Jack Higgins - The wolf at the door

The study was partly rococo and partly Victorian, with overstuffed chairs and two enormous sofas and an Axminster carpet that must have cost a fortune. A large round table in beaten brass was almost at floor level, and a bottle of Cristal champagne in an ice bucket sat upon it, with seventeenth-century Venetian goblets to drink it with.

"Sit down," he urged. "And you do the honors. I'll be back." He went out, and Daniel thumbed off the cork and poured. Selim returned with a black bag and a laptop, which he put on the table. "A present for you. But let's have a drink first."

He drank it straight down and poured another. "Allah be praised to see you out of that terrible prison. You must feel like Edmond Dantes escaping from the Chateau d'If."

"I think he did sixteen years, but I may be wrong," Daniel said.

"You haven't seen Hamid?" He chuckled. "Forgive me. To you, he was always Malik."

"An old habit. No, I haven't seen him, but we've spoken. I can buy my freedom. The Russians want me to do them a big favor right here in London. If I can bring it off, I'm rid of them for good."

"You think you can trust them?"

"Not really, but I must go with the flow, and hope."

"You know best. Don't tell me anything-I would rather not know what it is. Please open the bag and see if it's what you wanted."

Holley did and pulled out an ankle holster and a Colt.25 with a couple of boxes of ammunition. "Hollow-point," Selim said.

Next was a cardboard box containing a Walther PPK with a Carswell silencer, the new, short version. Last of all came a nylon-and-titanium bulletproof vest.

"This is wonderful," Holley told him.

"There should be a knife in there as well."

Holley groped around and found it, slim, dark, and deadly, with a razor-sharp blade leaping to attention when a button was pressed.

"Excellent. That's taken care of me perfectly."

"Not quite." Selim leaned over and opened a zip to a side pocket of the bag. He took out an envelope. "Expense money. Ten fifty-pound notes, and another five hundred pounds in twenties. There is more where that came from, so ask when you need it. Here's a company credit card. I've taped the PIN number on the back. Learn it and destroy. There's always the chance that you're going to need a credit card these days."

"What can I say?"

"Not much. Have you eaten?"

"No."

"Well, let me buy you a late lunch round the corner at the Lebanese. Great, great cooking, unless you have other plans."

"No, not for a while yet. I'd love to have a meal with you." He stowed the items back into the bag. "I'll leave these here for the moment and get them when I come back."

"That's fine." As they went through the shop, Selim said, "What's the plan, to get started at once or take your time?"

"Actually, I'm probably going to Mass," Daniel Holley said. "But don't ask me to explain."

He left the hotel in the early-evening rain, borrowing an umbrella, walked to the end of Curzon Street, hailed a black cab, and told the driver to take him to Kilburn. Darkness was falling and the traffic busy, but they were there quite quickly, and he asked to be dropped at Kilburn High Road. He walked the rest of the way.

Unfortunately, according to the times inscribed on the board at the gate, he was already too late for that evening's services. He hesitated, but a hint of light at the church windows encouraged him to go forward.

Walking through the Victorian-Gothic cemetery, with angels and effigies of one kind or another looming out of the darkness, he realized that he couldn't remember much from his first visit, but, then, it had been so brief. He turned the ring on the door and went in.

It was incredibly peaceful, the lights very low, and the church smelt of incense and candles, the Mary Chapel to one side. Money had been spent here, mostly during the high tide of Victorian prosperity that had coincided with the church-building period when the anti-Catholic laws changed. The stained-glass windows were lovely, the pews beautifully carved, and the altar and choir stalls ornate. Flowers were stacked all around the altar steps in polished brass vases.

Music was playing very softly and almost beyond hearing, but suddenly it stopped. A door creaked open and closed, the noise echoing, there was the sound of footfalls on tiles, and Caitlin Daly walked in from the right-hand side carrying a watering can, and he recognized her instantly.

Holley stayed back in the shadows and watched. The photo he'd seen of her on the Internet was perfectly recognizable but didn't do her full justice. The woman in the green smock and gray skirt, rearranging flowers at the altar and watering them, had been beautiful when he had last seen her in her mid-thirties. At fifty, she was still attractive, her face enhanced by the copper-colored hair that had been cropped in a style Holley remembered from an old Ingrid Bergman movie.

She finished, bowed to the altar, crossed herself, picked up the watering can, turned, and detected movement in the shadows. "Is someone there?" she called, and her voice echoed in the empty church.

He hesitated, then stepped forward. "Can I help you?" she asked.

"I'm not sure. I last saw you in 1995, when I gave you the message: 'Liam Coogan sends you his blessing and says hold yourself ready.' "

She stared at him for a moment, obviously shocked. "Oh, dear God. Who are you?"

"You asked me that last time, and I said: 'Just call me Daniel. I'm Liam's cousin.' You said I didn't sound Irish."

"You don't, you have a tinge of Yorkshire in your voice."

"That's not surprising, since I was born in Leeds."

She shook her head. "I still can't believe it."

"I phoned you at the presbytery and said I was sitting in a rear pew in the church and asked to see you. I said my time was limited, as I had to catch a plane to Algiers."

She nodded. "Yes, I remember so well, and the thrill of it."

"And the disappointment?"

"Oh, yes, but we can't talk here. Monsignor Murphy is at a dinner tonight. We'll use the sacristy."

It was warm and enclosed in there, a desk and a couple of chairs, a laptop, religious vestments hanging from the rails, registers of all kinds-marriages, deaths-and a church smell to everything that would never go away.

She leaned against the wall by the window, arms folded, and he sat opposite. "Tell me about yourself," she said.

"I'm using an alias at the moment: Daniel Grimshaw."

"A sound Yorkshire name that suits your voice."

"My mother was a Coogan from Crossmaglen, and I was a volunteer with the PIRA."

"So was I, and proud of it."

"I know. Liam told me about your sleeper cell and how he activated you in 1991. Twelve explosions that resonated in the West End of London for months."

Her face was glowing. "Great days, they were."

"Then you went back to waiting? Did that bother you?"

"It's what sleepers do, Daniel, wait to strike again."

"And hopefully for the big one. Back then, Liam asked me that if he activated you again, would I be your controller, and I said yes. Liam died, of course, from a heart attack, but I'm here now."

She nodded gravely. "God rest Liam's soul. He was a good man."

"Were your cell members disappointed not to have a role in the 1996 bombings?"

"Yes, but at least we had the satisfaction of seeing the British suffer such a great defeat. It's strange, but seeing you like this brings your last visit vividly back to me. We always met weekly in the chapel at Hope of Mary. The day you gave me Liam's message, I called a special meeting and gave them the good news."

"And how did they take it?"

"Excitement. Awe. We knelt and recited our own special prayer together."

" ' Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death, we who are ourselves alone'?" Daniel said.