by M S Morris
‘Welcome.’ A tall, olive-skinned man dressed in a well-cut suit strode across the marble floor to greet her. His hair was black and glossy, and he sported a neatly-trimmed beard. ‘Ms Hart, I presume? How good of you to come.’
‘It’s Detective Inspector Hart.’
‘Of course, forgive me.’ The man’s manner was gracious, almost servile, but when he requested, in the politest possible tone, that she switch off her mobile phone and hand it over “for her security and comfort”, there was a steel in his voice that made it clear he would not be argued with.
Bridget complied with his request. Then, divested of her only means of contact with the outside world, she followed the man – who had not given his name – past marble pillars, crystal chandeliers, and yet more gold leaf, to a room where two high-backed chairs upholstered in silk brocade were arranged either side of an octagonal table whose dark wood was inlaid with geometric patterns. The effect was exquisite.
Bridget felt that an appreciative comment might be in order. ‘What a beautiful table,’ she said, picking out the one detail in order to avoid being totally overwhelmed by her palatial surroundings.
‘Yes,’ said her host. ‘It is made from ebony inlaid with mother-of-pearl and tortoiseshell, and dates from the Ottoman Empire. Please do take a seat.’ He gestured to one of the chairs and Bridget sat down, crossing her feet at the ankles and tucking her legs under the chair. Was this how prime ministers felt at their weekly audiences with the Queen? ‘I have ordered tea to be served,’ said her host.
As if on cue, a young man dressed in a traditional Arabic tunic and headwear appeared bearing a silver tray on which stood a tall silver teapot and two gold-leaf-trimmed glasses with handles. He set the tray down on the table, bowed, and withdrew without saying a word. Bridget’s host filled the two glasses with deep amber tea and offered one of them to her. She accepted it and took a sip. The drink was hot, strong and very sweet, just what she needed.
‘Thank you for agreeing to meet me,’ she said.
He regarded her with eyes like deep, dark pools. ‘Not at all. We are honoured to be able to help our British friends.’ His lips expressed gratification, but the eyes did not change. ‘I understand that you have questions regarding the death of the academic and writer, Diane Gilbert.’
‘Yes, that’s right.’
Her host’s lips twisted down in obvious displeasure. ‘Diane Gilbert was not a friend to Saudi Arabia. Nor to your own country. She was, in fact, an enemy of the state.’ The smile returned. ‘Of course, she is not the only person in the world to voice criticism of the close relationship between our two governments, and in any case, that is no reason to wish her dead. We were deeply sorry to learn of her death.’
‘You were?’ asked Bridget.
‘Of course. Death is always a tragedy, but one that is natural and unavoidable.’
‘In this case, we believe that Dr Gilbert’s death may not have been natural.’
‘Indeed? What reason do you have to be suspicious?’
The man was clearly fishing for information, but Bridget wasn’t going to reveal how much – or how little – she knew. ‘It is the job of the police to investigate all such deaths.’
The man’s smile broadened. ‘Of course.’
‘Are you aware that Dr Gilbert received a death threat shortly before her death?’
Her host’s dark eyebrows rose, expressing surprise. ‘How could I possibly be aware of such a fact?’
Bridget held his gaze. ‘The threat made reference to Dr Gilbert’s new book, which as you know revealed information about the supply of arms to your country.’
‘A legitimate trade, sanctioned by your own government.’
‘You know nothing about who killed her?’
Her host’s smile dimmed, and a look of disappointment took its place on his face. ‘I believe that you do me a great injustice by asking such a question, Detective Inspector. Whatever you may have heard, my country is not in the business of making threats to foreign citizens, much less acting on them.’ He sipped his tea then returned his glass to the tray and steepled his long fingers beneath his chin. ‘Inspector Hart,’ he continued in a more conciliatory tone, ‘I do understand why you felt it necessary to come here today, but I can assure you that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia had nothing whatsoever to do with the unfortunate death of Diane Gilbert. Even supposing, hypothetically, that we had wanted to kill her, why would we have sent her a death threat? Would it not have been more efficient simply to carry out the killing without warning?’
That was, Bridget was forced to concede, a more logical way to act.
The man smiled again. ‘Perhaps the threat was made by someone who intended merely to frighten Dr Gilbert. It might not have been sent by the actual murderer. Have you considered that?’
Bridget gave no answer. There seemed little more for her to say now that her host had so categorically denied that his country had any involvement in Diane Gilbert’s murder. She finished her tea, thanked him once again for his time, and was escorted from the premises, collecting her mobile phone on the way.
Once the gates of the embassy clanged shut behind her, she paused and breathed a sigh of relief. She might not have learned anything very new from her visit, but she was glad to be outside again in a London street. It was possible that she had been fobbed off, but she was confident of two facts. First, that she had no desire to step foot inside the embassy building again. And secondly, that this was the only meeting she was ever going to be granted.
18
Ffion wasn’t in the habit of getting distracted at work, but it was hard to put thoughts of Marion aside. Their night out on Saturday had been great, and they had spent Sunday morning together too, walking through the University Parks and exploring its Genetic Garden, planted with all kinds of interesting species and hybrids. It had been a thoroughly beautiful weekend.
But Diane Gilbert’s phone and laptop weren’t going to give up their secrets unless Ffion knuckled down to some hard work and gave the task her full attention. She went to the kitchen to fetch herself a mug of her new favourite tea. Yerba maté was brewed from the leaves of a South American variety of holly tree. It had a smoky flavour similar to lapsang souchong, and gave a sustained energy boost, said to aid focus and concentration.
She carried it back to her desk and returned to the task of sifting through Diane’s emails. She had divided the messages on Diane’s phone into two categories: personal and work-related. The personal correspondence was mostly with her son, Daniel, her sister, Annabel, and her ex-husband, Ian.
The messages to her son were of most interest and seemed to reveal an imbalance in their relationship. On a number of occasions Diane had messaged Daniel to say that she would be in London for one reason or another, and did he want to meet up for lunch or afternoon tea? Her tone was always light and friendly, not expecting too much, just making the offer. But in every instance, Daniel had offered some excuse for not being able to see her – he had a meeting; he was snowed under at work; he was visiting a client in Essex. If he’d declined just one or two invitations, Ffion wouldn’t have thought anything of it. But to turn down every invitation? The pattern suggested that he was deliberately avoiding her. Yet Diane had persisted with her efforts to meet up with him. Her behaviour suggested a powerful desire to win her son back, whatever the reason for his antipathy. Ffion made a note of her observation and moved on to the message thread with Annabel.
From these conversations, Ffion learned that Diane had enjoyed a much closer relationship with her sister than she had with her son. She and Annabel had met up frequently in Oxford for a coffee and occasionally for lunch, and had been regular visitors to each other’s homes.
Despite the yerba maté, Ffion found her thoughts drifting to her own sister, Siân. She and Siân had never enjoyed a relationship as warm as Diane and Annabel’s, but they had kept in touch over the years, and Siân had been instrumental in bringing about the family reunion and reconciliat
ion that had occurred this Christmas. Now Ffion had begun to talk more regularly with her sister, and hoped to visit her and her family again soon.
She shook her head, forcing herself to return once again to the task in hand. This new habit of losing focus was becoming a nuisance, and she was going to have to discipline herself better.
She moved on to the conversations between Diane and Ian. She was surprised to discover that they had met up now and again for coffee or lunch. Ffion couldn’t imagine being on such friendly terms with an ex-partner. What could they have talked about? Daniel, possibly? But it wasn’t as if he was a child and they had to discuss his schooling or childcare arrangements. More to the point, what did Louise, Ian’s new wife, make of these meet-ups between her husband and Diane? There was no indication that Louise had been included. Ffion jotted down a couple of thoughts before turning to Diane’s work-related messages and correspondences.
Diane’s discussions with her colleagues were often esoteric and highly academic in nature and mostly beyond Ffion’s understanding. But a string of emails from her boss at the Blavatnik stood out. Professor Al-Mutairi, it seemed, had been in the habit of raising concerns about Diane’s papers and publications. His sustained attacks might even be described as a vendetta. In one particularly virulent message he had warned her that her new book was likely to create a political storm and urged her to withdraw it from publication. In a final message from Diane to her boss, which she had sent shortly after the argument that her colleagues had overheard at the institute, Diane threatened to expose the professor if he tried to take any kind of action against her. Ffion made a note.
Having reached the last of the messages, she put the phone aside and moved on to the laptop. This was where she expected to find out about the real Diane Gilbert. Text messages and emails might reveal someone’s outward-facing persona, but it was the private contents of a computer that gave a glimpse into their soul. Ffion was buzzing with excitement at the thought of extracting the documents from the hard drive.
She powered up the laptop and waited for the login screen to appear. As expected, it was password protected. Ffion had a few goes at guessing the password, before reaching for her trusty alternative. A USB cloning device. She plugged the pocket-sized gadget into one of the laptop’s spare ports and waited for the machine to boot up. Her handy device would bypass the laptop’s operating system and make a copy of all its data so that she could examine it on her own computer. The process didn’t take long. By the time she had refreshed her mug of tea, a cloned copy of Diane’s data was waiting for her and she sat down to peruse it at her leisure.
Within seconds her hopes were dashed. The data on the laptop was encrypted. Without knowing the password, there was nothing she could do to access the files on the drive. From beyond the grave, Diane Gilbert had slammed the door in her face and bolted it firmly shut.
19
As Bridget headed along Charles Street in search of a taxi or an underground station to take her back to Paddington, she switched her phone back on, hoping to see some updates from her team. But there was nothing from Ffion, Jake, Ryan or Andy.
What she did see was a message from Chief Superintendent Grayson.
Her heart skipped a beat. Was he angry at discovering that she had dashed off to London without informing him first? If so, she was ready with her defence. If she’d hung around at Kidlington waiting to speak to him, she’d have missed her train, and she didn’t think her contact at the Saudi Embassy would have looked kindly on her arriving late. But whether Grayson would see it that way was another matter. She paused on the street corner to read what he had written.
To her surprise, the terse message was neither a reprimand nor a summons to return immediately to Kidlington. Instead, Grayson had made good on his promise to fix her up with a meeting at MI5. He had secured an appointment for her to speak to someone in – she checked her watch – precisely twenty minutes. Oh God, how was she going to get from Mayfair to Westminster in such a short amount of time?
She turned into Curzon Street and was amazed to find that luck was with her. A black cab was just about to move off after dropping a passenger outside the Curzon Arthouse Cinema. She ran into the road and flagged it down before it could drive off.
‘MI5, Millbank, please,’ she called. ‘As quickly as you can.’
The driver’s jaw dropped open. ‘I’ve been waiting my whole life for someone to say that to me. Hop in, darling.’
Bridget clambered breathlessly into the back, ignoring the sexist endearment. Now was not the time. The cab was on the move before she had even strapped her seat belt on.
‘Grosvenor Place is blocked right up with roadworks,’ said the cabbie. ‘So we’ll have to take the tourist route. But don’t worry, I know these streets like the back of my own hand.’
There was no point arguing. London cabbies were a law unto themselves. Although technically, Bridget supposed, she was the law. But she would just have to trust that the driver knew where he was going. She tried to relax as the taxi flew down Constitution Hill and circled around Buckingham Palace. The Royal Standard was fluttering in the breeze from the top of the flag pole, indicating that the monarch was in residence.
Bridget studied the map on her phone to see how far away they were from the MI5 offices at Millbank. It shouldn’t take too long if they turned down Buckingham Gate, but to Bridget’s frustration, the driver was heading up The Mall towards Trafalgar Square, a distance twice what she had expected. She rapped on the glass window that separated her from the front of the cab. ‘Where are you going?’
‘Trust me, love. This is the quickest route.’
Bridget had little choice in the matter, so she sat back and tried to focus on the meeting ahead. Grayson’s message had contained scant information about who exactly she was supposed to be meeting, or what they might be able to tell her.
Soon they were passing beneath one of the three great archways of Admiralty Arch, circling the roundabout at the southern end of Trafalgar Square and heading down Whitehall, past Big Ben and the Palace of Westminster. The cabbie hadn’t been lying when he’d said they’d take the tourist route. From the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, past Downing Street to the Houses of Parliament, here was the heart of the British government set out in all its power and glory. The “deep state” according to Michael Dearlove. The very institutions that Diane Gilbert had railed against for all of her adult life. Was it the British state – or its security service – that sanctioned her untimely death? Bridget shivered at the thought as the taxi finally pulled up outside an imposing stone building on the bank of the Thames.
She paid the driver and tipped him generously. Despite the many detours, he had succeeded in delivering her to the doors of MI5 – or the Security Service to give the organisation its proper name – just in the nick of time. She smoothed down her hair, took a deep breath, and looked up at the huge, square building in front of her.
Thames House was vast and imposing, like one of the great edifices that lined Red Square in Moscow. But being in London, there was no room for a grand open space to offset the building’s bulk. Rather, the office block was positioned on a main road running right along the side of the Thames. The river glinted pewter in the spring sunshine, and one of London’s many river buses chugged past, ploughing furrows in the water as it carried passengers downstream towards Canary Wharf and Greenwich.
Bridget located the main entrance to the building and hurried inside. For the second time that day, she was obliged to switch off her mobile phone. This time, however, she was issued with a key to a wall-mounted storage locker where she was able to secure it for the duration of her visit. A security guard then directed her towards a security capsule. She stepped inside and the capsule doors closed behind her. When she emerged on the other side, a man and a woman were waiting for her.
‘Inspector Hart,’ said the man, stepping forwards to shake her hand. ‘Welcome to Thames House.’
The woman nodded at her, b
ut remained silent. They were both dressed in anonymous, dark suits, and could have been accountants or bank managers. Or paid assassins.
‘Who do I have the pleasure of meeting?’ asked Bridget.
The man smiled. ‘John.’
‘Jane,’ said the woman.
‘I see,’ said Bridget. ‘Do you have business cards?’
‘This way, please,’ said “John”, ignoring her question.
They took her up in a lift to the seventh floor then led her along a faceless corridor marked with door after closed door, before finally ushering her into a meeting room. The room housed a long table marked with circular stains from coffee mugs, a dozen chairs, and little else. It was very different from the Saudi Embassy. But it did offer a splendid view of the river, the glass and steel developments rising up on the opposite bank and, nestling amongst the trees just beyond Lambeth Bridge, Lambeth Palace, the official London residence of the Archbishop of Canterbury. Bridget suspected she was going to need some divine intervention if she was going to get anywhere with these people.
Once they were seated, “Jane” spoke for the first time. ‘I would like you to understand that this meeting is strictly off the record. Nothing you hear from us today will be admissible as evidence in court, and if pressed we shall issue a denial of anything you claim. We are able to discuss the circumstances of the murder of Dr Diane Gilbert, but we will not be able to comment on any other matters. Is that clear?’
Bridget responded in her politest, most detached tone. ‘Entirely clear.’