He had ID, of course, under a workname, but didn’t have to be a fisherman to know that you don’t go lobbing rocks in the pool before you cast your line. If anyone rang the number on his card, bells and whistles would sound at Regent’s Park. And Lamb didn’t want the suits asking what he thought he was doing, because he wasn’t sure what he thought he was doing, and there was no chance in hell he was going to share that information.
“Very important,” he added. He tapped his lapel. A wallet poked visibly from his inside pocket, and a twenty pound note peeped visibly from inside that.
“Ah.”
“I take it that’s a yes.”
“You understand we have to be careful, sir. With people asking questions at major transport hubs.”
Good to know, thought Jackson Lamb, that if terrorists descended on this particular transport hub, they’d meet an impregnable line of defence. Unless they waved banknotes. “Last Tuesday,” he said. “There was some kind of meltdown.”
But his man was already shaking his head: “Not our problem, sir. Everything was fine here.”
“Everything was fine except the trains weren’t running.”
“The trains were running here, sir. There were problems elsewhere.”
“Right.” It had been a while since Lamb had endured a conversation this long without resorting to profanity. The slow horses would have been amazed, except the newbies, who’d have suspected a test. “But wherever the problem, there were people being bused here from Reading. Because the trains weren’t running.”
The weasel was knitting his eyebrows together, but had seen his way to the end of this line of questioning, and was picking up speed on the final stretch. “That’s right, sir. A replacement bus service.”
“Which came from where?”
“On that particular occasion, sir, I rather think they’d have come from Reading.”
Of course they bloody would. Jackson Lamb sighed, and reached for his cigarettes.
“You can’t smoke in here, sir.”
Lamb tucked one behind his ear. “When’s the next Reading train?”
“Five minutes, sir.”
Grunting his thanks, Lamb turned for the barriers.
“Sir?”
He looked back.
Gaze fixed on Lamb’s lapel, the weasel made a rustly sign with finger and thumb.
“What?”
“I thought you were going to …”
“Give you a tip?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. Here’s a good one.” Lamb tapped his nose with a finger. “If you’ve got a complaint, there’s a helpline number on the posters.”
Then he wandered onto the platform, and waited for his train.
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