“I don’t like meeting in person. It’s a stupid risk.” She announced haughtily, looking furtively about. Monsieur Blanc watched her closely. Her nerves seemed genuine, he had asked her to meet him precisely because he wanted to observe her in person. He had acted on the information she provided on two occasions, first the raid on the lab and second the attempt to snatch the boy from the streets. Both times something had gone wrong. He didn’t like it when things went wrong, it started to make him uneasy, suspicious.
“I am sorry, I do appreciate the risks you are taking, but from what you intimated on the phone I thought it best if we met somewhere neutral, somewhere public.” He noted she hadn’t taken her coat off. Either she was what she said she was, a computer programmer who happened to write code for MI6, barely seeing the light of day in the basement, or she was an exceptional actress. He took in her appearance, the bright blue eyes, the unfashionably cut grey hair, the heavy tweed skirt and dull brown jumper. No make-up and no earrings. A rather dowdy figure. He took an envelope from his pocket and slid it across the table.
“What are you going to do with all this money?” He asked innocently. It wasn’t a great deal of money at all, but he imagined it would be to a low ranking civil servant. Mary looked embarrassed. Sir Clive had prepped her on how to respond. Simply answer truthfully, say what you would spend the money on.
“There’s a cat rescue centre near my house. They’re in desperate need. The amount of maltreated animals in there,” she shuddered. “You’d be horrified at the way some people treat their pets.”
Monsieur Blanc nodded, he had tried cat once but found the meat stringy and unpleasantly flavoured. He had long since ceased to be surprised by Westerners’ sentimentality when it came to animals. He suspected someone like Mary Dalkeith would have let him starve as a child so that the mangy neighbourhood cats could be fed.
“If you don’t mind, I do rather need to be getting in to the office. I’m usually at my desk by 8 and if I’m even a little late they might start asking questions.” He nodded.
“Of course. You said you had further news of the final device. How we could locate it.” Mary leant across the table towards him, her voice no more than a whisper.
“MI6 has been tracing him. He went to the hospital yesterday. Addenbrookes. They released him this morning. As far we know the device is still inside him.”
“Where is he now?”
“Back in Cambridge, at his rooms in College.”
“Why hasn’t MI6 taken him in?”
“They’re hoping,” another furtive look around her, “they’re hoping he’ll lead them to you. If they just keep watching.”
Monsieur Blanc nodded, it sounded plausible, but it meant he would have to be very careful when he next made a move on the boy. He couldn’t risk exposing his position, nor could he risk drawing any attention to the people he was working for.
“Thank you, most helpful. You may go now.” He waved her away.
Mary stood up, affronted by the dismissive gesture, stuffing the envelope into her handbag. She bumped into the customer sitting at the chair behind her, making a rather flustered departure. Monsieur Blanc watched her carefully before turning his attention back to the Eggs Benedict. A grey cat hair in the hollandaise sauce. A gift from Ms. Dalkeith. He pushed the plate away in disgust.
22
Harvey checked his watch. Ten to seven. He liked to get to the office early, even if all he had to look forward to was a succession of dull strategy meetings. Still, he could go to Lazy Joe’s for lunch, one of the few places in L.A where they knew how to cook a decent steak. Every cloud had a silver lining, he thought. All he needed now was some good news from Monsieur Blanc.
The reminder that one part of his plan was still unresolved made him grip the wheel tightly, his frustration at having to depend on someone else turning his driving aggressive.
He parked the large SUV expertly in his space outside the main office and nodded at the security guard on his way in.
“Any messages for me?” He asked his receptionist, a sultry Latina called Carla with a taste for designer shoes he was sure she couldn’t afford. Not on the salary he was paying her. He made a mental note to get one of his team run a check on her back accounts, make sure there weren’t any unexplained payments. The last thing he needed was a member of staff selling secrets to fund her shopping habit.
“Good morning, Mr. Newman. Just your wife, reminding you there’s a charity dinner at the Golf Club tonight,” she replied in her soft Hispanic tones, full sunbeam of a smile tilted in his direction.
“How could I forget that, an evening spent shaking hands with some of the most boring people in L.A.” He replied sardonically, his mood softening as he caught a discreet glimpse of the deep crevice between her tanned cleavage, the outline of a lacy bra just visible through the low-cut white blouse. Now that was a welcoming sight in the morning. Maybe he was being too suspicious and the shoes were just fakes, like the tits. The sort of thing his wife could spot a mile off, not that he would ever allow them to meet.
“Hey Harve,” Bob Lowenstein, his second in command and the head of Centurion Systems, their technology division, said as he walked through the door. A tall man with a rangy build. Limbs long enough to ensure he was always picked for the basketball team in his youth, bit of a stoop now he was middle-aged. He had deep-set blue-grey eyes and a habit of squinting into the distance, like an old-style frontiersman checking the horizon for rain clouds.
“Got some test results to take you through before the meeting,” he said in his considered Southern drawl, deep and slow, always careful with his choice of words.
Harvey nodded grimly and gestured for him to go through to his office. He was glad he had other people to deal with the finer points of detail, particularly in relation to the new weapons technology they were developing. It was a world removed from the tools he’d used in his early years of soldiering, the M16s and fixed blade Buck Hunter knives. But it was where the big money lay, the government contracts. He called back over his shoulder, “Couple of coffees please, Carla,” then turned back to Bob, “what you got for me?”
Bob Lowenstein unzipped his laptop from the black carry case and set down the papers he was holding.
“No more progress without new supplies of coltan I’m afraid. And we need a hell of a lot. Can’t complete the circuits without it and until then the project’s pretty much stalled.” Harvey nodded grimly, the conflict in the Congo had taken them by surprise and was disrupting supplies of the rare metal.
“The other elements are all but ready. Prototype is up and running. I’ve got some footage to show you.” He flicked quickly though the files on his laptop, bringing up a video.
“Here,” Bob pointed at the screen. Harvey couldn’t see much, but it looked like a deserted L.A street in a run-down neighbourhood, the neon flicker of a drugstore casting a jagged shadow across the sidewalk, the only indication it was continuous footage and not a single photograph.
“Help me out here Bob, what am I looking for?” Harvey said, not a patient man even at the best of times.
“The doorway, over by the warehouse.” Bob gestured toward the left of the screen. Harvey looked but couldn’t see anything. Just a dull grey bundle of blankets in a dark doorway. They moved slightly, a pale face appearing above them, dark shadows where the eyes should be. The sound of a voice whispering into a mic, PEP test, level 5, subject in range, 200 metres, preparing to engage.
A series of clicks, then a low hum and a whooshing sound. The bundle of blankets leapt upwards, a skinny figure visible, pale and ghostly, his ragged clothes hanging off him as he danced manically, feet on hot coals. A cry of pain distorted the sound recording, even at a distance of 200 metres. Gradually his movements becoming more controlled. The bizarre dance slowing down. Moving towards target, preparing to engage at 50 metres. The voice said through a fizz of static.