. ‘Stay back,’ he hissed. ‘I’ll shoot.’

‘Go ahead and kill me,’ Ben said calmly. He walked on. ‘But then you’d better start running. Because when your boss gets out of jail he’ll track you down and have you tortured in ways you can’t imagine for losing him his prize. Shoot me, you might as well shoot yourself.’

Flames had spread from the curtain across the rug. Fairfax’s trousers were on fire. A sickly smell of smoke and burned flesh filled the room. Fire trickled up the side of a sofa, quickly gaining a hold on the upholstery, licking and crackling.

Villiers had edged backwards close to the spreading flames. The hand clutching the gun was shaking.

‘There’s only one problem,’ Ben went on. He could feel his rage building up inside him like a cold, white light. He glared hard at Villiers as he advanced steadily towards him. ‘You can’t take me alive, not on your own. You’re going to have to pull that trigger, because if you don’t I’m going to kill you myself, right now. Either way, you’re a dead man.’

Villiers tightened his grip on the trigger, sweat pouring down his face. The revolver’s hammer moved back. Ben could see the jacketed hollowpoint round in the chamber rotating into place, ready to align with the breech just as the hammer came down to punch the primer and ignite the cartridge that would blow a hole through his skull.

But by now he had Villiers right where he wanted him, up close and unable to back away any further. He threw a sudden slicing blow that caught the man’s wrist. Villiers cried out in pain and the .357 sailed
into the fire. Ben followed up the blow with a kick to the stomach that sent Villiers sprawling into the suit of armour. It collapsed in a crash of steel plates, and its broadsword fell with a clatter. Villiers scrabbled desperately for the fallen sword and lunged at him, the heavy blade humming through the air. Ben ducked and the wild swing of the blade smashed into an antique cabinet, spilling crystal decanters of brandy and whisky. A lake of fire whooshed up and spread across the floor.

Villiers came at him again, hacking the sword from side to side. Ben backed away, but his foot came down on the gold chalice that Fairfax had thrown to the floor. It rolled, and he slipped and fell, hitting his head against the leg of the dining-table.

The sword came down again, hissing towards him. Stunned from the fall, he moved to the side just in time and the blade crashed into the table next to him. Dishes and cutlery fell to the floor around him. Something glinted at him out of the corner of his eye and he reached for it with groping fingers.

The black smoke was thickening as the blaze spread across the room, uncontrollable now as everything in its path burst alight. Fairfax’s body was burning from head to toe, his clothes little more than curling tatters of carbon, the flesh inside roasting.

Villiers’ figure loomed against the flames as he raised the heavy sword for the final strike. Fire glittered down the blade. His eyes were filled with a kind of animal triumph.

Ben twisted himself half-upright. His arm flicked
in an arc. Something blurred through the smoke between them.

Villiers stopped. His fingers slackened their grip on the sword. The heavy blade clattered to the floor. He teetered, one step backwards, then another. His eyes rolled upwards in his head and then his body fell backwards into the flames. Three inches of steel and the ebony handle of the carving knife protruded from the centre of his forehead.

Ben staggered to his feet. The whole room was on fire around him. He could feel his skin shrivelling from the heat. He grabbed a dining chair and hurled it at one of the tall windows. The eight-foot pane shattered. Air rushed into the room and the fire became an inferno. He saw a gap through the flames and dashed at it for all he was worth. Threw himself wildly through the splintered hole in the window and felt a sliver of glass slice his forearm. He hit the grass and rolled to his feet.

Half blinded from the smoke and clutching his bleeding arm, he staggered away from the house and down the garden towards the acres of parkland. He leaned against a tree, coughing and spluttering.

Flames were pouring from the windows of the Fairfax residence and a huge column of smoke rose upwards into the sky like a black tower. He watched for a few minutes as the unstoppable blaze ripped through the whole house. Then, as the distant sirens drew nearer, he turned and disappeared into the trees.

Ottawa, December 2007

The plane touched down at Ottawa’s small airport with a squeal of tyres. Some time later, Ben walked out into the cold, crisp air. A flurry of snow swept over him as he climbed into a waiting taxicab. The Sinatra version of
I’ll Be Home for Christmas
was playing on the radio, and a silvery length of tinsel dangled from the rear-view mirror.

‘Where to, buddy?’ the driver asked, turning his head round to look at him.

‘Carleton University campus,’ Ben said.

‘Here for Christmas?’ the driver asked as the car glided smoothly round the city’s broad, snowy-banked circular road.

‘Just passing through.’

The lecture theatre at Carleton’s science block was full when Ben arrived. He found a seat in the back row of the sloping auditorium, near the central exit. He and the 300 or so students had come to hear a biology
lecture by Drs. D. Wright and R. Kaminski. Its subject was
Effects of Weak Electromagnetic Fields on Cell Respiration.

There was a low murmur of conversation in the theatre. The students all had pads and pens at the ready to make notes. Down below the auditorium was a small stage with a podium and two chairs, a couple of microphone stands, a slide projector and screen. The lecturers hadn’t yet appeared on the stage.

Ben hadn’t the least bit of interest in the subject of the lecture. But he did have an interest in Dr. R. Kaminski.

The theatre went quiet and there was a discreet round of applause as the two lecturers, a man and a woman, walked on to the stage. They took their positions on either side of the podium. They introduced themselves to the audience, their voices coming through the PA system, and the lecture began.

Roberta was blonde now, her hair pulled back in a pony-tail. She looked every bit the serious scientist, just as she had when he’d first met her. Ben was pleased that she’d taken his advice and changed her name. She’d taken quite a bit of finding–that was a good sign.

Around him, the attentive students were deep in concentration and scribbling notes. He sank a little in his seat, trying to make himself as inconspicuous as possible. He couldn’t understand the words she was saying, but over the speakers the tone of her voice, the warm soft sound of her breath, felt so close that he could almost feel her touching him.

It wasn’t until that moment that he fully realized how much he’d longed to see her again, and how badly he was going to miss her.

He’d known, even as he was setting out for Canada, that this was going to be the last time he would see her. He didn’t plan to hang around long. He’d just wanted to check that she was safe and well, and to say a private goodbye. Before coming into the lecture, he’d left an envelope for her at the main reception desk. In it was her red address book, and a brief note from him to let her know he’d got back all right from France.

He watched her co-lecturer Dan Wright. He could see from the man’s body language–the way he seemed to want to stay close to her on the stage, the way he nodded and smiled when she was talking, the way his eyes followed her as she moved between the lecture podium and the screen–that he liked her. Maybe he liked her a lot. He seemed like a decent kind of guy, Ben thought. The kind that Roberta really deserved. Steady, dependable, a scientist like her, a family kind of man who would make a good husband, and a good father one day.

Ben sighed. He’d done what he planned to do, finished what he came for. Now he waited for his cue to leave. As soon as she turned her back for a few seconds, he would slip away.

It wasn’t easy. He’d run through this moment a million times in his mind over the last couple of days. But now, being in her presence with the sound of her voice washing over him through the PA system, it
seemed unthinkable to him that he was about to walk out of here, take the next flight back home and never see her again.

But does it have to be like this?
he thought. What if he didn’t leave? What if he stayed? Could they make a go of it, have a life together? Did it really have to end this way?

Yes, this is the best way. Think of her. If you love her, you have to walk away.

‘…And the biological effect of this EM waveform can be illustrated by this diagram here,’ Roberta was saying. With a smile at Dr. Wright she picked up a laser pointer from the lecture podium and turned round to aim the red beam at the image that flashed up on the big screen behind her.

Her back was turned for a few seconds.
This is it
, Ben thought. He took a deep breath, made his decision, tore himself out of his seat and made his way quickly towards the centre aisle.

Just as he’d started up the aisle, a ginger-haired girl in the back row put her hand up to ask a question. ‘Dr. Kaminski?’

Roberta spun round from the screen. ‘Yes?’ she said, scanning the audience for a raised hand.

‘I wondered if you could please explain the connection between rising endorphin levels and shifting T-lymphocyte cell cycles?’

Ben disappeared through the door and made for the outer exit. The cold hit him as he stepped outside.

‘Dr. Kaminski…?’ the ginger-haired girl repeated quizzically.

But Dr. Kaminski hadn’t heard the question. She was staring up at the exit where she’d just seen someone walk out.

‘I–I’m sorry,’ she murmured absently into the microphone, and cupped her hand over it with a thump that jolted the PA speakers. ‘Dan, you take over from here,’ she whispered urgently to an astonished Dr. Wright.

Then, as the lecture theatre erupted into a frantic buzz of chatter and confusion, Roberta jumped off the stage and ran up the centre aisle. Students twisted in their seats and craned their necks to watch her as she sprinted past. On the stage, Dan Wright’s mouth was hanging open.

Ben hurried down the steps of the glass-fronted science building and walked briskly away across the snow-covered university campus with a heavy heart. Drifting flakes spiralled down around him from the steely grey sky. He pulled his coat collar up around his neck. Through a gap in the squat buildings that formed a wide square around the edges of the campus he could see the road in the distance, and the university parking lot and taxi-rank. A couple of taxis were standing by, their roofs and windows dusted with snow.

He breathed a deep sigh and headed that way. A plane roared deafeningly overhead, taking off from the nearby airport. He’d be there in ten minutes, killing time before his flight out of here.

She burst out of the double doors and into the falling snow, and looked across the campus from the top of
the steps. Her eyes settled on a figure in the distance, and she instantly knew it was him. He was almost at the taxi-rank. The driver was out of the car, opening the rear door for him. She knew that if he got into that car, she’d never see him again.

She yelled his name, but her voice was drowned out by the sudden thunder of a 747 flying low over Carleton, the red maple-leaf Air Canada symbol on its tailplane.

He hadn’t heard her.

She ran, slipping in the snow in her indoor shoes. She felt the icy wind cooling the hot tears on her face. She yelled his name again, and in the distance the tiny figure tensed and froze.

‘Ben! Don’t go!
‘He heard her shout, far away behind him, and shut his eyes. There was a note of something like desperation, almost a scream of pain, in her voice that made his throat tighten. He slowly turned to see her running towards him across the empty square, her arms open wide, footprints tracing a weaving line behind her in the snow.

‘You coming, mister?’ asked the taxi driver.

Ben didn’t reply. His hand was resting on the edge of the car door. He sighed and pushed the door shut. ‘Looks like I’m staying a while longer.’

The taxi driver grinned, following Ben’s gaze. ‘Looks like you are, mister.’

With a flood of emotions, Ben turned and walked towards the approaching figure. His walk quickened into a trot and then a run. He had tears in his eyes as he called her name.

They came together at the edge of the square, and she flew into his arms.

He spun her round and round. There were snowflakes in her hair.

THE END