Secret Asset

36

Liz hadn’t been in Tom Dartmouth’s office since the day of Marzipan’s death, and then she had not taken in anything about her surroundings. Today she was attending a meeting Tom was chairing of the Operation FOXHUNT team. The room, a standard group leader’s room with a six-chair conference table, was full, and more chairs had been brought in. But in spite of all the people, it managed to look surprisingly bare, almost clinical in fact, thought Liz. Tom’s desk had none of the bric-a-brac that most people brought in to make their working space more personal. No family photos, no desk set, no curios brought back from abroad. Not even a favourite mug as far as she could see. The rather bleak prints on the wall were from a government-issue set of famous buildings.

There was an air of anxiety and gloom in the room. They were not making much progress in finding the bookshop group or their target. In fact, Operation FOXHUNT did not seem to be getting anywhere. And time was clearly running out.

Tom was chairing the meeting, the first Liz had attended for two weeks. He did it perfectly competently, but lacked Wetherby’s ability to bind people into a team. With Charles, even the most junior felt free to have a say, yet bores got cut off before they, well, bored. With Charles, Liz thought, you felt directed yet enabled at the same time, even when things were going badly. Today she felt only a disheartening impotence.

From A4, Reggie Purvis had given his report: there had been no significant visitors to the bookshop or to Rashid Khan’s home in Wolverhampton. Surveillance of his sister had produced nothing of interest.

Michael Binding for A2 was more long-winded but equally down-beat: there had been no more phone calls to the bookshop or to Rashid’s home from Amsterdam, no more calls of interest to his sister, and nothing relevant off the mikes in the bookshop.

Now Judith Spratt was finishing up her side of things. She had the only positive news to report. “I’ve just heard from Reading Control Room that they’ve got a possible dark-coloured Golf exiting the M4 at Newbury on the night the men left the Wokingham house. It was heading north. They’re working on it now. Dave, have you got anything more about the Golf from the neighbours?”

“I spoke to the man Trevor,” said Dave. “He’s certain it was a T-reg. Black. Any good?”

“Yes, thanks, I think we’ve got that already,” she said.

“Anything else, Dave?” Tom asked, sounding keen to wind things up.

Dave gave a short account of his interviews with Jamil Abdul-Hakim and Doris Feldman, then described his disappointing conversation with the letting agent in Wokingham. This mysterious white male was clearly important, but everyone agreed the sling wasn’t going to help identify him. It had probably been a bogus affectation, designed to distract attention from its owner’s face. If so, it had certainly done its job well. As Dave paused for a moment, Liz noticed Michael Binding collecting his papers for a quick exit. Judith was busy looking in her bag.

“Then I had a call this morning,” Dave said. Something in his voice made everyone stop and pay attention.

“When I interviewed Trevor yesterday, all he told me about was the car. But his wife rang me this morning to say she had remembered something else.”

He paused again, and Liz wondered what he was up to. She had seen Dave earlier that morning and he’d said nothing to suggest he’d found out anything important. So why the drama? He was milking this audience like an actor keen to take another bow. That wasn’t like Dave at all.

She looked around the room. Binding, Judith Spratt, Rose Love, Reggie Purvis and one of his A4 sidekicks, Tom Dartmouth at the head of the table, and of course Liz herself. Who was Dave trying to impress?

“Mrs. Dawnton says she saw someone visiting the terrorists a few weeks ago. He was a white male. He came at night, but she got a good view of him because he triggered the Dawntons’ security light. She thinks she could identify him if she saw him again. So I’m going down this afternoon to talk to her.”

Nobody said a word. In the silence Liz noticed the hum from a strip light. “Good,” said Tom at last. “Keep us posted.”