The Englishman

by David Gilman

  Pickering accompanied him to the entrance. ‘Your people are inside with Mrs Reeve-Carter. There’s a police family liaison officer with her and her family doctor, and there’s a friend from across the road. I insisted, in the gentlest terms, that the civilians leave the area but she is adamant that the friend stays. As far as we can see, sir, there is no immediate threat but given your association with the family I would appreciate it if you could convince her about the friend.’

  Maguire nodded. ‘Are you giving media interviews yet?’

  ‘They’ve already blocked the end of the road. We’ll get a Noddy to deal with them later.’

  Maguire smiled at the patronizing reference to the uniformed police. ‘All right, Tom, let me get started in there.’

  He took his leave and went into the house, past the policeman at the door who booked him into the house, checking his name off against a list of personnel. The place was locked down. Like a crime scene. Which it might be, Maguire thought to himself. The nagging doubt was that Carter might be the guilty party.

  6

  Amanda Reeve-Carter was one of those women who had a knack for creating a beautiful home without it looking like an interior designer’s death-wish fulfilment. It was her taste, her imprint and Jeremy Carter had been happy to pay for it. Yet she did not spend money for the sake of splashing out. The artwork hanging on the walls was more likely to be from art college students rather than from overpriced and, to her mind, self-indulgent, pretentious ‘names’. Maguire had always liked Amanda’s practicality. She had been an army wife before she married Carter and kept her late husband’s name as part of the new.

  Tony Reeve had been a major in the British Army, awarded the George Cross, the highest award for gallantry below that of the Victoria Cross. Seven years ago, Major Reeve, a bomb-disposal expert, died in Afghanistan defusing several improvised explosive devices that threatened the lives of a half-dozen wounded men already caught in an ambush. The men were evacuated as Reeve stood out in the open alone, coolly working through the intricate set of wired devices. The booby trap that killed him was triggered by a child probably no older than his own son. Jeremy Carter had insisted that the hero’s name live on for the boy and there were plenty of pictures of Steven’s father in the house. Maguire paused by the bank of family photographs and wondered whether a double tragedy might be too much for even the strong-willed Amanda to bear. One husband dead, one husband abducted and the possibility that her son had been taken. If there was a God, Maguire thought to himself, He knew how to wreak havoc in someone’s life. He glanced up as raised voices reached him from the rear of the house.

  He walked through to a bright modern room: a glass-panelled coach-house-roofed extension that housed the kitchen, dining and family day room; beyond glass doors spanning the breadth of the room lay the walled garden. Amanda Reeve-Carter was sitting on a sofa with a much younger woman. Maguire knew she had no other relatives so this had to be the friend from over the road. An older man, who presumably was the doctor, stood in front of them. Amanda held a glass containing what looked to be a generous helping of whisky. She was insisting that she did not need a sedative of any description and that she was not prepared to abandon alcohol. The ever-patient doctor was equally insistent that by nightfall she would need medication and implored the woman next to Amanda to ensure that she ate a meal as soon as she could be convinced to do so and then took the prescribed sedatives. He placed a small bottle on the table.

  Maguire glanced along a corridor to his right where members of his team were systematically searching Carter’s study. One of them saw him and stepped outside bearing a handful of files.

  ‘Well?’ asked Maguire quietly.

  ‘Nothing yet, boss.’

  ‘It’s here somewhere. Find the bloody stuff before we all go down the pan,’ Maguire told him. He carried on into the family room as Amanda Carter looked his way. He could see that she was stoically holding down her fear. She had clearly realized that offices of the state were now involved and whatever was going on in her home was procedure. Seated near to her was a woman in her forties. Her lined face suggested to Maguire that she was the police family liaison officer, a woman who had spent too many hours sitting with grieving relatives. She would have been trained to use specific words to try and ease trauma and grief. By the look of her, Maguire guessed she was a mother and wife who probably threw half the counselling advice down the pan. Woman to woman, she would have found the words needed.

  The fifth person in the room was one of Maguire’s junior officers, Abnash Khalsa. She wore jeans, trainers and a casual leather jacket over a finely knit mohair sweater. Her hair was cut to the nape of her neck, short enough to be cared for easily and long enough to attractively shape her face, a face that unlike the family officer’s was still unblemished by life’s vicissitudes. As he stepped closer she gave him a brief smile of greeting and an almost imperceptible shake of her head. Amanda Reeve-Carter had revealed nothing of interest in her general conversation.

  ‘She needs more than booze, Abbie,’ said Maguire.

  ‘I’ll put the kettle on,’ the young woman answered.

  ‘You’re not here to serve tea,’ he said quietly. ‘I need you working in the study.’

  She nodded. ‘I know, sir, but they’ll fetch me if there’s anything I need to see in there. I thought a bit of support out here was appropriate.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ said Maguire as he walked past her. ‘Amanda,’ he said in greeting, ‘we are doing everything we can.’

  She frowned. ‘Are you?’ she said bluntly. She’d had a drink too many.

  ‘I know this is a difficult time but we should get some food inside you.’ He nodded in acknowledgement towards the doctor.

  ‘You don’t control me. This is my house. You’re supposed to be out there finding my husband and my son.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Maguire, impervious to her antagonism, which was more than understandable given the circumstances and the fact that she and Maguire had never had an easy relationship, especially not with what he had asked her husband to do in the past. ‘That’s exactly what we are trying to do.’

  ‘Try harder.’ The edge to her voice bore sufficient pain to make the doctor look concerned.

  ‘Mrs Reeve-Carter, please let me help you, you are bound to feel increasingly upset.’

  She swallowed the last mouthful of whisky. ‘I’m not in the habit of becoming hysterical. I’ve gone through the bloody hoops before.’

  The doctor looked perplexed.

  ‘Thank you for your concern and help but I think it’s time everyone left,’ said Maguire. The moment’s hesitation shown by the doctor and liaison officer was quickly dispelled when he added firmly: ‘Now.’

  Amanda’s friend half stood from the shared sofa. ‘Not you, Helen,’ said Amanda, placing a hand on her friend’s arm.

  Maguire nodded. He needed to appease the grieving woman – momentarily at least. ‘You can stay. Where is…?’

  ‘Melissa?’ said friend Helen. ‘She’s at my house with our au pair and my two children. The man outside has some of his men in our garden. I do hope this won’t be for much longer, for everyone’s sake.’

  Maguire smiled. His voice softened. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t know your name.’

  Amanda’s friend reacted to what was a barely disguised charm offensive. ‘Oh. Helen Metcalf. I live across the road at Woodlands.’

  ‘Mrs Metcalf, does Melissa spend much time with your own children?’

  Helen Metcalf nodded. ‘Oh yes.’

  ‘Then rather than me send one of my officers across to… Woodlands, was it?’

  Once again the chatty friend nodded, her head bobbing like a small bird dipping into a water bowl.

  ‘Rather than have one of my officers see that she is not in any distress with everything that is going on here and in the street…’ He sensed that she felt calling her upmarket suburban road a street was a slight. ‘… perhaps you would see that all is well.’
>
  She flourished her mobile phone. ‘Oh, I can just…’

  ‘No, Mrs Metcalf. Go and see for yourself, would you?’ Maguire’s tone of voice left no doubt that it was not a request. Maguire didn’t give a damn that the woman looked crestfallen at being dismissed. Amanda Reeve-Carter understood perfectly well that Maguire needed to speak to her in private.

  ‘Go,’ she said. ‘See she’s all right.’

  Helen Metcalf hugged her friend and then Abbie escorted her from the room.

  Maguire pulled a dining-room chair around and sat facing the grieving woman. ‘He’s alive, Amanda. I know that much.’

  ‘And what is it they want then? He is not in the Service any longer. Hasn’t been for years, so what dirty little secret is he hiding from his past? Or is it from your past? Is that why your people are taking apart his study?’ She crossed an arm over her chest and then one leg over the other, folding in on herself, keeping Maguire at bay, protecting the inner place that resisted the unbearable pain. For the first time, he saw her fight back the tears that welled up. ‘And Steven. My boy. Whatever you have done my son is paying the price as well. Damn you and your dirty games, Maguire. I thought we were shot of you and the Service.’

  Maguire remained unperturbed. His voice softened again. He needed to soothe her. ‘I believe they are both alive and both of them are resilient.’

  ‘He’s thirteen, for God’s sake.’

  Her retort made Maguire realize there was little point in sympathetic platitudes. ‘Did Jeremy ever speak of having a safe deposit box anywhere? Would there be anywhere else that he might keep information?’

  She frowned as the question took its time to lodge in her scattered thoughts.

  ‘He was with the Service for nigh on twenty-five years. If there were any secrets they were locked away here,’ she insisted, touching her temple. ‘He’s a banker, Maguire. There’s nothing hidden here; there are no safe deposit boxes. If there are problems with the bank look there.’

  Maguire’s team had already swooped on the bank and raided his offices with the help of the Metropolitan Police. Whatever Jeremy Carter had that others wanted so badly, there was no evidence – so far – of it on his work or personal computer or in any paper files. And Maguire knew in his heart that there wouldn’t be. Not from an old pro like Carter. She was right. It was in his head. And that’s the safe the killers wanted to crack. There was nothing more to be gained by questioning her. She was superfluous to his investigation and he saw no point in feigning sympathy. He stood abruptly and walked out as Abbie carried a tray towards Amanda.

  ‘Finish up here and get back. I’ve a job for you,’ said Maguire and then made his way back outside.

  Amanda stood and watched him approach Commander Pickering in the garden as Abbie placed the tray on the coffee table.

  ‘It’s better if you have something,’ Abbie said.

  Amanda ignored her and kept her gaze on the two men. ‘They’re talking about Jeremy. Wondering how vulnerable he’s made you people.’ She looked at the girl who waited patiently. ‘Are you married?’

  ‘No.’ There had been offers, of course, but the wistful smile on Abbie’s face gave rather too much away. She had made the sacrifice because she was at the start of her career and wanted more than a marriage.

  Amanda Reeve-Carter saw it, knew the look, understood immediately. She sat down and allowed the attractive young woman to pour her tea. ‘Difficult in this line of work, isn’t it?’

  ‘We all make choices,’ Abbie said.

  ‘Don’t leave it too late,’ Amanda said, accepting the mug of tea.

  ‘For?’

  ‘Children.’ Amanda watched to see whether that touched a nerve. Abbie showed no sign that it had.

  ‘I want to get ahead,’ she answered, seeing Maguire’s car pull away.

  ‘Ah. Yes. God, how I hate dedicated soldiers and ambitious spies.’ She sipped her tea and looked into space across the rim. ‘I’ve been married to both. My first husband was a bomb-disposal officer, but you probably know all that. And now Jeremy. He and Steven... they’re really like father and son. Formative years, I suppose. Male bonding. Insidious, isn’t it? Or haven’t you noticed yet?’

  She had, but she wasn’t going to be drawn into the woman’s bitterness. Abbie stepped back. ‘I’m sorry.’

  Amanda tipped what was left of the whisky into her tea. ‘So am I.’

  7

  It had taken two hours flying from London to the pink stone city of Toulouse in southern France and then another hour on the A61 in a hire car to reach the outskirts of Castelnaudary. The journey gave Abbie time to absorb the information that Maguire had given her when she returned to his office after leaving Amanda Reeve-Carter. The MI6 man’s desk was bare except for a telephone, his two fountain pens sitting parallel to a desk blotter and a beige file with a double slash of red across one corner that showed its contents were, as the letters indicated, Top Secret.

  Abbie was security vetted to see its contents, but Maguire had not yet made the final decision about Abbie’s suitability for the task. She was not an operational field officer; she was a linguist, and it was that skill that her boss wanted, whether to read documents or hear conversations in the various languages she was expert in. He had a duty of care towards his staff. Risk was their business but his proposition could make the young woman vulnerable. She waited demurely until he asked whether she was prepared to consider undertaking the task he had in mind. She could not calm the pulse that beat rapidly in her neck but she answered in the affirmative.

  His forefinger slid the file towards her with the instruction to not open it yet. There was a man he wanted her to contact whose whereabouts were known only to an intermediary who was a retired legionnaire in Castelnaudary, south of Toulouse, where the Legion’s basic training was conducted for new recruits. Many of the old guard retire in the area around the base. The people he was sending her to were men who had been at the sharp end of danger. Was she still prepared to go? Again she nodded her assent. Maguire let her open the file. There was barely any information listed on the sheet of paper stapled to its parent folder. The man’s description was missing. There was no photograph. She looked over the file to Maguire.

  ‘Who is he?’

  ‘He doesn’t exist as far as we are concerned. Part of the agreement we had with him was that there should be nothing recorded officially. He’s done work for us in the past.’

  ‘And we kept to that agreement?’ she said, knowing full well that such a concession meant the man was off the books, unaccountable, which gave Maguire a free hand.

  ‘We did. And we will continue to do so.’

  A brief one-page single-spaced summary listed the basic information about the man she was to find. As she read Maguire gave her further details of the man’s background.

  His father had been a military attaché, so he had been exposed to different languages all his young life. British military surgeons are the best in the world when faced with serious battlefield wounds but they aren’t so hot on spotting ovarian cancer; the boy’s mother died when he was eleven. He was sent to a boarding school where he flourished. The teachers at the school channelled his grief into physical sports and he became an accomplished boxer and excellent rugby player. And he was academically bright, earmarked as a future rugby blue. It seemed likely that he would follow in his father’s footsteps and go to the University of Oxford. When he was a teenager, however, his father was killed in a car crash. The second tragedy hit the boy hard and his studies went to the wall as many times as a boxing opponent went to the mat. Basically, he went off the rails. Looked for trouble wherever he could find it. It seemed the more he got physically hurt the more he was determined to fight back even harder. He was getting a reputation with the police as a troublemaker and, for a while, it looked as though the only place he would be heading was prison. He was saved by his housemaster at school, and his wife, who took him in and treated him like one of their own children. It was risky:
their teenage daughter was also still at home, but by all accounts they were soon like brother and sister.

  One night the young man was returning home after boxing training when he tried to stop a street gang attacking a black teenager. He beat off two of the five and the teenager escaped but as he grappled with a third the thug produced a knife; the attacker was stabbed and died. The gang members told the police the kid from the nearby boarding school had stabbed their friend to death. His teachers spoke up on his behalf, convincing the police that his father’s recent death was still affecting him deeply and he should not be held in custody. When released on bail he must have thought the evidence against him was too great, that they would arrest him eventually and, with his record, not believe him. He ran, taking a cheap flight to Marseilles. At first he worked as a farm labourer. Six months later he walked into the Foreign Legion recruitment office at Aubagne. Meanwhile, CCTV footage and the black teenager’s testimony had proved his innocence but by then no one knew where he was.

  Despite public misconceptions, the Legion doesn’t take wanted criminals, but as there was no warrant issued for his arrest, he was sent to Castelnaudary for basic training after initial assessment. The best recruits got their pick of regiments within the Foreign Legion. Months later he volunteered for the 2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment. Five years later he was a corporal – the highest rank possible unless he took French citizenship.

  His potential was recognized when he passed selection for the Groupement des commandos parachutistes. These commandos were tasked with covert operations against terrorists and enemies of the state. After fifteen years he left the Legion following an incident in Mali and was recruited by the French Counter-Intelligence Service, Direction générale de la sécurité extérieure. His language skills and contacts from God knew how many nationalities from his time in the Legion made him a valuable asset as a freelancer. He and others like him are expert hunters of men.