Doctor Who_ Warchild - Andrew Cartmel [99]
And there was a desk in front of him with something on it, something big and red and wet, but he didn’t want to look at that, either. He knew these things would just distract him further. Instead he looked out of the window.
There was a window set in one wall and through it he Could see flourishing greenery outside, but he wasn’t out in the country. He wasn’t at the farm. He hadn’t been at the farm for years. His daddy’s old farm. He hadn’t been there for forty or fifty years.
Yet it had seemed so real, the smell of the long wet grass and the rhythmic damp chunking sound of hatchet biting into wood. But, where a moment ago there had been an endless smoky autumn sky, there were now white walls hemming him in. And instead of the long orchards of the farm, there was just a pissy little school garden beyond the window.
The school. That’s where he was. At Christian’s school.
He’d come here to see the principal.
Francis Leemark squeezed his eyes shut to help himself concentrate, to get his bearings. A man had to get his bearings now and then, and what better way to do that than just shut your eyes for a peaceful moment or two? Shut out the busy world and all its gaudy distractions. That’s why the Lord gave you eyelids. Sometimes, when he was driving these days, Francis would get a little confused. Especially in heavy traffic, or when he was driving along a familiar route and he discovered that the damned fools had changed it.
Changed the roads. No wonder a man had to stop now and then in traffic to squeeze his eyes shut and get his bearings.
Ignore those impatient idiots who started honking their horns at him, distracting him just when he was trying to concentrate.
One day he’d reach into the glove compartment to get the gun he carried there, the hand-gun he’d brought back from the Mexican wars. Then he’d teach those young bastards to honk at him. Then they’d be in for a surprise.
One day he’d reach into that glove compartment.
One day he’d do something that would show them all.
Francis Leemark opened his eyes and looked at the sticky ash-tray in his hands. He looked at the amazing bright red stains that had suddenly appeared on the clean white walls of this office. Then he looked at the mashed thing lying face down on the desk.
Slowly a smile formed on his lean, lined old face.
Mr Pangbourne wasn’t saying anything clever now.
Mr Pangbourne wasn’t saying much of anything at all now.
‘And don’t call me pappy,’ said the old man. He dropped the ash-tray on to the carpet with a wet thud and left the office, carefully closing the door behind him.
He nodded to the big fat secretary as he went out. She obviously hadn’t heard a thing. ‘Mr Pangbourne says he ain’t to be disturbed.’
The woman nodded curtly, as if he was saying something perfectly obvious. Big rude, fat girl.
Wolf s father went out of the school by the front entrance, striding out in his military way; there was absolutely no hurry.
He went out to the parking lot and opened the car door.
The car was as hot as an oven after sitting unshaded in the parking lot. He popped open the glove compartment and reached into it, his hand disturbing the still, warm air.
Francis Leemark took out his gun, slammed the car door shut, and turned back towards the school.
Chapter 31
‘Why are we going this way?’ said the stewardess.
Creed frowned with concentration as he steered the armoured car off the concrete podium and down a sloping ramp. A second later they were on the horseshoe-shaped road that encircled the estate.
The big vehicle bumped as it eased off the curb on to the road surface and Creed slowed down for a moment to steer through a narrow stretch between a thick cluster of parked cars.
The twin rows of empty parked cars seemed eerie on the abandoned estate. Either their owners had fled without them or they hadn’t managed to flee at all.
As Creed eased the armoured vehicle through into a clear stretch of road he relaxed and stepped on the accelerator. He glanced back at the stewardess, perched nervously in the navigator’s chair, staring