“Technically, it’s a convention. But that doesn’t matter. The point is, you’re still off the books. Officially, you don’t exist. And that’s what’s important right now.”
“Why?”
Fothergill took a moment to reply. He licked his lips, and I saw his eyes track across to a point on the wall in the shadow of the radiator below the left-hand window. To a patch of paint that was slightly lighter than the rest. A recent repair. Around an inch and a half square. The kind of area a bullet could still make a mess of, even after passing through someone’s arm.
Immediately, that second, I knew what was coming my way. Housecleaning. Again. The most distasteful task there is. And I realized something else at the same moment. That there was another difference between my aunt and me.
It gives me no pleasure when my premonitions turn out to be right.
None at all.
TWO
Back in the far-off days of basic training, I remember the various exercises we took part in always started with a full, formal briefing.
In the early days of the course, the administrators made a point of giving us plenty of notice. They gave out printed timetables, and posted any amendments on the huge notice board that dominated the training school foyer. That way, if something went wrong with someone’s performance, the instructors knew the person’s underlying skills were to blame, rather than wondering if they’d just misunderstood their instructions. As time went on, though, things became less reliable. We’d find ourselves being dragged into a conference room at the end of a run or hauled out of bed in the middle of the night, when we were too tired to concentrate properly. We were given less time to absorb the information. And details that were always bang-on accurate at the start became increasingly vague and unreliable with each passing week.
At the time I thought this was all done to boost our powers of initiative and self-reliance. It certainly did that. And whether this was an intended consequence or not, it taught us something else.
That however bleak things look at the outset, there’s a pretty high chance they’re going to get a whole lot worse.
Fothergill fetched some coffee, closed the door behind him, and told me how a man he’d known for ten years had tried to kill him.
“So who is this guy?” I said.
“His name’s Tony McIntyre,” he said. “He’s Scottish. A lieutenant commander, just like you. Five years’ less service, but a good man all the same. Or so I thought.”
“You worked with him in the past?”
“Four times. On four different continents. Plus another stint when we were instructors together. It’s funny how people’s paths keep crossing like that.”
“And he was recently posted here?”
“No. He was AWOL. Made it here under his own steam. Sought me out. Told me he’d gone off the rails—blamed some other people for it, of course—but said that he wanted to come clean.”
“Really? He just came out and told you that?”
“Yes. You’ve got to understand something. I’ve been around a while. People hear about me. And they’re only human. Sometimes they slip. This wasn’t the first time I’d been asked to help someone get back on his feet.”
“So what was it that tripped him up?”
“Weapons. The urge to steal them. Then sell them. To all sorts of shady characters, he said. For large sums of money.”
“That’s not good.”
“Actually, it was worse than just weapons. He’d got his hands on something really filthy. A canister of some kind of poison gas. Awful stuff, apparently.”
“Only one?”
“That’s more than enough.”
“Above the counter? Or below?”
“What do you think?”
“How did he come across it?”
“Goodness knows. But he’d been in Afghanistan for more than two years. Have you ever been there?”
“I can’t recall.”
“Well, I’ve been. Twice. And I can tell you—it’s crazy there. Absolute insanity. I’m not surprised by anything that finds its way over there. Or back out again.”
“So what was he planning to do with this stuff?”
“Ha. Here’s where everything went pear-shaped. He told me he was scared of it. He’d found out what it can do. Realized it was too dangerous to put in the hands of random terrorists. So, he wanted some kind of a deal. He wanted me to broker one for him. Because of our history. Said I was the only person he could trust. He thought he could just hand in the gas and squeal on his buyers in return for immunity.”
“And you went along with this? Were you smoking crack, at the time?”
“Look, I liked him. I knew him. I thought I could trust him.”
“But you found out the hard way?”
“I saw through him. Do you know what he was trying to do?”
“Let me guess. Sell the gas. Collect the money. Leave you to take the fall.”
“Right, right, and right. Unfortunately.”
“And?”
“He realized that I was onto him. We both drew down. We both took a round. I got a new rug to hide the bloodstains. He got out of the building and vanished. London tore me a new one for my troubles. Then sent you, to dig us all out of the mire. Now that you’re the blue-eyed boy again.”
“I doubt that’ll last—but anyway. Where’s the gas now?”
“He told me he’d brought it with him, to Chicago. To sell. We think it’s still in the city somewhere. Only we don’t know where.”
“Excellent. You can’t beat solid intelligence. And the guy? McIntyre?”
“Better news, there. We have a firm lead on him. We know where he went to get patched up.”
“Where?”
“To a cosmetic surgery clinic, of all places.”
“No chance. That’s too obvious. He wouldn’t go anywhere listed in the yellow pages. He’d find some other way. However badly hurt he was.”
“No. The police recovered surgical instruments from the place. The blood matched the samples he left behind on my floor. He was definitely there. And because of the way they organize things for hygiene, we even know which doctor treated him.”
“It’s got to be a setup. It’s got red herring written all over it.”
“Normally, I’d agree. But we didn’t stumble on this clinic by chance. It’s part of a chain. Here and in Europe. Remember McIntyre blamed other people for turning him dirty? Well, one of them runs mercenaries out of Prague. A bloke called Gary Young. He’s ex–Royal Marines, just like McIntyre. We’ve been watching him for years. And he uses these clinics whenever one of his men needs attention, away from the public eye. He may even own a slice of them.”
“I’m still not convinced.”
“It flies, David. We’ve checked. It was definitely McIntyre’s blood. And based on what the police recovered from the place, we know he had surgery. That means his wounds were serious. So his options were limited. He couldn’t wander the city indefinitely, leaking everywhere. He’d have been spotted.”
“OK. Maybe he was there. But how does that help?”
“Our doctors say he’ll need follow-up treatment. He’ll have to come back. Probably tomorrow. Possibly the day after. London want you to be there. To lift him when he appears.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Why?”
“One, he won’t show. Even if he risked it before, no way will he go to the same place twice. And two, even if he does appear, you don’t need me to nick him. The local plod’s already on board. They can pick him up.”
“We can’t let the police any further into this, David. We have to close it down in-house.”
“Why?”
“Two reasons. First, there’s the gas. The bottom line is, it has to be recovered.”
“I’m sure it does. But not by me. This has nothing to do with embassy or consulate security.”
“McIntyre tried to kill me, remember.”
“That’s a shame. And it’s something for Internal Security to sort out. Not me.”