Oxford
The tenth day

It had been a blur of time for Ben as he sat endlessly hunched over the desk in his flat, deep in study, completely immersed in textbooks and dictionaries and piles of notes, stopping only to eat and sleep. No phone calls, no visitors. It was a time of total focus, and his mind thrived on the concentration. It helped him forget.

By afternoon on the third day of it, his eyes were burning. The spread-out papers on his desk were turning into a mountain. The coffee at his elbow had gone cold hours ago, neglected while he’d been trying to decipher page after page of knotty Hebrew. It was driving him crazy, but as the lessons of twenty years ago slowly filtered back into his brain, things were coming into focus for him.

For the first time in days, his phone rang. He felt its pulsing buzz in his pocket, dug it out and answered. It felt strange to hear his own voice again.

It was Charlie. He sounded far away, anxious and agitated.

‘Ben, I need your help.’

Ben leaned his weight back in the reclining swivel chair and rubbed his eyes, light-headed from concentration. He forced himself back into the present. ‘Where are you?’

‘I’m still here on Corfu,’ Charlie said quickly. ‘Things are turning out more complicated than you said they would. I’m running into problems.’

‘What do you need from me?’

Charlie said something Ben didn’t catch.

‘You’re breaking up.’

‘I said, I need you to come out here as soon as possible.’

‘I can’t do that. Can’t you just tell me what’s going on?’

‘I know it sounds odd, but I have to explain it to you face to face. I can’t talk about this on the phone. There’s a situation developing here.’

‘It’s a simple job, Charlie.’

‘That’s what you told me. But believe me, things didn’t turn out that way.’

Ben sighed and was quiet for a few seconds.

‘Ben, please. This is serious.’

‘How serious?’

‘Serious.’

Ben closed his eyes. Shit. ‘And you’re absolutely certain you can’t handle this on your own?’

‘I’m sorry. I need backup. You know this kind of stuff better than me.’

Ben sighed again. Shook his head. Punched out his left fist and looked at his watch. He did a quick calculation. He could catch the Oxford Tube into London and be at Heathrow in a few hours. Catch a flight to Athens and from there to Corfu. ‘OK, copy that. Give me an RV point and I’ll be with you by midday tomorrow.’

He was there by breakfast.

It was an island Ben had never been to before. He’d expected an arid landscape but from the air Corfu was strikingly green, a paradise of woods and wildflower meadows, mountains and blue ocean. In the distance he could make out rambling ruins and sleepy villages nestling in the pine forests as the plane circled and dropped down towards the airport at Kérkyra, Corfu Town.

But he didn’t have much time for the beauty of the place. He was tired, and fighting to contain his annoyance. He couldn’t understand why he had to be here, why Charlie couldn’t deal with this on his own. Had he misjudged him? The man had been a good soldier. Tough, determined, resourceful. But maybe he’d lost his edge. Ben had seen that happen before.

He stepped off the plane into the warmth of the sun. In the small airport he rented a locker and stuffed into it his passport, his return tickets and the thick hardcover philosophy book he’d brought to read on the plane. He wasn’t planning on staying long, and he wanted to travel light. The only items he kept with him were his wallet, his phone and his whisky flask.

He wondered about the Bible. He’d been carrying it around a lot lately, and had got used to having it to hand to dip into. It was compact and not too heavy. He decided to bring it along. He slung the lightweight duffel bag over his shoulder, secured the locker and put the key and his wallet into his jeans pocket.

Outside the airport, he hailed a taxi. He leaned back in the noisy Fiat and took in the scenery. The driver talked incessantly in such rapid broken English that Ben couldn’t understand a word. He ignored him, and pretty soon the guy shut up. It was only two miles into Kérkyra, but traffic was already building, and by the time they entered the city the roads were badly snarled up. Ben paid the driver in crisp euros, hauled his duffel bag out of the back and decided to walk it.

He walked fast, impatient to hear what Charlie was going to tell him. The rendezvous was at the guesthouse where Charlie was staying. Ben had the address and used a cheap map he’d bought at the airport to find his way through the old town.

He walked up narrow streets where washing hung like banners on lines strung between the houses. The place was crammed with life and bustle – shopping arcades, tavernas, hot food bars and cafés. He walked through a thronging marketplace, rich with the salty tang of lobster and squid. Stand after stand of fresh olives glistened in the sunshine. In the hectic buzz of San Rocco Square people were sitting outside cafés, taking their morning coffee. Traffic rumbled through the old twisty streets.

He reached Charlie’s guesthouse just before nine, a faded stone building on the edge of a busy road right in the heart of the old town. It had a café terrace outside, tables lining the pavement and shaded by wide parasols and dozens of trees planted in big stone urns.

Charlie was sitting at one of the tables, a newspaper and a pot of coffee in front of him. He saw Ben across the street and waved. He looked relieved more than happy, and he wasn’t smiling.

Ben threaded his way across the brisk traffic and between the tables to where Charlie was sitting. The place was already busy with families eating breakfast, the season’s first tourists with their cameras and guidebooks, people grabbing a bite on their way to work. A small man in a light cotton jacket was sitting alone near the edge of the terrace, working on a notebook computer.

Ben hung his jacket over the back of the empty wicker chair at Charlie’s table, dumped the duffel bag on the ground and sat down. He leaned back in the chair, kicked his legs out in front of him and crossed his arms.

‘Thanks for coming,’ Charlie said.

‘This had better be good. I’m tired and I shouldn’t have to be here.’

‘You want coffee?’

‘Just talk,’ Ben said.

Charlie was frowning. He looked even more agitated than he’d sounded on the phone. He folded up his paper and laid it on the table beside him, took a sip of coffee and looked hard at Ben.

‘I have a bad feeling,’ he said. ‘About Zoë Bradbury.’