Narrow Ground

Chapter 1-1

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Gallagher could smell his clothes. This would usually be a bad sign, but he was playing a role. He was dressed as a rough sleeper: his trousers were dirty, his jacket torn and stiff with grime and sweat. He carried a small rucksack that looked like its best days had been spent being dragged through a hedge. A rough woollen hat was pulled down tight and he had several days of beard-growth itching on his face. His gloves were disgusting, but beneath them were a blue latex pair protecting against DNA traces and fingerprints.

Bannerman, the operation’s commander, had tasked an engineer. The power had been turned off in the small courtyard that housed a number of office buildings. It had taken Gallagher less time than he had expected to gain entry to the non-descript building situated beyond an unlit alleyway piled with rubbish ready for the morning collection. The approach had been easy due to the lack of CCTV coverage. He"d disconnected the phone line connecting the alarm to the security company, and the power outage had done the rest.

On the other side of the front door, he switched on a red-filtered torch. An eerie glow was cast by an aquarium to his left. The reception area was furnished with a collection of battered leather sofas and scratched coffee tables strewn with glossy, but old, magazines. To his front were the stairs, which he began to climb slowly, stopping at every level to listen. On the third floor, he found the door he was looking for. He took a tension tool and pick from a pouch in his jacket and opened the cylinder lock.

Inside, he looked around at the desks and noticeboards in the shabby room in the middle of a tired central London building, attempting to imagine working in such a place, day in, day out. Not a chance.

Crouching in front of the electronic safe, he removed a drill from his pack and destroyed the locking mechanism. He gathered all the documents, bundles of currency, three passports and an envelope containing half a dozen data cards. If this had been a film, it would have been the moment when the room was briefly lit with flashes of blue while the siren of a police car screamed past on the road below. Instead, there was only the quiet hum of late-night traffic and the occasional shouts of partygoers heading for the night bus.

Usually, on jobs like this, Gallagher would have checked that everything was as he"d found it using a digital camera to compare the room he"d entered with the room he was leaving. However, as the safe was now broken, he picked up a metal waste bin, tossed in some papers from the nearest desk and set a fire. He kept it low and under control until there was enough ash, and then doused it with water from the cooler in the corner. Now the owners wouldn"t know what had been taken and what had been destroyed. The motive for the break-in would be unclear.

Gallagher took a can of red spray paint from the bag and repacked the drill. He sprayed the desks, the chairs and the walls. He remembered a "tag," a graffiti signature, daubed on a wall nearby and attempted a replica near the door. If an observant policeman was led to the home of a teenage vandal, then all the better. If the matter was reported to the police. He doubted it would be.

Gallagher emptied all the unlocked drawers on to the floor, sprayed the contents and then the drawers themselves, inside and out. As he left the office he sprayed the door with dripping red paint, followed by the handles on both sides, placed the can in his bag and made his way down the stairs and out of the building.

Four streets away, a van was waiting. He gently banged the side of the vehicle in the agreed manner and the back door opened. Inside was Rob Alberton, one of Bannerman"s team.

"Evening, Owen."

"Morning, Rob."

"All OK?"

"No worries."

Alberton climbed into the front of the van and drove around to the drop-off point a mile away. He hadn"t been told what the target was – nor had the engineer. He didn"t ask: he wouldn"t have been answered. His career didn"t allow for indiscretion, especially on a job involving Gallagher. All taskings were on a "need to know" basis, but when Bannerman hired Gallagher it seemed that no one needed to know anything other than how to accomplish his or her own part of the mission.

Gallagher changed into the clean clothes that he"d passed to the team two days before and picked up his phone, watch and wallet. His rough-sleeper gear and other kit would be boxed and returned by a courier.

Having made its circuit of the area, the van stopped. Gallagher secured his watch to his wrist. Alberton nodded. His passenger stepped out of the van without another word spoken.

Back on the pavement, Gallagher looked at his watch again and walked slowly to the junction of the main road. He could head home or he could seek out a drink. Left would take him towards the sensible option and bed. He turned right. It began to rain.

The private members" club, Cowper"s, was situated in a side street on the periphery of Soho near St Giles. Gallagher inserted a plastic key card into an electronic panel over the lock and pushed open the door. The night porter, CJ, briefly looked up from his book to give a lazy salute. Gallagher was a well-known member of long standing, introduced to the club years before by his uncle, Edwin, now deceased. CJ was fond of Gallagher. Uncle Edwin had secured the man his job a couple of decades previously. CJ was old fashioned and utterly loyal. Gallagher had also done the quiet watchman some good turns, including collecting evidence against a g**g of young wannabe-gangsters that were making the lives of everyone on the man"s housing estate a misery. The nonchalant greeting and lack of scrutiny were reserved for only the most respected of those passing by the gatekeeper.

Having taken his drink from the shambolic bar, festooned as it was with memorabilia, photographs and assorted theatrical tat, Gallagher eased himself behind a small corner table. With a view of the door and his back to the wall, he began to relax.

He took the first sip and knew that it wouldn"t be his last drink. It never was. He savoured the taste and felt his mind begin to slow even before any chemical reaction could take place. His thoughts stopped dancing to their own beat and began to settle as he grew inwardly still.

Ideally, he should enjoy this relaxed state with a couple of glasses and then head home. However, the calm feeling would soon give way to a frenetic need and he"d end up drinking like a pirate. He saw the next few hours clearly laid out before him. He saw them because they would be no different to so many he"d lived before. He"d deal with his demons in the morning, as he always had. They would poke and accuse, tell him truths and project memories behind his eyes that he didn"t want to see. But until then he would hold them in check. Until then he would seek a kind of peace in the short-lived joys of a chemical addiction, holding back the truth of himself in the fragmented haze of what he considered to be a good time.

The club consisted of four floors in a tall narrow building that had settled itself into its street long before the real estate in the area became sought after and fashionable. There were two bars – one of which served snacks occasionally, but never consistently; several tired sitting rooms, and a ramshackle library containing mismatched desks and some randomly upholstered furniture. The top floor was no longer used, but had previously been the owner"s accommodation. It wasn"t a club for the posing rich or those fixated by networking at every opportunity. It was the home of the bon vivant on a budget, the serious drinker with no time for frippery or the company of those exhibiting status anxiety.

bon vivant

Gallagher scanned the assembled members for any unknown faces, saw none, and reached into his pocket for his phone. There were two missed calls and three text messages: all from Eve, a barmaid at his regular haunt, Le Lion Rouge. He wouldn"t be replying until lunchtime the next day at the earliest.

A fourth text message was from Sandy Bannerman, an old friend from Gallagher"s army days and the man who"d paid him to break into an untidy import/export office in the early hours of the morning. Gallagher was Bannerman"s "off-the-books" operative in times of need, a freelancer who could, and would, carry out work the MI5 watcher teams were unable to cover or couldn"t consider. Only six months before, such a tasking had drawn Gallagher into a nightmarish web of conspiracy and betrayal.

The image of a young man"s face and smashed body rose up in Gallagher"s mind. The corpse didn"t smile. He felt a chill run through him as memories clouded his consciousness. He wouldn"t be staying for just the one. Gallagher knew that sometimes the drink gripped him, holding him tight in the steady embrace of a long, if occasionally destructive, relationship. It wasn"t a problem. Self-medication on his own terms was perfectly rational: blocking out the images, the intrusive thoughts, quieting the ghosts – all necessary to his survival and sanity.

He took a sip of his drink and looked around the room again. A man in a crumpled linen suit stared blindly into the middle distance from his place at the bar. At the other end, nearer the door, a woman in a vintage dress and feather boa giggled and touched the arm of one of three older men who were courting her attention. He"d seen her before. She was a member but only appeared sporadically – usually when it was raining. Perhaps she wandered further afield on dry nights. Gallagher noted the predatory looks masked by gentlemanly attention and a readiness to pass the barman bank notes at regular intervals. Almost as soon as a round of drinks was served the next note was produced, maintaining the momentum, holding the woman in place.

All three men had clearly played the game for years and were united in their love of themselves, competition, and the thrill of the chase. Gallagher hoped she"d catch the sidelong looks darting between the sharks, that she"d sense the coldness behind the wide grins and shining eyes. However, as he watched, he discerned her lonely vulnerability and something else. She wasn"t a victim: she was playing them and wouldn"t be leaving with anyone that she didn"t want to be with.

A conversation on the other side of the room began to intrude on the wider festivities, puncturing the hum of drunken chatter, discordant and harsh against the music wrapping itself between the drinkers. Unappreciative glances from others in the room led to backs being slapped. Shoulders were soon being punched good-humouredly in a display of friendly machismo. More drinks were called for and the room"s decorum was restored to the satisfaction of its denizens.

This was why Edwin had brought him here all those years before. This was why Gallagher still came when he was in need of a particular form of sanctuary. There was rarely any hassle, everyone knew everyone else – and no one really knew anyone at all.

* * *

Flic Anderson had made the call. It would mark the beginning or the end but the only way was forward now. She"d been running for six months. She was tired of hiding, tired of moving back and forth across Europe, tired of waiting for a bullet in the back. She was still on the defensive, waiting to switch to attack. She stared at herself in the mirror and brushed a strand of her dyed-black hair behind her ear. The face that looked back at her was more pinched than it ever had been. The eyes were faintly haunted and the smile was thin across bloodless lips.