Billy glowered, wrinkling his whole face. It was almost theatrical, and Aleksey wanted to laugh, but there wasn’t time. ‘The causeway. Hurry.’ He began to pull him along.
Billy’s grimace of fury about his boat turned into a stubborn, ‘Billy don’t run.’ He sped up however, when another shot rang out. Aleksey glanced back at a dark figure coming after them. For the first time, he realised the significance of what the man had said:I don’t want to kill him...
They got down from the rocks onto the sand. He felt incredibly exposed on the flat track, an easy target. He said urgently, as he hurried the other man along, ‘He’s trying to killme, Billy. Notyou. If he gets me, you must run. Do you know the bookshop on St Mary’s?’
‘Billy don’t read. Silly books is.’
‘But do you know it?’
Billy pouted but nodded. Aleksey glanced behind. ‘Go there and tell the women in there that you needBen Rider. She’ll help you. Do you remember Ben?’
‘’e don’t like Marmite, do ’e?’
It was not how most people remembered Ben, but it would do. He could not believe how slowly they seemed to be going. ‘Yes. The bookshop. Ben Rider. Promise me.’
‘Cross my heart and ‘ope to die.’
Something loomed ahead of them in the dark.
Simon had reached the sand. He was sauntering.
It was time to make a stand.
He knelt by Billy, stilling him. The little old man was badly out of breath, wheezing, struggling badly. He glanced uneasily behind them and said once more, ‘Bad man.’
‘Keep going, Billy. I’m going to stay here and stop him. Go.’ He gave him a push. Billy resisted, but then he fished in his bundle and pulled something out, thrusting it into his hands.
‘For you. Present.’
‘Bookshop, Ben Rider. Run.’
‘He’s calledSlinky Snake.’
‘What?’
Simon was quite visible now, about a hundred yards away, still walking slowly, apparently realising Billy was slowing him up. But he appeared reluctant to risk another shot with them so close together.
Apparently satisfied that he’d handed over his precious toy safely, Billy turned and began to walk towards Benhar.
As soon as he was a few feet away, a shot rang out. Aleksey felt a sting against his leg, but turned to the big sea tractor, which had loomed out of the dark at them and climbed around to its far side, out of sight of the pursuing man.
‘What good do you think that will do, Sir Nikolas? I have a gun. You have a sword. I think even a man like you can work out those odds.’
‘I’m not the one who got pushed off a roof with a broom.’
‘Touché. Not my finest moment.’
The voice was coming closer.
Aleksey shifted cautiously down the side of the tractor away from the causeway and then came to the gaping opening at the back. It was dark inside, but he did not want to get trapped in there.
‘Make this easy on yourself.’
He replayed the previous few months and could not resist replying, ‘You are really not taxing me that much. Annoying me, I’ll grant you…’ He heard something rattling and assumed Simon was climbing, so he lowered himself softly into the water, which came over his knees and ducked beneath the huge axel. It was rusty and draped with the long seaweed. It looked as if it could harbour many things in its thick sliminess. But now it concealed him.
He could see into the cabin to his left through a hole which had been cut into the underside, presumably for drainage when waves overtook the vehicle.
He tracked the other man’s progress by the noise he was making clambering around, searching for him. He needed to get him into the open to effectively make use of the sword, but this would leave him vulnerable to the weapon Simon had. The more he made the man delay, however, the closer Billy would be to safety.
