The bombs were made with washing machine timers, phone parts and modified gas cylinders. There were packed with TNT and explosives found in the Sinai, proving once again the truth that nothing is ever wasted in a desert economy. The bombs were carried by cars. The bombers died in their respective explosions. Amongst the wounded in the three attacks were the British Consul’s wife and daughter. Amongst the dead were Egyptians, Jewish and Arab Israelis, Italians and Russians.

The next year, on Revolution Day, a second attack killed eighty-eight people, mostly Egyptians, a little up the coast in Sharm-el-Sheikh.

Mo’s last case

——

There was a little bit of fine yellow sand in the left pocket of Mo’s coat. The coat was made of wool and was too hot for this time of year. Cigar smoke had woven itself into the fabric, giving off an aroma that conjured for Joe images of private clubs and men in smoking jackets sipping sherry by a roaring fire. He’d put his hands in the pockets and was exploring them. He found a packet of cigars, one left inside, and as he stepped out of the British Museum he unwrapped the cigar and lit it. He stood outside in the sunshine, the coat itching against his body. He thought – maybe Mo just forgot it here. There might not be anything more complicated than that.

But he could feel the small, hard object inside the coat, against his chest. A sewn-in pocket, he thought. He walked down the wide steps and sat down in the courtyard, far enough that he could easily watch both the gate and the museum’s entrance. He could see nothing suspicious, and yet had the feeling of being watched. He smoked the cigar, watching people. Also in Mo’s pockets were sweet wrappers, a handful of penny coins, two pen caps with no pens, a black round stone, two creased and bent business cards, one for Madam Seng’s, the other even more interesting.

He could feel the weight of the unseen object against his chest.

He realised then that his reasoning had been wrong. He had thought the shots outside the Red Lion were fired at him. But what if they weren’t? What if, despite appearances, it was Mo who was the real target?

What had Mo been working on? He said he mainly did divorces. Perhaps, Joe thought, the man hadn’t been entirely honest with him.

He could feel the object against his chest. He smoked the cigar down to a stub, a pile of grey-black ash collecting at his feet. He threw down what was left of the cigar and crushed it with his foot. He was waiting for something, he realised. The sense of being watched increased. He felt suddenly angry. He was tired of waiting. He stood up. ‘Come on, then!’ he shouted. People turned their heads to look. A couple of Japanese girls hurried away from him, towards the steps. ‘Come on! You want to take a pop at me? What are you waiting for!’

There was a silence all around him. The courtyard seemed frozen, the sunlight caught in glass, dust motes and little tiny particles of sand that had travelled all the way across Europe from the Sahara desert hovering motionless in the air. He felt he was the only person alive, and all around him the living-dead were halted like statues in the frozen movements that went nowhere. ‘Come on,’ he said, with less force. His voice was brittle in the open air. There was no reply.

‘Fuck it,’ Joe said. Then he walked away.

lost again

——

He walked aimlessly through the London streets. He had the sense of being followed but could see no one. The early morning’s energy had left him and he felt heavy and dull. At an alleyway off Oxford Street he went through Mo’s coat. He found a small notebook in the sewn-in pocket, hard-bound, with neat, blue-inked notes handwritten inside. He put the notebook in his own pocket and dumped the coat. Somewhere in the maze of streets he found a tiny pub and sat away from the window and drank beer. The pub specialised in sausages. The menu listed around twenty different kinds. The English, he thought, had once conquered most of the known world, but their cooking hadn’t improved as a result. It was quiet inside The Dog & Duck. It seemed to him he was spending his entire life in bars and pubs, and wondered if it had ever been different. He couldn’t remember. He knew that what he should do is dump Mo’s journal, forget Chinatown, leave behind him the unwanted mysteries that were unravelling like the ball of twine in the Minotaur’s maze. He had a simple task to perform, only it was becoming a lot less simple. The ball of twine was entangled, knotted, but it was still a single twine, he knew that, in a deeper part of him where his night’s absolute darkness was. He didn’t know how long he sat in the pub but it was getting darker outside. It wasn’t yet night-time darkness, just a grey shapeless absence of light, a London summer day. It began to rain. He lit a cigarette and his mouth tasted bitter. He finished his pint and ordered another. After the second one he felt better, like streaks of light appearing against a grimy window-frame. He thought about the smell of opium, which was sweet, but hard to describe in words. He thought about the girl who hired him and his mind conjured up her image, the serious face and the pinned-back, delicate ears, and the soft brown hair, her hand on his, her voice as she said, ‘I want you to find him.’

He couldn’t find anyone and least of all himself. He thought about her and it was strangely comforting. He was feeling dissociated from the world around him, as if he were a man in a silent film walking through empty, pre-War streets in a dream, an invisible man: but thoughts of the girl eased his isolation. Or perhaps it was the beer.

Fuzzy-wuzzies, he thought. Was it the world that had become fuzzy while I remain in focus still? Or was it the other way around, the world still there, but I go in and out of focus, like that girl in Paris whose name I never learned but who knew my own, like Mo who was both there and not there, a shadow moving in a world of shadows, doing –

Doing what? Upsetting the shadows, Joe decided. That was what Mo had been doing. He pulled out Mo’s journal and squinted at it, but the blue letters ran blurred. Joe took a sip from the beer and ran the liquid around his mouth, rinsing.

He swallowed and opened the journal again.

If we are here, so must they be.

There were no dates, no detailed drawings. Just a series of scribbled notes, scattered haphazardly. He leafed through the notebook and realised only the first seven pages had been used. The rest were blank. On the first page, in bold letters, as if Mo had traced the lines of the letters again and again, almost cutting through the page; surrounded in a jagged frame, the blue inked so deep it was almost black; one question.

But where?

On page three, towards the bottom. Followed but lost them at Heathrow.

Page four, half-way down. Saw them again today. Tracked them down to Holborn. Lost again.

On page two, at the very bottom, in small letter still neat, right towards the corner: Met R. At BN. Disagree re: inv. Tld him to F hmslf.

Joe approved of the sentiment. He looked at the note again. Met R. at BN… He pulled out again the second card he had found in Mo’s coat. It was almost identical to the one Joe himself carried, the one his client gave him in the pub of the Regent’s Palace. Almost. He turned the card over. Rick, handwritten on the back. It matched – and assume BN for the Blue Note. Threads of twine all knotted together… Who was Mo following? Not Longshott, Mike, paperback writer, address unknown. Them. Lost them at Heathrow. Where did they go?

He thought of black shoes and a chequered shirt. Thought – Vientiane nice this time of year…

Final note, page seven, near the top. Found them. Boxed neatly underneath: British Museum Underground Station.