Vagabond (53 page)

At the next station, following Malachy Riordan, they changed and took the C line of the metro. How would he have handled ‘fucking up’? Not well.

Chapter 17

It was a slow train that rattled, bumped and shook on the tracks out of the city. The hill with the statue and the mausoleum was visible through a grimy window, then blocks of housing and abandoned factories. They had left behind the tower blocks of the modern capital and the relics of the imperial Austrian-sponsored empire. The sights to either side were from the collapsed Communist era. Danny saw factories that had once been a centre of excellence for the manufacture of pig iron, or crushing concrete, or where – under a five-year plan – workers’ overalls were manufactured. Their part of the carriage was half full and a woman sat across the aisle from him, reading a newspaper.

‘Pretty drab and flat. So ordinary.’

He thought nerves made her talk. He always did well with silence. He sat beside the aisle and could look forward. The target was a dozen rows ahead, facing away. Danny had eyeball on the shoulders and back of the head, except when it ducked lower. The man had killed before and would do it again if he had the chance. Perhaps if Gaby Davies had spent more time in ditches, her stomach pressed to Dusty’s hips, she would have learned the joy of silence. Might come to her in later life. He remembered the silence in the hide under the hedgerow.

She said, ‘Almost as if it’s a let-down, but it’s the way of the job, no emotion at the end. Sorry, flapping tongue.’

Good of her to understand. Nerves burrowed into most people. Special forces, élite reconnaissance troopers or grizzled sergeants who ran platoons and companies: there came a time before they hit a firefight when they needed to talk or smoke. He could drift into a field of memories.

‘I expect it’d figure in my line manager’s assessment.’

He was in the ditch, the fire not yet lit in the farmhouse, the wind soundlessly flapping the washing put out the night before, the dog quiet, the cattle not yet restless, and the dawn chorus still to begin. The silence was like a blanket. Then the distant sound, muffled, of the explosion. A barely noted break in the silence. It had been the child scream of anguish that had fractured the silence. Now he saw that ‘kid’s’ head, the hair uncombed, leathery skin at the back of the neck. It rose, then dropped.

‘You could say, “a bright kid, but talks too much”.’

It never bothered Danny Curnow that apprehension might knot the guts of those he worked with. Even Captain Matthew Bentinick might have succumbed. There were war stories about Bentinick and a sniper rifle, when the opposition had a marksman a few paces across the border and the South was squeamish about knocking him over. The magnificence that was the British military was cautious of laying down fire and zapping the bastard in a foreign field, taking out a farmer’s pigs or heifers while they were about it. There had been a shot at a quarter of a mile and an enemy buried without ceremony. It had not been corroborated but was believed by many at Gough. Clever man, Bentinick: he did nothing without purpose.

‘It’s when you don’t know what’s going to happen, and don’t know how you’ll be.’

A ticket inspector came into the carriage and worked towards their eyeball. They had already stopped three times. At each halt, Danny had felt Gaby stiffen and ready herself, half out of her seat, then subside when the train moved on. He had not moved. He understood why Bentinick had taken him to the church of St Cyril and St Methodius . . . Two or three boys would have set off that morning on bicycles and gone into extreme danger, and would not have been able to promise they’d succeed in their mission. They had hit Heydrich and had gone to the crypt in the church. They would not have grasped how they would feel when news filtered through that – because of their actions – Lidice had been destroyed, the men, women and children massacred or put into cattle wagons. They had worked to orders, as he did. He had seen their faces on the busts in the soft light of the crypt. They had killed an enemy and triggered the death sentence of thousands. Betrayed by treachery. Danny blamed no man or woman for babbling when fear caught them.

The inspector had come to them, and Gaby had shown him the tickets. He had nodded politely, and might have wondered why three foreigners, same carriage but sitting apart, had tickets to Milovice.

They were away from Prague’s suburbs and passed wide fields from which the maize had been harvested. He stood up, looked back and came out into the aisle between the seats. He started to move towards them.

There was purpose in the step and the eyes shone with determination. Gaby was rigid and Danny’s hand had gone to his waist. His fingers locked on the butt of the weapon, and the index was against the safety, but there was no bullet in the breach. What to do? The man came towards him. Danny had a clear view of the bites, the split lip and the scratches where the girl’s nails had gone deep. The eyes seemed dull. He stepped over a suitcase that was in the aisle, and a man moved a shopping bag. Back in the garden at Vyšehrad, Danny had had an ‘argument’ with Gaby. Malachy Riordan and Frankie McKinney had done the oldest trick on the counter-surveillance lecture course: the quick grab, boy and girl, the kiss with the chance to gaze over a shoulder. Danny was conscious of the marks on his own face, scrapes that would mark him out – he should be seen but not noticed, the instructors had said, but the wounds made him conscious. He was flush in his seat and Riordan came towards them.

Gaby reacted. He felt a sharp jab in his ribcage and she was pointing out of the window, gesturing at something he should see. Big decision. He followed her lead. His hand on the pistol butt was tight and his finger hard against the safety lever. When he looked to where she pointed, he had to twist so his back was to Malachy Riordan, who was coming down the aisle. The footsteps came closer. What was he looking at? A combine harvester. He peered at it as if it had the same significance as a space shuttle and lost sight of it. Then he looked at a trailer with a grain pyramid in it. Fascinating.

Riordan passed them. Danny watched a stand of pine trees. He could smell Riordan: no toothpaste, no shaving lotion and no deodorant – stale sweat, dirty socks and damp clothing. It was not to be expected that a man would kill a girl in a cheap hotel room, then stay close to her for most of a night and the next morning, than remember to change his socks. He had smelt beer on the man’s breath too. Riordan was gone.

He drew a deep breath. He felt the stress in his shoulders where the muscles were tight.

She was looking between the backs of the two seats. ‘Fancy that! He’s gone for a pee – he’s in the toilet.’

Too bloody old. He felt it – and knew it.

‘You all right, Danny?’

He was as fine as he’d ever be but too old. It was kids’ work. He was fine, and she had done well. He braced himself, listened against the rumble of the wheels for the returning feet.

Malachy Riordan didn’t see the views from the train’s windows. He lurched back to his seat as the brakes were applied and the train slowed. A woman read a newspaper. He must have cannoned into her shoulder, tearing the pages down the centre. He was moving on – it was only a newspaper – when his arm was tugged. No one pulled Malachy Riordan’s arm, and hadn’t since he was a child. The priest wouldn’t have done so, or any teacher, and the police had hesitated each time they had clipped the handcuffs on his wrists. She jabbered at him. He didn’t understand what she was saying. She appealed to the carriage for support and behind him to where a couple sat.

He ignored her. He had not been able, when Frankie had taken off her clothes, to hold back. She had come close to him and his hands had found her throat and— The woman bleated in his ear, then at his back. He went to his seat. Malachy Riordan had the paper he had taken from her notebook. On it were directions that had to be followed.

The train pulled away. One more stop. He tried hard to put her from his mind, to think of weapons and the power they brought.

‘They won’t take my call.’

Timofey Simonov had called the embassy before they had come close to the district in Prague where it stood. He had called it again when they had been in the Bubenec part of the city beside the walls that sheltered it from sight. He had rung a third time when Denisov had driven him almost to the front gates, and once more when they’d gone over the road bridge north of the Charles Bridge.

Each time the same.

He asked for the contact he had with Military Intelligence, then with Overseas Intelligence, then with Internal Intelligence. Last he requested to be put through to the ambassador. At any other time he would have heard the bastard at the other end, the central switchboard that dealt with priority numbers, saying, ‘Of course, Mr Simonov, straight away, Mr Simonov, just tracing him for you, Mr Simonov. Apologies for the delay, Mr Simonov.’ Regrettably, the competent official from Military, Overseas or Internal was unavailable. And the ambassador? His Excellency was out for the afternoon and was not expected back that evening. There was no need to leave a message with his staff as he had stipulated that he would be unavailable. Bastards, all of them.

He sat in the back of the Mercedes. Around him the air was filled with the camphor scent of his wardrobe. His skin itched where it was in contact with the material of the uniform. Denisov drove carefully.

It was the old way, the Soviet way. The talk in every office that had access to the matter – in Prague, London, Moscow – would have prioritised the issue of a marksman held in the British capital with a sniper rifle. He had been in a location that overlooked a house where British Special Services guarded a traitor. The contract was worth good money but, more importantly, it guaranteed his access to important and influential levels of the
siloviki
. It was how the state existed. It worked from the top, down and sideways, and any functionary with ambition must be assured he possessed the protection of a personality of repute; a
krysha
was obligatory or abject failure stared. The military were always respectful. Overseas had provided the weapon and Internal had produced the marksman. His Excellency’s office had handled the shipments of cash and their transfer through the banking systems. Without a roof he was a tree with its bark stripped. He would die. That was beyond doubt.

‘What do I do?’

They skirted the Stare Mesto and were close to the river. Denisov shrugged. ‘You will not listen. Why ask me?’

‘What should I do?’

‘Forget tonight’s business of no importance. Dump that clothing. Take the plane this evening to Moscow. Sort out what has happened there. Here you are isolated.’

‘I gave my word,’ he said loftily. Would the brigadier snigger?

‘You ask for advice. I give it.’

‘I cannot go against my word.’

They turned off the road beside the river and swept up the hill towards the rendezvous. The man was waiting. Timofey saw him over the brigadier’s shoulder. They might not meet again. This might be the last occasion on which a favour was called for, the last payment of a long-existing debt. They edged towards him. The Mercedes was in a long, slow-moving traffic queue. His friend Ralph Exton spun on a heel and waved with exuberance. The man was engaged in the illicit purchase of weapons of war and wore the look of one going for an evening in the country with a picnic and cocktails. They were alongside him. He reached over and opened the door. Ralph Exton sat beside him and secured his belt. A smile wreathed his face, ‘Bloody hell, Timofey, what is that outfit?’

They clung to each other, helpless with laughter. It was so strong, their friendship.

There was a black van behind them, which Timofey failed to notice. The brigadier had seen it first on the road by the river that led out from Karlovy Vary. He had seen a black van on the road near to the airport, but it had tinted glass so he couldn’t identify the driver, and hadn’t memorised the registration. It was a common enough vehicle. He said nothing.

In the van, Alpha drove, with Charlie beside him. Bravo was in the back, with the kit bags and Karol Pilar. It was reported that Ralph Exton was now in the Mercedes and that the direction was as expected. He had told them little. Perhaps all that they needed to know. It probably wasn’t necessary for them to know more. He thought them enthusiastic, like dogs wanting a chase in a forest where there would be the scents of boar and deer to track, with the possibility of a kill.

The sun had tipped and the light edged behind the high trees. The station had two lines, which were polished from use. It would once have been a major junction and a freight destination. Not now. Buddleia and birch saplings grew between old sleepers and the chipstone bedding had a covering of weed. Danny Curnow thought it a place where empire had ended, and there would be similar time-ruins around Basra, such as Bastion, and more in Northern Ireland. He went out of a forward door, Gaby Davies in front of him.