Jon Stock - Dead Spy Running

He decided against it. If the search for him should intensify, the police would focus on places popular with backpackers. Instead, he set off back down the street towards the temple, passing a large stable block, its studded wooden doors ajar. Through the darkness Marchant glimpsed a huge ceremonial juggernaut, standing at least twenty-five feet high.

He moved on, glancing at the local tribal women. They wore marigolds in their hair and nothing beneath their sari tops. Two Brahmins stopped to chat by a stall selling votive lamps and ghee, a solitary thread across their bare oiled shoulders. Marchant could feel the sap rising in Gokarna.

Earlier he had seen a Shivite baba sitting cross-legged in the doorway of the temple courtyard. He would drop some rupees into his lap and ask the way to Om Beach. Sujit had spoken of such people, said they were happy to discuss Eastern philosophies with naïve young Westerners — in exchange for a few rupees, of course.

‘Do you know what “Om” means?’ the baba said, his limpid eyes looking up at Marchant through a blue haze of ganga smoke. Above him, a single strip of tube lighting dangled from the temple’s painted doorway.

‘The sound of the vibrating universe?’ Marchant offered, thinking back to Monika’s words at the airport in Poland. He was still wearing the pendant she had given him.

‘The unstruck sound. Which place are you from?’

‘Ireland. I need to meet someone at Om Beach.’

‘It’s not far from here. Ten minutes in a rickshaw. Ask any driver.’ He paused, gathering his saffron robes around him. ‘I went to England once, with my wife and son. Nottingham.’

Marchant was surprised to hear he had a family. ‘Recently?’

The baba smiled. ‘Before my wife passed away. Om Namah Shiva. ’

‘And your son?’ The baba smiled again, but this time Marchant saw only sadness in his watery eyes. ‘How long have you been here, in Gokarna?’ Marchant continued, guilty that he might have disturbed the man’s inner peace.

The baba lifted one hand, palm upwards, turning it from side to side as if he was weighing something. ‘Twenty years, maybe longer. There are five beaches: Gokarna, Om, Kudle, Half-Moon and Paradise. Om is shaped like the Devanagari symbol. It is the most popular with Westerners. Paradise is the most remote. But there is a sixth that few ever reach. Shanti Beach. Ask the fishermen.’ He paused, flicking the faintest glance at Marchant’s pocket. ‘The bond between father and son is never broken.’

Marchant gave him his rupees and left.

Fielding’s office clock said 7.30 a.m.

‘Apologies for the early start, but I’m afraid this couldn’t wait,’ Sir David Chadwick said, breezing past Otto, who stood in the doorway, a pained look of failure on his face.

Fielding never liked it when Chadwick set foot in Legoland, particularly when he had Harriet Armstrong in tow. They always had the air of estate agents measuring up a flat. It was no secret that the Chief’s office was bigger than the Director General’s in Thames House. The views were also better, much to Armstrong’s annoyance.

This visit was different. It was unannounced, too early for Whitehall protocol, the bag-carriers and minute-takers. The envy was also not apparent. It reminded Fielding of the day they came for Stephen Marchant.

Fielding nodded reassurance at Otto as he ushered Chadwick and Armstrong into the adjoining dining room. Denton followed.

‘Take a seat,’ Fielding said. The rising sun failed to raise the temperature of the room. Denton glanced at Fielding, but he was looking down at a handful of transcripts and files he had brought through with him.

‘Harriet?’ Chadwick said, sitting down next to Armstrong. ‘Would you care to begin?’

They had chosen two seats at the end of the large oval table, as far away as possible from Denton and Fielding. For a moment Fielding felt as if he was present at a petty dispute in a provincial solicitors’ office.

‘We’ve just had the results back from new tests on the running belt,’ Armstrong said. ‘The lab sent them overnight. As you’re aware, there was a TETRA-enabled detonation device attached to the charges. We knew it could only be operated on the TETRA network. What we didn’t know was the number that a third party would have to call in on to detonate the charges, and who had that number.’

‘We’ve always suspected it was Daniel Marchant,’ Chadwick said, ‘given that he had a TETRA handset with him on race day.’

‘And despite the fact that he saved many lives,’ Fielding said.

‘But there was no proof,’ Chadwick continued, like a politician ignoring a heckler.

‘There is now,’ Armstrong said. She hoped to fix Fielding with a thin grin, but the Chief had sat back, his long legs thrown to one side, his head turned towards the window. Fielding knew what was coming. Leila had been too clever for them all. ‘When we searched Marchant’s flat, we retrieved his old TETRA handset, the one he had with him on the day of the marathon. He’d programmed in some speed-dial numbers — the office, Leila’s phone, his father’s home, and so on. But when we checked the office number, it wasn’t the MI6 switchboard, it was the detonator on the running belt.’

Fielding continued to stare out of the window. Marchant, he was sure, had handed the phone back to Leila after the attempted attack, and she must have visited his flat after the race and planted it there. ‘Just tell me one thing,’ he said. ‘Why didn’t he blow the bomber sky high, taking the Ambassador and every fucking fun runner in London with him?’

Chadwick winced at the words. He had hoped Fielding would go quietly when he was presented with their evidence. ‘Clearly he had a change of heart.’

‘I’ll say. He saved the Ambassador’s life.’

‘I gather from David that you were working on the assumption it was a set-up by the Americans,’ Armstrong said, glancing at Chadwick.

‘Not unreasonably, given that Leila’s on their payroll.’

‘Daniel was within the press of a button of murdering Turner Munroe. Do you really think the Americans would have risked that?’

Fielding said nothing. He almost felt sorry for Armstrong, with her misplaced admiration for Spiro, for America. It was the FBI’s fault. On a recent visit to New York they had presented her with a jacket and a baseball cap, both emblazoned with the letters ‘FBI’. She had even posed for photos in them. For a buttoned-up Whitehall mandarin, the culture shock had been exhilarating.

‘Marcus, I’m afraid it doesn’t look good for Daniel,’ Chadwick said. ‘I’ve already alerted the PM’s office. We’re going to need the cooperation of the Americans on this one. An MI6 officer nearly killing one of their most distinguished ambassadors isn’t great for the special relationship.’

‘Except that he didn’t kill him.’ It was almost an aside. Fielding had said it too often to care any more. He stood up and walked around the room, avoiding eye contact with Chadwick and Armstrong. His lower back was starting to ache. He had had enough of this game.

‘We all know the Americans have made no secret of their concerns about MI6,’ Chadwick said. ‘But we can’t pin this one on them, Marcus. They’ve been over it with Leila many times. She came off the course to alert MI5 as soon as she became aware of the bomber. She didn’t know if Marchant was involved, but she couldn’t take the risk, particularly in the light of her brief from the Americans.’

‘We don’t know why he had a change of heart out there,’ Armstrong said, ‘but perhaps it was Leila’s presence by his side, in which case we should all be grateful that the Americans had the sense to keep such a close eye on him.’