‘I assume, Mr Willis, that you are talking about legitimate weaponry? I don’t have many enquiries from amateurs for the sort of things you mention. Of course, what my clients want, I try to find, that is true. But I would need to know more about who they are, and their reasons for making such enquiries. Particularly, if I may say so, in this town.’
Dave was beginning to feel uncomfortable. He had a suspicion that Milraud was playing with him. So he said, ‘To be more precise, what I’m interested in is information. And we may well be talking about sums greater than fifteen thousand pounds.’
‘I should think so, mon ami,’ said Milraud, staring levelly at Dave. ‘I should think so.’
There was a tap on the door. When it opened Mrs Carson stood there. ‘Monsieur Milraud, I beg your pardon for interrupting. But could I see you for a moment please?’ She threw a small smile in Dave’s direction. ‘I’m so sorry. A rather awkward customer in the shop.’
Dave waved an arm in understanding, relieved at the opportunity to gather his thoughts. As Milraud left the room, he wondered what to say next. Money seemed the object, pure and simple; he supposed in Milraud’s world loyalty was always a function of the highest price. He was pondering his next move when he heard the door behind him open. ‘Everything all right?’ he asked.
‘Could not be better, my friend,’ said a foreign-sounding voice. It didn’t belong to Milraud.
27
Liz opened the door of her basement flat in Kentish Town with a sinking feeling. After being away for several weeks she wondered what she would find. She remembered how she had left in a hurry without the rigorous clearing up and cleaning that she had intended to do. But apart from a musty smell, a layer of dust and a carton of milk in the fridge that had separated into curds and whey, all was well, though in contrast to the bright flat in Belfast, kept in sparkling order by Mrs Ryan, the place seemed dark and unwelcoming. With all its disadvantages, Liz loved this flat, the first property she had ever owned, but now she found herself wondering whether she would settle happily back here again.
It was late and she was tired after the day in Paris and the flight home, but her answer phone was flashing demandingly. When she pressed the button to listen to her messages, it informed her that it was full, so telling herself that all the messages would be out of date, she deleted everything without bothering to listen. Then she went to bed.
She slept uneasily and woke to a grey drizzle and nothing more than black instant coffee for breakfast. Something about being back in her home environment caused her to remember guiltily that she hadn’t phoned her mother for days.
Susan Carlyle lived in Wiltshire in the gatehouse of a large estate, part of which was now a nursery garden which she managed. Liz’s father had been the estate manager and Liz had been brought up in the beautiful surroundings of Bowerbridge. But her father had died shortly after Liz had come to work in London, and ever since then she had felt responsible for her mother. She had dutifully made the slow, awkward drive from London down to Bowerbridge on Friday evenings at least one weekend a month.
But in the last year her mother had acquired a boyfriend, or partner (Liz was never quite sure which was the correct term for their relationship), and in spite of Liz’s fears that Edward Treglown would be a pipe-smoking, tweed-jacketed ex-military bore whom she would dislike on sight, he had turned out to be an excellent thing. Having been a Ghurkha officer for thirty years he was now director of a charity working to relieve blindness in developing countries – a charming and discreet man who seemed to be making her mother very happy. As well as liking him, Liz was grateful to him for that.
There was no answer from the phone at the house, but Liz knew that at Edward’s insistence her mother had recently taken the (to her) daring step of acquiring a mobile phone, so she now dialled that.
Susan Carlyle answered on the third ring. ‘Oh hello, dear.
How is beautiful Belfast?’
‘I hope it’s a lot nicer than here. I’m in London.’
‘London? So am I. We came up last night. How long are you here for?’
‘I’ll have to fly back later today. I was actually on business in Paris but I’ve had to stop off here on my way back.’
‘What an exciting life you lead! Any chance of seeing you before you leave?’
Liz hadn’t expected her mother to be in London. She thought about her day. ‘Well, I might be able to do a quick lunch. My flight’s not till six.’
‘Lunch it is then. I’ll bring Edward too, shall I?’
‘Yes, of course,’ said Liz. ‘I’d love to see him,’ she added truthfully.
At five foot eight inches Liz thought of herself as tall for a woman; even so she was used to having to look up at American men. But Daryl Sulkey was huge, probably a foot taller than Liz and far and away the tallest man she had ever encountered. She could see him waiting for her on the far side of the daunting security post at the American Embassy in Grosvenor Square. After her bag and jacket had gone through the X-ray machine and she had been patted down by an unsmiling uniformed female guard, she emerged on the other side to a warm welcome. Sulkey’s arms matched the length of the rest of him and ended in enormous hands, on one finger of which he wore a heavy gold ring, set with an appropriately large blue stone. Liz was thankful that the power of his grip, as his right hand engulfed hers, did not match the size of his hands, and she managed to escape with her fingers uncrushed.
As she followed him to his office, she noticed that he moved his right leg awkwardly and that his right foot was crooked, and she wondered if his size and the length of his back and his legs had affected his movement. She was relieved when he finally sat down behind his desk and she was able to see his face on something like a level with hers for the first time. It was a thinner, more lined face than she had expected from his vast size and she wondered whether whatever caused his awkward walk also gave him pain.
Liz had been in a number of senior FBI agents’ offices both in America and in London and she recognised the style. It was a very different feel from the set up in the CIA station, in another part of this massive embassy building, where the suspicious and distinctly unwelcoming Andy Bokus presided as head of station. Liz had recently encountered him in the course of another case and had got the impression that female MI5 officers were not his favourite form of life.
This office and its occupant had a much warmer feel. Behind the wooden desk crossed flags were draped and on the walls hung framed photographs of Sulkey with the director of the FBI, Sulkey shaking hands with a former president of the United States, and several of Sulkey sitting with a group of equally enormous men, obviously a basketball team.
‘I used to play ball,’ said Sulkey, seeing Liz eyeing the photographs, ‘until I got my injury.’
Liz smiled sympathetically but thinking it more polite not to pursue the question of the injury, she broached the reason for her visit: Seamus Piggott, once known as James Purnell.
‘Your colleague Miss Peggy Kinsolving told me on the phone that Purnell is now in Northern Ireland and causing you guys some concern. I’ve only been in London for a few months and I’m afraid I haven’t got round to visiting Belfast yet. It seemed to me that with the peace process having removed the worst of the violence, it wasn’t one of my priorities. But if James Purnell is causing trouble over there then maybe I was wrong.’
‘Well,’ said Liz, ‘we’re not entirely sure what he’s up to yet. On the face of it he’s running a perfectly legitimate business, but we’ve had some information from a source recently that Purnell is leading a breakaway group of ex-IRA people who are out to kill police and intelligence officers in Northern Ireland. Our files show that you were the special agent in charge of the investigation in Boston, and when I heard that you were here, it seemed a good opportunity to pick up some background on him – and to ask if you think that our source’s information sounds likely to be true.’