The Valley on Longing 24

‘Bloody hell, Jack,’ Isobel swore when she reached the living room doorway and saw the mess there. ‘That sergeant and his cronies did this?’ she asked, looking around the room. ‘Uh huh.’ Jack nodded. ‘I think they thought I might have Amy hidden in the sofa or something,’ he said, without showing any concern over the damage that had been done to his things. ‘It’s not that had been done to his things. ‘It’s not that bad really, they could have done worse - his laptop, which was the thing that mattered the most to him, was still intact, even if very little else was. ‘Cleaning up can wait ‘til morning, though, right now, all I want is a painkiller big enough to numb an elephant, and some food; I’m gonna make a fry - up, you want one?’ Isobel looked at her friend as though he had gone crazy. ‘How on earth can you think this isn’t that bad?’ she wanted to know. ‘The only way this could be worse, is if they actually set off a bomb. I don’t care what you say, we’re suing them for this, this and your injuries. If this is what it looks like in here, I hate to think what the rest of the place is like,’ she said, more to herself than to Jack. ‘I don’t suppose you’ve got a camera around here, have you?’ ‘What’s the matter with the camera on your phone?’ Jack asked, his voice harsher than he intended. ‘Sorry. It was in the desk, so it could be anywhere now, assuming the cops didn’t take it in the hopes of finding some evidence on it. ‘He looked around at the mess on the floor surrounding his desk, the majority of which had either been in or on the desk prior to the visit from the police. ‘If it’s somewhere in amongst that lot, it’s probably best if I leave it there,’ Isobel remarked. ‘I don’t want anything moved ‘til I’ve had a chance to take pictures of the mess that Sergeant Mitchell and his men have made. This is probably going to be the easiest lawsuit I’ve ever had to deal with, it’s like they were trying to give us everything we could need to sue them.’ Jack was glad that if there was going to be a lawsuit, it was going to be an easy one’ he knew from watching his ex w - wife when she handled such cases just how difficult they could get. ‘Did you want anything to eat?’ he asked from the doorway. Isobel didn’t answer straight away, she was distracted by fiddling with her phone. Once she was ready with the camera function, though, she realised what it was Jack had said. ‘Please. You couldn’t get us a drink as well, could you?’ ‘Sure, a glass of wine?’ Jack was not a wine drinker, he preferred ciders or spirits, but he always kept a bottle of red and a bottle of white in the house for guests. Jack produced the glass of wine - white - almost immediately, but it took a good half an hour or so for him to put together a fry - up for himself, and another for Isobel. When he entered the living room with the two plates, he found Isobel still taking photographs. ‘Alright, get your top off.’ Jack froze just inside the living room. ‘I beg your pardon.’ ‘Get your top off, Isobel repeated. ‘I’ve done everything in the house - this room’s the worst, by a fair margin, but they didn’t spare any room in the place, they’re all a mess, so now it’s your turn. If we’re going to nail Sergeant Mitchell, and the police, as fully as they deserve to be, we need pictures of what was done to you.’ ‘Can’t it at least wait ‘til we’ve eaten?’ Jack asked. He looked around for somewhere to put the plates down, and for somewhere to sit, that was when he saw the movement outside the window. He reacted instantly, shouting, ‘Get down.’ The plates he was holding, along with the food they contained, went up in the air as he dived for cover; he couldn’t have said how he knew the movement he had seen heralded danger, it was instinct, but his quick reactions saved him, for no sooner had he let go of the plates than the main window of the bay exploded in a crash of thunder. Jack landed alongside what remained of his sofa, which protected him from the shotgun pellets that had shattered the glass - he didn’t realise straight away that it was a shotgun that had caused the noise and the damage - though it didn’t protect him from the fry - ups he had thrown together. A mix of bacon, sausage, mushroom, egg and baked beans rained down on him, messing up his hair and leaving him with baked bean sauce running down his neck. It was only when he looked up from his position on the floor, and saw that Isobel was swaying on her feet and covered in blood - blood which couldn’t have been caused by the window because none of the fragments of glass had reached them - that Jack put together what he had seen and heard. He scrambled to his feet and launched himself at Isobel so he could protect her, since she didn’t seem able to protect herself. He crashed into her just as that shotgun went off again, and he felt a wave of pain sweep over him that was unrelated to the injuries he had received at the hands of Sergeant Mitchell and his constables. He ignored the pain and focused on making sure that Isobel was safe. He saw straight away that his friend was in bad shape, she had been struck many times by the pellets fired from the shotgun - covered in blood as she was, it was impossible to tell how many of the pellets had hit her, or where she had been hit. Her breathing was shallow, and her skin was pale beneath its Mask of blood, worst of all, the blood on her lips bubbled and frothed in a way that made Jack fear she had been hit in the lungs; whatever other injuries she might have, the possibility of a punctured lung worried him the most and he reached into his pocket for his mobile phone.

Goosebumps stood out on the exposed flesh of Mitchell’s arm as he stared skyward, watching the lights from the helicopter disappear into the distance. Once it had vanished from sight, bearing Jack and Isobel away to the hospital in the nearest city from Doring Draad. Mitchell refocused his attention on things a little closer to home, namely on Louise Hawkins, who was standing next to him - she showed no sign of being affected by the cool night air, but she was wearing a dressing gown that covered her from her neck to her feet, so he didn’t see why she should be, unlike him; he had rushed out of the house in such a hurry he had forgotten to grab either a jumper or a jacket. ‘Will you be alright if we talk about what happened?’ Mitchell asked. There wasn’t much to talk about, based on what he had seen when he took a quick look around, being careful not to get in the way of the paramedics as they worked on Jack Wild and his lawyer; it was clear to him what had happened, and after the conversation he had - had with Cecil Wright following the release of Jack Wild, he could easily guess who was responsible for the attempt on Wild’s life. Before he could do anything about the situation, though, he needed to know what Louise had seen and heard. ‘If you’d prefer, we can leave it ‘til morning, but I think it might be better if we do this while everything is fresh in your mind.’ Louise thought about it for a couple of seconds before responding. ‘I don’t imagine I will be able to sleep much for the rest of the night, not after this, so you might as well ask your questions now. Would you like a cup of tea?’ She started up the path to her front door without waiting for an answer, leaving the sergeant with no choice but to follow her. ‘Thank you.’ Mitchell accepted the cup of tea Louise brought him, and lifted it straight to his lips. The first sip was hot enough to burn on its way down his throat, but he put up with that, it was a small price to pay for the warmth that spread through him for the fist time since receiving the call about the attack On Jack Wild. ‘Do you think you could tell me what happened tonight, from the beginning?’ ‘Of course.’ Louise took a moment to sip at her own tea, and then she began. ‘I went to bed at my usual time, about ten o’clock, and read for a little bit, then I put my head down. I dropped off almost straight away - I’ve never had a problem getting to sleep, but it seems as though the older I get, the harder it is for me to stay asleep; the slightest little thing wakes me up. I hadn’t been asleep for more than an hour when I woke up; I heard a car pass the house and stop next door; I guessed that it must be MR Wild getting home, but as easy as it is for me to wake up, it isn’t as easy for me to get out of bed.’ Louise’s face took on a look that suggested she wished she had back the mobility of her youth. ‘I had barely made it back into bed and gotten my head down on the pillow, at least that’s how it seemed, the clock on my bedside table said about half an hour had passed, when I heard the shotgun blasts next door.’ ‘You knew what the noises were straight away?’ Mitchell asked. Louise looked at the sergeant with something akin to disgust. ‘Of course I did,’ she said. ‘You Can’t live your whole life in the countryside without knowing a shotgun when you hear it.’ Mitchell accepted that with a quick nod; he could hardly deny the truth of what Louise had said, he hadn’t grown up in the country as she had, but twenty plus years of living there did make him sure he would recognise a shotgun when he heard one being fired. ‘So you heard the shotgun, how many times was it fired?’ ‘Twice.’ ‘What happened after that?’ ‘I struggled out of bed and made my way over the window. I was hoping to see who had been shooting, and at what, though after Ollie’s little escapade last night I was reasonably certain what, or rather who, was being shot at.’ Louise paused in her narrative to sip at her tea; only when it was finished did she put her cup down and resume speaking. ‘By the time I made it to the window, though, they were gone. Since I was concerned about MR WILD, struggled into my dressing gown and headed next door to make sure he was alright. Thank goodness Mr Wild was able to remain conscious long enough to call for an ambulance; who knows how long it would have been before help was on the way if they had had to wait for me to find them.’ ‘Yes, very fortunate,’ Mitchell said. ‘You said you didn’t see the person who fired the shots, I take it that means you can’t tell me anything about the person who tried to kill Mr Wild.’ He Didn’t even consider the possibility that Jack’s lawyer might have been the intended target. ‘I’m afraid not, sorry.’ Louise felt more than a little bad that her lack of speed had prevented her seeing anything that might be of help. ‘Do you think it might have been Ollie again?’ He already tried to hurt Mr Wild once, and he’s never been the sort to let up on a grudge.’ ‘He would have been my number one choice,’ Mitchell admitted. ‘But he couldn’t have done it, he’s still unconscious in hospital after last night’s adventure; I would have been notified if he’s woken up.’ He sighed briefly, as though annoyed that Louise couldn’t tell him anything. ‘You didn’t see anything, but is it possible you heard something that might help me to figure out who tried to kill Mr Wild?’ he asked. ‘You mean like a car or something?’ Louise shook her head when Mitchell nodded. ‘Sorry, no, I didn’t hear anything, other than the two shots. I didn’t hear a car after Mr Wild got home, either coming or going, and I’m pretty sure I would have.’ It took Mitchell a few seconds to realise the implication of what Louise had just said. “Whoever did this must have walked here,’ he said. ‘Not that I suppose that means all that much - it wouldn’t take long for someone to get here on foot, even from the other side of the village.’ He sighed again. ‘Do you suppose Barry might have seen or heard anything?’ he asked, referring to Louise’s neighbour on the other side from Jack Wild. ‘I guess anything’s possible,’ Louise said. “I wouldn’t be too hopeful, though; Barry’s deaf as a door knob, I doubt if he had any idea anything was going on until you turned up with your siren going.’ ‘Surely he would have heard the blasts from the shotgun.’ Mitchell couldn’t see how Barry Whistlemore would have heard the siren if he didn’t hear the noise from the shotgun Louise offered an uncertain shrug. Mitchell banged noisily on the door, and then stepped back to wait impatiently. When almost a minute passed without a response, he hammered on the door again with his fist. Cecil Wright yanked open the door, ready to yell at whoever had disturbed his sleep, but the words froze on his lips when he saw who was on the doorstep. ‘Venter, what’s going on?’ he wanted to know….