I= They Ate the Truth 9

I have to look at my squashed bugs properly, so I move around them
lightly, trying not to tread on them, although it is too late for
niceties. Everything has gone sour, I can feel the pink little ducts in
the corners of my eyes start to swell and sting, like that one summer
when I was fifteen that I had hay fever.

What I find doesn't please me. Obviously the bugs are dead, and
although this is the third death I've seen today it is still painful to
be so close to it, but what I'm looking for is to see if any of them
fed before they were squished, I'm looking for swollen bellies, insects
that look like bubble-wrap.

None of these bugs have eaten.

Which means that whoever killed them had no guilt for them to feast on.
He couldn't have been too quick for them, I've seen my fellows operate
and they're too quick for any human. This observation leads me to one
conclusion. Whoever killed my bugs was either a nun, or more likely, a
licensed handler.

It isn't safe for me to be here. I don't know if this was Alastair's
doing (not him personally, I know he had stuff inside him that the bugs
wanted, but someone he works with), or someone from the other side, the
people who sent the boy to kill Lorrie. I don't even know for certain
that there is another side. Maybe there's just one side. One side and
then me and Lorrie.

I write Rachael a cheque for three months wages and a note that says,
"Sorry, I'm having to bail on you again. Three months pay and the job
is still yours when I come back. "

I really have no idea why she came back to work for me the first time,
after I walked out on the business to go away - firstly to Japan and
then after I'd seen Mount Fuji, to pursue my real dream and go up to
the Bearing Straits, to spend time with the icebergs and the bears.
Rachael is too bright to stick with the job I give her, I guess she
must just be curious about the people who come in and the stories I
tell her about their lives.

After that, I open my desk drawer and take out a golf ball, dropping it
into my pocket. I have a feeling that I'm going to need that kind of
inspiration over the next few days.

Lorrie can see that I'm troubled when I go out, more troubled than
watching someone shoot a teenaged boy or lifting a body into a car. I
tell her that the boys are all dead and that my office is all smashed
up.

She puts a fist to her mouth, as though she wants to stop it up, put a
barrier there to anything coming in or out. She comes over to me and
just holds me while I cry a little onto her hair. I'm not proud of it,
but I don't do much crying. Those boys and me have been together a fair
time now and have seen some things.

"What now ? " she says.

I tell her that I'd thought about being a doctor, once. It's true. It
was during my days studying medicine that I became an alcoholic and had
to drop out of university. The detective thing is all my father's
fault. Him and his books.

Talking about this reminds me that she had spoken about wanting to be a
teacher.

"What is it you do for a living? " I ask her.

She gets this look on her face, like she's searching for the
information. It is so beautiful. A look I never get and never tire of
seeing, but this is in the purest form. She is looking and may never
find. It is a little like waiting for a webpage to download, seeing the
numbers flash, but not being sure what will come up or even if it will
work at all. I love the unpredictability of the net. If they made it
certain it would lose most of its charm.

"I have no idea, " she says, "I remember an office, vaguely. White
everywhere, very clean. Doors that I had to put a card in to open.
People in it, saying hello to them while drinking coffee, reading
files, eating cream cakes, going to someone's leaving do, people buying
me drinks, lots of drinks. Certain people I can recall, but not the
sort of work I was involved in. I remember seeing Johann's face on a
screen. Maybe I was in the lab, a research assistant? "

"We've got to get out of here, " I say, "I doubt it'll be safe to go
back to my place and yours is definitely out of the question. How much
ready cash can you lay your hands on?"

She goes over to the car, reaches into her handbag. Purse I am
thinking, gun I am thinking. It's an envelope, a bank statement. Lorrie
hands it to me.

One hundred and sixty eight thousand pounds in her current
account.

I whistle softly and say, "You can't afford to be a primary school
teacher. Where did you get this money?"

She shrugs, but not dismissively. It is my turn to get my hair cried
on. She weeps out of anger and frustration, of not knowing who she
is.

"I thought I didn't care, " she says, "Fresh start. Wipe everything out
and just be me, just Lorrie. Instead I feel like I got out of the
shower sweaty. "

I know how she feels. I tell her what I learned about the person who
killed the bugs.

"Someone like you? " she says.

I shake my head and say, "There are two recognised routes to becoming a
bug-handler, making sure you've got no guilt, so the bugs won't turn on
you. One is to have nothing to hide, to be blameless. And the second is
to simply not give a damn about anything you've ever done, to regard
all of your actions as justified. "

She looks at me, with deep eyes, smudged from crying, "I don't think
you're either of those things. You have regrets or you wouldn't drink.
And I don't think you're uncaring. "

We need to get out of here, so I wrap this up, "I found a third way. I
spent three months living in the cold, up near the North Pole, living
as simple as I could get. I just froze off everything that happened up
till then - I still remember it, but I just decided that it happened to
someone else, that I didn't care that it was me. I guess I'm thawing.
"

A hotel is the best idea, if we pay cash. We need to ditch the car,
too. Quite apart from there being a body in the boot, it is too
distinctive and there might be any number of tracking devices inside
it. Anyone looking for me or the car will come to the office, so I may
as well leave the car nearby. I don't want Alastair to be in that boot
longer than he has to be. I want him found by people who will know who
he is and what needs to be done, not by some kids in a weeks time,
hoping that there's a camera in the boot they can sell on.

I take the gun out of the glove compartment and Lorrie does the same
with hers, slipping it into her handbag. I wonder if Alastair has any
more bullets, there are only four left in my clip. I tell Lorrie that I
need to check something in the boot and find the extra clip in his
inside jacket pocket. I really wish I'd been able to shut his eyes when
I tried before. It seems wrong them being open. I find a pair of
sunglasses in the glove compartment and put them on him. I think he
would have liked that, if he had to wind up a corpse, to be in
shades.

As we walk to the tube station, something stirs in me. His last words.
I hadn't given them a lot of thought, I've been busy reacting and
eating curry.

"He said something, " I say to Lorrie, "Alastair, before he died.
"

She doesn't break her stride, her shoes make the most delicious noise
on the pavement, fresh and precise like someone biting into an apple on
an advert. "I don't even know who Alastair is?was, " she says, "You
haven't told me. "

"A spy, of sorts, " I say, "Some sort of counter-terrorism thing. I
don't really know much about it. I know he trained to be a bug-handler
but failed the tests. He made them jump too much. He came to my office
yesterday, tried to? I'm not sure if it was threaten me, warn me, or
just to make contact. Hard to say. "

She puts out her hand and I hold it without feeling self-conscious.
Usually I have to look around to see if there are any groups of young
men who will laugh and try to provoke a fight, before holding hands
with a woman. I ought to feel stupid, paranoid - particularly given
that we might be followed, but instead I just feel dumb and happy. Not
a bad combination, as the usual alternative is clever and
miserable.

"He said, God Save the Queen, " I say to her, as her fingers squeeze
mine, "What does that mean to you?"

She chews her bottom lip, "Not sure. Anthem, jubilee, long to reign
over us? Maybe he was just, you know, acknowledging that he was dying
in service of Queen and country, the patriotic bit. "

"No, " I say, "He said specifically that he wanted to go out like a
spy, saying something cryptic. I think he wanted to help us. It fits.
His boss would have trained him to be cryptic to the very end. It's in
his nature. "

"You know his boss? " she asks, "Is he someone who can help?"

"Maybe, " I say, "He's dangerous though. I really wouldn't trust him,
and I don't think I can manage him. Chesterton's a real piece of work.
"

My shoulder jars, because we aren't matching strides anymore and she
still has hold of my hand. She has stopped walking. I turn to look at
her.

"Chesterton ? " she asks, "Plump man, eyes always working the room,
very patronising ?"

"That's him, " I say.

"That's my old boss, " she says, "Whatever I did for a living, I was
doing it for him. "