Macron had settled on his plan. It was absurdly simple. He had reconnoitred the house and understood the layout perfectly. A wide-open window led to the back of the Maset. He would wait for Sabir and Alexi to show themselves and then he would pass through it, counting on their voices – and the eye-man’s concentration on them – to mask the sound of his movements. The minute he had a clear sight of the eye-man he would take him out – a shot to the right shoulder ought to do it.
For Macron wanted his day in court. It wouldn’t be enough just to kill the eye-man – he wanted the bastard to suffer. Just as he had suffered with his feet. And his back. And his neck. And the muscle at the top of his buttock that had been crushed by the car seat and which ticked incessantly since the accident – particularly when he was attempting to drift off to sleep.
He wanted the eye-man to suffer all the tiny humiliations of bureaucratic procedure that he, Macron, had to suffer in his position as a junior police officer. All the stone walls and the Chinese whispers and the unintentionally intentional mortifications. He wanted the eye-man to rot for thirty years in a ten foot by six foot jail cell and to come out an old man, with no friends, no future and with his health in tatters.
Sabir had been telling the truth after all. This was a crisis. The girl was obviously on her last legs. She was swinging around like a rag doll on a light bracket. She couldn’t possibly hold out for the twenty-five minutes necessary for the CRS to land a helicopter the full kilometre and a half away from the Maset needed for effective sound containment – and then to hurry into position.
This had become his call. He was the man the service had in place. Any hesitation would only lead to tragedy.
Macron squatted down beside Sabir and Alexi. He checked the loads in his pistol, enjoying the feeling of power it gave him over the other two men. ‘Give me three minutes to get round to the back of the house and then show yourselves. But don’t come within the eye-man’s range. Stay near the trees and tantalise him. Draw him out. I want him framed against the front door.’
‘If you see him, will you take him out? Not hesitate? The man’s a psychopath. He’ll kill Yola without a second thought. God alone knows what he’s put her through already.’
‘I’ll shoot. I’ve done it before. It wouldn’t be the first time. Our part of Paris is no nursery. There are shootings nearly every day.’
Macron’s words didn’t ring true somehow – Sabir couldn’t quite get himself to believe in them. There was something fervid about the man – something just a little fake. As though he were a civilian who had wandered into a police operation and had decided, off the cuff, to act the part of a participating officer simply for the Hell of it. ‘Are you sure Captain Calque’s okayed this?’
‘I’ve just this moment called him. I’ve explained that a further wait might be fatal. My back-up are still a good fifteen minutes away. Anything could happen in that time. Are you with me on this?’
‘I say go in now.’ Alexi pushed himself up on his knees. ‘Look at her. I can’t bear watching this anymore.’
Given the tenor of Alexi’s words and the urgency of the situation confronting them, Sabir decided to ditch his reservations too. ‘All right, then. We’ll do as you say.’
‘Three minutes. Give me three minutes.’ Macron slithered through the undergrowth towards the back of the Maset.