Иэн Рэнкин - Watchman

‘Did you find your friends?’

‘Yes, but neither of them would own up to the joke. That’s why it’s been niggling me.’

Felicity nodded her head. What the hell, it was nothing to do with her. She was free to talk about it, wasn’t she? This was a free country. She made herself more comfortable in her seat. Business, she thought to herself, that was what this had become.

‘I don’t usually give away that sort of information, you know. It’s bad for my reputation. I do have my reputation to consider.’

Miles was ready for this. He reached for his wallet and produced two ten-pound notes, hoping it would not seem derisory. She stared at the cash, then lifted it swiftly and stuffed it into her clutch-purse, black and shining like a beetle.

The duty manager was in front of them like a shot, his voice colder than his eyes and his eyes as cold as icicles.

‘Out, please, both of you. I’ve been watching, and this is not that kind of establishment.’

Miles, despite the laughter he could feel rising within him, saw that this was a dangerous situation. Felicity, flaring her nostrils, was ready for remonstrance and, perhaps, physical action. The manager would not tolerate that, would telephone for the police. A couple at reception were already watching the scene with interest. Miles could not afford this, could not afford to be noticed. He grabbed Felicity’s arm.

‘Come on,’ he said.

‘How dare you!’ Felicity shouted toward the impassive figure as Miles steered her toward the door. ‘Just what the hell do you think—’

But by then they were outside, and the fresh air seemed to calm her immediately. She giggled.

‘Now then,’ said Miles, ‘what was it you were about to tell me?’

‘I was about to tell you,’ she said, her bottom lip curling, ‘that twenty pounds will get you more than conversation.’

But conversation was what he wanted, and she gave him five minutes’ worth. It wasn’t much, but it was just about enough. Afterward, he coaxed her telephone number out of her by suggesting that he might one day want to give her some escort work. The number was scribbled in his notebook, a 586 prefix: northwest London. He could find her address easily enough back at the office.

What was important was that she had substantiated his fragile theory. He had been set up. A man had motioned to her from the door of the hotel and, when she was outside, had given her a description of Miles. Could she describe this man? Tallish, good-looking, a bit suave even, nicely spoken.

And that was it. She had been paid to talk to Miles, probably to distract his attention ever so slightly. Well, it had worked like a charm. The question now was, who was it? Phillips seemed the obvious choice, but Phillips had been smartly attired, and the man who had approached her had been casually dressed.

He thought to himself for the hundredth time, so what if there is a conspiracy? Who cares? It’s over, nobody wants to know about it with the possible exception of Richard Mowbray. So why bother? Why not just go back to square one?

Because, he knew, if he did not solve the mystery, there could be no ‘going back.’ It was as though the first square had been removed from the board.

‘Dad!’

Jack came loping toward him, a pair of headphones clamped to his head.

‘Where the hell did you spring from?’

Jack slipped the headphones down around his neck.

‘Oh,’ he said, switching off the tape, ‘I’ve just been wandering about. I was supposed to meet someone for lunch at that little Greek place near the British Museum. They didn’t turn up.’

‘Oh Christ, what time is it?’ Miles looked at his Longines, left to him by his father. It was ten past one. ‘I’m supposed to be meeting Billy at one. Damn.’ He turned to Jack. ‘Would you like to join us?’ Miles hoped that his tone would hint that this was politeness only, that Jack would not be welcome. Jack smiled, touching his father on the shoulder.

‘Thanks but no thanks,’ he said. ‘Things to see, people to do. You know how it is.’

‘Well,’ said Miles in mitigation, ‘we must arrange to have lunch together in town before you leave. A proper lunch, just the two of us.’

‘Yes,’ agreed Jack, already moving away. And with a wave he was gone, putting distance between them.

Miles watched him go, then made for a nearby pub, the King and Country. He would telephone Billy at the restaurant. Billy would understand.

It was two when he arrived, but Billy had contented himself with four or five drinks meantime, and was now in a malleable state.

‘Bloody glad you could make it, Miles.’

‘I’m just sorry I’m late, Billy.’

A businessman, dripping gold, led a quite stunning young woman to one of the restaurant’s better tables. At once, Billy’s antennae caught the scent, and he stared at the woman even after she had settled down with the menu.

‘Christ, Miles, isn’t that superb?’

Checking in the mirrored wall behind Billy, Miles was forced to agree.

‘Yes,’ said Billy, ‘I wouldn’t mind, I can tell you.’

Miles thought again of the longhorn beetle, with its long and sensitive antennae, antennae that could pinpoint a female thousands of yards away. Billy could actually sense when a beautiful woman was nearby. It was quite a talent. At the same time, though, it seemed to Miles that Billy, for all his bravado, was afraid of women, taking lovers the way Mithridates had taken poison: sip by sip to make himself immune against them.

‘So what’s been happening, Miles?’

‘You know bloody well what’s been happening. You’re a magnet for office gossip.’

‘Well, I know some of it, but probably not all. You lost Latchkey?’

‘The very evening I’d been having a drink with you.’

‘Yes, a curious coincidence.’

The waiter came then, and they ordered, Miles sticking to dishes he knew: minestrone, fettuccine.

‘I take it there has been an inquiry?’ said Billy after the waiter had gone.

Miles fingered his soup spoon, wondering whether to drop it. He decided no, what the hell. Let them listen.

‘Of sorts. It was all very low-key.’

‘Funny,’ said Billy as the first course arrived, ‘I was thinking of Philip Hayton the other day. Do you remember him?’

‘No.’

‘He was one of the older boys. A headhunter. He was on my first interview panel, I recall.’

‘Of course, yes, Philip Hayton. He was killed in an accident, wasn’t he?’

‘Over in Ireland, yes. A boating accident. Except, of course, that there were rumors to the effect that he had been executed.’

‘Oh?’

‘Mmm. By the IRA, I suppose, though there wasn’t much of an IRA back then. Funny business...’

There was no more talk of the firm until they were sipping nicely bitter espresso coffee and Billy was debating whether he could manage another portion of cheese with his last crumbly biscuit.

‘I was wondering,’ he said, ‘what you thought of this Latchkey business?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, who’s to blame?’

‘I’m to blame, of course.’

‘Oh yes, well, as far as the record goes, but you said yourself that you’ve had your wrists slapped and that’s about it. No retribution, no demotion, nothing.’

‘They want it kept quiet.’

‘So as not to rile the Israelis? Yes, I can imagine.’

‘And I’ve been punished in another sense.’

‘Oh?’

‘Yes, they’ve sent me to work beside Richard Mowbray.’

Billy smiled. He knew Mowbray, whom he irritated by insisting on calling him ‘Mauberley.’

‘The Mauberley Barmy Army, eh? Now there’s a man who has his sights quite firmly fixed on nothing but the top slot. He wants the old boy’s job, and one of these years, God help us, he may just get it.’