At the ground floor, the doors opened and two men in pinstripe suits got in, giving her a moment’s glance, deciding they didn’t know her, and continuing their conversation.
“Spurrier’s doing a good job,” said one of them. “That office was a shambles...”
Witch got out at the second floor while the men continued upwards. She was standing in a small entrance area from which led, to left and right, narrow green-carpeted halls. She chose to go right, and passed several offices. Green seemed the predominant color: she saw lime green chairs in some of the offices, and olive green curtains. In some of the offices stood a single desk and chair. Other rooms were larger, with a staff of secretaries working away on word processors, or clerical-looking people rushing around with sheaves of paper or large manila envelopes under their arms. Telephones did not ring; rather, they buzzed, quite annoyingly. In the corridor ahead, two shirt-sleeved men were having an intense discussion. One stood with arms folded, resting most of his weight on his forward foot. The other had his hands in his pockets. Both wore pale shirts and dark ties. They looked senior. The one with arms folded turned and watched Witch approach.
“Can I help you?” he said.
Damn! She was supposed to look as though she belonged here. She swallowed.
“I’m looking for Mr. Spurrier,” she said.
He grinned. “Mrs. Spurrier, you mean.”
“Oh yes, Mrs. Spurrier.”
“Next floor up,” said the man. “You’re new, aren’t you?” He was almost purring. His colleague was staring fixedly, nervously, at the tips of his shoes.
She managed a coy smile. “No, I work at Number One.”
“Ah.” Folded-arms nodded as though this explained everything. “Back along here, lift to the next floor, corridor on the left.”
“Thank you,” she said, turning away. Another close call. What if he’d said, “I’m Spurrier, how can I help you?” It was bad enough that Spurrier had turned out to be a woman. She was beginning to take risks. The game was becoming difficult. Difficult, but not dangerous. It would turn dangerous if she were forced to take risks... She took the stairs, not the lift. Just to experience them. At the top of the stairwell, two girls were giggling together.
“What’s the joke?” said Witch, conversationally.
They looked around before confiding in her. “The hunky policemen,” one said.
“We’re wondering which one we’ll get outside our window,” explained the other.
“Ah,” said Witch, nodding. Yes, she’d been wondering about that. Police marksmen on the roofs along Victoria Street: it was bound to happen. There would be times when all the heads of state would be driving along Victoria Street towards Buckingham Palace. Police marksmen on the roofs... and in the buildings? There were ledges outside the windows of this building. Witch had spent a long time in her several disguises checking the look of the DTI buildings on Victoria Street. Staring up at them... sometimes taking a photograph. Just a tourist, eating her burger lunch or killing time.
The marksmen would be sited on the ledges. But did they...?
“Do you ever get the chance to talk to them?” she asked. The girls giggled again.
“Not enough,” said one.
“Not nearly enough,” said the other.
“God, there was one... when was it? Back in April.”
“March,” her friend corrected.
“March, was it? Yes, when that whassisname was in town. He visited just along the road. They had policemen on the ledges then. The one outside our office...”
“God, what a hunk!”
Witch laughed with them, asked them to describe the man. They did, then they all laughed again. The two girls hugged their files to their chests.
“I hope we get him again.”
“I’ll keep my fingers crossed for you,” said Witch. “How do they get out onto the ledges?”
“Oh, some of the windows open. You know, like in the minister’s office. You can get out that way.”
“I’ve never been in the minister’s office,” Witch admitted.
“No? We’re in there all the time, aren’t we, Shelley?”
“All the time,” she agreed. “He’s got his own telly and everything in there.”
“Drinks cabinet, all the papers, and paintings on the wall, supposed to be really valuable.”
“Yes?” said Witch.
“Oh yes,” said Shelley. “And if he doesn’t like them, they fetch him some more.”
“I don’t know about paintings. Give me a big poster of that police hunk any day!”
Witch left them to their giggles and walked along the third-floor corridor. She was keeping an eye out for Folded-arms. Maybe he’d follow her, try another chat-up line. She did not want him directing her personally to Mrs. Spurrier’s office.
She came to a solid wooden door with a plate reading CONFERENCE ROOM. Pinned to the door was a sheet of typed paper with dates, times, and names on it. Presumably bookings for use of the room. There was no booking for just now. She turned the door handle. The door, though it had a lock, was open. She slipped inside and closed the door again. The room had a stuffy, unused smell. There was a plain oval table, five lime green chairs, a single uninspired painting on one wall. Two glass ashtrays sat on the table, and on the floor by the window sat an empty metal wastebasket.
Utilitarian; Witch quite liked it. She went to the window and stared out, resting her hands on the inner sill. The window was not the opening kind. It was swathed in yards of off-white gauze curtaining, the kind popular in public offices because, the popular wisdom went, the curtains would catch shards of glass exploding inwards after a blast. Witch’s blurred view was of the traffic and the pedestrians below in Victoria Street. The holdup for the VIP convoy had led to frayed tempers and congestion. She thought for a moment of the drive she was going to take tomorrow or Wednesday. She had to get her routes right. She had to find a car tonight and make a test run. She had to find two cars tonight. There was so much still to do. The ledge, she noted with pleasure, was hardly wide enough to accommodate a man. The ledges on the next floor down, she knew, were wide enough. What was more, the ledge outside her window had crumbled a little, rendering it unsafe. Good. Very good. She examined the face of the building across the road, then spent a little time looking down onto the road itself, her lips pursed thoughtfully.
Back at the door, she examined the keyhole. An uncomplicated affair, as easy to lock as it would be to unlock. Better and better. She opened the door again and stepped out into the corridor, closed it behind her and checked the list on the door. There were no scheduled meetings tomorrow at all, and only two on Wednesday, one at 10 and the other at 4:15. A nice gap between. Excellent. Witch was in no doubt. At last, she’d found her bolt-hole, her assassin’s perch. Sometimes it happened like that, you just wandered into a place or up to a place and you saw it straightaway, the perfect position. Other times, you had to search and scour and scratch your head and maybe even make other plans, look at other sites. She’d lost weeks of her life changing initial plans, executing — apt word — new ones. But today it had come easy. Perhaps her luck was changing. She turned around and saw, coming towards her, Folded-arms. Only his arms weren’t folded anymore. They were spread out, palms towards her.