Chapter Four
No Ordinary Man – Of the Cruellest Kind – A Summons – A Fait Accompli – The Problem is Revealed – Incandescence – A Hasty Delivery – Leander Purrun is Unhappy – Preparing for the Worst – Into Darkest Cornwall – Before the Dawn.
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The Watchers, all three of them, had reported back to camp, very carefully advising Leander Purrun, the head of their company, on everything they had seen and everything that had happened.
Purrun was a sensible man; he knew that if they wanted to be left in peace, he needed to have the lie of the land, and this meant watching out for things that changed. The recent events at the Big House, as the children called it, were nothing if not intriguing. A rescue helicopter no less? This was interesting news indeed and he wondered just who it was living in the old granite manor.
The boys had reported two small children, a man and a woman, clearly the parents, and an older woman, possibly a grandmother. And it was the man who had been sick; again, interesting. In the house for less than a day and taken sufficiently ill that an emergency rescue had not only been warranted, but available … this was no ordinary man.
Chewing thoughtfully on a long stalk of sweet grass, Leander Purrun surveyed his small camp. Only eight families with no more than ten children among them, the youngest still babes in arms. The three boys who had become his sight beyond sight were all scamps, but good boys who knew not to damage or steal. Unless it was cake, of course.
Purrun smiled. He would get the ingredients of something sweet and sticky for the boys as a reward for their meticulous watching.
They were all good boys. They did exactly as they were told.
###
There was no question about it.
He had checked and rechecked. There was a problem with his thinking, his … mind, and nothing he could do, no exercise or reframing, was able to amend the result of his probing or change the outcome of his analyses. It was not even that he had lost the ability to function in his usual manner, but the fine edge, the sharpness and ease of cerebral integration that marked his thinking as different, was not as it usually was. It wasn't gone, but Mycroft could feel an inhibition and lack of plasticity, as if the vast and floating range of his intellect had been wrapped inside layers of detail-blurring resistance.
Ironically, just as some of his thought-processes had been repressed, so others had become increasingly acute and spontaneous, notably his emotive behaviours. A smile from one of his children and the subsequent emotional spike swamped all other response. He knew: he had tested several hypotheses in this regard.
The knowledge that his ability to think had been compromised, made his stomach churn. It was the quality of his intellect that made him him. It was his mind that had brought him Cate. Mycroft swallowed down a rising queasiness: would Cate even want him when she knew his thinking was impaired? If he lost his ability to reason, would he lose everything else as well? He closed his eyes and swallowed again in a dry throat.
Sitting with his elbows resting on the table in front of him now, fingers clasped beneath his chin, Mycroft was hideously aware that several decisions were needed and none were simple. Normally, such considerations required but a moment's thought, but not now. Now he found himself playing one alternative against another. It was exhausting. There was so much at risk and yet he was unable to seek aid from his peers at the very moment it was most needed.
And even though he had been reasonably successful so far in keeping the true dimension of the problem to himself, he knew was going to have to tell Cate. Tell her everything. She was going to be unhappy both for him and, he feared, with him.
He had spoken at length with the doctors at the hospital and on the telephone, had grilled them about their opinions of diagnosis and prognosis. Nothing they had said to him was of the slightest surprise. Nor was it of the slightest use.
He had to have help, but he could not go to his associates in Whitehall.
To do so would reveal a void of uncertainty, and that was impossibly dangerous.
Therefore any help must be discreet and unofficial, and there was only one person who could give him both things. Yet the very thought rankled: to ask for the kind of aid he needed meant openly declaring a vulnerability of the cruellest kind, one which he might never fully cast off.
He sighed. There was no help for it.
Pulling out his Blackberry, he phoned his brother.
The discussion between them was as charged as he imagined it would be, although the final outcome was as he desired. There was further conversation involving matters of equipment, but that was mere operational detail. The essentials of his request were agreed.
He rose stiffly from his seat, wondering how best to tell Cate that Sherlock and John were about to be joining the family sojourn.
###
Putting his mobile back down onto the coffee-table, Sherlock was thoughtful, resting his fingers against the side of his head and staring at nothing. To John, this meant either that he was about to burst out in one of his occasional tirades against the terminal ennui with which he was daily required to battle, or he was about to take on a new case. Prepared for the former but holding his breath for the latter, John waited.
"Mycroft's in trouble," Sherlock announced, slowly.
"Need our help to find some stolen government papers again, does he?" John returned to his newspaper. "Or has some MI5 operative gone rogue and threatened to tell everyone what Prince Philip has for breakfast?" he smiled, turning the paper over, only looking across at his friend when the silence grew.
"Sherlock?" John's first clue that this was something of particular significance was the look on the younger man's face. He was genuinely pensive. "What kind of trouble?"
Looking faintly uneasy, the younger Holmes linked his fingers in his lap. "He says he's been poisoned," Sherlock brought his fingertips to his mouth in meditation.
"What? Good grief," John sat upright. "Is it just him or are Cate and the kids affected too? Is he in hospital? Do they know what the poison was? How are they treating his condition?"
Shaking his head a little, Sherlock was curt. "Only him, some kind of toxin at the house in Cornwall."
Cornwall?
"What is Mycroft doing in the West country?" John looked puzzled. To his knowledge, the only things that got Mycroft out of London were either a government summit or … "Has Cate gone off on another of her escapades?" he inquired. "Has she gone missing or something?"
Shaking his head again, Sherlock tapped the knuckles of his joined hands against his chin. "Nothing to do with Cate or the children," he said. "He doesn't know much about the poison except that it's affected his thinking and he needs help locating the exact toxin, which is where I come in."
"He doesn't want anyone to know about the situation, so he's come to you for a bit of discreet chemical investigation?" John nodded to himself. It was the way Mycroft worked.
"But how was he poisoned in the first place?" the blonde man frowned again. "Does he know who is responsible? What's he planning to do about it? I bet he's not exactly happy."
A forced expression arrived on Sherlock's face. "An understatement, John," Sherlock smiled briefly at his friend. "And that's where you come in."
###
"For how long?" Cate met his eyes and waited. Though she wasn't unhappy with the idea, this was supposed to be a family holiday, and she already had Tomas to think about in addition to the twins. After explaining to the boy that she needed his help for a few days until Mycroft was well enough to pick up the reigns again, her sister's youngest had agreed to stay on and lend a hand. It was good to be treated as an adult for once, and Tomas was in no hurry to leave that feeling behind.
Thus the knowledge that Sherlock and John were about to join the party the following morning was a surprise, especially since the first she'd heard of it was after it had been arranged.
Mycroft could see she was a little put out by the unexpectedness of his fait accompli.
"I find I have need of my brother's assistance with a certain pressing problem," he looked down. "I am sorry, my love, to spoil the holiday."
He sounded so gloomy that Cate couldn't help but smile, rubbing his arm as she walked by him, not really noticing as he stepped carefully beyond the reach of her fingers.
"There are just enough bedrooms," she said, working out a new allocation in her head. "I can move Nora and the children into the second master as it has twin beds, and the boys can take the three single bedrooms at the back," she said. "Easy."
"Sherlock will also need a place to undertake some chemical analysis," Mycroft looked a little awkward. "Somewhere he won't be disturbed or be in anyone's way."
Meeting his eyes again, this time Cate was not so forgiving. He had been dancing around something since being discharged by the hospital, and her patience was wearing thin.
"What is it, Mycroft?" she asked. "Something is very much up, and you've chosen not to tell me, but even a fool could see something is wrong," she paused, staring through the window into the garden and sighed. "And I'm not exactly a fool."
Still unwilling to share his anxieties with her just yet, disinclined to see her expression crumble into pity for him for just a little while longer, Mycroft kept his own counsel. "I thought Sherlock might use the old scullery at the back of the kitchen," he said mildly. "It's bright and has power and a sink, as well as a long wooden bench," he paused. "The doors can be locked too."
So; he wasn't ready to confide in her. Very well. She knew enough not to waste her time pushing for things he wasn't willing to discuss.
But there would be a reckoning.
"Of course, if that's what he's going to need," her smile was overly bright. "Anything else?"
###
The sound of a powerful car engine approaching down the otherwise silent lane had Cate walking towards the front of the house, curious. An army Landrover Defender pulled to a halt in the small forecourt of the Cornish house, a tall, immaculately-groomed man stepping out the moment the vehicle had stopped. Dressed in a City-smart pin-striped dark blue suit, crisp white shirt, silk tie and shiny black shoes, Cate could only imagine him to be connected to Mycroft in some way.
"You have a visitor, darling," she called to him in the Book Room as it seemed to have become known. Waiting for his brother and John, Mycroft had decided the best thing for him to do was avoid any situation that might exacerbate his condition. Though he did not feel unwell, his thinking betrayed him in small but unanticipated ways. What had once been rich with the power of decision and control was now tentative at best. He found himself prodding his thinking processes like an aching tooth. Best to stay out of the way if he could.
Watching the visitor walk from the Land rover towards the front door, she felt her husband enter the room, though he kept himself well away from her side. Cate's stomach clenched with concern.
Since his return from the West Cornwall hospital yesterday, he had been in the strangest of moods: irritable, changeable, swinging from one thing to another. Was he still feeling unwell? If so, he should rest, but when she'd suggested a nap might do him good, he'd all but taken her head off. He hadn't even come to bed last night until after she'd fallen asleep, and his moods seemed to flit from one the next: first illness and anger; then denial, and now dismissal.
Cate wondered if he doubted her ability to handle the problem Sherlock and John were coming down to work on; possibly even that she might not want to have anything to do with him when he was in these peculiar tempers. She drew in a deep breath, turning with a smile.
"I'll go and make some tea, shall I?" she asked.
"Coffee for our guest," Mycroft nodded. "My Head of Security has not yet learned to appreciate the finer points of British tea-drinking rituals," he smiled, a little awkwardly, stepping back as she passed. "I'll let him in."
Gritting her teeth, Cate made her way to the kitchen, slamming the kettle around as well as the cupboard doors as she tried to calm herself. What was it about his situation that he wouldn't tell her? Why was he shutting her out? Banging cups and saucers onto a large tea-tray, she waited for the kettle to boil.
Mycroft had taken his visitor into the main front sitting-room of the house, warm and sunny as the afternoon sun streamed through the large bay windows. As Cate brought the tea-things through, the visitor stood, smiling, reaching over to take the tray from her hands.
"Good afternoon, Professor Holmes," he smiled genuinely. "Alex Beaumont," he added, offering his hand. "We spoke on the telephone two days ago."
When Mycroft had nearly died. Yes; she remembered.
"Lovely to meet you, Mr Beaumont," she smiled, gesturing him to sit. "As you can see, my husband is much improved, although not quite yet out of the woods, I feel."
"My wife has my complete confidence, Alex," Mycroft took the tea Cate left for him on the table. "There is nothing of my situation here about which Cate cannot be privy."
And just like that, he had changed again.
Cate looked down at the cup in her fingers. Now she knew something was wrong. A vague but deepening feeling of disquiet settled in her chest.
"Then I will be frank, Mycroft," Beaumont sipped his coffee. "When we spoke on the phone following your release from hospital yesterday, I was concerned by your apparently cavalier approach to your illness, some of the observations you made. They did not sound like you, not your usual way of handling such an issue," the American paused, toying with the handle of his cup. "I wanted to see for myself that you were ready to be out of hospital."
Sipping his tea, Mycroft smiled carefully.
"You suggest I might require a more constant form of medical supervision?" his smile grew a little more amused. "And you might be right," he turned to meet Cate's gaze. "I am still suffering the effects of the poison. It is … progressive," he added, slowly, lifting the cup to his lips.
Almost jack-knifing in her seat, Cate swivelled to stare at him, her heart thumping suddenly with fear and anger that she had received the information in such a way; that he hadn't been willing to tell her privately earlier.
Why hadn't he told her before? My love … what is going on?
Reading her dismayed expression, Mycroft shook his head. "I said nothing before now because I already knew there was nothing that could be done to help me at the hospital, that the damage had already been done," he looked down at his cup. "And I did not want you upset."
"Damage? What damage?" Cate felt a stab of ice. Jesus, Mycroft.
He looked at her calmly, almost impersonally. "The toxin that entered my system is still present," he said. "I have had and am still experiencing weakness and a lack of control in several areas of my thinking and emotional response," he added. "Which is why I have asked Sherlock and John to come; I need to find the source of the toxin in order to begin locating a remedy if such a thing exists. For all his idiosyncrasies, Sherlock is a first-rate research-chemist, and I don't want any of the government labs involved until I know what I have to deal with."
"And what is John to do?" Cate knew John and Sherlock worked together, but if it was chemical analysis that was involved …
"Once we have discovered the nature of the toxin, I will be able to do something to locate those who are responsible for it."
"And that's where John comes in." Cate stared at her untouched cup, realising.
"What happens if your condition becomes known?" Beaumont looked uneasy. "If it gets out that you are having problems with your mind, Mycroft, all hell will break loose, not only in Whitehall but across Europe. How long do you imagine we can expect to keep your situation a secret?"
"I am officially on leave until the end of the month," Mycroft replaced his cup on the tea-tray. "If I have been unable to identify and rectify the effects of the toxin by that time, then I will take an indefinite leave of absence or resign my position," he nodded quietly. "It would be prudent to begin considering candidates for my replacement."
His face as shocked as his thoughts, Beaumont's dark features paled visibly. "What?" he croaked. "Who could possibly be a replacement? You are entirely serious?" his voice reduced to a mutter.
"Naturally," Mycroft steepled his fingers. "If I am unable to function fully, then I am unable to function at all in my current role; you know that as well as I, however," he sat back, gazing between Cate and his Chief of Security. "There is still time."
"There are many excellent laboratories; there must be tests …" Beaumont struggled with the idea that Holmes could be so calmly accepting about something so dire.
"The hospital lab has already run several series of definitive tests," Mycroft raised his eyebrows. "I am having problems with my mind, but am not yet entirely without reason or the ability to function," he smiled austerely. "I will handle this in my own way."
Meeting Alex Beaumont's eyes, Cate knew the thought in his mind was the same one in hers: what if Mycroft's way was the wrong one?
Caught in the unthinkable dichotomy of an ailing but still brilliant genius or one whose mind was already playing him false, Cate realised that it didn't matter. If there were ever a moment when he needed her absolute support, it was now.
Taking a slow breath, she turned to face him, meeting his intent blue stare, and she nodded. "Tell me what you want," she said. "Anything."
Mycroft felt an abrupt rise of feeling at Cate's willingness to trust him, even when he had not been as forthcoming with her. He closed his eyes for a second, lest the irresistible tide of emotion betray him beyond his tenuous capacity to bear.
"Daddy?"
Blythe's artless voice cut through the moment as she zigzagged across from the open door to stand at his knee, looking between his face and that of the stranger in the dark clothes sitting beside him. Resting a warm little hand on her father's leg, she looked at the visitor with open curiosity, lifting her other hand towards him as she had seen grownups do.
Captivated, Beaumont smiled lightly, looking between the Holmes' as their daughter stepped closer, placing her free hand delicately on his knee, lifting the other once again.
Taking her diminutive fingers gently between his own, Alex Beaumont's smile increased as the small child looked at the contrast between her hand and his; one tiny and pale, the other long and dark. Taking Alex's hand between both of hers, Blyth's expression grew serious and thoughtful as she turned his fingers back and forth, measuring them against her own.
There was a strange silence as the adults wondered what the child was thinking.
Suddenly looking directly into Beaumont's eyes, Blythe gave him an enormous smile. "You're pretty," she giggled.
Instantly and totally disarmed, Alex felt his face heat in an unexpected blush.
The atmosphere in the room dissolved in an unavoidable smile.
"And you are very charming, Miss Holmes," Alex kept his voice perfectly normal as he looked up to meet Mycroft's eyes.
"If you could manage to hang on until your daughter reaches her maturity, Mycroft," the American drawled, raising a refined eyebrow. "I think we'll have a suitable replacement for you after all."
###
Mycroft was collecting his pyjama bottoms and his robe when Cate came into their bedroom. One look at his face and she knew he was still worried about his … condition. He was about to go and sleep in one of the spare rooms, or something equally noble.
"Going somewhere?" she asked, kicking off her shoes and enjoying the sensation of bare feet in the hedonistically lavish carpet.
There was silence.
Turning to meet his eyes, her heart ached at the wretched expression on his face. He was so determined not to make the situation any worse than it already was, that he was about to isolate himself for the duration.
"I think it best we sleep apart until I am more … myself," he murmured, everything about him troubled and uncomfortable.
Cate assessed him. "Are you feeling unwell again?" she asked. "Having violent impulses?" she looked at him carefully. "Because if you are, I'm taking you right back to hospital and I don't care what anybody thinks about it."
Mycroft's face registered immediate shock, in itself a sign his emotional control was dilute and inadequate. "Of course not," he shook his head, raising a hand to his brow. "It's nothing like that at all."
"Then tell me what it is like, my darling, so I can understand and can try to help you." Cate walked over to him, her hand reaching up to touch the side of his face. "Please don't keep me out like this."
He jerked back from her fingers, stepping towards the window, away from her nearness. "Don't," he snapped. "When I said I had no control in certain areas, this was one of them."
"No control … how?" Cate desperately wanted to understand so she could reassure him. "Tell me, Mycroft, so I can at least try and avoid doing anything to make you feel worse than you already are."
He looked away, shaking his head in the embarrassment of admission or shame at the loss of restraint, he wasn't sure which. He sighed.
"I can't control my mental state when you are too close," he whispered. "When you touch me, when I feel the warmth of your skin, smell the scent of your hair," he shook his head again. "Something inside me goes off," his voice was rough. "From calm to incandescence in a second, and there's nothing in between and no curb at the end," he paused, breathing hard. "Stay away from me, Cate. I have no right to your company if I am unable to comport myself without some semblance of civilised behaviour."
That her husband might be even tentatively right made no difference to her immediate decision, and she had never been one for taking the safe alternative. Besides, there was a limit to how much damage he could do; how much she would let him do …
"Mycroft," Cate said his name softly. "Mycroft."
He turned to her from his retreat by the window. The expression on his wife's face told him everything she was about to say and still he shook his head.
"No, Cate."
Keep her eyes on his; she walked closer, stopping no more than a yard from his stiff-backed warning. "My love, I am afraid your calculation has omitted a crucial value and is therefore incomplete," her smile was soft.
"And what is that?" Mycroft's features were rigid as he held onto what little remnant of self-discipline he could still muster.
"I adore incandescence," she whispered, her brown eyes refusing to leave his darkening regard for a second. She removed the space between them, her palms resting high against his chest, her lips parting as a high-pitched grunt caught in his diaphragm.
"No …" but it was too late, even as the syllable left his mouth, Mycroft felt the scald of unchecked desire burn the vague shadows of his resistance away, felt his hands stretch out for her, felt Cate's sigh of acquiescence as she folded into his arms. His mouth claimed hers with a heat of possession he didn't know he could feel. She was his, would always be his, and tonight, she would not refuse him ... his heart pounded in his chest as Cate returned his kisses, like for like.
It was fire and madness; it was storm and fury. It was incredible.
###
They had apologised to him for the rush-job, but the driver of the lorry still felt pretty aggravated that he'd been dragged into this thing again. It wasn't so much that he had a moral objection to what he was being asked to do, he just didn't want to get caught.
Driving carefully down the narrow little lane, once again he wished they could have waited until there was no moon in the sky. Even though this place was out in the back of beyond, there were still hikers and campers and suchlike. One report of his number-plate and they'd all be for the high-jump. The driver nodded grimly. He'd make sure that if he went down, everyone would go down with him; no way he was taking the fall for this if it all went south.
Arriving at the old mine, he turned the vehicle in preparation to backing it up, waiting for his guide to direct him safely towards the pit.
It was a matter of minutes only before another batch of the old steel drums went tumbling down into the depths of the ancient tin-mine.
###
Leander looked at their flushed faces. It was late enough that they knew to have been in bed, and yet they had still come to him, eyes bright and expectant.
"But it was the lorry again, Grampy," grandson number one waved a frantic hand, still panting from the mad dash back to camp. "It came like before and tipped things down the old mine."
"More drums?" Purrun scowled, a bad feeling permeating his bones.
"Lots of big drums, Grampy," grandson number two looked wide-eyed. "Big rusty-looking drums."
"Was it the same lorry or a different one this time?" Leander needed to be sure.
"Same one, Grampy," grandson number three handed over a scrunched up scrap of paper on which Purrun could see the unformed pencilled letters of a childish hand. It was the same registration as before; the same people. He felt his face turn sour.
"Good work, now bed!" he pointed a firm finger towards their van. "And do not wake your mother or there will be the devil to pay."
Grinning hellaciously, the three boys ran off, as sure-footed as young foxes in the dark.
###
Pale early light painted the bedroom grey-gold once again as Cate turned in the bed feeling heavy and warm and incredibly sleepy. Her half-closed eyes blinked slowly as she saw Mycroft's bright blue gaze not twelve-inches away. He pulled the duvet down from her face, the warmth of his hand stroking the contours of her neck and shoulder.
"How do you feel?" his voice was dry, gravelly. "Are you all right?"
"Like I climbed several alps," she held his fingers to her face. "Really big ones," she sighed. "I feel wonderful," she added, stretching like a cat under the bedclothes. "Although," she paused, assessingly. "My legs seem to have disappeared."
"I assure you they haven't," his mouth curved as his hand slid down her side to rest on the swell of her hip and the smoothness of her thigh.
"Is it all right to cuddle or will that set you off again?" she murmured, pleased by his pacific mood.
Rolling more onto his back, she saw a smile arrive on his face.
"I think my energy is sufficiently depleted that I pose no immediate threat to your welfare," he sounded entirely untroubled.
"Good, then come over here as I can't be bothered to move," Cate closed her eyes feeling warm and fuzzy with sleep.
With a groaning sigh, Mycroft rolled himself closer, draping an arm heavily over her waist, drawing her into his warmth and resting his face against her chest, feeling the steady beat of her heart and the flow of her breathing. He felt entirely content and deliciously free of any contrition.
"And how do you feel?" she murmured, her fingers stroking gently through the hair at the back of his neck where a small curl was trying to form.
"I believe your students have a phrase that most adequately describes my sense of being at this present moment," he sounded amused. "I'm confident you know the one I mean."
Cate felt herself smiling helplessly. She echoed the sentiment herself. Despite the difficulty of their overall situation, she had to stay confident they would find a way out of this; some way to fix the problem.
If not, then she would take Mycroft away from London, to Deepdene, possibly. If he was no longer able to be what he had to be for the British Government in the City, she would take him to the country and care for him there. He would be safe, she could look after him.
Holding him close against her, Cate listened to his quiet breathing and forced herself not to cry.
###
John spent the trip fast sleep in a standard bunk while Sherlock had walked the length of the train in between visits to the buffet car for endless cups of coffee. Arriving at their destination, they saw Mycroft had arranged for an Army Landrover to meet them off the overnight train from Paddington, its cabin packed solid with crates and boxes of equipment and materials. There was also a GPS navigation device in the driver's side of the front windscreen already queued for the Cornish house. According to the device, it was a twenty-three minute drive.
The weather was perfect: high white clouds and a blue expanse of sky. John remarked on its brightness as he headed out along the road towards Saint Just.
Deep in the observations of a paper on the latest in potentiometric titrations, Sherlock ignored his friend's wittering and focused on the issues of quantitative analytical chemistry.
"He said he found the substance under the house," John mused to himself. "Something to do with the house itself, do you think? Something to do with the ground beneath the house?"
Sighing, Sherlock left his reading of redox reactions, and met John's blue gaze.
"John, the house was built almost three hundred years ago," he said. "There's even a secret passage running all the way down to a private cove," he added, his eyes glinting. "Don't you think if there was something in the land beneath the building, that someone before my brother would have spotted it by now?"
"Dunno," John kept his eyes on the road. "Mycroft's pretty switched on. Maybe he was the first to find it, who knows?"
"Possible, but extremely unlikely," Sherlock frowned. "I have a suspicion the origin of the toxin affecting Mycroft, whatever it might be, is of far more recent generation."
"You already have an idea what the problem might be?" John flicked a look across his friend's face. Sherlock was being inscrutable as ever.
"Rémi Allanou," the younger Holmes turned back to his paper. "Possibly."
John was confused. "That would be a French person, yes?" he frowned, staring back at the road. "You think the French are trying to poison your brother?"
"What?" Sherlock was lost in John's rationale. The dark-haired man stared at his flatmate in confusion. "What have the French to do with Mycroft?" he demanded. "I'm not sure even the French would be entirely thrilled with my brother's demise," he paused, thinking. "He keeps too many secrets for them."
"Then who is this Allanou and how is he connected with the current situation?" John turned off the A30 onto Polmennor Road.
"He's a chemist in the European Parliament," Sherlock muttered abstractedly, turning a page and lapsing into silence.
Shaking his head, John focused on the road and watched for potholes. Didn't want to break any of the stuff in the crates. There would be time for questions when they arrived.
###
It was over one-hundred nautical miles from Saint-Pol-de-Lèon to the quiet cove on the island of St Mary's in the Scillies, and would take Bisset and La Ciel Claire's powerful dual motors every available hour of darkness to make it from the coast of France into British waters. If they were spotted either by passive means such as radar or satellite oversight, then the Coastguard would not be too far behind, and if that happened …
Peering through the unlit glass of his wheelhouse, Luc Bisset stared out across the deck towards their only passenger on this trip. A very special passenger indeed if the money he was paying them was anything to go by. Clearly this was not some homeless refugee trying to leave the squalor and the grim reality of conflict or inter-tribal war.
The passenger was a middle-aged man, greying and bearded; heavily-built and with the look about him of one accustomed to the reins of power.
Yves was talking to him at Bisset watched; handing the man a small cup of the bitter coffee Joubert was so fond of.
The sea was calm and the night was very still. This was both a blessing and a curse: a calm passage meant a swift one, but it also meant that the sound of the engines carried a great deal further than usual. Bisset knew that if even a whisper of authority appeared, he would be expected to give them a run for the large sum of money he was being paid.
The Frenchman scowled. Though he liked the revenue these special trips brought, he did not like the unusual conditions that inevitably came with them. He decided; this was the last trip he would do for a 'special' passenger. From now on, he would be playing it safe.
All he had to do now therefore, was to navigate his boat across a large expanse of treacherous water, avoid any contact or observation by the ever-vigilant British authorities; bypass the coastal security of St Mary's before dawn, and get everyone into hiding before the sun came up.
Lighting another Gitane, Bisset smiled grimly as he edged The Clear Sky's throttle a little further open.