Whiteout (25 page)

DAISY was shivering so much she could hardly hold the ladder. Elton climbed the rungs, grasping a pair of garden shears in one frozen hand. The exterior lamps shone through the filter of falling snow. Kit watched from the garage door, his teeth chattering. Nigel was in the garage, arms wrapped around the burgundy leather briefcase.

The ladder was propped up against the side of Steepfall. Telephone wires emerged at the corner of the house and ran at roof height to the garage. From there, Kit knew, they connected with an underground pipe that ran to the main road. Severing the cables here would cut off the entire property from telephone contact. It was just a precaution, but Nigel had insisted, and Kit had found ladder and shears in the garage.

Kit felt as if he were in a nightmare. He had known that tonight's work would be dangerous, but in his worst moments he had never anticipated that he would be standing outside his family home while a gangster cut the phone lines and a master thief clutched a case containing a virus that could kill them all.

Elton took his left hand off the ladder, balancing cautiously, and held the shears in both hands. He leaned forward, caught a cable between the blades, pressed the handles together, and dropped the shears.

They landed points-down in the snow six inches from Daisy, who let out a yell of shock.

“Hush!” Kit said in a stage whisper.

“He could have killed me!” Daisy protested.

“You'll wake everyone!”

Elton came down the ladder, retrieved the shears, and climbed up again.

They had to go to Luke and Lori's cottage and take the Toyota Land Cruiser, but Kit knew they could not go immediately. They were nearly falling down with exhaustion. Worse, Kit was not sure he could find Luke's place. He had almost lost his way looking for Steepfall. The snow was falling as hard as ever. If they tried to go on now, they would get lost or die of exposure or both. They had to wait until the blizzard eased, or until daylight gave them a better chance of finding their way. And, to make absolutely sure no one could find out that they were here, they were cutting off the phones.

This time, Elton succeeded in snipping the lines. As he came down the ladder, Kit picked up the loose cable ends, twisted them into a bundle, and draped them against the garage wall where they were less conspicuous.

Elton carried the ladder into the garage and dropped it. It clanged on the concrete floor. “Try not to make so much noise!” Kit said.

Nigel looked around the bare stone walls of the converted stable. “We can't stay here.”

Kit said, “Better in here than out there.”

“We're cold and wet and there's no heat. We could die.”

Elton said, “Bloody right.”

“We'll run the engines of the cars,” Kit said. “That will warm the place.”

“Don't be stupid,” Elton said. “The fumes will kill us long before the heat warms us.”

“We could drive the Ford outside and sit in it.”

Daisy said, “Fuck that. I want a cup of tea and hot food and a dram. I'm going in the house.”

“No!” The thought of these three in his family home filled Kit with horror. It would be like taking mad dogs home. And what about the briefcase with its virulent contents? How could he let them carry that into the kitchen?

Elton said, “I'm with her. Let's go into the house.”

Kit wished bitterly that he had not told them how to cut off the phones. “But how would I explain you?”

“They'll all be asleep.”

“And if it's still snowing when they get up?”

Nigel said, “Here's what you say. You don't know us. You met us on the road. Our car is stuck in a snowdrift a couple of miles away. You took pity on us and brought us back here.”

“They aren't supposed to know I've left the house!”

“Say you went out for a drink.”

Elton said, “Or to meet a girl.”

Daisy said, “How old are you, anyway? You need to ask Daddy before you can go out at night?”

It infuriated Kit to be condescended to by a thug like Daisy. “It's a question of what they'll believe, you brain-dead gorgon. Who would be daft enough to go out in a snowstorm and drive miles for a drink, when there's plenty of booze in the house anyway?”

She retorted, “Someone daft enough to lose a quarter of a million pounds at blackjack.”

“You'll think of a plausible story, Kit,” said Nigel. “Let's get inside, before our fucking feet drop off.”

“You left your disguises in the van. My family will see your real faces.”

“It doesn't matter. We're just unfortunate stranded motorists. There'll be hundreds like us, it will be on the news. Your family won't connect us with the people who robbed the laboratory.”

“I don't like it,” Kit said. He was scared of defying these three criminals, but desperate enough to do it. “I'm not taking you into the house.”

“We're not asking your permission,” Nigel said contemptuously. “If you don't show us the way, we'll find it ourselves.”

What they did not understand, Kit thought despairingly, was that his family were all very smart. Nigel, Elton, and Daisy would have difficulty fooling them. “You don't
look
like a group of innocent people who got stranded.”

“What do you mean?” Nigel said.

“You're not the average Scots family,” Kit told him. “You're a Londoner, Elton's black, and Daisy's a bloody psychopath. My sisters may notice that.”

“We'll just be polite and not say much.”

“Say nothing at all would be the best plan. Any rough stuff and the game will be up.”

“Of course. We want them to think we're harmless.”

“Especially Daisy.” Kit turned to her. “You keep your hands to yourself.”

Nigel backed Kit. “Yeah, Daisy, try not to give the bloody game away. Act like a girl, just for a couple of hours, okay?”

She said, “Yeah, yeah,” and turned away.

Kit realized that at some point in the argument he had given in. “Shit,” he said. “Just remember that you need me to show you where the Land Cruiser is. If any harm comes to my family, you can forget it.”

With a fatalistic feeling that he was helpless to stop himself hurtling toward disaster, he led them around the house to the back door. It was unlocked, as always. As he opened it, he said, “All right, Nellie, it's me,” so that the dog would not bark.

When he entered the boot lobby, warm air washed over him like a blessing. Behind him, he heard Elton say, “Oh, God, that's better.”

Kit turned and hissed, “Keep your voices down, please!” He felt like a schoolteacher trying to quiet heedless children in a museum. “The longer they stay asleep, the easier it will be for us, don't you see that?” He led them through the lobby and into the kitchen. “Be nice, Nellie,” he said quietly. “These are friends.”

Nigel patted Nellie, and the dog wagged her tail. They took off their wet coats. Nigel stood the briefcase on the kitchen table and said, “Put the kettle on, Kit.”

Kit put down his laptop and turned on the small TV set on the kitchen counter. He found a news channel, then filled the kettle.

A pretty newsreader said, “An unexpected change in the prevailing wind has brought a surprise blizzard to most of Scotland.”

Daisy said, “You can say that again.”

The newsreader spoke in a seductive voice, as if inviting the viewer back to her place for a nightcap. “In some parts, more than twelve inches of snow fell in as many hours.”

“I'll give you twelve inches in some parts,” said Elton.

They were relaxing, Kit saw with trepidation. He felt even more tense than before.

The newsreader told of car accidents, blocked roads, and abandoned vehicles. “To hell with all that,” Kit said irately. “When's it going to stop?”

“Make the tea, Kit,” said Nigel.

Kit put out mugs, a sugar bowl, and a jug of milk. Nigel, Daisy, and Elton sat around the scrubbed-pine table, just like family. The kettle boiled. Kit made a pot of tea and a
cafetière
of coffee.

The television picture changed, and a weather forecaster appeared in front of a chart. They all went quiet. “Tomorrow morning the blizzard will die away as quickly as it came,” he said.

“Yes!” Nigel said triumphantly.

“The thaw will follow before midday.”

“Be precise!” Nigel said in exasperation. “What time before midday?”

“We can still make it,” Elton said. He poured tea and added milk and sugar.

Kit shared his optimism. “We should leave at first light,” he said. Seeing the way ahead cheered him up.

“I hope we can,” Nigel said.

Elton sipped his tea. “By the cringe, that's better. Lazarus must have felt like this when he was raised from the dead.”

Daisy stood up. She opened the door to the dining room and peered into the gloom. “What room is this?”

Kit said, “Where do you think you're going?”

“I need a shot of booze in this tea.” She turned on the light and went in. A moment later, she made a triumphant noise, and Kit heard her opening the cocktail cabinet.

Kit's father walked into the kitchen from the hall, wearing gray
pajamas and a black cashmere dressing gown. “Good morning,” he said. “What's all this?”

“Hello, Daddy,” Kit said. “Let me explain.”

Daisy came in from the dining room holding a full bottle of Glenmorangie in her gloved hand.

Stanley raised his eyebrows at her. “Do you want a glass of whisky?” he said.

“No, thanks,” she replied. “I've got a whole bottle here.”

TONI called Stanley at home as soon as she had a spare moment. There was nothing he could do, but he would want to know what was happening. And she did not want him to learn about the break-in from the news.

It was a conversation she dreaded. She had to tell him that she was responsible for a catastrophe that could ruin his life. How would he feel about her after that?

She dialed his number and got the “disconnected” tone. His phone must be out of order. Perhaps the snow had brought down the lines. She was relieved not to have to give him the dreadful news.

He did not carry a mobile, but there was a phone in his Ferrari. She dialed that and left a message. “Stanley, this is Toni. Bad news—a break-in at the lab. Please call my mobile as soon as you can.” He might not get the message until it was too late, but at least she had tried.

She stared impatiently out of the windows of the Great Hall. Where were the police with their snowplow? They would be coming from the south, from Inverburn, on the main road. She guessed that the plow traveled at about fifteen miles per hour, depending on the depth of snow it had to clear. The trip should take twenty or thirty minutes. It should be here by now. Come on, come on!

She hoped it would leave here almost immediately, and get on the northward track of the Hibernian Telecom van. The van would be easy to spot, with the name in large white letters on a dark background.

But the thieves might have thought of that, she realized suddenly. They had probably planned to switch vehicles soon after leaving the Kremlin.
That was how she would have done it. She would have picked a nondescript car, something like a Ford Fiesta that looked like a dozen other models, and left it in a car park, outside a supermarket or a railway station. The thieves would drive straight to the car park and be in a completely different vehicle a few minutes after leaving the scene of the crime.

The thought dismayed her. How then would the police identify the thieves? They would have to check every car and see whether the occupants were three men and a woman.

She wondered agitatedly whether there was anything she could do to hurry the process. Assuming the gang had switched vehicles somewhere near here, what were the possibilities? They needed a location where a vehicle might be parked for several hours without attracting attention. There were no railway stations or supermarkets in the vicinity. What was there? She went to the reception desk and got a notepad and ballpoint pen. She made a list:

• Inverburn Golf Club
  
• Dew Drop Inn
  
• Happy Eater
  
• Greenfingers Garden Centre
  
• Scottish Smoked Fish Products
  
• Williams Press (Printing & Publishing)
  

She did not want Carl Osborne to know what she was doing. Carl had returned from his car to the warmth of the hall, and was listening to everything. Unknown to him, he could no longer phone from the car—Steve had sneaked out and taken the keys from the ignition—but all the same, Toni was taking no chances.

She spoke quietly to Steve. “We're going to do some detective work.” She tore her sheet of paper into two and gave half to Steve. “Ring these places. Everything's closed, of course, but you should find a caretaker or security guard. Tell them we've had a robbery, but don't say what's missing. Say the getaway vehicle may have been abandoned on their premises. Ask if they can see a Hibernian Telecom van outside.”

Steve nodded. “Smart thinking—maybe we can get on their trail and give the police a head start.”

“Exactly. But don't use the desk phone, I don't want Carl to hear. Go to the far end of the hall, where he can't eavesdrop. Use the mobile you took from him.”

Toni moved well away from Carl and took out her mobile. She called information and got the number for the golf club. She dialed and waited. The phone rang for more than a minute, then a sleepy voice answered: “Yes? Golf club. Hello?”

Toni introduced herself and told the story. “I'm trying to locate a van with ‘Hibernian Telecom' on its side. Is it in your car park?”

“Oh, I get you, the getaway vehicle, aye.”

Her heart missed a beat. “It's there?”

“No, at least it wasn't when I came on duty. There's a couple of cars here, mind you, left by gentlemen who found themselves reluctant to drive by the end of lunch yesterday, do you know what I mean?”

“When did you come on duty?”

“Seven o'clock in the evening.”

“Could a van have parked there since then? Perhaps at about two o'clock this morning?”

“Well, maybe . . . I've no way of telling.”

“Could you have a look?”

“Aye, I could look!” He spoke as if it were an idea of startling originality. “Hold the line, I'll just be a minute.” There was a knock as he put the phone down.

Toni waited. Footsteps receded and returned.

“No, I don't think there's a van out there.”

“Okay.”

“The cars are all covered in snow, mind you, so you can't see them properly. I'm not even sure which is mine!”

“Yes, thank you.”

“But a van, you see, would be higher than the rest, wouldn't it? So it would stand out. No, there's no van there.”

“You've been very helpful. I appreciate it.”

“What did they steal?”

Toni pretended not to hear the question, and hung up. Steve was talking and clearly had not yet struck gold. She dialed the Dew Drop Inn.

The phone was answered by a cheerful young man. “Vincent speaking, how may I help you?”

Toni thought he sounded like the kind of hotel employee who seems eager to please until you actually ask for something. She went through her routine again.

“There are lots of vehicles in our car park—we're open over Christmas,” Vincent told her. “I'm looking at the closed-circuit television monitor, but I don't see a van. Unfortunately, the camera doesn't cover the entire car park.”

“Would you mind going to the window and having a good look? It's really important.”

“I'm quite busy, actually.”

At this time of night? Toni did not voice the thought. She adopted a sweetly considerate tone and said, “It will save the police making a trip to interview you, you see.”

That worked. He did not want his quiet night shift disrupted by squad cars and detectives. “Just hold on.” He went away and came back.

“Yes, it's here,” he said.

“Really?” Toni was incredulous. It seemed a long time since she had enjoyed a piece of luck.

“Ford Transit van, blue, with ‘Hibernian Telecom' in large white letters on the side. It can't have been there long, because it's not under as much snow as the rest of the cars—that's how come I can see the lettering.”

“That's tremendously helpful, thank you. I don't suppose you noticed whether another car is missing—possibly the car they left in?”

“No, sorry.”

“Okay—thanks again!” She hung up and looked across at Steve. “I've found the getaway vehicle!”

He nodded toward the window. “And the snowplow's here.”