PATRICK PEARCE stood in the call box for nearly half an hour before the phone rang. It was raining lightly outside, and no queue had formed for the box. He had stood all that time with his hand holding down the cradle and the receiver to his ear, pretending to talk. When it finally rang, he released it so quickly there was only a tiny tinkle. He had not spoken with his brother since his mother’s death.
“Pat, how are you?”
“I’m grand, Michael. God, it’s good to hear your voice.” He was nearly trembling with excitement.
“Pat, do you think you’d still like to do a bit of work?”
His heart leapt. “Oh, Jesus, yes. You just tell me what.”
“How about a spot of lunch then, old boy?” His upper-class English accent was very good.
Pat laughed. “Are you sure it’s all right?”
“Ah, sure it is. It’s all in how you do it. Can you meet me in Central London in an hour?”
“Sure. Where?”
“A pub called the Grenadier. It’s in Wilton Row, just off Wilton Crescent; a dead-end mews right behind St. George’s Hospital, at Hyde Park Corner.”
The Grenadier was among the most fashionable of the West End’s pubs, full of businessmen, debutantes and affluent American tourists. Trust Michael, it wasn’t the sort of place the police might keep a watch, like the Irish pubs in south London. Pat laughed aloud when he saw his brother ambling down the mews. He was wearing striped trousers and a bowler hat and carrying an expensive brief case and a furled umbrella. They got some sandwiches and a pint and sat on a bench in the mews. It had stopped raining, and the June sunshine was warm. Pat noticed immediately that the bench commanded a full view of the approach to the pub, and that there was a walkway leading toward Hyde Park Corner. The mews was not a dead end for a man on foot. Michael would not let himself be boxed in.
“You look bloody marvelous, even in that getup,” Pat said.
“Just a bit of camouflage,” Michael chuckled, keeping his posh accent. “One can’t go about looking like a policeman’s idea of a terrorist, y’know.” He took a sip of his pint and a bite of his sandwich. “You know, your little number with Thrasher’s books did a lot better than our gelignite. We’ve had many a good laugh about that. How much did he actually run out of the country?”
“Not a penny, that I know of,” Pat said smugly. Michael’s eyebrows went up. “I cooked the whole thing.”
“How?”
“It was easy, once I got a grasp of their computer procedures. I used their own programs against them, just changed a lot of entries to establish a pattern.”
Michael looked at his brother with new respect. “That’s bloody marvelous, it really is. It’s given Thrasher fits; can’t even come into the country, from what I hear. I’m surprised there haven’t been any repercussions. Or have there?”
“I haven’t been able to find any very good work since. The Avondale thing has got about in accounting circles, so I’m done for in the City or the West End. I’ve been making ends meet by doing freelance bookkeeping for some small businesses down Streatham, mostly.”
“Is that it? Thrasher hasn’t retaliated in any other way?” Pat took a deep breath. “There was something else, but I handled it.”
“Tell me.” Michael was all business now.
“Thrasher put a goon on me. Ex-copper called MacAdam.”
Michael’s eyes widened. “Pat, did you do Blackie MacAdam?”
Pat looked at his brother evenly, his pride welling. “I did.”
Michael stiffened and began searching faces in the little crowd outside the pub. “Pat, has anybody been on you? I need to know that now.”
“Relax, Michael. They came to see me once, very politely. Didn’t even ask me in for a chat. I think somebody on the force may have known he was looking at me, but there was absolutely nothing to connect us. I looked ‘em in the eye and told ‘em I’d never heard of MacAdam, didn’t have a clue.”
“And you think they bought it?”
“I promise you, Michael, there hasn’t been so much as a hint of interest since, and that was in January. If they’d had anybody on me since, he’d have been bored to death, I can tell you, following me about to job interviews and to the pub and the like. A week after the bastard went the papers had it all wrapped as a fire to cover a burglary/murder. It was a hot blaze; took out the wine merchant downstairs and the building next door. I arranged a gas explosion. Couldn’t have been anything left but cinders.”
Michael relaxed a bit. “That’ll go down well with the lads. MacAdam was a real bother when he was on the force; hated the Irish. Pity we couldn’t have taken credit somehow.”
“Well, he won’t bother another Irishman again.”
Michael took one more careful look about, then took a new tack. “Pat, there’s something you can do for us, something bespoke for you.”
“Just tell me.”
“We’ve a couple of new people we think are going to be very useful. They’re green, just out of training, really, but they’ve got guts, and they’re ….well, one of ‘em’s smart. My bishop want’s ‘em controlled at a distance, and I reckon you’re ideal. Oh, it’s known you’re my brother, but nobody’s made us together for years, and they’ve never successfully connected you with anything. Are you game?”
“You know I am. How d’you want me to handle it?”
“Well, it’s delicate. First, I want you to transmit orders to them; second, I want you to keep tabs on them, as closely as you can.”
“You worried about them? Too green?”
“I’m worried, all right, but not because they’re green. They’re dangerous. They’ve insisted on an independence that worries me, and the bishop has gone along with it, I don’t quite know why. I think there may be some personal connection there that I don’t know about. Certainly they’re from his diocese, and I think he must have recruited them. There’s something going on there.”
“All right. How do we manage communications?”
Michael tapped the briefcase that lay on the bench between them. “There’s a nice bit of money in here. I want you to set up a business of some sort, but I don’t want you so busy that you can’t get away when you need to.”
“I could open an accountant’s office, do the same sort of thing I’m doing now. It only takes a couple of days a week.”
“That’s ideal. Don’t hire any help, though. Get a phone and a second, ex-directory number. Put an answering machine on it, one of those with a remote device. Check it twice a day, no matter where you are. Before we part today, I’ll give you some phone numbers for contact purposes. They’ll have the same numbers, if for any reason they can’t communicate with you.”
“Are we never to meet face to face?”
“On the contrary. I want them used to seeing you from time to time. If they give us too much bother, they’ll be excommunicated, and you’ll perform the ceremony, so I don’t want them uncomfortable about meeting with you.”
“I understand. What do they look like, and where will I meet them?”
“Set your meetings for places like this. Keep it upmarket. Dress well. As for what they look like, they’re sitting on the bench across the mews, just opposite.”
Pat turned and looked, being careful to keep it casual. A young couple, trendily dressed in the best Kings Road style, sat sipping their drinks. The man was thickly built, clean-shaven, his hair carefully cut. The young woman was tall, robust, with fairly short and beautifully styled auburn hair. “The girl’s a stunner,” he said quite involuntarily.
“In more ways than one,” Michael replied wryly. “She’s the smart one; very clever. He’s right under her thumb. Remember this, Pat, it’s important: if she’s taken out of the picture in any way—killed, even detained—do him immediately. He can’t be left to run loose on his own. Got that?”
Pat nodded. “I’m going to need a weapon.”
“That’s in the briefcase, too. Nice little nine-millimeter automatic and two boxes of cartridges. I expect you still carry a knife. If you get the order to excommunicate, do it without hesitation. I know it might be tough with somebody as beautiful as that, but do it.”
“I understand. If you say it’s to be done, it’ll be done.
They talked a few minutes more about communications; Michael gave him some phone numbers to memorize. “They’ll be known to you as priest and nun. You’ll be the curate. They’ve already got their first assignment. I’m sending them down to the west country. There’s a concentration of training for Her Majesty’s forces down there. I want a little havoc wrought at the Royal Marine establishment in Poole and at Plymouth, too. After that they’ll communicate with you. As soon as I’ve left, go over there and make their acquaintance briefly. Set up your own contact schedule, and leave a message for me at one of the Dublin numbers if you need me, and I’ll call you back. We’ll stick with automatic call boxes, they’re safest.” He stood up and shook hands, leaving the briefcase on the bench.
“Goodbye Michael. You’re doing fine work; I hear about it all the time; I’m proud.”
“Take care, Pat. It’s been good seeing you. I don’t expect we’ll manage it again for a while to come. Take care.”
Michael turned and walked up the footpath toward Hyde Park Corner, his bowler cocked at a jaunty angle, his umbrella resting on his shoulder in a mock military manner. Pat Pearce picked up the briefcase and walked across the mews toward the young couple, who turned to meet him.