ELEVEN

‘SO GIVE ME one good reason why you can’t take the whole thing to the police, let them catch the guy and have him stand trial for murder,’ said Alex.

He and Dawn were sitting in the cafeteria at Thames House. Beyond the armour-plated ground-floor window, the river moved brownly and sluggishly seawards. At the end of the counter steam rose from the electric urns as the staff prepared for the four o’clock tea rush. Like everywhere else in the building, the room was stiflingly overheated.

‘Too many people would be compromised,’ answered Dawn, in the tones of one dealing with a child. ‘Surely you can see that?’

‘I can see that your Service would come out of the whole thing looking bad, yes. The press would crucify them.’

‘And your Service too,’ said Dawn patiently. ‘We made the Watchman a spy, but your lot made him a killer and it’s the killer we’re after now. We’re in this together, like it or not. If my people go down, your people go down too.’

‘It’ll come out sooner or later. These things always do.’

‘Not necessarily. No one’s seen or heard of this man Meehan for years. We find him, you chop him – finito, end of story. He’s certainly not going to be missed.’

‘You think you’ll find him?’ asked Alex quietly.

The grey eyes hardened a fraction. ‘Don’t you think we will?’

‘If he doesn’t want you to find him, he’ll go to ground somewhere.’

She raised an ironic eyebrow. ‘Somewhere that only you Special Forces boys can follow, right?’

Alex shrugged. ‘I might be able to help you with the way that he thinks. Give you an idea of the sort of place he’d look for.’

She sighed. ‘Look, we have the Service’s best psych team dealing with the way that this man thinks and our best investigators looking for him. Any suggestions would, I’m sure, be very helpful, but we do, in fact, have the matter well in hand. What we’d really like you to do is wait and, when the moment comes, move in and eliminate him.’

‘Is that really all you think we’re good for?’

‘On this occasion, I’m afraid that it’s all we need you to do.’

They sat in uncomfortable silence. Outside on the river, a succession of interlinked barges moved upstream against the current. She had no real idea, thought Alex, what she was asking him to do. What it was like to look another human being in the eye and then kill him. How, in those moments, a few seconds could stretch into infinity.

It’s all we need you to do.

A belated flicker of concern crossed her face. She frowned. She seemed to be aware of the direction his thoughts were taking. ‘It’s not up to me,’ she said. ‘I’m just here as a go-between.’

He nodded. It was as close to an apology as he was ever likely to get. ‘So when did you join the Service?’ he asked.

‘Six years ago.’ She forced a smile. ‘I answered the same advert as David Shayler, as it happens.’

‘What did it say? “Spies wanted”?’

‘It said: “Godot Isn’t Coming”.’

‘Who the hell’s Godot?’

‘A character in a Samuel Beckett play called Waiting for Godot. The other characters wait for him.’

‘And he doesn’t come?’

‘No.’

‘Sounds unmissable. So you knew this was an MI5 advert?’

‘No. But I knew it had been placed by an organisation with a bit of … sophistication to it.’

‘Right,’ said Alex. ‘Because of this Godot stuff.’

‘Exactly.’

‘We watch a fair amount of Samuel Beckett’s stuff up in Hereford. Are you glad you answered that advert?’

‘Yes.’

‘And are you free this afternoon?’

She looked at him suspiciously. ‘No. Why?’

‘When I’ve looked through the photographs and the pathology reports, I’d like to go back to Gidley’s place. There are a couple of things I need to check.’

‘I thought we’d established that you were leaving that side of things to us.’

‘Dawn, I need to see what Meehan’s exact movements were the night before last. If I’m going up against him, I have to know how he operates.’

‘I very much doubt there’ll be anything to see.’

‘That depends on what you’re looking for. Trust me, I’m not going to be wasting your time.’

She regarded him expressionlessly for a moment and nodded. ‘OK, then, but like I said, I’m tied up this afternoon. It’ll have to be tomorrow morning.’

‘I guess that’ll have to do. Tell me something off the top of your head.’

‘What?’

‘Why is Joseph Meehan murdering the MI5 officers who ran him?’

‘I heard you ask Angela Fenwick the same question. She said she didn’t know.’

‘I heard her say it. But what do you think?’

‘I think he went native, like George said.’ She shrugged. ‘Why do any terrorists do what they do? It’s an armed struggle. We’re the enemy.’

‘But why choose such an extreme method of killing people? And why take out Fenn and Gidley who, let’s face it, were pretty much at the fag-end of their careers?’

‘He killed the people he knew. To Meehan, Fenn and Gidley represented the heart of the British Establishment. As do George Widdowes and Angela Fenwick, presumably.’

Alex shook his head. ‘I don’t think he killed them for symbolic reasons. As Brit oppressors or whatever. I think he killed them for a specific reason.’

She narrowed her eyes. ‘What makes you think that you can see inside this man’s head?’

Alex shrugged. ‘We’re both soldiers. Soldiers are methodical. They believe in cause and effect. What’s the point of carrying out an elaborate, ritualistic murder that no one will ever know about? That you know will be immediately covered up?’

‘Perhaps he’s mad.’

‘Do you know something?’ said Alex. ‘For a moment there we were almost having a conversation.’

Dawn held his gaze for a moment, then reached to the floor for her briefcase. When she straightened she was her usual brisk, businesslike self. ‘As well as the photographs and reports on Fenn and Gidley I’ve got some keys for you. They’re for a top-floor flat in St George’s Square in Pimlico. You can stay there if you need to or’ – she hesitated for a fraction of a second – ‘you can make your own arrangements.’

‘Thank you,’ said Alex neutrally.

Barry Fenn, he saw, had been a weaselly, narrow-shouldered man. From the photographs, in which he was wearing bloodstained pyjamas and was sprawled half in and half out of bed, it was clear that he had been woken from sleep. According to the pathologist’s report he had struggled briefly and ineffectually before being struck on the back of the head with some sort of cosh. The six-inch nail had been hammered into his temple while he was semiconscious and his tongue, it appeared, had been hacked out as some sort of afterthought. Livid and hideous, it had been placed in the unused glass ashtray beside the bed alongside a book of matches. There was less blood than there might have been.

Looking at the photographs, Alex realised that his earlier identification with Meehan had been dangerous and stupid. Beyond their training and a similarity in age, he had nothing whatever in common with this maniac. Dawn was right: the man was a psychopathic murderer and had to be stopped.

The pathologist’s report on Craig Gidley indicated that, like Barry Fenn’s tongue, the victim’s eyes had been cut out after the fatal hammerblow had driven the nail through his temple. To Alex this confirmed that the mutilations were there for a purpose other than to cause suffering. As a message, perhaps?

But a message for whom? For MI5 as a whole? For George Widdowes or Angela Fenwick in particular? Whatever the message, it was clear that either Widdowes or Fenwick was next on the Watchman’s list.

Would he get them? Alex wondered dispassionately. Would he catch them and kill them? Forewarned and with all the protective resources of MI5 at their disposal, they would be much harder targets than Fenn and Gidley had been.

But then the Watchman was clever. He had been taught by the best – in many cases the same people who had taught Alex – and he had clearly forgotten none of it. The combination of professionalism, sadism and sheer insanity he embodied was terrifying.

What did he want? What was the man trying to achieve?

Alex stared at the photographs of Meehan as if his gaze could somehow penetrate their surface and unlock the man portrayed in them. But the more he shuffled them around, the less they seemed to reveal. Just those pale, skinned-whippet features and that watchful, guarded gaze.

He looked tough. Not in the sense of being intimidating, but in the sense of being a hard man to break. He’d duck and he’d dive but one way and another he’d keep on going. There were a thousand looking like him on the streets of Belfast – dingy, forgettable figures hunched into donkey jackets. Alex could see why he’d been such a perfect undercover man.

Would MI5 find him? Meehan would have to make a serious mistake first and there was nothing to indicate that that was going to happen. Mad he might be, but careless he clearly wasn’t.

Alex turned to the large map of Britain on the wall. Where would Meehan be hiding out? No, turn the question round. Where would he – Alex – be hiding out if he were Meehan? In a city, among the crowds? No, he’d be in danger if he revisited his old London stamping grounds. He couldn’t risk going anywhere there was an Irish community. The arm of the IRA, like its memory, was long.

Meehan would know that MI5 would leave no stone unturned in their search and that unless he had built up a completely watertight new identity they would find him. He’d have to have a new passport, driving licence, social security number – everything. Just checking in and out of bed-and-breakfast houses was not going to be enough. He’d have a base somewhere. Somewhere he could hide.

Somewhere he could plan the next killing.

Alex arrived back at Sophie’s flat shortly before seven, having arranged to meet Dawn Harding at nine the next morning. She’d pick him up, she told him, where she had dropped him off the night before – outside the Duke of York’s Headquarters in the King’s Road.

He found Sophie changing. ‘We’re going out,’ she told him, swinging round so that he could zip up the fastening of her cocktail dress. ‘One of my clients – Corday – is launching a new fragrance range and I’ve helped organise a little party for them. The perfume’s called “Guillotine” and all the women have to wear a red velvet ribbon round their necks as if they’ve been beheaded.’

‘Do you mind if I give it a miss?’ Alex asked wearily, loosening his tie. ‘I’m not really in the mood.’

‘Oh, don’t be boring, darling! I’m sure you’ve had a horrible day doing whatever secret things you’ve been doing but so have I. It’s been impossibly grim at the PR coalface. Come and drink some champagne at Corday’s expense, and then …’

‘And then?’

‘And then you can take charge of the evening. How’s that?’

Alex agreed. If Five were going to leave him twiddling his thumbs while they pursued their investigation, then he might as well enjoy himself. And he wanted to please Sophie who, after all, was putting him up. He didn’t even have to drive the next morning – Dawn would be doing that, presumably at her usual infuriating crawl. So he might as well chill out. ‘So where are we going?’

She raised her chin to tie her red velvet ribbon. ‘Hoxton Square.’

‘Where’s that?’

‘Alex, sweetie, which planet have you been living on for the last few years? Hoxton is only the most desirable quartier in London. You can barely throw a stone without braining some famous artist, model or designer. It’s celebrity city!’

‘Right, well, just introduce me as a friend of your brother’s. Say I work in security or something.’

She frowned and pouted into the mirror, checking her make-up. ‘Security’s a bit dingy-sounding, darling. Can we manage something a bit more upscale? Something dot.com, perhaps?’

‘OK. I’ll have a think.’ He rubbed his eyes. Various subconscious worries were still nagging at him. ‘I realised something dreadful today, that I’d left a rebel sentry – a boy, can’t have been much more than ten – tied to a tree in the middle of the Sierra Leone jungle a couple of days ago.’

Sophie wriggled her toes experimentally in her raw-silk shoes. ‘I know. It’s awful how forgetful one gets. Do you want to ring someone about it?’

Alex stared at her disbelievingly. ‘He’s probably dead by now, or at the very least missing an arm.’

‘Shall we go?’

As they swerved through the traffic in the silver Audi TT, with Sophie impatiently cutting up every vehicle that had the temerity to draw alongside her, Alex tried to improve his mood. Things could be worse, he told himself. He was being paid to waste time in London – an opportunity that most soldiers would give their eye-teeth for – and he was sleeping with a rich, beautiful and highly sexed girl who gave every sign of thinking he was the cat’s pyjamas. He was on his way to a party to drink champagne with said highly sexed girl, and in two or three hours they would tumble into bed and tear each other to pieces.

So what was pissing him off, exactly? Was it that he seemed to be spending his life being shuffled about by women? Alex had nothing against working with women but right now his life seemed to be run by them. In the past whenever girlfriends had started making noises about permanence and commitment, Alex had started making noises about the incompatibility of soldiering and married life. And he had meant it. He had seen his colleagues go down like ninepins, their tiny independence skewered by the demands of ratty, frustrated wives. The wives hadn’t started ratty and frustrated, but they soon got that way when they discovered that the system could only accommodate them and the kids as sideline players. As Stan Clayton had once explained to him: getting the trouble-and-strife up the duff before an overseas posting was like spitting in your beer before you went for a piss!

Seeing the results – vengeful, careworn wives, fragged-out blokes worrying about money and their families’ security from dawn till dusk – Alex had sworn to have nothing to do with any of it. As far as he was concerned the deal was that you promised nothing that you weren’t prepared to give, had a good time for as long as it lasted and got out before things turned nasty. He had a sort of honour system, which went something along the lines that if a woman made it plain from the start that she wanted marriage and kids then you didn’t waste her time. Otherwise, you went for it.

Something told him, though, that with Sophie it was going to be different. For a start he was not in control of things. He didn’t automatically call the shots, as he’d always done before. She moved easily and fluently through a world in which, if he was honest, he felt insecure. And while she respected his skills and knew that there was another, darker world in which he moved with ease and fluency, she never allowed herself to be overimpressed by him.

Ultimately, he wasn’t sure of her. This made things exciting, but it also made things … difficult.

As they swerved round a traffic island in the TT, tyres screaming, Alex told himself that he ought to take a train up to Hereford and pick up his car. Behind the wheel of the Karman-Ghia he could at least pretend that he was in control of his life. For the time being, though …

What the hell?