Evensong

Its colour was distinctive, too. It wasn’t the usual rather vulgar Ferrari orange-red, but a beautiful deep dark red. Like her dress. By now it was only three cars behind him, and he could make out Gaetano’s face behind the windshield. He’d never talked about cars with Gaetano before, but a Ferrari Octavian would seem about right for him. As fast as the Cobra. Maybe even faster. Certainly more conventionally beautiful.

Gradually, coming out of Seven Dials, the traffic thinned. The buildings lining either side of the road were less densely packed, and the road itself was faster and wider. Time. Anwar floored the accelerator, and the Cobra did what it had always been designed for, both in its original incarnation and in its replica form.

The car chase that followed was something whose irony wasn’t lost on Anwar, and probably wasn’t on Gaetano either: it was a repeat of the Cobra-Ferrari Wars at Le Mans in the 1960s, though this one lasted only a fraction of the time. The Ferrari was at least as fast as the Cobra, and Gaetano was a driver of almost equal ability to Anwar. He couldn’t quite catch Anwar, but Anwar couldn’t quite lose him either.

In this fashion, though only for a few short miles, the two cars hurtled out of Brighton in the direction of the Downs. Then Anwar thought, Why do I need to lose him?He slammed on the brakes, downshifted the gears, and did a handbrake turn, so the Cobra was facing the Ferrari as it came round a bend.

He’d stopped right on the edge of Devil’s Dyke. In the small car park overlooking its northern slopes. He smelt the damp earth and grass, the same smell from before. They both got out of their cars and walked slowly towards each other. I always knew I’d come back here before I left Brighton. I never thought it would be like this.

“I’m done here,” he said to Gaetano. “I’m going to the Downs to pick up a VSTOL back to Rafiq. You should go back too. We don’t need this.”

“I can’t,” Gaetano said. “Not now.” There was something wrong about his voice, something thick and choked. He made an odd, swift movement inside his jacket.

“Don’t go for the gun,” Anwar said. “Or the knife. I’d be quicker.”

“Then...”

“Not combat, either. I’d win. And it’d be an anticlimax after the Signing Room.”

“Why did you do it?” Gaetano’s eyes were red-rimmed. Anwar knew what she’d meant to him, but he couldn’t for the life of him imagine Gaetano actually shedding tears.

“I can’t tell you. And you wouldn’t believe me anyway. Go back now. This belongs to another time.”

“I’ll hunt you down,” Gaetano said quietly. “For the rest of my life, and yours. I’ll never stop. I will find you.”

“I know you will. But it won’t be me.” 

JUNE 2061

She knows Gaetano is coming. Now. This evening. It will be either here in her flat, or in Rochester Cathedral. She doesn’t want it to be in the Cathedral.

She decides she won’t go there tonight. She’ll miss Evensong.

And Gaetano isn’t the only one getting closer. There’s also Michael Taber. She remembers her conversation with him after last week’s Evensong, and thinks wryly, He’s too clever. Surely Deans of Cathedrals aren’t supposed to be like that. Only people in positions like Rafiq are supposed to be like that.

Rafiq. She thinks of her meeting with him, at Fallingwater, on October 22, 2060.

“I’ve done your bidding. I completed the mission. I avenged your family. Now I want out of the Consultancy, and I want you to do this last thing for me.”

“Are you sure about this, Anwar?”

“Yes. I can’t remain as I am.”

“We can make you look like her on the surface, but you won’t be her.”

“Surface will be enough.”