Бен Ааронович - Lies Sleeping

‘Here’s a comforting thought for you, Peter,’ he said. ‘However long you may live, the world will never lose its ability to surprise you with its beauty.’

And the next morning there was kippers and jam and coffee and toast and everything was all right in the world.

For about six hours at least.

There once were railway sidings that ran right under Smithfield Market, allowing tons of animal carcasses to be shipped into the cold stores prior to dismemberment, distribution and, ultimately, dinner. In the 1960s they were closed by the same people who gave us streets in the sky, the urban motorway and myriad buildings that architects have spent the last forty years trying to blame on somebody else.

The sidings became an underground car park, but in an ironic twist their entrance is an elegant spiral ramp that winds its way around a small circular park. The park itself was built by the Victorians on a site made famous as an execution ground for such celebrities as William Wallace, Wat Tyler and a couple of hundred Protestants who got on the wrong side of Queen Mary. According to the Folly’s records, the area had been pacificatus as part of the process of building the original railway, the ramp and the park. The dispersal of all that negative energy was capped off with a bronze statue of ‘Peace’ by John Birnie Philip, which the Sons of Weyland had, apparently, had a hand in.

‘Does it say in what way?’ I asked.

‘Nope,’ said Abigail, who was back in the library at the Folly digging up references in real time.

I was sitting on a bench in the courtyard in the Church of St Bartholomew-the-Less, peering through the railings out at West Smithfield in the hope of catching sight of Martin Chorley and/or associates. I was there because parked halfway down the spiral ramp was one of the vans last seen leaving Martin Chorley’s factory. Spotted by one of the car park attendants, who called it in because the number plate ‘looked iffy’, which set off a flag at CCC, which filtered quickly over to Operation Jennifer, which didn’t so much spring into action as lurch sideways like a startled crab.

This is totally normal police behaviour, by the way, and nothing to be alarmed about.

Ranks and chain of command are all very well for administration, but when the wheels come off and the world is going fruit-metaphor-of-your choice, then the plod on the spot needs to know who’s in charge of what. That’s why we have the Gold, Silver and Bronze Incident Management Procedure (page 560, Blackstone’s Police Operational Handbook , Second Edition). Seawoll was Gold, which meant he was stuck in the Portakabin back at the Folly. Because this was a Falcon incident Nightingale was Silver and, theoretically, should have also been in a control room somewhere – like that was going to happen – while Stephanopoulos was Bronze (public safety) and I was Bronze (Falcon containment).

‘The Victorians did a lot of this pacificatus stuff,’ said Abigail. ‘And not just in London either.’

And was it just the unquiet dead? I wondered, thinking of the god of the Yellowstone River. Or had the wizards of the Folly gone forth like the loyal sons of the British Empire they were and done a bit of pacificatus in the dominions?

I thought you gentlemen should know how things go in the former colonies , the letter from America had said.

‘Peter?’ said Stephanopoulos over the Airwave. ‘See anything?’

I couldn’t see the van from my position, but I did have a good view of the roads around the park. Sandwiched between Smithfield Market to the north and Barts Hospital to the south, both providing ample cover to bring up van-loads of backup, the car park was tactically a terrible choice for Chorley to get caught in. Stephanopoulos already had spotters on the roofs and the upper floors of the buildings all around and two whole serials of TSG lounging around in the courtyard behind the hospital museum. This particular lot had worked with us before and had taken to wearing a sprig of mistletoe on their Metvests, presumably because a bulb of garlic would look stupid. TSG officers spend a lot of time waiting around in the backs of Sprinter vans and so are prone to violent practical jokes and moments of whimsy. Seawoll had suggested celery, but nobody but me got the joke.

I replied to Stephanopoulos. ‘Nothing from here.’

I listened while Nightingale and the rest of the spotters reported in from their various positions around the perimeter. Nightingale, I knew, was in Smithfield Market with Guleed comfortably ensconced in the Butcher’s Hook pub on the east side.

‘What’s the target, do you think?’ asked Seawoll.

‘St Paul’s at a guess,’ said Nightingale. ‘Possibly the site of the Mithraeum.’

The cathedral was half a kilometre to the south and the Bloomberg building site was further to the east and twice as far.

‘He certainly likes the Square Mile,’ said Guleed.

She was right. The Rising Sun, where Camilla Turner met the late John Chapman, was just around the corner, and beyond that was the Barbican, where Faceless Man senior had been stashed for all those years. Behind me on the other side of the hospital was Little Britain, where Martin Chorley had his think tank.

‘Everyone’s in position,’ said Stephanopoulos. ‘What now?’

‘If we’re lucky the fucker will show his face and Thomas can twat him,’ said Seawoll.

‘We’re not exactly covert,’ said Stephanopoulos. ‘We’ve got a couple of hours before we’re all over Facebook.’

‘If that,’ said Guleed.

‘The longer we wait the more we pass tactical advantage to Chorley,’ said Nightingale. ‘And I think we’ve all had quite enough of that.’

‘The bell is the key,’ I said. ‘We half-inch the bell and Chorley’s stuffed.’

‘There were two vans,’ said Stephanopoulos. ‘How do we know the bell’s in that one?’

‘Or not already in place somewhere,’ said Nightingale – unhelpfully in my opinion.

‘Somebody’s going to have to have a look, aren’t they?’ said Stephanopoulos.

It was a difficult decision. Chorley knew me, Guleed and Nightingale on sight and there was no way we were going to risk some poor non-Falcon qualified copper. In the end Stephanopoulos nicked a green London Ambulance service jacket from one of the nearby ambulance crews and got ready to do the walk past herself.

‘And what if you meet Lesley?’ I asked.

‘Then that will be one less problem to worry about, won’t it?’ she said.

‘Make sure she fucking wears her Metvest,’ said Gold leader when we outlined the plan.

Stephanopoulos, who claimed to have stashed her Metvest in her wife’s henhouse the day she made inspector, nonetheless promised not to get stabbed. I donned my magic hoody and dashed around through the hospital grounds so I could loiter suspiciously on the corner of Little Britain and keep the entrance ramp in view.

It was a bright day with scattered clouds and the air was still and warm. Stephanopoulos wore the jacket over one shoulder to sell the illusion, and to disguise the fact that it was too small for her. And to hide the X26 taser she was carrying in her left hand.

I still couldn’t see the van but I knew its exact position halfway down the ramp. I reckoned if I vaulted the safety rail further up, where the drop was less than a metre, I could get there in less than twenty seconds.

‘I’m approaching the van,’ said Stephanopoulos.

I’ve been told that in the old days undercover officers had to try and disguise the fact that they were using a radio. But now you just wear headphones and carry a phone in your hand. This explains why the next thing she said was, ‘Just as long as we don’t have asparagus again.’ A pause. ‘Because I hate asparagus.’