Part 9 (1/2)

'I need to be put in touch with your certain people in London,' he said, keeping the crimson notebook under his arm and waiting for the question 'why?'

'Thinking of joining them? I know they take all sorts these days but Christ, you you?'

Again Perry nearly headed for the door. Again he wished he had. But no, he checked himself and took a breath and this time managed to find the right words: 'I have stumbled by chance on some information' with his long, uneasy fingers administering a tap to the notebook, which emitted a ping 'unsolicited, unwanted and ' he hesitated a long time before using the word 'secret.'

'Who says so?'

'I do.'

'Why?'

'If true, it could put lives at risk. Maybe save lives as well. It's not my subject.'

'Neither is it mine, I'm glad to say. I talent-spot. I baby-s.n.a.t.c.h. My certain people have a perfectly good website. They also put cretinous advertis.e.m.e.nts about themselves in the heritage press. Either route is open to you.'

'My material is too urgent for that.'

'Urgent as well as secret?'

'If it's anything at all, it's very urgent indeed.'

'The nation's fortunes hang by a thread? And that's the Little Red Book Little Red Book you're clutching under your arm, presumably.' you're clutching under your arm, presumably.'

'It's a doc.u.ment of record.'

They surveyed each other in mutual distaste.

'You're not seriously proposing to give it to me, are you?'

'I am. Yes. Why not?'

'Dump your urgent secrets on Flynn? Who will stick a postage stamp on them and send them to his certain people in London?'

'Something like that. Why should I know how you people operate?'

'While you go off in search of your immortal soul?'

'I'll do what I do. They can do what they do. What's wrong with that?'

'Everything is wrong with it. In this game, which isn't a game at all, the messenger is at least half as important as the message, and sometimes he's the whole message on his own. Where are you off to now? I mean, this minute?'

'Back to my rooms.'

'Do you have a mobile telephone?'

'Of course I b.l.o.o.d.y do.'

'Write the number down for me here, please' handing him a piece of paper 'I never commit anything to memory, it's insecure. You have a satisfactory signal for your mobile telephone in your rooms, I trust? The walls are not too thick or anything?'

'I get a perfectly good signal, thank you.'

'Take your Little Red Book Little Red Book. Go back to your rooms and you will receive a call from somebody calling himself or herself Adam Adam. A Mr or Ms Adam. I shall need a soundbite.'

'Need what what?'

'Something to make them h.o.r.n.y. I can't just say, ”I've got a Bollinger Bolshevik on my hands who thinks he's stumbled on a world conspiracy.” I've got to tell them what it's about.'

Swallowing his outrage, Perry made his first conscious effort to produce a cover story.

'Tell them it's about a crooked Russian banker who calls himself Dima,' he said, after other routes had mysteriously failed him. 'He wants to cut a deal with them. It's short for Dmitri, in case they don't know.'

'Sounds irresistible,' said Flynn sarcastically, picking up a pencil and scribbling on the same piece of paper.

Perry had been back in his room only an hour before his mobile was ringing, and he was listening to the same skittish, slightly husky male voice that had this minute addressed him here in the bas.e.m.e.nt room.

'Perry Makepiece? Marvellous. Name of Adam. Just got your message. Mind if I ask you a couple of quickie questions to make sure we're both worrying at the same bone? No need to mention our chum's name. Just need to make sure he's the same chum. Does he have a wife by any chance?'

'He does.'

'Fat, blonde party? Barmaid sort of type?'

'Dark-haired and emaciated.'

'And the precise circ.u.mstances of your b.u.mping into our chum? The when and how?'

'Antigua. On a tennis court.'

'Who won?'

'I did.'

'Marvellous. Third quickie coming up. How soon can you get up to London on our tab, and how soon can we get our hands on this dodgy dossier of yours?'

'Door to door, about two hours, I suppose. There's also a small package. I've pasted it inside the dossier.'

'Firmly?'

'I think so.'

'Well make sure you have. Write ADAM on the outside cover in large black letters use a laundry marker or something. Then wave it around at reception till somebody notices you.'

Laundry marker? The voice of an old bachelor? Or a sly reference to Dima's dubious financial practices? The voice of an old bachelor? Or a sly reference to Dima's dubious financial practices?

Enlivened by the presence of Hector lounging four feet from him, Perry was speaking swiftly and intensely, not into the middle air where academics find their traditional refuge, but straight into Hector's eagle-eyed face; and less directly to dapper Luke, seated to attention at Hector's side.