Crocodile Tears

Ainsworth flicked a page in a file. There were fingerprints—ten of them in a row—and what looked like a chemical formula. “We’ve checked your DNA and your fingerprints, Jeremy. They all match up.

There’s no need to pretend anymore.”

“You escaped from Broadmoor two months ago,” Bennett said.

Broadmoor? Bulman blinked heavily. That was where they sent the most dangerous prisoners in the country, the ones who were considered criminally insane.

“Why did you kill Harold Bulman?” Bennett asked.

“I . . . I . . .” Bulman tried to find the answer, but the words wouldn’t come. Something had happened to his thinking process. He was aware that there were tears trickling down his cheeks.

“Don’t worry, Jeremy,” Ainsworth said. He sounded almost kind. “We’re going to take you back.

You’ll be safe, locked up in your cell. You won’t hurt anyone ever again.”

“You’ll be taken back to Broadmoor this afternoon,” Bennett added.

“No . . .” The room was spinning in ever-increasing circles. Bulman gripped the table, trying to slow it down. “You can’t—”

“We can. The arrangements have already been made.”

The door suddenly opened and a third man came in. From the very start he didn’t look anything like a policeman. He was more like a retired colonel, about fifty, with thinning hair and a face that was hurrying toward old age. He was wearing a suit that didn’t match his brown suede shoes. “Thank you,” he said. “I’ll take over now.”

He didn’t exactly radiate authority, but there was something in his voice, an edge of steel, that cut straight to the point. The two detectives stood up immediately and left. The man took their place at the table, opposite Bulman. His eyes were empty and cold.

“My name is Crawley,” he said. Bulman was still crying. There were tears dripping out of his nose.

Crawley reached into his pocket and took out a tissue. “Use this,” he suggested.

Bulman wiped his nose and ran a sleeve across his eyes.

“I work for the intelligence services,” Crawley explained. “A branch of MI6.” And suddenly Bulman understood. It was like being slapped across the face. MI6! Who else could have twisted his life out of shape with such ease? If he hadn’t been so terrified, he would have been furious with himself. He should have expected something like this. “Alex Rider . . . ,” he rasped.

“I’m not saying I’ve ever heard of Alex Rider,” Crawley responded. His voice was utterly flat. “But I am going to tell you this. I could snap my fingers now and a van would take you to a mental hospital and lock you up, and that is where you would spend the rest of your life. Harry Bulman would be dead and you’d be the lunatic who killed him.”

“But . . . but . . .” Bulman couldn’t talk. He could barely breathe.

“For that matter, I could eliminate you now myself,” Crawley continued. “I actually know thirty-seven different ways to kill you in a manner that will look completely natural. Some of them are quick. Some of them hurt.” He paused. “But those are not my instructions. I’ve been told to give you another chance.”

“You bastard.” Bulman was crying again.

“You can go home now. You can forget all about this. But if you ever go anywhere near Alex Rider again, if you approach any newspaper editor, if you so much as mention his name, we will hear about it, and next time we won’t be so generous. We will wipe you off the face of the earth. Do you understand me?”

Bulman said nothing. Crawley stood up.

“From now on, we’ll be watching you, Mr. Bulman,” he said. “Every minute of every day. Please believe me. This was just a lesson. Next time it’ll be for real.” He left the room.

Bulman stayed where he was. Alex Rider. The two words thundered through his head. Alex Rider. He knew that he would never write his story. His hopes of a major scoop had been destroyed, along with all his riches. He dragged himself to his feet. He was still trembling. Alex Rider. How he wished he had never heard the name.

10

GREENFIELDS

THE BUS HEADED WEST DOWN THE HIGHWAY, turning off at Junction 15, near Swindon. It passed through the attractive town of Marlborough, then on toward the vast area of empty grassland that was Salisbury Plain.

There was nowhere quite like it in the whole of England. Three hundred square miles in area, it had been inhabited long before the Romans had arrived. Stone henge stood on its southern edge. Traces of hill forts dating back to the Iron Age were still dotted around. The plain was used by the army, frequently shut down for night exercises using tons of live ammunition. And one small part of it had been leased out to Greenfields for a research center that the authorities had decided was best kept hidden, in the middle of nowhere.

Alex Rider was sitting in the back of the bus next to Tom Harris and James Hale. There were forty students from Brookland on the trip, along with two teachers—Mr. Gilbert and a prim, slightly nervous woman named Miss Barry, who taught music but who had been included to help with discipline. They had been driving for over two hours now and the initial excitement had long since faded away, replaced by the dull sense of endlessness that comes with any highway journey.

Alex took out the postcard that had arrived the day before. It showed a picture of the Eiffel Tower in Paris. On the back, someone had written a date—2/25—and a message: Paris is beautiful and fortunately we didn’t manage to get lost. I hope you have a great time. The signature was unreadable, but Alex recognized Smithers’s writing. He had been expecting the card, and Smithers had told him how to use it. He slipped it away and turned to Tom.

“Can you do me a favor?” he said casually.

“Sure. What sort of favor?”