by Mick Herron
Whelan bit down on the mint, and felt it crack between his teeth. For a moment, sinking heart, he thought it was the tooth that had cracked, and had to gather the pieces with his tongue, grade them bit by bit, to be sure. He almost was. It was probably just the mint. The PM was still talking:
‘This might be my last big day, you know. The wolves are gathering at the gate, if that’s even a bloody phrase. Gimball would have led the charge, but you know what? With him gone, others will come out of the woodwork. Nobody was going to make a move when he’d secured the popular vote. But now it’s anybody’s game. All anyone knows for sure is, who’s got the unpopular vote. And that would be me.’
‘You can’t know for certain,’ said Whelan, who was pretty sure that in this instance you could.
‘No, my days are numbered. But you know what? You catch these murdering swine on my watch, and that’ll do me, as swansongs go. Then I think I’ll buy a shed. Write my memoirs.’ He checked his frontage again; seemed to accept there was no way he was losing three pounds in the next thirty minutes, and nodded. ‘Interesting times, Claude. Good meeting.’ Then he left.
Whelan swallowed fragments of mint, and checked his teeth with his tongue. Not been my finest few days, he thought. Jaffrey, by now, would be lawyered up, but he’d know his career was over, his election lost. And that wasn’t much of a result, not for the folk of the West Midlands. He’d have been a good mayor, and what had got in his way hadn’t been greed or hatred or any of the myriad temptations of public office, but his love for a brother who’d have been better off incinerated by that missile. Or maybe not love: maybe loyalty. You didn’t have to love somebody to remain true to them. Who knew if the reverse also held?
As for Dennis Gimball, whatever his failings, what Whelan himself had done was unconscionable: used a harmless activity to bring pressure on the man. God knows, thought Claude: I’m one to talk. But there it was. He had a brief, and he was doing what he could to fulfil it. There’d be casualties, because there always were, but there was also a higher agenda, and it was his duty to pursue it. If he expected forgiveness from those he’d wronged, he’d not have lasted this long.
He had other problems too, of course. Sometimes, you had to make sure your own back was covered: what Diana Taverner would call London Rules.
Which meant the show trial the PM wanted wasn’t going to happen, for a start.
Whelan left the building, reaching for his phone. There’d be more armed soldiers in London’s streets this afternoon than at any time since the last war, and his job right now was to make sure they all had the same instructions. But first, he wanted a swift word with his wife. Her voice always fell on his ears like a kind of forgiveness. And he had a lot to be forgiven for right now.
They parked some miles short of their destination, and ate what food they had left: some congealing noodles from an icebox whose catch didn’t work. Danny felt a lurking foulness on his tongue, and at the same time savoured this experience: a working mouth; a body receiving nourishment. There would not be many more meals, perhaps.
Shin did not appear to feel the same way. The first mouthful, he spat into a handkerchief; the rest he left.
There were different ways of being a warrior, Danny knew. But Shin knew none of them. Shin was a coward, and deep in his belly recognised this. It was why he could not eat now. It was why he had let the girl live.
That in itself, Danny could forgive. It was an error and a betrayal, but it was a forgivable weakness to feel pity for a woman, and if this had been Shin’s only fault, Danny would have taken no pleasure in seeing him die for it. But in letting her go free Shin had put the mission at risk, and in lying about it afterwards had shown contempt for Danny and An and Chris. So when Shin died, Danny would look him straight in the eye and make sure he knew that Danny would piss on his corpse, and burn it in a ditch.
And if they survived this final assault, he would go looking for Kim, and put an end to her too. Because this had been part of their mission, and no part could be left unfinished.
An looked at his watch. ‘Four hours,’ he said. Like Danny, he had put on the same scrappy uniform he had worn at Abbotsfield; like Danny, he now carried a revolver in a holster at his waist. There would be no mingling within crowds when the hour came. They would arrive like furies, in a storm of war.
‘It sounds quiet,’ Shin said hopefully.
‘Quiet or not. We go in four hours.’
‘We should send someone out first. To make sure our approach is clear.’
‘You are tying yourself in knots,’ Danny told him. ‘You are like a dog leashed to a kennel. You bark when there are noises. You bark when there are none.’
‘If we are to succeed, we must proceed cautiously,’ Shin said. ‘And we go at my command, not yours,’ he added, looking at An.
Danny said, ‘You are scared.’
‘No more than you.’
‘I am not frightened,’ Danny said.
It was true. He was something, he wasn’t sure what – elevated, perhaps; in expectation of glory – but he wasn’t frightened. What came next, even if it included his death, would be a heroism not offered to many. He would be fulfilling the Supreme Leader’s vision, and his name would burn like an everlasting candle. Few futures had been offered to him, but this one he would seize.
Shin, though, would cower from any future more dangerous than a putrefying noodle.
‘You let the girl go,’ Danny said now.
‘I killed her.’
‘You lie.’
Shin said to An, ‘He is a fool,’ but his voice shook.
‘Did you hear that?’ Danny asked. ‘He knows I know. We all know. He let the girl go.’
‘That is enough,’ said An.
Chris said, ‘You let her go? You should not have done that.’
‘He endangered the whole mission,’ Danny said.
‘I did not endanger the mission!’ Shin shouted.
His words rang round the inside of the van, as if a stone had been thrown.
Danny said, ‘Before you let her go. Before you disobeyed your orders. Did you tell her what we planned next?’
‘I told her nothing.’
‘But you let her go.’
‘I disobeyed no orders. I am in charge!’
‘You are not worthy of command.’
‘Who are you to say—’
‘At Abbotsfield, you fired wild. You shot up the sky. You killed a chicken coop.’
‘At Abbotsfield, I did my duty,’ said Shin, his voice trembling with fury.
‘And what about today? Can we trust you today?’
‘Can we trust you?’ Shin demanded. ‘I am in charge here. When I speak, I speak for the Supreme Leader!’
Chris said, ‘I am worried that you let the girl go.’
‘Enough,’ said An.
Danny said, ‘When we set out, when we go to complete our mission. What will you do this time? Will you hide behind a dustbin? Will you throw your hands up and surrender?’
‘This will all be in my report!’ said Shin. ‘It is you who’s the traitor!’
Danny looked at An. ‘He endangers us all.’
‘I am in charge!’
‘Who is to say what he told the girl? Already they might be coming for us.’
‘You are a traitor,’ Shin told him. ‘You break ranks. You spit on the Supreme Leader himself.’
‘Enough,’ An said again.
‘Yes, enough,’ said Danny. He looked at Chris, then at An. ‘He is not to be trusted. If we are to complete our mission, we must do it without him. He will betray us all.’
‘Liar!’ screamed Shin.
An took his gun from its holster and shot Danny in the face.
Once the echo died away, he said to Shin, ‘The Supreme Leader put you in charge. To question that is to question Him.’
Shin nodded dumbly.
‘We go in four hours,’ An said, and put the gun down, and resumed eating noodles.
15
NOON COMES WITH BELLS on, because this is London, and London is a city of bells. From its heart to its ragged edges, they bisect the day in a jangle of sound: peals and tinkles and deep bass knells. They ring from steeples and clock towers, from churches and town halls, in an overlapping celebration of the everyday fact that time passes. In the heat, it might almost be possible to see their sound travel, carried on the haze that shimmers in the middle distance. And in time with the bells, other devices strike up: clocks on corners and hanging over jewellers’ premises strike the hour in their staggered fashion, all a little behind or a little ahead of the sun, but always – always – there’s one single moment when all chime together. Or that’s what it would be nice to pretend; that twice a day, around midnight and noon, the city speaks as one. But even if it were true, it would be over in a moment, and the normal cacophony re-establish itself; voices arguing, chiding, consoling and cracking jokes; begging for ice cream, for lovers to return; offering change and seeking endorsement; stumbling over each other in a constant chorus of joy and complaint, bliss and treachery; of big griefs, small sorrows, and unexpected delight. Every day is like this one: both familiar and unique. Today, like tomorrow, is always different, and always the same.
And today, London has slipped onto a war footing. Armed police on the streets are an unhappy outcome, but it seems there are prices to be paid for the common liberties London enjoys: the freedom of its citizens to walk its streets, to show their faces uncovered, to hold hands in public. Months go by without a civilian seeing a gun. But recent lessons have been harsh, and the capital’s dead, and the dead of its sister cities, are a familiar presence wherever crowds gather, so armed police are on the streets today. In the Abbey’s environs the pavements have been trammelled by metal barriers, and behind them Londoners, visitors too, are gathering to pay their respects to the Abbotsfield dead, because Abbotsfield could have been anywhere, and London is anywhere too. This is what London and its sister cities have learned: that hate crime pollutes the soul, but only the souls of those who commit it. When those who mourn stand together, their separate chimes sounding in unison if only for a moment, they remain unstained. So the people gather and wait, and the armed police officers study new arrivals, and twelve o’clock comes and goes in a welter of bells, and afternoon begins.
It was hours since anyone had put their head down. Claude Whelan was back at Regent’s Park; relieved to be at his desk, where he could at least feign some semblance of control; Di Taverner, likewise, was in situ, though roaming the hub now, looking over the shoulders of the boys and girls. She lingered longer than usual at one particular desk: a young woman’s – Josie – whose Breton-hooped T-shirt accentuated her breasts, and who had a way of blinking shyly when spoken to. The casual observer would have found it impossible to guess what Taverner was thinking, but a seasoned Lady Di-watcher would have known a mental note was being taken, information stored.
‘Sit rep,’ she said.
Josie blinked, then read from her screen. ‘The royals are due at the Abbey in fifty minutes. PM in forty. There’s been a disturbance on Great Smith Street, but it’s already over. A few drunks getting out of hand.’
Taverner said, ‘We don’t call them the royals, and we don’t call him the PM. Let’s maintain coding protocols, shall we?’
‘Sorry, ma’am.’
‘What’s our street-level status?’
‘Kestrel One’s on Millbank, Two’s on Westminster Bridge. Neither reporting anything suspicious. Three through Five are strung out along Whitehall. The crowd’s mostly subdued, they say, with a few angry outbreaks. Chanting about Dennis Gimball. Probably orchestrated by one right-wing group or another.’
That lines of connection were being drawn between the Abbotsfield massacre and the death of Dennis Gimball didn’t much surprise Taverner. Conspiracy theories bloomed at the rate of one hundred and forty characters a second.
She said, ‘Any arrests?’
‘A handful, ma’am. That we know of.’
Taverner placed her hand on the shoulder rest of Josie’s chair. It felt warm. ‘Are you keeping Mr Whelan up to speed?’
‘Yes, ma’am.’
‘Email, or …?’
‘He prefers me to step into his office.’
Taverner nodded, as if her mind was on something else entirely. ‘Tread carefully,’ she said, and returned to her room.
Kim Park, Roderick Ho’s girlfriend, was downstairs now, delivered by Flyte and Welles. On first time of asking, she’d had little to say she hadn’t already told Flyte, though her interrogation would continue for some while yet. Kim had been well aware of her rights; of how long she could be detained without charge. What she was now in the process of learning was that this only counted when she was under arrest, which she wasn’t. Legally, she’d been abducted. And the best of luck to her making an issue out of that, thought Taverner. She had at least provided identikit drawings of the terror suspects, though like every such picture Taverner had seen, the resulting images resembled automatons: batteries not included. She suspected their real-life counterparts would look little different. Terror-bots, she’d called them earlier. Those prepared to murder for their beliefs were inevitably without empathy, the human light in their eyes dimmed to nothing. She occasionally felt a little detached herself. But she’d never waged war on children.
Josie looked like she might be fair game, though. And if she was sitting on Claude’s lap while delivering her memos, she’d better be prepared to learn the meaning of collateral damage.
For a moment Taverner dimmed her own eyes. Emergencies tested the systems, her own not excluded. When this was over, she’d need to sleep for forty-eight hours. But not yet.
She turned the TV on, found a news channel. Aerial images of London filled the screen. Just ten years ago, it had looked so different: no Heron Tower, no Needle. Fold back twenty years, and you lost the Gherkin, the Eye, half the skyline. And twenty years from now, who knew; there might be monorails stretched between hundred-storey towers. But it would still be London, because that was the rule. Under the glitter and glad rags, the same heart beat.
Meanwhile, at ground level, the Met’s chief commissioner currently ruled the streets. But Di Taverner had agents out there too; Kestrels One to Five, watching, taking the city’s pulse. If an attack came, the terrorists were unlikely to be taken alive. Having agents on the scene pushed the odds a little further in that direction.
And it would soon be over either way; following which, there were other tasks in hand. Emma Flyte needed dealing with; her bagman, Devon Welles, too. The pair were confined to the Park for the duration. Taverner suspected conspiracy about seventy per cent of the time; whatever Flyte had been up to possibly fell into the cock-up category, but that was enough to come down on her hard. Slough House, too, was on her agenda. It was long since time Jackson Lamb got the message: among the bells heard today were some that tolled for him.
Protecting the Service was her top priority, now and always. Chopping away the dead limbs that threatened to choke its healthy trunk: that was good husbandry.
Up on the screen, footage of the gathering crowds was on both channels. Londoners were taking to the streets in a show of solidarity with the distant dead. It was a predictable, admirable response, and one the killers were relying on. Di Taverner hoped that, come tomorrow, there would be no more victims to remember. But it was true of every crowd that if you broke it down into its constituent parts, there would always be victims among them.
River Cartwright was in the crowd, threading through knots of people, most of them sombre, serious, aware of the day’s burden, and conscious of making a statement. We are not afraid. The talk was of Abbotsfield, Dennis Gimball’s death figuring highly too, and connections were being drawn. Every time he checked the BBC website, he expected to find his own face staring at him, alongside Coe’s. The police are seeking these men. But so far, nothing.
Twice he’d had to show his Service card to be allowed thr
ough a barrier: he didn’t remember London ever being tied this tight. But it made sense. An attack at the Abbotsfield memorial service would be more than a propaganda coup; it would be a dagger in the heart of the Establishment, even if the shooters got nowhere near the Abbey itself. Which they wouldn’t. Any armed hostile in central London right now would last seconds, no longer. Which didn’t mean he couldn’t take dozens of bystanders with him, writing headlines that would scorch their way around the world.
The snake eating its own tail …
He was exhausted, but couldn’t imagine what sleep might feel like. Every nerve inside him jangled like a landline.
He called Louisa. ‘Where are you?’
‘Storey’s Gate. You?’
‘Not far. Stay there?’
‘You asking or telling?’
‘Asking.’
‘Yeah, okay then.’
He disconnected, and headed up the street; a two-minute walk under normal circumstances, which now would take nearer ten.
Some hours before, they’d all been at Slough House. Flyte and Welles had departed, taking Kim; the slow horses were in Ho’s office, because that had become their common room, now that its regular occupant was absent. They should get rid of the furniture, River had thought; get a pinball machine. A jukebox. Not that he would have long to enjoy the amenities. That rumbling noise he could hear in the distance; that wasn’t traffic surging up London Wall. It was fate bearing down.
Catherine, who’d been reading her iPad, had said, ‘They’re expecting thousands of people. Tens of thousands. That’s what happens when there’s a tragedy. People want to show solidarity.’
‘Yeah, well, they’d be better off parking their arses at home,’ said Lamb. ‘Not like the dead are paying attention.’
‘It matters,’ she said sharply. ‘When bad things happen to the innocent, the rest of us should stand together. Otherwise we might as well live behind barricades.’
‘You know why bad things happen to good people?’ Lamb asked. ‘It’s because of all the dickheads.’
