The Ring of Death (29 page)

‘But the simple truth is that they'll be doing the dirty work for you – work you daren't have the army implicated in.'

‘Essentially, yes.'

‘And innocent people will die.'

‘It's a war we're fighting over there, Monika. And in a war, innocent people on
both sides
die all the time.'

‘I can see now why you were so keen to dispel any rumours that Adair was killed by the IRA,' Paniatowski said.

‘Can you?'

‘Yes. It would have been very bad for the morale of these men to think that the Republicans could get at one of their instructors so easily.'

‘Quite so.'

‘But what I
don't
see is why, once Adair had been killed, you didn't pull them out immediately.'

‘It's very simple,' Forsyth told her. ‘When their training period is over, we'll be putting these men back into a war zone, where not only they, but also their families, will be at risk. They have to be confident – in a situation like that – that they have our full and unqualified support.'

‘And do they?'

‘Of course not! If they do something particularly horrific – and they will – or end up in serious danger – and that will happen too – we'll say we never heard of them. Their value to us, you see, is based almost entirely on their deniability. But
they
mustn't know that.'

‘I still don't see . . .'

‘We have promised them that they will have the full force of the British government behind them. And how strong would that government look if, just because the police were investigating the murder of one of their instructors, we made them cut and run?'

‘So they're still here simply to prove they
can
still be here?'

‘Exactly. I suppose that, in some ways, Andy Adair's murderer did us a favour.'

‘A favour?'

‘Indeed – because it presented us with the opportunity to show these men just how determined we are to give them our full backing.'

‘Even though you're not.'

‘Even though we're not.'

‘So what happens next?' Paniatowski asked.

Forsyth opened his briefcase and took out three forms. ‘Now, you and your colleagues . . .' He paused. ‘I did mention that we'd also caught your colleagues, didn't I?'

‘You know you didn't.'

‘Well, we have. DS Cousins, isn't it? And, of course, DC Crane, my friend from
last
night's little adventure.'

‘Sometimes you sound just like a big kid,' Paniatowski said, with utter contempt.

Forsyth smiled. ‘You seem surprised at that. I'd have thought you would have realized, long before now, that the security service is the natural home of overgrown schoolboys. Who else would throw themselves with such relish into a game which, in the long run, we're bound to lose?' An expression of deep sadness crossed his face, and then was gone, leaving no trace. ‘But to return to my point,' he continued, ‘what happens next is that you and your colleagues sign the Official Secrets Act. And once you've done that, of course, you can leave.'

‘Just like that?'

‘Yes. At this delicate stage of the operation, the last thing I'd like to have on my hands is the unexplained disappearance of three police officers, and so I've decided to let you go.'

‘As long as we sign the Act?'

‘Exactly.'

‘Why does it matter if we sign it or not? An official secret is an official secret, and if we reveal what we've seen, we'd go to jail whether or not we'd put our names to a piece of paper.'

‘Indeed you would,' Forsyth agreed. ‘You would not be the first to suffer, of course – other heads would roll before yours . . .'

‘Yours, for example,' Paniatowski taunted.

‘Yes, mine would probably be the first, rapidly followed by those of some quite influential men in the Ministry of Defence,' Forsyth admitted. ‘But your turn would come. You'd be given a long sentence for breaching national security – but it's not really the
length
of your sentence you should worry about.'

‘Isn't it?'

‘Oh dear me, no. The security services have considerable influence in our prison system, and they'd make sure you had a very hard time while you were inside. You'd be raped, probably with some rather unpleasant kitchen implement. You'd be beaten on a daily basis. I honestly doubt you'd survive the experience.'

‘Why would your mates in the security services want
that
to happen?' Paniatowski wondered. ‘Is it because they're
all
sadistic bastards like you?'

‘Of course not! Overgrown schoolboys we may be, but we rarely have the luxury of doing things simply for our own pleasure, Monika,' Forsyth said. ‘You would be made to suffer as an example – and the
more
you suffered, the better the example would be. You would serve, if you like, as a deterrent to others who might be contemplating following in your footsteps.'

‘You still haven't answered the question I asked earlier,' Paniatowski said.

‘That was very remiss of me,' Forsyth said. ‘Remind me what that question was.'

As if he needed reminding! Paniatowski thought.

‘Since it's illegal to reveal official secrets under
any
circumstances, why do you
need
me to sign the Act?' she asked.

‘I suppose there are two main reasons,' Forsyth said, speaking in slow, measured terms, almost as if he were delivering an academic lecture. ‘The first is that this country unaccountably still believes in trial by jury – an archaic system in which those least able to reach a verdict are given the sole right to do so – and these juries feel happier convicting if the prisoner in the dock has signed the Act. It is almost, in their poor muddled terms, as if he or she had signed a confession.'

‘And the second?'

‘The person who has signed the Act almost invariably feels as if it has put him or her under a moral obligation. It isn't logical, of course, but I have seen it happen too often to deny that it's the truth.'

‘That's not it,' Paniatowski said firmly. ‘That isn't why
you
want
me
to sign.'

‘Then why
do
I want you to sign?'

‘As an act of submission – as proof that I'm prepared to bend my will to yours. I wouldn't be just signing away my right to speak – I'd be signing away part of myself.'

‘In one way, you're right,' Forsyth conceded. ‘That
is
part of the process. But you're wrong to see it – as you so obviously do – in personal terms. I have no desire to bend your will to mine – I merely wish to bend the will of a British subject to that of the British government.'

‘You're a bloody liar,' Paniatowski said. ‘You're a bloody liar and I
won't
sign.'

‘Then you'll never get your father's remains back,' Forsyth said. ‘In fact,' he continued, his voice hardening, ‘I'll see to it personally that they're flushed down the sewer.'

‘Did you hear what I said about your father's remains?' Forsyth asked.

He'd been a wonderful man, Paniatowski thought. Though he'd died when she was no more than a child, he had largely made her the woman she was. It was he who'd given her a fighting spirit, and without his example, she'd have gone under long ago.

‘Monika?' Forsyth said, with just an edge of irritation slowly creeping into his voice.

‘Do it!' she told him.

‘I beg your pardon?'

‘Flush his bones down the sewer. Go even further than that, if it'll make you happy. Feed his bones to the dogs. Pay some poor sod to spend the next twenty years daubing them with shit every day. I don't care!'

‘You
do
care, Monika,' Forsyth contradicted her.

‘You're right, I do care,' Paniatowski admitted, fighting back the tears. ‘It's important to me. But I'm not prepared to sell my soul for it.'

Forsyth sighed again. ‘I just knew, when that Irish thug told me they'd captured you, that you were going to be difficult,' he said. ‘And now, you see, by turning down my offer, you're forcing me to say something I'd hoped to avoid having to say at all.'

‘Let's hear it,' Paniatowski challenged.

‘If you sign the Official Secrets Act, I will instruct one of the Volunteers to go and collect your car from wherever it is you've hidden it. And once he has done that, we will drive back to Whitebridge together.'

‘And if I don't sign?'

‘Then I'll drive back to Whitebridge alone.'

‘And what will happen to us?'

‘I don't know.'

‘But you can guess.'

‘As can you.'

‘In other words,' Paniatowski said, ‘if we don't sign the act, you'll have us killed?'

‘No,' Forsyth replied emphatically. ‘If you don't sign, I'll do nothing to
prevent
you from being killed. The ultimate responsibility for your men rests with you and the decisions you chose to take, Monika. So ask yourself – do you really want to go to your own death knowing that you've caused their deaths, too?'

‘You win,' Paniatowski said.

‘Of course I do,' Forsyth agreed.

He reached into his briefcase again, and produced a thick folder. For several seconds he held it his hands, as if weighing not just the folder itself but also his own options.

‘I had almost decided not to give you this, Monika,' he said finally, ‘but it is sometimes necessary to allow even the vanquished to walk away with some small sense of victory, and this can be yours.'

‘What is it?' Paniatowski asked.

‘The information you asked me to collect on Sir William Langley,' Forsyth told her. ‘I think you might find it very interesting reading.'

TWENTY-FIVE

W
hitebridge Rovers FC had languished in the Football League's Third Division for over thirty years. Sometimes, when the season came to an end, they would be clinging to the middle of the division, like a thwarted mountaineer. Sometimes, they could be found hovering shakily just above the relegation zone at the bottom of the table. But never, in the memory of their younger fans, had they breathed the heady air at the top.

Last season had been different. Last season, the team had played like men inspired, become division champions, and gained automatic promotion to the Second Division.

The promotion would bring with it big changes. When the new season opened, the Rovers could look forward to higher attendance rates, and more appearances on television.

‘In other words,' said Thad Rogers, the chairman, who was a prosperous local businessman and had been running the club as a loss-making hobby for over a decade, ‘we'll finally see some money start to come in.'

But before the money could be earned, money needed to be spent, especially on the pitch. For though visiting Third Division teams had complained about it, they were well aware of their own place in the scheme of things, and had not – in all honesty – expected much better. The promotion had changed all that. Now the club had moved up the ladder – now they finally had their chance to play with the big boys – and it was clear to everyone that before Second Division players deigned to put their studded boots on it, the pitch would have to be radically improved.

It was in order to work towards this aim that Brian Dewhurst, the Rovers' head groundsman, arrived at the stadium at eight o'clock that Friday morning. He did not go straight onto the pitch, as he'd originally planned, because it occurred to him that since he'd recently been entrusted with the key to the directors' box, he might as well take advantage of the fact, and start his day with a small shot of the chairman's vintage brandy.

The small shot – as it happened – turned out to be not quite so small after all, because when you were drinking out of one of those big balloon glasses, Dewhurst explained to himself, you had to pour a fair bit into it before you could even
see
the brandy.

And since a drink like that couldn't be rushed – it would have been almost criminal to gulp it down – it was not until twenty-five past eight that Dewhurst forced himself to rise from the chairman's sofa and walk over to the picture window which looked out onto the pitch.