"No," Alex said. "But if we had enough reason to suspect he was involved in a major crime, in which hundreds of people were killed as a result of something he did or had done, we could get a judge to issue a search or an arrest warrant. We've had our President testify when he didn't want to. Even impeached."
"After weeks of consultation with his lawyers," Cooper said. "And the impeachment was a wrist slap — he wasn't tried and found guilty, was he?"
"The effort was made," Alex said. "No man is above the law."
"Men are not above the law here, either, Alex, but this is a small country, and despite our attempts to bring it into the twenty-first century, still very caste-conscious. Lord Goswell is at the acme of power here. He went to school with the senior members of the House of Lords. He knows the blue blood wealthy, he knows the most powerful barristers and solicitors, and he knows the judges, the high police officials. Every couple of weeks he has tea with the head of the Conservative government. He can get more done with a wave of his hand than Parliament can do in a week. He plays bridge with the king. Getting the wire- and wavetaps were small miracles and were managed only because Goswell didn't know about them. This is not a man upon whose door you knock and demand anything. If you want to go and beard this lion in his den, you need to enter into negotiations with a delicate touch, your hat in hand. It's one thing to call up and tell his head of security you are going to drop round for a chat; it is quite another to demand the same of one of the richest and most powerful men in the country."
Nobody had anything to say about that for a moment.
"Bullshit," Julio said.
Toni suppressed her smile. She had to agree with that one.
"That may be, Sergeant, but I am here to say that His Majesty's government will not be approaching Lord Goswell, save through his attorneys, and cautiously, at that."
"Even if we suspect he's involved in the computer assaults?" Toni said.
Cooper turned to face Toni. "Even if we knew for sure he was responsible and could prove it, Ms. Fiorella. Which we do not. We have no real evidence other than some very thin circumstantial materiaclass="underline" Bascomb-Coombs, who might or might not be involved himself, works for Lord Goswell and is there visiting him. That doesn't prove much of anything, now does it?"
Toni knew that Cooper was right. But she also knew in her gut that Bascomb-Coombs was tied into this, and Peel and Ruzhyo were somehow connected to it. But what could they do if the local authorities wouldn't let them even talk to the parties?
Alex said, "We can't barge into his lordship's house without an engraved invitation. All right. Can we short-stop Peel?"
"I beg your pardon?"
"Can you have your field ops pull Peel over and keep him from getting back to the safety of Goswell's estate?"
Cooper stared at him. "Why would we want to do that?"
Alex said, "Okay, follow my logic here. Let's suppose that Bascomb-Coombs is responsible for the computer disruptions."
"All right, for the moment let's assume that."
"If he is, he has to be doing it with help. According to Jay Gridley, this isn't something you can do cheaply, so somebody substantial has to be backing him."
"Yes. So?"
"Occam's razor. He's working for Goswell. He's at Goswell's house. How many people can fund a multimillion-dollar project and keep it secret? Wouldn't that have to be somebody with a lot of clout? Like somebody who owns lock, stock, and barrel a high-end computer company? That gives us Goswell. And wouldn't Goswell's chief of personal security have to have some idea who Bascomb-Coombs was? Any op worth his pay-check would surely run background checks on people who cozied up to his boss. If it was me watching over a rich man's health, I'd want to know everything about everybody who walked in the door. I'd make it my business to know what visitors had for breakfast, where they ate it, and how big a tip they left."
"You're saying that Bascomb-Coombs is the mad hacker, that Goswell knows about it, and that Peel also knows. Your logical chain is weak, even assuming the first link in it is as solid as steel."
"Stands to reason if they are all sitting around having tea together, doesn't it?"
Cooper gave him a small smile. "Come now, Alex, people who have tea together don't share all their secrets, do they?"
Alex flushed. John Howard turned and suddenly found a fascinating spot on the empty wall to stare at. Cooper's smile grew bigger and warmer. These actions didn't prove anything, but taken together, on a sudden, deeply intuitional level, an icicle of solid nitrogen formed and stabbed Toni in the heart:
My God. Had Alex slept with this bitch?
How? When?
God in heaven — why?
Alex cleared his throat and said, "Look, we know Peel is connected to Ruzhyo and the death of a suspected ice man."
"The fellow in the bookstore was, according to the coroner, a suicide."
"After Ruzhyo or Peel shot him! Peel knows something about all this. You know I'm right. Pull him in and let's sweat him before more people die and millions of lives are disrupted."
There was a long pause. Toni stared at Cooper with the new suspicion still piercing her to her soul. All of the rest of this was nothing. It didn't matter about Peel or Goswell or Ruzhyo. None of that was important.
Had Alex betrayed her? Surely not. He couldn't have. Could he?
She felt sick.
Cooper said, "All right. I'll have to get DG Hamilton to sign off on it, but I suspect we can do that much in the interests of national security."
Chapter 37
Ruzhyo took a couple of deep breaths and blew them out, trying to relax. He had been growing more tight as he drove, gripping the wheel harder, hunching forward, and that wouldn't do, to be tense when he needed to be loose. A tight man could not move properly. Even knowing that, it always happened. You had to work to overcome it, despite all the years and bodies.
Ahead of him and one lane over, the gray Neon with the two men in it who had been following Peel since London cruised fifty meters behind the major's car, using traffic as cover. So intent on tailing Peel had they been, they had not noticed Ruzhyo.
As soon as he had spotted them, Ruzhyo had made the call and had spoken but one word: "Company." That had been enough to alert Peel.
He'd replied. "Got it. I'll call back later."
They had passed Gatwick Airport a few miles back, still heading south on the big motorway as if going to the Sussex estate. The mobile phone on the car seat next to him rang. Ruzhyo picked it up. "Go ahead."
"Have they made you?"
"No."
"Good. We're getting off at the next exit, about two miles ahead, heading east. Down that road three miles, there is a large oak tree at an intersection with a narrow road to the right. Two miles down that road, on the left is a big sheering barn. We'll have a chat with our company there. Why don't you go on ahead and get set up?"
"Yes."
Ruzhyo thumbed the connection off. He accelerated and pulled smoothly ahead of the surveillance car, passed Peel, and was half a mile ahead of them when he turned off the highway at the next exit. The shadowers paid him no attention.
The oak tree was where it was supposed to be — Ruzhyo measured the distance with his odometer — and the barn, in front of a field of grazing sheep, sat alone and quiet in the middle of a long stretch of nowhere. A perfect place to have a chat you didn't want anyone to overhear.