‘So, what can I do you for?’ he enquires, and in answer she places a written list in front of him. A blood collection kit, hemostatic forceps, a sharps disposal bag and a packet of large condoms.
‘Having a party?’
‘Excuse me?’ She peers at him. She’s slightly cross-eyed, and the clunky glasses don’t help, but that apart, Dye concedes, not a total car-crash.
‘Well, you know what they say.’ He points to his name-tag. ‘Live and let . . . Dye.’
‘Have you got everything on that list?’
‘Give me a couple of minutes.’
When he returns, she hasn’t moved.
‘I’m afraid the condoms only come in standard size. Is that going to be a problem?’
‘Do they stretch?’
He grins. ‘In my experience, yes.’
She fixes him with one eye, the other looking disconcertingly over his shoulder, and pays for the goods in cash.
He drops the receipt into the Whitlock and Jones bag. ‘See you again, perhaps? You know what they say . . . Dye another day?’
‘Actually no one says that. Asshole.’
Eve follows Richard out of the gallery, across the riverside walkway, and down a slipway to a floating jetty, to which dinghies and other small craft are moored. It’s low tide, and the jetty rocks gently beneath their feet. There’s a faint smell of ooze and seaweed, and the slow rasp of mooring chains shifting with the river’s rise and fall. It’s cold, but Richard doesn’t seem to notice.
‘She’s quite a girl, your daughter.’
‘Isn’t she? I’m glad you liked her.’
‘I did.’ A breeze shivers the river’s thin glitter. ‘A professional shooter tried to take me out in the Moscow metro. If it wasn’t for the FSB, I might be dead.’
’Lance told me. Said that they took you to the Lubyanka.’
‘That’s right.’
‘I’m sorry, the whole thing must have been bloody frightening.’
‘It was. Although clearly it was my fault for insisting on going to Moscow in the first place.’
Richard looks away. ‘That’s not important now. Just tell me exactly what happened.’
She tells him. The metro, the Lubyanka, the conversation with Tikhomirov. All of it.
When she’s finished he says nothing. For almost a minute he seems to be watching a narrowboat edge past the jetty. ‘So they’ve got this Farmanyants woman in custody,’ he says finally.
‘Yes, in Butyrka. Which I gather is not a soft billet.’
‘No. It’s bloody medieval.’
‘I’m pretty sure she’s one of the women who killed Yevtukh in Venice. Tikhomirov thinks so too.’
‘Does he now?’
‘Richard, you recruited me to find out who killed Viktor Kedrin. I believe that it was a young woman named Oxana Vorontsova, codename Villanelle. A former linguistics student and prize-winning pistol shot from Perm, who was convicted of triple murder at the age of twenty-three. She was recruited and trained by Konstantin Orlov, the former head of the SVR’s Directorate S, as an assassin for the Twelve. He lifted her from prison, faked her death, and created a series of new identities for her, before he was killed himself, quite possibly by Villanelle. I’ll fax you my report in full over the next forty-eight hours, if I live that long.’
‘You really think—’
‘Look at it from Villanelle’s point of view. She’s dangerously compromised by what I’ve discovered about her, and her girlfriend’s in Butyrka, mostly because of me. So who do you think she’s coming for next?’
‘The people I’ve got watching you are the best, Eve. I promise you. You won’t see them, but they’re there.’
‘I hope so, Richard, I really bloody hope so, because she’s a killing machine. I’m trying to sound calm, and I’m more or less in control, most of the time. But I’m also scared to death. I mean, really fucking terrified. So terrified I can’t even think about the danger I’m in, or take the necessary precautions, because I’m afraid that if I face it straight on, or start thinking about it in any detail, I’m just going to fall to pieces. So there you go.’
He regards her with silent, clinical concern.
‘I’m not going back to Goodge Street,’ she adds. ‘Ever.’
‘All right.’
‘I’m out, Richard. I mean it.’
‘I hear you. But can I ask you one question?’
‘As many as you like.’
‘Where do you want to be in ten years’ time?’
‘I’ll settle for alive. If I’m still married that would be a bonus.’
‘Eve, there are no guarantees in this life, but you are in every sense more secure inside the citadel than outside. Let us take the strain. You were born for the secret life. You live and breathe intelligence work. The rewards could be . . . very great.’
‘I simply can’t do it, Richard. I can’t carry on. And now I’m going to go.’
He nods. ‘I understand.’
‘I don’t think you do, Richard. But either way.’ She holds out her hand. ‘Thanks for asking me today, and my compliments to Amanda.’
He frowns as he watches her go.
With the medical goods from Whitlock and Jones stowed in her rucksack, Villanelle meets Anton at the ticket barrier at Finchley Road tube station. He looks tense and short-tempered, and they’ve barely exchanged a few words before he turns away and leads her to the small Italian café outside the station.
Ordering coffee for both of them, he directs her to a corner table. ‘Ideally, I want it done tonight,’ he tells her. ‘The husband’s away, staying with friends, and I’ve just had confirmation he’s still there. The weapon, ammunition and documents you requested are in the bag under the table. You also asked for a vehicle, presumably for getting rid of the body?’
‘Yup.’
‘You’ll find a white Citroën panel van parked directly outside Polastri’s house. Key’s in the bag with the gun. Signal me in the usual way when the job’s done, and I’ll see you in Paris.’
‘OK. Nyet problem.’
He looks at her irritably. ‘Speak English. And why are you wearing those ridiculous glasses? You look mental.’
‘I am mental. Have you seen the Hare psychopathy checklist? I’m off the scale.’
‘Just don’t screw up, OK?’
‘As if.’
‘Villanelle, take me seriously. The
