John said, “It’s a delicate business, looking after the Service’s old-timers. I have to take into account their needs, their situations, their psychological—”

“Bullshit.”

Well, precisely, thought John. Their psychological bullshit.

“Benny Manors isn’t some traumatised asset still having nightmares about his weeks behind the Wall. He’s a small-time housebreaker and blackmail artiste who, if he hadn’t had his leg smashed up on a one-night stand for the Park, would almost certainly have had his dick caught in someone else’s mousetrap by now, except that way we wouldn’t be paying for his cornflakes. So when he told you about his needs, you should have told him about his obligations. Among which was keeping the Service informed of his whereabouts. And that would be you, John. In this very minor instance, you represent the Service.”

From over by the door, a snorting noise reminded John that Richard was still in the room.

“And yet, you have fucked up. Fucked up, John. And while that is nothing new in your long and unillustrious career, it puts me in an embarrassing situation, and that, let me make clear, is something new. And to make it even more humiliating, I now find myself in the demeaning position of looking to you to extricate myself from this embarrassment.”

“. . . Yes.”

“You still haven’t got the hang of this, have you? That wasn’t a question.”

Edward leaned back, which struck John as mildly dangerous. These chairs weren’t made for cavalier posturing. But mostly what he was thinking was, this wasn’t as bad as he’d feared. If he was required to do something, that meant being allowed to walk out of this room in order to do it. Moreover, whatever this was about, it wasn’t about Solly. It wasn’t about him living in dead Solly’s Service flat, which—the shock of a dawn collection notwithstanding—was far more crucial to John’s well-being than any minor fuck-up he might have made regarding Benny bloody Manors. Because if the Solly business came up he not only wouldn’t have the flat any more, he wouldn’t have a job either. And this wasn’t a world waiting with open arms to find future prospects for John Bachelors. It was a world waiting to crush them under its unforgiving heel.

“So, let’s start with the confession. Because there’s always a confession, John, we both know that. Let’s start with why you let Benny Manors wander away like a kid at a fairground, without ever putting it on a report.”

He could have lied, but John Bachelor had told enough lies in his life to know when one was likely to haul him out of the mud and when one would step on his head. So he told the truth: about that first meeting in King’s Cross, which had ended with Benny punching him in the face and him falling off his stool with a bloody nose. And about what Benny had said when he’d joined him outside in the sunshine; about how he planned to make it up.