Slow Horses (7 page)

White tee under a blue shirt. That’s what you said.

No, I said blue tee under—

Fuck you, Spider.

‘What was that?’

‘I didn’t say anything,’ River assured him.

At the end of the corridor, a set of fire doors opened on to a stairwell. Through a window, River saw a car turning down the ramp into the underground car park. He followed his guide up a flight of stairs, then another. On each landing a camera blinked, but he resisted the temptation to wave.

They went through another set of fire doors.

‘Are we nearly there yet?’

His guide offered him a sardonic look. Halfway along the corridor, he stopped and rapped twice on a door.

And River, all of a sudden, wished he’d left the parcel at reception. He’d not seen James Webb in eight months. For the year preceding that, they’d been all but inseparable. What made it a good idea to see him now?

White tee under a blue shirt. That’s what you said.

Apart from anything else, the urge to deck the bastard might prove overwhelming.

From inside the room a voice called a welcome.

‘In you go, sir.’

In he went.

It wasn’t as large as the office River shared with Sid, but it was a whole lot nicer. The wall to the right was book-shelved floor to ceiling, lined with colour-coded folders, while in front of him was a big wooden desk, which might have been carved from the hull of a ship. A pair of friendly-looking visitors’ chairs were placed in front of this, while behind it loomed a tall window that gave a view of the park, which was mostly muted browns right now, but would be glorious in spring and summer. Also behind it, in front of the view, sat James Webb; inevitably Spider.

… First time in eight months, though for the year preceding that they’d been all but inseparable. Friends wasn’t the word—it was both too big and too small. A friend was someone you’d go for a drink with; hang out with; share laughs. He’d done those things with Spider, but not because Spider was his first choice for doing them with; more because he’d spent days with Spider doing assault courses on Dartmoor, which had felt like it was going to be the most difficult part of training, until the days spent learning torture resistance techniques somewhere on the Welsh borders. Resistance techniques were taught slowly. Things had to be broken down before being built up again. Breaking down happened best in darkness. When you’d been through that, you wanted to be near others who’d been through it too. Not because you needed to talk about it, but because you needed your need not to talk about it to be shared by those you were with.

Friendship, anyway, was best conducted on level ground. Without the competitive undercurrent generated by the knowledge that they were in line for the same promotion.

White tee under a blue shirt. That’s what you said.

Fuck you, Spider.

So here he was, eight months later: no bigger, no wider, no different.

‘River!’ he said, getting to his feet, thrusting out a hand.

They were of an age, River Cartwright and James Webb, and similar sizes: both slim, with good bones. But Webb was dark to River’s sandy lightness, and Webb favoured smart suits and polished shoes, and looked like he’d stepped off a billboard. River suspected that for Spider, the worst parts of those assault courses had been staying muddy for days on end. Today he wore a charcoal two-piece with a faint chalk stripe and a grey shirt with a button-down collar, the obligatory splash of colour hanging round his neck. There was an expensive haircut not long in his past, and River wouldn’t be surprised to learn he’d stopped for a shave on his way in—paid someone else to do it, with a warm towel and flattering banter.

Someone who’d pretend to be a friend for as long as the moment lasted.

River ignored the outstretched hand. ‘Someone threw up on your tie,’ he said.

‘It’s a Karl Unger. Peasant.’

‘How have things been, Spider?’

‘Not bad. Not bad.’

River waited.

‘Takes getting used to, but—’

‘I was only being polite.’

Spider eased back into his chair. ‘Are you going to make this difficult?’

‘It’s already difficult. Nothing I do’ll make a difference.’ He surveyed the room, his gaze lingering on the bookshelf. ‘You keep a lot of hard copy. Why’s that?’

‘Don’t play games.’

‘No, seriously. What comes in hard copy?’ River looked from the shelves to the sleek, paperback-thin computer on the desk, then back. Then said: ‘Oh, no. Jesus. Don’t tell me.’

‘It’s above your pay grade, River.’

‘Are they job applications? They are, aren’t they? You’re doing applications.’

‘I’m not just doing applications. Have you any idea how much paperwork an organization the size of—’

‘Jesus, Spider. You’re HR. Congratulations.’

Spider Webb licked his lips. ‘I’ve had two meetings with the Minister this month already. How’s your career looking?’

‘Well, I don’t have an arse two inches in front of my nose, so my view beats yours.’

‘The laptop, River.’

River sat in one of the visitors’ chairs, and passed Webb the padded envelope. Webb produced a rubber stamp, and carefully affixed its mark.

‘Do you do it every morning?’

‘What?’

‘Change the date on your stamp.’

Webb said, ‘When I remember.’

‘The responsibilities of rank, eh?’

‘How’s the delightful Sidonie?’

River recognized an attempt to regain the high ground. ‘Not sure. She went swanning off this morning almost before she’d arrived. Didn’t show much dedication.’

‘She’s a bright officer.’

‘I can’t believe you just said that.’

‘She is.’

‘Maybe so. But Christ, Spider—
bright officer
? You’re not back at Eton, you know.’

Webb opened his mouth—to point out, River knew, that he hadn’t been at Eton—but came to his senses in time. ‘Did you have breakfast? We have a canteen.’

‘I remember the canteen, Spider. I even remember where it is.’

‘I don’t get called that any more.’

‘Not in your hearing, possibly. But face it—everybody calls you that.’

‘This is schoolboy stuff, River.’

‘Nyah nah-nah nyaah nyaah.’

Webb opened his mouth and closed it again. The padded envelope lay in front of him. He drummed his fingers upon it briefly.

River said, ‘My office is bigger than yours.’

‘Real estate’s cheaper that end of town.’

‘I thought the action took place upstairs. On the hub.’

‘I’m there a lot. Lady Di—’

‘She lets you call her that?’

‘You’re a laugh a minute, River. Lady Di—Taverner, she keeps me busy.’

River waggled an eyebrow.

‘I don’t know why I’m even bothering.’

River said, ‘You ever going to admit you made a mistake?’

Webb laughed. ‘You still on that?’

‘He was wearing a white tee under a blue shirt. That’s what you told me. Except he wasn’t, was he? He was wearing a blue tee under a—’

‘The guy was wearing what I said he was wearing, River. I mean, what, I get the colours the wrong way round and there just
happens
to be someone there, that exact moment, wearing what I said? Same general profile as the target? What are the odds?’

‘And the tape not working. Don’t forget the tape not working. What are the odds on that?’

‘EFU, River. Happens all the time.’

‘Enlighten me.’

‘Equipment fuck-up. You think they dish out state-of-the-art gear for assessment ops? We’re up against budgetary constraints, River. You don’t want to get Taverner started on that—oh, but hang on, you won’t, will you? On account of you’re in Slough House, and the closest you’ll get to the inner circle is reading someone’s memoirs.’

‘There isn’t an acronym for that? RSM?’

‘You know something, River? You need to grow up.’

‘And you need to admit that the mistake was yours.’

‘Mistake?’ Webb showed his teeth. ‘I prefer to call it a fiasco.’

‘If I was you, and smirked like that, I’d have someone watching my back.’

‘Oh, I play London rules. I don’t need anyone watching my back but me.’

‘I wouldn’t bet on it.’

‘Time to go.’

‘Should I shout for a guide? Or have you pressed a secret button?’

But Webb was shaking his head: not in response, but in reaction to River’s presence, which had tired him, because he had important things to get on with.

And nothing River said would get Webb to admit it was him who’d screwed up, not River. Besides, what difference would it make? It had been River on that platform, a star on CCTV. When you got to boardroom level, playing fair wasn’t even a bullet point. Who’d screwed up didn’t matter; who’d been visible during the screw-up did. Webb could put his hands up right now, and Diana Taverner wouldn’t care.

The only reason you’re still here is your connections, Cartwright. If not for grandad, you’d be a distant memory
.

River stood, hoping an exit line would occur before he got to the door. Something to make him feel less like he’d been dismissed: by Spider bloody Webb.

Who said, ‘Didn’t Lamb have a flash-box?’

‘A what?’

‘A flash-box, River.’ He tapped the padded envelope. ‘The kind you can’t open without a key. Unless you want a magnesium flash.’

‘I’ve heard of those. But at Slough House, frankly, I’m amazed we’ve got jiffy bags.’

River’s need for an exit line evaporated. Scorched hand wrapped tightly round the memory stick in his pocket, he left.

Chapter 3

When lovely woman stoops to folly, all bets are off. Was that how it went? Didn’t matter. When lovely woman stoops to folly, something’s got to give.

Such thoughts were pitilessly regular; as familiar as the sound of her footsteps clickety-clacking up the stairs of her apartment block. Lovely woman stoops to folly. This evening’s earworm, picked up from an ad on the tube.

When lovely woman stoops to folly, the shit has hit the fan.

Catherine Standish, forty-eight a memory, knew all bets were off. Last thing she needed was her subconscious reminding her.

And she had been lovely once. Many had said so. One man in particular:
You’re lovely
, he’d told her.
But you look like you’ve had some scary moments
. Even now she thought he’d meant it as a compliment.

But there was nobody to tell her she was lovely any more, and it was doubtful they’d say so if there were. The scary moments had won. Which sounded like a definition of ageing, to Catherine. The scary moments had won.

At the door to her flat she put her shopping on the floor and hunted out her key. Found it. Entered. The hall light was on, because it was on a timer. Catherine didn’t like stepping into the dark, not even for the second it would take to flip a switch. In the kitchen, she unpacked the shopping; coffee in a cupboard, salad in the fridge. Then she took the toothpaste into the bathroom, where the light was on the same timer. There was a reason for that too.

Her worst scary moment had been the morning she’d turned up at her boss’s flat to find him dead in his bathroom. He’d used a gun. Sat in the tub to do it, as if he didn’t want to make a mess.

You had a key to his house?
she’d been asked.
You had a key? Since when?

That had been the Dogs, of course. Or one Dog in particular: Sam Chapman, who they called Bad Sam. He was a dark difficult man, and knew damn well she’d had a key to Charles Partner’s house, because everyone knew she’d had a key to Charles Partner’s house. And knew it hadn’t been because of an affair, but simply because Charles Partner had been hopeless about taking care of himself—ostensibly simple things like remembering to buy food, remembering to cook it, then remembering to throw it away when he’d forgotten to eat it. Charles had been twenty years older than Catherine, but it hadn’t been a father/daughter thing either. That was a convenient label, but the reality had been this: she had worked for Charles Partner, cared for him, shopped for him. and had found him dead in his bathroom once he’d shot himself. Bad Sam could growl all he liked, but he’d only been going through the motions, because Catherine had been the one to find the body.

Funny how swiftly that happened; how swiftly you went from being Charles Partner—not a man whose name was known to the public at large, true, but a man whose decisions dictated whether significant numbers of them would live or die, which had to count for something—to being ‘the body’. All it had taken was one calculated moment in a bathtub. He didn’t want to make a mess, but what mess he’d made was for others to clean up. Funny.

Less funny was how quickly the scary moments accumulated.

Because she was in the bathroom, and because the light was already on, it was hard for Catherine not to catch herself in the mirror. It held no surprises. Yes, the scary moments accumulated, but that was the least of it. Some damage was gifted by your genes. Some you discovered for yourself. Her nose grew red-tipped in the cold, as did her cheekbones. This made her look witchy and raw. Nothing she could do about that. But the rest of it—the spidery tracing of broken veins; the gaunt stretching of the skin across the skull—they told a different story, one she’d written herself.

My name is Catherine and I am an alcoholic.

By the time she’d got around to formulating that sentence, alcohol was a problem. Prior to that, it had seemed like a solution. No, that was too glib: rather, it hadn’t seemed like anything at all; it had simply been what one did. Perhaps a tad self-dramatic (a bottle for solace was such a time-worn trope, it felt like you weren’t doing heart-break properly without a glass in your hand) but more often, just the normal backdrop. It was the obvious adjunct to an evening alone with the box, and absolutely de rigueur for an evening out with girlfriends. And then there were dates, which Catherine often had in those days, and you couldn’t have a date without a drink. A meal meant a drink; the cinema meant a drink afterwards. And if you were plucking up courage to ask him back for coffee, a drink was necessary; and ultimately … Ultimately, if you needed somebody there, because you didn’t want to wake in the middle of the night knowing you were alone, you were going to have to fuck somebody, and sooner or later you were going to have to fuck anybody, and that demanded a drink if anything did.