Chapter Four: "Seems Like Old Times"

The light from the lamp wasn't really enough to read by, but Harry couldn't find the impetus to switch anything else on. He seemed to have lost the impetus to do pretty much of anything. The album had come to an end, but he didn't bother to turn it over. The room was silent except for the faint hiss coming from the speakers and the deep rasp of a cat wedged up against a bank of cushions.

Even the book he was reading was not something he had actually chosen; it had been the thing he picked up and began and found he couldn't stop.

'All day long, my former love, I've been revising

a poem about us. First a gentle man

spoke it, then I gave the Devil a chance.

But you always knew my someone else

could only be me.'

He was sitting in the semi-gloom reading poetry about love and cruelty and he would have laughed in disgust but his own pathetic wretchedness didn't allow it.

He read until the dull ache behind his eyes became too much. The clock stood at a little after two. He scrubbed at his eyes, his head resting against the back of the chair for a moment; she was not always in his dreams and he wasn't sure if it was worse when she was or when she wasn't. In his waking hours she was there most of the time, in the back of his mind. A problem he worried at. If he could keep his thoughts rational for long enough he might actually think of something constructive. There should be a grand scheme but all he had were a few pieces.

Find Ruth before Mace did.

Keep an eye on Mace and try to second-guess him without letting him know he was doing it.

And then what?

Harry turned out the fire for the night; the cat's hoarse purring came to an abrupt halt, two slits of green glowering at him in the dark. Perhaps he should try naming them, he thought. Livia had taken them to her heart, if the amount of cat related items finding their way into his kitchen cupboards were anything to go by.

He said goodnight to it and left it soaking up the residual heat.

When he switched on the bathroom light the white tile was painfully brilliant. Toothpaste on the brush and- Harry stopped, hand frozen in midair. If he had looked in the mirror he wouldn't have been surprised to see a lightbulb over his head. Something she had told him once. In passing. So vague that even now he could barely grasp at it, but it was something.

He didn't have to pause to think of the number, dialled automatically and swore under his breath with every ring that went unanswered. The voice, when it came, on the other end of the line was rough and thick with sleep.

'Juliet.'

He could hear her moving. 'Har-Harry? God, what time is it? What's happened?' Something in the background fell.

'Nothing. Look, Juliet, I need to see you.'

A pause.

'Are you drunk?'

'Do I sound drunk to you?'

'Well, you never know.' She didn't sound sleepy anymore, just angry. 'I'm trying to think of a reasonable explanation as to why the hell you would wake me up in the middle of the night for a chat!'

'Tomorrow, Juliet, do you have any free time?'

'Oh, of course, Harry. In between coffee with the girls, getting my nails done and a gossip session over lunch, I have all the free time in the world. Have you any-'

He raised his voice, cutting her off. 'Look, I'm sorry to wake you up in the middle of the night, Juliet, I really am. But I need to see you. It's important. Please.'

She blew out a breath. A sharp sound down the line. 'Fine. Fine, all right. Come to my office-'

'No.'

'What?' Cold.

'Somewhere away from Whitehall, Thames House and anywhere else of the sort you care to mention.'

'You're unbelievable. First you call me in- You know, mobility is a bit of an issue for me these days, Harry, or hadn't you noticed?'

'You choose the place – I'll be there.'

Another pause.

'You put a strain on friendship, you know that?'

She told him the time and the place, called him a few more names and he let her go back to sleep. Nervous tension, the good kind. The type he needed and felt for the first time. He was holding something in his hand and when he looked down he found he still had the toothbrush, gripped so hard it had broken.

ooOoo

'Safe-houses I have known and loved.' Adam concluded his briefing with a heartfelt sigh. 'Seriously, Harry, how much longer are we supposed to be holding Milcic's hand?'

'Until he has been deposed and given testimony to the satisfaction of the judiciary before being spirited away to a tropical climate of the MoD's choosing; or his former friends from the Balkans catch up with him and put a bullet in his head, whichever comes first. I would prefer the former, Mr Carter.'

Adam's eyes crinkled slightly. 'Right.'

'Speaking of which - Ros, shouldn't you be on your way?'

The blonde smiled stiffly.

'Tell you what, Harry,' Adam leaned back in his chair, 'why don't I question him, and then Zaf can shoot him - save us and the taxpayer a world of trouble and money.'

'Why does Zaf get all the fun?' Ros enquired.

'We could take turns.' Zaf grinned at her. 'Just see it as a team-building exercise.'

Harry regarded them sternly. 'Please, don't tempt me.' He stood, meeting over. They filed out, Ros collecting a few possessions and heading for the pods, wearing an expression that clearly stated she would rather be on her way to a funeral. Surveillance on a target did, at least, have a purpose. But what amounted to baby-sitting someone whose continued existence on earth constituted a breach of human decency never seemed to fit the description of the job they had signed up for.

Zaf fiddled with some files, briefly annoyed Malcolm just for the sake of it and then went up to the roof. To get some air. Harry was leaning against the railing, fingers drumming against the metal.

'Not much to report,' Zaf said. There was no preamble: no need, no time. 'Mace seems to be following the same pattern each day. Wife and kids are away and he doesn't have many visitors. The only thing that stood out was this.'

He handed Harry the photograph. 'I think you'll find that "this" is actually a "her", Zafar.'

'Yeah, well...' He pulled the collar of his jacket closer around his neck; the wind had got up. 'Mike reckons she was watching Mace – it might be worth following up.'

Harry was still studying the picture. 'Don't worry about her, just concentrate on Mace.'

'But-'

'Mace, Zaf.' He met the younger man's eyes. 'That's all.'

Zaf took back the photo, folded it up, slipped it inside his jacket. 'Sure, Harry.'

He went back down to the Grid; Harry did not reappear. One of those high-level, utterly incomprehensible meetings he sometimes vanished to, no doubt.

Zaf leant over Jo's shoulder. She breathed heavily down her nose. 'I really hate it when you do that.'

He nudged her. 'And I really hate it when you insist on duetting with Beyoncé.'

Jo laughed softly. 'Only 'cos you fancy her.'

'Well, you're sullying her talent.'

Her eyebrows were raised to new heights. 'So that's what you're calling it these days.' His breath blew against the side of her neck. 'What do you want, Zaf?'

'Look, Jo, I'd do this myself, but I have to follow up on that Bosnian connection we got from Immigration.'

'Yeah, that's not actually answering the question is it, Zaf?'

He slid the photo onto her desk. 'D'you think you can find out who this is? Secretly?'

'How secretly?'

'Really, really secretly. So that no-one else knows, secretly.'

She had started playing with a pen, clicking the top – in, out, in, out, in- 'Does that "no-one else" mean Harry?'

'Clever girl.'

Jo groaned. 'Zaf-'

'This might be really important. I'll make it up to you, Jo, I swear. Scout's honour.'

She snorted. 'Zafar Younis as a Boy Scout? That'll be the day...'

He smiled. If he could have added extra twinkle to his eyes, she was sure he would. It was something to which she tried to be immune. 'I'll show you my uniform.'

'Wow, you really do know the way to a girl's heart.'

He nudged her again. 'Jo...'

'Yeah, all right, fine.' She stuffed the photo into the top drawer of her desk. 'But if Harry asks what I'm doing, I'm telling him.'

He flashed her another smile without the slightest hint that he had heard her.

ooOoo

Juliet was already waiting when he arrived. She looked tired and he felt a momentary twinge of guilt, quickly overcome. The woman would have no compunction whatsoever about rousing him at any time of the day or night. And this was supposed to be an era of equality.

'Juliet.' He sat opposite her, deciding against a more affectionate greeting – he didn't want to annoy her more than he had already. 'Thank you for meeting me; I know how busy you are.'

Her blue stare took on a steelier hue. 'This must be serious: Harry Pearce talking in clichés. Has there been a coup or something while I wasn't looking?'

Harry decided to adopt a gentle approach. He smiled at her slightly, 'I can only apologise so many times.'

The desire to insult him further warred with something else. He had always been able to read her so well. The something else won. She sighed. 'This almost seems like old times. Secret afternoon meetings.'

The countermove. He should have seen that one coming and conceded the point. For one moment they allowed a shared memory to creep past their defences. Just for one moment.

'Well?'

'Well.'

'I have many talents, Harry, but mind reading isn't one of them.' She leant her elbows on the table. It was a quiet place: exclusive and friendly at the same time; tables with sofas and big chairs arranged around them, all well-spaced. Easy to see why it was her preferred meeting point.

He kept his voice low and even. Anyone watching would see two people having a perfectly ordinary conversation – friendly, but not intimate. The sort of scene that would be playing in countless arenas across the country. 'I remember you telling me something once. A fragment of something. I'd like to hear the whole thing.'

Juliet watched him closely. 'You want me to play "Once upon a time"? What's going on?'

He shifted slightly.

'All right. We'll play this your way, Harry. What story is it you wish me to clarify?'

'It was something you told me about Oliver Mace.'

Her frame stiffened. Whatever the jumble of thoughts in her brain was it took several seconds before the words finally came. She ran both hands through her hair. 'Harry- Whatever this is, don't do it. It isn't worth it.'

His eyes were cold. 'Isn't it.'

'I didn't mean-' Juliet bit her lip, took a deeper breath. Her cheeks had paled and then flushed. 'Harry, Oliver Mace still has friends in the Service: friends who aren't exactly pleased with what happened. They blame you for his dismissal.'

'It never ceases to astonish me the capacity human beings have for laying the blame at almost any door except the one deserving of it.'

'For God's sake, we're not here to discuss the philosophy of the human condition.' She took another breath and continued more temperately, 'Mace may not be in the Service but he still has the capacity to do you a lot of damage, Harry.'

'I know.' His voice had softened again. 'But I like to think that I have a few friends of my own.'

She leant back again, her head tilting; she looked down at him. 'Don't turn this into a test of loyalty. It's beneath you. And me.'

'That isn't what I meant, Juliet.'

She had started to fidget. It was a new habit, acquired since her preferred activity of stalking about the room had been taken from her.

'What is it you know about Mace, Juliet?'

Her eyes raked his face. 'You're not going to give up on this, are you?'

'You know me.'

She snorted. 'More's the pity.'

'It was something you mentioned. It sounded almost like a bad joke, but I don't think it was.' Juliet was staring at the table, at the floor, at her hands... 'Something he'd done and it was covered up.' Harry was insistent. 'A girl he killed.'

'A boy.' She raised her head. 'It was a boy.'

He was very still for a moment. 'Operational?'

Juliet moistened her lips. 'Look, Harry, it's probably just a rumour-'

'Is it?'

'No.' The war was over; she looked smaller, somehow.

'Where?'

'A hotel room. In Budapest.' Juliet let out a breath and it shook slightly. 'I was working the East European desk... I got the story from a contact in Hungary.'

'What sort of contact?'

'A policeman.' Fingers through her hair again. 'I don't know all of the details; I barely believed it. Or maybe I didn't want to, I don't know... He'd made a lot of enemies in the region and those sort of stories go around all the time. But...'

'But you do believe it?'

Juliet nodded. Then, 'We needed him.' She would never convince him of that – she couldn't even convince herself.

'No, Juliet, we didn't. People like Mace are the last thing that we need in this job.'

She stared up at the ceiling and a laugh broke from her lips. 'Things are always very clear-cut with you, aren't they? Even your grey areas are sharply defined.'

'Not always. I've done things I'm not proud of.'

'Yes, but the things that you're not proud of wouldn't mean much to most people.'

A slight flicker across his face that might have been amusement. 'I am not most people.'

A flicker across hers that hardly anyone ever saw. 'No.'

Silence for a moment and the muted conversations of other customers filtered through.

'It was about ten years ago and it was brutal. And that's all I know, Harry.'

'Thank you.'

'Just be careful. And don't rely on too many people for favours.'

He left; and as he passed her his hand rested briefly on her shoulder.

TBC