“She’s staying with the di Fonsecas in their holiday villa—but not at home on the evening of July 19, 2002, when they are murdered. The murderers are gunmen reported variously to be members of the Palermo Mafia, the Brigado Rosso, or the Red Skull Cult, depending on who you ask. The girl, aged sixteen, is the sole survivor. Her claim to have been out on the town at the time is accepted by the local magistrates. She inherits roughly two million euros and the contents of the di Fonsecas’ library, changes her legal name, and moves out.”
I draw a deep breath. “Fast-forward two years—I’ll back up in a minute—and two badly decomposed bodies are dredged from a lake in Tuscany. DNA evidence places them at the scene of the massacre. The remains show signs of paranormal intervention.” That’s Laundry-speak for they were chewed on by extradimensional horrors.
“Inconclusive.” Lockhart frowns. “What next?”
How to summarize…? Oh, that’s easy. “She embarks on a five-year reign of terror. Instead of going to university, from September 2002 through to November 2007 BASHFUL INCENDIARY ran the most successful private occult intelligence service in history. The Hazard Network. An eighteen-year-old genius with a private income, the looks of a model, and a knack for identifying and hiring raw talent. She is, as it turns out, a very talented ritual practitioner”—one who risks their own cerebral cortex by working magic, raw, by force of will—“with a speciality in sex magic and, if that isn’t sickening enough, she’s a damn fine paralogician and a skilled programmer.” Ritual magic is rare enough; combining it with a talent for our kind of business is distinctly unusual.
“Let’s see: White Hat work. We know the Sultan of Brunei hired the Hazard Agency to track down a deep-cover Al-Qaida cell attempting to infiltrate the army intelligence service and the Sultan’s own personal bodyguard. A Swiss bank retained her services as a Tiger Team to test security on their new deposit facility—verdict: it needed serious improvements. That sort of thing.
“As for her Black Hat work, there’s nothing anyone can prove well enough to stand up in court—but a certain stench of brimstone attaches.” I begin checking off crimes and outrages on my fingers. “Suspected removal of occult artifacts and jewelry from sunken Roman merchant vessels in the Adriatic. Suspected involvement in smuggling of Egyptian antiquities. Suspected theft of previously stolen old masters from a rich collector’s hoard in Vienna, subsequent resale and blackmail—sexual as well as handling stolen goods—of their previous custodian. And an investment portfolio that bottomed out at 1.2 million euros in 2002 and peaked at just over one hundred million”—I do the Doctor Evil little-pinkie gesture at this point—“before the bottom fell out of the market in 2008.”
Lockhart nods. “Since that time?”
“In 2008 she retires to London. Waits six months, then dumps the thick end of twenty million pounds of her personal wealth into the property market—right after the initial crash—and another hundred thousand pounds in political donations that make her very difficult to dislodge. By this time she’s only got five or ten million left in the bank—she’s paid off her team—but she plays her hand expertly. She’s an EU citizen thanks to the di Fonsecas, a twenty-four-year-old millionairess who invites herself to the right parties and makes friends with the right Bright Young Things. Any crimes she did commit are swept under the rug, and she’s kept her nose clean for the past seven years. In fact, she’s done a terrifyingly professional job of turning herself into a pillar of the establishment. There’s absolutely nothing on her record after 2008 except for the financial and social work. To all intents and purposes it looks as if she dropped out of the whole occult world completely.”
“Yes, that’s always the way it works.” Lockhart nods.
“So why isn’t she one of us?” I ask bluntly. “She’d be a major asset…”
“You have no need to know.” The caterpillar stretches in a thin line: curls over and plays dead. “That decision was taken above your pay grade—or mine. However”—Lockhart places a hand on top of the BASHFUL INCENDIARY file—“you will doubtless have realized by now that if she was in here she would be required to work under the same constraints as you or I, which would severely reduce her value to us. And I am led to believe that, within certain parameters, her loyalty is absolute.”
I can’t help myself. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Lockhart’s cheek twitches. “For one thing, it means that she really does not like the Culto del Teschio Rosso and their playmates. And for another thing, if you ask her why she moved here, she will tell you that she conducted a rigorous survey of European occult defense agencies and concluded that we have the best chance of surviving CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN. In her opinion.” His tone is dry enough to curdle milk. “It would be unwise to confuse a finely tuned survival instinct with loyalty to the Crown, Mr. Howard, but it counts for something.”
“So we’re her lifeboat and you trust her to bail if you hand her a bucket?”
“Something like that. Or so I have been led to believe by Mahogany Row. And what’s good enough for them is, ipso facto, good enough for us.”
“Jesus.” I shake my head. (So this is coming down from the very top of the organization: the stratospheric, secretive executive country that mere mortal scum like me don’t get to see even from a distance unless we’re very unlucky.) “So, let me see if I’ve got this straight. Ray Schiller of the Golden Promise Ministries is doing breakfast with the PM, and you’re a little upset because he’s disturbingly convincing and gives off bad vibes. We can’t snoop on the PM ourselves, so you point this loose cannon at the pastor—” I stop. “Oh no you don’t.”
“Don’t what?” Lockhart’s face is as unreadable as a professional poker player’s.
I’m on my feet and leaning over his desk; I don’t remember standing, and I am so damn angry that I’m shaking: “You’re setting me up! You’re going to spin it as a rogue operation with no oversight and if anything goes wrong—”
“Calm down, Mr. Howard!”
I’m not sure quite what it is about his tone, but his words are like a bucket of cold water in my face.
“You are not being framed. Quite the opposite. Your role in this operation is to monitor and report on BASHFUL INCENDIARY’s officially unauthorized and unsanctioned activities; nothing more and nothing less. You will have…noticed…that at no point did I instruct BASHFUL INCENDIARY to act on our behalf. In fact I have no authority over her. What Ms. Hazard chooses to do next is entirely up to her. It is not impossible that she will decide to occupy herself with the Grand National and the Chelsea Flower Show instead. Or to emigrate to Brazil, or paint herself orange and join a Buddhist nunnery. The point is, she is not under our control. Not under yours or mine. You don’t have command authority; your job is to keep an eye on the external asset, not to direct it.”
“But”—I begin to slow down: the implications are sinking in—“with what she knows, what if she’s a threat?”
Lockhart looks at me grimly. “I think that is very unlikely, Mr. Howard, otherwise I would not have mentioned our little problem to her. However, in the hypothetical case that the loose cannon were to explode in our faces, your job would be to deal with the consequences as you see fit. If you happen to be one of the survivors.”
“I”—squeak—“survivors?” It wouldn’t be the first time an operation has blown up under me with fatal consequences, but I really hate the way this is shaping up, with Hazard carrying the detonator and me trailing along with bucket and spade. But Lockhart evidently misunderstands the nature of my reservations.
“This is not a game, Mr. Howard. Your new pay grade comes with strings attached; I am not referring to the management training. Further advancement as an officer within this service will put you in situations where you will be responsible for whether other people live or die—this is inevitable as we move closer to CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN. Worse: it is likely that you will encounter situations where you must choose who to save and who to cast adrift, answerab
le only to your oath of service and your conscience. I understand from your personnel file that you have been placed in situations where you have been required to use lethal force in self-defense. This is not the same.” He fixes me with a gimlet stare. “There is a huge difference between returning fire in personal self-defense and ordering an artillery strike on an inhabited civilian settlement suspected of harboring enemy forces. Do you understand?”
I sit down. My mouth is dry. Lockhart’s gaze is directed through me, almost as if he’s talking to a younger version of himself. Military background, I think. It’s his personal metaphor. Nightmare, whatever. Then I have a flashback of my own, to a buried temple: writhing bodies, hungry revenants in the surrounding darkness, a sacrifice of souls. “I’m afraid I do,” I say slowly. “Too bloody well.”
“Good.” His shoulders relax like an over-wound spring. “I trust that you were not suffering from the misconception that your promotion was directed towards a routine management role.”
“This doesn’t sound very routine to me.” As a joke, it falls flatter than a Brick Lane chapati.
The caterpillar twitches. “Ninety-eight percent of management work in this organization is routine. The other two percent is a tightrope walk over an erupting volcano without a safety net. Congratulations: here’s your balance pole.”
I lick my lips. “So what exactly am I managing?”
“Trouble.” Lockhart glances at his wristwatch. “Hmm. Well, I must be going—I have a meeting at four. I suggest you take the rest of the day off. Go home, check your go-bag, that kind of thing.” He looks at me again. “Make sure to wear a suit tomorrow.”
“What?” The phrase wear a suit does not fill me with joy.
“Be here tomorrow morning, nine thirty sharp. We’ll start by collecting your new passport. They’ll need to photograph you. Then we have a field trip.”
“New passport?”
“In all probability this operation will require you to travel outside the country.” Lockhart picks up the BASHFUL INCENDIARY file and bends over his office safe, putting his back between me and the keypad. “In which case you will need a passport with a diplomatic visa. In my experience, when pretending to be a diplomat working for the Foreign Office it usually helps to look the part.” He glances over his shoulder at me. “Well? What is it?”
I put my brain back in gear. “Where am I going?”
“Probably the United States, because that is where Schiller’s Golden Promise Ministries is headquartered—but in any event, wherever Ms. Hazard leads you. Remember: economy class on flights of less than six hours duration. Oh, and don’t forget to write.” He flicks his fingers at me. “Shoo.”
I shoo.
I AM IN THE BEDROOM PACKING MY GO-BAG WHEN MO GETS home.
There is a clattering from the front hall, then more noises from the kitchen—cupboard doors, the fridge, a dirty coffee mug rattling in the sink. Finally a loudly pitched question mark: “Bob?”
“Up here.” Five pairs of socks, six, or hit M&S for a new one-week pre-pack? I hear footsteps on the stairs.
“Who died?” she asks from the doorway.
“No one,” I say, straightening up. She’s seen the suit.
Actually, I own two suits these days. The other one is a black-tie job for formal bashes like the Institute of Chartered Demonologists’ annual ball. This one is my Reservoir Dogs Special. It does duty for all occasions that require a suit—court appearances, weddings, graduation ceremonies, funerals, and those situations when work absolutely requires something other than a tee shirt and jeans. It’s the kind of suit that is worn at arm’s length by a suit refusnik; the kind of suit that trails a screaming neon disclaimer overhead, saying: the occupant of this garment is clearly alive only because he wouldn’t be seen dead in one of these things; the kind of suit whose afterlife is destined to be spent surrounded by mothballs in a charity shop window display. I did not buy it willingly: when it became half past obvious that I needed one, Mo dragged me round the shops for seven solid hours until I finally surrendered.
“They’re sending you somewhere,” she says. “Diplomatic cover?”
“Er—”
Laundry employees are not supposed—in fact, not allowed—to discuss their work with civilians. But Mo is not a civilian. And (I don’t think Lockhart knows this) she and I have a special waiver to our binding geas to allow us to vent on one another’s shoulder. But this business with Raymond Schiller and BASHFUL INCENDIARY is a cut above the ordinary, and I’m not even sure she knows about Externalities and Lockhart’s little sideline.
While I’m vacillating over how much I can tell my wife, she works it all out for herself and nods, briskly: “Well, if they’re running you under FO cover they’ll want you to look like a junior FO staffer, and that won’t do. Let me see what you’ve got so far, then we can work out a shopping list to fill in the gaps.”
“A shopping—”
“Oh Bob.” She looks amused. “What do you think they pay me for?”
“Personal shopper?” It’s a bad joke; of course I know what they pay her for. Mo owns several suits, because part-time university lecturers are expected to look the part—and when she isn’t teaching, or researching, she’s traveling on business with one of the aforementioned diplomatic visas.
“Good guess.” She bends over the case. “Any idea how long you’ll be gone for? Or where?”
“You missed an ‘if’ out of those questions.” I shrug. “I may not be going anywhere at all. Or I may be going several places, in a hurry.”
“Oh, one of those jobs.” She frowns. “Okay, you pack for five days and work the hotel room service on expenses for priority cleaning if you overrun. Underwear, shirts, huh…is this your only tie?”
“Apart from the bow that goes with the dinner jacket, yes.” It’s a black silk tie with Wile E. Coyote’s head embroidered on it in raised relief, black-on-black. I’ve had it for two years; I was forced to buy it for my uncle’s funeral after the last neck-strangulator was disemboweled by the washing machine. (How was I to know they’re dry clean only?) I was wondering how long it would take her to notice.
“Jesus, Bob.” She shakes her head. “Okay, I’m taking you to work tomorrow. By tube, via the shops in Liverpool Street station. And I’m buying.”
“Why?” I will confess to sounding a tad querulous at this point.
“So you don’t end up with a diplomatic mug shot that makes you look like a hung-over hipster, that’s why.” She glares at me. “It’s work.”
I deflate. “No, it’s management bullshit,” I say weakly.
“Tell me about it.” For a moment her expression is bleak beyond anything her years entitle her to. And she’s five years older than me.
I take a chance. “There’s a department called—”
My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth and a taste of acrid brimstone fills my nostrils. So, being me, I try again.
“I’m working for—” There’s an immediate electric prickling in my eyes and a crawling on my scalp. Nope, oath of office ain’t having it.
“Looks like our usual waiver doesn’t apply to this job.” The ward of office agrees and refrains from frying my ass for explaining this to her.
Her eyes narrow thoughtfully. “You’ll forgive me for saying so, but that’s some serious shit you’re in.” I nod enthusiastically, which seems to be allowed. “Coming right on top of that course on, what was it, leadership skills…” She walks around the bed and prods disconsolately at the graveyard of trainers. “You’ll be needing a good pair of running shoes, then. And something that doesn’t call you out as anything other than your normal boring embassy desk pilot. Assuming you’re doing what I think you’re doing.” She pauses. “Have you been to see Harry yet?”
“That was on my to-do list for tomorrow,” I admit. Harry is our armorer. “But if I have to tool up, everything will already have gone to shit.”
“In which case you will need to be carrying, in order to evacuate
and report.” She pauses. “Scratch Harry; if you’re going overseas, guns are a liability. I think you want to have a word with Pinky tomorrow. He’s been working with a new application of SCORPION STARE, and you might be an ideal candidate for beta tester.”
I KNOCK ON LOCKHART’S OFFICE DOOR AT NINE THIRTY SHARP the next morning, wearing a sober suit and a new tie—one of three that Mo insisted on buying for me in Noose Hutch International on the way to work (which meant she got to vet them for cartoon wildlife first). It’s uncomfortable but I’m not panicking yet—I’ve got a compact Leatherman tool in my pocket, which means I can always stab it to death if it wakes up and tries to throttle me.
“Ah, Mr. Howard.” Lockhart’s stare is judgmental. “Come on, we’re running late.” He sweeps out of the office and I tag along in his wake.
Normally, when I apply for a passport I get some pictures taken in a photo booth, fill out a form, then go round to a post office and pay them to check the paperwork and send it off to the Identity and Passport Service. A couple weeks later a fat envelope flops through the letterbox. This is a bit different, and involves visiting an office about which we shall say as little as possible, because the Dustbin are not our friends (except when they’re arranging official cover documentation for our people, including shiny new passports with genuine diplomatic visas accredited by the US Embassy in Grosvenor Square without the need for an actual visit and interview).
After the photo-and-fingerprints session at Spook Central, Lockhart leads me outside the MI5 headquarters building and hails a taxi. Twenty traumatic minutes later we arrive at the sucking vortex of existential despair and chaos that is Euston, whereupon Lockhart hands me a rail ticket and leads me through the barriers. “Where are we going?” I ask. He ignores me, but pauses to buy a copy of the Daily Telegraph. The ticket, I note, is first class—something I thought was a strict no-no under our current hair-shirt expenditure controls.
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