Damn you, Hope. Get it together.
He walked on, eyes to the ground, fighting to bring the number back.
Nothing.
Then his feet reached the edge of the pavement. He looked up, and suddenly he knew where he was. He’d walked all the way up to the Place de la Trinite. Ahead of him across the busy square, nestling behind trees, was the dome of the Trinity church. It somehow seemed to beckon to him.
He crossed the square, walked up the steps to the entrance and went in. The inside of the church was cool and dark and rich with the pungent smell of incense. His footsteps echoed off the time-smoothed flagstones and carried up to the vaulted ceiling as he made his way up the aisle and settled in a pew. The traffic rumble was far away. Diaphanous light filtered in through the stained glass windows. He bowed his head, closed his eyes, felt the serene atmosphere penetrate his senses, purge away the confusion and shine clarity into his thoughts.
He visualised himself in that stinking tenement building back in Cairo.
Finding Morgan’s blazer on the stoned-out girl with the angel tattoo.
Searching through the pockets back at Morgan’s flat.
Finding the crumpled piece of paper.
Reading the number.
Come on.
Reading the number.
Suddenly, it came to him. His heart jumped. He opened his eyes, grabbed a pen from his pocket and scribbled the number on the back of his hand.
He stared at it. Yes, it was right. He was sure of it. The area code was 01334, but he’d no idea where in the UK that was. Then there was the main body of the number, and then the three-digit extension, 345. That part had been easy to remember.
He stood up. Stronger now, somehow. More focused. Clearer.
He walked out of the church, leaving its cool serenity behind. The building was surrounded by pretty, well- tended gardens railed off from the street. The trees rustled lightly in the breeze, and little sparrows hopped across the lawns. Ben headed for an old wooden bench under a gnarly oak. He sat down on the edge of it, took out his phone, glanced again at the number on his hand and punched it out on the keys.
After four rings his heart was already sinking. Maybe this wasn’t going to lead anywhere. Maybe the number meant nothing. If the junkie girl had been wearing the blazer for a few days, the piece of paper might have been hers. Doubts gripped him.
On the sixth ring, an answerphone cut in.
‘University of St Andrews. Faculty of History,’ said the female voice on the recorded message. She spoke with a lilting Scottish accent. ‘If you know the extension number you require, please enter it now. Otherwise, please hold for an operator.’
This didn’t sound like a contact a Cairo dopehead would have. Ben entered the extension and waited. Then swore under his breath as another answerphone kicked in after a couple of rings.
‘Hi, you’ve reached the voicemail of Dr Lawrence Kirby. I’m not around right now, so please leave your message-’
Ben killed the call before he got to the beep. So now he knew whose number he had. This was suddenly looking more promising. Maybe not much, but better than nothing.
Leaning back on the bench, he did an Internet search on ‘Dr Lawrence Kirby, St Andrews University’. His phone’s search engine took him straight to the Faculty of History website, where he found Kirby listed in the directory of staff members. He clicked on the name, and a thumbnail photo appeared with a two-line bio. The picture showed a somewhat bemused-looking, pasty-faced individual who hadn’t shaved that morning. He had a wild shock of black hair, a tuft of it hanging down across his brow.
Ben gazed at it. Is this fucker going to be any use to me? he wondered.
He laid the phone down next to him and took out his cigarettes and lighter. Lit up, watched the smoke curl away on the wind and tried hard not to think of Zara. It didn’t work. He finished the cigarette and went straight into another. After a few minutes he snatched up the phone and dialled Kirby’s number again.
This time, there was no answerphone, and it kept ringing and ringing. Just as he was about to hang up, a man’s voice answered breathlessly, as though he’d been running to get the call.
‘Dr Kirby?’ Ben said.
‘Speaking,’ the voice panted.
‘Dr Lawrence Kirby?’
‘This is he,’ the voice replied jovially. ‘Who’s this?’
‘You don’t know me. I’m calling about Morgan Paxton.’
The phone went dead.
Ben swore. He tried again. This time, Kirby answered on the second ring.
‘We got cut off,’ Ben said.
‘No, we didn’t.’ Kirby didn’t sound so jovial any more. ‘I cut you off.’
‘Why did you do that? I was just trying to talk to you.’
‘I cut you off because I don’t know any Morgan Paxton.’
‘You remember his name pretty well, though.’
‘Listen, I don’t know who you are, or what you’re talking about,’ Kirby answered, sounding panicked. ‘You must have the wrong number.’
‘It’s the right number and, if you let me explain, you’ll understand why I need to talk to you. It’s important.’
There was a pause on the other end. ‘I’ve nothing to say to you. I don’t know who Morgan Paxton is.’ Kirby hung up again.
Ben turned off his phone. OK, if that’s the way you want to play it, Kirby, he thought. St Andrews. East coast of Scotland, just north of Edinburgh.
Fuck it. He could be there in a few hours.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Ben hammered the Mini the fourteen miles northeast to Paris Roissy airport and got on the first plane bound for Edinburgh. After a short flight, he stepped down on Scottish soil. The air was colder and crisper than France, but he wasn’t interested in taking in his surroundings. At the Avis car rental outlet he picked out a Mercedes SLK two- seater sports that seemed about right for someone in the kind of hurry he was. Settling into the snug black leather interior, he entered his destination into the sat nav and hit the road fast and hard. Edinburgh shrank away quickly to nothing in his mirrors. He blasted across the giant suspension bridge spanning the Firth of Forth and carved northwards up the twisting A roads of the east coast until he reached St Andrews.
He vaguely remembered from his theology studies that the old university town had at one time been the religious capital of Scotland, steeped in the blood of butchered, tortured and burned martyrs. Its violent past was hard to imagine as he drove through the quiet streets, past ivied university buildings, cafes and hotels. It didn’t take him long to locate the Faculty of History. He left the car and walked along a path overlooking the sea, with the ruins of the medieval cathedral behind him and the craggy remains of St Andrews castle and the coastline stretching out in a wide curve ahead in the distance. He filled his lungs with the fresh, salty air and tried hard, for the millionth time, to keep Zara from the foreground of his thoughts but knew it was impossible.
Arriving at the fine stone building that housed the Faculty of History, he walked in the iron gates, crossed a small car park and shoved through the front entrance into a large reception area. There was nobody at the desk. He glanced around him. A row of chairs, some historical prints framed on the wall, a broad staircase winding upwards. On a panel by the bottom of the stairs were the names of the academic staff with their room numbers and a little push-button LED that showed who was in. Ben ran his finger down the list until he found Kirby and a room number-42. The little light next to it was on.
He headed up the stairs, two at a time. A bunch of students were heading down, clutching books and folders,
