Chapter 33: Back To Earth

The Air Kushtia return flight wasn't much better than the flight out. I emerged from the Arrivals Channel in Heathrow Terminal 3 to see Harry waiting. "Hi," I said.

He grunted, "I was your wet nurse, now I'm your babysitter. Clegg thought you might need a lift."

"Well thanks. I'm sure I'm fine," I responded.

Harry grabbed one of my bags. "Not with your track record. Anyway you need to be in the Whitechapel office." He pointed to a car parked outside the terminal. I got in the back, Harry followed. Tricia was driving.

"Hi," she said, "welcome back. Good trip?" She wasn't too effusive, neither of us liked to parade our relationship while we were at work. It wasn't like it was a secret or anything; we just preferred to get on with the day job when we were working.

"Thanks," I said. "Yeah sure. It's a very different place."

Tricia pulled out of the airport and down onto the M4, heading into London. "How's things?" I asked Harry.

He grunted in response. "If you're worried about your writer we've got her back."

"Great," I said, "Did she get far?"

"No, not too far but we had a hell of a job getting her back. She found a way to fuck up the chip in her collar. Seb's still trying to work out how she did it. It meant we couldn't use tracers. We had to use dogs for fuck's sake! We haven't done that for ages. You remember that farm we went to on your first pick up? We keep a few there but they were definitely off-form. First work they'd done for a while and too many dog biscuits, if you ask me."

I looked down at my own waist line. The past few days hadn't helped. The Kushtian's hospitality meant I'd put on a few pounds and the exercise with Emma and Ekrana hadn't had enough of a compensating effect.

"Still in some ways it was fun. It's good to go back to first principles occasionally. I haven't had to do any field tracking for a while. I guess she'd thought she'd be OK without the collar chip, she didn't go far. We were pretty certain she hadn't got clear, we'd have heard through some of Freddie's contacts in the police if she'd got far and that would got very complicated. We thought she was probably holed up in the woods at the back of the Prep Centre; picked up some tracks going through one of the gates — girlie shoes are a bit distinctive. We thought she'd be waiting for the hue and cry to die down. So we put on a show, moved a couple of squads through the woodland, crashing about and making a noise with the dogs. Then we left things quiet for a day."

The car pulled off the M4. Unusually the traffic was moving and we were soon heading on through Hammersmith and down the Euston Road. "And then she walked out?"

"Not quite," Harry went on, "but very nearly. We left a few heat sensors around the woods and put in a couple of guys with night vision goggles. They picked her up moving around near the northern edge. Anyway to cut a long story short, they flushed her out with the dogs, we had a team by the edge of wood and she took a tranquilliser dart in the butt as she tried to track out towards the road along a hedge. Went down as easy as you like. Well, apart from the yell of "No!" as she realised she'd been hit. I had to discourage the guys from bringing her back swinging by her wrists and ankles from a pole. They get a bit gung ho with things like that. She's back in storage now and Rick's team are having a very detailed discussion with her about just what has gone wrong with the prep programme."

"How's Freddie been about it?"

"Surprisingly relaxed. But then it's the first runner we've had in ages. I think maybe he feels that you need one now and then to get people back on their toes. He handed out a few ear blisterings though. People won't forget for a while. Plus the security teams have been having regular drills again."

"They'll not be happy with that."

"Well, maybe not but it's the only way. Anyhow, I hear you've been busy too."

I saw Tricia's head give a twitch of interest. "Just a pick up for the Trade Minister," I said, not keen to discuss Cora before I'd had a chance to show Freddie what I'd found in her case. "And I didn't have to do too much."

"Just as well given your previous performances," said Harry with a smirk. "If you're going to be doing this sort of thing you'll need some training."

"I wasn't planning on it become part of the job description," I said and looked out to see that we had arrived. Tricia stopped the car outside the office in Whitechapel. Harry and I got out. I gave Tricia a smile. She waved back and drove off.

We pushed passed a group of people on the pavement. One of their number was holding forth waving at the surrounding buildings. "And just here," he said, "were plotted some of the most violent crimes ever recorded against women."

I was looking over my shoulder, puzzled as we made our way into the building. "Jack the Ripper Tour," said Harry.

"I was worried there for a minute," I said, "I thought someone had done too good a job promoting our activities."

Five minutes later I was in Clegg's office. Ellie was with him. "You're going to find things a bit dull after Kushtia, I suspect," said Clegg.

"Well everyone was very hospitable," I responded with a smile.

"We got your writer back."

"So I hear. I suppose Seb's OK?"

"Oh yes. I think he got over his encounter with Rachel quicker than his encounter with me. They'll all have learned a few things from that."

"I guess so."

"And you were able to help out the Trade Minister, I understand. He called me. He seemed very happy."

"I thought it was the right thing to do."

Ellie got to her feet, stubbed her cigarette in Clegg's ashtray and blew a stream of smoke from her cigarette in the general direction of the window. "I'll let you boys get on with talking shop." She said. "I've got some stuff to do."

"OK," said Freddie.

"Can I drop a license agreement off with you later?" I asked. "It's something the Kushtian's gave me. It'll give us preferred supplier status out there."

Ellie gave me a pained look. "I can just imagine what Kushtian legal documents are like. I'll have a look at it but heaven knows what we'll have to do to make sure we're properly covered."

"Do what you can, Ellie," Freddie chipped in. "This could be good for us. If we're not having to invest I don't think we'll want to beat them up to hard on terms and conditions. Let me know if there's anything really troublesome."

"Sure," said Ellie. "I'll mug up on their legal system. Larry, if you can drop the license by when you've finished here."

"Sure," I said. Ellie left us. I turned back to Clegg. "You said the Minister was happy."

"Well yes. It caused a few ripples in the Diplomatic Corps, though. They tend to be a bit sensitive about that sort of thing you know."

"Sorry. I hadn't realised they were off limits. She might have worked out what was going on, you know. I mean she translated the whole thing with the Minister's tongue hanging out and practically dribbling on her."

"Yes, the Trade Minister mentioned that she wasn't the sharpest pencil in the box."

"There was one other thing."

"Uh huh?"

"You hadn't told me this was going to be fucking dangerous." I dumped Cora's pouch on the table between us. Clegg opened it and peered at the contents.

"Of course it's fucking dangerous," he said calmly. "To the best of my reckoning you've been involved in the abduction of twenty two women — twenty three including your friend in Kushtia - since joining us. You're doing things that will mean some of our competitors feel a bit more squeezed than they would like to. In this business they don't just write a letter to the local chamber of trade if they feel the competition is getting a bit keen. I'd take it as a complement if I were you."