CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
A young doctor at the
private practice saw her quickly. He was short, with wiry black
hair curling over a receding hairline and red blotches either side
of his nose. Within a few minutes of Herrick describing her
symptoms, he started nodding.
‘You’re suffering
from an anxiety disorder,’ he said. There was a slight hiss on the
‘s’ in disorder.
‘You mean panic
attacks,’ she said aggressively.
‘Yes. I don’t mean to
be rude, but judging by your appearance, they’re caused by
all-round exhaustion - lack of sleep, poor diet, too many
stimulants - and of course general pressure. Do you take any
exercise?’
‘No
time.’
‘You should make
time, and you should certainly look into your diet and eating
habits. Do you bolt your food? Eat irregularly? Sleep
poorly?’
She nodded to all
three.
‘And you have a fair
degree of unpredictable stress in your life? Do you ever
relax?’
She shook her head.
She knew this man was SIS-approved and must have seen the odd case
of burnt-out spy before. Although the Service was notoriously bad
at helping the casualties of the trade, it reacted quickly to any
hint of psychological disrepair.
‘So, how long is this
going to last? What can you give me for it?’ As she talked, the
heaviness in her chest began to disappear and she breathed more
easily.
‘Nothing. As soon as
you take some rest the symptoms will leave you but in future you’ll
have to learn to manage your stress levels. I suggest regular
physical activity, maybe some abdominal breathing exercises.
Perhaps you should consider yoga?’
‘Yoga!’ she said
contemptuously.
He shrugged. ‘Look,
it’s up to you. I can’t give you a pill to affect the choices you
make. You have an overactive fight and flight response. This
releases your body’s hormones to enable you to meet a dangerous
situation, or flee from it. You’re leading your life at such a
pitch that your body is unable to distinguish between what is real
danger and what is simply pressure. You’re constantly on the alert,
boiling over with unspent hormones. This is the first episode and
there is very little to concern yourself about. It’s an amber
light, that’s all. If I were you, I’d go home, have a sleep and
then take some time off. If you don’t accept this advice, you will
eventually find yourself with more serious problems - possibly a
nervous breakdown, alcohol dependency, that sort of thing. You have
to look after yourself, you’re getting on.’
‘I’m in my early
thirties!’
‘As I said, getting
on.’
‘Do you have any
advice for the short term?’ she said sharply.
‘If you experience
the hyperventilation again, you can stop it by breathing into a
paper bag to slow your intake of oxygen. But it’s not ideal. It may
not give the right impression. ’
‘I see that,’ she
said.
She left the surgery
with Christine Selvey, whom she found sitting primly in the waiting
room reading the Economist
.
‘Everything all
right?’ asked Selvey pointedly.
‘Iron deficiency,’
said Herrick. ‘A few supplements and some rest and I’ll be
fine.’
‘Good. Then we’ll see
you in a couple of weeks or so. I hope you don’t mind me saying
that the Chief was quite emphatic you take the time
off.’
They parted, Selvey
giving her a last matronly nod.
‘Fuck it,’ said
Herrick, as she made her way up Sloane Street to find a
cab.
When she reached home
she had no difficulty in falling asleep. She woke at 2.00 p.m.
feeling disorientated and vaguely guilty. How the hell was she
meant to turn off just like that? She called her father, but found
herself being evasive when he asked why she had so much time to
talk. He was busy painting - the light was right, the tempera just
mixed - and he would prefer to ring her later on. She read the
paper and ate some salad with self-conscious restraint, then phoned
St Mary’s Hospital. Dolph and Lapping were still too poorly to
receive visitors, but Harland was sitting up in his room. She asked
them to tell him to expect her.
On the drive there,
she stopped at Wild at Heart on Westbourne Grove and chose another
bunch of flowers. As she waited for the credit card payment to go
through, her eyes drifted to the couples sitting outside the cafés
along the north side of the street, and she thought that the doctor
was right. She really must find a way of taking more time off,
having more fun.
It was 3.25 by the
time she found Harland’s room. He was sitting by an open window, in
the shade of half-drawn curtains that lifted into the room on the
breeze. One shoulder was bare, but the rest of his torso was
wrapped in bandages. He sat forward so as not to risk his back
coming in contact with the chair, and winced a greeting at
her.
‘What happened?’ he
snapped. ‘Why were you out of the office? I phoned you. They said
you were on holiday. What’s going on, Isis?’
‘I felt a little
faint in the meeting this morning and suddenly I’m pegged as a
borderline neurotic. I was given two weeks’ gardening leave. More
important, how are you?’
His eyes turned to
the floor. ‘Shitty. They won’t give me any more
painkillers.’
‘Did you get the
things I brought last night?’ She was aware they were talking like
a married couple, concern somehow metabolising into briskness and
formality.
He
nodded.
‘Don’t you have some
painkillers in the sponge bag?’
‘You’re right.’ He
gestured to the bedside cabinet.
She gave him the bag
and knelt down beside him, determined to end the difficulty. ‘I
don’t know how to say this…’
‘You don’t have to.
She wouldn’t have hit you. I just put myself in the line of fire.
Bloody stupid of me.’
She shook her head.
‘That’s not what the police say. They say you pushed me out of the
way, and I know that to be the case. Please, I want to thank you… I
mean, I am thanking you … I’m just not
very good at putting it into words.’
‘Isis, this doesn’t
suit you.’ He smiled. ‘Please get up and tell me what’s going on.
There are a few hints on the news, but they must be keeping most of
it quiet.’
‘They’ve arrested the
lot of them, plus Rahe’s associate in Bristol. But it was more
serious than anyone suspected - nerve agents, suicide bombers. They
still don’t know what four of them were planning to do. That’s as
of this morning, when I was last in the loop.’
There was silence.
Harland looked at the window. ‘I’ve just had a call from Eva. She
said she needed to see me in New York.’
‘So it’s back on -
you and her?’ asked Herrick.
‘Don’t be bloody
stupid, Isis.’ He paused. ‘She told me there had been some activity
on a website that had been dormant these past three weeks. It’s an
important site and before it went down they were gaining useful
information from it.’
‘You’re talking about
the thing on Rahe’s computer. The encrypted messages in the
screensaver?’
‘No, this is
something they kept to themselves.’
‘By they, you mean Ha Mossad Le
Teum,’ she said.
‘Yes, the dear old
Institute for Coordination in Israel,’ he said.
At this moment a
nurse walked through the open door with Herrick’s flowers in a
vase. ‘I hope you’re telling Mr Harland that he’s not allowed to
use his mobile phone in here. Just because he’s darling of the ward
doesn’t mean he can break all the rules.’ She fussed over the
flowers and bent down to look into Harland’s face.
‘I saw a doctor using
one ten minutes ago,’ he said.
‘If you kept to the
odd text message, no one would know.’
‘I’ll bear that in
mind,’ he said.
Harland swallowed a
couple of pills with a gulp of water, then the nurse left with a
friendly wink at Herrick.
‘The Institute had been watching the activities of Sammi
Loz for some while,’ he said. ‘And I know Eva well enough to be
certain that she wouldn’t leave her dying mother to go to New York
unless it was absolutely essential. Second, if she called me about
it, she probably needs help. And I’m not exactly in a position to
give that help.’
‘You say this website
has been down for the last three weeks. You’re thinking that was
the time Loz was with us?’
He
nodded.
‘What did you tell
her?’
‘I said you would go,
and that you would meet her in the breakfast room of the Algonquin
tomorrow morning. That’s why I was trying to call you, to tell you
to get on a plane.’
‘You said I would go
to New York to see your ex-mistress! You must be suffering from
shock.’
‘Well,’ he said, his
eyes brimming with mischief, ‘I imagined you might have thought you
owed me. It was cheap of me, I know.’
‘And you think what
she’s got to say is serious?’
‘Yes. And I’ve been
thinking about something else. Loz is utterly obsessed with the
Empire State building. He goes on about it like it was his second
love.’
‘His first love being
a contest between Khan and himself?’
‘I’m serious, he’s
got a thing about it, and about the meaning of those tall buildings
in New York. He picked up a quote from Benjamin Jaidi. After Loz
mentioned it I got a copy of E.B. White’s Here
is New York, where it comes from.’
Herrick looked
blank.
Harland turned to the
window. ‘ “A single flight of planes no bigger than a wedge of
geese can quickly end this island fantasy.” ’
‘Well remembered,’
she said.
‘There’s more. “This
race - this race between the destroying planes and the struggling
Parliament of Man - it sticks in all heads. The city at last
perfectly illustrates the universal dilemma and the general
solution; this riddle in steel and stone is at once the perfect
target and the demonstration of non-violence, of racial
brotherhood; this lofty target scraping the skies and meeting the
destroying planes halfway, home of all people and all nations,
capital of everything, housing the deliberations by which the
planes are to be stayed and their errand forestalled.”
’
Herrick had sat down
on the bed. ‘That’s some prescience. But surely it’s about the
United Nations building, not the Empire State?’
‘True, but this has
some meaning for him in a general sense. Look, I don’t know if the
little bastard is still alive. But if Eva called me, I know it’s
important. She’s agreed to pass on everything she has to you. I
told her you were trustworthy and that you were the most natural
talent I’d seen since I met your father. That intrigued
her.’
‘Thanks. But you’re
forgetting I’m washed up. Besides, I am not that good. I’ve made a
lot of mistakes over the last month.’
‘Self pity doesn’t
suit you.’ His tone softened. ‘You’re not yourself. Who would be,
after finding a pair of armed thugs in their house, being on the
end of a brace of missiles and watching their friends being shot
up? The Chief is only concerned not to lose you. Let’s face it, he
took the right decision sending you home.’ He paused. ‘I think you
should go to New York. It would be good for you. You can catch the
last flight. It’s always half-empty.’
‘I’ve never been to
New York.’
‘Time to lose your
virginity then. Hand me my bag.’
He took out the
address book. ‘That was very thoughtful of you,’ he said, waving it
at her. ‘Look up the number for Frank Ollins. He’s with the FBI -
an awkward sod, but straight and reliable. He was in charge of the
Sammi Loz inquiries.’ She found the number and copied it
down.
He asked her to get
his wallet out of the bedside cabinet and then offered her ten
hundred-dollar bills. ‘You’ll need it, and it will save you time.
There’s a flight at midnight.’
‘I can’t take
it.’
‘Why not? You’re
working for me now, you’re my agent, and you’re going to be dealing
with Eva. That certainly requires payment of some
kind.’
‘That reminds me of
something in Shakespeare. I forget where it’s from. My father made
me memorise it for obvious reasons. “Friendship is constant in all
other things, save in the office and affairs of love. Therefore all
hearts in love use their own tongues. Let every eye negotiate for
itself, and trust no agent.” ’ She took the money and put it in her
pocket. ‘Don’t trust me to say what you should be saying
yourself.’
‘Okay, okay. Now, go
catch that plane. You have my mobile number and here’s Eva’s.’ He
pulled a card from his wallet and handed it to her. ‘Stay in touch.
If there’s anything important I’ll let the Chief
know.’
She bent down, kissed
his cheek and let her head hang by his so that she looked
myopically into his eyes. ‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘I do owe you.’ Then
she straightened, a hand still lingering on his forearm. ‘I’ll call
you first thing tomorrow.’
She walked from the
room without a backward glance.