The Double Tap (Stephen Leather Thrillers)

by Stephen Leather

  ‘Leave it out,’ said Cramer. ‘She’s just doing her job.’

  Martin ripped open the pack of bacon with his teeth and laid the slices down on the pan. They started to sizzle and Martin prodded them with a plastic spatula.

  ‘Either of you guys heard of red mercury?’ Cramer asked, leaning against the kitchen door.

  ‘It’s a con,’ said Allan. He opened one of the kitchen cupboards, looked inside, and closed it again.

  ‘What do you mean, a con?’

  ‘A hoax. There’s no such thing.’ Allan opened another cupboard and took out a jar of coffee. He took off the lid. The paper seal inside was untouched. ‘There’ve been rumours for years, but as far as the Ministry of Defence is concerned, it doesn’t exist.’

  Cramer ran a hand through his hair. ‘What’s it supposed to be?’

  ‘Something to do with nuclear weapons. It’s supposed to make them more effective or something. It’s supposed to be a sort of Russian secret weapon, there were rumours that they came up with it just before the end of the Cold War.’

  ‘So why do you say it’s a hoax?’

  ‘Because no one has ever been able to deliver the stuff.’ He spooned coffee into three mugs. ‘Every now and again some middleman will claim to have a supply of the stuff but it always turns out to be something else. The Russian Mafia have been making a fortune duping Arab buyers.’

  ‘Yeah, ragheads will buy anything,’ agreed Martin, dropping sausages into the frying pan. ‘Except sand, maybe.’

  ‘So if it’s a hoax, why do they keep buying it?’

  ‘Because,’ said Allan, ‘there’s always a chance that it does exist and that the powers-that-be are lying.’

  ‘Why would they lie?’ asked Cramer.

  ‘Habit,’ said Martin, but Allan and Cramer ignored him.

  Allan poured hot water in the mugs and stirred the coffee. ‘The way I heard it, if the stuff does what the Russians claim, they can use it to produce a nuclear bomb the size of grapefruit.’

  ‘So they’d try to suppress it?’

  ‘If it exists,’ said Allan. ‘And that’s a huge bloody if. The Russian Government says there’s no such thing.’

  ‘Yeah, well they would, wouldn’t they?’ said Martin. He used a fork to juggle the sausages and bacon onto two plates and then began cracking eggs one-handed into the hot fat.

  ‘Yeah, but if there was such a thing and the Russians had it, they’d sell it to the Yanks, or the Yanks would pay to get it off the market,’ said Allan.

  ‘Yeah. I guess.’

  Cramer didn’t sound convinced and Allan looked up from the coffee mugs. ‘Hey, wait a minute. Are you saying that’s what’s in the case? Vander Mayer’s buying red mercury?’

  ‘That’s what he said.’

  ‘Well he’s wasting his time,’ said Allan, handing one of the mugs to Cramer.

  ‘There’s documentation with it,’ said Cramer.

  ‘In Russian, I suppose,’ said Allan. Cramer nodded. ‘So it could be anything?’

  ‘Yeah, you’re right.’ Cramer put his coffee mug down on the work surface. ‘But Vander Mayer doesn’t strike me as the sort of guy who’d go on a wild goose chase.’

  Martin used the spatula to lift the fried eggs out of the pan, and he replaced them with two slices of brown bread. ‘It’s not our problem though, is it?’ he said.

  ‘I guess,’ said Cramer. ‘How do you know so much about it, Allan?’

  ‘Only what I’ve read in the papers. And I think Newsweek did a piece on it a while back. Hey, Martin, I want mine fried, not cremated.’ Allan went to stand behind Martin and looked over his shoulder at the frying pan and its sizzling contents.

  ‘Bit of charcoal never hurt anyone,’ said Martin, flipping the fried bread over.

  ‘The thing is, Vander Mayer offered me money to make sure no one asked questions about the case.’

  ‘How much money?’ asked Martin.

  ‘A lot.’

  ‘So take it,’ said Allan. He reached into the frying pan and took out one of the pieces of fried bread with his fingers and dropped it onto his plate. He scowled at Martin.

  ‘He wouldn’t do that unless he was pretty sure that it was the genuine article, right?’

  ‘Hell, I don’t know, Mike. Maybe he’s got more money than sense.’ Allan carried his plate back into the sitting room. Cramer followed him. Allan sat down in one of the steel and leather armchairs and ate off his lap. ‘If I were you, I’d take his money, hand over the case, and not worry about it,’ he said.

  Lynch went over to the window and looked across at the apartment block. ‘Perfect,’ he said. Down below he could see the entrance to the tower, though the angle was too steep to look inside the foyer.

  ‘It’s a nice room all right,’ said Marie, dropping her Harrods bag onto the large bed. ‘Should be, too, for what it’s costing.’

  ‘I meant the view,’ said Lynch.

  Marie walked over to stand next to him. She rested her head on his shoulder as she gazed at the tower block opposite. ‘He’s in there,’ she whispered. ‘The bastard who killed my parents is in there.’ She shuddered as if she’d been caught in a draught.

  Lynch wondered which floor Cramer was on. He couldn’t see into any of the apartments, either the windows were slightly tinted or the evening sun was reflecting off the glass. Either way, the tower block windows gazed blankly back at Lynch, like the eyes of a dead man. He turned away from the window. ‘I need a shower,’ he said.

  The bathroom was luxurious, gold fittings and flawless marble. Lynch stripped off his clothes and turned on the shower. He studied himself in the mirror behind the twin washbasins. He looked tired, the whites of his eyes were flecked with red and his hair was greasy and unkempt. They’d been worried that his dishevelled appearance might cause comment at reception, so Marie had done the talking and had used her credit card to pay for the room. All he needed was to get clean, followed by a few hours’ sleep. Then he’d work out what to do next.

  He stepped into the shower and let the steaming hot water play over his face and neck. He lathered up a bar of soap, keeping his eyes closed as the water cascaded over his aching muscles.

  He didn’t hear Marie get into the shower, and he jumped when he felt her hands slip around his waist. ‘Easy, boy,’ she whispered, pressing herself against his back. Her hands slid between his legs and she took hold of him. He gasped and the soap dropped from his fingers. Lynch started to turn around but Marie tightened her hold on him and told him to stay put. He raised his arms and placed his hands on the tiles, as Marie continued to caress him.

  She kissed him between his shoulderblades, her soft breasts pressed tight against his back, her hands making him hard and erect. ‘Tell me what you’re going to do, Dermott.’ Her hands tightened and he moaned. She loosened her grip and then rubbed him, agonisingly slowly, teasing him until he was almost crazy with desire. ‘Tell me, Dermott. Tell me what you’re going to do.’

  Lynch tried to turn again but she pressed him against the wall of the shower cubicle, keeping her grip on him. ‘I’m going to kill him,’ he gasped. ‘I’m going to shoot him like a mad dog.’

  Marie let him go and he twisted around. He grabbed her and picked her up. She pushed herself away from him, her eyes hard. ‘You promise?’ she urged. ‘You swear you’ll do it?’

  ‘Yes,’ he gasped. Marie raised her legs as he pushed her against the wall and he entered her, so hard that she almost screamed.

  Cramer walked along the corridor to his bedroom. A strip of light shone from under the door to Vander Mayer’s study. He stopped and listened but couldn’t hear anything so he knocked gently. Su-ming asked who it was.

  ‘It’s me.’

  ‘What do you want?’

  Cramer thought about that for a few seconds. He wasn’t sure exactly what he did want, or why he’d knocked on the door.

  ‘Come in,’ she said eventually. Cramer pushed open the door. She was sitting on a black leather so
fa at the far end of the room, her legs curled up under her. By her side was a small stack of paper and she was holding a sheet in her hands. Cramer saw to his surprise that she was wearing glasses, a pair of oval lenses in a thin wire frame. She took them off as she looked at him. ‘What’s wrong, Mike Cramer? Can’t you sleep?’

  Cramer walked over to the window. The study was as big as the master bedroom with views to the north, towards the hotel with its curved balconies and white stone walls and the brick-built office complexes of Chelsea Harbour. Between the tower block and the hotel was a small marina with a channel leading to the Thames. The boats moored in the marina were big, expensive models, vessels to be seen on, not to sail. To the left and right of the marina were smaller apartment blocks, their walls as white and gleaming as the boats in the water. ‘I’m sorry about earlier on,’ said Cramer. He paced the length of the room. The far end was covered with mirrored tiles, giving the illusion that the office was twice its true size. He watched her in the mirrored wall. She looked like a teenager studying for an important exam.

  ‘Earlier?’

  ‘That business with the Russian. I was out of order.’

  She didn’t reply and he turned to face her. She was watching him with an amused smile on her face. ‘You were like a child who’d been told he couldn’t open his Christmas present yet,’ she said.

  Cramer grinned sheepishly. ‘Yeah. I behaved like a kid, didn’t I?’

  ‘You’re not a man who likes secrets. But you’re right, you did behave badly. You could have jeopardised our position. Mr Vander Mayer has spent a lot of time and money trying to get in touch with Mr Tarlanov.’

  Cramer pointed at the papers she was reading. ‘Those are the papers he left?’

  Su-ming nodded. ‘They’re very technical. I’m having trouble with some of the terms.’

  ‘I’m amazed that you can even speak Russian.’

  She pulled a face. ‘Languages aren’t that difficult. Grammar and vocabulary, that’s all. Once you’ve studied two or three you start to see the patterns, then it’s just a matter of memorisation.’

  Cramer walked over to the large desk that dominated the far end of the study, facing away from the mirrored wall. Apart from a computer and VDU and two telephones, it was bare. On the wall behind the desk was a large map of the world. Cramer stared at it. England looked so small, so insignificant, compared with the total land mass of the world. There was something egocentric about the way it was placed dead centre, as if everything else revolved around it. That might have been the case in the days when most of the map was coloured pink and the British had an empire, but now it was little more than a small island on the edge of Europe.

  ‘Are you trying to find yourself, Mike Cramer?’

  Cramer smiled. Nothing could have been further from the truth. He knew exactly where he was and where he was heading. He turned away from the map. ‘Do you go to New York a lot?’ he asked.

  ‘Fairly often. In the last year we’ve been out in the Far East most of the time. That’s where the fastest growing markets are.’

  ‘What about the red mercury? Do you think your boss plans to sell that out there?’

  Su-ming put the paper she was holding onto the stack. ‘It’s a possibility,’ she said. ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s for making bombs, you said?’

  She put her hands together, like a child about to say its prayers. ‘That’s one of its uses, yes. It can be used for lots of other things, too.’

  ‘What you didn’t tell me was that it’s used in nuclear bombs.’

  If Su-ming was surprised at Cramer’s newly acquired knowledge, she didn’t show it. ‘Red mercury isn’t a bomb. It’s a chemical. And it’s a chemical with many uses.’

  ‘Is it used in nuclear weapons, yes or no?’

  ‘The honest answer is that we don’t know. Nobody knows. Nobody has yet detonated a nuclear weapon containing red mercury.’

  ‘Yet?’

  ‘I mean ever. It’s never happened, maybe it never will.’

  ‘And what about those documents? What do they say?’

  She waved her hand over the papers. ‘According to the section I’ve just been reading, it can be used to start up civilian nuclear reactors, nothing more sinister than that. And there’s a section describing a coating based on the substance which appears to make whatever you paint with it become virtually invisible to radar.’

  Cramer went over to her. The coffee table was carved from a solid block of black and grey marble, more than capable of bearing his weight, so he sat down on it, facing her. He linked his fingers together and leaned towards her. ‘So Mr Vander Mayer just wants to kick-start nuclear reactors and help keep the friendly skies safe, is that it?’

  ‘Mr Vander Mayer is a businessman. He does what business he can.’

  ‘Tell me about the other uses for this stuff.’

  Su-ming pulled a face as if she had a bad taste in her mouth. ‘I told you about the fuses. It can be used to detonate bombs. All sorts of bombs, not just nuclear. I don’t quite understand how, but it also makes nuclear bombs more effective.’ She patted the pile of papers beside her. ‘The chemistry is way beyond me, but it’s some sort of catalyst.’

  ‘And your boss will sell it to the highest bidder?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Even if it’s to terrorists?’

  ‘Terrorists? No. Mr Vander Mayer wouldn’t deal with terrorists.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  She frowned as if she was considering his question, then nodded. ‘Yes. I’m sure.’

  Cramer shook his head in amazement. He could scarcely comprehend what sort of life Vander Mayer must live, travelling the world selling instruments of death to anyone with the money to pay for them. ‘The sample that Tarlanov gave us. How is it made?’ he asked.

  ‘Why do you want to know?’

  Cramer shrugged. ‘Just curious, I guess.’

  Su-ming studied him for a while, then picked up the papers and riffled through them. She put her spectacles back on and looked at Cramer over the top of them. ‘It starts off as mercury antimony oxide.’ She studied the sheet of paper for a few seconds, her mouth working soundlessly. ‘Okay, it’s a ternary oxide with a cubic pyrochlore structure.’ She smiled up at him. ‘I’ve no idea what that means.’

  Cramer returned her smile. ‘Me neither.’

  ‘They take the oxide and dissolve it in mercury and irradiate it for three weeks.’

  ‘So the stuff in the case is radioactive?’

  ‘Slightly. Don’t worry, it’s shielded.’

  ‘Yeah? So was Chernobyl.’

  ‘I’m being serious, Mike Cramer. If the red mercury is going to be used in nuclear weapons, plutonium has to be added and it’s irradiated again. Then it is radioactive, but it can only be stored for thirty days. The sample we have is inert.’

  ‘So what is it that your boss is hoping to buy? The inert stuff or the radioactive stuff?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she replied. Cramer narrowed his eyes. ‘Really,’ she insisted. ‘I don’t know.’

  Cramer nodded at the stack of papers. ‘What else does it say there?’

  ‘Most of it’s very technical.’ She scanned the sheet of paper. ‘It explains how the red mercury works – it’s something to do with the way it changes the mass value of isotopes which makes the nuclear material more effective. Do you understand what I’m saying?’

  Cramer shook his head. ‘You lost me at the cubic structure part.’

  Su-ming smiled. ‘I don’t follow it either. I can translate it, but that doesn’t mean I understand it. Mr Vander Mayer has experts who will be able to tell him what it means.’ She took off her glasses again. ‘It’s not something you should be worried about. You should be more concerned about the man who’s trying to kill you.’

  Cramer shrugged. ‘There’s nothing I can do but wait.’

  Su-ming stared at him for several seconds, then suddenly she leaned forward and kissed him gently on the
cheek, close to his lips. It was a fleeting touch, little more than a peck, but it electrified Cramer. He sat with his mouth open as she moved away and put her glasses back on. ‘What was that for?’ he asked.

  Su-ming didn’t look at him. She began to read again. ‘Just curious,’ she said.

  Cramer watched her, stunned by the sudden kiss, and the longer he sat there, his fingers still interlinked, the more it seemed that he’d imagined it. Su-ming brushed a lock of hair behind her ear, as she studied the typewritten sheet, her brow furrowed as she tried to make sense of the technical information. Cramer wanted to press her, to get her to tell him why she’d kissed him, but somehow the question seemed inappropriate. He stood up and rubbed the spot where her lips had brushed against his skin. ‘I guess I’ll go to bed,’ he said.

  ‘Good night,’ she said, not looking up.

  Cramer left her sitting on the sofa. He closed the door behind him and walked slowly to his room. By the time he was lying on his bed and staring at the ceiling, he couldn’t even remember what the kiss had felt like.

  The Colonel was studying his chess computer, his brow creased in concentration. He had the machine set to its highest level which meant it took almost fifteen minutes between moves, and after two hours of play it had the Colonel in an almost impossible situation. Computers were taking almost all the fun out of chess, thought the Colonel. Now that they could regularly beat human grandmasters, what was the point? He sat back in his chair and pulled a face. It would be mate in four moves, maybe five, unless he was missing something. One of the three telephones on his desk rang, jarring his concentration. He stared at the black and white plastic pieces as he picked up the receiver. It was an overseas call.

  ‘Colonel?’ The accent was American.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It’s Dan.’

  Dan Greenberg, the Colonel’s liaison in the FBI headquarters in Washington. ‘What’s the problem, Dan?’ There was no mistaking the tension in Greenberg’s voice.

  ‘Discenza’s dead.’

  ‘I suppose it’s too much to hope that it was natural causes.’

  ‘It was a hit. Poison.’

  The Colonel slumped back in his chair. ‘That’s the last thing I want to hear right now, Dan.’