Crime in the Community

Chapter 17 The day after the day after....

'But their father's a political prisoner.....'

'No, he isn't a political prisoner. He's a drugs baron. He has so many people on his payroll that it's hard to find anybody who isn't working for him in certain areas.'

'But he can't be - Caroline said - '

Christopher ground to a halt. Caroline had let him believe the children's father was a political prisoner because he himself had guessed that was why the man was still in Iran and not in Scotland with his family. The children's father hadn't been prevented from leaving Iran by the merciless penal system; he had deliberately chosen to stay there to be in the best position to continue managing his drugs operation. No wonder Caroline was such a wreck. She must have run away from him, and been constantly worried that he would send people after her. But why hadn't she told him? And what did Amaryllis have to do with it? She was waiting now, watching him to gauge his reaction before saying any more.

'Caroline managed to get herself and the children away from him by being very brave,' said Amaryllis. 'She contacted us a few years ago, and we got her out of Iran. That was well before I retired. When it looked as if she might need protection they brought me out of retirement on a temporary basis, since I wanted to be here anyway.... I think I'm going to have to leave town, by the way. My cover's shot to pieces.'

'If it hadn't been for you, I would have been shot to pieces,' said Christopher. 'Do you still need a cover now that you've really retired? Pitkirtly's a nice quiet little place - well, apart from the things that have been happening over the past few days, that is. You could pick a worse place to retire to, all things considered.'

He didn't know why he was rambling on like this. She didn't want to hear it, and he didn't think he was making sense anyway.

'Getting back to what happened,' said Amaryllis, studiously ignoring his last couple of sentences, 'the children's father wanted to get them back, by fair means or foul. According to his value system, they belong to him - and so does Caroline. He wasn't too bothered about her though - she was no longer of much use to him. Too flaky.'

She said it without censure, just as a matter of fact. She carried straight on. 'He recruited Simon, who was one of ours.'

'A British spy?'

'We call them agents... Somebody got suspicious of him, and they decided I should come out of retirement for a while and keep an eye on things here. Simon was meant to be doing that and we wanted to give him just enough rope... His Iranian friends got a bit out of hand though - that's what all the shooting was about the other night, and the taking of Steve Paxman.'

'So it was all part of the same thing?' Christopher tried to suppress the naïve surprise that was in his mind as he spoke.

'I must be slipping - I used to be able to guess what my target was going to do, and get ahead of him, and I very nearly left it too late this time. Simon's out of circulation now, but it may not stop with him. There could be others. You have to be aware of that. But we're building up a dossier about Caroline's husband which we're going to pass on to the Iranian authorities when it's complete. He could be looking at a real jail sentence. Not a soft option, in Iran.'

'What about the Americans? Where do they fit in?'

'They - well, they haven't been very nice either. They wanted the kids too. They wanted to use them as bargaining counters. To get to their father. That was why they went along with all this stuff about terrorism - they can't really have believed that - one glance at your cv would have told them you were squeaky-clean, just an innocent playing with the big boys... They didn't want you dead though - it was Pearson McPherson who gave you the parcel of money and who rescued you from the gunman that night.'