The Accident Man:A Novel

69

Dame Agatha Bewley was back in MI5’s headquarters at Thames House, on the north bank of the river Thames. It wasn’t excitingly new. It wasn’t impressively old. It wasn’t provocatively ugly or inspiring in its beauty. It was just there, a Department of Works project from 1929. Millions of people drove to and fro in front of it along a crowded riverside route. Not one in a thousand ever wasted their time even looking at it. As a home for domestic spies, it really couldn’t have been better.
After her breakfast at the Travellers Club, she had been driven to work in her official black Jaguar, and on the way she’d thought about Sir Perceval Wake. Now that his services were not so regularly required by his country, had he gone into business for himself? What was it Grantham had said in that meeting, straight after news of the crash had come through? Something about Wake’s genius for black operations, his instinct for their execution and consequences. Wake had always disturbed her. She didn’t feel comfortable with a man whose desire for influence was so apparent but whose sexual and emotional needs were so well-masked.
Wake was a lifelong bachelor, with no known lovers of either gender. He’d been around so long, the chances were he hadn’t been security-vetted in decades. He could be hiding some secret shame that would leave him open to blackmail. He might equally well be asexual, of course, repelled by the thought of bodily contact. But a repressed sexuality was almost as dangerous as a perverted one.
So, what had he been doing for kicks? Dame Agatha knew she’d have to be careful. Wake was still connected all the way to the top. If he caught wind of any investigation, all hell would break loose. So she kept it discreet. A team had been dispatched to keep an eye on Wake’s home, his movements, and any contacts he made. She’d been summoned to the room where the operation was being controlled at around half-past twelve. Now she was leaning over a workstation, one hand on the tabletop, the other on the back of a chair. One of her agents was sitting there, running the communications system.
A voice came over the speakerphone:
“We have two males entering the building, both white, smartly dressed. One looks to be in his fifties, gray hair, florid complexion. The other is younger, probably late thirties, short-cropped hair, carrying a briefcase. We have pictures. Mark’s just setting up the link now, should be sending them through to you any second.”
Two grainy photographs, shot long distance through a telephoto lens, appeared on the computer screen at the center of the workstation.
“I know one of them,” said Dame Agatha. “Lord Crispin Malgrave, the chairman and major shareholder of Malgrave and Company. He’s a steward of the Jockey Club, receives regular invitations to the royal box at Ascot, and has donated at least five million to the Conservative Party.”
“You’re very well-informed, Agatha,” said her deputy, Pearson Chalmers, who was standing next to her, watching the same screen.
“I should be,” she replied. “The last time Lord Malgrave joined the royal family at Ascot, he had lunch beforehand in Windsor Castle. I was sitting next to him.”
“My, you do move in high circles.”
“Not often. But Lord Crispin lives in them. Now, who’s the man with him?”
“A bodyguard?” suggested Chalmers. “He has that military look.”
“Possibly.” Dame Agatha cast a skeptical eye over the figure on the screen. “But would a bodyguard carry a briefcase? Put him through the system. See if his face jogs the computer’s memory.”
She pressed a button on the workstation and spoke into a microphone. “Keep watching. Await further orders. Good work so far.”
Dame Agatha cut the conversation short with her field agents. She was thinking about the military man standing at Wake’s front door. Was this the killer Grantham had mentioned, coming back to England on the trail of his lost girl? It was a very long shot indeed, but if Wake really was involved, then the killer would certainly want to talk to him. But where did Lord Malgrave fit in? Dame Agatha decided to wait awhile and see if she could get to the mystery man without offending too many senior members of the British establishment.
She turned back to Pearson Chalmers. “You’d better call Jack Grantham at SIS. Tell him we may have something for him. If there’s an interrogation, he’ll want to sit in.”
Chalmers raised an eyebrow. “I’m all for interservice cooperation, but isn’t that taking it a bit far?”
Dame Agatha smiled. “No. We’ve both got our necks on the line. This time, for once, we’d better stick together.”
She pressed the button again and spoke to her agents in the field. “When Sir Perceval Wake’s visitors leave, I want a tail put on Lord Malgrave. But make it discreet. As for the other man, lift him and bring him back here. I’d like a word with our mystery guest.”



70

The first things Carver noticed were the photographs. On the bookshelves, on the mantelpiece, a couple on the desk itself—everywhere pictures of the man whose room this was. He was sharing a joke with Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev, standing in a dinner jacket next to an evening-gowned Margaret Thatcher; he was drinking cocktails with JFK and Jackie by the pool at Hyannis Port, admiring the steaks on the Bush barbecue at Kennebunkport. There were dedications to “My good friend Percy” from Richard Nixon and, “Mon cher Percéval” from General Charles de Gaulle. There was even a greeting in Cyrillic script on a picture of the old Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev.
This man didn’t name-drop. He name-bombed.
Then Carver spotted a picture on a cabinet behind the desk. It must have been taken at a royal gala. The old man was standing in a reception line. He was talking to the guest of honor. She was wearing a long blue dress, and a diamond tiara was pinned in her feathered blond hair. The inscription at the bottom, written in a rounded, girlish hand, read: “Thank you so much for those wise words of advice!” The “so” had been underlined. Twice.
Unbelievable. The old boy had just had the princess killed, but he still wanted the world to know that they’d been pals.
Perhaps he thought they still were. Sir Perceval Wake struck Carver as the kind of man who believes that reality is whatever he says it is, whose lies are convincing because he genuinely believes them to be true. He still believed, for example, that he could call the shots. His tame commander was bobbing about in the Channel with his head blown away. His troops were filling up the morgues of Paris. The Russians clearly reckoned they had him under control. But in Wake’s mind, he was the chairman, and he was still the boss.
It still worked, for some people. When they’d arrived, a secretary had told Malgrave that the chairman wanted to see Carver alone. He’d been asked to wait outside the office. Malgrave had obeyed at once. If anything, he’d looked relieved.
Carver was asked to leave his case and gun with the secretary. He complied, then went into the office.
“You’ve got nerve coming here, Carver,” Wake said, as if his arrogance alone were enough to keep a killer at bay.
“Who’s the Russian?” asked Carver.
“Which particular Russian did you have in mind? As you can see”—Wake waved an arm airily at the walls—”I’ve known quite a few.”
“Really?” said Carver, walking up to a bookshelf and peering at the pictures in the silver, wood, and leather frames. “Which ones are the Russians, then?”
“Well,” said Wake, “let’s see now.” He rose from behind the desk and came over to where Carver was standing. He searched among the rows of happy snapshots. “Ah yes, that’s Nikita Khrush—”
Carver swung around to face Wake and jabbed the first and middle fingers of his right hand into the old man’s eyes, as hard and fast as the fangs of a snake. The old man yelped and bent double, his head in his hands. Carver grabbed Wake’s jaw and pulled it upward till their eyes met. He kept his grip tight and repeated, “Who’s the Russian?”
Wake looked up at him, blinking back tears. “Can’t tell you,” he said. “Just can’t . . .”
Carver didn’t have time to waste. He wrapped his right arm around Wake’s neck, standing behind him, his mouth by Wake’s right ear, the two men clasped in a warped intimacy. Then he started tightening.
“Who’s . . . the . . . Russian?” he hissed.
Wake’s hands flapped helplessly. His head rocked back and forth and his chest heaved as he fought for air. It occurred to Carver that he might be going too far. The old man’s heart might give out before he could talk. When he heard a croaking sound in Wake’s throat, he eased his arm a fraction. Wake took a ragged breath.
“Zhukovski,” he gasped. “Yuri Zhukovksi.”
“Who’s he?”
“One of the oligarchs, the men who own Russia. He’s got paper mills, aluminum smelters, armaments factories, assets everywhere.”
Carver frowned, “I thought the state still controlled all weapons manufacturing.”
“It does. But Zhukovski is a middleman. He finds buyers, collects payments in dollars, and passes it on to the Kremlin in rubles, taking a cut along the way.”
“Nice business.”
“That’s not all,” said Wake, relishing the small sense of control that his knowledge provided. “Back in Soviet times, many factories had parallel, black-market production lines, controlled by local party chiefs and gangsters. Those lines still exist. The armaments industry is no exception.”
“And oligarchs like Zhukovski have taken over from the gangsters?”
Wake attempted a superior, if somewhat battered smile. “Do you seriously think there’s a difference?”
“But what’s his interest in the princess?”
“You’re a bright young man, you work that out. He was prepared to pay millions to get rid of her. It was his idea.”
“And you agreed. Why?”
“Long story, goes right back to the old days. . . . I had no choice. . . .”
Carver pulled his arm away from Wake’s throat, then shoved him back against the bookcase, pinning him there. “What exactly did Zhukovski do in the old days, then?” he asked.
“He worked for the State.”
“Everyone worked for the State. That’s what communism meant. What part of the State?’
Wake grimaced. “Dzerzhinsky Square.”
Carver understood. Dzerzhinsky Square was the headquarters of the KGB. So Zhukovski’s power over Wake went all the way back to the cold war days. The old bastard had probably been playing for the other side, just another one of Britain’s band of upper-class traitors. Zhukovski would have known and used the information as leverage. But that was ancient history. Carver had more important issues to deal with in the here and now.
“Has he got the girl?”
“I believe so.”
“Well, get on the phone and call him for me, then.”
Carver stepped back. Wake pushed himself away from the bookcase. It took him a second or two to find his balance, then he staggered back to his desk. He collapsed into his chair.
“You don’t believe in social niceties, do you?”
“Not when I’m working. Not when there are lives at stake.”
“You think you can actually save that girl? Ha!” The laugh came out as a bitter croak. “You don’t know who you’re dealing with.”
“Nor does he. Start dialing.”
Wake picked up his telephone and spoke to his secretary, trying to keep his breathing even and the pain out of his voice. “Please get me Mr. Zhukovski. I suggest you try his mobile number first.”
A few seconds later, the telephone rang. Wake answered it. He put on a fine performance. “Well,” thought Carver, “the chairman was hardly going to let this paymaster know that his whole operation was falling apart.”
“Yuri, my dear chap. . . . Yes, it’s good to speak to you too. I have someone here who wants to talk to you. His name is Samuel Carver.”
Wake held out the phone. Carver grabbed it.
“Have you got her?”
There was silence for a moment on the other end of the line.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Carver. My name is Yuri Zhukovski.”
‘So, we’ve been introduced,” said Carver. “Now prove that she’s still alive.”
“Of course,” said Zhukovski.
Carver heard the sound of scuffled footsteps, then Zhukovski said, “As you requested . . .” and he heard an unmistakable voice cry, “Carver! Don’t—” Then there was a slap, a muffled female cry of pain, and more scuffling as she was dragged away.
Zhukovski returned to the phone as if nothing had happened, his tone as even as before. “So, Miss Petrova is in my hands. To be frank, I had expected you to contact me sooner. I know all about your adventures with Monsieur Leclerc in Geneva.” He let out a contemplative sigh. “I hope you enjoyed watching Petrova at work. I always used to. In any case, I take it you want her.”
“Of course.”
“Very well, what will you offer me in exchange? Please bear in mind that I require a high price. My men wish to let her know what they think of her treachery. I need hardly describe what that will entail. If you want the woman, you must give me a very good reason for denying them their amusement.”
“The computer,” said Carver. “I have the laptop on which Saturday night’s operation was planned and controlled. The firewalls are down. The files have been decrypted. And the man who had it was very efficient. He kept records of every order, every transaction, every detail of the project.”
He was trying to work out how far to take the bluff. He had nothing in his hand, but he didn’t have an option. He had to go all-in.
“This man did some digging of his own,” Carver continued. “He must have had a suspicious nature. Two people he’d never heard of were dumped on him. He wanted to know who they were, where they were getting their orders. He followed the trail all the way back to Moscow. Trust me, Zhukovski, you need that computer. You certainly don’t want me to keep it.”
“What’s to stop you from copying the hard drive?” the Russian asked.
“What’s to stop you from killing the girl and taking the computer anyway?” Carver retorted. “But you want to get on with your business, I want to get on with my life. Neither of us has any interest in seeing any of this go public. Let’s just do the trade and be done.”
“Very well, be at the main entrance of the Palace Hotel, Gstaad, Switzerland, at seven p.m. this evening, with your precious computer.”
“That’s less than five hours from now,” snapped Carver.
“Yes,” the Russian agreed, “it is a tight schedule. But if you start now and do not waste time—for example, by trying to double-cross me in any way—it should be possible for you to make it. And of course, you will come alone and unarmed. I do not need to explain what will happen if you break either of those conditions. Beyond that, I make no promises. If you can convince me that you have something to offer, perhaps I will let you take the girl. If not, well, my people feel as strongly about you as they do about her.”
The line went dead. Carver handed the phone back to Wake.
“Call your secretary,” he said. “I need to get on an afternoon flight to Zurich or Geneva. Now.”
There was only one flight that could possibly get him to Switzerland in time to make the deadline, and even that would be tight. The plane left Gatwick Airport, roughly thirty miles away to the south of London, at 2:50. He should be checking in now. It got in at 5:20 local time, which would leave him an hour and forty minutes to get through passport and-customs control, meet up with Thor Larsson, pick up the computer, and drive 150 kilometers to Gstaad.
By any rational analysis, Carver didn’t stand a chance. But if he ran flat-out to Victoria station and caught the next airport express; if there were no delays in London’s notoriously inefficient train system; if he could pick up his ticket and dash to the gate; if the plane was on schedule and the customs quick; if Larsson’s Volvo had full tanks and the roads were clear . . . well, maybe he could make it. Just.
He put the handset back on the receiver. Wake was still sitting, unmoving, behind his desk, drained of animation.
“I suppose you’re going to kill me now,” he said.
“I’d love to, old boy,” said Samuel Carver. “But I really haven’t got the time.”



71

They caught Carver as he sprinted down Eccleston Street, just outside an Italian restaurant. He was going at full pelt, jinking between pedestrians like a rugby player evading tackles, his concentration focused on getting his exhausted body the best part of a mile through a crowded city in seven minutes flat. The only other thought on his mind, the one that was giving him the energy to keep going, was the nagging fear of what was happening to Alix, and what might be done to her if he did not make that evening deadline.
So he didn’t notice the black Ford Mondeo that dropped one passenger off behind him, sped up the street, and deposited another two some fifty yards ahead before coming to rest double-parked by the curb. The first he knew of any of it was when a heavily built man in a black donkey jacket stepped sideways right into his path, bodychecking him.
Carver was sent sprawling onto the pavement, the breath knocked from his lungs. Instantly, the other two men joined their pal in the donkey jacket, picked Carver up, dragged him to the car, and threw him into the back. By the time he woke up to what was happening, the doors on both sides of him had been closed, there were guns pointed at him left and right, and a tough-looking bastard in a Chelsea Football Club sweatshirt was holding out a pair of cuffs.
Carver cursed his carelessness, his stupidity, and the fatigue that had caused both failings. The kidnapping had been handled with practiced precision. But no matter how good the people who’d grabbed him had been, he should have been paying attention, he should have seen them coming.
He wondered whether Percy Wake had sold him out, but he couldn’t work out why. The old man must have known that if Carver went down, he’d be dragged down too. Maybe his Whitehall connections were so strong, he thought he couldn’t be touched.
Or was there another possibility? Maybe this had nothing to do with Wake. Carver looked at the two men sitting next to him in the back of the Mondeo, and the other two in the front. They were calm. They hadn’t said a word apart from a quick radio message, indicating that they’d got their man and they’d be back within five minutes. They didn’t act like criminals of any kind. They didn’t look tense, and they weren’t screaming threats or smacking him around unnecessarily.
Carver thought about the organizations based within five minutes of the Vauxhall Bridge Road that had well-trained men, capable of seizing a dangerous man in broad daylight, right in the middle of London. There were three possibilities. It was just a matter of where the driver went next.
He didn’t make the early left that would take them to New Scotland Yard. So it wasn’t the cops. When they made their way down toward the river Thames, he didn’t go straight over Vauxhall Bridge, so that eliminated MI6. Instead, he turned left onto Millbank and drove along the river till he arrived at the big pale gray building with its castiron ornamental lamps and decorative statues dotting the bland facade like hopeful dabs of makeup on the face of an unattractive woman.
Now Carver knew who’d taken him.


72

It was hardly a formal interrogation. They were in a regular office, rather than an interview room. There was no tape machine or video camera. This wasn’t a conversation anyone wanted on record.
“What a very complicated man you are,” said Dame Agatha Bewley, casting an eye over several sheets of paper and a series of photographs bundled in a plain brown folder. “Your adoptive parents raised you as Paul Jackson—their surname and the one under which you served in the royal marines and special boat squadron. You were awarded a Military Cross and three Queen’s Commendations for Bravery, as well as numerous minor awards and campaign honors. A very distinguished career—I congratulate you.
“Your birth name was Carver. That, of course, is your professional identity today. The passports found in your possession, however, make no reference to Jackson or Carver. They name you as a South African called Vandervart, a Canadian called Erikson, and a New Zealander, James Conway Murray. That’s odd, because not one of these gentlemen has entered the United Kingdom at any time in the past month. Yet here you are, large as life. And here”—she picked up a sheet of fax paper from the table in front of her—”is a reservation on the two fifty from Gatwick to Geneva in the name of Mr. Murray. Interesting. Do you go to Geneva a lot? Were you there on Monday? Do you, perhaps, own property there?”
“I’d love to help, but I’ve got a plane to catch,” said Carver, trying not to display the anxiety and tension ripping through his guts and grasping at his throat. There was a clock on the wall. It had a red second hand that swept around the dial, pulling Alix farther away from him with every completed rotation.
“Dashing off to rescue your Russian girlfriend, are you? The KGB tart?” Grantham spoke without any of Dame Agatha’s pretense of polite, civilized inquiry. He was playing the bad cop.
Looking at him, Carver wondered whether it was really his style. Grantham could handle himself, that much was obvious. But he didn’t have the oppressive reek of excess testosterone that oozes like rank body odor from the kind of man who likes to throw his weight around. Grantham’s natural instinct would always be to use a stiletto rather than an ax, a sniper’s rifle rather than a blunderbuss. He wasn’t convincing as a bully.
“Miss Petrova,” Grantham went on. “Let’s talk about her. Let’s discuss what the two of you were doing in Paris on Saturday night.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Carver.
“I’m talking about the murder of the Princess of Wales.”
“Murder? It said on the news it was an accident. The driver was drunk. He was driving too fast. An accident.”
Grantham got up from his seat, walked around to where Carver was sitting, and bent down till his mouth was right by Carver’s ear.
“Don’t piss around, Carver. You’re just a squalid, loathsome murderer. You don’t care about anyone. If the money’s right, you’ll kill them in cold blood.”
Carver looked at him and smiled. “That’s a nice pen you’ve got in your jacket pocket,” he said, as if he were paying a compliment.
Grantham looked down, puzzled. His jacket was hanging open. There was a gold-capped Waterman in the right-hand inside chest pocket.
“You’ve seen my service record,” Carver continued. “Forget the handcuffs, I could have stuck that pen in your throat, straight through the carotid artery, at any time during your moving little speech.” He waited a beat, then added wearily, “But I didn’t, did I?”
Grantham stood up, straightened his neck, and buttoned his jacket. He looked down at Carver, opened his mouth to say something, then changed his mind and stalked back around the table to his chair.
The second hand swept past twelve once again.
“Now . . .” Carver looked across the table at Dame Agatha. “You operate according to the laws of the United Kingdom.”
It was a statement of fact, not a question. She nodded in agreement.
“So a man is innocent until he is proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. That proof requires evidence—witnesses, forensics, a weapon. Is there any evidence whatever linking me to the death of the princess?”
This time it was Dame Agatha’s turn to stay silent.
“I thought not,” said Carver. “And even if there was, there’s never going to be a trial, not of me or anyone else. No one wants it. Everyone’s happy with the accident story. So there’s just one thing I want to say. I swore an oath to serve Her Majesty the Queen when I joined the royal marines. I took that oath seriously. I consider myself bound by it still. Do you understand me?”
Dame Agatha assessed the man in front of her through shrewd, narrowed eyes then said, “Yes, I believe I do.”
“Does the chimp?” asked Carver.
Grantham was breathing heavily. His anger wasn’t an act anymore. He was barely in control of his temper. Dame Agatha laid a hand on his arm, “Don’t let him provoke you,” she said, almost maternally, as if preventing a fight between two squabbling sons.
Then she spoke to Carver. “As you say, you have been very well-trained. You are familiar with covert operations. Let us imagine, purely for the sake of argument, that the tragic events in Paris were not an accident. Suppose foul play were involved. Why don’t you tell me, purely hypothetically, what you think might have happened?”
Carver shrugged. Fighting these people hadn’t achieved much. The only remote hope he had of getting out of this interview room anytime soon was to cooperate, as fully and quickly as possible.
“Well, if I were planning that operation, I’d want someone really good to do the job. Problem: No one reputable would knowingly accept it. Only a psycho would get a kick out of killing the world’s best-loved woman. But a nutcase like that would be too unreliable. So to get someone good, you’d need misdirection. You’d feed them a pile of crap about taking out a car carrying, say, a radical Islamic terrorist planning a major atrocity. Because that would seem like a job worth doing.”
“Yes,” said Dame Agatha. “I can see that.”
“Now you’ve got another problem. If this professional ever finds out what he’s really done, he’s going to be seriously pissed off. No one likes being lied to, right? So you’ve got to kill him before he knows what’s really happened.”
“A double cutout,” said Grantham. “Eliminate your own operative.”
“You got it,” said Carver. “But if the man’s any good, he might get away. He might do serious damage to the people who’ve been after him. And he might protect himself by, say, taking a computer that has details of the entire operation stored on it and putting that computer somewhere safe, so that if any harm comes to him, the computer’s contents can be made public.
“That’s the sort of thing that might happen. You know, hypothetically. Now, can I catch my plane?”
“Not yet,” said Grantham. “There’s something else. I lost two of my agents in Geneva.”
“I’m sorry about that. But I had nothing to do with their deaths.”
“I know,” said Grantham.
“So you’ll also know that the man who killed them was a Russian named Grigori Kursk. He was working for another Russian, Yuri Zhukovski. And on Zhukovski’s orders, he abducted what you called ‘the KGB tart.’ Her name is Alexandra Petrova. And yes, she’s the reason I’m flying to Switzerland.”
“How do you plan to get her back?” asked Dame Agatha.
“An exchange: her life for my computer.” He smiled. “My hypothetical computer.”
“And you trust this man?” Grantham did not bother to keep the disbelief out of his voice.
“Of course not,” said Carver. “But I trust myself. I can cope.”
“That’s not all, though, is it?” said Dame Agatha, thoughtfully. “You took a woman’s life, whether you intended to or not. Let’s not pretend otherwise. Now you want to save another woman’s life, even if you lose yours in the process. Some sort of redemption, isn’t that it?”
“If you say so. I’d rather think of it as a standard recovery mission. But I can’t complete it unless I catch my plane.”
“Don’t worry about that,” said Dame Agatha. “It can always develop engine problems and leave a little bit late. Happens all the time.”
Carver looked from one spy to the other. “So you’re letting me go. Why?”
Dame Agatha spoke first. “As you said, MI5 operates by the laws of the land. And you’re quite right, no one wants a trial. We could kill you, of course, outside the law. But that would be problematic. These things are hard to keep under wraps. Sooner or later, someone always talks. So we’re prepared to be accommodating . . . if you do a favor in return.”
“Such as?”
“Tell us what you know about the people who planned the assassination.”
“Were you watching Percy Wake’s house?”
“Yes.”
“Well then, you saw me go in there with Lord Malgrave. Start with them. Ask yourself how a former KGB agent like Zhukovski ever knew a British intelligence asset like Wake, how he had enough power over him to order a job like this. And call the coast guard. Check if they’ve found a body floating in the Channel—a bloke with a great big, smoking hole in his face. He used to be Lieutenant-Colonel Quentin Trench, once of the royal marines. He ran the operational side of the group.”
Dame Agatha jotted down a couple of notes on a leather bound pad. Then she asked, “So what was the reason for Paris?”
“Wake told his people it was vital to preserve the monarchy.”
“Yes, he said the same to me, at length,” said Grantham. His manner was calmer now, his self-control restored. But there was still an edge of hostility in his voice.
“That’s not why he ordered the hit, though,” Carver continued. “The whole thing was bought and paid for by Zhukovski. Does he give a toss about the fate of the British monarchy? I don’t think so.”
Grantham frowned. “So what was his motive?”
“Well, I reckon Zhukovski paid the consortium several million pounds. He’s a businessman. He must have thought he could turn a profit.”
“How?”
“Look at the guy’s interests. Zhukovski’s a player in the Russian arms trade. Well, I’m not big on the royals. But even I saw the princess on TV, talking to all those kids with their arms and legs blown off.”
Grantham frowned. “What are you getting at?”
“Land mines. Russia’s one of the world’s major producers of land mines, and mines are one of the world’s most tradable commodities. They’re tiny, weigh nothing, and they’re made of plastic. You can shift them as easily as cigarettes, and everybody wants them. Governments, terrorists, good guys, bad guys—everyone needs land mines. And what do they cost to produce—fifty quid each?”
“More like twenty-five,” said Grantham.
“And what do they sell for?”
“On the black market, around two hundred pounds.”
“Well then,” said Carver, “there’s your motive. Land mines are a billion-dollar business. But they’re also evil little buggers. So plenty of people want the business shut down. They start antimine campaigns . . .”
“I know. I’ve got the files on them,” murmured Dame Agatha, wryly.
“But those campaigns never got anywhere because politicians don’t care about mutilated kids in Africa or Kosovo,” Carver went on. “Not until the world’s most photogenic female turns up and starts cuddling babies. Then they take one look at the opinion polls and suddenly everyone’s drafting international treaties against land mines. That’s very bad for a man who makes the bloody things. Suddenly people don’t want to buy his products. All those billions are disappearing right in front of his eyes. So what does Zhukovski do? We know he has no problem with taking human lives. He wouldn’t make land mines if he did. So he spends a few million to make the problem go away. You could call it a motive. To him, it’s just a sensible investment.”
Dame Agatha tapped her pen against the tabletop. “Yes, that’s a theory.”
“Can you think of a better one?” asked Carver.
“No,” said Dame Agatha. “But I don’t have to. I can say it was an accident.”
“Okay then, anything else? I need to be on my way.”
“Yes,” said Grantham. “If we let you walk out of this building, don’t think you’ve got away with anything. Dame Agatha may have her scruples, but I’m not so bothered by the idea of an execution. I’d shoot you right now and not think twice about it.”
“Why don’t you, then?”
“Because I’d rather own you. You have a debt against your name. A debt that can never be repaid. What you did cannot be undone. But you can make . . . let’s call them reparations. You can do things for me, for your country. If you get killed along the way, tough luck, I couldn’t care less. If you succeed, well, you’ve done some good to set against the harm. So there it is. I have you taken out to some landfill site, shot in the back of the head, and buried under several thousand tons of garbage, or you go to work. . . .”
Grantham paused and looked Carver in the eye. Then, quite quietly, with just a twist of irony in his voice, he added, “Now who’s the chimp?”
Carver nodded, taking the shot. He’d started the pissing contest, Grantham was entitled to piss back. And he seemed like a decent bloke, underneath. Carver wondered what their professional relationship might have been if he’d stayed in the SBS: the soldier and the spook, both on the same side, both roughly the same age and with comparable ranks. They’d have worked pretty well together. It would be very different now.
“Okay,” he said. “Suppose I accept these terms. What’s the first job?”
“Zhukovski, obviously, but not because I care about you rushing off to rescue Moscow’s very own Mata Hari. You don’t strike me as a knight in shining armor. All you really care about is getting the Russian before he gets you. So get him. And get his sidekick Kursk. You’ll be doing us a favor.”
“Don’t suppose I get any backup,” said Carver.
“You must be joking.”
“Didn’t think so. What if I succeed?”
“Then you live to fight another day. Under the same terms as before. There’s no shortage of landfills.”
There was silence in the room. Then Grantham spoke again, a new note of conciliation in his voice. “Look, you used to be a good man, Carver. You did good work. This is your chance to do good work again. It won’t be public. There won’t be any medals. But you’ll know. . . .”
Carver weighed Grantham’s words. He was offering him a chance at redemption, just as Dame Agatha had done. Looked like there’d be a lot of redeeming going on. That was probably just as well, all things considered.
“Don’t bother calling the airport,” he told Dame Agatha. “That plane can leave without me.”
She looked surprised. “Are you declining our offer?”
“No, but I need a flight that gets me there faster. So, if it doesn’t sound too much like backup, I need the use of your phone.”
Dame Agatha pushed it across the table. Carver dialed the operator.
“Get me Platinum Private Aviation. They’re at Biggin Hill. . . .” He held a hand over the mouthpiece and said to Dame Agatha, “Also, I need my case back and everything in it: the gun, the passports, the video camera, and the money. Don’t worry, I won’t shoot.”
Grantham drew a gun from his own shoulder holster and pointed it at Carver. “Just in case you change your mind.”
Dame Agatha stepped outside the office. A moment later the door opened and she returned, accompanied by a secretary carrying the case. Carver gestured at her to bring it over. He was already talking to the charter jet company.
“You’re in luck,” said a friendly, efficient voice on the other end of the line. In British aviation, as in British medicine, it was amazing how much more helpful people became the moment you decided to go private. “We’ve got a Learjet 45 inbound from Nice. The crew overnighted in France, so they can still get you to Switzerland and back within their time limit for the day. I’d suggest flying into Sion. It’s a much smaller field than Geneva or Zurich, but closer to Gstaad: just a fifteen-minute helicopter ride across the mountains. Don’t worry, we’ll sort that out for you. Meanwhile, we’ll get the plane refueled, flight-planned, and ready to leave as soon as we can. Should have you on the ground at Sion in a little under three hours.”
“Great,” said Carver.
“Happy to help,” said the voice. “That will be 5,546 pounds, inclusive of all taxes and the helicopter charter at Sion. Can you give me a credit card?”
“Yes,” said Carver. “It’s an Amex, name of James C. Murray. . . .”
After completed the booking, Carver told the two spies, “Right, I’ll be on my way.”
Dame Agatha watched him leave the room, then turned to her colleague from MI6. “You didn’t tell him about the girl.”
Grantham put his gun away. “No.”
“I think you’re wrong about his feelings for her, you know.”
“Well in that case, he’s wasting his time.”
“But we win, whatever happens,” said Dame Agatha.
“Yes,” said Grantham matter-of-factly. “That’s the general idea.”
It was now 2:40 p.m. in London, an hour later in Switzerland. There were just under five hundred miles between London and Gstaad, and Carver had two hundred minutes in which to complete them. Up on the wall, the clock continued its measured, relentless progress.



73

Sion airport was laid out lengthways along a valley between two lines of mountains. The valley was narrow and the runway shared the space with a freeway, the two strips of tarmac running dead straight, side by side, barely two hundred meters apart. As he watched Carver’s Learjet land, Thor Larsson wondered how many times pilots got the two surfaces confused and landed on the A9 expressway.
When Carver got off the plane, Larsson was waiting for him with the computer.
“Here it is,” he said. “The, er, special adaptation has been made as you requested. And, aah . . .”
Larsson looked away, his eyes fixed on the distant mountaintops.
“What is it?” Carver asked.
“I finally managed to open some of the files. I know what all this is about, what you did.”
Carver nodded. “Okay. Did you also find out what they told me I was doing? Does the name Ramzi Hakim Narwaz mean anything to you?”
A diffident smile crossed Larsson’s face. “Yeah, I know about him.”
“And?”
“And I don’t blame you for what happened. You were double-crossed. So, anyway . . . you need to know the password. There are eight characters: T r 2 z l o t G. The first T and the last G are capital letters. This is very important. The password is case sensitive.”
“How the hell am I going to remember that?” asked Carver.
“Simple, I have created an image for you, like in a picture book. There r 2 zebras lying on the Grass. Capital ‘T,’ capital ‘G.’ Do you get it?”
Carver gave an impatient snort, but Larsson persisted.
“Come on, repeat after me: There r 2 zebras lying on the Grass.”
“Jesus wept, I haven’t got time. I can’t afford to be late.”
“You can’t afford to forget this, either. The system gives you three chances to get the password right. If you fail, a virus is released that wipes the entire hard drive clean. There’ll be nothing left at all.”
Carver did as he was told—five repetitions. Larsson handed over the laptop in its case, which Carver slung across his chest, from one shoulder to the opposite hip.
“Thanks,” he said. “My chopper’s across the airfield. Walk with me. We can talk on the way.”
It was just after half past six local time and the sun was just beginning to dip behind the highest of the peaks to the west, casting jagged black shadows diagonally across the valley as Carver strode across the apron to the helicopter pad. He had a little under thirty minutes to get to the Palace Hotel. The weather looked clear. Allow five minutes to take off, fifteen to get to Gstaad, and another five to get from the chopper to the rendezvous at the other end. It should just be possible.
“How much did you manage to retrieve?” he asked Larsson.
“Only a small proportion of what’s on there, but enough to know that Max had logged every detail of that operation, and a lot more besides. It looks like he was making himself a safety net in case anything went wrong.”
“Anything about the Russians?”
“Kursk and Alix are mentioned in a couple of e-mails. But nothing to link them to Zhukovski yet.”
“Damn!” Carver thought for a moment. “Never mind. That’s not necessarily a deal breaker. Anyone with proper investigative powers would be able to find a link. The point is, Zhukovski can’t afford to have those leads out in the open. You’ve taken a copy, right?”
“Of course.”
“Good, that’s part of my safety net. Here’s the other.” He reached into his briefcase and took out the video camera. “I taped my confession on the flight over. How I was recruited, how they tapped me for this job, the way the hit went down, all the names, what happened afterward. It’s got everything.” Carver smiled ruefully. “Well, almost everything. I kept Alix out of it.”
Larsson laughed out loud. “You old romantic!”
Carver cleared his throat gruffly. “Yeah, well . . . Anyway, if I don’t contact you by nine tomorrow morning, get the computer files and the confession out to every news agency and every Web site—anywhere you can think of. I want it everywhere.”
“You got it,” said Larsson. “But don’t worry, you’ll make it. You always do, right?”
“I don’t know this time,” said Carver.
They were getting near the helicopter pad now. The machine was sitting there silently, waiting to start up and go.
“It’s crazy,” Carver added. “I’m doing this all wrong, breaking every rule. I haven’t planned anything, not even my way out. But for some reason I don’t care. I don’t know. . . .” He looked beyond the helicopter at the mountainous horizon. “It’s like I’ve handed myself over to fate. I’m about to be judged. I’ll be found innocent or guilty. I’ll make it or I won’t.”
“I understand,” Larsson said.
The pilot started up his engines. Now Carver had to shout over the rhythmic whomping of the rotors. He handed Larsson his briefcase.
“Take this. It’s no use to me now. There’s a bunch of money inside. If I don’t make it, the money’s yours. Don’t argue. It’s the least I owe you.”
Carver gave Larsson a slap on the shoulder.
“Okay,” he said, “Gotta go. Cheers.”
Larsson watched the helicopter rise into the sky, then curve away toward the north and the mountain passes that would take it through to the wealthy ski resort of Gstaad. By air, you could cut straight across from one valley to the next; by road, you had to go the long way—around the mountains, not over them—and it took a little over an hour. Larsson jogged toward his car, the briefcase in his hand. Carver might not have planned a way out, but he was going to do his damnedest to make up for that.