A Darker Place

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2009

Copyright © Jack Higgins 2009

Cover design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2009

Digital illustration © Rob Wood/Wood Ronsaville Harlin, Inc.

Jack Higgins asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008124977

Ebook Edition © August 2015 ISBN: 9780007318292

Version: 2015-09-09

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Epigraph

NEW YORK

Chapter 1

MOSCOW LONDON

Chapter 2

ROPER BELFAST 1991

Chapter 3

LONDON

Chapter 4

MOSCOW LONDON

Chapter 5

LONDON PARIS

Chapter 6

THE MIDNIGHT EXPRESS

Chapter 7

LONDON

Chapter 8

CHECHNYA 1994

Chapter 9

HOLLAND PARK MAYFAIR BELSIZE PARK

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

END GAME

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

About the Author

ALSO BY JACK HIGGINS

Further Reading

About the Publisher

Once again, for Denise and Brewer Street

Avoid looking into an open grave.

You may see yourself there

– Russian Proverb

NEW YORK

1

Fresh from the shower, Monica Starling sat at the dressing table in her suite at the Pierre and applied her make-up carefully. She’d dried and arranged her streaked blonde hair in her favourite style as she always did, and now sat back and gave herself the once-over. Not bad for forty and she didn’t look that ancient, even she had to admit that. She smiled, remembering the remark Sean Dillon had made on the first occasion they had met. ‘Lady Starling, as Jane Austen would have Darcy say, it’s always a pleasure to meet a truly handsome woman.’

The rogue, she thought, wondering what he was up to, this ex-enforcer with the Provisional IRA and now an operative in what everyone referred to as the ‘Prime Minister’s private Army’. He was a thoroughly dangerous man, and yet he was her lover. Look at you, Monica, she thought, shaking her head – a Cambridge don with three doctorates, falling for a man like that. Yet there it was.

She put on a snow-white blouse, beautifully cut in fine Egyptian cotton, and buttoned it carefully. Next came a trouser suit as black as night, one of Valentino’s masterpieces. Simple diamond studs for the ears. Manolo Blahnik shoes, and she was finished.

‘Yes, excellent, girl,’ she said. ‘Full marks.’

She smiled, thinking of her escort, dear, sweet old George Dunkley, Professor Emeritus in European Literature at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, bless his cotton socks and all seventy years of him, and thrilled out of his mind to be here tonight. Not that she wasn’t a little thrilled herself. When she’d accepted the United Nations’ invitation to this international scholars’ weekend, she’d had no idea who the guest of honour would turn out to be.

Alexander Kurbsky – the greatest novelist of his generation, as far as she was concerned. On the Death of Men and Moscow Nights – astonishing achievements, born out of his experiences as a paratrooper in Afghanistan and then the years of hell during the first and second Chechen wars. And he was only, what? Thirty-four, thirty-five? Hardly anyone outside Russia had actually met him since the publication of those books, the government kept him on such a short leash, and yet here he was, in New York. It was going to be quite an evening.

She turned from the mirror and the phone rang.

Dillon said, ‘I thought I’d catch you.’

‘What time is it there?’

‘Just after midnight. Looking forward to meeting Kurbsky?’

‘I must admit I am. I’ve never seen George so excited.’

‘For good reason. Kurbsky’s an interesting guy in lots of ways. His father was KGB, you know. When his mother died giving birth to his sister, an aunt raised them both for several years, and then one day, Kurbsky just up and ran away to London. The aunt was living there by then, and he stayed with her, studied at the London School of Economics for two years, and then – gone again. Went back, joined the paratroops, and the rest is history or myth, call it what you like.’

‘I know all that, Sean, it’s in his publisher’s handout. Still, it should be quite an evening.’

‘I imagine so. How do you look?’

‘Bloody marvellous.’

‘That’s my girl. Slay the people. I’ll go now.’

‘Love you,’ she said, but he was gone. Men, she thought wryly, they’re from a different planet, and she got her purse and went to do battle.

In a room on the floor below, Alexander Kurbsky examined himself in the mirror and ran a comb through his shoulder-length dark hair. The tangled beard suggested a medieval bravo, a roisterer promising a kiss for a woman and a blow for a man. It was his personal statement, a turning against any kind of control after his years in the Army. He was a shade under five ten, much of his face covered by the beard, and his eyes were grey, like water over stone.

He was dressed totally in black: a kind of jersey with a collar fastened by a single button at the neck, black jacket and trousers, obviously Brioni. Even his pocket handkerchief was black.

His mobile phone, encrypted, buzzed. Bounine said, ‘Turn left out of the entrance, fifty metres and I’m waiting. Black Volvo.’

Kurbsky didn’t reply, simply switched off, went out, found the nearest lift and descended. He went out of the entrance of the hotel, ignoring the staff on duty, walked his fifty metres, found the Volvo and got in.

‘How far?’ he asked.

Bounine glanced briefly at him and smiled through gold-rimmed glasses. He had thinning hair, and the look of somebody’s favourite uncle about him, except that he was GRU.

‘Fifteen minutes. I’ve checked it.’

‘Let’s get on with it then.’

Kurbsky leaned back and closed his eyes.

Igor Vronsky was thirty-five and looked ten years older, but that was his drug habit. His hair was black and a little too long, verging on the unkempt. The skin was stretched too tightly across a narrow face with pointed chin. A paisley neckerchief at his throat and a midnight-blue velvet jacket combined, by intention, to give him a theatrical look. His notoriety in Moscow these days didn’t worry him. The government loathed him for his book on Putin’s time in the KGB, but this was America, he had a new job writing for the New York Times, and they couldn’t touch him. The book had brought him fame, money, women – to hell with Moscow.

He smiled at himself in the bathroom mirror, then leaned down to inhale the first of two lines of cocaine that waited. It was good stuff, absolutely spot on, and he followed it with the second line. He was dizzy for a moment, then slightly chilled in the brain and suddenly very sharp and ready for the great Alexander Kurbsky.

There was an old Russian saying: there was room for only one cock on any dunghill. He had no illusions that Kurbsky would be the star attraction at this soirée, but it might be amusing to knock him off his pedestal. He moved into the untidy living room of the small fifth-floor apartment, found a raincoat and let himself out.

‘He never books a cab,’ Bounine had said. ‘It’s only a step into Columbus Avenue, where he can have them by the dozen.’

So Kurbsky waited in the shadows for Vronsky to emerge, stand for a moment under the light of the doorway to his apartment building, then advance to the left, pulling up his collar against the rain. As he passed, Kurbsky reached out and pulled him close with considerable strength, his left arm sliding round the neck in a chokehold, the blade of his bone-handled gutting knife springing into action at the touch of the button. Vronsky was aware of the needlepoint nudging in through his clothing, the hand now clamped over his mouth, the blade seeming to know exactly what it was doing as it probed for the heart.

He slid down in a corner of the doorway and died very quickly on his knees. Kurbsky took out a fresh handkerchief, wiped the knife clean and closed it, then he leaned over the body, found a wallet and mobile phone, turned and walked to where Bounine waited. He got in to the Volvo and they drove away.

‘It’s done,’ Bounine said.

Kurbsky opened the glove compartment and put the wallet inside, plus the mobile phone. ‘You’ll get rid of those.’

‘Just another street mugging.’

‘He was on coke.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘I’m sure.’ He took out a pack of Marlboros.

Bounine said, ‘Does it bother you?’

Kurbsky said calmly, ‘Did Chechnya bother you?’ He lit a cigarette. ‘Anyway I’m not in the mood for discussion. I’ve got a performance to give. Let’s get the great Alexander Kurbsky on stage.’

As they moved along Columbus Avenue, Bounine said, ‘Is that all it is to you, Alex?’

‘Yuri, old friend, I’m not into Freud at the start of a dark winter’s evening in good old New York. Just get me to the Pierre where my fans are waiting.’

He leaned back, staring out at the sleet, and smoked his cigarette.

When Monica Starling and Professor Dunkley went into the reception at the Pierre, it was awash with people, the surroundings magnificent, the great and the good well in evidence. The US Ambassador to the United Nations was there, and his Russian counterpart. The champagne flowed. Monica and Dunkley took a glass each, moved to one side and simply observed the scene.

‘There seem to be a few film stars,’ Dunkley said.

‘There would be, George, they like to be seen. There seems to be a pop star or two, as well. I suppose they feel an affair like this touches them with a certain…gravitas.’

‘He’s there,’ Dunkley said. ‘Talking to the French Ambassador, Henri Guyon, and the Russian – what’s his name again?’

‘Ivan Makeev,’ Monica told him.

‘They seem very enthusiastic about something, their heads together, except for Kurbsky.’

‘He looks bored, if anything,’ Monica said.

‘We’ll be lucky to get anywhere near him,’ Dunkley told her mournfully. ‘Look at all those people hovering like vultures, waiting for the ambassadors to finish with him so they can move in. We’ve had it.’

‘Oh, I don’t know.’ She stood there, her left hand on her hip, her black suede purse dangling from it, and as he turned, she caught his eye and toasted him, glass raised, and emptied it. He knew her, of course, but she didn’t know that, and he gave her a lazy and insolent smile as he walked over.

‘Lady Starling, a pleasure long overdue.’ He relieved her of her empty glass and waved for a passing waiter. ‘How are things in Cambridge these days? And this will be Professor George Dunkley, am I correct? I’ve read your book on the other Alexander.’

Dunkley was stunned. ‘My dear chap.’ He shook hands, obviously deeply affected.

‘The other Alexander?’ Monica inquired.

‘An early work,’ Dunkley told her. ‘“An analysis of Alexandre Dumas and his writing salon.”’

‘All those assistants and Dumas prowling up and down the aisles like a schoolmaster in a black frock coat,’ Kurbsky said.

He resonated charm, throwing it off as if it was of no account, his voice pleasantly deep, only a hint of a Russian accent.

‘Was it really like that?’ Monica asked.

‘But of course, and look what it produced. The Three Musketeers, The Man in the Iron Mask, The Count of Monte Cristo.’

Dunkley said, breathless with enthusiasm, ‘The literary establishment in Paris in his day treated him abominably.’

‘I agree. On the other hand, they really got their faces rubbed in it when his son turned out one of the greatest of French plays, La Dame aux Camellias.’

‘And then Verdi used the story for La Traviata!’ Dunkley said.

Kurbsky smiled. ‘One would hope Dumas got a royalty.’

They laughed and Dunkley said, ‘Oh, my goodness, Captain Kurbsky, my seminars would be so crowded if my students knew you were going to attend.’

‘That’s an enticing prospect, but Cambridge is not possible, I’m afraid – and Captain Kurbsky belongs to a time long gone. I’m plain Alexander now.’ He smiled at Monica. ‘Or Alex, if you prefer.’

She returned his smile, slightly breathless, and an aide approached and said formally, ‘The Ambassador is ready. If you would form the party, dinner is served.’

‘Yes, of course,’ Kurbsky said. ‘These two will be sitting with me.’

The aide faltered, ‘But, sir, I don’t think that would be possible. It’s all arranged.’

‘Then rearrange it.’ He shrugged. ‘Of course, if there is a problem, we could sit at another table.’

‘No, of course not, sir,’ the aide said hastily. ‘No need – no need at all. I’ll go and make the necessary changes.’

He departed. Dunkley said, ‘I say, old chap, we seem to be causing a bit of a problem.’

‘Not at all. I’m their Russian Frankenstein, the great Alexander Kurbsky led out like a bear on a chain to astonish the world and help make Mother Russia seem great again.’

All this was delivered with no apparent bitterness, and those cold grey eyes gave nothing away. They reminded Monica uncomfortably of Dillon’s, as Kurbsky continued, taking Monica’s hand and raising it to his lips; ‘If you glance over my shoulder you may see the Russian Ambassador approaching to see what the fuss is about.’

‘Quite right,’ Monica told him. ‘Is he going to be angry?’

‘Not at all. The moment he claps eyes on the most beautiful woman in the room, he’s going to scramble to make sure you grace his table and no one else’s.’ He turned to Dunkley. ‘Isn’t that so, Professor?’

‘Don’t ask me, dear boy, I’m just going with the flow. I haven’t enjoyed myself so much in years.’

And then the Ambassador arrived.

The diplomat ended up with his wife seated on his right, Monica on his left, and Kurbsky opposite. Dunkley beamed away lower down the table, facing the French Ambassador and proving that an Englishman could speak the language perfectly. The whole thing was thoroughly enjoyable, but glancing across the table, Monica was conscious that Kurbsky had withdrawn into himself. He reminded her once again of Dillon in a way. For one thing the champagne intake was considerable, but there was an air of slight detachment. He observed, not really taking part, but then that was the writer in him, judging people, constantly assessing the situation in which he found himself.

He caught her eye, smiled slightly and raised his eyebrows, as if saying what fools they all were, and then silence was called for speeches and the Russian Ambassador led the way. It was as if it were international friendship week, nothing unpleasant was happening in the world, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan faded into obscurity, the only thing of any significance being this dinner in one of New York’s greatest hotels, with wonderful food, champagne, and beautiful women. Everyone applauded, and when Monica glanced again at Kurbsky, he had joined in, but with the same weary detachment there. As the applause died, the French Ambassador rose.

He kept it brief and succinct. He was pleased to announce that if Alexander Kurbsky would make himself available in Paris in two weeks’ time, the President of France would have great pleasure in decorating him with the Légion d’Honneur. Tumultuous acclaim, and Kurbsky stood and thanked the Ambassador of France in a graceful little speech delivered in fluent French. It was a fitting ending to a wonderful evening.

Later, as people dispersed, Monica and Dunkley hovered. There was no sign of Kurbsky. ‘What an evening,’ Dunkley said. ‘I haven’t enjoyed myself so much in years.’ They were on a Virgin flight to London in the morning, leaving at ten thirty local time. ‘I’ve got an early start, so I’m for bed.’

‘I’ll see you in the morning,’ she said.

As he walked away to the lifts, Monica paused, still seeking a sign of Kurbsky, but there wasn’t one. In fact, he was outside the hotel sitting in the Volvo talking to Bounine.

‘This Legion of Honour nonsense. Did you know about it?’

‘Absolutely not, but what’s wrong, Alex? The Legion of Honour – it’s the greatest of all French decorations.’

‘Do you ever get a so-what feeling, Yuri? I’ve been there, done that.’

‘Are you saying no? You can’t, Alex. Putin wants it, the country wants it. You’ll be there in Paris in two weeks. So will I. God help us, you’ve got your own Falcon back to Moscow in the morning, and a Falcon’s as good as a Gulfstream.’

‘Is that a fact?’

‘Yes, old son. I’ll pick you up at ten sharp.’

Kurbsky shrugged. ‘Yes, I suppose you will.’

He got out and Bounine drove away. Kurbsky watched him go, turned and went back into the Pierre. The first thing he saw was Monica waiting for a lift and he approached, catching her just in time.

‘Fancy a nightcap, lady?’

She smiled, pleased that he’d turned up. ‘Why not?’

He took her arm and they went to the bar.

There weren’t too many people. They sat in the corner and he had Russian vodka, ice cold, and she contented herself with green tea.

‘Very healthy of you,’ he told her.

‘I wish I could say the same to you, but I’m not sure about that stuff.’

‘You have to be born to it.’

‘Doesn’t it rot the brain?’

‘Not really. Drunk this way, from a glass taken from crushed ice, it freezes the brain, clears it when problems loom.’

‘If you believe that, you’ll believe anything.’

‘No, it’s true. Now, tell me. I know about your academic accomplishments – the Ministry of Arts in Moscow is very thorough when one is attending affairs like this – but nothing about you. I’m puzzled that such a woman would not be married.’

‘I’m a widow, Alex, have been for some years. My husband was a professor at Cambridge, rather older than me and a knight of the realm.’

‘So, no children?’

‘No, a brother, if that helps.’ Her smile faltered for a moment, as she remembered her brother, Harry, recuperating from the terrible knife wounds he had so recently suffered, and, even more, the terrible psychological wounds. To see his wife assassinated in mistake for him – the healing process would take a long time…

She brought the smile back. ‘He’s a Member of Parliament,’ she said, making no mention of what he really did for the Prime Minister.

Of course, Kurbsky actually knew all that, but he kept up the subterfuge.

‘But there must be a man in your life, a woman like you.’

She wasn’t offended in the slightest. ‘Yes, there is such a man.’

‘Then he must count himself lucky.’

He poured another vodka and she said, ‘What about you?’

‘Good heavens, no. The occasional relationship, but it never lasts. I’m a very difficult man, but then, I’ve had a difficult life. You know about me?’

‘A bit. Your aunt raised you, right?’

‘Svetlana was everything. I loved her dearly, but life in Moscow under Communism was difficult. When I was seventeen she got a chance to travel with a theatre group to London – she was an actress – and she met a professor named Patrick Kelly, a good man. For once she had found something for herself, so she refused to return to Moscow, stayed in London and married him.’

‘How was it you managed to join her?’

‘That was my father. As a KGB colonel, he had influence. He arranged for me to visit Svetlana, hoping she’d change her mind.’

‘And your sister?’

‘Tania was at high school and only fifteen. She’d never been close to Svetlana and so she stayed with my father. There were servants, a couple living in my father’s house, to care for her.’

‘And where did the London School of Economics come in?’

He grinned, looking different, like a boy. ‘I always had a love of books and literature, so I didn’t need to study it. I found a new world at the LSE. Svetlana and Kelly had a wonderful Victorian house in Belsize Park, and they felt I should fill my time for a few months, so I took courses. Sociology, psychology, philosophy. The months stretched out.’

‘Two years. What made you return to Moscow?’

‘News from home, bad news. Over fifty-five thousand dead in Afghanistan. Too many body bags. Broken-hearted mothers protesting in the streets. Student groups fighting with the police. Tania was only seventeen, but up to her neck in it. Pitched battles, riot police, many casualties.’ He paused, his face bleak. ‘And Tania among them.’

Her response was so instinctive as to be almost banal. She put a hand on his. ‘I’m so sorry.’

‘I returned at once. A waste of time, of course, it was all over. Just a headstone in Minsky Park Military Cemetery. My father used his influence to make things look respectable. She was already dead when he’d got in touch with me in London, so he’d trapped me into returning. I got my revenge on him when I went downtown and joined the paratroopers. He was stuck with that. To pull me out would have looked bad in Communist Party circles.’

‘Then what?’

‘If you’ve read the opening chapters of On the Death of Men, you already know. There was no time to learn how to jump out of a plane with a parachute. I got three months’ basic training, then I was off to Afghanistan. It was eighty-nine, the year everything fell apart, the year we scrambled to get out, and lucky to make it.’

‘It must have been hell.’

‘Something like that, only we didn’t appreciate that Chechnya was to come. Two years of that, and that was just the first war.’

There was a long pause and he poured another vodka with a steady hand. She said, ‘What now – what next?’

‘I’m not sure. Only a handful of writers can achieve great success, and any writer lucky enough to write the special book will tell you the most urgent question is whether you can do it again or it was just some gigantic fluke.’

‘But you answered that question for yourself with Moscow Nights.’

‘I suppose, but…I don’t know. I just feel so…claustrophobic now. Hemmed in by my minders.’

She laughed. ‘You mean the bear-on-the-chain thing? Surely that’s up to you. When Svetlana cast off her chains and refused to return to Moscow, she had to defect. But things are different now. The Russian Federation is not dominated by Communism any longer.’

‘No, but it is dominated by Vladimir Putin. I am just as controlled as I would have been in the old days. I travel in a jet provided by the Ministry of Arts. I am in the hands of GRU minders, wherever I go. I don’t even handle my own passport. They would never let me go willingly.’

‘A terrible pity. Any of the great universities would love to get their hands on you. I’m biased, of course, but Cambridge would lay out the red carpet for you.’

‘An enticing prospect.’

He sat there, frowning slightly, as if considering it. She said, ‘Is there anything particular to hold you in Moscow?’

‘Not a thing. Cancer took my father some years ago, there are cousins here and there. Svetlana is my closest relative. No woman in my life.’ He smiled and shrugged, ‘Not at the moment anyway.’

‘So?’ she said.

‘They watch me closely. If they knew I was even talking this way to you, they’d lock me up.’ He nodded. ‘Anyway, we’ll see. Paris in a fortnight.’

‘Something to look forward to. You should be proud.’

She opened her purse and produced a card. ‘Take this. My mobile phone number is on it. It’s a Codex, encrypted and classified. You can call me on it whenever you like.’

‘Encrypted! I’m impressed. You must be well connected.’

‘You could say that.’ She stood up and said, ‘I mean it. Call me. Paris isn’t too far from Cambridge, when you think of it.’

He smiled. ‘If it ever happened…I wouldn’t want an academic career. I’d prefer to leave the stage for a while, escape my present masters perhaps, but vanish. I’d like to think that my escape would be total, so Moscow had no clue as to where I had gone. I wouldn’t appreciate the British press knocking on my door, wherever I was.’

‘I see what you mean, but that could be difficult.’

‘Not if I were able to leave quietly, no fuss at all. Moscow would know I’d gone, but the last thing they’d want would be for it to be public knowledge, which would create a scandal. They’d keep quiet, say I was working in the country or something on a new book, and try to hunt me down.’

‘I take the point and will pass it on to my friends. Take care.’

He caught her arm. ‘These friends of yours. They would have to be very special people who knew how to handle this kind of thing.’

She smiled. ‘Oh, they are. Call me, Alex, when you’ve had time to think.’

She went to the lifts, a door opened at once, she stepped in and it closed.

Four o’clock in the morning in London, but in the Holland Park safe house in London, Giles Roper sat as usual in his wheelchair, his screens active as he probed cyberspace, his bomb-scarred face restless. He’d slept in the chair for a couple of hours, now Doyle, the night sergeant, had provided him with a bacon sandwich and a mug of tea. He ate the sandwich and was pouring a shot of Scotch when Monica’s voice came over the speaker.

‘Are you there, Roper?’

‘Where else would I be?’

‘You’re the only fixed point in a troubled universe. That’s one thing I’ve learned since getting involved with you people. Is Sean spending the night?’

‘Returned to a bed in staff quarters ages ago. How was your evening? Did Kurbsky impress?’

‘Just listen and see what you think.’

It didn’t take long in the telling, and when she was finished, Roper said, ‘If he’s serious, I can’t see why we couldn’t arrange something. I’ll speak to Sean and General Ferguson first thing in the morning. You, we should be seeing some time in the early evening.’

‘Exactly.’

She switched off. He sat there thinking about it for a while. Alexander Kurbsky doing a runner to England. My God, Vladimir Putin will be furious. He put Kurbsky up on the screen. Too good-looking for his own good, he decided morosely, then brought up his record and started going through it carefully.

Kurbsky had found Bounine in the Volvo outside the Pierre and brought him up to speed. He smoked a cigarette. Bounine said, ‘So far, so good. It’s worked. She must be quite a lady.’

‘That’s an understatement.’

‘So, if they take the bait, we have Paris to look forward to. Colonel Luhzkov will be pleased.’

‘Only because he wants to please Putin, and if Paris works, you mustn’t be a part of it, Yuri. No one should know who you are. Luhzkov will work out something for you. Cultural attaché, for instance, would do you very well. Someone I can trust personally when I’m in London.’

‘I’m glad you still do,’ Bounine said.

‘It’s been a long time, Yuri. You’re the only GRU man I know who looks like an accountant. No one would ever dream you were in Afghanistan and Chechnya with the paratroopers.’

‘Whereas you, old friend, look like they found you in central casting. The smiler with the knife, they used to call you from that first year, remember?’

‘Quite right.’ Kurbsky got out and turned, holding the door. ‘I also write good books.’

‘Great books.’ Bounine smiled. ‘One thing is certain, Putin will be happy the way things have gone.’

‘Putin has many reasons to be happy with the way things are going these days,’ Kurbsky said. ‘Night, Yuri.’ He closed the door and went back into the hotel.

MOSCOW

2

It had all started three weeks before with Colonel Boris Luhzkov, Head of Station for the GRU at the Embassy of the Russian Federation in London, being called. The summons to Moscow had come from Putin himself and could not be denied, although it had surprised Luhzkov that it had come from him and not from General Ivan Volkov of the GRU, Putin’s security adviser.

The reason became clear when he was driven to Berkley Down outside London, and found a Falcon jet waiting to fly him to Moscow, a luxury which should have warned him to expect the worst.

Two pilots were on board, the aircraft ready to go, and a steward, who introduced himself as Sikov, was waiting as he boarded. Luhzkov seated himself and belted in.

Sikov said, ‘A great pleasure, Colonel. The flight time is approximately seven hours. I was instructed to give you this from Prime Minister Putin’s office as soon as you arrived. May I offer you a drink?’

‘A large vodka, I hate takeoffs. I once crashed in Chechnya.’ Sikov had given him what looked like a legal file.

Sikov did it old-style, a bottle in one hand, a glass in the other. Luhzkov tossed it back and coughed, holding out his glass. Sikov poured another, then moved up to the small galley. Luhzkov swallowed the vodka and, as the plane started to roll, examined the file: several typed sheets stapled together, and an envelope addressed to him, which he opened.

The letter was headed: From the Office of the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation. It carried on: ‘Attention of Colonel Boris Luhzkov. You will familiarize yourself with the material contained in the enclosed report and be prepared to discuss it with the Prime Minister on your arrival.’

Luhzkov sat there, staring down at the report, a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach. The Falcon had risen fast to thirty thousand feet and the flight so far was very smooth. Sikov returned.

‘Would you like to order, Colonel?’

Business first. Better get it over with. More vodka was indicated. He suspected he was going to need it. In fact, it was worse than he could have imagined, although some of it was already familiar to him.

The report detailed an operation gone bad. General Volkov had hired a group of IRA heavies to strike at Ferguson and his associates, but instead it was Ferguson who had struck at them, killing them all at their base in Drumore in the Irish Republic. If that wasn’t bad enough, General Volkov himself and two GRU men had disappeared. It could only mean one thing.

On top of that, the attempted assassination of Harry Miller, the individual known as the Prime Minister’s Rottweiler, had been a botched job from the beginning and had only succeeded in killing his wife in error. And – the greatest shock of all – Volkov’s connection to Osama bin Laden, the shadowy man known only as the Broker, had been unmasked. It had turned out to be Simon Carter, the Deputy Director of the British Security Services. Luhzkov could hardly believe his eyes – he had known Carter for years! Needless to say, Carter was no longer in the picture, either.

Miller’s sister, Lady Monica Starling, had apparently played a part in the Drumore affair, too, and now she had an apparent relationship with Dillon. GRU agents, of whom there were twenty-four at the London Embassy, had sighted them together on a number of occasions.

It was all a bit too much for Luhzkov’s whirling brain, but he turned the page and found the next one was headed ‘Solutions’. He started to read, pouring himself another vodka, and gagged on it as his own name came up. He read the paper several times, phrases like ‘the Prime Minister’s final decision in this matter’ floating before him. Finally, he came to the last page, headed ‘Alexander Kurbsky’. It began: ‘Kurbsky is a man of extraordinary talents, who has served his country well in time of war. To use these talents again in the present situation would be of great use to the State. If he objects in any way, the enclosed DVD and the additional attached information should persuade him.’

There was a small DVD screen on the back of the seat in front of Luhzkov, and after reading the information, he inserted the DVD and switched on. It only lasted five minutes or so, and when it was finished, he switched off and removed it.

‘Holy Mother of God,’ he said softly and there was sweat on his brow. He took out a handkerchief and mopped it. Sikov approached. ‘Something to eat, Colonel?’

‘Why not?’ Boris Luhzkov said wearily. ‘Why not.’

They landed on time, and a limousine with a uniformed GRU driver at the wheel was waiting. The streets were dark, frostbound, a city of ghosts, snow drifting down – angel’s wings, his mother used to call them when he was little – and he sat there, thinking of what awaited him as they passed the great entrance of the Kremlin and moved through narrow streets to the rear, coming to a halt in a paved yard. Steps up to an entrance, a blue light over it. The door swung open and a young lieutenant in GRU uniform admitted him.

‘Please to follow me, Colonel.’

Luhzkov had never in his entire career been to Putin’s suite and he followed in a kind of awed trance, one gloomy corridor after another, the decorations finally becoming more ornate, oil paintings in gold frames on walls. Everything was subdued, no sign of people, not even an echoing voice. And then they turned left and discovered two individuals in good suits seated in high chairs one on either side of a large gilded door. Each of them had a machine pistol by their right hand on a small table. They showed not the slightest emotion as the lieutenant opened the door and ushered Luhzkov through.

The room was a delight: panelled walls painted in seventeenth-century style, heavily gilded furniture of the correct period, portraits of what were probably obscure Tsars confronting each other across the room, a large ornate desk in the centre.

‘It’s very beautiful,’ Luhzkov said. ‘Astonishing.’

‘This was General Volkov’s private office,’ the lieutenant informed him. The use of the past tense confirmed Luhzkov’s misgivings. ‘The Prime Minister will be with you directly. Help yourself to a drink.’

He withdrew and Luhzkov, in a slight daze, moved to the sideboard bearing a collection of bottles and vodka in an ice bucket. He opened the bottle, filled a glass and drank it.

‘It’s going to be all right,’ he murmured. ‘Just hang on to that thought.’ He turned, glass in hand, as a secret door in the wall behind the desk opened and Vladimir Putin entered. ‘Comrade Prime Minister,’ Luhzkov stammered.

‘Very old-fashioned of you, Colonel. Sit down. My time is limited.’ He sat himself and Luhzkov faced him. ‘You’ve read my report.’

‘Every word.’

‘A great tragedy, the loss of General Volkov. My most valued security adviser.’

‘Can he be replaced, Comrade Prime Minister?’

‘I shall handle as much as I can myself, but on the ground, I need a safe pair of hands, particularly in London. You will now be reporting directly to me. You agree?’

‘It’s…it’s an honour,’ Luhzkov stammered.

‘More and more, London is our greatest stumbling block in intelligence matters. We must do something about it. These people – Ferguson, Dillon, those London gangsters of theirs, the Salters. What is your opinion of them?’

‘The London gangster as a species is true to himself alone, Comrade Prime Minister. I’ve employed them myself although they wrap themselves in the Union Jack and praise the Queen at the drop of a hat.’

‘This Miller has suddenly become a major player. Do you think they’ll appoint him to Carter’s post?’

‘I don’t see him wanting the job. More likely, it’ll be Lord Arthur Tilsey. He held that post years ago, and was awarded his peerage for it. He’s seventy-two, but still very sharp, and he’s old friends with Ferguson. He’ll do for the interim at least.’

‘And Miller’s sister, Lady Starling. You think there is something in this attachment with Dillon?’

‘It could be so.’

Putin nodded. ‘All right. It is clear we need to infiltrate this group, people at the highest level of security in the British system. You’ve read my suggestion. What do you think?’

‘Alexander Kurbsky? An astonishing idea, Comrade Prime Minister. He is so…infamous.’

‘Exactly. Just like in the Cold War days, he defects. Who on earth would doubt him? It fits like a glove. The UN wants him for some gathering in New York. Lady Starling will also be there. All Kurbsky has to do is approach her and turn on the charm. A colossal talent, a much-decorated war hero and handsome to boot – he can’t go wrong. She’s the key – her links to her brother and Ferguson and now Dillon – they make everything possible. If she passes the information to her friends, they’ll think of Paris, and the right arrangements will be put in hand, I’m certain of it.

‘But Luhzkov – make sure you don’t tell his GRU minders in Paris what’s going on. His escape must at all times appear genuine to the British. If the minders fall by the wayside, so be it.’

‘Of course,’ Luhzkov said hastily.

‘Finally, Kurbsky makes it a clear condition that his defection attracts no publicity. He will demand a guarantee of that. Otherwise he won’t do it.’

‘And you think Ferguson and company will accept that?’

‘Absolutely, because he knows what jackals the British press are. We stay quiet about the whole matter, but all our security systems go through the motions of trying to recover him. As far as the general public knows, he’s working away somewhere, faded from view. Any questions?’

‘I was just wondering…this suggestion regarding the journalist Igor Vronsky in New York? That Kurbsky eliminate him?’

‘Is there a problem?’

‘No,’ Luhzkov said hastily. ‘I was just wondering, would this set a precedent? I mean would that kind of thing be part of his remit?’

‘If you mean would I expect him to assassinate the Queen of England, I doubt it. On the other hand, should a more tempting target present itself, who knows? I doubt it would bother him too much. He was in the death business for long enough, and in my experience few people really change in this life. Was there anything else?’

‘Only that everything hinges on him actually agreeing to this plan, Comrade Prime Minister.’

Putin smiled. ‘Oh, I don’t think that will be a problem, Luhzkov. In fact, I expect him any minute now. I’ll leave him to you.’

And he disappeared back behind the secret door. Moments later, the door behind Luhzkov opened and Alexander Kurbsky entered, the GRU lieutenant hard on his heels.

An hour earlier, Kurbsky had been delivered to the same door at the rear of the Kremlin by Military Police. Although he had been drinking when they picked him up at his hotel, he’d been enough in control to realize that when the Kremlin was mentioned, it meant serious business. He’d been led into a small anteroom next to the main office, with chairs and a TV in the corner.

He said, ‘All right, I bore easily, so what is this about?’

The lieutenant gave him the DVD. ‘Watch this. I’ll be back.’ He opened the door and paused. ‘I’m a great fan.’

The door closed behind him. Kurbsky frowned, examining the DVD, then he went and inserted it, produced a pack of cigarettes, lit one and sat down. The screen flickered. A voice quoted a lengthy number and then said Subject Tania Kurbsky, aged 17, born Moscow. He straightened, stunned, as he saw Tania, his beloved sister, but not as he remembered her. She was gaunt, hair close cropped, with sunken cheeks. The voice droned on about a court case, five dead policemen in a riot, seven students charged and shot.

Then came the bombshell, Tania Kurbsky had been given a special dispensation obtained by her father, Colonel Ivan Kurbsky of the KGB. Instead of execution, she’d been sentenced to life, irrevocable, to be served at Station Gorky in Siberia, about as far from civilization as it was possible to get. She was still living, aged thirty-six. There followed a picture that barely resembled her, a gaunt careworn woman old before her time. The screen went dark. Kurbsky got up slowly, ejected the DVD and stood looking at it, then he turned, went to the door and kicked it.

After a while, it was unlocked and the lieutenant appeared. One of the guards stood there, machine pistol ready. Kurbsky said, ‘Where do I go?’

‘Follow me.’ Which Kurbsky did.

In the next room, he looked Luhzkov over. ‘And who would you be?’ Behind him, the lieutenant smiled.

‘Colonel Boris Luhzkov, GRU. I’m acting under Prime Minister Putin’s orders. You’ve just missed him. How are you?’

‘For a man who’s just discovered that the dead can walk, I’m doing all right. I’ll be better if I have a drink.’ He went to the cabinet and had two large vodka shots, then he cursed. ‘So, get on with it. I presume there’s a purpose to all this.’

‘Sit down and read this.’ Luhzkov pushed the file across the desk, and Kurbsky started.

Fifteen minutes later, he sat back. ‘I don’t write thrillers.’

‘It certainly reads like one.’

‘And this is from the Prime Minister?’

‘Yes.’

‘And what’s the payoff?’

‘Your sister’s release. She will be restored to life.’

‘That’s one way of putting it. How do I know it will be honoured?’

‘The Prime Minister’s word.’

‘Don’t make me laugh, he’s a politician. Since when did those guys keep their word?’

And Luhzkov said exactly the right thing. ‘She’s your sister. If that means anything, this is all you can do. It’s as simple as that. Better than nothing. You have to travel hopefully.’

‘Fuck you,’ Kurbsky said, ‘and fuck him,’ but there was the hint of despair of a man who knew he had little choice. ‘Anything else?’

‘Yes. Igor Vronsky. Does the name mean anything to you?’

‘Absolutely. The stinking bastard was in Chechnya and ran a story about my outfit. The 5th Paratroop Company, the Black Tigers. We were pathfinders and special forces. He did radio from the front line, blew the whistle on a special op we were on, and the Chechens ambushed us. Fifteen good men dead. It’s in my book.’

‘He’s working as a journalist in New York now. We want you to eliminate him, just to prove you mean business.’

‘Just like that.’

‘I believe you enjoyed a certain reputation in Chechnya. “The smiler with the knife”? An accomplished sniper and assassin who specialized in that kind of thing. A lone wolf, as they say. At least three high-ranking Chechen generals could testify to that.’

‘If the dead could speak.’

‘That story in On the Death of Men when the hero is parachuted behind the lines though he had never had training as a parachutist. Was it true? Did you?’ Luhzkov was troubled in some strange way. ‘What kind of man would do such a thing?’

‘One who at the age of nineteen in the hell that was Afghanistan decided he was dead already, a walking zombie, who survived to go home and found himself a year later knee-deep in blood in Chechnya. You can make of that what you will.’

‘I’ll need to think about it. I’m not sure I understand.’

Kurbsky laughed. ‘Remember the old saying, “Avoid looking into an open grave because you may see yourself in there”. In those old Cold War spy books, you always had to have a controller. Would that be you?’

‘Yes. I’m Head of Station for GRU at the London Embassy.’

‘That’s good. I’ll like that. I had an old comrade in Chechnya who transferred to the GRU when I was coming to the end of my army time. Yuri Bounine. Could you find him and bring him in on this?’

‘I’m sure that will be possible.’

‘Excellent. So if you’re available, let’s get out of here and go and get something to eat.’

‘An excellent idea.’ Luhzkov led the way and said to the lieutenant, ‘The limousine is waiting, I presume? We’ll go back to my hotel.’

‘Of course, Colonel.’

He led them along the interminable corridors.

‘They seem to go on forever,’ Luhzkov observed. ‘A fascinating place, the Kremlin.’

‘A rabbit warren,’ Kurbsky said. ‘A man could lose himself here. A smiler with the knife could do well here.’ He turned as they reached the door. ‘Perhaps the Prime Minister should consider that.’

He followed the lieutenant down the steps to the limousine and Luhzkov, troubled, went after them.

But over the three weeks that followed, things flowed with surprising ease. They moved him into a GRU safe house with training facilities outside Moscow. On the firing range, Kurbsky proved his skill and proficiency with every kind of weapon the sergeant major in charge could throw at him. Kurbsky had forgotten none of his old skills.

Yuri Bounine, by now a GRU captain, was plucked from the monotony of posing as a commercial attaché at the Russian Embassy in Dublin and returned to Moscow, where he was promoted to major and assigned to London, delighted to be reunited with his old friend.

Kurbsky embraced him warmly when he arrived. ‘You’ve put on weight, you bastard.’ He turned to Luhzkov. ‘Look at him. Gold spectacles, always smiling, the look of an ageing cherub. Yet we survived Afghanistan and Chechnya together. He’s got medals.’

Again he hugged Bounine, who said, ‘And you got famous. I read On the Death of Men five times and tried to work out who was me.’

‘In a way, they all were, Yuri.’

Bounine flushed, suddenly awkward. ‘So what’s going on?’

‘That’s for Colonel Luhzkov to tell you.’

Which Luhzkov did in a private interview. Later that day, Bounine found Kurbsky in a corner booth in the officers’ bar and joined him. A bottle of vodka was on the table and several glasses in crushed ice. He helped himself.

‘Luhzkov has filled me in.’

‘So what do you think?’ Kurbsky asked.

‘Who am I to argue with the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation?’

‘You know everything? About my sister?’

Bounine nodded. ‘May I say one thing on Putin’s behalf? He wasn’t responsible for what happened to your sister. It was before his time. He sees an advantage in it, that’s all.’

‘A point of view. And Vronsky?’

‘A pig. I’d cut his throat myself if I had the chance.’

‘And you look such a kind man.’

‘I am a kind man.’

‘So tell me, Yuri, how’s your wife?’

‘Ah.’ Bounine hesitated. ‘She died, Alex. Leukaemia.’

‘I’m so sorry to hear that! She was a good woman.’

‘Yes, she was. But it’s been a while now, Alex, and my sister has produced two lovely girls – so I’m an uncle!’

‘Excellent. Let’s drink to them. And to New York.’ They clinked glasses. ‘And to the Black Tigers, may they rest in peace,’ Kurbsky said. ‘We’re probably the only two left.’

New York came and New York went. The death of Igor Vronsky received prominent notice in the New York Times and other papers, but in spite of his books and his vigorous anti-Kremlin stance, there was no suspicion that this was a dissident’s death. It seemed the normal kind of mugging, a knife to the chest, the body stripped of everything worth having.

On the day following Vronsky’s death, Monica Starling and George Dunkley flew back to Heathrow, where Dunkley had a limousine waiting to take them back to Cambridge. She hadn’t breathed a word about what had happened between her and Kurbsky, but Dunkley hadn’t stopped talking about him during the flight. It had obviously affected him deeply. She kissed him on the cheek.

‘Off you go, George. Try and make it for high table. They’ll all be full of envy when they hear of your exploits.’

There was no sign of her brother’s official limousine from the Cabinet Office or of Dillon. She wasn’t pleased, and then Billy Salter’s scarlet Alfa Romeo swerved into the kerb and he slid from behind the wheel while Dillon got out of the passenger seat.

He came round and embraced her, kissing her lightly on the mouth. ‘My goodness, girl, there’s a sparkle to you. You’ve obviously had a good time.’

Billy was putting her bags in the boot. ‘A hell of a time, from what I heard.’

‘You know?’ she said to Dillon. ‘About my conversation with Kurbsky?’

‘What Roper knows, we all end up knowing.’ He ushered her into the back seat of the Alfa and followed her. ‘Dover Street, Billy.’

It was the family house in Mayfair where her brother lived. ‘Is Harry okay?’ she asked as they drove away.

‘Nothing to worry about, but he’s been overdoing it, so the doctor has given him his marching orders. He’s gone down to the country to Stokely Hall to stay with Aunt Mary for a while. Anyway, this Kurbsky business has got Ferguson all fired up. He’d like to hear it all from your own fair lips, so we’re going to take you home, wait for you to freshen up, then join Ferguson for dinner at the Reform Club. Seven thirty, but if we’re late, we’re late.’

‘So go on, tell us all about it,’ Billy said over his shoulder.

‘Alexander Kurbsky was one of the most fascinating men I’ve ever met,’ she said. ‘End of story. You’ll have to wait.’

‘Get out of it. You’re just trying to make Dillon jealous.’

‘Just carry on, driver, and watch the road.’ She pulled Dillon’s right arm around her and eased into him, smiling.

It was a quiet evening at the Reform Club, the restaurant only half full. Ferguson had secured a corner table next to a window, with no one close, which gave them privacy. Ferguson wore the usual Guards tie and pinstriped suit, his age still a closely kept secret, his hair white, face still handsome.

The surprise was Roper in his wheelchair, wearing a black velvet jacket and a white shirt with a knotted paisley scarf at the neck.

‘Well, this is nice, I must say.’ She kissed Roper on the forehead and rumpled his tousled hair. ‘Are you well?’

‘All the better for seeing you.’

She wore the Valentino suit from New York and Ferguson obviously approved. ‘My word, you must have gone down well at the Pierre.’ He kissed her extravagantly on both cheeks.

‘You’re a charmer, Charles. A trifle glib on occasion, but I like it.’

‘And you’ll like the champagne. It’s Dom Perignon – Dillon can argue about his Krug another time.’

The wine waiter poured, remembering from previous experience to supply Billy with ginger ale laced with lime. Ferguson raised his glass and toasted her. ‘To you, my dear, and to what seems to have been a job well done.’ He emptied his glass and motioned the wine waiter to refill it. ‘Now, for God’s sake, tell us what happened.’

When Monica was finished, there were a few moments of silence and it was Billy who spoke first. ‘What’s he want, and I mean really want? This guy’s got everything, I’d have thought. Fame, money, genuine respect.’

‘But is that enough?’ Dillon said. ‘From what Monica says, he’s lacking genuine freedom. So the system’s different from the Cold War days, but is it really? I liked his description of himself to you, Monica, about being like a bear on a chain. In Russia he’s trapped by his fame, by who he is. In the cage, if you like. The Ministry of Arts controls his every move because they themselves are controlled right up to the top. From a political point of view, he’s a national symbol.’

Ferguson said, ‘Obviously I’ve read his work and I’m familiar with his exploits. It all adds up to a human being who hasn’t the slightest interest in being a symbol to anyone.’

‘He just wants to be free,’ Monica agreed. ‘At present, every move he makes is dictated by others. He’s flown privately when visiting abroad, he’s carefully watched by GRU minders, his every move is monitored.’

‘So let him claim asylum here,’ Billy said. ‘Would he be denied?’

‘Of course not,’ Ferguson said. ‘But he’s got to get here first. This Paris affair, the Legion of Honour presentation, presents an interesting possibility.’

‘They’d be watching him like a hawk,’ Dillon said. ‘And there’s another problem. You know what the French are like. Very fussy about foreigners causing a problem on their patch, and that applies big-time to Brit intelligence.’

‘Still, it looks to me like a straightforward kidnap job with a willing victim,’ Billy said. ‘It’s once he’s here that he’d need looking after. They’d do something even if they couldn’t get him back. How many Russian dissidents have come to a bad end in London? Litvinenko poisoned and two cases of guys falling from the terraces of apartment blocks, and that was in the same year.’

Roper beckoned the wine waiter. ‘A very large single malt. I leave the choice to your own good judgment.’ He smiled at the others. ‘Sorry, but the joys of champagne soon pall for me.’

‘Feel free, Major,’ Ferguson said. ‘I notice that you haven’t made a contribution in this matter.’

‘Concerning Kurbsky?’ Roper held out his hand and accepted the waiter’s gift of the single malt. He savoured it for a moment, then swallowed it down. ‘Excellent. I’ll have another.’

‘Don’t you have any comment?’ Monica asked.

‘Oh, I do. I’d like to meet his aunt, this Svetlana Kelly. Yes, that’s what I’d like to do. Chamber Court, a late-Victorian house in Belsize Park. I looked it up.’

‘Any particular reason?’ Ferguson said.

‘To find out what he’s like.’

‘Don’t you mean was like?’ Monica asked. ‘As I understand it, she last saw him in 1989. When you think of what he’s gone through since then, I’d suppose him to be completely different.’

‘On the contrary. I’ve always been of the opinion that people don’t really change, not in any fundamental way. Anyway, I’ll go to see her tomorrow, if you approve, General?’

‘Whatever you say.’

Monica jumped in. ‘Would it be all right if I came with you? I don’t need to be back in Cambridge till Friday.’

‘No, that’s fine. I don’t think we should overwhelm her.’

Dillon said, ‘Old Victorian houses aren’t particularly wheelchair friendly.’

‘I’ll phone in advance. If there’s a problem, perhaps we can meet somewhere else.’

‘Fine. I’ll leave it in your hands,’ Ferguson said. ‘Now I don’t know about you lot, but I’m starving, so let’s get down to the eating part of the business.’

Later, they went their separate ways. Sergeant Doyle had waited for Roper in the van that had the rear lift for the wheelchair. Ferguson had his driver, and Billy gave Dillon and Monica a lift to Dover Street in the Alfa.

‘Very useful,’ Monica told him, as they moved through Mayfair. ‘You being a non-drinker.’

‘I get stopped now and then,’ Billy said. ‘Young guy in a flash motor like this. I’ve been breathalysed plenty. It’s great to see the look on their faces when they check the reading.’ He pulled up outside the Dover Street house. ‘Here we are, folks. You staying, right?’ he asked Dillon.

‘What do you think?’

‘You’re staying.’

He cleared off, they paused at the top of the steps for Monica to find her key, and went in. She didn’t put the light on, simply waited for him to lock the door, then put her arms around his neck and kissed him quite hard.

‘Oh my goodness, I’ve missed you.’

‘You’ve only been away four days.’

‘Don’t you dare,’ she said. ‘Ten minutes, and if you take more, there’ll be trouble,’ and she turned and ran up the stairs.

He changed in one of the spare bedrooms, put on a terrycloth robe and joined her in her suite. He’d found a tenderness with her that he’d never known he had – he’d surprised himself as their relationship blossomed – and they made slow careful love together.

Afterwards she drifted into sleep and he lay there, a chink of light coming through the curtains from a lamp in the street. On impulse, he slipped out of the bed, put on the robe, padded downstairs to the drawing room, took a cigarette from a box on the table, lit it, then sat by the bow window, looking out and thinking about Kurbsky. After a while, Monica slipped in, wearing a robe.

‘So there you are. Give me one.’

‘You’re supposed to have stopped,’ he said, but gave her one anyway.

‘What are you thinking of?’ she said. ‘Kurbsky?’

‘That’s right.’

‘I thought you might. He reminded me of you.’

‘You liked him, I think?’

‘An easy man to like, just as you are an easy man to love, Sean, but like you, there’s the feeling of the other self always there, like a crouching tiger just waiting to spring.’

‘Thanks very much.’

‘What were you thinking?’

‘What on earth would we do with him if we got him?’ He stubbed his cigarette out and got up. ‘Come on, back to bed with you.’ He put a hand round her waist and they went out.

It was ten thirty when Roper found himself back in his chair in the computer room at Holland Park. Sergeant Doyle said, ‘You’ve everything you need to hand, Major, so I think I’ll have a lie down in the duty room.’

‘You should be entitled to a night off, Tony. What about Sergeant Henderson?’

‘He’s on ten days’ leave.’

‘And the Royal Military Police can’t find a replacement?’

‘But we wouldn’t want that, would we, sir? A stranger in the system? I’ll get a bit of shut-eye. If you need me, give me a bell.’

Roper lit a cigarette and set his main screen alive, bringing up Svetlana Kelly. In her early years, she’d been a member of the Chekhov Theatre in Moscow, which meant she was well grounded in classical theatre. She hadn’t been much of a beauty, even when young, but he saw handsomeness and strength there. There was a selection of photos from the early years, and then London in 1981. A Month in the Country at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket. Fifty-five and never married, and then she’d met Patrick Kelly, an Irish widower and professor of literature at London University. Roper looked at Kelly’s photos – he was strong, too, undoubtedly and yet there was a touch of humour about his mouth.

Whatever the attraction, it was strong enough for them to marry at Westminster Register Office within a month of meeting and for Svetlana to cut herself free of the Soviet Union. She would be seventy-one now. It was eleven o’clock, and yet on sheer impulse, Roper phoned her. He stayed on speakerphone, he always did, and there was an instant answer.

‘Who is this?’ It was a whisper in a way, and yet clear enough, the Russian accent undeniable.

‘Mrs Kelly, my name is Giles Roper – Major Giles Roper.’ He spoke fair Russian, product of an Army total-immersion course just after Sandhurst, and he’d kept it up since. ‘Forgive the intrusion at such a time of night. You don’t know me.’

She cut in. ‘But I do. I attended a charity dinner for the Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital last year. You spoke from your wheelchair. You are the bomb disposal expert, aren’t you? The Queen herself pinned the George Cross to your lapel. You’re a hero.’

It was amazing the effect of that voice, so soft, like a breeze whispering through the leaves on an autumn evening. Roper’s throat turned dry, incredibly touched. It was like being a child again.

He said in English, ‘You’re too kind.’

‘What can I do for you?’

‘May I come to see you tomorrow morning?’

‘For what reason?’

‘I’d like to discuss a matter affecting your nephew. I’d have a woman with me, a Cambridge don who has just met Alexander in New York.’

‘Major Roper, be honest with me. What is your interest in my nephew? You must know I haven’t seen him in sixteen years.’

To this woman, one could only tell the truth. Roper knew that nothing else would do. ‘I’m with the British Security Services.’

There was a faint chuckle. ‘Ah, what they call a spook these days.’

‘Only on television.’

‘You intrigue me. Tell me of your companion.’ Roper did. She said, ‘The lady sounds quite interesting. If you’re a spook, you know where I live.’

‘Chamber Court, Belsize Park.’

‘Quite right. My husband died ten years ago and left me well provided for. Here, I live in Victorian splendour supported by my dear friend and fellow Russian, Katya Sorin, who takes care of the house and me and manages to find time to teach painting at the Slade as well. I’ll see you at ten thirty. Your chair will not prove a problem. The garden is walled, but the entrance in the side mews has a path that will give you access to French windows leading into a conservatory. I’ll be waiting.’

‘Thank you very much, Mrs Kelly. I must say, you seem to be taking me totally on trust.’

‘You fascinated me at that luncheon. Your speech was excellent, but modest, and so afterwards I looked you up on the internet. It was all there. Belfast in 1991, the Portland Hotel, the huge bomb in the foyer. It took you nine hours to render it harmless. Nine hours on your own. How can I not take such a man on trust? I’ll see you in the morning.’

It was quiet sitting there, staring up at his screens, and he put on some background music. Just like comfort food, only this was Cole Porter playing softly, just as it had been all those years ago in the Belfast safe house not far from the Royal Victoria Hospital. It was a long time ago, a hell of a long time ago, and he lit a cigarette and poured a Bushmills Irish whiskey for a change and remembered.

ROPER

3

Roper remembered that year well and not just because of his nine hours dismantling the Portland Hotel bomb. There had also been the mortar attack on Number Ten Downing Street. The Gulf War had been at its height, and the target had been the War Cabinet meeting at ten a.m. on February seventh – an audacious attack, and the missiles had landed in the garden, just narrowly missing the house. It bore all the hallmarks of a classic IRA operation, although nobody ever claimed responsibility for the attack.

In Belfast, meanwhile, the war of the bomb continued remorselessly, and in spite of all the politicians could do, sectarian violence ploughed on, people butchering each other in the name of religion, the British Army inured by twenty-two years to the Irish Troubles as a way of life.

For Giles Roper, scientific interest in the field of weaponry and explosives had drawn him in even during his training days as an officer cadet at Sandhurst, and on graduation, it had led to an immediate posting to the Ordnance Corps. In ninety-one, he was entering his third year as a disposal officer, a captain in rank and several hundred explosive devices of one kind or another behind him.

Most people didn’t realize that he was married. A summer affair with his second cousin, a schoolteacher named Elizabeth Howard, during his first year out of Sandhurst had turned into a total disaster. It was a prime example of going to bed on your wedding night with someone you thought you knew and waking up with a stranger. A Catholic, she didn’t believe in divorce and indeed visited his mother on a regular basis. He hadn’t seen her in years.

The ever-present risk of death, and the casualty rate amongst his fellows in the bomb disposal business, precluded any kind of relationship elsewhere. He smoked heavily, like most of his kind, and drank heavily at the appropriate time, like most of his kind.

It was a strange bizarre existence which produced obsessive patterns of behaviour. On many occasions, he’d found himself dealing with a bomb and indulging in conversation, obviously one-sided, demanding answers which weren’t there. It was an extreme example of talking to yourself. A bomb, after all, couldn’t talk back except when it exploded, and that would probably be the last thing you heard. However, he still talked to them. There seemed some sort of comfort in that.

His father had died when he was sixteen. It was his uncle who had arranged for his schooling and Sandhurst, and maintained his mother at the extended family home in Shropshire. She was basically there as unpaid help as far as Roper could see, but on army pay there wasn’t much he could do about it, until the unexpected happened. His mother’s brother, Uncle Arthur, a homosexual by nature and a broker in the City with a fortune to prove it, had died of AIDS and, lacking any faith in his sister’s ability to handle money, left a considerable fortune to Roper.

He could have left the army, but found that he didn’t want to, and when he tried to get his mother her own place, it turned out she was perfectly happy where she was. It had also become apparent that the perils of bomb disposal were beyond her understanding, so he settled a hundred thousand pounds on her, and the same on his wife, and left them to the joys of the countryside.

Before the Portland Hotel, he had been decorated with the Military Cross for gallantry, although the events surrounding it had only a tenuous link with his ordinary duties.

On standby, he had been based in a small market town in County Down where there had been a spate of bomb alerts, mostly false, though one in four was the real thing. The unit had five jeeps, a driver and guard and a disposal expert. On that particular day, a call came in over the radio, and the jeeps disappeared, leaving only Roper and his driver, the unit being a man short. The first call was false, also the second. There was another, this time for Roper by name. There was something about it, the speaker had a cockney accent that sounded wrong.

Terry, his driver, started up, and Roper said, ‘No, just hang on. I’m not happy. Something smells.’ He had a Browning Hi-Power pistol stuffed in his camouflage blouse. He was also wearing, courtesy of his newfound wealth, a nylon and titanium vest capable of stopping a .44 Magnum at point-blank range.

Terry eased up an Uzi machine pistol on his knees. There was a nurses’ hostel to the side of the old folks’ home across the street and as the voice sounded over the radio again, still calling for Roper, a milk wagon came round the corner. It braked to a halt outside the hostel. Two men were in the cab in dairy company uniform.

The one on the passenger side dropped out, turning suddenly as Roper started forward, pulled out a pistol and fired. He was good, the bullet striking Roper in the chest and knocking him back against the jeep. The man fired again, catching Terry in the shoulder as he scrambled out with the Uzi, then fired again at Roper as he tried to get up, catching him in the left arm before turning and starting to run. Roper shot him twice in the back, shattering his spine.

The vest had performed perfectly. He picked up the Uzi Terry had dropped, got to his feet and walked towards the milk truck. The driver had slipped from behind the wheel and was firing through the cab where the passenger door was partially open. A bullet plucked Roper’s shoulder. He dropped down on his face and could see directly under the truck where the driver’s legs were exposed from the knees down. He held the Uzi out in front of him and fired two sustained bursts, the man screaming in agony and falling back against the hostel wall.

Roper found him there, sobbing. He tapped the muzzle of the Uzi against the man’s face. ‘Where is it, in the cab?’

‘Yes,’ the man groaned.

‘What kind? Pencil timer, detonators or what?’

‘Go fuck yourself.’

‘Have it your own way. We’ll go to hell together.’

He grimaced at the pain of his wounded arm, but managed to pull the man up and push him half into the cab. There was a large Crawford’s biscuit tin. ‘You could get a Christmas cake in there or a hell of a lot of Semtex. Anyway, let’s try again. Pencil timer, detonator?’

He turned the man’s face and pushed the muzzle of the Uzi between his lips. The man wriggled and jerked away. ‘Pencils.’

‘Let’s hope you’re right, for both our sakes.’

He pulled off the lid and exposed the contents. Three pencils – the extras just to make sure. ‘Oh, dear,’ he said. ‘Fifteen minutes. I’d better move sharpish.’ He pulled them out and tossed them away and eased the man down as he fainted.

People were emerging from the houses and the local bar, now a couple of dogs barked, and then there was a sudden roaring of engines as two jeeps appeared, moving fast.

‘Here we go, the bloody cavalry arriving late as usual.’ He slid down on the pavement, his back to the hostel wall, scrabbled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, fumbled to get one out, and failed.

It didn’t make him notable in any way beyond military circles. The national newspapers didn’t make a fuss simply because death and destruction were so much a part of everyday life in Northern Ireland that, as the old army saying went, it was old news before it was news. But the Portland Hotel a year later, the lone man face-to-face with a terrible death for nine hours, really was news, even before the decision had been taken to reward him with the George Cross. He’d continued to meet the daily demands of his calling, working out of an old state school in Byron Road which the army had taken over on the safe-house principle, fortifying it against any kind of attack, the many rooms providing accommodation for officers and men, with a bar and catering facilities. There were places like it all over Belfast, safe, but bleak.

Local women fought for the privilege of working there in the canteen, the laundry or as cleaners. That many would be Republican sympathizers was clear, and a rough and ready way of sorting the problem was to try to employ only Protestant women. On the other hand, it was obviously a temptation for Catholics who needed work to pretend to be other than they were. Such women lived locally, and came and went through the heavily-fortified gates with identity cards, often so false they could be bought for a couple of pounds in any local bar.

Roper had been posted to Byron Street for nine months, and in that time had caused something of a stir with his Military Cross and good looks, but his gentlemanly behaviour towards the younger women, which was conspicuously absent in his fellows, had provoked a suggestion that, as the local girls put it, there had to be something wrong with him.

On the other hand, his incredible bravery was a fact, and so was the fact that in those nine months, some of his comrades had paid the final price and others had been terribly injured.

The Portland Hotel caused many people to look at him differently, as if there was something otherworldly about him, and there were those who felt uncomfortable in his presence, hurrying past him. One who did not was a new young cleaner who replaced an older woman who’d moved away. The girl’s name was Jean Murray and she was from a Protestant Orange background.

Roper’s room was on her list and she was resolutely cheerful from the moment she started and knew all his business within two days. Her mother had been killed in a bombing four years earlier, for which she blamed the fugging Fenians, as she called them. Her father was a member of the local Orange Lodge and had a plum job at the Port Authority. There was also a brother of twenty-one named Kenny in his final year at Queens University.

She extracted as much personal information from Roper as she could. As long as it wasn’t military, he didn’t mind. The truth was that to a certain extent he rather fancied her, which gave him pause for thought, because it meant the defensive wall he’d built around himself was weakening.

‘What’s it get yer, Captain, the hero bit? You’re a lonely man, that’s the truth of it, and you’ve stared death in the face for so long, it’s dried up any juice that’s in you.’

‘Well, thank you, Dr Freud,’ he said. ‘I mean, you would know.’

‘Why do you do it? It’s a known fact in this dump that you’re well fixed financially.’

‘Okay, look at it this way. When the Troubles started in sixty-nine, the bomb thing was in its infancy. Very crude, no big deal. Over the years, as the Provisional IRA has grown in power, bombs have become very sophisticated indeed. The public image of the IRA as a bunch of shaven-headed yobs off a building site is well off the mark. Plenty of solid middle-class professionals are in the movement. Schoolteachers, lawyers, accountants, a whole range of ordinary people.’

‘So what are you saying?’

‘That the bombmakers these days have got university degrees and they’re very clever and sophisticated. Consider the Portland bomb. I’m an expert and I’ve dealt with hundreds of bombs over the years, but that one took me nine hours, and shall I tell you something? He’ll be back, that bombmaker. He’ll come with something just a little bit different, just for me. He can’t afford to have me beat him. It’s as simple as that.’

She stared at him, pretty and rumpled in her blue uniform dress, leaning on her broom, no makeup on at all, and there was something in her eyes that could have been pity.

‘That’s terrible, what you say. Still, it can’t go on, things change.’

‘What do you mean things change?’

‘The whole system. My Kenny says the bombs won’t need people like you soon. He’s read about you in the papers. He knows I work for you.’

‘What does he mean things change?’

‘He’s taking his finals in his degree soon. Electronics. He makes gadgets. These days you have a hand control to work your television, open your garage doors, unlock your car, switch on security systems in your house. We’ve only got an ordinary terrace, but the gadgets he’s created in it are brilliant.’

‘Very interesting, but what’s this got to do with bombs?’

‘Well, it’s too technical for me, but he’s been working on a thing he calls a Howler. It looks like a standard television control, but it’s really different. He can turn off security systems, and I mean really important ones. He demonstrated on our local bank. He kept locking the doors as we walked past. They didn’t know whether they were coming or going. Does it to people’s cars as we go by, turns on store alarms, even big shops in town.’

‘Very interesting,’ Roper said. ‘Fascinating, but I still don’t see the relevance to bombs.’

‘Well, that’s what he’s really been working on. He said he can maybe adapt the Howler so that even a big sophisticated bomb like your Portland Hotel job could simply be switched off. That’s the only way I can describe it.’ She smiled. ‘Anyway, I can’t stand around here chattering. I’ve got five other rooms to do.’

‘No, just a minute,’ Roper said. ‘Let me get this straight. Has Kenny really got anywhere with his invention?’

‘He’s working at it all the time at the moment. He was talking about bombs at the time because of that Paradise Street bomb the day before yesterday, the one in the car that killed the sergeant. He said the Howler could have switched it off at the touch of a button, that was what he was working towards.’

Roper was cold with excitement. ‘He said that, did he?’

She laughed. ‘I said could it work the other way, could what was switched off be switched on? He said a Howler has two faces. What could be switched off could be switched on again.’ She picked up her bucket. ‘Anyway, I’ll be away now. Work to do.’

‘Just one more thing. Could I meet Kenny?’

She had moved to the door and turned. ‘I don’t know about that. I mean, soldiers are targets at the best of times and you never know who’s who these days. Fenians everywhere.’

‘I wouldn’t be in uniform, Jean. I’d just like to meet him and discuss his work if he’d let me. It sounds very interesting. And he might find it rewarding to discuss his ideas with someone like me who has spent so much time at the coalface, so to speak.’

She looked serious. ‘You’ve got a point. I can’t speak for him, but I’ll give him a phone call, see what he has to say. I’ve got to get moving. I’ll let you know.’

She was away and Roper sat on the bed and thought about it. It wasn’t as crazy as it sounded. Most really sophisticated bombs had multiple electrical circuits of one kind or another, intertwining in complicated puzzles, feeding into each other, often in the most bizarre way. The theory behind this Howler device of Kenny’s was a kind of Holy Grail. After all, if the most complicated of security systems could be neutered at the touch of a button, it seemed logical that the right touch of genius could do the same thing to bomb circuits.

It was a thought that wouldn’t go away and he went down to the bar and ordered a large whiskey since he was off duty, took a newspaper to a corner table and sat there, pretending to read it, but thinking.

Major Sanderson, the commanding officer, glanced in. ‘I see you’ve got a night off, Giles. Lucky you. I’ve got a general staff meeting at the Grand Hotel. Your leave’s been approved, by the way. Starts Sunday. Two weeks, so make the most of it.’

He went, and for a moment there was no one else in the bar except the corporal behind the counter busying himself cleaning glasses. Jean Murray peered in at the door.

The corporal said, ‘You can’t come in here, you know that.’

‘It’s all right,’ Roper told him. ‘She wants me.’ He swallowed his whiskey, got up and joined her in the corridor. ‘What have you got for me?’

‘I’ve spoken to Kenny, and he says he’ll see you, but it’s got to be tonight, because he’s starting the practical side of his finals for his degree at Queen’s University tomorrow.’

‘That’s fine by me.’

‘I’m finished in an hour. I’ll meet you on the corner by Cohan’s Bar, and no uniform, like I said.’

‘No problem. Where are we going?’

‘Not far. Half a mile maybe. You know where the Union Canal is? He has a room he uses for his work in what used to be a flour mill. You’ll need a raincoat. It’s pouring out there.’

‘Sounds good to me,’ Roper told her.

He returned to the bar, ordered another whiskey and sat in the corner, thinking about it. His boss was out of the way at his staff meeting, there was no point in discussing his intended adventure on the streets of Belfast after dark with anyone else. There were risks, but risk of any kind had been so much a part of his life for years now that it was second nature.

He would go armed, of course, his usual Browning Hi-Power, but a backup would be a sensible precaution, and he drank his whiskey and went along to the weapons store, where he found a Sergeant Clark on duty.

‘I’m going on the town tonight, out of uniform, special op. I’ll have the Hi-Power, but is there anything else you could suggest?’

Clark, who regarded Roper as a true hero, was happy to oblige. ‘Colt .25, Captain, with hollow-point cartridges. It’s hard to beat. There you go.’ He placed one on the counter and a box of ten cartridges.

‘So that will do it?’ Roper enquired.

‘With this.’ Clark produced an ankle holder in soft leather. ‘Nothing’s perfect, but in a body search, when somebody finds an item like a Browning, they tend to assume that’s it.’ He smiled cheerfully. ‘You just have to live in hope. Sign here, sir.’

He pushed a ledger across and offered a pen. Roper said, ‘I knew I could rely on you, Sergeant.’

‘Take care, sir.’

In his room, Roper changed into a pair of old comfortable trousers, not jeans, because it made the ankle holder more accessible. He carefully loaded the Colt with six of the hollow-points and checked that he could reach it easily. He wore the bulletproof vest, a dark polo-neck sweater and a navy blue slip-on raincoat he’d had for years. He didn’t wear a shoulder holster and simply put the Browning in his right-hand pocket. He peered out of the windows, old-fashioned street lights aglow now in the early evening darkness, rain hammering down, although when didn’t it in Belfast? He went through his narrow wardrobe, found an old tweed cap, pulled it on and went downstairs.

The guards on either side of the gate stayed in their sentry boxes. They knew him well. After all, everyone did. ‘A hell of a night for it, sir,’ one of them called cheerfully as he raised the bar. ‘Whatever it is.’

Roper smiled back just as cheerfully, pausing for a moment, looking out into that Belfast street that as far as he was concerned was like no other street in any city in the world.

‘All right,’ he murmured to himself. ‘Let’s get moving.’ He slipped out and turned towards Cohan’s.

Jean Murray stood in the entrance of the bar, sheltering from the rain. She had a large old-fashioned umbrella ready and seemed impatient. ‘So there you are. I was beginning to think you weren’t coming.’

‘Will I do?’ Roper asked.

She looked him over. ‘I suppose so. But keep that gob of yours shut. You sound as if you’ve been to Eton or somewhere like that.’ She opened the umbrella. ‘Let’s get moving.’

He fell into step beside her as she walked rapidly. ‘A rotten night for it.’

‘Don’t rub it in. I’ve only had a sandwich all day and I’m starving.’

He kept up with her obediently, passing through one mean street after another, the river not far away. ‘A hard life, living in a place like this.’

‘Well, the British government in London never gave a damn about Belfast, that’s for sure. The forgotten city. Did you know the Luftwaffe blitzed it worse than Liverpool during the war?’

‘I suppose they were after Harland & Wolff and the shipyards. They built the Titanic here, didn’t they?’

‘Jesus and Mary, that’s history, mister,’ she said. ‘It’s what happens now that’s real and the future of this country.’

Jesus and Mary. Strange on the lips of a young Protestant girl, and he slipped a hand in his pocket and found the butt of the Browning, and then she laughed harshly. ‘What in the hell is getting into me, talking like a fugging Fenian? It must be the weather.’

They had moved into an area of decaying warehouses and a place where the Union Canal emptied into the river. There were narrow decaying Victorian buildings, like something out of Dickens, an old iron footbridge and a sign saying Conroy’s Flour Mill. An old-fashioned lamp was bracketed above the door, illuminating the area, and there was a light at the window above it.

‘Here we are,’ she said, and led the way up a narrow wooden stairway. The door at the top stood open, light shining down. ‘Kenny, we’re here,’ she called, paused for a moment so that Roper could see the table in the centre of a sizeable room, littered with a variety of technical equipment, tools and vices. She stepped forward, Roper following, his hand in his pocket on the butt of the Browning.

The door slammed behind him, the muzzle of a pistol was rammed against the side of Roper’s skull, and a hard Ulster voice said, ‘Easy, now, or I’ll blow your brains out. Hands high.’ Roper did exactly as he was told. He was patted, the Browning soon found. ‘A Hi-Power? You’ve got taste.’ He was pushed towards the table. ‘Over there and turn.’

Roper did and found himself facing a small wiry young man, hair almost shoulder length, a Beretta automatic in his left hand. He wore an old reefer jacket, dropped the Browning into his right pocket and grinned, making him look quite amicable.

‘The great man himself.’

‘And you’ll be Kenny Murray?’

‘As ever was.’

‘And there’s no Howler?’

Murray laughed. ‘Not here, bomb man, not here. It exists, though. I’m working to perfect it all the time.’

‘I’m impressed you’d bother,’ Roper said. ‘After all, your purpose is to make bombs explode.’

‘It is indeed, but the scientist in me can’t resist a challenge.’

Roper turned to Jean, who had taken a pack of cigarettes out of her pocket and was lighting one. ‘Oh, Jean, you disappoint me, turning out to be a decent Catholic girl after all.’

‘And you thinking I was some Prod bitch. All the worse for you.’ There was anger there, but perhaps at herself.

‘So what’s the reason for all this? If you’d wanted to shoot me, you would have,’ he said to Kenny.

‘You’re absolutely right. I’d love to have taken care of that, but I’m under orders. There are those who would like to have words with you. Information’s the name of the game. Our bombmakers would appreciate the chance to squeeze you dry. So let’s get going. You first.’

‘If you say so.’

Roper opened the door and stood for a moment at the top of those dark stairs. He found the rail with his left hand and started down. There was only one thing to do and he’d only get one chance, so halfway down he slipped deliberately in the shadows, cursing and gripping the rail, reaching for the Colt in the ankle holder. In the ensuing scramble, he dropped it in his raincoat pocket.

‘Watch it, for Christ’s sake,’ Kenny ordered.

‘It’s not my fault. The place is a death trap.’ Roper hauled himself up and continued.

Kenny laughed. ‘Did you hear that, Jean?’ he said to his sister behind him. ‘The man’s a bloody comic.’

Roper went out, his right hand in his pocket, and started over the bridge. Halfway across, he paused and turned. ‘There’s just one thing you should know, you Fenian bastard.’

Kenny stood facing him, holding the Beretta against his right thigh. ‘And what would that be, bomb man?’ he asked amicably.

‘You made a mistake. You should have killed me when you had the chance.’

His hand swung up, he shot Kenny between the eyes twice, the hollow-point cartridges fragmenting the back of his skull. Kenny spun round and half fell across the iron rail of the bridge. Jean screamed, Roper leaned down, caught the body by one ankle and heaved it over into the fast-moving canal.

‘There you go,’ Roper said. ‘Are you satisfied now, Jean?’

She started to back away. ‘Ah, sweet Jesus and Mother Mary. What have I done?’

‘You’ll be asking yourself that till your dying day,’ Roper told her.

She seemed to suddenly pull herself together. ‘You’re not going to kill me?’ she whispered.

He didn’t say a word, turned and walked away across the bridge, and behind him she started to sob bitterly, the sound echoing across the waters of the canal that had swept her brother into the River Lagan and out to sea.

He walked all the way back through mean rain-washed streets, the sound of shooting in the distance, walking carefully on pavements scattered with broken glass, passing bombed-out buildings boarded up. All of a sudden, it had all caught up with him, too many long and weary years, too much killing, too much death.

He made it to Byron Street without getting stopped once, which was something of a surprise, and ended up back in the bar. It was empty, the corporal behind the counter fussing around, stacking bottles.

‘Just in time, sir, I’m closing in fifteen minutes. What can I get you?’

‘A large Scotch, that’ll do it.’

He sat in the corner, his raincoat open, thinking of the nice girl who’d sold him out and the man he’d killed, and it didn’t worry him like it should have. The corporal had the radio on, some late-night show, and someone was singing a Cole Porter number, ‘They Can’t Take That Away From Me’, filled with heartbreaking and melancholic nostalgia, and Giles Roper knew that whatever happened, he was through with Belfast beyond any argument. First he had to return the Colt .25 to Sergeant Clark and report the loss of a Browning Hi-Power, but not now, not tonight. He needed sleep. He needed peace, and he said goodnight to the corporal and went to bed.

From his emergency kit he took a pill that knocked him out, slept deeply and came to life again at seven. He lay there for a while, thinking about things, and went and had a hot shower. He had a tea-maker in his room and made a cup and stood in his robe thinking of the events of the previous night, moving to the window and looking out.

The rain was worse than ever, absolutely pouring, and the women coming in for the day shift down below crowded through the entrance, many of them with umbrellas. He started to turn away and paused, to look down there again, for a brief moment convinced that he’d seen Jean Murray, but he was mistaken, had to be. The last place she’d show her face, Byron Street. On the other hand, it would be a long time before he forgot the sight of her standing under the lamp after he’d killed her brother.

He had the day shift starting at nine and was just about to get dressed in camouflage overalls when he had a phone call from the orderly room. ‘Message from Major Sanderson, sir. He wants you to join him as soon as possible at the Grand Hotel. General Marple flew in from London last night. Special ways-and-means conference.’

‘I’ll see to it.’

He groaned. Marple from London, which meant full uniform. He dressed quickly, taking it from the dry cleaning bag, grateful it hadn’t been worn. It looked rather good when he checked himself in the mirror, and the ribbons for Ireland and the Military Cross set things off nicely. He adjusted his cap, nodded to himself, took a military trench coat from the wardrobe and went out.

He had his own vehicle on allocation, a Ford pick-up painted khaki green. It was parked in the officers’ sector in the corner of the old schoolyard. Vehicles there were never locked in case of emergencies, and the gate sentries were deemed security enough. He opened the driver’s seat, tossed his trench coat into the rear, and got behind the wheel.

He reached the gate and slowed as the sentry stepped out, raising the bar. ‘You know Jean Murray, don’t you, Fletcher? I thought I saw her earlier.’

‘You did, Captain, but she wasn’t around for long and left again. In fact, I think that’s her over there in the church doorway.’

Roper was aware of a sudden chill, drove out slowly towards the other side of the road, and saw her standing there, soaked to the skin, hair plastered to her skull. She was like a corpse walking.

The moment she saw him, she started down the steps. He pulled up at the kerb and lowered his window. ‘What are you doing here, Jean?’

‘I wanted to give you a present.’ She produced a black plastic control unit about nine inches long. ‘The Howler, Captain. Kenny did finish it, but this isn’t your present. That’s under the passenger seat and, remember, the Howler has two faces. It can switch on as well as switch off.’

She laughed, and it was like no laugh Giles Roper had ever heard in his life, and as he scrabbled under the seat, pulling out the white plastic shopping bag he found there, the world became an infinity of white blinding light, no pain, not at that moment, simply enormous energy as the explosion took him into the eye of the storm.

So, Jean Murray died, killed instantly, just another bomber, a statistic of those terrible years, and the Howler, the Holy Grail, the ultimate answer to the bomb, died with her. Her final act of mad revenge started Giles Roper on a road that encompassed dozens of operations, a time of incredible pain and suffering, and yet it was also a journey of self-discovery and real achievement, as he became one of the most significant figures in the world of cyberspace.

He never disclosed what took place on that last night in Belfast. To the authorities, Jean Murray had just been another bomber, and over the years Roper had come to terms with her and was no longer disturbed by the memory. After all, what she and her brother had intended for him was kidnap, torture and murder. What they had given him unintentionally, was the wheelchair, and the new life that had brought him.

The George Cross had come afterwards, although it was a year and a half before he could face the Queen for her to pin it on. By then, his mother had died, and his wife, totally unable to cope, had moved on, pleaded for a quiet divorce, even with all her Catholic convictions, and finally married a much older man.

Roper was now an indispensable part of Ferguson’s security group, spending most of his time at the Holland Park safe house in front of his computer screens, frequently racked with pain which responded only to whisky and cigarettes, his comfort food, sleeping only in fits and starts and mainly in his wheelchair. Indomitable, as Dillon once said, himself alone, a force of nature.

LONDON

4

At 10.30 on the morning following his late-night conversation with Svetlana Kelly, Roper, accompanied by Monica, was delivered to the side entrance in the mews beside Chamber Court off Belsize Avenue. Roper was off-loaded, and a CCTV camera beside an ironbound gate in the high wall scanned them.

A voice, not Svetlana’s, said through the speaker, ‘Would that be Major Roper and Lady Starling?’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ Doyle told her.

‘I’m Katya Sorin, Svetlana’s companion. The gate will open now. Tell them to follow the path inside, and it will bring them round to the conservatory.’

‘Thank you, ma’am.’ The gate buzzed and opened. Doyle said, ‘I’ll wait. I’ve got a couple of newspapers.’

Roper went through into a quiet, ordered world of rhododendron bushes, poplars and cypress trees, a weeping willow. Not much colour around, but it was, after all, February. The path was York stone, but expertly laid so that the going was smooth. They approached a fountain in granite stone, moved on to the large Victorian house, and there was the terrace of the conservatory. A glass door stood open and Katya Sorin waited.

Roper had looked her up. She was forty and unmarried, born in Brighton to a Russian immigrant who had married an English woman. A senior lecturer at the Slade, where she taught painting, she was a successful portrait painter and had even had the Queen Mother sit for her. She also had a considerable reputation in the theatre as a set designer.

She had cropped hair, a kind of Ingrid Bergman look, and wore khaki overalls. ‘It’s lovely to meet you.’ Her handshake was firm. ‘Just follow me.’

She led the way into a delightful conservatory which was a sort of miniature Kew, crammed with plants of every description. Internal folding doors were open, disclosing a large drawing room, fashioned in period Victorian splendour, but Svetlana Kelly sat in the centre of the conservatory in a high wicker chair, a curved wicker table before her, two wicker chairs on the other side of it, obviously waiting for them.

‘My dear Lady Starling, how nice to meet you. Katya and I looked you up on the internet. Brains and beauty, such a wonderful combination.’

Monica had been well prepared by Roper. In a way, she felt she knew them already.

‘And such good bone structure.’ Katya actually put a hand under Monica’s chin. ‘I must do a drawing at least.’

Svetlana said, ‘And Major Roper. A true hero, a noble man.’

‘Yes,’ said Katya. ‘Now, please let me apologize, I must run off to the Slade for a seminar, so if you would accompany me, Lady Starling, I will show you the kitchen, and if there’s anything you’d like – coffee, tea, something stronger – I’m sure you won’t be shy about helping yourselves. We don’t keep a maid.’

‘Of course.’ Monica wasn’t in the least put out. ‘Anything I can do.’

Katya kissed Svetlana on the forehead. ‘Later, you may tell me all about whatever it is. Now I must go.’

She and Monica went out. There was a sideboard loaded with drinks and glasses. ‘Have a drink, my dear. What is your pleasure?’ asked Svetlana.

‘Scotch whisky in large quantities, I’m afraid.’

‘Which helps with the pain? You have had so many years of it that many drugs have lost their ability to cope, I imagine.’

‘How on earth do you know that?’

‘I’m a sensitive, my dear, I know the most intimate things about people. God blessed me as a child. Two gifts. To act – my abiding joy, my passion – and to heal. Come close.’ He eased the chair round and she took his face in her hands. ‘You have the pain in your head, am I right?’

‘Always.’

‘My hands are cool.’

‘Very.’

‘Now, my fingers on each side of your temples.’ The surge of heat was profound enough to shock him, and the usual tension subsided. ‘See, I told you so. Now go and get your whisky and a vodka for me.’

He went to the sideboard, poured the drinks, and brought them back. She raised her glass. ‘To life, my dear.’

They tossed it down and Monica returned. ‘Katya’s coming back. We got as far as her Mini Cooper and her mobile rang. It was the Slade cancelling her seminar, a water pipe burst or something. Anyway, I’m glad. I must say I like her enormously.’

‘And I like you, my dear. You are happy at the moment, you are in love, I think?’

‘Well, it certainly isn’t with me,’ Roper told her.

‘She will tell me in her own time, for we shall be good friends. Back to business and my nephew. I know his story, you know it, so does the whole world. So, let us start with you, my dear, having only just seen him, as I understand, at the gala cultural affair in New York for the United Nations.’

Katya, entering at that moment, heard her, and Monica hesitated, glancing at Roper. ‘Look, do I tell her where all this is leading? I mean, the most important thing he’s looking for if everything works out is total secrecy.’

Svetlana said, ‘If you hesitate over Katya, there’s no need. She is my most faithful friend and I trust her with my life.’

‘Excellent. I hope we haven’t offended you, Katya.’

‘Of course not. Please continue.’ She went to an easel by a window, removed a cloth, revealing a painting she was obviously working on, picked up a palette and brush and started to work.

Roper leaned over and took Svetlana’s hand. ‘When Kurbsky was seventeen, you came to London to do some Chekhov, met Patrick Kelly and decided to defect, which was a hell of a decision in Communist days. Did you ever regret it?’

‘Never. I fell in love with a good man, I fell in love with London. Life blossomed incredibly, but I see the direction you’re taking here. Alexander wishes to leap over the wall, too?’

Monica said, ‘They control his every move. He told me he feels like a bear on a chain.’

‘I see,’ Svetlana said calmly. ‘Then I suggest you tell me everything, my dear, exactly what he said and what happened.’

When she was finished Svetlana smiled. ‘You perform well, my dear, but then you are an academic, an actor in a way. I feel I know all the people you have mentioned. This General Ferguson and his people, you and your brother, the Member of Parliament. Such a tragic figure. And my nephew – how he feels, what he wants. It’s been sixteen years since he last sat with me, here where you are sitting now. For years, nothing, and then later on, the books, a photo on a cover, appearances on television. The falsity of the internet. To watch him was like watching someone playing him in a movie. In fact, that’s what he looked like to me with that absurdly long hair and that tangled beard.’

‘Tell me about him, please. You raised him, after all.’

‘My brother was KGB all his life, so for his family, things were okay in the Soviet Union. His wife was not a healthy woman. I came to Moscow hoping to act, but he agreed to let me come only if I lived with them and supported her. She shouldn’t have had another child after Alexander, but my brother insisted. Two years later, Tania was born and her mother died. We were all trapped. I was allowed to act with Moscow companies. He used his influence, but always I had to be a mother to the children, not that I objected. I loved Alex dearly.’

Monica said, ‘And Tania?’

‘Never cared for me, but she could do no wrong in her father’s eyes. The years passed, he became a colonel in the KGB, very important. We had a couple living in at the house, so I had more freedom. When the Chekhov Theatre was invited to London to perform, I was one of their lead players, so he agreed I could go. It was a prestige thing. The rest is history. I married Kelly and refused to return.’

‘And the children?’

‘Tania wasn’t bothered. She was fifteen, a wild child, and as always he doted on her. Alexander was a brilliant student, already at Moscow University at seventeen. I took a chance and wrote asking that he be permitted to visit. His father, knowing how close I was to Alexander, allowed him to come on holiday, but ordered him to persuade me to return.’

‘Are you certain of that?’ Roper asked.

‘Yes, Alexander told me, and Kelly. He liked Kelly. They practised judo together. Kelly was a black belt.’

‘All this fits not only with what I’ve found, but with what he told Monica,’ Roper said. ‘About being so happy here with you and Kelly, but then came the serious unrest, the battles with the police and student groups over Afghanistan, hundreds dead in street fighting in Moscow.’

‘And amongst them Tania,’ Monica said.

‘Her father contacted us saying she was wounded. That’s what made Alexander return instantly.’

Monica said, ‘He told me that he arrived too late for the farewell. He said she had a headstone at Minsky Park Military Cemetery because his father used his influence to somehow make her death respectable.’

‘That sounds like my brother. He lied about her only being wounded just to draw Alexander back.’

‘And when he joined the paratroopers, what did you think of that?’

‘I was horrified, but by then we’d lost touch. All mail was censored, so I didn’t know about it for a long time.’

‘He told me he thought he’d done it to punish his father, who couldn’t do anything about it because it would have made him look bad, a man of his standing.’

‘I can believe that, but I don’t really know. Everything after that, all his army time, Afghanistan and Chechnya, I know only from his books. I had no contact during all those years, and the years after that he covers in Moscow Nights, the years of his anti-establishment activities. I envy you for having been in his company and I’m grateful for what you have told me.’

Roper said, ‘What do you think about his insistence on total secrecy?’

‘That it might present difficulties for him. But that is a bridge to be crossed at a later date.’ She smiled and said to Katya, who had been working away quietly, ‘Have you anything to say?’

Katya put down her painting things and wiped her hands. ‘Let me just mention this. Svetlana and I first became friends when I was thirty – I’ve never met Alex, but I’m a play designer; a total concept specialist. Not just sets, but people, clothes, appearance, and one thing I can tell you: any problem, however difficult, has a solution.’

‘As she’s proved at the National Theatre on many occasions,’ Svetlana put in.

Katya found a pack of cigarettes in her smock and lit one. ‘Think of this whole affair as a theatrical performance. Alex flies from Paris, you and your people get him to England in one piece, Major, and then what do you do with him?’

‘Help him vanish,’ Roper said. ‘That’s what he wants.’

‘And what would you do with someone you really needed to keep safe?’

‘We have safe houses for situations like that. But for Kurbsky, it would just be a temporary solution.’

‘Here would be an impossibility,’ Svetlana said. ‘I’m sure they’d look for him here. He couldn’t possibly show his face.’

Katya went to the sideboard, poured a vodka and passed it to Svetlana. ‘True – if it was his face.’

Svetlana looked at her. ‘Thank you, my dear. I presume you mean plastic surgery?’

‘Not as such, although it’s a long-term possibility. Making him a new person, totally different in every way, that’s how I would approach it. What is a postman or a policeman? A uniform is what we see and accept, not so much the individual. Take Alex. His persona is like a Hollywood costume actor’s – the hair, the beard, so extravagant. Svetlana has told me of his love as a boy for The Three Musketeers and Captain Blood, the swagger, the boldness inherent in such costume dramas. That is what he projects and what people see in him.’

‘So how would you change him? By cutting his hair?’ Monica said.

‘If you did that and removed the beard, I think you would be amazed.’

They all thought about it and Svetlana said, ‘He couldn’t live in the house, of course. But Kelly used to use the apartment over the garage as a study. They practised judo up there.’

‘Do you still use it?’ Roper asked.

It was Katya who answered. ‘Until three months ago, we had a young Pole named Marek living there, taking care of the garden. He had a sociology degree, but in Warsaw that only brought him two pounds an hour as a teacher. We let him live in the apartment, and as long as he saw to the garden, we never queried what else he did. He was with us for almost a year before he decided to go home again.’

‘There’s another possibility, too,’ Svetlana said. ‘I have a cottage way down by the Thames estuary beyond Dartford looking out towards Sheerness and the Isle of Sheppey. Holly End the place is called, marshland, wildfowl, birds, shingle beaches. You can breathe there.’

‘It sounds nice. Could Alex hide himself there?’ Monica asked Katya.

‘It’s lonely and desolate enough. The problem is if it’s too lonely.’

‘We’ll take a look at it, too,’ Monica said. ‘We wouldn’t want Alex going stir-crazy, though.’

‘There’s an old Russian saying,’ Katya put in. ‘If you want to hide a pine tree, put it in a forest of pines.’

‘What’s your point?’ Roper asked.

‘I may be wrong, but I recall a story about an important letter that was the object of a heated search.’

‘I think I know the one you mean. The letter was in plain view all along, just another letter,’ Roper said. ‘And you think that might work for Kurbsky?’

‘Yes,’ Katya told him. ‘Let me give it some thought. But now, it’s time for lunch.’ She smiled at Monica. ‘If you’d mind helping me?’

‘Only if you call me Monica.’ They went out together and Svetlana reached and put a hand on Roper’s knee.

‘There is much more going on with Alex than it seems, I’m sure of it. I don’t know what it is, but I will find out, I promise you, my dear.’

‘So you and Katya will come on board, help us to find a solution?’

‘What else would I do? Alexander is my blood, and blood is everything. Now – I’m an old woman now and haven’t time to waste, so forgive my directness. When Monica was telling us the story, she mentioned General Ferguson and one of his closest associates, a Sean Dillon, who used to be with the IRA.’

‘Yes. When the General persuaded him, if you could call it that, to join the organization, he said it was because he needed someone who could be worse than the bad guys.’

‘I see. And it is this man whom Monica favours?’

‘You could put it that way.’

‘I look forward to meeting him. Kelly flirted with the IRA when he was a student in Dublin. He once said it brought out the romantic in him.’

‘There wasn’t anything in the least romantic about the IRA in Belfast in the years I was there,’ he told her.

‘But that is all over now, my dear, a long, long time ago.’

That evening, there was a council of war at Holland Park. Ferguson was there, Roper, Monica, Dillon, and Harry and Billy Salter.

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