That left Judd nowhere to go. There was a question he could have asked, but he’d had enough of breaking the barrister’s golden rule by asking questions to which he didn’t already know the answer. In this case it had only served to push him further and further up a blind alley.
Sir Greville was extremely glad he hadn’t been asked it. The question he had been dreading was, “When did this takeover happen?” and the truthful answer would have been: “Three days ago.”
‘May I just point out, Mr Judd,’ he said as he got up to go, ‘that had you told us something of the nature of your intended questions, we could perhaps have saved you a lot of time and trouble.’
He turned to leave, saw Johnny sitting there staring at him from the benches at the back and, trying to rescue himself from an involuntary expression of shock, gave him a curt nod before he strode out, giving the women each side of his stepson a hard stare.
Chapter Eighteen
‘That’s it, then, is it?’ said Johnny. ‘The Americans have knocked Rage on the head. Best thing for it, I think, and it wouldn’t have happened without you.’
‘What’s it like being one day old and six feet tall?’ asked Jo as they wheeled her out of the building.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, you must have been born yesterday if you take that steaming load of horse crap at face value.’
A civil servant coming out behind them flinched visibly.
Heather looked distracted. ‘We’d better head for the station,’ she said. ‘It’s past noon.’
‘What’s the hurry? I was going to offer you lunch,’ said Johnny.
‘I’m on shift tonight at the Hall.’
‘On shift? You’re working all night then going into court tomorrow?’
‘It’s not so bad. I’m number two. I’ll get plenty of sleep if there aren’t any problems. Where’s the nearest tube?’
‘No tube. I’m driving you.’
‘To Yorkshire? No, come on, Johnny. You don’t look too good. You go back and get some rest.’
She wasn’t exaggerating. The parts of his face that weren’t black and blue were doubly pale in comparison but he wasn’t about to argue.
‘I’m coming up anyway,’ he said, ‘I’m going to be in court, so of course I’ll drive you.’
They rang Mrs Thompson from a pay-phone at Toddington Services. Sir Michael’s cleaner was at the house, beside herself with anxiety, occupying herself with unnecessary dusting and desperate for news.
‘He’s much better,’ Heather assured her over the roar of truck diesels behind her. ‘His temperature’s down. We talked to the hospital an hour ago. He’s much more cheerful.’
‘Are you all right, dear?’
‘Yes, fine, thank you. So’s Johnny. That’s why I’m calling. He’s driving us up. I’m sure Sir Michael won’t mind him using the guest room.’
Johnny could hear a burst of excitement from the other end rising above the hubbub around them. Heather listened, smiling, tried a few times to get a word in edgeways, glanced at her watch eventually and said, ‘Eight o’clock or so. I’ve got to be at the Hall by nine.’
She turned to Johnny as she hung up. ‘She knows all about you.’
‘Surely not all?’
‘No, you’re right. Just the simple bits. She knows Sir Michael’s found his long-lost son. He’s probably been talking nonstop about that and she knows you saved our lives because she read it in the Mirror. She says she’s dying to meet you. She’s leaving a key under the plant pot by the back door.’
Back on the road, Johnny glanced back at Jo, who seemed to be nodding off in the back seat, and pitched his voice low.
‘How’s your barrister going to play it tomorrow?’
‘It’s my word against Hayter’s,’ said Heather. ‘We’ve just got to get them to believe me.’
‘Maybe I could help.’
‘How?’
‘Supposing I got up as an expert witness, told them my background and said we had evidence that the NSA was tapping British domestic phones.’
‘What background?’ said Jo from the back. Her eyes were still shut.
‘Long story,’ said Heather, ‘Johnny’s got a bit of a past. He’ll tell you some time. Anyway,’ she said turning to Johnny, ‘how would that help?’
‘It might help to justify your going in to the base. At least in the juror’s minds.’
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ she said and there was a bleak hopelessness in her voice that he hadn’t heard before. ‘Anyway, wouldn’t you get locked up? Breaking the Official Secrets Act or something?’
‘Well, at least think about it,’ he said.
Ray Mackeson was thinking about it too. There was a war cabinet in session at the Stray. Americans only – modplods keep out. Curtis Walsh was up from Grosvenor Square. The Base Commander made it three.
‘They could call him into the witness-box,’ said Mackeson. ‘He could stand up and say anything he damn well pleases. He could say he’d seen the plans.’
‘The judge would let him?’
‘Sure the judge would let him. Couldn’t stop him. If Kay swears on oath he’s ex-MI5, it’s down to us to disprove it. He’s got credibility on Rage. He’s got credibility on that cable diagram that he should never have been allowed to carry out of here. If he starts waving that plan around…’
He left the thought hanging and if none of them showed any emotion it was only because years of covert service had double-glazed their eyes.
‘Well, then, let’s go over the options,’ said Curtis Walsh. ‘And I think I might be allowed an opening opinion. Letting Kay blow us out of the water is not among them.’
‘You gotta know what Kay’s about,’ said Mackeson. ‘He’s been marinaded in British ruling-class values for three decades. Women and children first. Brought up to help the good guys beat the bad guys.’
‘So aren’t we the good guys?’ asked the Base Commander drily.
Mackeson looked at him through narrowed eyes. ‘Guess the Brits didn’t hear about the Nineties. Forget the adjectives. We’re the only guys. Masters of the Universe. What more does anyone need to know?’
Curtis Walsh raised an eyebrow. ‘Kay don’t seem to see it that way.’
‘His problem.’
‘Ours too?’
‘It’s my job to make him see. All I need to know from you,’ said Mackeson, ‘is just how far to go in the process.’
Walsh looked into Mackeson’s flat yellow eyes and doubted that anything he said would make any difference. He knew Mackeson had a direct line to higher authority than him and suspected the question had been phrased strictly for the record.
‘There are two projects riding on this,’ he answered. ‘You don’t need me to tell you your job.’
The phone buzzed. The Base Commander picked it up, listened, passed it to Mackeson. ‘Gerow,’ he said.
Mackeson gave a slow grin and glued his ear to it.
‘Yeah?’ He listened. ‘I got it. Good going, Pacman.’
He put it down, smiled some more and drummed on the desk. ‘Our boy and his friends still use telephones. He don’t learn. We got him just where we want him.’
‘Where?’
‘In a tailor-made trap. Down the longest dead end you ever saw. A million miles from help. Remember that movie? In space, no one can hear you scream. My man Pacman’s earned himself a prize.’
It was around 9 p.m. by the time Johnny had taken Jo home, reunited Heather with her car and seen her safely off to the Hall again. It would have been earlier but when they got to her cottage, he’d said, ‘Can I come in for a minute?’