Why did a grown man remember seeing a salmon killed, and picking a full bowl of blackberries? He had gone home to the bungalow, let himself in quietly, had put the brimming bowl beside the sink, had not told his grandparents of what he had done – or of the killing of something as beautiful as the salmon – and had gone to his room. He had waited there for praise and thanks. He had heard his mother return from the factory, had heard her in the kitchen, then her trill of pleasure, and she had gone to the sitting room to thank her parents for picking the blackberries – had never thought it might have been him. They had accepted her thanks, had not disclaimed them. A pretty small matter in the life of a child, the denial of gratitude for picking a bowl of blackberries, but it had cut him off from the adults who had reared him – a never-forgotten memory, never erased. He had thought then, as a child, he could live alone and without company.
And he was alone. Katie had abandoned him. She was in the sitting area, waiting for them to come. He was alone and suffering: she knew it, no one else in the team did. Quite deliberately, Carrick hit his forehead against the varnished planks beside the pillow, as if that would clear bloody melancholy. He pushed himself up, shook his head hard, as if that would expel demons. The Summer Queen was owned by Katie’s parents, and through the months of August and September they would take extended leave from work and navigate at snail’s pace through the networks of canals in the South and West Midlands. For the rest of the year it was available to Katie and she used it as a safe-house where an officer, in deep cover, could come to be debriefed, write up his Book and crash out from his stress. Every month, for a weekend, her parents would come to the Summer Queen, get the old Ford Escort engine coughing and alive, then move her to another branch of a canal or to the Thames. It was good, and secure, and no pattern of its movements existed.
Most times when they came to the narrowboat, they had sex on the bed – not wonderful but good and adequate – and they’d roll away, feeling the better for it. Not that evening. When he’d turned her down, with her blouse nearly unbuttoned, her shoes off and the zip on her skirt undone, he’d glimpsed her hurt, and had twisted to face the varnished wood and the porthole window. Most times, when George and Rob came, she had to scamper after their warning shout to get herself half decent for them. Always the Book was written up before they went down on to the bed. It was bad that he’d hurt her, but the gunfire was still in his head, and he lived with greater deception. All the guys in the SCD10 team had bad days when they screamed to be let free. Rob understood, and George, and they soothed the scratches. God … God … There was a whistle from the field.
Rob’s voice: ‘You there, Katie?’
A torchbeam scudded past the porthole. Maybe it was what they all needed, an ego massage. Rob, the cover officer, was expert at lifting the bloody dark clouds of an undercover’s doubts. George, the controller, could lift a level one’s self-esteem. Carrick wasn’t the first, wouldn’t be the last, to need them. He cursed himself that he had wounded Katie, had treated her like a tart.
‘I’m here. Come aboard.’
Then George’s voice, ‘Half Oxfordshire’s bloody cattle seem to be in this field, and I’ve walked in three heaps of their shit. What’s wrong with the marina?’
‘Marina’s full. Exercise does you good, sir.’
He had never worked alongside Katie on a plot. She’d had two runs as an undercover. She’d played at being a prostitute in an investigation of the call-girl trade in the Kings Cross area of London, had had her face scratched by rivals for the pitch, and had learned to accept volleys of abuse each time she found an excuse not to get into a punter’s car. Armed back-up had never been more than a hundred yards down the street. She had played the role of an undercover’s girlfriend up in Manchester, tracking the import of Croatian firearms, to give the officer his get-out excuse for refusing to screw girls and drink all night. She’d given evidence in the Manchester case, at the Crown Court, and it was thought she was compromised. She hadn’t wanted to go back to uniform routines and had been taken on as a desk worker in the Pimlico office George used. Carrick thought her the best girl he’d known – natural, easy, without ceremony, honest and, most of all, with a bucketful of loyalty – and that evening he’d failed her. He swung his legs off the bed.
And heard a voice he didn’t know: ‘Don’t mind me saying it, but a pretty stupid place to choose. I wouldn’t have.’
Feet hit the deck, then the steps down. Carrick smoothed his hair, tucked his shirt into the waist of his trousers, pushed on his shoes and knotted the laces.
Rob’s voice, chuckling: ‘Nice flowers, Katie – rather grander than my lady’s used to.’
‘He brought them.’
George’s voice, serious: ‘In my experience, the more lavish the expenditure on flowers, the more abject the apology it’s intended to cover. You got a problem with him?’
‘Just that he’s knackered, hasn’t talked much. It’s the biggest armful I’ve ever had.’
The voice of an unknown: ‘Very pretty, very charming. My colleague and I have not travelled to listen to your little soap opera. Can we get down to business? And I’d like coffee.’
He slid the door back, came out, pushed it shut behind him, walked past the kitchenette and into the living area.
Carrick nodded to George, took Rob’s hand and held it tightly for a moment, then saw the other two. One was older and suited, had neat grey hair, the other was younger than himself, wore a loose anorak over a crumpled checked shirt, faded jeans, and had tousled red hair. The flowers he had brought for Katie were still in the wrapping-paper but filled a plastic bucket on the screwed-down table.
The older man said briskly, ‘I haven’t yet worked out my name, or my colleague’s, but you’re N for November. Of course, I know your correct name, but it will no longer be used. You’re November.’
George said, ‘I’m afraid things have moved a bit quickly, and—’
Rob said, ‘Just what I’m looking at, sorry, but you seem shattered. Everything all right, old boy?’
Carrick grimaced. ‘Yes, I’m all right – not by much. Two things. First, Rawlings is done for drink-driving last night, and as far as I’ve ever known is teetotal, like a priest’s celibate, and is sacked. I get to drive the Bossman. Second, a hood tries to kill the Bossman down in the City today, two shots fired – God knows how they missed him and me. It’s not been reported. I’m now the Bossman’s flavour, and we’re travelling in the morning – don’t know where to. Shattered, yes. Dead, no. Otherwise, everything’s all right. Who are these gentlemen?’
George looked down, evasive. ‘Don’t know much more than I said. What I said was that things have moved a bit quickly.’
‘Meaning?’
Rob said, ‘These gentlemen are from the intelligence services.’
‘What? Dirty raincoats in the shadows? Spooks?’
George said, ‘I am hardly, as has been made clear to me, inside the need-to-know loop. Josef Goldmann is now of interest in a matter of national security.’
‘Nothing I’ve seen adds up to that.’ Carrick shrugged theatrically.
The older man rasped, ‘Then perhaps you haven’t been looking, November, where you should have.’
He bridled. ‘That’s rubbish. If it was there, I would have—’
‘And haven’t been listening. I’d appreciate coffee, soonest, but appreciate more that we conclude the preamble.’
‘Excuse me, I was damn nearly killed. If you didn’t hear me, two shots, bloody near on a slab – so don’t, whoever you are, tell me I’m not doing my job. Got me?’
‘These “gentlemen”, and it has authority from on high, require you to be seconded to their control.’ George looked at the carpet on the floor and the mud and shit he had brought on to it.
‘It’s out of our hands – sorry and all that.’ Rob fidgeted his fingertips aimlessly against his palms.
‘You washing your hands of me?’
Neither answered. Neithe
r George nor Rob met Carrick’s gaze.
‘Right. Can we now get to work?’ the older man said, with a studied calmness. ‘Matinée performance over – and the coffee, please.’
‘Might just be premature, going to work …’
The older man sighed, not from exasperation or annoyance but from a reckoning that time was being wasted and it was a commodity of value.
‘What if I refuse? What if I tell you to look elsewhere? What if I say I’m not interested in your invitation?’ Carrick felt a chill around him, not the heat of anger, and it settled on his skin.
The older man beaded his eyes on him. ‘Three very fair questions, November, and deserving of very brief answers. Do I have to make that coffee myself?’
Katie caved. As she went past Carrick she gave his hand a momentary squeeze – but she couldn’t help him and he knew it.
‘To the point. Refusal is not an option. Do I want you? Not particularly. Would I prefer to substitute for you an officer from my own organization? Most certainly. You alone have the access I need … Just pause for a moment, November, and think. Having thought, I imagine you wouldn’t believe I come lightly. It is not for some minimal personal amusement … I’m taking you over, and into an area that I predict will be of maximum danger, in the clear knowledge that national security may be involved. I will have a team with me, behind you, whose job will be to ensure – if possible – your personal safety … I tend to find morale-boosting speeches boring and usually irrelevant to the matter at hand. At last. Thank you.’
He was given by Katie, who glowered at him, a mug of instant coffee.
‘I’m not in the business of concessions, but the role of the young lady has been explained to me, and her detailed knowledge of the files associated with Josef Goldmann. She, too, I am co-opting. I suggest we sit down. Oh, gentlemen, goodnight.’
He had dismissed Rob and George. He saw the senior bite his lip, the junior shrug, as if this was a force beyond their remit. Embarrassment wreathed them, as if neither knew of anything apposite to add. Carrick realized that the transfer of an undercover, mid-investigation, to different masters was beyond their experience, would conventionally be regarded as disastrous and unprofessional. They left, tramped out and up the steps, and the narrowboat shook as they jumped off.
The younger man slapped his briefcase on the table, pushed the flowers aside, and said to the older man, ‘I suggest that you’re now Golf, and I think it would be appropriate if I were Delta. That all right with you?’
At that moment, Carrick believed the older man – Golf – betrayed confusion, as if he wondered whether the piss was taken but couldn’t be sure of it, and he thought Delta an ally of sorts, but it passed.
Carrick listened, and Katie stood behind him, her fingers gripping the muscles of his neck, and the man, Golf, said, ‘You will be told the minimum of what we have. Bluntly, the more you know the greater is the potential compromise to the operation – it’s called Haystack – in the event of you being suspected, then tortured. And you would be tortured … The stakes, for us and for those we regard as the potential enemy, are very high.’
He flicked his fingers. Delta opened the briefcase, and took out a map. Its sheets were Sellotaped together, and lines were drawn across it. Then photographs spilled out and he saw the images of Josef Goldmann, Viktor, and a bull of a man, with dead and chilling eyes. Delta’s finger stayed on that picture.
The man, Golf, said, ‘Where they lead you, you go. I imagine it will be to him. I don’t gild it, November. This man, Reuven Weissberg, will be as ruthless as a ferret in a rabbit warren, and if you fail with him – though we will try, bloody hard, to save you – you are, without question, dead. So, no misunderstandings. Dead.’
Chapter 6
11 April 2008
Carrick checked his bag again, had done it three times.
The first time he had gone through it, when tension had tightened his arms and made them clumsy, he had invented an excuse. He had said to Viktor he had no toothpaste so he’d walk down to the arcade and buy some. He’d thought there might be a brush contact or a casual approach – he’d be asked for directions or a light for a cigarette – and he had walked the three hundred yards to the chemist, had lingered inside and let the queue stay in front of him, then sauntered back, but no one had stopped him. He had been unable to report at first hand his flight and destination details, so had texted the information through. It was a shadow world he lived in, and needed lights shining bright, and those lights were brush contacts and approaches. Unless an undercover believed that support was close, he was alone … which festered.
He had not felt like this before, since coming to SCD10 and working with George and Rob. He sensed his isolation, and hated it. Could, of course, have turned them down. Was within his rights, and would have been backed by the Police Federation. It hurt that they had not attempted to talk him round and build his ego, but had taken his acquiescence for granted. Now the clock had moved on, and the chance to quit had gone. Viktor shouted from the staircase to the ready room that they were to move in five minutes.
He didn’t get a remark from Grigori, or from the housekeeper. Carrick did not belong in that household – their view, not hidden. He wore his best suit with his raincoat, and carried no weapon. The only protection he would offer Josef Goldmann was his body and a repetition of the instinct that had caused him to charge across the pavement and tackle a man. It would be his reputation, a bullet-catcher. The housekeeper was in the kitchen preparing food and Grigori was watching the satellite. Carrick went upstairs and dumped his bag by the front door.
The trust factor had been like a backbone to the operation of entrapment against Wayne in Mallorca, George had said, and the senior detective in charge of the investigation had nodded vigorously. ‘I can’t demand trust, or loyalty, I have to earn it.’ The handlers had been close and had lifted him … He had worn a wire woven into the waistband of his trousers, and the microphone was in the central button – had to be there because it was so damned hot. He’d had to plead a skin allergy as a reason for not joining Wayne and his associates in the pool below the villa’s patio, and for staying in the shade with his shirt on. They were brilliant guys who had nailed Wayne and his associates in Rotterdam when they’d taken delivery of the container from the docks. But it was history, and history had no place in the bloody present and the bloody future.
Grigori had come up the stairs, was behind him.
And the Bossman descended from the first floor with the family, kissed the kids and hugged his wife.
Viktor went down the front steps first, did the checks. Carrick had already brought the car to the door and Grigori had swept it. He thought the Bossman appeared pale, strained, the wife was distracted and the kids seemed to have caught something of their parents’ mood: they clung to their father’s arm.
Viktor nodded and had the rear door open for Goldmann; the boot lid was raised. Carrick threw in his own bag, the Bossman’s soft leather one and Viktor’s, then ran for the driver’s door.
He pulled away from the kerb.
He glanced in his mirror, saw the road behind was clear, saw the preoccupied gaze of the Bossman, as if he stared at nothing.
Viktor watched Carrick.
He thought Viktor’s eyes were locked on his face, studied it. Carrick did not know what the man thought he could learn from watching a driver’s expressions, movements, twitches, blinks. It was as though Viktor searched for a truth about him. He sensed no acceptance there … He took the car out on to the main route going west towards Heathrow. He played the part of the careful driver and often looked up to the mirror, but could find no car or motorcycle tailing them. Should have been able to see them if they were there, because that was Carrick’s trade. Almost shivered, felt the aloneness.
Remembered that cold, emotionless voice from the narrowboat: Where they lead you, you will go.
Felt he was on soft ground, sinking, and that nothing familiar remained to cling to.
‘Good of you to call by, Christopher … ah, and this is Luke – Luke Davies. I’m sorry our paths haven’t crossed before, Luke. I hear good things of you … Run it all past me, Christopher.’
It was the first occasion, in the five years and three months since he had joined the Service, that Luke Davies had been in the restricted-access lift to the top floor, east wing, of VBX, and the suite of the director general. He regarded himself as a creature of independence, a free and liberated thinker, and it annoyed him that he felt pangs of nervousness. He nodded in reply – and perhaps there was a trace of something surly at his face, but Francis Pettigrew’s glance lingered the fractional moment longer than necessary. He disliked himself for it, but smiled and did the head bob again, adopted a servile pose. He had not spoken as that would have betrayed his origins: a housing estate in the Yorkshire city of Sheffield, where his father was, the last he’d heard more than three years back and closer to four, a window cleaner, his mother did school lunches and his brothers were a lorry driver, a plumber and a struggling motor-repair mechanic. He felt disadvantaged. There were two cricket bats, autographed and mounted on the wall, but Luke Davies didn’t play. On another wall was a panoramic photograph of a villa with a backdrop of Tuscan hills, but Luke Davies lived like a pauper in Camden Town. On a side table, in a silver frame, was the photograph of a wife and three children, but Luke Davies was not even in a stable relationship. There was a friendship between the two older men. And Luke Davies was outside and felt awkward … and listened.
‘I’ve read your summary – God, what time did you write it? Have you had any sleep? Your stamina amazes me – and I find a welter of innuendo, supposition, hunch and instinct that I can hardly offer up to the Joint Intelligence Committee. There’s barely a hard fact in it.’
Davies let himself turn his head fractionally away from the director general and fastened on Lawson. Seemed pretty damning to Davies, and he thought Lawson might bluster, but he didn’t. He was indifferent to the assessment.
Timebomb : A Thriller (9781468300093) Page 14