Liz Carlyle - 07 - The Geneva Trap (8 page)

Maybe, thought Bokus. But it still seemed overly elaborate to believe this Russian Bravado was betraying his own side because they knew about a third-country threat to this Clarity programme.

Liz said gently, ‘I know it all looks very strange at this stage, Andy. But it’s early days. I have to believe Bravado until something proves I’m wrong, and that’s the starting point. We can’t ignore the information.’

Bokus noticed that Fane was staying quiet, which suggested he had another agenda. Bokus knew better than to ask what it was: Fane would never tell. Bokus looked at Liz, and decided there wasn’t any point arguing with her; besides, he had to admit her argument made sense. He nodded but also let a slight sigh escape, to show his agreement was reluctant. ‘Okay, so what do you want me to do?’

‘Alert your people. I suppose the Bureau will need to be told as well.’ It was clear she’d come knowing what she wanted out of this meeting. ‘Tell them we’re on the case over here but I’m sure they’ll want to look at your part of Clarity, though Bravado was clear it was the British end that had been penetrated. I need to know I can get help from you over here if I need it.’

‘Count on me,’ Bokus said. And he meant it, for the time being.

Chapter 13

Early on Saturday morning, Liz drove down to Wiltshire, to the Bowerbridge Estate where she had grown up in the gatehouse. When her father died, just after Liz finished university, her mother Susan had gone on living in the house and had eventually been allowed to buy it. She now managed the garden centre, which occupied the old kitchen garden. For many years she had hoped that Liz would give up what she thought of as her dangerous job in London and come back to live in the house and marry a local man. But she had abandoned that ambition a few years ago, realising that, though Liz loved to visit her old home, her heart lay in her work, and that the last thing that would make her happy was rusticating in Wiltshire.

Susan had been helped to come to terms with reality by Edward Treglown, whom she had met at a friend’s house and to whom she was now very close. Liz and Edward got on well and, just as importantly for Liz, Edward and Martin Seurat got on well too. Both had been in the military, and they had discovered contacts in common from when they had served in Kosovo in the eighties.

As she stop-started in the traffic on the M4, Liz thought about her meeting with Sorsky and wondered whether Fane and Bokus were right in their suspicion that there was something more behind Sorsky’s offer of information. It was not as if she could really assess the man. Despite the Russian’s easy familiarity with her in the Parc des Bastions, she hadn’t seen him before that for almost twenty years, and even then had barely known him at all.

Yet it was hard to see his approach as anything other than what he claimed it to be. In particular, his lack of specifics seemed convincing to her. If for whatever reason he wanted to seduce her into believing something that wasn’t true, surely he would have had more information on offer.

As she neared the Newbury exit, she felt herself gradually starting to relax. Martin was in Paris this weekend, helping his daughter move apartments, and though she’d rather be spending the time with him, his absence might make it easier to take her mind off work. She was looking forward to the weekend, to walking in the Wiltshire countryside, and seeing the hyacinths and the late tulips that would be colouring her mother’s cottage garden.

When she arrived, Susan seemed unusually preoccupied. Normally she would have come out into the yard as Liz was parking her car and there would have been a freshly baked cake on the kitchen table. But Liz found her standing in the sitting room, listening tensely to a conversation Edward was having on the telephone.

Liz frowned. ‘What’s wrong?’ she whispered. Judging by the anxious tone of Edward’s voice, something was clearly upsetting him.

Her mother sighed. ‘Come into the kitchen.’

As she put the kettle on Susan explained: ‘Poor Edward. His daughter Cathy’s come back to live in England, but it’s all proving rather …
difficult
.’

Liz’s mother was old school, trained to take troubles on the chin and just get on with it. So ‘difficult’ meant things were serious. Liz knew Edward’s daughter had been living in France; by all accounts she was a kind of latter-day hippie – Liz vaguely imagined her playing the guitar with flowers in her hair. She had a little boy, whom Edward adored but rarely got to see.

Liz took three mugs down from the dresser, while her mother stood in the middle of the kitchen, tapping her foot nervously.

A moment later Edward Treglown came in. Seeing Liz, he gave her a smile. ‘Hello, stranger, or should I say
bonsoir
?’

Liz laughed, acknowledgment that she had been in Paris for many of the weekends she would formerly have spent here. She gave Edward a big hug. He was a tall, loose-limbed man with a lived-in face that could seem stern, until it creased into a warm smile. Despite Liz’s initial suspicions (she remembered how pompous she had been, asking her mother if Edward’s motives towards her were ‘honourable’), she had come to like him very much, a feeling enhanced by the obvious fact that he made Susan very happy.

After leaving the Army, Edward had become chairman of a charity that provided operations to cure some of the simple diseases that caused blindness in the Third World. Now, having turned seventy, he claimed to be cutting back on his involvement, but his energy showed no signs of flagging.

‘Cuppa?’ Liz asked, but he shook his head.

‘Stiff whisky more like,’ said Susan sympathetically, and he nodded with a deep sigh.

‘Problems, I gather,’ said Liz. ‘Anything I can do to help?’

Edward smiled but there was sadness in his eyes. ‘It’s Cathy,’ he said. ‘Your mother’s probably told you that she’s moved back to England with my grandson. Teddy’s seven now and he’s a nice boy, if a little out of hand. I know single-parent families are nothing unusual these days, but I have to say, I do think there are times when a boy needs a father and Teddy’s hasn’t been seen for six years.’

‘But you’re a wonderful grandpa, Edward,’ said Liz’s mother loyally.

He shook his head. ‘Not the same thing, I’m afraid. I do what I can, but I’m too old to play football for hours with the boy – a few minutes is the most I can manage. And besides, I’m not there most of the time.’

‘Why has Cathy come back to the UK?’ Liz asked.

‘That’s the problem,’ said Edward. ‘I’d hoped she was doing it to get away from those people she’s been involved with.’

Susan said, ‘She’s been living in a commune in the South of France.’

‘How long has she been there?’

Edward sighed. ‘Five years or more. Teddy’s father, Paul, introduced her to the place when they were living in Cahors; the commune’s not far from there in the Lot-et-Garonne. When Teddy was born and Paul took off, her mother and I urged Cathy to come home. But she wouldn’t – she’s always been very independent. Still, it couldn’t have been easy on her own with a baby in a foreign country, and eventually she went to live in the commune. I thought she might come back when her mother died, but she didn’t.’

‘When did she leave France?’

‘About three months ago. I have the feeling the commune leaders didn’t want her to go.’

‘Is it some kind of a cult?’ asked Liz, imagining a hippie-style enclave, with a charismatic, controlling guru at its head.

‘Not really. They style themselves anarchists: none of this love and peace stuff for them – their activities can be pretty violent. They’ve clashed with the police on several occasions, though thank God Cathy has never been arrested. They like to disrupt G8 summits – that sort of thing.’

He sighed, and Susan said, ‘Why don’t you two go next-door and sit down and I’ll see about supper.’

They went into the sitting room and, equipped with a stiff whisky, Edward told Liz more. He had been pleased that his daughter had come back to England, happy that he could see her more often and get to know his grandson better. And at first things had seemed to pan out – Cathy had found work three days a week with a software company within walking distance of the flat she’d rented in Brighton; Teddy had adjusted to English school (and English) very well; and the upheavals of Cathy’s life in France seemed well behind her.

‘But then?’ asked Liz sympathetically.

Edward shook his head. ‘These wretched anarchists contacted her again.’

‘What did they want?’

‘Money, I think. You see, my wife set up a trust for Cathy, and I’m one of the trustees.’ His face darkened. ‘But the trouble is she’s twenty-eight now and she’s entitled to the money.’

Recently, she’d asked for some of it, to buy a house she’d found on the Hove side of Brighton. ‘The solicitor, who’s the other trustee, and I were happy with this – not that we could have done much if we weren’t. We told her to go ahead and make an offer, and we gave her enough for the down payment.

‘But then the French people she’d lived with got in touch, and since then nothing’s happened – Cathy’s still in her small flat with Teddy, and there’s no sign of her buying anything. Since she’s got some money now I’m worried she’s going to give it to these anarchists. It’s impossible to talk to her. She won’t explain anything or come here to tell us what’s going on.

‘If I push too hard, she just threatens to go back to France, and take Teddy with her. We’re barely on speaking terms, I’m afraid. When I rang last week and offered to take the boy out for the day, she said no and put the phone down.’

His distress was obvious. Liz realised it must be made worse by his feeling of powerlessness. From the sound of it the boy could use a strong paternal figure like Edward in his life.

‘It does sound very difficult,’ she said. There didn’t seem to be any useful advice she could offer.

‘The thing is, if Cathy wants to go and live with these people again, there’s nothing I can do to stop her. It’s her life after all. And ultimately the money’s hers … not just the ten thousand she’s already had, but the rest as well. I’m legally as well as morally obliged to give it to her.’

He hesitated for a moment. ‘But …?’ prompted Liz.

‘Well, I may be kidding myself, but I don’t think this is one of those classic scenarios – you know, where someone’s daughter goes off and joins the Moonies and the parents say the child’s been brainwashed and the daughter says not at all, she’s doing what she wants to do.’

‘How is this different?’ asked Liz gently, since it didn’t sound very different to her.

‘I think something else is going on. When I last saw Cathy, I got the distinct impression that she’s scared of these people. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn they were threatening her.’

‘Threatening her?’

‘Edward’s already spoken to the police about it.’ Susan Carlyle had come into the room.

‘They were very sympathetic,’ he said, but gave a resigned shake of his head. ‘The problem is, I didn’t have any hard evidence, and these people are all in France. The police here said there wasn’t anything they could do.’ He sat back gloomily in his chair, looking despondent and uncharacteristically vulnerable.

Liz thought for a moment, wondering if Edward was right about this. Or was it merely wishful thinking? Like any parent, he probably couldn’t bear the thought of his daughter choosing to get mixed up with a bunch like these French anarchists.

She tried to sound encouraging, ‘Why don’t I have a word with Martin? He could probably find out a bit about these people. If they are as violent as you say, they are sure to be known to the police in France. Then at least you’ll know what you’re dealing with.’

‘Would you?’ said Edward, brightening up. ‘Then I’d feel I was doing something and not just sitting back helplessly.’

‘Well, if you’re feeling helpless,’ Susan said cheerily, ‘you can come and set the table. Supper’s ready.’

Chapter 14

Liz Carlyle disliked visiting the Ministry of Defence. Its building, white and cold, sat at an awkward angle between Whitehall and the Thames. All those stiff-backed men walking smartly up the steps to its grand door made her feel like an alien. And once inside, there was a certain disapproving hostility about its security arrangements, which made it the least welcoming of all the government departments.

Now, having survived the first layer of security, and with her pass pinned to her lapel, she sat waiting to be collected by someone who would take her inside the Secretariat of Operation Clarity. Except that it wasn’t called that here. It had turned out that the codename itself was top-secret and she had been told to ask for Sy3A.

She watched as a military officer, dressed in what looked to her like a musical-comedy uniform, was ushered through the security barrier by a young Major who had greeted the visitor in a language Liz didn’t recognise. Serbo-Croat perhaps? she wondered idly as they disappeared up a long escalator.

Eventually, a voice at her elbow asked, ‘Miss Carlyle?’ and she got up to follow an attractive young woman, dressed surprisingly casually in trousers and a flowing top. She looked as though she might be pregnant. No uniform, Liz noted with relief.

They rose up through the building via escalator and lift to a floor near the top where the corridors were long, narrow and silent. Her escort stopped at a windowless, unmarked door, which clicked open in response to some numbers she tapped into a keypad.