Dead Lions полностью

It was also interesting that Catherine called Ho Roddy. Nobody else called Ho anything. He wasn’t someone you engaged in casual chat, because if you didn’t come with broadband, you weren’t worth his attention.

On the other hand, he currently possessed information River would like to share.

“Well then,” he said. “Let’s go talk to Roddy, shall we?”

“Nice,” said Min.

“Best you can do?”

“Spectacular, then. Better?”

“Much.”

They were on the seventy-seventh floor of one of the City’s newest buildings; a great glass needle that soared eighty storeys into London’s skies. And it was some room they were in, a huge one, yay metres long and woah metres wide, with floor-to-ceiling views to north and west of the capital, and then the wide space beyond, where the capital gave up and the sky took over. She could spend days in here, Louisa thought; not eating, not drinking; just taking in as much of the view as she could, in every weather, and all types of light. “Spectacular” didn’t come close.

Even the lift had been a thrill: quieter, smoother and faster than any she’d known.

Min said, “Cool, wasn’t it?”

“The lift?”

“At Reception. The plastic cops.”

The security guys, who’d checked their Service ID with what Min had interpreted as awe and envy. Louisa thought it more the look state kids aimed at their public school counterparts: the age-old enmity of yobs v toffs. A long-time yob herself, she savored the irony.

She laid her palm against the glass. Then rested her forehead there. This brought a delicious feeling of safe vertigo; set a butterfly fluttering in her stomach, even while her brain enjoyed the view. Min stood by, hands in pockets.

“This the highest you’ve been?” she asked.

He gave her a slow look. “Duh, aeroplane?”

“Yeah, no. Highest building.”

“Empire State.”

“Been there, done that.”

“Twin Towers?”

She shook her head. “They were already gone when I was there.”

“Me too,” he said.

They were quiet for a while, watching London operate way below, thinking similar thoughts: of a morning when people in a different city had stood at greater heights, enjoying similar views from different windows, not knowing they’d never put their feet on the ground again; that the threads of their future had been severed with box cutters.

Now Min pointed, and following his finger she saw a speck in the distance. An aeroplane: not one of the liners leaving Heathrow, but a small, buzzy machine, ploughing its own furrow.

Min said, “I wonder how close they get?”

“You think it’s that important?” Louisa said. “This mini-summit? Big enough for a … replay?”

She didn’t have to specify what it would be a replay of.

After a while, Min said, “No, I guess not.”

Or it wouldn’t have been entrusted to them, Regent’s Park audit or not.

“Got to do it properly, though.”

“Look at all the angles,” she agreed.

“Else we end up looking bad even when nothing bad happens.”

“You think this is a test of some kind?”

“Of what?”

“Us,” she said. “Finding out if we’re up to the job.”

“And if we pass it, we get back to Regent’s Park?”

She shrugged. “Whatever.”

This many people had made the return journey from Slough House to the Park: none. They both knew that. But like every slow horse before them, Min and Louisa hid secret hopes their story would be different.

At length she turned and surveyed the room. Still yay metres long and woah metres wide, it took up about half of the floor; the separate suite, also currently vacant, enjoying the views south and east. There was a shared lobby area where the smart lifts arrived; a third, the service lift, lay behind the stairwell, which was a vision of eternal descent. It passed floors and floors of high-end corporate offices, only some of which were yet occupied: the list in the folder Webb had provided included banks, investment companies, yacht salesmen, diamond merchants, a defence contractor. The tower’s lower third was a hotel, its grand opening scheduled for the following month. She’d read it was fully booked through the next five years.

Spider Webb must have called in favours, or opened some classified folders, to secure the suite for his meeting, a few weeks hence. Any part of town, a space like this commanded respect. This high up, it demanded awe. Kitchen and bathrooms aside, it was a single room, designed for business; its centrepiece a beautiful mahogany oval table big enough for sixteen chairs, which, if it hadn’t been larger than Louisa’s entire flat, she’d have coveted. But like the view, the table belonged to the moneyed. This wasn’t supposed to factor into her motivation, but still. Here they were, the pair of them, and they’d be ensuring the safety of some hotshot whose pocket change equalled twice their joint salaries.

Forget it, she thought. Not relevant. But couldn’t help saying: “Kind of flash for a discreet meeting.”

“Yeah, well,” Min said. “Don’t suppose they’ll have anyone peeping through the windows.”

“How do they clean them, do you think?”

“Some kind of hoist? We’d better find out.”