The taxi rank!

Cadel hurled himself across the road, dodging a motorbike. He didn't look back. He didn't want to know if anyone was chasing him. He focused all his energy on the intersection, the bus shelter, and the taxi rank, which, if his eyes weren't misleading him, had a taxi parked in it.

Cadel scurried towards the taxi, desperately afraid that someone might reach it before he did. That man, for instance a the one in the leather jacket a but no. That man walked right past. Cadel nearly knocked into him, dodged his leather-clad elbow at the last possible instant, and began to wave at the taxi. He didn't think to check whether its 'For Hire' sign was illuminated.

He just yanked open a door and threw himself into the back seat.

'Miss!' the cab driver was saying. 'Miss, I'm on my lunch break a '

'Blacktown!' Cadel gasped, wildly plucking a distant suburb out of his head. He knew, from his long study of the Sydney Rail Network, that from Blacktown he could catch a train to Lithgow, and from Lithgow a bus to the country a Bathurst, perhaps . . .

Then the driver's words sank in.

'I'll a I'll pay double,' he stammered, forgetting to disguise his voice. 'Triple! Look, I've got the money a '

'Cadel?'

He almost choked. The driver turned. There was a 'click' as the central locking system engaged.

Wilfreda was sitting in the front seat, wearing a black wig under a knitted beret.

'Christ!' she exclaimed, and the engine roared to life. Cadel couldn't believe it. His mind went blank.

The taxi burned rubber swinging into the street. Wilfreda scrambled for her phone. She jabbed at a single key and started to gabble, driving one-handed.

'Rudy!' she said. 'It's me! I need back-up, I've had to leave. Yes, the whole team. No, and I can't! Because I've got cargo! Of course I know what I'm doing!'

She stamped on the brake. Cadel banged his nose on the headrest in front of him. 'Sorry,' said Wilfreda. She opened a window, and yelled at the man in the leather jacket who had pa.s.sed Cadel not a minute before. 'Get in!' she cried. 'Quick!'

He didn't protest. Cadel heard the door locks again, but before he could pull at a handle, the man in the leather jacket was beside him.

'What the h.e.l.l?' gasped the man.

'Cargo!' Wilfreda growled, hitting the accelerator once more. Cadel's head snapped back.

'Who's this?' The man was staring at Cadel. He was unshaven, with floppy black hair and cold eyes.

'Guess,' said Wilfreda.

'It's not a it can't be a '

'It is.'

'b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l!'

'There's Nikolai.'

Nikolai was a fat, bald, elderly man in shirtsleeves, slouched on a fold-out tin chair that had been placed in front of a terrace house. He was nursing a string of blue worry-beads, and struggled to his feet when he saw the taxi come to a halt on the other side of the road.

At Wilfreda's signal, he waddled across to her.

'In,' she said.

Next thing, both of Cadel's escape routes were cut off. On one side of him sat the man in the leather jacket; on the other sat a big, fat, snorting old man who looked vaguely familiar . . .

Suddenly Cadel remembered him. From the train to Strath-field. He'd been slumped in one corner, snoozing.

'By all that's holy,' Nikolai said, as the taxi surged forward again. 'Cadel Darkkon.'

'He walked straight out of that G.o.dd.a.m.n police station,' Wilfreda exclaimed. 'All by himself.'

'I'm not surprised,' said Nikolai. 'Dressed up like that.'

'But you recognised him.'

'I was trained to.' Nikolai pulled a pair of sungla.s.ses out of his breast pocket. 'You should wear these,' he advised, pa.s.sing them to Cadel. 'Your eyes always give you away.'

Numbly, Cadel put on the sungla.s.ses. He didn't know what to do. What was he going to do? How had this happened?

'I wasn't expecting you, Cadel,' Wilfreda remarked, almost as if she'd read his mind. 'Christ, I was here on another job entirely.'

'We all were,' said the man in the leather jacket. 'What are you going to do about that, now?'

'This has priority.' Wilfreda glanced up into the rear-view mirror; for a moment, Cadel saw her eyes. 'Do you know they've got Barry Deakin holed up in there?' she asked him.

Cadel stared at her, mutely.

'Well, they do,' she continued. 'That's who we were after. Thaddeus hadn't even tracked you down. I only just got the alert about you myself. I was on standby while he checked his sources.' She chuckled. 'G.o.d, he's going to be pleased.'

'What happened to the others?' asked the man in the leather jacket. He was staring morosely at Cadel. 'What happened to Sue Croft? She was with you, wasn't she?'

'Leave it, Busy.' Wilfreda's voice was cold. 'Watch the road. It could be a decoy. They didn't let you go, did they, Cadel?'

Cadel swallowed.

'No,' he said hoa.r.s.ely. 'At least a I don't think so . . .'

'How'd you do it, then? How'd you get out?'

'I a I went to the toilet. Changed my clothes. Sneaked down the fire stairs.' Feeling the tears rush to his eyes, Cadel clamped his mouth shut. All that work for nothing!

'What a stroke of luck,' said Wilfreda. 'Still, we'd better switch cars. I'll just take care of it.'

'And use the Stage One car?' Busy protested. 'What about Rudy's team? What if they need to switch?'

'I told you. Cadel has priority.'

Cadel couldn't think straight. He was putting all his energy into fighting back his tears. It was a disaster, a total disaster. They had seen his disguise; he could never use it again. All he had now were his doc.u.ments, and what use were they if he couldn't use his disguise?

Then he remembered. He had told Bronwyn about Curramulla.

Was that where they were going now?

'I'm a I'm thirsty,' he said, grasping at straws.

'Sorry, Cadel. Can't stop now. Got to put some distance between us and them.' Wilfreda glanced into the mirror again. 'Maybe later. After we've switched cars.' Once again, she picked up her phone.

Cadel subsided. He sat trying to focus, but all he could think was: Thaddeus will know. If the police turn up at Curramulla, Thaddeus will know who told them about it.

Wilfreda was driving carefully. She didn't exceed the speed limit, and was as brief as possible with her phone calls. Cadel wondered if there was any way he might get her to run into the back of somebody else's car, but dismissed the idea at once. If it was a minor accident, Wilfreda wouldn't stop. And if it was major, what chance would he have to get out, wedged as he was between two bodyguards? No a his best chance would be when they switched cars.

He would demand to go to the toilet. Pee all over Busy's fancy boots if he had to. The important thing was to stay alert.

They drove for about twenty minutes, then plunged into a suburb of old brick bungalows, dodging and weaving through a network of almost identical streets. At last they reached a plain house with an attached garage. Wilfreda headed straight for the garage. Its blue roll-a-door ascended as they approached.

Within seconds it was rolling down again behind them.

'Wait,' said Wilfreda, her gaze on the rear-view mirror. 'Wait, wait . . . now!'

Everyone moved with bewildering speed. The moment the garage door closed, Cadel was jerked out of the car and hustled to the back of the filthy old garage, where another door led to a paved backyard. 'I need to go to the toilet!' he exclaimed, but n.o.body seemed to hear. They all charged straight past a rotary clothesline into a corrugated iron shed, where a second car was waiting. This was a red Daihatsu four-wheel drive.

When Wilfreda tried to push Cadel into the back seat, he jammed his hands against the door frame.

'Wait!' he said. 'I need to a '

'Later,' Wilfreda snapped. 'In a minute.'

Her grim expression subdued Cadel. So did the brisk, professional behaviour of her companions. Everything seemed to have been planned and practised. There wasn't a single wasted gesture or fumbled step. In one minute and twenty-two seconds precisely they were out of one car and into the other. Before two minutes were up, they were on the road again.

Something about the smooth execution of this manoeuvre frightened Cadel. It indicated what he would be up against if he tried to run away. He decided to wait a little. Until they had been driving for a while and had relaxed their guard.

Unfortunately, however, his companions never relaxed their guard. During the next half hour, no one spoke or even stopped watching the road. When Cadel finally, desperately, requested a pit-stop, Wilfreda took a detour through another suburb and parked, not at a busy petrol station, but beside a deserted sports field. Here, a toilet block stood in the middle of a barren waste of boggy ground. There wasn't anything much around, not even a tree or a bush. It was getting dark, but not dark enough. If Cadel did climb out a window, he would be spotted long before he could reach any kind of cover. And there was no one in sight to ask for help.

'Make it quick,' said Wilfreda, parking beside the toilet block. 'Nikolai, go in with him.'

The place stank. The cubicle doors wouldn't lock. There wasn't even any toilet paper. And Nikolai stood right by the door to Cadel's cubicle, holding it shut. Waiting.

Listening.

Cadel had to admit defeat. He did what he had to do before returning glumly to the car. It's all right, he told himself. You have to grab opportunities when they happen.

Once again, he found himself penned in by Busy and Nikolai. Busy had BO, and Nikolai's breath smelled of garlic. It was enough to make anyone sick.

This gave Cadel an idea.

'I feel sick,' he said, when they were drawing close to Wollongong.

'You what?' said Wilfreda.

'I feel sick. Car sick. I have to sit in front, with the window down.'

'For Chrissake,' Wilfreda muttered.

'That's not wise,' Nikolai remarked. 'He won't be properly covered.'

'Are you going to spew?' Busy asked Cadel. 'You'd better not spew on me.'

'Here,' said Wilfreda, emptying her handbag and pa.s.sing it over. 'If you're going to spew, spew in that. I'm not stopping. Not again.'

'But I feel sick,' Cadel whined. 'It's smelly back here! I need fresh air!'

'Climb in the front then. Quickly.'

'Wilfreda a '

'Shut up, Nikolai! I don't want him spewing in the car!'

Cadel saw his chance. As he clumsily hauled himself through the s.p.a.ce between the two front seats, he fell. Deliberately. He grabbed the gearstick as he thrust his knee at it, pushing it forward into 'park'.

Then everything went crazy.

FIFTY-FOUR.

'Cadel?'

'He's awake, look.'

'Oh, Christ. Thank G.o.d. Cadel.'

It was Wilfreda. She wasn't driving, any more. The car was motionless.

Cadel's head hurt.

'We've got to get out of here.' Nikolai sounded worried. 'Someone's stopping.'

'Cadel. Look at me. Say something. Can you hear me?'

'Yeah,' Cadel slurred. He could hear Wilfreda, and see her too. What had happened? He remembered a cracking pain, and a flash of light.

He must have hit his head on something. The windshield?

Looking past Wilfreda's wig, which had been partially dislodged, Cadel saw that the windshield wasn't broken. Though there was a smear of blood on it. His own blood?