“Pablo was killed last night in Madrid.”
The man bowed his head and closed his eyes before muttering, “Poor Gabriel…”
“Gabriel?”
“Pablo’s real name.”
Lucia sat down in shock as she realized the level of deceit she had been living with, but before she could respond, the man spoke again.
“How did you find me?” The whisky had calmed him now, and revealed the true man behind the false defenses. He looked like a nervous, broken man.
“We found something that led us to you,” Lucia said.
Liška looked aghast. “You found what? What did you find?”
“Pablo wrote your name in a book.”
“A book?” He lowered his voice to a mumble. “The clue…”
“The what?”
“Gabriel and I swore that we would leave each other clues that only we could solve — based on our interests. We both loved renaissance art, as you can see.” He swept his arms at the array of reproduction paintings on his walls. “We told each other we would leave clues based on that. The clue I left him was very clever — only he could have solved it, but now it’s all too late.”
“We know that Pablo…” Harry paused, glancing at Lucia. “Sorry, Gabriel, was hiding a NAND chip. We’ve seen its contents. It contains a strange film of birds dropping dead out of the sky above this apartment. This is how we were able to find you.”
“An experiment of mine that he recorded — something we were trying to reverse but it didn’t work…”
“What are you hiding, Andrej?”
“I cannot tell you — I am in grave danger.”
“Who is putting you in danger?”
“Don’t you understand? If you found me then they can find me!”
“Who are they?” Lucia asked.
Liška looked like he was about to be sick. He sank the Scotch in one gulp and poured another before getting up out of his chair and nervously looking out of the window. He began pacing up and down, shaking his head and muttering to himself.
“Mr Liška,” Lucia repeated. “Who will find you?”
He stopped in the center of his room and sank the second Scotch. “The Ministry.”
NINETEEN
Harry’s sharp eyes darted back to the Czech scientist as he studied the broken man who was now slumped down in his favorite leather wingback. “What’s the Ministry?” he asked.
Andrej looked up, startled for a moment at the blunt way the Englishman had asked the question. “I know very little about the Ministry, but one thing I know is that they wanted Gabriel and me dead. Now they have killed poor Gabriel. I am next.”
Harry frowned. “Not good enough.”
“I shouldn’t be telling you any of this…” Liška said, and then began mumbling in Czech. “You saw what they did to poor Gabriel, and I will be next.”
“Then you’d better speak up because right now it looks like we’re the only people who can help you,” Harry said.
“I don’t know…”
“They murdered Pablo!” Lucia said. “If you know who did it then you owe it to him to help us find them and have them punished!”
Liška gave a scornful laugh. “You do not punish the Ministry.”
Harry paced up and down the room for a moment before sitting down opposite Liška and fixing his eyes on him once again. The firm eye contact was important when you were interrogating someone. They had to know your attention was on them and nowhere else. “If you don’t tell us what you know, then we can’t help you and you really are on your own. I’ll just get up and walk. Right now.” As he finished his sentence he pulled a cigarette from his packet and fired it up, blowing a cloud of smoke out into Liška’s room. “No bluffing.”
Liška took the words in and then gave a long, low sigh. “I’m a scientist. My whole life has been dedicated to science, to technology, and for the last few years I worked for the Ministry. Not that I knew it, of course — that’s not how they do business. They live and move in the shadows. If they’re pulling your strings you won’t even know it. It’s been this way for centuries.”
“Sounds like a hell of a puppet show,” Harry said.
Liška stared at him, hollow-eyed. “We are all their puppets. Every last one of us.”
“I’m no one’s puppet,” Harry said.
Liška gave a low, sad chuckle and shook his head. “Maybe… but you said you were in MI6 once. How do you know who was pulling your strings? You would no doubt tell me the British Government, but your life will change if I tell you the Ministry pulls their strings, no?”
“Sounds like a conspiracy theory to me.”
“No! It is no theory! It is a fact — a real conspiracy and I know it! They’ve been ruling our society for a very long time.”
“If we’re all puppets,” Harry said coldly, “then tell me who is the puppet master?”
Liška took a quiet, deep breath and tried to steady his trembling hands. He poured more whisky sloppily in the glass, splashing some onto the varnished surface of the antique table beneath it. “You don’t understand. When I found out what the Ministry really was, I was nearly sick — and so was Gabriel — or Pablo as you knew him.”
“Pablo was a good man,” Lucia said.
“But he was misled — we both were… and not just us! Gabriel and I were only the two senior men at the top, but there were dozens of scientists and researchers working for us in our teams. They were all lied to by the Ministry.”
Harry sighed and dragged on his cigarette. “I’m still waiting.”
“For what?”
“For the name of the puppet master.”
“None of us ever knew information like that. It is strictly compartmentalized. There was a man called Hans Steiner who visited us from time to time, but he was merely a representative — just another puppet. I have no idea who was pulling his strings.”
Lucia sighed and sat forward in her chair, bringing her hands up to her face to rub her eyes. As she breathed out a long, stressed exhalation, the Czech professor looked at her and spoke again, more calmly this time. “I’m sorry — he was a good friend to me, but of course you were closer.”
“It feels like he betrayed me with his lies.”
“I understand.”
Liška and Harry listened intently as Lucia described how her life had turned to chaos in the last few hours. “I thought I knew Pablo — Gabriel… I don’t even know what to call him!” she said sadly. “Now I think everything we had together was a lie. I knew he was a physicist in his former life — we spoke about it all the time — but I really believed him when he told me he had turned his back on it and wanted to pursue his passion for art.”
“But you must understand why he had to conceal the truth from you,” Liška said quietly. “He knew if any part of his old existence was uncovered then his life would be at risk. We now know how right he was.”
Lucia nodded sadly and lowered her head. Wiping yet another tear from her eye, Harry moved closer and handed her a handkerchief from his pocket. She took it and glanced at him briefly as she dried her eyes. “Gracias,” she muttered. “I just can’t believe he’s really gone. His death was so violent. No one deserves that.”
“Now the fear is you’re next,” Harry said, turning to Liška. “So we need to move fast. Whoever found Pablo was fast and meant business. I worked in international intelligence for many years, and I know a pro when I see one.”
Liška let the words sink in and then replied with a sharp nod of his head. “So what is our next move?”
Harry walked to the window and gently pushed the voiles to one side as he glanced down the street. Except for a woman who was allowing her Finnish Spitz to relieve himself on the front wheel of a parked BMW, all was normal — pedestrians walking along with their iPhones, a young couple holding hands, a young man pumping up a flat bicycle tire. He closed the voiles and after helping himself to another of Liška’s malts he took a seat. “You can start by telling me about what we saw on this chip.”