It had crossed his mind to talk to Nikolai – Rod had suggested it too – and he had dismissed the notion. The last time he and Nikolai had talked at length had been before dinner, the day he had been discharged from the sanatorium. Troy had uttered a few words to the old man, and while he would readily concede that he was softly spoken, he had not thought himself inaudible.
‘Ah, dear boy,’ Nikolai had said. ‘I think perhaps you haff become a two-hearing-aid man.’
He was already wearing a hearing aid, the bulky batteries stretching his cardigan pocket out of shape, the black plastic receiver pinned to his waistcoat, a snaky, cream cable curling up his chest, around and into his right ear. He produced a second set from his jacket pocket. Stuck an earpiece in his left ear, fiddled with the volume and pinned a second receiver symmetrically to his waistcoat.
‘Proceed, dear boy. We haff stereo.’
When he opened the door to Troy at Albert Hall Mansions the following morning, he was still wearing two sets. The idea had taken root.
‘What brings you here, nephew? Am I dying and has no one told me?’ There was no answer Troy could or would make standing on the threshold. Nikolai ushered him in. It had changed much since the last time he was here. The room was now dominated by a huge desk, strewn with books and papers, and where the desk ended they overflowed onto lesser tables, onto chairs and cascaded down to the floor. The magnum opus, whatever it was, and he never said, had become his life. It seemed to Troy that he lived at the desk. The remains of bacon and egg congealed upon a plate perched high on a batch of manuscripts. His false teeth grinned from a tumbler between the inkwells. The living part of the living room was reduced to a chaise longue wedged between the desk and the wall and two small chairs either side of a roaring gas fire. This, plus the central heating, made for the typically stifling, overheated flat of an old person.
Nikolai resumed his seat at his desk, turned down the deafening blast of Mahler on the Third Programme. Troy stood. The only chairs not littered were the two by the fire. He’d roast if he sat there.
‘Thank God for Mahler, say I. Loud enough to get through to the deafest ear.’
‘I wanted to ask you about one of your neighbours.’
‘Which one? As if I could not guess from the look of the conspirator you wear so raggedly.’
‘Curran.’
‘Third floor back,’ said Nikolai. ‘Now, ask me your question.’
Nikolai began to shuffle papers. Troy was not at all sure he had the old man’s full attention.
‘You do know him?’
‘So, so . . .’
‘Professionally?’
‘I met him in the corridors of power from time to time.’
‘What exactly is it he does for Five?’
‘He was D1, as I recall. A good Russian speaker.’
‘Is he still D1? What do you think he does for them?’
‘Since Sir Roger Hollis saw fit to put me out to grass I have learnt nothing new, nor have I cared to. But when I knew Curran in the old days, he was many things – pimp, blackmailer, a purveyor of lies and misinformation, a rumourmonger, a . . . a . . .’
‘It’s OK. I get the picture.’
‘Do you, Freddie, do you? I cannot but think that if you did you would want nothing to do with the man. But he has crossed your path in some way, hasn’t he? What has he done?’
‘All the things you just listed.’
‘And?’
‘And murder.’
Nikolai stopped playing with his manuscript. The word did that. It was in the nature of ‘murder’ to eclipse other words and actions. He leant back in his chair, ran his fingers through the spirals of white hair that coiled out like a haircut from the Bride of Frankenstein.
‘Ach,’ he said as he was often wont. ‘Ach, ach!’
Troy pushed a sheaf of papers aside and sat on the chaise longue, a wayward spring grazing his backside. Whatever was passing through his uncle’s mind was taking its time arriving at language, any language.
‘No,’ he said at last.
‘No?’
‘Not Curran. I could fancify it by saying it is not his “style” but it is more . . . it is not . . . not his . . . not his “function”. He does not kill. They haff plenty who can kill. What skill does it take?’
Nikolai cocked his right hand and took aim at Troy, the thumb arced in lieu of a hammer, the long finger coiled round an imagined trigger.
‘You point a gun, you pull the trigger. Pouf ! Blackmail takes talent. Good blackmailers are not trained, well . . . not trained by MI5 anyway. They are made; they are shaped in their playpens, in their nurseries . . . families make blackmailers. To an organisation like ours they are priceless. They would never waste a man like Wallace Curran on the crudity of killing.’
‘Then he sent someone.’
This was to Troy the most plausible of arguments – Blood as a serving officer of Special Branch had spent much of his career at the beck and call of MI5. It was odd, very odd, for them to have sent a Branch man to carry out a hit, but it was, nonetheless, what had happened. What Troy would not believe was that they had sent Blood to carry out both murders. Therefore Curran had someone else at his beck and call, someone more subtle, less clumsy, less crazy than Percy Blood.
‘Do you propose to ask Curran yourself ?’
‘Of course,’ said Troy.
‘Then now is your chance. I heard his door close not five seconds ago.’
‘I thought you were deaf ?’
‘The vibrations, dear boy, the vibrations. I can feel this building as though I lived in the belly of a long-case clock. Every tick vibrates in the inner ear. He will pass the door any second. You have only to follow. But . . . I warn you. I would not. If I were you I would not want to mix my life with that of Wallace Curran. I would prefer it if our paths did not cross.’
‘As you said,’ said Troy, ‘they have already crossed.’
Feet were dashing down the staircase below as he left Nikolai’s flat, the old man’s voice ringing out behind him, ‘You don’t need an excuse to come and see me, you know!’
Out in the street a small man in a blue coat had his back to him, opening the door of a Riley Pathfinder.
‘Mr Curran?’ Troy said.
The man turned, hands resting on the open door of the car. He was short, as short as Troy, in heavy, black-rimmed, thick-lensed spectacles. All the same, he was recognisable. The thin, controlled version of Egg. Egg leaked and spilled. This man was contained.
Troy held up his warrant card.
‘Put it away, Commander. You may not know me, but I most certainly know you. Put it away and walk away. There is nothing you can discuss with me.’
His gaze was intense. Beyond the intimidation of words. He looked like a weasel. He did not act like one. He really did expect Troy to be stared down and walk away.
‘I have reason to believe you can help me with my enquiries.’
‘Why so formal? Why not just ask me who killed her? That is why you’re here, isn’t it? To expiate your own guilt by asking me who killed her?’
Troy kicked the car door shut on his hands. Curran moved quickly, but not quickly enough. One hand trapped in the gap, and held him by broken fingers. He screamed. Troy kept his foot against the door and pressed slowly. Curran sank to the ground, almost suspended by his fingers.
‘Fine,’ said Troy. ‘Tell me who killed her.’
‘I don’t know!’
Troy put all his weight on the car door. Curran no longer screamed; he gurgled from deep within his throat.
‘Who killed Clover Browne?’
‘I don’t bloody know. And if I did, I wouldn’t tell you!’
‘Who killed Clover Browne?’
‘You’ll regret this, Troy. Believe me, you’ll regret it.’
Troy eased back, pulled the door open and let Curran roll into the gutter. He turned onto his side, nursing his damaged hand up one armpit.
‘It wasn’t Blood. Who was it?’
It took a few seconds before Troy realised that the rasping, wheezing noise that Curran made was laughter.
‘Blood?’ he was saying. ‘Blood? Blood? You’re a fool, Troy. A complete bloody fool. If you think you’ve got a thing on me – a single damn thing – then arrest me. Go on, arrest me! Don’t expect me to make it easy for you. I won’t string myself up for your convenience. Go on, arrest me!’
Curran shoved down his throat what he had avoided thinking for days now. He had not a thing on him. The bastard was right. There was nothing they could discuss. Troy had but one question. All important and pointless. Who killed Clover Browne?
Troy kicked him once and walked on.