He would write her a note, but since Lira could no longer read, it would have to be one that could be read out to her, not saying too much… Félix approached the entrance to University College Hospital, where he had read that she was, wondering how he would get past the barriers in order to speak to her. His reflection in the glass doors still seemed to wobble: Mark had dragged him to a nightclub the evening before. It had been one of those wild noisy bars, full of men, with alcoves for assignations between people escaping from their conventional daytime existence. They had got home at dawn, still far from sober. At least the hospital’s reply had been clear: Lira Kazan was no longer there, the woman said, not even looking at the file. Félix only had one card left: the journalist who had written the article. “Kings Place, 90 York Way,” he told the taxi driver.
“Charlotte MacKennedy? She’s not available,” the receptionist said. She was a tiny, heavily made-up girl sitting in the middle of a huge, light-filled hall with The Guardian – The Observer etched in giant letters on the glass partitions. She hadn’t said Charlotte was absent, so Félix indicated that he would wait. He stood around, pretending to be interested in the photographs exhibited in the entrance, and the television screens from which world events seemed to spew like volcanic lava – they were the only indication that this was a place that dealt in news and current affairs. Otherwise this clean, modern, smooth building could have been that of any random insurance company. A tide of journalists came in and out, talking fast. Félix remembered his adolescent years listening to the BBC with gratitude. Nothing escaped him. He stood there for an hour, maybe two, feeling that he had become invisible. A man and a woman came down the escalator, arguing.
“We can’t print that statement!” she said.
“We’re cornered,” he answered.
“It’s a pack of lies!”
“Rassmussen is dangerous, Charlotte, he won’t let go. And I don’t want to have to pay damages and costs to Louchsky.”
Rassmussen, Louchsky, Charlotte! The winning combination! The words he heard made Félix wonder if he might still be under the effect of the hallucinogenic drugs of the night before.
The two figures left the building. Félix fell in behind them. They were walking fast, Charlotte in very high heels. Félix could no longer hear what they were saying, and waited for them to separate, but they went into a restaurant together. It was lunchtime. Félix chose not to follow them in, but bought a sandwich and a newspaper and settled on a bench within sight of the restaurant door. He felt like a private detective on an assignment. He hardly looked up at this development surrounded by water. The canal and the boats reminded him of a barge that he had seen in a documentary on television about the City of London: a priest on board heard confessions during the lunch hour. Traders could be forgiven for all the harm they had done to the world in the time it took to eat a sandwich. It was a pity they couldn’t tape the confessions, Félix thought, as Linda Stephensen’s shrink had done. That would have been a fascinating research project all right – hearing about the complexes of those who dealt in everything and nothing. He sometimes remembered what she had said; it came to him in entire sentences, nothing that advanced the inquiry, just enough to glimpse the chaos of a muddled life:
“When I got married, my father, who was a doctor, couldn’t stop saying: ‘This is the most successful operation of my life!’ I was marrying the richest man on the island!”
Félix wouldn’t have liked Linda Stephensen alive, but now she was dead he was becoming rather fond of her.
Finally the couple reappeared and went their separate ways. Charlotte MacKennedy took out her mobile. This wasn’t the moment to approach her. She went into a supermarket. Odd, that habit women have of always wanting to do some shopping just after lunch. In the household aisle she picked up soap, face cream, shampoo, cotton wool, hairbands and a hairbrush. She was filling up a basket – she seemed to be re-equipping her entire bathroom. Félix was just about to go up to her, but hesitated, trying to order what he wanted to say to her. Now she went to the underwear section. He might start looking suspicious if he began hovering around alone among the knickers. She chose plain cotton ones, some white and some black, without lace. Félix thought she would have worn more exotic lingerie, which would have gone better with her painted nails and high-heeled shoes. He grabbed some aftershave and stood behind her at the checkout. It was his last chance – she would be out in the street, on the telephone again and back in the office if he didn’t speak now. “Excuse me, miss, I need to speak to you about Lira Kazan. It’s urgent, I’ve got something for her.”
She stiffened. “Who are you?”
“I’m not dangerous, please let me speak to you.”
Charlotte’s purchases were already past the cash desk. Félix stared at them rather than at the journalist who was trying to get away. He paid for his aftershave as she closed her bags. She looked at him. “Who are you?” she asked again. He explained what his job was, told her about the investigation and what had brought him here; he showed her his pass for the law court, and she relaxed a little and agreed to have a quick cup of coffee with him, just next door.
There, leaning over the table so he wouldn’t have to talk too loud, she listened to him recounting the details of the Nice affair, how Louchsky’s name kept reappearing and how he had stumbled on Lira’s articles on the Internet. In return she told him about how she had met Lira long ago in St Petersburg during an earlier investigation, and how she had been to see her in hospital when she had heard about the attack.
“And you haven’t had any more news of her?”
“No,” she lied. “Just a demand for a right of reply from Louchsky’s lawyer, who thought my piece was full of libellous insinuations…”
“Rassmussen.”
“Do you know him?”
“Not really, just another client on the Côte d’Azure.”
There were some awkward silences, and a certain solemnity, hardly broken by the sound of glasses and cups clinking behind the counter. Charlotte kept touching the lobes of her ears as though she had lost her earrings, or was trying to avoid the issue. They were both wary, although not necessarily of one another. The embarrassment was almost tangible – the stakes were so high, after all.
“Isn’t there anyone, a friend perhaps, who could introduce me to her?” Félix asked.
Charlotte MacKennedy shook her head. She didn’t give him Nwankwo’s name. And Félix didn’t tell her what he had. Conversation soon ran out. Finally she asked him for his details, just in case. Félix pulled out a notebook, tore out a page, and wrote down his number, asking her to get in touch if she heard anything. She did the same, pulling a fat diary out of the chaos of her handbag and handing him a card, held between red-varnished fingertips. They separated on the pavement. He watched her as she walked back towards the office, turning round occasionally to make sure he wasn’t following her. Her shopping bag swung on her arm. It was certainly heavy…
Suddenly Félix realized that the shampoo he had seen sliding by on the mat was for blondes, and Charlotte MacKennedy was a brunette! That was why the pants she had bought had been out of character. She wasn’t shopping for herself, it must be stuff for Lira. All he needed to do was wait for her to come back out of the office and then follow her. The journalist would lead him to Lira.
Two hours later Charlotte MacKennedy reappeared on the pavement. Félix had had nothing to do but simply wait all that time, brooding and puzzling, thinking about the shampoo for blondes on the mat. He realized now that he couldn’t go back to the law courts and become clerk to another judge. It was impossible, he had slipped his moorings. Charlotte crossed the road and walked a little way down. Nwankwo was waiting there in his car. He took the bag. Félix watched them from the corner of the street. They were talking through the window, which meant he was about to drive off at any minute. He would lose sight of him when he could quite clearly lead him straight to Lira. It was now or never. He would tell Nwankwo what he had with him.
He walked quickly along the pavement opposite the car, planning to cross in front of it to stop it from setting off. Charlotte only spotted him at the last minute. She opened her eyes wide, and Nwankwo turned around, alarmed. Félix put his hand in his pocket, to take out a card, or the memory stick, to show that he must be heard. What he had not foreseen was Nwankwo’s police guards who, seeing him digging into his jacket, thought he had a gun and leapt on him, forcing him to the ground.
Charlotte shouted: “Don’t hurt him, that’s the man I was just telling you about.” Nwankwo got out, and told the policemen to release him. He helped Félix up, checked that he wasn’t armed and suggested that he get into the car. Charlotte hesitated, but Nwankwo told her to go back to her office. “The less you know the better.” He set off, but only drove a few yards and parked the car a bit farther down the street. He was already regretting the presence of his police escort, who were protecting him, but also watching him.
Félix told Nwankwo everything: where he had come from, what he knew and above all about the documents in his possession. He spoke factually and precisely like the clerk that he was, but sometimes his voice broke and he seemed to be begging: let me get close to you, come with you for the next few days, join my powerlessness to yours; let me help you, we’ve both lost a lot, let’s put what we have left together. He felt no reciprocal warmth from Nwankwo, who stared at him fixedly, trying to gauge what sort of person he was.
“If what you say is true, you’re mad to wander around London alone.”
“You know where she is.”
This, from Félix, was a statement, not a question.
“Lira is blind, she can’t help you.”
“You have no idea what’s in here – thousands of names, transactions, it’s dynamite!”
“Have you got a mobile?” Nwankwo finally asked. “Turn it off and remove the battery. I’ll take you there. Lira will be happy to know that there’s someone who needs her.”