'I can't have you listening in,' said Falcon.
'You're on our territory,' said Rodney firmly.
'When I go in there I'll be talking to him as his friend, not his spymaster.'
'So how were you talking to him when you were in Madrid yesterday?'
'That was business,' said Falcon. 'He was under too much pressure to be able to talk to me openly.'
'And that was why he lied to you,' said Rodney. 'Why should it be any different if you go in there as Javier, his close personal friend?'
'In his culture, in business, a certain amount of flexibility with the truth is permissible. Combine that with the paranoia induced by the new uncertainty of his situation, after what he'd just found out about his son, and his evasiveness becomes understandable,' said Falcon. 'If I establish a different level of intimacy with him from the start and he still lies to me, then I know we are lost. And I can't do that if I'm wired up to you.'
'You won't even notice it,' said Rodney.
Falcon stared him out.
The two Englishmen looked at each other in a complex communication that left Falcon thinking that they would be doing exactly what they wanted, regardless.
Rodney nodded as if to give way. Falcon didn't like his look; the man had a sort of unearned confidence about him that was not appealing. The ugliness of the Nervion Plaza shopping centre became more apparent the harder Consuelo looked for her son in its grey brutality. She thought it must have been designed by an East German before the Wall came down. She stood in the empty space at its heart, which was frequented by sprinting children and dazed adults. Above it there was a jazzy, modern awning which cast geometric patterned shade on the area, making it even more difficult to make out the children's faces. She could only assume that he had gone into the shop, got bored and been drawn to the animation here. There were a lot of ways in and out: the shopping mall, where they'd just been to buy his boots, the street, the stadium and the access to the cinema complex.
Consuelo walked around this area four or five times, darting down various alleyways to check for Dario, but always coming back to the centre in the hope of finding her blond boy clasping his cardboard box of football boots. As she did this, she called his brothers Ricardo and Matias, and told them they had to come to the Nervion Plaza immediately to help look for him. There was some protest, especially from Ricardo, who was already on his way to the coast.
Twenty minutes later they were all in Nervion Plaza. Consuelo's sister had brought Matias, and the family Ricardo had been with joined in the search. The father went straight to the first security guard he could find and got them to involve the local police. Announcements were made. Car parks were searched. Toilets investigated. Every shop was visited. The kids' films showing at the cinemas were all halted for ten minutes while they checked the audiences. The search was extended out into the streets and around the stadium. Local radio was contacted.
Only after everybody's reassurances had stopped working and Consuelo had retraced her steps a hundred times and she'd ransacked her mind for the final image of the last moment that she could picture Dario, standing in that area in the godforsaken heart of the Nervion Plaza with the box of football boots in his arms, did her paralysed brain think to call Javier. His mobile was switched off.
Ramirez was still in front of the computer screen when Consuelo's call came through.
'Javier's not here…' he started.
'Where is he?' she asked. 'His mobiles are switched off, both personal and police.'
'He's not in Seville today.'
'But where is he, Jose Luis? I need to speak to him. It's urgent.'
'We can't say any more than that, Consuelo.'
'Can you get a message to him?'
'Not even that at the moment.'
'I can't believe this,' she said. 'What's he doing that's so… so fucking important?'
'I can't say.'
'Can you get a message to him as soon as he's back in touch?'
'Of course.'
'Tell him that my youngest son, Dario, has… has…'
'Has what, Consuelo?'
Consuelo fought against the word in her throat, the word that she had not permitted to enter her consciousness, the word that had lurked low in some hideous dark corner of her stomach, where all mothers cordon off their worst fears, but which was now sickeningly illuminated.
'He's disappeared.'
10
Brown's Hotel, Mayfair, London – Saturday, 16th September 2006, 15.08 hrs
The receptionist at Brown's, an exclusive hotel consisting of eleven Georgian houses joined together in the heart of Mayfair, had an appraising eye, which was discernible only to those who did not meet his exacting standards. Falcon thought him polite, but did not realize how restrained this politeness was until someone, instantly recognizable but whose name escaped, appeared behind Falcon's shoulder. That was politeness, or maybe a caricature of it. Whatever, Falcon was made to wait for no other reason than it was evident, from his lightweight suit in autumn, that he did not belong.
The call was eventually made to Yacoub's room. Falcon, who'd already given his name twice, was asked to repeat it as if he might be a purveyor of game birds to back entrances. There was a lengthy silence while the receptionist listened. Then Falcon experienced the fully-fledged form of British hotel politeness.
Yacoub embraced him in the corridor outside his room. He put a finger to his lips, beckoned him in and shut the door. From the state of the room it was clear that Abdullah was staying there as well, but was not present. Still with his finger to his lips, he indicated that Falcon should undress. He went into the bathroom, shook out a towel and laid it on the bed. Falcon stripped to his underpants. Yacoub indicated that they had to come off as well.
They went into the bathroom. Yacoub didn't turn on the light. He ran the taps, shut the door. He minutely searched Falcon's ears and scalp and then made him take a shower and wash his hair. He fetched a packet of cigarettes from the bedroom and sat back on the bidet while Falcon dried himself off.
'Can't be too careful these days,' said Yacoub. 'They have devices the size of a nail paring.'
'Good to know you still trust me.'
'You've no idea how careful I have to be.'
'I don't know what's happening any more, Yacoub. One moment I'm swimming happily in the shallows, the next I'm off the continental shelf. I've got no idea who is with me or against me.'
'Let's talk about trust first,' said Yacoub, stone-faced. 'You spoke to Pablo.'
'You told me Abdullah was in a training camp back in Morocco.'
'You spoke to Pablo,' said Yacoub, pointing an accusing finger at Falcon's bare chest. 'That's why you're out of your depth. We've lost control of the situation. They, now, control it. The CNI, MI5 and MI6… probably the CIA, too. If you hadn't spoken to Pablo it would have been between us.'
'I don't have the experience in this game to let something like Abdullah's recruitment go without getting advice from Pablo,' said Falcon. 'I knew when I met you in Madrid that, at best, you were being economical with the truth. I thought that was a breach of trust. So I spoke to Pablo and he confirmed that you'd lied to me, Yacoub.'
'He's my son,' said Yacoub, lighting a cigarette. 'You will never understand that.'
'You gave me information, not so that we could control the situation, but so that you could,' said Falcon. 'I would always be in the dark because blood is thicker than water. You told me that from the beginning.'
'My only motivation is to protect him.'
'Well, he's unprotected now, isn't he?' said Falcon, leaning back against the cistern. 'You knew that it would eventually get back to me that you'd met up with Abdullah in London and that I would then know that you'd lied to me in Madrid. I spoke to Pablo and found out a bit earlier, that's all. What we have to do now is re-establish the trust. I can understand why you were in a state in Madrid. I can understand your wariness and your paranoia.'
'Can you?' said Yacoub, derisively. 'Before I got into this I thought I could imagine it, but I had no idea it would
