‘Got any whisky?’ ‘Of course not.’ ‘In that case, a coffee would be great. The stronger the better.’ He watched Roche disappear inside the empty kiosk and start banging about, trying to work the complicated-looking coffee machine. ‘What happened to the guy serving here?’ Carlyle asked no one in particular. ‘He took two in the head as well,’ David Ronan replied, matter-of-factly. ‘Ah.’ With a terrible sick feeling gnawing at his intestines, Carlyle scanned the scene. A forty-yard stretch of the park on either side of the kiosk had been sealed off. Beyond the police tape, a crowd of maybe 100 people had gathered, swelled by half-a-dozen or so TV crews and a deal more reporters. The satellite trucks illegally parked all along Park Lane had attracted a swarm of traffic wardens, who were happily writing ticket after ticket as excited television producers equally happily ignored them. Somewhere amid the scrum, Commander Simpson was doing a round of interviews, dispensing the usual platitudes, promising that the perpetrators would be brought to justice.
