Who’s here? Carlyle thought, increasingly irritated at being kept in the dark. A few moments later, the doorbell rang. Gesturing towards the hall, Donaldson smiled at their host.
‘Mr Cahill has arrived.’
‘Ah, yes.’ Hilda Blair nodded as she headed for the door. ‘I’ll go and let him in.’
Before Carlyle had a chance to ask who Mr Cahill was, the front door was opened and Mrs Blair had returned with a tall, middle-aged man in tow. Easily north of six feet, he was dressed in jeans, a pair of scuffed Dr Martens and a battered black leather jacket. Tired and haggard, he looked like a man who hadn’t seen much sleep recently.
‘Jamie,’ Cahill grinned. ‘How’s it going?’
‘Fine,’ Donaldson said genially. ‘Busy morning?’
‘Damn right.’ Ignoring Carlyle, Cahill turned to Mrs Blair. ‘Your boy Gerry has been up to his old tricks again.’
The old woman looked at each of her guests in turn. ‘All that I can say, Inspector,’ she said finally, ‘is that I have always found Gerald to be a very polite and personable young man. And a very satisfactory tenant.’
A crooked grin passed across Cahill’s face. ‘So why did he try to blow up Maggie Thatcher, then?’
‘I don’t know anything about that,’ the landlady huffed.
Carlyle glanced again at Donaldson, but the sergeant’s expression was still giving nothing away.
‘No one’s saying you do, Hilda,’ Cahill said calmly. ‘But it looks like he’s really dropped himself in it, this time.’
This time? Finishing his tea, Carlyle took another bite of his biscuit before placing his cup and saucer carefully on the carpet.
‘If Special Branch is so sure about that,’ the woman replied, a defiant smirk on her lined face, ‘why haven’t you picked him up yet? I heard on the radio this morning that there had been more than thirty arrests, so far, all over the country.’
‘We will,’ Cahill said wearily. ‘I don’t suppose you know where he is?’
‘I’m not his keeper,’ she snapped.
‘When did you last see him?’ Donaldson asked.
The woman made a show of thinking about it for a moment. ‘It would be about a week ago. I thought he was staying with his girlfriend.’
Carlyle fumbled for his notebook. ‘Who’s his girlfriend?’
Shooting Donaldson a quizzical look, Cahill held up a hand. ‘Don’t worry about that, son,’ he said, smiling at Carlyle. ‘We’ll come back to it later. Time is of the essence at the moment.’ He turned his attention back to their host. ‘Has anyone else been asking about Gerry?’
Hilda had a ponder then shook her head.
‘And presumably he didn’t say anything about what he was up to?’
‘I don’t pry,’ she told Cahill smartly. ‘I’m not one of your informers.’
Donaldson snickered. Carlyle stared at his feet, careful not to kick over his cup.
‘Ah well,’ Cahill said philosophically, ‘I suppose we’d better go upstairs and take a look at his room.’
‘Do you have a warrant?’ Hilda demanded.
‘Come on now. Why are you giving me such a hard time?’
‘It was a perfectly reasonable question.’ She drew herself up.
‘And this is a matter of national security,’ Cahill retorted. ‘I could have had a dozen armed officers kick the door in and ransack the place. Instead, it’s just a cup of tea and a quiet chat.’
‘But no warrant,’ the woman said obstinately.
‘Hilda,’ Cahill gestured towards Carlyle, ‘do you really want this young constable to take you down to the station, so that you can sit in the cells for the rest of the day? Maybe even longer?’
Glaring at each of them in turn, the landlady headed back towards the door. ‘Fine. Come with me, but please, no mess.’
‘You know me, Hilda,’ Cahill said, pushing a thin strand of sandy hair from his face. ‘Always super tidy.’
‘We’ll see,’ the landlady harrumphed, disappearing into the hall. Carlyle jumped to his feet, only to feel Donaldson’s hand on his shoulder, pushing him back down.
‘You wait here,’ the sergeant instructed, ‘while we go upstairs.’
‘But what should I be doing?’ Carlyle asked, irked at being left to feel like a spare part.
‘If a grubby Irish gobshite walks through the front door,’ Cahill sniggered, gesturing towards the street, ‘make sure you nick the bastard!’
As he listened to the two officers bundle up the stairs, Carlyle reached forward to retrieve the remains of his biscuit. As he did so, he caught sight of something under the sofa. Pitching forward onto his knees, he stuck out an arm and grabbed hold of a badly printed A5 flyer advertising something called ‘Rodeo Night’ at a pub called the McDermott Arms. Carlyle thought about it for a moment, but the name of the pub didn’t ring any bells; he was fairly sure that it wasn’t local. Under a drawing of a cowboy on a bucking bronco was the promise of lager for 75p a pint and spirits at doubles for a pound. Flipping it over, he saw that someone had scrawled the words Becky 7pm in blue biro. From upstairs came the sound of doors banging, followed by muffled voices and laughter. Standing up, Carlyle carefully folded the flyer into quarters and shoved it into his trouser pocket. Just as he sat back down, Mrs Blair reappeared.
‘I don’t know what they think they’ll find up there,’ she tutted. ‘Gerald is always so clean and tidy. He’s one of the nicest guests I’ve ever had.’
Carlyle smiled but said nothing. He idly wondered how much Mrs Blair charged for a week’s rent. It looked like she would soon be in the market for a new lodger. Surely even he could afford a room on Nelson Avenue?
‘I expect they’ll just create a lot of mess,’ she continued, staring unhappily towards the ceiling, ‘and then I’ll have to clear it all up.’
‘Sorry.’
‘Never mind.’ Stepping in front of Carlyle, she reached down and deftly scooped up his cup and saucer. ‘Would you like another cup of tea?’
6
Outside, the horns got louder as the traffic backed up along the Camden Road. Inside, the McDermott Arms was empty apart from a couple of long-haired youths in the back, drinking pints of lager and playing snooker. Sitting at a table near the door, perched upright on his stool, Martin Palmer sipped daintily at his gin and tonic while fishing the occasional crisp out of the packet of salt ’n’ vinegar. The young spook wasn’t a big imbiber — and certainly not at this early hour — but it had been a trying day and he needed one, or maybe even two, stiff drinks to help him try and think straight.
Palmer thought back to this morning’s meeting with his boss and shuddered. Commander Sorensen had made it clear that this was a career-defining moment. He had been given until the end of the day to find Gerry Durkan or face the consequences. ‘The consequences’ meant being sent back to analyst duties, alongside the chinless wonders Ryder, Flyte and Marchmain. Nibbling unhappily on a crisp, Palmer seethed at the complete unfairness of it all. After a stellar start to his time in the service, it looked like his career was going into reverse. Demotion beckoned — he could see himself rejoining the ranks of the graduate drones who did nothing all day but sit and read boring letters intercepted from Irish navvies, trying to glean hidden messages about upcoming terror attacks. He took another sip of his drink. It was so totally unfair! Hadn’t he proved himself in the field? In the grim fields of Yorkshire, no less, during the mineworkers strike? There, right in the middle of what was effectively an armed insurrection against the elected government of the day, he had been directly responsible for taking out a leading activist, as well as dealing with various troublesome Communist agitators.
Yorkshire. What a dump! On the plus side, it had allowed him to escape from his mother for a while, and develop a few peccadilloes of his own at the same time. The recollection of some of his more outrageous behaviour sent a gentle shiver of excitement through his loins.