The Wreckage

22

Chalcott is on the sideline, watching his teenage son play football. His phone is ringing: Sobel from London.

“I tried you in the office.”

“It’s my day off.”

“You’re outside.”

“My boy has a game.”

“Who’s winning?”

“Forty minutes and no score-foreplay shouldn’t last that long.”

A whistle blows. Chalcott shouts at the referee, “The kid dived-are you blind?”

“What position does your boy play?”

“There are positions?” Chalcott finishes his takeaway coffee and crushes the paper mug. “What news?”

“According to the bank Richard North ran off with fifty-four million.”

“Dollars?”

“Pounds. All sorts of theories are being bandied about.”

“ ‘Bandied’? You’ve been in Blighty too long. You’re starting to sound like a Limey shirt-lifter.”

Sobel laughs hollowly. “We’ve intercepted a phone call from Holly Knight to the ex-detective. She left half a message on his answering machine. The call was traced to a shopping mall in Richmond.”

“Did you pick her up?”

“She was gone by the time we arrived, but we’ve managed to get CCTV footage of her talking to some guy. The Brits may have an ID. He’s a tramp. No fixed address.”

“What about the ex-detective?”

“Ruiz says he’ll do a deal for the girl if we back off.”

“Do you believe him?”

“No.”

“How much do the Brits know?”

“Green shoots.”

Chalcott is walking along the sideline, ignoring the crowd noises. He pauses. “We may have a problem from another quarter.”

“What’s that?”

“Someone is asking about Ibrahim.”

“Who?”

“A journalist called Luca Terracini, based in Baghdad. He’s like Osama’s Lord Haw Haw.”

“Didn’t he win a Pulitzer?”

“That’s him. Sometimes I wish we were still in the fifties. We could haul guys like Terracini up before the Anti-American Committee and get them labeled communists and traitors. Instead we give the cunts prizes. If it weren’t for us, Terracini would be picking through the rubble of the next Ground Zero.”

“How did he trace Ibrahim?”

“He hasn’t, but he’s sniffing around. He’s with a woman-a UN auditor. She likely made the connection.”

“How are we playing it?”

“I don’t want Ibrahim spooked. The Iraqis are kicking Terracini out of the country.”

“That should solve our immediate problem.”

“You just worry about the girl.”