“Someone specific. Min Harper’s son, in fact.”
“Min Harper?”
“Uh-huh.”
Shirley thought about that for a moment.
Outside, the first few flakes of London snow were drifting down. By the time the third or fourth one hit the ground, buses would be returning to their depots.
“Flyte told you this?”
“Yes.”
“She’s seriously hot.”
“And reliable.”
Shirley considered this. “I don’t necessarily need them reliable,” she said. “But I do like them hot.”
“She says Louisa’s phone hasn’t moved in however long it’s been. Twelve hours? She’s worried.”
“Maybe Louisa’s asleep.”
“She said she’d check in with Emma.”
“Maybe she forgot.”
“And she’s not picking up calls. And Flyte reckoned her phone might be in a ditch.”
“How could she tell?”
“Roddy tracked its coordinates.”
“Can you be that accurate? To, like, the nearest inch?”
“I don’t know.”
“Because it doesn’t sound likely to me. Maybe they’re just accurate to the nearest motel. In which case probably Louisa’s found this kid, and is road-testing him for his old man’s sake.”
“You’re kind of sick, you know that?”
In response, Shirley banged on the window.
The café was on the other side of the road and a little way down from Slough House, between a hardware store and a Costcutters, and until recently had been vacant for six months, prior to which it had been an almost identical café but with different-coloured chairs. Its sole attraction for the slow horses was its proximity, which was the reason J.K. Coe was walking past now, garbed in his usual hoodie despite the cold, his head invisible, his hands jammed into pockets. When Shirley thumped the window he started. River only imagined, but it wasn’t that big a leap, Coe’s fist appearing with a blade in its grip. Coe was a sleeping dog: if you were going to startle him, River thought, it was as well to have a pane of glass in between.
Meanwhile Coe had stopped in his tracks and was staring at them.
“Do you think he recognises us?” River said, his lips barely moving.
Shirley gestured to Coe to join them. “Being a psycho doesn’t make him a bad person,” she said.
“No,” agreed River. “It’s being a bad person makes him that.”
Coe entered like someone expecting a hostile welcome.
Shirley said, “Louisa’s gone missing in Wales. Are you getting coffee? Can you get me another?”
Coe looked at River. “Wales?”
“If you’re at the channel, look up and left,” River explained.
Coe ignored that. “It’s snowing.”
“I noticed.”
“It’s snowing worse in Wales.”
Shirley and River shared a look. “I think,” Shirley said slowly, “I
Coe shrugged.
“That’s good input, thanks,” said River.
Coe shrugged again.
“I was talking to Shirley.”
They watched as Coe left the café and continued on his way to Slough House.
“Sometimes I think he’s just plain weird,” Shirley said. “And at other times I totally get him.”
“Well he’s fuck all use either way,” said River.
“What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“Wales’ll be, like, closed by now.”
“I know.”
“And Frank’s out there somewhere. We’re just waiting to find out where.”
River didn’t answer. Yes, Frank was out there somewhere, posing as a Canadian, or had been. But his hire car had dropped off the map, and he’d have a new ID by now. Given the run of the Hub they’d pinpoint his whereabouts in hours, but with the resources at their disposal River might as well be on Slough House’s roof, using a kitchen roll holder as a telescope.
And meanwhile Louisa was missing. And Louisa was his friend.
Unless she was just on a jolly, and had lost her phone.
“Flyte admitted it might not be an actual ditch,” he said. “I think she just wanted me to treat it like an emergency.”
“Well, if Louisa has been in a freezing ditch all night, the emergency part’s probably over by now,” said Shirley.
“Thanks.”
“Hey, she’s your friend. She’s always been arsey with me.”
“What if it were Marcus?”
“He’d have been a lot easier to find in the snow,” Shirley conceded.
Seems River wasn’t the only one spending too long in Lamb’s company.
They finished their coffees and walked to Slough House, the weather gathering pace: nothing lying yet, the ground still eating it up, but give it time, give it time. He’d speak to Lamb, he decided. If Lamb thought a joe was in peril—
And then Coe was approaching, emerging from the alley round back of Slough House.
“Wales,” he said.
“What about it?” said Shirley.
“Those plates from Stevenage.” He was talking to River. “I ran them through ANPR.”
“And one of them’s now in Wales,” said River.
“Two of them,” said Coe, but River was already gone.
