Louisa wouldn’t have come this way unless she had no choice. The path dipped and dawdled, and even in fair weather must have been hard going where it negotiated the ragged edge. And if you fell, to answer his earlier question, you wouldn’t drop straight into the sea; you’d bounce off the sloping face then land on a rocky outcrop far below. River didn’t want to guess how far. Didn’t actually want to be this close to the edge while he speculated. Pretty clearly, though, whatever hostile contact she’d encountered, there were ways and means out here of disposing of bodies.
On the other hand, this was Louisa. If an encounter with her involved someone going over a cliff, you couldn’t rule out it being the hostile. Not entirely.
He brought back to mind the map on Coe’s phone. The gun emplacement had been the first marked construction on this path, the next being a few hundred yards further on. After that there was a hike of maybe a mile to the lighthouse. He had no plans to walk that far, not along a path little more than a suggestion. But the next outbuilding, he’d take a look at.
And then the figure appeared, coming River’s way; moving at a lick suggesting it didn’t find the ground problematic. And familiar enough to warrant River checking the reassuring weight in his pocket.
The figure came to a halt five yards away.
It pulled the hood of its parka down.
“So you found me,” said Frank.
“Hi,” said Coe.
He wondered if that syllable sounded as false in the air as it did in his head. He was not someone who said Hi to strangers. One look should tell anyone that much.
It earned a response, though: “Hello.”
“I think I’m lost.”
“So do I,” said the man.
He was dressed like a soldier—combat boots, khaki trousers, a belt packed with Action-Man accessories, and fingerless gloves: okay, a bit hipsterish for the military, but probably an advantage when it came to triggerwork. Annex C material, then—legit/ grey area/ downright nasty—but even as Coe fed in the details, the soldier’s frosting of teenage acne had given him away. He was one of those whose face Coe’s program had recognised, coming through Southampton’s ferry terminal. Cyril Dupont.
Coe had a good memory for names, for faces. An attribute which would have been a boon in his career, if his career hadn’t terminated in trauma and after-shock.
The soldier said, “Where were you heading?”
“Pegsea.”
“That’s back the way you’ve come.”
“Oh. Right.”
His accent was what Coe would have expected: French, but with an American slant. Annex C, he guessed, put you on the kind of career plan where languages were thrown together like socks in a tumble dryer.
He was talking again. “You’re not much of a traveller, are you?”
“What makes you say that?”
The soldier made a vague gesture, head to toe. “You’re not dressed for the weather.”
“I don’t feel the cold.”
“You won’t feel your fucking toes in five minutes. Your boots. They’re ridiculous.”
Coe looked down at his boots. They looked wet, true, with that salty residue boots get when you wander in the snow too long. But ridiculous was a bit strong.
Then again, the soldier’s footwear was serious. Boots you could walk the mouth of hell with, frozen over or not.
He wasn’t here for macho fashion tips, though. “I’m looking for a friend.”
“Well you’re shit out of luck. Because I don’t want to be your friend, and there’s nobody else here.”
He sounded woozy, thought Coe. As if he’d walked into a wall, going faster than average. His boots might be combat-ready, but Coe wouldn’t have put money on him being able to lace them without help. Which was useful information, because this man knew Coe wasn’t a tourist. Sometime soon, that was going to have to be acknowledged.
Coe couldn’t see far into the barn, and there might have been any number of others in there, huddled quiet as mice, or their corpses stacked like firewood.
Best all round would be if he left now and regrouped with the others, but that option had been removed from the table. There was no way this guy was going to let Coe walk away, ridiculous boots or not.
The real question was whether he had a gun.
Well, thought Coe, maybe he did, maybe he didn’t. The answer wouldn’t be long in coming. And some moments you just arrived at, he supposed. His desk in Slough House seemed very far away. But sitting there would be another route to the same destination in the long run.
He rubbed a cheek grown numb in the cold and said, “You’re Cyril, right?”
“I’m not wearing that scuzzy thing,” Emma Flyte had said, and meant it. A white puffa jacket, visibly torn at the breast, and overdue a launder. “Why would you think I would?”
“Because they’re looking for a blonde in a dark overcoat.”
Emma wasn’t convinced a swap would help, though conceded that her disinclination to wear white came into it.
Whatever: more important things.
She left Louisa at the shed and headed towards the town, creaky at the joints. She hadn’t slept more than ten minutes, and was reminded of her early days in the Met, when a shift-change would skew her rhythms. But that hadn’t killed her. Then again, she hadn’t been evading armed men, or not often. The track wasn’t wide, and she kept to the middle to avoid snagging on upright brambles. To her left, through the trees, she caught glimpses of the estuary, slowly blanketing under snow. And then the track swung through a thicker patch of trees, and she lost it.
The road wasn’t far. Five minutes? But she hadn’t encountered anyone yet, the snow keeping people indoors.
She’d need to find someone, though; ask where the police station was, unless she got lucky, and it was bang in the middle of the High Street. Failing that, she could revisit the graveyard and retrieve her mobile. Even if the Park had thrown a towel over the birdcage, Devon Welles would take her calls . . . That’s what it had come to, she reminded herself. Jobless, out of favour, and relying on Mates’ Rules for back-up. Something Louisa had said came to mind.
Like it or not, you’re a slow horse now.
Yes, well. We’ll see about that.
A man rounded the corner ten yards ahead, coming her way.
One of the bad guys.
She kept walking, because the alternative was to turn and run, or plough through the undergrowth and end up draped across a bush like so much laundry. Besides, this one hadn’t laid eyes on her before; would be working from whatever description the man she’d put down last night had fed him, but already his eyes were narrowing, and it might just be that he had a thing for blondes, or he might be computing information. Either way, it was best to derail him.
She slapped her hand on her thigh and whistled so loudly he flinched.
“Seen my dog?”
“What kind?” he asked, closing the gap between them, but before she could invent a breed his fist slammed into her cheek.
Emma’s head filled with static.
The ground was harder than it looked.
Frank said, “So you found me.”
“Looks like.”
“Not that I made it difficult. A hire car? I mean, Jesus, son. Did you wonder why I didn’t just get hold of a biplane and drag a banner behind me?”
River said, “Every time I get one up on you, you make it sound like that was your plan all along.”
“It’s called parenting.”
Even in the snow, the whitewashed backdrop of the coastal sky, River could see Frank’s grin; his American teeth just another shade of white.
He gestured in the direction Frank had come. “Louisa’s not back there, then,” he said. “In whatever it is. A shed?”