“Ah! Enter Heimdallr, heir to the throne of the Norse Gods,” Joe muttered.

“Prussian father, but raised in America, remember.”

“They’re after world domination.”

“Continued world domination,” Kingston corrected.

“How did you get in so deep, Cornelius? I remember you speaking those lines of Mark Antony’s:

Then I, and you, and all of us fell down,

Whilst bloody treason flourished over us.

You saw it for what it was.”

“And I saw myself as that traitor—unless I was slick enough to pull out before I hit the buffers. I went along with them to get to the bottom of it. I figured I was always going to be a sacrifice. No way out for me from the moment I had an inkling of what they were about. I thought I’d take down as many of them as I could. Useless to pick them off one at a time. Might as well chop the head off the Hydra. Another one grows straight back in its place. The Nine-Headed Hydra! The Nine Men. They’d just elect another rich crook to join their game. They probably have a waiting list.”

“A Herculean task all right.”

“And Hercules has the answer. Don’t hack ’em off one at a time. Set the field on fire when the wind’s in a favourable direction and burn up the body. I planned that when the right moment came I’d tell the president what was intended. By then I’d have names and proof of conspiracy.

“I have them!” He turned to Joe the strained martyr’s face he’d seen before. “I have a feeling I’ll go down in the same bonfire I’m planning but, by God, I’ll set a match to this load of infected lumber! Just make sure there’s an ocean between us when I start playing with fire, Joe. This knowledge you have is damn dangerous but—not knowing—that might be even worse. I figured you’re a man who’d rather look a monster in the face.”

“Hold tight, Cornelius! You did the right thing. The only thing. But now you have to get back and blow the gaffe at once. Tell the president the whole filthy tale. Give him all the names you have, no matter how unlikely they may sound. He has to know. There’s nothing more you can do. They may try the same stunt again with some other poor sap holding the gun to the presidential head. At least, if warned, he’ll know what to expect.”

In their earnest conversation, heads together over the table, they hadn’t heard the silent approach.

“Have you paid the bill?” Armitage lowering over them wanted to know.

“Yes,” Joe said.

“Good. Wouldn’t want any waitress coming shrieking after you when you do a runner. Get on your feet and hoof it to those trees over there. We’ve got company. The sort of company we don’t want anywhere near these kids. I’ll watch your back. Either of you armed?”

They shook their heads and Armitage’s eyes gleamed with disdain. “Go!” he said. They went.

A moment later, Colt in hand, he beckoned them to move ahead of him down the path, deeper into the park. In the distance a child screamed with excitement at the pond and the band began to tune up for its afternoon performance. Normality only served to exaggerate their strange situation. “Here, we’ll regroup here,” Bill said.

“Here” was an uncomfortable place to halt and circle the wagons, Joe thought. A stand of elm trees surrounded them in a druidic formation. Thick underbrush beyond on the perimeter could be concealing a platoon. Joe had the uncomfortable feeling of being thrust into an arena. He looked about him trying to locate the danger Armitage was aware of. He found himself doing an awkward little soft shoe shuffle with Kingstone, each trying to get in front of the other as a shield, neither knowing from which direction an attack would come. He would have laughed had he not been alarmed by Armitage’s expression of cold determination. He remembered it from the war. It usually heralded some fearful barrage of noise and shot and a feat of physical prowess on the sergeant’s part. It had been etched on the face that leaned over his wounded body in the mud of Flanders, cursing him for an idiot, before dragging him, under fire, to safety.

“Backs to a tree and keep well away from each other.” Armitage used a gesture of his Colt to indicate the direction in which they should move. A regulation protection procedure but Joe was fighting back an anxiety that threatened to paralyse him. Who was out there? A single gunman or a firing squad? What on earth had spooked Armitage? Was all this defensive posturing necessary? He was about to call his old sergeant to heel when his sharp ears caught a sound on the path behind them. A movement? A footfall on the beaten earth of the path? He strained to listen. The sound was not repeated. But, behind Armitage, a shrub rustled in a stirring of air that seemed not to affect the leaves on the trees above.

Before Joe could call a warning to watch his back, Bill put a finger to his lips, telling him to remain silent. He stood smiling grimly at them. He drew a second gun from his pocket, holding it in his left hand. The spare. Joe recognised it as a .22 pistol. Probably the one he’d used on Natalia. “That’s better. That’s good. Now we won’t be interrupted. I’m going to do something I’ve wanted to do for a long time.”

He moved swiftly towards Kingstone and, deftly reversing the heavy Colt, he smashed it into the man’s face. Kingstone collapsed groaning onto the ground, blood beginning to flow from his mouth and nose. Still conscious, Joe thought, as the eyes flashed up at him briefly in appeal. But badly hurt. He’d been too startled to move his head back with the blow and he’d taken a cruncher.

“What the hell …!” Joe made to dash to the senator’s aid.

“Back off!” The Colt, right way round again, emphasised the command.

“Bugger you, Bill! What are you up to?”

“Carrying out an execution. And you’re going to help. This toe rag’s a traitor. Hadn’t you worked it out? And I thought you were smart! I tried to warn you. My firm’s had their eye on him for months. I’ve been charged with sorting out the problem. On foreign soil for choice. And if a British and highly respected copper finds he has to kill a renegade resisting arrest, there’ll be no comeback for the FBI. This is big, Sandilands and it stinks. More convenient for my government to contain the whole sorry mess and dispose of it well away from home.”

Joe was struggling to make sense of this. “But you saved Kingstone’s life—killing Natalia! If you wanted him dead why not stand back and let her oblige? What are you thinking, you barmy bugger?”

Was that doubt or irritation narrowing the sergeant’s eyes for a moment?

“She jumped the gun. Messed up. He was always my partner, my responsibility. I got my final orders in the hall this morning. He’s done or said something that’s made him surplus to requirements. ‘Kill him within an hour of leaving the conference.’ Those are orders you don’t disobey.”

Joe was bewildered and exasperated. This made no sense. “Of course you do! You’re a man with a mind of your own, not an automaton! What’s happened to you, Bill? Look here—I won’t be involved with your patriotic pigtail-pulling and wrist-slapping!” Joe’s anger was making him reckless. “Get a grip, man!”

“Or what—you’ll put me on latrine duty for a month? Stuff the officer talk. They’re giving you no choice. Here, take this!”

To Joe’s surprise, Armitage held out his Colt.

In his uncertainty, any gun would have felt reassuring in Joe’s grip. He took it, his finger reaching automatically for the trigger and held it down by his side.

“I’ve lent you my Police Positive, Sandilands,” Armitage said. “Your fingerprints will be found all over the stock of the gun that shot the senator. Clear as day. Go on then. It won’t be the first man you’ve killed and you’ll be doing the world a favour. You could do it in the trenches. You can do it now. If you need a reason, I’ll give you one. The best.” The voice lost its challenging flourish and took on the directness of a bayonet thrust as he added: “This piece of shit was planning to assassinate his own president.”