A Season in Hell

A Season in Hell Jack Higgins A classic thriller from the Sunday Times bestselling author of The Eagle Has Landed.Sean Egan, ex-SAS operative and private investigator, is hired by wealthy American to investigate the murder of her stepson – a student who has been brutally killed and his corpse used to transport a deadly consignment of drugs.Investigate, and avenge…Egan is initially unwilling to take the job, but when he discovers a personal link, choice becomes a luxury he can no longer afford.The hunt is on for a ruthless man with links not only to drugs but also international terrorism, and the old Sicilian proverb has never been more true: the price for revenge is a season in hell Table of Contents Title Page (#u6f43cab6-d50a-5565-80cc-a556d5a62c49) Foreword (#ucc5f1a58-0b50-5bc5-a19e-36f709c80bc7) Epigraph (#u5d9ef263-23b6-52fb-9b1f-e3ebf40b1a25) 1983 (#u9784b9ac-9202-5ade-8596-31971be96e81) Chapter 1 (#u624e3f35-6e1a-5791-afe7-e48a3148415b) Chapter 2 (#u46492897-d28d-5ece-9fdb-a1a429428c4b) Chapter 3 (#u52be4cf1-54d9-54bf-9a6d-43305e7c8b3f) Chapter 4 (#u3c278410-8a94-5d9b-be62-5e8163a2c42b) Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo) Chapter 16 (#litres_trial_promo) About the Author (#litres_trial_promo) Also by Jack Higgins (#litres_trial_promo) Copyright (#litres_trial_promo) About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo) FOREWORD (#ulink_5ed8efe0-faa2-57dc-8a5c-db2856df8886) Unusually for many of my books the leading character in this novel is a woman, highly educated, successful in business, and yet when her stepson is murdered she discovers, as many people do these days, that the law is unable to help. She turns to revenge, enlisting the help of a young, ex-SAS, sergeant to help her hunt down the villains concerned. A rather interesting thing happened with this book. A disgraced British Army officer turned gun-for-hire, Jago, is employed by the mysterious Mr Smith to dog her footsteps. The astonishing thing was that Jago actually became enormously popular with the readers and I received many letters asking me to use him again. The book is another example of twin obsessions in my writing: East End gangsters and the wonderful city of London. ‘Revenge is a season in hell’ —Sicilian proverb 1983 (#ulink_3e3cc5b6-cf75-5151-89fd-cd6295b1199e) 1 (#ulink_4e9e25df-de8a-5cb4-99c6-1d26d6910bcf) Just after four, as first light started to seep through the bamboo slats above his head, it rained again, slowly at first, developing into a solid drenching downpour from which there was no escape. Sean Egan crouched in a corner, arms folded, hands tucked into his armpits to conserve as much body heat as possible, not that there was much left after four days. The pit was four feet square so that it was impossible to lie down even if he’d have wanted to. He remembered reading somewhere that gorillas were the only animals who lay in their own ordure and didn’t mind. He hadn’t reached that stage yet although he’d long since got used to the stench. His feet were bare, but they’d left him with his camouflage jump jacket and pants. A khaki-green sweatband was wound around his head like a turban, desert style. Beneath it, the face was gaunt, skin stretched tightly over prominent cheekbones. The eyes were china blue and without expression as he waited, rain drifting down through the bamboo slats twelve feet above. The clay walls were wet with it and, occasionally, clods of earth broke free from the sides and fell into the bottom water, already three or four inches deep. He waited, indifferent to all this, and finally heard the sound of footsteps, someone whistling flatly through the rain. The man above wore a camouflage uniform similar to his own, but slightly different, the Afghanistan pattern developed by the Russian Army for use during the occupation of that country. A sergeant according to the rank badges on his collar tabs. Above the peak of his cap was the red star of the Soviet Army and the insignia of the 81st Regiment of Assault Paratroops. Egan recognized all these things because it was his business to. He looked up and waited in silence. The sergeant carried an AK assault rifle in one hand, an army ration can in the other, a length of twine tied to it. ‘Still with us?’ he called cheerfully in English, resting the AK beside him. ‘It must be wet down there?’ Egan said nothing. He simply sat, waiting. ‘And still not talking? Ah, well, you will, my friend. They always do in the end.’ The sergeant lowered the ration can through the slats. ‘Breakfast. Only coffee this morning, but then we don’t want to build up your strength.’ Egan took the can and opened it. It was coffee, steaming in the damp air, surprisingly hot. He fought the wave of nausea – even the smell of coffee made him feel sick. To drink it was an impossibility, as his captors well knew. The sergeant laughed. ‘But of course, you only drink tea. What a pity.’ He unbuttoned his pants and urinated down through the slats. ‘What about a change?’ There was no way to avoid it. Egan stayed there, squatting in the corner, staring up, still not speaking. The sergeant picked up the AK. ‘Five minutes and I’ll be back and I’ll expect a nice clean can. Be a good boy and drink it up or I might have to punish you.’ He walked away and still Egan waited, an intent expression on his face. When the sound of the sergeant’s footsteps had faded, he stood up. Five minutes. His only chance. He ripped the khaki sweatband from his head and it was immediately obvious that only the section visible to the eye was still whole, the rest had been torn into strips during the night, each one carefully plaited, the whole joined together in a crude rope. He quickly fastened it under his arms and passed a loop around his neck, placing the loose end in his teeth. He braced his back against one wall of the pit and his feet against the other, working his way up until he could reach out and touch the bamboo slats. He took the tail of the rope from between his teeth and passed it around two of the slats, tying it securely. Silence, only the rain falling. He was aware of the sergeant’s approach from a long way off. He waited, letting the seconds pass, then kicked his feet away from the wall and dropped, at the same time crying out. The bamboo dipped above his head, his body bounced and swung. He turned his head to one side so that the line of the rope was visible across his neck and half-closed his eyes, the rope cutting under his arms as it supported his weight. He knew the sergeant was above him now, heard the man’s cry of dismay as he knelt, pulling a combat knife from his boot, reaching through the slats to sever the rope. Egan let himself fall hard, bouncing against the wall and collapsing in a heap in the water and filth below. He lay there, waiting, aware of the slats being pulled back above, the bamboo ladder being lowered. The sergeant came down quickly and crouched. ‘You stupid bastard!’ he said turning him over. Egan’s two hands came in from each side, perfectly pointed in a phoenix fist, centre knuckles extended, targeting the neck below each ear. The sergeant never had time to cry out. A slight groan, the eyes rolled and he was immediately unconscious. Egan had the man’s jump boots off in moments, pulled them on and fastened them quickly. Then he crammed the camouflage cap with the red star down low over his eyes and went up the ladder cautiously. The clearing was deserted. There was a drift of smoke above the trees which would be the house, he knew that from his first interrogation. Down through the woods was the river, perhaps a quarter of a mile. Once across and he was safe, clear through to the mountains beyond. He picked up the AK and looked out across the wood at their snow-capped peaks, then started down through the trees. There was a tripwire within fifty yards which he negotiated carefully, another a few feet further on, so close that they’d calculated it would not be expected. Egan stepped over it and moved through the waist-high bracken, soaked with rain. Getting out wasn’t enough. Staying out was the hard part, an old SAS maxim that rang in his head as the trees on his right exploded. Not a land mine. If it had been he’d be lying in pieces. More likely an alarm charge triggered by an electronic eye beam at ground level. All this was amply confirmed when a hooter echoed mournfully through the trees from the direction of the farmhouse. He tightened his grip on the AK, holding it across his chest, and raced through the bracken. He sensed movement on his left and a figure in camouflage battledress came out of the trees, head down, to meet him. As they converged, Egan swerved, dropping to one knee, the other leg stretched out. The man tripped and Egan came up, kicked him in the side of the head and ran. There was pain in his left knee, but if anything, it sharpened him, and he kept on going, faster as the hillside steepened, the bracken almost jungle-high here. He burst out into a small clearing as three more soldiers came out of the trees on the other side. He went in on the run, never hesitating, loosing off a burst from the AK; swinging the butt in one man’s face, shouldering another aside, he carried on through the trees, very fast, too fast, losing his balance. He picked himself up and started forward. The sound of a helicopter was somewhere close at hand, but the weather was on his side and the bird wouldn’t dare to come too low. Through a break in the trees he could see the river, half-obscured by mist and rain. There was a tightness in his chest and the pain in his left knee was like fire, but he kept on going, sliding farther down the steep bank that brought him at last to the river. As he picked himself up someone leapt from the bracken and drove the butt of a rifle into his kidneys. Egan arched backwards in pain and the rifle came round in a second, braced against his throat. He dropped his AK and ran the heel of his right boot down the man’s shin. There was a cry and as the pressure of the rifle was released, he jerked his head back hard into the face behind, following this with a short, savage blow with his left elbow. As he turned, the knee let him down finally, the leg collapsing under him as the soldier, his face a mask of blood from the broken nose, raised his own knee into Egan’s face, throwing him on his back. He moved in, foot raised to stamp. Egan got his hands to it and twisted, hurling the man to one side. As he tried to rise, Egan, already up on his good knee, delivered a devastating blow under the ribs. The soldier groaned and fell back. The helicopter was not far away now, closer still were the sound of men’s voices and the barking of dogs. Egan picked up the AK and limped to the river’s edge. The mist was heavy here so that it was impossible to see the other side. Water rushed by, brown and flecked with foam, swollen by the rain. The current was fast, too fast for even the strongest swimmer, so cold that survival time would be minimal. He moved further along the bank. Here, the flood waters had risen several feet and a tree floated, its branches caught in a bush. Recognizing his one chance for survival, he jumped into the water, the voices very close now, and flailed towards the tree. He pushed hard. For a moment, it refused to move and then quite suddenly it was free, torn out by the current. The AK went as he grabbed for the security of the branches. Men on the bank now, dogs barking. A burst of firing and then he was out in mid-channel, cloaked by a curtain of mist and rain. It was cold, colder than anything he had known in his life before, numbing the senses. It had even taken care of the pain in his knee. The current seemed slacker now and he drifted more slowly, cocooned in the mist. The helicopter made a couple of passes overhead, but not low enough to cause him any trouble. After a while, it moved away. It was very quiet, only the ripple of the water, the hiss of the falling rain. His final chance, and not long to do it with the cold eating into his bones like acid. He started to kick hard, still hanging on to the tree, pushing for the other side. It was exhausting work, but he kept at it, aware of his own heavy breathing and then something else. A dull, muted rumbling behind him. As he turned to glance over his shoulder, a motorboat nosed out of the mist and nudged into the branches of the tree. Half a dozen soldiers were aboard but only one stood out – the officer who leaned over the rail to look down at him. He was in his early thirties, young to be a lieutenant colonel, of medium height with dark, watchful eyes, and black hair that was far too long by any kind of army’s standards. At some time his nose had been broken. Just now, he wore a camouflage jump jacket and a beige beret with the officer’s version of the SAS cap badge, silver wire wings with the regimental motto, Who dares, wins, all outlined in red on a blue background. He reached strong arms into the water to haul Egan out. ‘Colonel Villiers,’ Egan said weakly. ‘Didn’t expect to see you here.’ ‘I’m your control officer on this one, Sean,’ Villiers told him. ‘Seems like I’ve cocked it up,’ Egan said. Villiers smiled with considerable charm. ‘Actually, I think you were bloody marvellous. Now, let’s get you out of here.’ The 22nd Regiment Special Air Service is probably the most ?lite unit of any army in the world, its members all volunteers. Its selection procedure is so rigorous that it is not uncommon for only ten per cent of applicants to succeed. The ultimate test is the endurance march of forty-five miles in twenty hours, carrying eighty pounds of equipment over the Brecon Beacons in Wales, some of the roughest terrain in Britain, a course which has quite literally killed men attempting it. Standing at the window of the farmhouse looking out across the trees as rain swept in across the River Wye, Tony Villiers thought of the man who had just come within inches of destruction. ‘My God, it really is a bloody awful place in weather like this.’ The young officer sitting at the desk behind him smiled. The name on his desk said Captain Daniel Warden and he was in charge of the proving ground courses in the Brecons. He and Villiers shared another distinction besides being serving officers in the SAS. Both were also Grenadier Guardsmen. He opened the file in front of him. ‘I’ve got Egan’s record here from the computer, sir. Really is quite outstanding. Military Medal for gallantry in the field in Ireland, reasons unspecified.’ ‘I know about that,’ Villiers told him. ‘He was working with me at the time. Undercover. South Armagh.’ ‘Distinguished Conduct Medal in the Falklands. Badly wounded. Eight months’ hospitalization. Left knee plastic and stainless steel or what-have-you. Speaks French, Italian and Irish. That’s a new one.’ ‘His father was Irish,’ Villiers said. ‘Another interesting point. He went to quite a reasonable public school,’ Warden added. ‘Dulwich College.’ Like Villiers, he was an Old Etonian and the Colonel said, ‘Don’t be a snob, Daniel. A very good school. Good enough for Raymond Chandler.’ ‘Really, sir? I never knew that. Thought he was an American.’ ‘He was, you idiot.’ Villiers crossed to the desk, helped himself to tea from a china pot and sat in the window seat. ‘Let me give it to you chapter and verse on Sean Egan, all Group Four information and most of it very definitely not on your computer. A lot of remarkable things about our Sean. To start with, he has a rather unusual uncle. Maybe you’ve heard of him? One Jack Shelley.’ Warden frowned. ‘The gangster?’ ‘A long time ago. In the good, bad old days he was as important as the Kray brothers and the Richardson gang. Very well liked in the East End of London. The people’s hero. Robin Hood in a Jaguar. Made his money from gambling and protection, night clubs and so on. Nothing nasty like drugs or prostitution. And he was clever. Too clever to end up serving life like the Krays. When he discovered he could make just as much money legitimately he moved into a different world. Television, computers, high tech. He must be worth twenty million at least.’ ‘And Egan?’ ‘Shelley’s sister married a London Irishman called Patrick Egan. He was an ex-boxer who ran a pub somewhere on the river. Shelley didn’t approve. He never married himself.’ Villiers lit another cigarette. ‘And there’s one thing you should get straight about him. He may be a multi-millionaire who owns half of Wapping, but he’s still Jack Shelley to every crook in London and a name to be reckoned with. He took a fancy to young Sean. He was the one who paid for him to go to Dulwich College and Sean was good. Got a scholarship to Trinity College, Cambridge. Intended to read Moral Philosophy. Can you beat that, Jack Shelley’s nephew reading Moral Philosophy?’ Warden was well hooked by now. ‘What went wrong?’ ‘In the spring, of ’76, Pat Egan and his wife went across to Ulster to visit relatives in Portadown. Unfortunately they parked next to the wrong truck.’ ‘A bomb?’ Warden asked. ‘Big one. Took out half the street. They were only two of the people killed. Egan was seventeen and a half. Turned his back on Cambridge and joined the Paratroopers. His uncle was furious, but there wasn’t much he could do.’ ‘Is Egan Shelley’s only relative?’ ‘No, there’s some woman in her sixties, Sean’s cousin, I think. He told me once. She runs his father’s old pub.’ Villiers frowned, thinking. ‘Ida, that was it. Aunt Ida. Girl called Sally, too, adopted by Egan and his wife. I think her parents died when she was a baby. Shelley didn’t count her – not family. He’s like that. She went to live with his Aunt Ida when Sean joined up.’ ‘Sean, sir?’ Warden said. ‘Isn’t that a little familiar between a half-colonel and a sergeant?’ ‘Sean Egan and I have worked together a dozen times undercover in Ireland. That alters things.’ Villiers’s clipped public school tones changed to the vernacular of Belfast. ‘You can’t work on a building site on the Falls Road with a man, risk your life every waking minute, and expect him to call you sir.’ Warden leaned back in his chair. ‘Am I right in thinking that Egan joined the army looking for some sort of revenge on the people who’d killed his parents?’ ‘Of course he did. The Provisional IRA claimed responsibility for that bomb. It was the kind of reaction you’d expect from a boy of seventeen.’ ‘But wouldn’t that make him suspect, sir? I mean, his psychological assessment would throw it all up. Must have.’ ‘Or perfect for our requirements, Daniel, it depends on your point of view. When he was a year old his parents moved to South Armagh from London, then Belfast. When he was twelve they came back to London because they’d had enough of the situation over there. So, a boy with an Ulster background, a Catholic, for what it’s worth, who even spoke reasonable Irish because his father had taught him. The kind of brain which earned a scholarship to Cambridge. Come on, Daniel, he was pulled out of the crowd within six months of joining the army. And then, he does possess one other very special attribute.’ ‘What’s that, sir?’ Villiers walked to the window and peered out into the rain. ‘He’s a killer by instinct, Daniel. No hesitation. I’ve never seen anyone quite like him. As an undercover agent in Ireland he’s assassinated eighteen terrorists to my certain knowledge. IRA, INLA …’ ‘His own people, sir?’ ‘Just because he’s a Catholic?’ Villiers demanded. ‘Come off it, Daniel. Nairac was a Catholic. He was also an officer in the Grenadier Guards and that’s all that concerned the IRA when they killed him. Anyway, Sean Egan has never played favourites. He’s also taken care of several leading gunmen on the Protestant side. UVF and Red Hand of Ulster.’ Warden looked down at the file. ‘Quite a man. And now you’ve got to tell him he’s finished at twenty-five years of age.’ ‘Exactly,’ Villiers said, ‘So let’s have him in and get it over with.’ When Sean Egan entered the room he was in shirtsleeve order, creases razor sharp, the beige beret tilted at the exact regulation angle. He wore shoulderstrap rank slides with sergeant’s chevrons. On his right sleeve were the usual SAS wings. Above his left shirt pocket he also wore the wings of an Army Air Corps pilot. Below them were the ribbons for the Distinguished Conduct Medal, the Military Medal for Bravery in the Field and campaign ribbons for Ireland and the Falklands. He stood rigidly at attention in front of Warden who sat behind his desk. Villiers remained in the window seat smoking a cigarette. Warden said, ‘At ease, Sergeant. This is completely informal.’ He indicated a chair. ‘Sit down.’ Egan did as he was told. Villiers got up and took a tin of cigarettes from his pocket. ‘Smoke?’ ‘Given it up, sir. When I got my packet in the Falklands, one bullet chose the left lung.’ ‘Some good in everything, I suppose,’ Villiers said. ‘Filthy habit.’ He was filling time and they all knew it. Warden said awkwardly, ‘Colonel Villiers is your control officer on this one, Egan.’ ‘So I understand, sir.’ There was a pause while Warden fiddled with the papers as if uncertain what to say. Villiers broke in. ‘Daniel,’ he said to Warden, ‘I wonder if you’d mind if Sergeant Egan and I had a word in private?’ Warden’s relief was plain. ‘Of course, sir.’ The door closed behind him. Villiers said, ‘It’s been a long time, Sean.’ ‘I didn’t think you were still with the regiment, sir.’ ‘On and off. A lot of my time’s taken up with Group Four. You did a job for us in Sicily, as I recall. Just before the Falklands.’ ‘That’s right, sir. Still part of D15?’ ‘On paper only. Anti-terrorism is still the name of the game though. My boss is responsible only to the Prime Minister.’ ‘Would that still be Brigadier Ferguson, sir?’ ‘That’s it. You’re well informed – as usual.’ ‘You used to tell me that’s all that kept you alive in Belfast and Derry, undercover. Being well informed.’ Villiers laughed. ‘A damned Shinner, right to the end, aren’t you, Sean? Just like your dad. Only a dyed-in-the-wool Ulster Catholic would call Londonderry, Derry.’ ‘I don’t like the way they use bombs. That doesn’t mean I think they haven’t got a point of view.’ Villiers nodded. ‘Seen your uncle lately?’ ‘He visited me in Maudsley Military Hospital a few months ago.’ ‘Was it as difficult as usual?’ Egan nodded. ‘He never was much of a patriot. To him the army is just a big waste of time.’ There was another pause and he continued. ‘Look, sir, let’s make this easy for you. I wasn’t up to scratch, was I?’ Villiers turned. ‘You did fine. First time anyone has actually got out of the pit. Very ingenious, that. But the knee, Sean.’ He came round the desk and opened the file. ‘It’s all here in the medical report. I mean, they’ve done a clever job in putting it together again.’ Egan said, ‘Stainless steel and plastic. The original bionic man, only not quite as good as new.’ ‘It will never be a hundred per cent. Your own personal evaluation report on the exercise.’ Villiers picked it up. ‘When did you write this? An hour ago? You say here yourself that the knee let you down.’ ‘That’s right,’ Egan agreed calmly. ‘Could have been the death of you in action. All right ninety per cent of the time, but it’s the other ten per cent that matters.’ Egan said, ‘So, I’m out?’ ‘Of the regiment, yes. However, it’s not as black as it looks. You’re entitled to a discharge and pension, but there’s no need for that. The army still needs you.’ ‘No thanks.’ Egan shook his head. ‘If it isn’t SAS, then I’m not interested.’ Villiers said, ‘Are you sure about that?’ ‘Absolutely, sir.’ Villiers sat back, watching him, a slight frown on his face. ‘There’s more to this, isn’t there?’ Egan shrugged. ‘Maybe. All those months in hospital gave me time to think. When I joined up seven years ago I had my reasons and you know what they were. I was just a kid and full of all sorts of wild ideas. I wanted to pay them back for my parents.’ ‘And?’ ‘You don’t pay anyone back. The bill will always be outstanding. Never paid in full. So much Irish time.’ He got up and walked to the window. ‘How many have I knocked off over there and for what? It just goes on and on and it didn’t bring my folks back.’ ‘Perhaps you need a rest,’ Villiers suggested. Sean Egan adjusted his beret. ‘Sir, with the greatest respect to the Colonel, what I need is out.’ Villiers stared at him then stood up. ‘Fine. If that’s what you want, you’ve earned it. There is another alternative, of course.’ ‘What’s that, sir?’ ‘You could come and work with me for Brigadier Ferguson at Group Four.’ ‘Out of the frying pan into the fire? I don’t think so.’ ‘What will you do, go back to your uncle?’ Egan laughed harshly. ‘God save us, I’d rather work for the Devil himself.’ ‘Cambridge then? Not too late.’ ‘I don’t really see myself fitting into that kind of cloistered calm. I’d feel uncomfortable and those poor old dons certainly would.’ ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Villiers said. ‘I used to know an Oxford professor who was an SOE agent during the Second World War. Still …’ ‘Something will turn up, sir.’ ‘I expect so.’ Villiers looked at his watch. ‘The helicopter is leaving for regimental headquarters at Hereford in ten minutes. Grab your kit and be on it. I’ll arrange for your discharge to be expedited.’ ‘Thank you, sir.’ Egan moved to the door and Villiers said, ‘By the way, I was just remembering your foster sister, Sally. How is she?’ Egan turned, a hand on the door knob. ‘Sally died, Colonel, about four months ago.’ Villiers was genuinely horrified. ‘My God, how? She couldn’t have been more than eighteen.’ ‘She was drowned. They found her in the Thames near Wapping. I was in the middle of major surgery at the time so there was nothing I could do. My uncle took care of the funeral for me. She’s in Highgate Cemetery, quite close to Karl Marx. She liked it up there.’ His face was blank, his voice calm. ‘Can I go now, sir?’ ‘Of course.’ The door closed. Villiers lit another cigarette, shocked and disturbed. The door opened again and Captain Warden came in. ‘He told me you wanted him on the helicopter, back to regiment.’ ‘That’s right.’ ‘He’s taking his discharge?’ Warden frowned. ‘But there’s no need for that, sir. He can’t continue to serve in SAS, no, but there are plenty of units who’d give their eye teeth to get their hands on him.’ ‘No way. He’s quite adamant about that. He’s changed. Maybe the Falklands did it and all those months in hospital. He’s going and that’s it.’ ‘A hell of a pity, sir.’ ‘Yes, well, there may be ways and means of handling him yet. I offered him a job with Group Four. He turned it down flat.’ ‘Do you think he might change his mind?’ ‘We’ll have to see what a few months on the outside does to him. I can’t see him sitting in the corner of an insurance office, not that he would need to. That pub of his father’s – he owns it. He also happens to be Jack Shelley’s sole heir. But never mind that now. He just gave me a shock. Told me that foster sister of his was drowned in the Thames a few months ago.’ He nodded to the computer in the corner. ‘We can pull in stuff from Central Records Office at Scotland Yard with that thing, can’t we?’ ‘No problem, sir. Matter of seconds.’ ‘See what they’ve got on a Sally Baines Egan. No, make that Sarah.’ Warden sat down at the computer. Villiers stood at the window looking out at the rain. Beyond the trees he heard the roaring of the helicopter engine starting up. ‘Here we are, sir. Sarah Baines Egan, aged eighteen. Next of kin, Ida Shelley, Jordan Lane, Wapping. It’s a pub called The Bargee.’ ‘Anything interesting?’ ‘Found on a mudbank. Been dead around four days. Drug addict. Four convictions for prostitution.’ ‘What in the hell are you talking about?’ Villiers turned to the computer. ‘You must have the wrong girl.’ ‘I don’t think so, sir.’ Villiers stared at the screen intently, then straightened. The helicopter passed overhead and he glanced up. ‘My God!’ he whispered, ‘I wonder if he knows?’ 2 (#ulink_6c40b380-27fd-504f-9040-f95ed2574799) Paris on the right occasion can seem the most desirable city on earth, but not at one o’clock on a November morning by the Seine with rain drifting across the river in a solid curtain. Eric Talbot turned the corner from Rue de la Croix and found himself on a small quay. He wore jeans and an anorak, the hood pulled up over his head, and a rucksack hanging from his left shoulder. A typical student, or so he appeared, and yet there was something else. An impression of frailness, unusual in a boy of nineteen, eyes sunken into dark holes, the skin stretched too tightly over the cheekbones. He paused under a streetlamp and looked across at the caf? which was his destination. La Belle Aurore. He managed a smile in spite of the fact that his hands wouldn’t stop shaking. La Belle Aurore. That had been the name of the caf? in the Paris sequence in Casablanca, not that there seemed anything romantic in the establishment across the quay. He started forward and suddenly became aware of the glow of a cigarette in the darkness of a doorway to his right. The man who stepped out was a gendarme, a heavy, old-fashioned cape protecting his shoulders against the rain. ‘And where do you think you’re going?’ The boy answered him in reasonable French, nodding across the quay. ‘The caf?, monsieur.’ ‘Ah, English.’ The gendarme snapped his fingers. ‘Papers.’ The boy unzipped his anorak, took out his wallet and produced a British passport. The gendarme examined it. ‘Walker – George Walker. Student.’ He handed the passport back and the boy’s hand trembled violently. ‘Are you ill?’ The boy managed a smile. ‘Just a touch of flu.’ The gendarme shrugged. ‘Well, you won’t find a cure for it over there. Take my advice and find yourself a bed for the night.’ He flicked what was left of his cigarette into the water, turned and walked away, his heavy boots ringing on the cobbles. The boy waited until he had rounded the corner, then crossed the quay quickly, opened the door of La Belle Aurore and went inside. It was a poor sort of place, of a type common in that part of the waterfront, frequented by sailors and stevedores during the day and prostitutes by night. There was the usual zinc-topped counter, rows of bottles on the shelves behind, a cracked mirror advertising Gitanes. The woman who sat behind the bar reading an ancient copy of Paris Match wore a black bombazine dress and was incredibly fat with stringy peroxided hair. She glanced up and looked at him. ‘Monsieur?’ There was a row of booths down one side of the caf?, a small fire opposite. The room was empty apart from one man seated beside the fire at a marble-topped table. He was of medium height with a pale, rather aristocratic face and wore a dark blue Burberry trenchcoat. The thin white line of a scar bisected his left cheek, running from the eye to the corner of the mouth. Eric Talbot’s head ached painfully, mainly at the sides behind the ears, and his nose wouldn’t stop running. He wiped it quickly with the back of his hand and managed a painful smile. ‘Agn?s, madame. I’m looking for Agn?s.’ ‘No Agn?s here, young man.’ She frowned. ‘You don’t look so good.’ She reached for a bottle of cognac and poured a little into a glass. ‘Drink that like a good boy then you’d better be on your way.’ His hand trembled as he raised the glass, a dazed look on his face. ‘But Mr Smith sent me. I was told she’d be expecting me.’ ‘And so she is, ch?ri.’ The young woman who leaned out of the booth at the far end of the room stood up and came towards him. She had dark hair held back under a scarlet beret, a heart-shaped face, the lips full and insolent. She wore a black plastic raincoat, a scarlet sweater to match the beret, a black mini-skirt and high-heeled ankle boots. She was very small, almost childlike, which increased the impression of a kind of overall corruption. ‘You don’t look too good, ch?ri. Come and sit down and tell me all about it.’ She nodded to the fat woman. ‘I’ll take care of it, Marie.’ She took his arm and led him towards the booth, past the man by the fire, who ignored them. ‘All right, let’s see your passport.’ Eric Talbot passed it across and she examined it quickly. ‘George Walker, Cambridge. Good – very good.’ She passed it back. ‘We’ll talk English if you like. I talk good English. You don’t look too well. What are you on, heroin?’ The boy nodded. ‘Well, I can’t help you there, not right now, but how about a little coke to keep you going? Just the thing to get you through a rainy night by the Seine.’ ‘Oh, my God, that would be wonderful.’ She rummaged in her handbag, took out a small white package and a straw and pushed them across. In the mirror above the fire, the man in the blue trenchcoat was looking at her enquiringly. She nodded, he emptied his glass, got up and went out. Talbot tore the packet open and inhaled the cocaine through the straw. His eyes closed and Agn?s poured a little cognac in her glass from the bottle on the table. The boy leaned back, eyes still closed as she took a small phial from her handbag. She added a few drops of colourless liquid to the cognac and replaced the phial in her handbag. The boy opened his eyes and managed a smile. ‘Better?’ she asked. ‘Oh, yes.’ He nodded. She pushed the glass across. ‘Drink that and let’s get down to business.’ He did as he was told, taking one tentative sip, then swallowing it all. He placed the glass on the table and she offered him a Gauloise. The smoke caught the back of his throat harshly and he coughed. ‘All right, what happens now?’ ‘Back to my place. You catch the British Airways flight to London that leaves at noon. Carry the goods through in a body belt, only not dressed like that, ch?ri. Jeans and an anorak always get you stopped at customs.’ ‘So what do I do?’ Eric Talbot had never felt so light-headed, so remote, and his voice seemed to come from somewhere outside himself. ‘Oh, I’ve got a nice blue suit for you, umbrella and briefcase. You’ll look quite the businessman.’ She took his arm and helped him up. As they reached Marie at the bar, the boy started to laugh. She glanced up. ‘You find me amusing, young man?’ ‘Oh, no, madame, not you. It’s this place. La Belle Aurore. That’s the name of the caf? in Casablanca where Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman have their last glass of champagne before the Nazis come.’ ‘I’m sorry, monsieur, but I do not see films,’ she replied gravely. ‘Oh, come, madame, but everyone knows Casablanca.’ He lectured her with the careful, slow graveness of the drunk. ‘My mother died when I was born and when I was twelve I got a new one. My wonderful, wonderful stepmother, lovely Sarah. My father was away a lot in the army, but Sarah made up for everything and in the holidays, she let me sit up to watch the Midnight Movie on television whenever it was Casablanca.’ He leaned closer. ‘Sarah said Casablanca should be a compulsory part of everyone’s education because she didn’t think there was enough romance in the world.’ ‘Now on that, I agree with her.’ She patted his face. ‘Go to bed.’ It was the last conscious thing Eric Talbot remembered, for by the time he reached the door he was in a state of total chemically induced hypnosis. He crossed the quay, moving with the certainty of a sleepwalker, Agn?s’s hand on his arm. They turned onto a small wharf by some warehouses, a cobbled slipway running down into the river. They paused and Agn?s called softly, ‘Valentin?’ The man who stepped out of the shadows was hard and dangerous-looking. His shoulders enhanced a generally large physical frame, but there was already a touch of dissolution about him, a little too much flesh, and the long black hair and thick sideburns gave him a strangely old-fashioned appearance. ‘How many drops did you give him?’ ‘Five.’ She shrugged. ‘Maybe six or seven.’ ‘Amazing stuff, scopolamine.’ Valentin said. ‘If we left him now, he’d wake up in three days without the ability to remember anything he’d done, even murder.’ ‘But you won’t let him wake up in three days?’ ‘Of course not. That’s why we’re here, isn’t it?’ She shivered. ‘You frighten me, you truly do.’ ‘Good,’ he said and took Talbot’s arm. ‘Now let’s get on with it.’ ‘I can’t watch,’ she said. ‘I can’t.’ ‘Suit yourself,’ he told her calmly. She turned away and he took the boy by the arm and led him down the slipway. The boy followed without hesitation. When they reached the end, Valentin paused, then said, ‘All right, in you go.’ Talbot stepped off the edge and disappeared. He surfaced a moment later and gazed up at the Frenchman with unseeing eyes. Valentin went down on one knee at the edge of the slipway and leaned over, putting a hand on the boy’s head. ‘Goodbye, my friend.’ It was so shockingly easy. The boy went under as Valentin pushed, stayed under with no struggle at all, only air bubbles disturbing the surface until they, too, stopped. Valentin towed the lifeless body round the edged parapet and left it sprawled on the end of the slipway, almost entirely submerged. He walked back to Agn?s, drying his hands on a handkerchief. ‘You can make your phone call. I’ll see you at my place later.’ She waited until the sound of his footsteps had faded and then started to walk along the quay. There was a movement in the shadows of a doorway and she recoiled in panic. ‘Who’s there?’ As he lit a cigarette, the face of the man who’d been sitting in the caf? was illuminated. ‘No need to arouse the neighbourhood, old girl.’ He spoke in English, the kind that had a public school edge to it, and there was a weary good humour there, tinged with a kind of contempt. ‘Oh, it’s you, Jago,’ she replied in the same language. ‘God, how I hate you. You talk to me as if I was something from under a stone.’ ‘My dear old thing,’ he drawled. ‘Haven’t I always behaved like a perfect gentleman?’ ‘Oh, yes,’ she said. ‘You kill with a smile. Always very good-mannered. You remind me of the man who said to the French customs officer: no I’m not a foreigner, I’m English.’ ‘To be perfectly accurate, Welsh, but you wouldn’t appreciate the difference. I presume Valentin has been as revoltingly efficient as usual?’ ‘If you mean has he done your dirty work for you, yes.’ ‘Not mine, Smith’s.’ ‘The same difference. You kill for Smith when it suits you.’ ‘Of course.’ There was a kind of bewildered amusement on his face. ‘But with style, my sweet. Valentin, on the other hand, would kill his grandmother if he thought he could get a good price for her body at the School of Anatomy. And while we’re at it, remind that pimp of yours that I expect him to keep in close touch, just in case the court processes the body sooner than usual.’ ‘He’s not my pimp, he’s my boyfriend.’ ‘A third-rate gangster, walking the streets with those friends of his, trying to imagine he’s Alain Delon in Borsalino. If it wasn’t for the girls he couldn’t even pay for his cigarettes.’ He turned and walked off without another word, whistling tunelessly, and Agn?s left too, pausing only at the first public telephone she came to, to call the police. ‘Emergency?’ she demanded. ‘I was just walking past the slipway up from Rue de la Croix when I saw what looked like a body in the water.’ ‘Name, please,’ the duty officer said, but she had already replaced the receiver and was hurrying away. The duty officer filled details of the incident on the right form and passed it to the dispatcher. ‘Better send a car.’ ‘Do you think it might be a crank?’ The other shook his head. ‘More likely some whore doing the night beat by the river who just doesn’t want to get involved.’ The dispatcher nodded and passed the details on to a patrol car in the area. Not that it mattered, for at that very moment, the gendarme who had spoken to Eric Talbot earlier walked down the slipway for the purposes of nature and discovered the body for himself. Given the circumstances, the police investigation was understandably perfunctory. The gendarme who had found the body interviewed Marie at La Belle Aurore, but she had long since learned that in her line of business it paid to see and hear nothing. Yes, the young, man had visited the caf?. He’d asked where he might get a room. He’d seemed ill and asked for a cognac. She’d given him a couple of addresses and he’d left. End of story. There was the usual postmortem the following morning, and three days later, an inquest at which, in view of the medical evidence, the coroner reached the only possible verdict. Death by drowning while under the influence of alcohol and drugs. The same afternoon the body of the boy known as Walker was delivered to the public mortuary in the Rue St Martin, a superior name for a very mean street, where appropriate documentation was to be prepared for the British Embassy. Not that such documentation ever arrived, thanks to a cousin of Valentin, an old lady employed as a cleaner and washer of bodies, who intercepted the necessary package before it left the building. No possible query could be raised the following morning when Jago presented himself, in the guise of a cultural attach? from the British Embassy, with all the necessary documentation. The much respected firm of undertakers, Chabert and Sons, would take charge of the body, providing it with a suitable coffin. The grief-stricken family had arranged for it to be flown by a charter aircraft the following day from a small airfield called Vigny, a few miles out of Paris. From there, the flight plan would take it to Woodchurch in Kent where the remains would be received by the funeral firm of Hartley Brothers. All was in order. The documents were countersigned, the regulation black hearse appeared to bear the body away. The premises of Chabert and Sons were situated by the river and, by coincidence, not too far away from where Eric Talbot had met his death. The building dated from the turn of the century, a splendid mausoleum of a place, with twenty chapels of rest where relatives could visit the loved one to mourn in some decent privacy before the burial. As with many such old-established firms in most European capitals, Chabert’s had a night attendant, a row of bells above his head. There was a bell for each chapel of rest, a cord plated between the corpse’s hands against the unlikely event of an unexpected resurrection. But at ten o’clock that evening, the attendant was snoring loudly in a drunken stupor, thanks to the bottle of cognac thoughtfully left on his desk by some grieving relative. He was long gone when Valentin carefully unlocked the rear door with a duplicate key and entered, followed by Jago. They each carried a canvas holdall. They paused beside the glass-walled office. Jago nodded at the attendant. ‘He’s well away.’ ‘Bloody old drunk,’ Valentin said contemptuously. ‘One sniff of a barmaid’s apron is all he needs.’ They proceeded along the corridor flanked by chapels of rest on either side. There was the smell of flowers everywhere and Jago said in French, ‘Enough to put you off roses for the rest of your life.’ He paused at the door of one chapel and glanced in. The coffin was raised on an incline, the lid half down, a young woman visible, the face touched with unnatural colour by the embalmer. Jago lit a cigarette with one hand and paused. ‘Like a horror movie,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Dracula or something like that. Any minute now, her eyes will open and she’ll reach for your throat.’ ‘For God’s sake, shut up,’ Valentin croaked. ‘You know I hate this part.’ ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Jago told him as they continued along the corridor. ‘I think you’ve done very well. What is this, the seventh?’ ‘It doesn’t get any easier,’ the Frenchman said. ‘Intimations of mortality, old stick.’ Valentin frowned. ‘And what in the hell is that supposed to mean?’ ‘You’d need an English public-school education to understand.’ Jago paused and glanced in the last chapel on the right. ‘This must be it.’ The coffin was the only one closed. It was constructed in dark mahogany, the handles and studwork of gilded plastic in case cremation was favoured. Normally, international regulations concerning the air freight of corpses required a sealed metallic interior, but this was habitually waived in the case of small aircraft flying at under ten thousand feet. ‘All right,’ Jago said. Valentin unscrewed the lid and parted the linen shroud underneath to reveal the body of Eric Talbot. There were two enormous scars running from the chest to the lower stomach, roughly stitched together, relics of the postmortem. Valentin had spent two years as a conscript in the French Army, had served as a medical orderly. He’d seen plenty of corpses in Chad when he was on attachment to the Foreign Legion, but this was something he could never get used to. Sometimes he cursed the day he’d met Jago, but then the money … He opened one of the holdalls, took out an instrument case, selected a scalpel and started to work on the stitches, pausing only to wipe sweat from his forehead. ‘Get on with it,’ Jago told him impatiently. ‘We haven’t got all night.’ The air was tainted now, the sickly sweet smell of corrupt flesh quite unmistakable. Valentin finally removed the last stitches, paused, then eased the body open. Normally, the internal organs were replaced after the postmortem, but in a case such as this, where the body faced a considerable delay before burial, they were usually destroyed. The chest cavity and abdomen were empty. Valentin paused, hands trembling. ‘A sentimentalist at heart. I always knew it.’ Jago opened the other holdall and took out one plastic bag of heroin after another, passing them across. ‘Come on, hurry up. I’ve got a date.’ Valentin inserted one bag into the chest cavity and reached for another. ‘Boy or girl?’ he said viciously. ‘My goodness, I see I’m going to have to chastise you again, you French ape.’ Jago smiled gently, but the look in his eyes was terrible to see. Valentin managed a weak laugh. ‘Only joking. Nothing intended.’ ‘Of course. Now get the rest of it inside and sew him up again. I want to get out of here.’ Jago lit another cigarette and went out, moving along the corridor to the chapel at the end. There were a few chairs, a sanctuary lamp casting a glow over the small altar and brass crucifix. All very simple, but then, he liked that. Always had done since he was a boy in the family pew in the village church, his father’s tenants sitting respectfully behind. There was a stained-glass window with the family coat of arms dating from the fourteenth century with the family motto: I do my will. It summed up his own philosophy exactly, not that it had got him anywhere in particular. He tipped his chair back against the wall. ‘Where did it all go wrong, old son?’ he asked himself softly. After all, he’d had every advantage. An ancient and honourable name, not the one he used now, of course, but then one had to preserve the decencies. Public school, Sandhurst, a fine regiment. Captain at twenty-four with a Military Cross for undercover work in Belfast and then that unfortunate Sunday night in South Armagh and four very dead members of the IRA whom Jago hadn’t seen any point in taking in alive, had taken every pleasure in finishing off himself. But then that snivelling rat of a sergeant had turned him in and the British Army, of course, did not operate a shoot-to-kill policy. It wasn’t so much that he’d minded being quietly cashiered, although it had nearly killed his father. It was the fact that the bastards had taken the Military Cross back. Still, old history now. Long gone. The Selous Scouts hadn’t been too particular in the closing year in Rhodesia before independence. Glad to get him, as were the South Africans for work with their commandos in Angola. Later, there was the war in Chad where he’d first met Valentin, although he’d been lucky to get out of that one alive. And then Smith, the mysterious Mr Smith, and three very lucrative years, and the most extraordinary thing was that they had never met, or at least, not as far as Jago knew. He didn’t even know what had put Smith onto him in the first place. Not that it mattered. All that did matter was that now there was almost a million pounds in his Geneva account. He wondered what his father would say to that. He got up and returned to the chapel of rest. Valentin had carefully restitched the body and was replacing the shroud. Jago said, ‘Five million pounds street value. He’s richer in death than he knows.’ Valentin screwed down the lid again. ‘Six, maybe seven if it was diluted.’ Jago smiled. ‘Now what kind of rat would pull a stroke like that? Come on, let’s get moving.’ They went past the office where the attendant still slept and stepped out into the alley. It was raining and Jago turned up his collar. ‘Okay, you and Agn?s be at Vigny tomorrow, one o’clock sharp, for the departure. When the plane takes off, ring the usual number in Kent.’ ‘Of course.’ They had reached the end of the alley. Valentin said awkwardly, ‘We were wondering. That is, Agn?s was wondering.’ ‘Yes?’ Jago said. ‘Things have been going well. We thought a little more money might be in order.’ ‘We’ll see,’ Jago said. ‘I’ll mention it to Smith. You’ll hear from me.’ He walked away along the waterfront thinking about Valentin. A nasty bit of work. Rubbish, of course. No style. A true wharf rat, but a rat was still a rat and needed watching. He turned into the first all-night caf? he came to five minutes later, changing a hundred-franc note at the bar, going into a telephone booth in the corner where he dialled a London number. He spoke quietly into the tape recorder at the other end. ‘Mr Smith. Jago here.’ He repeated the number of the telephone he was using twice, replaced the receiver and lit a cigarette. They had always operated this way. Smith with his answerphone and presumably an automatic bleeper to alert him to messages so that he was always the one to phone you. Surprisingly simple and no way to trace him. Foolproof. The phone rang and Jago picked it up. ‘Jago.’ ‘Smith here.’ The voice, as usual, was muffled, disguised. ‘How are you?’ ‘Fine.’ ‘Any problems?’ ‘None. Everything as normal. The consignment leaves Vigny at one tomorrow.’ ‘Excellent. Our friends will pick it up as usual. It should be making us money within a week.’ ‘That’s good.’ ‘Your account will be credited with the usual amount plus ten per cent on the last day of the month.’ ‘That’s nice.’ ‘The labourer is worthy of his hire …’ ‘And all that good old British nonsense.’ Jago laughed. ‘Exactly. I’ll be in touch.’ Jago replaced the receiver and returned to the bar where he had a quick cognac. It was still raining when he went out into the street, but he didn’t mind that. It made him feel good and he was whistling again as he walked away along the uneven pavement. But at Vigny the following afternoon the weather was not good, low cloud and rain and a ground mist that reduced visibility to four hundred yards. It was only a small airfield with a control tower and two hangars. Valentin and Agn?s stayed in her Citro?n on the edge of the runway and watched as the hearse arrived and the coffin was manoeuvred inside the small Cessna plane. The hearse departed. The pilot disappeared inside the control tower. ‘It doesn’t look good,’ Agn?s said. ‘I know. We could be here all day,’ Valentin told her. ‘I’ll see what’s happening.’ He put a raincoat over his shoulders and strolled across to the main hangar where he found a lone mechanic in stained white overalls working on a Piper Comanche. ‘Cigarette?’ Valentin offered him a Gauloise. ‘My English cousin is expecting the body of his son this afternoon. He asked me to check things out. I saw the hearse arrive. I mean, is the flight on or not?’ ‘A temporary hitch,’ the mechanic told him. ‘No trouble taking off here, but it’s not so good at the other end. The captain tells me he’s expecting clearance around four o’clock.’ ‘Thanks.’ Valentin took a half-bottle of whisky from his pocket. ‘Help yourself. You don’t mind if I use your phone?’ The mechanic drank from the bottle with enthusiasm. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘I don’t pay the bills; be my guest.’ Valentin took out a slip of paper and dialled the number on it. It was a Kent exchange which he knew was south of London, but other than that he knew nothing of the mysterious Hartley Brothers. The voice at the other end simply said, ‘Yes?’ Valentin replied in his bad English. ‘Hartley Brothers? Vigny here.’ The voice sharpened. ‘Any problem?’ ‘Yes, the weather, but they expect to be away at four.’ ‘Good. Call me again to confirm.’ Valentin nodded to the mechanic. ‘Keep the Scotch. I’ll be back.’ He returned to Agn?s in the Citro?n. ‘That’s it. All off until four. Let’s try that caf? down the road.’ The man he had been speaking to replaced the telephone and clasped his hands together, leaning forward towards the weeping woman in front of him. He was sixty and slightly balding, wore gold pince-nez glasses, black jacket and tie, white shirt pristine, striped trousers immaculate. The gold-painted name plate on his desk said: Asa Bird. ‘Mrs Davies. I can assure you that here at Deepdene, your husband will receive only the very best attention. His ashes may be strewn in our own garden of rest if you wish.’ The room was half in shadows on that dull November afternoon but the flowers massed in the corners, the oak panelling, were reassuring, as was his soothing, slightly avuncular voice that had a touch of the parson about it. ‘That would be wonderful.’ He patted her hand. ‘Just a few formalities, forms to fill in. Regulations, I’m afraid.’ He pressed a bell on his desk, sat back, selected a handkerchief and proceeded to polish his glasses, standing up and peering out of the window into the immaculate garden. It always filled him with conscious pleasure. Not bad for a boy born on the wrong side of the blanket in the worst slum in Liverpool that had fitted him for nothing but a life of petty crime. Eighteen offences by the age of twenty-four. Everything from larceny to, although he preferred to forget about it now, male prostitution, which had led him to the chance of a lifetime, his relationship with the ageing Henry Brown, an undertaker with his own long- established firm in Manchester. He’d taken young Asa in, not that that was his name then, and groomed him in every way. Asa had loved the death business at once, taken to it like a duck to water, soon becoming an expert at every aspect, including embalming. And then old Mr Henry had died leaving only Mrs Brown who had never had a son of her own and doted on Asa, making perhaps only one mistake. Told him that she had made him her sole heir, an error which had led to her untimely death from pneumonia, helped on her way by Asa’s unfortunately leaving the windows of her room wide open on a December night after first removing the bedclothes. Mrs Brown’s thoughtful bequest had taken him to Deepdene and his own establishment, developed from an eighteenth-century country house. A garden of rest, with its own cremation facilities. You wouldn’t find better in California, and his association with the mysterious Mr Smith hadn’t done him any harm. The door opened and a handsome young black man entered. He was tall and muscular and the well-cut chauffeur’s uniform showed him to advantage. ‘You rang, Mr Bird?’ ‘Yes, Albert. The package from France. It will be later than we thought.’ ‘That’s a shame, Mr Bird.’ ‘Oh, I expect we’ll manage. Is the transport ready?’ ‘In the rear garage, sir.’ ‘Good. I’ll just have a look.’ Bird turned to Mrs Davies. ‘I’ll leave you for a few minutes to complete those forms and then I’ll help you choose a suitable coffin.’ She nodded gratefully. He patted her shoulder and went out. Albert opened a large umbrella and held it over his head as they crossed the cobbled yard. ‘Bloody weather,’ Bird said. ‘Always seems to be pissing down these days.’ ‘Dreadful, Mr Bird,’ Albert agreed and got the garage door open. When he pulled a dustsheet away a gleaming black hearse stood revealed. ‘There you are.’ Beautifully painted on the side in gold was the legend: Hartley Brothers, Funeral Directors. ‘Excellent,’ Bird said. ‘Where did you get it?’ ‘Knocked it off myself in North London, Thursday. The log book and tax disc are from a write-off I found in a scrapyard in Brixton.’ ‘You’re certain you won’t be remembered?’ Albert laughed. ‘In Brixton? You, they’d remember, but me? In Brixton, just another brother, just another black face. Do we go the usual way?’ ‘Yes, you take the hearse. I’ll follow in the Jaguar.’ Which Albert knew meant just in case anything went wrong, which really meant that he would be left carrying the can while the old bastard did a runner. Not that it mattered. His day would come, Albert was certain. ‘That’s fine, Mr Bird.’ Bird patted his face. ‘You’re a good boy, Albert, a lovely boy. I must think of some way to reward you.’ ‘Not necessary, Mr Bird.’ Albert smiled as he opened the umbrella. ‘Serving you is reward enough,’ he said and they started back across the yard. Agn?s and Valentin arrived back at Vigny at four to discover that the plane had already departed. She watched Valentin hurry across to the hangar and speak to the mechanic again. She lit a cigarette and waited. Valentin returned in a little while. ‘Left fifteen minutes ago.’ ‘Did you phone?’ she asked. ‘Yes,’ he said as he switched on the engine. ‘And a funny thing happened. You know how sometimes an answering tape stays on even though someone has picked up the receiver?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Well, as my usual man answered, I heard a tape playing.’ ‘What did it say?’ ‘It said: This is Deepdene Garden of Rest. We regret there is no one here at the moment, but leave your number and we’ll get back to you.’ ‘Now that is interesting, ch?ri.’ Agn?s smiled, managing to look quite vicious. ‘A chink in Monsieur Jago’s armour that could be worth a great deal.’ Woodchurch Airfield was not much bigger than Vigny. An aero club really, used occasionally for charter or freight flights. Situated in the depths of the Kent countryside, it had no customs facilities which meant that the customs officer who received the Cessna with Eric Talbot’s coffin had to drive all the way from Canterbury. He was not pleased by the delay, wanted only to be on his way. Formalities were of the briefest. The necessary papers were signed and he and the pilot helped Albert load the coffin into the hearse. As Albert drove through the gate and turned into the country road the Cessna roared down the runway and lifted into the sky. Behind him, Bird, who had stayed discreetly out of the way, took up station in the black Jaguar. Albert reached for the half-pint of vodka in the glove compartment, then shook a couple of his special pills from a bottle, driving one-handed. He washed them down with the vodka and within a few minutes was on a marvellous high. He checked out the Jaguar in his rear-view mirror. It was already dusk and Bird had turned on his lights. Always a cautious one, Albert thought. Never took a chance if someone else could take it for him and, usually, that someone else was Albert. ‘Albert this, Albert that,’ the chauffeur said softly, glancing into the mirror again. ‘I sometimes wonder what the silly old bugger thinks I am.’ He took another swig from the bottle, then realized, too late, that he was running into a bend. He dropped the bottle and swung the wheel. His offside front wheel mounted the grass bank, collided with a block of granite which had fallen from a low wall. The hearse careered across the road, went straight through a wire fence and ploughed down a slope, uprooting young fir trees on its way, sliding to a halt in a gully below, half on its side. Only the seat belt had saved him from going through the windscreen. He got the driver’s door open and pulled himself out. He stood there, slightly dazed, aware of the Jaguar pausing on the road above. Bird appeared at the top of the short slope. ‘Albert?’ There was genuine fear in his voice. ‘I’m all right,’ Albert called. At the same moment he saw that the coffin had smashed through the glass side of the hearse, the lid bursting open so that the corpse hung out, still swathed in the shroud. He dropped to his knees and peered under the vehicle and saw that the bottom end of the coffin was caught underneath. Bird scrambled down the slope to join him. ‘Just get him out. We’ll put him in the boot of the Jaguar, but for God’s sake hurry. Someone might come.’ Albert reached under the hearse. There was a slight, uneasy creaking and it swayed slightly. He jumped back. ‘This damn thing could topple over at any moment and he’s pinned by the feet.’ Bird stooped and when he straightened he was holding the vodka bottle. ‘Drinking again,’ he said furiously. ‘What have I told you?’ He slapped Albert across the face and threw the bottle into the trees. Albert cowered away, a hand raised, a child again. ‘I’m sorry, Mr Bird. It was an accident.’ Bird took a penknife from his waistcoat pocket and opened it. ‘Cut his stitches. Open him up. We’ve got to get that heroin.’ ‘I couldn’t do that, Mr Bird,’ Albert said. ‘Do it!’ Bird cried and hit him in the face again. ‘I’ll get a bag from the car.’ He thrust the penknife into the chauffeur’s hand, turned and scrambled up the slope. Albert, terrified, dropped to his knees and pulled the shroud away. The boy’s eyes were open, staring at him. He averted his own eyes as best he could and started to hack at the stitches. On the road above, Bird got the boot of the Jaguar open and found a canvas bag he used for shopping. He went back to the top of the slope and peered down into the gathering darkness. ‘Have you got it?’ ‘Yes, Mr Bird.’ Albert’s voice was strained and muffled. ‘Put it in this.’ Bird tossed the canvas bag down and looked anxiously along the road. Thank God it had happened on a side road and the flat farmland beyond the bend meant that he could see some considerable distance. His heart was pounding and there was sweat on his face. What would Smith say? The prospect was too awful to think about. He slid down the slope. ‘Are you ready, for God’s sake? Have you got it all?’ ‘I think so, Mr Bird.’ ‘Right, let’s get out of here.’ ‘But they’ll still find the body, Mr Bird. Certain to.’ ‘Even if they do, they can’t trace any of us. Not in France, not here, and there is such a thing as destroying the evidence. Go on! Get up there and get the car started!’ Albert scrambled away and Bird unscrewed the cap on the fuel tank. Petrol spilled out onto the ground. He took out his handkerchief and soaked it, then went halfway up the bank. He found his lighter, touched it to the handkerchief and tossed it down onto the hearse. For a moment, he thought it was going to go out and then a yellow tongue of flame flickered into life. By the time he reached the top of the slope, the hearse was beginning to burn. He had a glimpse of the corpse’s eyes staring at him accusingly, then turned and got into the Jaguar and Albert drove away. Later, at his desk at Deepdene, waiting for Smith to return his call, he sipped brandy and tried to pull himself together. It was going to be all right. It had to be. Smith would understand. The telephone rang as Albert entered the room with the tea things on a silver tray. Bird held up a hand, motioning him to silence, and picked up the phone. ‘Smith here.’ ‘It’s Bird, sir.’ Bird’s hands were shaking. ‘Actually we’ve had a bit of a problem.’ Smith’s voice didn’t change in the slightest. ‘Tell me about it.’ Which Bird did, omitting any reference to Albert and his drinking, blaming the entire incident on a steering defect. When he was finished, Smith said, ‘Most unfortunate.’ ‘I know, but accidents will happen, sir.’ ‘I can’t comment on that, I’ve never had the experience,’ Smith said. ‘So what do we do, sir? Will Mr Jago be picking up the stuff as usual?’ ‘Not necessary this time. I’ll take delivery of the goods tomorrow afternoon at three o’clock precisely. You will leave it in luggage locker forty-three at Victoria Station in London.’ ‘But the key, sir?’ ‘Will be in an envelope in your morning mail. I’ll have a duplicate,’ Smith said. ‘Right, sir.’ ‘There had better not be any more accidents, Mr Bird, or Jago will be round to have words, and you wouldn’t like that, would you?’ ‘No need for that, sir,’ Bird gabbled. ‘Don’t worry, Mr Bird. The young man was a nobody. They’ve all been carefully selected nobodies. No way of tracing him to any of us. With any luck, this should prove to be a temporary inconvenience. Goodnight.’ Bird replaced the phone and Albert said, ‘What did he say?’ The older man told him. He was brighter now, relieved and reassured at the way Smith had taken things. ‘He’s right. The kid was a nobody. The hearse was stolen. All the paperwork phoney. The scuffers won’t stand a chance on this one.’ ‘Scuffers, Mr Bird?’ ‘Sorry, Albert, betraying my youth there. That’s what we called coppers in Liverpool when I was a lad.’ Albert nodded. ‘I was thinking, Mr Bird. A locker at Victoria Station. I mean, if I hung around, maybe I could catch a glimpse of him. I did it before, remember, when that Frasconi geezer turned up.’ Bird shook his head pityingly. ‘Albert, I don’t know how you’ve survived this long. Do you really think someone as big as Smith would be that stupid? If you even tried it that bastard Jago would be on you like a vulture. Miracle you got away with it before. They’d find you floating down the Thames with your dick in your hand, and that would be such a waste. Now what have we here?’ ‘Tea, Mr Bird.’ Albert poured some from Albert’s favourite silver pot into a delicate porcelain cup. ‘Ceylon, just the way you like it!’ ‘Lovely.’ Bird took a sip, then gulped it down gratefully. ‘Nothing like a nice cup of tea, as my old mother used to say.’ He glanced up at Albert, reached up and patted his cheek. ‘You’re a good boy, Albert, but a little foolish sometimes.’ ‘A good thing I’ve got you to look after me, Mr Bird,’ Albert said and poured him another cup of tea. In Paris, at that precise moment, Jago was listening to Smith’s version of events. ‘A balls-up is putting it mildly,’ he said. ‘What do you want me to do?’ ‘Nothing for the moment,’ Smith told him. ‘With luck, we might get away with it. Let’s wait and see, but if things go sour, I’ll need you over here to handle the disposal work. You’d better come over to London in the morning. The usual service flat in Hyde Park. I’ll be in touch.’ ‘My pleasure, sir.’ Jago replaced the telephone. He stood staring down at it, then started to laugh. It really was too funny for words. He was still laughing when he went into his bedroom to get dressed. 3 (#ulink_5923b273-1b2c-55da-9f32-9cb90b203987) Brigadier Charles Ferguson had commanded Group Four since its conception in 1972, a large untidy man in his early sixties with a deceptively benign face who affected crumpled suits, his only hint of anything in the slightest sense military his Guards’ tie. Ferguson preferred to work at home when possible, in the Georgian splendour of his Cavendish Square flat, which was where he was the following morning, sitting in comfort beside the Adam fireplace, drinking tea and working his way through a stack of papers, when his Gurkha manservant, Kim, appeared. ‘Colonel Villiers is here, sir. He says it’s urgent.’ Ferguson nodded and a moment later Tony Villiers entered, wearing a black polo-neck sweater, Donegal tweed jacket and faded green cord slacks. His face was white, the eyes very dark, every evidence of real distress there. He was carrying a briefcase. ‘My dear Tony.’ Ferguson stood up. ‘What on earth is it?’ ‘This report just came in, sir. Fed into the general computer, it arrived on my desk, following the usual cross-indexing procedure for service personnel.’ Ferguson adjusted the half-moon reading glasses he wore, walked to the window and studied the report Villiers had handed him. ‘Quite extraordinary.’ He turned. ‘But why you, Tony? I don’t understand.’ ‘Eric Talbot was my cousin Edward’s boy. You remember him, sir? Half-Colonel in the Paras? Killed in the Falklands.’ ‘Good God, yes. So you’re family?’ ‘Exactly, sir.’ ‘But if the boy was passing himself off as this George Walker, how did the Kent Police establish his real identity so quickly?’ ‘The boy was only partially burned. They were able to take his fingerprints and they were on the national computer.’ ‘Really?’ Ferguson frowned. ‘The boy was a student at Cambridge – Trinity College. Last year he got picked up in a police raid on the wrong sort of party.’ ‘Drugs?’ ‘That’s right. It was a user only charge, so he didn’t go to gaol. I’ve only just found this out from Central Records Office at the Yard.’ Ferguson walked to his desk and sat down. ‘Talbot, yes, I remember Colonel Talbot’s death in the Falklands now. Tumbledown wasn’t it?’ ‘Yes, he was liaising with the Welsh Guards.’ ‘And the father. Baronet as I recall. Sir Geoffrey Talbot.’ ‘He had a stroke some time ago when his wife died,’ Villiers told him. ‘He’s been in a nursing home ever since. Doesn’t even know what time of day it is.’ He paused. ‘Look, do you mind if I have a drink, sir?’ ‘Of course not, Tony. Help yourself.’ Villiers went to the sideboard and poured a brandy into a cut-glass tumbler. He walked to the window and stood there, peering out. ‘The thing is, he’s my uncle you see, sir. My mother’s brother, not that we were ever close.’ ‘Tony, I really am sorry. A good thing the old boy’s not capable of taking this in. I mean, he lost one heir to the Falklands, another in this particularly distressing way.’ He tapped the report. ‘I wonder who inherits the title.’ ‘Actually, I do, sir,’ Villiers said. Ferguson removed his glasses wearily. ‘In normal circumstances such a thing would be a cause for congratulation …’ ‘Yes, well, we’ll forget about that and concentrate on this.’ Villiers opened the briefcase and produced a plastic packet, which he placed on the desk in front of the Brigadier. ‘Heroin, and the immediate opinion at the lab on briefest of examination is that it’s very good stuff indeed. This is the kind of article you could cut three times over and still sell on the street.’ ‘All right, go on,’ Ferguson said, his face grave. ‘It was found inside Eric’s body when the medical examiner checked him. It also became plain to him that the boy had been dead for days and the subject of a postmortem. Apparently, he recognized the surgical technique used as French, so Kent Police tried the fingerprints on the S?ret? in Paris and came up with this.’ Villiers passed another report across and Ferguson studied it. Finally he sat back. ‘So what have we got here? The boy goes to Paris on a false passport. Drowns in the Seine under the influence of drugs. After the postmortem, his body is claimed using forged papers and flown to England.’ ‘Packed with heroin,’ Villiers said. ‘Of which this is only a sample. Is that what you’re saying?’ ‘It makes sense. The police have already established that the hearse was stolen. There’s no such funeral firm as Hartley Brothers. The whole thing was an elaborate front.’ ‘Which went wrong. An accident of some sort.’ ‘Exactly. They had to retrieve the stuff quickly and get the hell out of it fast.’ ‘So fast that this packet was overlooked.’ Ferguson looked grim. ‘You do realize what you’re suggesting, don’t you? The possibility that the boy was deliberately killed in the first place so that his body could be used in this way.’ ‘That’s right,’ Villiers agreed. ‘I’ve asked the lab for an estimate. They say, judging by the size of that packet, the body could have carried at least five million pounds’ worth at street value.’ Ferguson drummed his fingers on the table. ‘However, except for your own personal connection, I don’t really see how this concerns us.’ ‘But it does, sir, very much so. I’ve got a copy here of the French coroner’s report.’ Villiers took it from the briefcase. ‘Notice the chemical analysis of the blood. Traces of heroin, cocaine, and also scopolamine and phenothiazine.’ Ferguson leaned back. ‘Science was never my strong point at school. Explain.’ ‘It all started in Colombia last year. The depressive alkaloid scopolamine is produced from the fruit of shrubs in the Andes. It can be converted into an odourless serum, no colour, no smell, a few drops of which can reduce any individual to a state of total chemical hypnosis for at least three days. The condition is so absolute that the victims have no recall of what they’ve done. Men have killed, women been totally degraded, turned into sex slaves.’ ‘And the phenothiazine?’ ‘It neutralizes certain side-effects. Makes the victims more docile.’ Ferguson shook his head. ‘God help us if it ever takes root over here.’ ‘But it has, sir,’ Villiers said urgently. ‘During the past twelve months in Ulster there have been four cases of members of the Provisional IRA executed by Protestant paramilitary forces where the postmortem has revealed the same thing. Scopolamine and phenothiazine.’ ‘And you think there could be a link with this business?’ ‘There could be other cases. We’ll have to run a computer check, but if there is a link and if it concerns the UVF or the Red Hand of Ulster or any other Protestant extremist group, then it is our business.’ Ferguson sat there frowning. Finally, he nodded. ‘Right, Tony, drop everything else or get someone in the department to handle it. I’ll leave you to sort this one out. Top priority. Keep me informed.’ It was a dismissal. He replaced his glasses and Villiers took the reports and the heroin and put them in his briefcase. ‘There is just one more thing, sir, on the personal side.’ Ferguson looked up in surprise. ‘Well?’ ‘Eric had a stepmother, sir, Sarah Talbot. She’s an American.’ ‘You know her?’ ‘Oh, yes. She’s a very unusual woman. Eric adored her. His own mother died when he was born and Sarah meant a great deal to him, as he did to her.’ ‘And now you’ve got to tell her about this tragic business. How will she take it?’ ‘I’m not sure.’ Villiers shrugged. ‘She was a Cabot from Boston. Very Blue Book. Her father was a millionaire several times over. Steel, I think. She’d had no mother from an early age, so they were close. She was a typical spoiled rich bitch, as she once told me, who still managed an honour’s degree from Radcliffe.’ ‘And then?’ ‘She underwent a sea-change at twenty-one. Hated what was happening in Vietnam. Lost a boyfriend there. Two or three years later, she ran for Congress. Almost won, too. But the voters grew progressively disenchanted with her politics, she lost the election, gave up politics entirely, got her MBA from Harvard and joined a Wall Street firm of investment brokers.’ ‘Helped by Big Daddy’s money?’ Villiers shook his head. ‘Started from scratch on her own and now has a considerable reputation. She met Edward on a visit to London, in the National Gallery one Sunday morning. She told me once that she forgave him for being a soldier because he was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen in a uniform and red beret.’ ‘And there was the boy.’ ‘As I said, it was love at first sight for both of them. I don’t mean this in the wrong way, sir.’ Villiers sounded awkward. ‘But I sometimes felt she loved Eric more than his father.’ ‘Women go with the heart, Tony,’ Ferguson said gently. ‘Where is she at the moment?’ ‘New York, sir.’ ‘Then you’d better get it over with.’ ‘Yes, I’m not looking forward to that.’ ‘Of course, this Irish connection making it a security matter does mean you could legitimately make the whole affair the subject of a D-notice. That would keep it out of the newspapers, television and so on.’ Ferguson shrugged. ‘I mean, no need to make things any more unpleasant for the family than they already are.’ ‘That’s good of you, sir.’ Villiers walked to the door, paused, then turned. ‘There is one more thing I should mention, sir.’ ‘More, Tony?’ Ferguson said wearily. ‘All right, tell me the worst.’ ‘Sarah, sir. She’s a very good friend of the President.’ ‘Oh my God!’ Ferguson said. ‘That’s all we needed.’ Victoria Station was crowded with people, queues for some of the express trains. Albert wore a brown suede jacket and jeans as he pushed his way through the throng carrying the bulging holdall filled with heroin. Locker number forty-three was locked, of course. He took the key from his pocket and opened the locker. All very simple. He put the bag inside, locked the door and walked away. He hesitated just by the main entrance, intrigued. He had to know, it was as simple as that, and none of Bird’s overprotective hysteria could put him off. He turned round and walked back, going into one of the caf?s, ordering a coffee and finding a seat by the window from which he had a clear view of the lockers. The caf? was already busy and two women came and sat at the table, crowding him in, and then the whole thing was over in an instant. He’d been looking for a man, of course, not the grey-haired, stout old woman in a man’s raincoat and beret, already at the locker, key in hand. She got the bag out as Albert struggled to get past the women at his table, had disappeared into the crowd by the entrance to the underground before he could do anything. He stood outside the caf?, angry for a moment, then shrugged and walked away. Smith, from his vantage point beside the newsagent’s where he had witnessed everything, shook his head and said softly, ‘Oh, dear, I’m really going to have to do something about you, aren’t I?’ Manhattan was, as Manhattan always is on a wet November evening, busy, the traffic quite impossible, the sidewalks crowded with people hurrying through the rain. Sarah Talbot eased down the window of the Cadillac and looked out with conscious pleasure. ‘A hell of a night, Charles.’ Her chauffeur, a tough-looking young man in a smart black suit, his cap on the seat beside him, grinned. ‘You want to get out and walk, Mrs Talbot?’ ‘No thanks. My shoes are by Manolo Blahnik. I got them in London on my last trip and he definitely wouldn’t like me to go out in the rain in them.’ She was a month away from her fortieth birthday and looked thirty, even on a bad morning. Her dark hair was held back by a simple velvet bow leaving the face clear, grey-green eyes sparkling above rather prominent cheekbones. It was not that she was beautiful in any conventional sense, but people always looked twice. Just now, she was particularly elegant in a black velvet suit by Dior. She was on her way to her favourite restaurant, The Four Seasons, on 52nd Street, to dine alone, strictly from choice. A personal celebration, for that afternoon she’d pulled off the deal of her career, the takeover of a chain of department stores in the Midwest, and against tough male opposition. Oh, yes, my girl, she thought, Daddy would have been proud of you tonight. Which didn’t give her any particular satisfaction. She said, ‘I need a vacation, Charles.’ ‘That sounds fair, Mrs Talbot. The Virgins are nice this time of the year. We could open the house, get the boat out.’ ‘You’d be down there every other week if I let you, you rogue,’ she said. ‘No, I was thinking I might fly over to England. Visit Eric at Cambridge.’ ‘That’s nice. How’s he doing over there?’ ‘Fine. Just fine.’ She hesitated. ‘To be honest, I haven’t heard much from him lately.’ ‘I wouldn’t worry about that at all. He’s a young guy and you know what students are like. Girls on their mind all the time.’ He swore softly, swinging the wheel as the car in front braked, and Sarah sat back, thinking of Eric. It had been two months since she’d had a letter and when she’d tried to get him on the phone he’d simply not been available. Still, as Charles said, students were students. The chauffeur passed a newspaper over. ‘Good story in there you maybe missed. That big Mafia trial, the members of that Frasconi mob. The judge handed them down two hundred and ten years between them.’ ‘So?’ Sarah said as she took the paper. ‘Look who they got a picture of coming out of court. The guy who was responsible for putting them all away.’ The man in the photo on the courtroom steps was at least seventy, heavily built, with the fleshy, arrogant face of an ancient emperor. An overcoat was draped over his shoulders and he leaned on a cane. The caption read: Ex-Mafia boss Rafael Barbera outside the court. ‘He’s smiling,’ Sarah commented. ‘He should be. He owed those guys from way back. The Frasconis killed his brother in the Mafia wars twenty years ago.’ ‘Twenty years seems a long time to wait.’ ‘Not for those guys. They believe in paying you off if it takes a lifetime.’ She read the rest of the report. ‘It says here he’s retired.’ Charles laughed. ‘That’s good. Listen, Mrs Talbot, I’m from Tenth Street. That’s Gambino territory. Let me tell you about Don Rafael. His parents brought him over from Sicily when he was ten. He was Mafia by family tradition. Went through the ranks so fast he was Don at thirty and the smartest of them all. Never served a day of his life in prison. Not one.’ ‘A lucky man.’ ‘No, not lucky, smart. He retired back to the old country a few years ago, but the word is he’s number one man over there. Capo Mafia in all Sicily.’ At that moment, a hand appeared at her partially open window and she turned to see Henry Kissinger reaching across from the car next to hers. She opened the window completely and leaned out. ‘Henry, how are you? It’s been ages.’ He kissed her hand. ‘Get back in, Sarah, you’ll get wet. Where are you going?’ ‘The Four Seasons.’ ‘So am I. I’ll catch up with you later.’ His car moved away and she sat back and closed the window. ‘Jesus, Mrs Talbot, is there anyone you don’t know?’ Charles asked. ‘Don’t exaggerate, Charles.’ She laughed. ‘Just concentrate on getting us there.’ She sat back and looked at the photo of Don Rafael Barbera and suddenly realized, with a certain surprise, that she rather liked the look of him. The Four Seasons was very definitely her favourite restaurant and not only because of the superb food, but the decor. The whole place had such style, from the shimmering gold curtains and dark wood to the quiet elegance of the waiters and captains. She was seated instantly, as a favoured customer, at her usual table in the Pool Room, from where she could survey the room. The place was crowded and she could see Tom Gayitfai and Paul Kori, the owners, hovering in the background, looking even more anxious than usual, which was hardly surprising in view of the guests. Henry Kissinger was sitting at a table to her right and the Vice-President himself was at a table at the far end of the pool, which explained the large young men in dark suits she’d noticed in the vestibule on the way in, their air of efficient, quiet violence filling her with distaste. Her waiter appeared. ‘The usual, Mrs Talbot?’ ‘Yes, Martin.’ He snapped his fingers and the Dom Perignon 1980 was at her table in an instant. ‘Looks like a fun evening,’ she commented. ‘Actually the Vice-President is getting ready to leave, but they’ve all been waiting to see whether he or Kissinger would be the first to go and say hello to the other,’ he told her. ‘Can I take your order now?’ He offered the menu, but she shook her head. ‘I know what I want, Martin. Crisped shrimp with mustard fruit, then the roast duckling with cherries, and since it’s a big evening, I’ll finish with …’ ‘The bitter chocolate sherbet.’ They both laughed and he started to turn away, then paused. ‘Hey, he’s on the move.’ ‘It seems Kissinger wins on points,’ Sarah said. ‘Like hell it does.’ Martin was in a panic. ‘He’s coming right this way, Mrs Talbot.’ He moved to one side fast and the Vice-President arrived plus his inimitable smile. ‘Sarah, you’re looking as remarkable as usual. No, don’t get up. I can’t stop. Due at the UN.’ He took her hand and kissed it. ‘Talking about you at the White House last night.’ ‘Good things, I hope?’ she said. ‘Always good where you’re concerned, Sarah,’ and he was gone. People were staring at her curiously and Henry Kissinger gave her a little nod, a slight smile on his face. Martin refilled her glass and he was smiling too. She savoured the Dom Perignon, thinking about it. They’d be talking about this at the bar of ‘21’ within an hour; the gossip columns would have it in the early editions. ‘Woman of the Year next, Sarah,’ she said softly and raised her glass. ‘To the woman who has everything.’ She paused. ‘Or nothing.’ She frowned. ‘Now why in the hell did I say that?’ And then Martin was there, leaning over the table. ‘Your chauffeur’s in the vestibule, Mrs Talbot. He says it’s urgent.’ ‘Really?’ She got up at once, no unease in her at all, bewildered, if anything. Charles’s face should have told her, the hunted look, the way he glanced to one side as he talked. ‘I’ve got Mr Morgan in the car, Mrs Talbot.’ ‘Dan?’ she said. ‘Here?’ Dan Morgan was president of the brokerage firm of which she was now a senior partner. ‘Like I said, he’s in the car.’ Charles was obviously upset. ‘If you wouldn’t mind, Mrs Talbot.’ The doorman held up an umbrella for her as she crossed the pavement to the car and Dan Morgan, greying, distinguished in black tie and evening dress, glanced up at her, his face grave. ‘Dan, what is this?’ she demanded. ‘Just get in, Sarah.’ He opened the door and pulled her to him. ‘Get Mrs Talbot’s coat, Charles. I think she’ll be leaving.’ Charles moved away and Sarah said, ‘Dan what’s going on?’ He had a large envelope on the seat beside him, she noticed, as he took her hands. ‘Sarah, Eric is dead.’ ‘Dead? Eric?’ She was underwater now, in slow motion. ‘That’s ridiculous. Who says so?’ ‘Tony Villiers tried to get hold of you earlier. When he couldn’t, he phoned me.’ Charles returned with her coat and got behind the wheel. ‘Just drive,’ Morgan told him. ‘Where to, Mr Morgan?’ ‘Anywhere, for God’s sake,’ Morgan said violently. The car pulled away. Sarah said, ‘It can’t be true. It can’t be.’ ‘It’s all in here, Sarah.’ Morgan picked up the envelope. ‘Villiers wired it all over to the office. I went and picked it up.’ She stared at the envelope and said dully, ‘What’s in there?’ ‘Doctor’s reports, police coroner, that sort of thing. It’s not good, Sarah. In fact it’s about as bad as it could be. Better you leave them till later when you’re calmer.’ ‘No,’ she said, her voice dangerously low. ‘Now. I want them now.’ She took the envelope from him, had opened it and turned on the interior light before he could stop her. Her face was wild, the eyes staring. When she had finished, she sat there, unnaturally calm. ‘Stop the car, Charles,’ she ordered. ‘Mrs Talbot?’ ‘Stop the car, damn you!’ He swung the car into the kerb, she had the door open before they could stop her and was running through the rain to the nearest alley. When they reached her, she was leaning against the wall beside overflowing trash cans being violently sick. Finally, she stopped and turned to face them. Morgan held out his handkerchief. ‘We’ll take you home now, Sarah.’ ‘Yes,’ she said calmly. ‘I’ll need my passport.’ ‘Passport?’ he said incredulously. ‘The only things you need are the right pills and bed.’ ‘No, Dan,’ she said. ‘I need a plane. British Airways, Pan Am, TWA, it doesn’t matter which, as long as it’s going to London and it’s going tonight.’ ‘Sarah!’ he tried again. ‘No, Dan, no arguments. Just get me home. I’ve got things to do,’ and she walked away from him through the rain and got into the back of the car. 4 (#ulink_582b6ebb-091c-5938-8a5b-634906baf5b9) She could have waited for Concorde, the fastest passenger flight in the world. It would have had her in London in three hours, fifteen minutes, but that would have meant waiting until the following morning. By chance, Pan Am had a delayed flight leaving for London just after midnight, a Boeing 747, so she took that. The truth was she needed time to think. She’d left a still protesting Dan Morgan behind at Kennedy. He’d wanted to come with her, but she wouldn’t have that. There were things he could do, of course. Alert their London associates. A car, a driver, the house in Lord North Street they all used when visiting London. A good address, Edward had once told her. Very convenient for Parliament and Number Ten Downing Street. Edward, she thought. First Edward in that stupid little war. Such a waste of a fine man. Now this. She stared down through the window at the lights of New York below as the plane turned out to sea, and the pain was unbearable. She closed her eyes and felt a hand on her shoulder. The blonde stewardess who had greeted her on boarding smiled down. ‘May I get you a drink now, Mrs Talbot?’ Sarah stared blankly up at her, unable to speak for a moment, and her own intelligence told her that this was shock and that she had to fight it or go under. She forced a smile. ‘Brandy and soda please.’ Strange, but for the first time since boarding, probably because of the subdued lighting, she noticed that all the seats around her were empty. In fact, she seemed to be the only person in the whole of the first-class cabin. ‘Am I it for tonight?’ she asked as the stewardess brought her brandy. ‘Almost,’ the girl said cheerfully. ‘Just one more on the other side.’ Sarah glanced across and saw at first only the back of another stewardess in the far aisle and then she moved to the galley and Sarah saw the other passenger. It was Rafael Barbera. She felt bewildered, shocked. For a moment, she closed her eyes and was in the back of the car again reading Charles’s newspaper and looking at Barbera’s photo. She’d been so happy, everything going so well, and now this terrible nightmare. She sipped some of the brandy and took a deep breath. It was just like that dreadful cable from the Ministry of Defence in London telling her of Edward’s death. You fought or you went under. The stewardess appeared again. ‘Would you like the menu now, Mrs Talbot?’ At first, Sarah was going to say no, but then remembered that she hadn’t eaten since breakfast and that wouldn’t do at all. There’d been no time for lunch with the big deal breaking so she had a little smoked salmon, a salad, some cold lobster, eating with no kind of conscious pleasure, but because strength was important now. She was aware of Barbera also eating on the other side of the cabin, saw him speak to his stewardess who turned and came across. She leaned over Sarah. ‘We have a movie for you as usual, Mrs Talbot, but as there are only two of you tonight, we won’t show it unless you want us to. Mr Barbera over there isn’t bothered one way or the other.’ ‘Neither am I,’ Sarah told her. ‘So let’s skip it.’ The stewardess returned and spoke to Barbera who nodded and raised his champagne glass in salute and smiled. He spoke to the stewardess again and she returned. ‘Mr Barbera was wondering if you might join him in a glass of champagne.’ ‘Oh, I don’t really think so,’ began Sarah, already too late, for he was on his feet, moving with surprising speed for a man of his size. He leaned on the cane and looked down at her. ‘Mrs Talbot, you don’t know me, but you come highly recommended. I believe you are an associate of Dan Morgan? He handles the occasional business matter for me from time to time.’ ‘I didn’t know that.’ He reached for her hand, kissed it gracefully and there was a slight quirk of amusement at the corner of his mouth. ‘You wouldn’t. It’s a special account.’ He eased into the chair beside her. ‘Now then, champagne. You need it. I’ve been watching you. At the very least it’s been a bad day.’ ‘Oh, no,’ she protested. ‘I don’t think so.’ ‘Nonsense.’ He took the two glasses from the stewardess and passed them to her. ‘A strange thing for a Sicilian to say, but when you are tired of champagne you are tired of life.’ He raised his glass. ‘As my Jewish friends would say, lechayim.’ ‘Lechayim?’ she said. ‘To life, Mrs Talbot!’ ‘I’ll drink to that, Mr Barbera.’ She emptied the glass in one long swallow. ‘It’s really very appropriate. I’m drinking to life and my son’s dead. Isn’t that the funniest thing you ever heard of?’ And then she dropped her glass and turned into the window and cried as she had not cried since she was a little girl and he stroked her hair gently, motioning the worried stewardess away. Finally, she was still, but she stayed curled up staring into the shadows, letting him soothe her, a child again with Daddy when it had been good. When it had worked. Finally, she pushed herself away, got up without a word and went to the toilet. She washed her face with cold water and combed her hair. When she came out, the stewardess was there. ‘Are you all right, Mrs Talbot?’ ‘It’s quite simple. I just got news of my son’s death. That’s why I’m on my way to London. But I’ll be fine. I won’t break down on you, I promise.’ The young woman instinctively flung her arms around her. ‘I’m so sorry.’ Sarah kissed her on the cheek. ‘That’s very kind. I see Mr Barbera’s ordered coffee, but actually I’m a tea person.’ ‘I’ll see to it.’ She took her seat again beside Barbera. ‘All right now?’ he asked. ‘I will be.’ ‘When we’ve talked,’ he said calmly and raised a hand as if to forestall protest. ‘This is necessary, believe me.’ ‘All right.’ She opened her bag, took the battered old silver cigarette case they’d found on Edward’s body at Mount Tumbledown and extracted a cigarette. She lit it, blew smoke up at the ceiling in a strangely defiant gesture. ‘You don’t mind?’ He smiled. ‘At my age, Mrs Talbot, you can’t afford to mind anything.’ ‘How much do you know about me, Mr Barbera?’ ‘They tell me you’re one of the best brains in Wall Street. And when you were very, very young, you were almost a Congresswoman.’ ‘I was a rich little spoiled bitch. My father seemed to have all the money in the world. Because I didn’t have a mother he indulged me. Oh, I went to Radcliffe, graduated magna cum laude. No trouble. I was very bright, you see. I didn’t need to work. I smoked marijuana like everyone else did in the sixties and I screwed around like everyone else did.’ She turned sideways to look at him. ‘Does that shock you?’ ‘Not particularly.’ ‘I had a boyfriend who dropped out of college and was drafted to Vietnam. They gave him a gun and sent him off to play. He only lasted three months. Pure mindless destruction.’ She shook her head. ‘I was very smart. I didn’t join the protest movement until after I got my party’s nomination to Congress.’ ‘And your father didn’t like that.’ It was a statement, not a question. ‘Didn’t speak to me for three years. Considered me some sort of traitor. The voters didn’t think much of me either. I finally pulled out and decided to get my MBA and then go to work.’ She laughed. ‘Wall Street beckoned.’ ‘Where you could show your father what you were made of?’ ‘In spades. And I did too.’ There was the defiance there again. ‘Mind you, I did please him in one way. In my husband.’ ‘I didn’t realize until tonight that you’d been married.’ ‘Oh, yes, if briefly. To an English army colonel. It didn’t last long. He was killed in the Falklands, but he did leave me my stepson.’ ‘I see.’ ‘I wonder if you do? Eric’s mother died when he was born. I understood that because I’d gone through the same pain. I understood him and he understood me.’ ‘And now he’s gone. What happened?’ She sat there thinking about it for a moment, then got her briefcase from under the seat, opened it and took out the buff envelope containing the material Villiers had sent over from London. ‘Read that.’ She lit another cigarette and lay back in her seat while Barbera worked through the various papers. He didn’t say a word until he was finished. He carefully replaced the papers in the envelope and turned to her, his face like a stone. ‘Drugs,’ she said. ‘How could he? Heroin – cocaine.’ ‘You told me earlier how you smoked pot back in the sixties. It’s an even worse problem for kids these days because it’s all so available.’ ‘You would know, wouldn’t you?’ The words were out before she could take them back. He showed no anger. ‘Mrs Talbot, I’m an old-fashioned man. Sure, I was what you would term a gangster, but those I harmed tended to be my own kind. To me, other people were civilians. My family had business with the unions, gambling, prostitution, even booze during Prohibition, and these are human failings which everyone understands. But I tell you this. The Barbera family never took a penny on the drugs market. My grandson, Vito, in London, for example. We got three casinos there. Restaurants, betting shops.’ He shrugged. ‘How much does a man need?’ ‘But Eric,’ she said. ‘I still don’t understand.’ ‘Look,’ he said, ‘it’s a popular misconception that people on hard drugs are hooked by some pusher. The first fix is almost always offered by a friend. Probably he was at some student party the first time it happened. Had a few drinks …’ ‘But afterwards,’ she said. ‘Afterwards came the pushers, the suppliers, all happy to keep the pot boiling. To destroy young people on the threshold of life, and for what? For money.’ ‘To some people money is serious business, Mrs Talbot. But let’s leave that on one side. What do you intend to do about this? What do you want?’ ‘Justice, I suppose.’ He laughed harshly. ‘A rare commodity in this wicked world. Look, the law is a joke. You go to court, it goes on and on. The rich and powerful can buy anything they require because most men are corruptible.’ ‘Then what would you do?’ ‘It’s difficult for me. Spilled blood cries out for vengeance, that is the Sicilian way. My son dies, he must be avenged. It isn’t a question of choice. I have no choice. I can do no other.’ He shook his head. ‘You’re from a different world. Violence has never had any place in your life, I suspect.’ ‘That’s true. I once saw a fist fight as we were driving through the Bronx, from my privileged position in the rear seat of a Cadillac.’ He smiled bleakly. ‘That’s good, you can mock yourself. But now, there is something you must promise me you will do and it is essential.’ ‘What’s that?’ ‘You must insist on seeing your son’s body.’ He raised a hand to stop her saying anything. ‘No matter how terrible an ordeal. Believe me, I know a great deal about death and of this I am certain. You must see for yourself, you must mourn, or you will be haunted for the rest of your life.’ She nodded. ‘I’ll think about it.’ ‘And there is one more thing you must face up to. Something quite terrible.’ ‘And what would that be?’ ‘The French coroner’s verdict was clear. Accidental death by drowning under the influence of drugs and alcohol.’ ‘That’s right.’ ‘His body, Mrs Talbot, was a considerable convenience to those who used it. It occurs to me that it might have been more than a convenience that it was available at all.’ She said flatly, ‘You’re actually suggesting that there was no accident to any of this?’ It was difficult for her to get the word out, but she forced herself. ‘That he was murdered.’ ‘Please. It’s all been very convenient, that’s all I’m saying. I don’t wish to make things worse for you than they already are. I’ve lived in a harsh world for too many years. I tend to suspect the worst.’ ‘I didn’t think it could be worse,’ she told him, her voice shaking with anger and the last vestiges of denial. ‘I may be wrong and, in any case, I’m sure the authorities would consider the possibility fully.’ He took out his wallet and extracted a card. ‘This is my grandson, Vito’s, address in London. I’ll speak of you to him. He’ll do anything he can. I myself don’t even leave the airport. I fly straight on to Palermo. I know it is unlikely, but if you are ever in Sicily, you will find me at my villa outside the village of Bellona in the Cammarate.’ He took her hand and kissed it gently. ‘And now, my child, you need sleep.’ She reached and kissed him on the cheek. He smiled, stood up and went back to his own seat. She switched off the light and lay there in the darkness thinking about what he had said. The suggestion that Eric’s death had not been accidental filled her with horror. She refused to accept it, pushed the thought away and after a while she did sleep, head pillowed on her arm as the plane droned on through the night. A journalist in Kent, alerted by a sympathetic friend in the local police force, sent a brief report of the affair to the Daily Mail in London. It recounted only what he knew. That a hearse had crashed on a Kent country road and had caught fire. There was also the mention that a body was involved. Details being understandably sketchy at that stage, it merited no more than a paragraph at the bottom of page three because of the macabre implication. In any event, the issue of the D-notice Ferguson had authorized meant that the story was deleted in later editions, but not before Eric Talbot’s identity had been revealed to the world. Jago had flown over on the breakfast plane from Paris and was at the service flat in Connaught Street close to Hyde Park by eleven o’clock. As he was unpacking, the phone rang. Smith said, ‘There’s a small item in the Daily Mail this morning. It seems the boy wasn’t what he seemed. His real name was Eric Talbot and he was a student at Cambridge.’ ‘So he used an alias,’ Jago said. ‘That’s perfectly understandable. Why should it be a problem?’ ‘Because he wasn’t a nobody after all,’ Smith told him. ‘I’ve made discreet enquiries with the porter at his college. Pretended to be a journalist. His grandfather’s a baronet, for Christ’s sake.’ ‘Oh, dear me,’ Jago said, resisting the impulse to laugh out loud. ‘And who got us into this mess?’ ‘A bitch in Cambridge called Greta Markovsky. She was a student too. A pusher. I’ve used her for a year now. I thought she was reliable.’ It was the first hint of weakness Jago had ever noted in Smith. ‘But my experience of this wicked old world is that no one ever is. Where is Miss Markovsky to be found?’ ‘It seems she overdosed badly on heroin two nights ago. She’s in some rehabilitation place outside Cambridge called Grantley Hall. A closed unit.’ ‘Do you want me to do something about her?’ ‘I don’t think it’s necessary, certainly not at this stage, and in any case, she’s never met me.’ ‘Who has?’ Jago said. ‘Exactly.’ ‘So what do you want me to do?’ ‘There’s a coroner’s inquest at Canterbury at two o’clock this afternoon. Be there.’ ‘All right. And Bird and his boyfriend?’ ‘That can wait. I’ll speak to you later.’ ‘Yes, I’d better get moving.’ Jago put down the phone and finished unpacking quickly. He decided against changing. There wasn’t really time, not if he was to be certain of making the inquest by two. Five minutes later he emerged from the lift into the basement garage. The car he habitually used in London, a silver Alfa-Romeo Spyder, was in its usual place. When he got behind the wheel, he paused only to reach under the dashboard for a hidden catch. A flap dropped down to reveal a Walther PPK, a Browning and a Carswell silencer, all neatly clipped into place. He checked both weapons quickly, just to make sure. Life, as he had found, could be hideously full of surprises. Two minutes later and he was part of the traffic in Park Lane. Ferguson looked up from his desk as Tony Villiers entered the room. ‘How is she?’ ‘I met her at Heathrow. Went to Lord North Street with her. Her company has a house there.’ ‘Have you gone into things in any detail with her?’ ‘Not really. There wasn’t the need. I sent all the relevant material over to her in New York before she left. French coroner’s report and all the medical stuff. She’s here now. She wants to attend the coroner’s inquest in Canterbury at two o’clock. I said I’d go with her. I’ve warned her that if she puts in an appearance, then as next-of-kin she could be called.’ ‘Did you now?’ Ferguson frowned slightly. ‘Is she going to be difficult?’ Villiers managed to restrain his anger. ‘It would be perfectly understandable in the circumstances.’ ‘For God’s sake, Tony, you know what I mean. This could be a tricky one for all of us. Anyway, show her in and I’ll see for myself.’ He moved to the window, thinking about how he should handle this distraught woman, and turned as she came into the room with Villiers, to get the surprise of his life. She wore a brown suede jacket belted at the waist and matching slacks. The hair hung to her shoulders, a dark curtain on each side of her face which was calm and determined. ‘Mrs Talbot.’ He came round the desk, at his most charming, and took her hand. ‘I can’t tell you how sorry I am.’ ‘Thank you.’ ‘Please sit down.’ She produced Edward’s silver case from her handbag, her one sign of nervousness, and he gave her a light. She said ‘Why am I here, Brigadier?’ He moved round the desk to his chair. ‘I don’t understand.’ ‘I think you do. When Tony said he was bringing me here, I asked him why. He said you were his boss. That you would tell me.’ ‘I see.’ ‘Brigadier, my husband was a colonel in the British Army and I was a service wife for long enough to learn a few things.’ ‘Such as?’ She turned and put a hand on Villiers’s arm. ‘Well, I’m aware that my darling cousin by marriage here is not only Grenadier Guards, but SAS. I was always given the impression that his main line of business was military intelligence of some sort.’ Villiers said wryly to Ferguson, ‘I told you. The smartest brain on Wall Street.’ ‘Exactly, Brigadier,’ she said. ‘So if you’re Tony’s boss, what does that make you, and what’s more to the point, why are you involved in what I would have assumed was a matter for the police?’ ‘Tony was right, Mrs Talbot. You’re an exceptional woman.’ He glanced at his watch and stood up. ‘We’d better get going.’ ‘Where to?’ she said. ‘My dear Mrs Talbot, you wanted to go to the inquest. Then by all means we’ll go, and in my car. We can talk on the way.’ She and Ferguson sat together on the rear seat of the Daimler limousine, Villiers opposite on the jump seat, the glass partition raised between them and the driver. Ferguson said, ‘There are aspects of this case, one in particular, which do make this, at least in theory, a matter of national security rather than a more conventional crime that would be handled by the police.’ ‘That’s hardly the kind of statement to instil confidence,’ she said. ‘It takes me right back to Vietnam and my protest days. I mean, I’ve experienced the best the CIA have to offer at first hand, Brigadier.’ ‘You’d better do the explaining, Tony.’ ‘International terrorism needs money to keep going,’ Villiers said. ‘A great deal of money, not only for arms, which are expensive, but to fund operations. Drugs are a ready source of that kind of money and we’ve known for some time that in Ulster both the IRA and various Protestant paramilitary organizations have been raising money by becoming involved in the trade.’ ‘But how does this affect Eric?’ Villiers took an envelope from his pocket and passed it to her. ‘There’s a more detailed postmortem report from France. They discovered not only heroin and cocaine, but a mixture of scopolamine and phenothiazine in his blood. In Colombia, where it originated, it’s known as burundanga.’ ‘It induces a kind of chemical hypnosis, Mrs Talbot,’ Ferguson put in. ‘Reduces the subject to being a zombie for a while.’ ‘And that happened to Eric?’ she whispered. ‘Yes, and during the past year, four members of the IRA executed by Protestant factions in Ulster have had traces of the same drug revealed at their postmortems.’ ‘And that’s what makes it a security matter, Mrs Talbot. It’s a very rare occurrence,’ Ferguson said. ‘Four members of the IRA in Ulster and now your stepson.’ ‘And you think there could be a connection?’ she said. ‘Perhaps the same people were involved,’ the Brigadier told her. ‘That’s what we’re getting at. We’ve got a computer hunt on now covering all Western European countries.’ ‘And what have you found?’ ‘Several cases in France over the past three years, all rather similar to your stepson’s actually. Death by drowning under the influence of drugs.’ Barbera’s suggestion could no longer be avoided. ‘Which would seem to suggest to me,’ she said evenly, ‘that a number of people have been murdered while in this state of chemical hypnosis you mention.’ ‘So it would appear,’ he said. ‘Murdered for one reason only. So that their bodies could be used like some damned suitcase.’ She hammered a clenched fist on her knee. ‘They did that to Eric. Why?’ ‘Five million pounds a time, Mrs Talbot, that’s our conservative estimate of each consignment of heroin at street prices.’ She took out the silver case. Villiers gave her a light. The smoking helped to steady her trembling. And it was anger she felt now. No, more than that – rage. They were entering the outskirts of Canterbury, threading their way through the ancient streets. She gazed up at the towering spires of the great cathedral. ‘It’s very beautiful.’ ‘The birthplace of English Christianity,’ Ferguson told her. ‘Founded by St Augustine in Saxon times.’ ‘And bombed by the Nazis in 1942.’ Villiers shrugged. ‘Not exactly a military target, but we bombed some of their cathedral towns, so they bombed some of ours.’ The Daimler turned into a quiet square. She said, ‘So the computer hasn’t thrown up any more cases then?’ ‘I’m afraid not,’ the Brigadier said. ‘That’s not quite true,’ Villiers put in. ‘A case came up this morning. I didn’t have a chance to tell you. Eighteen-year-old girl found in the Thames at Wapping a few months ago.’ ‘You’re sure?’ ‘I’m afraid so, sir.’ Villiers paused. ‘Actually, she was Egan’s foster sister, sir.’ Ferguson was astonished. ‘You mean Sean Egan?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Good God.’ Sarah interrupted. ‘And who would this Sean Egan be?’ ‘A young sergeant who served with me in the SAS. Badly wounded in the Falklands. He’s just left the Service.’ ‘Tell me about him,’ she demanded, but at that moment they pulled in at the kerb at the bottom of a row of steps leading up to an imposing Georgian building. Конец ознакомительного фрагмента. Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес». Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/jack-higgins/a-season-in-hell/?lfrom=688855901) на ЛитРес. Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.