The Lucifer Network (11 page)

Sam nodded. He could imagine her as a child, constantly seeking her father's approval. ‘So Harry's death must have . . .'

‘. . . upset her a lot more than she's saying, yes. To be honest with you, she should have gone to the funeral. But she said she'd only go if I did, and there was no chance of that. Somebody had to stay and look after Liam. And anyway, I had no feeling for the man any more.'

‘No, I don't suppose you did,' Sam murmured.

‘You know, Julie really has had more than her fair share of life's rough face, Simon. She got in with a bad lot at college. Drinking and clubs and all that. And then there was drugs. That's when she started going with Brendan. He was a disc jockey. Good-looking feller, but he had no thought for anybody but himself. By the time the baby came and she dropped out of college she was pretty near bottom. She'd not been in touch with home for months. I didn't even know she was pregnant. She just turned up one day, grey as a ghost, with this three-week-old scrap in her arms, and the two of them suffering withdrawal symptoms.'

‘Withdrawal symptoms?' Sam raised his eyebrows.

‘Julie was addicted to heroin.'

‘Really? I'd never have guessed.'

‘She's clean now, thank God. It took her a while. And Harry played his part, I'll give him that. When he heard the state she was in with a newborn baby, he was back here on the first plane. Blamed himself for never being there when she needed him.'

‘So he stayed for a while?'

‘Oh no. Said his business didn't allow it. But he phoned a lot. And he fixed a clinic for her – to get her off the drugs. Eventually he persuaded her back to college to complete her degree.'

‘While you looked after Liam.'

‘While I looked after Liam,' she confirmed. ‘Had to give up my own job to do it.' She looked embarrassed suddenly. ‘Och, you poor man. You came here to read some crazy letter and you get a life history rammed down your throat.'

He was about to tell her it didn't matter when he heard tyres on the gravel at the front.

‘That'll be them now. They went in my Clio,' she explained. ‘Julie doesn't have a car of her own.'

A few moments later Sam heard a key in the lock. He stood up. The boy stumbled in, rubbing his eyes.

‘Fell asleep,' Julie mouthed to her mother as she gathered her grandson into her arms.

‘What'll it be, Liam?' the older woman asked. ‘Fish fingers, I suppose.'

The sleepy boy dumped his head on her shoulder, then stuck a thumb in his mouth.

Julie turned to Sam. She still had her glasses on from the driving, but took them off and held them in her hand. There were tight lines of tension round her eyes. ‘I'm sorry if you've been waiting,' she told him.

‘That's all right.' She looked sun-baked and wholesome and he could forgive her anything.

‘I'll get you the letter.'

Sam stared longingly at her lean limbs as she climbed the open staircase to the floor above. She wore blue shorts and a white sleeveless vest that clung to her breasts. Her shoulders were red from the sun. She reappeared a few seconds later with an envelope.

‘If you want to read it in peace, there's a bench in the garden,' she told him, sliding the patio door fully open. She was eyeing him with reserve, as if trying to form a judgement of him.

‘You said it arrived this morning?' Sam asked as they crossed the lawn to where it sloped to the water.

‘That's right. It shook me when I picked it off the mat and saw the writing.'

‘Why would it have come here instead of to Acton?'

‘He chopped and changed. Anything he wanted to be sure I got he sent to Woodbridge, for some reason. He knew I was here at the weekends.'

The seat was under a willow tree. She sat close beside him, as if not trusting him to be alone with the
letter. Solemnly she handed the envelope to him and he extracted the contents.

Harry Jackman's handwriting had a slight backward slope. ‘There's no date,' Sam commented, inhaling the orange-blossom smell of her sun cream with the intensity of a solvent sniffer. She sat close enough for him to feel the warmth of her body.

‘No. There's nothing to say when it was written.' She hugged her arms to her chest and clamped a hand over her mouth, staring downriver to where the racing dinghies were being hauled from the water.

Sam began to read.

‘
If
you
ever
get
this
letter
it'll
be
because
I'm
dead,
my
dearest.
Don't
grieve
for
me
long.
We
all
got
to
go
some
time.
'

He glanced at Julie, wondering how it must have felt for her to read those words. In the next sentence Jackman explained he was leaving the letter with a trusted friend to be mailed if anything happened to him. Sam checked the envelope. The postmark was Kitwe.

‘Any idea who this friend was?' he asked, turning to her again.

‘Not a clue.' She pushed her hair back, revealing a perfectly shaped ear with a small mole behind the lobe. Her slender neck was white where the hair had covered it, but reddened by the sun where it plunged below the T-shirt collar. He was in love again.

He regained his concentration and read on.

‘
I've
done
lots
in
my
life
that
I'm
none
too
proud
of,
my
sweet.
Forgive
me.
But
if
I
hadn't
done
it
someone
else
would
have.
If
African
tribes
are
going
to
kill,
they're
going
to
kill.
The
press
always
blame
the
“merchants
of
death
”
for
selling
them
guns,
but
it's
nonsense.
If
the
Afs
didn't
have
guns
it'd
be
pangas.
Look
at
Rwanda.
All
those
split
heads.
'

Julie had her hand clamped over her mouth again, as if by doing so she could hold everything together. She
felt perilously close to disintegrating. Pressure was being put on her from the grave which she was finding hard to handle. She knew the letter by heart. Knew the words of this one, and of the other which she'd received that morning, a more personal letter hidden for now under the floor mat in the boot of her mother's car.

Conscious of her tension, but unaware of the reasons for it, Sam read on.

‘But there is one trade I did that troubles me. It happened a year ago. One of the other fellows involved has been murdered. I'm scared I may be next. I wasn't a big player, just a shipper for the cargo, but the deal was a bad one. I'm telling you my sweet, because someone needs to know about it. I intend to tell the British intelligence people, but only if they agree to leave me in peace when I come back to England. If you get this letter, you'd best show it to the police. They'll pass it on to the appropriate place.

Did you ever hear of red mercury? It was supposed to be a chemical the Russians invented for making miniature nuclear bombs. Some people say it doesn't exist, but I think it does.'

His pulse quickening, Sam turned the page over.

‘It
started
in
the
summer
of
1997
when
I
was
contacted
by a Russian
trader
who
operated
out
of
Vienna.
He
wanted
me
to
import
something
into
Zambia
under
diplomatic
seals. I had
good
contacts
with
Zambian
officials,
so I could
arrange
for
there
to
be
no
police
or
customs.
The
Russian
told
me
to
find a secure
warehouse
in
Kitwe
to
store
the
cargo
for a few
days
before
it
was
collected
by a man I knew
called
Van
Damm,
who
traded
for a big
chemicals
company
in
Jo'burg. I asked
him
what
the
cargo
was,
explaining
that I wouldn't
touch
Class A drugs.
Because
of
you,
my
darling.
What
you
went
through.'

Sam glanced at her smooth skin, imagining her arms once scarred by needles. Julie guessed where he'd reached in the letter. She met his look.

‘It's history,' she said flatly.

‘I know,' Sam answered. ‘Your mother told me.'

Julie hissed. ‘She's got a mouth like a runaway train, that woman . . .'

‘The Russian told me it was red mercury from a Siberian laboratory. People had been trying to get hold of the stuff for years, so I was pretty excited by the deal. And there was big money in it. The cargo was to be delivered to a Zambian embassy compound in Moscow in late July, then boxed up with the diplomatic seals and flown first to Vienna and on to Kitwe. I had everything arranged, the aircraft booked, the Zambians paid off, and I went to Vienna to finalise the plans and meet the Russian trader, Vladimir Kovalenko . . .'

Sam sat bolt upright. Kovalenko's name was uncomfortably familiar to him. The man was a major player.

‘. . . an impressive fellow, whose connections in Moscow went right to the very top.'

He knew that to be true. It was Kremlin links that had allowed Kovalenko's bent business empire to flourish. Sam read on, his attention now riveted.

‘When I got to Vienna, Vladimir told me there'd been a change of plan. The red mercury wasn't going to South Africa after all but to somewhere else. The shipping arrangements had to be extended. Once in Kitwe the boxes were to be put onto another plane, still under diplomatic seals, and flown to Italy. I told him it made things very complicated for me. Van Damm might think I'd stolen the cargo, but Kovalenko said I had no choice. You see he knew about you, my love. Where you lived. Everything. Said that if I didn't co-operate I would never see you alive again.'

‘Christ,' Sam breathed, suddenly understanding Julie's nervousness. But it puzzled him.
How
could Kovalenko know about her?

‘Dad was a bigmouth at times,' she whispered, answering his unasked question. ‘He used to tell people about
this daughter of his he was so
proud
of.' She said it self-effacingly.

‘This Kovalenko – you met him?'

‘No.' She was emphatic.

‘He's never been in contact with you?'

Julie shook her head. ‘There's one more page,' she prompted, as if wanting to change the subject.

Sam read on.

‘I fixed it. Five containers, each weighing about ten kilos, were flown from Russia to Zambia and then to Rome, all under diplomatic cover.'

Fifty kilos. Enough red mercury for a whole arsenal of nuclear bombs – if the stuff had ever existed.

‘He never talked to you in person about any of this?' Sam checked.

‘Never.'

The letter was nearing the end.

‘Last week I heard that Van Damm was dead . . .'

Last week . . . Killed three months ago, Denise Corby had said. Now they had a date for the letter.

‘My
guess
is
the
Israelis
were
expecting
to
get
some
of
the
red
mercury
from
the
South
Africans
and
thought
that
Van
Damm
had
double-crossed
them.
Probably
suspected
he'd
slipped
the
cargo
to
the
Islamics.
That's
what
worries
me,
Julie.
If
those
ragheads
get
hold
of
nuclear
weapons,
they'll
cause
mayhem.
And
also,
with
Van
Damm
gone, I could
be
next
for
an
Israeli
bullet.
If
you
get
this
letter
it'll
be
because
I'm
already
dead.
And
if
I'm
gone
it'll
either
be
because
of
the
red
mercury
or
because
my
negotiations
with
the
spooks
backfired.'