But on that occasion it had been the drug baron's henchmen who'd had the advantage of surprise, and now Luke had it. He didn't have the odd pair of paper scissors handy, or the pocketful of small change, or the knotted bootlaces, or any other of the fairly ridiculous bits of household killing equipment that the instructors were so enthusiastic about, but he did have a state-of-the-art silver-cased laptop and, thanks not least to Aubrey Longrigg, huge anger. It had come over him like a friend in need, and at that moment it was a better friend to him than courage.

Dima is reaching out to shove the door in the middle of the stone staircase.

Niki and the cadaverous philosopher stand close behind him, and Luke stands behind them, but not as close as they are to Dima.

Luke is shy. Descending to a lavatory is a man's private business, and Luke is a private person. Nevertheless, he is having a life-moment of spiritual clarity. For once, the initiative is his, and no one else's. For once, he is the rightful aggressor.

The door they are standing in front of is occasionally locked for security reasons, as Dima rightly pointed out in Paris, but today it isn't. It's guaranteed to open, and that's because Luke has the key in his pocket.

Therefore the door opens, revealing the rather poorly lit staircase beneath. Dima is still leading the way but that situation changes abruptly when a truly ma.s.sive blow from Luke with the laptop sends the cadaverous philosopher clattering without complaint past Dima down the staircase, unbalancing Niki and providing Dima with a chance to seize his hated blond turncoat of a bodyguard by the throat in the manner that, according to Perry, he had fantasized about when describing how he proposed to murder the husband of Natasha's late mother.

With one hand still round his throat, Dima drives Niki's astonished head left and right against the nearside wall until his useless, worked-out body collapses under him, and he lands speechless at Dima's feet, prompting Dima to kick him repeatedly and very hard, first in the groin and then on the side of the head, with the toe of his inappropriate Italian right shoe.

All of this happening quite slowly and naturally for Luke, though somewhat out of sequence, but with a cathartic and mysteriously triumphant effect. To take a laptop in both hands, raise it above his head at full stretch, and bring it down like an executioner's axe on the cadaverous bodyguard's neck conveniently placed a couple of steps beneath him was to repay every slight that had been done to him over the last forty years, from his childhood in the shadow of a tyrannical soldier-father, through the catalogue of English private and public schools that he had detested, and the scores of women he had slept with and wished he hadn't, to the Colombian forest that had imprisoned him, and the diplomatic ghetto in Bogota where he had performed the most idiotic and compulsive of his life-sins.

But in the end, it was undoubtedly the thought of rewarding Aubrey Longrigg for betraying the Service's trust that, irrational though it might be, delivered the greatest impetus because Luke, like Hector, loved the Service. The Service was his mother and father and his bit of G.o.d as well, even if its ways were sometimes imponderable.

Which, come to think of it, was probably how Dima felt about his precious vory vory.

Someone should be screaming, but no one is. At the foot of the stairs, the two men slump across one another in seeming defiance of vory vory h.o.m.ophobic code. Dima is still kicking Niki, who is underneath, and the cadaverous philosopher is opening and closing his mouth like a beached fish. Turning on his heel, Luke treads cautiously back up the steps and relocks the swing-door, returns the key to his pocket, then joins the tranquil scene downstairs. h.o.m.ophobic code. Dima is still kicking Niki, who is underneath, and the cadaverous philosopher is opening and closing his mouth like a beached fish. Turning on his heel, Luke treads cautiously back up the steps and relocks the swing-door, returns the key to his pocket, then joins the tranquil scene downstairs.

Grabbing Dima by the arm who must have just one last kick before he goes Luke leads him past the lavatories, up some steps and across an unused reception area until they arrive at the iron-clad delivery door marked EMERGENCY EXIT EMERGENCY EXIT. This door requires no key but has instead a tin green box mounted on the wall, with a gla.s.s front and a red panic b.u.t.ton inside for emergencies such as fire, flood or an act of terrorism.

Over the last eighteen hours Luke has devoted serious study to this green box with its panic b.u.t.ton, and has also taken the trouble to discuss with Ollie its most likely properties. At Ollie's suggestion, he has loosened in advance the bra.s.s screws attaching the gla.s.s panel to its metal surround, and snipped through a sinister-looking red-clad wire that leads back into the bowels of the hotel with the purpose of connecting the panic b.u.t.ton with the hotel's central alarm system. In Ollie's speculative view, the effect of snipping the red wire should be to open the emergency exit without provoking an emergency exodus of staff and guests from the hotel.

Removing the loosened pane of gla.s.s with his left hand, Luke makes to push the red b.u.t.ton with his right, only to discover that his right hand is temporarily out of service. So he again uses his left hand, whereupon with Swiss efficiency the doors fly open precisely as Ollie has speculated, and there is the street, and there is the sunny day, beckoning to them.

Luke hustles Dima ahead of him and either out of courtesy to the hotel or a desire to look like a couple of honourable Bernese citizens in suits who happen to be stepping into the street he pauses to close the door after him, and at the same time establish, with grateful acknowledgements to Ollie, that no siren call for a general evacuation of the hotel is resounding behind him.

Fifty metres across the road from them stands an underground car park called, rather oddly, Parking Casino. On the first level, directly facing the exit, stands the BMW car that Luke has rented for this moment, and in Luke's numb right hand lies the electronic key that unlocks the car's doors before you reach them.

'Jesus G.o.d, d.i.c.k, I love you, hear me?' Dima whispers through his panting.

With his numb right hand, Luke fishes in the hot lining of his jacket for his mobile, hauls it out, and with his left forefinger touches the b.u.t.ton for Ollie.

'The time to go in is now now,' he orders, in a voice of majestic calm.

The horsebox was backing down a hard incline and Ollie was warning Perry and Gail that they were going in. After the wait in the lay-by they had driven up a tortuous hill road, heard cowbells and smelled hay. They had stopped, turned, and backed, and now they were waiting again, but only for Ollie to ratchet up the tailgate, which he did slowly in order to be quiet, revealing himself by stages up to his wide-brimmed black fedora hat.

Behind Ollie stood a stables, and behind it a paddock and a couple of good-looking young horses, chestnuts, which had trotted over to take a look at them, then bounced off again. Next to the stables loomed a large modern house in dark red timber with overhanging eaves. There was a front porch and a side porch, both closed. The front porch faced the road and the side porch didn't, so Perry chose the side porch and said, 'I'll go first.' It had been agreed that Ollie, as the stranger to the family, would stay with the van till summoned.

As Perry and Gail advanced, they noticed two closed-circuit television cameras looking down on them, one from the stables and one from the house. Igor's responsibility, presumably, but Igor has been sent out shopping.

Perry pressed the bell and at first they heard nothing. The stillness struck Gail as unnatural so she pressed it herself. Perhaps it didn't work. She gave one long ring then several short ones to hurry everyone up. And it worked after all, because impatient young feet were approaching, bolts were being shot and a lock was turned, and one of Dima's flaxen-haired sons appeared: Viktor.

But instead of greeting them with a buckwheat grin all over his freckled face, which was what they would have expected, Viktor stared at them in nervous confusion.

'Have you got her?' he demanded, in his internat's American English.

The question was directed at Perry not Gail because by now Katya and Irina had come through the doorway and Katya had grabbed one of Gail's legs and was squeezing her head against it, and Irina was reaching up her arms to Gail for an embrace.

'My sister. Natasha! Natasha!' Viktor shouted impatiently at Perry, suspiciously eyeing the horsebox as if she might be hiding in it. 'Have you seen Natasha, for Christ's sakes? 'Have you seen Natasha, for Christ's sakes?'

'Where's your mother?' Gail said, breaking free of the girls.

They followed Viktor down a panelled corridor that smelled of camphor into a low-beamed living room on two levels with gla.s.s doors leading to a garden and the paddock beyond. Crammed into the darkest part of the room between two leather suitcases sat Tamara, wearing a black hat with a piece of veil round it. Advancing on her, Gail saw beneath the veil that she had dyed her hair with henna and rouged her cheeks. Russians traditionally sit down before a journey, Gail had read somewhere, and perhaps that was why Tamara was sitting down now, and why she remained sitting when Gail stood in front of her, staring down at her rouged, rigid face.

'What's happened to Natasha?' Gail demanded.

'We do not know,' Tamara replied, to the void before her.

'Why not?'

Now the twins took over, and Tamara was temporarily forgotten: 'She went to riding school and didn't come back!' Viktor insisted, as his brother Alexei clattered into the room after him.

'No, she didn't didn't, she only said said she was going to riding school. She only she was going to riding school. She only said said, a.s.shole! She lies, you know she does!' Alexei.

'When did she go to riding school?' asked Gail. did she go to riding school?' asked Gail.

'This morning. Early! Like eight o'clock!' Viktor yelled, before Alexei could get his word in. 'She had a date there. Some kind of demo lesson on dressage! Dad had called like ten minutes earlier, said we'd gotta be ready midday! Natasha says she's got this date at riding school. Gotta go there, an unbreakable deal unbreakable deal!'

'So she went?'

'Sure. Igor took her in the Volvo.'

'Bulls.h.i.t!' Alexei again. 'Igor took her to Berne Berne! They never f.u.c.king went went to riding school, you idiot! Natasha to riding school, you idiot! Natasha lied lied to Mama!' to Mama!'

Gail the lawyer forced her way back: 'Igor dropped her in Berne Berne? Where did he take her to?'

'The train station train station!' Alexei shouted.

'Which train station, Alexei?' said Perry severely. 'Calmly now. At which train station in Berne did Igor drop Natasha?' train station, Alexei?' said Perry severely. 'Calmly now. At which train station in Berne did Igor drop Natasha?'

'Berne main station main station! The international train station, Jesus Christ! It goes all over. Goes to Paris! Budapest! Goes to Moscow!'

'Dad told her to go there told her to go there, Professor,' Viktor insisted, lowering his voice in deliberate counterpoint to the hysterical Alexei's.

'Dima did, Viktor?' Gail. did, Viktor?' Gail.

'Dima told her to go to the train station. That's what Igor said. You want I call Igor again and you talk to him?'

'He can't can't, you a.s.shole! The Professor don't speak Russian!' Alexei, by now nearly in tears.

Perry again, firmly as before: 'Viktor in a minute, Alexei Viktor, just say that to me again slowly. Alexei Alexei, I'll be yours just as soon soon as I've listened to Viktor. Now, Viktor.' as I've listened to Viktor. Now, Viktor.'

'It's what Igor says she told him, and that's why he dropped her at the main station. "My dad says, I gotta go to the main train station."'

'And Igor's an a.s.shole too! He don't ask why!' Alexei shouted. 'He's too f.u.c.king stupid. He's so frightened of Dad he just drops Natasha at the station and goodbye! He don't ask why. He goes shopping. If she never comes back it's not his fault. Dad told him to do it, so he did it, so it's not his fault!'

'How d'you know she didn't go to the riding demo?' Gail asked, when she had weighed their testimony this far.

'Viktor, please,' Perry said quickly, before Alexei could b.u.t.t in again.

'First the riding school calls us, where's Natasha?' Viktor said. 'It's a hundred and twenty-five an hour, she hasn't cancelled. She's supposed to do this dressage s.h.i.t. They got the horse all saddled and waiting. So we call Igor on his cell. Where's Natasha? At the train station, he says, Dad's orders.'

'What was she wearing?' Gail, turning to the distraught Alexei out of kindness.

'Loose jeans. And like a Russian smock. Like a kulak kulak. She's into totally shapeless. Says she don't like boys looking at her a.s.s.'

'Has she any money?' still to Alexei.

'Dad gives her whatever. He spoils her totally totally! We get like a hundred a month, she gets like five five hundred. For books, clothes, shoes she's nuts about; last month Dad bought her a violin. Violins cost like millions.' hundred. For books, clothes, shoes she's nuts about; last month Dad bought her a violin. Violins cost like millions.'

'And you've all tried calling her?' Gail to Viktor now.

'Repeatedly,' says Viktor, who by now has cast himself as the calm, mature man. 'Everyone has. Alexei's cell, my cell, Katya's, Irina's. No answer.'

Gail to Tamara, remembering her presence: 'Have you tried to call her?'

No answer from Tamara either.

Gail to the four children: 'I think you should please all go to another room while I talk to Tamara. If Natasha rings, I need to speak to her first. Agreed everyone?'

There being no other chair in Tamara's dark corner, Perry pulled up a wooden bench supported by two carved bears, and the two of them sat on it, watching Tamara's tiny, black eyes move between them without engaging.

'Tamara,' said Gail. 'Why is Natasha frightened to meet her father?'

'She must have a child.'

'Has she told you that?'

'No.'

'But you've noticed.'

'Yes.'

'How long ago did you notice?'

'It is immaterial.'

'But in Antigua already?'

'Yes.'

'Have you discussed it with her?'

'No.'

'With her father?'

'No.'

'Why have you not discussed it with Natasha?'

'I hate her.'

'Does she hate you?'

'Yes. Her mother was wh.o.r.e. Now Natasha is wh.o.r.e. It is not surprising.'

'What will happen when her father finds out?'

'Maybe he will love her more. Maybe he will kill her. G.o.d will decide.'

'Do you know who the father is?'

'Maybe it is many fathers. From the riding school. The ski school. Maybe it is the postman, or Igor.'

'And you have no idea where she is now?'

'Natasha does not confide in me.'

Outside in the stable yard it had come on to rain. In the paddock the two handsome chestnut horses were playfully head-b.u.t.ting each other. Gail, Perry and Ollie stood in the shadow of the horsebox. Ollie had spoken to Luke on his mobile. Luke had had a problem talking because he had Dima with him in the car. But the message that Ollie now relayed brooked no argument. His voice remained calm but his flawed c.o.c.kney became a tangle in the tension: 'We're to get the h.e.l.l out of here right now. There's been serious developments and we can't hold up the convoy for one single ship no more. Natasha's got their mobile numbers, and they've got hers. Luke don't want us to run into Igor, so we b.l.o.o.d.y don't do that. He says you got to get everybody aboard now, please, Perry, and we hightail it now now, got it?'

Perry was halfway back to the house when Gail drew him aside: 'I know where she is,' she said.

'You seem to know quite a lot I don't.'

'Not that much. Enough. I'm going to get her. I want you to back me up. No heroics, no little-woman stuff. You and Ollie take the family, I'll follow you with Natasha when I find her. That's what I'm going to tell Ollie, and I need to know I've got your support.'

Perry put both his hands to his head as if he'd forgotten something, then let them fall to his sides in surrender: 'Where is she?'

'Where's Kandersteg?'

'Go to Spiez, take the Simplon railway up the mountain. Have you got money?'

'Plenty. Luke's.'