The Hit List (12 page)

'Yeah. Have you ever done that?'

Holland paused. He was older, Slater saw, than he

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. originally seemed. feet's just say that it happens, OK? But let me give i word of advice. If it ever happens to you . . .' He ied Slater meaningfully. 'Don't tell your leagues. You're not in a regiment now, and there's '.mates' code of honour to protect you. One of the ^er BGs'll grass you up to Duckworth and that'll be ;,end of it. No work, no mortgage payments, no Star

stickers for the kids.' |*Should such a situation ever arise,' Slater said wryly,

; remember what you said.' ffjDo that,' said Holland.

/hat would you do if you weren't BGing?' Slater 1 him.

The dream's to start a little gardening consultancy |the Chichester area,' said Tab. 'Installing fountains

\ water-features and that. Statuary.' B*So when's that going to happen?' |*I told the wife it'd be this year. Trouble is, the icy for BGing is just too good. There's always just more job you can't turn down. And then one of ar kids asks for the new Man U strip and you have Conversation with the bank manager and that job

into one more season you can't turn down . . .' |He drained his glass and pushed it towards the iinness tap. 'What I'd really like, to be honest, is a sd war. Nine months or so of total fucking &yhem. If I could just have that, and survive, I'd eerfully install precast concrete sundials for the rest Pmy life.'

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Slater laughed. ' Vive la mort, vive la guerre . . .' 'Vive le sacre mercenaire!' they roared in unison.

By the time the pint glasses had each been refilled four times over, Slater was feeling a bit more like a warrior and a bit less like a domestic servant. He and Tab Holland had worked out how, for an investment of less than .�100,000, they could kidnap the radical Islamic leader Osama bin Laden from Kabul in Afghanistan and claim the $5 million reward supposedly on offer.

After a couple of large drams each of Jameson's Irish whiskey, the barman had somehow been recruited into the scheme. When trying to remember the details later - details which had appeared watertight at the time - Slater would be able to remember only that a scuba kit and a plastic dustbin were involved.

'You're not driving are you, gents?' the barman had asked them at the point at which they'd switched to brandy.

'No mate, public transport!' Slater had replied. For some reason it had seemed the saddest, funniest answer in the world.

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FIVE

woke to a bad hangover - the worst since New

'$ Day - and the insistent ringing of the Motorola, sorry if I woke you, Mr Slater. It's Lark here,

. the Treasury Solicitors' office.'

a,e hangover was immediately overlaid by dread.

.didn't wake me,' Slater lied. 'What's up?'

fell I won't beat around the bush. There have i' a number of developments in the Bolingbroke's

>1 case and I'm afraid it looks as if there's going to

. inquiry, at the very least.'

Iter's stomach churned. 'What exactly does that

i?' he asked. the first instance it means that you and I should

t How are you fixed for, say, tomorrow?' Tomorrow was Friday. He was booked to look after

i. 'Would Monday be too late?'

Jo, Monday would be ... fine. Shall we say ten

ck here at Northumberland Avenue?'

ater pressed the off button and flipped the little

le on to the bed. This was seriously bad news. For ten minutes, mind and body screaming, he >d under a cold shower. Trust in Lark, he told

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himself. Lark had always come good in the past. But he wasn't inside the system any more, and something distant in Lark's tone told Slater that this made a difference.

Pulling on a track suit and trainers, pocketing his keys, he went out for a run. He felt terrible, but experience told him that exercise and fresh air were the only effective counter to a hangover. Soon he was sweating, lengthening his stride as he pushed himself round the cheerless perimeter of Finsbury Park. His head pounded, but he ignored it.

A second shower -- hot this time -- and he was beginning to feel human again. The worry about the inquiry had receded to the point where he could think about it clearly, rather than in a state of sick panic. They had to bale him out, he told himself. They bloody well had to. But of course he was being childish. They didn't have to do anything. If it suited them, and if more serious considerations than his own well-being were at stake, they'd bang him up without hesitation. He made a decision. If he went down for murder, or even for a long manslaughter stretch, he'd top himself. Open a fucking vein. He wasn't rotting away in a cell for anyone.

After arriving at this decision, and imagining for a morbid minute or two his blood flowing darkly and secretly into a prison mattress, Slater felt better. Dressing himself in off-duty clothing - jeans, a sweatshirt and his old leather jacket - he left the flat in

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ch of a full English breakfast. ; eleven o'clock, as requested, he presented himself )onna Karan in Bond Street. A glance inside the showed no sign of Grace Litvinoff, nor was the er Lexus anywhere in sight, an I help you?'

las Mrs Litvinoff been in today?' Che male assistant consulted a pad. 'Are you Mr

Slater?' Je nodded.

> Litvinoff isn't coming in today, but she's left us instructions. We're to provide you with some Srthes.'

ater gaped. 'Provide me?'

je assistant smiled. 'Let me get Alexia, who spoke iMrs Litvinoff.' Slater waited, and a minute later a svelte figure in

i-fitting grey was shaking his hand. "You're Neil, right? Grace gave me a list of what needed. And she asked me to tell you that there Ifsome other bits and pieces to be collected from ..." : consulted her list - 'Prada. OK?' ^Dazzled by her smile, Slater could only nod his iffent.

|, 'Do you have the prices on that list?' he asked her llcertainly.

fnAlexia laughed. 'Grace said you weren't to be given ^y prices. She said you'd only make a fuss.' I Slater stared about him in disbelief, digesting the airy indeur of the place. Not long ago he'd have felt

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acutely uncomfortable even standing somewhere like this, and while he'd begun to learn the laws of the Mayfair jungle, he was still capable of finding himself at a disadvantage.

'Shall we do it?' asked Alexia, still smiling.

For ninety minutes, without daring to consider the cost, he tried on a dark and gorgeous array of suits, jackets, shirts, ties, trousers and shoes. Sometimes Alexia nodded her approval, sometimes she stood birdlike and thoughtful, sometimes she made a note or added a pin to a trouser-leg, sometimes she shook her head dismissively.

For Slater, the hour and a half was an education. His own clothes seemed cheap, shapeless and dowdy in comparison to this finery. Luxury was a ratchet. It only turned one way.

'So what do you think?' Alexia asked him when the session was finally completed and he stood there surrounded by crisp, neatly aligned bags. His own, for once.

'I'm lost for words,' he told her. 'What do you think?'

She folded her arms. Gave him the full-beam smile. 'I think Mrs Litvinoff has . . . great taste. I'm glad we've been able to help.'

Half an hour later, with several Prada bags added to his haul, he was sitting on a bench reading a newspaper and wondering about lunch. His hangover was no more than a memory now, and he had

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to put the whole business of the inquiry out mind. There was nothing he could do to anything - it was all up to Lark. On Monday juld start worrying. For now he would think Grace.

i checked his text messages. )KING GOOD? LOVE U.' shook his head admiringly. She was just too

ley're very cute those things, aren't they? cially for love affairs.'

jter turned his head. Behind the bench, vaguely in an old grey leather Luftwaffe flying-jacket, ; a grinning Andreas. At his side was a woman of at thirty in a long black coat. Where Andreas somehow actorish, like a terrorist glamorised if'TV, the woman looked entirely businesslike. Her were a pale sea-grey, her strong, neatly made res were devoid of any obvious make-up, and the ; blonde hair that fell to her collar was quietly but snsively styled.

watched Slater in polite silence. There was no that they were a couple, you could sense that at a ice. They had to be colleagues. If he had to bet he >uld have said that she was the senior one of the two, he couldn't be sure of it. She radiated the cool irance that came with a privileged Home Counties bringing and expensive schooling, but then so did le of the most stupid people Slater had ever met. ' Turning off his phone, he pocketed it. 'Andreas,' he

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said resignedly. 'Now just what is it that tells me this meeting isn't completely accidental?'

Andreas van Rijn turned to the woman in the coat. 'This guy,' he told her apologetically, 'is just the most cynical. . .' He dropped his voice. 'Let me present Neil Slater, lately of Her Majesty's Special Air Service, more recently poodle-walker to ladies of a certain age.'

'Hi,' she said, turning an amused smile on him. 'I'm Eve.'

The accent -- suggesting first-floor flats in Kensington and weekends in the country - went with the coat. And the haircut.

'Neil Slater. And you mustn't believe Andreas. I've yet to walk my first poodle.'

'But obviously not doing too badly,' said Andreas, bending over the Prada bag. 'What's this? A wallet? And three belts? And . . .' he peered into some of the other bags, 'shoes, and a suit, and a ... Bloody hell, Neil, there must be thousands of pounds' worth of stuff here.'

Slater shrugged. 'I have to look good. The clients expect it.'

'You don't have to look this good. At least . . . you fox, Neil, you've been snaking one of Duckworth's clients!'

Slater was a little embarrassed by Andreas's crudeness.

'That's a rather unlovely metaphor, Andreas.' Eve turned her level, grey gaze on Slater. 'We were just thinking of getting a bite to eat. Will you join us?'

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pfWhy not?' said Slater, amused at the directness of approach and impressed by the way she took reas's laddish remarks in her stride. le followed them up Bond Street to Stratford ce. 'We're going to the Oriental Club,' explained . 'I seem to remember you being a bit of a addict.'

|;The club was old and quiet and smelt of furniture Paintings of colonial administrators and ivings of battle scenes hung from the walls, re you a member here?' Slater asked Andreas, as : hall porter removed his bags. It seemed unlikely, am,' Eve answered. Beneath the coat she was ring a darkly anonymous business suit. Neither she Andreas handed their briefcases to the porter. I'In the dining room, when they had placed their srs, the three of them sat for a moment in silence, tell me, Neil, how's it going?' Andreas asked (tentually. 'Do you think bodyguarding's going to be aur future?'

'Not necessarily,' said Slater. 'But it'll do for now. ts got its down-sides, but the up-side is that I'm in large of my own life. If I don't want to do a job I can st walk away from it.' 'Did you read about the Karadjic snatch?' 'I did. Do you know who did it?' 'Some of the guys from A Squadron. Ray Mortimer ed the team, apparently. The boss is over the moon was a real result. And I'll tell you this for nothing.' !e levelled his gaze at Slater. 'There certainly aren't

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going to be any prosecutions on behalf of those Serbs they wasted. Cheers!'

Thoughtfully, Slater raised the glass of Kingfisher lager the waiter had placed in front of him. Eve, he saw, was drinking mineral water.

'So how do you know Andreas?' he asked her, although by now he was certain what the answer would be.

'We work together,' she answered, her expression neutral.

'I see.' She was the watcher, Slater realised, and Andreas was the talker. What would the deal be this time? he wondered. What were they offering?

They waited in slightly awkward silence as their curries were laid out on the hot-plate at the table's centre. When the waiter had finally withdrawn Andreas lifted his fork and examined the insignia stamped into the heavy silver.

'Neil, vis-a-vis that school stuff, you're in trouble,' he said quietly. 'I spoke to Lark last night and his words were that there was only so far his department could stick its neck out for a civilian. Now this doesn't mean that everyone doesn't want the whole thing to go away - everyone does, and the Saudis in particular. They're supposed to be the Islamic state we can do business with, not some bunch of whacko trigger-happy fundamentalists. So they'll be throwing plenty of time and money at the thing. But the bottom line is that the Firm protects its own. Without some commitment on your part, they can't promise to go the distance for you. Given the way

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press works these days, it's just too risky.' !�see,' said Slater. He was quietly furious. Who the ; did these people think they were -- following him it and, for all he knew, intercepting his phone calls Did they know about Grace? They could hardly

Mressionless, he turned to Eve. 'So which is the ten jalfrezi?'

jr five minutes they busied themselves with their The other club-members and their visitors ed to be male, blazer-wearing and of a certain age. rcouple of Gurkha Rifles ties were in evidence. A irnalist of either sex would have been very visible eed.

"Is this one of your department's places?' Slater asked sdreas.

jf,*No, it's more one of Eve's places.' I'Not a very feminine establishment,' Slater

ared.

tfShe turned amused grey eyes on him. 'I'm not your reotypical girly girl, Mr Slater. More pilau rice?'

icn they had finished their meal Eve asked for

fee to be brought to them in the reading room.

lere, she selected a table some distance from the ?lace and from the other club members. Andreas

iered a glass of Cognac.

'So tell me,' Slater asked her wanly as he stirred his affee, 'what exactly do you and your department lean by commitment?'