But he knew that she could see through him, just as she always had.

He pictured her, standing there beside him, a small hand on his shoulder, her beautiful eyes full of compassionate sadness. Sitting, propped up on the grass, he put his free hand on his shoulder, gently touching where hers would have been.

‘I’m sorry, baby . . .’ He choked on the words he wanted to say, sitting in trembling silence as he struggled to compose himself.

‘I don’t mean to be like this, but it hurts. It hurts so much.’

A wry little smile, flashed through the tears, the best he could manage.

‘You made quite an impression on me, you know?’

He sat for a while in silence, just as they used to, not needing words, satisfied and complete in each other’s company.

Sniffing, he closed his eyes, shutting out the emptiness around him, imagining her kneeling down on the grass beside him.

‘I suppose you know I’m not doing that well without you.’

Instinctively, he knew how she would have reacted to that, her perfect little brows furrowing into a frown.

‘Okay.’ He smiled sadly. ‘I know you’ll always be with me. Maybe that’s what makes it so difficult.’

He slowly opened his eyes and squinted out across the rows of gravestones and the gently rustling trees beyond. Hurting him was the last thing she would have wanted.

‘It’s impossible, isn’t it?’ he grinned. ‘Can’t live with you, can’t live without you . . .’

She would have laughed at that, a brave little smile on her worried face as she gazed up at him.

‘The worst part is, I actually feel guilty for not thinking about you. I know you wouldn’t want that, but I’m just being honest. If I’m feeling good about something, laughing, whatever, and then I suddenly remember what happened?’ He shook his head. ‘Enormous feelings of guilt. Stupid, isn’t it?’

He ran his fingers through the grass again.

‘But I could never leave you,’ he said. ‘How can I just abandon you here, in this . . .’

He gestured with his hand, taking in the lines of grey stones that lay all around.

‘Maybe that’s why I don’t visit you here that often, because I keep you with me at home . . .’ He bowed his head, hoping it wouldn’t sound like an excuse. ‘You understand, don’t you?’

And she would have understood him, only too well. She was always more practical than him, always had more common sense. He pictured her, regret on her serious little face, moving apart from him and sitting down silently by her own headstone.

She would want him to live. She’d insist on it, but it was asking an awful lot.

‘Oh my beautiful girl,’ he sighed. ‘Why did it have to be you? I wish it had been me . . .’

But he knew how stubborn she could be. Sitting on the grass, feeling the warmth of the sun as it climbed in the sky, he stayed with her until a strange peace came over him. Eventually, he got to his feet and took a few steps forward, looking out across the cemetery. In the distance, the rattle of a passing train rose above the background rumble of the city. He turned his head, speaking over his shoulder.

‘I love you, Alice,’ he said softly.

I love you.

That familiar smile, those wonderful bright eyes that always seemed to sparkle when she heard those words. She would be here, waiting, whenever he needed her.

Sighing to himself, he trudged down the hill without looking back.

43

Thursday, 6 September

Naysmith had left the conference early. The late afternoon seminars were frequently space-fillers and networking opportunities would be limited – he really wasn’t missing much. In any case, he’d already had several very productive meetings, so he’d earned a few hours off.

It hadn’t taken him long to travel back to Bank and retrace his steps to that narrow cutting between the office buildings. Now he sat in a claustrophobic little pub, looking out through the grubby window onto Throgmorton Street. From here he couldn’t quite see the glass doors of the office where the target worked, but it was the best vantage point available – anyone heading towards the station from here would have to pass him.

He checked the time again – it was just after 5 p.m. Hopefully, the sandy-haired man wouldn’t be working too late. Fortunately today was Thursday – if it had been Friday there would be more chance of the man going out for a drink, but with luck he’d be heading straight home tonight.

Gently turning a beer mat with his finger, Naysmith wondered where he lived, what his home would be like. He clearly came from somewhere to the east of the city, but what sort of place? Would it be a good neighbourhood or bad? Did he live alone, or was there someone waiting for him? He found himself hoping that there wouldn’t be children, but quickly pushed that train of thought away, unwilling to go where it led.

Frowning, he closed his fist around the beer mat, crumpling it into a jagged ball, and went back to his patient study of the street.

The target didn’t appear until 6:15 p.m., a slightly weary figure in that same blue anorak, trudging past the window in the direction of the station. Naysmith swallowed the last mouthful of drink that he’d been nursing and slipped out after him. The street was busier now as the offices released their staff into the evening rush hour. It was easy to hide in the swirling flow of commuters, hurrying along the pavements then disappearing down the steps to the underground station, like water down a storm drain.

Naysmith shadowed his target through the crush of the ticket barriers, along the passageways and down to the busy DLR platforms. He stood a few yards away from him, not near enough to be noticed, but close enough to keep him in sight.

When the train arrived, he felt the crowd surge towards the doors. The sandy-haired man was caught up in a tight knot of passengers and swept forward to the edge of the platform. Naysmith kept him in view until he was on board, then shouldered his way through the slow commuters to secure his own place in an adjacent carriage. There was no need to get too close just yet – he knew the target was travelling at least as far as Poplar.

As the doors hissed shut, and the passengers jostled around him to maintain their personal space, he closed his eyes in disgust. Brash fragrances, body odour and bad breath, all sealed in the heat of a busy train. How did these people do it every day? Why would anyone settle for this sort of existence? He sighed. Life was too short for this kind of misery – he knew more than most how quickly it could be snuffed out.

The train rattled through the noise and darkness of the tunnel and out into the evening gloom. Rising steadily, the rails climbed to an elevated track that swept along, carrying them eastwards between the grim-looking neighbourhoods that sprawled out below. Grey tarmac streets and endless parked cars slid by, all bathed in the tainted glow of street lamps and garish shop signs.

Stations came and went – islands of harsh white light in the darkening evening – and gradually the passengers around him began to thin out. He found a seat where he could see the target in the next carriage, head bowed, reading a book.

Outside, the towering heights of Canary Wharf obscured the horizon. There was a lonely beauty about this part of Docklands as the glittering buildings bloomed with lights, and shadows hid the wasteland around them. Naysmith smiled to himself and turned away from the window. They had just passed through Poplar – from here on, he would need to be ready. The train was bound for Woolwich Arsenal, so at least he now knew which line the target travelled on, but that wasn’t enough. He had to find out where the man lived.

Outside, everything was growing darker as they sped onwards, leaving the vast glow of Canary Wharf behind. After a while, a faint sense of unease began to gnaw at him. The Dome lay a long way behind them now, and several stations had slipped by – how far out of the city were they going? The train rattled across a junction and sloped off to the right. An unfriendly landscape of high fences and dark industrial buildings finally gave way as the track curved up beside a long expanse of water. Apartments looked out between the old dockyard cranes and there, in the distance, he could make out the ExCeL Centre where the conference was being held.