Tim Stevens - Jokerman

Purkiss drove until he found himself in a run-down part of town, where the Audi’s shattered rear window wouldn’t be as conspicuous. He stopped again, sat behind the wheel, and ran over the connections in his head yet again.

Yes. It added up. There were some missing details, but most of it fitted together.

And he’d been blind.

He picked up his phone. The second call he made was to Vale.

‘John. Are you — ’

‘I’m operational.’ Purkiss took a moment to collect his thoughts. ‘Two things, Quentin. First, I need a chartered flight out of here. Preferably from a private airfield, if you can manage it, but if not, from one of the other commercial airports. I can’t go back to King Khalid. It’s being monitored, and this time I won’t get away.’

‘I can arrange that,’ said Vale.

‘The second thing is, tell Kasabian the person we’re looking for is Hannah Holley. She’s a Security Service agent I’ve been working with on this. She’s the person we need to apprehend. But she’ll have gone on the run.’

And Purkiss explained.

Monday morning came, and with it the increasingly pressing need for Emma to start getting things ready for the children’s return to school the following week. New uniforms, stationery, all the paraphernalia of a fresh school year.

She’d been planning to do it herself, but after Brian had left for work, she gave Ulyana the nanny a list and some money, and packed her off with the kids to get the necessary.

After finding the second bug, or whatever it was, in the lipstick tube yesterday, Emma’s instinct had been to turn the entire house upside down. But, mindful of her promise to meet Brian and the rest of the family in Hyde Park, she’d hurried away, her mind churning. She’d found them near the ponds, the children leaping and cartwheeling, Brian smiling and presenting her with a bouquet of flowers he’d bought. For a while, as they enjoyed the Sunday afternoon ambience, Emma had almost been able to put the other matter to one side. Almost.

But in the darkness of the bedroom that night, Brian snoring gently beside her, the fears had crowded in once more.

She had no doubt now that James had planted the tiny and strangely malevolent-looking objects in her lipstick and her handbag, and who knew where else. He’d done so during their trysts in the assorted hotel rooms they’d booked. But as for his reasons, Emma was utterly baffled. Didn’t he trust her in her role as personal physician to Sir Guy Strang? Was he listening to hear if she discussed Sir Guy’s health with her husband, her friends, her fellow doctors? She understood that as Sir Guy’s head of security, James had a responsibility to protect his boss; but this appeared to be taking the notion to ridiculous lengths.

Emma hardly slept, drifting off a couple of hours before dawn crept through the curtains. She was awoken abruptly, not by a noise but by a thought.

Was James spying on his own boss?

Befuddled by lack of sleep, Emma sat up, padded into the bathroom without waking Brian, and got in the shower. The cool water dragged her to full alertness. She returned to the thought.

Had James planted the objects — bugs, she supposed, though the word sounded silly — on her in order to eavesdrop on her conversations with Sir Guy? Again, it seemed ludicrous. James was closer to Sir Guy than almost anyone else she knew. Closer in many respects than Emma was. And surely James would have plenty of easier opportunities to listen in on his boss’s conversations than by going the convoluted route of planting bugs on Emma.

With Brian, Ulyana and the children gone, Emma set about systematically searching the rest of the house. She moved on to the garage, even the garden shed. Three hours later, sweaty, exhausted, she flopped down on a sofa.

Nothing.

She peered at the bug she’d found in the lipstick yesterday.

Should she confront James with it again? He’d shrugged off the one she’d shown him in the gallery yesterday; but then he would, wouldn’t he, if he’d planted it? He’d find it harder to deny the significance of a second such object, though.

But then what? Ought Emma to state her suspicions openly, to ask James directly if he’d been spying on her? He might open up, admit that it was a routine security procedure, and apologise. If that was the case, Emma might be able to understand, and forgive. But what if he continued to deny it? How could she carry on with him, with her doubts about his trustworthiness hanging between them?

A new thought flashed through her mind like a shock.

Sir Guy Strang was her employer. She had a responsibility to go straight to him with this.

But that would blow everything apart. She’d have to admit she was having an affair with his head of security. It would mean the end of her job, and possibly more than that. She might be prosecuted, for putting the security of the Service at risk in some way.

And it would cause irreparable harm to her marriage, and her family, f the truth about her and James came out.

Emma thought about James. Despite her intimacy with him, despite his warmth and his charm, there was something hidden, unknown about him. He had a tendency to clam up at the oddest times, which she’d always taken to be part of the necessarily cautious, secretive character a man in his position had to possess. Overall, she knew relatively little about him. He’d never been married, as far as she knew. He was a former soldier, a veteran of Iraq where he’d been injured, hence his scar. He’d been Sir Guy’s head of security since before Sir Guy assumed the top job three years earlier. And that was about it.

Emma felt unable to get up from the sofa, as though its fat leather embrace was pulling her down. She’d always hated passivity, indecision; hadn’t been able to afford either in her work as a doctor. But now she felt utterly helpless, trapped by her sunlit suburban surroundings, with no course of action open to her that wouldn’t lead to disaster one way or another.

The hell with it. She set her jaw.

If she didn’t bring the subject up with James again, she still wouldn’t be able to continue with him. Her mistrust of him would corrode what they had between them.

She’d confront him, and this time not allow herself to be fobbed off.

Emma considered reaching for her phone, but she was due to meet him that afternoon anyway. It could wait.

With the relief of a decision having been taken, she began to busy herself.

‘It’s pretty thin.’

Kasabian had insisted on meeting Purkiss and Vale at the Covent Garden flat rather than talking on the phone. She looked more haggard than usual, Purkiss thought.

Purkiss had boarded a flight at an airstrip east of Riyadh which looked like it was used by visiting nouveau riche . It had taken Vale an hour to procure it, and by the time the plane touched down at Heathrow it was after eight in the evening. Monday evening , Purkiss had to remind himself. The back-and-forth across time zones and the erratic sleep were confusing him slightly. He’d gone straight to the flat.

‘It’s the best lead we’ve got,’ said Purkiss.

Kasabian blew air out slowly, closed her eyes.

‘Let me get it straight. Hannah Holley is working with Strang.’

‘Yes.’

‘Your evidence being…’

Patiently, Purkiss ticked off the points on his fingers. ‘She conveniently had Morrow’s notebook, with Al-Bayati’s and Arkwright’s names in it. She was conveniently on the scene when the car bomb that killed Al-Bayati went off. She was there with me when Arkwright revealed Strang’s involvement in organising the torture of prisoners, and a few moments later we came under attack. I’m assuming she signalled the attacker somehow. She conveniently missed the flight to Riyadh, because she’d tipped off Scipio Rand that I was coming, and she knew I’d be walking into a death trap.’