Turning Point (6 page)

‘Agent Terry has our full confidence.' Representative Horrington leapt into the breach. ‘Something awkward has come up…' He tailed off, seeing Tulsa emerge from the room something gripped tightly in one fist.

Scott had only ever seen a bug once before, but he knew what they were – and they weren't woodlice that had somehow managed to hibernate through the winter on the seventeenth floor.

‘Not a word, Mr Horrington, but I suggest you instruct the marines not to let anyone leave. Do you have a back– '

A door slammed. Sean Terry swivelled round sprinting for the kitchen. Scott caught a glimpse of startled faces and a tray, loaded with sandwiches, left unattended on the buffet table.

The sound of feet jumping their way down concrete steps reverberated throughout the fire escape stairs. It faded abruptly as the discordant jangling of an alarm took over – warning staff throughout the building of an emergency. Scott caught the heavy thumps and guessed Sean Terry was taking the stairs three at a time, Tulsa hot on his heels.

Scott eyed the roomful of people, their expressions both shocked and dismayed. Most had collapsed into a conveniently placed chair, waiting anxiously for news – although what was the point? Every word that had been spoken, every telephone conversation, identities of the speakers verified and noted, not a single sound would have gone unnoticed by a bug that remained on duty twenty-four hours a day. And for how long? That morning only? Longer? Two days, three days…more? Were these men and women even now wondering if they would become the target of an assassin's bullet on their way home that night?

The Secretary of State, her expression unchanged, stared impassively at the photograph of the current president; the diamonds on her fingers creating shafts of brilliance as she moved her wrist to check the time. But it was the change in Emma Arneson that really shocked Scott. The woman had turned as white as a sheet. He caught sight of her hands trembling before his father covered them with his own, turning her away from the room so no one else would witness her distress.

But why? What had she been saying? It had to have been something pretty catastrophic to produce a reaction like that.

A feeling of guilt swept over Scott, rumbling around like the hunger pains of a moment before. Fancy chatting up a terrorist. And she was so pretty too. How could anyone that pretty possibly belong to a terrorist organisation? Holy crap!
How could he have been so stupid!
He'd never live it down.

The kitchen doors swung open. Heads jerked round. Sean Terry, his expression grim, stood in the doorway. He didn't speak, still panting harshly from his manic pursuit of the girl. Instead, he drew his finger across his throat and shook his head.

She'd got away?
How could that be?
Sean Terry was fast, Scott knew that. The girl had obviously been faster or had an escape route already planned. The horrendous thought that someone so innocent-looking needed an escape route knocked Scott's breath out of him. He drew in a lungful of air, ashamed at what he might have let slip if Sean Terry hadn't arrived in the nick of time to stop him.

Nodding, Stewart Horrington picked up the phone. ‘Most embarrassing!' he muttered, pausing long enough to punch in a group of numbers.

Scott caught at a bubble of hysterical laughter in his throat. Coughing to disguise it, he swung back to the window, staring down at the streets of Geneva where normality reigned. It certainly didn't in this office.
Embarrassing!
The man had to be joking. He had a roomful of people on his hands, most of them scared silly, including him, and the only word he could come up with was embarrassing.
Devastating, disturbing, horrific, unbelievable
– any of them would have fitted the circumstances better.

‘I'm afraid, ladies and gentlemen,' the US Representative continued, ‘we're in for a long session. I suggest you make yourselves comfortable while we wait for the all-clear. Help yourselves to drinks and something to eat.' He spoke briefly into the phone, glancing back at the agent over the receiver. ‘How on earth could this happen? Here, of all places; the seat of civilisation. And why?'

For Scott, the need to laugh vanished as quickly as it had come. The
why
was easy especially after what Sean Terry had just said, but only if you believed in the global mastery of one man, Mr Smith, and could accept he had a mole in the newly refurbished American Embassy in London. It was too much of a coincidence otherwise – a listening device turning up the same day as his father addressed the UN. No way. Besides, he no longer believed in coincidences.

Stewart Horrington had assured them that the date had been kept secret, known only to him, his staff, and a colleague in London who had arranged the flights. His staff were totally trustworthy, hand-picked from families he had known since childhood, for generations solidly Democrat. And it was his car, with his personal driver, that had collected them from the airport and hotel. The Embassy in Geneva knew nothing of his dad's visit, purposely kept out of the loop. Neither did any of the other delegates; the appearance of his father unscheduled until early that morning when a confidential memo had been delivered by hand. It had to be London. Knowing when they were travelling, it would have been so easy to bug the suite. There could be no other explanation unless bugs were commonplace in the UN?

Scott swung round glancing briefly across the room. Emma Arneson looked better, less green, although the fingers gripping her glass were still rigid. And the people scattered around the room? The majority of them worked in the building on a daily basis and all of them were influential. These were the men and women that had striven to bring Styrus to the notice of the UN and were now being thanked with champagne, caviar, and smoked salmon sandwiches. The eager expressions they had worn on first encountering the Secretary of State had been wiped off, leaving their faces haunted, sombre or blank.

No, this was not an everyday occurrence.

But the waitress?
No, not her,
it couldn't be. Perhaps she ran because she was working illegally and didn't want to be picked up by the Swiss authorities and deported. Scott clutched at the idea.
That,
he could believe. But not that she was a terrorist, someone evil. He scowled angrily. The thought that, once again, someone might have betrayed his father to that elusive person who called himself Smith made him feel sick.

Behind him the American staff, out of a sense of loyalty, tried to maintain a cheerful front pushing waves of conversation at anyone capable of listening. The sudden and haphazard outbursts of noise reminded Scott of toadstools erupting from a grassy bank. Innocent-looking on the outside but containing toxins lethal to the unsuspecting – exactly like a word spoken out of turn.

Unashamed, he eavesdropped on a conversation nearby, hearing the words
snow
and
Christmas
repeated with monotonous regularity, as if they were imbued with magical properties and, if you said them often enough, everything would be all right. The speaker, a woman, spotting his interest, bridled with indignation and, turning her back, lapsed into silence.

The door to the suite banged open; eyes like startled rabbits caught in a car's headlights riveted on the uniformed figures blocking the doorway. Half-a-dozen men stood there, their appearance so formidable it was practically hostile. Wearing their caps perched at an angle and their hair shorn close to the scalp, a knife-like crease ran down the front of their grey uniform trousers, and the polish on their black boots was so bright the overhead light was reflected in it. Armed and with an identity tag pinned conspicuously to the breast of their uniform, they paused for another couple of seconds racking up the tension in the room before striding in. Four out of the six carried black rectangular boxes and a wand, rather like an electric toothbrush, and certainly no larger. The remaining two had a heavy leather belt strapped to their waist, with household tools, such as hammers and screwdrivers bulging out of it.

If Scott hadn't been one of the victims, he would have found the whole procedure curiously comical. Like at school, when guys joined the auxiliary training corps. The act of putting on a uniform seemed to change their behaviour and qualities emerged never before noticed: pride, leadership, discipline, and on the other side bullying and aggression. There was no doubt girls loved uniforms, fancying guys they wouldn't give a second glance to in ordinary gear. It was like that now. The officer had said nothing but he was obviously quite aware that his appearance could stop a room in its tracks. And, rudely, he'd not even bothered to acknowledge the importance of the guests, particularly the Italian Ambassador and the Secretary of State.

Gesturing with his hands, he directed the guests into a line in front of him, running his wand up and down the victim's clothing before waving them abruptly away. One of the waiters, ignoring the gesture to be silent, hurried forward.

‘
Ce n'est pas nous, monsieur
,' Scott caught the words and guessed it was French. The man sounded nervous and defensive. Not receiving a response, he tried again. ‘It not me,' he said painfully, his speech so severely accented it was almost unintelligible. ‘We many, many years here. No problem. Not us.' He swept an arm round the other two figures, a man and a woman, both middle-aged. ‘I promise.'

‘
Attends!
' The office in charge silenced him with a finger.

The head waiter said nothing further. He collapsed into a chair, his head nestling against the wall as if it was a pillow. Almost absentmindedly, he picked up a sandwich and nibbled at it, the majority of guests ignoring food in favour of alcohol, its properties well-known for deadening both guilt-ridden and despairing thoughts.

The office beckoned Scott forward. He flinched nervously. Accidentally talking to a terrorist wasn't a crime, but maybe she'd planted something on him – she'd certainly stood close enough, with her fingers brushing the sleeve of his jacket. He froze, holding his breath tightly as the electric wand swept over his clothes and sneakers. The machine remained silent and Scott sighed, an equally silent breath.

He stepped out of the line and moved to the window, his place taken by the Secretary of State, her turn to be prodded and poked like some species of cattle, the expression on her face glacial. It matched the weather outside. Even with double-glazing Scott could sense a drop in temperature. Snowflakes tumbled from the sky, the roofs and pavement already carpeted with a blanket of white, only the heavy traffic keeping roads free.

The sight of a line of vehicles exiting the underground car park like a gigantic centipede did little to alleviate the dark cloud hovering above Scott's brow. The emergency obviously had its upside, with some offices suspending work and giving their staff an unexpected bonus or an afternoon off. The absurdity of the situation made it worse somehow. That something so delicate and fragile, no bigger than a caterpillar's cocoon (and almost identical in colour and shape), had the power to create fear in people – even in the modern day.

‘Come on, Scott, lighten up, you look like you've just lost the winning lottery ticket.'

Scott spotted the grin on Tulsa's face before being hastily wiped off. At least someone was happy. He glowered at the agent. ‘Stop gloating.'

Tulsa seemed surprised. ‘I'm not. I'm trying to cheer you up. Even with this mess, you can find something to smile about. For starters,' he pointed out of the window towards the snow-swept scene. ‘I bet every single one of those people rushing to exit the building is desperately trying to remember conversations they've had since the place was swept last Monday. Some of them won't sleep tonight – remembering. In a way, you can blame the Swiss,' Tulsa chatted on, his voice quite light-hearted as if discussing nothing more serious than a day at the fair. ‘They pride themselves so much on their diligence and efficiency, I'd like to bet their sweep of the building is performed at the same time each week.'

Scott caught sight of his father making his way across the room. The security officers appeared to have already swept the inner offices and cloakrooms. Now the men were on their knees in the reception room, carefully lifting the carpet around the edges and rolling it back to expose its brown underlay. Circling around them, Bill manoeuvred a path to his son's side.

‘How long till we can get out of here, Dad?'

‘Soon, I hope. I have asked Jane Oliver to check on flights – we may have to divert to London. We can catch a train from there.' ‘We're leaving? But we planned to spend the day in Montreux tomorrow.'

Scott had been looking forward to his visit to the fabled lakeside resort ever since he'd known of their meeting with the UN in Geneva. On the edge of the lake was a statue of Freddy Mercury – one of the all-time greats. He kept a photograph of the pop star pinned to the wall in his bedroom. A legend like Elvis Presley, both had died far too young. Now, only their music lived on. Even Hilary agreed he was a great songwriter.

‘I'm afraid that won't be happening, Scott. Another time, perhaps.'

‘But it's all arranged,' he protested. ‘We've never had a holiday outside England before and you want to cut it short…' Scott heard the stutter of indignation in his voice, his tone readying itself for an argument. ‘That's so unfair, Dad. Besides, if they already know you're in Geneva, a day's not going to make much difference. We could see Montreux and go back tomorrow night, that's if we really need to go. But…'

The young officer in charge of the sweep headed towards Stewart Horrington. The Representative got to his feet, his eyes fixed on the man's clenched fist, and passed an unsteady hand across his mouth and chin.

‘Bad news?' he managed.

‘Five, sir.'

The American groaned silently.

The officer, his young face amiable and unconcerned, opened his fingers; the five miniscule objects sitting on his palm like dried peas that had rolled under a refrigerator and been forgotten about. He gave a brief smile, nodding to where the two men with work belts were carefully inching the edges of the carpet back into place, fixing brass carpet plates into position with small screws.

‘Fortunately, nothing deep cover, sir,' he said, his English impeccable. ‘Randomly distributed – it would take five minutes.' He pointed to the lamp on the desk. ‘Standard placement. You lean against something, attach a bug and walk away.'

‘So most likely it was the girl?' The American rubbed his chin, his voice hopeful.

‘Could be anyone, sir. That's the point.' The officer stared round the room. Scott, catching his eye, immediately felt guilty again. It was gross, this guilt by association. Without being aware he was doing it, he straightened up, his hands by his sides, almost standing to attention.