t  up,
told Kelly to stand, and listened at the door.
     The woman had found a policeman. I imagined the scene outside. A little
crowd  would have gathered around. The cop would  be making notes,  radioing
Control, maybe checking the other stalls. I broke into a sweat.
     I stood  at  the door and waited for  what  seemed like an hour.  Kelly
tiptoed  exaggeratedly toward me; I bent  down and she  whispered in my ear,
"Is it all right yet?"
     "Almost."
     Then I heard a banging noise, and  knocking.  Somebody was pushing back
the doors in the vacant stalls and knocking on the doors of the others. They
were looking  for  the thief  or, more likely, to  see  if the bag had  been
dumped once the money had been taken. They'd be at our stall any second.
     I didn't have time to think.
     "Kelly, you  must  talk  if they knock. I want you to  "  Knock, knock,
knock.
     It sounded like the slam of a cell door.
     A male voice shouted, "Hello, police anyone in there?"
     He tried to turn the handle.
     I quickly moved Kelly back to the toilet and whispered in her ear.
     "Say you will be out soon." She shouted, "I'll be out in a minute."
     There  was no reply, just  the same thing happening at  the next stall.
The danger had passed, or so I hoped.
     All that was left to do was dump my  pistol and  mags. That was easy. I
slipped  them into Sarah's bag and crushed it into a package  that would fit
in a trash can.
     It was an  hour  before  I decided  it  was safe to leave.  I turned to
Kelly.
     "Your name is Louise now, OK? Louise Glazar."
     "OK."
     She didn't seem fussed at all.
     "Louise, when  we leave here in a  minute I want you to be really happy
and I want you to hold my hand." With that I picked up the bag.
     "OK, we're off!"
     "To England?"
     "Of course! But first of all we've got to get on the plane. By the way,
you were great--well done!"
     We got into the departures area at 11:30 a.m. Still several hours to go
before the first possible flight, British Airways flight 216 to Heathrow  at
5:10.
     I went  to  a  phone and,  using the numbers in  the  airport magazine,
called each airline in turn to check seat availability.
     The British Airways flight was fully booked. So was  United Airways 918
at 6:10,  the  BA at 6:10, and  the United at  6:40. I eventually managed to
find  two spare  seats on  a  flight  with Virgin at  6:45, and gave all the
details  of Mr. Glazar, who was on his way to the airport right now. Payment
was courtesy of the details for Big Al's plastic on the car rental form.
     I  wandered past  the Virgin  desk and found  it didn't open until 1:30
p.m. One and a half hours to sit and sweat.
     Christian  Glazar was a little  older than me, and his  shoulder-length
hair was  starting to  go gray.  My hair was just below  the ear, and brown.
Thankfully, his passport was four years old.
     To  the  delight of  Kelly  and  the  terminal's  barbershop  owner,  I
underwent a number one crew cut, coming out looking like a US Marine.
     We  then  went into the travel store and bought a  pack of  painkillers
that claimed to be the answer to female pains.
     Judging by  the list of ingredients, they were certainly the answer for
me.
     All the time, I kept hoping that the  police had assumed the motive for
the theft was money and had left it to  the Glazars  to report the cards and
passports missing rather than pursuing the matter further. I didn't want  to
turn up at the ticket sales  desk and be jumped on by several hundred pounds
of cop.
     Still  thirty minutes to go before we could check in. One more thing to
do.
     "Kelly, we have to go to the bathroom up here for a while."
     "I don't need to go."
     "It's for me to get into my disguise. Come and see."
     We  went to the  handicap toilet in departures  and closed  the door. I
took out Sarah's glasses. They were  gold-framed and had lenses as  thick as
the  bottom of Coke bottles. I tried them on. The frames weren't big  enough
but they looked OK..  I turned to  Kelly and crossed my eyes. Then I had  to
stop her laughing.
     I took the painkillers out of the duffel.
     "I'm going to swallow  these and they're going to make me ill. But it's
for a reason, OK?"
     She wasn't quite sure.
     I took six capsules  and waited. The hot flashes started, then the cold
sweats. I put my hands up  to show it was OK  as  the contents of my stomach
flew out of my mouth into the toilet bowl.
     Kelly watched  in  amazement  as I rinsed out my mouth in the basin.  I
looked at myself  in the  mirror. Just  as I'd hoped, I  looked as pale  and
clammy as I felt. I took two more.
     There  were few  customers at the long line of check-in desks and  only
one woman on duty at Virgin Atlantic ticket sales.
     She was writing something so her head was down as we approached.
     She  was in her mid-twenties and  beautiful,  with relaxed hair  pulled
back in a bun.
     "Hello, the name's Glazar." Because of the  vomiting my voice was lower
and coarse.
     "There should be two tickets for me."  I tried to look disorganized and
flustered.
     "Hopefully,  my brother-in-law has booked them?" My  eyes looked to the
sky in hope.
     "Sure, do you have a reference number?"
     "Sorry,  he  didn't give  me  one. Just Glazar, Christian  Glazar"  She
tapped that out and said, "That's  fine, Mr. Glazar, two tickets for you and
Louise. How many bags are you checking in?"
     I had the laptop on my shoulder and the duffel in my hand.
     I dithered, as if working out if I'd need the laptop on the flight.
     "Just this one." I put the bag on the scale. It didn't weigh  much, but
it was bulked up respectably with the blanket.
     "Could I see your passport, please?"
     I looked in  all my pockets without apparent success.  I didn't want to
produce Glazar's documents right away.
     "Look, I know we were lucky to get seats at all, but is it possible  to
make  sure   we're   sitting  together?"  I  leaned  a   little  closer  and
half-whispered, "Louise hates flying."
     Kelly and I exchanged glances.
     "Everything's going to be OK.," I told her. My voice dropped again.
     "We're on a bit of a mercy mission."
     I looked down at Kelly and back at the woman, my face pained.
     "Her grandmother^ ..."  I let it hang, as  if the  rest of the sentence
would be too terrible for a little girl's ears.
     "I'll see what I can do, sir."
     She was hitting the keys other PC at such a speed it  looked as  if she
were bluffing. I put  the passport on top of  the counter. She looked up and
smiled. "No problem, Mr.
     Glazar;' "That's marvelous" But I still wanted to keep the conversation
going.
     "I wonder, would it be possible for us to use one of your lounges? It's
just  that,  after my chemotherapy, I tire very  easily. We've been  rushing
around today and  I don't feel too good. I  only have to knock myself  and I
start bleeding " She looked at my scabs and pale complexion and under stood.
There was a pause, then she said, "My mother went through chemo  for  cancer
of the liver. The therapy worked;
     after all that pain she came through "
     I thanked her for her concern and her message of support.
     Now just get me into the lounge, out of the fucking way!
     "Let me find out." Smiling at Kelly, she picked up the phone and spoke.
After  several seconds  of weird  airline  vocabulary she looked at  me  and
nodded.
     "That's  fine, sir. We share  facilities with United. I'll fill out  an
invitation."
     I thanked her  as she reached for the passport. I hoped that by now she
knew me so well it was just a formality.  She flicked it open; I turned away
and talked to Kelly, telling her how exciting it  was going to be, flying to
see Grandma.
     I heard,  "You'll be boarding at about five-thirty."  I looked up,  all
smiles.
     "Go to Gate C. A shuttle will take you  to the  lounge. You both have a
pleasant flight."
     "Thank you so  much. Come on then, Louise, we've got a plane to catch!"
I let Kelly walk on a few steps, then turned and said, "I just  hope Grandma
can wait for us." She nodded knowingly.
     All  I  wanted  to do  now  was get  through  Customs. First hurdle was
security. Kelly went through first, and I followed.
     No  alarms. I had to open up the laptop and switch  it on  to prove  it
worked,  but I'd been expecting  that. All the Flavius files were  now  in a
folder called Games.
     We went straight to Gate C, walked through, and got on the shuttle bus.
There was a five-minute wait while the bus filled up, then the doors closed,
the hydraulics  lowered, and we drove about half a mile across the tarmac to
the departures lounge proper.
     The area was plush and busy. I heard a lot of British accents, mixed in
with  snatches of  German  and  French.  Kelly  and I headed  for the United
lounge, via a detour to the candy stall.
     We  sat quietly with a large  cappuccino and a Coke. Unfortunately, the
downtime just gave me a while to think about whether I'd made any mistakes.
     A security man walked into the  reception area and talked to the people
at  the desk. My heart beat faster. We were so close to the aircraft  on the
other  side  of the glass that I felt I could reach  out and  touch them.  I
could almost smell the aviation fuel.
     I told myself  to calm down. If they'd wanted us, they would have found
us by now.
     But,  in truth,  so many things could  still go wrong that one of  them
almost certainly  would.  I was still sweating away. My head was glistening.
And I didn't know if it was the capsules or my  worrying, but I was starting
to feel weak.
     "Nick, am I Louise all day today or just for now?"
     I pretended to think about it.
     "The whole day. You're Louise Glazar all day."
     "Why?"
     "Because they won't let us go to England unless we use another name."
     I got a smiling, thoughtful nod.
     I said, "Do you want to know something else?"
     "What?"
     "If I call you Louise, you have to call me Daddy. But just for today."
     I  wasn't  sure what kind of  reaction that  would  get, but  she  just
shrugged.
     "Whatever." Maybe that was what she wanted now.
     The next three hours were grim, but at least we were out of the way. If
I'd  had any heart  problems,  I  would probably have  died,  the blood  was
coursing through me so fast and hard. I could hear it pumping in my ears.
     I kept saying to  myself: You're here  now, there's nothing you can  do
about it; accept it. Just get on that fucking aircraft!
     I looked at Kelly.
     "You all right, Louise?"
     "Yeah, I'm all right. Daddy." She had a big smile now. I just hoped she
kept it.
     I  watched the  receptionist  move to the microphone. She announced our
flight and told us that she had really enjoyed having us stay in the lounge.
     There were  about a  dozen  others who  stood  up and  started to  sort
themselves out, folding papers and zipping up bags.
     I got to my feet and stretched.
     "Louise?"
     "Yeah?"
     "Let's go to England!"
     We walked toward the gate, father and daughter,  hand in hand, chatting
about nothing.  My theory went: if I talked with  her, they wouldn't talk to
us.
     Four or five people were  ahead of  us in line--like us,  families with
young children. Passports were being checked by a young Latino; he had an ID
card on  a chain around his neck, but we were too far way yet for me to make
out what it said.
     Was he airline security or airport security?
     Two uniformed  security men  came  up and stood  behind him, talking to
each other.  It  was the  kind  of chat  that  looked so  casual it probably
wasn't. I used my sleeve to mop sweat from the side of my face.
     Both of the uniformed  men were armed. The  black one cracked a joke as
the white one laughed and looked around.
     Kelly and I shuffled forward.
     I held her beside  me,  the  protective parent anxious in a  crowd. The
laptop was over my shoulder. Kelly held a teddy bear under each arm.
     We moved three steps  forward; another wait, then it was  our turn with
the Latino.
     I  wanted to make it all  very easy for him. Smiling, I handed  him the
boarding  passes  and the passport. I was convinced the uniformed  guys were
looking at me. I went into boxer mode: everything was focused on the Latino;
everything else was  in the distance, muffled, distorted, peripheral. A bead
of sweat fell down my cheek, and I knew he'd noticed it. I knew he could see
my chest heaving up and down.
     Kelly was just  behind and to the  right of  me.  I  looked at  her and
smiled.
     "Sir?"
     I silently exhaled in preparation and looked back at him.
     "Just the  passport,  sir." He  handed me back the boarding  passes.  I
grinned, the inexperienced dickhead traveler.
     He  flicked through  the  pages  of the passport,  stopping at Glazar's
photograph. He glanced at me, then back at the passport.
     I'm in deep shit.
     I let him see I was reading his thoughts.
     "Male menopause," I grinned,  rubbing my hand over what  was left of my
hair. My scalp was drenched.
     "The Bruce Willis look!"
     The  fucker didn't  laugh. He  was  making  up his  mind. He closed the
passport and tapped it in his hand.
     "Have a pleasant flight, sir."
     I went to give him  a nod, but he was already  paying attention  to the
people behind me.
     We moved  two paces  toward the women from Virgin and  handed them  our
boarding passes. The two security men didn't budge.
     We started to walk onto the air bridge I felt  as if I'd been trying to
run through waist-high water and was suddenly on the shoreline.
     The Latino still worried me. I thought about  him all the  way onto the
aircraft.  It  was only  when I'd found  our seats,  put  the  laptop in the
overhead  locker,  settled down, and picked up the in-flight magazine that I
took a  deep breath  and let  it out very, very slowly. It  wasn't a sigh of
relief; I was boosting the oxygen levels in my blood. No,  the fucker wasn't
happy. His suspicions had  been aroused, but  he hadn't asked any questions,
hadn't even asked my name. We might be on the shoreline, but it was far from
being dry land.
     The aircraft was still filling up. I kept taking deep breaths to try to
control my pulse rate.
     Officials were moving in and out of the  aircraft with manifests. Every
time it happened I was expecting to see the two security guys in  tow. There
was only one entrance, only one exit. There was nowhere to run.  As I worked
through the  scenarios  in my  mind, I just had to accept that  the die  was
cast. I  was  a passenger now, and  for  a  fleeting second  I  had the same
feeling that I'd always had on  any aircraft, military  or civilian I was in
the hands of others and powerless to decide my own destiny. I hated it.
     People were still filing on. I nearly burst out in nervous  laughter as
the speakers played Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive " I looked at  Kelly and
winked. She thought it was great, sitting there trying to strap in her teddy
bears.
     One of the male  flight attendants came down our aisle,  still  wearing
his Virgin uniform, not  yet  in shirtsleeves. He came  down  to our  row of
seats and  stopped. Judging by his line of sight, he seemed to  be  checking
our seat belts.  It was too  early for that, surely? I nodded and smiled. He
turned back and disappeared into the galley.
     I watched the entrance, expecting the  worst. One of the  female flight
attendants poked her head out and looked directly at me. Kelly's teddy bears
were suddenly very interesting.
     I could  feel tingling in  my feet. My stomach tightened. I  looked  up
again. She was gone.
     The  male  attendant  came  out  again,  carrying  a  garbage  bag.  He
approached us again, stopped, and squatted down in the aisle next to  Kelly.
He said, "Hiya!"
     "Hello!"
     He put his hand into the bag; I  waited  for him to  bring out the .45.
Good ploy,  letting me think he's a member  of the crew doing  something for
the kid.
     He pulled out a little nylon day sack Splattered all over the back  was
the Virgin logo and the words kids with altitude.
     "We forgot to give you one of these," he said. I nearly hugged him.
     "Thank you very much!" I grinned like  an  asylum inmate, my  eyes  one
hundred percent larger through the lenses of Sarah's glasses.
     "Thank you so much!"
     He did  his best not  to look at me, as if I were indeed  some  sort of
weirdo, then offered us  a drink before takeoff. I was dying for a beer, but
I  might have to  start performing  on the other  side and,  anyway, I  just
wanted to lean back and rest.
     We each ordered an orange juice instead.
     Sharing the in-flight  guide  with Kelly,  I said,  "What film  are you
going to watch, Louise?"
     "Clueless," she grinned.
     "Whatever," I said.
     Twenty minutes  later, right  on schedule, the aircraft finally  lifted
off from the runway. Suddenly I didn't mind  being in a pilot's  hands after
all. We went through  all the nonsense of  the introduction by the captain,
how wonderful it was to have us on board, and  when we were going to be fed.
My body heat was starting to dry  out my sweat-drenched shirt. Even my socks
had been wet. I  looked over at  Kelly. She had a sad face on. I nudged  her
with my arm.
     "You OK?"
     "I guess. I couldn't even tell Melissa I'm going to England."
     I knew how to get out of this type of thing now.
     "Well, all you have to do is  think good things about Melissa  and that
will make you feel  happy." I was waiting for  her reply. I knew the sort of
thing it was going to be.
     "Do you think about David? What do you remember about David?"
     Easy; I was prepared.
     "Well,  nearly twelve years ago, we were  rebuilding his house together
and it needed a new wooden floor."
     She  was enjoying this,  stories at bedtime. She certainly looked as if
she would go to sleep soon, cuddling up to me.
     I continued telling her how we'd  both swiped a squash court floor from
one  of the HQ Security Forces bases  in Northern Ireland.  We were there at
three o'clock  in the morning with spades,  hammers, and chisels. We put the
boards in a van and brought  them  over to  his Welsh cottage. After all, HM
Government spent all that time and money training us  to break in and  steal
things. Why not use it for ourselves?
     The next three days had been spent  laying  the hallway  and kitchen of
the house near Brecon with his nice new flooring.
     I grinned down at her for a reaction, but she was already sound asleep.
     I started to watch  the video but knew I was  going  to fall asleep any
minute--as long as the capsules wore off and I could stop my mind going back
to the same question over and over again.
     There was an unholy alliance  between PIRA and corrupt  elements of the
DEA, of that there  was  no  doubt--and it very much  looked as though Kev's
boss  was at the center of  it. Kev had found out about the  corruption, but
not who was involved.
     He  wanted  to talk to somebody about  it.  Was  it  his boss whom he'd
unwittingly phoned  for  an opinion  the day I  arrived in Washington?  Very
unlikely,  because  Kev  would  have  had  to include  him on his  list  of
suspects. Much  more probable was  that  he'd spoken to  someone unconnected
with the DEA, someone who'd know what he was talking about and whose opinion
he valued. Could it  have been  Luther? He knew Kev; would Kev  have trusted
him? Who knows? Whoever he had called, he was dead within an hour of putting
down the phone.
     The cabin lights came on a  couple of hours before landing, and we were
served breakfast. I tried to wake  Kelly, but she groaned and buried herself
under her blanket. I didn't bother with the food. From feeling almost elated
at having gotten past security, I awoke profoundly depressed. My mood was as
black  as the  coffee  in front  of  me. I'd  been crazy to let  myself feel
relieved. We weren't out of the woods by a long shot;
     if they  knew  we  were  on  the aircraft, of  course they  wouldn't do
anything about it until we landed. It was at the point that I walked off and
stepped onto the ramp that they'd lift me.
     Even if that didn't happen, there was Immigration. The officials trying
to keep out undesirables are much  tougher and a lot more  on  the ball than
those in charge of waving you off.
     They  vet  your  documents  much  more  closely,  scrutinize your  body
language, read your eyes. Kelly and I were on a stolen passport. We'd gotten
through at Dulles, but that didn't mean we could pull it off again.
     I took four capsules and finished my coffee. I remembered that I was an
American  citizen  now.  When the attendant  came  past I asked  her for  an
immigration card. Kelly was still asleep.
     Filling in the card, I decided that the Glazars had just moved and  now
lived next door to Mr. and Mrs. Brown.
     Hunting Bear Path was the only address I could talk about convincingly.
     If I was lifted at Immigration, it wouldn't be the first time.
     I'd come into Gatwick airport  once from a job.  I  gave my passport to
the Immigration officer, and  while  he was inspecting it a boy  came  up on
either side, gripped my arms and took the passport from the official.
     "Mr. Stamford? Special Branch. Come with us."  I wasn't going to argue;
my cover was good, I was in the UK now, everything was going to be fine.
     They strip-searched  me  in an interview  room, firing  questions left,
right, and  center. I  went through the whole  routine of my  cover  story:
where I'd been,  what I'd been doing, why I'd been doing it. They telephoned
my cover, and James supported my story. Everything was going swimmingly.
     Then I got put in the airport detention cells, and three policemen came
in. They wasted no time; two held my arms, one threw punches; they then took
turns. They beat the shit out of me. No word of explanation.
     Next I  got taken for an interview and was accused of being a pedophile
and procuring kids in Thailand which was strange, considering I'd been  on a
deniable op in Russia.
     There was nothing I could say; it was just down to denying, and waiting
for the system to get me out.
     After about four hours of interviews I was sitting in my  cell. In came
people from  the intelligence service, to debrief me  on my performance.  It
had been a fucking exercise.
     They'd been testing all the operators as we came back into the  UK; the
only trouble  was, they'd  picked  the wrong charge  to pull  us up  on. The
police don't  wait for niceties  like  court rooms when it comes to  dealing
with child molesters, so everyone  who was lifted got  taken to one side and
given the good news. One bloke got such a severe kicking he ended  up in the
hospital.
     * * * Kelly looked as if she'd been sleeping in a hedge. She yawned and
made an attempt  to stretch.  As  she  opened her  eyes  and looked  around,
completely bewildered, I grinned and offered her the carton of orange juice.
     "How are you today, Louise?"
     She  still seemed lost  for  a second or  two,  then got back with  the
program.
     "I'm  all  right." She paused, grinned, and added, "Daddy." She  closed
her  eyes and turned over, trying to sort  herself  out  with the pillow and
blanket. I didn't have the heart to tell her we were landing soon.
     At least I got  to drink her orange  juice as a Welcome to London video
came  on  the screens:  loads  of pomp,  circumstance,  and  pageantry,  the
Household Cavalry astride their horses. Guardsmen marching up and down,  the
Queen riding down the Mall  in her  carriage. To me, London had never looked
so good.
     Then  the aircraft landed  and we became actors again.   We taxied and
stopped at  our  ramp. Everybody jumped out of their  seat  as  if they were
going to miss out on something. I leaned over to Kelly.
     "Wait here. We're in  no rush." I wanted to get into the  middle of the
crowd.
     We  eventually got all the  bits and pieces back into  Kelly's day sack
organized the teddies, and joined the line. I was trying to look ahead but I
couldn't see much.
     We got to the galley area, turned  left, and  shuffled toward the door.
On  the  ramp  were three men--normal British  Airports  Authority reception
staff  in  fluorescent jackets,  who were  manning the  air bridge helping a
woman into a wheelchair.
     Things were looking good; freedom felt so close.
     We  walked up  the  ramp  and joined  the  spur that  led  to the  main
terminal. Kelly didn't have a care  in the world, which was good.  I  didn't
want her to understand what was happening.
     There was  heavy foot traffic  in both directions, people  running with
hand luggage, drifting in and  out of  shops, milling around at gates. I had
the day  sack and  the laptop  over my  shoulder and held  Kelly's  hand. We
reached the walkway.
     Heathrow airport is  the  most monitored, most  camera'd, most visually
and physically secure airport in the world.
     Untold  pairs of eyes would  already  be on  us;  this was no time  for
looking furtive or guilty. The moving walkway stopped by Gates 43-47, then a
new one started about  ten yards later. As we trundled along I waited  until
there was a gap on each side of us and bent down to Kelly.
     "You mustn't forget I am your daddy today OK, Louise Glazar?"
     "As if!" she said with a big smile.
     I just hoped we were both smiling in thirty minutes' time.
     We came to the end of the walkway and  took a down escalator, following
signs  for Passport Control and  Baggage  Re  claim. From  halfway down  the
escalator  I could see  the Immigration hall  straight ahead. This was where
we'd stand or fall.
     There were about four or five people waiting to go through the desks. I
started joking with Kelly, trying to give myself something to do instead of
just looking nervous. I'd entered countries illegally hundreds of times, but
never so unprepared or under such pressure.
     "All set, Louise?"
     "I'm ready, Daddy."
     I passed  her the day sack so I could  get the passport and immigration
card out of my pocket. We ambled up  to Passport Control and  joined the end
of a line.  I kept reminding myself about an  American friend who'd traveled
from Boston to Canada, and then  from Canada back  to the UK. He'd picked up
his friend's passport while they were sharing a hotel room;
     he couldn't get back to exchange  it so he had to fake it.  No  one had
even batted an eyelid.
     We waited in line. Still with the  laptop  on my right  shoulder, I was
holding Kelly's hand with my left. I  kept  looking down at her and smiling,
but not excessively so; that was suspicious behavior, and I knew that people
would be watching on  monitors and from behind two-way mirrors. The business
type in front of us went through with a wave and a smile to the official. It
was our turn. We approached the desk.
     I handed  my passport  and visa waiver to the woman.  She ran  her eyes
down the details on the card. She looked down at Kelly from her high desk.
     "Hello, welcome to England."
     Kelly came back with a very American, "Hi!"
     I guessed the woman was in  her late thirties. Her hair was permed, but
the perm had gone slightly wrong.
     "Did you have a nice flight?" she asked.
     Kelly had Jenny or Ricky in one hand, hanging by its ear, and the other
one's head was  sticking out from the top flap  of the day sack on her back.
She said, "Yes, it was fine, thank you."
     The woman kept the conversation going.
     "And what's your name?" she asked, still checking the form.
     Could I trust her to get it right, or should I butt in?
     Kelly smiled and said, "Kelly!"
     What a farce. We'd  come so far, we'd come through so much, only  to be
caught by a line straight out ofaB movie.
     Right away I smiled down at Kelly.
     "No, it's  not!" I didn't want to look at the  woman; I could  feel the
smile drain from her face, could feel her eyes  burning  into the side of my
head.
     There was a pause that felt like an hour as I tried to think of what to
do or say next.  I  pictured  the woman's finger hovering  over a  concealed
button.
     Kelly got there before me.
     "I know, I'm joking." She giggled, holding out a teddy.
     "This is Kelly! My name is Louise. What's yours?"
     "My name's Margaret." The smile was back. If only she'd known how close
she'd been to a kill.
     She  opened the passport. Her eyes flicked  up and down as  she studied
first the picture, then my  face. She put the pass port down below the level
of  the  desk, and I saw  the  telltale glow of ultraviolet light.  Then she
looked back into my eyes and said, "When was this picture taken?"
     "About four years ago, I guess." I  gave a weak smile and said in a low
voice  that Kelly wasn't meant to overhear, "I've been  having chemotherapy.
The hair's just starting to grow back." I rubbed  my head. My skin felt damp
and  cold. Hope fully I still  looked like shit. The capsules certainly made
me feel it.
     "I'm bringing Louise over to see  my parents because it's been quite  a
traumatic time. My wife's staying with our other child  because he's  ill at
the moment. When it rains, it pours!"
     "Oh,"  she said,  and it sounded  genuinely sympathetic. But she didn't
hand back the passport.
     There was a big lull, as if she were waiting for me to fill the silence
with  a  confession.  Or  maybe  she was just  trying  to think of something
helpful and human to say. Finally she said, "Have a  good stay," and put the
documents back on the desktop.
     There was that urge just to grab them and run.
     "Thank you very much," I said, picking them  up and  putting them  back
into my pocket, then carefully doing up the button, because that was  what a
normal dad would do. Only then did I turn to Kelly.
     "C'mon, Louise, let's go!"
     I started to walk, but Kelly stood her ground. Oh fuck, now what?
     "
     "Bye, Margaret." She beamed.
     "Have a nice day!"
     That was  it. We were  nearly there. I knew  there wasn't going to be a
problem with the luggage, because I wasn't going to collect it.
     I checked the carousels. There was a flight from Brussels that was also
unloading, so I headed for the blue channel.
     Even if they  were watching and stopped us because  Kelly had a  Virgin
Atlantic bag, I would play the stupid person routine.
     But there weren't any Customs  officers on duty in the blue channel. We
were free.  The large sliding doors  opened up into the  arrivals  hall. We
walked  through into a throng of  chauffeurs holding  up  cards  and  people
waiting for their loved ones. Nobody gave us a second look.
     I went  straight to the currency  exchange. I found I'd  done well last
night  with Ron, Melvin, and the Glazars, ending up  with  more  than  three
hundred pounds in cash. Like a dickhead, I forgot to ask for a smaller  bill
for the subway ticket machine, so we had to stand in line for ages to get to
the kiosk. It didn't seem to matter; even the hour-long ride to Bank station
was enjoyable. I was a free man. I was  among ordinary  people, none of whom
knew who we were or was going to pull a gun on us.
     The central London district known as  the City is a  strange mixture of
architecture. As we left the subway station, we passed grand  buildings made
up of columns  and puritanically straight lines--the old Establishment. Turn
a corner  and we were confronted  by monstrosities  that were built  in  the
sixties and early  seventies  by architects who must have taken  a "Let's go
fuck up the City"  pill. One  of  these buildings was the one I was  heading
for, the NatWest bank on Lombard Street, a road so  narrow that just one car
could squeeze down it.
     We  went through  the revolving  steel and glass doors into the banking
hall, where  rows  of  cashiers sat behind protective screens. But  I wasn't
there for money.
     The reception desk  was  staffed  by  a man and a woman, both  in their
early twenties, both wearing  NatWest suits; they  even had little corporate
logos  sewn into  the  material  of their breast pockets, probably so  staff
wouldn't wear them after hours. As Kelly would have said, "As if!"
     I saw  both of them give  Kelly and me an  instant appraisal and  could
feel them turning up their noses. I gave  them a cheery, "Hi, how are  you?"
and asked to speak with Guy Bexley.
     The woman said, "Can  I  have  your name, please?" as she picked up the
phone.
     "Nick Stevenson."
     The girl called an extension. The man  went  back to being efficient on
the other side of the reception desk.
     I bent down and whispered to Kelly, "I'll explain later."
     "He'll be along in a minute. Would you like to sit down?"
     We  waited  on a couch that  was very long,  very deep, very plastic. I
could sense Kelly's cogs turning.  Sure enough.
     "Nick, am I Louise Stevenson now, or Louise Glazar?"
     I screwed up my face and scratched my head.
     "Umm ... Kelly!"
     Guy Bexley came down. Guy was my "relationship man ager," whatever that
was. All I knew was that he was the  man I asked for when I wanted to get my
security blanket out. He was in his late twenties, and you  could see by his
hairstyle and goatee that he felt uncomfortable in the issued suit and would
be  far happier wearing PVC pants, holding a bottle  of  water, and partying
all night bare-chested.
     We shook hands.
     "Hello, Mr. Stevenson, haven't seen you for a long time."
     I shrugged my shoulders.
     "Work. This is Kelly."
     He bent down and said,  "Hello there,  Kelly," in his  best  "I've been
trained how to introduce myself to kids" manner.
     "I just need my locked box for five minutes, mate."
     I followed him toward  the row of partitioned offices on the other side
of the hall. I'd been in them many times before.
     They were  all identical;  each contained  just  a  round  table,  four
chairs, and a  telephone. It was where people went to count money or beg for
a loan. He started to leave.
     "Could I also have a statement on my savings account, please?"
     Guy nodded and left. Kelly said, "What are we doing here?"
     I should  have known by now  that she hated to be  left  out of things.
Just like her dad.
     "Wait and see." I winked.
     A few minutes later Guy reappeared, put  the box on the table, and gave
me a folded printout of my account. I felt nervous as I opened up the paper.
My eyes went straight for the bottom right-hand corner.
     It read four hundred twenty-six thousand, five hundred seventy dollars,
converted at a rate of 1.58 dollars to the pound.
     Big Al had done it. I had to control myself, as I remembered Bexley was
still standing there.
     "I'll just be about five minutes," I said.
     "Tell reception when you're ready. They'll put it back in the vault for
you." He left with a shake of my hand and a "
     "Bye, Kelly!" and closed the door behind him.
     The  box was eighteen  inches  by twelve,  a metal  file container  I'd
bought for ten pounds in Woolworth's, with a very cheap lock on the top that
opened under  pressure.  It meant  that I didn't have  to turn up with a key
every time--I couldn't always guarantee  I was going  to have  that with me.
The only problem was  that  if I had to make a  run out of  the country,  it
could only be during banking hours.
     I flipped the lock and pulled out  a couple of old soccer fanzines  I'd
put on top in case it accidentally opened. I threw them over to Kelly.
     "See if you can make any sense of those."
     She picked one up and started to flip through the pages.
     The  first thing I  took out  was the  mobile  phone and  recharger.  I
switched it on. The battery was still working, but I put it in the recharger
anyway and plugged it into the wall.
     Next I pulled out a clear plastic freezer bag that contained bundles of
US dollar bills and pounds sterling, five South African Krugerrands, and ten
half-sovereigns that  I'd stolen  after the Persian Gulf War. All troops who
were behind enemy lines in Iraq were  issued twenty of the things  as bribes
for the locals in case we  got in heavy shit.  In my patrol we'd managed  to
keep ten of  them each; we said we'd  lost  the rest in a contact.  To begin
with I'd  kept them only as souvenirs, but they'd soon increased in value. I
left them in the bag; I was interested only in the sterling.
     I dug out a French leather porte-monnaie with a strap, in which I had a
complete set of ID: passport, credit cards, driver's license, all  the stuff
I needed to  become  Nicholas  Duncan Stevenson. It had taken  years  to get
cover  in such  depth,  all  originating from a  social  security number I'd
bought in a pub in Brixton for fifty pounds.
     I then  got out an electronic notebook. It was great; it  meant that  I
could fax, send memos, word process, and maintain a database anywhere in the
world. The problem  was I didn't have a clue how to use it. I used only the
phone number and address section facility because it could  be accessed only
with a password.
     I  had  a quick  look  over at  Kelly.  She was  thumbing  through  the
magazines, not understanding  a word. I pushed my hand to the bottom  of the
box and extracted the  9mm semiautomatic Browning  I'd liberated from Africa
in the late eighties.
     Loading the mags with rounds from a  small Tupperware box, I made ready
and checked chamber. Kelly looked up but didn't give it a second glance.
     I  powered  up  the  notebook,  tapped in 2422, and  found the number I
wanted. I picked up the telephone on the table.
     Kelly looked up again.
     "Who are you calling?"
     "Euan."
     "Who is he?"
     I could see the confusion on her face.
     "He's my best friend." I carried on pressing the phone number.
     "But..."
     I put my finger to my lips.
     "Shhh."
     He wasn't  in. I left  a message  on the  answering  machine in  veiled
speech. I then put the laptop into the box, together with  everything that I
wasn't taking with me including the printout.
     Kelly was bored with the fanzines now, so I put them back in the box. I
knew there was a question on its way.
     "Nick?"
     I just carried on packing.
     "Yes?"
     "I thought David was your best friend."
     "Ah yes. Well, Euan is my  best friend. It's just that sometimes I have
to call him David because--" I started to think of a lie, but why?
     "I told you  to make sure you wouldn't know  his real  name if  we  got
caught. That way you  couldn't tell anyone. It's  something that is done all
the time.  It's called OP SEC--operational security." I finished packing and
closed the box. She thought about it.
     "Oh, OK. His name's Euan then."
     "When you see him he might even show you the floor I told you about."
     I poked my head around the corner and waved at the receptionist.
     She came in, picked up the box, and left.
     I turned to Kelly.
     "Right, then, time for a shopping frenzy.
     Let me see; we'd better buy some nice new clothes for us both, and then
we'll go and stay in a hotel and wait for Euan to call. Sound good to you?"
     Her face brightened.
     "OK.!"
     Once this was all over I would have to set up a different named account
and move the money, and I'd stop  being Stevenson.  A pain  in  the  ass  to
organize, but I could live with that for $426,072.
     The cab ride  to Trafalgar Square became a tour given by me to Kelly. I
was  more  into  it than she  was,  and I  could tell by the  taxi  driver's
expression in his  rearview mirror  that I  was getting  most of the details
wrong.
     We  were going down the Strand when I  spotted  clothes stores  on both
sides of the road. We paid off the taxi and shopped for jeans, T-shirts, and
a washing kit. Once that was done, we took another cab to Brown's Hotel.
     I said to Kelly, "You'll like  this place. It's got  two entrances,  so
you  can enter from Dover  Street and come out the other side, on Albermarle
Street. Very important for spies like us."
     I switched on the phone, got hold  of information, and called the hotel
to make a reservation. Less than half an hour later we were in our room, but
only after discovering that the Dover Street exit was no longer open. Finger
on the pulse.
     The room  was a world removed from the ones we had been used to. It was
plush, comfortable, and, best of all, had a minibar with Toblerones. I could
have killed for a beer, but not yet; there was work to do.
     Jet  lag was starting to  kick in. Kelly  looked exhausted. She flopped
onto the bed and I helped undress her, then threw her between the sheets.
     "You can take a bath tomorrow," I said.
     She was a starfish in about two minutes flat.
     I  checked that the  phone had  a good  signal and that the charger was
working. Euan knew my voice, so the "It's John the plumber, when do you want
me to come and fix that tap?
     Give me a ring on..." would have done the trick.
     I decided  to  have a  quick nap for  ten  minutes,  maybe shower, have
something to eat, then go to bed. After all, it was only 5 p.m.
     At a quarter to six in  the morning, the phone rang. I pressed Receive.
I heard "Hello?" in that very low, very controlled voice I knew so well.
     "I need a hand, mate," I said. I didn't want to give him time to talk.
     "I need you to help me. Can you get to London?"
     "When do you want me?"
     "Now."
     "I'm in Wales. It'll take a bit of time."
     "I'll wait out on this number."
     "No problem. I'll get a train; it'll be quicker."
     "Thanks,  mate.  Give  me a  call  about  an hour before  you  get into
Paddington."
     "Yep. OK."
     The phone went dead.
     I had never felt so relieved. It was like putting  the phone down after
a doctor's just told you the cancer test was negative.
     The  train journey alone would  take  more  than three hours,  so there
wasn't much to do apart from enjoy the lull  in the battle. Kelly awoke as I
caught up with some  international  news in the  copy of the  Times that had
been slipped under the door--no walk to the street corner with  a  couple of
quarters at Brown's Hotel. I phoned room service and tried  out the hotel TV
channels. No Power Rangers. Great.
     Lazily, we both eventually got  up, showered, changed, and were looking
good. We took a  leisurely stroll through Piccadilly  Circus  and  Leicester
Square. I delivered another tour lecture that Kelly didn't listen to. I kept
on  looking at my watch,  waiting for Euan  to call. While  Kelly  was being
overrun by pigeons  having a  feeding frenzy in  Trafalgar Square, the phone
rang. It was  9:50  a.m. I  put my finger  in my other  ear to block out the
traffic  and  the screams of delight  from Kelly and the other kids as birds
tried to peck their eyes out.
     "I'm an hour from Paddington."
     "That's great. I'll meet you at Platform Three, Charing  Cross station,
OK, mate?"
     "See you there."
     The  Charing  Cross  hotel was part of  the  station  complex, just two
minutes' walk from Trafalgar Square. I'd picked it  because I knew that from
the foyer you could see the taxis  pull  into the station and drop off their
fares.
     We waited and watched. The place was full of package-tour Americans and
Italians. The Americans were at the tour-guide desk, reserving every show in
town, and the Italians just moved  from the elevator to the exit door in one
loud, arm-waving mob, shouting  at each other and all trying  to get through
the glass doors at the same time.
     It was about half an hour later when I saw a cab with a familiar figure
in the back. I pointed him out to Kelly.
     "Aren't we going to go and meet him?"
     "No, we're going to stay here and look, because we're going to surprise
him. Just like we did with Frankie in Daytona, remember?"
     "Oh, yes. We have to stand off."
     I watched him get out.  It was so wonderful to see him that I wanted to
jump up and  run outside.  He was  dressed in jeans and wearing  the kind of
shoes  you  see  advertised  in  a  Sunday  supplement.  Hush  Puppies  were
positively cutting-edge fashion compared  to  these. He was  also  wearing a
black nylon bomber  jacket,  so  he'd be  easy  enough  to pick  out  in the
station. I said to Kelly, "We'll give him a couple of minutes, then we'll go
and surprise him, shall we?"
     "Yeah!" She sounded quite excited. She had two lumps  of  bird shit  on
the back of her coat. I was waiting for them to dry before picking them off.
     I  waited for five minutes, watching his  back for him. Then we  walked
toward  the station and through a couple of arches to the ticket offices. We
looked for Platform  3 and there he was, leaning against the wall, reading a
paper. The same feeling: I wanted  to run over  there and hug him. We walked
slowly.
     He looked up and saw me. We both smiled and said, "Hi, how's it going!"
He looked at me, then at Kelly, but he didn't say anything; he knew that I'd
tell him at some stage. We went off to the side of the station to steps that
led  down toward the river.  As we walked  he looked at my head and tried to
hide a grin.
     "Good haircut!"
     Outside  Embankment  station   we   got   into   a   taxi.  Drills  are
drills--they're there for a reason, and that is to protect you:
     the moment you start falling  down on drills, you start fucking  up. We
took the driver on a roundabout route, covering  our tracks,  taking  twenty
minutes to  Brown's instead of the straight-line ten. As soon as we got back
to  the room I turned the TV  on for Kelly and phoned room service. Everyone
was hungry.
     Euan was already chatting away with  Kelly. She looked pleased  to have
somebody  else to talk to, even if it was only  another grown-up  and a man.
That  was  good--they were  getting a  relationship going;  she  was feeling
comfortable with him.
     The food came; there  was a hamburger and fries for Kelly, and two club
sandwiches for us. I said to Kelly, "We'll let you eat in peace. We're going
into  the bathroom because  you're watching TV, and  I  want to talk to Euan
about some stuff. Is that all right?"
     She nodded, mouth already full.
     Euan smiled.
     "See  you in a minute,  Kelly.  Save us some  fries." We went into the
bathroom with  our coffees  and sandwiches  the  noise  of the TV  dying the
moment I closed the door.
     I started to tell him the story. Euan listened intently. He was visibly
upset about Kev  and Marsha. I'd got as  far as the  lift by Luther and  Co.
when he cut in. By now he was sitting on the edge of the bath.
     "Bastards!  Who were they?  Do you  think  it  was the same group  that
zapped Kev?"
     "Must be." I sat next to him.
     "Kev knew the three who killed him. Kelly confirmed that Luther  worked
with Kev.
     Then there's the question of that phone call to 'get the ball rolling."
     " "You reckon it was Luther?"
     I nodded.
     "Who the fuck  knows where he  fits  into the picture,  but my guess is
he's  DEA, and also  corrupt. It looks like  some of the  DEA  are  bent and
working for drug money." I told him about  the McGear killing and what I had
found on the backup disk once de Sabatino had loaded the GIFs.
     Euan understood so far.
     "So it all has to  do with PIRA running  drugs into Europe? To keep the
route  open  it  needs  bribes,  blackmail,  and  threats.  But  what  about
McGear--did he say anything?"
     "Not a word. He knew he was going to die anyway."
     "This guy de Sabatino? Does he have any copies of the intelligence?"
     I laughed.
     "You know I'm not going to tell you that.
     OP SEC mate, OP SEC
     "Fair one." He shrugged.
     "Just being nosy."
     I explained what I had found in Kev's house. Euan didn't speak. He just
sat  there, letting  it all soak  in.  I  felt  exhausted,  as if by somehow
passing  on  the  baton to Euan everything that had happened in the last ten
days could now catch up with me and take its toll.
     I looked at him. He seemed pretty drained himself.
     "I can see only one thing wrong with what you're saying."
     "What's that, mate?"
     "Wouldn't the Colombians  have anticipated that  a bomb  would heighten
security in Gibraltar, making it harder to get the drugs in?"
     "It was a warning.  They  were sending it  out to anyone who might  not
want to keep business going. I tell you, mate, this is far too big for me to
be messing around with. I just want to  get it to Simmonds and wash my hands
of it."
     "I'll help any way I can."  He  opened a pack of Benson &  Hedges; he'd
obviously taken up smoking again. I stood up, out of the way.
     "I  don't want to get you directly involved. Kev,  Pat, me,  we've  all
been fucked over but I'm going to need you to back me if things go wrong."
     "You just have to name it."
     I could smell the sulfur from his match. He smiled as I started to wave
the smoke from  my face. He knew I hated that. Even  under  extreme pressure
some things never changed.
     I said, "Tomorrow afternoon, you should receive copies  of the files by
FedEx.  If anything happens to me or Simmonds, it's basically down  to you."
By now we  were  in  a  cloud of  smoke. The alarm was  going  to go off any
minute.
     "No  problems  with that, mate," he said  in his  very slow, very calm,
very  calculating  way.  If you  told  Euan he'd won  the lottery he'd  say,
"That's nice," then go back to stacking his coins or folding his socks.
     "How many copies of the disk are  there besides the ones you're sending
me?"
     "I'm not going to tell you, mate. Need-to-know!"
     He smiled. He knew I was protecting him.
     "One more thing," I said.
     "I don't want to take Kelly with me to the Simmonds meet. He wasn't too
pleased with  me the last time we  spoke. If this turns  into a gang fuck, I
don't want her caught in the crossfire.  You're the only  person I can trust
her with.  It's going  to be for  only one night, maybe two. Can you do that
for me?"
     I expected an immediate answer and I got one.
     "No problem." He smiled. He knew I'd let him talk freely  with Kelly so
they'd get to know each other.
     "Will you take her back to Brecon?"
     "Yeah. Have you told her I live in Wales?"
     "I've told her you live in a sheep pen."
     He threw the butt  into the toilet because he knew  I hated that smell,
too.
     I put both my hands on his shoulders.
     "This has been a fucking shit week, mate."
     "Don't worry about it. Let's just go  back in the  room and finish  the
coffee. Then you just  go and sort  your shit  out with Simmonds  and get it
over and done with."
     "How was the burger?"
     "Fine. I saved Euan some fries."
     I sat on the bed next to her.
     "Listen, Kelly, me and Euan have been talking, and because I've  got to
do  some  stuff  in  London, we reckon it's  a good idea  if  you go  to the
countryside with him and stay at his house. It's only for one night; I'll be
back  tomorrow.  What  do you  think? Hey,  you  can even see the  floor  we
laid--remember I talked about it?"
     She suspected she wasn't  being offered any  option, and  her face said
so.
     I said, "I won't be long, and Euan's house has sheep all around it."
     She looked down at her fingers and mumbled, "I want to stay with you."
     I said with mock surprise, "What, don't you want to go?
     You'll see all the sheep!"
     She was embarrassed. She was too polite to say no in front of Euan.
     I  said,  "It  won't be  for long." Then, like a bastard,  I closed the
trap.
     "You like Euan, don't you?"
     She nodded, never losing eye contact with me  in case she made  it with
Euan.
     "It's just going to be for one  night. I'll be calling you anyway; I'll
be able to talk to you."
     She looked very unhappy about it. After  all, I'd promised not to leave
her again. I caught sight of my mobile and had an idea.
     "How about  I give you my mobile phone. I'll show you how to use it." I
started playing with the buttons.
     "Here you are, you have a  go. If I show you how to use it, you can put
that under your pillow tonight, all right?"
     I looked up at Euan, trying to bring him in.
     "Because she'll have her own bedroom, won't she?"
     "That's right. She'll have her own bedroom, the one that overlooks  the
sheep pen."
     I said, "And I believe there's a TV in her bedroom, isn't there?"
     "Yes, there's a TV  in there." He nodded and agreed, wondering where he
was going to get one from.
     There was an  acceptance; she wasn't wild about it, but  that  was good
enough.  I  switched  on the phone,  tapped in my  PIN number, and handed it
over.
     "Just plug the charger into the wall when you get there and it'll work,
     OK?"
     "OK."
     "Then put  it underneath your pillow so when it rings you'll be sure to
hear it. All right?"
     "Whatever." By now she understood that she definitely had no choice.
     Euan said, "I'll tell you what. We'd better get  your teddies organized
if we're going to the country. What are their names? Have they  ever been on
a train before?"
     She warmed to him. We went downstairs and got into a taxi to Paddington
station. We bought Kelly ice cream, candy, soda,  anything to keep her mind
off what  was happening.  She was still deciding what  comic  to buy as Euan
looked at his watch and said, "Wheels turning soon, mate."
     I went with them  along the platform and gave her a big hug at the door
of the train car.
     "I'll call you tonight, Kelly. I promise."
     As she  climbed up. Jenny and  Ricky were looking at me from the Virgin
Atlantic day sack on her back.
     "OK."
     The guard was  walking the length of the train, closing the doors. Euan
lowered the window so Kelly could wave.
     "Nick?" She leaned toward me through the open window and beckoned as if
she wanted to whisper something.
     "What?" I put my face near hers.
     "This." She threw her arms around my  neck, squeezed, and planted a big
kiss on my cheek. I was so taken aback I just stood there.
     The train started moving.
     "I'll see you tomorrow," Euan called.
     "Don't worry about us. We'll be OK."
     As  the  train slowly disappeared  from  the platform,  I felt the same
wrench  as  I  had at the moment I'd seen  Pat's body being loaded into  the
ambulance. But this time I couldn't figure  out why.  After all, it  was for
the  best and she was in  safe hands. Forcing myself to  see it as  one more
problem out of the way, I headed for the pay phones.
     I got a very businesslike reply from Vauxhall: "Extension please?"
     "Two-six one-two."
     There was a pause, then a voice I recognized at once.
     "Hello, two-six one-two?"
     "It's Stone. I've got what you needed."
     "Nick! Where are you?"
     I put  my finger  in  my ear  as a  departure was announced.  "I'm  in
England."  Not that  he needed me  to say that  when he could hear that  the
Exeter train was leaving in five minutes.
     "Excellent."
     "I'm pretty desperate to see you."
     "Likewise. But I'm tied  up  here until the early hours." He paused  to
think.
     "Perhaps we can go for a walk and a talk.
     Let's say three-thirty tomorrow morning?"
     "Where?"
     "I'll walk toward the station. I presume you'll find me."
     "I'll do that."
     I put the phone  down with a  feeling that at long  last the  dice were
rolling for me. Kelly was  safe, Simmonds sounded amenable. With luck  I was
only hours from sorting out this mess.
     Back at the hotel I rented a car  so I could pick up Kelly from  Brecon
after the  meeting, and  had something  to eat.  In  my  head  I ran through
exactly what I was going to say  to Simmonds, and the way I was going to say
it. Without a doubt, I had  in my possession precisely the sort of  evidence
Simmonds had asked for. It  was a shame I didn't have the videotape to  back
up some of it, but, even so, the stuff I had was probably more than he could
have hoped for. The worst-case scenario now was that I'd get the slate wiped
clean and be let loose. At least I had a few quid to start a new life with.
     I thought about Kelly.  What would  become  other? Where would  she go?
Would  she have been affected  by everything  she'd  seen  and  all that had
happened  to her and her  family?  I tried to  cut  away  from that, telling
myself that it would all get sorted out--somehow. Simmonds could help there.
Perhaps he could orchestrate the  reunion with her grandparents, or at least
point me in the direction of the right kind of expert help.
     I  tried to get some sleep but failed. At 2 a.m. I retrieved the rental
car and headed for Vauxhall Bridge.
     I went a long way around,  going all  the way down the King's  Road  to
World's  End,  then turning for  the  river and  heading  east again, mainly
because I wanted to organize my thoughts one last time,  but also because to
me, the  drive  along the deserted Embankment and past  all  the  historic,
floodlit bridges offered one of the most beautiful sights in the world.
     This particular night  the lights  seemed to shine a  bit brighter, and
the bridges seemed  more sharply in focus; I found myself  wishing Kelly was
there to see it with me.
     I got  to  Vauxhall  Bridge  early.  I drove east  along the road  that
follows the river toward the next bridge, Lambeth.
     Nothing looked suspicious at the RV point on the drive-by.
     The gas station on the opposite side of the road, about halfway  toward
Lambeth bridge, had about four cars by the pumps, groups of kids buying fuel
and Mars bars, and some early-morning office cleaning vans filling up before
their shift.
     Farther along the river, and on the other side,  I could see the Houses
of Parliament. I smiled  to myself. If  only the  MPs  really knew what  the
intelligence services got up to.
     I did a  full circle and headed  back on the  same road toward Vauxhall
for one more drive-by. I still had time to kill, so I stopped at the station
and bought a drink and a sandwich.
     The RV point  still looked fine. My plan  was to pick up Simmonds, make
distance and angles  as we walked to my car, and  go for a drive. That way I
controlled the environment. I could protect myself as well as him.
     I  parked about  four hundred  yards  west  of the RV  While  eating my
sandwich I checked my  route back to the car. I got out and walked down  the
road, arriving at five minutes to three.  There was  still nothing to do but
wait,  so I window-shopped at the motorcycle shop, resolving that  I  really
would buy one as a gift to myself. No, more than a gift--a reward.
     At  twenty after three I moved  into  the shadows of the railway arches
opposite the exit point I knew Simmonds  would  use. There were one  or  two
people  wandering  about, clubbers on  their  way  home, or to another club.
Their drunken laughs shattered the still morning air, then there was silence
again.
     I  could tell  it was  him  right off, leaning slightly  forward  as he
bounced  along on the balls of his feet. I watched him branch right from the
exit  and  stand at the pedestrian crossing, intending to head for the metal
footbridge  over  the five-way  road intersection to  the railway station. I
waited.
     There was no rush; I'd  let him come to  me.  As he crossed the road I
came out of the shadows at the bottom of the footbridge steps.
     He smiled.
     "Nick,  how  are  you?"  He  kept walking,  nodding left toward Lambeth
bridge.
     "Shall we walk?" It wasn't a question.
     I nodded the opposite way, toward my car.
     "I've arranged a pickup."
     Simmonds stopped and looked at me with the expression of a disappointed
schoolteacher.
     "No, I think we'll walk."
     I was sponsoring the RV; he should have known that I'd organize for our
safety. He stared at  me a few more moments and then, as if  he  knew  I was
going to follow, continued on walking. I fell into step beside him.
     Simmonds looked the same as ever, his tie about half an inch loose, the
shirt and suit looking as if his wardrobe were a carrier bag.
     "So, Nick, what have you got?" He smiled  but didn't look at me, and as
I  told him the story he didn't interrupt, just kept his eyes on the ground,
nodding. I felt like a son unloading his problems onto  his dad, and it felt
good.
     We'd been walking for about fifteen minutes when I'd come to the end of
my presentation. It was his turn to talk. I somehow expected him to stop, or
at least find a bench where we could sit, but he kept on walking.
     He turned his head toward me and smiled again.
     "Nick, I had no idea you'd be so thorough. Who else have you  spoken to
about this?"
     "No one else, only de Sabatino and Euan."
     "And has Euan or this de Sabatino also got copies of the disks?"
     I lied.
     "No,  no one apart from me." Even  when you come  to  someone for help,
you never play your full hand. You never know when you might need an edge.
     He remained incredibly calm.
     "What  we  have to ensure is that  no  one else  finds out not  for the
moment, anyway.
     This is more than low-level corruption. The links with PIRA, Gibraltar,
and, it  seems, the DEA mean  this is very grave  indeed. You seem to have a
pretty good grasp of this so far, so let me ask you something." He paused as
if he were a judge about to hand down his decision.
     "Do you think it goes further?"
     "Who the fuck knows," I said.
     "But you can't be too careful. It's why I wanted to talk to you on your
own."
     "And where is the Brown child now?"
     "In  a  hotel, fast asleep. I'll be needing some help to pass her on to
her grandparents."
     "Of course. Nick. All in good time."
     We walked on a while in silence. We got to a bar on the corner of a car
tunnel under the railway line. Simmonds turned to the right, taking us under
the arches. Then he spoke  again, and it was as if there was no question  of
me not com plying with his demand.
     "Before I can do anything to help you, what I need from you, of course,
is the evidence." He was still not looking at me, making sure he avoided the
puddles of water stained with engine oil.
     "I haven't brought the disks with me, if that's what you mean."
     "Nick, I shall do my best to see that you both have  protection.  But I
do need the proof and all copies of it. Can you get them for me now?"
     "Not possible. Not for a few hours."
     "Nick, I cannot do anything without them. I need all copies.  Even ones
you'd normally leave in that security blanket of yours."
     I  shrugged.  "You must understand that it's for my own protection" We
turned  right  again and  were now heading back  toward  the train  station,
paralleling  the railway. For a couple  of  minutes we moved  along  narrow,
warehoused streets in silence.
     Simmonds was  deep in  thought.  He wasn't  happy about  the  disks.  A
freight  train  rumbled above  us on its way to waking  up the residents  of
southwest London. Why the  fuck was it so important for him to know how many
copies there were and get his hands on all of them?
     "Believe me," I shouted above the noise, "I've got that side all  under
control. I've  been fucked over enough. You know  as well  as I do that I've
got to protect everyone, including you."
     "Yes, of course, but  I  need to control all the information. Not  even
you should have it. There is too much risk involved."
     This was getting stupid.
     "I understand that. But what if you  get zapped? There would be nothing
to back up what I'm saying. It's not only the DEA corruption, don't you see?
     Gibraltar was a setup. It includes us."
     Simmonds slowly nodded at a puddle in the gutter.
     "A few things puzzle me," I said.
     "Why  were we  briefed  that  the bomb  would  be  initiated  by remote
control? How  come  the intelligence was so good about the ASU, but so wrong
about there being no bomb?"
     Still he gave no reply.
     Things weren't adding up here.
     Ohfrick.
     I  felt  as  if  I'd been  hit  on  the  back  of  the head by  a  fire
extinguisher again. Why hadn't I thought of it? The freight train's rumbling
was now in the distance. The early-morning silence had returned.
     "But you know all this, don't you?"
     No reply. He didn't even break his stride.
     Who had briefed us that the Gibraltar bomb was going to be initiated by
remote control? Simmonds, who  was  there at  Alpha  to oversee it. Why the
fuck hadn't I thought of it before?
     I stopped. Simmonds kept walking.
     "This  isn't  just an American-PIRA thing, is it? It's much bigger. You
are part of it, aren't you?"
     The  rear  arches were  more light  industrial than retail  auto repair
shops, sheetmetal works, and storage units, most  with company vans that had
been parked outside for the night.
     He turned to face me  and took the six steps back to where I stood. For
the first time, we had eye-to-eye.
     "Nick, I think you need to be aware of something. You will give me  all
the  information  and I  mean all  of  it. We  cannot take the risk of other
copies being in circulation."
     The  look  on his  face was of a  chess grand  master about to make the
decisive move. The shock in mine must have been plain to see.
     "We  didn't necessarily go along  with  the Americans' determination to
kill you, but you  should be in no doubt that we  will do so  now if we have
to."
     "We?"
     "It's much bigger than you think. Nick. You're intelligent.
     You must realize the commercial and political  implications of a  cease
fire  Exposing what is on the disks would mess up  much more  than just what
you know. It's unfortunate about  Kevin and his family, I grant you. When he
told me  what he'd discovered, I did try to talk my American colleagues into
a subtler course of action."
     So  that  was  why I'd been  ordered back  to the UK so  abruptly. Once
Simmonds had talked with  Kev, he wanted me  out  of  the US  and  quick. He
didn't want me speaking to Kev or interrupting his murder.
     I thought of Kelly At least she was safe.
     It was almost as if he were reading my mind.
     "If you decide not  to give  me  all the  information, we will kill the
child. And  then we will kill  you after extracting what  we  need. Don't be
naive. Nick.  You and I,  we're the same. This isn't about  emotion; this is
business. Nick, business. You really have no choice."
     I tried  to  fight it. He had to be bluffing. "Euan sends his regards,
by  the  way, and says  that  he managed  to get a  television  set for  her
bedroom. Believe me, Nick, Euan will kill her. He rather likes the financial
benefits."
     I shook my head slowly from side to side.
     "Think back. Who initiated the contact?"
     He was  right,  it was Euan. Simmonds was there to direct it,  Euan was
there to pull the trigger. But I still fought against the idea.
     He opened his jacket and pulled a mobile phone from his inside pocket.
     "Let Euan explain; he was expecting a call later anyway."
     He  turned on the power and waited to put in his PIN  number. He smiled
as he looked down at the phone's display.
     "This  is  how the  Americans found you,  you know. People  think  that
detection  can take place only when the phone is  in use. Not so. As long as
they're switched on, these things are miniature tracking devices, even if no
calls are made or received. It's actually a  form  of electronic tagging. We
find it terribly useful."
     He tapped in his PIN number, the tones blaring out of his hand.
     "However, once you'd given them the slip at Lorton, our only option was
to let you  make entry back into the UK. I needed  to know what you'd  found
out. I have to say, I'm so glad your cancer treatment was successful."
     Fuck! He hadn't  even  mentioned my  lack of hair. That was because  he
already knew. But  Euan. He'd been aware  enough to mention it. I felt  sick
knowing he was using his skills against me.
     Simmonds smiled. He knew he had me by the balls.
     "Nick,  I'll say this  again.  I really do need all the disks. You know
the child  would suffer greatly; it's not something that we would enjoy, but
there are important matters at stake."
     I wanted so much for him to get through to  Euan. I  wanted to speak to
him, wanted him to confirm  that it was a bluff. But in my heart of hearts I
knew that it wasn't.
     Simmonds had nearly finished tapping in the number.
     I  had no choice.  I couldn't risk Kelly.  He wasn't going to make this
call.   With  my right  arm in a hooked position, I swung  around  hard and
connected with his nose. There  was a dull crunch  of fracturing  bone as he
went down with a muffled moan. While he writhed  on the ground I kicked  his
case under one of the vans and, in the same motion, picked up  the  phone in
my left hand, got behind  him, and positioned it at the front of his throat.
Grabbing the  other  side  with my right hand, I jammed  it firmly under his
Adam's apple.
     I looked to the right and left. We were too exposed where we were; what
I had in mind would take several minutes  to complete. I shuffled  backward,
dragging him in between two of the trucks. I got down onto my knees, all the
time  pulling  back  on the  phone.  He was kicking out, his  arms flailing,
trying to rip my face apart.
     His whimpers and chokes filled the air. I responded by leaning forward,
using the weight of my upper body to bend his head down so that his chin was
more or less on his chest.
     At the same time I pulled even harder. Just another two minutes and I'd
be done.
     After thirty  seconds he started to struggle  furiously,  with all  the
frenzied  strength that a man  draws on when he knows  he  is dying.  But no
matter what he did now, he wouldn't be getting up.
     His hands still scratched at my face. I bobbed and weaved to avoid them
but maintained the pressure on his throat.
     Already the scabs from the fight with McGear had been pulled off, but I
couldn't feel much blood. Then Simmonds managed to get  his fingernails into
the cut just below my  eye. I stifled a  scream as  his three  nails started
into the already damaged soft skin. I made the injury  worse  by  pulling my
face away; as I did, Simmonds's nails took my skin with them.
     I didn't bother now to see if anyone was watching. I was beyond caring.
I  was  fighting  for breath  myself with  the effort, as  sweat  stung  the
injuries on my face.
     Gradually at first, his movements subsided to no  more than a spasmodic
twitching in  his  legs. His  hands  stopped  grasping. Seconds later he was
unconscious.  It crossed my mind just to get up and walk away, to leave  him
to suffer  the effects  of hypoxia and be brain-damaged for life. I  decided
against that. I wanted this fucker dead.
     I gave it another thirty seconds. His chest stopped moving.
     I put my fingers on the carotid pulse and felt nothing.
     I dragged him to the wall and  sat him up against  the doors of a unit.
Then I got to my feet and started dusting myself off.
     Keeping to the shadows,  I tucked my shirt in and wiped away  the sweat
and blood with my sleeve. I checked the phone. It had been turned off in the
fight. I wiped my prints off it, then just left everything where it  was and
casually walked  away. If  anybody had  seen  me, so what?  It didn't really
matter. I had more important things to worry about.
     I drove west, holding my coat cuff against my eye to stop the bleeding.
     The whole situation was still  spinning around  inside my head,  slowly
beginning to make sense.
     I now knew how Luther and his lot had found  me--they must have  beaten
the number  out of  Pat and traced the  signal while  I  had  it switched on
waiting for his call.
     If I'd let on to  Euan or Simmonds that there was just one more set  of
backups in my laptop and had handed it  over, I'd have been  dead. They were
covering their asses by retrieving the information.
     Had Simmonds arranged to phone Euan some  time  after our meeting? Euan
was  more than  three hours away,  and Simmonds's  body would be  discovered
soon. If  Euan  found  out, he  wouldn't take  any chances. He would  change
location,  maybe even kill Kelly  right away. Either way, I'd have lost her.
This time there was no question of just leaving her. I could call her on the
mobile and  tell  her  to  run,  but what would that achieve? She was in the
middle of  nowhere; even  if she  ran for half  an  hour, it would  make  no
difference.
     Euan's cottage was  in the middle of acres of mountains, grass,  rocks,
and sheep shit. He would find her.
     I could call the police, but would they believe me? I could waste hours
trying to convince them,  by which time it would be too late. Or they  might
take it  on themselves  to raid Euan's  house,  and the result would  be the
same.
     For a fleeting second I thought about Big Al. I hoped he'd be  well out
of  it by  now. He  didn't  have  getaway  accounts  for  nothing.  If  he'd
transferred four  hundred grand into mine, for sure  he'd  have taken  eight
hundred for himself. Old Watermelon would be OK. I cut him from my mind.
     The highway services just before Heathrow were just coming up.  I had a
thought.
     I pulled off and drove into the  parking lot. Now  all I had  to do was
get to a phone and make  a call. The service station was  busy. I'd had  to
park a hundred yards from the  main entrance.  I got out of the car  just as
the  heavens opened. By  the  time  I reached  the  bank of  four telephones
outside Burger King,  I  was  soaked. The  first two  I tried  accepted only
cards. I had about three  pounds  in change in my pocket--not enough. I  ran
into the shop,  wiping  my  face to get  some of  the blood off.  I bought a
newspaper with a river, walked  out, the woman  looking worried at the state
of my face. I men went back in and got  a  packet of M&Ms with a tenner. The
woman looked even more scared. She was just happy for me  to take  my change
and get out.
     As  I  dialed the number I felt a knot  in my stomach, as if I  were  a
teenager phoning to  arrange his very first  date. Would she have charged it
and left it switched on? Why wouldn't she? She had never let me down before.
     It started to ring.
     For a moment I felt like a child in a candy store  with his dad, hardly
able to contain my excitement. Then  I had  new  things to worry about. What
ifEuan had the phone now?
     Did I  hang up or  did I  try to bluff it and maybe find out where  she
was?
     It was too late to think. The ringing stopped; there was  a pause, then
I heard a quiet, hesitant, "Hello, who is it?"
     "Hi, Kelly, it's me. Nick," I said,  trying for  all the world to sound
like Mr. Casual.
     "Are you on your own?"
     "Yes, you woke me up. Are  you coming  back now?" She sounded tired and
confused. I was trying hard to think of an answer; thankfully she went on.
     "Euan said that I might be staying with him longer, because you have to
go away. It isn't true, is it. Nick? You said you wouldn't leave me."
     It was a bad connection. I had  to put a finger in my other ear to hear
her above the  noise of  the  rain on the  glass of the phone booth. A truck
driver in the  next one along was shouting loudly and  angrily, arguing with
his  boss that  he couldn't  go any farther  because of his odometer, and he
wasn't going to lose his license just to get a  few  boxes of bloody anoraks
up  to Carlisle. On  top  of  that  was  the steady  boom of traffic  on the
highway, and the noises of people coming in and out of the station. I had to
block all that out and concentrate on  the phone call, because there  was no
way I could ask Kelly  to speak up.  I said, "Yes, of course, you're right,
I will never leave you.
     Euan  is lying  to you. I  have found out  some bad things  about  him,
Kelly. Are you still in the house?"
     "Yes, I'm in bed."
     "Is Euan in his bed?"
     "Yes. Do you want to speak with him?"
     "No, no. Let me think for a minute."
     My  mind was racing now, trying to think of the best way to  say what I
wanted.
     "Of course I'm coming to get you. In fact, I'll be there very soon. Now
listen.  I  need you to do  something very difficult and very dangerous. You
only have to do this one last thing for me and everything will be over." The
moment I said it I felt like a lowlife.
     "I don't have to run away again, do I?"
     "No, no, no it's not like that this time. But it's the most special job
a spy ever does." I didn't want  to give her  time to think,  so I just went
on.
     "But I want  to check something first, OK?  You're in bed,  aren't you?
Get under the covers and talk to me only in a whisper, OK?"
     I  could hear  the rustling, then she said,  "What are  we going to do.
Nick?"
     "First, I  want  you to press a number and  look  at the front  of  the
telephone. Can you  see  it  light up? Tell  me  if  there's a picture  of a
battery. How many  blocks  are there where  the battery sign is? Can you see
it?"
     I heard some scuffling.
     "I can see that."
     "How many blocks are there in the picture?"
     "Three. There's three blocks. One of them is flashing."
     "That's good." It wasn't really. I  was sweating: two blocks meant she
hadn't recharged it and the battery was down to less than half-power, and  I
was going to need a lot of air time to talk her through the whole process.
     "What's that noise?" she said.
     The  truck driver  was  now  really pissed off  and hollering  into the
phone, the cigarette in his hand  making  the phone booth look like  a steam
room.
     "Nothing to worry about.  Kelly, I'm going to  tell you what to do, but
you need to keep listening to me on the telephone.
     Can you do that?"
     "Why is Euan bad, Nick? What.. " "Listen, Kelly, Euan wants to hurt me.
If he  finds  you  doing this thing for me,  he  will hurt you, too.  Do you
understand that?"
     I could hear lots  of  rustling;  she was obviously still under the bed
covers. Then there was a very quiet "Yes."
     She wasn't  sounding  like a happy bunny. I was sure there was a better
way  I could be going about all this, I just didn't have time to  think what
it might be.
     "If Euan wakes up," I said, "or if the telephone stops  working, I want
you to leave the  house very, very  quietly. I want you to go down the track
to  the road and hide behind the trees, just by the big gate that Euan drove
through to get to his cottage. Know where I mean?"
     "Yeah."
     "You must hide there until you hear a car  come and stop, but don't get
out from  your  hiding place unless it  toots its horn two  times. Then come
out. Do you understand that? I'll be in the car. It's a blue Astra, OK?"
     There was a pause.
     "What's an As--Astra, Nick?"
     Shit, she was seven years old and American. What was I expecting?
     "OK. I'll stop in a blue car and come and get you."
     I got her  to repeat it, and for good measure I said, "So if Euan wakes
up and sees you, I want you to run to the trees as fast as you can and hide.
Because if Euan catches you doing what I want you  to do, we will never see
each other again.
     Don't  let me down, OK? And remember, don't  you come out  from  behind
those trees, even if Euan calls for you, OK?"
     "OK. You will come and get me, won't you?"
     There was a bit of doubt in her mind.
     "Of course I will. Now, first of all, what I want you to  do is get out
of bed, then put the phone on the bed and get dressed, very  quietly. Put on
a nice thick coat. And you know those sneakers we bought? Make sure you take
those as well, but don't put them on yet."
     I heard her put the phone down and start rummaging around the room.
     For God's sake, hurry up!
     I forced myself to calm down.
     It was almost two minutes before I heard: "I'm ready, Nick."
     "Now listen to me very carefully. Euan is not a friend; he has tried to
kill me. Do you understand, Kelly? He has tried to kill me."
     There was a pause.
     "Why? I--I don't understand. Nick. I thought he was your best friend."
     "I know, I know, but things change. Do you want to help me?"
     "Yes."
     "Good. Then you must do exactly what I tell you. I want you to put your
sneakers  in your coat pockets.  OK, now it's time to  go downstairs. I want
you to keep the telephone with you. All right?"
     "Yeah."
     Time was running short, and so was my money.
     "Just remember, you must  be very, very quiet,  because  otherwise  you
will wake Euan.  If that happens, you run  out of the house toward the hidey
hole--promise?"
     "Cross my heart."
     "OK, I want you to creep very, very gently down the stairs. Don't talk
to me again until you're in the kitchen; and re member, from now on, what we
must do is whisper all the time. OK?"
     "OK."
     I  heard  the door  open. As she  came out of  the  room I imagined her
passing the bathroom on her left. Ahead of her, up a half-landing and  about
twelve feet  away, would be the door to Euan's  room. Was it open or closed?
Too late to ask  her. A few  steps  now and she'd be at the top of  the main
stairs and  next  to the old grandfather  clock. On  cue,  I heard its slow,
ponderous tick-tock; it was like something out of a Hitchcock movie.
     The sound  receded very slowly: good girl,  she must be going down  the
stairs  very carefully. Only once did I  hear the  creak  of a  board and  I
wondered  again about  Euan's  door.  Did he usually sleep  with it open?  I
couldn't remember.
     At the bottom of the stairs she'd be turning back to the right, heading
toward the kitchen.
     I tried to imagine where she was but lost her in the silence.
     At last  I  heard the barely  perceptible sound of  a protesting hinge;
that was the kitchen door. I  felt a stab of  guilt  for using the girl like
this, but she  knew the score well, sort of. Fuck it, the decision was made;
I just had to do it. If it worked, fine;
     if  it  didn't, she was  dead. But if I  didn't try  it,  she  was dead
anyway, so let's get on with it.
     "I'm in the kitchen,  but  I can't see very  much. Am I allowed to turn
the light on?"
     It was the loudest whisper I'd ever heard.
     "No, no,  no, Kelly, you've got to speak very slowly and  very  quietly
like this," I demonstrated.
     "And don't  put the light on; that would wake  Euan  up. Just  go  more
slowly, and  listen to me  all  the time. If you don't understand  anything,
just ask, and remember, if anything goes wrong or you hear a noise, stop and
we will both listen. OK?"
     "OK."
     The problem with her being quieter on the phone was that it  was harder
to hear her. The truck  driver had now finished, slamming the phone down and
storming into the Burger King. A woman took his place and was yammering to a
girlfriend.   The kitchen was two areas knocked into one, the old back room
of the house and what  had used to  be an alley between the  cottage and the
old sheep-pen wall. The alley  had been closed in by a sunroom, with all the
kitchen units arranged galley-style in one long range beneath it. There were
plants on pedestals and  a large circular wooden table in the middle of  the
area;  I  hoped Kelly  wouldn't knock anything  over  onto  the squash-court
floor. Thinking of the night we'd spent "rescuing" the wood made me  shudder
at all those years  of friendship,  trust, and  even love. I felt let  down,
used, fucked over.
     There couldn't be much battery time left.
     "Everything OK?" I said. I tried hard not to convey any sense of panic,
but I knew we  would be in trouble soon.  If the  phone went dead, would she
remember what I'd told her to do?
     "I can't see a thing. Nick."
     I thought for a few seconds, trying to remember more of the layout.
     "OK, Kelly, go very slowly to where the sink is.
     Go and stand by the hob."
     "What's that?"
     "It's the bit you cook on with saucepans. You see it?"
     "Yeah."
     "OK, there's a switch on the right-hand side. Can you see that?"
     "I'll look."
     A second or two later she said, "I can see now."
     She  must have switched on the small fluorescent light that illuminated
the stove top; she sounded relieved.
     "Good girl. Now I want you to go back and very gently close the kitchen
door. Will you do that for me?"
     "OK. You are coming for me. Nick?"
     I wasn't feeling confident about this  at all. Should I stop it now and
just get  her to open the door for me  and  wait? No, fuck it.  He  might be
getting a phone call any minute about Simmonds's death.
     "Of course  I am, but I can't come  unless you do  what I say, OK? Keep
the telephone to your ear and very gently close that door."
     I heard the telltale click.
     "What I want you to do now is go and have a look under the sink and put
all the bottles and things on the table. Will you do that for me?"
     "OK."
     There was silence, then  a soft clatter as she  moved bottles and  cans
around.
     "Everything's out now."
     "Well done! Now, very quietly, read out the labels to me.
     Can you do that?"
     "I can't."
     "Why not?"
     "There's too many things and it's too dark. I can't do it."
     She  was  sounding  under pressure  now; there  was  that wobble in her
voice.
     Fuck, this is taking too long.
     "It's OK, Kelly, just  walk  over to the light switch by the  door  and
turn the light on. Don't rush. Will you do that?"
     "OK." It  sounded  as if her  nose  was stuffed up. I knew the sound so
well  by  now. The next stage, if I  wasn't very careful, would be tears and
failure.
     I heard her shuffling toward the light switch.
     "I can see now, Nick."
     "OK, go back and read to me what the labels say, OK?"
     "OK." She  moved  back to  the table. I could  hear  her  pick  up  the
cleaning products.
     "Ajax."
     "OK, Kelly, what's the next one?"
     Fucking  hell, this was outrageous.  I held the phone  hard  against my
ear,  almost holding  my  breath as I silently willed her to succeed. I was
really pumped; I  could feel my heart going. I was writhing like a madman in
a straitjacket, twisting and turning in the kiosk, miming Kelly's actions to
myself. I looked across at the other booth; the woman who was talking to her
friend had wiped the  condensation from the glass to get a better view of me
and now  seemed to be relaying a running commentary. I must have looked like
a mass murderer, with cuts and scratches on my face, and my hair and clothes
soaking wet.
     The loud noise of metal clattering onto wood made me jump.
     Kelly? Kelly
     Silence, then the phone was picked up.
     "Sorry,  Nick. I knocked a spoon off. I  didn't  see it. I'm  scared. I
don't want to do this. Please come and get me."
     It wasn't long before the crying was going to start.
     "Kelly, don't worry, it's OK, it's OK."
     No, not now, for Christ's sake! I heard sniffing on the phone.
     "It's OK, Kelly, it's OK. I can't get you unless you help me.
     You must be brave. Euan is trying to kill me; only you can help me. Can
you do that for me?"
     "Please hurry. Nick. I want to be with you."
     "It's all right, it's all right."
     It  wasn't  all  right.   Nick,  because  Nick's  fucking   money   was
disappearing. I was down to my last few coins. They weren't going to last. I
put  another  coin  in  and  it rattled out into  the coin  return; I had to
scramble for another one.
     Kelly  started to go through more of the labels. Most of the  words she
couldn't read. I asked  her  to spell  them. As she got  three letters out I
worked out the rest.
     "No, that one's no good. Read the next."
     My mind was now racing, trying to remember ingredients and formulas. At
last she read out something I could use.
     "Kelly, you must listen very carefully.  That's a  green can, isn't it?
Put it where you can find it again. Then I want you to creep out to the room
next door, where the washing machine is. You know the one?"  "Yes."
     Euan had a place for everything,  and everything had  its place. I even
knew that his forks would be lined up beside each other in the drawer.
     "Just by the door is a cabinet, and in it there's a blue bottle.
     The label says antifreeze."
     "What?"
     "Antifreeze. A-N-T-I... I want you to bring it to the table,
     OK?"
     The phone clunked onto the stove. I started to sweat even more.
     After what seemed like an eternity she came back on.
     "I've got it" "Put it on the table and then open it."
     I  heard  the  phone  go  down  again and lots  of  heavy breathing and
sniffing as she struggled with the bottle top.
     "I don't know how to do it."
     "Just twist it. You know how to open a bottle."
     "I can't. It won't move. I am trying. Nick, but my hands are shaking."
     I then heard a soft,  long moan.  I  was sure it was going to turn into
crying.
     Shit, I don't need this. It isn't going to work.
     "Kelly? Kelly? Are you OK? Talk to me, come on, talk to me."
     I was getting nothing.
     Come on, Kelly, come on.
     Nothing. All I could hear was her holding back tears and sniffing.
     "Nick... I want  you to get me. Please, Nick, please."  She was sobbing
now.
     "Just  take  your  time,  Kelly,   just  take  your  time.   It's   OK,
everything's OK. I'm here, don't worry. OK, let's just stand and listen. If
you  can hear anything, you tell me on the phone, OK, and I'll try to listen
at the same time."
     I  listened. I wanted to make sure  Euan wasn't awake.  I also wanted a
break: there needs to be a cut  in the action at a time like this, otherwise
the errors snowball and people start tripping over themselves; so let's take
our time, but at the same time be as fast as possible. I knew exactly what I
needed  to do,  but the  frustration  lay in trying to interpret  it to this
child, under pressure, and to get her to work quietly and all the time I was
running out of money and the mobile was running out of battery life.
     The woman left her booth  and gave me a  grin  of appeasement in case I
was going to lunge at her with a meat cleaver.
     "Are you OK now, Kelly?"
     "Yes, do you want me to unscrew the bottle still?"
     I couldn't understand why she couldn't do it. I started giving her more
instructions. Then I  remembered:  the bottle had  a  childproof  top.  As I
started to tell her how to undo it, there was a soft bleep.
     Battery. Shit!
     "Yes, remember to push the top down before you turn. We just have to be
a bit quicker or the phone is going to stop before we finish."
     "Now what?"
     "Is it on the table with the top undone?"
     Nothing.
     "Kelly? Kelly? Are you there?"
     Was the battery dead?
     Then I heard, "What do I do now?"
     "Thank goodness, I thought the battery had gone. Is there anything  you
can open that  green  can with? I know,  use the  spoon, Kelly.  Very,  very
carefully  now, pick  it  up, put the phone on  the table, and then open the
can. OK?"
     I  listened, running through all  the different options there were left
if this scheme fucked up. I came to the conclusion there were none.
     "Now here comes the  hard  part.  Do you think you can do  this? You've
got to be pretty special to do this bit."
     "Yes, I'm OK now. I didn't mean to cry, it's just that I am--" "I know,
I know, Kelly. I am, too, but we will do this together.
     What  I need  you to do now is put  the phone in your pocket with  your
sneakers. Then take one of those big bottles from the  table and walk to the
front door of the house and open it just a little bit. Not wide open, just a
little bit. Then  put the bottle behind the door, to stop it  swinging shut.
Now remember, it's  a big heavy door, so  I want you to do it really slowly,
really, really gently so it doesn't make a noise. Can you do that for me?"
     "Yeah, I can do that. Then what?"
     "I'll tell  you  in  a  minute.  Now don't forget,  if  the phone stops
working and  you can't hear me anymore, I want you to run to  the trees  and
hide."
     Chances were Euan would find her, but what else was there to do?
     "OK."
     This  was  going to  be the tough part.  Even  if he was  sound asleep,
Euan's  subconscious  was  likely to  detect the  change in air pressure and
ambient noise when the front  door was opened and  make something of it in a
dream, giving him a sort of sixth sense that something was wrong.
     If so, at least she'd have a head start as long as she remembered  what
I'd told her.
     "I'm back in the kitchen what do I do now?"
     "Listen to  me. This bit's very important. What number can you count up
to?"
     "I can count to ten thousand."
     She was sounding a little happier now, sensing the end was in sight.
     "I only want you to count up to three hundred. Can you do that?"
     "Yeah."
     "You've got to do it in your head."
     "OK."
     "First, I want you to go to the hob again. You know how to turn the gas
on?"
     "Of course! Sometimes I help Mommy with the cooking."
     I had never felt so sad.
     I made myself  concentrate again. There  was  no room for distractions.
She might be dead soon anyway. I felt enough of a shit for getting her to do
my dirty work; while I was at it, I might as well make sure she  did the job
properly.
     "That's  good, so you know how to  turn on the gas in the oven, and all
the rings on the hob?"
     "I told you, I can help cook."
     A coach load of teenage kids returning from a school trip was streaming
into the Burger King.  A gang of six or seven  of them  hung back and headed
for the phones, laughing and shouting in newly broken voices, all trying  to
cram into the  one vacant booth. The noise was horrendous; I couldn't hear a
thing Kelly was saying. I had to do something.
     "Kelly, just wait a minute."
     I  put  my  hand over  the  mouthpiece, leaned out  of  the  booth, and
shouted, "You shut the fuck up! I've  got my  aunty here, her husband's just
died and I'm trying to talk to her, OK? Give us some time!"
     The kids  went quiet, their  cheeks red. They slunk off  to  join their
friends, sniggering with mock bravado to disguise their embarrassment.
     I got back on the phone.
     "Kelly,  this is very important. The phone might stop  soon because the
battery is running out. I want you to turn on all the gas jets on the stove.
Take the phone with you so I can hear the  gas. Go there now while I talk to
you" I heard the hiss of the bottled propane that Euan used.
     "It's very stinky, Nick."
     "That's good. Now, just walk out of the kitchen and close the door. But
be very quiet in the foyer. Remember, we don't want to wake Euan. Don't talk
to me anymore, just listen.
     Ready?"
     "OK."
     I heard the door close.
     "Nick?"
     I tried to keep calm.
     "Yes, Kelly?"
     "Can I get Jenny and Ricky to take with me, please?"
     I tried hard to keep myself in check.
     "No, Kelly, there is  no time! Just listen to me. There isn't  time for
you  to talk. I want you to count  up to three hundred in your head.  Then I
want  you  to take  a  really, really  deep  breath  and  walk back into the
kitchen. Don't run.  You  must walk. Go  into the  kitchen and pour  all the
antifreeze in the blue bottle into the green can.
     Then I want  you to walk out of the kitchen don't run! I don't want you
to wake Euan."
     If  she tripped up and hurt herself, she could get engulfed by what was
about to happen.
     "Walk out very  slowly, close the  door behind you, then go  out of the
house and close the front door, really, really gently.
     Do not go back for Jenny or Ricky."
     "But I want them please. Nick?"
     I ignored her.
     "Then  I want you  to run as fast as you can  up to the trees and hide.
When you're running you will hear a big bang and there will be a fire. Don't
stop and don't look back.
     And don't come out until I get there, no matter what happens.
     I promise I will be there soon."
     It  was  at  times  like  this  that  I was pleased  I'd  done  all the
laborious, rote learning  of mixtures and formulas for making  incendiaries.
At the time, many years ago, it had been mind-bogglingly  boring, but it had
to be done because you can't take a notebook on the job with you. I learned,
by heart, how  to make  bombs  from everyday  ingredients  and how  to  make
improvised  electrical  devices. As  clearly as even  atheists remember  the
Lord's Prayer from the time it was drummed into them at school, I remembered
the  formulas and  step-by-step instructions for  making  everything from  a
simple  incendiary like  the  one I was using to  try to kill  Euan--Mixture
Number  5--to a  bomb that I could initiate by using a  pager from the other
side of the world.
     The  phone started  bleeping urgently,  and then it just  went  dead. I
visualized the glycerine in the antifreeze working on the mixture.  In forty
or fifty seconds it would ignite. If it was damp, maybe a little longer.
     Kelly had less than a minute  to get out of the house; the  instant the
gas was ignited there  was going to  be a massive explosion and then a fire.
Hopefully, it would take Euan down, but would it take her with it?
     Please, please, please don't go after those fucking teddy bears!
     I  ran back to the car and started driving  west. First light  was just
trying to fight its way through the clouds. It was the  worst journey of my
life.
     I saw a  sign saying it was  seventy miles  to Wales. I raced along  at
warp speed for  what I  guessed was thirty miles,  then another sign told me
that Wales was sixty miles away.  I felt as if I were running on a treadmill
to nowhere and the treadmill was waist-deep in water.
     My body had calmed down  from all  the excitement and was telling me  I
was hurt. My neck was in agony. The flow  of blood had stopped, but the  eye
Simmonds had gouged was starting to swell up and affect my vision.
     Euan, the fucker. The friend I had trusted for years. It was almost too
painful to think about. I felt numb. I felt bereaved.
     In time, maybe that numbness would turn to anger or grief or some other
thing, but not yet. In my mind's eye all I could see was the look on Kelly's
face as the train left the station and the smile on Euan's.
     Where did  I go  from  here?  No fucker was going  to  move against  me
because they'd know that I  still had the files. If the  plan worked, Euan's
package would sit in the post office now that there was no one to deliver it
to. The  killing of  Simmonds would be covered  up, no matter what. If  some
zealous policeman started getting too close to the truth, he'd be removed.
     It all made  sense to me, now, that every time peace talks began, PIRA,
or  someone claiming to be  PIRA, had dropped  a soldier or  a policeman  or
bombed the mainland  UK. And  why? Because it was good business to keep  the
Troubles alive.
     There  were plenty  on  our side who  profited from  conflicts  such as
Northern Ireland and didn't want them to end. The Royal  Ulster Constabulary
is  probably the  highest-paid  police force in Europe, if not the world. If
you're  its chief constable,  it's your duty to  say that you want an end to
the war,  but  the reality is that  you've got  a massive police force under
your command and limitless amounts of resources and power.
     The  British  army doesn't want it to stop, either.  The province is  a
fantastic testing ground for equipment and training ground  for troops  and,
as with the RUC, it means the  army gets  a bigger  slice of the cake. Every
year the army has to justify its budget, and it's up against the navy, which
is asking for more funds for Trident submarines, and the air force, which is
banging on about needing to buy the Eurofighter 2000.
     With  Northern Ireland on the agenda, the  army can talk about a  "now"
commitment, an operational imperative and no  body's going to  argue against
the  need  for funds to  fight  terrorism.   British industry stood to lose
substantially from a  cease fire, too.  Major  defense  manufacturers design
equipment specifically for internal security  and  make fortunes  out of the
operational conditions. Equipment that was battle-proven in Northern Ireland
was eagerly sought after by foreign buyers.
     No  wonder  the conflict had made Britain  one  of  the  top three arms
exporters  in the  world,  with  beneficial  effects  on the UK  balance  of
payments.
     I knew now why McCann, Farrell, and Savage had had to die. Enniskillen.
The  backlash  against  PIRA.  People  signing books  of  condolence.  Irish
Americans stopping their donations.  Dialogue  and reconciliation must  have
looked a real prospect. Simmonds and his mates couldn't have that. They  had
to create martyrs to keep the pot boiling.
     Me?  I was probably just  a  very small glitch in a well-oiled machine.
Come  to  that. Northern Ireland  was probably  only one item  among many in
their  company accounts.  For all  I knew, these guys also provoked killings
and  riots in Hebron, stirred up Croats against Serbs, and even got  Kennedy
killed  because he wanted  to stop the Vietnam War. As Simmonds had said, it
was  business.  There  was  nothing I could do to  stop them.  But  I wasn't
worried about that. What was the point?
     The only thing I had achieved--perhaps--was revenge for Kev's and Pat's
deaths. That would have to be enough.
     I got off the freeway  and onto  the  secondary highway to Abergavenny.
The  rain had  stopped, but  it  was a stretch of  road notorious for repair
works. Euan's house was  about ten mi