Dead in the Water (8 page)

Jeremy pushes through the crowd and, in spite of his garish disguise, is accorded the authority of a police chief. Most of these people have met him, if only in passing, and think of him as genial if slightly crazy. Someone lends him a torch, and he steps into the office. Salvador wants to accompany him; but Jeremy insists he stays by the door, no less irritated by his anxious puppy dog discomfiture than by his failure to turn off the sprinkler system.

Smoke has blackened the ceilings and walls, the filing cabinets, the chairs and tables; but the sprinkler system activated almost immediately and there is no smell of petrol. Either they were amateurs, or the fire was a warning, a careless gesture of brutal derision on their way out after a robbery. Salvador calls from the door that the police have arrived and are on their way up. He’s determined to explain what he was doing here at this time in the morning. But Jeremy has no time for it now. “It’s fine. I’ll tell them you were coming in to work. It’s OK.” Salvador’s mouth twitches in the anxious smile of a child who’s used to punishment. “You were here,” says Jeremy, impatiently. “That’s good. OK.” Nothing more is to be said about it. If he wanted to bring his new girl here, so be it; and just as well as it turns out.

What’s worse than the fire is that the computers have gone – not the screens, or the keyboards, none of the peripherals, just the machines themselves with all the data stored on them. And the back up discs. Even an old-fashioned card index. That’s gone too. The bastards might have been clod-handed, but they got what they wanted: identities, phone numbers, e-mail addresses for everyone in any way connected with
One World
in Venezuela; employees, researchers, field agents, independent observers. And that includes Da Silva, Dias and Rachel. Jeremy is convinced that the attack was politically motivated, but the officer in charge merely shrugs in a gesture that says ‘Tell me about an attack like this which isn’t.’ He’s not bothered by the fire, not bothered by the break in, and doesn’t want to question Salvador. Nobody died. Nobody’s hurt. So it’s a waste of his time.

11
Amazonas

The source of the light is a luminous spider. Rachel lifts her face closer to watch the almost spherical body pulsing on and off like a beacon. Perhaps a mating signal, a courtship ritual, an arachnid equivalent of the peacock’s fan? Or a warning against predators? When the body is illuminated, the light makes it seem transparent – and she realises that nearby is another spider, dark, unglowing, presumably a mate, caught in the lucent spell, dazzled by the radiant one. A fatal attraction? She regrets her ignorance; but feels curiously elated. However bizarre the private lives of these little creatures, they are not helicopter gunships.

Exhaustion overtakes her. José seems more at peace. He has not called out for a while now; and the regularity of his breathing soothes her.

Rachel is woken by an eruption of sound as daybreak prompts every forest creature to announce its presence to a world obscured in heavy morning mist. As the burning sun gains strength, it draws mist up the trunks of the trees to the canopy, and in less than an hour, for the first time in several weeks, the sky is cloudless, blue and harsh. They are, as she guessed, in a clearing. She extricates herself from the survival bag, waking José as she does. His naturally dark skin looks lifeless, pallid as candle wax,. He claims he’s feeling OK, but she knows he’s lying: he has no appetite, and is reluctant to talk. Yesterday, when they stopped, he was convinced they were less than an hour from the river, but it looks unlikely that he can stay on his feet for an hour. The heat of the sun is already ferocious.

She digs into a pocket for the compass. South West will take them to the river. She shakes out the survival bag, trying to rid it of ants and bugs; and then rolls it up. They both need water. Fresh water and shade. She takes the machete; it’s a measure of José’s physical state that he allows her to lead the way. When they first arrived in the village he showed her forest plants with leaves rich in moisture, showed her others which are toxic; and now he’s trusting her to make those judgements. But she’s making mistakes – it wasn’t until after they have left the clearing that she thought to use the solar charger on the satphone battery.

As the hours pass and they seem no closer to the river, Dias stumbles and falls with increasing frequency; and although he says nothing of his pain, Rachel fears that fortitude alone will not see him through another night. Her hands are covered in blisters from wielding the machete, her feet are covered in sores. And the forest is closing in on them. If there had ever been a path here, it has long since healed over. An hour to the river he said. It’s taken an hour to cover a hundred metres. José’s childlike trust in her is all that’s keeping her from succumbing to her own terrors. She’s losing confidence in her ability to identify the leaves which are nourishing. And they have to find fresh water. She checks her pocket again. The digi-card and the camera are sealed in the protective bag, zipped in a pocket..

Her gloom lifts as they reach another small clearing, bordered by plants with enormous green leaves that act like funnels, storing rainwater. Gently, she manoeuvres José to sit beside one of the giant leaves; then reaches into her rucksack and pulls out the water bottle. Gives it him to drain the last drops. He moistens his lips; but his eyes are shut and he’s losing consciousness. She kneels and scoops water from the leaf. She should taste it before filling the bottle. As she raises her head and puts her cupped hands to her lips, she sees a lion marmoset, the smallest of all primates, watching her from a branch. Its eyes seem moist, as if it has been crying. A river of tears. And she hears a murmuring. The murmur of flowing water? A movement of air as a thermal lifts from the blackened clearing? Time slows. She is transfixed by the marmoset’s beautiful eyes, as clear as the pool of water in the leaf.

Then the marmoset falls from the branch. There is no sound as its body hits the forest floor. But she doesn’t register this, for even as it falls there is a sudden searing pain in her upper right arm as if she has been stamped with a branding iron. Unable to breathe, her sight narrows and she falls into a tunnel of darkness, fireflies shooting past, an iron band clamped round her head, her skull crushed as her brain implodes.

The pain dissolves, the fireflies slow, waft by her like seeds on a breeze, and she’s falling... face forward onto the ground.

The bottle rolls from her hand. The water gurgles out over rotting leaf mould, and saliva dribbles from a corner of her mouth.

12
London

Although the group calling itself the
Angels of Light
has claimed responsibility for both bombs, and a short-lived web site has briefly proclaimed the group as ‘Protectors of the Environment’, they have still not made their list of demands public.

Most of Mark’s morning is spent giving interviews. For the last of these, which will go out live on
The
World At One
, Mark has to make his way to a BBC radio car parked outside the House of Commons. When he was first interviewed in a radio car he found it a very strange and disconcerting business, sitting with headphones, talking to a well known radio personality as if they were in a room together. Since then, he has rapidly learnt to turn the circumstances to his advantage. With no body language to intimidate, seduce or cajole, he finds it easier to imagine the disembodied interviewer in whatever role best suits his purposes; and to manipulate the interview in such a way that he retains the moral high ground.

“
You find yourself in a difficult position, do you not? Having once embraced what people are now calling the Extreme Green agenda.”

“
I used to advocate direct action, but never violence. In those days I felt that the pace of change needed forcing. At that time no party was taking Green issues seriously. This government has actively pursued policies which have already made a very positive impact on the environment.” And, refusing interruption (so much easier with his inquisitor not present), he lists the major achievements of the Walker government, rebuffing attempts to disparage its environmental record.

“
Were you aware of the existence of this group?”

“
We’ve known of the threat of Green terrorism for several years. But not this group. No.”

“
You may not approve of the means that these people have adopted, but did you not author a pamphlet for the
One World
organisation which expressed similar aims?” Mark’s eyes are shut. He smiles.
Just what I was waiting for..

“
Mussolini wanted to make the trains run on time. So do we. So has every government for the past 100 years. That does not make us fascists. I don’t know what this group’s aims actually are. I have no idea who they are. What I do know is that the Green agenda that I am interested in is one which improves the quality of life of every citizen in this country. Whatever this group may claim, their actions pose a serious threat to lives and to the national economy. I totally repudiate their actions.” His forcefulness is authoritative. The interviewer seems uncharacteristically chastened.

“
Are they likely to strike again?”

“
People should remain very alert.”

“
That doesn’t answer my question. Are they likely to strike again?”

“
You need to ask the police.”

As he’s walking back to the office, he remembers about his own car. He stops at the canteen for a sandwich, switches on his personal mobile – which he always keeps switched off at work – and calls the garage on the card Daniella gave him last night. James Harvey is very personable – must have been a damn good salesman at some point in his career – and knows immediately who Mark is.

“
We should be able to take it in on Monday. You can never be sure before you get it on a ramp; but from what you say we should be able to get it done by Wednesday. How does that sound?” That sounds brilliant. Mark will have a key couriered over first thing Monday morning and they’ll pick it up.

His thoughts drift to Sara; and he checks for messages before switching off the mobile. He’s going through the menu, when he becomes aware of a tall woman with straight, shoulder length blond hair standing on the other side of the table.

“
Nobody there?” she asks.

“
They never are when you want them.”

She introduces herself as Robyn Westacott. She works for SIS; she’d like to talk. He suggests they go to his room, asks if she’d like tea or coffee. She looks at her watch before declining. She’s neat, well groomed; slim and tall. In high heels, taller than Mark. Probably ten years younger than he is. He tells Ba that they shouldn’t be disturbed.

“
I thought this kind of thing was always done in pairs.”

“
And that I’d be older and probably male?” Mark lifts his arms and opens his hands, a gesture of self-mocking confession. She has a calm authority and a hint of prim about her. Post-modern ironic prim perhaps? “And what ‘kind of thing’ did you have in mind, Mr Boyd?” She almost smiles. “This is not an interrogation. It’s not really even about you. You are not under investigation. You’ve been vetted.”

“
Thank you.”

“
Have you seen the list of demands?” she asks.

“
The Prime Minister briefed me; but no, not directly.”

She passes him a piece of paper with a photocopy of an e-mail on it, expecting him to comment. Why hasn’t he seen this before?

“
No government could possibly agree to this,” he says. “It would turn us into a Third World Economy in a matter of months.”

“
But it was the election platform, wasn’t it?”

“
It’s the timetable that’s crucial in this. There’s a global agreement to cut carbon emissions by eighty percent – but not in six weeks”

“
Is the e-mail genuine?” she asks.

“
I have no idea.” His tone is sharper than he’d like, but she smiles, as if to reassure him his defensiveness doesn’t bother her.

“
Are these the kind of demands that an extremist Green group might make?”

Mark nods. “Yes, I suppose they might – as a kind of bargaining position.”

“
Meaning that they wouldn’t expect these demands to be met?”

“
They can’t be met. They can’t possibly be met. They must know that.”

“
Is that the way you’d have seen it twenty years ago?”

He tries to suppress the feeling that she’s laying a trap for him. “I underestimated the positive links between a buoyant economy and the kind of technological change which improves the environment. And I was inclined to romanticise a kind of anti-technology, anti-science. But I always argued strongly against violence.” It’s a mechanical answer, an answer he’s given several times to interviewers; and she knows it.

“
There were people in the movement who did advocate it?”

“
Of course,” he says. “But you know who they were.”

“
I’m interested in thought processes,” she says “It may not be fashionable amongst politicians to acknowledge it publicly, but in the security services we still equate intelligence with understanding.” He smiles. She may not be interrogating him; but she’s scrutinising his responses. It’s how he frowns and smiles, twitches and blinks, what he does with his hands, whether he touches his chin; that’s what matters.