It was a corner pub off Great Portland Street, with a battle-scarred mirror behind the bar in which he could keep an eye out for undue interest. The afternoon’s false alarm didn’t mean real alarms couldn’t happen, and since leaving the Park he’d had that uneasy sense of hearing footsteps in synch with his own. There were tricks you could pull—double back to check a shop window, pause to fix a shoelace, halt at a bus stop—and he’d tried each in turn. But if he had a tail, it failed to wag. Now inside, he ordered a gin and tonic; made it a double. However exemplary his actions of the afternoon, he didn’t want to dwell on them. Nor was he keen to know what the boys and girls of the Hub would be chatting about over their own after-work cordials.
He wished he were meeting Hannah. Amazing how a hint, a swift deflection, could turn disaster into weather-beaten triumph.
“What the fuck?”
“I was passing. Saw you through the window.”
Pynne turned automatically to the window, then back to Wicinski. “You shouldn’t be here. Shouldn’t be talking to me.”
“What are you, royalty?”
Good as, Pynne thought. Given their respective status. He shook his head. “Lech. Remember your letter? From HR? No contact, not with anyone from the Park, while—”
“Yes, I remember. It’s a fucking earworm. But you know what?” Wicinski waved a finger and the barman approached; he ordered a pint, then picked up where he’d left off. “I don’t much care.”
Red tape held things together. Once people like Wicinski started cutting through it, it would be a full-time job maintaining integrity. That wasn’t the reason he’d been let go, obviously, but he wasn’t doing himself any favours.
Now he said, “It turns out I don’t have many friends at the Park.”
“Many? Try none. That was some pretty sick shit you were looking at.”
“It wasn’t me.”
“There’ll be a hearing. You know how this works.”
“I don’t, actually. I’ve never been in this situation before.” His pint arrived, and he forked over a tenner. “You know what they say about you on the Hub, Dick? That you’re one pocket-protector away from being a geography teacher.”
“Very amusing.”
The barman laid Wicinski’s change on the counter.
Pynne watched the mirror while this was happening. The two of them, side by side; you might mistake them for friends. That was how appearances worked: they pulled you one way, reality went another. He slid a hand into his overcoat pocket and said, “Why were you following me?”
“Because, like I say, you have a rep. Geography teacher.”
“And what, you were lost?”
“Meaning you like things done the way they should be done. And I realised something earlier today. I don’t need a friend. I need someone who wants things done properly.”
Pynne drained his G&T, in perfect unison with his reflection. He was okay with the way he looked. Calm. In control. ’Fronted by a pissed-off junior, but not letting it get to him. Hear what the man had to say, then blow his candle out. Gently.
“They will be,” he said. “The hearing happens later this week. Lady Di, Oliver Nash. There’ll be evidence.”
“But I won’t be there to state my case.”
“It’s not a court of law. It’s Regent’s Park.” His hand still in his pocket, he fondled his Service rape alarm, as they were called. Anyone tried to slip a hand between your thighs, you pressed the button. “That being so, let’s both save our breath and you get back on home to, remind me. Sara?”
“Keep her out of this.”
“Sure thing. We done yet?”
“No. I want you to do something. Not for me, not just for me, but because it’s the right thing to do.”
“Hurry it up.”
“A couple of weeks ago, I ran a search and hit a flagged name. A person of interest. I think I triggered something. I think I was being shut down.”
“This is paranoia, Lech.”
“Well in the circumstances I’m entitled, don’t you think?”
“I—”
“Dick, listen. Could you follow up on that name? Please? It’s Peter Kahlmann, that’s K-A-H-L-M-A-N-N. Peter. But don’t run the usual checks, or it’ll be noticed. I was thinking maybe put in a request through GCHQ, with the wanted ads?”
Wicinski meant the list of trigger words the monitoring agency updated daily, as it reaped the national chatter. Emails and phone calls, online conversations: plucking syllables out of static. And since communications between the Service and GCHQ didn’t always flow smoothly, chances were, the same flags wouldn’t be in place on their respective targets. Especially if the flag in question was internal to the Park. Pynne knew all this. He didn’t need it spelled out.
“Before the hearing. This is evidence, Dick. It might be evidence.”
The man should listen to himself. There was desperation in his voice; a whiny, needling pitch to make any listener flinch.
Pynne signalled for a refill, and while it was coming pulled the alarm from his pocket. He set it on the bar. “You should know, I just pressed this.”
