THIRTY-FIVE
WE PARKED IN a no-parking zone in a side street near the Paddington railroad station. The plan was to lock the car and walk away. It was a very busy area. There were plenty of onward transportation options. There were buses, and black cabs, and two subway stations nearby, and the regular trains. On foot we could head south to Hyde Park, or north through Maida Vale to St John’s Wood. We would be caught on camera, for sure, no doubt many times, but it would take hundreds of hours of patient viewing to figure out who we were, and where we had come from, and where we had gone, and why.
I checked my appearance, to make sure I was fit for public consumption. My jacket was made of thin, stretchy material, no doubt good for all kinds of freedom of movement on the golf course, but it clung to the shape of whatever I had in my pockets. Which might have been OK with golf balls, but which wasn’t OK with the Glock. I wanted it on the right, and it barely fit. Mostly because there was something else in there already.
It was the main man’s cell phone. It was a drugstore burner, pretty much the same as the pair we had found in the Romford Boys’ glove compartment. I passed it to Casey Nice and said, ‘See if you can find the call log.’
She did something with arrows and a menu, and she scrolled up and down, and she said, ‘He made a thirty-second call to what looks like a local cellular number, and three minutes later the same number called him back, for one minute. That’s the last of the activity.’
I nodded. ‘Probably the APB on us went out in the middle of the night, and all the bad guys in London got briefed first thing this morning, so the Serbian guy called Romford and said, hey, those people you’re looking for? I’ve got them locked in a room. But maybe he was only talking to a lieutenant at that point, who said we’ll call you back, and who then went to tell Charlie White the news, and Charlie White called back himself, and made the arrangements.’
‘Would a minute be long enough for arrangements?’
‘All they needed was an address. I’m sure Bentleys have satellite navigation. Even our pick-up truck in Arkansas had satellite navigation.’
‘OK.’
‘Although I didn’t hear the phone ring.’
She used the menu again, and the arrows.
She said, ‘It’s set on silent.’
I nodded again. ‘So that’s what happened.’
‘I should give this Romford number to General O’Day. Don’t you think? MI5 could trace it.’
‘To a cash payment in Boots the Chemist. Doesn’t help.’
‘What’s Boots the Chemist?’
‘Their pharmacy chain. Like CVS. John Boot set it up, in the middle of the nineteenth century. He probably looked just like the guy who built the wall around Wallace Court. It started out as a herbal medicine store, in a place called Nottingham, which is way north of here.’
‘MI5 could track the phone to a physical location.’
‘Only if it’s switched on. Which it won’t be much longer. They’ll trash it as soon as they hear the news from Wormwood Scrubs. They’ll know their number was captured.’
‘They probably already heard.’
I took the phone back from her.
I said, ‘Let’s find out.’
I peered at the buttons and found one marked redial. I pressed it with my thumbnail, and I watched the number spool across the screen, and I pressed the green call button, and I raised the phone to my ear.
I got a ring tone. The classic British two-beat purr. More urgent than the languorous American sound. I waited. Three rings, four, five, six.
Then the call was answered. By someone who had spent the six-ring delay checking his own screen and identifying the incoming number, clearly, because he had his first question all set and ready to go. A deep London voice asked, ‘What the hell is going on there? About a hundred filth have come past us already.’
Filth meant cops. London slang. I said, ‘Where?’
The voice said, ‘We’re parked three streets away.’
I said, ‘Little Joey?’
He said, ‘Who is this?’
‘I’m the guy who offed your guy. Last night, in the van. I saw your little tantrum.’
‘Where are you?’
‘Right behind you.’
I heard him move.
‘Kidding,’ I said.
‘Who are you?’
‘I’d call myself a challenger, Joey, but I’d be selling myself short.’
‘No, you’re a dead man.’
‘Not so far. You’re confusing me with your boys. Or the Serbians. They took some casualties. That’s for damn sure.’
‘They told me they had you locked up.’
‘Nothing lasts for ever.’
‘What do you want?’
‘John Kott,’ I said. ‘And William Carson. And I’m going to get them. Best bet is for you to stay out of my way. Or I’ll run right over you.’
‘You have no idea.’
‘About what?’
‘You have no idea the trouble you’re in.’
‘Really? Truth is I feel pretty good right now. I’m not the one losing men left and right. That would be you, Joey. So this is a time for common sense and mature judgement, don’t you think? Cut Kott and Carson loose, and I’ll leave you alone. They already did Libor for you, and I’m guessing you already got your money. So what’s in it for you now?’
‘No one messes with me.’
‘As statements go, that’s not entirely accurate, is it? I’m already messing with you. And I’m going to keep on messing with you, until you cut Kott and Carson loose. Your choice, pal.’
‘You’re a dead man.’
‘You said that already. Wishing doesn’t make it so.’
No answer. The call ended. The phone went silent. I pictured the activity, on Little Joey’s end. A minion, dispatched. The battery in one trash can, the phone body in a second can, the SIM card cracked with a thumbnail into four separate pieces, and dumped in a third can. A burner, burned.
On my end I wiped the phone on my shirt and tossed it on the back seat. Casey Nice said, ‘Will he listen? Will he cut them loose?’
I said, ‘I doubt it. Clearly he’s used to getting his own way. Backing down would make his head explode.’
I shoved my Glock deep in my pocket. It fit pretty well, without the competition. Nice watched me and did the same. Smaller pocket, but a smaller gun. I heard its stubby barrel click against her pill bottle.
I said, ‘Keep your pills in your other pocket. You don’t want to get all snagged up.’
She paused a beat. She didn’t want to take the bottle out. She didn’t want to show me.
I said, ‘How many left?’
She said, ‘Two.’
‘You took one this morning?’
She nodded and said nothing.
‘And now you want to take another?’
She nodded and said nothing.
‘Don’t,’ I said.
‘Why not?’
‘They’re the wrong pills. You have no reason to be anxious. You’re performing very well. You’re a natural. You were superb this morning. From the pawn shop onward. All the way to the splinter of glass.’
Which was possibly one sentence too far. I saw her hand move, as if involuntarily, as if cupping itself around the dirty sweater padding the jagged edge. She was reliving the experience. And not liking it. Her eyes closed and her chest started to heave and she burst into tears. Tension, shock, horror, it all came out. She shook and howled. She opened her streaming eyes and looked up, and down, and left, and right. I turned to her and she collapsed against me, and I held her tight, in a strange chaste embrace, still in our separate seats, bent towards each other from our waists. She buried her head in the fold of my shoulder, and her tears soaked my jacket, right where Yevgeniy Khenkin’s brains had been.
Eventually she started breathing slower, and she said, ‘I’m sorry,’ all muffled against my coat.
I said, ‘Don’t be.’
‘I killed a man.’
‘Not really,’ I said. ‘You saved yourself. And me. Think about it like that.’
‘He was still a human being.’
‘Not really,’ I said again. ‘My grandfather once told me a story. He lived in Paris, where he made wooden legs for a living, but he was on vacation in the south of France, sitting on a hillside near a vineyard, eating a picnic, and he had his pocket knife out, to lever open a walnut, and he saw a snake coming towards him, real fast, and he stabbed it with the pocket knife, dead on through the centre of its head, and pinned it to the ground, about six inches from his ankle. That’s the same as you did. The guy was a snake. Or worse than a snake. A snake doesn’t know it’s a snake. It can’t help itself. But that guy knew what he was choosing. Just like the other guy, yesterday, who wasn’t helping old ladies across the street, or volunteering in the library, or raising funds for Africa.’
She rubbed her head against my arm. Nodding agreement, maybe. Or not, perhaps. Maybe just wiping her eyes. She said, ‘Doesn’t make me feel better.’
‘Shoemaker told me you knew what you signed up for.’
‘I did, in theory. Actually doing it feels different.’
‘There’s a first time for everything.’
‘Are you going to tell me it gets easier?’
I didn’t answer. I said, ‘Save the pills. You don’t need them. And even if you do, save them anyway. This is only the beginning. It’s going to get harder later.’
‘That’s hardly reassuring.’
‘You have nothing to worry about. You’re doing well. We’re both doing well. We’re going to win.’
She didn’t answer that. She hung on for a moment longer, and then she eased away from me, and we both retreated to our own spaces, and we sat up straight. She huffed and sniffed and wiped her face with her leather sleeve. She said, ‘Can we go back to the hotel? I want to take a shower.’
I said, ‘We’ll find a new hotel.’
‘Why?’
‘Rule one, change locations every day.’
‘My new toothbrush is still there.’
‘Rule two, keep your toothbrush in your pocket at all times.’
‘I’ll have to buy another.’
‘Maybe I’ll get a new one too.’
‘And I want to buy clothes.’
‘We can do that.’
‘I don’t have a bag any more.’
‘No big deal. I’ve never had a bag. All part of the experience. You change in the store.’
‘No, I mean, how do we carry the boxes of ammunition?’
‘In our other pockets.’
‘Won’t fit.’
She was right. I tried. The box stuck half in, half out. And my pocket was bigger than hers to begin with. I said, ‘But this is London. Who’s going to recognize it for what it is?’
She said, ‘One person in a thousand, maybe. But what happens if that one person is a cop, like at Wallace Court, with a bulletproof vest and a sub-machine gun? We can’t be seen walking around town with boxes full of live ammunition.’
I nodded. I said, ‘OK, we’ll get a temporary bag.’ I looked all around, in front, behind, both sides of the street. ‘Although I don’t see any bag stores here.’
She pointed half-left. ‘There’s a convenience store on the corner. Like a miniature supermarket. One of their chains, I think. Go buy something. Gum, or candy.’
‘Their bags are thin plastic. I’ve seen them. You put the Coke in one last night. It was practically transparent. As bad as our pockets.’
‘They have big sturdy bags too.’
‘They won’t give me a big sturdy bag for gum or candy.’
‘They won’t give you any kind of bag. You have to buy them here. Which means you can choose whatever kind you want.’
‘You have to buy the stuff and the bag it goes in?’
‘I read about it in a magazine.’
‘What kind of country is this?’
‘Environmental. You’re supposed to buy a durable bag and use it over and over again.’
I said nothing, but I got out of the car and walked up to the corner. The store was a bare-bones version of a big supermarket. Daily necessities, lunch items, six-packs, and soft drinks. And bags, just like Nice had predicted. There was a whole bunch of them near the checkout lanes. I picked one out. It was brown. It looked about as environmental as you could get. Like it had been woven out of recycled hemp fibres by one-eyed virgins in Guatemala. It had the supermarket’s name screen printed on it, faintly, probably with all kinds of vegetable dye. Carrots, mainly, I thought. Like the writing would all disappear in a shower of rain. But as a bag it was OK. It had rope handles, and it opened out into a boxy shape.
I didn’t really want gum or candy, so I asked the woman at the register whether I could buy the bag on its own. She didn’t answer directly. She just looked at me like I was a moron and slid the bag’s tag across her scanner, with an electronic pop, and she said, ‘Two pounds.’
Which I figured was OK. It would have been fifty bucks in a West Coast boutique. The Romford Boys paid for it, and I put their change in my back pocket, and I walked back to the parked Skoda.
It wasn’t there.