Shockwave, p.3
Shockwave, page 3
I jogged from Waterloo station to the broad stone steps in front of the gallery to make sure I was there first, but he’d beaten me to it. As I was looking for somewhere dry and out of the way to put myself, he tapped me on the shoulder. ‘Hi there, Jack.’
I spun around, hot from the jog, wet from the rain, and annoyed to have been jumped like that.
‘It’s good to see you again,’ he said, reaching out and patting me on the shoulder. ‘Shall we go inside?’ he asked, nodding at the gallery entrance, ‘and get out of the rain?’
I can’t explain why, but every bone in my body ached with the urge not to go along with him. I didn’t like that he’d touched me, and I wanted to insist we stayed outside, rain or no rain. Something about the guy just didn’t seem right, but I felt compelled to do as he asked. An irresistible force pulled me after him as he turned and headed swiftly up the slick steps.
In Somalia he’d worn khaki and looked like a soldier. Today he was in jeans, trainers and a waxed jacket with the collar turned up. He seemed younger and more athletic. I hurried to keep up with him as he strode between the huge stone pillars of the massive entrance porch. We could have stopped there to talk – the checked tile floor was sheltered from the rain – but he walked into the museum. He didn’t stop when he got inside either. You don’t have to pay to go into the National Gallery. With a nod to the attendant, he strode on, trailing me in his wake. He didn’t slow down until we reached a huge picture of a horse rearing up on its hind legs. There was a long leather bench in the middle of the room. Armfield sat on it and motioned for me to join him. I did so, at a distance.
‘I’m pleased you decided to meet me,’ he said.
His eyes were grey and clear; it felt like he could see inside me. I had to look away.
‘What has your mother told you about me?’ he asked, his voice low. ‘Let’s start there, shall we?’
I stared at the rearing horse. The veins were visible in its raised forelegs; its haunches pulsed with power; there was an untameable madness in its glinting eye. I wasn’t about to let this man dictate everything. Instead of answering his question, I turned to face him again and asked one of my own. ‘What are you doing for GreenSword Investments?’
He blinked once.
I followed up immediately with, ‘And while we’re at it, what were you really doing in Somalia?’
‘I hoped I’d explained that in my letter,’ he said.
He’d ignored my first question and didn’t elaborate on his answer to the second.
‘You gave an explanation of sorts,’ I said. ‘It was pretty vague.’
‘It was the truth. I was working to shut down child-soldiering camps like the one you got yourself caught up in, run by General Sir.’
‘By buying kids from him and sending them off to war?’
He sighed and ran his fingers through his short brown hair. ‘Come on, Jack, what are we really here to talk about?’
‘That,’ I said simply, and looked back at the horse. It was so lifelike, yet the painter hadn’t included any background. There was no rider, no saddle, no bridle; the horse was alone, rearing up in infinite space.
‘What can I do to prove it to you?’ he said gently.
‘You can give me more detail. Who were you working for, for example?’
‘Why does that matter?’
‘Because it does. In the same way that I want to know what you’re doing for GreenSword Investments now. I want to know who you are and what you do.’
‘I thought we were here …’ he began, then tailed off, shook his head and looked from me to the painting. A Japanese couple had stopped to look at it too. They were wearing identical trousers – the sort that zip off at the knee to become shorts. They were also wearing headphones, no doubt listening to a recorded tour that explained who had painted the horse, when and why. I wouldn’t have minded knowing myself. Was Armfield pausing because he didn’t want to be overheard? The headphones made the chance of that pretty unlikely. I sat there listening to the hush, taking in the floor-polish smell, waiting.
Eventually he said, ‘OK. I’m an intelligence and security contractor. Way back in history I trained with and worked for the British government, but now I work for myself. Which means I have many varied clients. In Somalia I was helping a Swiss charity. GreenSword is an entirely different job. I’m impressed that you found out about my involvement with them, by the way. It’s pretty recent. They’re an interesting new outfit looking to invest in energy projects. The stakes are high in that world. There are some tricky situations to negotiate. As there were in Somalia, I think you’ll agree. That’s the only link between the two jobs. I take on challenging projects I believe in: that’s about it.’
His face was open and friendly and his voice was low and warm as he gave this explanation. Why then couldn’t I trust him? The stuff he’d said about the Swiss charity was the only news to me. He’d told me less about GreenSword than I already knew. He’d not specified where these energy projects were or mentioned sustainability, for example.
I looked back at the painting. Although it was utterly realistic the painter had in fact blurred the horse’s outline in places, ever so slightly. It was rock solid, utterly still, and somehow, at the same time, moving.
‘What’s the Nordic next-generation power project about?’ I asked.
He puffed out his cheeks. ‘Wow, you really have done your research,’ he said. ‘To be honest, I don’t have a lot of detail yet. The client is in the early stages of investigating opportunities in that region.’
That hardly seemed likely. From messages Xander had hacked, I knew that Armfield was booked on a flight to Helsinki the following week. He wouldn’t be setting off without knowing what he was going to do, would he? I looked back at the painting, at the panicked eye and flared nostrils of the rearing horse, the electricity in its muscles. The thing radiated strength.
‘It’s good, isn’t it?’ Armfield said.
I glanced at him and saw he was indeed looking at the painting. He went on. ‘Apparently George Stubbs – the painter – showed the picture to the horse, who was called Whistlejacket, and when Whistlejacket saw it he reared up to fight. He must have seen the picture of himself as a rival stallion or something.’
‘Huh.’
‘Legend has it that the painting was intended to end up as a portrait of King George III. He was supposed to be sitting on top of Whistlejacket or holding his reins, and the pair of them were to be set against a rural landscape. But when the horse reacted as it did to the painting, the rich guy who commissioned it was so impressed that he told Stubbs to put down his brushes and hang it up just as it was.’
‘So, it’s unfinished.’
‘If the story is true, yes. Either way, I like the painting as it is.’
Despite myself, I nodded. Had he planned to bring me here to see this particular artwork? Was Whistlejacket supposed to represent something? I had no idea, but bonding over the painting with Armfield was making me feel uncomfortable.
I changed the subject, saying, ‘You must know more about GreenSword than that.’
‘I know they intend to invest in new sustainable power projects in the Nordic region,’ he said.
‘Sustainable?’
‘Wind farms, hydroelectric, solar, nuclear.’
‘And your contract is to help them do that how exactly?’
He was doing a good job of looking bemused by my questions, but there was something slick about his answer. ‘My role is twofold. I’m assisting with the due diligence – intelligence-gathering on potential investments and so forth – and I’m helping with security, ensuring the company’s representatives are kept safe.’
‘I didn’t realise that countries like Norway and Finland were so dangerous.’
‘They’re not especially. But Finland borders Russia and there are oligarchs with interests in the region’s power supply. Some of them can be … pretty unscrupulous. Really, though, this is just a routine contract for me.’ He smiled. ‘Trust me, it’s nothing out of the ordinary. Why are you so interested, anyway?’
I wasn’t about to answer that, not directly, but I still surprised myself with what I said instead. It came out of my mouth before I could stop it. ‘I just am. You want me to trust you? Well, let me come to Helsinki with you. Show me what you do first-hand.’
His smile faded. His face became unreadable. I felt strangely frightened, like I’d decided to play chicken with an unstoppable force. Again, he seemed to be staring right into me, weighing me up. I hadn’t expected to ask him that question. I knew there was no way he’d let me tag along, and with every passing second I was less sure I wanted to. I just needed him to see that he would have to earn my trust with something more than a few reassuring words in front of a picture of a horse. I certainly didn’t expect him to answer the way he did.
‘You want to come and see what I do? Well, you’ll appreciate that I can’t take you into every meeting I have. The client wouldn’t put up with that. But if it matters that much to you, and if it means you’ll take me seriously, I’ll take you along and show you what I do as best I can.’
‘Really?’
‘If your mother agrees, and if you can get the time off school.’
‘There’s two weeks of the Easter holiday left, and I reckon I can persuade her.’
He breathed in through his nostrils, held the breath for a second, and breathed out with a slow nod. ‘Then … yes.’
8.
A stillness descended in the gallery after Armfield said yes. The Japanese couple had moved on and we had the room – and the monumental Whistlejacket painting – to ourselves for a moment.
‘Right then,’ I said, checking my phone. ‘We’ll have plenty of time to talk on the trip. I’d better get home now. Text me with the details.’
He nodded again and said, ‘Yes sir,’ amusement in his eyes.
I had nothing in particular to be getting home for, but since he’d surprised me at the start of the meeting, I wanted to be in charge of how it ended. I returned his nod as I stood up then walked away slowly, trying to appear calm. In fact, my pulse was flickering in my neck. It annoyed me that the guy put me so much on edge.
On the train home I thought about the meeting, trying to make sense of it. He’d agreed to take me with him on his business trip. Wasn’t that proof enough that what he was doing was above board? Not quite: he’d said I could go with him, but he’d also told me there’d be stuff I couldn’t be part of. We’d see about that.
He obviously wanted to get to know me. Well, that made sense if what Mum had nearly said (I’d cut her off – I didn’t want to hear it) about him being my biological father was true. She had no reason to lie to me and he had no reason to reach out, but I still didn’t have to accept the fact. I’d only do so when I was absolutely sure I wasn’t about to be burned again.
I’d push him, see how far his openness and generosity went, make sure he was for real before I risked that. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but something about his willingness to say yes to my request made me more suspicious of him, even as it felt like a good thing. Part of me was impressed; part smelled a rat.
I messaged Xander and Amelia: Asked to go with him to finland and he said yes.
Xander replied straight away. Yeah, right. Assume we get to come too?!
And Amelia immediately added, If so, I’ll need help with the funding.
I smiled to myself. Xander was joking. Amelia wasn’t. She’s not the best at spotting a gag, even when it’s obvious. But as I was thinking of a witty reply the train ran between high embankments and the roar of the engine immediately took me back to the moment before the second slab of avalanche hit me.
As they had before, Amelia and Xander had been my back-up then. Without them, I’d be dead.
I deleted the opening ha ha ha of my draft text and typed instead, Sure, why not?
Later that evening, the three of us met online. Amelia was in her bedroom sitting in front of a wall of unfluffy-looking books. I knew the sort of titles – A Brief History of Tomorrow, Trends in Contemporary Trust Law, Virus Taxonomy, Europe at War – piled on her shelves without having to read them. Xander was in the expansive kitchen of his parents’ second home – not the one with marble columns in Nairobi, but their red-brick London townhouse in Pimlico. His dad is into abstract art; the wall Xander had chosen to sit in front of held a huge swirly painting the colour of tarmac and cement. Each to their own, I guess.
‘Were you serious?’ Amelia asked straightaway. Like I said, she’s not the best at getting when people are joking. The flip side of that is that she doesn’t care at all and always dives straight in and asks if she’s unsure.
‘Yeah,’ I said.
‘Good,’ she said. ‘I’ve been working on that assumption.’
Xander laughed softly. ‘But he’ll never agree to it. Why would he?’
‘It’s not like he doesn’t know who you are,’ I said. ‘He helped us all escape in Somalia.’
‘So what?’ said Xander. ‘That means we owe him, if anything. The debt definitely doesn’t flow the other way.’
‘He’s right,’ Amelia acknowledged. ‘But still, what we need is a parallel purpose out there. It doesn’t have to be real, just convincing. I’ve been giving it some thought.’
I leaned forward. ‘What have you come up with?’
‘We know he’s flying into Helsinki. The bit of the message chain that Xander managed to uncover suggests they’ll be heading up north. There was mention of a boat – a ship, really – called the Polar Flow. I’ve looked it up. It seems to be a research vessel of some sort, an ice-breaker. What they’re chartering it for, I don’t know, but I thought we could say we want to make a film of the journey to go with the stuff we shot in the Alps. You know, developing the global warming angle. On the Brink, et cetera.’
‘Maybe see if we can get out into the tundra and shoot a snowscape that isn’t trying to wipe me out,’ I said, as much to myself as them. Amelia’s plan seemed a good one to me. Mum would be likely to back us contributing to her cause. If Armfield agreed to let us film with him, that is.
‘It’s better than nothing,’ said Xander. ‘But it needs some work. If we knew precisely where he was headed, I could try to come up with something more specific.’
‘Let’s all give it some thought,’ I said. Mum’s car had crunched to a stop on the drive; in seconds she would be coming through the kitchen door. ‘Gotta go now. Talk soon.’ I shut my laptop screen.
Mum brought a blast of cold air into the kitchen along with our cat, Geoff, whose fur was beaded with rain. He mewed loudly at us.
‘Did you not hear him asking to come in?’ she asked.
I had not. Geoff normally comes and goes through the window we leave ajar in the utility room, but when the weather is savage Mum sometimes closes it – normally after checking that Geoff is in. Whose fault was it if Geoff had had to put up with a spell outside? Mum had also been rain-lashed in the short dash from her car to the kitchen. She dropped her bags on the mat, unpeeled her coat and hung it, dripping, on a peg on the door, saying, ‘Good day?’ with a hopeful smile.
I decided to cut her some slack. She’s tirelessly optimistic, totally committed to her environmental campaigning and yet also generally worried – for me, the country, the planet – at the same time. It struck me that she would be pleased to hear about the unexpected development between me and Armfield. What’s more, she might be able to influence him over the whole Xander-and-Amelia thing.
‘Yeah, as a matter of fact, today’s been all right. I met up with Jonny Armfield’ – it seemed right to use his ‘real’ name with her – ‘and it went pretty well.’
Slowly, she turned towards me and surveyed me, taking stock with a little nod. I could tell she didn’t want to look too enthusiastic too soon; I don’t understand why, but when she does that it generally pushes me the other way and she knows it.
‘Where? When? What did you … discuss?’ she asked.
‘Some gallery in London, this lunchtime, and just … stuff,’ I said.
‘I see.’ She was obviously dying to ask for more detail, but knew better than to press me. ‘Cup of tea?’ she asked instead.
I felt selfish. Whatever she’d been out doing in the rain, it wouldn’t have been for herself. For Mum, other people always come first.
‘Sit down,’ I said, pulling out a chair. ‘I’ll make it.’ As I boiled the kettle and dug out our least-chipped mugs I said casually, ‘Yeah, he was decent to me. Even offered to take me with him on his next overseas trip. You know, for work experience, and an opportunity to get to know one another. He has a client in Finland, I think … or Norway.’
‘When?’ she asked cautiously.
I waited until I was handing her the tea before looking at her. Sure enough, there was concern in her eyes. I hadn’t been expecting that.
‘Soon. Leaving sometime next week, in fact.’ Trying to sound upbeat, I went on, ‘It’s in the holidays, at least. And the project he’s working on is to do with sustainable energy. With any luck I’ll be able to get some footage for our On the Brink film.’
Mum sipped her tea then slowly placed the mug on the kitchen table. ‘I see,’ she said, pressing her fingertips together. ‘And he offered to take you, did he?’
I don’t know why, but it was easier for me to nod than tell her that I’d asked to go.
‘Kind of him,’ she murmured, looking out of the window. I’d thought she would be happy, but her brow was furrowed with concern. ‘I’m sure he’ll keep you safe, but make no mistake, his world is pretty full-on. You’ll need to keep your wits about you.’
‘The film idea, though. You’re happy about that, surely?’
‘Oh, yes.’ She said this quietly and, perhaps surprised by the lack of conviction in her own voice, repeated more emphatically, ‘Oh yes.’
