Slow Horses: Slough House Thriller 1

18

THERE WAS SOMETHING different about Catherine Standish. This was what Louisa Guy decided as she watched Ho swing through the virtual jungle, a Second Life Tarzan. There was something different about all of them, probably, but it was Catherine who’d assumed the leader’s role. She’d been the Slough House ghost; shifting papers, tutting about mess, always there but virtually absent. A recovering alcoholic, because this was somehow common knowledge. Something about her spoke of loss; of an element missing. A blown bulb. But it had never before occurred to Louisa to wonder what Catherine must have been like at full wattage. She’d been Charles Partner’s PA, hadn’t she? Christ, that made her Miss Moneypenny.

Louisa should keep her mind on the job, though. Lamb thought they were useless. If they were, Hassan would die. If they weren’t, he might die anyway. The odds weren’t good.

But watching Ho, Louisa realised that he wasn’t useless, anyway; that he might be a dick, but he knew his way round a keyboard. And as he pilfered information from the ether, then peered up at the three of them through the thick black frames of his glasses, it occurred to Louisa Guy that she wouldn’t want him turning his hacker’s gaze on to the private corners of her own life and career.

Though of course, he probably already had.

Regent’s Park – the building – was lit up: blue spotlights at ground level cast huge ovals across its façade, drawing attention to the fact that important stuff took place inside. Once upon a time, not many people knew what that was. These days, you could download job application forms from a website adorned with its picture.

Jackson Lamb parked the stolen SUV half on the pavement outside, and waited.

It didn’t take long. The vehicle was surrounded inside quarter of a minute.

‘Could you step out of the car, please, sir?’

There were no weapons in evidence. There didn’t need to be.

‘Sir?’

Lamb wound the window down. He was looking at a youngish man who evidently knew his way around a gym: taut muscles under a charcoal grey suit. A white cord coiled from his left ear to the suit’s lapel.

‘Step out of the car, sir,’ he repeated.

‘Fetch your boss, sonny,’ Lamb said pleasantly, and wound the window back up.

‘He hired a car,’ Ho said.

‘You have got to be kidding.’

‘Straight up. Triple-D Car Hire. Leeds address.’

‘He’s in the field? And he hired a car?’

Catherine said, ‘No. It makes sense.’

It was a measure of their changing relationship that they waited for her thoughts.

‘He’s in the field, sure. But let’s not forget, this wasn’t an op with a future. The boy was going to be rescued. Black didn’t have to worry about covering his tracks.’

‘So hiring a car was the simplest thing to do.’

‘Quite.’

‘Anyone got a phone?’ Ho asked.

‘Lamb made us trash them.’

‘There’s a payphone by the loos,’ Catherine said. ‘What’s the number?’

She scribbled it down as he read it off the screen; was heading for the phone a moment later.

‘It’s barely dawn. A car hire place’ll be open?’

‘Triple-D gives twenty-four-hour breakdown relief,’ Ho quoted.

‘A kid with a van and a spanner,’ Min reckoned.

‘Tenner says she blows it.’

‘I’ll take that,’ Louisa said.

‘Me too,’ Min added.

Ho looked alarmed. ‘What happened since yesterday? Every-one’s acting strange.’

‘Slough House went live,’ Min told him. ‘She’ll come back with something we can use.’

‘The lady’s got game,’ Louisa said.

James Webb, whose futile mission in life was to dissuade everyone from calling him Spider, was in his office. After Jackson Lamb had dumped him and Nick Duffy on the pavement – after he’d recovered from the shock of having a middle-aged woman point a gun at him: I’ll put a bullet through your foot. That’ll wipe the smirk off your face – they’d made their way back, Duffy barely speaking. Hey, Webb had wanted to tell him. It wasn’t my fault. But here he was anyway, back in his hutch, Duffy having no further use for him.

But then, Webb wasn’t one of Duffy’s Dogs. He’d come through the graduate channel; done his two years’ rotation; attended the seminars, taken the exams. Spent nights on various godforsaken moors in harsh weather, and undergone assessment exercises, staging posts on the fast track: arresting a putative suicide bomber outside Tate Modern, and acting as control when River Cartwright had spectacularly failed an exercise of his own. Along the way, he’d been taken under Taverner’s wing; which was why he, not Cartwright, was still in Regent’s Park.

And unlike River, he’d never wanted to be a field agent. Joes were pieces on the board; Webb’s ambition was to be a player at the table. His current role, interviewing graduates – HR, River had scoffed – was a step on the road to being the keeper of secrets, and if there was less glam to it than the streetwork, there was also less weather, less chance of finding out how well those interrogation-resistance lessons stood up in the field, and, theoretically, fewer opportunities for middle-aged women to point a gun at him. Suits and joes was an age-old opposition, but the game had changed in the last ten years, and intelligence was a business like any other. There would always be battlegrounds where things got bloody, but at boardroom level, today’s intelligence wars were fought the way Coke battled Pepsi. And that was a war Webb felt comfortable waging.

But right now River seemed to be at the centre of events, because it was the slow horses that had everyone uptight tonight. Sid Baker was under the surgeon’s knife; somebody else was dead; and there were rumours that Jackson Lamb had orchestrated the kidnapping of that internet kid. Whatever the truth, there was a general air that shit was about to hit the fan. But it was all internal. There was no ministerial presence. Spider would have noticed: when the Minister was in the building, the ripples spread outwards.

But suit or not, Webb felt sidelined. Taverner didn’t like him showing up on the hub uninvited – this was the flipside of being under her wing: she didn’t want anyone knowing about it – but he couldn’t sit here under the unwavering gaze of files and folders much longer without starting to feel like he, and not River, had failed an important test.

He didn’t think he could, anyway. But after reflecting for a moment on whether he minded pissing Lady Di off, he decided he might manage it a little longer.

‘How did you do?’

Catherine Standish said, ‘Dermot Radcliffe hired a Volvo three weeks ago. Family holiday, he said. He wanted plenty of boot space.’

Taking this detail in, Louisa felt her heart pound her chest.

‘And they just told you that?’

‘Why wouldn’t they? I’m his sister, desperately trying to reach him. Our mother’s in hospital.’ Catherine sat and picked up her coffee cup. It was cold to the touch. She put it down and recited from memory the car’s number plate.

‘Of course, we don’t know they’re using it now.’

‘They left Roupell Street in a hurry,’ Min Harper said. ‘So they either took that car or stole another one. In which case, that car’s still nearby, and their new one’ll be reported missing soon.’

‘Can’t drive anywhere through London without showing up on CCTV.’

‘Which would be great if we were at the Trocadero,’ said Ho. He meant the nerve centre of the city’s surveillance systems, with its massed ranks of monitors covering every inch of the capital. ‘But I’ve only got a laptop.’

‘Still,’ said Catherine. ‘That might do the trick.’

Three pairs of eyes turned her way.

‘Triple-D cars come fitted with sat nav,’ she said.

Joanna Lumley was the saviour of the Gurkhas, who’d been shabbily treated by a succession of British governments. Joanna Lumley was a formidable woman. The Gurkhas had been denied the right to live in the country they’d served in the war, and Joanna Lumley had deplored this state of affairs. So Joanna Lumley, in one of those quintessentially English turns of events, had turned a government on its head and bent it to her will. Forcibly charmed, the government bestowed upon the Gurkhas rights of residence. In return, the Gurkhas worshipped Joanna Lumley as they might a god.

So how was Hassan supposed to ignore her commands?

Hassan. Open your eyes, darling. There’s a good boy.

He didn’t want to open his eyes.

I’m not going to ask you again.

He opened his eyes.

There was nothing to see, of course. But at least this nothing was actually there, as opposed to the huge unexisting blankness through which he’d been falling a short while ago.

Things hadn’t changed. He was still folded into the boot of a car, still hooded, gagged and bound. He was still being thrown about like a pea in a whistle. And he could still hear Joanna Lumley, though she was no longer talking to him; she seemed, rather, to be offering directions to somebody else. Straight ahead for two hundred yards. It came to Hassan that he was hearing a sat nav system, programmed with Joanna Lumley’s voice. More expensive than the regular version, but there were those who found it worth it.

Joanna Lumley hadn’t been talking to Hassan at all.

On the other hand, for the moment at least, Hassan was back in the land of the living.

Nick Duffy said, ‘Is this a joke?’

‘I’m returning your car. I was worried they’d take it out your wages.’

‘You pulled a gun on me.’

‘No, I delegated that. And she didn’t pull it on you, she pulled it on your boy.’ Jackson Lamb, who was still in the driving seat, placed a meaty elbow on the rim of its open window, and mock-whispered: ‘The gun’s in my pocket. Case you thought I was getting excited.’

‘Out of the car.’

‘You’re not having me shot, are you?’

‘Not out here, no.’

‘Good. Only I was wanting a word with Lady Di.’

He sat back, and pressed the button that closed the window.

Duffy opened the door, and held a hand out.

Panting with the effort – a piece of drama Duffy wasn’t falling for – Lamb levered himself on to the pavement, then produced the weapon from his coat pocket.

For a brief moment, everyone within sight tensed.

Lamb put the gun in Duffy’s outstretched hand, then farted loudly. ‘Sausage sandwich,’ he said. ‘I’ll be doing that all morning.’

Behind him, the taut young man in the charcoal suit slipped behind the wheel of the SUV. So smoothly it might have been choreographed, he swung the car back into the road and drove it round the corner, where it would disappear down the ramp and into one small part of the subterranean world of Regent’s Park.

‘So,’ Lamb said, once this was taken care of. ‘I could murder a coffee. Shall we pop inside?’

‘Turn here.’

‘Here?’

‘Am I talking to myself?’

Larry took the exit road. Joanna Lumley objected.

‘Change of plan, darling,’ Curly said, and switched the sat nav off.

‘To what?’ Larry said.

The turn-off took them onto one of the minor roads skirting Epping Forest. If they’d headed directly north they’d not be within miles of here, but getting lost had its advantages. Curly had never been here, but he knew the name. Everyone knew the name. It was a place of shallow graves; regularly name-checked on true-crime programmes. This was where your gangsters buried their enemies. Or sometimes didn’t even bother: just set fire to the car they’d shot them in, then whistled their way home to the concrete jungle. Place had probably seen more deaths than picnics. Plenty of room for another. Two, if necessary.

This road was thickly lined by trees, and the sky disappeared behind a canopy of branches. An approaching car dipped its headlights. Flashing past, its noise reached Curly’s ears like something happening under water.

‘We’re gunna cut to the chase,’ he said.

A bubble welled inside him, and escaped as a brief giggle.

Larry cast him a sideways glance, but didn’t dare open his mouth.

Pissing off Lady Di was not a good career move, and Spider Webb’s choices were largely dictated by such demands. But he didn’t have to go onto the hub. He could wander downstairs instead. Regent’s Park was like any other office block: the guys on the desk were the first to know what was up. So like any suit with an eye to the edge, Spider made a point of being friendly to the guys on the desk.

Leaving his office, he walked down the corridor, through the fire door, and into the stairwell. Here he paused a moment, distracted by movement through the window. Two storeys below, a black SUV was coming down the concrete ramp into the car park beneath the building. One SUV was much like the next, but still: Webb wondered if this was the same one Lamb had hijacked earlier. If it was, Lamb had either been picked up again, or turned himself in. Spider hoped the former, and hoped it had happened roughly. The woman, too. I’ll put a bullet through your foot. He wasn’t forgetting that in a hurry. Mostly for the absolute sincerity of the woman’s tone.

The car was gone. No way of seeing from here who’d been driving, which left open the possibility that it had been Lamb himself. Without Park clearance, Lamb shouldn’t have made it through the barriers, but Webb had heard myths about Jackson Lamb. Clearance might be something required by other people. In which case, Lamb might be loose in the belly of the building.

It wasn’t likely, but it gave Webb all the excuse he needed to go and find out what was happening.

As Catherine Standish watched Roderick Ho perform more virtual acrobatics, another shock of excitement fired through her body. Nothing to do with Ho. Catherine didn’t especially admire technological ability; it was useful when other people had it, because this rendered it unnecessary to have any herself, but she no more regarded it as an aspect of character than she would ownership of a particular make of car.

No: the excitement had been born earlier that morning, when she’d lifted Lamb’s gun from her bag, and pointed it at the young man next to her. I’ll put a bullet through your foot if I need to. And that’ll wipe the smirk off your face, won’t it? Sometimes the scary moments happened to other people.

Min Harper had spoken, unless it had been Louisa Guy. She said, ‘Sorry. I was miles away.’

Harper said, ‘You think we’ll trace him in time?’

This was new too. They were looking to her, as if she had answers, or opinions worth listening to. Below the tabletop her right hand curled, as if it were once more wrapped around the handle of a gun. ‘I think we act as if we’re saving Hassan’s life, not finding his body,’ she said.

He shared a look with Louisa that she couldn’t interpret.

It was growing lighter, and traffic was building outside. There was a flow of custom inside, too; people collecting takeaway coffee and breakfast rolls, or grabbing supper on their way home from the nightshift. Catherine was an early riser, a poor sleeper; none of this was unfamiliar to her. But she was seeing through new eyes this morning. She unclenched her hand. Fighting her addictions had taught her about their power, and she knew she was clinging to an unhealthy memory. But right now it felt good, and she could only hope those shocks of excitement weren’t visible to the others.

Ho said, ‘Now we wait.’

Louisa said, ‘You’ve got the sat nav system?’

‘Sure. They use RoadWise. It’s just a matter of hacking the system.’

‘And how does waiting help?’

‘Because I’ve reached out for someone who’s done it already. Quicker than doing it myself.’ He bent to his laptop again, until his colleagues’ silence broke through his self-absorption.

‘What?’

‘Care to elaborate?’

He sighed, but overdid it. ‘Hacking, there’s a community, you know?’

‘Like stamp collectors.’

‘Or trainspotters.’

‘Or poets.’

‘A bit,’ Ho agreed, to general surprise. ‘Only way more cool. Hackers hack systems for one reason only. They’re there. Some people do crosswords or sudoku.’ His expression made it clear what he thought of that. ‘We hack. And we share.’

‘So someone will have hacked, what did you call it? RoadWise?’

‘RoadWise. Yeah, sure, if it’s there, it’s been hacked. And anyone cool enough to hack it’ll be in the community.’ He nodded at his laptop, as if it held global masses. ‘And they’ll be getting back to me any moment.’ Perhaps he saw doubt in their expressions. ‘We never sleep,’ he said.

Catherine said, ‘There’s something I don’t get.’

Ho waited.

‘You’re telling us you’ve got friends?’

‘The best kind,’ Ho said. ‘The ones you never meet.’

His laptop bleeped.

‘My ride’s here.’

Catherine watched as he bent to work. We act as if we’re saving Hassan’s life, not finding his body. It was the only approach they could take.

It would be good, though, if they could hurry up a little.

Time was not on Hassan’s side.

The car stopped, and the engine cut out.

For a moment, the silence and stillness were worse than the noise and the motion. Hassan’s heart pounded, struggling for release. He wasn’t ready, he thought – wasn’t ready to put an escape plan into operation, because he didn’t have one. And wasn’t ready because, well, he wasn’t ready. Wasn’t ready to be poured out of the boot and told he was going to die. He wasn’t ready.

Eyes clamped shut, he tried to summon up Joanna Lumley, but she wouldn’t appear. He was on his own.

And then he wasn’t, because the boot was opening, and rough hands were hauling him out, dropping him like a sack of vegetables onto cold ground.

Instinctively, the first thing he did was pull the hood from his head; a clumsy operation with his hands bound, but he managed it. With his head free, Hassan saw the world for what felt like the first time. He was in a forest. The car had come to a halt on a dirt track, and all around stretched trees, with mossed-over stumps lurking like goblins in the hollows. The ground was hard-packed mud, with a covering of dead leaves and twigs. The air tasted like early morning. Light was starting to make its presence felt; etching a fine tracery of bare branches overhead.

His two remaining kidnappers stood over him, so his first view was of their boots. That seemed appropriate. He guessed their boots saw more action than their brains ever did. And this thought liberated Hassan a little. He was cold and bruised and filthy and stank, but he was not in a cellar. And he was not these bastards’ dog, ready to roll over on their word. In every way that mattered, he was better than the pair of them.

Then one of the boots was on his shoulder, pressing him down on to the earth. It belonged to the one Hassan called Curly. Way up above his boot, Curly was showing him a thin, cruel smile.

‘End of the line,’ he said.

Taverner said, ‘I’m glad you’ve seen sense.’

Lamb ignored her, surveying her team instead, who were at their own or each other’s workstations, and engrossed in their current tasks, and studying every move he made. Soft light rained on them, and there was a slight buzzing in the air, white noise, which seemed to act as an aural curtain. Even without the glass wall, he doubted whether anyone could have heard their conversation.

Nick Duffy was a different matter, of course. Nick Duffy was with them in Taverner’s office. Nick Duffy could hear every word.

If there’d ever been any doubt that Diana Taverner could read minds, she put it to rest then and there. She said, ‘It’s okay, Nick. You can leave us.’

He didn’t like it, but he went.

‘Three sugars, there’s a love,’ Lamb said to his departing back.

Taverner said: ‘You want the bottom line?’

‘Oh, I’m gagging for it, darling.’

‘Black’s body’s been found. He used to be one of yours. It’s clear he was involved in the kidnapping of Hassan Ahmed. You were seen meeting with him in the early summer, long after he’d quit Slough House. Two of your crew have signed statements to that effect. You want me to continue?’

‘It’s the only thing keeping me going,’ Lamb assured her. ‘These statements. Loy and White, right?’

‘They make credible witnesses, and they put Black and you together. That, plus Moody’s homicidal outing last night, puts Slough House in a very messy frame. If you want it to go away, we can manage that. But you’re going to have to cooperate.’

Lamb said, ‘Homicidal?’

For the briefest of moments, a shadow crossed Taverner’s face. She said, ‘I’m sorry. You hadn’t heard.’

He smiled, but it wasn’t a real smile; just a tightening of the flesh across the face. ‘Well. That’s another loose end clipped off, isn’t it?’

‘That’s how you see your team? “Loose ends”?’

‘But Baker was never on my team, was she? You assigned her to Slough House, but not because she’d slept with the wrong boss. She was a plant. She was watching River Cartwright.’

‘Your evidence being?’

‘Her own words.’

‘Which she won’t be repeating any time soon.’ Taverner’s gaze was steady. She said, ‘I’ll make you an offer, Jackson. Something clean we can all walk away from. Co-sign Loy and White’s statements, and that’ll be the end of it.’

‘I don’t do subtle. You’re going to have to explain why I’d want to do that.’

‘You’re old school, Jackson, and not in a good way. You’re out of the loop. I go to Limitations with a sacrificial victim, and outcomes will matter more than proofs. That’s how things are done now. If there’s a quiet out available, Limitations will sign off on it. They’ll even call it a retirement. It’s not like you’ll lose your pension fund.’

Jackson Lamb reached inside his coat, and had the satisfaction of seeing her flinch. Her expression turned to distaste as he scratched his armpit. ‘Think I might have been bitten at the canal.’

She didn’t reply.

He withdrew his hand and sniffed his fingers. Then put his hand in his pocket. ‘So your plan is, I cough to your sins? Or else what?’

‘It gets messy.’

‘It’s already messy.’

She said, ‘I’m trying to find a way out that causes the least damage for all of us. Like it or not, Slough House is in the firing line, Jackson. Appearances count. You’ll all come under scrutiny. All of you.’

He said, ‘This about Standish again?’

‘Did you think I’d forgotten?’

‘You know me. Always hoping for the best.’

‘Charles Partner implicated her in everything. He left an itemised statement of his treachery in which he named her as an accomplice. She was lucky not to be arrested.’

Lamb said, ‘She’s a drunk.’

‘That’s not an excuse for treason.’

‘It wasn’t meant to be. It’s what made Partner think he could get away with it. Why he kept her on after her breakdown. A dried-out drunk is still a drunk. She was loyal to him so he used her, tried to make out she helped him sell secrets. But no one who saw his, what did you call it? – itemised statement, believed it for a second. That was his last-ditch attempt to spread the blame, and it was pure fiction.’

‘And swiftly covered up.’

‘Of course it bloody was. Service had enough problems. Partner’s crimes were black-ribboned from the off, and half the chinless idiots on Limitations still don’t know about them. Drag all that up now, and things’ll get messy all right. You sure that’s a road you want to go down?’

‘Covering up treachery’s a crime in itself. This time round, they’ll do a full audit.’ Of the two Diana Taverner was in better shape, and knew it. But then, Jackson Lamb could climb out of a sauna, wrap himself in brand-new threads, and still come off second best to her on her worst day. ‘You found her a safe berth once, else she’d have drunk herself to death in a bedsit by now. But you can’t save her twice. I’m offering to do that for you.’ Her eyes shifted from Lamb to the hub behind him. Her team were making little pretence of not studying events in her glass-walled office. She deepened her voice slightly. It’s the tone she’d have used if she were trying, God help her, to seduce him. A tone that rarely failed. ‘Put your hands up to this. It was an honourable attempt to get a good result, and not your fault it went wrong. The public at large will never know. And between these walls, you’ll be a hero.’

She stopped. She was good at reading people. Lamb was a tricky subject – had taught himself to be illegible – but still, Diana Taverner could see him weighing her words. His eyes suggested he was immersed in calculation; the consequences of a scorched-earth policy, as against the walk-away compromise on the table. And seeing this, she felt as a whaler must feel, watching the first harpoon strike flesh: a single wound, and far from mortal, but enough to guarantee the outcome. All that was left was the waiting. And she continued believing this until Jackson Lamb bent, scooped the metal waste-paper basket from beside her desk, and in a surprisingly graceful near-pirouette, hurled it at the glass wall behind him.

‘Got it.’

‘Got what?’

‘What are we looking for?’ A flash of the familiar Roderick Ho; an expression of lofty contempt for the analogue mind. ‘The car. Dermot Radcliffe’s Volvo.’

Min Harper scraped his chair round the table, so he could see the laptop’s screen. For a moment he thought Ho was about to block his view; hook an arm around it like the class swot hiding his homework. But he restrained himself, even shifting the laptop slightly so Min could see it.

If he’d been expecting a blinking red light on a stylised street map – which he partly was – Min was disappointed. Instead, he was looking at a slightly out-of-focus but recognisable photograph of the tops of a whole bunch of trees. ‘It’s under there?’

‘Yes,’ Ho said. Then said, ‘Probably.’

Catherine Standish said, ‘Care to elaborate on that?’

‘That’s where the sat nav system registered to the car Dermot Radcliffe hired from Triple-D Cars three weeks ago was, roughly fifty seconds ago.’ He looked across the table at Catherine. ‘There’s a slight time lag.’

‘Thank you.’

‘And they might have dumped the sat nav, of course. Might have tossed it out of the window hours ago.’

Louisa said, ‘Assuming Black was the brains, they probably wouldn’t have thought of that.’

‘Let’s not underestimate them,’ Catherine said. ‘Black’s dead. They’re not. Where’s the sat nav now, Roddy?’

Ho coloured slightly, and his finger stroked the keyboard’s touchpad. An OS map sprouted on to the screen. Two more taps, and it had magnified twice over.

‘Epping Forest,’ he said.

Curly moved his boot away. Hassan pulled the handkerchief from his mouth, and tossed it as far as he was able. Then lay on the ground, sucking mouthfuls of cold damp air. He hadn’t realised how empty his lungs were. How foul it had been in that boot, with only his own stink to survive on.

He sat up, every part of his body protesting. Behind Curly stood Larry: taller than Curly, broader too, but somehow less substantial. He was holding what looked like a bundle of sticks. Hassan blinked. The world turned swimmy, then washed back into line. It was a tripod. And that matchbox in his other hand: that would be a camera.

Curly was holding something altogether different.

Hassan drew his knees up, leant forward, and pressed his hands to the cold earth. It felt reassuringly solid, and at the same time coldly alien. What did he know about the outdoors? He knew about city streets and supermarkets. He pushed himself unsteadily onto his feet. I wobble, he thought. I wobble. Here among these trees, which are so very big, I am small, and I hurt, and I wobble. But I’m alive.

He looked at Curly, and said, ‘This it, is it?’ His voice sounded strange, as if he were being played by an actor. Someone who’d never actually heard Hassan speak, but had worked out what he might sound like from a faded photograph.

‘Yeah,’ Curly told him. ‘This is it.’

The axe he was holding looked to Hassan like something from the Middle Ages. But then, it was something from the Middle Ages – a smoothly curved length of wood with a dull-grey metal head, sharpened to a killing edge. Used down the centuries, because it rarely went wrong. Sometimes the handle wore thin, and was replaced. Sometimes the blade grew blunt.

Joanna Lumley was long gone. Hassan’s inner comedian had not returned to the stage. But when he spoke again his own voice had returned to him, and for the first time in an age, he uttered the precise words he was feeling.

‘You fucking coward.’

Did Curly flinch? Was he not expecting that?

Curly said, ‘I’m a soldier.’

‘You? A soldier? You call this a battlefield? You’ve tied my hands, dragged me into a forest, and now you’re what? Gunna cut my head off? Some fucking soldier.’

‘It’s a holy war,’ Curly said. ‘And your lot started it.’

‘My lot? My lot sell soft furnishings.’ A wind stirred the woods, making a noise like an appreciative audience. Hassan felt blood run through his veins; felt fear build into a bubble in his chest. It might burst at any moment. Or might just float him away. He looked at Larry. ‘And you, right? You’re just gunna stand there and let him do what he wants? Another fucking soldier, right?’

‘Shut up.’

‘Yeah, right. Or what? You’ll cut my head off? Fuck the pair of you. You want to film this? Film me now, saying this. You’re both cowards and the BN fucking P are a bunch of fucking losers.’

‘We’re not BNP,’ Curly said.

Hassan threw his head back and laughed.

‘What’s so funny?’

He said, ‘You think I care? You think I care who you are? BNP or English Defence League or any other kind of stupid fucking Nazi, you think I care? You’re nothing. You’re nobodies. You’ll spend the rest of your lives in prison, and you know what? You’ll still be nobodies.’

Larry said, ‘Right. That’s it.’

Duffy arrived full-tilt, of course. He’d never been far away. He found a waste-paper basket rolling harmlessly across the carpet, and a glass wall showing no sign that violence had been offered. But Taverner was white-faced, and judging by Jackson Lamb’s expression, that counted as a result.

Lamb said, ‘A handler never burns his own joe. It’s the worst treachery of all. That’s what Partner was doing, using Standish as a shield. That’s what you’re doing now. Maybe I am old school. But I’m not watching that happen twice.’

Nick Duffy said, ‘Partner?’

‘Enough,’ Taverner said. Then: ‘He’s been running Slough House like a private army. He’s been running ops, for Christ’s sake. Take him downstairs.’

While she was speaking Lamb had found a loose cigarette in his overcoat pocket, and was now trying to straighten it. His expression suggested this was currently his major problem.

Duffy wasn’t armed. Didn’t need to be. He said, ‘Okay, Lamb. Put that down, and drop your coat on the floor.’

‘Okay.’

Duffy couldn’t help it: he glanced at Taverner. She was glancing right back.

‘Something you should know first, mind.’

And now they both looked at Lamb.

‘The SUV your guy just drove under the building? There’s a bomb on the back seat. A big one.’

A second passed.

Duffy said, ‘You’re kidding, right?’

‘Might not be.’ Lamb shrugged, then stared at Taverner. ‘I told you. I don’t do subtle.’

The desk guys weren’t as fond of Spider Webb as he thought, but everyone likes having information. Somebody had parked a Service car on the forecourt, and received the inevitable response: the security drones and a couple of Duffy’s boys, not long back from various errands. They’d surrounded the car until Duffy himself appeared.

‘Who was it?’

‘Jackson Lamb,’ the older desk guy said.

‘You sure?’

‘I’ve worked here twenty years. You get to know Jackson Lamb.’

The word sonny was all the more eloquent for remaining unspoken.

Lamb had come in under Duffy’s steam; was up on the hub. The desk guys’ monitors didn’t cover what happened there, but he hadn’t reappeared.

Spider chewed his lip. Whatever Lamb was up to, it didn’t involve the madwoman with the gun; or River, either. He mumbled his thanks to the desk guys, and didn’t see the look they shared as he headed back upstairs. On the landing he stopped by the window. Nothing was happening on the street. He blinked. Something was happening on the street. A black van screeched to a halt, and almost before it had stopped moving the back was open, allowing three, four, five black-clad shadows to pour like smoke into the morning. Then they were gone, headed into the underground car park.

The achievers, everyone called them. Spider Webb had always thought it a ridiculous name; a piece of jargon that shouldn’t have stuck, but had. They were the SWAT guys, who mostly did extractions and removals; he’d seen them in action, but only on drills. This hadn’t struck him as a drill.

He wondered if the building were under attack. But if so, there’d be alarms, and a lot more activity.

Through the window, the same nothing was happening again. Small disturbances only. A wind rearranged the trees over the road; a taxi passed. Nothing.

Webb shook his head; an unnecessarily dramatic gesture, given there was nobody to witness it. Story of his life. The joke was, last time he’d been close to anyone, it had been River Cartwright. Some of the courses they’d been on, you couldn’t get through without forming alliances; what people called friendships. More than once, he’d assumed that their futures would run on parallel lines, but something had prevented that, which was Spider’s slow-dawning realisation that River was better than him at most things; so much so, he didn’t have to make a big show of it. Which was the sort of moment on which alliances foundered.

He carried on upstairs. Next flight up, he opened the door to his corridor, and one of the achievers stuck a gun to his temple.

Larry said, ‘That’s it. I’m done. You want to do this, you’re on your own.’

‘You’re going?’

‘It’s all fucked up. You can’t see that? We were only meant to scare him. Film it. Show them we meant business.’

‘Scaring them’s not business.’

‘It’s enough for me. You killed a spook, man. I’m leaving. Get back to Leeds, maybe just …’

Maybe hide under the bed. Maybe get home, and hope it would all go away. Close his eyes tight enough, and none of this would have happened.

‘No way,’ Curly said. ‘No fucking way are you going anywhere.’

Larry dropped the tripod and tossed him the digicam. It landed by Curly’s feet. ‘Still want to film it? Film it yourself.’

‘And how am I supposed to—’

‘I don’t care.’

Larry turned and started to pick his way along the track.

‘Get back here!’

He didn’t reply.

‘Larry! Get fucking back!’

Hassan said, ‘Soldiers, right. You’re soldiers.’

‘Shut up!’

‘Soldiers get shot for deserting, don’t they?’

‘Shut your fucking hole!’

‘Or what?’ Hassan asked. Inside him, the bubble burst. He’d soiled himself, wet himself, sweated and wept through days of fear. But now he’d come out the other side. He’d done the worst of dying: the knowing it was going to happen, the absolute shame of knowing he’d do anything to avoid it. And now he was watching his murderers’ plans crumble. ‘Show this on the internet, you fucking Nazi. Oh, right, you can’t, can you? You’ve only got one pair of hands.’

In pure blind rage, Curly hit him with the axe.

The four sat around the table, their plates now cleared away. Since Catherine had got back from the phone, and the other three had confirmed, in the way of small groups of people everywhere, what they all knew already – that she had called the police, explained who she was, what she knew, and how she knew what she knew – no one had spoken. But Ho had folded his laptop away, and Louisa was leaning forward, her hands cradling her chin, her teeth grinding. Min’s lips were pursed in a way that suggested deep thought. And every sudden noise attracted Catherine’s attention, as if every rattle of every cup, every dropped spoon, threatened disaster.

Out on Old Street, cars whistled past in bursts dictated by the nearby traffic lights.

Min cleared his throat as if about to speak, but thought better of it.

Ho said, ‘You know something?’

They didn’t.

‘I’ve got my mobile in my pocket.’ He took it out and placed it on the table, so they could see it for themselves. ‘All this time, Catherine’s trotting off to the payphone in the corner. And I’ve got my mobile in my pocket.’

Catherine looked at Louisa. Louisa looked at Min. Min looked at Catherine. They all looked at Ho.

Min said, ‘For a communications genius, that was kind of rubbish, wasn’t it?’

Then they waited some more.

A man in black – an achiever – appeared on the hub. Under his arm was a cardboard box, which he carried into Diana Taverner’s office and placed on her desk. It was ticking loudly.

‘I assume that’s not a bomb,’ Taverner said.

He shook his head, removed the box’s lid, and put Lamb’s office clock on Taverner’s blotter. Wooden, friendly faced, it was out of place in these hi-tech surroundings.

Taverner said, ‘I didn’t think so.’

Duffy and Lamb were still there. Out on the hub, the same crews were doing the same things they’d been doing before Lamb’s announcement had brought the achievers into play; or at least, were still pretending to do them, though with less plausibility. What was happening behind the glass wall was occupying all of their attention.

Lamb said, ‘Technically – and I might be wrong about this, but I get a lot of e-mail crap from HR – technically, you should still have evacuated the building.’

‘Which is what you wanted.’

‘I mean, if that was an actual bomb, you’d be in a shit-load of grief.’

Duffy said to Taverner, ‘If that thing had been ticking on the back seat when my guy drove into the car park, he’d have heard it.’

The achiever was already leaving, talking into his throat-mic as he went.

Taverner pointed at Lamb. ‘You didn’t want us out of the building at all. You brought somebody in.’

Lamb said, ‘You still think a cover-up’s a possibility? Or is it all falling apart?’

Spider Webb stumbled backwards into his office, tripped on the rug, and sprawled on the floor. River pulled Moody’s balaclava from his head and stuffed Moody’s gun into the back of his waistband. He thought about punching Spider in the head, but only for a moment. Climbing out of the SUV’s boot, putting Lamb’s fake bomb on the back seat and making his way up the stairs hadn’t taken long, but he didn’t have much time to play with. If Lamb had done his bit, the real achievers would be swarming the building soon.

He said, ‘My assessment report.’

Spider said, ‘Cartwright?’

‘You kept a copy. Where is it?’

‘That’s what this is about?’

‘Where is it?’

‘Are you out of your fucking mind?’

River bent and grabbed Spider by his shirt collar. ‘This is not a game.’ He was armed, he was in Regent’s Park, more or less dressed as an achiever. If the real thing arrived, he’d be shot on sight. Thoughts that carried a certain amount of heft. He pulled out Moody’s gun again. ‘Let me put it this way. My assessment report. Where is it?’

Spider said, ‘You’re not going to shoot me.’

River slammed the handle of the gun into Spider’s jaw, and Spider yelped as a fragment of tooth flew free. ‘You sure?’

‘You bastard—’

‘Spider. I’ll keep hitting you till you give me what I want. Get it?’

‘I haven’t got your assessment report, why the hell would I?’

‘London rules, remember?’ River said. ‘You said it yourself, the other day. You play London rules. You cover your arse.’

Spider spat a mouthful of blood on the fawn-coloured carpet. ‘How long do you think you’ve got? Before your brains join my tooth on the floor there?’

River hit him again. ‘You crashed King’s Cross, and we both know it. Blue shirt, white tee, whichever way round it was. It was Taverner put you up to that, because she wanted rid of me. You didn’t know why, did you? And didn’t care, so long as you got the nice office and meetings with the Minister and a bright shining career. But you knew enough to keep a copy of the report because you’re playing London rules, and the last person you trust is the one you just did a favour. So where is it?’

Spider said, ‘Screw you.’

‘I won’t ask again.’

‘Shoot me and you’ll be dead one minute later. Then you’ll never find it, will you?’

‘So we agree you’ve got it.’

Footsteps sounded in the corridor, and Spider opened his bloodied mouth to shout. But River clubbed him again, and guaranteed his silence.

Hassan must have blacked out. Who wouldn’t have done, struck with an axe? But it had been the blunt end Curly hit him with; a swift vicious jab with the handle, bang in the forehead. Perhaps half a minute ago. Long enough, anyway, for the scene to have shifted: Larry had stalked off down the track, and Curly had chased after him, caught him up; was shouting at him – words floated back on the cold, moss-flavoured air: stupid chicken bastard …

The axe hung limply in Curly’s hand. The pair of them, arguing – well, they were no longer the Three Stooges, obviously. They were Laurel and Hardy. Stan and Ollie. In another fine mess again.

And here was a funny thing. Sometimes a blow to the head can clear away the cobwebs.

This wasn’t true, but for a moment Hassan pretended it was, and wondered what he’d do if it were. He would stand up, he decided. So that’s what he did.

There. That was better.

Wobbly on his legs, he became aware of the enormous space everywhere. Space hemmed in by trees, but without walls, and with a sky overhead. He could see it now. Branches were growing into focus. Somewhere, there’d be a sun. Hassan couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen the sun.

He started walking.

The ground was spongy and unfamiliar. Partly this was due to his condition, but mostly it was because he was in a wood. But still, Hassan could walk, he could shuffle; he could almost break into a run. The trick was to look down. To watch where he placed his feet. This sudden view of the ground gave him the illusion that he was moving much faster than he really was.

If he looked back, he would see Curly and Larry breaking off their argument; come lolloping after him, Curly with axe in hand. So he remained focused on the ground instead, on how much space he was covering. He had no idea where he was going. Whether he was moving deeper into the forest, or would break into open land any moment … Which didn’t seem probable. Everything was too thick, too woody, to surrender itself so swiftly. But those were things Hassan had no control over, while he did, at last, control his own movements. So thinking, he tripped; thrust his hands out before hitting the ground, and couldn’t prevent a cry escaping him as a sharp pain seared outwards from his wrists. Which mattered much less than the noise he’d made.

So now he did look round. He’d travelled much less further than he’d thought; maybe half what he’d hoped. Curly and Larry were about the distance away that Hassan could have thrown a kitchen chair. Both were staring at him.

Hassan could have sworn he heard the grin break out on Curly’s face.

The footsteps passed Webb’s office in a rush, and River released the breath he’d been holding, along with his grip on Spider’s collar. Spider collapsed on to the carpet, incapable of further conversation.

River waited, but there was no more noise. It occurred to him that if it had been the achievers, he’d not have heard a sound: there was more to them than dressing the part. And with that thought an idea occurred, which he wasted two minutes implementing before turning to his search.

The files and folders took up seven shelves, stretching the length of the far wall. There could easily be a hundred on each, and River had maybe three minutes to find the one he wanted, always supposing it was there rather than, say, locked in a desk drawer. So he tried the drawers first, most of which contained junk, and only one of which was locked. River retrieved the key from Spider’s pocket, but the locked drawer hid only bank statements and a passport in Spider’s name. Dropping the key, River headed for the shelves. A snapshot memory from last year told him he’d submitted his interim exercise report in a black plastic folder, but at least a third of the spines were that same glossy colour, the rest being orange, yellow, green. He pulled a black one at random, to find it labelled in the top right corner: Ennis. Assuming this was a surname, he checked the Cs; found a Cartwright who wasn’t him; then looked under R, but found no Rivers. Tried A for Assessment, and found a bunch of them, all black, but none of them his.

He took a step back and assessed the wall as a whole. ‘Spider Spider Spider,’ he murmured. ‘London rules …’ Webb had said it himself: those were the rules he played by. So if Webb had burned River at King’s Cross, on Taverner’s instructions, he’d have kept evidence of it, to make sure he didn’t end up in the line of fire himself. Given Taverner’s expertise at throwing former allies to the Dogs, this was wise.

‘Spider Spider Spider …’

London rules he’d said, but he’d also said something else. As River groped in his memory the door opened, and into the office slipped one of the achievers, a real one, his drawn pistol aimed directly at River’s head.

It wasn’t a grin. Curly turned when he heard the yelp, and snarled when he saw the kid was on the move. He barked at Larry – a cross between a threat and a prediction – and took off.

Behind him, he knew, Larry would be rooted to the spot. Glad to be left behind; hoping he could vanish.

I’m not doing this. I’m out of here.

No balls. With soldiers like him, the war was lost. Hell, it wasn’t even fought. It was all hot air and history.

But Curly was at war. If Larry didn’t know which side he was on, that was his lookout. The thing about an axe was, it didn’t need reloading.

The Paki was showing his heels again. He ran like a girl, elbows tucked into his sides. Curly, though, was flying. Days of tension, of built-up excitement, and here was the moment at last.

We’re gunna cut your head off.

Call it a declaration of war.

Then his right foot landed on something slippery and wet, and for half a beat he might have lost his balance and sprawled on his back, while the axe went flying freely through the air – but it didn’t happen, he didn’t fall; his body was finely in synch with the natural world, and his left foot firmly in place on solid ground; his hip twisting just enough that his centre of balance held, and now he was moving even faster, and the distance between himself and his prey was disappearing by the second.

He wished the Paki had been looking back to see that. Get some idea of what he was dealing with.

We’re gunna cut your head off and show it.

But he was still making tracks, running like a girl. Scared as a mouse. Frightened as a rat.

Curly slowed his pace. This was too good. This was too good to hurry. This was what they meant by thrill of the chase.

We’re gunna cut your head off and show it on the web.

Nick Duffy covered his phone with a hand and said, ‘They’ve got him.’

‘Where?’

‘Webb’s office.’

Taverner glanced at Lamb, who shrugged. ‘If my guys were any good, they’d be your guys.’

‘Why Webb?’ she asked. Then: ‘Never mind.’ To Duffy, she said, ‘Tell them to take whoever it is downstairs. And tell Webb to get up here.’

‘He’s on his way.’

‘Thank you. Give me a minute, would you?’

Duffy left, talking into his phone.

Taverner said, ‘Whatever just happened, that was your last chance. Hope you enjoyed your morning, Jackson, because it’s the last you’ll see for a week. And by the time you’re back upstairs, you’ll have signed a confession, and anything else I tell you to.’

Lamb, sitting facing her, nodded thoughtfully. He seemed to be about to say something important, but all he could manage was, ‘Mind, your lad Spider doesn’t half like a colourful tie.’

Behind her, the door opened.

‘Of course, my lad River can’t do a knot to save his life.’

The minutes spent swapping shirts with the unconscious Spider hadn’t been wasted after all. River Cartwright, wearing Webb’s jacket and tie, closed the door behind him, a black folder tucked under his arm.

Hassan couldn’t look back. Could barely look forward. Had to look at the ground, scan it for roots and stones and unsuspected dips; for anything that might grab his ankle and bring him to a sudden end. For dangers at head-height, he trusted his luck.

‘Having fun yet, Paki?’

Curly, gaining on him.

‘Playtime’s nearly over.’

Hassan tried to speed up, but couldn’t. Everything he had to offer, he was already pouring into this one aim: to keep moving. To never stop. To run to the end of the wood, and then beyond; to always be one step ahead of this Nazi thug who wanted to kill him. With an axe.

The thought of the axe should have been a spur, but he had nothing left to give.

A sudden dip in the ground almost threw him, but he survived. A root reached for his ankle, but missed him by an inch. Two escapes in as many seconds, and that was it: his luck ran out. A branch struck him in the face and Hassan staggered from the blow, ran into a tree without enough force to damage himself, but with more than enough to bring him to a halt. His legs didn’t quite buckle, nor his body quite fall, but there was nothing left. He couldn’t start the engine again. He held on to the tree a moment longer, then turned to face his murderer.

Curly stood on the other side of the dip, panting lightly. A doglike smile was painted across his face, colouring every aspect but his eyes, and he was swinging the axe gently, as if to demonstrate his total control over it. There was no sign of Larry. No sign of the digicam, either; no tripod; nothing. Hassan, though, had the feeling that events were moving to a conclusion regardless. Curly’s need to film this horror was paling beside his need to commit it. The axe was all he required now. The axe, and Hassan’s participation.

But even knowing that, Hassan had given all he had. He couldn’t move another step.

Curly shook his head. ‘The trouble with you lot,’ he explained, ‘is you’re just not at home in the woods.’

And the trouble with your lot, thought Hassan … The trouble with your lot … But there was so much wrong with Curly’s lot that there was no smart phrase to do it justice. The trouble with Curly’s lot was that it contained Curly, and others like him. What more needed saying?

Curly stepped forward, into the dip, and up the other side. He swapped the axe from one hand to the other; made a little lunge with it to tease his victim; then was neatly hooked round the ankle by the root Hassan had avoided, and hammered down flat on his face. Hassan watched, fascinated, as Curly took a mouthful of leaf and mud; was so engrossed by the spectacle that it took him a full second to register that the axe had just landed at his feet.

But even with bound hands, it took him less than a full second to pick it up.

Mistake? I prefer to call it a fiasco.

Spider Webb’s words, the other day. They were right up there with London rules as far as River was concerned. I prefer to call it a fiasco. Thank you, Spider. That would be a clue.

The folder he held was neatly labelled Fiasco.

‘And this,’ he said to Taverner, ‘is why you had Spider burn me.’

‘Burn you?’

Lamb said, ‘He’s a kid. He gets carried away with the jargon.’

‘I’m calling Duffy back in.’

‘Be my guest,’ Lamb told her. He was fiddling with his bent cigarette again, and seemed at least as interested in it as in whatever River’s folder held. But still: River waited until Lamb threw him a barely perceptible nod, before he went on.

He said, ‘I did my upgrade assessment last winter.’

‘I remember,’ Taverner said. ‘You crashed King’s Cross.’

‘No, you did that. By getting Webb to feed me misinformation, sending me after a plant. A fake fake. Not the real one.’

‘And why would I do that?’

‘Because an earlier part of the assessment was compiling a profile on a public figure,’ River said. ‘My designated target was a Shadow Cabinet Minister, but he had a stroke the night before, and was hospitalised. So I covered you instead. I thought that showed initiative, but you know what?’ He opened the folder, and removed a pair of photographs he’d taken months ago, the day before the King’s Cross assignment. ‘It showed you in a coffee shop instead. Happy memories?’

He laid them on the desk where they could all see. The pictures had been taken from outside a Starbucks, and showed Diana Taverner at a window seat, drinking from a regular-sized mug. Next to her was a crew-cut man in a dark overcoat. In the first photograph he held a handkerchief to his nose, and could have been anyone. In the second he’d lowered his hand, and was Alan Black.

‘He must have been about to go undercover. Was that your last meet?’

Taverner didn’t reply. Behind her eyes, Lamb and River could see calculations rolling once again; as if even here, in a glass room, she might still find a way out that neither of them had yet noticed.

Lamb said, ‘When you found out what Cartwright had done, you took steps. The King’s Cross business should have meant game over, he should have been on the street. But because he had a legend in the family, the best you could manage was Slough House, and once the op was running, and the Voice of Albion was in play, you had Sid Baker assigned to us too, just to make sure Cartwright wasn’t getting any clever ideas. Which, given grandad, he’d likely be prone to, right?’

On a train of her own, she said, ‘I told Webb to get rid of the file.’

‘He’s a quick learner too.’

‘What do you want, Lamb?’

Lamb said, ‘There’s a reason why handlers are always ex-joes. It’s because they know what they’re doing. You couldn’t have fucked this up worse if you were trying.’

‘You’ve made your point. What do you want?’

River said, ‘You know what I want?’

She turned her gaze on him, and he understood a fundamental difference between suits and joes. When a joe looked at you, if he was any good, you’d never notice. But when a suit turned it on, you could feel their glare scorching holes in your intestinal tract.

But still, he was the O.B.’s grandson. ‘If Hassan Ahmed dies,’ he said, ‘there’s no hiding place. It all comes out. Not just here in the Park, but out there in the real world. If your idiot plan gets that kid killed, I will crucify you. Publicly.’

Taverner made a noise halfway between a snort and a laugh. She said to Lamb, ‘Are you going to tell him the facts of life, or shall I?’

‘You already screwed him,’ Lamb told her. ‘Bit late for a theory lesson, I’d have thought. But I’ll tell you what I’ll do.’

She waited.

He said, ‘If Hassan Ahmed dies, I’ll watch Cartwright’s back while he does whatever he thinks necessary.’

And River learned something else about suits and joes; that when a joe wants to be noticed, he is.

After a while, Taverner said, ‘What if the boy’s rescued?’

Lamb gave her his shark’s grin. ‘That happens, maybe we’ll keep it between ourselves. There’s bound to be favours we can do each other.’

The grin made it clear in which direction the favours would flow.

‘We don’t even know where he is,’ she said.

‘Well, my crew’s on it, so I’d call it sixty-forty he’s toast.’ He looked at River. ‘What do you reckon?’

River said, ‘I don’t think it’s a joking matter.’

But he was thinking: fifty-fifty. Absolute tops, he’d give Hassan fifty-fifty of seeing lunchtime.

Curly was moaning, a long low keening sound, and his foot was twisted at a peculiar angle. Perhaps, Hassan thought, it was broken. One broken ankle versus two bound hands – that made for a level playing field. Or would have done, except that Hassan now had an axe.

On the whole, that gave him the edge.

Placing one foot heavily on the fallen Curly’s hand, Hassan rested the blade on the fallen Curly’s head.

‘Give me a reason not to kill you,’ he said.

Whatever Curly answered was lost in a mouthful of earth and a whimper of pain.

‘Give me a reason,’ Hassan repeated, lifting the axe an inch.

Curly turned his head aside and spat grit and leaf. ‘Foo’s ur.’

‘I’m supposed to understand that?’

He spat again. ‘My foot’s hurt.’

Hassan lowered the axe once more, so the blade touched Curly’s temple. He pressed down, and watched Curly’s eyes close and his features tighten. He wondered if the fear Curly felt was the same fear he’d felt himself. Since it seemed to have departed him now, he suspected it probably was. And how’s that for a joke, he wondered? How would that work with an audience? That the same fear Curly had set loose in Hassan’s gut was now burying its snout in his own bowels? But maybe not everyone would get it. Maybe you had to be there.

Another push on the axe loosed a trickle of blood down Curly’s face.

‘Did you say something?’

Curly had made a noise.

‘Did you?’

He made another one.

Wrapping his bound hands tightly round the axe handle, Hassan dropped into a crouch. The blade pressed heavily on the side of Curly’s head. He said, ‘Did you have something to say?’, and gave equal weight to each syllable.

Curly said, ‘D-do it.’

Or he might have said, ‘Don’t do it.’

Hassan waited, his eyes six inches from Curly’s. He wished there were some way he could see inside Curly’s head; some way he could allow light into Curly’s brain in a way that didn’t involve brute surgery. But there wasn’t. He was sure there wasn’t. So he leant a little closer.

‘You know what?’ Hassan said. ‘You make me ashamed I’m British.’

Then he stood and walked away.

He walked back to the car and then along the track that led to the distant road. He had no idea how far away it was. He didn’t care. He was thirsty, hungry and tired, which were all bad things; he was cold and filthy, and that was bad too. But his hands were no longer bound, because he had severed the cord with the blade of the axe; and fear was no longer chewing at his innards, because he’d left it behind in the woods. He was alive, and nobody had rescued him. He was alive because of who he was.

And maybe because Joanna Lumley had come through, too.

He saw no sign of Larry, and that didn’t matter. He saw no rabbits, either, nor heard any birds, and his sense of time had long deserted him, but before Hassan reached the road lights bloomed way ahead of him: flashing ovals which painted the trees blue and then blue and then blue. And soon people were rushing towards him in a fever of noise and motion.

‘Hassan Ahmed?’

The axe was taken gently away, and arms were holding him up.

‘You’re Hassan Ahmed?’

It was a simple enough question, and it didn’t take him long to find an answer.

‘Yes,’ he told them. ‘Yes, I am.’

And then he added, ‘I’m alive.’

They were very glad to hear it, he learned, as they carried him back to the world.