‘Coppers. Snooping around.’

‘Coppers!’ he shrieked. He raised the Sten gun. His hands were shaking. ‘What you brought them here for? What are we going to do with them?’

‘I don’t know,’ replied the slim man angrily. He pointed a thumb towards the open door. ‘Tell Eddie. Tell him we’ve got company.’

The big man rushed out of the barn, shaking his head and muttering expletives.

‘What do you want with us,’ Angel said to the man with the Walther.

‘Shut up,’ the man said thrusting the gun into his Angel’s stomach. ‘Don’t you understand plain English?’

Angel’s faced reddened. He could hear his pulse banging away in his ears.

Seconds later, three men and a young woman appeared at the open barn door; they stared open-mouthed at Angel and Gawber. The two heavies with menacing expressions, their stock-in-trade, carried old Sten guns and pointed them at them. The third, an older man with a face as hard as a life sentence, waved another Walther in their general direction.

Angel wished he was anywhere but there. His eyes darted round their sockets. He was seeking and searching for any opportunity to get away.

The older man with the Walther stared angrily at the younger man and said: ‘What you got here, kid? Ox said they are coppers. Are you completely off your trolley?’

‘They were snooping round. I had no choice, Eddie,’ he said.

Angel clocked the name ‘Eddie.’ He remembered the prison photograph of the man in the Police Review. It took only a second to work out that it was the Glazer gang, on the run. It was Eddie ‘The Cat’ Glazer, his wife, Oona, and his younger brother, Tony. He didn’t know the two big men, though he had just heard one of them referred to as ‘Ox’.

The younger brother, Tony, continued: ‘Their car was parked at the farm gate. They were snooping through the hedge at the house.’ There was a whine in his voice. He was clearly afraid of his elder brother.

‘Have you searched them?’ Eddie snapped.

‘How could I? I was on my own. He dropped this,’ Tony said, handing him the mobile which Angel had discarded in the long grass. ‘Thought I hadn’t noticed.’

Angel bit his bottom lip. He didn’t know that Tony Glazer had found it.

Eddie took it, glanced at it then at Angel.

‘Clever copper. I don’t want it,’ he snarled. ‘No use to me!’ he added and threw it angrily into the straw at the back of the barn and glared suspiciously at Angel and then at Gawber.

Angel sighed inwardly. He didn’t like the situation one bit. He hoped that when Waldo White discovered that they weren’t at the rendezvous, that he would hunt around for them, find them and that that would be sooner rather than later.

‘Well bloody well search them then now,’ Eddie yelled. ‘They might be armed, or wired up and telling the world where we are.’

Tony stuck the Walther into his waistband and began to pat Angel down.

Eddie glared at Ox and waved the gun in the direction of Gawber. Ox dropped the Sten so that it hung loose on the strap from his shoulder. He turned Gawber round and began to pat him down.

Tony took out Angel’s wallet, badge and ID card. He passed them to Eddie, who angrily snatched them from him.

Eddie glared at Angel and said, ‘How did you find us, copper?’

‘Fancied rhubarb pie for tea, but there was nobody about, Mr Glazer. You know, you’ll never sell rhubarb if you keep the place shut.’

Eddie glared at him as he fingered roughly through his wallet and ID.

The girl Oona was terrified. Her hands were shaking. Her face was redder than a monkey’s backside. She grabbed Eddie by the arm. ‘He knows who you are! What are we going to do?’ she wailed. ‘What are we going to do?’

‘Shut up. And get off,’ he said, pushing her away. ‘Detective Inspector Angel,’ he said scornfully, reading from the ID. He threw the wallet, badge and ID angrily into the straw behind them. ‘Well, well, well. You’re the smart-arse inspector looking for the murderer of Harry Harrison, aren’t you?’

Angel looked at him.

Eddie pointed to the man tied up with his head bowed. ‘Well there’s your murderer. Spencer’s his name. I’ve done your job for you.’

Angel looked across at the man tied to the post. His eyes were closed. He seemed to be asleep. He hoped he was asleep. Angel had to agree, the man did look a bit like the photograph of Spencer, which Thurrocks, the bank manager had supplied.

‘He and Harrison worked a scam across a rich punter at the Northern Bank called Smith,’ Eddie continued. ‘Harrison got greedy and tried to put one across Spencer. He got wise to it and threatened to cut him up if he didn’t tell him where he’d hidden the money. Harrison refused. Spencer went in a bit too heavy, and Harry died before he told him where he’d hidden it. That’s what he said, anyway. Stabbed him five times.’

Angel pursed his lips. He wondered why Eddie Glazer should be volunteering information so freely. Hard nuts like him never gave information away for nothing.

Ox handed Gawber’s wallet, badge and ID to Eddie. He rummaged through the wallet, read the ID and said, ‘Just another rubbish copper. A bleeding sergeant!’

He angrily threw the wallet, badge and ID into the straw.

Angel’s lips tightened back against his teeth. ‘What have you done to him?’ he said, nodding towards Spencer. ‘He doesn’t look well.’

‘He’ll be all right,’ Eddie said. ‘Just getting over a hangover, that’s all,’ he added with a grin.

Angel turned away. Eddie’s breath smelled. Angel thought he should see a dentist urgently for a scale and polish.

‘What’s he doing tied up?’ Angel said.

‘He’s a murderer. I’ve told you.’

Angel pursed his lips.

‘Does anybody else know you’re here, copper?’

The barrel of the Walther was getting ever nearer; Glazer was waving the gun about like a kid with a flag at a coronation. Angel’s mind was wonderfully concentrated. He knew he could be dead in a second.

‘Of course,’ he said evenly. That was the only reply he could have given. Those few words might help save their lives.

Eddie snarled. It wasn’t the reply he wanted to hear.

‘I don’t believe you,’ he said. ‘You’re just a frigging liar. Say anything to save your skin.’

‘Why did I have a phone in my hand then, Eddie? Did you think I was ordering custard?’ Angel said.

‘Custard?’ Eddie bawled. ‘What yer frigging on about?’

‘To go with the rhubarb,’ Angel said.

Eddie Glazer’s face tightened. He was thinking about what to say.

Ox sighed loudly and growled. ‘Come on. What we going to do with them, Eddie,’ he said gruffly.

‘Yeah. We’re wasting time. We need to get way from here, now,’ Tony yelled.

‘I’m for clearing out,’ Ox growled.

‘We gotta get away from here, Eddie,’ Oona wailed and grabbed his arm.

‘Shut up or I’ll belt you one,’ he snarled and pulled away from her. He pulled a face like a man who remembered the taste of prison hootch. He ran a hand through his greasy hair and swivelled angrily round to face them. ‘All right!’ he bawled. ‘All right!’ Then he added quickly: ‘Oona bring the Merc round to the front. Ox and Kenny, tie these coppers up. Make it good. Tony, stay with them. Keep your gun on them. Then come back to the house. We’ll take just the money and the ammo. Leave everything else. Right, now, all of you, move it!’

Eddie and Oona ran out of the barn.

Tony stood by the open door pointing his gun straight ahead at Angel and Gawber. Ox snatched some pieces of rope from a few lengths hanging from a big hook screwed onto the barn side, no doubt used to tether animals in the past. He tossed a length over to Kenny and they both began tying the wrists of Angel and Gawber around the wooden support posts. They did it roughly, quickly, silently and efficiently. Then they ran out of the barn towards the house. Tony stuffed the gun in his waist band and dashed over to Angel. He went round the back of the post, looked at the fastening and then checked the tightness. He moved over to the next post and checked Gawber, then Spencer in the same way. He seemed satisfied. He took one quick look round, then dashed out of the barn, unhooked the door and closed it.