the way the British treated him. Angry at Adrian, perhaps, in particular. You must admit it, you fit the bill.”
“So do a lot of people,” she replied. She was calm now. “Look, Logan, if you’ve done your research on Finn, you know that he had many, many friends. I don’t know who he was with in Paris, or who he called when he knew he was in trouble. Dying,” she added ruthlessly. “But he was popular—loved even—by many. There were plenty of people who would have done almost anything for him. I can give you a list if you like, but I don’t know the answer. I don’t know how his body got to Berlin, or who got it there.”
At which point Marcie stood up. “Is Logan getting on your nerves?” she said.
Logan smiled tolerantly.
“There are many ways to say no,” Anna said. “I guess he just needs to hear them all.”
“It’ll do him good,” Marcie said. “My impression of Logan is that he gets his own way too much of the time.”
With that, she left the room. On her way out, she called back. “If you want to have a walk at lunchtime,” she said, “I’m all yours.”
Burt looked up to the table for the first time now.
“Let’s resume after lunch,” he said.
Chapter 17
ANNA AND MARCIE WALKED up through the meadow after lunch. It was a cold afternoon. The land was preparing for its long winter sleep.
“You and Logan have worked together before?” Anna asked her.
“No. I only met him two months ago, when we started working on you,” Marcie replied.
“Burt says he was sacked. Something to do with the Balkan war. Weren’t you out there too?”
“After the war, yes. I was working with the UN. Before that I was a teacher in New York, then I took a psychology degree. Then I studied conflict resolution at military academy. That’s where I started this kind of work. Joined the CIA. Life progression,” she laughed.
“And now you work for Burt’s company,” Anna said.
“For the moment. Burt’s a good employer, I guess. He inspires.”
“Yes,” Anna said. “I can see that.”
“But I’m not sure I’m going to get on too well with Logan,” Marcie said.
“Why not?”
“We’re sharing the guesthouse, you know? I guess it’s his attitude to women. He’s predatory, he has assumptions. He thinks he doesn’t need to try.”
“With women?” Anna said.
“Or anything else.”
“Do you want him to try with you then, Marcie?”
“God, no!”
“Sounds like the perfect partnership, then,” Anna joked. “A guy who doesn’t like trying, and a woman who doesn’t want him to.” But again Anna didn’t believe the rift Marcie seemed keen to project between herself and Logan. It was a trap Anna was intended to fall into. Marcie was developing her role as a safe place for divulging confidences—Marcie and Anna against Logan.
They walked on in silence for a few minutes, before Marcie spoke.
“Tell me about Finn,” Marcie said.
And so Anna told someone else for the first time about her relationship with Finn. But she did it, not to unburden herself, only to play the same game of artful intimacy that Marcie had begun.
Back at the house, Logan greeted them both with a smile. Burt was nowhere to be seen. Marcie went up to the guesthouse, and Anna and Logan were left alone in the kitchen.
“Ready for another grilling?” he said.
“I don’t think I’m doing anything else this afternoon,” she replied.
They paused while Logan drank from a cup of coffee.
“East Coast,” she said at last. “Private school, followed by Harvard, and then in the footsteps of your father into the agency.”
“Eight out of ten,” he replied with a grin. “My father was a banker, not a spook.”
“Retired?”
“He died. In a car crash.”
“That’s bad luck.”
Not “Sorry,” Logan noted, just “Bad luck.” She was a tough bitch. But he inclined his head in acknowledgement. “And you?” he said.
“What is there you don’t know about me, Logan?” she replied.
“Not a lot from your own lips,” he answered.
“What do you want to know?”
“Tell me about Finn.”
“Everybody wants to know about Finn.”
“I’d like to think this isn’t all about sitting on different sides of the table,” Logan said. “It looks like we’re going to be spending a while together.”
“Let’s just stick to the script,” she said. “We’re just two people who happen to be working together.”
“Whatever you say,” he replied amiably. “I guess it’s time to move anyway.”
“Afternoons aren’t my favourite time,” she said. “I’m a lot better in the mornings.”
“That’s a shame.” He grinned and looked at her directly for once. “I prefer the nights.”
Burt was already sitting in the study when Marcie returned and the three of them walked in, Anna first, then Marcie, with Logan some way behind.
But it was Logan who began the questioning again. Burt hardly looked up.
Logan gave her a file first of all, which he asked her to open and read. She saw it contained a list of Russian names, but with no explanation of what or who they were.
“Recognise any of them?” he said casually.
She ran her eye down the list. There were twenty-seven names altogether. She read the list a second time, but this time it was to compose herself, to avoid making eye contact. All were KGB, in one form or other. But there were two names she recognised very well indeed. Near the top of the list was an old friend and former lover whom she’d known since school days. But three from the bottom of the list was the name that really shocked her. Vasily Dubkov. It was Mikhail’s real name.
“Yes,” she said with a touch of bored interest. “I recognise several. What’s the significance?”
“Tell me first what you know about the ones you recognise,” Logan said smoothly.
She knew twelve of the twenty-seven, some well, others remotely. Then there was Vladimir, her old school friend and lover. But at the bottom of the page, Mikhail’s name seemed to burn a hole in her consciousness.
She outlined the details—background, rank, and experience—of each. She didn’t do it in the order they were written on the page, but as she remembered or knew of them. That way, she could better conceal Mikhail rather than leave him until last, when she knew it would be more difficult. There were no names beneath his that she recognised.
But Marcie was interested in Vladimir.
“So how long have you known Vladimir?” she said. “Since you were children? How old were you? Did you stay in touch?”
What did they know about her and Vladimir? Anna saw no reason to conceal anything.
“Vladimir, like me, was from an SVR family. We were at school together from the age of ten. We trained together at Yasenevo, at the Forest, in the early nineties. Vladimir spoke out against the abuse of privileges by KGB officers. We were encouraged to voice our thoughts in those days. But he was the only one who fell for it. He was exiled to the KGB residency in the Cape Verde Islands for ten years. I met him again when I was assigned to watch Finn.”
