Sabbathman (59 page)

‘Don’t see it,’ Allder had said. ‘Why should he have done it? What’s in it for us?’

‘Everything. You told me we’re in a war. Wasn’t that the phrase? Us and Five?’

‘Yes, but–’

‘So if Cousins turned out to be Sabbathman? Renegade MI5 officer? Recently promoted? Totally out of control? Wouldn’t that settle it?’

Allder had nodded, warmed by the proposition but ever-practical. ‘Proof?’ he’d inquired drily.

‘Won’t matter. Gifford’s stuff is proof enough. Cousins is dead. The case’ll never see the light of day.’

‘But what’s the objection to Dave Gifford? He’s an accessory. We’ll get a result. Bound to.’

‘You’re right,’ Kingdom had nodded, ‘but he saved my life, too.’

Kingdom hadn’t taken the idea any further, letting the ambulancemen manhandle him onto the wet tarmac, knowing that the RUC boys had yet to deliver their report to New Scotland Yard. He’d spoken to them on the phone from hospital in Inverness. They were promising Wednesday lunchtime.

Now, the car swept south-east towards the crematorium at Chatham while Kingdom waited for a verdict. Allder would have seen the report by now. Bound to have. On the outskirts of Bexley, the Daimler swerved to avoid an old man crossing the road. Allder hung onto the strap over the window.

‘They’ve found the bloke in the photo,’ he said, ‘the one you brought back from Dublin.’

‘Who have?’

‘Your friends from Knock. The RUC lads. They picked him up on Sunday. They’ve been at him ever since.’

‘Who is he?’

‘UFF fella. Not a name you’ll know.’

‘UFF?’
Kingdom was staring at him now. The Ulster Freedom Fighters were one of the loyalist killer groups operating in Northern Ireland, a particularly vicious splinter from the Unionist block. Protestants, not Catholics, he thought. Loyalists, not Provos.

‘And what did he tell them?’

‘Everything. In the end.’ Allder glanced across at him, a man settling down after the meal of his dreams. ‘The Unionists have been trying to wreck the peace talks. The last thing they want is Sinn Fein at the negotiating table. As far as they’re concerned, there’s nothing to negotiate.’

‘And Cousins?’

‘Came up with a little plan to wreck the talks. To prove once and for all that the Provos would always be at it.’

Kingdom nodded, following the smoke upwind. ‘Sabbathman,’ he said quietly, ‘just fell into his lap.’

‘Exactly.’

‘Way back.’

‘Yes.’

‘When Dave Gifford met his ladyfriend. And Andy obliged with the rest. And someone took a good look at those Twyford Down transcripts.’

‘Exactly,’ he said again. ‘Cousins was running a two-track plan. He knew all about the Downing Street contacts with the Provos, the secret channels. It was his job to be part of all that. But it went against the grain. He saw it the way the Loyalists see it. He hated the Provos. He didn’t want them legitimised. He wanted them to stay terrorists for ever. He wanted a war without end. Thus Sabbathman.’

‘And Fishguard?’

‘Yeah, that was the second track. Anything. Anything to preserve the Union. Anything to keep the war going.’

Kingdom nodded, saying nothing. They were negotiating a stretch of roadworks now, the driver trying to avoid the worst of
the ruts. Kingdom’s hand went to his knee. In a couple of months, they’d said, he’d be walking again. After that, Allder had promised a lengthy convalescence. Time enough to put some sense back into his life, pick up with his kids, even make friends with his wife again.

‘And Annie?’ Kingdom said.

‘Killed by our UFF friend.’

‘The voice on the tape?’

‘His.’

‘Did he’ – Kingdom shrugged – ‘say anything about her?’

‘Like what?’

‘I dunno …’ Kingdom shook his head. ‘Daft question, really.’

They got to the crematorium forty minutes later. They turned in at the gates and drove slowly towards the chapel of rest. Close by, there was a car park. Allder was sitting up beside the window, looking for someone.

‘There,’ he said to the driver, ‘the blue Toyota.’

They parked beside it. Allder got out and joined a thin, greying man in his late fifties. He was wearing a dark suit with a raincoat folded over his arm. He was carrying a file. Kingdom watched the exchange of handshakes, then the older man gave Allder the file. His head turned towards the car, and Kingdom saw Allder nodding.

Allder opened Kingdom’s door. ‘Francis Wren,’ he muttered, ‘wants to say hallo.’

Kingdom reached forward. Wren had an awkward, slightly wooden handshake.

‘I understand you and Annie …’ he nodded towards the chapel of rest. ‘I just wanted to say how sorry I was to hear the news. How sorry we all were.’

Kingdom began to thank him but he stepped back, turning away, pulling on the raincoat against the bitter wind blowing off the river. The policeman helped Kingdom into the wheelchair and Kingdom caught Allder’s arm as he tossed the file into the back of the car and closed the door.

‘What was all that about?’

Allder looked down at him. ‘Cousins kept strange company,’
he said, ‘Ulster Unionists and the odd cabinet minister. Tory Central Office too, the backroom boys, one or two of the blokes who really matter. He did them all a lot of favours. Ending with Willoughby Grant.’ He smiled. ‘I don’t think there’ll be a problem with Five any more.’

The service lasted barely half an hour, a couple of dozen mourners scattered amongst the rows of seats. The pallbearers from the undertakers shouldered the coffin and walked slowly down the aisle. The organist played a hymn and when it came to talk about Annie’s life the priest did his best with what few facts he’d been able to gather. Annie had evidently been born in Dartford. Her father had disappeared early on and her mother had died when she was scarcely four but she’d stayed in the area, brought up by an aunt. The aunt, sadly, had recently died as well leaving, Kingdom concluded, absolutely no one. As the priest intoned the final committal and the curtains closed behind the coffin, he felt a chill steal over him. It shouldn’t have been like this, so cold, so cheerless. Not if he’d been bolder, more assertive. Not if he’d thought a little harder and cared a little less. The organist reached up for a bank of audio switches on a panel above his keyboard, and Kingdom suddenly found himself listening to the song he’d lived with for the best part of a year.

Kingdom peered round, wondering whose idea this was, Elkie Brooks’ ‘Sunshine After the Rain’, Annie’s all-time favourite, the song she always sang to him when she was really happy, the lyrics she always got wrong. Allder was studying his hands, looking faintly embarrassed. One or two others assumed it was a cue to leave. People began to file out.

Oh where is the silver lining

Shining at the rainbow’s end?

Outside, in the tiny garden of remembrance where the wreaths were displayed, Kingdom recognised the face for the first time. He
was taller than the photograph had suggested but he had the same smile, the same strong chin, the same neatly barbered hair.

Kingdom looked up at the policeman, back behind the wheelchair. ‘Over there,’ he said, ‘the blond bloke.’

The policeman pushed him over. The man in the photo was examining the cards on the wreaths. Kingdom touched him lightly on the leg. He looked up, surprised.

‘Excuse me?’ he said blankly.

Kingdom caught the intonation in the voice, unmistakably foreign. German, he thought. Just like the letter he’d found in Annie’s bedroom the night they’d wrecked her flat.

‘My name’s Alan Kingdom,’ he said, ‘friend of Annie’s.’

The man looked down at him a moment, the smile widening. He was older than Kingdom had first thought. Perhaps late thirties, even forty.

He knelt beside the wheelchair. ‘Yes?’ he said.

Confused now, Kingdom nodded back towards the chapel. ‘I was just wondering about the music. The last bit. Elkie Brooks.’ He paused. ‘Whose idea was that?’

‘Mine.’

Kingdom thought about the photo again, the pair of them by the rail, the smile on Annie’s face, the mountains in the background.

‘You knew her?’ he asked.

‘Sure,’ the man nodded, ‘she was my wife.’

They talked for twenty minutes, a light rain beginning to fall. His name was Bernd. He’d met Annie in Dusseldorf when she’d joined a big German travel company. They’d married within a month. Kingdom nodded, recognising the pattern, the headlong dash down the highway, the absolute refusal to consult a map.

‘And what happened?’ he said.

‘We split up. After six months.’

‘Divorced?’

‘No. She just left. There was never time.’

‘Yeah,’ Kingdom grinned, ‘I can believe it.’ He paused. ‘You see her again? Keep in touch?’

‘I wrote to begin with. Years ago. But then I gave up. She never answered the letters. Never.’ He lifted a gloved hand, wiping
the rain from the end of his nose. ‘But she phoned recently. Found my number.’

‘Why?’

‘She wanted a divorce.’

‘Really?’ Kingdom was frowning now. ‘Why?’

‘She said she’d met this man, this guy. A policeman, she said. A detective from Northern Ireland. She said she wanted to marry him.’ He paused, apologetic. ‘Would that be you?’

‘Yes,’ Kingdom felt himself blushing, ‘I suppose it would.’

‘And she never told you?’

‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘But she never told me anything. Maybe that’s why I loved her so much.’

Allder pushed Kingdom back to the car park. The rain had got heavier.

‘I’ve been thinking about your dad,’ he said. ‘How is he?’

Kingdom looked up, still brooding about Annie and his conversation with her husband. On reflection he didn’t know whether finding out about her plans was good news or bad. Maybe it would have been better not to have known.

‘Dad?’ he said vaguely. ‘You mean Ernie?’

‘Yes. Is he getting better. Or what?’

Kingdom shrugged. He’d tried to get through to his father twice but both times the staff nurse on the ward had been less than helpful. ‘Still very poorly,’ Kingdom said. ‘That’s the phrase they’re using.’

‘And what happens afterwards? Once he’s better? Once he gets out?’

‘God knows.’

Allder nodded. They were back in the car park now. The police driver was already at the wheel of the Daimler and there was someone else sitting in the back. Allder brought the wheelchair to a halt beside the rear window, gesturing for the stranger to lower it. He did so, leaning out. He was a youngish man with a mop of curly hair and a well-cut linen suit. Kingdom recognised the face from the news report he’d watched at
An Carraig
.

‘This bloke’s taken over from Willoughby Grant,’ Allder was
saying, ‘at
The Citizen
. They’re offering a reward for the Sabbathman jobs. Information leading to the killer. I’ve told him you’re the one who cracked it. Singlehanded.’

Kingdom blinked. It sounded a bit strong but he could see where Allder was driving. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I did.’

‘So my feeling is,’ Allder was looking pointedly at the new editor now, ‘that my friend has some money coming to him. Quite a lot of money.’

The man in the back was frowning. He’d clearly been through this before with Allder. ‘I told you we need information,’ he said. ‘Facts. Faces. Names. Colour. I can’t just blow fifty grand on bugger all.’ He paused, looking at Kingdom. ‘So why don’t we talk? Either here and now, or maybe later?’

Kingdom began to answer but Allder got in first.

‘Because we can’t, my friend. I’ve told you. Not now. Not ever.’

‘So what am I supposed to do? Invent it?’

Allder looked at him for a long time. Then he bent to the car window. ‘You’re a journalist,’ he said quietly. ‘If I were you I’d be keeping my eyes open.’

He stood up again, gazing out across the car park at the last of the mourners drifting back from the garden of remembrance. His hand found Kingdom and rested lightly on his shoulder, and for the first time Kingdom remembered Wren’s file, still lying on the Daimler’s back seat. He peered into the car, watching the smile spread across the newspaperman’s face. The file was already open on his lap and he was uncapping a fountain pen with his teeth.

The wheelchair began to move.

‘I thought we might take another look at those flowers,’ Allder was saying, ‘just you and me.’