Red Station

FORTY-FOUR

He got back upstairs to find the others waiting for him. Mace stepped forward, a determined set to his jaw. ‘Is there something you’d like to tell us, lad?’ He had lost his hung-over expression but not his untidy appearance.

The others stood in the background, waiting. Clare refused to meet Harry’s eye, concentrating on the contents of her mug.

‘Like what?’

‘Like what’s going on. You’ve had a contact with the Clones.’

‘They’ve been pulled out.’ Harry didn’t blame Clare; she would have had a duty to tell Mace eventually. She’d just done it sooner than he’d expected.

‘How the hell do you know that?’ Mace was bristling. ‘What happened last night?’

He told them about finding Stanbridge in his flat, about recognizing the man from Kosovo; about Clare’s call and how he had ‘dissuaded’ the other Clones from hanging around. When he looked at Clare for confirmation, she was staring down at the floor, her jaw clenched tight. Deniability, he thought angrily. It runs deep when your neck is on the block, even for colleagues.

‘You took a bloody big risk,’ Mace muttered. ‘How did you know they wouldn’t have back-up?’

‘Because Stanbridge wasn’t hiding anything. He had no reason to. All he knew was that he and his team had a simple assignment: to watch and follow. They wouldn’t need back-up for that. Clearly our masters don’t trust us very much.’

‘What else?’

‘He told me his team was being replaced this morning.’

‘That would be standard procedure,’ Fitzgerald mused thoughtfully. ‘Rotate them on a regular basis and nobody gets to know their faces.’ He chewed his lip. ‘Are you sure they’re a home team?’

‘Yes,’ Harry replied bluntly. ‘But not friendly. The Clones were, but they’ve gone. The new team is a specialist unit called the Hit. And they’re not coming to audit the books.’

‘What sort of specialists?’ Rik looked worried.

‘With a title like that, what do you think? The leader’s name is Latham. He tracks people for a living… and he’s not always required to bring them back alive.’

There was a stunned silence in the room. Only Mace looked unsurprised, but that might have been because the idea was taking a while to sink through his alcohol-fuelled fog. He looked at Clare, but she didn’t offer any helpful advice.

‘You’ve been busy,’ he said finally to Harry. It sounded like a condemnation.

‘Well, it wasn’t by choice.’

‘It’s nonsense, of course. I’ll be putting that in my report to London.’ Mace was finding comfort in bluster.

‘You do that,’ Harry replied. ‘In the meantime, Latham and his buddies will be dropping by to say hi. They won’t be asking anyone’s permission, either.’

‘You can’t know that.’ Fitzgerald was still frowning. ‘This — Stanbridge? — could have been spinning you a load of tosh. Maybe somebody local showed up and did him in. It’s not exactly law-abiding around here. There’s a lot of poverty and not much in the way of jobs. People get desperate. Random killings happen all the time, mostly over small change and a mobile phone.’

Harry looked at him, trying to determine if that remark was meaningful in any way. He decided not. Fitzgerald wasn’t the sort to make oblique comments. Blunt accusation was more his line.

‘It wasn’t random.’ Clare Jardine finally spoke up. ‘You didn’t see the body. It was a professional hit. Harry had tied Stanbridge up with a clothes line. All the killer did was walk in and shoot him in the head. He had no chance.’

Nobody spoke for several seconds. Then Rik said, ‘What do we do?’ He looked anxious but determined, and Harry decided he would just need pointing in the right direction and he’d be all right.

‘I don’t know about you,’ he said softly, allowing anger to fuel his own resolve, ‘but I’m buggered if I’m going to sit here and wait for a bunch of Vauxhall Cross body snatchers to come and take me out.’

Fitzgerald nodded and went to the door. ‘I’ll get the lights.’

Nobody questioned what he meant.

Outside, someone shouted and a car door slammed, followed by a burst of laughter. Bottles rattled in a crate and somebody gave a wolf-whistle. Normal sounds. Echoes of life being lived.

The minutes crept by, each individual alone with their thoughts, until Harry turned to Mace. ‘Something’s wrong. Do you have any other weapons here?’

Mace shook his head. ‘Never saw the need. Why?’

‘I need an equalizer.’ He moved over to the window and looked out. Nothing moved down there. Then he remembered the operations representative in London saying his sidearm would be sent out in a diplomatic pouch. ‘Did a bag come for me?’

‘A bag?’ Mace was vague, his face pale.

‘A secure pouch from London.’

Rik said, ‘It arrived yesterday. Sorry, I forgot to tell you.’

‘Where is it? Quick.’

Rik went to a metal cabinet on the wall and opened the door. Inside was a canvas bag the size of a small briefcase. It had a zipped front with a sturdy combination lock and seal.

Harry ripped off the seal with a pair of scissors and fed the last four digits of his field number into the combination dial. The lock sprang open.

‘Now we’ve got an equalizer,’ he explained, and withdrew his semi-automatic and two spare clips. He checked the action, the sounds loud in the quiet room.

‘So now you’re Action Man?’ Rik looked stunned. ‘I thought you were Five… and…’ He stopped and blushed.

‘Too old for this stuff?’ Harry shrugged. ‘I thought so, too. We’ll soon find out.’

‘Why would anyone come to take you out?’ Clare Jardine looked calm but her voice trembled as she spoke.

‘Does it matter?’ he replied. ‘Someone must have decided I’m a liability.’ He nodded towards the north. ‘Personally, with what’s going on up there, I wouldn’t bet on the rest of you being served tea and buns, either. Get used to it.’

He left them to digest that and went out on to the landing. The building was silent, with a buzz of traffic in the background. He walked slowly downstairs, the gun under his jacket. Noonday shadows filled the corners of the building, producing a variety of dark shapes.

He tried to recall how long it had been since he’d done the close-quarter combat course, where officers learnt the rudiments of sweeping a building. Five years at least. Too bloody long. But some things you never forgot — like the agony of letting off shots in a confined space.

He stopped at the halfway mark. A noise had disturbed the silence. Up or down? Difficult to tell. He waited. It came again: the scuff of shoe leather on tiles.

From above.

He looked up, sweeping the gun from under his jacket. Clare was looking down at him. Her eyes went wide when she saw the gun pointing at her.

He signalled for her to stay where she was, then turned and tossed a coin down the stairs. It bounced and rolled, the tinkling sound echoing off the walls like the ringing of a small bell. It finally came to a stop on the ground floor.

He followed it down, the gun held by his side. If anyone was waiting for him, being above them would give him a marginal element of surprise.

And margins were what counted in situations like this.

The foyer was empty.

He checked the front door, which was closed, then made his way to the basement. His breathing sounded unusually harsh in the enclosed space.

The storage rooms were undisturbed, the under-floor panel still in place.

There was no sign of Fitzgerald.