It wasn’t hard to find, in the end. He arrived a little before eight, to find a tall, thin man chopping wood in the courtyard. Novak drove into the yard, parked, and exited the car. “Good morning,” he called out in perfect English. “Do I have the right place? I’m looking for my colleague, Bridget.”
The man had paused chopping as Novak drove up, and now he shrugged. “Colleague? Where from?” His English was heavily accented. Presumably this man was the Baudin in the farm’s name.
Whatever Novak said now, it would be a gamble; a combination of guesswork and years of experience at letting other people do the work. Tell people just enough to sound convincing, act as if you naturally expect them to understand what you’re talking about, and they will fill in the blanks for you without realising it. Whether or not this man believed Novak to be a threat would determine the course of the next twenty seconds, and both their lives. It would decide whether Novak needed to draw the Grach tucked under his shoulder. “Up at Agenbeux,” he said, and winked. “Rather hush-hush, you know?”
The man looked sceptical. “I’m sorry, but there’s no person here called Bridget,” he said, returning to his wood. “I can’t help you.”
Novak weighed his options. The man was obviously lying, but now he faced a tricky decision. If Bridget Short was in the house he would need to get inside quietly, or risk her making a pre-emptive strike. But if she was somewhere outside, on the farmland, he had to conduct a search without alerting her. The man’s wood axe was no threat against Novak’s gun, but would he remain quiet? It was a chance Novak would have to take. He reached inside his jacket, fingers closing around the butt of the pistol.
The farmhouse door burst open. A young girl ran out, shouting, “Auntie Bridge, Auntie Br — oh. Who are you?”
Marko Novak smiled. “Au contraire,” he said to the man, and drew his gun. “I think you can help me a great deal.”
62
The first thing Bridge noticed was an absence; the lack of noise, of Stéphanie running out to greet them and shouting their names. The first thing Izzy noticed was an object out of place; the wood axe, lying carelessly on the ground. Fréderic was strict about leaving it safely embedded in the chopping block when not in use, but there it was, seemingly discarded. Around it were scattered loose logs, some chopped, some still whole.
“Izzy, stay in the car and wait for me.”
“What’s going on, Bridge? What the hell is going on?”
“Hopefully nothing. But stay in the car.” Izzy killed the engine, and Bridge stepped out into the yard. No Stéphanie, no Fréderic, no sound except the distant call of blackbirds from the trees at the edge of the estate.
She opened the front door slowly, making as little noise as possible. Her natural urge was to call out, to shout “Hello,” and see if anyone responded. But her professional paranoia was at the forefront of her mind, and she said nothing. In the kitchen, she quietly picked up the keys to her Fiat and slipped them in her pocket. She glanced down at Fred’s HP laptop and saw it had finally completed the data recovery. But now wasn’t the time to go browsing photos. She gently closed the lid, slid a kitchen knife out of the block, and moved toward the lounge.
Fred and Steph were facing her, their back to the fireplace, sitting on wooden chairs from the dining area. Their arms were pulled behind them, tied to the chair backs. They were gagged, with scarves stretched across their mouths and tied behind their heads, and both were wide-eyed with fear and frustration.
Behind them stood Marko Novak, in plain clothes, pointing a Grach at the back of Steph’s head.
“The game’s up, Marko,” Bridge lied. “Exphoria is safe, and SIS is onto you. My colleagues are picking up your contact in London right now, and the DGSE is going to hunt you down like a dog.” She was surprised at how calm she sounded. Was it because the danger was now to her own family? Or had she simply had enough of running away, tired of always playing defence?
To her surprise, Novak laughed. “The DGSE couldn’t find their arse with four arms,” he said in perfect English. “And you, Ms Short — am I to suppose you lured me here deliberately? Using your own family as bait would be a most unorthodox tactic.”
She noticed he’d used her name, just as she’d used his. This was now a battle of wits, to see who could persuade the other that they had the upper hand, that resistance was futile. But Novak had called her ‘Short’, which boosted Bridge’s confidence. “That was a mistake,” she said. “I didn’t think you’d be stupid enough to actually follow me. I thought you’d be licking your wounds in Zurich, after the pasting I gave you at the guest house. How’s the leg?”
Novak grunted in acknowledgement, then smiled. “I realise now that I was wrong about you. I thought you were a specialist, but it seems you’re just another MI6 durak. And so —”
Whatever Novak wanted to say next would be forever lost, as he was interrupted by a sudden loud gasp from a
