Robert Young

Gatecrasher

The morning after

I

1

Sunday. 8am.

It was the kind of morning that people stayed in bed for. A damp, grey dawn blew in off the river and across the thinning trees of the park. Three men gathered by the walled water’s edge. Their hands, thrust deep into pockets, drew overcoats tight against themselves as they tried to keep out the cold and the drizzle that swept about them.

One of the men looked sharper and more affluent than the other two. His long dark coat looked heavy and expensive, well cut. His brown hair, short and styled, barely shifted in the breeze. The other two wore jeans and cheap looking jackets, slightly ill-fitting. Plain and nondescript, they appeared altogether less sophisticated than their companion.

Though their only company in the park were joggers and dog walkers, squirrels and pigeons, they huddled close and spoke quietly and guardedly. Frequently they turned to look about them, their eyes scanning people as they passed, searching the trees and the shadows they cast.

Behind them the London skyline struggled out of the drab morning, a light fog blurring it gently as the sun drew lazily into the sky. Most eyes in the park looked past the men to landmarks beyond, or at the floor, the trees, the isolated greenery around them penned in by the city. Still they shifted uncomfortably, their exchanges brief, their gestures small and understated as they talked and their breath misted about their heads.

‘Tyler, don’t give me maybes. I don’t give a shit about maybes,’ the smart man said sharply as he turned to one of the men who had the squat solid build of a nightclub doorman.

‘Of course, I know that. All I’m saying is that at this stage, we shouldn’t have a problem,’ he explained more politely than his appearance suggested of him.

‘Absolutely sir,’ added the other. A tall, athletically built man named Matthew Drennan, he looked the smart man in the eye. ‘Last known sighting he was somewhere in Fulham.’ The line was delivered as though it should mean something. It was met with a disdainful shrug from the smart man.

‘Meaning what exactly?’

‘Well it wasn’t as if he were wandering around Whitehall sir or knocking on the door of the Telegraph. I think we can assume that he is out of our hair and I think that we have our friends in the east to thank for that too.’

‘We have our friends in the east to thank for a lot Drennan,’ he said with heavy sarcasm. ‘And whilst I am extremely eager to share in your mindlessly optimistic little worldview, I am more concerned with knowing what actually happened rather than what might have happened because I really do not want to start thinking about what could happen. So please, reassure me. Justify my occasional faith in your ability.’

It was Tyler, the doorman, who spoke. ‘We don’t have any definites at the moment but we are confident that there is no cause for concern … at present…’ he faltered at the glare this was met with but continued regardless, ‘…and we will have answers for you shortly sir.’

‘The right answers,’ added Drennan.

The smart man looked at them both sternly for a moment and then adjusted his coat against the rising wind. ‘Gentlemen, I rise at five o’ clock in the morning. I shower, take breakfast and dress and I leave my home at six o‘clock for the office. This gives you a window of one hour in which to call me and give me the answers I require. If I have to leave my home for work without this information I will become really rather agitated at the uncertain prospect of what might await me.’ As he spoke he inspected his fingernails and then looked briefly into both men’s eyes. ‘I am, of course, understood,’ he said softly but did not wait for confirmation and he turned and left the park at a brisk walk.

Tyler and Drennan watched him leave in silence and they turned together and began walking in the opposite direction. It was several minutes before either of them said anything when Drennan lifted a mobile phone to his ear and began to speak.

The night before

2

Saturday. 10pm.

The room was loud and lively, voices raised above the music and people laughed and danced in the dark, stuffy space. Nobody was sitting. That was a good sign.

Daniel Campbell pulled a bottle of wine from the rack behind him and began twisting a corkscrew into the neck. He offered the bottle to the three people grouped around him and then topped up his own glass.

‘So how long have you been here?’ asked one of the group, a short blond haired girl that had turned up with a friend of his.

‘About six months,’ he replied.

‘Six months? It’s taken six months to organise a flatwarming?’ said a tall, skinny man with a goatee as he slurped noisily at his wine.

Campbell shrugged.

‘So how can you afford to buy a place in Fulham? You must be minted.’ The tall skinny man again. Campbell looked at him and winked as he noticed how interested the girl suddenly looked in hearing his answer.

‘You know, the usual. Couple of enormous drug deals, bit of people-trafficking.’ He grinned as the three others laughed. ‘Sold a kidney,’ he added.

They laughed louder and the blond girl flashed a smile at him that Campbell thought he could grow to like.

‘No, Daniel’s actually landed gentry,’ said the other young man who had until now remained silent. ‘Father owns most of Leicestershire.’

‘Yeah. You can tell by the accent how posh I am.’

He began to drift around the room, greeting people and shaking hands, kissing cheeks. Campbell guessed that he knew probably only two-thirds of the people here but he had decided to make the invitation an open one rather than end up with a half-empty flat and a half-hearted party.

A few unfamiliar faces were par for the course anyway and as far as he could tell, most of those that he didn’t know, seemed to know people that he did and had tagged along with them. In any event, most of the guests that he spoke to seemed more than happy with their host and Campbell was enjoying his new-found popularity.

At one point he was drawn into a round of tequila shots, salt and lemon fetched from the kitchen, the bottle from his own cupboard. Everybody grimaced and groaned as they sucked on the sour fruit. Someone’s barely suppressed retching draw great amusement from the others.

More than once he spotted the short blonde girl that he had been talking to earlier, looking across the room at him. More than once he made sure that he returned her eye contact.

After chatting with a couple of work colleagues who he’d invited the week before after a few post-work drinks and then regretted it the next morning, he resolved to work his way back through the crowded living room to the blond girl. He turned to look for her, raising his glass to his mouth, trying hard to look distracted.

Suddenly he froze. The brutal, jarring sound of breaking glass and the thud of something heavy hitting the floor burst through the flat and silenced everyone, leaving just the sound of the music in the background, pounding like a heartbeat. His head snapped around to the source of the sound from the end of the hallway, toward the kitchen and something surged and slammed in his chest.

He could hear it in his head again like an echo as he ran and hairs danced on his neck. The shattering of the glass was almost to be expected, several hours into a drink-soaked party. But that other sound. A sort of crunching, thudding noise: of dropping. Of falling.

Slumped face down across the floor of his kitchen lay the figure of a man, his head surrounded by broken glass and, it seemed to the stunned Campbell as he stood there aghast, by a pool of blood that looked positively black in the soft light. Someone behind him screamed: the most perfect description of his own feelings.

Rooted to the spot in the doorway he could hear the clamour of people behind him trying to look into the room, asking each other who it was, what had happened.

Campbell stared dumbly at the scene before him, not quite able to grasp what he was seeing.

‘Did anyone see?’ he asked of no-one in particular. When no answer came he turned to the group of people arranged in the hallway around the kitchen door. ‘What happened here?’ he asked again but his question met only with blank stares.

‘Nobody saw anything? No one was in here with him?’ A note of incredulity touched his voice as he turned back again to look at the motionless form sprawled across the floor. Campbell had not yet crossed the threshold of the doorway, his toe making it no further than the metal carpet rail that separated his hall carpet from the kitchen lino and formed a barrier that seemed now somehow impossible for him to breach.

Turning slowly he stepped into the room and as he did so, the crowd at his back pressed forward. There were more screams, gasps, more talking and he span and ushered them back out of the room and closed the door but a brown-haired woman who had arrived with a friend moved forcefully through the door and then closed it for him.

‘I know a little first aid,’ she said and then looked from him to the figure on the floor.

‘OK,’ he nodded blankly. Campbell’s head was still swimming and he blinked hard twice to try to clear his vision. It failed. He tried to think about how much he’d drunk. A lot.

He stepped forward and reached his hand out toward the man’s neck. A hooded top obscured all but the back of his head, the hair there dark and matted with blood. Neither of them spoke; not when Campbell had drawn back the hood to expose a number of vicious gashes in the man’s neck, blood flowing freely from the wounds. Not when Campbell took up the man’s wrist and rolled his eyes in relief when he found a faint pulse.

Shards from a wineglass lay broken in the blood and the long thin stem rocked gently back and forth on its circular base next to the man’s head. Campbell guessed that he had fallen and somehow the glass had ended up between the floor and his throat as he landed. He speculated about this aloud and they both winced at the thought, picturing it as they stared again at the wound.

‘Pass me a dishcloth or something,’ Campbell instructed trying to sound decisive, but she was kneeling now and rolling her sleeves up. Campbell grabbed clean dishcloths from a drawer and tossed them about in the pooling blood, pressing firmly on them as they began to colour a deep, deep red.

‘How’s that first aid looking?’ he said. She looked up at him with a pale face and red hands.

‘All I can think is that you’re supposed to stop the bleeding by applying pressure. But I’m not exactly sure how we do that without strangling the guy.’

‘Shit… Ambulance.’

She nodded and he pulled his mobile phone from his pocket and began dialling.

‘Where’s the nearest A and E?’ she asked looking back at the motionless figure and his pallid looking face.

‘Not far actually. Five minutes up the road maybe.’ he said and then started talking into the handset, fighting to keep the panic and the booze from his voice, trying not to look at the prone figure next to him.

When he finished he looked up at her and nodded, exhaling noisily. ‘Who the hell is this guy?’

After a protracted silence she spoke. ‘Party’s over then.’

Campbell was staring at the blood. So dark, he thought. He nodded but said nothing.

3

Saturday. 11.30 pm.

He shifted his backside on the thin cushioning of the waiting-room seat and looked again at his watch and then the clock on the wall.

Campbell shook his head. Where was this guy, he thought. How long was this going to take?

He had been sitting here for a little over an hour now. Half past eleven on a Saturday night in the waiting room of an A and E. The last place on earth he wanted to be and he wasn’t allowed to leave. The identity of the man he had brought in had yet to be established and he had been asked to stay until some official people asked some official questions.

Campbell squirmed in the seat and tried to stay calm. The drink was not helping. And the cheap machine-coffee in the plastic cup was worse than useless.

He tried hard to count up the number of drinks that he had got through that evening, recalling numerous glasses of wine, a couple of beers early on as he milled about on his own waiting for guests to start arriving.

Then there were the tequila shots. A sambuca? Had there been anything else? He couldn’t remember exactly but one thing was for sure; no amount of shock or black coffee was going to change the fact that he was drunk. He’d tried to remain as composed as possible with the ambulance crew but had become so conscious of slurring his words that he had then tried hard not to say anything at all. That only made him worry that in clamming up he might seem suspicious or uncooperative.

And then they’d asked him to stay. Asked him if he’d mind answering a few questions about the man, about what had happened. And he’d nodded dumbly and taken a seat, trying hard to fight down the clamouring sense of fear and panic.

But that wasn’t it.

His short term memory had been swilled away earlier that evening and already he was struggling to recall the scene in his kitchen. He was alarmed that the details evaded his recall when so little time had passed since it happened. He tried to piece it together. The brunette woman had said ‘Party’s over then’ or something and he’d nodded. You can say that again love.

And then he’d ushered her out into the hallway, told them all that an ambulance was coming and that it was probably best if people headed off now. Nobody needed asking twice and he went back into the kitchen to the man lying there in his own gathering blood hearing the noise outside drop until it was silent. Five minutes it had taken them to clear his flat as he sat wishing that he could go too, thinking about what would happen, what he would say to the paramedics. Soon the keening of the ambulance siren rose in the background and he felt the panic growing again as it drew closer. Homing in on him, seeking him out.

Which was when the man moved.

And spoke.

What had he said? Campbell frowned as he tried to remember, tried to blink his vision clear — to focus — but the memory just wasn’t there. Just a fleeting image of the head rising from the floor, something mumbled. Something. What?

Campbell slid further into the uncomfortable chair, the seat back now digging into his shoulders. He looked toward the far side of the room where a tall, well dressed man was walking slowly and deliberately toward the reception desk, blood streaked down his face from his hairline and across his brow where a large cut traced a line to his eyebrow. Campbell winced and squirmed in his chair, the train of thought abruptly derailed. Another thirty minutes passed, the room began to fill with more unfortunates; cuts and burns. Twisted ankles, broken bones. Still no-one came to him.

He racked his foggy brain again and again but all he could summon was that same fleeting image like a blurred, grainy instant-replay on loop.

As the waiting room filled with more hurt and pain, he began to feel as though he had been forgotten entirely and began to doze off before finally a suited gentleman in rimless spectacles called his name and ushered him through into a small office. Brisk and efficient he sat him down and offered him a drink in a tone that made it quite clear that to accept would have been an inconvenience. He seemed irritated by Campbell’s obvious inebriation.

‘Sorry to have kept you waiting for so long. Terribly busy out there as you can see and there are always a million other things to do to keep a place like this running. Hope its not too much trouble,’ he said with rehearsed sincerity.

‘No, no problem,’ said Campbell politely. Whilst he didn’t mean it he was careful not to say so. ‘Can you tell me anything?’ he asked, his words slow and deliberate.

‘Well we’re rather been hoping that you might be able to do that for us actually…’ he replied and pushed his glasses up his nose.

Campbell’s irritation was already simmering at nearly two hours on a cheap plastic seat, tired and paranoid. ‘Look, I’m sorry mate, but I’ve already said that I don’t know who he is, where he came from or what happened.’ Campbell was aware as he spoke that he was still slurring his words and he became instantly self-conscious about it again.

‘Of course, of course. Its just difficult to deal with when we have no identification, no-one to contact… I’m sure you understand.’

Campbell shrugged, said nothing.

‘Well unfortunately he’s not in a good way, I’m afraid. He’s lost a lot of blood already and he lost consciousness completely more or less as soon as you arrived with him. It’s impossible to say at this stage what will happen, very touch and go. We’re doing all we can for him of course but his injuries…’ he trailed off and looked at Campbell, seemingly watching for a response. ‘Did he speak to you? Were you able to find out anything at all?’

Campbell was careful not to let his expression betray him. He thought for a moment, saw again the briefest flash of memory, of that dark, blood-matted hair raising itself up… ‘Nothing.’ he said flatly and hoped that his slow wits would be put down to drunkenness.

The gentleman scribbled and Campbell tried to read his writing upside down but couldn’t. He seemed to contemplate the words he had written there for a moment, as if he might suddenly be able to figure out what this all meant. Campbell thought that the man was probably far less important than he was making out and was playing this up for effect.

‘Right. OK,’ he said with a mournful shake of the head. ‘Well, we have no desire to inconvenience you further. Of course we appreciate you trying to help out. I think the best thing is that we take some contact details from you so we can get in touch if needs be but in the meantime, you might as well go and get some sleep.’

Campbell hurriedly scribbled his home and mobile phone numbers on the piece of paper that was handed to him and was already at the door before the suited man could stand up and show him out.

4

Sunday. 10am.

The usual Sunday quiet of the East London street was punctuated by the occasional sounds of passing cars and barking dogs. A radio played through the open windows of a parked Mercedes as a teenage boy worked a large sponge over the bonnet. The paintwork gleamed proudly in the morning sun and streams of soaped water ran against the edge of the pavement down into the drain.

Close by, a car pulled up to the curb across the street and Julius Warren, a slim muscular black man, climbed out, locked it and crossed the road. Walking around the front of the sparkling vehicle he walked through the gate of the nearest house, up the short path which he covered in three strides, and pressed his finger to the bell.

The door opened and the man was invited in and pointed along the hallway.

In the kitchen, disturbed by the doorbell, George Gresham stood at the counter with a large knife in his hand and was staring at the doorway as Warren walked in.

‘Mr Warren. Always a pleasure old son. Lovely day,’ Gresham greeted him brightly.

‘George.’ he replied with a curt nod.

‘Rabbit stew,’ Gresham jabbed the knife toward the chopping board where a pair of long, limp dead rabbits lay. He began slicing through their beige fur, working his thumbs underneath as he deftly skinned the animals. Warren noted both the fact the knife seemed far too large and cumbersome for the seemingly delicate job that Gresham was using it but equally how adept the man was at handling the blade. Gresham, without looking up, picked up on Warren’s train of thought.

‘I love this big bastard,’ he said holding it up for a better look. ‘You could skin a fucking Rhino with this Jools. Beautiful isn’t it?’ he said and went back to the rabbits. ‘Not that you’d want to I s’pose. Even so, lovely piece of work. Keep this sharp and this sharp,’ he said as he tapped his temple with the tip of the blade and then thrust it into the air in front of his face.

Warren raised his eyebrows and nodded again, attempting to convey his affirmation. Gresham’s attention was back on the lamb.

‘Lovely meat, rabbit. You cook Jools?’ Warren opened his mouth to answer but Gresham was still going. ‘I love cooking. Very stress relieving, you know, chopping things up. Taking out your frustrations after a hard day in the office on a pound of carrots and a chicken. But there’s art in it too, you know? Craft. Getting the perfect balance, getting everything just right. There’s a lot of technique and skill. Timing. You know what I mean son? You cook?’ Gresham’s voice was thick and deep and always sounded to Warren as if the big man had just woken up.

‘I’ve got a few little specialities in my repertoire George, yeah. Soon as I realised that I couldn’t live with me Mum forever I quickly realised that I couldn’t live without her rice and peas and jerk chicken either. Used to hang around the kitchen when I was 18 and watch her work. Still can’t get close to the old girl but I do alright.’

‘I’ll bet you do son. Now,’ Gresham said as he went back to work on the meat, ‘are you going to tell me why you are standing in my kitchen on a Sunday morning, watching me skin a brace of rabbits and talking to me about your Mum?’

Warren drew in a breath and the rehearsed words that he had run through several times in the car deserted him entirely. ‘Last night boss… Tony,’ he said and stood silently searching for the next sentence to form.

Gresham put down the knife, which Warren found strangely more threatening than had he still been holding it. ‘Jools, I am going to assume that since you were not alone last night when we spoke and you are now that the others have sent you as the messenger because they know I like you and they know that I’ll have their fucking knackers if they turned up here and said to me what I am very much concerned that you are about to say to me. Am I right, Jools? Are you here alone because you have bad news for me?’

Warren, to his credit, looked his boss in the eye when he answered. It was one of the reasons the older man liked him. He had balls. He had balls enough to own up when he fucked up. Gresham could only respect that quality in a man.

‘Think he walked on us.’ he said flatly.

‘Fuck off Jools,’ he spat. ‘He did or he didn’t. Stop messing about.’

‘OK, he did. But… well he can’t have got far. He was not a well boy.’

‘If you believed that, you wouldn’t be here ruining my weekend.’

‘OK. We followed him round most of the day, but he was really edgy so we couldn’t get near him for ages. Anyway, when we finally got hold of him, well, it wasn’t much fun. He was a mate too you know.’

‘Jools-’

Warren stopped him. ‘I know George, I know. But it doesn’t make it easier.’

‘Just makes him more dangerous.’

Jools shrugged a reluctant acknowledgement. ‘Anyway, Keano did him. Volunteered for the job in fact.’ Gresham’s eyebrows arched but Warren pressed on. ‘You know what he’s like though, keen as mustard. It’s like one-upmanship with Slater half the time. Anyway, he found somewhere quiet and we left him to it.’

‘Why do I get the feeling you’re about to tell me that boy is making us all look like cunts again?’

‘He forgot himself gov. Came back over to us and Slater says to him ‘Have you done it right?’ — I don’t think Slater really wanted to leave Keano to do it alone but Cooper knew Slater’s game all the way. Maybe he fancied his chances with Keane.’

‘Keith’s the only one with any intelligence half the time.’ observed Gresham. ‘So what did the little shit do wrong?’

Warren then began to explain to his boss what had happened the previous afternoon. They had taken the other man, into a pub, feigning innocence, playing friendly, although he was clearly not convinced by their false sincerity and forced conversation as he nervously swigged back a number of drinks. Drinks they had been careful to spike.

Before long the man — Tony Cooper, another of Gresham’s crew — was slurring his words and had begun to plead with them as he dropped the pretence but his words were met with denials as they insisted not to know what he meant.

Soon they left the pub, Warren with an arm around Cooper’s shoulder as he staggered through the door. They assured him they were going for a curry and he had reluctantly stumbled along with them, eyes slightly glazed but still darting between them with suspicion.

Stuart Keane, a short man of twenty six with a prominent brow and a double chin had helped Cooper into a dark, quiet passageway — ‘Come on Tone, you must need a slash. I’m dying for one,’ — and emerged alone not two minutes later.

‘Have you done it right?’ asked Keith Slater. Slater was to all intents and purposes, Gresham’s number two, his hatchet man. Intelligent and soft-spoken he was as hard as he was cruel. But his ruthlessness made him a very efficient professional and his loyalty to Gresham was clear from the number of scars he had gained in his service and the two brief stints in prison he had done in place of his boss.

‘Fuck off Slater,’ replied Keane irritably and dropped the zip on his jacket six inches to show the dark bloodstain smudged across his sweater beneath.

‘Alright Keano. Alright. What you going to do with his stuff?’ Warren asked.

Keane frowned.

Slater looked about ready to swing at him.

‘His stuff, Stu. His wallet, his watch. It won’t look like much of a robbery if nothing’s been taken, will it you prick?’

A look of cold rage passed over Keane’s face and he span and stalked back round the corner. Warren turned to Slater whose mouth was hanging open. He smoothed his beard, usually a bad sign in Warren’s experience.

‘You fuck off home when we’re done here. I’ll take him out for a few. He’ll want to let off steam and he’s not going to do that if you’re hanging around looking to slap him,’ Warren told him. But Slater was already looking over Warren’s shoulder by now and his expression told him that all was not well.

‘He’s… Jesus! What the hell…?’ muttered Keane as he shook his head.

‘Christ Keano, what now?’ barked Slater.

‘He’s gone.’

George Gresham had quietly closed the kitchen door and showed him politely to a seat. Breezily he asked if Warren wanted a drink of something. For all the courtesy he was being shown Warren felt a palpable sense of menace. Suddenly he was acutely aware of the knife rack, the heavy looking pots that hung suspended in the corner, the gas burners on the hob. He accepted an offer of tea.

Gresham filled the kettle and Warren began to question the wisdom of having the man boil water but the last thing he was going to do was speak out of turn. His only job now was to sit and wait until the boss said something.

Thankfully he wasn’t kept waiting too long.

‘So where did this little circus take place? I mean, is Cooper running around somewhere looking for a copper? Is he going to come knocking on my door with a shooter and a grudge? You said you think he walked. Tell me it wasn’t far Jools.’

Warren shook his head slowly and tried to think of how best to finish the story. ‘Keano said he knifed him in the neck — I can’t imagine he got too far.

‘Anyway, we figured that the booze and stuff had put him half to sleep and the knife would finish the job. I guess it woke him up. We checked a few streets round there, ‘cos he must have jumped a wall or something — lots of houses round there, lots of gardens. But we didn’t find him. My guess is he started crawling off somewhere but he didn’t crawl far. Can’t have done. My guess is we check the Standard for the next few days and read about where they find him in there.

‘This was down Fulham way. He ended up going to the Chelsea, West Ham game see — goes to loads of Hammers games right? — so we kind of pretended it was all spontaneous, that we’d figured on heading down to meet him and picked up a few tickets off a tout. Handy that it was miles away from here too.’

Gresham handed Warren a cup and saucer and offered him milk from a jug. Again Warren felt the incongruity of such niceties against the topic of their conversation. He prepared himself for an onslaught from his boss — instead he got a biscuit.

‘Julius. We appear to have a situation don’t we? Yes we do George,’ he answered for him. ‘Now, you boys have fucked up and you’ve left us even deeper in it than we were this time yesterday. Not only is he still out there somewhere, where he can be spotted, identified and pulled in and take the whole lot of us down — and if you don’t know otherwise Jools then we are sure as fuck going to have assume that he is out there and looking for the nearest Old Bill to help him — but he’s walking round with a hole in his neck. And that doesn’t make us look like a nice bunch of men does it Jools? No, George, it surely does fucking not. Not to mention the fact that it was one of his best mates that shoved a blade into him — well, I think I’d fancy my chances with the Bill personally given the choice. I would think that our position and his position were pretty bloody crystal now, don’t you? Cooper’s going to find a copper as soon as he can and he’s going to give them all sorts of juicy stories to make them keep vicious bastards like you and Keane and Slater away from him.’

Warren nodded his head. Cooper, as an associate for many years, could give enough information to the police to bury the lot of them if he wanted to try to buy his own safety.

‘Which means you and Slater and Keano should be in Fulham, or wherever he’s got to, tidying this lot up.’

‘Course boss. I’ll call the lads,’ he replied trying to sound upbeat, on the ball.

‘The lads are already there aren’t they Jools?’

Warren didn’t move. Gresham stayed silent which was enough to scare the other man into responding.

‘We didn’t really know where else to look. We couldn’t exactly start knocking on doors…’

‘That, my useless friend,’ hissed Gresham through tightly clenched teeth, ‘is exactly what you could do. Pretend you’re the Bill, pretend you’re the fucking Gas man! Now get your black arse back to Fulham and start from where you left him. I don’t want to see any of you back here until you’ve made absolutely certain that that bastard isn’t going to put the whole fucking lot of us on the front page of the fucking papers!’ Gresham finished with his voice a coarse roar.

Warren stood and walked sheepishly to the front door, his shoulders low and sagging.

‘Jools,’ growled Gresham.

Warren turned.

‘They win? The Hammers?’

He shook his head and stuffed his hands into his pockets.

‘No boss. They took a spanking.’

5

Sunday. 12pm.

It felt like he was paralysed, like he couldn’t move at all and when his eyes flicked open he immediately squeezed them closed again.

Campbell’s head thumped like something was trying to pound its way out through his temples. Slowly he drew his arm up and wrapped it over his eyes, burying the bridge of his nose in the crook of his elbow. After a moment he became aware of his tongue which felt like it was slightly too large for his mouth and as if it had been stuck in place with something foul tasting.

He rolled to the side of the bed, opened his eyes a crack and felt around for the glass of water that he knew was on the floor. Grabbing it he lifted the glass, rolled his head upright from the mattress and poured water between his lips. The glass was empty before his thirst was satisfied. He slumped onto his back again and rolled his tongue around his mouth.

He lay there for long minutes stretching his limbs slowly, trying to work out whether he was going to throw up or not, that maybe getting up and moving around might hasten it but also that if he didn’t get another drink of water soon it was probably going to happen anyway. At least if he was up, he could get to the bathroom. Keep it tidy.

The flat was dark as he moved through it, the curtains drawn in the living room, blinds lowered in the kitchen and bathroom. This, he knew, masked the reality of what he faced. He had staggered through the mess the night before on his way to bed and in the subdued daylight it looked worse still and the smell of stale tobacco and lager was thick in the air. Campbell avoided the kitchen entirely and headed with his empty glass to the bathroom instead. Nothing had happened in there.

He ran the tap until the water ran very cold and sipped from the glass before taking larger swallows. Seconds after finishing the glass his mouth felt dry again and his stomach was turning. The thirst was worse than the nausea he decided and drank another glass down in three big gulps.

Stepping into the hall he looked one way toward the kitchen at one end and then looked the other way toward his gloomy bedroom and the lounge on the opposite side.

Even from here he could see mess everywhere and the smell of it once again assailed his sensitive nostrils. Campbell closed his eyes and turned back to the bathroom and shower.

After showering he felt as if a stiff layer of filth had been rinsed away and his clean clothes smelt fresh and felt like it. As prepared as he could be Campbell now set about trying to rid his flat of all the evidence of the night before, throwing open windows to chase out the stale stink of tobacco and alcohol.

As he worked, flashes of the evening replayed in his mind but bigger chunks were missing now than last night and he found himself every so often pausing from one chore or another and staring blankly at the wall trying to summon up memories.

The blonde girl. She’d been a looker he thought. Or at least had seemed so at the time. Maybe that was the drink though, impairing his judgement. Certainly it had impaired it enough for him to empty so many glasses down his throat. To mix his drinks. Wine, beer, Tequila. He could still taste sambuca somehow, though could only barely recall sinking one shot of that. Had there been anything else?

Dropping empty beer cans and wine bottles into black refuse sacks he wondered how much of these he had been responsible for. There were so many. Then his stomach lurched again and he tried not to think about how much he’d drunk at all.

Having woken late he noted that the time was now getting on for three in the afternoon. The kitchen would wait no longer and he moved gingerly to the door, pausing there with his hands on the doorframe, that same invisible barrier holding him back as it had the previous night. The scene before him was a stark and vivid reminder of what had taken place.

An hour later, the kitchen as clean as he had ever seen it, he was back in bed again. The headache, the nausea and the black mood that refused to lift could all be avoided in sleep he reasoned, so he crawled back under the duvet and slowly drifted off.

For two hours he slept as the daylight crept out of the room, as a jumble of images, real and created, tumbled through his mind, as the phone rang unanswered in the other room and an officious male voice droned out a message for Daniel Campbell.

When he awoke he felt no better. The pounding in his temples had grown more insistent and his tongue felt as thick and dry as before. His dreams had been confused and disturbing and though the images faded quickly when he opened his eyes, they had already set his mood low and morose.

Pulling on his dressing gown, not bothering even to dress properly now, he wandered back into the kitchen to fill another glass of water to rinse the persistent thirst. He left the light off though, as if afraid that he might see something he didn’t want to, as if something might have come back. Campbell shuffled through to the living room, hand on his somersaulting stomach, frown on his face. As if this wasn’t bad enough already, Monday was looming now and with it the grind of work. His spirits sank further with this thought.

His employer was a respected research company operating in the retail investment industry. Offering independent assessment and analysis of the many different investment funds available to the public the company had large numbers of staff whose job it was to constantly research and monitor different funds and fund managers in the industry. Campbell was one of those people.

Sometimes he enjoyed it, digging around for information on investment houses or individual fund managers and their teams of analysts or occasionally the companies in which they invested, the stocks they bought, the different sectors. Dissecting the numbers, the patterns they formed. Sometimes it was something to get his teeth into, cutting through all the spiel and the salesmanship and gloss to the facts and figures and trends beneath.

Mostly though, Campbell found himself regularly bored. He read through pages of dull figures and financial reports, fund portfolios, profits and loss and pages and pages of charts and graphs. The columns of figures and the bars and lines often became meaningless shapes and colours and patterns. The meetings with people trying to convince him and his colleagues that everything in their company or their fund was positive and wonderful and up, up, up often became an exercise in chewing back his yawns.

His growing frustration was compounded by his utter inability to decide what else he might want to do with his life instead. The money was decent and the work well within his capability and it was all so… safe. He knew that was pathetic though and often he yearned to escape the tedium.

Turning on the television, he began to jump channels impatiently, finding nothing that held his interest for more than a few minutes. Then an advert for mobile phones caught his attention as he flicked channels again and he lazily placed the tea and the remote control down on the floor in front of him, looked around the room for his own mobile and spotted it across the room. Drawing himself up from the sofa he walked across to the corner of the room where his telephone sat on a small stand and his mobile next to it.

Three missed calls.

His answerphone also displayed a large glowing red 1 on its tiny display.

First checking the mobile phone he found that two of the calls had been the automatic call-back function that let him know he had messages, of which, there was in fact just one.

‘Mr Campbell. This is Michael Bellamy from the hospital. I’m just ringing this number too in case you missed the message on your home phone number but it is very, very important that you call me as soon as you can.’ And he left a number.

Campbell slapped at the playback button on his answering machine, his fingernails digging into the palms of his hands as he clenched them tight whilst the electronic voice crawled through the introduction and time of message.

Before the message finished playing, Campbell was already dashing through his flat to the toilet where finally he threw up and then threw up again, the hospital administrator’s voice echoing through his head.

6

Monday. 7.30am.

Julius Warren picked up a paper napkin from the table and wiped the egg yolk from his chin. Around the table Stuart Keane and Keith Slater — the rest of Gresham’s crew — sat quietly finishing their own breakfasts.

Keane placed a crisp ten pound note on the table and then found a five in his wallet and placed that on top.

‘I’ve got these,’ he said, his voice noticeably deeper than its usual pitch.

‘Cheers,’ said Slater. Warren only grunted his thanks. ‘What’s the time?’ asked Slater and belched quietly into his hand.

The polite gesture seemed out of place from a man whom the others knew to be a very dangerous individual in the right — or wrong — circumstances. The man was full of contradictions.

‘Too fucking early,’ growled Keane.

Slater regarded him coldly. He had made no secret of his contempt for the way Keane had handled the situation on Saturday night and had made it clear to him that was the way he felt.

‘It’s half seven,’ Warren said as he tugged his sleeve back over his wrist. ‘Guess we should get cracking on round two.’

‘George knows we’ve already looked doesn’t he?’ asked Keane, determined not to let Slater intimidate him.

Warren had long thought that the younger man had a cruel and ambitious streak that made him so competitive that he might create a problem for them. That one day, in his haste to impress the rest of them, Gresham especially, he would slip up. And so he had.

The defiant look on Keane’s face now told him that he wasn’t about to admit to it though. Perhaps they’d miscalculated this, misjudged Keane.

Warren was nodding his head. ‘Yeah. But Slater spoke to him after me, once he’d calmed down,’ he said and nodded toward the big man. ‘Decided that it would’ve looked too dodgy to keep snooping around on a Sunday, especially once the rain started like that. We aren’t going to find him today, but we need to find out where he got to.’

‘I s’pose. So where do we kick off then?’ said Keane.

He already knew what they would be doing but he was probably trying to sound breezy, as if he wasn’t bothered by Slater’s sneering, as if he wasn’t going to blame himself for the situation even if the others did. He ignored another look from Slater although Warren could see his irritation rising already. ‘Back to where we left him,’ Slater said before Warren could answer. ‘Back to square one.’

An hour later they stood in a small alleyway staring at a section of the wall. Blood streaked across the top of the wall and splashed around the floor at their feet had caught their attention. Kane insisted that there had been much more, that the downpour the day before must have washed it away.

They all stood peering over the wall into the garden beyond.

‘He went in there. Must have,’ said Slater trying to see between the small gap in the curtains of the nearest window.

‘Yeah but to get help? Call the Bill? Hide?’ said Warren.

‘Not the Bill or we’d have heard by now. Maybe to get help but that would probably have meant Old Bill again so probably to hide. In which case we may never hear from him again,’ reasoned Slater. ‘In which case, we’d better get moving. Make sure whoever lives here is at work or whatever and check the place out.’

‘What if they aren’t at work?’ asked Warren.

Slater turned back and stared over the wall but he didn’t say anything and Warren didn’t press him.

7

Monday. 9.30am.

The offices of Griffin Holdings Ltd stood gleaming in glass and steel alongside The Great West Road in Hammersmith. Ten stories high it stood not much taller than the small church next door but still made the older building look quaint and out of place in the changing environment.

Griffin Holdings Ltd occupied the top three floors of the building and had done so for almost four years. In that time, its Chief Executive, Andrew Griffin, had carefully rebuilt the company from the floundering mess he had found it in, back into a formidable reflection of its former glory. It traded now on the slogan that reflected its reputation: “anything, anytime, anywhere”.

When he had assumed control of the operation it had just lost its two founding partners and figureheads, and with it its name and thus its identity. Griffin had been forced to take a robust approach to restructuring the company — with the departure of the previous owners contracts had been lost and as a result income was a dwindling commodity. Parts of the operation had become redundant and were starting to make losses rather than profit.

He had made difficult, unpleasant decisions that put men out of jobs; men who had been loyal to the company for many years and who left behind them close friends with whom Griffin knew he would still have to work and would have much to do to win over.

Property had been sold to raise cash but this had proved the easiest part of the rebuilding process as the property market remained high and they were able to realise some excellent returns on holdings that had been bought near the bottom of the market. Griffin had been lauded for this move which had at once streamlined an operation that was beginning to look decidedly flabby and inefficient and placed the balance sheet firmly back in the black.

That had been a simple way to finish his first year at the helm with the accounts looking deceptively favourable but the second year had been the struggle. The long hours and hard slog to win contracts against the fiercest of competition in a tightening marketplace, watching some of that effort come to nothing when they were awarded elsewhere. Trying hard to motivate an increasingly demoralised workforce with little cause for optimism. Griffin had had to take a very public pay cut in order to force through a salary freeze that year.

But now, after several years, Griffin Holdings Ltd was a name to be respected in the import and export industry. Which made the latest incident all the more frustrating for the CEO who stood now in his office, pacing the carpet and chewing his fingernails anxiously. No matter how often he turned to look at the telephone on his desk it staunchly refused to ring.

He was waiting for a phone call to report on exactly what it was that had happened that weekend. At three o’clock on the previous Saturday morning he had been roused from his bed by a telephone call telling him that there had been a break in at the company headquarters. From the soft warmth of his bed and his wife there in his Berkshire home the decision to stay put and deal with it later had appeared perfectly sensible. Burglars and stolen computers were an irritation, particularly in the middle of the night, but little more and in any case, they were insured.

He had made a cursory visit during the daylight hours the following day but he made it obvious that there was little that he could do and he contented himself with growling at the security people to make sure they locked up properly tonight.

Whether that decision would have changed anything there was no way of knowing. But it was becoming clear now that nothing so simple as a broken window and a few snatched PCs had gone on that weekend. There was precious little damage done and more ominously, nothing seemed to have been taken. Nothing tangible at least, nothing physical.

He had ordered that a quick inventory be done to see what had been taken — was it computers they were after? Or had they come for the more valuable servers perhaps? Something else? So far, his staff told him, it seemed like nothing had been taken. Many of his subordinates, now frantically checking through the offices and delegating his instructions down the line were optimistically chirping that perhaps they had been scared away somehow, by the alarm or the security people, before they could take anything.

Griffin had nodded his agreement with cheery positivity but was sure that wasn’t true and the knot of tension twisting in his stomach was getting worse every minute that he waited and his phone remained silent.

Computers and furniture and other fixed assets were not the only saleable commodities to be found within the walls of Griffin Holdings Ltd.

Any idiot will tell you, Andrew Griffin thought to himself as he began to chew on a fingernail, that information is power.

8

Monday. 10am.

Campbell was sitting in an episode of The Bill.

The office was tucked in the corner of a larger open-plan expanse of desks and paper, a meeting of varnished wood and grey-painted steel but the paint had long since become chipped and the pine-effect of the wood was all veneer hiding cheap woodchip beneath. It was fooling nobody. Amid these drab surroundings Campbell could understand why coppers were such miserable bastards.

Sitting on a plastic chair with no armrests and exhausted cushioning Campbell felt tense and uncomfortable. He had not slept well the previous night. The answerphone message kept replaying itself in his head over and over again. Images of the man lying face down on the floor of his kitchen, the thick dark pool of blood, all flashing through his mind.

‘How are you today?’

Campbell looked up and tried to raise the corners of his mouth into a smile but it ended up looking nothing like a smile at all but an expression that said more than he could about how he was today. He shrugged instead of answering as the non-smile dropped from his face.

The policeman on the other side of the desk shot him a sympathetic look and tried to look efficient, to give the impression that this wouldn’t take too long.

‘Right well I’ll take down a few details first of all. I’m Constable Scott by the way. Call me Dave.’

‘Sure.’

‘Drink of something first? Tea, coffee?’ he offered.

Campbell was grateful for the Constable’s patience and soft approach. He felt as if he would bruise easily today. He thought that he could do with two or three coffees but then he noticed the plastic cup on the desk in front of him and looking around him, noted a lack of any ceramics. No mugs. Another coffee machine.

‘Do you have water?’ he said.

‘No problem.’ Constable Scott said and vanished from the desk, shutting the door behind him.

Campbell was here to give his statement about the events of Saturday night, or those at least that he could remember. The fact that he had thought of little else since it had happened was not enough to have jogged anything loose so far. He could remember working his way around the living room, playing the host, the reluctant raconteur. Laughing, talking, joking. Drinking. Making eye contact with the blonde girl whose name he could not recall.

And then that sound. It had made his scalp tingle and hairs rise on his neck as he stood there in that room. Afterward though, knowing what had made the sound — what had muffled and smothered the breaking glass — made it all the worse and he could still hear it as sharp and clear as he had two nights before.

But as well as he could recall that sound, the other memories were vague and fuzzy like a bad recording, the focus and clarity fading out in certain patches, going blank in others. Then coming back into sharp focus.

Campbell could see the brunette woman, could see the man on the floor and blood spreading dark and sticky around his head. He could see the navy blue of the man’s hooded top, the dark brown hair matted and slick with blood. And then it went blank again for a minute and then again that image of the head struggling to lift from the floor, the brunette woman going out of the room again, people leaving quietly.

The door ker-thunked open behind him and Campbell jumped a little. A white plastic cup landed in front of him but he didn’t look up, trying to regain his composure before the policeman looked him in the eye again.

He swallowed. ‘Thanks.’ he said, pleased when his voice came strong and clear.

The constable smiled and sipped from his own cup.

‘Sooner we start, sooner we finish.’ Constable Scott said picking up a pen and straightening the paper in front of him.

Campbell nodded and sipped his water.

For the next hour and thirty minutes Campbell answered questions as the policeman prompted him through the sequence of events of the preceding Saturday evening. He seemed to believe him when he said he couldn’t remember things, perhaps recognising the anxious look on Campbell’s face for the fear and confusion that it was, rather than for guilt.

They went over it twice and Campbell signed his name and told Scott the names of four people whose numbers he could remember who he swore would be able to corroborate the story, to confirm that nobody knew the man, that nobody had even spoken with him.

‘Ask anyone,’ Campbell said imploringly, ‘Honestly. Nobody knew him.’

‘Of course Mr Campbell. As you say. In fact that’s very much the problem at the moment.’ the policeman replied with a frown.

When they had been over everything and the paperwork was put to one side, the Constable looked at his watch and then at Campbell. ‘Sorry to have kept you.’

‘That’s ok,’ Campbell replied. ‘So that’s it then? I mean, you’re happy? With what I told you. It’s all…’

The policeman waited for him to finish the sentence, the note of desperation obvious, the desire for him to say that yes, everything was fine, we believe you. ‘Fine for now. Naturally we need to check a few more things out. Speak to people.’

‘Of course.’

There was a pause as Campbell’s disappointment hung in the air and the Constable refused to do anything about it and then spoke again. ‘Listen, we’ll probably need to look over the place. I mean we will. For definite. I know you said you cleaned everything but even so.’

As he had done earlier, Campbell’s cheeks reddened a little. Cleaning the grisly mess had seemed the most obvious thing to do the day before. Now he fretted that it just made him look more suspicious.

‘We might be able do it now if you like?’ Constable Scott said.

‘Well… OK. Sure.’

‘I’ll have to bring a superior along. Let me just see if anyone’s free.’ he said and trotted out of the room again.

Campbell had already called the office to tell his boss that he would be late this morning, offering only scant information about exactly why he was going to the local police station. That scrap alone would have started a feeding frenzy amongst the gossips and dodging them for another hour was alright with him. Especially if he could get things tied up with the police, he thought. Show them everything was as he said it was. Then when they’d spoken to some of the other guests and his story checked out he’d be in the clear again. Wouldn’t he?

He realised this was as positive as he’d been since it had happened and the awful hangover, the paranoia and the lack of sleep had compounded his dark mood. Once things were cleared up he’d be ok, he told himself. Perhaps he’d even call in sick and get some more sleep. That would make him feel better, a few hours sleep.

He had just started thinking over viable ways of getting the rest of the day off when the door opened again. A tall man in a dark suit with a pale blue shirt and pink tie followed Constable Scott into the room and offered Campbell his hand and a forced smile. Campbell took the hand but no reasuurance.

‘Mr Campbell. DC Samuel. How are you?’

Campbell had long since given up trying to answer that question without either lying or sounding miserable so he shrugged again.

‘Of course. Nasty business. Constable Scott here tells me that you’d like us to come and look around?’ the detective continued.

‘Yeah. I mean he said we could do it now, you know, get things out of the way.’

‘Indeed. Let’s.’ Detective Constable Samuel said and span on his heel leaving Campbell and Constable Scott to conclude that they were expected to follow.

*

Campbell sat in the back of the big Vauxhall and told the story to DC Samuel, feeling all the time like he was accused of something that nobody had yet decided to mention and very self-conscious that the two men would be looking for holes in his story. Then he realised that he was so uptight in trying to tell the story exactly the way he had to Constable Scott that it might be considered too similar, as if he had rehearsed it and could now repeat it like a script. That just made him more uptight.

He finished talking, DC Samuel having nodded his way through it with minimal interruption, and settled back into the seat trying to still his racing mind. Had he seemed suspicious? Had he missed something that the two policeman would later discuss when he wasn’t there? Had he said more to DC Samuel than he had told when giving his statement? Did they suspect him?

The more he thought about it, the more ridiculous it sounded. And how much did he really know about what had gone on in that kitchen? Could someone at the party have been responsible after all and was Campbell about to take a fall for them because he was too naive and too stupid and too eager to drink and drink to be able to get out of this mess?

Unlocking the door to the flat he noticed how dry his mouth was now and how much his head hurt. He began to mentally inventory his bathroom cabinet, trying to remember what painkillers he had there and to think about how much he needed a cold glass of water. He thought about offering tea to the policemen but then wondered if that would look as if he was trying to suck up to them. But how would it look if he didn’t? As if he’d rather they weren’t there at all and that they’d hurry up and go. Which was true of course but-

Campbell froze.

Across his hallway lay a navy blue fleece sweater and a jacket, the lining torn.

His three foot tall yukka plant lay lengthways on the carpet beyond that, soil scattered around the broken pot it had once stood in, almost as if the fired clay had simply burst. The long thin leaves splayed out on the carpet, pointing like fingers to the living room at the far end of the hall.

It was there that most of his possessions were tossed and scattered about the floor.

A cold, cold breeze nipped at Campbell through the broken window at the far end of his home. He stepped slowly inside.

9

Monday. 10.30am.

Keith Slater was a heftily built man who stood six foot two in his socks and had a neck like a normal man’s thigh. He was quiet and thoughtful a lot of the time, an extremely cold and efficient professional others and was exceptionally gentle with his own children of which there were four.

Aside from his imposing physique he had a soft face, pale blue eyes and sandy hair which was kept short, but not so short that it didn’t need the attention of a comb each morning. He had a small tidy beard, was well groomed and never, ever wore anything other than jeans, except to funerals or court.

He had been married for nearly twenty years to a loving wife who made every effort to steer their children away from the same path their father had taken. Something that he himself actively approved of.

He was solid, dependable, loyal and occasionally very considerate. Which was why George Gresham liked him so much and why he was Gresham’s number two. He was also a vicious, merciless individual when called upon and was responsible for a number of unsolved murders in parts of east London.

Another reason Gresham liked him.

The two of them strolled together through a small park near Gresham’s home sipping take-away coffee from a local cafe. Neither man was smiling.

‘Nothing. Fuck all. We never had too much time of course. That time of the morning, we had to get in and out quick,’ Slater told his boss.

Gresham nodded. ‘Fair enough. Not the ideal time to go kicking someone’s door in really. Long as none of the neighbours clocked anything.’

‘Nah. Its all fucking bankers and their secretary girlfriends in Fulham boss and all wedged safely onto a tube or an office by that time. Anyway, we found sod all. There was blood on the wall where Keano says he did him, Jools saw some blood on the steps by the back door, he thinks. But frankly it could have been anything if you ask me. Nothing inside.’

‘It wasn’t an empty flat was it though Keith? I mean someone lived there?’

‘Oh yeah. Jools had the DVD player away — make it look kosher. But no sign of what we were looking for.’

‘And you were thorough?’

‘Like I said, much as we could be.’

‘Fuck. Which means ‘Not really George.’ Was there an alley onto the street? A way past the house?’

Slater shook his head. ‘No. Terraced houses. Just the back of the house and the neighbours gardens either side.’

Gresham looked his subordinate in the eye. ‘He went in that house Slater. He knocked on the door and went right in that house. Whoever lives there knows something that we don’t. And right now I’m not very comfortable with other people knowing more than me about my business.’ Slater was nodding as his boss spoke. ‘Keith, I think I’d like to have a few words with whoever it is lives there. I wonder if you’d arrange something?’

Slater’s smile almost scared Gresham.

10

Monday 11am

After the initial shock and the effort to keep his composure in front of the policemen Campbell had walked through the flat, stepping over the mess, checking each room carefully before pointing dumbly to the large dust-free patch on the TV unit where his DVD player used to be.

‘Mmn. Well sometimes they just grab what’s easiest to carry off. No cash taken? Jewellery?’ said DC Samuel.

Campbell shook his head. The policeman was not being condescending at all but he still felt like a child who’d lost a favourite toy getting a sympathetic word from an adult. ‘Don’t keep cash about the place,’ he said and tapped his trouser pocket. ‘Wallet.’

Making their way to the kitchen Campbell filled the kettle and pulled three mugs from the drainage board and dropped teabags into them. Scott asked Campbell if the man had been seen anywhere else that night. He shrugged as he struggled to remember.

‘Like I said, just in here. I mean, someone said they saw him in here when they came to get a drink but not everybody knew each other. They paid him no attention. Then we heard the noise. You know…’ He winced involuntarily as he heard it again, all too clear in his mind.

‘Mm-hm. And no-one remembers letting him in then?’ Scott asked.

Campbell shook his head silently.

‘So I guess he might have come in this way?’ the policeman went on, pointing at the door at the end of the kitchen that led to the garden.

‘I guess.’ he replied but he was distracted. ‘Look, you don’t think this has anything to do with…’ he said and gestured with a slight nod at the mess of the break in.

Scott deferred to the senior man who paused for a moment and then shook his head. ‘Bad coincidence I’d say on the face of it. They took the DVD, made a big bloody mess looking for cash, or just for a laugh. It happens. But a gatecrasher on Saturday night at your party has an accident and then you get burgled Monday morning during work hours? I think it’s a long shot Mr Campbell. I wouldn’t go looking for any conspiracy theories. I’d say you’d had enough worries to be going on with without creating all new ones. Now, mind if we have a peek at the garden?’

Soon afterward they had found a wallet; thirty pounds in tens, a Blockbuster card, various receipts, a ticket stub from the Chelsea match the Saturday just gone. And a driving licence. It had been in the bushes at the rear of the garden, up against the wall, hidden until a policeman’s toecap had nudged the foliage aside in an almost token gesture at searching.

DC Samuel peered at the document as if it were some rare and ancient artefact. ‘Anthony Cooper.’ he read the name, enunciating carefully as if this was significant and Campbell looked from one policeman to the other trying to figure out if he ought to know who Anthony Cooper was.

Campbell had felt slightly panicked at the appearance of the wallet, suddenly fearing the focus of suspicion falling again on him but soon reason returned and was confirmed by the idle musing of the policemen.

‘Drunk Chelsea fan hears party, climbs over wall, drops wallet in garden and can’t find it in the dark…’ Samuel had a distant look on his face like he was picturing it all.

‘Or is too pissed to find it.’ offered Scott.

‘Mmm. Gives up looking, gets cold, gatecrashes party.’ finished Samuel.

‘…nicks more booze in kitchen, falls down drunk and gets a wine glass in the neck for his trouble.’ Scott went on but quickly stopped himself when he saw Campbell wince once more.

‘Mr Campbell, what happened here on Saturday was probably just a terrible accident and I am sorry you were involved. We had to come and have a look around as you can appreciate; someone has died.’ DC Samuel spoke the words softly. ‘But on the face of it…’ the policeman shrugged. ‘Accidents like this happen you know. I’ve seen plenty stranger than this. Plenty. Take comfort from the fact that you did all you could.’

Campbell felt the surprise before the reassurance. He wasn’t expecting that. No hard questions? No cuffs? He smiled philosophically and nodded. ‘I suppose so. What about this lot?’

‘You could come down the station, report it, make a formal report. We’d get the burglary looked into, you’d eventually get a crime number to give to the insurance company… ’ He glanced knowingly at Constable Scott. ‘Or you could just buy yourself a new DVD player and a burglar alarm.’

11

Monday. 2pm.

‘Drennan.’

Michael Tyler looked up from his newspaper and put down his coffee mug as he watched Drennan nod, grunt and curse responses into his phone.

He finished the conversation and ended the call before looking up a number from the contact list in his computer. He punched the number into the phone and plucked the receiver from the cradle.

‘It’s me. No sign of anything inside the place sir but they found blood in the garden and on the wall. Looks like he jumped over and maybe cut through to the other street or jumped into another garden… no sir, still no sign… of course, as soon as I get anything… I do have people in the Met I could try if you like but personally I think that we might be putting our head above the parapet a little if we went to them yet and discretion is the key… yes… yes… I will sir. Goodbye.’

Tyler didn’t speak but his expression asked all the questions.

‘They said there was nothing in the flat but that there was blood on the door handle. Probably tried to get in but found it locked. They gave it a good going over but it was this morning and they didn’t want to hang around in there too long. Looks as if we still have a loose end.’

Tyler span his own chair and started clicking through different applications on the PC on his own desk and began making calls. He passed a list of numbers to Drennan that had churned out of the printer and the two of them spent half an hour dialling numbers and chattering politely to a succession of people, some of whom they knew, some they didn’t.

Drennan let the receiver drop before he finished dialling the next number when he saw Tyler concluding a conversation with a smile. He sat expectantly as Tyler repeated his thanks several times and then put the phone down looking pleased with himself.

‘Just got someone in the Charing Cross A and E who let slip that they had someone come in Saturday night with a serious neck wound.’

‘That’s our Tony. What’s that, a mile or two from Fulham?’

Tyler nodded. ‘Got to be him. She said they had no idea who he was because he had no ID on him and he didn’t regain consciousness.’ Tyler paused then. ‘Died on Sunday.’

Drennan smiled a ghoulish smile that suddenly made Tyler feel uneasy, not just because of the coldness that it displayed but because he noticed that he was doing the same.

‘So no loose end then.’ Drennan said. ‘All done. He vanishes and nobody knows how or why. No trail.’

Tyler hesitated and Drennan’s smile sagged on his face. ‘She said something that didn’t sound great.’

‘Well go on then for fuck’s sake, tell me.’ Drennan snapped when Tyler left a pause.

‘She said “and the man that brought him in said he didn’t know him either.”’ Tyler said and let the words hang there for a moment. ‘So a new loose end I’d say. Some Good Samaritan helped take him in. Not that it did Tony any good.’

‘Or our Samaritan.’ said Drennan, his eyes looking hard as he turned back to his computer. ‘Who’d cover that then… ah,yes.’ he said and dialled another number.

12

Monday. 4pm.

Campbell looked at his watch and noted with dismay that there was still at least an hour before he could get out of the office.

Not that he’d really done anything of note so far. He had been there for just two hours. Having set about tidying up his flat for a second time in as many days it had taken the best part of two hours and another hour to get in to work.

Since arriving his time had been spent talking with colleagues about the weekend and the subsequent burglary, staring blankly at his screen, reading through various articles and reports without taking in a single thing and emailing his friends about his awful last few days.

The hangover that had dogged him throughout Sunday had still not cleared entirely and he had been unable to sleep properly worrying about the implications of the death of his gatecrasher.

He had trawled through various news sites on the internet but had found nothing about the incident; not that he’d expected to but it killed half an hour so the effort was not a total waste. He had emailed some of his friends about the party but none of them had seen anything more than he had and most just wanted to know what had happened and Campbell found their curiosity morbid and unsettling and gave only brief responses to their breathless enquiries. It kept his mood low and ensured that his mind kept returning to the sketchy memories of that night.

Volunteering to make drinks for his colleagues Campbell returned to his desk and resolved to get some work done for the remainder of the day before somebody said something to him about his lack of productivity. He would knuckle down and the time would pass quicker and then he could get out of here.

But in an hour Campbell was back into the same rut that he’d been stuck in only now the tiredness was much worse and his eyes felt as sore as his head. His mind was wandering again, turning back to the slideshow of memories of the party, his stomach turning as he remembered the drinking.

Hanging his head and closing his eyes Campbell tried to clear his thoughts and turn back to work but suddenly he was seeing the man lying on his kitchen floor again. He could hear people shuffling out of his home on the other side of the closed kitchen door, the shallow breathing of the man next to him, the ambulance announcing its approach.

He was looking down at the man, at his blood. He was trying to focus but his eyes seemed unable to stay trained on the same point for any length of time. Then the head raised unsteadily from the floor and Campbell’s heart beat pounded yet faster as the panic and alcohol did their work. The man’s head was turning slightly toward Campbell.

‘Stiff and cold.’ he said.

Stiff and cold.

13

Monday. 4pm.

‘Its me,’ said Drennan.

When the reply came the policeman’s voice was lower than the bright clear tone he’d used to answer the phone. ‘Mr Drennan. What’s up?’

‘Now why would there have to be something up? Maybe I just like the sound of your voice.’ The tone was mocking, confident. Tyler watched him talk and found that even he was riled by that smirking arrogance just listening in.

‘Fuck off. What’s up?’

‘I understand you have a bit of a mystery caller down there. A very cold one.’ The line went quiet and Drennan prompted irritably. ‘Saturday night.’

‘Nobby-no-mates from Fulham? You heard about that?’

‘I did.’ A pause. ‘Who’s dealing with it? You?’

‘I got landed with it. How d’you know that?’ the policeman asked sounding guarded. Drennan hadn’t known but had taken a guess, which had paid off.

‘Not married are you?’

‘No.’

‘Well I already know what your kids names are going to be.’

‘Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know everything. You going to get to the point?’

‘Listen, don’t break your back trying to find out who it is.’

‘Do what?’

‘Let’s just say that it won’t reflect poorly on you should your enquiries not lead to any firm conclusions. He was a scumbag. You don’t need to waste your time and resources. You’re a busy man. Lots of other things to do.’

Silence.

‘You do understand me?’

‘I’m not sure I want to hear more than I have, but I’m not sure I can help you.’

‘You don’t need to do anything,’ Drennan said as if he thought that perhaps the other man was stupid. ‘This case is no longer in your in tray.’

‘I mean, I already know. Things have, uh, developed.’

‘Developed how?’

‘Found his wallet. We already know who he is. You want to tell me what the fuck this is about?’

The question was ignored.

‘Well you want to know who he is exactly…? No. No I suppose you already know that. Otherwise you wouldn’t be on the phone asking me to pretend he’s nobody.’

‘No I don’t suppose I would. Who knows?’

‘Just me and DC Samuel. We’re already checking his records and looking for known associates.’

‘Congratulations. Where was the wallet?’

‘He gatecrashed some house party in Fulham. Pissed as a fart after the Chelsea game. Anyway, seems he had an accident with a wine glass and managed to impale himself on the thing falling over in this guy’s kitchen. Wallet was in the garden. Dropped it climbing over the wall.’

‘Address?’

Another pause, longer this time. Apprehensive.

‘It’s just some nobody. Some bloke having a party — never knew the guy, never seen him before.’

‘Address.’

‘For God’s sake. Why? What happens to this guy if I give you his name? What does he know? More to the point what does MI5 care about this?’

‘Address.’ Firmer, impatient.

‘Christ. Look, I’ve spoken to him, he doesn’t know a fucking thing. He got burgled while he was in giving his statement! He’s had enough shit without you on his case too. Leave him alone Drennan you bastard.’

‘Burgled? That is bad luck isn’t it?’

14

Monday. 6.30pm.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, the controller has just told me that there is a signalling problem up ahead and we are in a queue so it might be a few minutes before we get into Hammersmith station. I do apologise for any inconvenience this may cause you and thank you for your patience.’

Hammersmith. Campbell was surprised that he was nearly at his stop. He had lost track of where he was as the train passed through the stations and he had stared absently into space. Stiff and cold.

People around him groaned and shook their heads but nobody said anything and some people even smiled a here-we-go-again sort of smile. Just another tube ride.

Campbell rolled his head back onto his shoulders and tried to grind out some of the tension in his neck. The afternoon in the office had dragged even more after that flash of memory had come stumbling in on his consciousness and nobody had complained when he up and left a little earlier than everyone else. Most people knew about the party — some of his colleagues had even been there — and about the burglary that morning. More than one person had remarked that they were surprised that he’d come in at all but Campbell knew that he had to escape the flat.

As he closed his eyes the driver came over the speaker to advise that they would be moving into Hammersmith station shortly and repeated his apology. Campbell saw the same image again, the same instant replay of that blood-matted head lifting itself up slowly and uncertainly and the words: stiff and cold. He was sure that was what it was. He thought that he had then told the man not to worry about being stiff and cold, that the ambulance was coming. But he couldn’t be certain what he’d said exactly. In that state it wouldn’t have sounded much like anything.

The train jerked to a halt and the doors hissed open and Campbell swung himself up and out of the seat and through the doors. It was getting dark now and chilly too. People were wearing long shapeless clothes again and holiday tans had faded pale.

Up the escalators he worked his way out to his bus stop and stepped out of the doors to join the queue. It always seemed to be a strange bunch here, perhaps because the bus stopped outside the Charing Cross hospital down along the Fulham Palace Road and Hospitals often attracted the oddballs. He knew all about that.

As one bus pulled up he surrendered quickly to the swarm of people that surged for the door and realised that he would be lucky to get on this one, let alone find a seat so he hung back and let the crowd fight amongst themselves. Two minutes later his patience was rewarded as another bus swung around the corner to sweep up the small group of people that had been unable or unwilling to squeeze themselves onto the previous one.

Touching his oyster card against the card-reader Campbell moved along the aisle to the rear toward a seat where he saw a discarded newspaper which he picked up for something to read for the ten minutes or so it would take before his stop. To his mild disappointment it was a local, not a national paper, but the sports pages carried a couple of stories about Fulham Football Club so he skimmed through them and then turned it over to read from the front.

There was nothing of interest for Campbell as flipped the front page over and then skimmed past the headlines: something about house prices, something about a spate of muggings near the Hammersmith underground station. Both of which he could well believe and the thought occurred to him that perhaps there might have been some connection and police searching for leads on the latter should look up some local estate agents since Campbell certainly felt as if he’d been mugged when he bought his flat. He smiled, amused at himself and flipped again. Something in a smaller side column caught his eye. The headline read: Break-in at Griffin Holdings.

Campbell stared into space for a minute, sure that it meant something.

Griffin Holdings. Did a friend work there? No, that wasn’t it. They heard so many company names at work when analysing stocks, perhaps that’s where he’d heard it before? Perhaps, but he didn’t think so.

Then why did it sound familiar? Campbell started to read the article and then stopped again as it hit him.

Stiff and cold. That’s not what the man had said.

15

Monday. 7pm.

It was raining now and the wet road reflected the glare of lights from shops and traffic alike. Campbell hardly noticed though. His mind had gone into high gear now and his head ached. A thousand, million thoughts flashed at him as he walked, about the gatecrasher and what he’d said. About what he’d read in the paper, the break-in. Were the two linked? Was he being paranoid? Surely that was just a coincidence. Surely.

He shook his head.

Stiff and cold.

Griffin Holdings.

He knew that he must have been saying stiff and cold. He was bleeding heavily, apparently drunk, looked a mess. Maybe he’d been outside for a while in a chill autumn night. Of course he’d be stiff and cold. At the very least.

But he also knew, with absolute certainty, that wasn’t what he’d said at all. Somewhere through the alcohol fogged memory a flash of recall and a dash of logic had filled in the blanks, incorrectly. But as soon as he had read the words in the paper the memory had returned, clear and unambiguous. ‘Griffin Holdings,’ the man had said.

There was no question about that and the more Campbell tried to talk himself out of it, to convince himself that he had heard ‘stiff and cold’, the more certain he became that he hadn’t.

He ducked into a large convenience store and toured his way through the freezer cabinet, picking up a frozen Lasagne, past the DVD rentals, picking up a comedy and then headed for the till and asked for ‘anything with Ibuprofen’.

Half an hour later he was changed into jeans and a sweatshirt and stood barefoot in the kitchen trying to peer though the darkened glass of the oven door where the lasagne bubbled away gently. It looked reasonably edible despite his reservations about frozen food. Anything would do right now, anything with a minimum of effort.

As he waited he heard those forced, weak words echoing over and over again. He struggled against his eager imagination, which kept conjuring extraordinary scenes with the man that had ended up on his kitchen floor and the break in the week before; on the run from police, hopping his garden wall in his desperation to escape. Or a witness to the break in, terrified and taking refuge in his home and finding only tragedy… the wound in his throat nothing to do with the glass at all…the burglary of Monday morning nothing to do with cash or Campbell’s DVD player.

Marching into his living room Campbell began rifling through the compact discs on his shelf pausing at some aggressive, bass heavy hip hop and then selected some noisy rock, put the disc in the player and turned his amplifier up. He needed to distract himself. He needed to drown out his wandering thoughts.

He couldn’t.

Campbell felt tired, strung out. Spread thin. He knew that he looked it too, his face looked pallid, the skin almost grey but dark ringed around the eyes. He paced the room as the guitars roared over thumping bass and drums, closing his eyes he tried to listen to the chords, the words but he could hear nothing except that dying man’s weak voice saying it over and over again. Griffin Holdings.

He was telling me something. He was trying to pass me something before he died. Oh God! He knew he was dying. As he lay there in a strange room next to some drunken stranger he must have realised that he was going to die.

Campbell clamped hands over his eyes, pressed against them as if he could push everything out. He tried not to think about how the man must have felt lying there cold and frightened and faced with the reality of his own mortality, that he had found his end. Who was he? Where had he come from? A life? A wife?

He couldn’t imagine the anguish of those final moments, whether the realisation would have been attended by great fear or great calm, by panic or acceptance. Weak and shivering in a spreading pool of his own blood in a place he didn’t know, had the man felt any sort of gratitude to Daniel that he did not spend those fading moments completely alone? That there had at least been somebody there to help him, to try at least to save him. What a shock to have met such a shocking and sudden end. That such a terrible and painful accident could so swiftly have robbed someone of a husband, a brother, a son, defied logic and understanding. Campbell had a brother. He too had loving parents that would be shattered to wake one morning to find that their eldest son had suffered a fatal wound whilst out drinking and trying to have fun one night. Just gone one day forever.

And what now would become of him? The police seemed satisfied that it was an accident, a coincidence. They seemed to see nothing overly suspicious in what had happened, even considering the burglary. Why not? Campbell wasn’t so sure. Especially so since he knew something they didn’t. Should he tell them? This man had said those words to him as the last thing that he could do. Had he been telling Campbell something more? Perhaps the man had been involved in the break in at Griffin Holdings that Campbell had read about and perhaps that was more sinister and significant than anything the newspaper report had indicated. Perhaps this man had been killed for what he knew. After all, had anyone seen the accident happen? Nobody had admitted to it.

What more to this situation was there to discover? Campbell wondered how he would ever find out what with the state of his memory of that night.

The music stopped abruptly and snapped Campbell from his train of thought. Maybe that was it. Maybe he shouldn’t trust his shaky memory anyway. Perhaps, after all the fretting and the paranoia, he had in fact heard ‘Stiff and cold’ and was just blowing everything out of proportion. Making connections where none existed.

Glancing at his watch he saw that he had a few minutes before the food would be ready so he and turned on the TV and his home cinema equipment.

That finished, he trotted back through to the kitchen and pulled open the oven door. He scooped the foil tray off the shelf in the oven with a dishcloth over his hands and swung round to slide it onto the worktop as he kicked the oven door shut behind him with his heel.

Slipping a plate underneath the lasagne he tugged the dishcloth away from under it but as he did this, a thread caught on the crimped edge of the foil tray and Campbell could only watch helpless as his dinner slipped back off the pate, flipped in the air and spread itself across his kitchen floor.

‘Deep breath,’ he told himself and took one and then swore loudly anyway. He lifted a hand to his face, covered his eyes and started to shake his head. Swearing again he turned to the cupboard under the sink and pulled out the dustpan to begin cleaning the mess away. He had lost his appetite completely now as he stared at the steaming mess of yellow, brown and red and decided to bin it and sit in front of a noisy, mindless blockbuster of a film.

On his knees with a wet cloth Campbell found himself again cleaning a large patch of lino with a headache and the smell of alcohol in the air which had still not quite cleared and he was glad at least that this time it wasn’t blood. Judging by the price of the frozen lasagne in fact, he wasn’t sure it was even meat.

He noted that the sauce had splattered up over the door of the oven and he leaned over to wipe that too when he noticed something in the inch or so gap between the oven and the floor.

He stared for a minute, frowning. Why hadn’t he noticed that on Sunday when he’d last been down here cleaning? Too hungover probably. Or still drunk.

It looked from his angle like a large key fob. It was black, less than two inches long and looked clean and grease free, unlike the other detritus down there.

He reached his fingers in gingerly, the heat from the oven making him cautious and he tried to drag it but it stuck where it was. He shifted around and worked his hand a little flatter so he could reach in further and this time his fingers got purchase and it began to slide out toward him.

Picking it up he examined it. Dark rusty smears across the plastic left no doubt who had left this here — must, in fact, have hidden it he realised. There was a logo on it identifying the manufacturer and the end of it slid off to reveal a USB key. This was a memory stick.

16

Tuesday. 2.45 pm.

Sarah Knowles sneezed again. The dry dusty air in this room was playing havoc with her sinuses.

She looked back down at the stack of papers in her lap and started flicking through each document in the dwindling pile that had yet to be checked. Almost done, she thought.

Nearly two days she had been stuck in this musty cupboard pulling files off shelves and leafing through each one and what had she found? Nothing. Not one piece of paper out of place, not one single document missing. Of course there wasn’t, she had filed this lot herself years ago. As thorough a job as you might find anywhere. She knew that everything in here would be in order.

She got to the end of the final stack and returned the papers neatly to the box file they had come from and slid it back into place on the shelf.

Finished.

Looking at her fingers, she noticed that the skin was peeling at the tips. The dry paper had leached all the moisture out of them over the last few days. Going to need some hand cream, she thought to herself. Going to need some hand cream, a long hot bath and about a pound of chocolate.

Closing the door to the storeroom behind her she strolled wearily along the corridor toward the lift. As the doors slid open, she scowled at the mirror inside and turned her back on it as she stepped in but she’d seen the state she was in. Hair a mess, clothes smudged and dirty from the dust and the print. She sighed and hit a button.

Upstairs she walked briskly through the office, keen that nobody get too good a look at her. She was going to report in and then ask to be excused for the day and intended to make it pretty clear that she would be going home anyway so she might as well be excused.

Stopping at the door she resisted the urge to barge straight in and knocked, perhaps a little too firmly.

‘Come.’

She raised her eyebrows at the closed door and mouthed the word ‘come’. Typical of her boss, she thought, trying to sound so imperious. She opened the door and walked in. Andrew Griffin had the phone to his ear and was telling someone to hold on for a moment.

‘Sarah.’

She shook her head. ‘Nothing. Nothing at all. Nothing’s been touched, nothing’s been moved, nothing is missing.’

He nodded but his expression remained stern. He didn’t appear to care what she had found. Or not found.

‘OK. OK then.’

She stood still for a moment, a little surprised after all her effort, after being cooped up in the store room for two days, after the secrecy and the ‘don’t go telling everyone about this’ from Griffin himself and now she wasn’t even sure he was listening. Anger began to flare up in her.

‘I’ve pretty much had it with that lot anyway,’ she said, hooking a thumb over her shoulder. ‘I thought I’d take off early. Shower, change — I’m covered in dust and ink…’

Griffin looked distracted. Sarah began to back out of the room. ‘That OK?’

He nodded and seemed to snap to his senses. ‘Sure. Great. Definitely. Take yourself home, stick your feet up. Absolutely. Thanks for your help Sarah. Really appreciate it. Really.’

Confused she left and pulled the door shut and then stood staring at it momentarily. Then she turned and walked quickly for her desk to grab her handbag and coat. Better get out before he changes his mind, she thought.

*

In his office, alone again with no-one to hear, Griffin had taken the phone off mute and began speaking again, his voice low, cautious.

‘So something definitely was taken? Can you tell me what exactly? I mean can you find out?’ He nodded as he listened to the reply, only partly understanding. Something about the server, a log, keystrokes. ‘Right, sure, ok. Well whatever it takes, but I don’t want anybody else on this. Just you. And I need it soon. Really soon.’

17

Tuesday. 3pm.

‘Cheers Steve,’ Campbell said and set the huge take-out Starbucks cup down on his desk and began tearing sugar sachets open. He had just cajoled a colleague into doing a coffee-run for the four people that sat on his bank of desks.

The bags under Campbell’s eyes had done as much to convince his colleague to go as his promptings had. ‘You’ll be needing the Uberlatte then Danny?’ he’d said refusing Campbell’s proffered tenner.

Another unproductive day was passing and the feeling of despondency and self-pity that had characterised his previous morning was being overtaken by worry and a creeping fear.

His first instinct the night before, looking at the blood smeared plastic memory stick had been to call the police. DC Samuel had left a card; let him do his job. But Campbell’s mind would not be still and he had sat in silence in his living room, his attention shifting between the memory stick and mostly the empty space in front of him that he stared blankly into for a long time.

There was clearly, undeniably, a link to the break-in he’d read about in the local paper. It was no great leap of logic to realise this was what had been stolen in the break in, or at least that it contained whatever had been stolen. Which meant data. Which meant industrial espionage.

Which, to Campbell’s mind, meant something serious.

That it was tucked right under his oven, near where the man was lying and smeared in his blood didn’t allow for chance or coincidence. The gatecrasher had pushed it in there to hide it. And if that was true, then it naturally followed that it must be something worth hiding.

And that there was someone worth hiding it from.

So why not call DC Samuel? Why not run straight out of his front door to the local police station and get rid of the thing?

Because they knew where he lived didn’t they? And, more to the point, they knew that he had it. Because they’d come looking for it.

They. Who the hell were they? Campbell thought of a million possibilities but had no real idea. His gatecrasher had obviously known who they were though since how the hell else would he have got hold of this USB? And if he had gone to the effort — when he could barely even speak or open his eyes — to actually hide this, then he must know how much they wanted it back and what they would do to get it.

No, Campbell thought. I can hand this over and leave it safe in the police station but I can’t hand myself in can I? No. And then what? Who knows who might come knocking. Setting the police on their trail might just make them angry. Them. They.

All these things he ran through again as he sipped his coffee and tapped at his keyboard absently.

The USB now sat where he had found it, having tried various hiding places and discounting them all, along with the idea of carrying it with him to work, the thought of which terrified him. He had decided that its original hiding place was the best one — certainly it had eluded whoever had come looking for it that Monday morning.

But what to do now? Campbell had slept poorly again as the idea that they might come back had occurred to him. Every noise was a footstep, a lock being picked, a door creaking open. Campbell had given up on trying to sleep for a second night and left for work early, almost hurrying out of the flat where he couldn’t escape a creeping sense of vulnerability.

He had to do something, he decided. Sitting here worrying about going home again was no good at all. Maybe he was being silly. Maybe the drinking and the lack of sleep and the stress of the last few days was making him think and act strangely. Of course. Perhaps he’d just check up on this himself first, set his mind at ease and then hand over the USB to the police after all. It would probably be a bloody florist or something. A toy shop.

Campbell felt himself relax slightly for the first time in days. What did he know really? Sure, this seemed sinister enough in the absence of anything but his own paranoid speculation. The problem he had was there were too many questions without answers. What he needed to do was some simple research. That was his job after all.

18

Tuesday. 3.15 pm.

Sarah Knowles sat feeling a little self-conscious at her desk as she sorted through the emails that had accumulated in her absence.

She was uncomfortably aware of her shabby appearance and though she knew she probably felt worse than she looked she still thought that people were looking at her. As well as that she was about to stand up and walk out at least two hours before most other people would and she knew that would not pass without comment. People would feel put out if they thought that Sarah was getting special treatment from the boss. Fat chance, she thought to herself.

Sarah sent a few quick replies to friends who had been gossiping and joking over email about what they had all got up to on their girls night out the previous Saturday. She had not been able to make it. She hated missing out on anything but at least she felt a little more involved with the girls copying her in on the banter.

The phone on her desk warbled. She hesitated a moment but then realised that she hadn’t altered her voicemail message to say she was out and in any event it might be urgent. It was only one call, she thought, and then she could go home.

‘Good afternoon, Griffin Holdings. Sarah Knowles speaking.’

‘Hi there. Good afternoon.’ It was a man’s voice, slightly hesitant sounding, which pricked her attention, but young she thought and a nice voice, friendly. ‘I, uh, I wonder if you can help me. I’m just after some information about your company.’

‘Yes? What kind of information were you after?’ she replied trying to sound friendly back.

‘Oh, you know, just general company information. Structure, brief sort of trading history, what it is you do there. That sort of thing.’ The voice was trying to sound breezy and as if this were an everyday sort of request. It wasn’t and Sarah found herself frowning.

‘That’s a little, uhh… vague sir,’ she said. ‘What is it you are trying to find out exactly?’

There was a pause but before he could answer she cut in. ‘I’m sorry, where did you say you were calling from?’

‘Oh, sorry. Yes of course. I, uh… I’m calling from a local paper. Just a little thing really, doubt you know of us. But I heard about the break-in the other night and I’m looking into it.’

‘I see.’ She wasn’t convinced by that. He seemed to be talking a little too fast, trying to speed her into a response before she could ask any more questions.

‘Well, my editor wants me to. You know. Doing what I’m told really.’

‘Sure.’

‘Odd business though.’

‘I’m sorry Mr…?

Silence. She continued regardless. ’I’m sorry, I don’t want to be rude as I’m sure you’re just doing your job but the company has released a short press statement regarding this matter. I can refer your enquiry to Mr Griffin if you’d rather but I’m not in a position to say anything further.’

‘Of course, of course. No need to trouble Mr Griffin. I wonder though if you could pop something in the post for me? Some sort of company brochure? Corporate literature?’

‘I should think that would be OK. Can I get your name and address then?’ Sarah tried a different approach, still suspicious. Something was odd.

‘And perhaps a copy of the press release?’

‘Statement. Of course. Your name and address?’

‘Well let’s see. I work from home a lot so may as well send it there — second thought, where are you based exactly?’

Sarah told him.

‘Right. That’s not too far away actually. Why don’t I just drop in there and pick it up?’

She paused for a moment before answering, intrigued. She didn’t believe the story he was telling. Sarah felt that she had a good antennae for liars and all the pauses and the umms and ahhs and the well-nows that gave people away were too obvious in the reporter’s voice. He was definitely being evasive.

‘That should be fine. Just pop into reception and ask for me. My name is Sarah Knowles. And you are?’

‘Owen,’ said the voice. ‘Michaels.’

‘Sorry? Owen Michaels?’

‘Right.’

‘OK. When would you be planning to drop by Mr Michaels? It’s just that I was due to finish shortly…’

‘Oh I see. Well, maybe half an hour, an hour.’

She didn’t answer for a minute and considered leaving an envelope on reception for him and getting off home. But something stopped her and she shrugged and decided to sit it out. Might only be half an hour. ‘Alright then Mr Michaels. I’ll see you then.’

She had gone as far as filling an envelope with the paperwork, writing his name on it and putting it to one side on her desk before it dawned on her that he hadn’t actually told her which local paper he was calling from.

19

Tuesday. 3.20pm.

‘You look awful Daniel.’

That knocked Campbell off balance and it took a moment before he spoke. He was standing in the corner office of his boss about to ask if he could leave early and working up to a convincing performance but the other man had beaten him to the punch.

‘Yeah. Not doing well at all.’

‘Rough couple of days.’

‘Could say that. Look I’ve not slept very well the last couple of nights and I’m pretty stressed what with everything so it would be good if I could take off early. I’m all over the place.’

‘Sure. You’re probably not doing me much good in here in that state anyway. You alright?’

He nodded weakly in response.

‘No, not really,’ said his boss. ‘Listen, maybe you should take a day off. Get some sleep and rest up a bit.’

Didn’t see that one coming either. ‘Probably a good idea actually. Maybe I will,’ he replied, trying not to sound too enthusiastic. ‘I’ll call in tomorrow morning to let you know — if that’s ok?’

‘No need. Just get a good night’s sleep mate and don’t worry about getting up early to call in. Bye.’

‘Thank you.’

Striding out the door and swinging his jacket onto his shoulders Campbell caught his reflection in a window in the hallway and saw what his boss meant. He did look terrible. His eyes were ringed and dark and there was no colour in his face.

Inside forty minutes he was staring at a notice board in the reception of an office building where he finally found the name he was looking for and headed for the lift. Stepping out into another smaller reception area Campbell approached the desk purposefully, trying to mask his nerves with bravado.

‘Good afternoon. I’m here to see a Sarah Knowles,’ he announced with a smile.

‘Is she expecting you?’

‘Yes. In fact she may have left me something here for me to collect?’

The receptionist shook her head as she looked over her empty desk.

‘OK. Well I guess she is still here then. I hope I haven’t held her up too much. Said she wanted to get off.’

The receptionist nodded politely but looked a little puzzled as to why he was telling her all this.

Talking too much again, he thought, but he didn’t want to have to tell another lie in case he gave himself away. The look on the receptionist’s face told him that he had no choice however.

‘Owen Michaels.’

‘Certainly sir.’ She tapped the numbers into the telephone and informed Sarah that a Mr Michaels was in reception. ‘She’ll be right out,’ she told him and then turned back to reading a magazine.

Campbell looked around and found a seat but his backside had no sooner touched the cushion than the door was opening and a young woman stepped out and looked at him.

‘Mr Michaels, hello. Sarah Knowles.’

Campbell was up straightaway and thrusting his hand out to shake hers. Suddenly he felt very conscious of his appearance, certain that his hair was a mess, his pallid skin and sunken eyes obvious to see. He found himself wishing that he’d stopped at home first to shower and change.

‘Miss Knowles. Thank you very much for waiting for me,’ he said as she took his hand and he found that he had no words to say momentarily as their fingers slid together, squeezed gently and then slipped apart.

‘That’s OK. I had a few things to tidy up anyway,’ Sarah said and smiled at him with her eyes. She held an envelope in one hand and was tucking a lock of her dark hair behind her ear with the other. Her eyes were locked onto his and for a brief second neither of them said anything.

‘I take it that’s what I came for,’ Campbell stuttered and dropped his eyes to the envelope at her side. Moving his eyes down allowed him a chance to appraise her more fully and he leaned back as he noticed that they were still standing close from the handshake.

She wore black leather shoes with a small heel and he guessed that she must be about five nine in her socks. She wore tights and he noted the smooth curve of her calves as they disappeared into the knee length black skirt she wore which sat delicately on the sweep of her hips. A white blouse was buttoned one off the top suggesting at a cleavage where his eyes lingered a moment longer than they should.

He noticed that she hadn’t answered and he looked her in the face again, realising that he was staring now and rather obviously. He cursed his hormones. When he looked up though he noticed that she too had glanced down over his shoulders and chest before she met his gaze from beneath her eyelashes.

‘Oh. Yes. Couple of brochures like you said. I didn’t really know what else to give you. It would help if I knew what you were trying to find out,’ she said.

Be good if I knew too, he thought to himself and then said ‘Oh just a bit of background on the company, you know.’

She nodded but it was obvious that she didn’t know. ‘Might I ask what kind of article are you writing Mr Michaels?’

The pause was obvious, as was the slight raise of the eyebrows that made it clear that he hadn’t thought about that particular point. He was thinking fast of a lie to tell and they both knew it.

‘Not too sure yet. I mean the editor told me to look into the burglary, thinks we should cover that sort of thing, you know, local interest and all that. Depends what I find out really.’ He talked fast to try to cover up the pause but it did nothing to help. And then he found himself saying something that was against his better judgement but the words just sprang right out of his mouth. ‘Would it be alright if I contact you again Miss Knowles? If I need to. You’ve been very helpful.’

In fact she had not yet even given him the envelope. But it was the question that caught her off guard. Him too.

She handed him the envelope and then laughed nervously. ‘Its nothing really.’

‘Well I’m grateful anyway. I have your number so perhaps I’ll call again.’

‘Sure. No trouble at all.’ Sarah said backing toward the door. ‘Please do.’

20

Tuesday. 6pm.

George Gresham was sweating profusely and his face burned scarlet with exertion. Pumping his legs he pedalled hard on the exercise bike and stared off into nowhere, his mind working as hard as his body.

He was waiting to hear from Slater. It was over a day now since they had spoken about what they were going to do next and Gresham was anxious. Anxious because if this turned out to be a dead end, he had no idea where to go next.

Gresham could hardly believe that they were in this mess and wondered with a shake of the head how on earth they’d got here. Of course he knew how they’d got here; a combination of bizarre meetings, circumstances and, if he had to be frank, fuck-ups.

He’d been introduced to a man named Drennan by Julius Warren — whom he trusted and who vouched for the man — saying that he’d known him years. Drennan had been a bit of a flash bastard; plenty of talk, and he seemed always to have a smirk on his face for some reason. Like he knew something. Warren didn’t have many friends like that and it struck Gresham as odd at the very least. Gresham had him pegged as a bit of an actor. He was always cagey with information, reluctant to say too much. It was a way of seeming important, of having the power. Gresham wasn’t taken in though.

But the man had offered him money and quite a lot of it for what sounded to him like a pretty easy job. Normally that would have got Gresham’s radar screeching for all sorts of reasons. Nobody just gave you cash for nothing. If you got offered ten times what the job seemed worth to do it, it was almost certainly worth ten times more than they were offering you. If they told you it was no big deal, then it probably was.

Despite the fact that he knew that there was more to it than Drennan was letting on (and he seemed often unable to resist alluding to how much more to it there really was) he needed the money badly. He decided that the risk was small enough in this instance. Do the job, grab the cash and get shot of Drennan.

So the previous Friday Gresham had sent the four of them in; Keith Slater, Julius Warren, Stuart Keane and Tony Cooper. They had gone in late at night, dodged the alarms the way Drennan had told them, pulled off the data from the computer system as Drennan had specified and then trotted back out the door. Drennan seemed to know so much about it that Gresham had been tempted to suggest that he might be better doing it himself but that, of course, would not have been so lucrative.

It had been fine until the last minute. Buoyed and euphoric at the smooth ease of the job Gresham’s four men had been making quietly for the exit in the subdued night-lights of the office they had ghosted into only fifteen minutes before when Cooper — who had been the one at the terminal, tapping the keyboard, downloading the data — had peeled off the black balaclava obscuring his face at the very moment that he passed a security camera. He was looking full into the lens before he even realised it.

Slater, glancing back over his shoulder, had seen it and had called Gresham almost immediately. They had first considered ripping out the camera but knew that was as futile as killing the bee that had already stung you. They had discussed somehow getting into the security system to delete Cooper’s image from the record but they didn’t know if it was tape-based or digital, or even what other kind of system it could be or how to do it. Every second they stood there debating how little they knew about this and what to do and whether Drennan had said anything about such an eventuality was a second closer to getting caught in the bright glare of police headlights and Gresham had made the snap decision to get out of there.

Perhaps Drennan could come up with something, perhaps they could go back the next night and this time steal the incriminating evidence and perhaps this time keep their masks on too.

But Drennan had not been able to come up with anything like that. In fact Drennan had sounded both horrified and angry, cursing their incompetence and threatening not to pay the cash, the smooth facade of control and assurance dropped completely for a moment.

Still he wouldn’t say what the data was and why it was being stolen but he had gone to some length to convince Gresham that the implications of this were grave indeed, that Drennan’s employer would not view such a mistake kindly. Though he would not be drawn on exactly how unkindly he would view such a mistake, Gresham had been threatened often enough to see it when it was looking him in the eyes.

Finally Drennan had let Gresham talk himself back into favour so that Drennan’s employer would not involve himself in the matter any further than necessary and that, provided the USB was delivered as arranged, the cash would also be forthcoming. There was a condition though that Gresham could not duck out of.

Cooper’s mistake left them all exposed and they could not afford exposure of any kind. Something would need to be done about that. Something swift and final.

And so it had. But here his boys had messed up again. Keane had been sloppy about it, because he had been too concerned with letting them see that he was willing to get his hands dirty and not nearly concerned enough about doing the job right. Because he didn’t understand the danger that Cooper had placed them in and because he didn’t understand how much Gresham needed that money. Because he was young and eager and foolish.

He could worry about slapping Keane back into line later. For now the focus was on getting this mess cleared up. Warren had reported in on Monday afternoon to tell him that Cooper had been found dead. Or at least had turned up in hospital and then died.

But if Cooper had vanished into someone’s house — as it looked like had happened — and then turned up in a hospital somewhere before finally dying, well that left enough time for talking. Gresham wanted very much to know what he had or had not said to whoever he’d stumbled on that night after Keane had finished with him.

That’s what he’d told Slater at least. But there was something else too that had come to his attention. Something far, far more worrying than the off chance that Cooper had spilled his guts to some stranger.

Gresham stopped pedalling and bowed his head down to rest against the handlebars of the exercise bike. Sweat dripped down from his forehead and ran down his back and his chest. He was trying to work out some of his frustration but he still felt wound up and now he was exhausted too. Where was Slater?

The phone rang a few minutes later as Gresham wandered through to the shower. On hearing the ring he dashed to take the call.

‘Where the fuck have you been?’ he growled.

‘Sorry George, I — ’ Slater began but Gresham cut him off.

‘Never mind. What’s going on?’

‘Can’t get near him at the moment. He lives in a house that’s been turned into three flats and there’s lots of coming and going — in that house and the ones all around it. Not sure what I could pull without looking really obvious. He doesn’t seem to be acting weird at least, I mean nothing to suggest anything too major has happened you know?’

Gresham grunted acknowledgement.

‘He puts his suit on and he gets on the bus and goes to work and then he comes home and watches TV. Saw him come in with a big carrier bag from Dixons actually,’ Slater chuckled. ‘Must have needed a new DVD.’

‘Shut up Keith. Its worse than you think.’

‘Worse how?’ Slater sounded suddenly apprehensive.

‘I can’t find the USB.’

‘Say that again boss?’

‘I cannot find the fucking memory stick Keith. It’s gone.’

‘Oh shit — How?’

‘I’m not certain but I have a good idea.’

‘Cooper?’

‘Yes, Cooper. He knew something was up straight away. He knew he was in trouble. Maybe Keano even told him. Point is I reckon he had it away before you lot left my place on Saturday morning. Insurance.’

Gresham remembered the four of them racing back to his house in the middle of the night after it had happened, the frenzied negotiating with Drennan, the arguing and sniping and the worry as they sat there thinking it over and over. Cooper had got quieter and quieter the whole time.

Gresham had put it down to worry then but now it seemed more like Cooper had been scheming already. They’d already given Gresham the stick to hold but in the excitement and distraction it had slipped his mind. Only after Warren had called him to tell him that Cooper had turned up dead had he realised that it was gone. His relief turning to fear and panic as he stared at the empty space in his kitchen drawer where it should have been, he had moved methodically through the house trying to think where he might have moved it, if his wife might have done so, if he’d actually put it somewhere else. But all the time he knew that he wouldn’t find it and soon he realised why. Cooper must have taken it back again when he began to understand the trouble he was in. A bargaining chip. Perhaps the only leverage he would have.

‘Oh fantastic. Nice one Keano.’ Slater hissed.

‘Yeah. Well I don’t know if he told him or not.’

‘Well he certainly didn’t do such a good job of sorting him out on Saturday either did he? Even if he did keep his mouth shut.’

‘True.’

‘So what now then? What do you think he’s done with it?’

‘My guess is he had it with him on Saturday. He didn’t have time to come up with a plan by then or find a good place to hide it. If he still had it on him in the Hospital then it would have shown up by now and Drennan would be asking us why it had turned up there.’

‘You spoken to Drennan about this?’

‘No. He wants us to hold onto it anyway so I let him think its safe. He’s more worried about what Cooper did before he died. All I know for certain is that whoever lives in that flat knows something and I don’t fucking like it when other people know more about my business than I do.’

‘Right George. I’ll sort it out.’

21

Tuesday. 6pm.

There was nothing unduly strange about Andrew Griffin leaving the office at the same time as the rest of his workforce. It was true that he would often leave much earlier to pursue some ‘meeting’ which would invariably involve a round of golf or a long boozy lunch with a business associate. Or indeed nothing other than simply going home to his young family a little early, but then that was one of the perks of being in charge. He worked late into the evening just as often as this as well. But sometimes he did the same working day as everybody and joined the rush hour crush to get home.

On this occasion however, though nobody else took any particular notice other than to offer a polite farewell or hold the door as he left, Andrew Griffin felt particularly conspicuous.

He looked smart and immaculately presented as ever, his shoes polished, tie straight, collar and cuffs sharp and crisp. He carried his briefcase at his side with him though it contained nothing other than a notebook and fountain pen, a copy of the Telegraph, some accounting reports and an apple.

In fact there was nothing about Andrew Griffin that stood out at all as he joined the evening throng and began his journey east, away from his Berkshire home. He felt for all the world however, that everyone was watching him, that his mood was obvious, his tension pronounced and visible. He was edgy and tense and thoroughly preoccupied, his attention divided between what he was going to have to say and the tunnel-vision focus of getting through the crowd to his hastily arranged appointment as quickly as possible.

The afternoon had been long and fraught. His personal assistant had confirmed that there was nothing taken from their extensive paper records but of course, all the signs indicated that it was computer data that had been targeted. He had to spend empty hours waiting for confirmation of this as he waited to hear back from the computer technician that he had charged with investigating it.

Then, at last, the call had come. The technician had identified the specific block of data that had been accessed, had confirmed that the machine had “carried out an instruction to duplicate to external media” as the technician had put it. Copied to disk. It was part of the other man’s job to know the codes and references used in the data and what it signified but the names and transactions referred to were beyond his understanding. They far pre-dated his employment in the company and his working remit anyway. He had no reason to know. Best that way.

Griffin had asked that the information be passed to him to examine and had played down its significance, although the tension in his voice may have betrayed him. Checking through what had been stolen he knew that this could, in the wrong hands, bring down more than just him and his lovingly-built company. He knew that the risk needed to be neutralised as quickly as possible and for that there would, inevitably, be a cost.

22

Tuesday. 6.30pm.

Keith Slater hunched his shoulders up higher and drew his head and thick bull-neck down into the collar of his jacket. The autumn felt like it was giving way to winter already. The cold in his car was bitter and he couldn’t turn the heating on without the engine running and that was out of the question.

He peered across the street through the dim evening toward Campbell’s flat and stared again, intent on the house although he could neither see nor hear a thing. Gresham wanted him to make his move and fast, which meant that he was going to have to grab the man or coerce him into the car. Slater was alone and it would be harder to do the job without a second pair of hands. He considered calling Warren to come and back him up but then thought that it could barely look much more conspicuous the two of them manhandling Campbell into the car in front of his well-to-do neighbours. Slater began to see every curtain in the street twitching and every passer-by or car that rolled along the street was staring at him, taking a mental note of his appearance, his car, model, make and number plate.

It wasn’t quite dark enough yet anyway, just a soft, early-evening dimness. Too early in the evening, too much activity. He needed the cover of late night darkness and people tired and sleeping or hypnotised by the television before he could do anything. Maybe he did need Warren after all.

Rubbing his palms briskly and feeling himself begin to shiver he glanced quickly at his watch and cursed. He began to think of all the houses and flats around him and all the evening meals being cooked and he tried to work out how long it was since he had eaten and whether he could leave his post to get something hot. But then he pictured Campbell walking out of his front door and away unseen into the night the very moment that he pulled away so he stayed right where he was and continued staring through the gathering gloom. He wasn’t going to fuck things up like Keane.

Slater was finding himself growing increasingly frustrated with everyone. Warren, fucking Keane, this Campbell guy, bloody Cooper. Even Gresham.

Julius Warren had got them all into this through his contact with Drennan whom Slater hadn’t liked from the start and had told Gresham as much. The guy was a slimy bastard and though Slater didn’t have him pinned as a copper there was something about him that didn’t fit. He was too smooth but at the same time, there was no question the guy wasn’t a snake.

Stuart Keane had fucked the whole thing up for them just as badly as Cooper had the night before and Slater found himself wishing that he had taken care of Cooper himself and that he could do the same to Keane now.

And Gresham should know better too. He seemed to have been blinded by the pound signs in front of his eyes on this particular job and Slater couldn’t understand that. Still, he had decided that rather than leave them all to it he could at least make sure it got done properly even if he didn’t like it. So far though, he was loathe to admit, he hadn’t even been able to do that.

And the key to this was locked up safe and warm in his flat right now not fifty yards from where Slater sat watching his breath turn cloudy and feeling his backside turn numb. Probably sat watching Eastenders with a cup of tea and some chocolate biscuits, slippers on, stomach full, leftovers tipped absently into the bin. Bastard, he thought to himself. You wait til I get my hands on you.

As he sat there chewing over his situation, the headlights of an approaching car lit up the inside of his own and flashed back at him from his rear-view mirror. Slater looked away from the glare and into the wing mirror and noted that the other car was drawing up very slowly behind him. Slater’s antennae was up now and he watched the wing mirror intently and fought the urge to turn and get a better view. The car stopped.

Slater was itching to turn round and see what was happening behind him. He knew there was no real reason that this should have anything to do with him but he’d been sitting for long boring hours watching Campbell’s home and he was keyed up now for something to happen.

Was it the police? Had he been noticed sitting in the car? Or maybe Warren. Sent by Gresham to help out. No, he would have received a call about that. Who then? Somebody else after Campbell? Surely no-one else knew what they knew. But then… maybe someone had let something slip to Drennan and it was him turning up to nose around.

The car started up again and drew closer to and then alongside Slater’s car and he wiped a hand over his face as if he were yawning and totally indifferent to what was going on around him. He stole a glance at the driver as he passed; didn’t recognise him.

A few yards ahead the car stopped again. Slater watched the driver looking at the doors across the road and then give two quick honks on the horn.

Seconds later Slater watched frozen as a figure trotted out onto the pavement, made straight for the car and jumped in the back seat. In the gloom and despite the streetlights Slater was not sure whether the figure had been Campbell but as he watched the silhouette in the back seat gesticulate to the driver and then settle back before the car pulled away, a seed of doubt took root in his mind.

Had it been him? Slater was rattled and jumpy and it was darker in the street now and the streetlights threw confusing glares and reflections off the glass and paintwork of his car and those around him.

For a moment he was torn and he held the keys in the ignition, ready to follow the car, thinking that perhaps it was Campbell after all. If he didn’t follow then he might lose him for good.

No.

Calm down, he thought. The figure he had seen climb into the cab had not carried a large bag with him to indicate that he was going anywhere for any length of time. And what if it wasn’t Campbell and Slater left his post and lost the chance to grab him tonight?

No.

If that was him then he would be back later. And if it had not been Campbell, then Slater would know soon enough anyway and would finally make his acquaintance.

23

Tuesday. 9pm.

Campbell drained the last lukewarm mouthful of tea from the mug and began rubbing his eyes, which were feeling sore from staring at the screen.

His head was hurting too.

For hours Campbell had sat and read through the corporate literature that he had collected from his little ‘undercover’ trip to Griffin. Thinking about the hastily stammered pseudonym he had offered he cringed; ‘Owen Michaels’ he had said as the photo of the ex-England footballer looked back at him from the newspaper on his desk. Still, at least it hadn’t been David Beckham, he thought. That would have been a little bit too obvious. As it was he wasn’t entirely convinced that the girl had believed him but she’d given him the benefit of the doubt at least.

Griffin Holdings was a company that did a little bit of everything it seemed. The glossy brochures and grand but vague language did not give Campbell much in the way of detail. Its reach was international, taking in countries across Europe, Africa and the Middle East as well as a fast expanding Asian operation. It appeared, in the main, that Griffin engaged in shipping goods of various types around the world both on a private client basis as well as in trading goods itself. This was achieved via different subsidiary companies with their own specific remits all run by one man, Andrew Griffin, the Chief Executive Officer, under the umbrella of Griffin Holdings Ltd.

Campbell had begun to dig deeper than the surface that these brochures had allowed him to scratch. He was well versed with using the internet to research people and companies. It was what paid his wages and now he had plenty of motivation and a burning curiosity driving him.

Andrew Griffin had, it seemed, assumed control of the company some years previously and modernised and rebranded it pretty thoroughly such that it was now largely unrecognisable from its original incarnation.

Griffin had focused on the existing company’s two strongest areas. It had begun in trading in rare and expensive goods, art and artefacts, which they would buy and sell or broker as middlemen. This in turn gave rise to an import/export business which had developed into something of a specialised skill through several years of trading in goods that they had found difficulty in moving via more traditional routes and carriers. With a burgeoning reputation of being able to move difficult items over long distances, clients included museums and art dealerships initially but as their expertise and contacts grew this developed into precious stones and even, occasionally, small arms.

Campbell had seen no cause for alarm until this point but was naturally starting to worry about what he may have become embroiled in. Further investigation allayed his initial fears though as he looked up Griffin’s competitors. There seemed little untoward in this specialised and well-regulated industry and less still with regard to Griffin itself.

Next he looked at the company’s early history. It had been founded by two men in the mid-1980s. The elder of the two, Geoffrey Asquith, held a PhD in Art and Art History and had at the time of the company’s founding lectured on a part time basis at a leading English University. The younger man, Michael Horner, held a postgraduate degree in Banking and Finance and had worked for two leading Investment Banks in the City before joining forces with Asquith in a trading venture that utilised both men's skills to the full, not to mention Horner's extensive book of contacts.

Success naturally led to growth and then specialising in different areas as the business developed. Eventually it seemed that the art expert and the banker had grown apart from the company they had created and sold it on at a handsome profit.

By now their contacts were considerable and not just limited to the world of art, arms and shipping. Both men had expanded their interests into other areas, taking directorships in offshore investment companies, consultancy work and eventually for Asquith, politics.

Resting his forehead on the heel of his hand, Campbell squeezed his eyes tight, trying to blink away the discomfort.

What did this all mean? What was the relevance to a break in at Griffin? Did it relate to these two older, more influential men, or was it some attempt at industrial espionage on the part of one of Griffin’s current competitors?

The answer, he knew, would be contained somewhere on the memory stick that nestled in his bag. He had not looked at it yet, had balked at examining its contents. He was, on the one hand, concerned that here was potentially confidential and sensitive company information and that he may in some way leave himself liable to legal action by the company if he accessed it. But that was an excuse really. It was a different fear that stayed his hand. Campbell was afraid of what he might find.

Given the circumstances of the stick's delivery, he figured that was only normal. Peeking at some private company records was one thing, but quite another when you knew that it was stolen and had arrived in the cold dead fingers of a stranger.

Slow down Campbell, he told himself. The guy wasn’t actually dead when he turned up.

The double ring of the doorbell jarred him from his thoughts and he looked up surprised and then checked his watch. It was late. Who was this? His nerves jangled but he sat motionless in the chair, suddenly alert.

It rang again. Two times, three.

Slater was grinding his teeth now, impatient and agitated. The creeping cold and long empty hours were winding him up like a watch spring.

‘Come on for fucks sake,’ he muttered through his teeth and watched the air cloud around him.

He stole a quick glance around but the street was quiet now and many lights in the surrounding windows were going out as people went to bed. The thought of crawling into his warm comfortable bed with his warm comfortable wife turned the tension up a notch and he turned and reached for the doorbell again.

‘Where are you then you bastard?’ he hissed, hitting the button on every other word.

He waited.

‘Ok, ok, buddy. I’m coming.’ His brother, Luke, appeared at the doorway with a smile but the surprise made Campbell start. ‘I rang for Pizza. How long are you going to be sat at that thing for anyway?’ he said pointing at the laptop.

‘Um. Nearly done,’ he replied and pushed the chair back to stand ‘You… you need cash?’ he called after him but Luke waved a wordless dismissal over his shoulder.

‘Christ! No tip for you mate,’ said Luke fishing a twenty from his wallet and opening the door. ‘In a hurry?’

Listening, Campbell cringed at his brother’s confrontational attitude. It had always been his way and not a trait that Daniel shared with him. Sometimes it had its virtues as Luke had always been more confident and assertive. But Campbell often felt that he would get himself into trouble one day.

The door slammed and Campbell stood, his knees popping and he rolled his shoulders and stretched the stiffness from his joints, peering through the doorway at the empty hall beyond. The memory stick would have to wait now. He was too tired to think straight, too hungry to care and more than a little apprehensive about the doorbell. The feeling of apprehension nagged at him. Silly, he thought.

‘Danny!’ Luke’s voiced called out.

‘What?’

‘Get two plates and two beers from the fridge you lazy bastard,’ Luke replied and appeared round the corner with a huge flat pizza box and a plain paper bag resting on top.

‘What’s that lot? We expecting guests?’

‘What sort of terrible fucker orders a massive mighty meaty without sides? Not in this house mate. Not on my watch. Now; beers.'

The two of them moved into the lounge to tuck into their feast, laughing and rubbing their hands at the smell of hot food. Campbell’s tension lifted momentarily and he smiled at the way he had allowed his paranoia to get the better of him.

‘You been on-line the whole time?’ asked Luke through a mouthful of Mighty Meaty.

Campbell nodded sheepishly and shrugged.

‘You owe me for the food.’

‘Alright. I’ll pay for it.’

Slater resisted the urge to stick his foot through the door and walk straight into the flat but he knew he wasn’t there, that he had missed him jumping into the taxi earlier.

Gresham was going to be livid when he told him. Still, no point wasting any more time. He would be back soon enough and Slater would be there waiting. Slater knew he had fucked-up this time but he was beginning to run out of patience with everybody now and there absolutely would not be any more fuck-ups. This little shit had run him around plenty. He took one last look at the front door of Campbell’s empty flat through narrow eyes and stalked back across to his car.

Home to bed now for some much needed sleep and then back in the morning nice and early to give the lad a proper wake up call. Enough was enough.

'You going to tell me what's up then, or are you just a bit menstrual?' Luke's standard approach to any kind of potential awkwardness, as Campbell knows, is to confront it in a belligerent and insensitive manner.

'Nice,' Campbell replies as he slides hot pizza from the box.

'Well fuck, Dan. You forgot to bring beer, you've been buried in the laptop for hours and it's not even porn. Either it's a girl, a job hunt or you've found some weird online forum to indulge your inner nerd. Something is up.'

'None of the above actually. Actually, perhaps a tiny bit of each of the first two.'

'You need a new job because you shagged some girl at work and you're afraid she's going to tell everyone about your tiny weiner?' There it was, thought Campbell. Imagine if I had an actual problem to talk to you about.

'Nothing major really. Just a bit cooped up in the flat after all the shit of the last few days.'

'Yeah, you now how to throw a party,' Luke smiled and shook his. Equal parts sympathy and morbid fascination.

Campbell couldn't help but smile back. His brother may be employing bravado in the face of all the things he had told him about the gatecrasher and the burglary and the police, but maybe a little false courage and nonchalance was what was required here. Campbell had scarcely switched off thinking about things and as much headway as he was making with the research this evening, what he'd most like was a bit of a mental block, something to numb.

He had been surprised how edgy he had been at the sharp incessant ringing of the doorbell. There could surely be no way that anyone could know where he was, but they new where he lived and Campbell harboured dark thoughts of being trailed and watched, stalked from the shadows by determined, malevolent figures.

'So when are you off then?' Campbell said through a mouthful of garlic bread.

'Two days and then it is wall to wall sunshine, food and booze. And when I'm finished burning and bingeing it is back to the room with the missus.' A broad grin and an entirely unnecessary wink.

'She excited?'

'She has no idea. I sorted the time off with her boss, and as far as she is concerned we're off to her parents for the weekend.'

'So they're in on the big surprise too?' Campbell looked quizzically at his smiling brother, obviously pleased at the smooth planning of a surprise holiday trip for his girlfriend of a year.

'So won't they be disappointed when you come back and she isn't any more engaged than when you left?'

'I'm not proposing. Why would they think I'm proposing?' Luke replied, the grin dropping a little.

Campbell's smile moved in the other direction.

'I never said anything about that. I'm fucking miles away from any of that…' he said and after a moment more of Campbell's broadening grin, added 'Fuck off.'

'You've paid for and organised a surprise holiday for their only daughter and you have involved them in the deception. The thought won't have crossed their mind that you have a plan here of some kind?' He was enjoying this, particularly the slowly dawning realisation of the corner that Luke may have painted himself into.

'I've got one very simple plan which involves a pool, a bar, an all-you-can-eat-buffet and copious nudity.'

'You might want to keep those relatively separate. There's a limit to what "all-inclusive" means at these paces. Bringing your own sausage to breakfast is considered poor form.'

But Luke wasn't playing along and the look on his face was getting sourer by the moment.

'I was just trying to do a good thing,' Luke protested to nobody in particular. 'Now I'm right in the shit.'

Daniel Campbell felt the smile fade from his own face.

'Well that backfired on me,' Luke said. 'How the hell do I get out of this?'

Campbell shrugged at him. 'No good deed goes unpunished.'

24

Tuesday. 10.30pm.

Michael Horner quietly replaced the telephone receiver in its cradle and turned up the volume on the television. There was a calm serenity about him that was directly at odds with the tone and manner he had taken during the previous brief conversation.

Geoffrey Asquith was not a man given over to unnecessary worry or drama but he had certainly sounded rattled as the conversation wore on. At first he had sounded relaxed, almost confused — that what he had called Horner to talk about couldn’t possibly be the truth but some terrible misunderstanding. Horner, for his part had begun by responding in a vague and noncommittal manner until Asquith pushed him, revealing that information had come into his possession that indicated strongly that Horner had, whilst the two were business partners, engaged in corrupt and illegal activity. This, Asquith had speculated, would have been of great personal profit to Horner and great risk to the business at the time and to both men for some time to come.

Reluctantly Horner had been forced to admit it. It certainly sounded as if Asquith had convincing evidence.

‘I’m not entirely sure that you appreciate the magnitude of this Michael,’ Asquith had said indignantly when Horner tried to play it down and whose apologies did not allay Asquith’s obvious sense of injustice and betrayal.

‘Please Geoffrey, there’s no cause to panic. It was many years ago. I took numerous precautions. The money and transactions have been layered and laundered countless times. Do you really think I would have put you or the company in any real risk?’

‘Michael, that is precisely what you have done,’ Asquith countered sharply. ‘If this information finds its way into the public domain it will ruin both of us, not to mention Griffin and the staff it employs. This is no game.’

‘Everything is a game Geoffrey, it just depends on how you play it.’

‘For God’s sake! You can dispense with the fortune-cookie wisdom. I am seriously upset about this. You may have the luxury of a low profile but my own life is now very much lived in public. There are grave implications. I'm probably in breach of any number of rules or regulations just having this conversation with you. This could destroy everything I’m working for. Do you know the number of foreign development contracts we are negotiating at the moment? The number of companies and jobs that could be affected if I am forced out of office?’

‘I think you’re jumping the gun a little. Has anyone contacted you yet? Threatened you? To what end? Think clearly man. You’d have heard by now if this were about you or I. It’s probably some bungled industrial espionage — one of Griffin’s competitors stealing the wrong bloody information.’

‘How can you be so blase?’

‘I am not being dismissive Geoffrey but with all due respect, until someone comes forward and declares their intent then there is nothing we can do. Except of course work yourself into a lather of paranoia and panic if you really want to. But until then we have no problem to tackle and if we do, then we will deal with it. I rather fancy the two of us can dispense with a couple of small time blackmailers or troublemakers if they do deem to come into the open. Stop borrowing trouble. And more to the point please don’t dump this nonsense on me.’

Asquith had paused, surprised by the stinging rebuke from Horner who had long played the understudy to Asquith’s wise old hand. Horner would relive that moment over again in his mind.

‘I thought you ought to know at the very least,’ Asquith had said sounding a little more reserved. ‘But this is potentially very serious and we need to remain alert.’

When the conversation had ended with Asquith making a further pointed comment about what Horner had done and how shocked and let down he felt by the younger man, Horner had apologised again. But he had not missed the opportunity to underline that as upset and angry as Asquith might be, any sense of injustice or instinct toward retribution would not only be counterproductive but foolhardy in the extreme. Like it or not, he reminded him, they were still partners, even now. Particularly now.

It was quite obvious from what Asquith had said, what he had learned about Horner’s past, that the implications were extremely serious. The consequences could be far reaching, could impact on the lives and livelihoods of a very many people if the situation was not handled correctly. Horner could hardly deny what he had done, not in the face of what Asquith had quite demonstrably discovered and in any event such a course of action struck him as futile. No, in order to control and contain this it was important that Asquith did not panic. The old man had sounded scared and Horner would have to be in charge of the situation to guide them safely through it. And so he had done.

Michael Horner was a veteran of a thousand board meetings, of hostile take-overs, of making million pound trades on foreign equity markets before most people had eaten breakfast. He had skied alpine black runs in blizzards and scuba dived with sharks. As he sat thinking everything through he began to feel the strange and unfamiliar pangs of fear in his stomach.

25

Wednesday. 6.45am.

He had gone home thinking about it, all the long drive back across city. He had fallen asleep thinking about it and woken up thinking about it as well. Slater was going to enjoy this. He was going to savour each second.

The space that he had been parked in the night before was still vacant but he decided not to leave the car there this time where the neighbours might begin to wonder. All the others in this leafy SW postcode seemed to be sporty hatchbacks and soft-tops. He found a spot around the corner and trotted back along the pavement to Campbell’s front door.

‘Here we go again,’ he said and pressed the bell.

He would answer in a minute. Give him a moment or two — maybe he wasn’t even up yet. And then, all bleary-eyes and bed-hair — Slater was picturing it now — in his dressing gown, he would look blank for second as Slater asked if he was Mr Campbell? And then, before he’d got to the S of yes Slater would be on him, barrelling into the flat, a heel kicking the door shut behind him, maybe stick a couple on him. Crack a rib, or loosen a tooth perhaps.

‘Wake up sleepyhead,’ he said and pressed the doorbell several times.

Then he’d explain carefully that all Campbell needed to do was hand over the memory stick — which he would dutifully do — and then Slater would make it clear that Campbell had not seen nor heard a thing. They knew after all, he would point out with maybe a physical emphasis to the midriff, exactly where he lived.

The morning was mostly silent but somewhere in the distance a bus revved its engine and he could hear the manic enthusiasm of a breakfast radio DJ blathering.

There was no sign of activity from inside yet, no giveaway sounds of movement. Slater pushed the button repeatedly and then his frustration got the better of him and he knocked sharply on the door.

‘Wakey fucking wakey sunshine,’ he hissed and then looked at his watch. It was not even 7am. No-one left for work this early. He’d watched him leave the day before at 7.45. Slater began to consider the possibility that he had messed up once again. That Campbell had got jittery and not returned to the flat last night after leaving in the taxi, was gone for good. Or maybe he had left for work even earlier today. Perhaps yesterday he had in fact been late and he was normally up with the lark.

‘Don’t make me come in there,’ he said and jabbed the bell again and then, with a quick look around to check that the street was still empty he turned and headed for the rear of the flat. He began to run through a new scenario in his head now, imagining the rude awakening that Campbell was about to get.

Daniel was having a dream which featured two of his work-mates, a TV personality and someone who he was certain was an old school friend but who he did not actually recognise at all. They Suddenly he noticed that Sarah Knowles was part of the group. How he had not noticed before he couldn’t think but it didn’t seem strange to him all the same. She had made eye contact with him and was smiling and seemed eager to talk to him.

Feeling a little self-conscious and awkward he found himself trying to find a good reason to talk to her. At the same time he became aware that the scene made no sense and that in fact this must be a dream and with the realisation he began to come round.

Then there was a sharp shuddering jolt and Campbell was instantly, jarringly awake.

‘BASTARD!’ Slater roared, all caution thrown aside, all thoughts of staying quiet and unnoticed now forgotten. His temper lost, Slater pounded his fists down on the duvet, raining heavy blows into the crumpled cotton before throwing it across the room in his fury.

His teeth were clenched and his breath hissed between them, spittle flecks flying from his snarled lips. His nostrils flared and his eyes shone with rage.

‘FUCKING BASTARD!’ he shouted and slammed both fists down again.

Campbell shot a hand up over his eyes, which were still sensitive to the light. He felt a sudden pain in his arm and turned his head to look up, squinting through the glare.

Above him stood a man who had gripped his arm to steady himself as the tube train jolted to an unexpected stop. Opposite, a flustered young woman picked herself from someone’s lap, all red cheeked and embarrassed, and someone in front of him gathered his newspaper from the floor of the carriage.

‘Sorry mate,’ the man said as he righted himself and released his grip on Campbell’s arm. Looking around he noted that the train was stopped on the platform and people were standing waiting to get off. He had slept one stop past his own so when the doors opened he jumped up and dashed across to the opposite platform and rode back the other way.

Stopping for coffee and some hot breakfast to take to his desk, Campbell began planning what more he needed to find out. The office would be quiet for an hour at least and he could get some more research done here and with better tools. He could maybe look up what involvement Asquith and Horner still had in Griffin if any, exactly where their lives had taken them, what their other business interests involved. Begin to build a picture.

But something else nagged at him. For all the background he was building, all the detail he was filling in, there was really only one thing that was going to tell him anything of substance and the thought filled him with trepidation.

It was time to look at the memory stick.

26

Wednesday. 6pm.

He had found a quiet side street to make sure that he would be able to hear clearly and not to be drowned out. He had also spent some ten minutes pacing and trying to compose himself, trying to come up with what to say, a line of argument that would convince her but not scare her off or send her running to her boss. Or worse.

After it had rung twice he had a sudden jolt when he realised that she may well have left already for the day. He had been so worked up about what he would say to her that he had barely even stopped to notice the time. His nerves were already shredded and he didn’t want to have to wait another night.

‘Come on…’ he pleaded with the unanswered phone.

It rang again.

‘Griffin Holdings, good evening.’

‘Ah, you’re still there. Thank god.’ The relief in his voice was obvious.

‘Hello? Who’s this?’

‘Sorry, is that Sarah Knowles?’

‘Yes.’ She sounded apprehensive. Bad start.

‘Sarah its Owen Michaels… we met last night. You were kind enough to give me some information on the company.’

‘Oh yes. I hope it was of some use.’ A little friendlier.

‘Very helpful, yes. Look, I wonder if I could speak with you…’

‘Mr Michaels, as I’ve already told you, I’m not the person that deals with the press.’

‘I know that. Look, hear me out, please. It’s really very important. I need to talk to you. I didn’t say I wanted to ask you questions about this.’ Campbell felt a sudden urge to tell her everything all at once, to tell her his real name, that he had lied to her, that he knew far more than she could begin to imagine. He held his tongue and drew in a deep breath.

‘What is this about Mr Michaels? I’m not sure I should even be talking to you.’

‘Wait!’ Campbell felt the panic rising. If he messed this up, he had no idea what to do. His thoughts raced. There was silence on the line and he wondered if she’d gone for an awful moment.

‘What is it?’ Her tone was sharp now, irritable. She was out of patience.

‘I know what was stolen in the break in.’

For a second Campbell was probably as surprised as she was at the outburst. Neither spoke. Long seconds passed in silence. Would she bolt? Run to the boss? Think this was some kind of threat or blackmail?

‘And I think I know why,’ he said, laying the rest of his cards on the table.

A pause. ‘Why are you telling me this?’

She was biting. He could hear just an edge of intrigue in her voice.

‘Your boss may be involved.’

Each breath felt agonisingly long, tortuously drawn out as he waited. Each heartbeat took an hour as his words hung on the airwaves.

‘Sarah?’

‘I’m here.’

‘Will you meet me?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘To talk. Its extremely important.’

‘No. What do you mean, that-’ she paused ‘he may be involved?’ She obviously didn’t want to mention her boss whilst standing in the office where she might be overheard.

‘The break in, what was taken. He might be behind it.’

‘How? I’m afraid I don’t follow you.’

‘Sarah, I can’t explain everything now. It would be easier if we met. I need to show you something. I just — I need you to look at it, maybe tell me I’m wrong, tell me I’m way off. Frankly I’d be delighted if you did.’

She went silent again and once more the doubt crept over him. Perhaps he was pushing too hard now. Perhaps she just thought he was an insistent journalist trying to fool her into giving him the story he wanted. Or maybe she’d just been keeping him on the line whilst she called somebody over to listen in. He opened his mouth to speak again, fighting the urge to shout, to beg, to plead with her to help him.

‘Where?’ she said.

27

Wednesday. 6.30pm.

It was dark when he got in the door to his flat and a little cold so he set the kettle to boil and trotted through to his bedroom to change out of his suit into jeans and a sweater. Looking around the room he thought that his room looked a little different — more untidy? — than he remembered leaving it. No, he thought. It was always a mess and he was tense and paranoid. Of course that was how he’d left it.

He didn’t really know whether Sarah would actually show up to meet him. He had let her nominate a neutral venue as a gesture designed to demonstrate that he could be trusted. She was suspicious of him; that was obvious. Whether she believed his cover story about being a journalist but simply suspected his motives, his journalistic integrity, or whether her mistrust ran deeper than that he couldn’t know. He could have been anyone of course, and she a lone woman asked to meet with a strange man… what else could he expect her to be but suspicious of him?

By agreeing to her terms of time and place he hoped that he had given her some small cause to trust him. To grant him at the very least the benefit of the doubt. But would she even show up at all? He had fretted over that since ending the call. It was a gamble, he’d known that, and until she actually showed up, he wouldn’t know if it had worked. Again the paranoia had him seeing her turn up surrounded by company officials and police, pointing an accusing finger at him from the doorway.

He checked the memory stick again; still hidden, still invisible. He switched on his laptop computer again and made another cursory check that there was no trace of the data that he had accessed on the stick itself just as he had on his PC at work, eager to remove any trace at all, to leave no trail.

As he shut the machine down and began to pack it back into its tough leather case the shrill sound of his doorbell cut through the silence of the flat and he could almost feel the sound of it reverberate through his chest.

Nervously he went to the door and peered through the fisheye. He was surprised to see a woman standing there. Wrong doorbell? He pulled open the door and found himself staring into the blue, blue eyes of a pretty young woman.

She said hello but Campbell’s eyes were paying more attention than his ears. Her golden hair was scraped back from her forehead and arranged in an elaborate twist, which left a spray of hair falling away from her head like flowers in a vase. She wore fitted black trousers and a tailored shirt with large collars that was unbuttoned halfway down. Underneath the shirt, which clung to her slender frame, the pinstripes tracing its shape, was a plain black top cut straight across the chest.

He quickly snapped his head back up and looked her in the eye again hoping she hadn’t spotted it. In his confusion he almost asked her if she knew Sarah but stopped himself.

‘Hi. Can I help you?’ he said and tried to make it sound breezy, nonchalant.

‘Hope so,’ she said and flashed a dazzling smile at him. He nodded at her to go on, aware that speaking now would almost certainly result in him saying the wrong thing. He told himself to relax.

‘I’m having a bit of a nightmare actually. There’s this guy who’s been following me since I got off the bus up the road.’ She hooked a thumb back over her shoulder in no particular direction. ‘I thought I was being a bit mental at first you know, paranoid. But then I started walking along this road and he kept following,’ she explained, embarrassed that she might be overreacting. Campbell peered out into the street but could see little past the hedge in his front garden.

‘I’m really sorry. Would you mind if I just came in for five minutes or something until he goes away? I know it probably sounds silly…’

‘No, no. That’s not silly.’ He tried desperately to think of what to say. He was reluctant to let her in and get involved in this, not when he was supposed to be heading out to meet Sarah. But he couldn’t just leave this girl alone, scared and asking for his help. And the longer he stood there, the more awkward he began to feel. ‘Of course,’ he spluttered finally. ‘Come in. Please. Come on — ‘

He stopped, frowning as the girl stepped backwards and from the side of the door appeared one of the burliest, most threatening looking men Campbell had ever seen.

‘ — in.’

‘I thought you were never going to ask,’ said Keith Slater as he clamped a huge hand over Campbell’s shoulder and thrust him roughly back inside, sending him sprawling onto his back. ‘Close the door Angie,’ he called over his shoulder and stepped into the hallway.

II

28

Wednesday. 10.30pm.

‘Drennan, its me.’ The accent was clipped and well spoken, the delivery abrupt.

‘Ah, good morning.’ A breezy, self-assured tone, or a valiant attempt. ‘To what do I owe this pleasure?’

‘We still have a situation. Imagine my shock to hear that you’ve made a spectacular mess of things once again.’

‘Imagine,’ replied Drennan flatly.

‘I take it that the matter is being dealt with?’

‘Naturally.’

'The security cameras in the building happened to suffer a systems failure the very same evening. Just a small one though. No one will have even notice that. A frame or two lost from the recording, though those in the East didn't need to know that. I figured I'd let them spend time worrying about each other than what they were asked to do. Keep them occupied.'

‘How considerate of you. Would you like to avail me of the very latest information?’ The other man clearly had the upper hand despite Drennan’s cool responses. He didn't always talk like this, just when he wanted to rub Drennan's nose in shit. He knew his questions would have to be answered.

‘Delighted. The, um, real annoyance to which you no doubt refer is in hand. The Barrel-Maker turned up cold in a hospital in south west London and he’s been identified but I’ve spoken with somebody and I’m making that go away…’

‘Hate to be sceptical old chap but you aren’t overestimating the scope of your influence are you?’ said the other man, his voice thick with contempt. Drennan felt his hackles rising but he fought his temper. He needed to conduct himself with cool detachment and politeness, just as he had in the park that cold morning, days ago.

‘It shouldn’t be an issue. Anyway, I’m also running down a lead where he was last seen and will be tidying up that loose end shortly as well. All a touch unfortunate but taken care of without too much fuss. Certainly no need for panic.’

‘You’ll excuse me if I don’t share your confidence. This loose end. How loose is it?’

‘Well I haven’t taken care of it yet but — ‘

‘So how do we expect to tidy that up? Please elaborate Matthew.’ The tone was both condescending and irritable now.

There was silence on the end of the line briefly. ‘He was taken into the hospital by somebody and I have an address. Seems the barrel maker stumbled into a party in his haste to uh, disassociate himself from the others and then… had a fall. This chap — and trust me, he is nobody — he brought him in saying something about falling and landing on a wine glass apparently.’

‘I take it he didn’t land on any such thing.’

‘Who’s to say? He may well have.’

‘Let me rephrase that. The wine glass was not what did for our friend.’

‘Not entirely no. But as I said, I have an address so I think perhaps myself and Tyler ought to pop over and explain to him how very virtuous silence can be.’

‘Drennan, far be it from me to suggest that your subtle psychological manipulation might be less than flawless but have you given this any sort of thought at all? As far as we know, these two had a good long cosy chat about this whole fucking business and he’s sitting at home now on the phone having a natter with the press.’

‘I think you’re over reacting, with respect.’ Drennan said carefully.

‘Really? Well its wonderful that you feel you can share your informed and considered opinion Matthew but I think this has gone far enough now don’t you?’

‘I have people on it and the guy doesn’t have a clue. In and out to work nice and punctual, picking up his dry cleaning, renting movies.’

‘Nevertheless Matthew. Tick tock.’

‘I’m not sure I follow you.’ Drennan’s self-assurance was deserting him now and the other man did not miss the note of apprehension creeping into his voice.

‘Well, assuming that the worst has happened and we have a major leak on our hands, a bloody spillage — and considering the implications of this, there is absolutely no reason I can see that we may risk assuming otherwise — then only swift and decisive action is likely to be of any value at this stage. I will ensure that such action is taken. Let me have the name of the police contact you have. Unlike yourself, I am under no illusions as to the extent of my own influence.’

‘Very well. I’ll dig it out and pass his number on. What about our loose end? What do you want to do about that?’ There was a nervousness in his voice now, an uncertainty that was rarely present.

‘That’s no longer a concern of yours Matthew.’

‘Let’s not be rash.’

‘You would rather we rely on cheap scare tactics and the word of some young man we don’t know? One uncertainty is one too many.’

‘Well, may I ask who you intend to use for this?’

‘I maintain a number of associates in various fields. Many of them can be relied upon for efficiency, discretion and loyalty. There should be no reason why this need go on any longer, nor for any of us to be further entangled in this mess. Agreed?’

A pause. ‘Agreed.’

‘Perfect. Consider our problem eliminated.’

Drennan said nothing.

‘The Barrel Maker?’ snorted the other man. ‘You are beyond parody sometimes.’

29

Wednesday. 12am.

Somewhere off to the left he could hear a squeaking sound, more metal than animal. An occasional tapping punctuated it. A loose window? The air was cold and he could feel his muscles begin to tense and shiver as a breeze crept around his ankles.

The shuffling of feet, movement around him, a wooden clunk as something heavy was set down. A cough from behind.

His wrists, tightly bound at his back, had begun to feel warm with the friction as he struggled to find a more comfortable position and he thought that he felt something wet there now. Sweat?

Suddenly he felt a sharp pain at the back of his neck as a huge hand clamped around it and pinched the skin there. He felt his head snapped backwards and twisted sideways and then he could feel hot breath on the side of his face.

‘Now you be fucking polite and I might decide to leave you alone,’ a voice growled in his ear and he was released with a rough shove that threatened to knock him off balance for a moment before his seat righted itself.

‘Good evening gentlemen. And what do we have here?’ From the right came the thick East London accent and he could tell immediately that this new presence was in charge. Anyone that would speak to the other man in that way could only be his boss.

‘Take the blindfold off,’ the same voice instructed sharply.

Even in the relative gloom of his surroundings the light stung his retinas and Campbell squinted hard. Standing in front of him was a balding man in thick rimmed glasses who stood a very stocky five foot six or seven he guessed. His chin was stubbled and jowly and his nose sat squat in the centre of his face but his black eyes peered out through the lenses of his glasses and Campbell knew that even without the ropes he would have been unable to move under that gaze.

‘Mr Campbell. Been fucking itching to meet you old son,’ he growled and offered a hand that looked as if it could enclose his entire head in its grasp.

‘Don’t forget your manners, please,’ he said after a pause and Campbell frowned, puzzled.

‘Uh, George…’ said the other men and nodded toward where Campbell sat.

Gresham looked from the man to Campbell and leaned forward to look down over his shoulder. ‘Oh yeah. Silly me. Slater, take the ropes off.’

Campbell felt the ropes being tugged roughly from his wrists and it stung the raw flesh there as much as it relieved his discomfort. He drew them into his lap and saw that the chafing of the rope had drawn blood, which had run down over his hands and spread rusty smudges of it around his wrists and forearms.

‘Mr Campbell.’ He looked up at the man called George as he slid a stool across the floor and sat in front of him face to face. Close enough to smell the sweet coffee on his breath.

Campbell nodded but his jaw felt as if it were clamped shut and he said nothing.

‘Do excuse my enthusiastic friend. No harm done?’

Campbell shook his head. ‘No. No, fine.’

The other man eyed his wrists and raised an eyebrow. ‘Not fine at all are you?’

‘Um. No. Not really.’

‘Not really. That’s one lie.’ Gresham said and held up a finger as if to count it off. ‘How did Keith treat you?’

Campbell turned his head slightly to see Slater pat a hand on his ribs. Gresham leaned forward and took hold of Campbell’s shirt at the bottom, lifting it to reveal two large and darkening bruises on either side of his rib cage. Campbell winced as he saw the extent of it for the first time.

He had been bundled roughly back into his flat and almost lifted off his feet. Slater, without a word had landed a solid right into his left side. Campbell, the wind knocked thoroughly out of him, collapsed to his knees and gasped for breath, curling up on the floor and clutching at his ribs. Before he could regain his breath Slater had snatched him back up to his feet and with both fists gripping his shirt at his shoulders had pinned him solidly against the wall.

‘You’ve got something I want so hand the thing over and don’t even think about fucking me around,’ Slater had hissed at him through clenched teeth.

Confused, scared and off guard Campbell had spluttered and coughed as he tried to draw proper breath and had managed only a few words in response. ‘I don’t know…’

And then Slater slammed a fist into his other side and Campbell had felt as if his chest were about to collapse.

‘Where is it?’ he snarled but now Campbell really was struggling for breath and answering was beyond him.

‘Right. Pull the car up out front Angie,’ said Slater gesturing toward the door. Then Slater was in his face again, talking still through clenched teeth, spittle hitting Campbell’s cheek. ‘Don’t say I didn’t give you a chance.’

Campbell was brought rudely back to the present as he felt a further jabbing pain in his tender ribcage. Gresham was poking a finger into the bruise and screwing his face up with mock pity. ‘So come on. How did he treat you? Nice was he?’

Campbell stared at Gresham bewildered. Was he seriously expected to answer the question? Gresham stared back, waiting. Campbell gave an uncertain nod, thinking that perhaps it was best to be co-operative.

Gresham held up two fingers. ‘Two lies.’ He shook his head reproachfully. ‘No more.’

And then he backhanded Campbell hard and sharp across the face, opening a cut across his cheekbone. Campbell screwed his face tight as the pain exploded across his cheek, white heat in his eyes. He tasted blood in his mouth.

Eventually, when his vision cleared and the vicious stinging began to subside Campbell found himself looking at the two rings on Gresham’s fingers.

‘Understand?’ Those eyes again. Straight into his. Campbell nodded.

‘Good. Now, the quicker I get answers to my questions — no lies — the quicker we can all be on our way.’

‘Yeah… S-sure.’ Campbell tried to keep the fear from his voice but it emerged as little more than a croak.

‘Lovely. Right. Why don’t you tell me what you’ve been up to lately then, eh? Met anyone interesting recently?’

30

Thursday. 3am.

After initially playing dumb Campbell had been roughed up by the two of them in a manner that seemed designed as much to intimidate as hurt him but had comfortably achieved both. His fear of what may or may not happen if he did tell them everything he knew was greater though than if he didn’t and for some time he remained silent but for the involuntary sounds of pain as they punched and hit him.

At first they had simply fired questions at him quickly from either side, starting one before he could answer the last. Then they were softer and more relaxed, his friend, trying to coax the information from him. And then the violence returned and the threats, the aggression.

Then, as suddenly as it had started it stopped. Slater had re-tied the ropes on his wrists and replaced the blindfold and then gagged him firmly too, both men in silence as Campbell struggled to breathe through a bloodied nose. He had then heard them walk briskly across the floor and then slam the door and shoot the bolt.

Campbell had seen only the inside of the place, the tiny, creaking window revealing only a dark night outside. It was a typical untidy lock-up. Oil stains on the floor, a battered old workbench covered with various detritus of long use; old newspapers, rags, tools, a can of paint. It could have been anywhere at all. Now he was tied up again and not dressed for the cold, still air that he sat in.

He ached all over and felt dazed and very frightened. He began to shiver. As the minutes piled up into an hour, two, he gave up trying to count them. He began to wonder how, or even if, he would get out of this. To what ends would these men go for their answers? Did they even know as much as he did? Certainly they didn’t seem the types that he had expected to be mixed up in what he had discovered. And more worryingly for Campbell, and the thought that sustained him throughout, was what would they do with him if he did tell them? He was only of any use if he still had something they wanted.

Another thought had occurred to him too; even if he gave them what they wanted, did what he was told, he would still know about them, about the situation. He would still be a witness.

He would still be a threat.

He tried to tell himself that his fear and paranoia were getting out of hand, that he was conjuring monsters from the shadows. But tied and blindfolded and beaten in a filthy, empty outbuilding in god only knew where, his nightmarish visions didn’t seem quite so far fetched anymore. They were becoming a cold, dark reality.

Eventually, even in the uncomfortable position he was in, he began to doze off, exhausted both mentally and physically but was quickly awake again. He had heard something, though through his sleep-haze he did not know what. He began to hear things around him in the dark, scurrying and scratching. A voice. A footstep.

And then after a time that may have been an hour or may have been three, he heard them again. A distant engine sound, he thought but maybe not. Maybe tires. Probably footsteps. Certainly the door.

‘Daniel.’ George was back.

He said nothing.

‘Daniel.’ His voice was soft and calm but there was an edge of malice in it all the same.

Outside he heard water running and the squeak of an old tap.

‘You awake there son?’

Campbell nodded but kept his head bowed. He felt hands on his head and the blindfold was taken off and fell into his lap, the gag followed. Then the ropes were drawn from his wrists. Pulling them instinctively into his chest he saw how much more raw they now were. He hadn’t even realised he had been struggling against them. Still he did not look up.

‘We’ve been back to your house for another look. A bit more time and privacy this time. Very nice place son. Doing alright for yourself. It would be a shame to let that all go to waste.’

He wanted to swear at the other man, to scream his rage into his face and his thoughts raced and raced as he tried desperately to see a way out.

Slater’s looming shadow swept across the space and Campbell saw a bucket of water set at his feet.

He began to panic again and his breathing quickened. What were they going to do to him now? How much more could he take? He could feel his spirits crashing as he knew that he had reached the end. Surely he could not cope with whatever terrible thing they had in mind.

‘We couldn’t find what we were looking for. Shame,’ George said and then Slater handed him something but it was only a movement in the periphery of Campbell’s vision.

He had once read of a torture technique where the victim had a towel thrown over his head which was then doused with cold water. The shock of the cold water would make the victim breath in sharply and the towel, now heavy, wet and clinging, would be sucked hard over the mouth and nostrils.

Slater placed a hand on top of his head and pulled it back until he was looking up at George. In his hand he held a familiar object but it was not a towel. The relief was short-lived. A dark green leather-bound book with a single word embossed in gold across the front.

Addresses.

Campbell didn’t need to ask what they meant.

They didn’t just know where he lived. They now knew where all of his friends and his family lived.

‘OK,’ he whispered.

31

Thursday. 6.30 am.

He didn’t recognise anything but got his bearings by the postcodes on the street signs. It was early enough for the traffic to be fairly light and for few people to be around but it was getting light now and it had still been dark when they had left.

Slater exuded menace in the driving seat next to him and Campbell felt almost as if his presence alone were making his ribs ache more. Swinging the car around a corner the seatbelt cut into him and he winced but tried to remain silent and deny the big man any further satisfaction.

Neither spoke a word as they moved through the early morning traffic. Slater still seemed to be full of anger at him although Campbell was not exactly sure why. He felt as if the other man might, at any moment, begin smashing those ham-fists into him again.

His ribs burned with each and every breath and his eye was half closed and swelling. In the mirror he could see it colouring red already and soon it would be much darker and angrier. There was a dark cut on the very top of the swelling and his now-plump bottom lip too wore a black line across it where Gresham had slapped him open-handed and split it open. A dark gash was darkening on his cheekbone as it dried. George had told him to clean himself up with the bucket of cold water and that had actually felt very good against his raw skin and he had dunked his forearms in up to the elbow.

Pulling his car right up behind the tall red shape of a bus Slater revved the engine of his car impatiently and swore through his teeth, clenching the steering wheel tighter. Campbell watched with his head half turned, scared to stare at him directly but unable to look away. He could not help but think about what awaited him when he did hand over the disk. Would Slater leave, satisfied that he had done the job he had set out to do, content with his prize? Watching the man’s barely controlled fury twitching through the muscles of his tense body, Campbell doubted it.

The bus in front was still stationary. Slater suddenly shifted in his seat, wound down the window and leaned half out, propping himself on an elbow, impatient to see what was happening up in front.

His eyes fixed, utterly intent on Slater, Campbell’s hands began to move slowly, almost independent of his will and his rigid fear. His right dropped smoothly and silently to the seat belt clasp and began squeezing it ever so gently.

Slater leaned further out of the window.

Campbell didn’t even blink. His hand squeezed a little more, a little more.

Click!

He thought his heart would burst right in his chest but Slater didn’t flinch, fixed on the motionless traffic ahead of him.

Campbell’s left arm moved quickly to the door handle now and he curled his fingers inside the latch. He felt as if he might pull it open just by the shaking in his hand. It was too far to turn back. Too late to change his mind.

‘OOYYY!!!’ bellowed Slater but he was shouting at the cars ahead of him.

In one fluid movement Campbell yanked the door handle and straightening his legs up from the floor thrust himself against it, bursting out and through and rolling into the road. His battered ribs exploded in pain as he rolled across the Tarmac and he felt stiffness and tightness in his muscles the like of which he'd never known.

He heard Slater shout again as he realised what was happening but Campbell was up in an instant and sprinting away though the gaps in the cars. Without looking back to see how quickly Slater had disentangled himself from the car and started after him Campbell raced for a gap in the buildings which he had recognised as an entrance to Spitalfields Market. It would be quiet at this hour but there was activity nonetheless and most people stopped to look up as Campbell dashed across the open space for the other side. Past halfway he heard a shout behind him that filled him with terror and the adrenaline surged and boiled through his veins.

Campbell flew. He barely slowed pace as he went out through the exit at the far side and began running along the road beyond. Pain like fire roared through his chest and flared through his arms and legs as he ran. Either side of him were the tastefully restored and redeveloped brick buildings and warehouses and further ahead at the end of the road was the glass and steel of the City. It was a stark and swift transition between the old and the new, barely a few streets between the shiny office blocks of investment banks on one side and the urban rot of Whitechapel on the other but he knew it well enough. Round the next corner would be Liverpool Street Station. That was where he was heading.

His vision tunnelled and he could hardly see the people and buildings flashing past him. As his lungs worked harder he tried not to notice the pain in his ribs or any tiredness as his feet kept pounding the road beneath him.

Campbell, wearing training shoes and with more than a decade on Slater, began to put some distance between them and as he dashed round the corner and onto Bishopsgate he deftly side-stepped a woman coming the other way without breaking stride. He looked around him urgently as cars passed on either side of the road, none of them cabs, no buses nearby.

He risked a look back over his shoulder and saw Slater come barrelling round the corner and collide heavily with a group of suited young men.

Campbell turned right sharply, still running and looked each way along the road. It was busy but not fast moving and a little further along he saw people gathered at a crossing, the traffic light still red. Behind him he could hear raised voices as the suits protested with Slater, shouted and swore in surprise and pain.

Before the light changed he skipped into the road, judging the gap in traffic as sufficient. He could make it. And if he couldn’t then they could probably stop in time.

Up the steps and through a small flow of commuters coming the other way Campbell swept through the entrance, galloped down the escalator two at a time and out into the cavernous space of the station. His shoes squealed on the polished floor and he made his way toward the huge blue arrivals board, dodging in and out of the people with an agility he had not known since his younger sporting days. Even at this hour he was surprised at the number of people there were.

Looking back again he saw movement at the escalators which seemed now far behind him. Slater was barging his way angrily through the crowd, like a bowling ball through skittles. In moments Campbell was in the underground ticket hall, fumbling for the wallet that he still had stuffed in the pocket of his jeans. He ducked rudely in front of two women at the ticket barrier who protested noisily but he slapped his Oyster card to the reader and was through and away before they could make any more of a fuss and then he was dropping swiftly down the next escalator toward the platform below.

He slowed to a trot as he hit the platform but there was no train and the dot matrix sign was too far away for him too see when the next was due. He kept moving along the platform, looking back to the entrance to see if Slater would appear. But there was more than one tunnel to choose from after the ticket barriers as well as this one. Surely Slater had been too far behind to see which one he had chosen.

Walking now, his breath came hard and heavy. He noticed the roaring pain in his chest again, riding with every breath but never falling. He felt his legs jburn and his arms cramp and his head began to spin. He winced and pulled his arms around his chest.

Behind him came the clank and the rush of a train pulling through the tunnel and then the whole platform was filled with noise as it rolled along the platform to a stop and the doors hissed open. Still just halfway along the platform, Campbell strode a few paces the other way, wanting to put as much distance as possible between himself and Slater as he could.

And then he appeared.

Stumbling onto the platform in his haste he almost ran straight into the side of the train and then he looked up and straight at Campbell, almost as if he knew where he would be. Campbell turned and ran again, keeping close to the train but his energy was gone. The long sprint from the car and through the streets having drained his final reserves.

He was running out of platform now and all he had was the exit on one side and the train on the other.

He chose the train.

Turning and stepping through the other door he finally stopped and looked back. He could see nothing from where he stood and he clung to the bar and willed the driver to shut the doors and go.

Nothing. Seconds passed. Campbell inched a little toward the door to see if Slater was still coming. Perhaps he had jumped on a carriage further down and would make his way through the doors between the cars toward Campbell as the train moved through the tunnel. He noticed that his was the front carriage of the train and there was nowhere for him to go. When the doors closed he would be trapped. If Slater was on here.

With a loud thud, Keith Slater planted both heavy feet down on the carriage floor, appearing in the space between the next set of doors along from where Campbell stood. The smattering of people seated in the carriage looked up at them both curious, Campbell’s bruised and swollen face, Slater’s look of wild rage.

Campbell froze, fixed in Slater’s hateful glare. They stood like that for only a moment and then the doors began to beep and Slater took two strides along the aisle towards him.

Motionless for another second Campbell waited until he heard the hiss and saw the first movement of the doors and then, in one step, leapt through the gap and sprawled across the platform, landing heavily on his elbow and damaged ribs.

The doors closed behind him and Slater, stranded halfway between the two sets of doors, stared open mouthed at Campbell lying on the floor looking back at him.

Scrambling to his feet and bolting for the exit from the platform Campbell did not see Slater slam his hand against the glass of the train door. Nor did he see the look on Slater’s face as he roared his fury at him but he heard it all the way back up the escalator, fading in the reassuring sound of the train pulling away.

32

Thursday. 7am.

Matthew Drennan slapped at the alarm clock and shut the radio off. It was early and his body felt like it was telling him it wanted several more hours sleep. He stretched and curled up again, burying his face in the soft cool cotton of his pillow.

This was not how it was supposed to be. Not what he’d imagined. When he’d signed up for this it was the culmination of a long held ambition. Working for the security service was not going to be mundane or everyday. No nine to five grind for him in this life; that he would leave to the plebs. All those guys at school and university who had worked so dilligently, drank so often, slept around so freely and then had fallen into such mediocrity, such stultifyingly pointless middle-management cul de sacs could keep it. Drennan was on a different path. There would be excitement and danger and bad guys to take on.

There would be intrigue and subterfuge, undercover work and infiltration. He would smash drug rings, prostitution rackets, catch people traffickers, counterfeiters. He would do something, be someone, go somewhere.

But there was drudgery after all. There was boredom. Paperwork and procedure and politics at every turn. Eight years in the job and he’d barely seen any danger, barely taken any more risks than when he crossed the road or caught the night bus home late at night. As much as he’d insisted to his friends and family that he knew what he was going into, that he was realistic about what to expect, Matthew Drennan had come to realise that he had not become James Bond.

In fact, he had not become anything close to what he had expected, nor even liked. He was bored and frustrated at first but he could cope with that. He was eager to get on, to achieve. Of course he would be frustrated. But time kept passing uneventfully and with the dawning realisation that he was merely a cog, a small part of a much bigger system, Drennan felt that frustration and boredom turning into bitterness and resentment.

Sure enough there were plaudits and praise when a job was done well, when the team did what they were supposed to do. But where was the glory? The action? When did this get interesting?

Pats on the back and a moderate paypacket he could pick up working in a bloody bank. If he was going to be bored and unfulfilled he might at least have chosen a career that made him rich in the meantime. He could have gone into finance, worked in the City. He had the character and the personality for that sort of environment certainly. Cold and ruthless and hardworking when necessary.

It hadn’t always been so. At the start he’d been young and idealistic. There were principles to uphold, ideals to protect. But that had all gone now, soured through the years of disappointment.

The radio alarm blared again and he sat up and hit the snooze button, and then slumped back into the soft bedding.

It was depressing, he reflected, how easy it had been to fall into corruption, to find the men who would value and pay for his services and his position.

How easy Tyler had been to turn as well. He had spotted in the burly man that same disillusionment, that same growing detachment from the ideals he had once held close which Drennan felt so keenly. Priniciples could be expensive to buy, but when a man had abandoned them, had discovered that they were a sham, his conscience was far more easily acquired.

Of course the circles both men moved in, the contacts they had made on both sides of the law, at both ends of the criminal spectrum, had made opportunities easier to spot and much harder to ignore. Drennan had been the first to act, but Tyler had quickly followed.

At first it was bribes. Simple enough to look the other way. So often had both men been frustrated when their hard work had come to nothing, when the guilty had gone unpunished, that it made little difference to their conscience to play dumb occasionally. But it had made a difference to the bank balance.

Soon enough it was more than their silence that was for sale though. They had information with a value, influence with certain people in certain places.

And then this latest job had come along. Not from nowhere exactly. They’d had dealings with their paymaster on other occasions but on a much smaller scale. But nothing of this magnitude and certainly nothing so lucrative.

Tyler had been positively breathless at the prospect of what they were set to make from it, not least because of how simple a job it seemed to be and more so at how little they really needed to do by themselves. Those things had simply made Drennan more suspicious of the whole thing but as much as he looked at it and analysed the risks and possible outcomes, he could never, and would never, ignore the cash that was there for the taking. Cash it would take years to put in the bank normally.

So they had accepted it, found the men to do the dirty work for a slice of the money, and with the relevant information supplied to them about the job they had felt like little more than middle-men much of the time. But he’d enoyed it too. Handing out orders to these men, using the threat and intimidation of the power that he had over them. He could pay them well or put them away and though he barely said as much explicitly, he made sure that they all knew it.

But this too was falling apart now. How something so simple had unravelled so quickly and so alarmingly made Drennan’s chest tighten and his pulse pick up. Their paymaster who at first had seemed no more to him than a corrupt, white collar criminal had begun to assume a far more sinister aspect. Drennan had not felt threatened by the man at first and blamed that now as much on his own arrogant assumptions and inflated ego as on the way the man had played his part. He’d wanted Drennan and Tyler to think of him that way, and they had been more than happy to.

Stupid. But now the wolf was shedding its sheep’s clothing and Drennan was wondering what they had become embroiled in. They knew a little of it of course, the boss had to tell them something of what he was doing. But Drennan had never once presumed that he’d told them everything and the longer things went on the more keenly he felt the creeping sense of threat.

More than that, he was starting to worry that if he and Tyler didn’t take some more decisive action, that the job would stop being a job anymore, that the money would disappear. They wouldn’t get paid for failure. Particularly not when it was supposed to have been so simple in the first place.

Their paymaster had hinted at that already with the phone call the day before.

‘What about our loose end? What do you want to do about that?’

‘That’s no longer a concern of yours Matthew.’

No longer a concern. Drennan didn’t like the sound of that. Not because of the implications for the young man from Fulham but because the less involvement they had in the job, the less chance there would be of being paid the full amount. Let alone picking up other lucrative work. The man may have more uses for them if they did it right, may have friends with similar interests or requirements.

Failure would be costly. These risks he had taken would not be for nothing. Matthew

Drennan knew that all was not lost yet and when the opportunity presented itself to set things right, to stake their claim, he and Tyler could not afford to let it slip.

33

Thursday. 7.30am.

Campbell had nothing but the clothes he had been snatched and beaten up in, the wallet, phone and keys that were in his pockets and a few extra cuts and bruises.

He was heading home now. A hundred different thoughts had gone through his head since he had left Slater behind him and he knew without question that they would be back to look for him at his home. But with Slater’s car left abandoned in the road right outside Spitalfield Market Slater would have to go back for it. Maybe it had even been stolen, left there in the middle of the street. That would slow Slater up some more. Whatever the case, he would know that there was no hope of finding Campbell back at Liverpool Street now so he would head first for the car and then make for Fulham. Given the traffic across the centre of the city at this time of day Campbell knew that he would beat Slater there on the tube but also knew that he couldn’t stay around for long.

He would, he decided, have to pack a bag and get out. He would have to take the memory stick with him too. Given that he had made his escape from Slater after all that had happened would make it clear enough to them that he knew something — which of course he did — and that he represented a significant threat — which of course, he did.

Sitting on the train as it rattled along toward his station he could not stop his mind from wandering. How did this rough and unsophisticated bunch of thugs fit into this? It made no sense. Though he knew little of them, it was evident that they were pretty straightforward villains. Their violent methods and unsubtle approach made that obvious enough. Theirs was a world where fear and intimidation were blunt and often used tools. They would steal and extort, threaten and occasionally enforce those threats. This was not a gang who were involved in skilful and complicated white-collar crime.

The train stopped and Campbell got off and headed for the bus that would take him the short trip to the end of his road. Would they be there waiting? How long had it been since he last saw Slater?

Pushing the question of who they were and where they fitted in to one side, Campbell turned again to the immediate problem. What to do next? Where to go?

He would call in sick to work for a start. They may not believe him — probably not at all in fact considering how erratically he had been behaving throughout the week. Then again, that might work in his favour.

Then what? Collect a bag of clothes and a toothbrush from the flat and then get out quickly. But to go where? Who would he tell?

He chewed it over on the bus ride back but he could not decide. Every road led back to Gresham because with the address book he had stolen, Gresham knew everyone he knew. Which meant that wherever he went, Gresham and Slater would never be too far away.

Campbell approached his street full of apprehension. But though he was alert and checking every single car he could see, a weariness had settled on him. He was exhausted, cold and in pain. He did not know where to turn, unable to bear the thought of dragging any of the people he loved into this mess with him and knowing that if he did that he would be found anyway. As he neared his front door he felt almost ready to collapse and concede everything. What could he really do now? What cards did he still hold?

Stepping into the silence of his home he listened and heard nothing at all and he knew exactly which card he still held.

Collecting the memory stick from its hiding place, the same place that the gatecrasher had left it, pushed far underneath the oven, he made for his bedroom and filled a bag with clean clothes from his wardrobe. After some short deliberation he gambled another precious few minutes on a hot shower which felt well worth it afterward, leaving him looking and feeling a little more human.

Less than twenty minutes after stepping through the door, Campbell had left and was walking briskly back up the road, no Slater or Gresham in sight.

He had also decided what he was going to do next. There was nobody in his address book that he could call without putting them in danger so he would have to call somebody that was not in it.

‘Griffin Holdings.’

It was a male voice and the noise of a passing bus disturbed him too.

‘Hello? Sorry, is Sarah there?’ he said.

‘Which Sarah?’

Suddenly her surname was gone. He was blank. He hadn’t even thought that there might be more than one Sarah in the office.

‘I thought that this was her direct line.’

‘No, sorry.’

What was it? He couldn’t remember at all no matter how hard he thought.

‘Knowles or Evans sir?’

‘Knowles! Knowles! Sarah Knowles. That’s it. Sorry. Total blank,’ he said trying to temper his initial excitement with a more composed tone of voice.

‘She’s not in yet… oh hang on a sec-,’ the line went muffled for a moment and then the man was back on. ‘She’s not in at all until Monday I’m afraid. Annual leave. Is there anything I can help with?

‘No. Thank you,’ he said flatly as his spirits sagged. Gone until Monday. What would he do until then?

Suddenly he remembered, with a sense of relief that almost made him swoon, that he had swapped mobile phone numbers with her the night before. But he was still apprehensive. How would she react to him calling her on her holiday? As far as she was concerned she was an employee of Griffin Holdings and he a local journalist. That was where his interest began and ended. Would she even be in the country any more?

Campbell shrugged. No time to waste.

‘Hello?’ Yes!

‘Sarah?’ he said trying to hard to sound normal.

‘Who’s this?’

‘Its Daniel.’ Shit.

‘Who?’

‘Hello?’ Campbell tried to play it as if the line were bad and that she’d misheard him but it was a flimsy ploy. He had made a silly mistake in his excitement and relief to hear her voice.

‘Who is this?’

‘Sarah, it’s Owen Michaels.’

Silence.

‘Sarah?’

‘Mr Michaels. What can I do for you?’ Very frosty. Campbell felt a film of sweat on his brow.

‘I need to talk to you.’

‘Well I made an effort to come to see you last night Mr Michaels.’

‘Yes, something came up.’

‘So I saw.’

Campbell frowned. ‘I’m sorry?’

‘I turned up on time and there you were getting into a car with two other people. Not even a phone call. Evidently whatever it is is not that urgent after all.’

Shit.

‘But it really is.’

‘No Mr Michaels-,’ she began, her tone reproachful.

‘My name is Daniel Campbell,’ he blurted.

‘What?’

He couldn’t stop it.

‘My name is not Owen Michaels. I’m not a local journalist. I think you probably knew that anyway. My name is Daniel, I work for a firm of investment analysts in the City. But I do know about the break-in at your offices, I know what was stolen but it wasn’t me that stole it. It is highly sensitive information which I think is also potentially both very damaging and also very valuable.’

There was a long silence whilst she took this all in. Campbell was surprised to hear all those words come tumbling out of his own mouth so he could only imagine what she was thinking.

‘How do you know?’ she said finally.

‘Because I have it in my pocket.'

34

Thursday. 9am.

The booming, roaring shout was followed by the smash and pop of a breaking glass as Gresham launched his drink against the far wall.

‘FUCK.’ he shouted and Slater continued to stare at the floor. ‘I might expect this from Keane or even Jules, Keith, but not you. What the fuck is going on?!’

With that Gresham stalked back across the room toward Slater and landed a heavy right hand across the big man’s jaw. Slater, other than to raise a hand to the blood that began to run from the side of his mouth, did not react, as if he were accepting what he deserved.

Gresham turned and sank into the armchair in the corner and hung his head into his hands. Slater knew better than to speak now. Just to listen.

Eventually Gresham spoke but the anger was gone. ‘Sorry Keith. Its not your fault. I should have never got us mixed up in this in the first place. I thought it stank from the start.’

‘Seemed a bit too easy. Sod’s law that it’s all gone to shit,’ replied Slater hesitantly.

‘I still haven’t told Drennan what’s happened to the memory stick. I mean he knows about Campbell and all. Seems more worried about what he might have heard off Cooper that night than the idea that he has the bloody thing as well.’

‘You spoke to him recently?’

‘Hour ago. Sounds like he’s got someone else involved. Says that they’ll take care of it. Whoever they are.’

‘Oh shit. Take care of it? As in…’

Gresham nodded. ‘Yep, as in forever. Which means if we don’t find him first, there is no stick to hand over and no cash to collect.’

Slater remained silent while Gresham looked deep in thought.

‘I’m sick of this mess Keith. I wish I could just walk away.’

‘Well why don’t we just cut our losses? Tell Drennan we don’t know what’s happened to the stick, very sorry and all that but let’s just call it quits and go our separate ways.’

‘Because I need that money. We need that money.’

‘I realise it’s a good payday George but is it worth all this crap?’

‘Remember that deal we did with Frankie Walker in the summer?’

Slater remembered it well. They had unexpectedly come into possession of a large amount of class A drugs. Not their normal line of business but they bought it very cheap from an old associate who claimed to have stolen it from a Customs and Excise storage facility shortly after if had been confiscated from a trafficker.

Recognising a bargain and eager to move it on as quickly as possible they had sold it at a reasonable profit to a local gangster with whom they had always enjoyed an uneasy relationship but one largely without trouble. Frankie Walker was a more influential and powerful figure than Gresham and had many more men on his payroll and fingers in many more pies. He had the wherewithal to shift the cocaine that Gresham had offered him and they had done the deal quickly and without too much fuss. It had seemed good business at the time.

‘Well it seems that a lot of what he took off us has turned out to be shit. I mean they checked some of what we showed them and that seemed ok at the time but Frankie called me up the other week. He told me that they thought a lot of it had been cut by the time they got it which either means we cut it — which we both know we didn’t — or we got stiffed at our end, which seems likely. Either way Frankie isn’t happy.’

‘Oh shit,’ was all Slater could say.

‘Oh shit is right. He made it clear I had two months to pay and he wanted 50 per cent on top. You know and I know that Frankie Walker does not fuck about. That memory stick was going to pay him off in one go and give us some change.’

‘So when does he want it?’

‘Two days.’

Slater closed his eyes and inhaled. ‘How much George?’

‘He needs thirty grand.’

‘Thirty grand in two days? Surely he shifted some of it though? I mean even if it was cut they could still sell it on?’

‘Frankie says that’s the reason we’re still alive. You know what he’s like. If he says it’s thirty, then it’s thirty. Needs to make sure he looks like he’s in charge. Anybody tries to fuck him over, he comes back hard.’

Slater nodded. He had heard plenty of stories about Frank Walker. His reach extended across much of East and South East London and a little beyond and he was said to have people in his employ from hookers right up to policemen and judges. He bought, sold, stole, laundered, dealt and extorted and was not above involving himself personally in the dirty end of his business. Word had it that when one of the companies that Walker ran to help launder money got frozen out at the last minute on a construction contract to a Saudi owned company who had legitimately outbid Walker’s firm, he took it upon himself to cut off the hands of the man who handled the negotiations.

There was no way that Walker would let them get away with this without making an example of them all. Slater wondered, not for the first time, how something so simple could mean so much, to so many people. Drennan would pay a lot for this memory stick, and so would Gresham and the rest of them if they failed to get hold of it and deliver Walker’s money.

35

Thursday. 1pm.

The numbers on the digital display scrolled higher, through the 80’s and into the 90’s before they stopped and found a station.

‘- the latest in a spate of recent sightings of so-called big cats in the area. Two eyewitnesses claim to have seen the animal walking across fields near their village and into woodland beyond. Local police were called in and are said to be treating the sightings as serious.’ Static hissed across the news bulletin and he hit the tune button and the numbers climbed again.

Through the window fields swept past, a deep green shade in the early evening light. Tree lined hills formed a dark backdrop as the sun rolled down out of the sky and he could make out the lonely shapes of small farms and cottages dotted throughout the landscape. His own reflection was becoming more clear now in the glass of the window as the light outside faded and could no longer compete with the fluorescent strip lights inside.

She had agreed to meet him after he had done some fast-talking to convince her that what he said was genuine. However, she told him, she was, at the time they spoke, driving to Cornwall to visit her parents who lived in a small village on the south coast of the county. He could come and meet her there if it was so important and she would hear him out at least but that was it. If she didn’t believe him she would call the police and her boss and that would be that.

He had readily agreed and made straight for Paddington station and jumped on the next train in that direction; nervous and edgy all the while, checking over his shoulder regularly, scanning the faces of passers-by, particularly those who looked at him.

When he’d arrived at Paddington and come up from the underground Campbell had received a phone call that had disturbed him greatly. An ex-girlfriend had told him that a gruff-sounding man with a thick London accent had called her saying he knew Daniel and that he was in some trouble and had then asked for a number to contact Campbell. She had, she said, declined to give the man Campbell’s number, unsettled as she was by the tone of the man’s voice. Instead, she had offered to contact him herself and perhaps pass on a message.

The man had then given her a telephone number to call and informed her that she too might be in some danger if Daniel did not make contact. Campbell had assured her it was nothing more than a prank, though she had seemed less than convinced, but he had taken the number and promised to call the prankster and tell them to stop playing jokes, that it wasn’t funny. Though a year had passed since they had last been in touch and the girl had sounded eager to catch up and interested in his wellbeing, Campbell had ended the call rather abruptly, his mind very much elsewhere. He had known it might happen — expected it really — but he was surprised by his own reaction. He was afraid of course, worried and guilty that innocent people might be drawn into this and come to harm. But more than that he had found himself filled with anger at what Gresham had done.

Before boarding the train he made the call to Gresham from a public phone in a noisy pub near the station. ‘Now you listen to me you fat vicious cunt, if I hear that you’ve even dialled a single number in that book I’ll duplicate the information that you are so eager to get your hands on and send it to every single newspaper in the country. I'll post it on the internet. I’ll go to the police and tell them all about what you and your fucking gorilla did to me and the guy that bled all over my kitchen floor the other night. I don’t give a fuck anymore, do you hear me? You just fucking try it you bastard, you just try and fucking bully me any more. I dare you.’

Just thinking about it he could feel his scalp tighten and his skin prickle with the fear and excitement of what he had done. He may yet pay for talking to Gresham like that but at the same time he felt pretty confident that the other man would not call his bluff. Not yet at least.

Now finally the train was slowing as it neared its destination and she would meet him here and they would talk.

He tossed his jacket over his shoulders and shuffled along the aisle to the door of the train as it crawled to a halt. Campbell felt the pinch of anticipation and tried to calm himself as he strolled through the ticket hall and out onto the broad pavement at the front of the station.

Waving off the attentions of the first of the queue of taxis lining up in front of him, Campbell scanned the area. There were a few more cars idling at the kerbside and he looked out for the one she had described but couldn’t see it. Then from across the car park headlights flashed and he noticed that it was the one he was looking for.

He moved gingerly across the tarmac, the stiffness from his ordeal was clear to see and as he drew nearer, the driver side door opened and Sarah stood up and peered at him. He saw her expression change as she noticed his swollen eye and fat lip, the dark cuts on both.

‘What the hell…?’ she began and he tried to smile as if it were nothing but she looked visibly shocked at the sight of him.

She came around the car and looked more closely at him. She studied the puffy eye that he could barely see through and the colourful bruise blooming across his cheek, the thin dark scab across his plump lower lip.

‘What the hell happened to you? You look like you’ve been hit by a bus.’

He smiled at the description. ‘Feels like it too.’

‘Daniel Campbell I suppose? Not quite the same man I remember meeting.’

‘Well I was Owen Michaels then, local hack,’ he said and swung his bag from his shoulder with a wince that she noticed.

‘Want to tell me what happened?’

‘All in good time Sarah. Can I dump this in the boot?’

She nodded and then took the bag from him, swatting away his protestations.

Climbing into the car was a slow and clumsy process as he tried to avoid further aggravating any of his injuries. Sarah watched him intently, frowning.

‘Seriously Daniel. What happened?’

‘You remember I said that I thought this could be valuable? Well, let’s just say I found out first hand how valuable…’

Sarah stared at him, examining his battered face for signs that he may be lying. She was clearly still less than convinced about the whole thing, despite this latest shock. Highly suspicious and alert that this was some sort of sting or set up. But seeing the state of Campbell, and having heard the pleading desperation in his voice that morning, she must have concluded that he might well be telling the truth.

Campbell turned to her as he clipped in his seatbelt. ‘Someone really wants it back.’

Without a word she started the car and pulled out of the train station car park, past the taxi rank that was still doing a brisk trade in collecting some of the other passengers of Daniel’s train.

‘So you a local girl then?’ Campbell asked breezily, trying to chase away the tense silence that had descended.

‘No. Born and raised in Muswell Hill actually. Parents moved down here when they retired. Dad has a few properties here and there and used to rent some out down here as holiday cottages and stuff. They decided to buy one of them outright and live in it.’

‘Very nice too. So, uh, how come you work down there in Hammersmith?’

‘Not really my choice where they have the offices.’ she replied, slightly puzzled.

‘No, I mean it’s a bit of a way from Muswell Hill.’

‘Oh right. No I live down in Chiswick now. Moved down there with the boyfriend. Then got the job.’

‘Oh I see.’

‘Stayed in the area after we split up.’

‘Oh.’

They fell silent again. As they drove through the town and out into the countryside beyond, the light of the afternoon dimmed and heavy clouds drew in overhead. The first fat spots of rain hit the windscreen as Sarah swung the car off the road and eased it slowly along a bumpy lane toward a small whitewashed cottage beyond.

‘Are your parents going to be in then?’ he asked, suddenly feeling nervous that she was going to walk him into a room full of people. Campbell wanted to avoid meeting anyone new right at that moment.

‘Not my parents place. One of their holiday cottages. Very quiet at this time of year. Private. I borrowed the keys and told them I’m off with some friends.’

He nodded, relieved and more than a little surprised at the trust she was showing.

‘Sarah,’ he said looking at her across the roof of the car as they stepped out into a light drizzle. ‘You seem — this is by no means a complaint — but you seem very trusting. How do you know I’m not some nutjob?’

‘I could ask you the same question Daniel. Why do you trust me? I mean, how do you know I haven’t called the police? How do you know I haven’t got this place wired with CCTV? Or told twenty different people exactly where I am and exactly what time I’ll be back?’

Campbell was silent and he stared back at her, waiting for her to reassure him that none of what she said was in fact true.

‘Look at you. For a start, I think I could beat you up if you did try something. Secondly, the things you’ve told me just sound too weird for you to have made them all up. And thirdly, you have no reason to trust me either, as far as I can see and that makes us evens,’ she said, walking to the boot of the car and pulling out his bag. ‘But I do think you’re a nutjob.’

He smiled at her, unwilling to argue and then followed her as she started up the path to the front door.

‘Come on then. Start talking.’

She put the mug on the table in front of him and then sat in the chair opposite.

‘From the start then. Who are you? What’s going on?’

‘Like I said before, I work for an investment analyst in the City. Mainly I just do research on investment companies, funds, fund managers. I read prospectuses every day, examine portfolio construction…’ he let the sentence trail off and shrugged at her. ‘Nothing of earth shattering significance. And I have nothing to do with Griffin at all. I am nobody!’

‘And yet you called me the other day pretending to be a local journalist.’

Campbell pulled a business card from his wallet and slid it across the table. Then he pulled out his credit cards, driving licence and tube pass so she could see that the name was the same on all of them. ‘See. Nobody. Says it right there.’

She nodded and said nothing.

Campbell recounted the story of his party that Saturday night and the uninvited guest on his kitchen floor. He told her about the phone call from the hospital administrator and the trip to the police station. She looked concerned when he told her of the burglary and then genuinely shocked when he explained finding the disk under the oven in his kitchen. He barely needed to emphasise his point that the man must have had a real motivation to make such an effort to hide it when he could scarcely even breathe.

Her eyes wandered over his black eye and puffy lip again as he went through his ordeal at the hands of Slater and Gresham and then widened in disbelief as he described his escape through Spitalfields Market and Liverpool Street station.

‘That’s pretty much when I rang you.’

‘Oh my God! That’s unbelievable.’

‘I know. If I hadn’t been there…’

‘Are you ok? I mean, do you need painkillers or something?’

He shook his head, eager to talk now, to share the burden. ‘What I have found out so far is a little surprising. I mean, certainly it’s a lot of speculation on my part — you have to make a few assumptions. But you shouldn’t find that too hard given what I’ve just told you and the state of my ribs.

‘Your company was the brainchild of two men in the mid-1980s. One was an expert on antiquities, rare and valuable artefacts and so on. The other a bit of a financial and business brain who did the deals and the negotiating. All perfectly above board and legal. That kind of thing is pretty specialised though which meant that they had to become experts at moving difficult and sensitive items to and from difficult and sensitive places. Such expertise has a wide cache. It is a valuable commodity. Before you know it they’re even shifting guns. Again, all legal and above board. Private contracts, security firms.’

Sarah was nodding as he spoke, obviously familiar with this potted history of her employer.

‘You know this I guess. Sure. Well the arms trade is not exactly full of kindly benefactors and philanthropists set on world peace and the eradication of poverty,’ he said.

‘What are you implying?’

‘I think that one or possibly both men got caught up in some… questionable activity. I found a number of references to the shipment of unspecified goods to Tunisia and then Liberia. I don’t presume they were selling fine art and ancient sculptures to the starving Liberian public.’

Sarah shook her head. ‘Guns obviously.’

‘Well… not that obvious really. There is no direct reference to any arms that I could see — everything is coded, reference numbers and that sort of thing. But there were some unnecessarily complicated transactions in those particular cases and some interesting shipping records. But I have found something else. Like I said, I’m making a few leaps of logic here.’

‘Guesses.’

He nodded but held up a hand that she listen, before dismissing. ‘Western companies that set up operations in third world countries often do so in quite lawless areas. As such they are generally required to provide their own security arrangements. The same is true in Liberia and Sierra Leone. Or was true at least. So you get firms who are ostensibly mining companies — geological surveyors, oil — who also have close ties, even subsidiaries that are involved specifically in providing security — in certain circumstances, that can be quite extreme. I’m talking guns, troops, vehicles. Serious personnel and serious hardware and ex-military guys.’

Sarah was listening intently to Campbell now. He changed tack.

‘Michael Horner is an investment expert. Before Griffin he worked in the city for two different investment banks. He was very successful in a short space of time, real whiz kid. When he set up the venture with Geoffrey Asquith it was a sideways step into a new area of industry. But he never cut his investment ties and continued to play the markets. Shortly after the first shipment of arms to Liberia — of which there were several more over about three years — Horner, or at least a hedge fund of which he was a director — invested heavily in two private security firms. He also personally bought stocks in three mining companies who have clearly established links to these security firms.’

‘How the hell do you find this stuff out?’

‘It's all there if you know where to look, albeit fairly well hidden. Shareholder registers, Companies House searches, that sort of thing. Transparency and corporate governance and all those buzzwords. Anyway, about three months later, the Sierra Leonean government contracted those same security firms in separate operations near the capital Freetown and further inland in the diamond areas and in both cases they assisted government forces in pushing back rebel troops and securing the territory. Subsequently those related mining companies were awarded diamond-mining licences in Sierra Leone. Michael Horner profited handsomely. In both instances.’

‘Slow down Daniel,’ Sarah said frowning. ‘You’re saying he was insider trading?’

‘Keep up because there’s more. I’m saying that he may well have been or he may have just got in to those firms on the off chance that they won the deals. The point is he was profiting from the civil war. Not just that, but these other, more mysterious shipments were going to Liberia. Liberia was generally acknowledged to be the source for most arms supplies to Sierra Leonean rebels. I think Horner was providing guns to both sides one way or the other.’

‘Jesus.’

‘Quite. When the UN tried to go in and stop the fighting, the rebels — the RUF — repeatedly stalled on agreements to disarm. The rebels held huge areas of rich diamond mining country. According to what I’ve found out the official production of diamonds for Sierra Leone was,’ Campbell shuffled through some papers, ‘in 1998, 8,500 carats. The Belgian Diamond High Council in Antwerp had it at 770,000 carats.’

‘Quite a profitable war.’ Sarah said looking stunned.

‘Yes but for who? 75,000 people were killed between 1991 and 1999 in the civil war. 75,000 people. Quarter of a million women and girls were raped or abused. Some unbelievable human rights abuses and atrocities against the civilian population — limbs hacked off, eyes gouged out. Half the population was displaced by the conflict. Half. Sierra Leone has the world’s third biggest reserves of diamonds but in the year 2000 the average annual income was $100. $100 per year. In 2000 it was at the bottom of the UNs Human Development Index — the poorest in the world. Most of the soldiers that fought for the RUF — the rebels — were children. The average age was about fifteen. Most of them were addicted to alcohol and hard drugs. Horner got rich off that.’

Sarah stopped Campbell and began to pace the room, running her hands over her face as if washing something away. ‘This is too much to take in. How is Griffin involved in this? Is this all on the memory stick?’

‘Most of it. Clues at least. The rest of the information is available, so long as you know where to look and you can pretty much fill in the blanks. There is one last thing though. Horner also developed ties with a company in Antwerp not too long after he began his little African adventure. Antwerp is the centre of the world’s diamond industry.’

‘So he was spreading the net a little wider? Investing in the diamond industry in Belgium?’

Campbell stopped her with a shake of his head. ‘The way it works in Antwerp is this: companies or people called ‘Sightholders’ are presented with mixed parcels of rough diamonds from the mining companies which they buy and then sell on, having re-sorted and repackaged them. Horner was not investing in a sightholder.’

‘What then?’

‘He wasn’t buying anything in Antwerp. He was selling.’

36

Thursday. 2pm.

Michael Horner was a very self-assured man who took particular interest in his appearance and was always impeccably dressed.

Walking stiffly at his side, the equally immaculate figure of Geoffrey Asquith was eyeing the camera-laden tourists bunching around Cleopatra’s Needle with a mixture of contempt and caution. He dipped his head a little into the upturned collar of his coat as the two men strode past them.

‘How far does it go Michael? How much did you hide from me?’

Horner took a deep breath before speaking. ‘Everything Griffin told you is true. I was routing shipments of arms into Liberia, through Tunisia and Guinea and did so on seven separate occasions. The illusion of legitimacy was maintained for the company through the fact that there were various waypoints for the merchandise. As far as you were concerned they were delivered on time and accounted for by the clients in North Africa. What you did not know was that the merchandise did not stop there. It was moved on again through another African state and repackaged before arriving in Liberia.’

‘And then?’

‘And then I presume into Sierra Leone. Perhaps it stayed in Liberia. I wasn’t on the ground.’

Asquith shook his head but it was obvious that he was wrestling with a boiling temper.

‘How could you have even contemplated such a thing?’

‘I don’t need to answer that. You were never especially sharp on the operational side of things and that made it easy enough for me to do what I did. You were rarely watching.’

‘And where did the money go?’

‘The goods were largely paid for already, separately. We acted as the carrier. The company was paid on arrival at the first stop. A sub-contractor took it on from there. After that the final legs of the journey were funded privately. Myself and others involved in the physical movement of the goods were remunerated separately. Entirely off the books.’

They stopped at the wall and looked out across the river, County Hall sprawled out across the bank down to their right and a cold wind whipped up off the water and stung their eyes as they gazed up at the majestic sight of the London Eye.

‘This could destroy us both Michael. What worries me is why we haven’t heard anything yet. I mean what are they waiting for? What do they want?’

‘I imagine we’ll find out soon enough. Whoever is in possession of this data assuredly has some agenda or other and clearly it relates to the two of us.’

Asquith nodded. ‘More to the point, who is behind this?’

‘We are both wealthy and successful men. You don’t get that way without making a few enemies, making a few people jealous. It could be anybody.’

37

Thursday. 3.30pm.

Daniel Campbell leaned back in the chair and stared at Sarah Knowles who had her hands over her face and her elbows on the table. In front of them the laptop computer hummed quietly.

‘I just can’t get my head around this,’ she said.

Campbell had spent the past hour showing her the information on the memory stick and then showing her the different sources of information with which he had filled in the blanks. Some of it he accessed through different websites which were either publicly accessible or to which he had subscribed through necessity at work. He also had a wad of documents that further backed up his story. It was all there, as fragmentary as it was, and the stick itself only gave a hint at the wider picture.

‘I know. It took me a while. Then I got a pretty good demonstration as to its significance.’

‘But why? I mean, why steal this? What good is it?’

‘If I could find out what I have found out with just a little application and initiative then you can bet there are a few people who can do the same, or don’t need to because they already know.’

She said nothing but looked up at him from the table.

‘Maybe they want to blackmail your boss? Perhaps simply discredit the company so some competitor can win a few more contracts, run you out of business. Maybe they are going after Asquith or Horner. I mean you know who Geoffrey Asquith is right?’

She shook her head. ‘An MP or something isn’t he?’

‘Exactly. A member of the Cabinet no less. That’s where my money is at a good guess — I mean, that seems the most obvious right? But I don’t know how or why. Or even who.’

‘Surely you know who. You met them.’

Campbell shook his head. ‘I think they were just muscle. Something about them just didn’t seem right in light of this. Its way out of their league I think. These guys were heavies you know — stolen goods and extortion and such. Maybe drugs. This is far too sophisticated for their type. There’s someone behind the scenes who knows exactly what they are doing.’

‘Or did. I don’t suppose they planned on losing the memory stick.’

‘No I suppose not.’

‘You said that you thought my boss might be involved too?’

‘Possibly. I mean everything about this is very murky so who knows who is involved and who isn’t? Maybe they had ties before he bought them out. Maybe he knows all about what went on and is looking to blackmail them.’

‘Have you gone to the police with this?’

He shook his head emphatically.

‘If people like Asquith and Horner are involved then why should I trust the authorities?’ he said ‘These are powerful men. If they want to keep this quiet they will and that doesn’t bode well for me. Maybe your boss is involved too, maybe there is more to him than meets the eye. Maybe I have some mysterious accident when I walk out of the police station.’

‘I think you’re overreacting.’

‘Am I? Really?’ he said and hoisted up his sweater to reveal a rainbow of colour spreading out across his ribs.

She gasped at the sight of it and instinctively reached out to touch the huge bruise. Campbell pulled away.

‘OK, maybe you’re right. But if you’re in trouble so am I,’ she said suddenly indignant.

Campbell shook his head. ‘Nobody knows who you are. They know about me but not you. So far as anybody else is concerned you are on holiday visiting your parents for a few days. You briefly met some small-time journalist called Owen Michaels the other night. But you have never heard of or laid eyes on Daniel Campbell before.’

She was quiet for a moment. ‘I guess you’re right. But then why me? Why did you come to me?’

‘Because there’s no-one else. Because you can help me. Because you’re on the inside.’

‘How Daniel? Help you do what?’

She stared at him, waiting for an answer that didn’t come, staring at the angry red swelling that almost closed his eye over. At the dark bruise that ringed it and spread down across his cheek to join with another, darker one, at the swollen, cut lip. She did not repeat the question.

38

Thursday. 6.30pm.

When Sarah shut the door behind her Campbell awoke suddenly and found himself with his head on the table in front of the laptop which was still on. There was a small patch of drool pooled around his cheek and for a moment he felt disoriented and alarmed.

‘Fall asleep?’ she said as she moved through into the kitchen with a bag of groceries.

Campbell felt as if he were barely even awake and rubbed at his eyes and wiped his cheek. He didn’t say anything.

Sarah walked back through to the living room where Campbell sat and looked closely at him. ‘You look shattered. No surprise really after everything…’

Campbell raised his eyebrows and nodded.

‘I got some food for you and stuff. Toothpaste, teabags,’ she went on, tilting her head toward the kitchen. ‘You can stay here tonight. If you want. I mean, I don’t think you have anywhere else to go do you?’

He shook his head.

‘Then it makes sense doesn’t it? I mean you look terrible too. You must really need some sleep.’

He nodded and looked a little taken aback by the reference to his appearance and began patting his hair down, conscious that it looked a mess.

‘I, uh, I got quite a bit of food,’ Sarah said, walking back toward the kitchen and calling over her shoulder. She seemed edgy somehow, more uncomfortable than when she had been with him earlier in the day.

‘Thanks,’ Campbell replied.

Had something happened whilst she was out? Had she decided to call someone after all? He imagined Sarah being told to come back, to keep him there while they sent someone. Certainly she had been pretty shaken by the things he’d told her and had mentioned going to the police. But this seemed like a distinct change in the way she was acting.

Campbell yawned and stretched in the chair and rolled his head back on his shoulders, feeling his neck click. His head was throbbing and the awkward position that he had fallen asleep in had doubled the pain in his ribs. Campbell stood up slowly and rubbed his hands lightly over his sides. He noticed that the bandages that he had wrapped around his wrists were starting to show red patches underneath where they had begun to weep and bleed.

He started through to the kitchen where Sarah had begun to unpack the shopping. She straightened quickly and looked tense.

‘Plenty of food,’ he said.

Sarah blushed slightly and turned away. Campbell frowned and started to wonder if he was just being paranoid.

‘Hope you’re hungry.’

‘I hope so too. Wouldn’t want this to go to waste.’

Sarah turned and looked at him again. She opened her mouth and then closed it. Campbell looked at her for a moment and decided that he wasn’t being paranoid. Before he could speak she did.

‘I, uh, don’t suppose you really have anything to do this evening… I thought that I might keep you company for a bit.’

Campbell noticed that as she spoke she seemed to draw herself up again, to dispel the nerves and awkwardness that he’d seen there before and now looked full of the calm self-assurance that seemed so much a part of her.

‘I got enough for two…’ she said with a shrug as if that settled it, she might as well stay now.

‘Well I hadn’t really got round to making plans yet,’ he replied with a hint of a smile.

‘Don’t over do it will you? I could go if you’d rather…’

‘No, no. I’m kidding Sarah… That’s very kind of you. Thank you.’

There was a moment of silence that was broken by Sarah busying herself with the groceries, rustling bags and tossing things into the refrigerator.

‘Oh I put the boiler on when I left so there should be hot water.’

‘OK. Great.’

‘I thought you could use a shower or a bath or something,’ she added by way of an explanation.

Suddenly Campbell could think of nothing else in the whole world that he would rather do to soothe the aches and pains that seemed to cover him from his head down through to his feet. He thanked her again and turned and made for the stairs, grabbing his bag on the way through where he had had the presence of mind that morning to throw in a few toiletries.

He drew a hot bath and sank slowly into it, the water stinging the more tender bruising on his ribs and the graze on his knee that he had noticed that morning and one on his elbow that he hadn’t. He must have picked those up sprawling across the tube platform.

With weary surprise he noted that had only been around twelve hours beforehand. How much had happened in so short a period? Campbell could barely take it in even now. When he had recounted things to Sarah it didn't seem as if this had all started only five days previously. It had taken almost no time at all to have come so far, for his life to unravel so completely. How long would it be before he could get back to normal he wondered. More to the point, was that even likely?

He closed his eyes and slid right under the water for a moment pushing away the thoughts and the pain and just trying to relax. The hot water gradually began to do its work and the aching started slowly to subside.

In thirty minutes he was back in the living room where Sarah was looking through a newspaper at the table. She looked up as he walked in.

‘Better?’

He nodded. ‘Yes thanks. Much.’

‘You look better.’

‘I needed that.’

‘Dinner’s cooking. Hungry?’

‘I should be,’ he said. ‘But I don’t feel that hungry really. Sorry.’

Sarah looked a little disappointed but did well to hide it. ‘Well it will be ready in about half an hour anyway. Maybe you’ll have an appetite then.’

Campbell felt stupid all of a sudden. She had gone well out of her way for him already and didn’t need to be here at all, let alone making him dinner. The least he could do was feign enthusiasm, even if he didn’t actually feel it.

He opted to say nothing else rather than risk making it worse and he moved to the sofa and sat down quietly and closed his eyes.

For ten minutes neither said a word. Sarah read the paper and Campbell sat wondering whether he should make polite conversation but then stopped himself, worried that she would think he was doing it just to make up for the previous comment.

Finally Sarah closed the paper and turned in her chair. ‘So. What’s on your mind? You’re very quiet. Still a bit shaken up I guess?’

‘A bit, yeah,’ he replied but he couldn’t hide the distance in his eyes. He wasn’t sure about telling her what he had been looking at whilst she had gone out before he fell asleep.

‘Something else?’

Campbell was staring into space across the room. He nodded vaguely.

‘Something important?’

He nodded again. ‘Think so.’

‘Come on Daniel, what’s up? Tell me.’

He ran his hands over his face and inhaled deeply. ‘I think…’ he started. ‘I think I know who’s behind all this. And why.’

39

Thursday. 11pm.

She could see little through the window of the bus as it swept through the wet London night but she stared at the glass all the same, determined to avoid eye contact with the drunk young men who sat nearby and stared over regularly looking for an excuse to speak to her.

Normally she would take a cab, but cabs were hard to find on a wet night and she wasn’t too far from home and anyway, until the last stop she had been sat with two friends. Now she was alone and trying hard to look preoccupied and unapproachable and she wished away the five minutes until it was her stop.

Her flatmate would probably be up and was a nice enough guy that he would come and meet her at the bus stop if she rang and asked him to. She toyed with the idea but watching the rain sheet down against the tarmac she decided not to be so cruel to drag him out in this. It wasn’t a long walk. It wasn’t that late.

A red haired young man that she guessed was barely out of his teens and certainly not in her league stood and took a step toward her but the bus rounded a corner fast and hard and he lost his footing and stumbled awkwardly to the noisy delight of his friends.

It didn’t put him off though and he walked over to her and asked if he could sit next to her. She shrugged and then regretted not saying no.

‘What’s your name?’ he slurred.

‘Sorry?’ she replied turning to him. He wasn’t attractive and the effect of alcohol did nothing to help that as his eyelids drooped and his mouth hung open.

‘Your name love.’

‘Well its not love for a start,’ she said flatly.

‘Could be if you give it a chance,’ he replied and grinned.

She bit back a laugh. That had amused her but there was no good reason to encourage this and she turned away from him. ‘Doubtful,’ she said.

‘Eh, come on. I’m just trying to be friendly,’ he kept on, his words slurring.

‘Thanks. But we don’t even know each other.’

‘We can soon put that right.’

She looked him in the eye for a moment and her silence and expression said most of what she wanted it to but she spoke as well, just to make sure. ‘No. We can’t.’

He looked at her for a moment, no quick response this time.

‘Please, I get off at the next stop,’ she said politely and her tone made it clear that the conversation was over and that he had been let off without humiliation in front of his watching friends.

‘Well it was nice to meet you anyway, he smiled sheepishly and stood.

Smiling to herself she turned back to the window and noticed that she was near her stop now and she stood and made her way along the aisle to the stairs.

‘See you later gorgeous,’ the redhead called out and she flashed him a quick smile from the top of the steps before dropping from sight and bouncing off the bus.

The rain had begun to fall more heavily now, plump drops of cold water splashed down on her and she pulled the compact umbrella from her bag and opened it quickly before she started walking.

The street was well lit and lined with shops, most of which were shielded now behind metal barriers drawn down at closing time. Some were still open and shone bright neon across the wet pavement which reflected the light back up from beneath her feet. Off-licences and all night convenience stores and take-away shops manned by dark skinned men and the smell of frying onions and cooked meat mingled with the pungent scent of the display of fresh vegetables outside one shop with a sign in Turkish above the door.

Few cars rolled past at this time but the noisy hiss of tires on wet tarmac was still pervasive and she looked up to see if there might be one with a large orange light on the top. It was only a five-minute walk to her flat but this weather was disgusting.

Another burst of wind and cold rain pushed itself under her umbrella as she surveyed the street and she dropped it back down against the oncoming bluster and picked up her pace.

Soon she had turned off this road and into more residential one; fewer lights here, more shadows. The wind barrelled down at her along the high narrow channel created by the terraced houses on each side and she dropped the umbrella lower again and kept on, pushing against the wind.

From behind, a car slid past and the horn sounded a short sharp blast and three young men whooped and wolf-whistled at her through the window. She ignored them and breathed deeply trying to settle the surge of adrenaline in her chest that the shock had brought. Wankers, she thought as the car rounded the corner at the end of the street ahead of her.

She didn’t really hear the sound of a car door opening then. The footsteps she heard were just footsteps and though on edge she wasn’t about to jump at every sound she heard and start imagining rapists and killers out of the shadows.

She definitely felt the thick arm wrap around her chest though and the big hand close solidly over her mouth before any sound could escape. And she certainly felt the ground disappear from beneath her feet as she was plucked from the pavement and stuffed into the black back seat of the car.

Her face was pressed into the stale smelling fabric of the seat and the crushing weight of the body on top of her pinned her utterly motionless where she lay. The adrenaline already in her veins served only to heighten the rising, suffocating panic she felt as the engine tone rose and the car began to move.

Somewhere, less than a mile away through the rain, a phone would soon ring in George Gresham’s home. He would be told, as he tried to blink away the sleep from his eyes, that his debt would be paid and that to make sure he was adequately motivated he would not be hearing from his only daughter for some time since she would be unable to speak properly through the rag in her mouth.

40

Thursday. 11.30pm.

The fire was dying now and there were only two small logs in the basket, hot orange embers glowing in the grate. The two of them shared a sofa, Campbell sunk low in the corner against the arm with his legs thrust out across the rug toward the hearth. Sarah sat at the other end with her legs curled up beneath her and a glass in her hand. Her hair was tied back into a ponytail and she wore jeans and a white scoop-necked t-shirt.

Outside, the blustery afternoon had worsened into a stormy evening. They had listened as the wind picked up and the rain went from a pattering on the windows to a rattle against the glass to a full-blown hammering on the roof tiles above them. The wind whistled loudly and the windows and doors rumbled every so often as they shook in their frames.

The wine and the food had relaxed them both immensely and Campbell drew himself up to place the last logs onto the fire. He arranged the wood on the embers and shifted them with the poker to let air in underneath until the flames were jumping up beneath the logs. He stood, slowly and stiffly and moved back to the sofa where Sarah sat staring into space.

‘How the hell are you going to pull this off then? I mean, how are you going to get hold of a senior member of HM government? You don’t just pop in to the office in Whitehall and ask if he can spare five minutes.’

Campbell looked back at her for a long moment. ‘I realise that,’ he said.

‘And what are you going to say? How on earth are you going to make him listen to you or even believe you?’

‘I know Sarah,’ he said running a hand through his short hair and shaking his head. ‘I know. Its impossible. I don’t even have any proof really, just a lot of connections. Some of them pretty tenuous at that. I just have no idea. Need to think this through.’

‘You need to be sure.’

‘That too,’ he said but looked her in the eye. ‘Do you…?’

‘What?’

‘Believe me? Are you sure?’

‘It’s the most preposterous thing I’ve heard in my life,’ she replied, holding his gaze. ‘But I do believe you. How can I not? It’s too preposterous not to be true.’

Campbell plopped himself back down on the sofa next to her and smiled wearily. ‘I think the phrase is ‘damned with faint praise.’

‘I don’t mean there’s anything wrong with your conclusions and certainly not your methods,’ she said taking a sip of wine. ‘I just mean that the whole idea is crazy and seems even more insane because we’re involved in it. A few days ago I was up to my eyeballs in filing bloody paperwork. And now…’

Her words trailed off and Campbell noted the expression on her face.

‘I’ve just remembered something.’

‘What?’ he asked.

‘Well, like I said, a few days ago I was sorting paperwork. Griffin asked me to go and sort through the paper archive to see if anything had been taken from there in the break in but it hadn’t been touched. Anyway, it’s a boring job you know, just making sure paperwork is all still there and in order. Especially when its all years old and you don’t recognise the names and the information and so on. So your eyes wander.’

Campbell nodded.

‘Well I saw a few things that probably tie in with what you were saying earlier.’

‘Really?’ Campbell felt both relieved and excited at the same time to hear some corroboration of his theory.

Sarah was staring up at the ceiling, her hand over her mouth. ‘I can’t believe I didn’t think of this earlier. What you were saying about things getting shifted around before final delivery in Liberia? Well I saw records relating to goods shipments being delivered to Tunisia. Then right next to it there was some contract note for a different carrier, moving the same stuff from Tunisia on to Guinea. We didn’t actually ship it ourselves but we sub-contracted someone to do it for us. It didn’t seem strange at the time I saw it; that’s not unusual for us. Sometimes it’s easier to use established local firms. We’d done the main job of getting it onto the continent so after that we sometimes use other companies to do the next bit.’

‘Where does Guinea come in?’ asked Campbell eagerly.

She grabbed a map from the papers on the table and showed him. ‘Guinea is right next door to Sierra Leone. It shares a border with Liberia too.’

‘You sure? You saw all this in the records there?’

‘Yep! That’s straight from the bloody horse’s mouth Daniel.’

Campbell nodded but said nothing. If he felt vindicated by what Sarah had said, he certainly didn’t feel all that pleased about it. In fact, Campbell realised, despite all the evidence he had uncovered, he was still wishing that he was wrong.

Another hard gust of wind banged against the walls and rattled the panes. And then there came a distant but unmistakable sound of glass breaking from somewhere outside.

Campbell was upright in an instant, the wine almost spilling from his hand.

‘What the hell?’ Sarah mumbled and the two of them stared in the direction of the door and the yard beyond. ‘Probably a fox in the rubbish bins or something,’ she offered uncertainly.

‘Mmmn. Probably,’ he replied but stood up instead of sitting again. ‘I’ll just check it out. Breaking glass makes me nervous.’

She made to speak but remained silent and he was moving quickly across to the door, stepping into his shoes and shrugging his shoulders into his jacket.

Cold, wet air swept into the room and Sarah padded across to the door as Campbell stepped out into the gloom, her hands drawn up around her against the chill. Pushing the door closed until there was only a crack a few inches wide she peered into the night after him but he was out of sight quickly amid the darkness and the swirling rain. As she strained her eyes there was a sudden bright strobe-flash of lightning almost instantly followed by a sharp, loud crack of thunder. For a moment she thought she caught sight of a leg trailing around the corner of the cottage but the flash was startling and the image was gone as quickly as she had seen it.

Sarah closed the gap in the door a little more as she felt her skin pinch into gooseflesh and she wrapped an arm across her chest to try to block the cold.

Minutes passed. She began to shiver but opened the door a little wider to peer out. The soft light from the windows barely penetrated the darkness though she could make out the shape of her car and the high hedge lining the narrow lane beyond.

Suddenly there was a muffled sound off to her left, the opposite direction in which Campbell had gone. She hesitated and then opened the door wider, moving forward but instinctively moved back again as the wind whipped at her, driving cold rain into her face.

‘Daniel,’ she called out but was drowned out by the hiss and fizz of rain against the ground and the low howl of the wind.

She began to move forward again but before she could the doorway was filled with the drenched shape of a man, rain streaming down his face, his dark hair plastered against his forehead and his hands in front of him were streaked slick with blood and water. Shocked, she stumbled backwards into the room, almost falling.

‘Cut my bloody hand on a broken bottle,’ said Campbell as he stepped inside.

Sarah opened her mouth to speak but said nothing as he slipped off his drenched jacket and backheeled the door closed noisily behind him.

‘W-what?’ she stuttered.

‘Wind blew some empty bottles over by the bins round the back. Cut myself on one,’ he explained and blinked hard at the water running into his eyes.

Both were on edge as she led him to the kitchen sink to rinse the cut but neither betrayed their nerves and Campbell was already eyeing another bottle of wine on the sideboard as Sarah played nurse.

41

Friday. 1.30 am.

The bottle sat on the hearth was empty and glittered the fire light into the dark room. Campbell lay on his back on the floor in front of the dying flames. Sarah was stretched out similarly on the sofa above him her feet level with his head. They both stared up at the ceiling, both silent, both deep in thought.

Sarah would be, he knew, extremely apprehensive about what he had asked her to do. It meant abusing her position in the worst way and she could, very likely, lose her job. The only thing that seemed to quiet her own fears were the risks that Campbell himself was prepared to take. Sarah could, for the most part remain anonymous and hidden whilst Campbell was already known to at least one group with a vested interest in getting hold of the disk and who would do almost anything to get it.

He knew also, that in order to get himself out of this situation he would first have to stick his head further above the parapet. The only bait he had was himself.

He wondered who else wanted this thing? To whom was the information valuable? If Gresham and his cronies were so keen on getting it then it followed somebody else must want it too otherwise how else would it have any value to them in the first place?

Would Sarah go through with what he had asked of her? She seemed as if she knew what he was going to ask before he had even said the words, knew that by letting herself become as involved as she had that she was all the way in now, all or nothing. In the short time he had known her he thought he saw a strength and determination in her character, a goodness and sense of right and wrong that gave him faith that she would not walk away without helping.

The thought comforted him and for the first time in days he felt the burden he carried lighten a little as he shared it. It was too late now to wonder if he should have involved her — if he even had any right to — but somehow he knew that he’d had to do so. He knew that he really did not have anyone else to turn to. Since Gresham knew everyone that was important to Campbell, the only thing he could really do was to get himself away from them all, to remove them all from the firing line. To put Sarah in it was terrible he knew, but she did, he reassured himself again, have her anonymity. There was no reason for anybody to link him to her, no reason for anyone to ever know who she was or what she knew.

Gradually they drifted into a not-quite-awake, not-quite-dreaming state, on the cusp of sleep and his thoughts drifted and became irrational and surreal as his subconscious began to overlap. He tried to fight it back, feeling somehow protective and duty bound to look after her now that he had put her in harm’s way. But what could happen here in this warm, safe place? And what could he do in this state anyway, utterly exhausted and beaten up?

And then the fire in the grate wasn’t dying down any more, it was growing and licking up around the walls and there was somebody with them in the room but it wasn’t Sarah he saw moving. Did he see her moving? No, that was a man over there, and he had moved back away to the stairs and was climbing them again and was this real? Was this the dream now? Had he begun to dream? Was it really this hot?

Campbell’s eyes snapped open as his instincts kicked in and told him something was wrong. The fire in the grate was still fading away and the room was quiet but for the sounds of the storm outside. He looked around, saw that Sarah’s eyes were closed, saw the soft orange light of the fireplace and the glint of the glasses and bottle. The dream had set him on edge.

The figure moving up the stairs flashed again through his mind and he snapped his head round in that direction to see the black shape of a man at the top of the staircase. The top half of his body was obscured by the ceiling, but his lower half was visible and his right hand gripped an enormous knife, its curved edge serrated.

Campbell sprang up and gripped Sarah’s arm without looking and he bolted for the door.

42

Thursday. 11.45pm.

She followed him without question and she matched his pace because she was fit and because her whole body was alive with the alertness that fear and shock give. They didn’t go for the road or the car and somehow, as he pulled her in the other direction toward the field away from the lane and toward the coast, she knew he was right. They would never have time enough for opening the car doors, for climbing in, starting up, pulling away.

That afternoon, as the light left the day, Campbell had stared through the windows of the cottage and could see the coastline not two hundred yards away. Sarah had told him that they were some hundred feet up and that the cliffs to the sea below were steep and sheer. But in places there were gaps where the gradient was more forgiving and you could climb down, and that further along there were even steps cut into the rock and mud leading down to small inlets and intimate little coves and beaches. Campbell had intended to walk there after she had left him but had got no further than the chair at the table where she found him on her return.

She didn’t look back as she ran. Keeping up with Campbell was enough of a task as it was. His eyes were focused dead ahead of him, checking the ground and trying to read the surroundings in the dark.

The pain in his bare feet was sharp and Campbell felt the cold rain slashing against him as he sprinted and the wind came at him and he knew that Sarah must have felt worse even than he did. Her soft feet and the flimsy clothes she wore, the thin cloth of her top, its short sleeves and scoop neck. But to stand and fight whoever that had been in the cottage, whatever grave threat he brought to them, would have put her in yet more danger.

His mind was clearing by the second now; the sleep and the drink suddenly vanished as he ran through this icy night. The path he had seen earlier was not too far in the distance. He thought maybe they would find one of those coves or beaches to slip down into or perhaps it would lead them to another house or cottage or even a town.

Looking behind him he noticed how much faster they were moving than he realised and how much ground they had already put between themselves and their pursuer. But he knew he couldn’t keep moving like this much longer and he knew that Sarah probably couldn’t either at this pace but whoever was chasing might be able to go all night. No, they would have to use the darkness to their advantage and they would have to find a place to hide and wait it out in the cold and wind and wet and hope that he didn’t find them.

They hit the cliff path sooner than he expected. It was not paved but a rough worn path of gravel and soil and the loose stones cut his feet but he tried not to slow down and he didn’t let Sarah’s hand go as he moved and kept her with him.

‘I can’t see a thing,’ she hissed as they stumbled over the uneven ground but he shushed her sharply and she fell silent again. Here where bushes and trees narrowed the pathway into a corridor in places they would need to stay as silent and invisible as possible in order to drop quickly into a hiding place, unseen.

A stand of trees and thick undergrowth rose up on top of the slope in front. Campbell took them up over the lip of the hill and then, when he thought that they had dropped out of sight on the other side, ducked hard left into the trees. They waded through the leaves and brambles away from the path and pressed close behind the trunk of a large tree, pulling Sarah close to him.

The sound of the rain hitting the trees and the ground around them sounded like it was raining ball bearings. Sarah pulled herself closer in to Campbell and he felt for the first time how cold she was. He turned to her in the darkness, her hair dark and dripping, her clothes sodden and clinging to her taut shivering flesh. She looked back at him and there was fear in her eyes but there was trust too.

Campbell could see over the lip of the hill and back the way they had come and could make out the bouncing black shape of somebody following along the path. Next to him she had begun to shiver and her teeth were chattering and her breathing becoming more audible as her body shook.

Sitting listening to her he knew that when he came past them she might give them away and he knew he had a decision to make.

Standing, he made it.

‘Stay here and be quiet,’ he told her.

‘Daniel…’ she protested but in the darkness his eyes answered her and she crouched lower against the tree trunk. Campbell moved off the way they had come.

The darkness out here, away from the city and the lights of his home, was thicker, colder somehow. Blacker.

Above him he knew that the stars were bright and clear over the fat heavy cloud and he wished that he could stand staring up at them all night, just drinking in the tranquil silence. The freezing rain and harsh wind chased away such thoughts now as thunder cracked through the night again and he crouched low in the bushes watching the black shape of his pursuer dashing up the path.

Campbell pressed himself low to the ground to stay out of sight, not willing to trust the wind and the rain and the night to hide him. He had no plan. He had no thoughts to attack this man or confront him but Sarah’s breathing and her shivering would have brought the man right to them and they could not keep running like this. Here above the beaches and coves below and the fields around them he knew that there were no other houses nearby that they could get to for help. He had seen no lights in the darkness as they had crested the hill, only more empty miles of the same dark pathway and the white sea smashing the base of the cliffs below.

He could hear the footsteps of the other man now as he came and he could see him moving up the slope toward where Campbell hid. Did he move now? Did he wait until he passed and then jump him? Take his chances fighting the man?

Campbell was scared. He hadn’t been in a real fight since he was at school and the minor scuffles and scrapes that he had got into over the years had all amounted to little more than shoving and raised voices. He had played rugby for a couple of years after University which was often pretty rough though never particularly dirty or genuinely violent but he had turned an ankle badly and not finished the season or rejoined the team the following year. That was about it other than the beating he had taken from Slater and Gresham the night before, which as fights went, was pretty one sided.

The man was almost at the top of the slope now and Campbell could hear his breathing and as he tensed and this thoughts raced, the man slowed almost to a stop and began peering into some undergrowth to his left. Campbell, ahead and to the man’s right watched with interest. Had he seen them go for cover or was he just guessing? No matter, it had bought him a few moments to think.

Carefully feeling around the floor he closed his hand over a rock the size of his fist and then hurled it along the path toward the undergrowth, a few feet along from where the man was standing.

He turned to the noise and moved quickly to the spot, bending slightly to peer into it. There was a clattering sound that quickly followed as the stone dropped over the edge to the rocks below. The man stood still for a long moment. Perhaps he would think that they were making their way down to the cove.

Still he paused at the bushes, looking off into the darkness.

Come on, thought Campbell, take the bait.

Nothing.

Finding another stone on the ground, Campbell again hefted it toward the same spot. But then something awful happened.

As the stone flew up through the trees that hid him, it clattered into branches and the man turned and then began making his way quickly along the path.

Right toward Campbell.

In seconds the man was within feet of him, and though he had not seen him yet would spot him quickly and he knew it.

In two strides Campbell was on him. Stumbling slightly over the uneven ground he connected his shoulder solidly into the man’s side and took him off his feet. As they hit the ground, Campbell heard, rather than saw, the knife jarred loose from his attacker’s hand and clatter across the path and into the darkness. They rolled across the rough ground and as they came to a stop on the wet grass, Campbell brought a knee up but it failed to make a serious contact and thudded into a thigh.

The other man responded quickly and began hammering fists rapidly into his back. Campbell’s adrenalin was rising and the bones and muscles of his back soaked up the blows without troubling him. Struggling on the ground, both of them tried to pick themselves up and as they moved Campbell felt an elbow crack into his ribs and he almost yelped in pain.

This wasn’t missed and he felt a fist jab into his chest sharply again and this time he did make a noise but managed to stop himself from crying out.

Galvanised by pain and fear and surging adrenaline Campbell swung a fist at his attacker which landed uselessly on his shoulder, merely rocking him backward. Campbell had a split-second to look him over as they wrestled and tried to stand and he wondered if he knew the man, had he seen him before? How had he found them? Had he followed all the way from London, from his flat back in Fulham? But there was no time to think where he might have seen him before because he was coming at him again, hands clawing at his throat.

Pulling away he lost his balance and slipped on the grass over onto his back and the other man was quickly on top of him. He used his momentum to roll and dragged him over and then as the man’s weight moved right above Campbell he kicked out, shoving his feet hard into his assailant’s midriff and straightening both legs, sending him sliding across the wet grass and away.

Continuing the roll he was back on his feet quickly but he had taken his eyes off the other man for a moment and now couldn’t see him at all as he stood and frantically scanned all about, waiting to be rushed again.

As he stepped gingerly forward in the shadows he could see the flattened grass at his feet and then, as he searched the ground ahead of him there was suddenly a loud sound of sliding, scraping and a shifting of stones and then a brief silence.

And then he heard a short cry from below him, full of terror and desperation

And then a thick, crunching, thud that sent a feeling through Campbell like there was ice in his veins and he thought he was going to vomit.

Eyes wide and chest heaving he dropped to his knees and stared blankly at the cliff edge. Then he crawled to it and looked over.

III

43

Monday. 11am.

The cold, pale light of the day outside told of approaching winter and he could almost feel the chill as he stood in his warm, comfortable office.

On his desk lay that morning’s newspaper. The lead story was about a terrorist atrocity in a tourist resort in Turkey, which had been blamed on Kurdish extremists.

There was a small column about the possibility of the Government’s opponents lowering income tax as an election pledge. There was also a banner across the top about the colour photos that could be found on pages 4 and 5 from the wedding of a leading British actor.

Geoffrey Asquith’s name was nowhere to be found but he worried all the same. If not today, then perhaps tomorrow or sometime soon.

Days were passing in agonising silence with no word from anyone about who was behind the break in at Griffin Holdings or what their intentions were. Andrew Griffin had come to see him and told him all about the evidence of Horner’s activities in the early 1990’s, how the paper trail had remained hidden deep in the company’s records for long years.

Horner had admitted this to him without too much of a fight. Once it was apparent what Asquith already knew, Horner had surrendered any pretence of innocence and admitted to it all. Initially flippant and dismissive, Horner had seemed gradually to lose his nerve and the tables had turned almost completely now. More than once Asquith had angrily hung up the phone on the man, telling him not to panic, to wait and see what would happen. Until then he had other things on his mind, things that he could deal with, that were within his control.

By the end of the week Asquith would have to deliver his verdict on a proposed Dam building project in Malaysia. The project would be part funded by the British Department for International Development, which existed with the official mandate to help eradicate poverty and hunger in the poorer countries of the world. Most often this came in the form of aid packages and grants to the countries in question which would often go to large infrastructure projects; gas and electricity supplies, schools and hospitals, roads and bridges.

As a matter of course however, such projects, which were often on a massive scale, requiring expertise, experience and sophistication in order to implement them, the contracts for their construction went to companies outside the recipient country. Usually, in fact, to companies within the donor country.

This was nothing new and Geoffrey Asquith knew it. He did feel more than a little guilty and hypocritical that ‘aid’ packages for these poor countries often amounted to little more than back-door investment in British industry. But he still believed that in most cases, if the execution might leave something to be desired, the end results still benefited the people they were supposed to.

If a dam helped provide electricity to the homes of many thousands of families who might otherwise be without it, what did they care whether a British company built it instead of a local one? What matter that a foreign firm was paid to construct much needed municipal facilities in a poor and run-down city?

This Malaysian project was not without its critics though. Thousands of acres of land would be flooded as a result of the dam and many thousands of local people displaced. An ancient religious site would also be lost beneath the reservoir as well as the breeding sites of rare birds that existed in only a few other places in the region now.

But the hydroelectric power plant would need to be manned and run and that would create employment. Also, with the power it provided to the local area, industry could flourish and more jobs would be created, helping improve the economy and the quality of life for tens, possibly hundreds of thousands of people.

Asquith’s task was firstly to decide whether it would go ahead in the face of the opposition it had received and then to decide which of the firms that had tendered for the multi-million pound contracts would get them. The first point he knew was a formality. The opposition could not stand in the way of the project, the fate of which had long ago been decided. It was the latter job that would occupy his time now and he would need to meet with the last of various committees and interest groups and non-governmental organisations before presenting his final decision.

That his professional reputation and political future might be in jeopardy was something that he had no control over at present and this work needed to be finished either way. The livelihoods of many people depended on it, and on him.

44

Monday. 12.30pm.

The strain was clear on Gresham’s face and he turned away from the reflection in the glass and stared at the floor. He knew the others in the room could see it too and he didn’t like them to see him weak or scared.

And right now he was both.

He had not been able to sleep in the two nights that she had been gone. When finally exhaustion overtook him, the dreams that he’d seen in sleep were too awful to bear and he had woken shouting her name more than once.

He had sent Slater and the others to see what they could find out, see what people knew about Walker. But no-one would talk even if they did know anything and Gresham was well aware that he would find out where she was only when Walker told him.

But the waiting was worse. The inactivity and the feeling of impotence as he stared at the phone were more than he could take. At least if he was doing something to find her, however futile, it was better than the waiting.

‘Have we heard anything about Campbell? Did Drennan’s man get to him yet?’ Gresham asked them.

Nobody spoke. Slater shrugged. Keane and Warren exchanged a brief look.

‘I want somebody watching Campbell’s flat. All the time. If he even pops in to get his post I want the fucker. We get him, we get the stick, we get the money and then we get Angie back,’ he said quietly, his eyes still cast down.

Nobody wanted to suggest that there might be no Angie to get back. Or Campbell. They all knew that Gresham was already all too aware of that thought anyway. Now was the time to say the right thing and do what the boss said and find some way out of this. Ever since that fateful night the fabric of their world had started to tear and it got worse at every turn, not better.

‘We’ll do shifts then. Me and Keano will take first shift,’ offered Warren.

They all murmured their agreement and the two men shuffled out the door, Warren patting a hand on Gresham’s shoulder as he passed.

45

Monday. 2pm.

Tyler looked no less like a doorman whether he wore a suit and tie or the jeans and black leather jacket that he favoured. Drennan tried to make more of an effort over his own appearance and was a vain and self-important man. He made no effort to encourage Tyler to improve his own hair and clothes though, preferring the impression of menace that Tyler’s unkempt appearance tended to convey and the often unsettling contrast it presented with his own.

They had heard from their paymaster only once since the end of the previous week and been told to wait. The young man who had got himself embroiled in this situation was soon to be eliminated. Drennan thought this more than over-cautious behaviour on his employer’s behalf but was in no position to question or influence the decision.

Once he was out of the equation they could proceed with the plan as agreed. In the meantime he had been in contact with Gresham once more to tell the man to sit tight and to keep hold of the memory stick he had stolen and keep it safe. Drennan had felt that the further removed it was for the time being from himself and his employer the better. There would be no call for it yet.

Gresham had struck him as edgy and ill-tempered but gave no reason why. Bad night’s sleep Drennan thought, or maybe he was just a belligerent bastard all the time. Maybe he was getting nervous keeping hold of the memory stick, which had, after all, got one of his men killed. Never mind, he’d just have to be patient if he wanted his money.

The phone rang and Drennan noted the caller on the screen of his mobile.

‘Sir?’

‘Afternoon.’

‘Are we ready to move?’

A pause. ‘It seems that our young friend is a more resilient man than we gave him credit for.’

‘Sir?’ Drennan thought he knew what he was getting at but knew better than to say so.

‘My man failed Matthew. I have heard nothing in two days. I can only presume that something has gone gravely wrong. He was due to report in yesterday evening but has yet to do so and cannot be reached.’

Drennan remained silent, aware that they were both probably thinking the same thing: that there was more to Campbell than they had thought, or perhaps he had finally gone to the police despite Gresham’s best attempts to threaten him into silence. What was clear was that Drennan’s paymaster had sent someone to kill him but that Campbell had evidently escaped that fate as well. Which meant that he was still out there somewhere, still in a position to ruin everything for them.

‘Do we wait?’

Another pause. ‘No. No more waiting. There’s no more time. We make our play now.’

‘Very good. You would like me to make contact?’

‘Yes. Today.’

‘I’ll make the call.’

‘And Drennan, do me another favour.’

Drennan waited for it but knew what was coming.

‘Get rid of Campbell for me. As soon as you can.’

46

Monday. 2.30pm.

Two hours after leaving Gresham’s house and Warren was getting bored and uncomfortable. They had found a parking spot a few hundred yards short of Campbell’s flat and sat drinking hot coffee and listening to the radio quietly. Nudging at his colleague to get out and take a walk past the flat he turned down the stereo and watched as Keane zipped up his jacket against the chill and strolled nonchalantly off down the road.

Soon bored with the radio station Warren began sifting through the cds in the glove compartment and slid one in. Looking up again as the bass kicked in through the speakers in the doors he saw Keane walking briskly back towards the car and then the door popped open.

‘Lights are on,’ he said.

‘He’s back?’

The telephone ring sounded like an alarm bell and sent a surge of shock ripping through him. His hand trembled as he picked up the receiver and he had to fight to control his voice before he spoke. Slater stared at him eager for a sign.

‘Looks like we got a break George.’ Warren’s voice.

Gresham felt something sink again when he didn’t hear his daughter on the end of the phone but then the words began to register.

‘Do what?’

‘Looks like he’s home. Lights are on.’

Feeling a rush of elation Gresham gripped his empty hand into a fist. ‘About time. Right, now let’s be careful. One of you ring the bell and the other go round the back make sure he doesn’t get scared and do a runner again right?’ Gresham ordered and noted that already he felt more in control, less helpless.

‘No worries George. We’re moving,’ said Warren and then he passed the instructions on to Keane. He came back on the line. ‘I’ll call you back in a tick boss.’

‘Alright son. Give me good news Jools.’

He dropped the phone and then sank into a chair as Slater began asking questions.

It rang again and he had the receiver up in half a ring.

‘Jools?’

‘Try again.’

Walker. Gresham’s head dropped.

‘Frank. How is she?’

‘Lovely George. Just lovely.’

‘You fucking lay one finger on her Frank-’

‘Now, now George. Lets be professional. I find that insulting.’

Gresham seethed silently.

‘OK. Now listen. I’ve been having a little natter with the young lady and I must say I am mighty intrigued George. Seems like you had some sort of scam going to get my money back. Something of value to be sold off, no?’

‘Sort of,’ he replied apprehensively.

‘Hmm. Sort of. I see. Well here’s what I think George. I think if you have something of value and I have something of value then we might be able to make some sort of swap. I know you’re a big cheese and all that but I rather think I might be able to negotiate a better deal than you have and… well… you aren’t too worried about making yourself any money right now are you George? Mind on other things?’

‘Fine. I don’t care if its cash or not Frank. Just leave her the fuck alone and you can have the thing,’ snapped Gresham.

‘Excellent decision George. I’ll be in touch.’

And he was gone.

On the third ring Slater picked up the receiver as he noted that Gresham, now slumped in a chair, eyes closed, looked broken. The memory stick would have got them the cash they needed but there may have been other ways to get cash if that had failed. Now his boss had cut their options down to one in his desperation and he looked like he was beginning to question the wisdom of his rash decision.

‘Jools?’ he said into the phone.

‘Keith? Where’s George?’

Slater held the phone out to his boss who took it from him almost hesitantly, as if afraid of what it might do to him this time.

‘George here.’

‘George. Nobody home.’

‘Shit,’ he murmured and raised a hand over his eyes. After a pause he spoke again. ‘Stay there until he gets back then alright? Lights are on aren’t they? Then he’s probably just popped out.’

‘No, I don’t think he’s coming home any time soon George.’

‘What?’

‘He’s left you a note.’

‘He’s what?! What does it say?’

‘Says “George. Call zero, seven, seven, eight, nine…”’ but the words trailed off as Gresham stared off into space.

The little bastard.

What the fuck did he think he was playing at?

47

Monday. 3pm.

His schedule was a busy one and allowed little time for relaxation. His working day began when most people were waking up and ended after they had all gone home again. Unless there were some meeting or function to attend he would snatch a quick lunch to eat in his office or between appointments.

Today he had few actual engagements booked in to his diary and he was trying to make headway with the Malaysian project. Two junior ministers from the Department for International Development sat on the other side of the table from him in the corner of his office poring over files and schematics, columns of figures and graphs. Asquith was starting to get the feeling that the more he looked the less he saw.

The ringing phone was a welcome distraction.

His secretary greeted him. ‘Sorry to disturb you Minister but I have a personal call on line three. Insists that it’s important. Name of Griffin.’

The call was patched through and Asquith put his back to the two men in the corner. ‘Andrew?’

‘Not quite but that should serve as a clue. Are you alone?’

Asquith turned around. ‘Gentlemen would you give me a moment? I’m most terribly sorry. Take a ten-minute breather shall we? This is all getting a bit much.’

If they were offended by the dismissal neither man showed it and shuffled quickly out of the office with Asquith smiling his polite gratitude at each of them.

‘Who is this?’ he barked into the phone as the door closed.

‘I represent certain interests Mr Asquith. Certain interests who are familiar with certain transgressions of your past.’

‘That’s nonsense!’

‘You could argue the technicalities of that with the gentlemen of the press if you’d prefer.’

‘Don’t threaten me.’

‘Well strictly speaking I’m not threatening you. The interests that I represent might not like that choice of word either. They seek only your co-operation in exchange for their own. Let’s look at it as more of a statement of facts. Allow me to list these facts for you.

‘Number one. You were, Mr Asquith, involved, knowingly or otherwise, in the shipping of illegal armaments to rebel organisations of Sierra Leone who were engaged at the time in a brutal civil war with that country’s government. This was clearly in direct contravention to international law not to mention morally reprehensible. As a result you are directly tied to breaking several UN Resolutions, profiteering from an illegally waged war and, last but by no means least, the trafficking of conflict diamonds. Fact two. You are responsible for the award of numerous highly lucrative construction and engineering contracts to be carried out in Malaysia. Fact number three. You will award these contracts to the following tenders:’

Asquith listened as the voice set out the terms of the blackmail to which he was to be subjected. It was immediately clear what was happening. Of the various tenders that had been submitted for the Malaysia contracts the names of the companies he was hearing had submitted the weakest or most expensive. They were the least likely to succeed. Or had been.

‘Number four, Mr Asquith. When the interests I represent are satisfied of fact Number three you will be sent a memory stick which contains evidence pertaining to fact Number one. This is the only copy of the data in existence. You will do with this whatever you choose. Is this clear Mr Asquith? Are you comfortable with these facts or would you like me to reaffirm them for you?’

‘There will be no need for that.’

‘Excellent. We will contact you in due course.’

48

Monday. 3.30 pm.

To Campbell this felt like a siege. They had been in Sarah’s flat since early Saturday morning, having packed up and fled the cottage almost immediately.

Campbell reasoned that Sarah’s anonymity was safe. Whoever the man at the cottage had been, Daniel had told her, he could know nothing about Sarah. How could he? He must have followed Campbell down to the cottage and waited for his moment but the chances that he knew anything about Sarah were minimal.

Since their return they had slept fitfully, read, and found various things to pass the time. Sarah had taken much convincing to go into work and looked nervous and scared when she left and would probably be on edge all day and watching over her shoulder. She had conceded that he was right however and that they must do something rather than sit and wait. That meant that she had to go to work. There she could help him, there she could be of more use than waiting at home.

He had made one brief trip out on the Sunday to leave the note for George and had returned inside two hours. Now as the day slipped by in silence Campbell’s mind raced. Would they send someone else for him? Had they been followed back from Cornwall as they had evidently been followed down there? Would Sarah return? Maybe she would lose her nerve and run to the police or would somebody get to her before she got back.

There was a buzzing sound like an angry wasp and the mobile phone handset flashed and moved slightly across the wooden surface of the table in front of him.

Snatching it up he pressed answer and lifted it to his ear.

‘Hello?’

‘Daniel. Its George.’

‘George. Hello there,’ his attempt to sound relaxed was almost convincing.

‘You wanted me to call.’

‘I did. I think we need to talk.’

‘Well spotted. What do you think you’re up to sunshine?’

Campbell noted an odd tone to the man’s voice. There was still the gruff threatening manner that he had encountered before but gone was the menacingly playful tone. There was something slightly hesitant now, something apprehensive lurking there. Campbell remembered the way he had spoken to him after Gresham had tried to threaten an ex-girlfriend and was surprised that the man wasn’t baying for his blood down the telephone.

‘Just trying to work out what the hell is going on George,’ said Campbell.

‘It’s got nothing to do with you lad.’

‘Well that isn’t true is it?’

‘I just want that stick back.’

‘See, I don’t quite get this George. From what I can see from the data on it, there just doesn’t seem to be anything that might be in your line of work. I mean no offence of course but you know what I’m getting at.’

‘Don’t start getting clever son.’

‘Look, George. I don’t want this fucking thing alright?’ he snapped. ‘I don’t want any of this to be happening but you aren’t the only person after this are you? And it seems to me that if I just hand it over to you then I might end up upsetting somebody else instead. So humour me.’

There was a pause on the line and Campbell started to sweat. This was a dangerous man he was annoying. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea.

‘OK. Listen up. Since I can’t fucking find you I can hardly threaten you. It looks like you have the advantage, so I’ll ask nice.’ His tone had actually softened much to Campbell’s surprise. ‘That memory stick is worth a fair bit of money. I owe a fair bit of money to a very unpleasant man called Frank Walker who has decided that to make sure I pay him back, he has kidnapped my daughter.’

Campbell wasn’t sure what to make of this. There was no reason to trust the man and every reason to assume that this was some new ruse to get his hands on what he wanted. But there was something in his voice that made Campbell wonder.

‘You’ve met her actually,’ Gresham continued. ‘Just before we met, she lent Slater a bit of a hand convincing you to come along and see me.’

The pretty girl on his doorstep when Slater had first appeared. Angie he’d called her.

‘Family business George. Heart warming,’ he said.

‘Mmmn,’ the response sounded distant, distracted. Perhaps he wasn’t making this up. Certainly if Gresham was just the courier, just moving the stick from one place to another it made a little more sense.

‘Look George, that may be true or you may be spinning me a line. I don’t really care so long as I can back out of this mess without anybody getting hurt and just forget about the whole thing. Tell me what you know. I mean, even if you get off my back I still have whoever it was tried to off me the other night to contend with and at the moment that’s more scary than you are.’

A pause. ‘I didn’t have anything to do with that. Frankly, I’m not about to go chucking my weight around like that on someone like you.’

‘My ribs would disagree.’

‘Shut up. You’ve had worse than that in the playground. Now this is what I know. We did some job a week or so ago, which is what that memory stick is all about. Not usually our thing but the money was good — and like I said, I have a debt to pay off. The job was easy and we had pretty clear directions about what to collect. Problem was, one of the boys got his boat clocked by the cameras and it all started looking a lot nastier than we expected. So we took steps.’

‘I think you may have mentioned my gatecrasher before.’

‘Right. Not particularly proud of it but self defence really. Anyway, seems that the stick has something on it that should be kept quiet and we weren’t the only ones worried about getting caught with our pants down. Which explains this other guy trying to off you.’

‘I’m not seeing any great reason to trust you yet George.’

‘I guess not. But believe me, I didn’t want that to happen. I need the stick and to be honest, it’s a fucking shame you’ve got caught up in this. You seem like a decent enough lad but this whole thing has got way, way out of control.’

‘Thanks a lot,’ Campbell replied, unable to check his sarcasm.

‘Bottom line is, I just need the stick to get Angie back. That’s all I give a shit about now.’

‘This chap you were working for, he sent someone after me, right?

‘Yes.’

‘He still after me? I mean is he planning to send someone else?’

A pause before he spoke. ‘I think you can assume he won’t be happy to hear that you’re still around.’

‘If I let you have this memory stick George, can you call him off?’

Silence.

‘George?’

‘Yes. Yes sure.’

It was a lie and Campbell knew it immediately.

‘I’ll call you back.’

49

Monday. 4pm.

Sitting at the table with the two ministers from the DfID Geoffrey Asquith was finding it increasingly hard to concentrate on the task at hand.

As they examined the dossiers and tender documents from the various companies vying for the construction contracts, it was becoming ever more clear just how much weaker the ones he had been instructed to choose were than the others.

Having had so little time to really chew over the proposition that had been put to him he was trying to continue his work as if nothing were wrong. But every time one of the other men highlighted a particular feature or benefit of one of the stronger tenders it felt as if they were just rubbing it in. He wanted to shout; Yes, I get it! I understand!

‘Are you OK Minister?’ one of them asked. He must look distracted.

‘Sorry? Oh, yes. Fine. Lots on, you know.’

‘I hope you don’t mind me saying but you don’t look at all well.’

Asquith was a little taken aback hearing this from the younger man. He looked at the other whose expression told him he agreed.

‘Can I get you a glass of water?’ said the first man helpfully.

‘No, no. That’s…’ He was about to say it was quite alright but stopped and then excused himself. In the bathroom he stood at the sink and gazed in the mirror. They had been quite correct; he looked dreadful. His skin was pallid and his eyes dark and a thin sheen of sweat glistened along his hairline and lip.

That telephone call had hit him harder than he thought.

Shortly he was back in his office alone again. His effusive apologies had been waved away by the junior men as they left, insistent that it was no problem and they just hoped he felt better soon. He was a busy man and shouldn’t overdo it. His secretary had dutifully, if a little reluctantly, cleared his diary for the afternoon and he had told her that he would be leaving shortly because he was feeling unwell and should she wish to leave early she was welcome to do so.

When he was sitting in traffic on his way out of town he made a brief call and then told the cab driver to make a detour and pick someone up. They both got out at Asquith’s home in Hampstead and began to walk the quiet streets near the Heath.

‘Has something happened?’ said Horner. The effort of remaining silent throughout the entire journey seemed to have taken its toll on him.

‘You might say that. You have put me in an extremely awkward position Michael. Extremely awkward.’

‘I’m sorry Geoffrey, I never wanted to involve you.’

‘Well you have! I had a call this afternoon. It’s an insider-trading scam, Michael. Whoever they are, they are trying to set up an insider-trading scam.’

‘What? That’s insane.’

‘Not really. I am currently in charge of a Hydroelectric Dam project that our overseas aid department is part-funding. As is usual, these contracts will probably go to British contractors to build the thing. I’m sure you’re familiar with this type of deal.’

‘Well construction is not my area and nor is Asia but I have an idea.’

‘Yes, well they have kindly informed me exactly which firms they want the contracts to be awarded to.’

‘Incredible!’ Horner looked surprised. ‘How can they ever imagine they’ll get away with it?’

‘Michael please. That seems plain enough.’

‘Well perhaps it’s the firms themselves. I mean, maybe they all have ties to one another? Organised crime, front-companies, that sort of thing?’

‘I’m not really interested Michael to be perfectly honest with you. I don’t really give a shit,’ Asquith hissed, momentarily losing his cool. ‘The point is it’s extremely corrupt and illegal and will probably mean my job, my reputation and my livelihood.’

Horner sighed. ‘God, I’m so sorry Geoffrey. I wish there were something I could do, put myself in the firing line.’

‘What would you do Michael? In my shoes?’ Asquith sounded genuinely interested in the answer.

‘I’m not in your shoes Geoffrey, thank God. This is ludicrous. I’ve never heard anything like it. Is there no way round this? Call their bluff? Have them arrested?’

‘If we gamble and lose we’re both ruined. Completely. Prison for you probably and for me too possibly. Not to mention the political ramifications. We’re looking at a General Election in a little under a year.’

‘So we play their game?’

‘If we do, they say they’ll hand over the data they took from Griffin and disappear. Simple as that.’

‘You believe them?’

‘On the strength of one phone call? No. But they do have us backed into a corner somewhat. I don’t suppose they expect me to play along without some proof but that’s a moot point really. Andrew Griffin told me exactly what data had been accessed and copied and filled in a few blanks. It’s pretty obvious that the data is incriminating Michael, even if you hadn’t confessed it yourself.’

Horner was staring at the ground as they walked, not meeting Asquith’s accusing eyes.

‘Do you have no idea who it might be Michael? For God’s sake, how do they know this? What sort of people do you associate with?’

‘That was in the past Geoffrey, I learned my lesson the hard way. When you move in the circles I do you cross paths with an assorted cast of characters. A few of them not nice. That’s inevitable really. Maybe someone heard about it from the guys I was in with back then. Maybe it’s one of them, I don’t know. Our links were pretty loose and easily terminated, of necessity. We didn’t have a lot of contact really. Lots of middlemen, lots of smoke. Tried to cut those ties long ago. It isn’t like we have diamond smugglers reunions.’

Asquith slowed his pace and stared at the younger man at his side, astonished to find how little he’d known him, at how cheaply cast aside was his trust and hard work when they had been partners. Horner glanced up again and then back at the floor.

‘So that’s it then. We’re fucked.’ The word sounded strange coming from such a refined and well-spoken man, somehow the ruder because of it.

‘I can’t change the past Geoffrey.’

‘So we play ball?’

Michael Horner just kept on staring at the ground.

50

Monday 6pm

Sarah turned and closed the door behind her and locked it, dropping her bag to the floor and her jacket from her shoulders. Campbell watched her back, not sure what to say and wanting to look her in the eyes before he opened his mouth.

She looked shattered.

‘Hi. How was your day?’ she said.

Campbell shrugged. ‘You first.’

Sarah wandered past him into the living room and flopped onto the sofa, stretching out and kicking off her shoes.

‘I thought I was going to get attacked or kidnapped or sacked or arrested about a hundred times today. Before lunch.’

Campbell stood looking down at her trying to look sympathetic.

‘Don’t give me that look Daniel. You want to help, get me a drink.’

He did, handing her a beer from the fridge and taking one for himself.

Sarah sipped at the beer quietly for a while and then she upended the bottle and drained it quickly.

‘I set it all up. Wednesday.’

‘You spoke to him?’ Campbell asked, with a note of surprise. His eyes were wide and he sat staring at her in amazement.

‘You asked me to didn’t you?’

‘Yeah sure, but…’

‘But nothing. Don’t fuck it up,’ she said and sat up. ‘I need a shower.’

‘George rang.’

She was at the doorway with her back to him. She stopped but did not turn.

‘The guy in Cornwall anything to do with him?’ she asked.

‘No. Like I said, not their type at all. George says it was someone else.’

‘Who else?’ Her back was still turned.

‘Whoever it is wants the memory stick.’ Campbell told her what he had heard from Gresham earlier that afternoon about being paid to break in, told what to steal. ‘Someone else is pulling the strings. Maybe one of Horner’s old shady business associates is after him. Maybe he messed with the wrong shitbag. Point is George is just a lackey. Hired help.’

‘That doesn’t really help us does it?’

‘No,’ Campbell replied. ‘I don’t think there’s anything he can do about this other guy. He takes orders. Kind of a one-way deal.’

Sarah took a deep breath and nodded. Then she was gone.

Campbell sat down in the armchair and picked absently at the label on the beer bottle, staring into space. He listened to the sounds from the bathroom as the water hissed and splashed and wondered what to do next.

As scared as he had been since the whole thing had begun, Campbell still had not lost hope. At first it had just seemed like a strange and unfortunate situation to be in but as everything had snowballed the fear had driven him on, given him strength and determination.

Now though, he was beginning to think that he was out of his depth, that he should never have run or put up a fight or tried to do things himself. What was he thinking calling a man like Gresham those kinds of things? How could he have involved Sarah like this?

He thought about the morning of the burglary, the two policeman that had come to his flat. Professional, sympathetic men. DCI Samuel, wasn’t that the name? And didn’t he have his number somewhere? The man had left a card.

He lay back on the sofa and he thought about what he had asked Sarah to do that day, what, indeed, she told him she had done. Don’t fuck it up. He pondered the chances of his success, of what he would have to do, how persuasive, how convincing, how brave and resolute he would have to be, and how downright lucky too. He thought again of DCI Samuel.

He needed a Plan B.

51

Tuesday. 12.30am.

He had made her park the car a couple of streets away but he was not able to convince her to stay there and wait for him, just as he had failed to make her stay at home.

Having heard the tone of Gresham’s voice that day, Campbell finally knew that they were on their own and that they were up against something and someone far more powerful and far more sinister than he could contend with any longer. He had tried to figure some way through the mess but at each turn he had become more deeply embroiled in it, more lost and isolated, more scared.

Sarah had suggested that they call the station to ask for Samuel or an off duty number if he wasn’t there but Campbell had refused point-blank. The indications that the people behind this had power and influence were still too strong. Any call to the station might be intercepted or they might arouse suspicion by asking for a personal contact number. No, safer to wait until Samuel was likely to be well out of the station and then call, demand secrecy, some sign that they could trust him before they involved him and then, perhaps, turn themselves in.

Campbell had decided nothing yet. Samuel represented some hope in a bleak scenario but there was no guarantee that hope would become concrete. He might be a useful back-up to have nonetheless and since there seemed to be nobody they could trust at the moment, just the thought of a sympathetic ear made him feel less desperate.

The first step would therefore be to go back, again, to Campbell’s flat where the policeman’s card was clipped to the fridge door by a magnet. Sarah had protested loudly that this was a crazy idea, that if there was anywhere that someone would be looking for them, or him, it would be there. Wasn’t there another way?

Not, he had explained, unless they wanted to while away yet more scared and stressful hours. This way, taking the correct precautions, they could speak to Samuel that night, maybe meet with him the following day. As frightened as she appeared to be, Campbell could see that she had no wish to drag this out any longer. The incident in Cornwall had shaken her badly. Of course it had, it had shaken him too. But after the episode in Gresham’s lock-up it had perhaps come as less of a surprise. For Sarah, who was just beginning to comprehend the scale of the situation, to be faced with such a brutal, terrifying demonstration of its reality must have been almost unbearable. The news that Gresham was unable to help them must have robbed her of the last scrap of hope that she had.

Now they approached the rear of Campbell’s flat through an alleyway. They would clamber over his garden wall and go in the back door since walking right up to the front door was obviously insane. They could of course be watching both entrances but this was the lesser of two evils and so essentially, was their only choice.

‘If any of the neighbours stick their head out the window, I’ll say I lost my front door key,’ Campbell said. ‘But at this hour, I doubt we’ll see anyone.’

Sarah nodded, too tense now to speak.

They stopped at the wall, where the brickwork reached Campbell’s chin. He watched the darkened windows all along the row of houses on either side. There were some lights on too but he could see no signs of movement. Sarah, several inches shorter and in flat shoes, could see little, even raised on her toes.

‘You’ll have to go first,’ he said.

She looked at him, open mouthed and panic in her eyes.

‘You’re smaller, so I’ll have to help you up.’

‘I’m not going in first,’ She told him and her tone was emphatic. He thought about arguing but realised that it was pointless. He had wasted long enough trying to make her stay at home or wait in the car earlier on. If this girl said it, she meant it.

‘Fine, you stay in the alleyway and wait on your own then,’ Campbell replied and hoisted himself up onto the wall.

As he swung a leg up and over he manoeuvred himself into a sitting position and then swivelled round to see if he could help pull her up. Sarah, however, had both feet planted on the brickwork and her hands clamped on the top of the wall. Campbell watched in silence as she scrambled up, hooked a leg over and swung herself onto the wall next to him.

Smiling, Campbell swung his other leg over and dropped onto the grass below. Sarah was standing next to him in a moment, close at his back, a hand gripped his arm gently.

Moving to the back door, Sarah in tow, Campbell resolved to get things done as fast as he could. There were no sounds or signs of life that he could detect and he had no wish to hang around here any longer than he needed to. Oddly enough, for all Sarah’s obvious nerves and fear, Campbell was finding that it was her strength that was keeping him going. For the hundred reasons she should have crumbled by now, the times that she might have just turned and fled, here she was, still at his side as they walked back into possible danger.

He opened the door and they stepped inside. It was cold but the heating would have been off at this time. Even so, as his breath clouded in front of his face, Campbell felt uneasy. They stood listening intently for a minute to the complete quiet in the flat.

As his eyes became accustomed to the darkness in the kitchen, Campbell moved to the fridge searching for the card. He found a phone bill, a supermarket discount voucher and a postcard that his parents had sent him several months before from Italy. No card.

‘Shit,’ he hissed.

She didn’t ask what was up. She didn’t need to.

For a second, the thought occurred to him that someone had been here and taken it but then he remembered suddenly that he had had it in his hand when last he was in the flat after having given Slater the slip at Liverpool Street. He had sat on his bed staring at it, trying to decide whether to call or not but deciding quickly against it before packing his bag and leaving. It would be on the bedside unit in his bedroom.

‘Wait here a sec,’ Campbell told her and moved through into the lit hallway — the light here left on by them on their return as a marker for Gresham to come and find the note that they had left. In his bedroom he dared not flick on the light, mindful that they might be sitting outside waiting for some sign. He found the card where he had left it and turned quickly, suddenly filled with an urgency to get away from the flat now they had what they had come for. Just then, more light spilled in through the doorway from the hall and it hit him almost physically. He froze. That must be the kitchen.

Sarah and Slater faced each other across the space of the room, his bulk filling the doorframe. The light had startled her but she had seen, in the split second before it flicked on, that the huge, broad shape looming in the doorway was not the one she had expected. He was tall, thick-necked and fierce looking and he stared at her with a mixture of anger and confusion. She was obviously not who he had expected to see.

Come to think of it, where was Daniel? It was less than a minute that he had been gone, tip-toeing through the door.

Slater nodded at her. ‘Now this is interesting isn’t it?’

She didn’t reply because she had no idea what he meant, except perhaps to scare her, and also because he was already scaring her. There was a spark behind his narrowed eyes that was as unsettling as the sight of him.

‘And who might you be?’ Slater asked. ‘Creeping around in the dark? Don’t you ring the bell like normal people?’

Sarah paused for a minute, unsure what to say. It struck her suddenly, crazily, that this man might actually live here, that Campbell had somehow tricked her. Slater took a step forward.

‘She got fucking invited in.’

Campbell was not actually visible, obscured by the size of the big man in the doorway, but she could just make out a flash of movement rushing across the hallway as Slater turned, and a huge ceramic plant pot came crashing down against his temple.

The massive frame of Slater came sprawling back across the kitchen toward her, his legs buckling immediately as he lost consciousness. He fell and his back crunched heavily into the sideboard before he slumped the floor, knocking plates from the side as he went. Sarah had jumped backwards to avoid him and she stood shocked at the sight of him on the floor, an enormous red gash running from his temple across his cheek.

Campbell stepped over the prone figure and grabbed Sarah’s hand. ‘I really hate that prick.’

‘Daniel,’ she said, pointing to the wound which was now bleeding freely. ‘What…?’

He shrugged and dragged her quickly through the back door again. ‘Owed him that.’

He almost walked into the man that was standing there waiting for him.

52

Tuesday. 12.35am.

The air outside was bitingly cold and Drennan and Tyler both had their overcoats buttoned to the neck. Tyler pulled a pair of gloves from his pocket and slipped them on after they had been sitting for an hour.

The leafy tree-lined street looked peaceful in the still evening and the lights burning softly behind drawn curtains gave it a safe, suburban feel. Drennan eyed the expensive cars along either side of the road, the litter free pavements, the well tended hedges.

They sat in silence for a spell, shifting occasionally in their seats and trying not to allow themselves to become distracted from watching Campbell’s flat or the street around them for signs of his return.

Soon Tyler was fighting off sleep as he sat and waited in the cold. His eyes grew tired and heavy and his head began to sag against his shoulder. Occasionally he had to blink his eyes open as he felt himself dropping off.

Suddenly a car swept noisily past them down the road and drew to a sudden halt up ahead, the tires squealing on the road. Tyler was sharply awake and trying to take things in as he sat up in the seat.

‘What the fuck is this?’ hissed Drennan as he sat forward and grabbed for the ignition.

Up ahead the driver side door of the car swung open and a tall, solid figure stepped out and jogged around to the rear door on the other side, pulling it open.

From the gap in the hedge in front of Campbell’s flat several figures emerged, a man and a woman in front as far as Drennan could see, both being manhandled by another two figures who pushed them roughly toward the open door.

As they bent toward the car the light from inside lit their faces briefly.

‘Shit. That’s him.’ said Drennan.

‘Yeah, but who the fuck are the rest of them?’

The driver had leapt back into the car and as one of the other two figures followed Campbell and Sarah into the back seat and the other man took the front, the car roared to life and sped away.

‘I think we ought to find out,’ said Drennan starting the car and pulling out after them.

53

Tuesday. 1.15am.

Gresham had not been lying about his kidnapped daughter and the evidence was sitting in front of him now looking tired, scared and unkempt, like she hadn’t slept or eaten or washed in days.

Even so he recognised her.

Campbell’s eyes met with hers and through the fear in her expression he could see defiance too, a strength that Campbell did not feel he could match. He was terrified.

He and Sarah were both standing, hands bound, in a small room lit with a naked lightbulb. The snot green paint on the walls was flaking and stained and a pair of long navy curtains hung loosely in the window.

In front of them stood a tall, slender man with short dark hair swept sharply across his scalp and parted at the side with almost geometric precision. His nose was thin and pointed and his eyes were small and intense as he stared at them drawing deeply on a cigarette. Nobody spoke.

On the floor in the corner sat the girl that Campbell had last seen pleading with him on his doorstep to let her in so she could get rid of the man that had started following her. A lie of course, which had led to Slater bustling through the door and dragging him off to meet Gresham.

This was Angie then.

Slowly and with a menacing assurance the tall man straightened up from where he had been resting against the wall and walked towards Campbell, stopping only when he was inches away from him and he could feel the heat of the burning cigarette near his face. The smoke wafted into his eyes and his eyelids instinctively blinked it away.

And this must be the very unpleasant man George had told him about. Frank Walker.

‘I won’t insult anybody,’ started the man looking from Campbell to Sarah where his gaze lingered, ‘by pretending that we don’t all know what this is about.'

Campbell tried not to break eye contact, failed.

‘Angela tells me that you have something worth a lot of money my friend,’ he continued as his eyes drifted back to Campbell and fixed on him. ‘You are going to give it to me.’

Christ, thought Campbell, who the hell else knows about this now?

Walker continued to stare into his eyes and slowly lifted the cigarette from his mouth, exhaled through his nose and then replaced it.

Leaving it hanging in his lips he calmly stepped to the side and took Sarah’s arm, drawing her across the room with him away from Campbell whose eyes went wide as yet more fear fizzed through his body.

Spinning her around so she faced Campbell, Walker slipped a hand around her waist and drew her close to him, resting his chin on his shoulder and allowing Campbell to watch his gaze wander down over her body. Sarah froze and stared imploringly at Campbell, tears beginning to well in her eyes.

The hand at her waist began to creep up over her midriff toward her chest and Walker looked up again at Campbell with a smirk full of malevolence. As his hand moved closer to her breasts she squirmed suddenly and tried to pull away but this only made Walker grin more broadly and he clamped his arms around her ribs and shoulders and held her to him, his cheek pressed against hers.

Campbell made only the slightest of movements toward them, with no clear thought of what he might do. In a second he had dropped to his knees as a solid fist slammed into his kidneys from behind and his vision blurred as he winced in agony.

‘I could make this clearer for you,’ came that voice again. Sarah began to cry at the sight of him on his knees, ‘But I don’t think that’s necessary.’

As he knelt there, the pain shooting up through his abdomen he blinked tears from his eyes and tried to fight off a tangible feeling of panic. Not when bound and beaten in Gresham’s filthy lock-up, nor when Slater had chased him or even when the mystery caller at the cottage had run them down along the cliff-top had Campbell felt this scared. The situation had never been so completely out of his control until now.

The stakes had been raised once more and he was way out of his depth. Again, Sarah was at risk and Campbell could do nothing to help her this time. He felt his resolve crumbling fast and he knew he wanted out. Now. He had been foolish to think that he could win this game, foolish to think that he could even play it.

As he looked up again the tall thin man called Walker was in front of him and Sarah had slid down the wall and was crouched now next to Gresham’s daughter who had watched the entire scene in silence. He caught her eye and she looked almost apologetic for a moment.

‘Now then,’ said Walker and suddenly huge hands had wrapped painfully around Campbell’s bruised chest from above and he was dragged roughly to his feet. ‘Go with the boys, waste precisely none of my time trying to fuck me about and then bring me back what I want.’

He turned theatrically to look at the two frightened young women cowering on the floor behind him. ‘Do be quick though. I’ll have to find something to do if I get too bored.’

54

Tuesday. 1.20am.

It wasn’t quite clear what was happening here but it was obvious that Campbell was the key to it. Who then, were these others? As far as Drennan was concerned it was only Gresham and his motley crew that ought to even know who Campbell was, let alone be carting him off in the middle of the night.

So what was going on?

Drennan had been chewing this over for a few minutes since having parked the car further along the street and watched the group in the other car empty out and enter a run-down looking terraced house. Gresham had been sitting on the memory stick since the fiasco of the break in at Griffin. Then they had screwed up knocking off Cooper as he’d told them to but that had somehow panned out OK when he’d died in a west London hospital.

Neither Drennan nor his boss thought that Cooper would have been able to say too much to Campbell, who had got himself involved in something he couldn’t possibly understand. But Gresham’s lot had seemed as if they were going to tidy that up for them anyway, which meant that Drennan, Tyler and their boss could stay nice and anonymous. Of course as time passed and there were no results his boss had grown increasingly nervous.

Drennan could only imagine that perhaps Campbell himself had involved others and got himself further into trouble. He had certainly proved unpredictable so far and everybody had underestimated him, Drennan and his paymaster included. The other option made Drennan more nervous.

That Gresham had involved someone else.

Because if that was true, it could only mean one of two things; either Gresham was trying to sell the stick to a higher bidder. Or he didn’t actually have it. Otherwise, why would somebody else be after Campbell?

The young man was an irritation, and a possible witness and that meant that he was a threat to Gresham. But this new development seemed to change all that. Could that be it? Could that be the reason for his involvement? Not just that he knew something but rather that he had something?

Drennan needed to find out what was going on. But there was something more important on the agenda and that was to eliminate the exposure of this information. Campbell — and now the girl, whoever she was — would be disposed of shortly and then the memory stick, if indeed it was in Campbell’s possession rather than Gresham’s, would be his. No more time for messing around with these amateurs he decided, unbuckling his seatbelt and nudging Tyler. It was about time the professionals tidied this up.

The bigger of the two men, was at least six feet three and must have been pushing twenty stone, none of it fat. He walked in front of Campbell twirling his car keys on his finger whilst the other man gripped his bound hands from behind. It seemed like it had been some time since he had last been tied up like this but the sores on his wrists from Gresham’s rope stung as sharply as ever as he stumbled down the narrow staircase.

His course was clear now and left no room for improvising or running. This new man, Walker, had the upper hand and he seemed to know exactly what he was doing. Campbell recalled the look of lost helplessness and terror on Sarah’s face as he’d been dragged from the room and he felt nauseous at the memory and the thought of her alone back there.

Now the driver and the man that he had run into as he had tried to flee his flat earlier on walked in front and behind him along a dim hallway of a small house. The bedroom upstairs, sparse and dingy with Sarah inside, was only a short distance away but already he felt as if he were miles from her.

Obviously Walker was the boss of the outfit. Obviously he was bad news as well. If he was willing to do something like this to a man like Gresham, he had to be.

They moved quietly through the shadows and stuck close to the wall, watching the front of the house carefully, checking the windows for signs of movement.

At the door Drennan pulled his hand from his coat and Tyler saw that his handgun had a suppressor attached. Just like Drennan, Tyler thought, always trying to be so bloody flash. Always playing the secret agent. Still, he was a handy enough operator and since Tyler was going to be the one popping the door open with his foot, Drennan would be leading the way in and that was fine with him.

He had no idea what they were getting into here but he could feel that familiar buzz of excitement and he fixed his eyes on the door figuring out where the locks were and where he’d have to kick.

Here we go then, he thought and closed his hand around the butt of his own gun.

55

Tuesday. 1.30am.

Gresham could see Walker standing over Angie and he was watching him remove his belt and begin to beat her with the leather strap. Then he was dropping his trousers and moving down on top of her as she lay there, gagged and tied and helpless.

Then something strange happened as Gresham saw that it wasn’t Walker at all. This man was bigger and his skin was dark and his hair cropped short and not parted with that dead straight line at the side. Gresham saw now that he was looking at Julius Warren.

Warren had betrayed him. Warren was helping Walker to do this to him and maybe the others were helping too. Maybe there was nobody he could trust anymore.

He could hear Warren saying his name as he looked on but he didn’t answer and the calls grew louder.

‘GEORGE!’

He jolted awake. Warren was staring at him and holding the phone out. ‘Slater’s on.’

For a moment he did nothing. Dazed and bewildered he knew he was in his own living room and he realised that he must finally have fallen asleep but the dreams had come again and this one had been so clear. He pressed his hands to his eyes, trying to clear the image and snatched the phone.

‘Keith?’

Late in the afternoon Gresham had sent Slater to go and swap places with Warren. As his number two he had wanted him on hand, close. But Slater had been restless and grown more edgy as the time passed and eventually Gresham had relented, deciding that the man’s energy might be better put to use elsewhere.

‘George. Something’s kicking off.’

‘Where the fuck have you been?

‘We were watching the place and it had been quiet for about ten minutes or so and I decided to have a poke around inside while Keano waited in the car. Then fuck me if Campbell didn’t pop up out of nowhere, right there in the hallway,’ Slater explained, barely able to believe it himself.

‘Where did he come from?’ demanded Gresham.

‘Christ knows. And he had some bird with him. Anyway, I was creeping around with the lights off and heard something in the kitchen. I turned the light on and it was just this girl. No idea who she is. Then, two seconds later and he appeared behind me and smashed a fucking huge pot over my head. Put me out. Little bastard.’

‘Where are you now?’

‘Keano saw them loaded into the back of a car — Walker’s lot turned up. I came round as they were walking out the front door. Keano pulled the car up and we followed them.’

‘So now Walker has Campbell and Angie? We’ve got nothing,’ Gresham was staring at the floor, his eyes blank.

‘Listen to me George. We’re sat here for a minute or two and Drennan just appeared with his fat little sidekick. They just kicked the front door in.’

‘Drennan? As well? What the fuck is going on here Keith?’

‘Search me. You want us to follow him in there?’

Gresham paused for a moment. His instinct was to send them in. God knows what was happening in there but his Angie was there too, of that much he was certain. But if there were too many of Walker’s men about then it would be over before it began. Slater and Keane wouldn’t get two inches inside the front door and that wouldn’t help her one bit.

‘Sit tight Keith. Wait and see what happens for a minute.’

Wondering if anybody even lived in this house Campbell was trying to make mental notes of the place in case he needed to give details to someone in the future, like the police, and he was struck by the dank and run-down look of the place. The wallpaper was faded and had a garish design the likes of which he had last seen when stripping the walls in his own flat and discovering aged layers beneath.

The carpet at his feet was a smudgy brown colour with a number of stains and tears in it and worn through to the wood beneath on the lip of each step of the staircase. He noted once again that the lightbulbs had no shades.

From the front of them came a loud, thumping, crashing sound and he heard wood splinter noisily. Suddenly he was alert again and trying to see over the shoulder of the man in front who obscured his view.

The twin popping sounds he heard were only vaguely familiar to him and for a split second he could not understand why. But then the big man’s hands were flung into the air as something slammed hard into his chest and he staggered against the wall and dropped to his knees.

The man at his rear had released his hands now and as Campbell looked from the big man’s slumping form to the hallway in front of him, he saw a spray of crimson splashed across that grimy wallpaper and carpet. And then he saw a coated figure in the doorway, a handgun with a sleek lengthened barrel gripped in two hands still aimed at the man down on his knees.

Campbell found himself yanked backwards almost off his feet and he slammed shoulder-first against the wall and toward the staircase, struggling to keep upright. A hand was placed roughly in his back, propelling him forward and the momentum took him onto the first of the steps but it was too quick and he wasn’t ready and tripped, falling onto his knees.

With his hands tied behind him he pitched forward, unable to balance and he landed face first on the coarse carpet.

Behind him the other man was desperately trying to get him back on his feet and moving back up, away from the door before he heard that pop-pop sound again.

Tyler swung himself in behind Drennan and followed him through the door.

The shots had come as a shock. He hadn’t expected that things would escalate so fast but almost as soon as his foot had landed on the door he had seen a huge figure of a man lumbering toward them and he had ducked back to the side to allow Drennan his clear shot.

The big man had slumped against the wall, eyes wide. They had been just as surprised to get visitors it seemed as he and Drennan had been to see a welcoming party. Drennan had obscured his view as he moved quickly into the house, gun raised still and trained on the first man but Tyler had caught a fleeting view of two other figures turning and scrambling for the stairs beyond but they seemed to stumble.

Perfect.

Drennan dropped slightly to the side, his aim moving to the two figures scrabbling at the foot of the staircase, and Tyler had a better view now and covered the big man on the floor with his own weapon. The two of them stepped along the hallway and everything seemed to be going their way already. One down, two to go.

Another two steps and he could hear the distressed, laboured breathing of the big man slumped against the wall. His chest was leaking blood profusely and he looked bewildered, as if he wasn’t quite convinced that this was really happening.

Suddenly, there was a flurry of movement off to the right of Drennan and another figure burst from a doorway and slammed straight into the surprised man. Tyler watched as they tangled, Drennan stumbling backward and tripping over the wounded man on the floor.

As Drennan fell over, the wounded man seemed to come to attention, suddenly aware that his attacker was now vulnerable. He used the momentum of Drennan’s fall to drag him to the ground where he rolled and shifted his bulk up on top of him.

Tyler raised his gun to aim it at the wounded man before he could pin Drennan down but there was no time to pull the trigger as the new figure turned away from Drennan and span to face Tyler.

The man rushed him and for the first time Tyler realised that he was armed; a huge kitchen knife gripped in his fist. He shifted the aim of the gun toward his attacker but the man slashed wildly with the knife and hot pain lanced up his arm as the blade flashed through his jacket and cut him.

Startled, he drew his arm away instinctively from the slashing blade.

And then realised that he had surrendered the advantage.

The knifeman was onto him all too quickly, the blade still flailing wildly in front of him and as Tyler tried to duck back away from him to avoid it the man pounced and the two of them staggered backward. Tyler had caught the knifeman’s wrists as he came and his gun was knocked from his fist. He tried to avoid falling to the ground and to hold the knifeman off, but as he did so the long blade stabbed at his face.

He had slowed the forward momentum of the knife and the wound was not deep but it had glanced across his forehead and opened a long cut. He felt blood running into his eyes and they blinked shut automatically.

Half blind, Tyler felt himself begin to panic and he tried to wheel away back toward the door, tried to remember his training. He felt the man’s hands pulling free of his grasp and he raised his own to his eyes, frantically trying to rub the blood from them to clear his vision.

In the distance he heard the pop of Drennan’s gun and for a moment he felt hope rise up. Maybe they were regaining control here. Maybe Drennan had just shot the knifeman.

The weight of the body on top of him was nothing like he’d expected it to be and Drennan was struggling hard to avoid being pinned to the floor by the injured man hauling his bulky frame on top of him as he lay prone on the threadbare carpet.

From beneath him he had seen Tyler stumble back in a struggle with the figure who had sprung Drennan and knocked him off balance. He’d been so intent on getting to the two on the staircase before they could regain their feet that he’d carelessly left himself open from the other side. Stupid. He felt battered but not cut however and was sure that the knife he’d seen glint in front of him had not made meaningful contact.

Shifting his body backward underneath the wounded man he tried to lift himself a little. With his weight mostly on his right side he was resting on his gun hand and was therefore not able to use it.

Seeing what he was attempting, the wounded man made a grab for Drennan’s right hand and lurched forward knocking him flat to the floor again. Drennan desperately jerked the gun away. He wondered how soon the two on the staircase would be up again and whether they would join the fight or if they would continue to flee in their panic.

His chest felt warm and was beginning to dampen already, even through his thick coat, as the other man’s wounds wept blood freely. He was amazed that the man still had the strength to fight but seeing the injuries and sensing that his opponent’s only real advantage was his weight, Drennan made his move.

Bucking his hips he managed to loosen himself a little from under the other man and he repeated this move quickly as he shifted his backside a few inches along the carpet. Once more he did it, shifting further and then once more and suddenly his upper body was free of the hulking form which now lay across his legs, still grasping at him. Sitting up, his arms free again, Drennan raised his hands in front of him and levelled the pistol at the man who stared at him over the dark barrel, his eyes blank, his mouth hanging open.

He squeezed the trigger once and put a round straight through the big man’s forehead.

As he looked up to see how Tyler was getting on he raised the gun at the knifeman and he noticed that Tyler’s face was smeared with blood, saw his hands wiping frantically at his eyes.

He hesitated just a moment. The knifeman was right in front of Tyler. If Drennan fired now, would he hit Tyler by mistake? Would the bullets pass through his target and into his partner’s body? But what else could he do?

Too late, Drennan fired.

Two shots to the head dropped the knifeman quickly and suddenly to the floor. As he fell away, Drennan sat staring at the black handle of the kitchen knife protruding from Tyler’s chest where it had been buried to the hilt.

56

Tuesday. 1.35 am.

Slumped in the corner next to this other young woman Sarah was so frightened she had begun to shiver. Campbell was gone and she was now left to the mercy of this vile looking man whose hands had wandered so repugnantly over her body. After the other two men had left with Daniel she had cowered away from him, pressing herself against this woman she did not know.

Pacing the room he had turned occasionally to glance down at the two of them, a look in his eye that made her blood run cold. She had not said anything to the other woman yet though she desperately wanted to, to make some kind of connection with her now that she seemed like her only ally.

Then suddenly a flash of memory came to her. It had been a few days ago. She had been walking along his road, looking for the right number to his flat and then seen him, some fifty yards further up, hurrying — being hurried, so he said — into a car with a man and a woman.

Sarah turned her head and suddenly she was looking at the face of the woman that had been there that day.

What the hell?

Before she could say anything or even think about it there came from the doorway noises that turned all their heads. Running, shouting, falling and a strange popping noise that sounded out of place but chilling nonetheless. The tall man went suddenly alert and stared at the door for a moment before striding forward and looking out and down the passageway. As they all stared and tried to focus their hearing the sounds continued to drift up to them; more footsteps, grunting, another popping noise.

The tall man, without a look back, disappeared from the room and began to move down the hall and Sarah and the other woman exchanged a glance of bewildered terror. She wanted to run now too, to get away from this cold bare room and its filthy walls, away from these people. But she was frozen there, listening, a hostage to her fear.

Campbell was bouncing up the stairs now, stooped slightly forward to keep his balance. He stole a glance over his shoulder at the scene behind him.

The man in the coat with the handgun was rolling the bleeding, lifeless body from his legs and was turning now toward the stairs, raising the gun.

Campbell heard that terrible pop again and he felt, rather than saw, the second of his captors flung forward and down against the steep stairs behind him. In three more huge strides he was at the top and bounding along the hallway.

Careering around the corner he crunched clumsily against the wall and was suddenly face to face with Walker. He froze for a moment, uncertain of what to do. His overriding instinct was to get to Sarah but here he stood, between a rock and a hard place.

Walker looked at him questioningly but before he could speak there was a shout from behind and he span to see the gunman cresting the stairs and calling his name.

For a second Campbell was confused, shocked that this new man should know his name. Walker had heard the shout too and had suddenly flattened himself against the wall. Campbell looked back at the gunman, the barrel being swung up toward him, and he bolted out of sight around the corner and past Walker, instinct overriding reason.

Now Campbell moved back along the hall to the room that held Sarah and Angie and he turned again to check his back. Suddenly, as the gunman burst round the corner he was pounced on by Walker who grabbed the wrist of his gun-hand and pushed it high into the air and the two of them slammed against the far wall and began to wrestle.

With a push, his heavy coat flapping up around him, the gunman managed to swing a fist at Walker but the tall slender frame absorbed the punch. He kept his feet and flashed a knee up into the gunman’s ribs.

Again they fell onto each other and Campbell could see the gun waving around above both their heads as they struggled with the weapon. Rolling along the wall as they fought, Campbell watched as suddenly the door they fell against crashed open and the two men went tumbling through into the room beyond.

Campbell found the door he was looking for and rushed in. The two of them were huddled into the corner as if trying to put every possible inch of space between them and the noises they were hearing and both looked terrified. They stared up at him for a moment frozen, bewildered.

‘Come on!’ he barked, ‘NOW!’

In the rising tension Slater had forgotten the cold and very nearly also the pain in his head so focused was he on the house.

Keane, sitting next to him, rubbing his hands and glancing every so often at the red stained tea towel that Slater had hurriedly wrapped round his head, evidently had forgotten neither. He sat forward and tried to peer through the gloom at the front of the house but there was nothing to tell from here. There was silence and nothing moved at the house or anywhere else in this street.

‘You think we should call George back? Might be worth sticking our head round the door now,’ Keane said but the apprehension in his voice gave him away.

The both of them were torn. The wait was agonising and they were itching to get involved, but they had no idea how many men were in there and seeing Drennan and Tyler go bursting in had done nothing for their confidence. If those two had their own agenda now there was no telling how they would react to seeing Slater and Keane follow them in.

‘He’ll ring back,’ Slater replied flatly. He was struggling with his emotions now and knew that he shared Keane’s reluctance to get involved and the probable risks they would be facing. Drennan looked like he was armed when he had burst in through the door and he had dealt with Walker’s boys enough times to know that they were dangerous even when they weren’t carrying.

Even so, it was Angie stuck in there in the middle of it. All of them had an affection for her. More than once Slater had felt a big-brotherly compulsion to sort out some disrespectful young lad only to find that Angie had dealt with him more than capably. Slater also had a burning desire to get his hands on Campbell again, to hit him and hit him until he’d handed over the stick and then begged and then cried and then bled.

Slater felt though, through the fury, a strange feeling toward Campbell developing. A certain grudging respect. Slater had dealt with plenty of people far harder than the young man, far tougher and more ruthless individuals, but none, he thought, so resilient, so resourceful, so pig-headedly determined as he was. He just didn’t know when he was beaten. As much as he wanted to knock him about, he couldn’t ignore that in Campbell. If Keane or Cooper had shown some of his nous they’d never be in this shit in the first place.

‘Get a bit closer,’ Slater said.

Keane slipped the car into gear and rolled quietly away from the kerb and along the road. Back in the shadows where they had been hiding their view was poor. Slater didn’t much want to go in there but he they needed to get a better view, and besides, they couldn’t sit around waiting for too much longer.

Pulling level with the front of the house Keane slowed to a crawl to get a good look. The front door was open but only a crack, seemingly having swung closed behind Drennan and Tyler on their dramatic entry. Light shone from the hallway beyond but he could see no shadows giving signs of movement.

He turned his head quickly to check the road was still clear in front of him and when he turned back he thought he spotted something in the light of the doorway, some shift of shadows to betray activity inside. He grabbed Keane’s arm and the other man tapped the brakes and the car stopped.

In a blaze of light the door crashed open and three running figures filled the frame. Slater stared in astonishment as they came racing down the path and as they dashed into the road he realised that he recognised Angie; tired and gaunt looking but Angie nonetheless. He saw that she had spotted his car and was shepherding the other two toward it. He noticed then that all three had their hands tied.

The rear door popped open as Angie span round to reach the handle with her hands and then all three were falling into the seat, shifting and bumping awkwardly across the leather. Angie was last in.

‘Go!’ she shrieked. ‘Fucking go!’

But Keane didn’t need to be told twice and already he was waking up the neighbours with the engine growling noisily and the tyres squealing away down the road.

57

Tuesday. 2.30am.

There was menace in the room from every corner and Sarah’s eyes were wide and darting.

Slater in the corner, all forearms and fury, looked ready to spring across the carpet and start pounding him to the floor as if giving him the slip outside in Liverpool Street all those days ago was still as fresh in his mind as the wound on his temple.

The other two were somehow less frightening. The coloured man, Campbell noted, was a laid back character and seemed delighted at the look on Gresham’s face when they had brought his daughter back to him. The other man, the driver, seemed more concerned with Slater than with him and had barely spoken a word to anybody since they’d poured themselves chaotically into the back of the car. This did little to reassure him.

Gresham for his part had not let Angie go since he had engulfed her in a bear hug ten minutes previously and he did not look as if he would let her go ever again. He did though, and all too soon.

Campbell and Sarah were sat on two straight-backed chairs in the corner where Keane and Slater had parked them minutes before. As yet Slater had held back from laying into him though he had not exactly been gentle manhandling Campbell from the car to the house. He seemed to be waiting for a cue from his boss.

Gresham walked slowly toward Campbell, eyeing him and Sarah both with exaggerated interest as if to highlight their compromised position. He looked from Campbell to Slater’s head and back again and raised his eyebrows. He had been waiting for this moment, Campbell knew, and he was milking it.

‘Aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend?’ said Gresham with a wolfish grin.

Campbell’s cheeks flushed at the implied threat.

Gresham stared down at Sarah and Campbell stared up at him in turn as he did so.

‘Is that the best you can do?’

Gresham looked more surprised than Campbell to hear Sarah speak, and more so at the defiant, almost mocking tone of her voice.

‘You what?’ Gresham said.

‘You heard her George you fucking bully.’ Campbell couldn’t stop the words before he’d said them.

In a flash, Gresham had him pinned by to the wall, his sweater bunched on his chest in two huge fists.

‘You, my son, have got a big mouth and a small brain.’ Gresham was right in his face, lips curled in a snarl, eyes narrowed.

‘Stop it.’

Campbell saw his eyes flicker before he realised that it wasn’t Sarah’s voice.

‘Stop it Dad,’ Angie repeated.

‘You can leave now love,’ Gresham said without taking his eyes off Campbell.

‘Listen to your daughter George,’ Campbell said, returning the steady gaze. He had seen and heard the gratitude from Angie as she had spoken to them and to the other men in the car now she had spoken up for him against her father.

Gresham’s face was burning deep red now and sweat was beading on his brow. He gripped Campbell’s sweater tighter in his hands pulled him away from the wall and then slammed him back against it.

‘You fucking owe me one George,’ Campbell shouted, even as the wind was knocked out of him. Gresham paused and his grip eased just a tiny amount. He bent close to Campbell’s ear as he bowed his head and tried to get his breath.

‘What?’ he hissed.

Coughing, Campbell said, ‘You owe me. You owe me for her.’

Gresham said nothing for a second and Campbell, suddenly enraged, reached up and tore Gresham’s hands away from him, shoved the bigger man back from him violently.

‘Come on George. You were fucked! You had no idea where she was or how to get her back,’ Campbell shouted. ‘Those two were sat outside doing nothing. I got her out of that house George. Ask her what happened. Go on. I went back in there and got her out with me.’

Gresham stayed silent, part of him amazed at the younger man’s behaviour, part of him thinking reluctantly that perhaps he had a point. He turned and looked at Angie who stayed silent but whose eyes gave Gresham the answer that Campbell wanted.

‘You guys have no clue what this is about. Nothing. You know why you stole that data? Who it was for?’ Campbell looked around the room. He saw hard angry eyes looking back at him but no answers. He shook his head. ‘Not a clue.’

‘Who gives a shit?’ Gresham said suddenly. ‘Who the fuck are you anyway? Who cares why and who for? They’re paying me sunshine. Paying cash which I happen to need.’

Campbell was shaking his head. ‘Not anymore.’

‘Come again?’ Slater finally broke his silence. ‘George, we’ve heard enough of this haven’t we?’

Campbell was still shaking his head but he was looking Gresham right in the eye again, level, confident. ‘You don’t. You don’t have a debt. This guy, Walker? He’s dead George. I saw some bloke sticking a gun into his chest.’

Gresham returned the stare, his eyes daring Campbell to even consider lying to him.

‘I saw the gun shoved into his ribs as we were running down the hall. They were fighting in the room and I saw the other guy with his gun on top of your man Walker. And I heard the shots. Two.’

‘You see him get shot?’

Campbell hesitated. ‘It was half a second after I turned my head George, a tenth of a second. He’s dead.’

Gresham turned his head slowly to look at Slater. Both men stared silently at each other for a long moment. Though they said nothing, Campbell sensed that they might actually believe him.

‘So what then? You trying to tell me you’re keeping the memory stick?’ Gresham said turning back to him.

‘You owe me one for Angie George. You owe me a favour.’

‘My favour will be to not give you a proper belting and stop him from tearing your head off.’ Gresham said jabbing a finger in Slater’s direction.

‘No George,’ said Campbell, staring over Gresham’s shoulder. ‘No, you can do me a little job.’

‘Are you fucking mad son?’

He looked back at George Gresham and smiled.

‘Hear me out. Just give me ten minutes.’

‘This better be really good.’

‘She goes home. OK?’ Campbell pointed at Sarah. ‘She’s got nothing to do with this and you lot have got no gripe with her. Take her home. Just me and you George. Ten minutes and I promise you, it will be worth it. We’ll be all square. Just me and you.’

Gresham stared at him for a long time, intent and thoughtful. He waved away a protest from Slater and then turned to Warren. ‘Do it. Take her home.’

Sarah looked frightened and turned to Campbell but he shook his head and looked her in the eye. ‘It’s alright. I’ll be fine. They won’t do anything. Not while we still have the stick.’

Warren stood and opened the door for Sarah who walked nervously through. Angie stood as well. ‘I’ll come along too if it makes you feel better. Jules is a pussycat anyway but still…’ Sarah seemed to appreciate the presence of the other woman and they all left the room.

‘Keano. Go home. It's late. Keith, you stay.’ Gresham said, his gaze still on Campbell.

Keane made to protest but Gresham turned and silenced him with a look. Keane trudged dejectedly out the door. Gresham turned back to Campbell. ‘Keith stays. You convince us both.’

So Campbell explained it all to them; how they were being used, why and by whom. He told them what he had learned since Cooper had landed bleeding on his kitchen floor and they listened intently, surprised and enthralled at Campbell’s tale. He told them how they would get paid twice over. How Drennan, or whoever else it was they had contact with, would pay them their money, that they could make much more for themselves on top of this, and exactly how they would do it.

Campbell told them all that he knew exactly what he was going to do next, exactly how this would all end.

IV

58

Tuesday. 12pm.

The first thing to do, Gresham knew, would be to call Walker. They would have to find out for sure if what Campbell was saying were true.

Had George not been so anxious himself, he might have noticed the sweat on Campbell’s brow as he dialled the Gangster’s number. It would not be unusual of course to get one of Walker’s men on the line instead given the late hour and the fact that as one of the capital’s foremost violent criminals, he might be attending to some other important business. Even so, Gresham was no more reassured by the fact that no-one answered Walker’s phone, despite what that signified and despite the fact that after what had gone on earlier that night at Walker’s safe house, Gresham was probably the first person that Walker would have called on.

They had no more joy when they instead tried to call Drennan.

Soon Gresham concluded that if Campbell was wrong and Walker was still alive then they would know soon enough when he got in touch again. The hour was not so much late now as it was early. It would be starting to grow light soon and Gresham was, like all of them, exhausted.

Campbell would sleep here it was decided, in Gresham’s spare room and Slater would be on the floor next to him, just to discourage any further thoughts of escape, which was far from his mind as it was.

Given the conversations they'd had, the things that Campbell had told them and the danger they all faced, Campbell felt almost safer here with these men, hard and cruel though they were, than had he headed off alone into the night once again. He was asleep as soon as he had phoned Sarah to check that she was OK; Warren had taken her to her sister’s place where she was safe and happy. The moment that he lay on the bed he was sleeping and Slater followed him into tired oblivion soon after.

The morning came sooner than anybody wanted but Gresham finally heard the news that they all wanted. Not from Walker though, whose phone still went unanswered, nor from Drennan, whose phone was evidently now switched off.

Warren it was who called them. He had gone home himself to get sleep after dropping Sarah off and on awaking the next morning it was one of the first things that he heard. Everyone was talking about it on the street, what had happened last night. A bust by the police gone wrong, or a turf hit by one of his gangland rivals. One idea even had it that an Eastern European group, who were expanding from people trafficking and prostitution into drugs and racketeering was responsible. Whatever the speculation was, they all agreed on one thing. Frankie Walker was dead.

With that phone call Campbell had his freedom but accepted it almost reluctantly. Here, beneath the umbrella of protection provided by Gresham and his men, Campbell had felt momentarily secure. This most unlikely of alliances gave him a group of ruthless and hardened bodyguards with a vested interest in his safety.

Even so, if they were to put Campbell’s plan into effect, he and Sarah needed to return to their homes and their lives and the fear and uncertainty that was part of the deal.

Gresham instructed Warren to watch them. He would take Campbell home and remain contactable at all times, on protection and surveillance detail. In this way Campbell and Sarah felt a little safer and more confident and Gresham got to make sure that they did what they said they would. On past experience he had little reason to trust Campbell but the things he said about his accidental involvement and his wish to be free of the danger and threat that dogged him Gresham knew to be true. The deal that he had proposed was good enough to take a chance. Warren was insurance and that kept everyone happy.

By midday, Campbell was heading across London again, to his home in the west of the city. Slater, Gresham and Keane sat down and began to make plans. They would have to move, quickly and carefully. It would have to be tonight and this time, there could be no mistakes.

59

Tuesday. 5pm.

Once or twice at University and occasionally at work Campbell had found himself giving presentations. He didn’t enjoy it. He didn’t like to be the centre of attention too much and his nerves and obvious discomfort had often let him down when faced with a crowd of expectant people.

He wouldn’t have to do that tomorrow he knew, but the preparation was the same, the reading and re-reading, the notes he kept scribbling as he tried to absorb the information so he could reel it off without reading it. He needed facts and figures in his head, he needed to know what it was he would be talking about. It was this parallel that made him uneasy because it invoked memories of what normally followed; standing up to speak, all eyes on him, the dry mouth, the quick pulse, the pressure. Tomorrow, he knew at least that his would be an audience of one. But what an audience.

He was beginning to feel that he was soon to hit the wall; that what he was reading now was not going in anymore. His brain had reached its capacity and he couldn’t force himself to absorb anymore. He probably knew enough now and he wondered as he sat there, surrounded by paperwork and the humming PC in his flat, how much he would need to say and how much was already known.

Campbell was nervous. He would have to make an instant impression. There would not be any long introductions where he could build a damning and convincing picture or put forth his claim, no visual aids or overhead projections, no PowerPoint. He would live or die in those opening seconds and he would need to have the other man listening from the off, to get him into the position that Campbell needed him. Campbell knew that the other man wielded immense power and influence and if he got it wrong the implications were grave and unthinkable.

But as much as he tried to formulate that clear, decisive argument, other details clouded in on his thinking, and one more than most. A name, Ben Wishart. One he knew that he knew but when or how he’d heard it, he couldn’t pin down. Wishart’s name popped up here and there in the research he’d been so submerged in as did others. Though it were no surprise that other people might have become involved, inadvertently or otherwise, along the way, this name wormed its way into his thoughts the more he tried to dismiss it.

Sarah walked into the room and he looked up. She wore jeans and a fitted t-shirt with a Superman S emblazoned across the front. Her hair was pulled up into a ponytail and she wore no make-up. Having come over to see him immediately on his return, she had retired exhausted and had been sleeping for the last hour leaving Campbell to his reading and his peaking sense of isolation and impending confrontation. She rubbed at her eyes and Campbell wondered that she might not be better going back to sleep.

‘How you doing?’ she asked.

‘Headache. Losing the plot,’ he replied. ‘You?’

‘Better for the sleep.’

She stood there in the door for a long moment. Campbell had hardly spoken to her since he had negotiated her safety the night before.

On arriving that afternoon she had looked tired, fraught and had told him that she had slept badly at her sister’s flat. Yes, she had been safe there and out of the way, where no-one might think to look, but she knew nothing of what was happening all the same and she had worried. She knew nothing of how he might be faring.

As she stood in the doorway running her hands over her tired face he felt as if he should be apologising for everything, that he should be begging for her not to hate him for what he had involved her in. He remembered that desperate sprint through the cold wet night, leaving her hiding frightened in the trees. He saw Walker touching her, leering at her. He remembered the look in her eye as he was led from the dark squalid room, leaving her behind in a cold and threatening place that she had not seen before and with people she did not know.

‘Danny,’ Sarah said looking at him. He realised he had been staring at her as his thoughts wandered.

‘Yes?’

‘Thank you. Thank you for coming back for me.’

‘What? Don’t be silly.’ It was the last thing he had been expecting.

‘Really. I know you think you’re responsible but I do make my own decisions, for better or worse. You didn’t have to do what you did.’

Campbell remembered his clumsy flight down that dingy corridor, racing back toward her and Angie. He had been trying to escape from the gunman as much as anything. Had he any clear plan to rescue them? Any idea where he would go had Walker or Drennan followed him? All he could really remember was a fierce and driven determination to get to her.

‘I really didn’t do much you know.’

Sarah smiled at him and then walked across the room. Campbell felt something in his throat tighten and he swallowed as she drew near.

Without a word Sarah’s arms reached around his neck where he sat and she pulled him toward her, squeezing him to her chest and bending down to kiss the top of his head.

She held him there for a long time and he couldn’t tell for sure but it felt as if she might be crying. Nervously, uncertainly, Campbell put his arms around her back and turned in the chair. She moved her legs so they were between his and pressed herself closer to him and his arms reached as far around her as they would go, one at her waist, the other snaking up around her shoulder. He closed his eyes as they leant against each other.

And the name came back to him again. Ben Wishart.

60

Tuesday. 6pm.

Drennan had been sitting at home that morning after a restless night throughout which the image of Tyler’s dead vacant eyes staring upwards at nothing had haunted him. Drennan stepping over his body. Stepping into the road dazed, looking for his car, trying to decide whether to call someone, what he would say to them. Fighting panic.

He still had blood over him from the scuffle with the tall wiry man upstairs who had jumped him. Skinny but tough the man had proved a real problem and they had wrestled on the floor of that dank bedroom for long seconds, struggling desperately until Drennan had pushed the long snout of his gun into the man’s abdomen and pumped two rounds into him.

It had been as if someone had set a small bomb off inside his body and as he had drawn himself up out of the tangle on the floor to stand he could see what he had done to the man’s insides as they slipped out of his back. Only the detached unreality he had felt had saved him from vomiting at the stench of all that blood and the man’s relaxing bowels.

He remembered feeling very little at the sight of the knife handle pointing up at him from Tylers red chest like an accusation. Guilt certainly that it was his fault somehow, fear at what would happen now. But remorse? Grief for his fallen colleague? Drennan had only been worried, as he carried Tyler’s body to his car, that he didn’t feel these things. That perhaps he lacked something vital.

The one thing he was missing of course was the memory stick and as mystified as he still was about what he had walked into the night before, Gresham was insistent that he still had it and that the time had now come to make the exchange.

Drennan agreed. He suspected that Gresham had somehow managed to lose the stick after seeing Campbell in that house with men that had no obvious connections with Gresham. All the same he seemed pretty confident that he had it now and that he now wanted shot of it.

Perhaps one of his gang had run his mouth off and put one of Gresham’s rivals on the scent. That seemed a reasonable possibility and it seemed as though whatever they had tried, Drennan and Tyler had put paid to it since all the men in the house were now dead and Campbell and the girl had vanished again.

With Gresham now demanding his money, it seemed that the attempt of the man he had shot to get in on the deal had prompted Gresham to speed things up. With Drennan equally keen to get his hands on the memory stick, where it would be safer than with that useless rabble, he had readily agreed to meet with him that coming Thursday. His boss would sanction the payment now, eager to regain some grip on a situation that had threatened to spin out of control. With Gresham paid off and out of the way and the stick safe there remained only Campbell, who seemed more interested in running than fighting and that suited him fine. Maybe he would show up again soon, in which case they would take their chance to silence him when it presented itself. But maybe they would never hear from him again.

Drennan hoped so because so far he’d been nothing but trouble.

61

Wednesday. 6pm.

Andrew Griffin dipped his chin down into the woollen scarf he wore and hurried his pace but he felt unsettled enough by this meeting already to be too bothered about the temperature. He was both intrigued and agitated by what he was going to hear.

The neutral location suggested something clandestine, but as he trotted up the steps and into the lobby of the hotel he felt more comfortable in the anonymity that it might provide than in using a more public location. He could never have done this in the company offices.

He gave his name at reception and waited with a polite smile whilst the attractive blond girl behind the desk tapped a keyboard and watched a screen.

‘Five one four,’ she said and handed him a keycard.

Griffin thanked her and walked to the lift trying to remain composed, trying to fight the rising unease. He had no idea what he would be told or asked. Was there more to discover that he did not yet know or had he found out everything about his predecessors?

Griffin was nervous that things seemed to have gone quiet since the break-in. Though that did mean at least that nothing bad had yet happened that might threaten him or his company, neither did it rule such things out. He would rather have something tangible to deal with, a challenge to tackle. Waiting was pure frustration for Griffin but now perhaps he was finally going to find something out.

He hit the button for the fifth floor and loosened his coat and scarf. Already he was getting warm.

62

Wednesday. 6.15pm.

Campbell sat in the chair near the window and watched the evening gather over London. He wore a navy suit, the only one he owned that was tailored. It was an indulgence but he had decided to spend a little of his bonus a year before on getting a tailored suit so he could look good in important meetings and at the summer wedding of his boss.

In a clean, crisp white shirt and red silk tie Campbell had looked at himself in the mirror and was surprised at the little boost of confidence that it gave him. A simple thing but effective to look well-dressed and professional. Campbell wanted to make an instant impression and jeans and a sweatshirt was not the first thing he wanted the other man to notice about him. The black eye he could not hide but he could at least take the focus from it.

After a moment Campbell stood again, conscious that he might be creasing the suit or the shirt beneath, scared that the slightest detail might wreck his carefully laid plans. He was unable to sit still for more than a few minutes. He knew that his wait was almost over now but it did not ease his tension.

He ran through what he would say again, rehearsed his opening line quietly to himself but every time he spoke it was different; now strong and confident, now nervous and pleading, now challenging and with an edge of aggression. The wealth of information that he had taken in over the past two weeks and in the previous twenty-four hours fought for priority in his mind. Facts and figures were piled on top of each other and he was starting to feel that he didn’t know which was most important, what might be irrelevant. He worried that in his haste he would simply spew out the information in a stream rather than building the coherent and definite argument that he wanted to present.

He looked for a moment at the mini bar in the corner, wondered whether a stiff drink might bolster his shaking nerves but thought better of it. He needed a clear head and the smell of alcohol on his breath would hardly help his credibility.

There was subdued noise from beyond the hotel suite and the sounds of other guests opening and closing doors, of a television turned up too high in the next room. Campbell heard voices in the corridor which caught his attention although he was not expecting more than one person. Perhaps his guest had not come alone, he thought with alarm, but the voices passed and it was quiet again.

Campbell was not expecting a knock at the door — had in fact left instructions at the front desk to avoid that — but it came nonetheless. Campbell froze. He was here.

This was the door. Griffin looked along the corridor as two suited gentlemen talking noisily appeared and hurried past him toward the elevators.

He pulled the white plastic keycard from the envelope and checked the room number again, more of apprehension than uncertainty. He pushed the keycard into the slot and the light blinked green.

‘Hello?’ he said as he walked in and closed the door behind him. His view was impeded by the narrow hallway into the room and Griffin walked cautiously forward.

A smart looking man sat in an armchair near the window. At first Griffin did not recognise him in the subdued lighting of the room and he squinted as the man turned to him and stood.

‘Andrew. Thank you for coming.’

Griffin took the proffered hand and shook it.

‘Michael. How are you?’

‘Very well. And yourself? The family?’

Griffin simply nodded in response. ‘Is this all necessary?’ he said and gestured around the hotel room. ‘What is this about?’

‘I thought it better to keep things discreet. This is a sensitive matter.’

Griffin said nothing but simply waited for Horner to continue. His impatience was obvious.

‘Do take a seat Andrew. Can I get you a drink? I took the liberty of having a very good bottle of Bordeaux brought up.’

‘Mineral water please.’

‘Of course. Perhaps later.’

Griffin sat himself in the chair opposite the one that Horner had been sat in and waited for his drink. Horner appeared to be in no rush and Griffin felt his irritation climb. Pouring them a glass of water each Horner took care to position the glasses on the coasters that were set out on the table between the two chairs. He smoothed the fabric of his suit down across his lower back and eased himself down into the chair and then reached forward and sipped from his own glass.

Griffin thought he was deliberately delaying whatever it was he had to say but resisted the urge to prompt him.

‘I think I owe you an apology.’ Horner’s opening gambit was not what Andrew Griffin had expected to hear.

Griffin regarded the other man blankly for a moment. ‘I think at the very least you owe me an apology Michael. Others too.’

‘It was a very long time ago Andrew, my drives and ambitions were unfettered then by the wisdom and ethics one tends to develop with age. I was young, hungry and yes, ruthless too. I can admit that. I’m not especially proud of it Andrew but let he who is without sin cast the first, erm…’

The thought flashed through Griffin’s mind as Horner’s unfinished sentence hung in the air that the words had been carefully chosen. That he had failed to say the word ‘stone’ out loud not because he had thought better of what might be considered a reference to his shameful behaviour with the diamonds, but precisely because he wanted to put the thought in Griffin’s head. That he was mocking him.

‘Now might not be a good time to plead your innocence based on the collective guilt of mankind Michael. It insults us both and my sense of Christian charity is in rather short supply just now.’

Horner held up his hands in deference to Griffin’s simmering anger. ‘Of course I’m not suggesting that my own behaviour is in some way assuaged because others might too have strayed. I know that most people have not and would not do what I did given the opportunity. Indeed, if I had the choice to make again Andrew, I wouldn’t be so foolhardy as to repeat it.’

‘What an inspiration you are to us all. Even rats learn their lessons Michael. Now, would you mind explaining your purpose? Are you so vain as to drag me all the way here merely to attempt to convince me that you are somehow the erring child made good? That your ill-judged transgression needs only to be understood to be forgiven? Because I have to tell you Michael, I’m not in the mood to understand, let alone forgive when the future of my company, my livelihood and those of many valued and loyal staff hangs in the balance. What will you do then? When you have ruined all of us? Will you be cashing in those diamonds to help soften the financial impact on those that you showed so little regard for years ago?’

Horner barely seemed to register any response to the vitriol of Griffin’s speech. He sat in the chair with a thin smile, as if allowing the outlet of an indignant but foolish child who could not be expected to understand such matters. Griffin did not react.

‘I seek neither understanding nor pardon. It is too late for that now and in any event it’s irrelevant. Any decision you make upon which moral stance to adopt is unlikely to have any impact on the bearing of events. As you may or may not know, the real point of the break-in was the acquisition of incriminating evidence to be used as leverage in blackmailing my former partner Geoffrey Asquith, who, though innocent, would be considered guilty by association and ruined.’

‘What then Michael? You think I might be able to help? To rescue yourself and your precious wealth and reputation? You should know that that would be purely a by-product of my own self-preservation.’

‘And you Mr Griffin would be well advised to realise that this has nothing to do with your influence or your employees, both of which are negligible factors in this situation. You should not presume that Griffin Holdings is anything but a prop in this particular play. Mere scenery. Certain groups or individuals have decreed that they will manipulate Geoffrey through the results of some ill-judged folly of my youth and they will not be deterred. Do you really think they would have made such an audacious attempt at blackmailing a man in Geoffrey’s position unless they were certain of its success? I think you afford yourself a little too much credit Andrew.’

Griffin’s cheeks burned but he held his tongue. ‘Your remarkable self-regard is always a spectacle to behold but I am growing a little tired of repeating the question Michael. Perhaps you could get to the point?’

63

Wednesday. 6.20pm.

Campbell’s voice failed him and his legs refused to function. Force of habit compelled him to call out and invite the man in, to go to the door. Instead he stood stiff at the back of the suite and stared across toward the door.

There was a sliding sound and a click and then he heard the handle turn and light spill in from the hallway, silhouetting the figure of the man who stepped inside.

‘Is there anyone here?’ he called out.

‘In here,’ Campbell said finally but still he did not move.

The other man let the door close behind him and stepped cautiously into the room, glancing around for any signs of company.

‘Its just me,’ Campbell said.

‘And you are?’

This was it. Everything he had been building up to, each agonising second, minute, hour of the past few days had arrived in this moment.

‘Two weeks ago, a man by the name of Tony Cooper, a man with a record of criminal activity and associations, came uninvited into my home. He had been wounded fatally and he passed me something of a highly sensitive nature before I helped him into an ambulance. All of which has involved me, rather unfortunately in what I believe to be a very personal dilemma involving yourself and your old business associates.’

Campbell fell silent, unsure whether to maintain his momentum, to continue making his pitch or let the other man respond.

‘That doesn’t tell me who you are,’ the man said. ‘Nor what you want.’

‘Mr Asquith,’ Campbell addressed him directly, ‘I am familiar with Griffin Holdings Ltd and its previous incarnation, founded and run by yourself and a Mr Michael Horner. Mr Horner became involved in the smuggling of guns into Sierra Leone during the period of its civil war and involved in the smuggling of uncut diamonds out of the same country by way of payment for his services. Whether you had any involvement in that- ’

‘I had nothing to do with that!’ Asquith interrupted sharply. ‘Michael acted entirely in secret and of his own volition.’

‘As you say. Even so, the mere association is enough, for a conviction, as they say, in the court of public opinion. You know this perfectly well and you know that this would ruin you, your ex-partner, and the existing company and every one of its staff.’

Campbell paused for a moment, to let his words sink in. He needed the other man to realise what he knew, how far this went and that he was to be taken seriously. Asquith didn’t respond this time, his quick temper apparently replaced now by apprehension, as if he couldn’t figure out Campbell’s role in this.

‘I am aware of the attempt to blackmail you Mr Asquith though I can assure you, I am in no way involved, if that is what you are thinking.’

‘I think you should tell me who you are before I call the police,’ Asquith replied with a hard edge to his voice, clearly short of patience now. Time to play your hand Campbell.

‘I can tell you who your blackmailer is Mr Asquith, and why.’

‘I saw what I thought to be an opportunity to make a significant sum of money many years ago and that is exactly what I achieved. Did my small actions prolong the civil war? Did they sway the war in any particular or decisive direction? Could I have stopped it by abstaining from what I did?’ Horner shook his head at Griffin, his expression dismissing any objections the other man might seek to make. ‘My actions represented a tiny fraction in a far wider situation. There were larger institutions with vested interests in the conflict, getting paid vastly more than I received and involved in ways that dwarfed my own involvement. But those actions were despicable and shameful nonetheless. I profited from the misery of other people. Yes. I was ruthlessly opportunistic and those actions have come full circle to haunt and threaten me and other people. Yes. I do not want you to understand this Andrew and I do not ask for such hollow luxuries as forgiveness. But what I would like from you is discretion.’

The silence that followed was thick with tension as Griffin took in the weight of Horner’s words. He reached for the glass of water and took a sip, then another, set the glass down.

‘Silence?’ Griffin said, his tone cool and challenging.

Horner said nothing. After a moment he dipped his head just a fraction in assent.

‘I have no more interest in this information becoming public knowledge than you do,’ Griffin said.

‘Not now I grant you. But things change, people move on, retire. I should very much like to ensure that should circumstances, uh, alter in time, I can rely on you to remain, what is the phrase? On message.’

And then Horner slipped a hand inside the jacket of his expensively cut suit and took out a small dark object. He laid it on the table in front of him and pushed it halfway toward Griffin. It was a small black velvet pouch. Griffin wanted to examine Horner’s expression, his eyes, but his own eyes were fixed on the bag.

Time passed and neither man spoke or moved. Horner sat motionless, watching Griffin stare down at the table.

Then, slowly, Andrew Griffin sat forward and hesitantly reached for the pouch on the table. Though he knew what he would see there, something compelled him to look anyway, something he couldn’t fight.

He picked it up and could feel the hard sharp shape inside the velvet as he pulled it open.

‘The price of silence,’ Michael Horner said softly.

Griffin gave no indication that he had heard him as he continued to stare inside at a large uncut diamond.

64

Wednesday. 6.40pm.

His bait cast, Campbell watched to see whether it would be taken. He had further to go yet though. Even if Asquith did bite, he still had to reel him in.

‘Over the course of around the last eighteen months, three companies have been quietly purchasing stock in three specific firms,’ Campbell began. ‘This is perfectly normal since they are investment companies and the purchases have been so arranged that they were spread out over time and transacted through a number of different dealers. The use of more than one investment firm to do this and the process of layering the investments helps to disguise the true nature of what is happening. But the upshot is that these three investment houses now collectively represent the majority shareholders of each of the companies in which they are investing, holding in total just short of 30 per cent of each firm. The shares that they have been buying up are in construction and engineering firms Mr Asquith, firms who are now awaiting the results of the tender process for the Malaysian Dam project that is being in large part funded by the British Government’s Department for International Development. The contracts for the design, construction and implementation of the project are worth many tens of millions of pounds and will, naturally, bolster both the coffers and the share price of the firms that win those contracts. You of course are perfectly familiar with what I am telling you since it is you that is due, tomorrow, to announce who the successful tenders have been and which firms will win those contracts.’

‘If you are threatening me…’ Asquith began but his tone was uneven and Campbell had the feeling that the Minister for International Development had yet to decide which side of the fence he was on. He had obviously not figured out whether this was just another part of the blackmail plot, if Campbell was one of the conspirators or whether he were not involved at all, as he had asserted.

‘I’m not threatening you in the slightest. On the contrary; the real danger so far has been to me, not from me.’ Campbell said and with that he walked slowly from the shadows across the room toward Geoffrey Asquith and into the light where the other man could see the colourful array of bruising and swelling on his face.

‘Believe me Mr Asquith when I say that I’m here to help. Help us both.’

‘That remains to be seen,’ Asquith replied. He was still being abrupt but that was hardly surprising as far as Campbell could see. What was more significant was that he was still listening.

‘The Dam project has been referred to in various quarters save the very highest and most official, as a white elephant. The hydroelectric plant will produce energy for a region that already has an energy surplus. Already some 10,000 people have been displaced from their homes — land owned by their ancestors for generations — and moved to smaller, inferior plots where the land is of poorer quality and in places largely infertile. The fabric of these communities has been torn; alcoholism and violent crime already on the increase. The environmental assessments are widely acknowledged to be deeply flawed and accusations of suppression and even falsification of information are common. An area the size of a large town will be flooded by the dam, threatening the habitat of a diverse range of plants and animals and the costs of the entire project are said to be significantly higher than comparable examples in the developed world.’

‘There have been a number of in-depth studies conducted both by the Malaysian government and our own agencies. We could exchange stories all evening about whose sources are the more credible or politically motivated,’ Asquith replied defensively.

‘Of course we could but only one of us would then be a liar Mr Asquith. This is all a matter of public record anyway and there’s no point me trying to argue with you. I have no doubt you are far more extensively read on this subject than myself. Indeed, that is why you are here.’

‘So you are one of them?’ he said but his tone lacked conviction. Campbell wanted him uncertain though because if he was intrigued then maybe he would keep listening.

‘The British Government, amongst most other western countries, regularly earmark funds for the purposes of overseas development.’ Campbell raised his forefingers in a quote-unquote gesture that was intended to convey sarcasm. ‘It used to be referred simply as overseas aid but political correctness soon saw that off didn’t it? No longer helping out the poor, useless old Third World, now we’re promoting International Development. Assisting the forward progress of those capable but unfortunate people in less privileged countries. Very noble. Makes you proud to be British eh?

‘The point is Mr Asquith, that it’s all smoke and mirrors isn’t it? Aid, Development. Progress? It’s none of those things is it? Not really. Not in the way it’s made to sound. Not unless you consider the recipients of course. And I don’t mean the indigenous populations. I’m talking about the large corporations that always seem to be called upon when there are highly controversial or large contracts to hand out. How nice of them to step in where local firms might find it all a bit too tricky. How oddly convenient that so many millions of UN sanctioned foreign assistance pounds end up back on the balance sheets of British companies.’

‘Well, well. Read a little Chomsky have we? We aren’t in the business of handing out hundreds of millions of pounds to build some bridge in the middle of nowhere, some mining operation on an ancient temple. You think these things are just handed out arbitrarily to keep the UK economy looking rosy and the fat cats well fed? You think we don’t actually carry out endless feasibility studies, environmental, economic, geological, topographic surveys before any of these things even get out of the planning department?’

Campbell felt reprimanded and slightly patronised.

‘That’s not exactly what I think no but you aren’t too wide of the mark. But we digress, or at least I do. You see Mr Asquith, I genuinely believe that you are a good man. Albeit doing the work of less reputable souls. I would sooner have someone like you in the position you are in than half the other snakes in your party. Or the others.’

‘I’m honoured, no doubt.’

‘I’m sure you will be if you play your cards right but that’s beside the point.’

‘Ah yes, the point. You do have one I take it?’

‘Money.’

‘Isn’t it always?’ If Asquith had decided that Campbell was one of the blackmailers he seemed almost resigned to it now.

‘You have been told by certain anonymous but undoubtedly serious people that you must award these three contracts, these glittering prizes, to the three companies least deserving of them. It does not take an investment wunderkind to work out that since these three firms have got the weakest tenders for the work that they are highly likely to fail. Their share-price will therefore be depressed and represent, for those with foresight or an eye for a bargain, a significantly good buy. Indeed, for those who have accumulated enormous tranches of stock in each of these three rank outsiders already, the potential to reap considerable rewards — should the unthinkable happen and they actually win those contracts — is enormous. Imagine what the share price would do.’

‘You aren’t exactly telling me anything I hadn’t figured out for myself.’

‘Perhaps not. You’re a highly intelligent man. Of course you’d have seen what their purpose was, seen it a mile off.’

‘And you too apparently.’

‘Not really, it was more of a necessity with me than anything else. Self preservation.’

‘Do you know something? I would really, very much like to know who you are and what you want.’ The older man sounded angry now, irritated at Campbell’s persistent effort to evade the question.

‘My name is Daniel Campbell. I work for an investment analyst in the City and I live in a one bed flat in Fulham. Cuts and bruises aside I have no distinguishing features, nothing that would make me stand out. I do, however, know who is actually behind all this. So do you as it happens.’

Asquith regarded him for a moment with a quizzical expression, looking almost amused by the scene and what Campbell was saying.

‘Perhaps we should take a seat whilst you tell me some more, dear boy.’

‘I’m not entirely sure that I follow you.’

Horner watched him replace the black pouch between them on the table.

‘I thought that was obvious. Very well,’ Horner drew a deep breath and let it out. ‘I am acutely aware since the most unfortunate turn of events in your offices two weeks ago, that the evidence of my malfeasance has come to light. I am utterly determined that this information should not come into the public domain under any circumstances given the consequences of such an eventuality.’

Horner stopped then and looked across at the other man, almost as if he were waiting for him to catch up.

‘Whilst the problem is more immediate, I have absolute faith in your discretion. However, should life lead you somewhere else in the coming years your own motivation for silence might be somewhat eroded. I was hoping that I might perhaps… strengthen your resolve.’

Griffin was nodding impatiently as Horner finished repeating his explanation. ‘One question first of course is why on earth you still have something like this?’

‘Well one should maintain a broad asset base. You never know when you might need to cash something in you see.’

‘This does rather undermine your protestations of innocence Michael.’

‘I hardly think so. It is simply a remnant of my past. And besides, as I explained, it is your silence that I seek, not your approval.’

‘Yes, of course. And you suppose this-,’ Griffin waved a hand at the pouch sitting between them, ‘- blood diamond might secure my compliance through to the grave? To bury your secrets with something that you dug up? That is precious Michael. Your arrogance and your vanity I mean.’

‘That stone is flawless and likely worth six digits. Are you quite sure you can afford to be so judgmental? That’s quite an indulgence for the sake of occupying the moral high ground.’

‘Spare me Michael. Please. You are a crass, vulgar man and woefully poor of judgement if you think for a moment that I’m for sale. You had better hope that Geoffrey gets you out of this one.’

‘I’m sure Geoffrey will do the right thing.’

‘Yes, I’ve no doubt he will,’ Griffin said and stood up. Horner remained seated. ‘How much you owe him.’

‘I will be forever in his debt,’ Horner replied.

‘You know to be honest, I’m a little surprised that you don’t already know. In fact I think you probably do,’ Campbell said as the two men sat themselves down in the comfortable armchairs at the far end of the suite.

‘Once again Mr Campbell I get the strangest sense that you are implying something about me that I’m not sure I like. Are you trying to suggest that I’m involved in all this?’

Campbell wondered for a second whether Asquith was trying to suggest as much himself. ‘Well you are perfectly placed aren’t you? And a man of your intelligence and connections shouldn’t have too much trouble in taking the necessary steps to do this. I mean who on earth would suspect?’

Asquith’s expression was both dismissive and disdainful.

‘Of course I don’t believe that for a second but stranger things have happened in the past fortnight believe me.’

‘So you’ve said.’

At that, Campbell stood and swept open his jacket, hoisted up his shirt and showed off the patchwork of colour on his ribs.

Asquith winced at the sight of it. ‘What on earth is this all about? Uninvited guests with mysterious memory sticks, a comprehensive knowledge of a blackmail plot that not even my wife knows about. And you look as if you’ve been hit by a bus.’

‘It’s a long story.’

‘And while we’re at it what on earth is this charade? I thought I was meeting an old business associate.’

‘I know that, I had it set up,’ Campbell replied. How much of the story should he tell? How much would the other man really want to hear? The idea crossed his mind that Asquith was starting to play along now as a stalling tactic. Perhaps he had some way of signalling someone or a prearranged time when he should have reported in.

‘Very resourceful, young man.’

‘I’m not so clever, or resourceful. Just scared.’

‘Well I’m confused. Do go on.’

‘OK.’ He stared at the ceiling for a moment. Where to begin? ‘Right then. The guy that left the memory stick with me, the one with the evidence of what your old business partner was up to in West Africa?’

Asquith nodded for him to go on and Campbell recounted everything. The original hiding place of the stick, the break in at his flat and the night with Slater and Gresham in the east London lock-up. He told him about his escape and his subsequent flight to Cornwall where he was found and attacked and his return to London, running out of options and deciding finally that he might have to go to the police but being snatched before he could do so. He told him about the showdown in the house where Walker had been gunned down and the deal that he had struck with Gresham.

He left out any reference to Sarah, unwilling to involve her any more in the whole situation. If he could bring the other man around to his way of thinking then all this could end and Sarah would be in the clear and him too and then they could try to get back to having normal lives again.

‘Come on. Who would have access to that information? Who was best placed to know exactly what had gone on? Who would be in a position to maintain ties with you down the years, to be able to get to you whenever they decided they needed to? Someone who had influence and capital, someone with nous and business sense and intelligence.’

‘Dear God,’ Asquith muttered.

Campbell looked him in the eye and nodded, happy and relieved that the old man had finally got it, surprised that it had taken him so long to figure out.

Asquith’s expression was almost as if Campbell had just told him that it was his own mother. ‘Andrew Griffin?’ he said.

65

Wednesday. 7pm.

The room was silent and Horner’s mask of self assurance had slipped just a little. Griffin was staring out of the window now looking relaxed and as though he were simply appreciating the view across the park outside and the glittering skyline beyond.

‘You know something Michael? I feel slightly ashamed. Underestimating you the first time around was one thing. I didn’t know you well enough then to have been able to get your true measure. But twice? That’s inexcusable really. I should have seen this coming.’

‘Is it worth it Andrew?’

‘And what’s that?’ he said, finally turning to look at Horner.

‘Is it worth turning down a six figure sum — the security of your family, your future — just so you can preach to me for a few short moments? Make it good.’

‘My family? My future?’ Griffin’s tone was mocking now and he looked as if he might start laughing. ‘Always the cheap shot isn’t it? Always the obvious approach. No subtlety about you, no vision, that’s the problem. No tact. It is always the way with men like you whose self-regard is so divorced from reality. They say that childhood ends the moment you realise that the world does not revolve around you. You should think about that.’

‘Moral instruction and philosophy too? You do surprise me Andrew. Are you finished?’ Horner’s anger was barely concealed, Griffin’s words stinging him as much as the rejection of his offer which still lay there, a small black stain on the polished veneer of the table.

‘With you Michael, yes. Quite finished. Good night.’

Michael Horner was facing the window when the door closed but he could see the triangle of reflected light grow and then fold into nothing in the plate glass. He watched the night for a minute longer and then decided that he shouldn’t ought to waste the Bordeaux he had arranged for and got up and poured himself a glass.

‘Of course. Andrew has access to all of the records at any time he wants them. He must have known for years, perhaps even decided years ago to do something like this. What an opportunity! And the money of course to set up the stock purchases, the nous to know where to place them, how to layer them. The perfect cover too because, after all, why would he jeopardise his own livelihood? His own firm?’

Daniel Campbell watched as Asquith became more animated and then finally stood and began pacing, barely pausing even to look in his direction.

‘He could arrange the break-in with minimal damage, make it look like industrial espionage. He played the subservient role perfectly of course. Yes Geoffrey, of course we are working around the clock to resolve all of this! Oh dear, Geoffrey, you’ll never guess what they took! All the time manipulating me, feeding me exactly the right titbits at exactly the right times…’ Asquith stopped and turned to Campbell. ‘You’ve got to hand it to him I suppose.’

Campbell was shaking his head. Asquith frowned at him and stopped talking.

‘Its not Andrew Griffin,’ Campbell said and Asquith stopped his pacing. ‘Andrew’s been played just as effectively as you. He was supposed to come running to you, to say all the things he said about finding out what had happened and then what had been discovered. That just helped move all the pieces into position.’

Asquith’s frown hadn’t shifted at all but Campbell thought that he saw something flicker.

‘For God’s sake! It’s Michael Horner.’

‘Michael?’

‘Yes. Of course. He’s been in banking all his life, you know that better than anybody. He has all the cover in place for the deals through his business interests. He has directorships in two offshore investment funds and a majority shareholding in another one. He would have been able to sanction any large purchase of stock as Director, instruct the purchases through different companies at different times almost as if it were the everyday motions of the business. He bought up stock personally as well as through his business interests.’

‘But that’s preposterous. I know Michael. We’re friends for God’s sake. He would never dream of something like this.’

‘And what about the diamonds? Would he dream about doing that?’ Campbell tried to fight down the anxiety in his voice. Asquith, who had seemed so fired up when he thought he had pinpointed Griffin as the culprit, seemed positively crestfallen now and Campbell wondered if he would be able to convince him after all, particularly if the man didn’t want to be convinced.

‘But …I mean that was years ago. I know this man! And who are you? Some spider, come to spin a web of tales and lies. I know Michael. We have a long relationship together, we spent years building that company up. Are you trying to tell me that Michael really orchestrated all this, this break in, this so-say attempt to have you killed? This blackmail of me, one of his oldest associates?’

‘Yes. Precisely. What risks was he taking? He knew that he could contain any leaks because he would be stealing the information himself. And that led them to you, through Griffin who had no choice but to remain silent. And then, when he thinks things are going wrong he uses his contacts to get to me and tries to have me eliminated, murdered for Gods sake! He probably figured that you’d go along with it. Why not, it’s your decision after all who get these contracts, why shouldn’t they go where you say? You’ve read the tenders, the information, you’re hard working, diligent, trustworthy. It wouldn’t be the first time something like this has happened in the British establishment and it would be forgotten in a month or two.’

Asquith was shaking his head as Campbell spoke but with less vigour at each word. ‘It can’t be. It just can’t be Michael.’

Campbell walked to the desk that sat behind the two armchairs and slid open the drawer. Pulling out a plain brown A4 envelope he walked back to Asquith and held it out. Asquith looked at it for a moment but didn’t move. He stared at the brown paper as if it were poisoned, polluted. As if by taking it and looking inside he might be betraying his old friend the way this young man was telling him that he had been betrayed.

‘Some of it is what I have been able to find out through relatively straightforward means. If you know where to look. Shareholder registers, fund-holding information, registered directors of companies. That sort of thing,’ Campbell told him and continued to hold it out. ‘Some of it not so simply obtained.’

Hesitantly Asquith took it and tore it open, sliding out a sheaf of papers.

‘The top three sheets you will note are on original company letterheads. They are not copies or computer downloads. They are the original documents from the offices of the three companies for whom Michael Horner occupies a shareholding or executive role. These forms look slightly different but they serve the same purpose. Most companies of this type operate a ceiling above which major purchases of stock must be signed-off by a senior member of staff.’

Asquith was staring at them now, flicking between pages.

‘These forms give instructions to dealers for specific and significant purchase of stocks. You will recognise the names of the companies in which large investments were being made. Indeed you will also recognise other names. The orders against them are sell orders. You know what short-selling is?’

Asquith looked up at Campbell, half pleading with him to stop, to say it was all an invention. But the realisation was setting in. He nodded slowly.

‘Selling shares you don’t own.’

‘Pretty much. Basically betting that a share price will fall, rather than rise. Except it isn’t a bet when you already know the outcome.’

For a beat he felt almost sorry for the other man, but knew he had to arrive at the point.

‘You will recognise the signature at the foot of each page, authorising these trades.’

Slowly, Geoffrey Asquith moved back to the armchair he had sat in earlier and he dropped into it heavily and then he looked Daniel Campbell in the eye and he nodded.

66

Wednesday. 8pm.

Michael Horner reflected that in leaving so hastily and such a flurry of self-righteousness, Andrew Griffin really had not done himself any favours. Not only had he denied himself a rather lucrative payment for his silence he was also missing out on a quite delicious glass of wine.

Horner sat enjoying the peaceful silence of the room and watched the city relax into its evening routine beneath him, taking time to think everything through as he sipped the Bordeaux.

In addition to his costly, short-sighted reaction Griffin had failed to see that there would of course be other consequences.

He had never intended to involve Griffin to this degree but when the call had come from Griffin’s office requesting a meeting to discuss a personal and sensitive matter Horner had agreed to it with a sense of suspicion and caution. Things had already been allowed to go wrong, mistakes made and made again. But not this time. Not where he was personally in charge. The business with the young man in Fulham and his persistently slippery behaviour had worried him. What ought to have been a watertight operation had sprung a number of leaks and Horner had determined to plug them. When he heard that Griffin wanted to talk he decided that he would pre-empt the man and head off any further problems. He was surprised the other man had rejected him and stormed out with his wounded pride.

Now he would have to try something different. He could probably find some dirt on Griffin somewhere and if not, he could have it fabricated. Otherwise a simple threat or two might be more effective than appealing to the man’s wallet. A few photographs of his wife and child. Nothing nasty, just engaged in normal activities but the suggestion would be enough. This time we were only pointing a camera at them Andrew.

That could wait though, for the time being. He’d talk about that with Drennan once the data was handed over. Horner was fed up waiting and once Drennan had paid the useless rabble — something he’d had to think twice about approving given their incompetence — he would set about upping the pressure on Asquith a little, just as a reminder.

The old man was principled but he would not be stupid enough to risk everything for those principles. Standing up to Horner’s ‘blackmailers’ would be precisely the sort of thing he’d want to do but faced with this sort of leverage the old man would buckle, not least because he wouldn’t want to betray an old friend despite what mistakes that old friend might have made.

Horner tipped the glass up to his nose and took in a deep breath though his nostrils. It was almost done now, he though to himself, almost finished. Two years in planning and execution and once Asquith announced the contracts Horner would reap what he had sown.

67

Thursday. 5 pm.

The two men sat on either side of a dark stained wooden table with a nondescript glass ashtray in the centre and two cardboard beer mats with the pictures half peeled off.

Slater was hunched over his pint of lager, arms folded, jacket still on. His face was blank and his expression did not betray the crackling rage he felt underneath. He had been given a real run around in the past week and a half, made a fool of at every turn and he had probably dropped in his boss’s estimation as a result. It was, in all honesty, attributable to the man sitting opposite him.

Well dressed and looking faintly self-satisfied for reasons not apparent to Slater, Drennan sat rolling the long neck of a beer bottle between thumb and forefinger. Even his choice of drink riled Slater. Fucking poncy Italian lager, why couldn't the prick just have a pint? But he knew he had to play nice. He was here for a simple job and once it was done they could all relax again, in the clear and in the cash.

That was, of course, provided Campbell was right. Gresham had been reluctant to trust him at first although the man clearly seemed to know what he was talking about. But in the end the promise of further riches, not to mention the debt of gratitude for getting Angie back had swung it. Slater himself was far more cynical. The guy was as slippery as soap and Slater thought it was madness to listen to him, although his own pride had been wounded more than the others by Campbell’s best efforts. Though he had begun to feel a grudging respect for Campbell as a worthy opponent, a stubborn, determined and resilient man, he still wanted to knock his lights out.

But sat here looking at Drennan trying to catch his own reflection, or self-consciously watching every other passer by with theatrical suspicion, Slater had a new target for his fury. When this was done, he thought, Drennan might come after them. Drennan and his boss and whoever else they could muster.

For all Campbell’s tales of shadowy figures and men of great wealth and long reach, Slater didn’t feel in the slightest bit perturbed now. With Walker gone he feared no-one and the prospect of being able to vent some of the brewing frustration was delicious.

He was picturing Drennan’s nose broken and blood gushing from his shattered gums when the other man spoke.

‘You know for a while we thought you lot had fucked the whole thing. I mean, you only had to follow instructions and Tony made a right mess of that. And I had my suspicions you’d lost the stick too. This Campbell bloke, wherever the hell he’s vanished to, I thought he had it. Couldn’t figure out why you lot were so keen to follow him around when we said that we’d sort it out. I mean, Tony probably told him nothing after Keano got at him but still.’

Slater’s face didn’t shift. He shrugged.

‘What got me though wasn’t all that. I suppose you wanted to tidy up after yourselves after what happened but it was that other lot. The ones that dragged him off the other night…’

Slater stared back at him for long moments. Drennan was fishing. After a while, Slater dropped his gaze to the table and picked up his pint, taking a long, deep drink.

‘You got what I want?’ he said as he set down the glass.

Drennan stayed silent, trying to play Slater at his own game, but failed. Giving up quickly he said ‘No flirting Keith?’

Slater went back to staring through Drennan.

‘Please yourself big man. I have it. You?’

Slater reached into the pocket of his jacket and slipped a small, plain memory stick across the table. Drennan looked at it and picked it up.

‘It has been such a pleasure,’ Drennan said with a smug wink and then he stood up, placed a hand on Slater’s shoulder as he passed, and walked away.

Slater had been sorely tempted to grab the hand on his shoulder, to twist it round and up Drennan’s back but he sat still, his eyes fixed on the spot where Drennan’s face had been as Slater had pictured smashing the beer bottle into it a few times.

Distracted by a young girl asking if the other seat was free Slater looked at her, nodded and then finished his beer. Then he reached under the table for the small backpack that had been left there and, swinging it onto his shoulder, he made for the door, smiling at the doorman on the way out.

68

Thursday. 7pm.

As Campbell approached his front door he noticed that Warren’s car had gone. Without even bothering to feign nonchalance he looked up and down the road and he kept walking, right past the flat and to the end of the street. At the corner he looked along the roads branching left and right and then he turned and walked back to his front door again. Nope. Definitely gone.

Smiling, he twisted his key in the lock and moved inside. It looked different in his flat, cleaner and fresher than it had looked in weeks. He could feel the approaching return to normality — not that he was out of the woods yet. Campbell was pessimistic enough after what he had been through to realise that everything could still come totally unstitched, could yet come smashing down again.

Not out of the woods yet then, but the trees were thinning now.

There remained only one more thing for him to do to set himself back on track, to be rid of all that had happened. Everything else was in place. Gresham and Slater had followed his instructions to the letter, grumbling at the last minute adjustment he had made but then silenced when he told them how much better it would actually work out for them all.

He too had ensured that in addition to the insurance he had put in place to ensure his own safety that there would be compensation as well. His own reward was less lucrative than the others could expect but it was untainted and that felt more important than anything else.

‘Ten per cent?’ Gresham had said to him down the phone, his tone too surprised and disbelieving to be angry. ‘You really are pushing it now sunshine.’

‘Look George, if you do everything I’ve told you you’ll all be even better off than I when I explained it to you the other day.’

‘Then do the same as us with your own cash. That’s my money.’

‘No. I was nearly killed because of that stick George and I deserve a share. Ten per cent. That’s all. You’ll have the ninety left.’

Gresham had been stubborn at first but eventually relented and agreed. Campbell had stopped short of telling him what he really thought. The idea that he could put his savings into buying shares that he knew would rocket in price had never really crossed his mind as a realistic prospect. When he thought about it he couldn’t get past the fact the that not only was it illegal, that he would be knowingly breaking the law to make money, but worse; that it would make him the same as Horner.

Horner’s whole plan had been to make a bundle of cash by manipulating the market and the share price. How could Campbell do the same? How could he even think about doing anything remotely similar in nature to Horner? As much as he might have told himself that he could get away with it, make a lot of money and leave no trace, he could not escape the fact that his conscience would never allow it. He simply couldn’t bring himself to do it.

At the end of the day he knew that all he really wanted was his life back.

Of course a nice holiday wouldn’t hurt. Perhaps a new car. And though he couldn’t face the idea of becoming like Horner in some tiny way by just hijacking his scam, he had no such qualms about taking a little of the man’s money. He was owed something at least.

So Gresham had finally surrendered to Campbell’s insistence though he loudly protested that he did not understand it. Campbell didn’t think that the man could understand.

The doorbell rang. The end was coming.

69

Thursday. 9.30pm.

None of it had seemed to fit together at the time. Even now it didn’t seem real.

The meeting with Griffin had been odd given that the other man had set it up, or his secretary at least. But when he’d got there Griffin had seemed more inclined to let Horner take the lead. Perhaps that was it. Perhaps once he’d got going and made his offer he had knocked Griffin off his stride. The man was so full of self-righteous indignation at the time it would be no surprise to imagine that he’d abandoned whatever it was he had come to say. But now it seemed obvious that it had all been set up, perhaps to keep Horner busy and distracted whilst Campbell got to Asquith.

The data too had confounded him at first after Drennan had dropped it off earlier in the evening. Not what he had expected to see; no data on his west African venture but instead a detailed spreadsheet giving the various transactions that his three investment companies had made, or some of them at least. It wasn’t subtle particularly but it told him that Campbell knew what he was trying to do. Too late of course had he realised this.

Now finally, with the news announcement echoing in his head it fell into place. He had been outmanoeuvred. Beaten. Asquith had of course called his bluff, and ignored the threat, convinced no doubt by Campbell that Horner would never dare be so foolish as to actually expose the both of them. Spiteful and vengeful though he felt now, even he knew that he would never inflict such damage on himself.

Horner was sitting in the living room of his home. A broad, sumptuous leather sofa sat squarely in the centre of the room facing a large wide-screen plasma TV. Beneath it a number of electronic units flickered with LED displays. The lights were dimmed soft and the heavy drapes were drawn across the large picture window that looked out over landscaped gardens. The sound of the television, filtered through five separate speaker channels by a home-cinema amplifier, filled the room. Horner heard nothing.

His thoughts wandered. He wondered at what point he had let it get out of his control. Should he have taken greater charge over things rather than let Drennan do so much legwork? How on earth had this Daniel Campbell, this random stranger, inflicted such terminal damage to his best conceived plans?

None of it meant anything now of course. Campbell, through his scheming and his desperate gamble, had backed him right into a corner. It wasn’t the financial damage, the losses he would make on the stock investments. Their already low price would probably fall further in the wake of the announcement.

What he also knew, though Horner could not imagine how, was that the decision would affect not only Horner’s investments. Others too would suffer the consequences, others who had made investments based on Horner’s own confident and self-conscious bragging. Here’s a tip. Trust me, can’t fail.

A further spreadsheet of data on the stick gave detailed accounts and established otherwise murky links between Horner, his business interests with individuals, groups and companies with numerous well known and acknowledged associations with organised crime. Some of these connections were tenuous. But Campbell had put them together nonetheless, spotting the patterns, perhaps recognising names. He had been nothing if not thorough.

Without saying it he knew what Campbell was telling him. That Horner had his own problems now, too big and too immediate for him to be able to spare any time coming after Campbell. He would be a marked man, deeply out of favour with those powerful and dangerous men with whom he had nurtured relationships down the years. They would not take kindly to being made fools of. The loss of face that went with the loss of money would be the worst thing for them. He would have to pay for that and dearly.

He walked slowly through his home toward his bedroom, clutching a cordless telephone. He wasn’t sure which call to make first, where to start. But he had to begin making plans now. Had to stay a step or two ahead. Campbell had given him a head start through his thinly-veiled warning. It was up to him now how he used it.

Placing a suitcase on his bed he unzipped it, throwing back the lid. He pulled open the large doors of his wardrobe and stared at the contents. There were rows of suits and shirts, tidy stacks of folded sweaters and a neatly arranged line of shoes at the bottom. It would be some time before his life would again have this sort of order. If ever.

He was vaguely aware of the calm resignation with which he had greeted his defeat. There was no panic or alarm with the dawning realisation of the predicament he was now in. He wondered idly where he would go next, what he would do. He thought about what life would bring next for him, the people he would meet, reflecting bitterly that he would probably need some of the guile and resolve that Campbell had demonstrated since Horner had burst so violently into his life.

One thing he knew for certain, he would not forget Daniel Campbell.

70

Thursday. 9.30pm.

At first she had seemed oblivious to it, asking excitedly about what he had said in his meeting with Asquith, what the future held. But Campbell had not been able to maintain the charade convincingly and he could see that the doubt had crept into her eyes.

No matter now though. The short slot on the News had finished and she had not turned her head from the screen yet though minutes had passed.

Asquith had contacted him earlier in the day to tell him what time to switch on his television and to inform him, almost apologetically Campbell had thought, that with the pulling of a few strings, the item had been tucked quietly away in the middle of the programme.

‘In what has been described as a significant policy-shift, the Foreign Office and the Department for International Development today announced that they had awarded three major engineering and construction contracts to local Malaysian firms for a controversial Dam Project in that country. The contracts, worth in the region of?75 million, had been expected to go to a number of more well-established British based firms tendering and who had undertaken such projects in the past. The Minister for the Department of International Development Geoffrey Asquith said earlier this evening, that this decision will allow the full benefits of the project to be felt at every level of the community.’

After another minute had passed and Sarah’s eyes remain fixed ahead of her, Campbell jabbed the remote toward the TV set and silenced it.

‘How long would you have kept it up?’ he asked quietly. ‘What was the plan?’

Sarah turned and looked at him. Her smile was uncertain and her eyes did little to mask what was going on behind them. ‘I–I can’t believe you pulled it off!’ she said and then swallowed. ‘Change-‘

Campbell waited for her to go on but she seemed to have choked on the words.

‘Change of plan? Tack? Direction?’ he suggested for her. ‘Little bit yeah. I had a real bolt of inspiration at the last minute.’

Sarah nodded at him, her eyes still wide, smile still fixed in place.

‘How long then?’

‘Daniel, what-,’ but he cut her off dead in mid-sentence with a look of cold, naked contempt.

‘How long Sarah? Couple of weeks? Months? What? I figured you’d maybe play along for a bit, all hugs and eyelashes and then maybe play the you-remind-me-too-much-of-what-happened-card. Something like that? Too traumatised by what we went through to be able to keep seeing me.’

The smile was gone now and her mouth hung open. Campbell had to break his gaze off then and he stood and stalked across to the other side of the room.

‘It was an accident you know. How I found out. A fluke. I’d heard the name before of course. I mean, he’s a bit of a name these days in the industry and, well you know, it’s my job. I think I missed it the first time, just skimmed straight past. But it was the stuff that George and Slater got for me that did it. I needed something to convince Asquith that I wasn’t mad — stop me if this is familiar — so the job I asked them to do, the documents that those boys stole were exactly what I needed. But his name was all over them too. I mean, not just his of course. But Ben Wishart just stood out.’ Campbell paused and looked at her but her eyes were not on him but fixed somewhere in the middle distance.

‘God bless search engines eh? I ran him through a couple and found all the usual stuff — the professional profile on the company website, couple of people with the same name keeping on-line diaries about Christ knows what. And then a picture of him. It was in the trade press so it was tucked away but I recognised it properly then. Special Commendation in Global Equity Funds sector wasn’t it? Not bad going really. Tough competition. And the photo was of him at the awards function in his black tie and his girlfriend — sorry — fiance, on his arm.’

She looked at him then finally but her expression told him nothing. It was empty.

‘Red really is your colour.’

Campbell could see the muscles around here eyes begin to twitch before the first tear spilled out onto her cheek. He looked away, determined to be resolute.

‘I mean really Sarah, you’re a looker anyway. Don’t think that was lost on me. In fact you know that it wasn’t don’t you? But you really scrubbed up well that night. Really. Wow! … And you know what? I knew then. The absolute fucking nanosecond that I saw the picture that I didn’t need to check the date. Not because I remembered the article or when the awards were. I just knew right then. I did check of course. Checked and checked and checked again because — fuck you Sarah — because I really wanted to be wrong.’

‘When? When did you figure it out?’ she said finally but her voice sounded small in the room.

‘Just in time. In time to fix everything. Make a few alterations to the plan. See at first I thought maybe you had just let me think there was no boyfriend. Maybe to make it easier on me, to make me feel better when I was so fucking scared and confused and vulnerable. I told myself that maybe you’d just let the lie get out of hand. Seriously. Believe that shit? I really told myself that. I even tried to convince myself that you didn’t know that he was in on it. Jesus!’

She was staring at her hands clasped in her lap and saying nothing. When she lifted her head Campbell was holding a box of tissues out to her and she took the box, thanking him quietly.

‘So Horner and your other half Ben meet through work and Horner recognises in Ben the qualities he so fruitfully puts to use himself. They cook up this plot, plant you inside Griffin to be the person on the ground, keep an eye on everything, set it all up and all that and then they start getting the money invested. When everything is ready to go, you give the instructions on what to look for and where to find it so that Gresham’s boys can do the break in without a hitch — oops! — make it look like an outside job and then sit back and let Horner take care of blackmailing Asquith. I turn up sniffing around and you decide to keep an eye on me to make sure I don’t wreck everything… But what went wrong in Cornwall? I can only presume that Ben didn’t tell Horner in time to call that guy off. Unless Ben is really as big a shitbag as Horner and was happy to let him bump his own fiance off for the sake of a few quid. But what I can’t really work out is why you were ready to let me ruin it all — or at least ruin Horner. I imagine that you two had cash in this — Ben got his first million pound bonus two years ago right? I read about that. So then he just rearranges the investment of your own money accordingly and then you stand back and let me set up Horner’s downfall. Why?’

‘You’re making a lot of guesses Dan. You don’t really know anything do you?’

‘Am I getting warm?’

Sarah looked at him in the eye for the first time since the News item and gone were the tears and the emotion, switched off easily when she saw how little use they were, how little effect it had made on Campbell. This was a person Campbell did not recognise.

‘Warm yes. But not as close as you think. I’d been at Griffin for about six months when Ben mentioned Michael Horner. It was a coincidence, nothing more. Ben kept getting snippets from Horner about what he’d done in the past, about some of the dodgy stuff he was mixed up in but he only ever dropped hints. Such an arrogant man. So preoccupied with the impression he makes, with his reputation. He was just trying to impress Ben most of the time but after a while we thought that maybe there was something to it. So I started to dig around at work and found out about the arms shipments, about Africa. Ben and I came up with a plan to blackmail Horner with it, get our hands on some real cash and go off somewhere. Give up work. He’s loaded you know? Horner. Totally fucking loaded. But then when we confronted him with what we had he just turned around and laughed. He said ‘Is that the best you can do?’ and told us we should have a little more ambition. Eventually the two of them came up with the idea of the aid contract blackmail of Asquith. The Dam Scam Ben called it.’ She laughed humourlessly at this.

‘Genius,’ Campbell replied sarcastically.

‘It was all in place and we were supposed to wait until Horner got to Asquith and then we’d collect our winnings. When you showed up I was worried that you’d go to the police or something and we already had everything under control. You’re right — I decided to try to keep an eye on you. We decided. I did come round to see you that night like I said. Saw you getting dragged off and I thought that maybe Gresham would deal with you. Keep you quiet, out of the way. But when you called me that day and I was halfway to Cornwall I was pretty surprised. I played the indignant employee of course, didn’t want to raise your suspicions by agreeing to see you right away or turn the car around. So then you show up, tell me you know pretty much everything that’s going on and I’m thinking that if we don’t do something, you’re going to ruin two years of work. I’d been running around in that shitty secretary job for two years! Two years of being totally fucking bored, just waiting it all out. No way I was going to let you wreck everything.’

‘And the guy that turned up at the cottage? Why didn’t you just stay there on the sofa and let him cut me up?’

‘You were right about that too. I left you that afternoon and called Ben. We decided that we should try to use you to manipulate things, We wanted to get Horner out of the way. Ben hated him. Really hated him. Since we came in with him on the deal he just got into our lives too much, had too much control over the whole thing. He was running the show, but getting Ben to do all the running around, all the hard work, and I was stuck in a job that was really killing me to stick at. But he insisted that it looked less suspicious with Ben dealing with a lot of the paperwork, helped cover our tracks by spreading things out a bit. And he said that I needed to stay there all the way through to keep on top of everything — I was his “point man” he said. Christ! We thought that with you on board we had a secret weapon. Ben and I could still make a bundle, could still go through with the deal but we could get rid of Horner. Ben thought that after this we’d maybe never get away from him, didn’t trust him to just let us walk away — we would be a threat to him just because we knew and Ben was starting to worry about what would happen to us afterwards. By then though, Horner had already sent the man to follow you and get rid of you and Ben could hardly tell Horner that you were with me. That would have blown everything so I took a chance. I’d searched around the cottage and the fields nearby to see if I could find anyone — if they’d followed you down there with me I thought I could find him, not many places to hide round there. Anyway, no sign.

‘So I started playing nice with the food and the hot bath and all that. Smiling and listening and talking to you. I was as scared as you when he appeared, never ran so fast in my life. When you left me in those trees I didn’t think you were coming back. After that it all started falling into place, I could see what you were thinking, what you were trying to do and it suited us perfectly. Until you decided to go to the police. I went along with you, followed you here to the flat hoping that I might talk you out of it but I was thinking on my feet and I didn’t really know what I was going to do then. I even considered seducing you just to stall you. And then Slater turned up and the other guys and everything went crazy. After I got out of Gresham’s place and that guy drove me home I made him take me straight to Ben’s place. The whole thing was just a nightmare but you’d already told me what you were planning by then so as soon as you told me that you had convinced George to help you we figured that we were through the worst of it.’

Campbell listened to Sarah’s confession in silence. He had dropped into a chair at the table and could not take his eyes off her as she spoke, could not fathom how dispassionate she was about the whole thing, could not understand how completely he had been used, deceived and manipulated. Since he had made the shocking discovery about Sarah and her fiance he had wondered how much she had been involved in the plan. Was she merely tagging along with the two other men, a passenger? Or was her role in this more active? He had found himself hoping that it was the former, that she was the kind and decent person that he had come to see her as. But as he had stared at the picture of her with her fund-manager boyfriend taken less than two months ago he knew that it was not true.

Listening to her now Campbell’s initial shock was tempered by a growing sense of detachment. Hearing her talk about what she had done with not a shred of remorse, about how she had felt all through, how she had suffered. She was indifferent to Campbell’s own fate. He noted that her observation that he may not return when he had left her to tackle their attacker on the Cornish clifftop held no sense of regret, no suggestion that she had been upset by the prospect. She had simply noted it, remarked on the event, the outcome of which seemed to hold little interest for her.

‘Pleased with yourself Daniel? Filled with self-righteous pride? The good guy? You’ve taken us all down and put money in the pockets of Gresham and Slater instead. Violent criminals, guys that kidnapped you and beat you up, threatened your friends and family.’

‘Well at least they were honest about it. At least with them I knew what I was dealing with Sarah.’

‘Oh Daniel. The heart weeps,’ she said, making no effort to mask her contempt.

They looked at each other in silence then. Long moments passed without words as he looked at her, seeing the pretty, smiling woman he had met in Griffin’s offices, seeing her expression when she’d seen his own bruised and swollen face, the nervous edgy person unpacking groceries in the kitchen like a schoolgirl with a crush. None of them was really Sarah. Sarah didn’t really exist.

‘Get out,’ he said finally.

Her lips were pressed thin and her eyes narrowed. With a final poisonous look she turned slowly, picked her coat up from the end of the sofa and walked out of his flat, the door closing loud and hard behind her.

For a long time after she’d left, Campbell stared at the space in the room that she had been standing. He noticed that the chair he sat in had been the one where he’d sat and held her only days before, her arms around him and drawing him into her.

He stood and walked into the kitchen, staring at the clean floor, the pristine surfaces, the small gap beneath the oven. In the glass of a cupboard door he caught his reflection. The swelling around his eye was going down now and the black lines on his cheek and lip where he had been cut were smaller and not so obvious. He hoisted his t-shirt up to see the bruising on his chest and ribs was softening into lighter shades of green and red. Walking back into the living room and stretching out on the sofa Campbell closed his eyes and listened to the silence.

Content

Robert Young
Gatecrasher

The morning after

I 1

The night before 2

3

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II 28

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III 43

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IV 58

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