Ratcatcher - By Tim Stevens Page 0,1

the taxi rank, picking up the pace. The crowded streets would slow any taxi to a crawl. He’d get there more quickly on foot.

Message number three, at nine fifty: no words, just a muttered sigh.

Ten o’clock, and Kendrick again, a snarl: ‘Where are you, for Christ’s sake?’

And at ten oh three: ‘Fuck this. I’m going in.’

Manta – whose real name was John Purkiss – closed his eyes for an instant. Then he began to run.

*

Purkiss had worked his way into Spiljak’s confidence over the previous month. He wasn’t, as it happened, particularly interested in Spiljak or his operation. The prize was instead one Nicholas Hoggart, retired officer of the British Secret Intelligence Service, who ran a private security firm in Rijeka. Suspicion had arisen that Hoggart was involved with Spiljak’s outfit and was using to their mutual advantage the knowledge of the local criminal scene and of local law enforcement he had gathered while an active agent. Retired or not, Hoggart was an embarrassment to SIS. That was where Purkiss came in.

Purkiss had chosen the guise of an Italian Swiss, knowing Spiljak spoke the language, as did many Croatians in this part of the country. He’d presented himself as having access to Swiss bank accounts Spiljak couldn’t afford. They had agreed on a deal granting Spiljak and his unnamed partner the use of these accounts in return for a cut of their profits. The unnamed partner was, of course, Hoggart, and Purkiss was supposed to meet them both on Spiljak’s yacht tonight to seal the deal. It would be the only opportunity he’d have to get Spiljak and Hoggart in the same place together, and obtain recorded proof of Hoggart’s involvement in criminal activity. Kendrick’s role was to act as lookout, and to provide backup if needed.

The meeting was scheduled for ten p.m.

Thirteen minutes ago.

*

He was wearing a light linen suit, was towards the lower end of the normal weight range for his height, and hadn’t smoked a cigarette in his life, yet Purkiss felt as though the marina was receding from him as quickly as he approached it. He sucked in the salt air coming off the bay and spewed it back harshly, the sweat slick on his face and sodden in the creases of his clothes where they bunched against the skin. He weaved and dodged and barged through the crowds filtering down the streets between the restaurants, trailing angry cries behind him.

The phone hummed against his hip. Purkiss slipped it out and glanced at the display as he ran. A text message, with an attached photo.

The message was from Vale: Finish up and get back here ASAP. This picture was taken this morning.

He looked at the picture.

Purkiss stopped running.

He was in the middle of the road and a car bore down in a yowl of brake and horn. He leaped forward onto the pavement.

He stood, staring at the picture, his thoughts cold as sweat.

Impossible.

The bustle around him took on a detached quality, as though he were the observer of a documentary film showing on a wrap-around screen.

Vale had it wrong.

At the top of the phone’s screen the time display flicked to ten nineteen.

Purkiss drew a breath and closed his eyes. He shrank the picture and the thoughts and the feelings it evoked into a tiny box in his mind’s eye. Then he sealed the box shut and buried it deep. He felt for the adrenaline wave in his blood, caught it and began to coast on it.

The final run to the water’s edge, and the ground began to level out. Ahead he saw the pier and Spiljak’s boat, a fifteen-metre German model, beginning its slow turn out of its berth towards the open sea.

Purkiss put everything he had into it, palms stiff and straight and arms whipping alternately past his sides and legs pumping, his mind already there and commanding his body to catch up. The end of the pier was twenty metres away, fifteen, five. The boat had turned its back on him and he could see the spume churning at its base. He reached the end and leapt, legs cycling at the air and arms lunging. For an instant he was suspended between pier and boat. Then his torso slammed against the fibreglass of the boat’s stern and his palms slapped the slick surface. He began to slide but caught the upright of the rail, and he gripped it and and hauled himself up on to the deck.

*

Zagorec brought the gun up as Purkiss stepped