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Gatwick Airport
Crawley
West Sussex RH6
England
The United Kingdom
Ava looked around at London Gatwick airport’s depressing immigration hall.
After Dubai airport’s acres of gleaming marble, touching down at Gatwick felt like arriving in the third world. The Gulf emirate’s terminal had offered a surplus of smiling staff, a forest of sparkly white columns, walls of flowing silver water, indoor palm trees stretching up to the impossibly high roofs, and gentle hints of incense and perfume.
By contrast, Gatwick featured a stretched skeleton staff, an overheated gloomy immigration hall, a stained dank threadbare carpet held together in places with black masking tape, polystyrene ceiling panels hanging off at angles or missing, and stale air smelling of unwashed bodies.
Ava was regularly amazed that first time visitors to the UK did not turn back within fifteen minutes of getting off the plane.
When she eventually reached the front of the queue, the bleary-eyed immigration official surveyed the assortment of Middle-Eastern stamps in her passport with suspicion, before slipping the photo page under the winking red eye of the electronic scanner.
Glancing at his small screen, he paused, then looked up slowly. When he spoke, his tone was apologetic. “I’m sorry, Dr Curzon. I’m going to have to ask you to step to one side.”
Before Ava had a chance to register her surprise, two uniformed Border Agency guards arrived at the booth and escorted her away.
As she walked between them, she could sense hundreds of judging eyes watching her from the snaking lines of tired passengers waiting their turn, and could feel her cheeks burning.
What did Immigration want with her?
Thoughts were tumbling around her mind as they marched her through a door marked ‘Private’ and into the non-public part of the building.
It opened into a shabby lino-floored corridor. As they reached the end, one of the men opened a door to reveal a grotty windowless room.
Two jaded-looking uniformed policemen were sitting at a bare table drinking tea from beige vending cups. They looked up as the door opened.
“Dr Curzon?” the one nearest the door asked, rising.
She nodded.
He was in his mid-forties, with a physique that suggested he had spent more time in recent years behind a desk than on the beat. “We’ve orders to take you to London, madam.”
“Whose orders?” Ava asked, not at all happy at the turn of events.
“We’re just the delivery men,” he answered, pushing his chair out of the way. “Please follow us.” He stepped out into the corridor and indicated for her to follow.
“Am I under arrest?” Ava asked. After all that had happened, she just wanted to get back home and collect her thoughts in peace.
“Not by us,” he answered. “Our orders are to escort you into London.” He pressed the button for a lift.
“Where?” she asked. It had been a long few days, and she was not in the mood to be given the run around.
He shook his head. “Just follow us, please. Someone wants to talk to you.”
It was clear she was not going to get any more information. And there was little alternative to accompanying them. She would not get far if she made a run for it. The two Border Agency guards were still behind her.
Down in the neon-lit car park, she slid into the battered backseat of the fluorescent-striped police car.
She was pleased to see the two policemen climb into the front, leaving her space to be alone with her thoughts in the rear.
If she was honest, she was not surprised that someone in the UK was taking an interest in her. Even back at the first meeting at Camp as-Sayliyah in Qatar, she had known there was more going on than Hunter and Prince were telling her. Not because they were obviously concealing anything—but just in her experience, there always was. People rarely revealed the whole picture.
She knew her priority now was to find out what Malchus was up to. She had no proof, but assumed he had been behind the heist at the Burj al-Arab. At this stage she had no idea why he wanted the Ark, or what was so important he had to kill Yevchenko over it. But instinctively she knew that the voice she had heard over the walkie-talkie quoting the demon from the Bible could only have been Malchus.
Just as pressing, she needed to get to the bottom of who Saxby was fronting for. It was obviously someone wealthy and discrete, but it was not clear why he was staying in the shadows. Or why he was so interested in the Ark.
The journey to London passed in silence.
Turning it all over in her mind, she gazed out of the rain-spattered window at the night around her—watching as the pale moonlit fields and hedgerows gave way to the beginnings of London’s sprawling suburbs, uniformly studded with colourful all-night kebab and chicken shops.
As the car drove towards the south bank of the Thames, she eventually saw the MI6 building ahead at Vauxhall Cross.
So that was it.
She felt her stomach turn.
She had not been back since she left nine years ago, and she was surprised to find the sight of the building immediately brought back the same feelings of uneasiness she had worked so hard in the intervening years to forget.
She looked up as it loomed over them out of the London night.
Affectionately known as ‘Legoland’, the Vauxhall Cross building was a bold statement by the British government that it possessed a world-class foreign spy service. Gone were the days of men in raincoats slipping in and out of Piccadilly offices rented in false names, or the bland and nondescript Century House in London’s down-at-heel borough of Lambeth, where her father had spent much of his career.
Legoland was one of London’s most easily identifiable buildings, dominating all around it.
With its bizarre multi-level design of bold ziggurats and turrets, all set off in a striking sand and turquoise colour scheme, it looked as if it had been clicked together using a giant child’s set of vast plastic building blocks.
As the car pulled up outside the fortified building, the policeman in the front passenger seat got out and opened Ava’s rear door.
The rain was tipping down now, leaving her a dreary view of the quasi-deserted bleak Victorian railway arches the other side of the road. She turned away from the depressing sight, which always reminded her of the seedy railway arch lockups in London gangster films.
As she walked around the car towards the bright modern lights of Legoland, right on cue DeVere appeared at the top of the steps, spotlit in the driving rain. He beamed at Ava, and headed down towards her.
“Ava! Good to see you again!” he yelled over the noise of the hammering water, ushering her under the protection of a large blue golf umbrella.
“This is a bit dramatic, isn’t it?” Ava smiled, relieved it was DeVere. “You could’ve just phoned.”
“Well,” he answered, directing her up the stairs and towards security. “I thought we’d get you through customs and into town as quickly as possible. Police car is always faster than taxi, I find.”
“I’m being serious, Peter,” she answered. “Just call me if you want to talk next time. All this effort is really not necessary.”
“Actually, it wasn’t really my decision.” He sounded apologetic as the security guard passed her a visitor’s ID card with a four-digit number on it. “I’m afraid Uncle Sam is running this one. I just do what I’m told.”
Ava glanced around the large designer atrium. Gentle lighting washed over it from overhead, making it feel more like the foyer of a boutique hotel than a government building.
As she approached the row of six Perspex security bubbles, she swiped the card and typed in the number. A small green light went on beside the bubble in front of her, and the clear door slid open. She stepped inside onto its pressure mat, and the door closed behind her with a hiss, allowing the machine to test the air around her for traces of firearms and explosives, and to record her weight on entering and exiting the building. After a few seconds, the Perspex door in front slid open, allowing her into the main body of the building.
DeVere emerged from the bubble next to her, and steered her into one of the two massive elevator columns. He punched a number into the control panel, and the elevator began to ascend quietly.
Once on the fourth floor, DeVere led her down the corridor to the video suites.
“She’s in here,” he said in a confidential tone, swiping his ID pass into an unobtrusive metal security scanner outside one of the doors. “I think she’s a bit upset about Dubai.” He rolled his eyes in mock exasperation as the lock clicked, then pushed open the heavy wooden door to reveal a neat well-ordered room.
It was lit only by the soft green glow of a brass and glass banker’s lamp on a low side table next to a deep chocolate-brown leather sofa and a pair of matching armchairs.
There was a two-yard-wide glass screen suspended from the ceiling by the far wall, and a very tall woman on the sofa was cycling through images on it with a slim silver remote control.
Ava recognized Anna Prince immediately.
“Did you find anything?” DeVere asked Prince, dropping down into one of the armchairs and glancing up at the sequence of photographs.
Prince looked up. She flicked off the screen and stared hard at Ava for a few moments, gauging her, then indicated for Ava to sit down opposite her.
When Ava was seated, Prince exhaled audibly. “Dr Curzon, I thought we had an understanding?” Her tone was not friendly.
Ava raised an eyebrow, indicating she did not follow.
Prince continued, unfazed. “You were
meant
to tell us if you heard anything further about the Ark.”
Ava shot a glance at DeVere. He shrugged discretely, making it clear this was Prince’s show.
“Yes. About that—” Ava began, before she was cut off by Prince, who was clearly in no mood for polite chat.
“This is a serious matter,” Prince looked none too pleased. “We need to know we can trust you.”
“Why? So you can support me, like you did in Kazakhstan?” Ava had no intention of being patronized by Prince. “I didn’t feel a lot of transatlantic trust when you nearly got me killed in Astana.”
Prince seemed not to have heard. “Well you should be thanking me now.” She slapped a cardboard folder onto the coffee table between them, and opened it to reveal a pile of photos Ava quickly recognized as her entering Yevchenko’s room in the Burj al-Arab hotel.
“You’re in a
lot
of trouble, Dr Curzon,” Prince continued. “Our friends in the UAE wanted to pull you at Dubai airport. It took a great deal of effort to keep you out of an Emirati police station.”
“What on earth do they want me for?” Ava did her best to sound surprised and outraged.
Prince spread the photos out, revealing one of Yevchenko’s corpse on the table, and another of his executioner sprawled on the kitchen floor.
“Hotel CCTV shows you were the second last person to enter the room of a Mr Arkady Sergeyevitch Yevchenko, room 2004. He’s the dead one on the table. The last person to enter the room—he’s the one on the floor—obviously never left it either.” Prince glared at Ava. “Although he would’ve found it hard, as you can see—the back of his skull has been pulped.” Prince paused. “The curious thing is that the hotel’s CCTV record shows you were in the room with the pair of them. Yet you’re the only one who left it alive.”
Ava could feel Prince eyeing her carefully for any reaction. “So understandably,” she continued. “The Dubai authorities are keen to speak with you.”
Ava was unimpressed. “And presumably the CCTV also shows a group of men in black jumpsuits going into Yevchenko’s hotel room some time earlier? Did it occur to anyone they may have something to do with it?”
Prince made no comment.
“Why are they so concerned about the death of one of Yevchenko’s murderers?” Ava countered. “I would’ve thought they ought to be much more worried how a fee-paying guest was tortured and executed under their noses in one of the hotel’s suites, before the hit-team made a getaway from the hotel’s helipad? I’m no travel agent, but that has to be bad publicity for a seven-star hotel welcoming a string of wealthy people, many of whom have made a few enemies on their road to riches.”
Prince nodded. “But they still want to talk to you.”
“Of course they do!” Ava exploded, exasperated. “An armed hit-squad doesn’t just land on the Burj al-Arab’s helipad, torture a guest to death in broad daylight, then lift off into the blue.” She stared at Prince. “Do you know how much organization and collaboration that stunt will have taken? They’ll have had to file flight plans in and out of Dubai airspace, a range of permissions and approvals to use the hotel’s helipad, and a host of other bureaucratic forms. They are, without doubt, being helped by people on the ground, including officials. So it’s a lot easier for everyone concerned to avoid the awkward questions by moving the focus onto me—even though some would say I did them a favour.”
Prince drummed her fingers on the table. When she spoke her voice was quieter, although barely concealing her anger. “You don’t get it, do you? We all understand you have many talents, but you told us you would let us know if you heard any more about the Ark. Yet now we find you’ve been busy in Dubai on the trail of the Ark behind our backs.”
“Who said anything about the Ark?” Ava ventured.
Prince looked incandescent. “This all works on give and take. We’ve just pulled you out of pretty hot water. And it took a lot of doing. I don’t mind saying there were a number of senior people on our side who wanted to know why we should make the effort to help you, given your disregard for our agreement.” She stared at Ava. “I’ve gone out on a limb for you here. There are people on my team a lot angrier than I am. I hope you can appreciate that.”
Ava did not respond.
“Good. So we understand each other?” Prince looked expectantly at Ava.
“Well, I understand you want something more from me,” Ava returned her gaze. “Or you wouldn’t have gone to all this trouble.”
Prince pursed her lips. For a moment she looked as if she was going to lose control, but then she held back.