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Back A Change of Circumstance Save as PDF
Chapters (67)
  1. Cover
  2. One
  3. Two
  4. Three
  5. Four
  6. Five
  7. Six
  8. Seven
  9. Eight
  10. Nine
  11. Ten
  12. Eleven
  13. Twelve
  14. Thirteen
  15. Fourteen
  16. Fifteen
  17. Sixteen
  18. Seventeen
  19. Eighteen
  20. Nineteen
  21. Twenty
  22. Twenty-One
  23. Twenty-Two
  24. Twenty-Three
  25. Twenty-Four
  26. Twenty-Five
  27. Twenty-Six
  28. Twenty-Seven
  29. Twenty-Eight
  30. Twenty-Nine
  31. Thirty
  32. Thirty-One
  33. Thirty-Two
  34. Thirty-Three
  35. Thirty-Four
  36. Thirty-Five
  37. Thirty-Six
  38. Thirty-Seven
  39. Thirty-Eight
  40. Thirty-Nine
  41. Forty
  42. Forty-One
  43. Forty-Two
  44. Forty-Three
  45. Forty-Four
  46. Forty-Five
  47. Forty-Six
  48. Forty-Seven
  49. Forty-Eight
  50. Forty-Nine
  51. Fifty
  52. Fifty-One
  53. Fifty-Two
  54. Fifty-Three
  55. Fifty-Four
  56. Fifty-Five
  57. Fifty-Six
  58. Fifty-Seven
  59. Fifty-Eight
  60. Fifty-Nine
  61. Sixty
  62. Sixty-One
  63. Sixty-Two
  64. Sixty-Three
  65. Sixty-Four
  66. Sixty-Five
  67. Sixty-Six

Vince shook his head. ‘Here, watch it, come out of there like a charging bull. No reason I should give you my name that I know of.’

But the ginger one was waving a torch in front of his face.

‘Don’t know him. What you doing here?’

‘None of yours.’

‘C’mon, let’s get out of it.’

‘He’s seen us, he’d know us.’

‘So? What’s he going to say to who?’

Ginger shone the torch again, this time directly into Vince’s eyes. ‘Listen up, shitface. You weren’t here, we weren’t here, you didn’t see nothing.’ He made a dive for Vince’s phone but missed.

‘Back off.’

‘You stop there until we’re out of the way and you don’t hear us no more and then you bugger off home.’

And their car doors slammed and they were gone.

Forty-Four

It never took long for the quiet and calm of his apartment to smooth Simon‘s frayed edges and restore his mood. Now, he stood with a vodka and tonic looking out over the empty Cathedral Close, relishing the prospect of an evening by himself. The last of the snow had thawed, but the grass was still frosted over and sheened silver in the moonlight. A Bach cello suite was playing, he had a sirloin steak to move quickly round a red-hot pan, and John le Carré's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy to reread. Crime writing had never attracted him, even the old-school classic detective story, being too close to the day job, and he had come late to spy fiction, but had been hooked by the first he had read. The only trouble was that whereas crime novels had spawned by their thousand during recent years, spy stories were still thin on the ground, but rereading the master, along with an occasional replay of the televised versions, was fine until a new genius came along, and he was keeping a close eye out for another episode from Mick Herron’s anti-hero Jackson Lamb in his run-down department of espionage situated on the wrong side of the tracks.