All the Colors of Darkness

made himself some serious and lasting enemies. And that was just on his own side.

The whole espionage business had changed a lot since the Cold War, Banks knew, and these days you were more likely to get the head of MI5 sending secret memos to CEOs of banks and oil companies about Chinese Internet espionage than anything else. But it wasn’t that long ago since people had been risking their lives to climb over the Berlin Wall. If Laurence Silbert hadn’t traveled much for the past A L L T H E C O L O R S O F D A R K N E S S

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ten or fifteen years, as his mother had indicated, then he had probably done most of his overseas operations before all the major changes in Germany and the former USSR.

Banks decided he might as well read up on it and find out as much as he could, so on Tuesday he had gone to Waterstone’s and bought Stephen Dorril’s MI6 and Peter Hennessy’s The Secret State. He had read Hennessy’s Having It So Good a few months ago and liked his style.

On Wednesday evening, Banks was in the kitchen in his jeans and an old T-shirt putting together an Ikea storage unit, now that his collection of CDs and DVDs was getting close to pre-fire proportions again, cursing because he had got the top on the wrong way around and wasn’t sure he could get the back off to fix it without ruining the whole thing.

Stanford’s Symphony No. 2 was playing in the background, and the agitated movement he was listening to at the moment echoed his frustration with IKEA. When he heard the knock at the door and got up off his knees to go and answer it, he realized that he hadn’t heard a car.

That was odd. His cottage was isolated, even from the village it belonged to, at the end of a long driveway that ended with the beckside woods beyond, and nobody walked there except the postman. The music hadn’t been playing so loudly that he wouldn’t have heard.

Banks answered the door and found a slightly stooped man of around sixty, with thinning gray hair and a neat gray mustache, standing there. Though it was a warm evening, and the sun hadn’t gone down yet, the man was wearing a light camel overcoat on top of his suit. His shirt was immaculately white, and his tie looked like old school, or old regiment, the emblem of a castle keep dotted between its maroon and yellow stripes.

“Mr. Banks?” he said. “Detective Chief Inspector Banks?”

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry to bother you at home. My name is Browne, with an e.

Er . . . may I come in?”

“I don’t mean to be rude,” said Banks, “but I’m busy. What’s it about?”

“Laurence Silbert.”

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P E T E R R O B I N S O N

Banks paused for a moment, then stood aside and gestured for Mr.

Browne to enter. He did so, glanced around the front room and said,

“Cozy.”

“I was working in the kitchen.”

“Ah,” said Browne, and followed him through.

The media storage unit lay on the f loor, the untreated edge of wood that formed its top plain to see. “You’ve got the top the wrong way around,” said Browne.

“I know,” Banks grunted.

Browne grimaced. “Quite a job to put it right. I know. I’ve done it myself. It’s the back that’s the problem, you see. Flimsy stuff. I suppose you’ve already nailed it on?”

“Look, Mr. Browne,” said Banks, “much I as appreciate your advice on constructing IKEA products, I do know the problem I’m facing.

Please, sit down.” He gestured to the bench at the breakfast nook.

“Would you like a drink?”

“Thank you,” said Browne, wedging himself into the corner. He hadn’t taken off his overcoat. “A small whiskey and soda wouldn’t go amiss.”

Banks found a bottle of Bell’s in the booze cupboard and added a touch of soda. He poured himself a small Macallan 18-year-old with the merest threat of water. He used to be a confirmed Laphroaig drinker, but a bad experience had put him off, and he was only recently starting to enjoy whiskey again. He found that he couldn’t take the peat, seaweed and iodine taste of the Islay malts anymore, but he could handle the richer, more caramel tones of the old Highland malts in small quantities. Mostly, he still stuck to wine or beer, but this seemed an occasion for whiskey.

Browne raised his glass as Banks sat down opposite him. “Slainte,”

he said.

“Slainte.”

“Stanford, I hear,” Browne said. “I knew you were a big classical music aficionado, but I would have thought Stanford was very much out of fashion these days.”

“If you know that much about me,” Banks said, “then you must also know that I’ve never been very concerned about what’s in or out A L L T H E C O L O R S O F D A R K N E S S

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