…LONDON…
Palmer sat behind the desk, hands together, fingers steepled.
‘Come in,’ he said.
The man came in, looked at Palmer and Charlie Price and Martie and Carrick, looked around with an air of distaste, like a First Class traveller allocated a seat in Economy by mistake.
‘Couldn’t we have done this another way?’ he said. ‘I’m not ecstatic about coming here.’
‘I don’t have time for the cloak-and-dagger,’ said Palmer. ‘And I wanted to impress on you this business has been fucked up to high hell. There’s shit flying, there’s no error margin left.’
‘You may consider me impressed,’ said the man. His eyes panned over the three other men. ‘The committee may also consider me impressed.’
Palmer thought he would like to kick the man’s arsehole north of his eyebrows. He said, ‘There are possible complications.’
‘Life’s a vale of possible complications.’
Palmer looked at his reflection in the glass door behind the man. He could just make out the furrows on his forehead and the deep folds flanking his mouth. When the kick urge had subsided, he told him about the problem.
‘Well,’ said the man, ‘that’s a pity. And it’ll make the laundry work troublesome. Where are we talking about?’
‘Right here,’ said Carrick.
He had the maps out on the table. ‘It’s difficult country,’ he said. ‘I’ll talk you through the…’
‘Just point, darling,’ said the man. ‘I was reading maps when you were doing wee-wees and poo-poos.’