Adrian Magson - Execution

They stopped on the far side, checking the two other streets. Gawpers were converging in numbers to see what all the fuss was about, but nobody was walking away. No woman with a crutch.

‘She can’t have moved that quick,’ said Rik. ‘Not in her condition.’

Harry agreed. She must have gone under cover somewhere. It’s what she would have been trained to do, to get off the radar and keep her head down until it was safe to move on. Having two gunmen on her tail would have been encouragement enough to make it quick.

He spun on his heel, and was staring up at a camera fixed to the top corner of a building when two squad cars pulled up and disgorged armed officers. They each immediately grabbed a likely looking witness and began to question them, isolating witnesses from new arrivals. Others began to seal off the area and direct traffic away.

Harry ignored them. Time was running out. If he and Rik got dragged inside the cordon, they would be caught up answering questions about why they were carrying weapons to go looking for Clare. If she got pulled in, she’d be exposed and vulnerable. They had to get her away from here.

But first they had to find her. There were alleyways and a few side entrances to the shops that she could have ducked into, but checking those out would take too long and be noticed. He studied the onlookers, most of them with their backs turned, staring at the action going on outside the Starbucks, and the people helping the wounded policeman. One of the two women outside the public convenience block had joined the crowd, but the other was still where Harry had first seen her, shifting from foot to foot.

The policeman. He’d been shot by one of the Russians. And where he had fallen was in direct line with where Harry and Rik were standing. And in line with the convenience block.

‘Come on.’ Harry walked across to the woman who was staring impatiently at the locked toilet door.

‘Problem?’ he queried.

The woman looked at him, suspecting a flanking move to get inside first. ‘She’s been in there ages,’ she muttered, nodding at the door. ‘She might be disabled and all that, but really. . you know?’ She gave a toss of her head and tutted at woman’s inhumanity to woman.

‘Disabled?’

‘Yes. On a crutch. You know, those metal things. Not that she was moving slow. It was just after all that banging and shouting.’ She jerked a thumb over her shoulder, evidently unconcerned by the fact that a shooting had happened only yards away from where she was standing.

Harry said, ‘Excuse me — I think I know who she is.’ He turned so that he was shielding the door from the police across the road and put his head down. ‘Clare? It’s Harry. I got your message. We need to leave. Now.’

‘Hey — what are you doing?’ The woman tapped him on the shoulder. ‘What’s going on?’

‘We’re looking for a young woman who walked out of a secure unit,’ Rik told her. He tapped his head. ‘She’s. . confused, you know?’ He waited until she nodded, then said, ‘We’re here to take her back, so she doesn’t come to any harm.’

Then the door clicked open and Clare Jardine stepped outside.

Harry and Rik virtually lifted Clare off her feet and steered her away from the police activity. Surprisingly, she didn’t put up any protest. In fact, both men kept looking at her; this was not the Clare Jardine they both knew. Gone was the spiky attitude, the energy and the ‘leave me alone or suffer the consequences’ aura she habitually wore around her like a force field. Instead she looked drained, her face greasy and pale and her shoulders slumped in a display of defeat.

Once they had a couple of street corners between them and the police, Harry slowed and gestured at a low stretch of wall outside an apartment block. Clare was breathing heavily and he was worried that she was going to collapse if they pushed her too far.

She slumped down on the wall and looked at both men. ‘Is this where I say thank you, you big brave boys, and go all gushy and grateful?’

‘Christ, that’s more like it,’ Rik muttered. ‘I thought they’d overdone the meds and made you into a human being.’

‘Spin on it, Ferris,’ she murmured, but there was a glint of something resembling humour in her eye. Then she added, ‘OK, thanks.’

Harry sat beside her. ‘Who were the shooters and what did they want?’

‘Russians. One of their direct actions units, probably. They were the same two who came to the hospital and killed Tobinskiy. I suppose he was killed? I haven’t heard any news.’

‘Choked on his own vomit. That’s the official line, anyway. But there are signs he was smothered. It won’t be made public until they get full autopsy results and make up their minds how to play it. How do you know they were the same men?’

‘One of them likes peppermints. They also threatened to shoot everyone in the cafe if I didn’t behave. Like it was an everyday thing. And they weren’t joking. Is that good enough for you?’

‘How did they find you?’

‘I don’t know. I think they had spotters out looking for me. There was this young guy on the phone near the Starbucks. He pretended not to see me, but he wasn’t a pro. He disappeared and minutes later, those two arrived and started with the threats.’

‘What did they say?’

‘They wanted me to go with them. They didn’t explain why, but I think if I’d put up a fight, they’d have slotted me on the spot. Then a cop car stopped outside because their car was blocking a reserved space for builders. That’s when I decided to leg it.’ She took a deep breath and shivered. ‘That’s when the shooting started. Was anyone hurt?’

‘A cop,’ said Rik. ‘But he looked OK. The Russians got away.’

Clare nodded and looked at Harry. ‘Have you still got friends in dark places?’

‘You mean Six? Yes, why?’

‘I got their registration.’ She recited the number and make of car. ‘It’s probably been dumped already but someone might see who left it.’

Harry texted Ballatyne with the details. He didn’t hold out much hope of it carrying a trace, but it was worth a try this early on in the day.

Ballatyne called him five minutes later. ‘You’ve got Jardine there with you?’ He sounded surprised. ‘I suppose it would be asking too much for her to pop in for a chat.’

‘Why don’t you ask her.’

Harry passed the phone to Clare, who listened for a second, then said, ‘Dream on, Ballatyne. I’ll deal with Tate and Ferris, but that’s it.’ She passed the phone back and pulled her jacket around her.

‘She’s a little charmer, isn’t she?’ Ballatyne commented. ‘Still, can’t blame her, I suppose. Leave this with me and I’ll put out a city-wide search.’

‘You do that.’ Harry thought about the street camera and its scope of coverage. ‘You might have someone check out a camera across the junction from the cafe, above a kitchen shop. If it’s working, it should give you a clear shot of everyone arriving and leaving the Starbucks where Clare was approached. They were the same two from the hospital.’

‘What are you going to do?’ Ballatyne clearly meant with Clare.

‘For the moment, keep our heads down.’

‘Where?’

‘You don’t need to know.’

‘That sounds ominous.’

‘Don’t blame me. You’re the ones with the leaky windows.’

Ballatyne gave a grudging murmur. ‘Fair comment.’ He paused, then said, ‘I want you to come in for a meeting. We need to get some action decided and I need your input.’

Harry thought about arguing against it; he hadn’t been near Vauxhall Cross or Thames House since leaving the Security Service, and didn’t want to do so now. But it might give him some advantage if he knew what the official security agencies’ line was. Sitting in on a meeting wouldn’t be so bad.