‘One step ahead. Once you phoned and explained the situation, we had people out on the street asking passers-by. Also, we’re checking the hotels now. If, as you say, she’s running scared, she may have stayed close to the city centre, or moved on somewhere else.’
‘Not likely that she’s moved,’ Wendy said. ‘Time’s against her now, and she knows it. We believe that she will strike today in London. She’s already phoned the target; scared the living daylights out of her.’
‘Give us three hours, and we should have checked the main possibilities,’ Downton said.
***
Charlotte wandered down by the river, throwing some bread for the ducks to eat. It was still early, too early to complete what remained unfinished from Newcastle. Usually, she would skip breakfast, but today, for no apparent reason, she decided that a full stomach was needed.
‘Full English breakfast, dear?’ the waitress at the small café asked.
‘Yes, please,’ Charlotte replied. She checked inside her bag; all that she needed was there.
Ten minutes later, her breakfast arrived: tomatoes, eggs, bacon and sausages. Charlotte gulped down the meal, paid the bill and left the café. She walked to the railway station in Windsor and took the 7.55 a.m. to Waterloo. From there it was a one-mile walk across Waterloo Bridge to Chancery Lane, and the London International Medical Centre where the conference was to be held, although she intended to leave the train at Vauxhall, two miles further away from the venue.
She realised that there would be police at Waterloo looking for her; her phone call to Gladys Lake would have alerted them to her primary target. A rational person would not have made such an error, but she was no longer rational, only focussed. If she was to die in the attempt, so be it, but Gladys Lake had to die first.
The train moved rapidly to its destination, Charlotte barely registering the movement. It was only when she heard the driver announce ‘Vauxhall next stop’ that she raised herself from her seat.
As she had predicted, there was no police presence at the station, only railway security, and they weren’t looking for her. She left the station on the side closest to the river and walked up the Albert Embankment; it was only 9.30 a.m., and time was on her side. A police car came hurtling by, its siren blaring. For a moment, Charlotte moved over to one side, closer to the river, but the car did not stop. She resumed her steady pace up the road, passing Lambeth Bridge, Westminster Bridge and the Houses of Parliament; at any other time scenically impressive, but not for Charlotte. She came to Waterloo Bridge and looked around for a heightened police presence; she could see none. The crowds had started to form on the bridge: locals going about their usual business, tourists with iPhones taking photos, mainly selfies to post on social media. None of them interested her as she maintained her pace over the bridge, looking left and right, straight ahead, not noticing the River Thames flowing beneath her. Leaving the river, she reached the Strand and turned right, eventually reaching Chancery Lane and her destination. The police car outside was the first sign of trouble; the second, the two police officers checking everyone entering the building.
Anxious to ensure that her plan was not thwarted, she walked around the edifice looking for another way in. She found Clifford’s Inn Passage, a lane to one side of the building. History would have told her that the name referred to an Inn of Chancery, one of the country’s legal institutions that had been founded in 1344, but she was not interested in that, only in whether the passage would afford her entrance into where she wanted to go. Moving up the lane, she found a small door; it was unlocked. She turned the handle and entered the basement of the conference centre. She ascended a flight of stairs: yet again, police. A cupboard solved the problem; it contained cleaning utensils and a cleaner’s uniform. She put it on and moved around the building, pretending to clean. Soon she reached the room where Gladys Lake was to present her paper; it was empty. Easing herself into a space beneath the elevated stage, she waited.
It had been luck that the room was empty when she had entered. Within a few minutes, people started to file in, ready for the opening speech at midday. Gladys Lake entered the room just before it started, in the company of Sara Marshall. Charlotte watched them come down the stairs through a crack in the raised-floor's plinth. Up on the stage, the microphones were being given a final test: ‘One, two, three. Can you hear me at the back?’ They could.
Charlotte listened to the boring speeches about subjects that she had knowledge of after years in a hospital. Gladys Lake was due to speak at 2 p.m.
Charlotte, unsure how to proceed, waited patiently, although it was dusty where she was, and there was evidence of vermin. Regardless, she kept still, hoping that an opportunity would present itself. She saw the doctor fiddling with her notes, talking to Sara Marshall, looking around the room nervously. At ten minutes before her nominated time, Gladys Lake rose and left the room in the company of the police officer. Charlotte cursed, unable to follow them. She moved back, finding an exit. Quickly, unseen, she moved around behind some partitions to the rear of the room and through a side door into the corridor outside. At the other end, she could see the Ladies toilet; her assumption was that was where the two women had gone. She gingerly approached the door, listening for voices, hearing muffled sounds from the other side. Charlotte checked her bag and withdrew the knife she carried.
Carefully she pushed opened the door; it squeaked. Once through it, she concealed herself behind a pillar. Certain of
