Disengaged

by Mischa Hiller

  Julian shrugged, impatient with Boris’s self-obsession and not really understanding what he was on about. ‘You’re part of the madness, Boris. Retire, go fishing. Play chess,’ he said, pointing at the chess set.

  ‘Yes, I could retire, but I don’t want to live it out in a prison, even if I am provided with a pension.’ He shrugged. ‘I suppose I could join a security firm. There are hundreds of them now – even the intelligence community is being contracted out to the private sector. But that would mean just more “grubbing around” as you so accurately put it.’ He picked up the plastic cup and drained it, and with some difficulty, given his bulk, level of inebriation, and the low seat of the camping chair, got up to look for the wine bottle.

  ‘So you were working for the Iranians, is that it?’ Julian asked as Boris emptied the bottle into the plastic cup.

  ‘No, it was neither one thing nor the other. Are you sure you don’t want some wine?’

  ‘So why me? Why did you need me?’

  ‘I needed your skills, obviously, but I also needed a cut-out, someone who would deliver but didn’t know what he was delivering, someone over whom I had leverage. I needed a means of exchange, a go-between. Although I don’t know if they’ve fulfilled their part of the bargain. Did she give you anything, the attractive woman?’

  Julian remembered the email address she’d written down. He threw the gun on to the sleeping bag and took the Scrabble score sheet from his wallet. ‘Is this what you’re expecting?’

  Boris took it and looked up at Julian. ‘She gave you this?’

  ‘Yes, although she didn’t seem to know who it was for.’

  ‘It’s for me, old chap. It’s for me. It’s the other side of the equation. Criss-cross, like the film.’

  Julian understood nothing except that Boris had lost his ideologically and religiously confused, vodka-addled mind.

  ‘Where’s Sheila, Boris?’

  ‘She’s in a room at the top of the stairs,’ he said. ‘The key is in the door.’ As Julian got to the door Boris called out to him. Julian turned to see him stuffing things into a case and zipping it up. ‘Here are her things. I’ve put everything in there.’ It was the case she’d taken the night she’d left.

  Boris looked terribly old in the candlelight as Julian took took the case.

  ‘Listen,’ Julian said. ‘I don’t know if this is important but there was a couple, a man and woman. I saw them break into my house when they thought I’d left.’

  Boris’s eyes flashed in the dim light. ‘How long?’ he asked.

  ‘Twenty minutes ago.’

  ‘OK, Julian, whatever happens, get that control board back to Rami as soon as you can – he’ll know what to do. But tell him nothing of our conversation.’ He grabbed Julian’s upper arms. ‘Now get Sheila and leave, tovarisch, as quick as your little bourgeois feet can carry you.’

  FORTY-FIVE

  Boris looked curiously at the small weapon, a silly little Ruger, and smiled. Julian, probably without realizing it, had had the safety on. He studied the email address given him and switched on the satellite phone. He dialled. His boss answered on the third ring.

  ‘Where the hell have you been?’ he said in Russian. ‘You are out of order not calling in. What’s going on?’

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ve got it. Do you have a pen?’

  ‘You need to go home right away.’

  ‘Home?’

  ‘Yes, tovarisch, home.’

  ‘Do you have a pen?’

  ‘Have you had a breakdown or something? You should know the problems we’ve been having here. We’ve had to take action with our friends.’

  Boris had to consciously relax his grip so as not to crush the phone. ‘What action?’

  ‘An accident is all it took, Borya, just a car accident. The roads here are terrible. Today’s spies are not so good in the field, they spend too much time in front of a computer.’ Another laugh while Boris desperately tried to process what was being said.

  ‘This must be a scrambled line, right? Write this down. It’s the email address I told you I could get. You need to give it to the cyber-spooks, they’ll know what to do with it, they were briefed before I left. They should already have an appropriate video ready containing the Trojan.’ He carefully read out the email address and asked his boss to repeat it.

  Someone was vigorously using the brass knocker on the front door.

  ‘I’ve got it. This is good, Borya, but it’s not brilliant. What about the other thing you were there for?’

  ‘The other thing is taken care of as well, that will go back via the commercial channels. Everything was a success.’

  ‘Good. Now get yourself back home. Your local office has sent someone to help. There’s a flight in the morning.’

  Boris laughed at the word help. ‘They’re here now.’

  ‘Good. Go with them. I’ll see you back home for debriefing. Your methods, Borya, have got me in a lot of trouble. We’ll need to sit down and sort it out.’

  ‘You have the email address, you’ll soon have the control unit. Use them. I have done my bit to ensure that the motherland remains secure. Now I am retiring, comrade.’ Boris enjoyed the stunned silence at the other end for a few seconds before hanging up, then switched off the phone. The front-door knocker was used with more urgency. At this rate the neighbours would be alerted. He held the piece of paper Julian had given him against the candle and let it burn, then rubbed the ashes to powder; technology was such that nothing was private any more.

  He was pleased at how things had come together, especially with so many variables. He regretted what had happened to Sheila, but then she may come out of it stronger than before. Julian too, for that matter. And as for whatever happened in Baku, it would be a shame if the earnest young man hadn’t lived to see that Boris had kept his side of the bargain. Picking up the tiny gun, which his hand enveloped completely, he went to the bottom of the stairs and looked up. Julian and Sheila were halfway down, holding hands, uncertain as to what to do. They’d been too slow. Someone was putting something into the lock. He waved Julian and Sheila back up, gesturing that they should hide. He wiped any previous prints off the weapon with his shirt and undid the safety with his thumb, slowly drawing a round into the chamber before going to the door as it opened and was immediately restrained by the chain.

  ‘Who is it?’ he asked amiably, as if he didn’t know.

  FORTY-SIX

  As Julian and Sheila reached the middle of the stairs someone used the door knocker and they both froze. The sound reverberated around the empty house.

  ‘Who’s that?’ Sheila whispered.

  Julian said nothing, thinking of the Google map of Onslow Square he’d left on the screen of his laptop which would have led them here. He looked at Sheila.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked as the knocking sounded again.

  He was about to tell her about the couple who’d entered their house when Boris appeared at the bottom of the stairs, gun in hand. Whoever was at the door was trying the lock. Boris looked up and gestured urgently for them to get back. They went back into the bathroom where Julian left the door ajar so he could hear as well as get a little light from the upstairs hall window that looked on to the street since he didn’t want to switch on the camping light. Sheila was pressed up against him and he reached round reassuringly.

  ‘Who is it?’ she whispered.

  ‘A couple broke into our house just as I was coming here – they might have followed me.’

  ‘Are they looking for you?’

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t think so. They may be after Boris, or the Iranian woman, or the circuit board I was working on.’ He felt for it in his pocket.

  ‘What Iranian woman?’

  Julian put his fingers to his lips as he heard Boris, with his booming voice, call, ‘Who is it?’ through the front door. He couldn’t hear the answer but Boris opened the door and he heard voices, although it wasn’t clear what was being said.

 
‘Speak English – my Hebrew is not good enough for this level of conversation,’ Boris was saying. ‘Unless, of course, you can speak Russian?’

  Julian wondered whether that was for his benefit but he couldn’t hear the reply, just a lot of urgent talking, from both man and woman.

  ‘Look, I’ve just called it in, I’ve spoken to the boss. Everything was a success. There’s no need to panic. Let’s all just calm down.’

  ‘Is there anyone else here?’ the woman asked. She must have moved to the bottom of the stairs.

  ‘No, of course not.’

  ‘Sure? We’ve just come from Julian Fisher’s house.’

  ‘Nobody is here – I spoke to him on the phone at work. The control board will go back to Leeds tomorrow, right on schedule.’

  Julian fingered the Jiffy bag in his jacket again. He heard footsteps which faded and now he couldn’t even hear Boris.

  ‘Why are we hiding?’ Sheila whispered. Julian didn’t really have an answer. He just knew that if Boris had asked them to hide then he had good reason to. He put his fingers to his lips as he heard the voices again.

  ‘No, I’m not going with you,’ Boris was saying.

  ‘You must come with us,’ the man said. ‘Those are the orders.’ Then the woman must have been on the phone because she was speaking in Hebrew very fast while the man and Boris argued. Then the woman shouted for them to stop and said something he couldn’t hear.

  ‘So you’ve called the Cossacks,’ Boris said. ‘I’m not going back to Israel. I’ve had enough of this. Do svidaniya.’

  The woman shouted, ‘Lo,’ and a loud crack reverberated around the empty house.

  Sheila clutched Julian painfully, breathing heavily in his ear. His own heart was thumping hard. He could hear the couple talking quietly, but no sound from Boris. Then it was quiet and nothing but the sound of the front door opening and closing. He heard the woman talking fast, possibly on the phone, judging by the one-sided nature of it. Then it went quiet again. Julian slipped off his shoes and opened the door with Sheila pulling at his jacket as he went on all fours to the top of the stairs. Boris was slumped against the wall, his legs splayed out on the wooden floor. It looked like he’d fallen asleep while sitting with his back against the wall were it not for the splatter of blood and brain matter higher up, where he’d been standing. He’d left a trail of it as he’d slid down the wall. The woman was kneeling by him, her back to Julian. She was removing things from his pockets, putting them into a plastic carrier bag. The trigger guard on the gun was jammed on Boris’s forefinger, like a wedding ring over which a finger’s grown fat, so she was having to twist it off. Her phone vibrated and she answered it, said nothing and, hanging up, went to the front door, which she opened to let in her companion. Julian froze, but he was in the dark with no light behind him. It was definitely the same couple who had been to their house. The woman put her hands to her face, shaking her head, and her companion hugged her briefly before gripping her arms and giving her a little pull-yourself-together shake.

  He said something to her in Hebrew and handed her some surgical gloves which she put on. She disappeared and came back with more plastic carrier bags. The man knelt down and held Boris away from the wall as the woman put a bag over his head. Sheila touched Julian on the back and he turned to see her horrified face. The couple half-dragged, half-carried Boris to the front door and Julian understood that the bag on his head was to minimize the amount of blood and brains he left behind as they did this. They sat him up by the door – they were getting ready to take his body away. They disappeared and came back with things in bags, including Boris’s books in the cardboard box. Concerned that others were on the way and that they’d search the rest of the house, Julian went back into the bathroom. He took the key from outside and locked them in the dark, but not before he saw the fear on Sheila’s face. He reached out for her.

  ‘Is he dead?’ she whispered.

  ‘Yes, he took his own life.’

  ‘What shall we do?’ she asked.

  ‘We wait until they’ve gone.’

  ‘Shouldn’t we call the police?’

  He took out his phone. They were lit up in a bluish light, but there was no signal. He held it up near the vent and a bar appeared then disappeared, but even if he could keep it still he would have to talk loudly and have it on speakerphone to be able to have a conversation with his arm stretched that far. He turned it off and they were plunged back into darkness. He was relieved in a way – he had no idea what he would say to the police.

  ‘You think they’ll search the house?’ she asked.

  ‘I don’t see why they should,’ he said, although in truth he couldn’t think of a reason why they wouldn’t.

  ‘We should lock the rest of the doors up here.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘One locked door is odd, but if they’re all locked on this floor it won’t seem out of the ordinary.’

  He nodded, then remembered she couldn’t see him.

  ‘The keys are in the doors,’ she added.

  ‘Won’t the floors creak?’ he asked.

  ‘No, this place is solid and it’s carpeted up here.’

  ‘OK, let’s do it. Take your shoes off.’ He quietly unlocked the door and whispered. ‘You take the back, I’ll do the front. We’ll meet back in here.’

  ‘Right, but bring the keys, don’t leave them in the doors.’

  Julian made his way past the top of the stairs to the end of the hall and looked out of the window on to the square. A dark van pulled up outside the house and he stepped back as three men got out and came up to the house and disappeared under the porch. He heard a more gentle knocking on the door. He carefully locked his two doors, removing the keys, and met up with Sheila in the middle. They went back into the cramped cloakroom and locked themselves in. They sat on the camping mattress with their backs to the wall and waited. Indeterminate noises came from downstairs, and about forty-five minutes later someone came up the stairs and tried the door as they held their breath and each other’s hand. Whoever it was moved to the other doors and tried them, went up a floor where they could hear them walking about, then went downstairs again. Julian squeezed Sheila’s hand to acknowledge her idea. His eyes, growing accustomed to the dark, discerned moonlight coming through the vent high up on the outside wall. The noises from downstairs ebbed and flowed, then the front door closed and it was silent. She took her clammy hand from his.

  ‘I don’t know about you but I think we should wait until it’s light,’ he said. ‘Just to be sure.’

  ‘Shouldn’t we call the police now?’

  ‘And say what? What are they going to do? I suspect those people will have disappeared by the time they’ve finished questioning us, which could take days.’

  ‘I was fucking kidnapped, Julian.’

  ‘Yes, and the guy that did it has blown his brains out, isn’t that enough for you?’

  She blew out some air and he could picture her face. They could have put a light on but he liked it better in the dark. Their anger and frustration filled the small room like a toxic gas. He could smell her sweat and bad breath. He reached out and found her knee. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said.

  ‘He said he’d known you a long time,’ she said, her voice soft.

  ‘Yes, it’s a long story.’

  ‘We’ve got time, why don’t you tell it to me?’ She found his hand.

  He’d read or heard somewhere that people often had their most intimate conversations while driving or walking, as they were facing forward and were spared the inhibiting fear of the other’s facial reactions to what they were saying. Or perhaps it was something to do with the distracting nature of forward movement that made self-revelation easier. He did not have the benefit of such movement but being in the dark, which removed one of the senses, seemed to help.

  ‘I don’t know where to start,’ he said, surprised to find his voice wobbling.

  FORTY-SEVEN

  When, in due course, exhaus
ted, their legs stiff with sitting on the floor, they ventured downstairs, trepidatious in the early light, they found the place empty.

  Nothing was left of Boris where his brains and hair and skull had been plastered on to the wall, just a damp stain and the smell of bleach remained. But Sheila noticed a small hole in the wall above the wainscoting, at head height, perhaps where the bullet had lodged and been removed. She would have to get it filled, she thought, then immediately felt ashamed of thinking it. All Boris’s things had also been removed, and, Jules told her after looking through the bay window, his taxi had gone.

  ‘It’s like last night never happened,’ Jules said. It was true. It was as if Boris had been scrubbed clean from the face of the earth.

  ‘Let’s get out of here,’ she urged. He didn’t argue.

  They travelled the short distance home in silence and she immediately rushed upstairs, stripped and, catching just a quick glimpse of the dark swelling around her eye, got under the shower, letting the hot water plaster her hair to her skull and wash the last twenty-four hours away. When she emerged, a good ten minutes later, she could smell coffee. She was fatigued but wired, having listened to Jules all night. He had gradually, with a little prompting at first, unpeeled the various layers of himself. He’d revealed himself as someone new, a stranger she didn’t know existed, someone she’d been living with. A liar, and, let’s face it, a traitor, however misguided he’d been, although to his credit he hadn’t used the folly of youth to excuse his behaviour. She examined her bruised face more leisurely in the mirror, with the intention of disguising it as best as she could with foundation, then decided not to put on any make-up at all, to wear the bruise as a badge, although of what she didn’t know. Not honour exactly. A mark of respect? Reality? In a life happily void thus far of violence it was like a rude wake-up call, a literal slap in the face. She dressed in jeans and a white T-shirt and went down to the kitchen, where Jules was grilling bacon and mixing eggs with a fork. He looked her up and down and smiled, but it was the smile of someone she didn’t recognize. She poured coffee. He scrambled eggs and flipped bacon. She checked for landline voice messages: nothing. She plugged in her spent mobile to discover two messages on it – one from Cassie asking whether she was OK and one from Gulnar wondering how she was getting on with the paperwork. She hadn’t started any paperwork, but she would.