Quiller's Run

In a moment, 'I see.'

He didn't.

'I've been scared plenty of times. Life on the brink's like that – you know what I'm talking about; you've been there too. And I've been pretty certain I've had it, too, often enough. But this is the first time I've felt -' I couldn't find the right word, so I threw in something close, though it was appallingly melodramatic, 'the first time I've felt doomed.'

Pepperidge said nothing. The word hung around like a whiff of cheap scent. I began wishing to Christ he'd break the silence, say anything he liked to cover the ticking of the tin clock.

Finally I stopped pacing and stood looking down at him; he was sitting in one of the upright chairs with his feet together and the tape-recorder on his knees and his head tilted as he watched me, and I was suddenly looking at a new dimension in the man, and it shook me. It was as if the Pepperidge of the Brass Lamp in London had been an act.

'Doomed,' he said, because he knew what I'd seen and he wanted to cover it, not give it any attention.

I took a step away, a step back, touched by anger. 'I suppose you're playing straight with me, are you?'

'Yes,' at once and with emphasis. 'You and your mission are my total concern.'

He wasn't lying. I would have known.

'I've no choice,' I said. 'I've got to believe you.'

'Oh, you've got a choice, old boy. You could just tell me to fuck off, couldn't you?'

Deadly serious.

'I suppose I could.'

'But you're not going to, and of course you're perfectly right.' Tilted his head straight. 'Doomed, you were saying.'

I let out the tension on a breath. 'Yes, I mean, we've faced situations, you and I, in whatever mission, and we've had to deal with them and get them behind us and go on, since we're still alive. We've had periods of relief, in between, when we can breathe again.' I leaned my back against the wall, feeling its coolness in the warm room. 'It's different, Pepperidge, this time. For the last week I've begun to feel I've walked into a shut-ended operation that's going to be the death of me whatever I do.'

In a moment he said, 'I've never felt that, but I know what you mean.'

'Do you?'

Even his understanding would be something to grab and hold on to – but even that thought was a warning of how far gone I was. The room grew even smaller suddenly, the walls pressing in. It could just be this bloody place, all these poor bastards cutting their wrists and swallowing Valium, could just be the atmosphere here, the vibes.

It wasn't.

'I understand very well,' he said, 'what you're feeling. It's the effect Mariko Shoda has on people, particularly people she doesn't like. I've talked to a couple of them. They told me the same thing as you, in their different idiom – she scares the shit out of them.'

Cho was suddenly in my mind, the way he'd reacted when I'd spoken her name, Shoda's.

'So it's not just my… nerves,' I said.

'No.' He shoved the recorder into his side pocket and got up, going from wall to wall. 'I'll really have to get you a bigger room, you know. You need space. But we're doing some good work here, and I think you know that. Let me tell you' -stopping and standing in front of me, very direct – 'that I've been getting a very distinct picture of what this mission really is. I didn't see it at first, nor did you. This is a very different sort of job from the ones we've been used to doing – getting someone across, digging out papers or tapes or a hot product, cutting down an assassin, the usual things. This has turned into a duel. You agree?'

'On a psychological level.'

His eyes narrowed. 'You could even have said psychic. Because that's what she's like, and I know that now. And so, quite clearly, do you. Which is exactly why I asked you why you felt compelled to go into that temple and confront her, though I must say I didn't know you were going to take half the night to come out with it.' He looked at his watch. 'So how do you feel about the future?'

I took a minute to think.

'Bit keyed up.'

He was doing an extraordinarily good job as a local director, considering he'd spent most of his career life as a ferret in the field. He was critically concerned with what was going on in my mind, in my nerves, and this could be because he'd got some briefing set up for me that would push me right to the brink, but I didn't think so. He'd come out here because he'd sensed that if he'd stayed in Cheltenham I would have lost direction and run the whole of the mission into the ground, and now that he'd got here he was testing the ropes for slack and getting down to business, conning a safe house for me and tapping the High Commission for resources and debriefing me within hours of his landing in Singapore.

But now he wanted to know what condition the ferret was in, and how far I was prepared to go. And I didn't know. I hadn't had time to think. But I'd have to, and soon, because Shoda was putting a lot of pressure on and we'd have to react, push it back, before it became overwhelming.

'Keyed up,' Pepperidge nodded. 'That's understandable. But, I mean, how do you feel about Mariko Shoda herself, as an adversary?'

'Do I think she's too powerful for me to break?'

'Sort of.'

'It'll take a bit of doing, but I suppose anything can be done.' Didn't sound too sanguine, no. 'All right, then, yes, I know I can bring her down.'

'Given,' he said, 'a secure base and a director and immediate access to support, the whole works. I want you to think about that. You're not alone any more; you're not hunted, as long as you stay inside these walls. The thing is'

he checked his watch again – 'I think you're absolutely right: you can bring the Shoda organisation down, given enough support and briefing, and I'll get that for you.'

I could feel the nerves steadying.

'When?'

'At any minute, because it'll have to come from the tapes from the Shoda bug. We've got a window on her now and all we've got to do is watch. The critical factor is the Slingshot, as you know, because the minute she gets her hands on it then God help us all. Now, I'm meeting the Thai ambassador in half an hour, so why don't you phone Sayako before I leave here?'

He gave me the number and stuck a suction pad onto the side of the phone and plugged the lead into his recorder and I dialled.

Ringing tone.

'She said she wanted to talk to you,' Pepperidge murmured, 'about something personal, remember? She might have meant Colonel Cho, and that could be interesting.'

I nodded.

Ringing tone.

'If you can, persuade her to let you meet her. I'd like to know what other bugs she might have been putting around.'

Nodded.

Ringing.

'She's not there.'

'Then try again later, and put it on tape for me.' He dropped the recorder onto the night table. 'Anything interesting, give me a signal.'

I went into the main hall with him and he got me a laissez-passer from the night staff desk, so that I wouldn't have to keep to my quarters after curfew.

'Questions?'

'Yes.'

He knew very well I'd got a question and he'd been waiting for me to come out with it and I hadn't done that until now because it was so very important and I think I was scared of the implications.

He watched me steadily, his yellow eyes narrowed.

'If all further briefing,' I told him, 'depends on the Shoda bug and what it gives us, I might never be able to move out of this place. If the bug stops transmitting – if it's found and destroyed – we'll be working on a very thin chance.'

'True.'

He waited.

'And there's also Kishnar.'

Tilted his head. 'True indeed.'

This time I waited but nothing happened, and it was then that I knew what he was doing, and it was going to change the whole of the mission from this point onwards.