The man sitting across the table had come on his own, with no sign of an entourage, and had requested that Hammer do the same. That was surprising, and so was his appearance. His suit, though expensive, was too big and sat clumsily on his shoulders, which were lightly scattered with dandruff, and his glasses looked as if they hadn’t been cleaned for days. He was mousy in coloring—a little mousy generally, in fact—and somewhat stiff in his greeting, so that if Hammer hadn’t seen his photograph and read the headlines he would have found it hard to imagine what was generally held to be true, that this was the richest man in Poland. The head of the risk department of a provincial manufacturing firm, perhaps, or a tax partner in some calcified City law firm, but no ruthless entrepreneur or clear-eyed oligarch.
Still, he had to have something. Such people didn’t rise by chance.
From a cheap-looking metal case the man produced a card, slid it across the table, and, while Hammer inspected it, looked down at London, bright and jumbled below them. The view was quite something from up here, or so Hammer had been told, but he took it in calmly, almost blankly, as one might a menu or an invoice. Milek Rapp. Just the name on the card—no company, no phone number.
Hammer passed him his own card in return.
“Welcome, Mr. Rapp. Beautiful day.”
“My lawyer says I can trust you.”
His voice was deeper than Hammer had expected, and more commanding, like the sound of a tuba coming from a penny whistle. When you heard it, it was easy enough to imagine it being obeyed.
“Then you’re well advised.”
“This is a sensitive matter.”
“I don’t doubt it. Most are.”
So there would be no small talk, which was a shame; as a rule it was rather more revealing than the big talk. Rapp took a moment to consider the man in front of him, seemed to approve of what he saw, and continued. Behind the smeary lenses of his glasses his eyes were wary and quick. In the main he kept them on Hammer, but he was also checking out the details, just as Hammer was: the cut of his clothes, the lines in his face, the clues in his manner.
“How many leaks have you had, in your time?”
“From my organization? None. In twenty years. From my clients, their lawyers, hangers-on? A few.”
“This matter, no one knows about it but me.”
“Then we should be fine.”
Rapp took his glasses off, inspected the lenses, and, satisfied, put them back on his nose.
“Do you have a family, Mr. Hammer?”
“I don’t.”
“A wife?”
Hammer knew from his reading that Rapp was on his second. He shook his head. “I came close. But no.”
Rapp studied him some more, without hurry, before committing. Hammer knew this tactic: dictate the pace of a meeting and you dictated the meeting itself.
“You control your risk. This is clever.”
That wasn’t my intention, Hammer wanted to say, but he left it. Across the table Rapp clasped his hands together and Hammer saw the muscles in his forearms flex as he squeezed, hard. The dusty exterior masked a passion or two, it seemed. His fingernails were cut so close that no white showed.
“I am good with risk,” said Rapp, his tone matter-of-fact, as if the subject were cooking or some other manual skill. “I make it work for me. There is advantage in it. But not always. Not now.”
Hammer thought he knew where this was heading, and wondered whether he should save the man his discomfort and tell him that Ikertu didn’t do matrimonial work, no matter who the client. Too grubby, and too messy. But Rapp interested him, and he wanted to see how he would come at it. With a nod he encouraged him to continue.
“In one corner of my life there is currently too much risk. It is dangerous for my interests. I am hoping that you can restore the balance.”
“I’m an investigator, Mr. Rapp. I work best with specifics.”
Rapp nodded, twice. A resolution made. His hands tensed again and his eyes stayed locked on Hammer’s, transmitting a certain expectation of power.
“My wife is sleeping with a man. A young man, Russian.”
Hammer nodded in sympathy, and confirmation. He raised a hand.
“Mr. Rapp, we don’t do that kind of work. Never have.”
“You don’t know what I want you to do.”
“I can imagine. You want us to prove it’s happening. Get some evidence, get rid of the guy.”
Rapp shook his head. A brisk shake, impatient, as if Hammer might yet disappoint him.
“I have all that. No. Something else. I want you to study him, this man. Where he goes, who he calls, his e-mails, bank accounts, everything, going back as far as you can.”
“You planning on ruining him?”
“I can do that on my own. And I will. No. She gives him money. I know this. An allowance, she will say, but it is blackmail, in another form. I want to show he has done this before, with other women. That it will get worse. That as I was a business proposition to her, so she is to him.”
“You know he’s done this?”
“I have reason to believe.”
“And then what?”
Rapp’s eyes screwed a little tighter and he shook his head again, not understanding.
“What does that accomplish?” said Hammer. “Where does it get you?”
“She stops entertaining thoughts of freedom.” Rapp’s hands relaxed and separated, his voice chill. “It restores the contract. And then I can stop worrying.”
Hammer was glad he had allowed Rapp to come this far. This was a species of craziness that in all his years he hadn’t seen before, not quite in this form. One for the collection. Before he let him down he had one more question.
“Why us, Mr. Rapp? You clearly have resources.”
“Because if this comes from you she will be forced to believe it. From Isaac Hammer.”
Hammer raised an eyebrow to acknowledge the compliment.
“Well, peace of mind is important, Mr. Rapp. But I’m not sure we’re the right people, and I’m not sure you’ve thought this through. First thing, we don’t eavesdrop. Not on phones, not on e-mails. We can’t, and we won’t.”
Rapp cocked his head a fraction, as if to suggest that between men of the world there need be no pretense about such things.
“It’s a practical objection, Mr. Rapp. A lot of people would love me to put a foot wrong, and so for your benefit, and all my clients, and the couple hundred people on this floor whose livelihoods depend on me not screwing things up I try very hard not to. OK? Apart from anything else, we do things properly, I get to charge you more money.”
Hammer smiled, a little curtly.
“And we could. We could do things properly. But I don’t want to, is the thing. This kind of work I leave alone, because I don’t like it, and neither do you. Even if I do a great job, you’re never going to think fondly of me again. You’re not going to send me a Christmas card. I’m like the guy who comes to do your drains. You forget the sweet smell I leave behind and remember the stench that brought you here in the first place. Some of the stench stays on me. Now, I hate to send you to the competition, which ordinarily is what I do in these situations, because I’m a helpful guy and you have a problem that needs some help. Ordinarily, that’s what I’d do. But in this instance, I have to say I don’t agree with your strategy.”
“I didn’t come here for strategy advice, Mr. Hammer.”
Hammer smiled again, beginning to mean it. A stubborn client brought out the contrary in him. “Well, with respect, that may be your loss, Mr. Rapp.”
The quick eyes were considering again, and Hammer could tell that the conversation had reached a crisis. Even money he would leave, but if he did he wasn’t the right sort of client in any case.
Rapp didn’t do what most men would have done in such a situation. He didn’t narrow his eyes, or stroke his chin, or cross his arms, or try to establish his dominance by staring Hammer out. He just sat, and looked at Hammer, and thought. After perhaps half a minute he gave a little nod; Hammer reciprocated and went on, after a brief ceremonial pause to acknowledge the new footing of their relationship.
“Good. OK. Twenty years ago, this company was maybe a year old, I took on a case for this well-known guy, a very successful guy in entertainment. You’d know him. A big name. And he says to me, ‘I think my wife is cheating on me, and I want you to follow her and find out.’”
Rapp cocked his head again, but this time it meant something different. Is this relevant? We may have an understanding but my time is important.
“Bear with me, Mr. Rapp. I don’t enjoy this story but I think it’s something you need to hear. I tell this guy everything I’ve just told you, but I made a mistake, which was to tell him that in any case I’d have to charge him a million pounds. This was when million-pound cases weren’t so common. I shouldn’t have said it, but I thought it would end the conversation. And of course he says, fine, make it two, whatever it takes. So I have nowhere to go, and part of me is thinking, OK, this is good money, and also he’s this big guy and back then maybe I’m a little wowed by that, so we do the case. For two months we followed that poor woman everywhere she went. Team of God knows how many people. We did everything. Wired the house, the cars. We knew every step she took. No terrorist has ever been as closely watched, and I hated every minute. I have never liked a case less. And after everything, this huge operation? There was nothing going on. Not a thing. She went to the shops, she played with her kids, she had drinks with her friends. That was it. Didn’t so much as smile at another man all that time.”
Hammer paused, took a breath, nodded to himself. Rapp was still paying attention.
“I had the guy just pay me my costs, because I didn’t like myself very much by this point and didn’t want to make a profit. And a year later, less, they divorced. She met someone else and left him.”
“She knew what you had been doing?”
“No. We were spotless. Maybe he told her, but I doubt it. No. He wanted it to happen, is my guess, somewhere deep down. Or he made it impossible for it not to. Anyway, point is, some situations, you don’t need information. Information’s my business, and I believe in it, and I can see you do, too. But this guy, everything he needed to know was in his head, and in hers. He didn’t need surveillance, he needed a conversation.”
“This is what you’re saying? I should talk to my wife?”
Hammer grinned, held his arms up. “That’s what pays for all this, Mr. Rapp, advice of that caliber. Of course you should talk to your wife, but that’s not what I’m saying. What I’m saying is, take the route you’re planning and where does it get you? It doesn’t change the situation. She breaks it off with this guy, but what about the next one? Maybe he’s not a gold digger, and what then? You’ve got the same risk and no defense.”
“It is always about money.”
“Maybe the next guy’s rich.”
“He will not be as rich as me.”
That was true. Hammer had to admire the singularity of the man’s perspective.
Rapp’s brow tensed a little into a frown. He had the look of someone encountering something foreign for the first time.
“Why do you tell me this?”
“Because it’s true, and one day you might remember that. Man like you has other problems, I imagine, and advisers everywhere telling him what he wants to hear.”
Rapp pushed his glasses up his nose. Hammer felt the urge to clean them for him.
“So you do not want my business?”
Hammer smiled. “I’ve told you. It’s not business.”
Against expectation, and all the odds, Rapp smiled back. It was dry, and quick, but a smile nevertheless. Putting both hands palm down on the table, he gave Hammer one last, significant look, and stood.
“I think you are right to concentrate on your work.”
“Keeps things simple.”
“Perhaps we will talk again.”
Any time, Hammer was going to say, but he was interrupted by the phone on the table.
“Excuse me,” said Hammer.
It was Katerina, one of Hammer’s directors. “We need you in reception.”
“I’m just finishing with someone.”
“Well, finish quickly. It’s the police.”
“What do they want?”
“You. There are fifteen of them.”
He put the phone down. If there were fifteen they had come to talk about Ben. No question. Not for the first time Hammer cursed the man and his deceptions.
“My next meeting’s here,” he said, and ushered his new friend toward the door.