The Hornbeam Tree Read online

  ‘Not yet, but they’re sure to know I’m involved by now, so I’m expecting something any day. Meanwhile, I’ve got an ex-SIS guy who’s a good friend asking around, seeing what he can find out. He’ll get back to us in the next few days.’ As he slowed up at a set of traffic lights he looked across at the driver who pulled alongside. It was a woman, alone and oozing the kind of brazen appeal that immediately made him think of Andraya. He turned quickly away, not wanting any reminders of the transient lust that had screwed up his life, then swung the car round hard to the left as the lights made the abrupt change from red to green. ‘So what’s the next move?’ he asked Tom, relieved to see the woman taking the right-hand fork, almost as though it were symbolic of a parting with his own weakness.

  ‘First, I want you to take a look at what I have,’ Tom answered. ‘There’s no mistaking what it is, but the maps are of an area that includes a nuclear power plant, which is fundamentally why I’m convinced there’s more to it, because no way is anyone from our side going to gain anything from blowing up a nuclear site in the middle of Britain.’

  Finding no fault with that assumption, while still managing to hope it was right, Elliot said, ‘So tell me about the source, Joshua Shine. We’re assuming he’s broken ranks to give you classified information?’

  ‘That’s definitely how it looks, but we’ve got to remember he’s one of them, and in my experience, nothing’s ever that straightforward where spooks are concerned.’

  ‘But you’re certain he is CIA?’

  ‘He didn’t deny it, and everything backs it up, from information he’s given me in the past, to the way he lives his life, right down to his recent disappearance. What we need to know is whether he’s taken himself into hiding, or if they’re holding him somewhere. My guess is the second, given the fact he went back to Washington. However, we should also consider the possibility that he hasn’t broken ranks at all, but is part of some elaborate conspiracy to leak information for purposes we’re yet to discover.’

  ‘Making us CIA puppets if we go with it?’

  ‘It’s possible. The intelligence services have been dumped on from a great height this past year, so they could be after some revenge, and I’d say exposing an outfit like P2OG would do it.’

  Finally reaching the autostrada Elliot accelerated hard, heading towards the medieval town of Pietrasanta, where a trusted Italian colleague kept a secret apartment for love trysts and other clandestine needs. ‘So why not just give you proof of its existence, and ask you to protect your source?’ he said.

  ‘Proof of existence won’t have the same impact as details of an actual mission,’ Tom pointed out. ‘What we need now is to understand that mission, and connect it to the right body, which has to be the P2OG, or why point us in that direction. Any luck tracking down the original 21 Project yet?’

  ‘No, everyone’s working on it, but Max is giving priority to this new committee that’s recently been formed, mainly because he’s received an anonymous, uncontactable dot-gov email.’

  Tom was immediately interested. ‘Saying what?’ he demanded.

  ‘It gives a list of four names – Daniel Allbringer and Ronald Platt?’

  ‘Allbringer’s with the Defense Intelligence Board, and Platt’s with the NSC.’

  ‘Michael Dalby, Director of Operations with MI6, which isn’t a name in the public domain, so it won’t be easy to get through to him. Laurie’s going to start with the chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee, Sir Christopher Malton, if she can get him to take her calls, which he’s ignored so far today.’

  ‘Anything else?’ Tom prompted.

  ‘The only other detail was “21 Project – 97 version” which we already know we need,’ and speeding up to overtake a slow-moving truck, he waited until they were back in the right lane before saying, ‘Laurie had an interesting piece of advice from the FBI Legal Attaché in London earlier. When she called to say she’d heard they were looking for you in Pakistan, and had they had any luck tracing you yet, she was told she’d do well to disassociate herself from the matter unless she wanted to join the rest of us on a fast track to the end of a great career.’

  Tom’s head drew back in surprise. ‘Subtle,’ he commented, though his expression was turning dark as he gave more thought to the warning. ‘I was kind of expecting something like this,’ he said. ‘With everything they took from my apartment, terrorist training manuals, books on explosives, fake Pakistani passports, jihad tapes, you name it, it won’t be hard to spin it so’s I end up as the one involved with terrorists, and there are people in Washington who’d like nothing more than to be rid of me. I’m not controllable, and the US Establishment is very prone to eliminating elements it can’t control, particularly this current regime.’

  Elliot shot him a glance.

  Tom raised his eyebrows and grinned. ‘OK, eliminate might be putting it a bit strong,’ he conceded, ‘but they play dirty, these guys, you know that as well as I do.’

  Elliot wasn’t disagreeing, but as Tom yawned and yawned again he said, ‘Let’s drop it for now, start afresh in the morning, when we can run every theory to every possible conclusion, and take a look at the backgrounds of all the major players that Katie and Michelle are faxing over to the apartment.’

  Feeling only too relieved to let the subject slide for a while, Tom drew a hand over his tired face and turned to stare through his own reflection, out into the night. It wasn’t long before his mind was full of Michelle, and picturing her the last time he’d seen her, looking more beautiful than he could bear in only the gaudy jewels. He couldn’t even begin to put into words how much he longed to hold her right now. It was a need that was so pressing it was almost impossible to contain, though he knew it often grew stronger with tiredness, and maybe having reduced the six-thousand-mile gap between them to a mere eight hundred was making it seem more profound.

  It was after midnight by the time the ancient wall of Pietrasanta came into view. By then they’d made a stop for dinner and had returned to discussing the story, though were ready to break off again to decipher the directions their temporary landlord had faxed to Elliot’s XDA. Luckily, they turned out to be reasonably easy to follow, and the key, as arranged, was found magnetized to the bottom of a fire hydrant on the second landing of a smart, mid-terrace town house set well back from the main piazza. The only payment required was a bottle of good wine when they left and a generous tip for the maid.

  Being familiar with their host’s famously flamboyant tastes, it came as a pleasant surprise to discover that their home for the next few days had a much more minimalist interior than they’d expected. There were a few intriguing abstracts on the walls, a vast cream-coloured sofa strewn with bronze pillows and throws, and a long oak-veneer dining table that crossed both sash windows and would double nicely as a desk for them both. The bedroom, with its garishly ornate four-poster bed, lavish silk drapes and faux-fur spreads was much more in keeping with their expectations, and created a few moments of amusement as each insisted the other make themself at home.

  In the end it was Tom who won the more highly prized sofa, though he couldn’t escape one of the fur spreads to cover him. He wondered why it made him think of Michelle, and decided it was because almost everything did if he allowed it, and being this exhausted he wanted nothing more than to absorb himself in memories of her as he sank into oblivion.

  ‘I’ll leave this with you so you can look it over in the night, if you wake up,’ Elliot said, coming out of the bedroom with the fifteen-page fax Katie and Michelle had sent across. ‘There’s a note at the end you might want to look at now though.’

  When he received no response, he put the fax down on the floor next to Tom so he’d see it when he woke up, and returned to the bedroom, feeling pretty tired himself. Since Nick was in New York, and therefore not with Laurie, he felt hopeful that tonight he might actually be able to sleep.

  Chapter Thirteen

  IT WAS TUESDAY afternoon. Over the weekend autum
n had finally made its bow, turning the skies over Wiltshire belligerent and gloomy, while buffeting the countryside with fierce bursts of rain and random hits of wind as though to remind everyone of just how temperamental this season could be. It was cold too, and definitely not the kind of day to go walking. However, Katie seemed to have it fixed in her head that she wanted to get out of the car, so Michelle obligingly pulled into a layby that curved in a half-moon across the front of a small, lonely-looking copse and turned off the engine.

  ‘Where are we?’ she asked, gazing through the smeary windscreen for a clue as to why they’d stopped, but all she could see were trees that seemed about to be smothered by sky.

  Despite the paleness of her cheeks and creeping weariness in her bones Katie was smiling. ‘We’re in my secret place,’ she answered with a playful lilt in her voice. ‘Come on, I want to introduce you to my friend.’

  Intrigued, though concerned, because they’d just left the hospital where Katie had been given more chemo to compress her swollen tumour, Michelle got out of the car and followed her along a narrow muddy path into the wood.

  ‘Don’t you think it’s beautiful here?’ Katie said, gazing around, and barely noticing the fat blobs of rain that plopped down from the leaves on to her face.

  Seeing the light in her eyes Michelle felt more curious than ever, though she had to admit that the stillness of the air, and a strange feeling of watchfulness in the trees, were somehow entrancing.

  The smell of damp wood and earth filled the copse as they trudged on along the path, pulling back brambles to pass, and ducking under low-hanging branches. Birds were singing and somewhere, a long way overhead, a plane passed by. Michelle looked at Katie’s slight frame in front of her, and hoped that it would soon fill out, for since taking the megace again her appetite had returned, and even now she was carrying a packet of biscuits that she was crumbling to share with the wildlife.

  ‘There,’ Katie declared, coming to a stop in a tiny clearing.

  Puzzled, Michelle looked around, wondering what exactly she was supposed to be looking for.

  ‘That tree, right there,’ Katie told her, using both hands to present the giant, greying trunk that soared upwards into a golden tangle of leaves and branches. ‘It’s mine.’

  Michelle followed her eyes, surprised and quite taken by the notion that Katie was laying claim to a tree that looked like a beech, though actually might not be.

  ‘Isn’t it magnificent?’ Katie said. ‘It’s a hornbeam, and I want you to promise me that when I go, you’ll make it yours. I’m serious,’ she insisted, when Michelle turned to look at her. ‘It doesn’t cost very much, only two pounds fifty each month and you’ll be helping to save our countryside. I think it’s a worthy cause, don’t you?’

  Unable to give any other reply, Michelle simply said, ‘Of course.’

  Katie smiled and winked. ‘Never imagined myself as a tree-hugger,’ she confessed, ‘but that old fellow there … Come on,’ she said, taking Michelle’s hand to lead her closer. ‘Come and touch it and tell me if you feel anything, because I know I did.’

  Obediently Michelle traipsed through the undergrowth to the tree, and put her hands to the brittle grey bark. Then, copying Katie, she closed her eyes. For a long time she felt only the girth of the trunk, and the smear of damp on her cheek. Then she became aware of a distant stirring sensation very deep inside her, followed by a soft rush of emotion that moved into her heart and swelled gently in her chest. Immediately her eyes opened.

  Katie was smiling, though her eyes remained closed as she inhaled the musky scent of the wood. ‘The day the doctor gave me the bad news,’ she said, ‘I came here, and when I saw this old hornbeam I just knew it was special.’ She breathed deeply again, absorbing the heady power of the tree as though it were able to transpose its magical healing directly into her skin. She looked up, her slightly jaundiced eyes moving amongst the jagged, pointed leaves and tiny catkins of the female flowers. ‘It was green and proud and in full bloom the last time I came,’ she said softly. ‘Now the leaves are starting to yellow.’

  Unable to escape the symbolism Michelle put her arms around the tree again, as though to pull in the strength she needed to get through the next few minutes without breaking down.

  ‘When you feel something like this it’s hard not to believe there’s a God, isn’t it?’ Katie murmured.

  ‘Have you told Molly about this?’ Michelle finally managed to ask.

  ‘No, not yet. I wanted to show you first, because it’s something I knew you’d understand, and probably feel too, being the exceptionally sensitive soul that you are. I don’t think everyone would feel it.’

  Smiling, Michelle drew her into an embrace. ‘I love you Katie Rowe,’ she said, using the name she’d been born with.

  ‘I love you too,’ Katie responded, ‘even though you’ve just crushed my last chocolate biscuit.’

  Laughing, and swallowing the lump in her throat, Michelle said, ‘Come on, we need to get you home.’

  Katie took a last, lingering look at the hornbeam, then linking Michelle’s arm she said, ‘You see, I feel all charged up and able to cope again now. I thought I might, if I came here.’

  Knowing she was probably referring as much to the looming scene with Molly as to her own physical challenge, Michelle hugged her arm in tighter, and said, ‘I’m glad it’s helped, but I still don’t think you should confront Molly today. You’re just not up to it.’

  Katie sighed deeply and looked down at the soggy leaves and damp, broken twigs they were treading underfoot. ‘You’re probably right,’ she said. ‘I just wish she’d told me the police had talked to her about the picture she had confiscated, then the call this morning might not have come as such a shock.’

  ‘Well at least this monster, whoever he is, has been arrested,’ Michelle said comfortingly. ‘And what you have to do now is stop tormenting yourself with what could have been. I know it’s hard, but she’s OK, and thank God, she didn’t ever meet up with him.’

  ‘But if he’d been closer to home she might …’

  ‘Stop!’ Michelle broke in, gently but firmly. ‘She didn’t, and that’s as far as you need to go.’

  ‘She has to be told who he is though,’ Katie persisted.

  ‘Of course, but not today. Give yourself some time to recover from this first.’

  ‘What about taking her computer away? I really think I should …’

  ‘That’s going to be hard when you’ve told her you trust her not to use the chat rooms any more. And for all you know she’s kept her word.’

  ‘The police have asked to see the computer …’

  ‘Katie, why don’t you leave this to me. I’ll deal with Molly and the police, while you just concentrate on you.’

  Katie’s eyebrows rose, but she said no more until they were back in the car and pulling out on to the road. ‘You’re going to deal with Molly?’ she said, sounding intrigued and even amused.

  ‘Do you have a problem with that?’ Michelle responded.

  ‘No, not at all,’ Katie assured her, opening another packet of biscuits, ‘but I think Molly might.’

  ‘Then Molly will just have to deal with it.’

  Katie crunched into a ginger nut and offered the packet to Michelle. ‘Yes, she will,’ she decided, as Michelle shook her head. ‘I said I was going to stand aside and let you take over, so that’s what I’m going to do. In fact I’ve been creating the problem all along, by not letting you establish a relationship with her, so what better way to do it than to tackle her head on? Yes, I can see there’s some merit in setting off all the fireworks at once …’

  ‘Katie.’

  Katie finished her biscuit, took out another and was halfway through that when she said, ‘Aren’t you scared?’

  ‘Stop it,’ Michelle laughed.

  ‘I know I would be,’ Katie confessed.

  ‘I’ve just had a hornbeam fix,’ Michelle reminded her, ‘so I’m fearless.’


  ‘You must have OD’d – either that, or you’re more in touch with your inner twig than I am. But I’ll say no more. You’re in charge now, and I can’t tell you how wonderful it feels to let go.’

  Suspecting that a creeping exhaustion had forced that admission, rather than the truth, Michelle glanced over at her, and seeing how tired she looked, she gently removed the biscuits from her hand and told her to lie back.

  Without a murmur of protest Katie turned her head to one side and rested it on the seat belt. She really was worn out, which was a pity, because she’d felt so alive at the weekend while they were researching for Tom’s story and talking to him and Elliot on the phone, but she’d be right on top of it again just as soon as she’d had some sleep – and after Laurie had reported back on the interviews she was conducting in London.

  ‘Did you manage to talk to Laurie before she left on Sunday?’ she asked, turning blearily back to Michelle.

  ‘You mean about her bringing a camera next weekend?’

  ‘No, about this situation with Elliot and Nick van Zant.’

  ‘Yes, but only briefly.’

  ‘It’s not good, is it?’

  ‘No, but it’s not for you to worry about. She’ll cope.’

  Katie sighed. ‘I like worrying about other people, it takes my mind off me.’

  ‘Ah, but we need your mind on you if we’re going to pull off a miracle,’ Michelle reminded her.

  Katie’s eyes remained closed as she smiled. ‘Miracles do happen, don’t they?’ she said softly.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Michelle answered.

  Still smiling Katie finally relinquished herself to the arms of sleep, while Michelle continued to drive, tears spilling on to her cheeks as she prayed silently and fervently to God to prove her right.

  ‘Where’s Mum?’ Molly demanded, coming to stand in the doorway.

  Michelle looked up from where she was sitting at one end of the big, downy sofa, with a cascade of paperwork between her lap and the floor. She’d been so engrossed in the files they’d printed out over the weekend that she hadn’t heard Molly come in. She was certainly standing there now though, all bristling five foot four of her, with a school bag clutched in one hand, a damp raincoat shrugged half off her shoulders and a supercharged attitude that brooked no ignoring.