‘And computers? I don’t understand them so much.’ Viktor was the first man in Russia to hack into the IBM mainframe computers in the Pentagon.
‘The system is simple: I can guide you through it if you have your computer there?’
Viktor’s technique would always be the same. Enter the room, sit, chat. Build a rapport, maybe clear up a bit of blood, light a cigarette and find a consensus.
‘You sound like my son, Aleksandar,’ says Viktor. Viktor never married, never had children, although the KGB encouraged it. They liked you to have a family, something they could leverage, something to keep you in Russia should you ever be tempted to stray. Many women were put in his path. Funny, brave, beautiful women. But Viktor’s life was made of lies, and love doesn’t blossom among lies. If it wasn’t to be love, then Viktor wasn’t interested. And now that he is out of the game, it is too late.
‘Are you maybe twenty-one? Twenty-two? What is your name?’
‘Umm, I’m Dale,’ says the voice. ‘I’m twenty-two. Would you like me to take you through the process?’
‘You finished university, Dale? You didn’t go, maybe?’ asks Viktor. Viktor likes people, and he wants the best for them. These days that is seen as a weakness, but, over the years, it has been his greatest strength.
‘I, I was at uni, but I dropped out,’ says Dale.
‘Loneliness?’ asks Viktor. He can hear it in the voice. ‘You found it difficult to make friends maybe?’
‘Uh, I have to finish this call in under five minutes or there’s a report,’ says Dale.
‘There’s always a report,’ says Viktor. ‘I have written many, and no one looks at them. So at uni, there were no friends? I too was very shy at twenty-two.’
‘Well, I suppose, yes,’ says Dale. ‘I didn’t really know where to start. It got to me. Are you on the website?’
Sometimes you would walk into a room, and there would be a young man slumped in his chair, blood down his shirt, eyes swollen closed, and you just had to make a connection. Any interrogation is a conversation, and there have to be two people in a conversation. If you want something, you cannot take it; you have to let somebody give it to you.
‘I was the same, this was many years ago though,’ says Viktor, as he looks out of the window. The Saudi princess is no longer in the pool. Now there is a young man eyeing the water. Viktor recognizes him: the man has a radio show, and once helped Viktor with his bags. Viktor likes him and tried to listen to his programme once. It wasn’t for him, but he couldn’t fault the young man’s enthusiasm. They gave a caller a thousand pounds for knowing the capital of France. And there were three options. ‘You think everyone around you knows some secret about how to live life. That there was a lesson you missed somewhere.’
‘Yeah,’ agrees Dale. ‘Are you on the website, I can take you through –’
‘I still feel it, Dale. These people who know how to live. They can dance, they know what clothes to wear, how to cut their hair. I am not one of them, are you?’
‘No,’ says Dale.
‘It passes though,’ says Viktor. ‘It passes, and you become yourself. You were a boy, and now you have to be a man, and that’s not easy.’
‘Right,’ says Dale. ‘My dad left, and, well, I always felt lonely after that. We used to do all sorts together.’
‘You swim alone, Dale, we all do. And you have to keep swimming until you reach the far shore. You can’t turn around and swim back.’
‘I wish I could,’ says Dale.
‘It’s not an option. You don’t want to work on the phones talking to old men like me, Dale – right?’
‘Right,’ says Dale. ‘No offence.’
Viktor giggles, high and tinkling. ‘None taken. What do you want to do?’
‘I don’t know,’ says Dale.
‘Yes, you do,’ says Viktor.
‘I want to work with animals, maybe,’ says Dale.
‘Then you will,’ says Viktor. ‘You will work with animals. But you might have to wait. Might have to do this job for a while. Wait for the various pieces of you to come together and settle.’
‘You think?’ says Dale. ‘I feel like I’ve already messed it up.’
‘You are young,’ says Viktor. ‘And I can hear that you are bright and kind. As the years go by, you will find that people need someone who is bright and kind more than they need someone who knows how to dance and has got the right haircut.’
‘So just –’ says Dale.
‘Just be patient and show yourself the same kindness you show others. It’s difficult, and it takes time, but you can practise until you get good … Now, shall we go through this process and see when I can get an engineer?’
There is an encouraging pause on the other end of the line. ‘Look …’ starts Dale, ‘I shouldn’t really do this, but I can put an “Urgent Need” flag on your request, and it’ll jump to the front of the queue.’
‘Oh, I don’t want to get you into trouble,’ says Viktor. This year on Bake Off there is a woman from Kyiv, called Vera, so he is even more invested than usual.
‘We’re only supposed to do it if someone is either clinically vulnerable or a celebrity. Are you either of those?’
‘In my way, I am both,’ says Viktor.
‘OK,’ says Dale, and Viktor hears the tapping of buttons. ‘You’ll have someone out to you in the next ninety minutes.’
‘Thank you, Dale,’ says Viktor.
‘No, thank you,’ says Dale. ‘Thank you for listening.’
That’s all it was in the end. People were always trying to tell you something, and all you really had to do was let them.
‘My pleasure,’ says Viktor. ‘And good luck – it’s all there ahead of you.’
Viktor puts his phone down. He catches sight of himself in the mirror. That bald head, too big for his shoulders. Those pebbly glasses, too big for his face. A face he has grown to love. If you are disappointed with your face, eventually it shows.
An email alert pings on Viktor’s computer and he turns towards the sound.
Viktor has an elaborate system of alerts. An alert for day-to-day emails, of course, the Gardeners’ Question Time newsletter, Waitrose offers and so on. Then different sounds for different clients. For different levels of urgency. There were certain email addresses that were completely unique for, say, an important Colombian client or an impatient Kosovan. In all, Viktor had over a hundred and twenty email accounts, all changing, all the time. But the sound alert for each client would stay the same.
He also has an alert for an email address that he has given nobody. It was a line of security, hidden deep on the dark web. It was an early-warning system really. If anyone ever found this email address, he would know his security had been compromised. And if his security had been compromised, he knew he was in trouble.
The alert for the secret email is a gunshot. Viktor’s little joke. A gunshot for the Bullet.
The alert that now rings around Viktor Illyich’s apartment is a gunshot. Viktor pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose.
He scans the skyline. Anything? Anyone? In the pool, the radio DJ is also now taking a selfie.
Viktor lights a cigarette. You would have to look long and hard to detect the slightest of trembles in his hand.
He opens the email. There are two photographs attached.
21
Joyce
Heather Garbutt has been murdered.
The fraudster, not the hockey player.
They found her in her cell, where she had been killed in a very unpleasant way. Chris wouldn’t go into the details, but it involved knitting needles.
She left a note in one of her drawers:
THEY ARE GOING TO KILL ME. ONLY CONNIE JOHNSON CAN HELP ME NOW.
It seems to tell us two things.
Heather has been murdered. Though by who, and for what? Is it a coincidence that this has happened so shortly after we started investigating?
Connie Johnson has some information. But what information?
Elizabeth suggested that Ibrahim might like to return to Darwell Prison and ‘be a bit more thorough this time’. He took that about as well as you’d imagine.