I Said the Spyder

By Larry Johns

To get at the truth - in a world that deals in lies - Ryderbeit has to methodically chip away at the normality of indifference and betrayal that skulk behind the façade. It seems that the system is there to pervert, and everyone who is anyone - including himself - is guilty as charged. And the guilt has no upper limit. In fact, the higher up the chain of command you delve, the deeper lies the guilt. The trick is to find a friend who can help when your back is hard against the wall. But what if all your friends have died in the line of duty...what then?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Larry Johns
• Release date: Apr 13, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310488023

Larry Johns

Born and raised in Cornwall, Larry Johns has earned a living as a soldier, an artist, a jazz musician, a music lecturer and a writer, circumnavigating the world in these professions many times. He learned the mechanics of his original trade with the Staff Band of the Royal Engineers and at Kneller Hall School of Music. Moving directly to London, he occupied the lead alto saxophone chair with several big bands, whilst jazzing at many nightspots; most notably ; The "100 Club", Oxford Street; the "Allnighter", Soho and "The Bull's Head" at Barnes. At these and other venues he blew jazz shoulder-to-shoulder with Vic Ash, Harry Klein, Brian Dee, Joe Temperley. One of his enduring memories of those heady be-bob days is of swapping "fours" with the legendary vibraphonist Vic Feldman immediately prior to his moving to the U.S. to join the Woody Herman Orchestra. During this period he also played repiano clarinet with an embryonic London Symphonietta and several smaller classical combinations. Latterly, he was one of Charlie Katz's "session men", performing on numerous "hit" (and "not-so-hit") recordings of the day. Later, he worked directly for several recording companies: Decca, H.M.V., Major-Minor, Philips etc. holding the "Artists and Repertoire" position with most. With Mercury records, he fronted various stage bands on promotional tours across Europe and the Far East, working alongside rising stars of the recording world, Phil Coulter and Mike Leander. On the demise of viable big band work worldwide, Larry - along with many of his contemporaries - joined "Geraldo's Navy", and would cross the Atlantic many times - on both "Queens" - haunting the New York jazz scene...For many years to come, during "dry" periods, he would utilise this "jewel" of an employment facility, both for the pocket and for the heart. His seascapes are sold around the world. When not writing, painting, performing or travelling, he teaches art and woodwind privately in Cornwall. For more details visit his website at: www.holler-it.com

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I…said the Spyder

Larry Johns

Copyright © Larry Johns 1981.

The right of Larry Johns to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Contents:

ONE

TWO

THREE

FOUR

FIVE

SIX

SEVEN

EIGHT

NINE

TEN

ELEVEN

TWELVE

THIRTEEN

FOURTEEN

FIFTEEN

SIXTEEN

SEVENTEEN

EIGHTEEN

NINETEEN

TWENTY

TWENTY ONE

TWENTY TWO

EPILOGUE

Author’s Note:

Other Books:

Place of Bones

About…

…Innocence? What the hell is innocence?...

Andrew Teviner, MI6 field agent 1975 – 1997

ONE

I was screwed.

In less than twenty seconds they would be in my face and there was nothing I could do to avoid it.

I was wedged between a tree trunk and the Embankment railings some fifty metres east of the Hungerford footbridge, which was where Edward Lewis’s mystery tour of night-time London had led me, and there was no escape. There was also no escaping the conclusion that Lewis - damn him to hell and back - was bent; that Donald Burgess was right, and that I had been wrong. Woefully wrong. And this, control-freak that I was, stung most of all.

The breeze had dissipated and the rain had turned into a seemingly weightless vapour that clung to the lamp standards like impossibly localised mist. The river itself was invisible, whilst the lights of the south bank were little more than yellow-grey smudges in a muddy nothingness. The skyline towards Westminster would have made the perfect backdrop over which to superimpose the opening credits of one of the old Hammer horror films. There was even soundtrack music. I can't remember what it was or who was playing it. But it was probably coming from a parked car on the far bank. Muffled and tinny. Coming and going. Weird. London was a dank, dark, dreary and hopeless place where things that a moment before had been going exactly right, were suddenly going exactly wrong.

I was everywhere cold and damp. In places I was drenched. The surface moisture from the spread of branches above my hiding place; a hiding place that was now an inescapable cell - fell in large exploding droplets all around and over me. My hair clung to my scalp like a wet towel and the collar of my shirt was a sodden rag about my neck. I doubt I have ever felt so useless. I had turned my raincoat collar well up when I had abandoned the TR near the Festival Hall in favour of continuing the surveillance on foot, but in no way was that impeding the continual trickle of water that was finding its way down my neck and spine to soak, now, the waistband of my underpants.

Lewis and the stranger from whom he had accepted the envelope were now walking slowly yet inexorably down the rain-slicked pavement towards me. I could hear the soft mumble of their voices and the echoing clicking of their feet on the flag-stones above the muted sounds of a city already half asleep. The source of the soundtrack music seemed to have gone. The two conspirators had decided to pass the time of night and, whatever else it was to me personally, Lewis’s part in that decision was his second mistake of the day; his first being a diversion from the well-established routine that had underscored my previous conviction that he was totally innocent; nothing more than a victim of Burgess's twisted imagination.

Had the transaction been executed, say, on Kensington High Street, where Lewis did his almost daily shopping then I might have missed it completely. A brief brush with a stranger amongst a hundred other strangers. Furthermore, had they done it now but gone their separate ways, instead of placing me in the impossible position of having no retreat, then neither of them would be dead now. Up to their armpits in custody, maybe. But not dead.

My position was hopeless because I just could not move without being seen doing so. I had followed Lewis up that street at what had been a safe distance and there had been several other pedestrians amongst whom I had managed to lose myself to good effect. And I had felt reasonably happy about the situation when I had slipped in behind that tree to allow Lewis a slightly longer lead. I gave it about thirty seconds before venturing a look out around the trunk. But in those thirty seconds; exactly according to Sod's Law, it had all changed. The other pedestrians had vanished - God alone knew how or to where - thereby robbing me of their cover and, worse, Lewis had been joined by the stranger, who must have been waiting for him in the shadows near the steps rising to the footbridge. The pair of them had then started to walk back along the street towards me.

I saw the envelope changing hands as I snatched a glance around the tree.

And that was that. Confrontation, despite what I still maintain was a well-managed tail under the worst possible conditions.

I did, for an instant, consider a leap out over the railings and into the Thames. It would have been a radically drastic remedy. But had I been certain of continued anonymity I would have done it, and to hell with the soaking. To hell with the danger to life and limb also. But I knew I would have been seen, so I remained where I was; my stomach contracting in spasms not totally disassociated from a kind of fear and my mouth drying fast, as it usually did with the prospect of impending violence.

My next consideration was a philosophical one. If, whatever I did or did not do, the cat was definitely out of the bag, then why not try for second best? Second best ended the whole matter there and then, but at the very least the stranger, plus whatever the envelope contained, would constitute some kind of a lead; a concrete base for a continued operation. I did not like the notion but there seemed no other way to go. The power that dictates our fate had done its thing. So I swallowed my disappointment and reached for the gun under my belt.

*

Watch his every move, Burgess had instructed me, Check everything he does, everywhere he goes and everyone he meets against his entries in the computer P.D.B. (Personal Day Book). If, nay, when you find the discrepancy, prise it open. Dig into it. The worms that'll crawl out will be bait for a month. You mark my words. He aimed a manicured finger at the file case he had just handed me. Run the same checks on that load of garbage. It's a compendium of his Immediate and General files. Run it all through the computer. And keep at it until you find the flaw.

The, ah, the flaw is in here then, is it, sir? I flipped a thumbnail over the wad of pages. More than in something the man is likely to get up to in the future?

Burgess clucked his tongue, his face a nice mixture of agitation, annoyance and impatience. The flaw, he growled darkly, is in his character. I want you to supply the nuts and bolts evidence.

Unusually, we were not in Burgess's office next to St. James’ Park. We were in a top floor bedroom of an S.A.S. safe-house in Willesden. Outside, the weather was overcast and dull with sporadic spatters of heavy rain. Inside, it was positively depressing. The furnishings could not have been more sparse or ill-matching and the wallpaper had grey ducks on it. There were no carpets, anywhere in the house, just bare boards. Gloom.

Burgess had on a black overcoat and a Homburg that he wore well down over his forehead. He fitted the surroundings perfectly.

I had switched on one of the bedside lamps but whoever took care of the place must have been on an economy drive because the bulb, I took pains to note, was 25 watts; barely enough light to cast shadows; certainly not enough to illuminate the subtleties of Burgess's expression, and I wonder now if he had not planned it that way. If the bulb had been more powerful I might, even then, have noticed the faint glimmer, the first beginnings of the very real fear and confusion his eyes were to display so obviously later on. I might have noticed these things, but I doubt very much I would have recognised them for what they were.

Burgess was a hundred complex things, most of them distasteful, but a man capable of being confused, of experiencing fear, he most definitely was not. These were things he cultivated in others. Besides, Burgess never, but never, allowed the truth as he saw it that kind of an outlet. The truth was for him alone and let the rest of the world take care of itself.

Donald Burgess was cast-iron. Cold, diamond-hard and, for my money, totally depersonalised cast-iron. His displays of emotion were never anything but a facade. And too many years of my standing in front of his desk, watching his face go through its motions as he instructed me to finalise agent-A, or compromise agent-B, or bring about the public ruination, by whatever means, of agent-C or public figure-D, had taught me to accept such displays of emotion in the spirit in which they had been perpetrated. Namely, with the proverbial pinch of salt.

A team of dedicated men would have scoured the grey world of Intelligence for just such a man as Burgess. A man who could sense deceit, see through the lie, who could find the obvious in the not-so-obvious. A man who would devote himself, body and soul, to the allotted task. For such men are needed; mandatory even.

Burgess, as well as running a viable 'cover' section, excelled in all these things.

To my mind his single concession to human frailty was a capacity to dislike an individual for no apparent reason. And this, it seemed to me, he did more and more often as the years ate into him. And God help you if you were unlucky enough to find yourself on the receiving end of his dislike. At which point, a few minutes later, I was to assume Edward Lewis had arrived.

''But you must have something on him already,'' I said, ''Something to indicate a suspicion. A starting point?'' I added hopefully.

Burgess stepped over to the window and stared out at the glowering sky. ''Now look, Ryderbeit,'' he said conversationally, using my given name instead of my code name for once. Burgess never called me Jackie. Or even Jackson, which was my first name. Didi, being someone rather closer to me than anyone else in the service. called me Jay. I called her Dee, or Didi, depending upon prevailing circumstances. …I’m putting you on this case because I can think of no-one more suited to it. Nothing else concerns you. He grunted as if satisfied that he’d used the right phrase, then continued, You have the file, get on with it. Use the computer as much as you need. Scour the records departments; you have all the authority you require. For the round-town work you may use C-11 as back-up. I have already cleared that with the appropriate authority. All you have to remember is that this is classified 'Eyes-only' A Pause. Yours.'' He turned abruptly, ''And mine.'' His tone was no longer conversational. ''No-one, absolutely no-one must come into contact with the fine details of it. For the record you are lnternal Security. This also has been cleared. And the restrictions, if you need be reminded, include other members of the section. Especially them! He stared at me for a moment. ''And,'' he added, his eyelids falling like roll-down doors, Miss Dianne Seabrook.

Ah, I said weakly. I was not surprised that Burgess had found out that Didi was now living with me on the boat, but I was disappointed. I had found a great deal of perverse satisfaction in that little secret. But before I could dwell further on the possible ramifications of Burgess's not-so-minor bombshell, he went on, Dig and watch, Ryderbeit. Dig and watch. You'll find your own starting point, I feel sure.

It was at that moment of confusion on my part that several of my more latent instincts joined force, sinking like dirty water to the natural level - the level where it became a pleasure, if not a duty, to take the opposing stance to the one Burgess was taking. His face was now bland as he stepped forward into the arcing beam of the 25 watter and he refused to meet my eye. And a refusal to meet the eye meant that lies were in the air somewhere. Couple this with the fact that he appeared, by his very abstinence from the subject, to be actually condoning my living with a member of M.I.5 – Five, as it is known - then add the fact that he failed for the very first time to supply me with any kind of a reason why he would want, in this case, a member of the Covert Activities Administration of M.I.6 – Six, - placed under close surveillance, and you have the reason why I slipped all too easily into the role of Champion Of The Underdog. Burgess, I reasoned, was out to get this man, and for purely personal reasons. It had happened before. Some relatively innocent skeleton - and let's face it, we all have one or more of those buried somewhere - and Bob's your uncle. One otherwise patriotic and innocent field officer bites the dust at Burgess's heels, simply because the man's face did not fit into his scheme of things, or because he had made a pass at his current office floozy, or something equally as ridiculous.

Yes, there was definitely a touch of McCarthyism in Burgess. A surfeit of near unbridled power can put that into the strongest of men. Take Hitler as a prime example. Or Nero. Or Saddam Hussein. Any one of these, or a hundred others throughout history, may well have started life as very nice people.

So it was that when I began the brief a lot of me was already cheering for Lewis. I was determined to give it my very best shot in the sincere, if spur-of-the-moment belief that nothing worthwhile was going to turn up. And I was looking forward to the moment when I could rub Burgess's thickening nose in Lewis’s clean bill of health.

I got together with the C-11 coordinator, a weaselly man with a bony forehead and a permanent grouse, and we hammered out a path to some kind of an understanding whereby I had instant and unquestioned access to any one or all of six operatives at any given moment. But it was no walkover.

Stretching us bloody thin,'' the man complained, as if the whole thing had been my idea. We’ve already got every available man out searching the shadows for Al Qaeda sympathisers.''

I nodded. "It never rains but it pours.'' A pedestrian remark for a pedestrian man.

Plus, he went on urgently, There's a - ' Hesitation.’ - a major event to be catered for.

He was referring to King Hussein of Jordan's stopover, which was one of the big secrets of the day. For global consumption it wasn't even taking place. But, as generally happens, the extent of common knowledge is directly proportionate to the size of the secret. And that one was a monster. I shrugged. ''That's all we seem to have these days.''

The Weasel frowned a puzzled frown at me.

''Major events. '' I qualified.

He hmmm’d, looked at me sideways for a moment, then returned to the list. ''And do you know how much all this will cost the taxpayer?'' he suddenly digressed, pinching the bridge of his nose with Meccano fingers and closing his eyes tightly as if all the troubles of the world were being heaped on his overworked shoulders. ''A small fortune…A..bloody...small...''

''Fortune,'' I finished for him. ''Yes. I know. I’ll need your guys’ mobile numbers, just in case. But I won’t be using mobiles as a first option on this one. Burgess did not allow cell phone communications for sharp-end business. Certainly not on ops. Such was too prone to global, even random, interception. So we’ll use radios. Short wave. That okay?"

He treated me to an old fashioned look. Naturally. He curled up the corners of his mouth. Bloody mobile phones!

I let that remark lie. Now, about protocol…

We rambled on and finally had all the daylight hours more or less covered. For the role of night watchman he gave me the names of a couple of ex-C11 men who were now variously employed in the private security field. These men, he explained, were specialists in night work and noted for their blank memories. I knew one of the men, as it happened; or rather I had known him some years before, so was not averse to the suggestion. Diversification always helps when you need a smokescreen operation. Then we got onto the subject of radio codes and responses. That was a hoot. The man loved codes. Eventually I had a list of silly things to say over the radio, when to say them, and what I might expect to hear by way of reply. The idea was that no-one ever knew who he was speaking to, or why. Except me.

This way'' said the Weasel with commendable neutrality, as he scanned his own copies, they’ll be totally in the dark the whole time. Frustrated as hell, of course.'' He chuckled. "But these things can't be helped. Can they?''

Nope, I replied, ''They can't.''

We tied it all up and parted on amicable enough terms.

Almost two leeks later, to the minute, I was staring at my reflection in a wall mirror in the Festival Hall restaurant, groaning silently, and trying to persuade myself that I did not look ridiculous.

The man in the mirror was wearing thick horn-rimmed spectacles and a moustache that I hoped only I knew was false. His hair was parted high on his head and held in place courtesy of Didi’s hair spray. Below all this was a baggy roll-neck sweater that an old flame with a bad eye for measurement had knitted me some ten years before and that we had both once inhabited for a giggle, and which now covered a perfectly respectable business suit complete with button-down collar and grey tie. On top of all this was a threadbare duffel coat, circa '83, that I had picked up in some Oxfam shop. Not seen in the mirror was a pair of even older vintage galoshes over my shoes. God alone knows where Didi had dragged them up from. I used to make jokes about people who perpetrated this kind of comic opera stuff on the profession. Which was one in the eye for me, because it was actually working.

I had been on Lewis's tail for nigh on two weeks, mornings to late evenings; weekends notwithstanding, in an assortment of odd guises - most of them creations of Didi’s over-fertile imagination - and he was still oblivious to the fact. But this was no real surprise. Despite the pantomime trappings I was still harbouring the conviction; the steadily deepening conviction, that Lewis was totally innocent. For only an innocent man could have failed to sense such close and determined surveillance.

Intuition; a sixth sense. Call it what you will. But a man with something to hide will always look behind him; over and over again. And hard, in a case such as Lewis's might have been. But Edward Lewis was not looking behind him. I was rock-bottom certain of that. And it made me feel very happy indeed.

Right now he was sitting four tables away from me, picking a steady path through a plate of cottage pie and chips. I had settled for coffee and a sticky bun. I took another despairing glance at the apparition in the mirror then returned to a careful knife and fork dissection of the bun, which oozed strawberry jam like something on a vivisectionist's bench.

They were playing an old Mantovani track over the Muzak system; cascading strings and clattering utensils. It was the kind of unobtrusive, subliminally-soothing background music you might hear in a hotel lobby or a supermarket not yet managed by a growing number of eternal teenagers. What drew my attention to it now was that it did not sound right. The reason being that a middle aged man dressed in an evening suit and bow tie was crooning a soft, somewhat embarrassed ‘Happy Birthday’ to the woman sitting opposite him at the corner table. He and Mantovani were at loggerheads over the key- and time-signature. The woman, also in evening wear, was apparently revelling in the attention. Both had to be something to do with the current performance in the Festival Hall itself; a break in dress rehearsals, or something. Lewis glanced over his shoulder at them, smiled the way you might, then continued eating. I was reminded of Dorothy Burgess. She had a birthday coming up soon. I knew this because Pete Yance had been bemoaning Burgess' instruction to ''dash out and buy her something appropriate.'' Pete was Burgess's whipping boy for such last minute gift purchases. He, Pete, called Dorothy Burgess The Dragon. I knew little of her, except that she and Burgess were almost the same age - 54 and 53 respectively. I could not see Burgess as a family man. And perhaps he was not. There were no children that I knew of and Burgess certainly spent more time roaming the various Intelligence offices than he did at home.

I forgot about Dorothy Burgess and glanced at my watch.

It registered 1-05. So Lewis had 25 minutes of his self- imposed, self-selected lunch hour remaining. Then, if true to form, it would be back to Century House - the ''Six'' H.Q. in Battersea - and I could relax a little; if ploughing through a file in the driving seat of a car can be termed relaxing.

A few minutes later I paid my bill and stepped outside, totally ignoring the stranger who appeared in every reflective surface I passed.

It was unusual weather for October. The sun cut a gaping white hole out of an ice-blue sky and people were smiling at each other. Had it not been for the fact that in the shadows it was cold - bitter even - then I would have felt even more out of place in my multi-layered get-up. But it was good to see the sun and a clear sky after the prolonged spell of grey and dismal London and the Home Counties had just dragged muddy feet through. Except for the ice-box of the shadowed areas and that the trees along the Embankment were shedding brown leaves by the sack-full it might have been a spring morning instead of an autumn afternoon.

I sucked in a lungful of air and glanced in the window of the restaurant, where I could just see Lewis counting change into the cashier's hand. I strode out to where I had parked the motor pool Volvo; one of three cars I had dotted about in west London. By the time I reached it the spectacles were in the duffle coat pocket and the duffel coat was over my arm. The moustache, supplied by a highly amused but a carefully un-smiling J-Division officer, was in my pants pocket and I was ready to shrug out of the roll neck sweater; which I did the moment I was behind the wheel. Some hefty comb-work took care of the hair style. Lewis, I could see, was by now unlocking the door of his Audi which was parked on its usual spot on the corner of Belvedere Road. There being no pedestrians nearby who might see what I was doing, I lifted the microphone of The Weasel's S/W transceiver and pressed the transmit button.

''Passer By...passer By...You there, Charlie-one?''

The response was immediate. ''Vanity Fair...vanity Fair...Charlie One responding. In position and ready to move."

Conscientious, this one, by the tone of his voice. Also in his tone, I read anticipation of an exciting cat and mouse game. He would be disappointed; as they all had been so far.

Grey Audi,'' I said, keeping my own tone flat and bored-sounding, ''Licence KVM 377 W...Male Caucasian at the wheel...No passengers at the moment. It’ll be a milk run, Charlie- One. Belvedere Road heading west in a few minutes. No panic at all.

Oh, said the voice resignedly, and it repeated the relevant part of my instruction word perfectly, adding, Wilco.

I dropped the mic onto the passenger seat and fired up the engine. Lewis's Audi was already on the move. Three minutes later I saw the unmarked Rover of Charlie-one slide in behind Lewis, but holding back and allowing a couple of motors to fill the gap. Copy book.

"Got it, control.'' said the radio.

Okay, I replied, ''Sorry it's nothing interesting. Maybe next time, eh?''

The voice said, ''Story my life. Oh, if you’re somewhere behind us I'd better warn you there's an accident on Carlisle Lane. Just heard about it. Snarling things up. If you want to get in front I'd do it pretty sharpish.''

I said, "No, thanks all the same, Charlie-one. I’ll just kick around back here. Rushing gives me heartburn.''

''Fair enough'' replied the voice, "I’ll keep you informed if I hear any more. They say sixteen year old virgins are good for heartburn.''

I smiled. I did not stay behind. I crossed the river via Westminster Bridge and dodgemed my way around the Houses and onto St.Margaret's Road. Then I powered along Abingdon Road, teeing people off left right and centre, and very nearly coming a cropper in a four wheel drift that was becoming a regular feature of my driving lately, and onto Millbank after sneaking a highly illegal passage through the build-up of southbound traffic at the bridge intersection, eventually recrossing the river via Vauxhall Bridge. A spit later I was pulling onto Nine Elms Lane where I teed even more people off with some driving that only a late-night drunk might purvey. The radio remained predictably silent.

I parked the Volvo in Cringle Street, removing only the radio and my 35mm camera, locked up and dashed to my own TR3 which I had left in the adjoining Kirtling Street that morning. Snatching the parking tickets from under the screen wiper blades was an art I had off pat. Fixing them was someone else's headache. I was back on the road inside two minutes. I had reached Wandsworth Road roundabout when the radio squawked, Control…Charlie-one calling.

I put the mic to my mouth, at the same time prising off and kicking to one side the galoshes I had forgotten about in the Volvo. You can’t get it all right all of the time. Which was one of the reasons why my disguises were never exactly the way Didi envisaged them. Without raising my tone to the question, I said, Yes, Charlie-one. Wandsworth Road headed east. Right?

Correct,'' came the terse reply. Human curiosity being what it is, even in seasoned C11 operators, the man would have had one eye glued to his own rear view mirror in the hope of catching a glimpse of this nameless, faceless entity - me - that had the power to disrupt, apparently unilaterally, the smooth-running of the C11 world and everything in it, and at a time when, according to The Weasel, they were already stretched bloody thin. He would have been sure that no-one had stayed visibly behind him, and equally sure that no-one was lurking up ahead - these people are experts in spotting tails in any direction - and he would be wondering how the hell the voice on the other end of the frequency could possibly know where they were at that moment. But what the man could not add to his equation was that this was Wednesday – Lewis’s Wednesday. His day for picking up his fishing magazine from his favourite Smith's on Wandsworth Road. The voice continued, Subject is pulling over...stopping."

Right I said evenly, ''Stay back.''

A few moments silence. Entering Smith’s bookshop, opposite –

The Red Lion pub I slipped in as I heard his mic click off, probably as he was leaning over to take a look.

As you remark. the said the voice dryly.

I put my foot down and positively zoomed along York Road, taking the corner of Fairfield Street almost on two wheels. I pulled up close to the traffic lights of East Hill and waited, collecting a justly deserved share of horn blasts from other road users who felt they were also entitled to utilise the facility of the lights. I very nearly gave one of them the two’s up, but stopped myself in time; instead I mouthed him a contrite ''Sorry.'' And I meant it. I like to kid myself that I dislike people who misuse their power, and it is a salutary lesson for me to learn that, if I let myself go, I can be as bad as the next man. Provided, of course that the next man is not Donald Burgess. Then again, who really knows how far they are capable of letting themselves go, if the situation allows it.

I stayed where I was, weathering the angry glances as the half dozen or so motors sneaked past me as best they could.

Subject on the move again.

Fine. I said flatly, which probably irritated the man even more, though I had not meant it to. The radio did not respond.

And here came Lewis’s Audi. The mic was already in my hand. "Okay, Charlie-one. Break off. And thanks very much for your cooperation. I have the con.''

''Break off?" spluttered the voice incredulously.

''That's a Roger," I grinned tightly. ''Break off. He's mine now. Go have a coffee or something.''

I did not hear the man's sigh, but I sensed it. Then, in a now totally bored voice, he said, ''Very well, Control. Breaking off. Out."

Lewis's Audi crossed diagonally in front of me, followed shortly afterward by the Rover, which actually turned down the road I was on and I caught a glimpse of a very sour faced man behind the wheel. I lifted my foot from the clutch pedal and burned rubber to make the lights, which had just flicked to amber and red. The time was 1-30 precisely and Lewis would be late back at his section office. Not that that mattered a damn to anyone but Lewis himself, and why it mattered to him I will never know. Edward Lewis could come and go as he pleased. All that was required of him was that he recorded his movements; date, time and venues, on the computer. Otherwise he was his own man.

Whatever else he may have been, Lewis was fastidious in his self-imposed habits and a damn sight too conscientious for him to be really popular in a business that, despite the rules, thrives on corner-cutting and rule-bending.

None of which, however, made him a traitor. And, besides, now that there was no iron curtain to complicate matters, I could not imagine who a man like him would possibly find to sell his services to in any case. On the surface anyway the old enemies were dead. There would be others, no doubt about that. But who? And when?

Whatever maggots would crawl out of the future woodwork Edward Lewis was not a candidate. I was certain of that.

At six-o-clock I tailed him back to his Holland Park Road flat and at ten-thirty I handed him over to the night watchman. Situation exactly normal.

Then I went home.

TWO

The thing about my boat was that I'd done 90% of the structural conversion work myself and was proud of the fact. I had paid a little over £6,000 for her as she sat; and she sat as a fishing lugger, sixty feet stem to stern and close to twenty midships. Which made her a ''beamy'' boat. I had bought her up in Great Yarmouth and sailed her down to the Thames myself; which feat, I now realise, was a stupid and foolhardy thing to tackle, me being a total novice at that time. Her previous owners, two brothers whose father and grandfather before them had been North Sea fishermen, had named her ''Our Emily". Their father had simply used the fleet number - F1O2.

Out of respect for something I could not put my finger on I decided to retain the name. Only a fear of being thought pretentious stopped me from putting the number on the shore-side mail box. River people, I