Assassin

30

Bill Selsey was beginning to understand that he had entered into an arrangement that was much like smoking a first pipe of crack. You might think you could handle it. But it would soon be handling you.

He was scared – physically scared, with prickling armpits and quivering bowels – whenever his anonymous new master called. He'd been on again that morning.

'So, you got Carver on the run yet?' the man had asked.

'How do you mean?' Selsey replied, stalling for time.

'I mean, has the Firm taken him off its Christmas-card list? Is he persona non bloody grata? Has he been put on a hit-list yet?'

'Not exactly…'

'What do you mean, not exactly?'

'It's just that Carver still has powerful friends. One friend, at any rate. He's not convinced yet…'

'Have you given him all the information from California yet? The Krebs job?'

'Not yet: I was going to do that this morning.'

'About time. And you make sure you do it well. Go upstairs with it, if you have to, over this friend of Carver's head. Just get the job done.' 'Your boy Tolland seems to be making a name for himself,' said Jack Grantham from behind a copy of The Times. The words 'Exclusive: Slavery, Sex and Murder in Dubai: p.23' were printed in bold white text against a blue banner right across the top of the front page. 'I hope he gives you a piece of the action when the film studios come calling.'

He closed the paper, folded it in two and put it down on his desk. Then he looked up at Bill Selsey, standing by his desk. 'So, Bill, what can I do for you?' he asked.

Selsey gave a nervous grimace, a look Grantham recognized at once as a man bearing bad news to his boss.

'It's Carver. You're not going to believe this, Jack, but it looks like he's done another job. America this time.'

'I thought I told you, quite clearly, to find out what he was doing, and tell him to stop it.'

'So would you like to know what I've found out?'

Was Grantham imagining it, or was there an edge to that question?

'Of course,' he said. 'Go ahead.'

'Well, a financier called Norton Krebs had a car accident in northern California last week. He had a massive blow-out, swerved off the road and got himself decapitated by some cattle wire – a real Jayne Mansfield job, by the sound of it.'

'Ouch,' winced Grantham. 'And we care about Krebs because…?'

'In the first place, because he laundered money for a number of extremely unsavoury individuals, several of whom are suspected of having ties to gangs in this country. And in the second place because the local police in Amador County were puzzled to discover that the valves in the car's surviving tyres looked a little unusual. So they sent them off for forensic analysis…'

'Don't tell me. The valves had explosive filaments inserted in them. And we all know who uses valves like that, because we had to clean up the mess he made on the M25, last time he did it.'

'Quite,' agreed Selsey.

'But Carver's not the only operator out there who knows that technique.'

'Absolutely, which is why I wouldn't even bring it to your attention, except that Carver arrived in Boise, Idaho-'

'Which is not in California, evidently.'

'No,' said Selsey with only the merest sigh of impatience, 'it isn't. But it is a great deal closer to northern California than, say, Carver's flat in Geneva. And Carver certainly arrived there, two Saturdays ago. Our American cousins have supplied security footage from their airport. I've got a couple of stills for you here. As you can see, he was met by a woman.'

'They don't get any uglier, do they?'

'Apparently not,' Selsey agreed. 'Anyway, this one drove Carver away in a vehicle registered in the name of Madeleine Cross. I checked her record. It appears entirely clean.'

'Or conveniently so,' said Grantham. 'What else have you got?'

'A couple of days after Carver's arrival in Idaho, a second-hand car dealer in Boise sold a Tacoma, whatever that is, to a man who gave his name as Carver and answered to his description. The same vehicle and its driver were seen in Amador County near the crash over the days leading up to the crash. Witnesses say the driver spoke with an English accent. Several remember him mentioning Norton Krebs.'

'And Carver?'

'He seems to have scuttled back to his new woman. Then they both left the country, together. They're in Paris at the moment, with tickets booked through to Oslo.'

'That makes sense. That hippy pal of Carver's with the ridiculous hair – Larsson – he's Norwegian. But I still think this is all too pat. I can just about believe Carver would go back to what he does best. But that's the point – he's very good at it. He doesn't leave clues lying around like losing tickets on a bookie's floor.'

'Not in the old days,' Selsey agreed. 'But maybe times have changed. He's out of practice, getting a bit ragged. The point is, the evidence overwhelmingly says it's him. Why should the evidence be lying?'

Grantham shrugged, conceding the strength of Selsey's point. 'I think it's time we got together with Samuel Carver and had a little chat. See if you can set something up, but very discreetly. Keep this under the radar till we know exactly what's what.'

'I'm afraid I can't do that, sir.'

'I'm sorry?' said Grantham. He and Selsey had worked together for years, always on first-name terms, with barely a serious dispute. Now his deputy was simultaneously calling him 'sir' while disobeying a direct order.

Selsey continued: 'I don't think that it's appropriate to treat Carver's activities-'

'Alleged, unproven activities,' Grantham interrupted.

'I don't think that it's appropriate to treat Carver's alleged activities,' Selsey repeated pointedly, 'as a private matter. If a British citizen is going round killing people in friendly countries, it could have very serious repercussions, particularly if he has links to the Firm.'

'I see,' said Grantham. 'And how would you like to proceed?'

'Formally,' said Selsey. 'I expect to have a full report on Carver's recent movements, finances, associates and suspected activities ready by tomorrow afternoon. It goes without saying that you will be the first to see it. But I want to state now, for the record, my strong recommendation that it should then be passed upstairs, so that a decision can be made at the highest level as to how we should proceed.'

'Your recommendation is noted,' said Jack Grantham in a voice devoid of emotion. 'I look forward to your report with great interest. Now, if that is all, I am sure you will want to be getting on with it.'

As Selsey left the room, Grantham asked himself what had led to this declaration of war. Both men knew that Grantham could not afford to have his relationship with Samuel Carver exposed to close scrutiny. Selsey was now threatening precisely such an exposure. Under normal circumstances, that would simply be part of the normal office warfare by which an ambitious, unscrupulous deputy might seek to undermine his boss. But Selsey had never wanted Grantham's job, and even if he did, he would never get it – he was too old, too long mired in middle-management.

There had to be another reason for this sudden hostility. And the more Jack Grantham thought about it, the more he wanted to know just what that reason might be. Selsey went for a walk along the Thames, as much to gather his nerves as to find some privacy, before he made the call.

'I think we're getting somewhere,' he said. 'I spoke to… to Carver's friend. I told him I felt obliged to take the evidence of the two hits to a higher authority. I'm pretty confident that either he'll have to cut Carver loose, or he'll be facing a formal review of our links with Carver. He won't want that.'

'A review?' his contact said, his voice rising. 'That's the best you can do? I don't think you've grasped the urgency of this situation. I'm about to make my move on Carver. And when I do, I want him to know that he's all alone, that no one's coming to rescue him. Forget friends in high places. I don't want him to have a single friend anywhere. Not one.'