doctor let go of Simon McLeod’s waist and grabbed his ankles, trying to pin them to the table and failing – he was just too big for her.
‘Bugger this!’ Logan tightened his grip on Simon’s wrist and yanked, pulling Simon off the examination table and onto the floor. He crashed into the linoleum, and Logan twisted, forcing him over onto his ruined face.
The doctor tried to drag Logan off. ‘What the hell are you doing? He’s been seriously injured!’
Logan stuck a foot on Simon McLeod’s shoulder and shoved, keeping the arm fully stretched out and twisted round. ‘You want me to let him go?’
She paused for a second. ‘No. Stay there!’ She hurried out through the curtain and was back thirty seconds later with a hypodermic syringe and a small glass vial of clear liquid.
She threw the syringe cover onto the floor, drew a hefty measure from the vial, then stepped in close to Logan. ‘Hold him still…’ She yanked Simon’s shirt sleeve back, smacked his wrist a couple of times, and slid the needle in.
Slowly the struggling began to fade. One kick. Two. The fingers clenched and unclenched. And then Simon McLeod went limp.
Which was when three burly men in hospital security uniforms burst in through the curtains.
The doctor dropped the used syringe in a yellow sharps bin, then gave the new arrivals a slow handclap. ‘Oh yes, well done. Very good. We could all be dead by now.’
One of the guards shrugged. ‘Fight in the maternity ward – some bloke turned up to see his kid. The mother’s husband wasn’t very happy about it.’
‘You think Doctor Patel’s happy about the state of his goolies?’ She pointed at her groaning colleague. ‘You’re lucky I was next door, or he’d be a eunuch by now.’ Then she asked Logan to help her get Simon McLeod’s unconscious body back onto the examination table.
‘Is he going to be OK?’
‘I doubt it.’ The doctor peeled back the gauze dressing they’d put on in the ambulance, exposing the top half of Simon’s face. Then winced. ‘Both eyes are gone and the optic nerve’s been burnt. He’s blind. Probably in a great deal of pain. All we can do is clean his wounds, keep him sedated, and hope he doesn’t get an infection.’
Five minutes later, Logan followed the doctor through to the next cubicle, where DI Steel was sitting up on the examination table, wobbling slightly. The doctor pulled out a tiny torch and shone it in Steel’s eyes, flicking the light away, then back again. ‘OK,’ she said, ‘can you tell me who the Prime Minister is?’
‘Is it…? I can picture him…’ Steel scrunched her face up, lips moving silently for a moment. ‘Whatsisname – slimy, lying tosspot…?’ As if that narrowed it down.
‘Well, you’ve definitely got a concussion.’ The doctor felt around the back of Steel’s head with a latex-gloved hand. ‘Probably going to have one hell of a lump tomorrow, but nothing’s broken. We’ll keep you in overnight for observation, OK?’
Steel frowned again. ‘Is it Margaret Thatcher?’
‘I’ll give you something for the headache.’ She turned to Logan, ‘Do you want to contact her next of kin? Let them know where she is.’
‘I’ll give Susan a call. Get her to bring in some—’
‘Next of kin!’ Steel hopped down from the table. ‘We—oops!’ Her legs gave way and the doctor grabbed her. Steel kissed her on the cheek. ‘Is that a stethoscope in your pocket, or are you just pleased to see me?’
‘Maybe we should sedate you?’
The inspector tugged at Logan’s sleeve. ‘We need to tell McLeod’s next of kin.’
‘I’ll get someone on it when I get back to the station.’
She shook her head, and nearly collapsed again. ‘You do it. I’m no’ trusting one of Finnie’s monkeys: they’ll screw it up.’ She snapped her fingers. ‘Tony Blair!’
The doctor steered her towards the wheelchair in the corner. ‘Nice try, but no cigar. Come on, we’ll get you into bed.’
‘Ooh, saucy. I love a woman in uniform.’
Logan held the curtain open for them, watching as the doctor wheeled Steel away. The inspector flapped her arms and tried to turn around in her seat. ‘Laz! Laz – look after my car, OK? It’s parked round the back of … thingy. You know: the place we work?’ And then she was round the corner and out of sight, laughing like something out of a Carry On film.
But Logan didn’t have anything to laugh about – not if he had to tell Colin McLeod someone had mutilated his brother.
‘Ah…’ Rory Simpson looked up at the camera bolted to the wall of the interview room. ‘That wasn’t what I meant.’
Logan sat back in his seat and folded his arms. ‘You said you saw them!’
‘Heat of the moment. I got caught up in all the excitement: high-speed chase, the sirens… Being handcuffed bent double like that, blood must have rushed to my head.’
Rory had developed amnesia the moment he’d overheard some idiot talking about what had happened to Simon McLeod and the other victims.
‘Do you have any idea how important this is? People are being—’
‘Suppose I had seen them – and I’m not saying I did – but suppose I had. What do you think they’d do to me if they found out I’d identified them?’ He ran a hand across his bushy grey moustache. ‘I’m rather attached to my eyes. I need them for looking at stuff.’
‘Rory, we can stop them. But we need to know what they look like.’
‘Can’t you…’ He waved his hands around. ‘You know, DNA, fingerprints, that kind of thing.’
‘They were wearing gloves.’ Logan scooted his chair closer to the interview table. ‘We can protect you. Make sure they can’t lay a hand on you.’
Silence.
‘Hmmm…’ Rory pursed his lips and stared at the camera again. ‘And would it make you forget all about our little … misunderstanding at the school this morning?’
‘You mean when you were trying to coax little kids into your car with drugs?’
Rory actually blushed. ‘Well, it might have looked like that, but—’
‘Were you shopping for yourself, or someone else?’
This time the awkward pause stretched out for almost a minute. ‘I … I don’t know what you mean.’
‘Don’t play dumb, Rory. We know someone’s in the market for young “livestock” – we’ve
