Doyle lit up a cigarette and began pacing the office slowly.
'Neville still thinks we've got his daughter,' he said. 'As long as he believes that we're OK. If he finds out she's missing we're fucked.'
There was a knock on the office door.
'Come in,' Calloway called and a uniformed officer entered the room.
He crossed to the desk and handed something to the DI.
It was an envelope.
'This was handed into reception just now, sir,' the officer said. 'Some kid brought it in, early teens. He said a bloke stopped him on the street and promised him a tenner if he delivered it here.'
'Where is the kid now?'
'We've got him downstairs,' the officer replied. 'I thought it best to hold him until you'd seen the note.'
Calloway opened it, unfolded the paper inside and smoothed it out on his desk.
The other men gathered round.
I WILL CALL AT FIVE. I WANT TO SPEAK TO MY DAUGHTER THEN. I NEED TO KNOW SHE IS ALL RIGHT. IF I DO NOT TALK TO HER I WILL DETONATE ANOTHER BOMB. NEVILLE
Doyle looked at his watch.
'Unless we find that kid in the next hour,' he murmured, 'you'd better make sure you've got a good supply of fucking body bags.'
4.03 P.M.
Neville spooned sugar into his cappuccino, watching as it sank slowly through the froth.
As he stirred, he glanced out of the cafe window.
The Harley Davidson was parked directly outside the building, wedged between two cars.
A couple of dispatch riders were leaning against their bikes, sipping from Styrofoam cups and talking, both of them dressed from head to foot in leathers.
Neville took a sip of his coffee, decided it wasn't sweet enough and added more sugar.
Like so many of the other cafes in Dean Street, this one was barely large enough to accommodate four tables, a counter and some stools. Visitors came and went with great rapidity, taking drinks and sandwiches with them or occasionally sitting if there was an empty seat.
Apart from himself, there were four American tourists inside the cafe, seated around one table.
At another, two young women talked and shared a cigarette, much to the consternation of the man at the table next to them. Every time one of them exhaled he wrinkled his nose and glared disdainfully at them.
At the other table a man a little younger than himself was consulting one of the daily papers while his wife fed their baby using a plastic spoon.
Neville gazed intently at the woman.
Perhaps a little too intently.
It was as if she felt his gaze upon her and finally looked in his direction.
He continued to stare, watching her over the rim of his cup as he drank.
She tried to ignore him, concentrating on feeding the baby.
There was a roar outside as one of the dispatch riders revved his engine and pulled away, a sound which seemed to distract both Neville and the woman.
The child would take no more food and began to cry softly until it was lifted on to its mother's shoulder for winding.
Neville watched again, his fascination with the woman and her child restored.
He couldn't remember much about Lisa's childhood.
Not surprising really, he'd hardly been there.
He only ever saw her on leave visits. Months apart.
She seemed so different to him every time he saw her.
All those years lost.
He'd been in Londonderry when she was born.
The first he'd known of her arrival was a phone call from Julie that night when he'd returned to barracks after a patrol. It had been another two weeks after that before he'd finally seen her.
And when he had?
Neville had wondered if he was supposed to cry, supposed to feel some massive upswell of emotion at the sight of his first born.
He remembered how carefully he'd held her, as if she were formed from fine porcelain instead of flesh and bone. The tenderness required had been alien to him.
He'd loved her. He still did, more than anything in the world, but in the beginning her fragility had frightened him. He couldn't cope.
Tenderness was not his way. It never had been.
He'd been on road-block duty near the border on her first birthday.
Riding a convoy of trucks through Strabane on her second.
Whenever he came home he brought her presents. He came loaded with toys and sweets like some ill-timed Santa Claus. But all the time he was with Lisa, he wanted to be back in Northern Ireland.
She was the most important part of his life, the army was his life.
Had been.
There was nothing for him any more. Not there.
No army. No life.
No point?
He drained what was left in his cup and got to his feet, glancing at the young woman and her baby for the final time before heading out on to the pavement where he slipped on his helmet and climbed aboard the Harley.
He flicked on the ignition and the bike roared into life.
Neville swung left into Old Compton Street, and he turned right into Moor Street. He slowed down slightly as he emerged into Cambridge Circus.
The phone box was to his left. Neville smiled.
4.14 P.M.
Kenneth Baxter stood with the phone pressed to his ear.
Despite the fact that the line had gone dead he still kept the receiver there, as if the dormant device was suddenly going to spring into life once again.
Then finally, slowly, he dropped it back on to the cradle.
As he did so he checked his watch.
The clock on the mantelpiece showed a different hour.
The same hour it always showed.
It had belonged to his mother. One of the few things he'd claimed when she died. The clock hadn't worked since. Baxter wasn't even sure if it had ever worked. It was what was affectionately known in families as an heirloom. In other words it was a piece of old junk which successive generations had tried to sell, found out was worthless and clung to because I hey had nowhere else to hide it away.
So it was with the clock.
It looked strangely incongruous on the mantelpiece. A relic of a bygone age. At odds with the more modern furniture and decoration in the rest of the place.
Antique clocks didn't usually sit well with Ikea and MFI furniture.
Baxter made his way to the bathroom, spun the cold tap and splashed his face with water, gazing at his reflection as he straightened up.
He looked dark beneath the eyes, as if he were in need of some sleep.
He'd napped for an hour or so earlier in the day, not long after returning from New Scotland Yard, and it had revived him somewhat. The cold water against his flesh seemed to complete the job.
Through the open window he heard a train.
His home in Newham was close to West Ham station, and on the still air, he could hear the rumble of another tube as it passed through.
The sound competed with some noise coming from the recreation ground close by.
Kids probably, Baxter thought. Skiving.
He checked his watch again.
No. School was closed for the day. They were entitled to be there.
He remembered where he should be and pulled on a denim shirt, slipping it over his T-shirt, the tails flapping as he walked.
Baxter dropped a packet of cigarettes into one top pocket and his front door key into the other as he headed out.
The voice he'd heard on the other end of the…
'Not bad,' said PC Mark Hagan, studying the photo of Julie Neville approvingly.
It was a monochrome snap. Taken on holiday, he guessed.
Julie was smiling into the camera, seated on a blanket spread out on the ground, slender legs drawn up beneath her.
Beside him in the passenger seat his companion, younger by a year, PC Rob Wells glanced across at the photo then back at the two which he himself held.