Newton’s Fire

‘We’re shifting you to City of London. One of our people will meet you there. His name’s Richard Morgenstern.’ He gave Croke his cell and other contact details. ‘He’s seconded to a new counterterrorism group the Brits have just set up; but he’s loyal to us. To us personally, I mean. To my boss.’

‘Does he know what we’re looking for?’

‘He knows what. We had to tell him that much. But he doesn’t know why. My boss just told him that finding it was her number one priority right now. That’s all he needed to know. He’s a true patriot.’

‘Another one. Excellent. We can sing anthems together.’

‘We’re not going to talk again, you and me. Everything is to go through Morgenstern. And if you ever breathe one word about our involvement in all this, you’re a dead man. Am I clear?’

Croke smiled. ‘As crystal,’ he said.

EIGHT I

Before setting fire to Penelope Martyn’s house, Max Walters had flipped through her address book to find out where Rachel Parkes lived. Now he pulled up opposite her front door. There was no sign of life inside, and when he tried her telephone he was switched over to voice mail. He glanced around at Kieran, who was monitoring the old bat’s email account on his laptop. ‘Any reply yet?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Okay,’ Walters said. ‘Let’s do it.’

They waited for a cyclist to pass, crossed the road. The afternoon had grown sticky, hinting at storms. A communal front path led to a shared front door with buzzers for the top and bottom floor flats. He rang the ground-floor bell. No reply. An elderly couple walking slowly by along the pavement darted suspicious looks at them. Walters smiled cordially and wished them a good afternoon, but it did no good. They kept glancing around as they crossed the road and went inside a house opposite. Then their net curtains began to twitch. ‘Shit,’ muttered Walters.

‘Maybe there’s a back way in,’ suggested Kieran.

They walked to the end of the street, turned left. ‘What about those locks?’ asked Walters. ‘Any problem?’

‘The Yale’s a piece of piss,’ Pete assured him. ‘The Chubb’ll be a bit harder. Say a minute for the pair. Plenty of time for those old farts to see us and call the cops.’

They turned up the next street. An unbroken terrace blocked any hope of breaking into Parkes’ flat through a rear window. ‘Maybe we’d better wait until dark,’ said Kieran.

Walters snorted. ‘Today’s about the longest bloody day of the year. And what if she opens her email while we’re waiting?’ He took a deep breath. He hadn’t yet reported this mess to Croke, hoping to sort it all out first. But he couldn’t put it off any longer. He didn’t want Pete and Kieran listening in, however, so he walked off a little way before calling Croke’s number.

‘Have you got my papers?’ asked Croke.

‘Yes,’ said Walters. ‘But there’s been a hitch.’

‘A hitch?’ asked Croke.

Walters had meant to play it cool, but somehow the story came blurting out. Croke had that effect on him. ‘We’re outside the girl’s place now,’ he finished. ‘But there are curtains twitching everywhere.’

‘I don’t believe this,’ said Croke acidly. ‘I ask you to buy me some papers, and instead I get arson and a dead woman. And now you’re worried about curtains?’

‘We work for one of your companies, sir. If we’re arrested, it’ll lead the police straight back to you. I wanted to make absolutely sure you think it’s worth the risk.’

Silence. ‘Okay,’ said Croke finally. ‘Stay where you are. I’ll see what I can arrange.’

II

Pelham scrolled for a number then jammed his phone between shoulder and ear. ‘Hey, gorgeous,’ he said. ‘It’s me. Yeah. Listen, that friend of yours at Caius. Sonia, isn’t it? You couldn’t give her a call for me, could you? Brilliant. I need to get hold of a girl there. Rachel something …’ He glanced across at Luke for a prompt.

‘Rachel Parkes,’ said Luke.

‘Rachel Parkes,’ relayed Pelham. He listened a moment, laughed loudly. ‘No. Nothing like that, I promise. A favour for a mate.’ He laughed again. ‘What do you mean? I’ve got plenty of mates. I just won’t introduce you or you’ll run off with one of them.’ He nodded vigorously. ‘Yeah, anything you can get. Mobile, home phone, address, whatever. Thanks, sweetheart. Love you.’ He killed the call, turned to Luke. ‘Miriam,’ he said. ‘I think she might be the one.’

‘You always think they might be the one.’

‘Keeps the heart young, falling in love. Try it yourself sometime.’

‘Maybe next week. This week I’m focusing on staying alive.’

‘You’ll need something to write on when she calls back.’ He gestured at his glove compartment. ‘Have a rootle around in there.’

‘Jesus, mate,’ said Luke, as he precipitated a small avalanche of candy bars and boiled sweets.

‘Better give me one of those,’ said Pelham. ‘Wouldn’t want to faint from sugar deficiency; not with all these telephone poles around.’

‘Was that when the last one attacked?’ asked Luke, finding himself a stubby pencil and a notepad. ‘While you were feeding?’

‘What are you? A claims adjuster?’ He tore the wrapper off one with his teeth, stuffed the molten mess inside into his mouth. He was still chewing when his phone rang, had to give himself a couple of moments to swallow it away. ‘Hey, sweetheart,’ he said. ‘Any joy?’ He listened a moment, grinned. ‘You’re a star.’ He called out phone numbers and an address for Luke to jot down. ‘Thanks, gorgeous,’ he said. ‘And we’re still on for tomorrow, yeah? Great. Then take care, now.’ He ended the call and handed Luke his phone so that he could try the various numbers. Without success. ‘Do you want to go sit outside her place?’ asked Pelham. ‘You can’t consider yourself a proper stalker until you’ve done that.’

‘How far is it?’

Pelham turned on his GPS, typed in her address. ‘Other side of town,’ he said. ‘Twenty minutes or so.’ He gave Luke a pointed look. ‘Just about long enough for you to tell me what the fuck’s going on.’

‘Fair enough,’ said Luke. He took a moment to order his thoughts. ‘Remember that business with the Uni?’

Pelham nodded soberly. ‘Of course.’

‘I tried to get myself another job, but I was way too toxic. It was clearly going to be a year or two before the whole thing died down, so I decided to make a virtue of necessity, write my book. I’d been talking about it long enough.’

‘Telling me.’

‘I had some savings, but it was still going to be pretty tight, you know; so I put the word out that if there was any work-’

‘I asked around,’ said Pelham. ‘I swear I did. But you know how things are.’

‘I wasn’t having a go. I’m just explaining the background. Because around last Christmas this guy rings out of the blue. He tells me his name is Steven, though I doubt now that it really was. He says that he’s a lawyer and that he’s got a possible job for me. One of his clients is apparently a Newton obsessive.’