Sabbathman (24 page)

‘So do we.’

‘That’s not the point. We worked on the Matrix-Churchill business together. It’s left a bruise or two. Nothing personal. On the contrary, we get on very well. It’s just …’ he shrugged. ‘We tend to keep these things one on one.’

‘You and him?’

‘Yes.’

‘So you don’t want me to pursue it?’

‘No, on second thoughts, best to leave the guy alone.’ He glanced across. ‘Sorry.’

‘But I still don’t understand. Why would anyone phone him? Out of the blue?’

‘God knows.’ Cousins dropped into third gear and then floored the accelerator. ‘But I’m not complaining.’

Half an hour later, stuck in traffic on the Great West Road, Annie began to think about Devereaux again. In the pub, before they’d all said goodbye, she’d come back from the loo to find the two men deep in conversation. Devereaux had apparently been on the phone to the Features Editor at
The Times
. As well as a straight news report, he’d been given half a page the following day to tease out the implications. Thinking he meant O’Keefe and his Dublin political connections, Annie had been surprised to hear Devereaux speculating about the balance of power amongst the UK’s rival security agencies. His feature piece, he confided to Cousins, would be in the nature of a half-time report. Given the editor’s weakness for wordplay, he’d suggest some headline like ‘FIVE ONE, YARD
NIL’, plus – of course – the obligatory question mark. Cousins had laughed at the line, obviously delighted, and Annie remembered the two men walking out of the pub, still chuckling.

Now, she gazed out at the oncoming waves of rush hour traffic. ‘Tell me something,’ she said quietly, ‘how come Devereaux made it down from London? In time for the press conference?’

Cousins was fiddling with the radio, trying to catch the five o’clock news headlines. ‘I phoned him last night,’ he said, ‘before I went down there.’

‘Knowing you might find nothing?’

‘Of course.’ He glanced across at her. ‘Who dares wins, remember?’

Back at her desk in Gower Street, Annie found a sealed brown envelope carrying her name. She examined it a moment, recognising Francis Wren’s careful handwriting. She opened the envelope. Inside was a thick sheaf of transcripts, pages and pages of single spaced typing on the distinctive yellow paper favoured by the transcription staff at Gresham Street. Attached to the transcripts was a breakdown of all outgoing calls on the Portsmouth number supplied by Kingdom. Annie glanced down the list of numbers. The transcribed calls were highlighted in green, standard procedure. Only two numbers had been subject to transcript, and the code NFA after the warrant termination date indicated that the yield from the interceptions had been zero.

Annie reached for the phone, glad that she was spared the chore of wading through the transcripts herself. Kingdom answered on the second ring, and Annie realised how glad she was to hear his voice. The last twenty-four hours had exhausted her.

‘In the office?’ she said. ‘Nothing better to do?’

Kingdom favoured her with an obscenity or two and then asked at once about his transcripts. Annie told him what had turned up and said she was sorry he’d drawn a blank.

‘Blank?’

‘NFA,’ she said, ‘no further action. There’s nothing there.’

She heard Kingdom yawning. Then he suggested a drink, a pub they sometimes used in Knightsbridge, the Pelham Arms. She
glanced at her watch, wondering whether it was too late to phone the MoD. She told Kingdom she’d meet him in half an hour.

‘OK,’ he said, ‘but bring the stuff anyway.’

‘What stuff?’

‘Those transcripts. And the call breakdowns.’

Annie hesitated a moment, looking at the stapled sheets of yellow paper. For the first time, she saw the note that Wren had added across the top. ‘Old campaigners like me should know better,’ he’d written, ‘but good luck all the same.’ She smiled to herself, reading it, barely registering the click in her ear as Kingdom hung up.

Ten minutes later, the phone rang. Annie was in the big office next door, trying to coax a full cup of coffee from one of the communal jugs. She returned to her desk, failing to recognise the voice at the other end. Definitely a man. Probably middle-aged. Plainly excited.

‘Miss Meredith,’ he said again.

‘Yes.’

‘The name’s Dalzell. Hugh Cousins asked me to give you a ring.’

Annie remembered the name, and reached for her pad, confirming it. Bruce Dalzell. A middle-ranking civil servant in the MoD public relations set-up. The man she was to quiz about impending events at Deal.

‘We’ve come across a map,’ Annie began. ‘It’s all rather sensitive.’

‘I know, I know. Hugh’s been on already, about half an hour ago. I’ve had a chance to talk to the Palace now, and they’ve confirmed it.’

‘Confirmed what?’

‘The date.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Annie reached for the coffee, ‘I’m not with you.’

Bruce Dalzell apologised and started again. The Royal Marine School of Music were hosting a Festival of Military Bands. The festival was to take place over the weekend of 16–17 October. The Colonel in command at the school was laying on a modest presentation on the Sunday. There’d be a field gun crew from Devonport, a tracked vehicle display, a mock-battle on the parade
ground, and – of course – lots of music. For some of the regimental bands, due to disappear under MoD budget cuts, it would be a last opportunity to perform in front of royalty.

Annie blinked. ‘Royalty? Who?’

‘The Duke of York.’

‘Anyone else?’

‘Yes. The Secretary of State for Defence.’ He paused. ‘You should tell Hugh.’

‘Yes,’ Annie said, looking at her notes, remembering Cousins’ description of the other items recovered from the Fishguard arms haul. One of them had been a sniperscope, the kind you fit to a high-velocity rifle. She hadn’t seen the thing herself, but according to Cousins the scope had a low-light capability which meant nothing short of pitch darkness could hide a potential target.

She returned to the phone. When does this Sunday thing start?’ she said. ‘What time of day?’

‘Oh, late, seven o’clock.’ Dalzell sounded mortified. ‘And I forgot to mention the firework display.’

Annie phoned Cousins the moment Dalzell hung up. When she finally got through to the office at Euston Tower, it was the secretary who answered. Annie gave her name and said it was urgent. The woman was sympathetic but explained that Cousins had already gone. She’d had a car standing by most of the afternoon, and he was at last on his way to the airport.

‘Why?’ Annie said blankly. ‘Where’s he going?’

The secretary hesitated a moment, then came back on the line. ‘Belfast,’ she said. ‘I thought you knew.’

By the time Annie got to the Pelham Arms, Kingdom had been waiting for nearly an hour. He’d folded himself into a corner beside a tank of tropical fish. His glass was empty and he’d finished the crossword in the
Evening Standard
.

Annie kissed him on the lips, gave him Wren’s envelope, and picked up his glass. By the time she returned with the drinks, the transcripts were back in the envelope. She could tell he’d flicked through them because there was green hi-lighter on his fingertips.

‘Cheers,’ she said, lifting her glass. ‘Compliments of my ex-boss.’

Kingdom glanced up. He looked exhausted. ‘Sacked? Retired? Run-over?’ He paused. ‘So Cousins can step in?’

‘Something like that …’ She hesitated a moment, before deciding there was no harm in going on. Wren was history, after all. ‘They call him Jenny. His real name’s Wren. That’s something else I never thought was quite fair.’

‘And he gave you these?’

‘Yes. He’s at Gresham Street now. Lashed to the transcription wheel.’ She paused. ‘It pays to have friends sometimes.’

‘You’ll miss him?’

‘Yes.’ Annie nodded, glancing at
The Evening Standard
, ‘I will.’

Kingdom reached for his glass and swallowed a mouthful of beer. Annie was reading the paper now. The Fishguard arms haul was on the front page and there was a big piece inside about reaction from Dublin. The Garda were crawling all over O’Keefe’s factory and the Taoiseach had called an emergency cabinet meeting. In a statement afterwards, the Minister of Justice had promised ‘fullest co-operation’ with UK investigators.

Annie read the story quickly and then looked up. Kingdom was smiling at her, Wren’s envelope already tucked into the pocket of his trenchcoat.

‘You should get over there,’ he said, ‘while they’re still in the mood.’

‘Where?’

‘Dublin. You could cop a look at their files. I’m sure they’d show you everything.’ He paused, reaching for his glass again. ‘Seriously. You won’t believe what they’re offering. They were on to us this afternoon. They want Allder to go over there. I think they’d even send a plane, if he asked nicely.’

‘Why? Why all the drama?’

‘Embarrassment. They’re as anti-Provo as the Brits and they want to prove it.’

‘So they’re calling for Allder?’

‘Yeah. That’s more or less it. Or that’s what he says.’

Annie nodded, remembering her last glimpse of the man, storming off across the draughty freight shed.

‘How is he? After this morning?’

‘Choked. Pig sick.’ Kingdom laughed. ‘Cousins got him out of bed at four o’clock this morning. Gave him four hours to get to Fishguard. I’ve never seen him so angry, poor little bastard. Real stitch-up. Class bit of work.’

‘You’re saying we stole his thunder?’

‘Yeah. Of course you did. Not that it matters. It’s games, really, isn’t it? Games for the big boys. When they’ve got fuck all else to do. Have you read this bit?’

Kingdom reached for the paper and found a paragraph at the bottom of page three. According to unnamed sources, the Fishguard arms haul was a tribute to MI5 intelligence.

Annie looked up. ‘What’s wrong with that?’

Kingdom laughed again. ‘Nothing,’ he said, ‘except Allder doesn’t believe it. Mind you, he doesn’t believe anything.’

‘But what is there to disbelieve? Does he think we make these things up?’

‘God knows. I just tell it the way I see it. The man’s rabid. Barking. Off his head about it all.’

Annie nodded, thinking about Devereaux again. If the Allder household took
The Times
, she’d recommend cancelling the order. She smiled at the thought, aware of Kingdom watching her.

‘You hear about Fat Eddie?’ he said at last.

Annie nodded. ‘Yes.’

‘Word is he’d been to a meet last night. Your lot.’

‘Oh?’

‘Nothing to do with you, by any chance?’

Annie looked away, not answering the question. The pub was filling up now, businessmen mainly, in twos and threes. ‘When did it happen?’ she said.

‘Last night.’

‘I know. But when, last night?’

‘Late. Round eleven-thirty. The pubs had just shut.’

‘And he’d been drinking? All evening?’

‘Must have. He was loaded. Four times over the limit.’

‘But specific pubs? Witnesses? Anyone with him? Anyone see him?’

‘Dunno.’ Kingdom was leaning forward now. ‘Why?’

Annie shook her head, remembering Eddie’s parting words as
he fumbled for change for the pay booth. He’d been keen to get home. It was his youngest’s birthday. He’d promised to be back in time for the cake and the candles before wee Liam went to bed. She thought about it now, quite certain that Eddie McCreadie would have been as good as his word. Maybe he’d returned home, celebrated in style, and then gone out again. Or maybe something else had happened, an unplanned detour to some pub or other, a chance encounter with a friend, more drinks, more laughter, then a glance at his watch, and an oath or two, and the final dash to make it home for young Liam. Kingdom was still watching, still waiting for an explanation. She smiled at him and reached for her drink, changing the subject.

‘That liaison arrangement,’ she said brightly, ‘you and me.’

‘Yeah?’

‘It’s been cancelled.’ She lifted her glass. ‘Fancy an early night?’

They were back at her flat by nine. Annie lay on top of the big double bed. She’d lit a small scented candle and the warm, yellow light painted shadows across her naked body. She gazed up at the ceiling, waiting for Kingdom. He was still in the bathroom and she could hear the water sluicing out of the shower. After a while, the bathroom door opened and she heard his footsteps crossing the living room towards the open bedroom door. She closed her eyes, anticipating the next couple of hours, the games they’d play, the way they’d bury all the nonsense of the last few days.

In the hotel room, down on the south coast, she’d nearly lost him and she thought about it now, the gulf that had opened up between them, how angry she’d been, and then how sad. In a way, she knew it had been her fault. She’d never realised just how much his work mattered to him. In Belfast, he’d always seemed detached from it all, almost indifferent, shutting the bedroom door on the day’s events, preferring to muse about the bundle of mistakes he called his private life. The closer they’d become, the more he’d opened up to her. She knew about his childhood, his mum and dad, his sister, and later his wife. She’d shared his passion for his kids, when they’d first arrived, and his bewilderment when the
marriage began to go sour. He’d told her about the affairs he’d had, the answers they’d never given him, how easily he fell in love, how hopeless he was at finding the right woman. And when it dawned on her that he’d fallen in love again, with her this time, she’d let him talk about that, too.

She loved hearing him talk. She marvelled at his lack of inhibition, the way he gambled so recklessly with his feelings, telling her how much she mattered to him, how good she was in bed, how deeply she touched him. Curiously, unlike most men, he’d never asked for anything in return, respecting her reticence, her self-control, her mistrust of sentiment and easy passion. All that stuff she’d always hated. Words were like tissue paper, a wrapper for the real thing. They were disposable. You could screw them up and throw them away. A relationship, to her, was the sum total of what actually happened. Real things. Like passion, and laughter, and the treacly warmth that spread inside her when she and Kingdom made love. She smiled, feeling herself beginning to moisten, rolling over on her side, peering at the door.