to his chair. He doubted that the assassin had asked for five million dollars, but Aslam was acting as middle man and middle men always took their percentage. That was how Othman had made his fortune, so he did not grudge another man his share. Besides, Othman didn’t care how much it cost. All that mattered was that the man and woman who had murdered his sons should die in agony, knowing why they had been killed.
The bell rang and Shepherd opened the front door to find two men in blue overalls and a Pickfords van parked outside. A third man was unlocking the back of the vehicle.
‘Mr Pierce?’ said the oldest of the three. He was holding a metal clipboard.
‘That’s right,’ said Shepherd.
‘I’m George, from Pickfords,’ he said. ‘If you show me which rooms are which, we’ll get started. Don’t suppose the kettle’s on, is it? I’m parched.’
Shepherd grinned. ‘Tea or coffee?’
‘Coffee, unless it’s instant,’ said George. ‘Mutt and Jeff here will drink anything.’
The young man raised a hand. ‘I’m Jeff,’ he said, ‘and he’- pointing at their companion – ‘isn’t really called Mutt.’
Shepherd took George around the house, then went to the kitchen and made four cups of filtered coffee. The removers worked quickly and efficiently. Even with a ten-minute break, they took just two hours to unload the van, open the cardboard boxes and set out the furniture. As Shepherd was signing the receipt, a white VW Golf turned into the driveway next door. Shepherd slipped George three twenty-pound notes, then waved at Elaine Carter as she climbed out of her car.
She looked prettier than she had in the photograph Button had shown him. Her hair was dark red rather than ginger and she was wearing makeup that emphasised her high cheekbones and full lips.
Shepherd stepped over the line of shrubs that separated his garden from hers. ‘Hi,’ he said, holding out his hand. ‘I’m Jamie Pierce. I guess I’m your new neighbour.’
She was wearing a dark blue overcoat with the collar turned up and carrying a leather attache case. She transferred the case to her left hand and shook his. ‘Elaine,’ she said. ‘Elaine Carter. You’re English, huh?’
‘I’m afraid so,’ said Shepherd. ‘Is that a problem?’
‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘You don’t want to believe all the bad press Belfast gets.’
‘Hey, I’ve heard nothing but good,’ said Shepherd. ‘That’s why I was happy to move here.’
Elaine gestured at the house. ‘Did you buy it, or are you renting?’
‘It’s mine,’ said Shepherd. ‘Or, at least, it will be in thirty years.’
‘It’ll be a great investment.’
‘Are you an estate agent?’ said Shepherd.
‘Independent financial adviser,’ said Elaine. ‘Pensions, insurance, investments.’ She grinned. ‘Mortgages, too. Pity you didn’t talk to me first. There are some good deals to be had just now.’
Shepherd rubbed his chin. ‘Maybe we should talk about it some time,’ he said. ‘I’m self-employed and everyone tells me I should get a pension.’
‘The sooner the better,’ said Elaine. ‘Let’s have a chat once you’re settled in.’
Jeff tooted the horn of the Pickfords van as it rumbled off down the road. George seemed disgruntled and Shepherd guessed that the tip hadn’t been big enough.
‘Got everything you need?’ asked Elaine.
‘An Aston Martin would be nice,’ said Shepherd.
Elaine laughed. She had a pretty laugh, Shepherd decided, and definitely not the laugh of a hardened killer. ‘I meant bread or milk. The basics,’ she said. ‘Anyway, the Audi’s a nice enough motor.’
‘It’s a business expense,’ said Shepherd.
‘You drove it here?’
‘Sure, the ferry’s easy enough.’
‘I know – I drive to the UK when I have meetings over there. I’m afraid of flying, believe it or not.’
‘Have you got time for a coffee?’
‘I’ve some calls to make. Maybe tomorrow. What time do you get back from work?’
Shepherd grinned at the house. ‘I work from home,’ he said. ‘This is my office.’
‘Tomorrow then,’ said Elaine. She flashed him a smile, showing toothpaste-commercial teeth. ‘Welcome to the neighbourhood.’
There were more than five hundred people in the queue that ran back and forth between the taped barriers. A dozen immigration officers stood behind podiums, their faces blank as they matched passport photographs to faces and quizzed the holders on their reasons for wanting to enter the United Kingdom. The air-conditioning was struggling to cope and people were fanning themselves with magazines or wiping their brows with handkerchiefs. Children were crying and businessmen with briefcases muttered under their breath. Most waited patiently, though. They came from countries where every bureaucratic function took ten times longer than was truly necessary.
Hassan Salih strode towards the EU nationals line. Ahead, a group of Indian women in brightly coloured saris clutched British passports and chattered in Urdu. The line moved quickly. There were no questions, no interrogations, just a quick look at the passport, a swipe through a terminal and a curt nod. Salih was travelling on a French passport under a Moroccan name. The passport was genuine, as was the photograph. It had been applied for under the name of a French Moroccan labourer who was about Salih’s age. Salih had paid the man ten thousand Euros to apply for the passport and then killed him and dropped him from a motorboat some twenty miles off the coast near Marseille, the body weighed down with a length of anchor chain.
There were just two immigration officers dealing with the EU line, compared with more than a dozen handling the non-EU visitors. Anyone with an EU passport had automatic right of entry into the United Kingdom. No visas were necessary, no forms had to be filled in, and there were no questions to be answered. Provided the passport was valid, and provided the face of the person holding it matched the photograph inside, entry was guaranteed. It was a major weakness in the country’s border controls, Salih knew, and one that he was more than happy to take advantage of.
Salih had his story well prepared, but it would only take a few careful questions for a suspicious immigration officer to realise that he wasn’t French. There would be no questions. There never were. If the passport was genuine, the holder could not be refused entry. And Europe had allowed itself to become so multi-racial that there was no way of telling a person’s nationality from their appearance. Salih could spot an Egyptian at fifty feet, could list half a dozen differences between a Saudi and an Iraqi, could recognise a Palestinian among fifty Jordanians. But there was no way of telling if someone was British by looking at them. The British had granted citizenship to every race and creed on Earth, everyone from Bosnian war criminals to Jamaican drug-dealers, and once granted it was virtually impossible to revoke. The French, too, had been eager to offer citizenship to anyone who wanted it. The line moved forward. Behind Salih were a Pakistani couple and three small children. The husband was clutching five British passports.
One of the immigration officers was a middle-aged Chinese woman with thick-lensed spectacles, the other a young man barely out of his twenties, with a neatly trimmed goatee beard. Both smiled politely as they handed back passports. The famous British politeness.
The Indian women continued to chatter in their own language as their passports were checked. The immigration officers didn’t speak to them. Salih shuffled forward. When it was his turn he handed over his passport with a smile and kept his head up. The Chinese woman studied the photograph, then looked up at him. Salih maintained eye contact. She scrutinised his face for a couple of seconds, then returned to the photograph. She pursed her lips and flicked through the passport. There were only a couple of visa stamps, one for South Africa and another for Dubai. She ran the bar code inside the cover through the reader on her terminal. A copy of the passport picture flashed up on the screen. She closed the passport and handed it back to him. ‘Have a nice day,’ she said.
‘You too,’ said Salih. He headed down to Baggage Reclaim, then straight out through the green channel. He only ever flew with hand luggage. Everything he needed he could buy.
The arrivals area of Heathrow’s Terminal Three belonged more to a third-world country than the capital of the United Kingdom. It was packed with people waiting to greet passengers and the authorities made no attempt to keep the walkways clear. Africans,Indians and Arabs were pushing,shoving and shouting. Salih had to ask half a dozen times for people to move so that he could get through, and most did so grudgingly. He emerged to find a line of drivers, men in dark suits, holding signs with the names of their clients. Most were Afro-Caribbean or East Asian.
