“What makes you think she’s in danger?” Catherine said, arriving from her own room.
River said, “Coe traced two of the cars from the Travelodge where Harkness and his crew stayed. Both crossed the Severn Bridge Wednesday evening.”
“So. Some people drove from Stevenage to Wales,” Catherine said.
“Same time Louisa heads there?”
“Coincidences happen.”
“What’s she doing in Wales, anyway?” Lamb asked. “I assumed she was on the shag. Has she seriously been through everyone closer than that?”
“She’s looking for Min Harper’s kid.”
For once, Lamb said nothing.
River said, “Tell me it’s a coincidence that Harkness and his crew are exactly where Louisa went.”
“Well,” Catherine said. “The same country. If it was even them.”
“Wales, though. It’s not a huge place.”
“It’s exactly the size it is, isn’t it?” Shirley said. “Reports are always saying something’s “an area the size of Wales.” And that’s exactly the size Wales is.”
This was met with a short silence.
Lamb said, “And to think I had you down as incapable of coherent thought.”
Roderick Ho had appeared. “Louisa’s phone hasn’t moved all night. When Emma was at my place, she was asking.”
“. . . Emma Flyte?”
“Yeah. She was at my place.”
Shirley put her head in her hands.
Lamb said, “So Louisa’s looking for Harper’s boy in Wales, and you think Frank and his crew are after Louisa. There’s a slight flaw in this.”
“Which is?”
“That you’re an idiot. If Frank was after Louisa, what stopped him taking her at the funeral? Your Wile E. Coyote impersonation? No, if Frank and his crew are in Wales, it’s not Louisa they’re after. So unless it’s a coincidence, like Madame Guillotine here says, it must be Harper’s boy.” He paused. “And I don’t believe in coincidence.”
River said, “Why would they want Lucas Harper?”
“Well, if he’s anything like his old man, because he’s lost something that belongs to them. On the other hand, let’s assume for the moment there’s stuff going on we don’t know about. That’ll be harder for me than for you, but the least you can do is make an effort.”
He produced a cigarette from inside his shirt, and plugged it into his mouth.
“And it would explain what Frank was doing at the funeral,” he went on. “He wasn’t there to see you. He was there to check out Louisa. He must have known she was looking for the kid.”
Catherine said, “How?”
“Golly, good question. Oh hang on, I know. We’re fucking spooks.” He lit his cigarette. “If I was after the boy, I’d have kept tabs on his mother. Tapped her phone. Presumably she got in touch with Louisa?”
“Don’t know,” River said.
“Big surprise. So once that’s happened, first thing Harkness does is put a tag on Louisa, to make sure she doesn’t fuck up his plans. That would involve having her picture, which is why he was at the funeral. Stop me if I’m going too fast.”
“And Louisa found the boy,” said Coe. “Or knows where to look.”
“See? Norman Bates is keeping up.”
Ho said, “I found the boy through his Fitbit. Emma asked me to.”
“She’s almost certainly after your body,” Lamb said. “Probably needs a draught excluder.” He blew out smoke. “Okay, sounds like you’re off to Wales. How do you plan to get there?”
“My car’s off the road,” Shirley said quickly.
“And I haven’t got one,” said River.
Everyone looked at Coe.
“Mine’s at home. An hour away.”
Everyone looked at Ho.
Ho said, “I don’t want to go to Wales.”
“We don’t want you to come,” Shirley explained.
“But we’re going to need your car keys,” said River.
Lamb said to Coe, “Try not to kill anyone.”
Coe shrugged.
“On our side, I mean.”
“Why do you need my car keys?” Ho asked suspiciously.
When they’d all clattered out of the office, Catherine said, “And this is wise?”
“Said the drunk with the wine cellar in her living room.”
“If Louisa’s in trouble, we need to call the Park. Or the police. Ho said her phone’s not moved all night.”
“Neither did mine,” said Lamb. “And I was alive last time I checked.”
“Did you ask for a second opinion?”
He ignored that. “We’ve been over this. The Park can’t be trusted where Harkness is concerned because its fingerprints are all over his lunatic fucking misdeeds. And I’m not watching him walk away again.”
“But you’re not going to Wales yourself.”
“Christ no. I’m on a crusade, not a one-star mini-break.”
“And what if Louisa’s already dead?”
Lamb became absent for a moment, as if a light had winked off. It winked back on again. “She’s probably okay. Going dark’s protocol in joe country.”
But he stamped on the floor, to summon River back upstairs.
Catherine raised an eyebrow.
“What kind of boss would I be,” he said, “if I despatched the office junior without a going-away present?”
“A normal one?” she suggested, and just avoided colliding with River as she vanished back into her own room.
That going-away present was in River’s pocket now, weighing his jacket down.
