Sean Dillon 3-Book Collection 2: Angel of Death, Drink With the Devil, The President’s Daughter

After an hour, they stopped for a break and sat on the grass. He lit two cigarettes as always and gave her one. She lay on her back. ‘I like you, Rupert, I like you a lot.’

‘Snap, my sweet,’ he said. ‘Except I love you a lot.’

‘Yet you’ve never put a hand on me once.’

‘I know, my gorgeous one,’ he teased her. ‘But you see, I’m terribly faithful. Fell in love with Tom first time we met at Cambridge. Women – and please don’t get upset – don’t do the slightest thing for me.’ He turned over and kissed her. ‘Having said that, I adore you. I suppose you think I’ve got a piece missing in my personal jigsaw.’

‘Oh, Rupert, my lovely Rupert, don’t we all?’ she said and kissed his cheek.

He rolled away and raised himself on one elbow. ‘The Navajo’s doing a return; bringing an old friend of mine down just for twenty-four hours. George is picking him up.’

‘Who would that be?’

‘Ian McNab. Used to be my company sergeant major in the Paras. He runs a gym in London. Karate, judo, aikido – all that sort of thing for those who want it.’

He paused and she said, ‘And something more?’

Rupert lit another cigarette. ‘Most martial arts and defence techniques generally are designed to help you defend yourself, ward the attacker off, that sort of thing. To come to terms with those techniques takes years of training. Ian McNab offers something quite different.’

‘And what would that be?’

‘His self-defence system is delivered with extreme prejudice. No point in using it except to kill or maim.’

‘Good God!’ she said.

‘There we go again, you invoking the almighty.’ He stood up. ‘Come on, let’s get going.’

Ian McNab was surprisingly small, a grey-haired man of fifty, wearing a black tracksuit and trainers, with a broken nose and a pleasant, Highland voice.

‘A great pleasure, Miss Browning. I was in Glasgow on business last year and saw you do that Tennessee Williams fella’s Cat on a Hot Tin Roof at the Citizen’s Theatre. Wonderful, you were.’

Lang said, ‘Plenty of judo mats in the barn, Ian.’ They left the house and walked across the yard. ‘The thing is, Miss Browning was attacked by a mugger last week. Shook her up badly. Luckily someone drove by, but it occurred to me that you could help her. Your special course. The seven moves.’

‘Of course, Captain.’ McNab shook his head. ‘The terrible times we live in.’

They went into the barn and he and Lang got a number of judo mats from a pile in the corner and laid them out together. McNab turned to Grace. ‘Right, miss. My system is special and it’s only to be used in extreme situations.’

‘I understand.’

‘You see, I can show you seven things to do which will always cripple, but may also kill. You follow me?’

‘I think so.’

‘For example, if you extend your knuckles in the right hand – you are right-handed, I take it?

‘Yes.’

‘Good. If you extend a punch under the chin at the Adam’s apple, then even a sixteen-stone rugby player will go down. You can also do it with stiffened fingers. The trouble is, he could choke to death. That’s why I call it my special course with extreme prejudice.’

‘I see.’

‘There’s another. The kneecap is one of the most sensitive parts of the human body. Again, let’s imagine our sixteen-stone rugby player. If you raise your foot in a struggle and stamp down on his kneecap you’ll dislodge it and he’ll go down. You won’t kill him, but you’ll cripple him and very probably for life.’

‘I see. Extreme prejudice again.’

‘That’s right. No offence meant, miss, but there’s then the question of your attacker’s private parts.’

Grace laughed out loud. ‘There always is with men, Sergeant Major.’

Lang laughed and McNab smiled. ‘Too true, miss. Then there’s the reverse elbow strike. Very lethal, that.’

She turned to Rupert. ‘Are you an expert in all this?’

‘Now do I look the physical type, darling?’ he said. ‘I’ve got phone calls to make. Give her the works for an hour, Sergeant Major. I’ll see you later.’

He went out and McNab turned to Grace. ‘Right you are, miss, let’s get started.’

Just before midnight she came down in her dressing gown and found Lang in the drawing room, examining some faxes.

‘Problems?’

‘Government business, my love, particularly the Irish mess. Never goes away. Nightcap?’

‘All right.’ He poured two Bushmills and gave her one. ‘What about the Sergeant Major?’ she asked.

‘Thought you very promising. He has a gym in Soho. He’d like to see you there when you can manage it.’

‘Sounds good to me.’

‘I’m having the Navajo take him back to Gatwick tomorrow. It will return late afternoon, bringing Tom and Yuri Belov.’

‘That should be interesting.’

The wolfhound dozed in front of the fire. ‘He’s lovely,’ she said. ‘Why do you call him Danger?’

‘Well, he can be pretty ruthless when roused.’

There was a portrait of a Regency buck over the fireplace. He wore a tailcoat, light buskins and top boots. He bore an extraordinary resemblance to Lang.

‘Who is that?’ she asked.

‘An ancestor of mine. He was a Rupert, too. He was the Earl of Drury and a great friend of the Prince Regent. The title was lost in the eighteen sixties when the male line died out. I’m descended from the female side.’

‘What a shame – you could have been Earl of Drury.’

‘True.’

‘He looks very arrogant, and there’s a restlessness to him. I sense it in you, Rupert.’