What Izzy Jacobs liked about Myrtle Fanning had long admired was her stoicism in the face of adversity. She had endured a marriage to Mikey Fanning whom Izzy thought of as a brother but who had been wasteful, now a failure, poor with money and a shell of his old self. He had never heard Myrtle Fanning complain or resort to self pity. She took what life threw at her and shrugged it away. He had never declared himself. Before he had met his own wife, Izzy had fenced Mikey's nicked goods and wished Myrtle's smile had settled on him. After Beryl's death, alone in the environs of San Pedro, a little of him had hoped that illness would make a widow of Myrtle. She never whined. She was brusque, fierce and strong.

He let himself in and put the paper bag on the kitchen table.

Myrtle told him she had switched on the TV. On the television there had been pictures from a beach down the coast, near Fuengirola: a police officer had been carrying a bin-bag with the same reverence as if she'd been carting the waste from an abattoir. There were, the TV reported, severed legs in the bag and an officer reckoned a criminal gang war was being fought out.

She said, dry eyes, controlled, 'Later they freshened up the report. They put some shoes on the TV. They were Mikey's best, what he always wore at funerals. Then they said that a car had been found burned out in a quarry up beyond Fuengirola on the Sierra de Mijas, and there was a body in it. They said the body had no legs. I switched the TV off.'

If she had been any other woman, Izzy Jacobs would have put an arm around her, and reckoned he risked having tears stain the cream cotton jacket he wore most days. He said he would put the kettle on and went towards the kitchen. He thought a cup of tea was called for, with a splash of Scotch it, but no hugging. There would be no tears. She followed him. He filled the kettle, put it on. He knew his kitchen was a palace compared to hers, and his apartment was double the size. He heard paper rustle.

He did not look round. 'Take care, Myrtle.'

'They were always around the house when I was a kid. My dad, brothers, uncles and cousins all had firearms practice out on Rainham marshes. I can handle a shooter. Can you, Izzy?'

He poured water into the pot, two bags when one would have done. He let his mind drift back fifty-six years, to when he had been nineteen and a conscript in the Service Corps. He was smart, his hair Brylcreemed, and his driving skills were excellent. He had been a colonel's driver in Egypt and had worn a service revolver on his webbing belt. It was a Webley Mark lV, firing .38 bullets, and he'd used it on the range when the colonel had practice shooting. He'd been a chosen man and had done good deals because that was his talent. His colonel had eaten and drunk better than any contemporary in Ismailia. He'd loved the feel of the thing on his upper webbing, the weight of it and the pressure of the holster.

He said, 'Enough experience to get by.'

He filled a mug for her and stirred in two sugars. He imagined her fighting for space in the kitchen of a terraced home in south-east London, down by Peckham railway station, scrabbling to get the weapons out of the hands of the young bucks and into her own fists. She aimed it at the window.

Izzy Jacobs said, 'He was my best friend, Mikey was. If no one else will go after those bastards, I will. I'd swing for him.'

Her first half-turn on her heel had been on the far side of the gate. Snapper had grabbed her arm. He'd been on one side of her, Loy on the other, and the man who'd driven them from Marbella bus station was close behind her. His knees nudged the back of her thighs.

'Just get your bloody passport out,' Snapper mouthed.

'Best do as he says,' added Loy. 'Have it ready.'

Posie hadn't taken the passport from her bag. At the desk she'd shrugged clear of their hands and used her heel to kick the third man's shin.

'They don't want you,' Snapper hissed.

'They'll slam the door in your face,' Loy spat. 'You've burned your bridges.'

Snapper again: 'Burned your boats.'

The man behind her said, 'No going back, that's ''burned your boats''. Fourteen hundred years ago, a Moor invaded this coast of Spain and brought twelve thousand troops ashore and ordered all their boats to be destroyed so there was no way of retreating.'

The queue had built behind them. Impatience surged.

Snapper had said sourly, 'Please yourself. See if we care.'

'Your call, Posie,' Loy had said. 'Not our shout.'

She'd gone.

One had shouted after her but she had not known which, and a flight was called. She'd had her backpack looped on her shoulders and had gone to the bus place. Within twenty minutes the coach had pulled up and she'd paid for the one-way journey back along the A7 highway.

She supposed it was a sort of madness.

There were stories in the papers, the tabloids, and on the news bulletins of people doing daft things, and being unable to explain themselves. She'd heard that sort of playing dumb called 'riding the wind'. The wind was the coach that speared along the road, going west towards the door of the Villa Paraiso that might be slammed in her face, and might not.

Nerves gripped her.

She climbed down off the coach.

He might not even open the door to her, let alone slam it in her face. And the rifle would be there, the magazines loaded in it. That was the degree of the madness. It had captured Jonno and now her.

She walked up the hill, felt the cool of evening and shivered.

It was over. The liaison officer from the RAF detachment still lingering in the Crown Colony had raised his eyebrows when she told him what she wanted, had stamped on the brake and had helped clear their gear from the Land Rover. They were dropped by the Shell garage. There were perfunctory handshakes and the officer said, with ill-disguised irony, 'Hope it went well . . . whatever it was.'

Winnie led, Kenny and Dottie trailing after her on the narrow pavement.

Three members of an Irish bomb team had died there, but there was no room for them in Winnie Monks's mind. She would have been in her first year at university at the time; and politics, economics and international relations didn't go with blood on the ground. She wanted to walk and taste the last of the Rock, which loomed behind her. The RAF cleaners would no doubt bitch that there had been smoking inside the building. She knew it was over. Behind her, they talked. Might have thought she wouldn't hear, or that it didn't matter if she did.

Kenny spoke of the backlog there would be in clearing the expenses claims he dealt with, which would be piled in his in-tray the next Monday morning. Dottie, then, would have gone back to A Branch to the rosters, the days-in-lieu and the requests from team leaders for foot-surveillance people. Kenny wondered if Caro Watson had already returned to the deputy director's outer office. Dottie thought it likely that Xavier would have accumulated time off and would not be called into the Yard, and his liaison job, before the weekend.

They talked easily. The wheels on the trolley Kenny was pulling needed oil, which was mentioned, as was the awesome light on the rockface. They wondered whether the flight out would be on time. Dottie said she believed it was right that they were quitting, and Kenny said it was sensible because nothing remained here for them.

Winnie didn't know if anything had ever been there for them. She trudged on and her feet hurt, but it was a last flavour of the place before the death moment. It would be the end of her Graveyard Team, the gatherings in the gardens behind Thames House, the burial of self-perpetuating elitism and the mantra that nobody appreciated them. She had reached the runway. The lights were green for vehicles and pedestrians, and the aircraft had not arrived on schedule. She kept to her brisk stride and ignored the ache in her swollen feet.

She could have talked to Dawson, but no one else.

Her Graveyard Team, fashioned when they had investigated organised crime, had been confident they were light years ahead of the Metropolitan Police. That might have been delusional, she reflected. In the corridors of the building where she worked there were corporate notice-boards. Perhaps the Graveyard gang were no more relevant than the Light Operatic Society, the tennis team, or the bloody Pilates crowd, who took over the gym on any early morning, then went sweaty to their desks. She remembered those evenings in the gardens, among the old stones of the graveyard where once the body-snatchers had skulked until night. They'd smoked, drunk coffee, eaten sandwiches and congratulated themselves on their abilities. A delusion. She had said to Kenny, taking the body out of central Budapest and en route to the airport, '. . . so arrogant, those fucking people. They think they're untouchable.'

He had said, 'They believe they're untouchable, Boss, because they aren't often touched.' She had raised her voice in the car and made her declaration.

She said, over her shoulder, to Kenny, 'You remember what I said when we were bringing that boy home. I said, ''My promise to him. I'll nail those who did it. Believe me, I will. As long as it takes, wherever it goes.'' I failed to honour my word. Fucking hurts, Kenny.'

'You did what you could, Boss. It'll be the dagoes that field the blame couldn't stand up when we needed them to. Folded at the first whiff of grapeshot, like always. None of it'll be at your door.'

Dottie said, 'Can't do more than your best, Boss.'

That the strength of her team was a delusion came hard to Winnie Monks.

'I owed him more. When we get in we should damage a litre of something. Soften the pain. Sorry for the maudlin stuff.'

'. . . but it was a long time ago. It has served me well and enhanced my reputation.'

The Major smiled thinly. He was relaxed and comfortable in the car and the lawyer drove smoothly. The man once known as the Tractor had coaxed from him the story of the missing fingers. He had told it factually, using the language of the military to describe the malfunction of the supposed recoilless weapon. He had grimaced when he added that the pain of a lost finger was as nothing in comparison to the pain if the position had been overrun by those savages 'Wonderful fighters, the best, heroic' and they had been taken alive. 'I think what did me most good was what I said to the senior man. I was dosed with morphine, should have been on my back, and delayed shock had set in. I was told afterwards that my voice had dripped contempt. What I said to that idiot, with an army of juniors listening, cemented the legend about me. It's the way of life. You have no idea what's hidden behind a corner. I had no idea that I would bawl at a veteran commander and ridicule him.'

'Your reputation has travelled, but the story was the better for coming from you.'

'Rarely done. I don't care to live in the past.'

The headlights were on, and he saw the rows of white-painted villas, the flowers in tubs and baskets, signs on walls and balconies. The lawyer had said that half of the coast was now for sale at idiot prices.

'But from the past you have a good roof and solid protection.'

A girl was walking in the road ahead, going slowly up the hill.

The Major snorted, almost derisively. 'Because I'm a whore, do whatever is asked of me, and am paid. I have my own life, but I belong to them, and am not allowed to forget it.'

She was a young girl and did not turn to gaze into the lights but edged off the tarmac on to the verge. She tripped and the weight of the rucksack almost toppled her. The lawyer pulled out to give her room as she regained her balance, then the car powered ahead, but the Tractor rapped on his shoulder. He trod on the break pedal and the car stopped.

The Tractor leaned across him. The window was down, an offer made. The lawyer reached to the passenger door in the front, pushed it open and gestured at the empty seat. Would she accept a ride up the hill? The Major was told that the girl was British, staying close to the villa on holiday. She looked inside and seemed, for a moment, to weigh her options.

Her eyes caught his. There was an old irritation at the side of his nose. He rubbed it, then dropped his hand. He stared back at her. Most people, when his gaze locked on their eyes, averted them. She stared through him, then stepped back. She said, 'Thank you, no. I prefer to walk, but thank you for the offer.'

She was walking again. The lawyer pulled the door shut, and the Tractor raised his window.

They went on up the hill and the girl was forgotten. The Major saw the distant sunset on the mountain and across the sea. The wind had died and the cloud had broken up. Small lights were sprinkled below, then the lines of the main highway showed clear, and the town, and there was a straight slash where the lights ended and the sea began. Perhaps the Tractor caught his mood. He told the Major that the house, where they would talk, eat and sleep before the morning's drive into Portugal, was named Villa del Aguila. It had an eagle's view of the coast. On a small adjacent plot there was a collapsing bungalow, notable only for its name Paradise. It was where the girl was going, where she was staying with her boyfriend. No one wondered why she had with her a bulging rucksack.

Another bend. He asked if this were the only route to the villa. It was. They straightened, surged again. The next bend was sharper, and the lawyer slowed to work his way round it.

In the lights, a couple sat on a stone that had been cut into a rough cube. They twisted away from the glare. They were, for their age, smartly dressed. She wore a coat that would have been suitable for a slow walk in the evening chill on the Paseo Maritimo, and he had on a raincoat. Then they were gone.

They came to the gates. He saw the wire, and the camera followed him. The wall was high, well built, and arc lights had come on. The gates opened.

The lawyer took the car up the last slope.

The Tractor told the Major he was welcome.

He was out of the car, stretched and drank in the view of the night lights of Marbella below. He could smell the flowers on the bushes. This was not a hotel, as they had had in Nouakchott or Baku, or a hovel like the one in the mountains of Morocco, but a home. His own in Pskov was at the edge of the marshes. Pskov had been ravaged by Estonian police battalions following the main armoured and infantry units in the Great Patriotic War. It was a backwater, where central government's money seldom reached. The thought of home made the Major feel melancholy. Images flitted: his wife, who was indifferent to him, the Romanian whore, who had partially amused and partially excited him. An argument and an accusation, the glitter of diamond earrings. The face of the boy he had trusted, and the howl of the slipstream when a door was opened. . . . They raced in his head.

The Tractor had told him he was beside Paradise. The Major believed it.

The lawyer took his hand and shook it. There was barking at the back. The lawyer drove away and the gates closed behind the car.

Why did a young woman refuse a lift when she was struggling up a steep hill? Why did an old couple, dressed in their best, sit in the darkness on a road that led nowhere? He didn't know, didn't care. He thought the place he had come to was an island of safety. He paused while the front door was opened and one of the Tractor's men darted inside to silence the howl of the alarm system. Guns were produced from his hosts' belts and made safe, then were dumped noisily on the glass surface of the table nearest the door. He saw an anteroom off the hall with a bank of TV screens inside it. He heard the dog again. Around him the furnishings were not those of a palace or a hotel. They were decent and used. They were what his wife might have chosen and . . . He could not wipe away the melancholy.

'Did you mean it that the boy was the best? Were you joking? Or was it true?'

'You didn't. Why didn't you?'

'There wasn't a shot.'

'He was out of the car. He stood there, looking around. The photograph was in front of your face.'

'And he was moving. There were others in front of him.'

'The head was clear,' Jonno protested.

'It's my decision when I shoot.'

They were in darkness. Sparky was back from the table, behind it. The rifle was across it, but he had not picked it up. Twice his hands had wavered towards the stock but they had not lifted it and aimed. At first, when the men had pitched out of the lead car, Jonno had stared down at them. He'd expected the rifle to be at the shoulder, and maybe that the cocking would have been done. He'd seen the faces. The picture was on the table. Recent enough, three days old. Same shirt, same lightweight jacket, same stubble on the face, same brush moustache, and the hair hadn't grown across the scalp. He recognised him. And Sparky hadn't lifted the rifle, let alone armed it.

They had gone inside.

Marko had led, the target had followed, and the Russian had been a pace after them. He had dropped the photograph on the table and done circuits of the room. What bloody business was it of Jonno's? Who was Jonno to judge the man? He had jumped in and attacked. You didn't. Why didn't you?

'It's what you're here for.'

He wished he hadn't spoken. Sparky's eyes held a haunted look, like those of a hunted animal . . . or of a man edging back from the medical condition that affected more soldiers than wounds from roadside bombs. The woman in the photograph had put him in this place, given him this theatre to play his part. He wished he hadn't said it and hesitated . . . The front door closed. He heard it. As Sparky did.

Then there were steps on the stairs and the creak of the two loose boards, one at halfway, the other near the top.

Now Sparky had the weapon in his hands, dragged back the lever, and lifted it to his shoulder, aiming the barrel at the door.

Why was Jonno there? It seemed a good time to come up with an answer. Why was he not struggling for a train on the Central Line with all the other morons who thought it a life worth living? The door might fly open, and a man's shape might be silhouetted against the light. He would be as helpless as the man carried, trussed, to the chipper.

Something about being a little man, about being kicked from dawn to dusk by the barons of the world. Something about staring into the face of the big player and not backing off. Something about being his own man . . . He gripped the chair Snapper had used and lifted it.

The handle turned.

Jonno heard Sparky's sharp intake of breath, and from the corner of his eye he saw the finger flick from the guard to the trigger. He had the chair's feet off the carpet and held it up. He could plough forward into the doorway and be a little protected by the seat.

A sliver of light ran under the door.

Jonno saw Sparky's thumb move to a lever and depress it. He assumed it was the safety catch and that the weapon could now be fired. The finger hovered on the trigger guard. Their backs were to the window.

Her voice came through the door. 'It's me. I came back. Try not to shoot me. I'm coming in. Like I said, don't shoot me.'

It opened and she came in.

Sparky cleared his weapon, ejecting a shell that hit the table, cannoned across the floor and stopped by Jonno's feet. The chair fell from his stiffened fingers and barked his shin. Sparky might have shot her. Jonno might have battered her.

Jonno struggled to know why he, himself, had stayed. He could not imagine why she had come back and he could not have formulated the question.

She dumped her rucksack on the floor.

Jonno thought she looked good, sweaty and grimy. In London she would have curled her lip at any vagrant stuffed into a doorway, looking half as destitute as she did. Posie said she would make tea. Sparky said no, the kitchen was clean and they had a water bottle. They wanted nothing.

Posie said, 'And you've company, competition. They're down the road having a cigarette, waiting for the dark.'

18.

'You could have had the shot and you bottled it.'

Too dark now for Jonno to see Sparky's face.

'At that range, still with some daylight and arc lights and the sight on it you could have counted the hairs in his moustache. But you didn't fire.'