“Marcus didn’t make it,” she said, and turned and went back upstairs.
The rain was never going to stop. It had found a loophole in the weather-laws, and henceforth would fall without interruption, soaking the guilty and innocent alike, though mostly the former, a statistical inevitability. From the dazzle ship’s sheltered platform, River could see the neon blur it was making of the South Bank, drawing a grey curtain across the monolithic pile that was Sea Containers House, and dampening the Coca-Cola colouring of the Eye to a dotted outline.
He said to Frank, “Mission? Me? What are you talking about?”
“You’re wasted where you are.”
“What would you know about it?”
“I’ve made it my business to know. You went into the family business. You know how proud that makes me? I was CIA, back in the day. And still fighting the good fight.”
“No,” said River. “Whatever fight you’re fighting, it’s dirty.”
“You don’t know the full story. What we were trying to do at Les Arbres, it benefits everyone. Everyone.” He waved a hand, taking in the Thames, which meant the whole of London. “Look around. When you went into the Service, it was to protect all this, wasn’t it? You wanted to serve, to defend. And what have you ended up doing? Slough House is a cul de sac. A joke. Everything you might have been, all the promise you showed, and you’re spending your days finding different ways of stapling bits of paper together.”
“Are you about to offer me a job? Because sending someone to kill my grandfather’s a hell of a recruitment strategy. Or did you get your definitions of headhunting confused?”
“Okay, that was an error. I’ve admitted that. But it’s brought us here. You, me. And you now have the opportunity to decide what you want the rest of your life to be. Because if you stay in the Service, River, you’ll be in Slough House forever. And if you leave, what will you do? Get an ordinary job in an ordinary office?”
“I haven’t much thought beyond seeing you charged with conspiracy to murder.”
“Seriously, son, that’s not going to happen.”
Son. River shook his head. He was foggy with disbelief still: his father? His
“I get that you’re mad,” he told Frank. “And for all I know, you drag that I’m-your-daddy line out every time you meet someone new. But what I want to hear is what triggered this whole thing. What made you burn your house down, and send your son to kill my grandad? You’ll be coughing all this up at the Park soon. Might as well give me the preview. Think of it as making up for all those missed birthdays.”
“Son—”
“And stop calling me that.”
“Why? It’s who you are.”
River became aware, though they’d been there all the time, of high red lights glowing way up in the dark, marking the tips and joints of the ubiquitous cranes.
Frank had a red tip too: the end of his Gauloise. From behind its brief curtain, he said, “I know it sounds insane, after this past couple of days. But think about it, River. You can carry on at Slough House, which you just know is designed to kill your spirit. Or you can come join me and do some serious good. I promise you. What we’re doing, what we started at Les Arbres—it’s about protecting all those things you hold dear. About making a difference.”
River said, “What do you mean, this past couple of days? For me, this all started last night. What happened before then?”
And as the tip of Frank’s cigarette glowed bright again, he realised he already knew.
“I turn my back for five minutes,” said Lamb.
Catherine had found some plastic ties in a drawer, the kind that tightened onto themselves, and had to be cut loose. With them, Coe had secured Patrice to the radiator, which—if she hadn’t prevailed on Shirley to turn it off—would have scorched his flesh by now, adding burnt meat to the other smells crowding Slough House: the gunpowdery whiff of a discharged firearm, and the leakage from two fatal head wounds. Only Lamb’s voice was a normal sound. Everything else was stunned and reduced, like a recording of its own echo. Even the heating, running down to zero, failed to summon its usual clamour: the bangs and ticks from the ancient pipework were a half-hearted symphony, a weary requiem.
“I said—”
“We heard. Now is not the time.”
Lamb gave her a savage smile. “When’s good for you? If I hadn’t come back, there’d be seven corpses, not two. You’re supposed to be secret service, not sitting ducks.”
He was holding the bottle he’d brought Patrice down with, his fingers curled around its neck. The way he was caressing it, you might think it was his favourite survivor.
But Catherine shook her head. No. We’re all his joes, and he’s just lost two.
She said, “We need to call the Park.”
“We’ll call the Park when I say so.”
“We’ve got two fatalities, Jackson, and we can’t just—”
