When the car pulled up the bodyguard in the front of the car stayed in his seat, his hand a few inches from the hidden Uzi. The man who had ridden in the back with the Ambassador unlocked the door, climbed out, scanned the pavement where it ran down from Birdcage Walk towards the Horseguards Parade, and nodded. The Ambassador got out quickly, and had been shepherded through the narrow door in a matter of seconds. Both he and his bodyguard ignored the Special Branch man who had also stepped on to the pavement. The London detective assigned to the Israeli embassy was used to that, familiar with being treated as an unnecessary bystander, there to make up the numbers, but not to be consulted.
Through the working part of the week a liveried official would have been there to escort the Ambassador to the second-floor office where the Under Secretary who specialized in Middle East Affairs now waited. But at the weekend there was simply a man in a dark suit. The wide passages were darkened, electricity switched off to save money, leaving the portraits of the great British Foreign Secretaries that lined the walls mysterious and shadowy.
'Thank you for coming, your Excellency,' said the Under Secretary, as the door closed behind the Ambassador. The Israeli said nothing.
'The Minister would like to have been able to see you personally. It is regrettable, but he is out in the country, and cannot return to London in the time we felt was available.' Liar, thought the Ambassador. More likely up to his thighs in a trout stream somewhere in his beloved Yorkshire.
'On the basis of the information with which your own Security Service was able to provide us, and because of additional information that our own departments have obtained, the Minister has asked me to request of your Excellency that further consideration should be given to the visit to Britain of Professor Sokarev.'
The Ambassador said, 'You say "further information".
To what end?'
Spell it out in words of one syllable, thought the Under Secretary. God protect us, they're a gauche crowd.
'With a view, Excellency, to deciding whether or not the visit should continue as planned, in the face of what your service and ours regard as a serious threat.'
'You are asking me to recommend to Jerusalem that the visit be cancelled?'
'I am asking you nothing. I am merely suggesting, on the direction of my Minister, that you might wish to reconsider the value of the visit.'
'There is only one set of circumstances which would lead me to tell my Government that in my personal opinion Professor Sokarev should cancel his lecture on Tuesday night and by-pass Britain.'
The Under Secretary inclined his head, and the Ambassador went on. if I were to believe that the police forces and other agencies of Britain were incapable of providing the necessary protection for Professor Sokarev, then I would suggest to my Foreign Ministry that the visit should be cancelled.'
Cunning fox, the Under Secretary said to himself.
'There is no question of that. We will provide protection…'
'Then there is nothing further to discuss.' The Ambassador's voice was cold. 'When you report back to the Minister about our conversation I would be grateful if you could relay a sentiment of my Government. We are not prepared to be taken simply as a nuisance-child, a bother-some problem that will go away if the door is barred to it.
Professor Sokarev has been offered the hospitality of a learned and illustrious body in your capital. We intend to make sure that he honours the engagement. The rest, my dear fellow, is in your hands.'
The Under Secretary bridled. 'You must understand that I was passing on a request from my Minister.'
The Ambassador smiled, without friendship, puckered his eyes fractionally, and said, 'And I will pass on to my Minister that the British Government will be providing — what was the word you used? — yes, "adequate protection". Perhaps you should know, since it seems you have not been informed, that while we have been discussing the suitability of the visit the security attache at my embassy has been talking with the relevant people on your side on the very question of Professor Sokarev's safety. At times like this, Under Secretary, it is liaison that is needed.'
He turned on his heel and made his own way out of the room.
In the early afternoon McCoy took Famy from the house and to the car parked fifty yards up the road on the far side.
'I didn't bring it down to the station last night,' he said, it's nicked — stolen — and that's too public a place to leave it lying around. It's all right in a street like this, half the bloody motors here have separated from their log books.'
It was a two-door Ford Escort, painted green and unscratched, 'M' registration. 'I got it over in Wembley, that's on the far side of London, out in the suburbs, night before last. Goes okay, though it's a bit small.'
Famy looked at the car, disinterested, and waited for the passenger door to be opened for him. Soon they were heading past Islington Green and stopping at the lights, indicator clicking, ready to turn right down the Pentonville Road and then into the main university complex. And as they drove McCoy realized the extent to which he was involved. It had begun simply, and without complications; providing back-up, assistance. The shooting in France had changed that, and ensured that if he carried on with the enterprise it would be as an equal partner.
There's no bloody help from this bastard, he thought to himself. Talks in spasms, then goes silent, just gazes into bloody eternity, like no one else exists. Doesn't give a damn whether we come out of it or not. A different war, the hedgerow actions that he had perfected among the fields of South Armagh. Political assassination… something that his Active Service Unit had never contemplated.
A soldier or a policeman, or a local Proddy councillor, that was different. That was attrition.
This was a totally new concept to him; a killing on such a grand scale that the shock waves would fill the world headlines for a week. It was one thing to drop a Para, to blow a Woolworths, to take out a policeman, but this…
And he was being drawn into it, he recognized that, and thought even now that the point of retreat was already lost. He was experienced, had known the tension of guerrilla combat in the hills round Crossmaglen, had fired the cumbersome RPG 7 rocket launcher at the tin-fenced, screened and barricaded police station on the edge of his town, had given orders, had had men follow him. And yet this other man who had known none of this was directing him, controlling him — and had outstretched him in commitment.
Perhaps it was the hate. He'd heard of it, read about it, the simple hatred the Palestinian hard-men felt for the Israelis, and he knew he couldn't match it. Even in the cage at Long Kesh when he had paced beside the interior perimeter wire and watched the camouflaged uniformed soldiers in their watch-towers, traversing their machine-guns, and jeering down at the men below, even then he could not hate to the exclusion of all else. When these people blasted their hostages, threw their grenades without hesitation, without remorse, into cinemas, they put themselves beyond the reach of McCoy's understanding. His men could never do that. There had to be a purpose to killing. Every victim ought to know why he would die at McCoy's hand. But just for the sake of it, just for the gesture… that was not enough.
At the bottom of the Euston Road, in the last lap to the university, he asked, 'Why this man? Why Sokarev?'