Patrice said, “That’s something.”
River, as if explaining an object of national pride to a tourist, said, “They were painted like that to confuse submarines. It made it harder to sink them, to pinpoint them as targets.”
“And that worked?”
“Well, this one’s still here.”
Though its patterning was not the World War I design, but a recent hommage, jauntier than the original.
HMS President was moored on the Embankment, on the approach to Blackfriars Bridge. In the background, cars and buses crossed the Thames, their tyres a swooshing soundtrack. This riverside road was quieter; one lane closed to traffic. Someone was always trying to improve the capital’s roads, and if they ever finished the job, they might turn out to have succeeded. Meanwhile, canvas-shrouded fencing was pitched along a stretch of kerb, reaching from the ship’s purpose-built jetty up to the bridge itself, lanterns fixed to it at regular intervals. These too wobbled in the wind, bouncing dizzy halos off the sturdy buildings on the other side of the road: banks and publishers and other dubious institutions.
River and Patrice had walked, because they were already so wet it made no difference, and it didn’t seem like something a pair of fugitives would do: stroll along in the pouring rain, pointing at the sights along the way.
Though their apparent camaraderie didn’t stop River wondering whether Patrice would kill him before the night was done.
He could run for it, of course. But running from trouble had never been a core skill of his; running towards it was more his thing. And running wouldn’t give him the answers he was after.
A figure waited near the dazzle ship, on its walkway’s sheltered platform. Before they reached him, River said, “There’s something I should tell you.”
Patrice showed little curiosity, but so far, apart from that moment he’d first laid eyes on River, he hadn’t shown much of anything. Had simply transmitted a dull grey pulse, performing each action as it was required; as if he were a wind-up construct, its movements oiled to perfection.
“I met your mother today,” he said. “Natasha.”
Patrice said nothing.
“She misses you.”
Patrice shook his head, but still said nothing.
“She wants to know you’re all right. It worried her, when Les Arbres burned down. Any mother would worry.”
“I have no mother.”
“She didn’t abandon you, you know. Or at least—she came back. She wanted to see you, to be with you. They wouldn’t let her.”
“I have no mother,” Patrice repeated.
“She was there for years. Never far away. In case you needed her.”
Patrice looked at him and said, “Those things never happened. Stop talking.”
“I will if you want. But I don’t think you do.”
As casually as if he were swatting a fly, Patrice reached out to slap River’s cheek, but River had been expecting this, or something like it, and blocked the blow. But not the second, which was aimed at his throat. Patrice pulled it at the last second, or River would have been laid out on the pavement.
Patrice said, “Stop now. Or I’ll make you.”
Maybe he had a point.
The figure under the shelter watched them approach. He wore a raincoat, its collar up, but there was something familiar about him, about the way he stood—because this was Frank, of course. His hair thinning; his cheekbones more pronounced; but still tall, fairish, broad-shouldered. Strong and capable. His way of growing older had been to grow more like himself.
As they reached him, he opened his arms. Patrice stepped dutifully into them, and Frank kissed him on one cheek, then on the other. There seemed little affection in the gesture. It was more, River thought, like a general greeting a soldier back from the front.
“I didn’t know you were in England,” Patrice said.
“You didn’t need to know I was in England,” Frank said. He turned to River. “You’re River Cartwright.”
“And you’re Frank. I didn’t get your surname.”
“Harkness. Frank Harkness.”
The accent was American, but with its corners sanded away by European exile.
River said, “Great to have this opportunity to chat. You sent someone to kill my grandfather.”
There were noises from the boat, whose features included a bar; overlapping voices and the tinselly ringing of glasses, mostly muffled by the rain. There was nobody in sight. River could have shouted without risk of being overheard.
To his surprise, Frank laughed.
River said, “You do know what happened, right? To your boy, Bertrand.”
Patrice took a step nearer, like a dog reacting to danger.
“You want to call him off?” River said.
Frank said, “It’s okay, Patrice. He’s got things he needs to say.”
“Why did he have Bertrand’s passport? And he said he was at Les Arbres.”
“There’s nothing to see there,” Frank said. “Not any more.”
“But why—”
“Excuse us,” Frank told River. “This won’t take long.”
It took River a moment to realise he was being asked to give them some privacy.
Well, he couldn’t get wetter.
From the laughably inadequate shelter of a nearby tree, he watched Frank put an arm round Patrice’s shoulder, and lean close. Whatever instruction or advice he was offering demanded intimacy . . . Water snaked down River’s back, throwing an uncontrollable shiver into him; a full-body spasm. How long had today gone on for? It had already been old when he’d arrived at his grandfather’s to find the body in the bathroom. How much longer, and what would happen yet?
Then Frank kissed Patrice again, and stepped back.
When Patrice approached River, he tensed, wondering if he’d just witnessed a Godfather moment; the older man explaining to the younger why he, River, had to die. But instead Patrice paused, then leaned forward, hands in pockets, and kissed River on the cheek. One cheek only.
He said, “We will speak again soon.”
Then he walked back the way they’d come; just a man hurrying through the rain, eager for the next place of shelter.
“Sorry about that,” Frank said. “Patrice, he’s a little confused right now.” He produced a pack of cigarettes, and offered them to River, who shook his head. Frank used a lighter, and the space filled with blue French smoke. “On account of your grandfather killing his best friend.”
“And your son.”
“Uh-huh.” He might have been acknowledging a vaguer relationship. Someone he shared a lift with once, perhaps. “I can’t believe he let that old bastard get the better of him. It’s like, lesson one. Don’t let your guard down just because the target appears harmless.”
River said, “The target was my grandfather.”
“I hadn’t forgotten.”
River wanted to punch the cigarette clean out of his mouth. Break his nose, black his eyes, watch him crumple in the rain. But instead of using his fists he said, “I shot your son’s corpse in the face. To mess up the forensics. I thought it might buy us twenty minutes.”
“His name was Bertrand.”
“I don’t care.”
“You should,” said Frank. “He was your brother. It’s good to see you, son. How’ve you been?”
Taverner disconnected and said: “I swear to God, I sometimes think I’m the only thing standing between this place and total chaos.”