here.” Crawley pointed the way.
They had passed three doors when Alex stopped. Each door had a nameplate and this one he knew. 1504: Ian Rider. White letters on black plastic.
Crawley nodded sadly. “Yes. This was where your uncle worked. He’ll be much missed.”
“Can I go inside?” Alex asked.
Crawley seemed surprised. “Why do you want to do that?”
“I’d be interested to see where he worked.”
“I’m sorry.” Crawley sighed. “The door will have been locked and I don’t have the key. Another time perhaps.” He gestured again. He used his hands like a magician, as if he were about to produce a fan of cards. “I have the office next door. Just here…”
They went into 1505. It was a large, square room with three windows looking out over the station. There was a flutter of red and blue outside and Alex remembered the flag he had seen. The flagpole was right next to the office. Inside there was a desk and chair, a couple of sofas, in the corner a fridge, on the wall a couple of prints. A boring executive’s office. Perfect for a boring executive.
“Please, Alex. Sit down,” Crawley said. He went over to the fridge. “Can I get you a drink?”
“Do you have Coke?”
“Yes.” Crawley opened a can and filled a glass, then handed it to Alex. “Ice?”
“No, thanks.” Alex took a sip. It wasn’t Coke. It wasn’t even Pepsi. He recognized the oversweet, slightly cloying taste of supermarket cola and wished he’d asked for water. “So what do you want to talk to me about?”
“Your uncle’s will…
The telephone rang and with another hand sign, this one for “excuse me,” Crawley answered it. He spoke for a few moments, then hung up again. “I’m very sorry, Alex. I have to go back down to the lobby. Do you mind?”
“Go ahead.” Alex settled himself on the sofa.
“I’ll be about five minutes.” With a final nod of apology, Crawley left.
Alex waited a few seconds. Then he poured the cola into a potted plant and stood up. He went over to the door and back into the corridor. At the far end a woman carrying a bunch of papers appeared and disappeared through a door. There was no sign of Crawley. Quickly, Alex moved back to the door of 1504 and tried the handle. But Crawley had been telling the truth. It was locked.
Alex went back into Crawley’s office. He would have given anything to spend a few minutes alone in Ian Rider’s office. Somebody thought the dead man’s work was important enough to keep hidden from him. They had broken into his house and cleaned out everything they’d found in the office there. Perhaps the office next door might tell him why. What exactly was Ian Rider involved in? And was it the reason why he had been killed?
The flag fluttered again and, seeing it, Alex went over to the window. The pole jutted out of the building exactly halfway between rooms 1504 and 1505. If he could somehow reach it, he should be able to jump onto the ledge that ran along the side of the building outside room 1504. Of course, he was fifteen floors up. If he jumped and missed, there would be a couple of hundred feet to fall. It was a stupid idea. It wasn’t even worth thinking about.
Alex opened the window and climbed out. It was better not to think about it at all. He would just do it. After all, if this was the ground floor, or a jungle gym in the school yard, it would be child’s play. It was only the sheer brick wall stretching down to the pavement, the cars and buses moving like toys so far below, and the blast of the wind against his face that made it terrifying. Don’t think about it. Do it.
Alex lowered himself onto the ledge outside Crawley’s office. His hands were behind him, clutching onto the windowsill. He took a deep breath. And jumped.
A camera in the office across the road caught Alex as he launched himself into space. Two floors above, Alan Blunt was still sitting in front of the screen. He chuckled. It was a humorless sound. “I told you,” he said. “The boy’s extraordinary.”
“The boy’s quite mad,” the woman retorted.
“Well, maybe that’s what we need.”
“You’re just going to sit here and watch him kill himself?”
“I’m going to sit here and hope that he survives.”
Alex had miscalculated the jump. He had missed the flagpole by an inch and would have plunged down to the pavement if his hands hadn’t caught hold of the Union Jack itself. He was hanging now with his feet in midair. Slowly, with huge effort, he pulled himself up, his fingers hooking into the material. Somehow he managed to climb back up onto the pole. He still didn’t look down. He just hoped that no passersby looked up.
It was easier after that. He squatted on the pole, then threw himself sideways and across to the ledge outside Ian Rider’s office. He had to be careful. Too far to the left and he would crash into the side of the building, but too far the other way and he would fall. In fact, he landed perfectly, grabbing hold of the ledge with both hands and then pulling himself up until he was level with the window. It was only now that he wondered if the window would be locked. If so, he’d just have to go back.
It wasn’t. Alex slid the window open and hoisted him self into the second office, which was in many ways a carbon copy of the first. It had the same furniture, the same carpet, even a similar painting on the wall. He went over to the desk and sat down. The first thing he saw was a photograph of himself, taken the summer before on the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe, where he had gone diving. There was a second picture tucked into the corner of the frame. Alex aged five or six. He was surprised and a little saddened by the photographs. Ian Rider had been more sentimental than he had pretended.
Alex glanced at his watch. About three minutes had passed since Crawley had left the office and he had said he would be back in five. If he was going to find anything here, he had to find it quickly. He pulled open a drawer in the desk. It contained four or five thick files. Alex took them and opened them. He saw at once that they had nothing to do with banking.
The first was marked: NERVE POISONS. NEW METHODS OF CONCEALMENT AND DISSEMINATION. Alex put it aside and looked at the second. ASSASSINATIONS: FOUR CASE STUDIES. Growing ever more puzzled, he quickly
