by Mark Dawson
7
MILTON WALKED across the Golden Jubilee bridge, up Villiers Street and then took the Strand in the direction of Nelson’s Column. There was a branch of easyInternetCafe just before Trafalgar Square. He went inside, paid for an hour, and took a seat at one of several vacant workstations. Each PC was equipped with a set of headphones and a microphone, and Milton put his on, adjusting the microphone so that it was just below his mouth. He opened Skype, logged in, and searched for the username that Logan had given him. He found it and clicked that he wanted to add the name as a contact.
He waited. Nothing happened.
And then it did.
The phone icon started to buzz and Milton heard the sound of ringing.
He accepted the call.
“Hello,” she said. “Can you hear me?”
He recognised her voice at once. “I can. But I can’t see you.”
“Oh. Hold on.”
A moment passed and then a window opened out to show the feed from the webcam at the other end of the call.
“Better?” she said.
The blank screen was replaced by the feed from her webcam. She smiled, and Milton remembered why he had fallen for her so hard. Her long black hair was tied back, revealing a slender, graceful neck. Her eyes were brown, soulful, and expressive, and, as she leaned back in her chair, she raised a hand and waved to him.
“It’s been a while,” he said.
“Years. I’m sorry to contact you like I did. I didn’t know how else to find you.”
“It’s all right,” he said. “I’m pleased to see you again.”
“You were surprised, though?”
“I was.”
“What did they say?”
“That…” He paused, finding that the words didn’t come easily. “They said that you had a child.”
She smiled. “A son,” she said. “His name is James.”
“They said that you… that you told them he was mine.”
“He is.” She stopped for a moment, reaching down below the line of the camera. “Would you like to see a picture?”
Milton swallowed and cleared his throat. “Yes,” he said. “Of course.”
She brought up a smartphone. She played with it for a moment and then turned it around and held it up so that Milton could see the screen.
“Can you see it?”
He could. The photograph was of a young boy—Milton guessed that he was nine or ten—holding up a football and beaming into the camera. He had a head of thick dark hair, tousled and untidy and falling down over his forehead. His skin was a very light brown, a shade or two lighter than Jessica’s, his teeth were white and even and his eyes were a sharp blue.
“Hold on.”
She flicked through additional photographs: the boy holding a PlayStation controller; riding a bicycle along a neat and tidy street; turning to the camera in a busy shopping mall, a wide smile on his face.
“He looks like you, John.”
Milton swallowed once more, his throat dry. The noise of the Internet café faded out, and his focus narrowed on the screen and the pictures of the boy. There was a resemblance.
“John? Can you still hear me?”
“Yes,” he said. “Sorry, I… He’s a handsome lad.”
She smiled. “He’s started asking about his father. There’s only so much that I can tell him. I just say that his father didn’t know about him.”
“I didn’t,” Milton said.
“Of course. I’m not blaming you for anything, John. It was my choice. I didn’t think it would be a good idea. But I wonder, now that he is older, whether I made a mistake.”
“I wouldn’t have been a very good father,” Milton said. “And it would have been complicated. My work—”
“I know. I don’t want you to feel I’m resentful. And I don’t want any money from you. We are comfortable. He has a good school and he works hard for the things that he has.”
“They didn’t tell me—”
She cut him off. “James wanted to know whether you would come here to meet him. I said that it might not be as easy as that—that you have an important job, that you—”
“I don’t,” he corrected her with a wry smile. “A lot of things have changed since the last time you saw me.”
“You don’t work for the government?”
“Not for a long time,” he said. “But that’s a long story.”
“Perhaps you could come here and tell me about it?”
He looked at the screen and, within it, the window from which Jessica was smiling hopefully at him. He had been reluctant to speak to her, to risk opening up old feelings and long-buried memories, but now, with her familiar face in front of him, listening to her warm, reassuring voice, he found himself responding.
“When?” he said.
“You’ll come?”
He nodded. “When are you thinking?”
“I don’t have any plans.”
Neither do I, he thought. Nothing at all.
There was no point in waiting.
“How about tomorrow?” he said.
8
MILTON PUSHED up the blind and gazed out of the porthole window at London laid out below them. It was dark, and the lights of the city glittered around the dark snake of the Thames as it wound its way out to the sea. The pilot banked and continued their climb to cruising altitude. The flight was scheduled to take thirteen hours and forty-five minutes. Milton hoped to be able to sleep through most of it.
There had been no reason to delay once he had made his decision. He went into the shelter after he had spoken to Jessica and told Cathy that he needed time off for personal reasons. She was understanding, didn’t ask questions, and said that his job would be waiting for him when he came back. As she reached up for him and gave him a warm hug, Milton wondered, again, whether he was doing the right thing. He had a life here, or at least a semblance of one. The job was the anchor around which he could arrange everything else. It was a point of normality, a steadiness in an existence that had, for so long, been a vortex of uncertainty and confusion.
But then he thought of Jessica and he knew that he had no choice.
There were other things he had grown used to. He had his flat. He had a series of meetings that he had come to rely upon, the emotional bulwark that helped him deal with the burden of his guilt. The longer he went without meetings, the heavier that guilt would become and the more likely he was to resort to his old method of coping.
He resolved to find a meeting in Manila as soon as he landed.
Logan had offered to pay for his flight, but Milton did not want any more contact with him and the government than was absolutely necessary. The fact that they had found him was disturbing enough; it was a wake-up call that he had relaxed a little too much, and he would take steps to change that from now on. He would guard his privacy. He had a little money salted away, so he used it to purchase a non-stop Philippine Airlines flight from Heathrow to Manila.
Milton looked at his cheap Timex watch. It was just after ten. They would arrive mid-morning. The plane levelled out and the captain switched off the fasten seatbelts sign. The cabin crew busied themselves with the dinner service. Milton put on his sleeping mask and then slid his headphones over his ears. The steward was approaching with the drinks trolley. Milton could do without being asked if he wanted a drink or the temptation of the jangling bottles.
THE WOMAN sat three rows behind Milton on the other side of the aisle. She couldn’t have asked for a better spot: she was able to watch him without the need to move, able to observe him with the discretion that would be necessary for a mark like him. Another member of the team had followed him from the café that afternoon. They did not know what to expect, but he hadn’t been particularly careful; they had three of them on standby should he attempt any counter-surveillance techniques, but he had not. Rather, he had gone to the tube station, travelled across London to Paddington, and then taken the Heathrow Express to the airport. The woman
had picked him up as he had arrived at the departures hall. Logan had taken the precaution of booking seats on all of the direct flights to the Philippines, and it had been a simple enough matter for her to check in at the same time as he did and then follow him down to the gate.
She watched as he reclined his seat and put the eye mask over his face. This part of the operation was simple. They just wanted to know where he was and, particularly, that he was doing what he had promised to do.
The difficulty would come later.
9
THE APPROACH had been spectacular. Milton had looked out of the window as they passed over the islands that made up the Philippines, many of them marked by tall volcanoes and others garlanded with sandy crescents of beach that were as white as bone against the deep blue of the ocean. There were acres of paddy fields, vast rectangles that were separated into hundreds of uniform terraces.
They touched down on schedule and taxied to Terminal NAIA-1. Milton watched the baggage handlers fussing with the luggage as it was unloaded from the hold, and then followed the shuffling queue of passengers as they made their way down the aisle to the air bridge. He felt the warmth and humidity as he left the plane and crossed over to the terminal. The captain had announced that the temperature was already eighty degrees, and that the forecast was for ninety by the time the day was done. Milton had packed a T-shirt in his case and he stopped in the first bathroom to change into it, splashing his face with lukewarm water in an attempt to scour away the rheum of sleep. He followed the windowed alleys to the luggage reclaim and went straight through since he had only brought his carry-on with him. He passed through health control and stood before the infrared camera as a glum-looking official checked the temperatures of the arriving passengers and asked a few cursory questions about SARS and bird flu. Milton carried on, queued for immigration and finally shuffled forward to hand over his passport and arrivals card. He bought some Philippine pesos at the exchange desk and, finally, pushed through the doors into the muggy soup outside the terminal.
He waited there for a moment, watching the other travellers as they emerged onto the concourse.
He spotted a woman dressed for business, with a sheen of sweat on her skin, and went over to her.
“Hello,” he said.
She looked at him with an expression that mixed surprise with resignation.
“Tell Logan that I don’t need to be followed,” he said. “I’m here like he wanted. But if I see anyone else following me, that’ll be the end of things. I’ll just disappear. All right?”
“I-I—”
“The same goes for your friend on the train,” he said. “He was just as sloppy as you. Now—piss off and enjoy the weather.”
He took one of the yellow airport taxis and asked to be taken to the city. The driver pulled away and Milton watched through the rear window as the woman fumbled in her purse for her phone.
The driver made no effort to engage Milton in conversation, turning on the radio and resting his forearm out of the open window as they set off. Milton was fine about that. He was happy to look out of the window, remembering the occasional buildings and landmarks from his previous visits to the city.
It was a twenty-five-minute drive from the airport to the city. Milton took out his phone, waited for it to connect to the local network, and then called for an Uber to meet him at Raffles. They arrived in Makati and Milton leaned forward and told the driver to drop him off. He paid the fare, not commenting on the fact that he had grossly overcharged him, and got into the waiting black BMW.
“Makabat Guesthouse?” the driver said, consulting the booking information on his own phone.
“That’s right,” Milton said. “In Malate.”
The Uber driver was chattier, telling Milton that he used to be a driver for KFC, delivering chickens and supplies to local restaurants. He complained that he had been making five hundred pesos per day but now he made fifteen thousand a week. Milton congratulated him on his new job, but then settled back to watch out of the windows to check that he wasn’t still being followed. The driver was happy to fill the silence and all Milton had to do was make encouraging noises every now and again. In the end, the driver turned up the radio and they continued along the route in companionable silence.
HE HAD found the place on TripAdvisor before he left London and had booked a room for three nights. It was mid-range, and the reviews suggested that the rooms were clean with reliable air conditioning. It was just as advertised: small, tidy rooms, and a pleasant respite from the heat of the morning outside. Milton put his carry-on suitcase on the bed. He wrote down the address of the two o’clock meeting and ordered another Uber.
It took twenty minutes to drive to the Church of the Holy Trinity. It was a busy meeting and Milton was five minutes late. He made his way to the back of the room and sat down on a metal folding chair.
The proceedings were being conducted in Filipino, and, since Milton didn’t speak a word of the language, they were incomprehensible. The structure of the meeting was identical to what he would have expected at home, however, and, as the secretary handed over to the evening’s speaker, Milton was able to close his eyes and tried to relax.
He realised that he was nervous. It wasn’t something that he was used to feeling. Milton planned everything that he did with exacting precision, and, as much as he could, he minimised the effects of chance. Excellent preparation reduced the scope for surprises and that, in turn, gave him confidence. But the future was impossible to plan for. He had no idea what Jessica would say to him and no idea how he would feel. It made him uneasy. She had suggested that they meet in a bar, too, and that made him even more nervous. There was an old AA adage that he had always found particularly apt: if you go into a hairdresser’s, eventually you’ll get a haircut.
Milton knew himself too well: he would be tempted to drink. He would be unable to make a plan that would insulate him, and the conversation that he would have with Jessica tonight had the potential to change his life.
He concentrated on his breathing, maintaining an even rhythm, in and out, and tried to tune out the thoughts racing through his mind. He listened to the speaker, the clatter of the unfamiliar language, and tried to find his usual quiet space of calm.
10
LOGAN FOUND the bar. It was called the Lazy Lizard, and it was in Poblacion in Makati. It was hot outside, the heat pressing down on the busy streets like a dead weight. The temperature seemingly incited the drivers, who thronged the roads impatiently, and he ignored a cacophony of horns as he reversed his rental into an empty bay a hundred feet down the road from the bar. One of the drivers who had been forced to wait until the conclusion of his manoeuver opened his window and gave him the finger. Logan ignored it and walked back to the bar.
Logan had been in the city for twelve hours. Milton had flown in after him. Logan had been irritated, although not especially surprised, that Milton had made the tails who had been following him. Logan didn’t like to feel bested, but he didn’t allow it to bother him. It was temporary, and, of course, Milton had no idea what he was walking into. He would let him have his small victory.
The bar was a cheap dive that catered to tourists. It lacked any semblance of glamour, the decor resembling a hut rather than the sleek futurism of the glass and chrome establishments that were popping up elsewhere. Those places were not suitable for what Logan had in mind. He needed somewhere quieter, somewhere he could exert influence over the staff. The Lazy Lizard was perfect.
He went up to the bar. The owner was the only member of staff here today, as Logan had expected. The man was not much older than thirty-five. He had a sleeve of tattoos all the way down his right arm and long, lank, black hair. Logan sat on the stool and smiled at him until he came over to serve him.
“Hello, Rodrigo,” Logan said. He used English; he knew that the owner spoke it well.
“How do you know my name?”
“That doesn’t really matter.”
“Who are you?�
��
“You can call me Logan.”
Rodrigo looked flustered. “What do you want?”
“A drink would be a good start.”
“Sure. I—”
“What beers do you recommend?”
“We have Cerveza Negra,” he said. “Or Colt 45. It’s stronger.”
“Cerveza will be fine. In a cold glass, please.”
Rodrigo took a bottle from the fridge, popped the top, and poured it into a chilled glass. He set a napkin on the bar top and rested the glass on it. He rang up the purchase and laid the ticket next to the glass.
“Thank you,” Logan said. He raised the glass in salute and then drank a little.
The bar was quiet. Logan could tell that Rodrigo would have liked to leave him be, but there was no one else to serve. He made do with taking a cloth and wiping up a puddle of spilled beer. Logan watched. He could tell that he made the man uncomfortable.
“Do you need anything else?”
Logan picked up the napkin, folded it in half and then meticulously wiped his lips. He laid the napkin down again and rested the glass atop it.
“Can I speak frankly with you, Rodrigo?”
“What do you want to talk about?”
“Your financial situation.”
“I’m sorry,” Rodrigo said. “I don’t know who you are or what you want. You’ve got your beer. I have work to do.”
“Can I tell you what I know?” He loosened his top button and went on before the barman could react. “You’ve been open here for six months. You took a large loan from the bank to get started, but now that money is nearly all gone. How am I doing?”
Rodrigo didn’t respond; he looked confused.
Logan went on. “The rent was late last month and your landlord threatened to throw you out unless you paid. Your bank manager isn’t flexible, and you knew there was no point in asking for any more money. So you had to be creative. One of your regulars has an under-the-counter loan business and, when no other options presented themselves, you approached him. This lender—Espinosa, I think his name is—was happy to front you the cash. He encouraged you to let it ride for a month or two, but then, when you had the money and were ready to pay it off, the interest had doubled the amount that you owed.”
