Outside in the street it was nearly dark. The last of the rush-hour traffic had long disappeared and the Mercedes was clearly visible, 100 metres away, parked outside a bank. Telemann crossed the street, whistling, happier than he’d felt for months. His father had once told him, hours from his death, that everyone, in essence, was alone. He hadn’t made a point of it, no long speech, no big deal, but the phrase had stuck in Telemann’s mind for years afterwards. He thought about it when he remembered his parents’ marriage, the dark, loveless house down in Carolina, his father’s long absences abroad, the gilt-framed photographs his mother kept for family visitors, and it came back to him now, as the Mercedes coasted to a halt beside him. In his stiff, Marine Corps way, the old man had been right. At the end of it all, sooner or later, you got to be alone. Not anxious. Not fearful. Just alone.
Telemann bent to the window of the Mercedes. He’d expected Inge, the girl. Instead, there was another face behind the tinted glass, curly blond hair, the beginnings of a smile. The window hummed down. Nathan Blum. The Mossad katsa. He eyed the jacket for a moment, grinning broadly. Telemann looked down at him. ‘Yours?’ he said.
Blum nodded, reaching across to open the door. ‘Mine,’ he agreed.
*
For a second or two, standing in the wet darkness, Sarah McVeigh thought it was a joke. She looked at the proffered address card, then up at the face beneath the dripping brim of the Homburg. ‘Mr Friedland?’ she said blankly.
The man nodded. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘May I come in?’
Sarah looked again at the card. Underneath the name, lightly embossed, the card read ‘Curzon Securities’.
‘Are you selling something?’
‘No.’
‘Then what do you want?’
‘It’s about your husband.’
‘My ex-husband.’
‘Your ex-husband.’
Sarah looked at him for a moment longer. It was quarter-past ten. Billy was in bed. Every instinct told her to shut the door, to keep the man out, to shield herself from the life she’d turned her back on.
‘Has something happened to him?’
‘He’s disappeared.’
‘He’s always disappearing.’
‘We need to find him.’
‘We?’
The man looked at her. His face was grey and puffy with fatigue. He tried to smile. ‘I work for the Government’s security services,’ he said patiently. ‘I can give you a number. I’m happy to wait here if you’d prefer to ring.’
He reached into his pocket and produced another card. Ross had sent it over by special courier. He’d thought it might help.
Sarah glanced at the card. ‘Downing Street?’ she said.
‘Yes.’
Sarah hesitated for a moment, then stepped back into the house. Friedland followed her, a line of wet footprints up the hall. They sat in the lounge, Friedland’s hat and coat draped over the clothes-horse, a steady plop–plop of drips into the plastic washing-up bowl beneath.
‘I was doing the ironing,’ Sarah said helplessly. ‘I’m afraid it’s a bit of a mess.’
‘My fault. I should have called.’
Sarah nodded, saying nothing, wondering why she felt so disturbed, listening to this stranger talking quietly about a man she’d shared her life with. McVeigh meant nothing to her any more. He was simply another of life’s passing irritations, calling to collect his son, eternally late, eternally gruff. His work, what little she knew of it, suited the person he’d become. It was tatty. He dealt with third-rate people, riff-raff, petty criminals. It probably suited him very well. And yet … She blinked, shaking her head, trying to concentrate. The stranger, Friedland, was talking about phone calls. Had McVeigh phoned at all? Written? She shook her head, emphatic.
‘No,’ she said.
‘The boy?’
‘No, nothing.’
‘Isn’t that unusual?’
‘What?’
‘I understood they were very close.’
Sarah looked at him, not answering, not liking the man’s use of the past tense.
‘They are very close,’ she said at last. ‘Very close.’
‘And does he normally stay in touch? When he goes away?’ He paused. ‘Postcards, for instance?’
‘Sometimes.’
‘This time?’
‘I’ve told you.’ She shook her head again. ‘There’s been nothing.’
Friedland nodded, looking around, speculative, and Sarah realized that he didn’t believe her. For a moment, she wondered whether he had the authority to search the place, whether this house of hers was – after all – as vulnerable to the ebb and flow of McVeigh’s life as everything else had always been. But then the stranger was off again, something to do with phoning his office, and she realized that the visit was nearly over.
He left shortly afterwards, collecting his sodden coat from the clothes-horse and bidding her a weary goodnight. Watching him disappear down the street, she fingered the card he’d left for her, the two telephone numbers, the address in Sidmouth Place. Any contact at all, he’d said. Any hint. Any clue. Night or day. Closing the door, she turned back into the hall, aware at once of the figure at the bottom of the stairs, one hand on the banister.
‘Billy,’ she said. ‘You’re supposed to be asleep.’
The boy nodded, staring at her, huge brown eyes.
‘Who was that?’
‘Friend of your father’s.’
‘What did he want?’
Sarah paused, fingering the card again, trying to keep the anxiety out of her voice. Billy was his father’s son, the same tight frown of concentration, the same gruff directness.
‘I don’t know,’ she said at last.
*
Stepping back into the office on ‘F’ Street, Emery knew at once that Sullivan was waiting for him. His coat was folded on top of one of Juanita’s filing cabinets. The scent of the small black cheroots he sometimes smoked still lingered in the air. Emery glanced at Juanita, raising an eyebrow, and she nodded.
‘He’s been here half an hour,’ she said. ‘He’s phoned the airport twice to check your flight.’
Emery nodded, closing his eyes for a moment, running a tired hand over his face. Part of him had anticipated the next half-hour, but that didn’t make it any easier. He went into the office. Sullivan was sitting at his desk his shirt-sleeves rolled up, his head buried in a thick sheaf of NSA intercepts. Emery closed the door.
Sullivan didn’t look up. ‘You make sense of any of this stuff?’ he said.
Emergy glanced over his shoulder. Sullivan was halfway through a series of decrypts from Damascus.
‘Yeah,’ Emery said. ‘But none of it’s relevant.’
Sullivan grunted, looking up at last. His eyes were red with exhaustion. ‘That a judgement or a guess?’ he said.
Emery shrugged, ignoring the provocation. ‘Neither. It’s simple logic. One thing after another. Brick on brick …’ He paused. ‘You give me the bricks, I build the wall.’
‘Yeah?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Then what about London? What about all that stuff I sent over? The gas the Brits have lost? Al Zahra? All that?’
Emery looked at him for a moment, then sank into the chair behind the opposite desk. ‘I told you about Al Zahra,’ he said. ‘We discussed it already.’
‘Sure. You told me the guy’s a schmuck. You told me he’s playing at it.’
‘I said he’s only interested in influence. Collateral. An hour or two at the top table. That’s what I said. Guy wants a few names to drop. That’s why he’s always on the phone. Offering his services.’
‘Is that a crime?’
‘Depends.’
‘On what?’
‘On whether you’re buying or selling. Problem with Zahra is he never had anything to sell. I’m telling you, sir, the guy’s a waste of time. He never gave us a cent’s worth of real Intelligence. Not one red cent.’
‘And now?’ S
ullivan leaned forward, one thick finger stabbing at the air. ‘All this stuff about missing nerve gas? The Israeli guy? Shot dead in the street? You’re telling me that’s not relevant?’
Emery shook his head, weary now, anxious for the conversation to end. ‘No, sir. I’m not saying that. I’m saying it’s interesting. I’m saying we’ll check it out. But we need confirmation. Other sources …’ He shrugged.
Sullivan was quiet for a moment. ‘What if there was confirmation?’ he said at last. ‘Another source?’
‘Then we’d check it out.’ Emery paused. ‘You’ve got a name?’
Sullivan looked at him, speculative. Then he shook his head. ‘No,’ he said, ‘I haven’t.’
Abruptly, he stood up, crushing his cheroot in the remains of his coffee. At the door, he paused, half-turning. ‘You gonna do anything at all about Zahra?’
‘Sure …’ Emery shrugged again, gesturing at the pile of paperwork on the desk. ‘It’s a question of time, that’s all. Just now, we have other priorities.’
‘Better than Zahra?’
‘Yes.’
Sullivan nodded, reaching for the door-handle. Then he hesitated for a moment, looking back at Emery. ‘I’m no expert,’ he said softly. ‘But you’d better be fucking right.’
*
Late evening, McVeigh went back to the kibbutz school.
It was a low, whitewashed building, flat-roofed with metal-framed windows. He’d found it during the day, following a couple of kids as they wandered back from lunch. They’d taken the path that snaked down through a stand of eucalyptus trees, past the fenced enclosure that contained the swimming-pool, down to the furthest corner of the kibbutz where the hillside dropped abruptly away, offering a fine view of the valley floor and the mountains of Lebanon beyond. The lawn around the front of the school had recently been mowed, and there were kids everywhere chasing each other with handfuls of grass. McVeigh had watched them for a minute or two, wondering whether Cela was inside, knowing it was pointless finding out. The first contact would be all-important. The last thing he wanted was an audience.
Now, though, the school was empty, a single light in the room at the front, a woman sitting at a desk, bent over a pile of paperwork. McVeigh left the shadow of the trees and crossed the grass towards the double front doors. The nights were cool, up from the valley, and he could smell the newly mown grass beneath his feet.
At the door he hesitated, knocking lightly. One of the doors was half-open, and he could see the woman at the desk. She was still looking down, the pencil in her hand moving briskly across a sheet of paper, pausing occasionally, making a note, but he knew at once that it was Cela.
He knocked again, and the woman looked up, the face from the photograph in the Jaffa flat, the high, slightly Slavic cheekbones, the wide-set eyes, the single crooked tooth in the beginnings of an enquiring smile.
‘Yes?’
‘My name’s McVeigh. I knew your husband.’
‘You’re from London?’
‘Yes.’
Cela looked at him for a moment longer, then got up, putting the pencil carefully to one side. She stepped out from behind the desk, her hand outstretched. It was a city gesture, the first time anyone had bothered with a formal greeting on the kibbutz, and McVeigh realized how much he’d missed it.
‘Erev tov,’ she said. ‘Welcome to Shamir.’
‘Thank you.’
She smiled at him for a moment, then nodded at the row of desks. Her English was fluent but heavily accented. ‘You can sit down if you want to,’ she said. ‘The desks are quite strong.’
McVeigh sat down. Cela was smaller than he’d expected, five two, five three. She was neat, compact, with sturdy outdoor legs and the beginnings of a good tan. She wore an old pair of khaki shorts, buttoned at the front, and the check-patterned shirt was several sizes too large. She saw him looking at it and she smiled again, amused. ‘My father’s,’ she said simply.
McVeigh grinned, caught out, and mumbled an apology. Cela waved it away. She was very direct, no evasions, no games, and McVeigh understood at once why Yakov had talked the way he did about her. ‘The best person I ever met,’ he’d once told McVeigh. ‘Not a lie in her body.’
Now she sat down on the big table opposite McVeigh, her knees drawn up to her chin, her hands round her ankles. She wore a single ring, gold, on the third finger of her right hand.
‘You’ve come about Yakov,’ she said.
‘Yes.’
‘What do you want to tell me?’
McVeigh blinked. Cela had taken command of the situation immediately, without hesitation, the teacher in the classroom.
‘I didn’t know him that well,’ he said at once. ‘We used to meet at the weekends. The kids used to play football. He was very keen on football.’
‘Yes,’ said Cela, ‘he was.’
McVeigh hesitated, not knowing quite which way to play it. ‘I’m sorry about what happened,’ he said finally. ‘I read about it in the newspaper.’
‘So did I.’
‘Here? In Israel?’
‘Yes.’
‘That’s the way you found out?’
‘Yes.’
‘Must have been a terrible shock.’
‘Yes.’
‘Terrible surprise.’
Cela said nothing, looking at McVeigh. Her eyes were a deep, flawless green. McVeigh shifted his weight on the desk, wondering about the years with Mossad, what she did for them, how much she knew.
‘You worked with Yakov?’ he suggested. ‘Same firm? Same organization?’
‘I worked in Tel Aviv.’
‘For the same people?’
‘For the Government.’ She shrugged. ‘Of course.’
McVeigh nodded, aware of how guarded she’d become, a confirmation that she indeed worked for Mossad. ‘So why didn’t they tell you?’ he said. ‘About his death? About what happened?’
Cela looked at him, saying nothing.
McVeigh frowned. ‘Were you at work? When it happened?’
Cela shook her head slowly. ‘No.’
‘Were you on leave?’
‘On what?’
‘Holiday?’
‘No.’
‘You’d left them?’
For the first time, Cela looked down. There was a long silence. Outside, the night was busy with cicadas and far away, on the other side of the valley, McVeigh could hear the distant rumble of a heavy truck. Cela looked up again. Her face was clouded and McVeigh knew that the easy part was over.
‘Who are you?’ she said. ‘Who do you work for?’
‘I’m freelance. I work for myself.’
‘No one works for themselves.’ She paused. ‘Who pays your bills? Who bought your ticket? Who sent you here?’
It was McVeigh’s turn to refuse an answer. He shook his head. ‘I’ve come to say I’m sorry,’ he said quietly. ‘I knew him well enough to miss him. He was a good bloke. In this business, that’s not as common as you might think. It was a funny relationship. All we ever talked about was football, but I felt I knew him just the same.’
Cela smiled, nodding. ‘He said you knew nothing about football. But he said that didn’t matter.’ She paused. ‘He liked you too.’
McVeigh gazed at her. ‘He told you that?’
‘Yes. You think I’d be talking to you now if he hadn’t? You think I’d be saying these things? Letting you ask these questions?’ She shook her head. ‘He wrote a lot towards the end. He was very open. And very lonely.’
‘He missed you.’
‘I know.’
‘He wanted to get out. To get back. He never said it but that’s the feeling I got. I think he’d have been happier back here. With you.’ McVeigh hesitated. ‘Was he from this kibbutz too? Yakov?’
Cela pursed her lips for a moment and frowned, feigning an effort of memory, then swung her legs off the desk and stood up, suddenly brisk again, the overworked teacher with an evening’s marking to complete. McVeigh glanced down
at the desk. It was littered with kids’ paintings. Upside down, it wasn’t easy to make sense of them. The colours were strong, slashes of blue sky, white bubbles of cloud, heavy browns and greens. McVeigh reached across and pulled one of the paintings towards him, recognizing a child’s version of the kibbutz, the hillside blobbed with toffee-apple trees, and cartoon houses, and fat-wheeled tractors with smoke pluming from their exhaust-pipes. Overhead there were aeroplanes, drawn in heavy black. Dart-shaped objects, not small, were dropping from the aeroplanes, and there were stick figures all over the kibbutz. They had guns, pointing at the aeroplanes, and something had gone wrong with some of their heads. Their eyes were too big. Their mouths were too round. They had trunks, like elephants. They looked like visitors from Mars.
McVeigh peered at the painting, at the men with the strange heads, aware of Cela watching him. Finally, he passed it across to her.
Cela didn’t even look at it. ‘You know what these are?’ she said.
‘No.’
‘Gas masks. The kids here listen to the news. Everyone listens to the news. Some of the kids think it’s funny.’ She nodded at the painting. ‘Some don’t.’
‘You’re expecting gas attacks?’
‘No one knows. Saddam could do anything. Not here, maybe. But Tel Aviv …’ She shrugged. ‘Haifa. They want us in the war. They want us to move against them. They want us to break the coalition. That way, the Americans will go home.’
‘The kids understand that?’
‘Of course not.’ She paused, her eyes returning to the painting. ‘Why should they?’
McVeigh said nothing. Cela glanced up. ‘You’re here on the kibbutz for a long time?’
‘I don’t know. It depends.’
‘Depends on what?’ She looked at him. ‘Me?’
McVeigh nodded. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘It’s your decision, not mine.’
A smile ghosted across Cela’s face. Then she began to gather up the paintings, a single pile, quick deft movements of her hands. Watching her, McVeigh thought suddenly of the flat back in Jaffa, the wreckage of the bedroom, the piles of underwear slashed and scissored on the floor, the statement the place made, the photo he’d found in the bathroom. He still had the photo. It was back in the hut where he slept, hidden in his bag. Once or twice he’d thought of transcribing the single line of Hebrew, showing it to someone, getting a translation, but finally he’d decided against it. The thing was too intimate, too personal, someone else’s emotional property.
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