White death

NINETEEN

As soon as Lamont had finished examining Steven and given him a clean bill of health, Steven requested that he be allowed to make some telephone calls.

‘Calling Sci-Med?’ asked Lamont.

Steven nodded.

‘I’ve already informed Sir John Macmillan that you’re back in the land of the living. He left instructions when you were admitted that he be kept informed of your progress at all times. I gather he’s the one responsible for the guards on the door. He’ll be expecting your call.’

Steven called Macmillan but spoke first to Jean Roberts who said how worried they had all been. ‘I’m so glad you’re all right. When we heard it was cyanide… well, you know…’

Steven was touched by the note of genuine concern in Jean’s voice. He had to swallow before saying, ‘Thanks, Jean. I was very lucky. I wonder if you’d mind phoning my sister-in-law in Scotland and telling her why I’ve not been in touch. Don’t tell her the whole story, maybe just that I’ve been away on operations and I’ll call as soon as I can? Give her my love and ask her to tell Jenny that Daddy loves her very much. He’ll be in touch as soon as we’ve caught the bad guys.’

‘Will do. John’s had a bit of a job squaring things with the local police and trying to keep the story out of the papers.’

‘But he managed?’ asked Steven anxiously.

‘Yes, after enlisting some pretty heavy assistance from the Home Office.’

‘Good.’

Steven spoke to Macmillan for more than ten minutes, both trying to come up with some explanation for the attacks on his life but in the end failing.

‘It has to have something to do with what I’ve been working on’ insisted Steven. ‘But I can’t see any conceivable Russian connection with the green sticker kids. Can you?’

Macmillan said not. ‘Someone obviously thinks you know more than you do about something,’ he said.

‘Which puts me in a very uncomfortable position.’

‘Especially as they’ll probably try again,’ said Macmillan.

‘I need you to step up protection for Tally,’ said Steven. ‘They might well try to get to me through her.’

‘I did that as soon as I heard what had happened,’ said Macmillan. ‘I think the history of your car and its previous owner lulled us both into thinking it was someone else they were after.’

Steven nodded.

‘How is Dr Simmons taking things?’

‘Pretty much as you’d expect,’ said Steven, the tone of his voice suggesting not well.

‘Well, it’s a bit much for anyone to take on board. Give her time.’

‘I’m hoping that’s what she might give me,’ said Steven ruefully.

‘The sooner this investigation’s concluded the happier we’ll all be,’ said Macmillan.

Steven took the phone from his ear and looked at it in disbelief. He’d just been told to get on with things in ever such a civilised way. He fought the urge to point out to Macmillan that he’d been knocking on death’s door for the past couple of days. Instead, he said, ‘I should be out of here in the morning but one thing…’

‘Yes?’

‘I returned my gun to the armoury when I thought I wouldn’t be needing it. I’d better have it back.’

‘Glock 23, wasn’t it?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’ll have it delivered to the hospital. It’ll be there before you leave in the morning.’

It was a little after six in the evening when Tally came back. She was dressed in her outdoor clothes with a bag slung over her shoulder. ‘How are you feeling?’

‘How are you feeling which is more to the point?’ countered Steven. ‘All this must have come as a hell of a shock to you.’

‘Life’s rich pattern, I suppose,’ said Tally with a sigh. ‘But I must say I didn’t plan on being a Bond girl: I’m really not the type. I’m quite happy as a paediatrician.’

‘My life isn’t usually like this,’ said Steven. ‘I’m not a spy or any kind of secret agent. You know what I do: I told you. I wasn’t lying.’

‘And the Russians?’

‘I’ve no idea why they want me dead. I can only think I must have stumbled across something and upset the wrong people. The trouble is I’ve no idea what it is or who they are.’

‘Which makes things even more dangerous,’ said Tally.

‘It does,’ agreed Steven, deciding not to even try putting a gloss on things.

‘I hear I am to have people looking after me?’

‘Special Branch. John Macmillan thought it would be a wise precaution. He arranged it while I was in the land of nod. They’ll be discreet.’

‘And the men outside your door?’

‘Special Branch too. They’ll be gone in the morning when I check out.’

‘You’re expected to look after yourself?’

‘Yes.’

‘I suppose that means you’re an expert in unarmed combat and carry a gun under your arm?’ asked Tally. There was no mistaking the accusation in her voice.

‘Yes,’ said Steven flatly.

There was an uncomfortable pause before Tally shook her head slightly and her eyes filled with renewed doubt.

Steven took her hand and said, ‘I served with Special Forces. I was a doctor but I acquired certain other skills along the way — but they’re a legacy of the past — nothing to do with my current job, and I only carry a gun when there’s cause to believe my life’s in danger. I don’t have a double 0 licence… although I have a TV one… and a driving one with three points for speeding on it.’

Tally couldn’t resist a smile. She sat down on the edge of the bed and looked Steven straight in the eye. ‘I hope I don’t live to regret this but I’m going to believe you,’ she said.

Steven closed his eyes and gave silent thanks.

‘What are your plans when you leave here?’

‘Back to London. I’m going to pick up the pieces of the investigation.’

‘Please be careful.’

‘I will, I promise. I’ve got too much to live for.’

‘You could always stay at my place until you decide what you’re going to do… Special Branch could look after both of us?’

Steven kissed Tally and thanked her for the offer. ‘I have to talk things over with John Macmillan face-to-face. We’ve not been told the whole story about the vaccine. I’m convinced of it.’

‘Keep in touch,’ said Tally. It sounded so poignant that Steven took her in his arms and held her close. ‘As soon as this thing’s over we’ll start making plans about us, right? We come first.’

Tally gave a slightly distant smile and nodded. ‘Take care, Steven.’

Steven was officially discharged next morning after final tests on his reflexes and cardiac and respiratory functions were completed to George Lamont’s satisfaction. ‘You’ll never be that lucky again,’ said Lamont. ‘There can’t be too many people in the world who’ve been injected with cyanide and lived to tell the tale.’

‘I believe you.’

Steven dressed and thanked the unit nurses for looking after him before having a word with Jenkins and Ritchie, the two Special Branch men on the door. ‘Thank you, gentlemen, I’m grateful to you but happily I won’t be requiring your services any longer.’

‘Oh, just when we were beginning to enjoy ourselves,’ said Jenkins, a thickset, bald man who would not have looked out of place in the front row of a rugby scrum. ‘Nothing we like better than baby-sitting Sci-Med agents. Delicate flowers they are, George,’ he said, turning to his colleague. ‘Did you know that?’

Ritchie, his more thoughtful-looking colleague, gave an embarrassed smile.

‘They’re all graduates,’ continued Jenkins. ‘Brains the size of planets, some of them, they reckon. Isn’t that right, Doctor?’

‘Well, all things are relative,’ said Steven, making sure he was looking directly at Jenkins when he said it.

‘But when push comes to shove… it’s Special Branch they call on when noses need blowing and arses wiping…’

‘And an excellent job you do,’ said Steven.

Jenkins bristled at being patronised. ‘Now are you sure you wouldn’t like us to see you across the road, Doctor?’ he asked Steven. ‘Check to see if there are any bad people out there? I mean, are you quite sure you’re fighting fit again…?’

Before Jenkins knew what had hit him, Steven had his arm twisted painfully up his back, his legs splayed apart and the side of his face rammed hard up against the wall in the corridor so that he looked like a gargoyle on a cathedral wall. ‘Yes,’ said Steven thoughtfully. ‘Everything seems to be working well… but thanks for asking. It’s always just as well to check…’

As the two Special Branch men walked away, Steven heard Ritchie say to Jenkins, ‘You arse, didn’t you know he was ex-Regiment?’

Steven found an official government courier waiting patiently for him in Reception. The man smiled politely and examined Steven’s ID carefully before handing over the package Steven knew would contain the pistol and ammunition he’d requested. He signed three forms and wished the man a safe return to London before following the signs for the ground floor visitors’ toilets where he used a cubicle for privacy while he loaded the weapon and secured it in its shoulder holster which he put on with some difficulty in the confined space. Finally, he adjusted the straps for comfort before putting his jacket back on and coming out to check in the mirror that there was no telltale bulge showing.

He used the exit nearest to where taxis dropped off their passengers and timed it so that he was exposed for the minimum of time before jumping into one that was just about to drive away after dropping off an elderly couple.

‘You’re supposed to wait at the stand,’ growled the driver.

‘Twenty quid says you’ll overlook it this once.’

‘Where to?’

Steven deliberately had the driver follow a circuitous route to the police compound where his car had been taken at Macmillan’s request. He first asked to be taken to the hotel he’d stayed at on his first visit to Leicester, changing his mind half way to ask instead for the French restaurant that he had taken Tally to before finally directing the driver to the police compound when he felt sure that they weren’t being followed.

‘Are you having a laugh?’ the driver growled.

‘Call it the gypsy in my soul,’ replied Steven.

He picked up the Honda and drove back to London without incident but spent the entire journey wondering why anyone should want to kill him, trying his best to work through things logically but without much success. Both attacks had originated in Leicester not London. He was certain that the first had been because of the tracking device on his Porsche — the fact that someone had reported his car stolen in order to get the information on its whereabouts seemed to confirm that. But that couldn’t have been the method employed to trace him for the second attack. The Honda wasn’t fitted with a tracker — at least he didn’t think it was… He called Stan Silver.

‘No, it isn’t. Don’t tell me you’ve lost the bloody thing,’ said Silver.

‘Nothing like that,’ Steven assured him. ‘I was just wondering how somebody knew exactly where I was the other day.’

‘If you think you’ve been followed and the car’s to blame, maybe someone stuck one on?’

‘It’s a possibility,’ agreed Steven.

‘Bring it round.’

Steven glanced at his watch. ‘I’m driving down from Leicester. I’ll be there in about half an hour.’

‘Inside’s clean,’ said Silver, finishing his inspection and edging out backwards. ‘I’ll put her up on the ramp.’

Silver drove the Honda on to the hydraulic ramp and pressed the button to raise it. He lit a cigarette while they waited for the vehicle to clear head-height. ‘So, are you winning?’ he asked Steven above the noise.

Steven shook his head. ‘Somebody wants me out the game and I don’t know why.’

‘Sounds like bad news,’ said Silver. ‘One particular person or a gang?’

‘A gang, east European.’

‘Shit, not been muscling in on their interests, have you?’

‘I almost wish I had, then at least I’d know what it’s all about,’ said Steven.

Silver was examining the underside of the Honda with a powerful torch, using the fingers of his left hand to rub away dirt. ‘Well, well, what have we here?’ he said, pulling something from the offside rear wheel arch and handing it to Steven. ‘Problem solved.’

Steven looked at the tracking device for a few seconds in silence. ‘I didn’t tell anyone about the Honda,’ he said. ‘No one knew I had it.’

‘Someone must have seen you driving it.’

‘I tend not to drive at all in London.’

‘Well, I’ll leave it to you to work it out,’ said Silver. ‘Maybe you should leave that with me,’ he added, nodding to the tracker.

Steven handed over the device. ‘What will you do with it?’

‘I pass a transport caff on the way home. I’ll stick it on one of the sixteen-wheelers heading for the Channel ports. That should keep the buggers amused for a while.’

Steven thanked Silver and headed for his flat. He felt better for having discovered how his attacker had known where he was but was still left wondering how the opposition knew about the car in the first place. He had deliberately opted not to use a pool car and had made a point of not telling anyone what he was using and yet someone had still managed to find and tag it. His blood ran cold when he considered that it could have been an explosive device instead of a magnetic tracker.

Steven was still thinking about this in the bath with a gin and tonic in his hand when the phone rang. Cursing the fact — or was it his imagination? — that it always did when he forgot to take it into the bathroom with him and thinking that it might be Tally — although he had said he would phone her — he got out the bath and padded through to fetch it.

‘Dr Dunbar? It’s Linda Haldane in Edinburgh.’

‘Oh, hello,’ said Steven, remembering with a slight frisson of excitement that he’d asked her to phone him if she recalled anything at all that might throw light on what had angered her late husband so much. ‘How are you?’

‘Well, thank you,’ replied Linda automatically. ‘The children and I are moving out tomorrow. We’ve spent the day packing.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Steven, remembering that she and the children couldn’t afford to stay on in the house because of the financial problems raised by Scott’s death being treated as suicide.

‘You said that I should contact you if I came across anything, no matter how small…’

‘Yes, I remember.’

‘Scott taped something to the underside of his desk. I found it this morning when I was clearing away his things and dropped something on the floor. I had to crawl under to get it.’

‘What was it?’ asked Steven, aware that his pulse rate had risen sharply.

‘An envelope with two cards in it.’

‘Cards?’

‘Record cards like the ones he used in his file index. I suppose he didn’t want anyone to find these ones.’

‘Like the burglars who came to call,’ said Steven thoughtfully.

‘The police said they were looking for drugs,’ said Linda.

‘Maybe,’ said Steven, suddenly seeing things in a different light. ‘What’s on the cards?’

‘Some sort of code. There are letters and numbers, not telephone numbers. They don’t make a lot of sense to me I’m afraid.’

Steven, who was still dripping wet, wiped his hands on the towel he’d hastily tied round his waist and grabbed pen and paper from his desk before asking for details. He copied down the information as it was read out.

‘First one, C-O-L-E space N-A-T space 4-0-9 space 1-0-0-7 hyphen 1-0-1-1 space 2-0-0-1.’

Steven read it back to her.

‘Second card reads, N-R-G space 2 space 2-3-7 space 2-0-0-1. That’s it, nothing else I’m afraid.’

Once again Steven read the letters and numbers back to her.

‘Do you think it could be significant?’ asked Linda. ‘I mean, does it mean anything to you?’

‘Not right now but if your husband went to the trouble of hiding these cards, there has to be a good reason,’ said Steven.

‘Something that will help prove Scott didn’t take his own life?’

‘I hope so,’ said Steven. ‘Keep in touch. Let me know where you are.’

The bath water had gone cold. Steven dried himself and got dressed. His whole demeanour had changed because of the phone-call. At last he had got a break. It might not make sense right now but he felt he had something to kick-start an investigation that had been threatening to hit the buffers. He called Tally and told her about the call.

‘You deserve a break.’

‘All I have to do now… is decipher it,’ said Steven.

‘I have confidence in you.’