Part 23 (2/2)

'What else did he recommend?'

'What d'you mean?'

'Did you have a cheese fondue?'

'Not much fun if you're on your own. I need you and Mum. I need you both.'

'Oh, right.'

'And with any luck I'll be back for the weekend. We'll go to a movie or something.'

'I've got this Spanish essay, actually, if that's all right.'

'Of course it's all right. Good luck with it. What's it about?'

'Don't know really. Spanish stuff. See you.'

'See you.'

What else did the concierge recommend? Did I hear that right? Like Did I hear that right? Like is the concierge sending you up a hooker? is the concierge sending you up a hooker? What's Eloise been saying to him? And why in G.o.d's name did I tell him that I'd been to the Einstein Museum simply because I saw the brochure lying on the concierge's desk? What's Eloise been saying to him? And why in G.o.d's name did I tell him that I'd been to the Einstein Museum simply because I saw the brochure lying on the concierge's desk?

He went to bed, turned on the BBC World News and switched it off again. Half-truths. Quarter-truths. What the world really knows about itself, it doesn't dare say. Since Bogota, he had discovered, he no longer always had the courage to deal with his solitude. Maybe he had been holding too many bits of himself together for too long, and they were starting to fall apart. He went to the minibar, poured himself a Scotch and soda, and put it beside his bed. Just the one and that's it. He missed Gail, and then Yvonne. Was Yvonne burning the midnight oil over Dima's trade samples, or lying in the arms of her perfect husband? if she had one, which he sometimes doubted. Maybe she'd invented him to fend Luke off. His thoughts went back to Gail. Was Perry perfect too? Probably was. Everyone except Eloise has a perfect husband. He thought of Hector, father to Adrian. Hector visiting his son in prison every Wednesday and Sat.u.r.day, six months to go with luck. Hector the secret Savonarola, as somebody clever had called him, fanatical about reforming the Service he loved, knowing he will lose the battle even if he wins it.

He'd heard that the Empowerment Committee had its own war room these days. It seemed appropriate: somewhere ultra, ultra secret, suspended from wires or buried a hundred feet underground. Well, he'd been in rooms like that: in Miami and Was.h.i.+ngton when he was trading Intelligence with his chers collegues chers collegues in the CIA or the Drug Enforcement Agency or the Alcohol, Firearms & Tobacco Agency and G.o.d knew what all the other agencies had been. And his measured opinion was that they were places that guaranteed collective insanity. He'd watched how the body language changed as the Indoctrinated Ones abandoned themselves and their common sense to the embrace of their virtual world. in the CIA or the Drug Enforcement Agency or the Alcohol, Firearms & Tobacco Agency and G.o.d knew what all the other agencies had been. And his measured opinion was that they were places that guaranteed collective insanity. He'd watched how the body language changed as the Indoctrinated Ones abandoned themselves and their common sense to the embrace of their virtual world.

He thought of Matlock, who took his holidays in Madeira and didn't know what a black hotel was. Matlock cornered by Hector, pulling Adrian's name out of his pocket and firing it at point-blank range. Matlock sitting at his picture window overlooking Father Thames and droning out his elephantine subtleties, first the stick, then the carrot, then both together.

Well, Luke hadn't bitten and he hadn't bowed either. Not that he had much guile, as he was the first to admit: insufficiently manipulative insufficiently manipulative one of his annual confidential reports had run, and he was secretly rather pleased with it. He did not regard himself as a manipulator. Obstinacy was more his thing. Holding out. Clinging to the one note through thick and thin: one of his annual confidential reports had run, and he was secretly rather pleased with it. He did not regard himself as a manipulator. Obstinacy was more his thing. Holding out. Clinging to the one note through thick and thin: no no whether you're chained up in a stockade or sitting in the other armchair of Matlock's comfortable office at whether you're chained up in a stockade or sitting in the other armchair of Matlock's comfortable office at la Lubianka-sur-Tamise la Lubianka-sur-Tamise, drinking his whisky and parrying his questions. A man could drift off into his own thoughts, just listening to them: 'A three-to-five contract down at training school, Luke, nice housing thrown in for your wife, which will help things along after the troubles I needn't refer to, a relocation allowance, nice sea air, good schools in the neighbourhood ... You wouldn't have to sell sell your London house if you didn't want to, not while prices are down ... Rent it out is your London house if you didn't want to, not while prices are down ... Rent it out is my my advice, enjoy the income. Have a little chat with Accounts on the ground floor, say I told you to drop by ... Not that we're in advice, enjoy the income. Have a little chat with Accounts on the ground floor, say I told you to drop by ... Not that we're in Hector's Hector's league for property, few are.' A pause for decent anxiety. 'Hector's not dragging you in out of your depth, I trust, Luke, you being somewhat promiscuous in your loyalties, if I may say so? ... They do tell me Ollie Devereux's fallen under his spell, incidentally, which I wouldn't have thought prudent of him. Full time, would you say Ollie was? Or more in the line of casual labour ... ?' league for property, few are.' A pause for decent anxiety. 'Hector's not dragging you in out of your depth, I trust, Luke, you being somewhat promiscuous in your loyalties, if I may say so? ... They do tell me Ollie Devereux's fallen under his spell, incidentally, which I wouldn't have thought prudent of him. Full time, would you say Ollie was? Or more in the line of casual labour ... ?'

Then repeating it all for Hector's benefit an hour later.

'Is Billy Boy for us or against us by now?' Luke had asked Hector over the same farewell drink at Charles de Gaulle Airport, when they had moved gratefully to less personal topics.

'Billy Boy will go wherever he thinks his knighthood is. If he's got to choose between the gamekeepers and the poachers, he'll choose Matlock. However, a man who hates Aubrey Longrigg as much as he does can't be all bad,' Hector added as an afterthought.

In other circ.u.mstances Luke might have questioned this happy a.s.sertion but not now, not on the eve of Hector's decisive battle with the forces of darkness.

Somehow Wednesday morning had arrived. Somehow Gail and Perry had slept a little, and risen bright and ready for breakfast with Ollie, who had then gone off in search of their royal coach, as he called it, while they made a list and went shopping for the children in the local supermarket. Unsurprisingly, they were reminded of a similar expedition they had made to St John's on the afternoon Ambrose set them on the overgrown wood path to Three Chimneys, but their selections this time were more prosaic: water, still and fizzy, soft drinks and oh, all right, let them have Coca-Cola (Perry) picnic foods kids in general prefer savoury to sweet even if they don't know it (Gail) small backpacks for everybody, never mind they're not Fair Trade; a couple of rubber b.a.l.l.s and a baseball bat which was the nearest they could hope to get to cricket but, if needs must, we'll teach them rounders or more likely, since the boys are baseball players, they'll teach us.

Ollie's royal coach was an old twenty-foot green horsebox with wooden sides, a canvas roof and s.p.a.ces for two horses in the back with a part.i.tion between them, and cus.h.i.+ons and blankets on the floor for human beings. Gail sat herself down cautiously on the cus.h.i.+ons. Perry, pleased at the prospect of riding rough, sprang in after her. Ollie put up the ramp and bolted it into place. The purpose of his wide-brimmed black hat became clear: he was Ollie the merry Roma, off to the horse show.

They drove for fifteen minutes by Perry's watch, and stopped with a jolt on soft ground. No hanky-panky and no peeking, Ollie had warned them. A hot wind was blowing and the canvas roof above them billowed like a spinnaker. By Ollie's calculation they were ten minutes from target.

Luke Alone, his teachers had called him at his preparatory school, after the derring-do hero of some long-forgotten adventure novel. It struck him as a bit unfair that, at the age of eight, he should have manifested the same sense of solitude that haunted him at forty-three.

But Luke Alone he had remained, and Luke Alone he was now, wearing horn-rimmed spectacles and a red-hot Russian tie, tapping away at a silver laptop as he sat under the splendidly illuminated gla.s.s canopy of the great lobby of the Bellevue Palace Hotel, with a blue raincoat slung conspicuously over the arm of a leather chair pitched midway between the gla.s.s entrance doors and the pillared Salon d'Honneur, the scene of a midday apero apero presently being hosted by the Arena Multi Global Trading Conglomerate, see the handsome bronze signpost pointing guests the way. It was Luke Alone, keeping an eye on arrivals by way of the many elegant door mirrors, and waiting to exfiltrate single-handed a red-hot Russian defector. presently being hosted by the Arena Multi Global Trading Conglomerate, see the handsome bronze signpost pointing guests the way. It was Luke Alone, keeping an eye on arrivals by way of the many elegant door mirrors, and waiting to exfiltrate single-handed a red-hot Russian defector.

For the last ten minutes, he had looked on in a kind of pa.s.sive awe as first Emilio dell Oro and the two Swiss bankers, immortalized by Gail as Peter and the Wolf, made their deliberately inconspicuous entrances, followed by a clutch of grey suits, then two young Saudis, by the look of them, then a Chinese woman and a swarthy man with broad shoulders whom Luke had arbitrarily appointed Greek.

Then in a single bored flock the Armani kids, the Seven Clean Envoys, unprotected save by Bunny Popham with a carnation in his b.u.t.tonhole, and the languidly charming Giles de Salis with a silver-handled walking stick to go with his offensively perfect suit.

Aubrey Longrigg, where are you now they need you? Luke wanted to ask him. Keeping your head down? Wise fellow. A safe seat in Parliament and a free ticket to the French Open is one thing, so is a multi-million offsh.o.r.e kickback and a few more diamonds for your witless wife, not to speak of a non-executive directors.h.i.+p in a fine new City bank with billions of freshly laundered money to play with. But a full-dress, front-line signing in a Swiss bank with the spotlights on you is a bit too rich for your blood: or so Luke was thinking as the lank, bald-headed, ill-tempered figure of Aubrey Longrigg, Member of Parliament, came stalking up the steps the man himself, no longer a picture with Dima, the world's number-one money-launderer at his side.

As Luke buried himself a little deeper in his leather chair, and raised the lid of his silver laptop a little higher, he knew that if there had ever been such a thing as a Eureka moment in his life, it was here and now, and there would never be another like it, while once more thanking the G.o.ds he didn't believe in that in all his years in the Service he had never once set eyes on Aubrey Longrigg, and nor had Longrigg, so far as he knew, on him.

Even so, it was not until the two men were safely past him on their way to the Salon d'Honneur Dima had almost brushed against him that Luke dared raise his head and take a quick reading of the mirrors and establish the following nuggets of operational Intelligence: Nugget One: that Dima and Longrigg weren't talking to each other. And probably they hadn't even been talking as they arrived. They had simply happened to be close to each other as they came up the steps. Two other men were following sound, middle-aged Swiss-accountant types and it was more likely, in Luke's view, that Longrigg had been talking to one or both of them, rather than to Dima. And although the point was tenuous they could could have been talking to one another earlier Luke was cautiously consoled, because it's never comfortable to discover, just as your operation is reaching fruition, that your joe has a personal relations.h.i.+p with a main player that you didn't know about. Otherwise, on the subject of Longrigg, he had no further thoughts above the exultant, blindingly obvious: have been talking to one another earlier Luke was cautiously consoled, because it's never comfortable to discover, just as your operation is reaching fruition, that your joe has a personal relations.h.i.+p with a main player that you didn't know about. Otherwise, on the subject of Longrigg, he had no further thoughts above the exultant, blindingly obvious: he's here! I saw him! I am the witness! he's here! I saw him! I am the witness!

Nugget Two: that Dima has decided to go out with a bang. For his great occasion he sports a custom-built blue pinstripe double-breasted suit; and for his delicate feet a pair of black calf Italian slip-ons with ta.s.sels not ideal, in Luke's teeming mind, for making a dash for it, but this isn't going to be a dash, it's going to be an orderly withdrawal. Dima's manner, for a fellow who reckons he's just signed his own death warrant, struck Luke as improbably carefree. Perhaps it was the foretaste of vengeance he was enjoying: of an old vor vor's pride soon to be restored, and a murdered disciple atoned for. Perhaps, amid all his anxieties, he was glad to be done with the lying, ducking and pretending, and was already thinking of the green-and-pleasant England that awaited him and his family. Luke knew that feeling well.

The apero apero is getting under way. A low baritone burble issues from the Salon d'Honneur, starts to grow, and drops again. Some honourable Salon guest is making a speech, first in Russian blur, now in English blur. Peter? The Wolf? De Salis? No. It's the honourable Emilio dell Oro; Luke recognizes his voice from the tennis club. Handclapping. Church silence while an honourable toast is drunk. To Dima? No, to honourable Bunny Popham, who is responding; Luke knows that voice too, and the laughter confirms it. He looks at his watch, takes out his mobile, presses the b.u.t.ton for Ollie: is getting under way. A low baritone burble issues from the Salon d'Honneur, starts to grow, and drops again. Some honourable Salon guest is making a speech, first in Russian blur, now in English blur. Peter? The Wolf? De Salis? No. It's the honourable Emilio dell Oro; Luke recognizes his voice from the tennis club. Handclapping. Church silence while an honourable toast is drunk. To Dima? No, to honourable Bunny Popham, who is responding; Luke knows that voice too, and the laughter confirms it. He looks at his watch, takes out his mobile, presses the b.u.t.ton for Ollie: 'Twenty minutes if he's on time,' he says, and once more settles to his silver laptop.

Oh, Hector. Oh, Billy Boy. Wait till you hear who I b.u.mped into today.

Mind a bit of off-the-cuff pontification before I go, Luke? Hector is asking, draining his malt at Charles de Gaulle Airport. Hector is asking, draining his malt at Charles de Gaulle Airport.

Luke doesn't mind a bit. The topics of Adrian, Eloise and Ben are behind them. Hector has just pa.s.sed judgement on Billy Boy Matlock. His flight is being called.

In operational planning, there are two opportunities only only for flexibility with me, Lukie? for flexibility with me, Lukie?

With you, Hector.

One, when you draw up your plan. We've done that. Two, when the plan goes belly up. Until it does, stick like glue to what we've decided to do, or you're f.u.c.ked. Now shake my hand.

So here was the question in Luke's mind as he sat staring at a lot of gobbledegook on the screen of his silver laptop and, with zero minutes to go, waited for Dima to emerge alone from the Salon d'Honneur: did the memory of Hector's parting homily come to him before before he saw the baby-faced Niki and the cadaverous philosopher taking up their positions in the two tall-backed chairs either side of the gla.s.s doors? Or was it instigated by the shock of seeing them there? he saw the baby-faced Niki and the cadaverous philosopher taking up their positions in the two tall-backed chairs either side of the gla.s.s doors? Or was it instigated by the shock of seeing them there?

And who first called him the cadaverous philosopher cadaverous philosopher anyway? Was it Perry or Hector? No, it was Gail. Trust Gail. Gail has all the best lines. anyway? Was it Perry or Hector? No, it was Gail. Trust Gail. Gail has all the best lines.

And why was it that, precisely precisely at the moment when he spotted them, the burble in the Salon d'Honneur swelled into a babble, and the great doors opened actually only one of them, he now saw to disgorge Dima alone? at the moment when he spotted them, the burble in the Salon d'Honneur swelled into a babble, and the great doors opened actually only one of them, he now saw to disgorge Dima alone?

Luke's confusion was not only one of time, but of place. While Dima was approaching from behind him, Niki and the cadaverous philosopher were rising to their feet in front of him, leaving Luke hunched at mid-point between them, not knowing which way to look.

A furious bark of Russian obscenities from over his right shoulder informed him that Dima had drawn to a halt beside him: 'What the f.u.c.k d'you want with me, you s.h.i.+t-ants? You want to know what I'm doing, Niki? I'm taking a p.i.s.s. You want to watch me p.i.s.s? Get out of here. Go p.i.s.s on your b.i.t.c.h Prince.'

Behind his desk, the concierge's head discreetly lifted. The impossibly chic German receptionist, showing no such discretion, swung round to take a look. Determinedly deaf to all of it, Luke tapped meaninglessly at his silver laptop. Niki and the cadaverous philosopher remained standing. Neither had stirred. Perhaps they suspected Dima was about to make a straight dash for the gla.s.s doors and the street. Instead, with a subdued 'f.u.c.k your mothers,' he resumed his walk across the lobby and into the short corridor leading to the bar. He pa.s.sed the lift and drew up at the top of the stone staircase that led to the bas.e.m.e.nt lavatories. By then he was no longer alone. Niki and the philosopher were standing behind him, and a few feet behind Niki and the philosopher stood meek, unnoticed little Luke with his laptop under his arm and his blue raincoat over it, needing to go to the loo.

His heart is no longer beating vigorously, his feet and knees feel good and springy. He is hearing and thinking clearly. He is reminding himself that he knows the terrain and the bodyguards don't, and that Dima knows it too, which gives extra incentive to the bodyguards, if they ever needed it, to be behind Dima rather than in front of him.

Luke is as astonished by their unscripted appearance as Dima patently is. It defeats him, as it does Dima, that they should be hara.s.sing a man who is of no further use to them, and will by his own reckoning and probably theirs shortly be dead. Just not here and now. Just not in broad daylight with the entire hotel looking on, and the Seven Clean Envoys, a distinguished British Member of Parliament, and other dignitaries, putting back the champagne and canapes twenty metres away. Besides which, as is well attested, the Prince is fastidious in his killing. He likes accidents, or random acts of terror by marauding Chechen bandits.

But that discussion is for another time. If the plan has gone belly up gone belly up, in Hector's words, then it is a time for Luke to exercise flexibility, a time not to finger it but to not to finger it but to do do it it, to quote Hector again, a time to remember the stuff that has been dinned into him on successive unarmed combat courses over the years, but he has never been obliged to put into effect except the once in Bogota, when his performance had been fair to middling at best: a few wild blows, then darkness.

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