David Cartwright blinked, then blinked again. He mumbled something, and she had to replay the sound in her head a few times before she thought she’d caught it: a repetition of what he’d said earlier,
“He came to my house. Weeks later. Living in the city then. Bayswater. It was the fag end of summer, and he was . . . different. He suggested a drink. I suggested he disappear, if he didn’t want to find himself in pokey.”
She remembered River telling her of evenings spent like this, the young man listening to the old one, spinning spook yarns, brandy in hand, and wondered if that was where David Cartwright had retreated in his mind.
He needed River, she thought. But River was out slaying dragons, or looking for dragons to slay.
“Knew what he wanted, of course. Saw it in his eyes when he showed up at the Park. Because he was one of the believers. His Project Cuckoo, it wasn’t just a strategy he favoured. No, he thought it was our only possible direction, that we’d be doomed without it. That was his faith, you see? Why the Agency got shot of him. Nothing more dangerous than a believer.”
Because believers were always on a quest, for one Holy Grail or another. And quests were fuelled by the blood of anyone who happened to get in the way.
“So I thought he was there to make one last plea. If I got on board, he knew I’d carry the Park. More power behind the throne than there ever is sitting on it.” He grew cunning, like a man with a magic ring in his pocket, about to show what it can do. “You’ll have to turn the tape off now.”
Bad Sam said, “There’s no tape. You can speak freely.”
The old man tapped the side of his nose. “Do I look like this is my first time?”
Sighing theatrically, Lamb opened his desk drawer and reached inside it. Something made a clunky noise. It might have been a hole punch. “There,” he said. “Now, your American crusader. What did he want?” He was revolving his glass in his hand, and by the lamp’s yellow glow Catherine could see its sticky surface, its film of smudged fingerprints. “Well, we know what he wanted. But how did he get it? Why did you give it to him?”
“I never . . . ”
“The Park turned him down. We’ve established that. And the Yanks had kicked him out. But the following year there he is, middle of France, running his little colony, raising his children as prototype terrorists. And there you were, checking on his progress. But not officially. Because as far as the records go, you were paying welfare visits on an old spook. So whatever happened, you did it under the bridge. Why?”
She shouldn’t be party to this, she thought again, but it was too late; everything was too late. Jackson Lamb would ebb and flow, and the old man would crumble. Whether there’d be anything left of him once it was over was anybody’s guess. And she had promised River she’d look after his grandfather, but God help her, she wanted to know too. Whatever had happened back then, it had sown the seeds of the Westacres bombing, and she wanted to know what it had been. Because she’d been kidding herself if she’d thought she’d escaped Slough House. It didn’t matter where she was, she was as much a spook as Lamb, and every bit as hungry to learn these secrets.
“He had something on you,” Lamb said. “He turned the screw. What did he know?”
“He’s had enough,” Bad Sam said. “Let’s leave it for now, shall we?”
“He’s had enough when I say he’s had enough. What did Frank have on you, Cartwright? What did he know that you wanted kept hidden?”
“Jackson—”
“You said it yourself. Secrets don’t stay secret, not on Spook Street.”
“Stop now, or I’ll make you stop,” Bad Sam said. “I mean it.”
“Frank had something. What was it?”
“Leave him, Jackson,” Catherine said.
And the old man said, “Isobel,” and started to cry.
“Well,” Louisa said. “I wasn’t expecting this.”
Her companion said, “I’ve been up for eighteen hours. I’ve spent most of them in my car, and the rest looking at bodies, being lied to, locking up innocent people, and letting a French whackjob steal my gun. Oh, and having what feels like my cheekbone broken by the very hard head of that colleague of yours. Who, when my day started, was dead. I deserve a drink or seven after that.”
“No argument,” Louisa said, who hadn’t been fazed by being in a bar; just by Flyte’s invitation. She was drinking fizzy water: her car was down the road. But Emma Flyte was putting away tequila shots, one either side of a Mexican beer, and nothing about the way she was doing this suggested amateur status.
“Met your boss this morning,” Emma said.
Ah, Louisa thought. It was rare you got the chance to hear first impressions of Lamb. “And how did you get along?”
“He gave me about a dozen good reasons for bringing disciplinary charges against him.”
Louisa nodded seriously. “If you decide to do that, I very much want to be there when it happens.”
