under the table, and here he would be staying until he was damn well finished… and if the Security Officer didn't like it, he could go suck peppermints.
'And I'll want to sec his Superintendent, and perhaps some of his colleagues.'
'I'll not have a hand grenade thrown in here. You don't have my authority to disturb the work of very able and very dedicated men.'
' N o, indeed, sir, and nor would I need it.'
' Y o u got my phone burning,' Ruane said.
' T h e British, Dan, they're a race apart. What did that asshole Barker say?'
' H e said he could use a tough operator like you in his department – mind you, he didn't say what for – and he said to watch my ass, you'd be after my job first chance I gave you.'
'I got him to admit it, Colt was there.'
' Y o u got more than that, Bill… '
Ruane slid a fax across his desk. Erlich read. The smile was spreading on his face. The report of the laboratory in Washington.
The analysis of saliva on a cigarillo tip. The D. N. A. print. Great stuff. Getting better. Analysis of a tobacco leaf. Produce of Iraq.
Grown in Iraq. Manufactured in Iraq. Linkage. That was very good indeed.
' Y o u find your Colt, you match that saliva, and you got yourself a case. Meanwhile, and it may be the last thing we wanted, we've a case against those sweet-talkers in Baghdad.'
He should never have come. He should have let Sara go on her own. He was out of the range of his pocket, here, out of his class.
The women talked about school fees and holidays and 'little places' in the West Country. The men talked about the Market and tax schemes and the hideous price of commercial property.
That was before the champagne got them going. He was welcome, of course, because he was Sara's husband. Poor Sara, married to that nobody. He was asked where his boys went to school, failure.
He was asked where he had been on holiday, failure. He was asked where he lived, failure. After that they made no effort in his direction, that first group. He could see Sara. He'd seen her glass filled twice. He watched her laughing. The man she was laughing with was the man who had answered their ring at the front door. The man wore midnight-blue corduroy trousers, and a green silk shirt. The man had his hand on Sara's arm, and he made his Sara peal in laughter.
He drifted from the group. They didn't seem to notice his going. He forced himself. He penetrated a second group. Across the room he saw that Sara blushed, and that she giggled, and he saw the man's head close to her face, saw that he whispered to her.
He stood his ground in the second conversation. Noise growing all around him. The babble of the voices, and the heavy beat of the music from hidden speakers. The hostess, the one called Debbie, was at his elbow, more champagne. These were the chosen people around him. The ones who were never breathalysed. The ones who knew the back doubles in life. These weren't the people who would have themselves stopped, where everyone could see, at the Falcon Gate. These were the Thames Valley Triangle people. There was the sweep of lights through the window, thrown from another car in the drive. These were the new rich, and he couldn't think for the life of him what he was doing here… There was a ring at the front door. He saw the back of them. Sara's back and the man's back, going out into the hall. A man asked him if he knew that club in Barcelona where the girls stripped in feathers, feathers would you believe it? Bissett said, to general merriment, that he was willing to believe everything he was told of Spanish strippers. Could no longer see Sara, or the man.
He thought it must be the guest that Debbie Pink had been waiting for. A tall, younger man, in jeans and a faded denim shirt. He managed a surreptitious look at his watch, not even ten, Christ… ' O h, Freddie, someone for you to meet…'
'Hello, I'm Frederick Bissett.'
'This is Colin T u c k. '
The young man smiled. ' I ' m usually called Colt,' he said.
Bissett tried to grin, ' Y o u want to be called Colt, you can be called Colt.'
The introduction had eased him out of the conversation group, and Debbie had moved away, more glasses to find and fill.
Colt said quietly, 'This sort of crowd makes me want to throw u p . '
About the best thing he could have said to inch his way to Frederick Bissett's affection.
It was Debbie's bedroom. He held the picture in front of her.
The picture was of herself, sitting in front of the fire, in the dining room downstairs. The drawing had been framed in a simple black border. He held it for her to see herself. He put the picture down on the arms of a chair, where it faced the bed. She could have walked away. She could have pushed him away.
Slowly, he began to unbutton the front of her blouse. He slipped the blouse from her shoulders and reached behind her to unfasten the brassiere. She could have walked out through the door, slammed it on him. He pulled the zip on her skirt, and the skirt fell. She kissed him. His hands on her hips, and pushing down on her pants, and her stepping out of them. Her tongue in his mouth. Sara pulled the shirt off him, she had his belt open, she drove down at the waist of his trousers. She crouched. She pulled off his trousers and threw his shoes aside and peeled at his socks and underpants. She stripped him. Still not a word was said.
He led her to the bed, Debbie's bed. There was the photograph of Debbie beside the bed on the small table. Beside her own bed, Sara's bed, was the photograph of Frederick with Adam and Frank. She looked away from the photograph of Debbie. She lay on the bed and she threw out her thighs and she lifted her knees.
' O h, you're there, are you? Must be fascinating work.'
'It has its moments.'
'Well, that's the best brains in the country.'
'Some of them.'
'Well, m y privilege… '
'Thank you.'
The food was in the dining room, and there was a slow movement towards it. Colt had manoeuvred Bissett towards the corner of the room away from the dining room door.
'What I heard, people work in that place for peanuts, lifetime of sacrifice on the altar of science.'
'Well… '
' I f true, it's scandalous.'
'I wouldn't say that we're… '
' L o o k at this crowd… Does any one of them do anything that is remotely valuable? Yet the drive outside looks like this year's Motor Show. This country's got its values upside down.'
'I wouldn't disagree.'
Colt reached for a bottle. A splash for himself, a fill for Bissett.
The man didn't look like a successful drinker.
'All the rewards go to the tax dodgers, the system buckers, the free enterprise merchants. And the best brains in the country?
Ground into the dust.'
'We're not paid well, it's true.'
'Understatement of the year, Frederick. You're very loyal, but you're paid awful money. One wonders if it will ever get any better.'
' I ' m afraid we've missed out. World's upside down and Frederick Bissett's on the bottom.'
'It's like a trap, really, isn't it? And it's difficult to know how to break free.'
Her back arched, her thigh muscles taut. Reaching for him, rising to him. Him deep in her.
Oh, the fucking goodness of it, of him. When was it last as fucking good? Was it ever as fucking good with Frederick fucking Bissett?
Grinding her slowly away, breaking her will to compete with him. He was marvellous. Taking her with him. Best ever… better than the Ceramics tutor, and that was forever ago. Don't match him. Let him do it all, because that's what he was telling her.
Kissing him, holding him, running her fingers on his back. She was falling, she was letting her legs slide from
