Gerald Seymour - Condition black

Colt stood beside the hotel room door because he knew where the camera was secreted inside the wardrobe, behind the fractionally opened door. He knew that the door of the wardrobe cut out all vision of him from the video camera.

Bissett had nearly kissed him when they had met at the end of the platform at Paddington station. He had pumped his hand, he had clung to his arm all the way across the concourse of the station and into the Great Western and across the hotel's lobby to the lift and the ride up to the room.

Colt listened.

He was behind Bissctt.

There was the Military Attache and the Assistant Military Attache and Faud and Mamir. It was their job to do the talking.

Colt's job was to have brought Bissett, and to escort him away.

That was the extent of his job. They'd put a drink down Bissett, and Colt had seen the nervousness of the man as he had held the glass in his two hands and still slurped it from the side of his mouth and down his shirt front. They had filled his glass again, and they had sat Bissett down and they had gone through the questionnaire. Like a job application… not that Colt knew anything that mattered about job applications. They were pushing to be certain that they had the real thing. The questions and the answers roved over Colt's head. Place of work: H3 building…

Work to: Reuben Boll and Basil Curtis… Current work: Implosion physics… Specific current work: Development of cruise warhead as replacement for WE-177 bomb drop warhead…

Detail of current work: Physical interaction of material elements at detonation macro-second… Colt didn't know what was tritium, and he didn't know about beryllium. He had not heard of gallium. He had no concept of a fashioned plutonium sphere.

He saw that confidence was restored in Bissett. Bissett had the message. These chaps hadn't a clue about tritium, either, or beryllium or deuteride-oxide or gallium or plutonium, they were just working to a brief that had come in code off the teleprinters.

Bissett's confidence was growing because even he could fathom that the questions had been supplied to them. Bissett was the swot at school with all the answers. Bissett blossomed.

The Military Attache left the room. He carried away with him the question papers and the answers that Bissett had supplied.

Bissett was asked by the Assistant Military Attache if he would please to be patient. Namir fed him another drink. There were no canapes this time.

Bissett was talking too much, like the drink had got to him and like his self-importance had overcome the fear. He was asking all the questions. Where would he live? What would be the work area? Who would his working colleagues be?

They seemed to take it in turns to give him the bullshit. He would live in the finest accommodation, fitted with the best European appliances. His work area would be the most modern and sophisticated that money could build. His colleagues would be the finest scientists who had come from all over die world to join the team that had very many distinguished achievements to its credit already and would welcome the arrival of I)r Bissett.

The Assistant Military Attache, Faud and Namir, soaped the bastard, and all the time they flattered him. They had Frederick Bissett eating out of their hands, and the drink flowed. After an hour the Military Attache returned.

He stood stiffly in front of Bissett, and he shook the pathetic bastard's hand.

"We are sincerely honoured."

The glasses were raised. Colt could see the flush of pleasure spewing on Bissett's face. Not Colt's problem, not if Bissett wanted to go and bury himself in Iraq when he didn't have to.

"You will be a most valued member of our scientific community.. . "

Colt said, "Sooner rather than later. We have not offered Dr Bissett the opportunity to tell you that he has been under the scrutiny of the Security Service, and that he was interrogated yesterday morning. It would be advisable to move him fast."

Bissett gabbled his explanation. There was the anxiety on their faces.

Colt said, "We just lift him out, before the net closes."

Bissett was just the package. He was left to his drink, and his embarrassment. Around him they talked flight times, schedules.

He had been propositioned, he had accepted, he was no longer the centre of attention.

The Military Attache said, "Tomorrow night, we can hold the aircraft.''

Colt said, "He works tomorrow, perfectly normally. He leaves work, I'll pick him up, get him to Heathrow."

The Military Attache nodded. "Tomorrow night."

Bissett cut through both of them, his head was shaking, his finger jabbing. "Hold on a minute. You're forgetting… I mean, well, my family arrangements have to be…"

The Military Attache said, "You tell no one, Dr Bissett. You make no arrangements. You have the normal day."

"But I can't just… My wife, she has to…"

He supposed that it was where all such things ended up. A grubby little man with too much drink and not enough food in his stomach standing and whingeing his confusion in a hotel bedroom. No time now for flattery, no time to make arrangements, to talk the wife round. And way too far down the road to back off.

Colt said, "If you don't do as you're asked, Dr Bissett, you'll go down for 20 years."

In his unlit office, the cold bristling through the opened window, the Swede heard snatches of the conversation.

"… He could be better, he could be worse."

" H e wants to come, Dr Tariq… Wants to, surely that is important?"

" H e is not a senior man, but then senior men are buried with administration… You have done me well, Colonel."

"It is the privilege of all of us to serve the Revolutionary Command Council."

" T h e putting together of a team is a delicate affair. This man is not, in himself, important. But to the overall performance of the team he is quite vital."

His fingers, in the darkness, were clumsy on the dials of the receiver. He could almost hear the slow turning of the spools.

" M y people say he is very impressive, a good man… "

He had the left side of his headset clamped on the ear, he had the right side behind the ear. With his left ear he heard the talk, as best he could. With his right he listened for any footstep in the corridor. Each slow minute was the worst, each last minute was torture. With his handkerchief he mopped at the sweat gathering on his forehead. They wanted more, and he had as yet so little. He heard the jangle of a telephone in his left ear. Then only the drum..I an air conditioner. Then in his left ear the Colonel's report, ''He's coming. It isconfirmed, Dr Bissett is coming tomorrow night. We will hold a plane-, if necessary; he will be on the flight from London tomorrow night,''

" Y o u are to be congratulated, Colonel."

"There has heen an unexpected difficulty with Bissett; s security, Dr Tariiq Thai is why he must leave at once "

" Y o u would not lose him, Colonel?"

" T h e hands on him, Dr Tariq, they are excellent hands The Swede gulped at the air. So worn down by the late evening vigil. He gulped at the air, and his sigh sang his relief. He had what they wanted of him. Feverishly he dismantled the rifle microphone, and the receiver, and the aerial. He reached between the slats of the blind and drew his window slowly shut.

Fifteen minutes alter the Colonel had reported to the Director of the Atomic Energy Commission that Frederick Bissett would travel from London to Baghdad the following evening, the Swede walked from his workplace to his small bungalow. The tall, shambling, blond-haired figure was familiar to all the guards who patrolled the area between the offices and laboratories and the accommodation area. He was not challenged and he was not searched.

"This is just dumb, James."