Doctor Who_ Trading Futures - Lance Parkin [49]
‘By getting the Eurozone – or the Americans, whoever will cough up – to give you money.’
‘Giving me money… yes. I hadn’t thought of it in quite those terms, but yes. They will give me money. Now… I think I’ve told you plenty about myself. How about you, Miss Kapoor. It is “Miss”?’
She nodded. ‘What would you like to know?’
‘You’re young.’
‘I’m twenty‐seven.’
‘But you’re good at your job?’
‘Yes.’ It might have sounded arrogant, but as far as Anji was concerned she was just stating the facts.
‘And you clearly have initiative. The CIA and the EZSS have been after me for years. They don’t know my real name, only one of them knows what I look like. Yet here you are, standing in my cabin, looking very fetching I might add, and you’ve managed to get to the truth of it in a matter of hours.’
Anji shifted a little uncomfortably. ‘Well, yes.’
‘I don’t have an electronic presence,’ Baskerville said. ‘There were army records, of course, ID numbers. But I faked my death. Most people who fake their death adopt a new identity – usually someone about their age who died. I… didn’t. The whole world is data, now. Every square centimetre is just a set of GPS coordinates, every human being is just a serial number. The intelligence services have their listening posts, they have the keys to datanet encryption, they have their CCTV and image recognition software. This is a world where every syllable uttered is stored and logged. But I don’t exist. They don’t know my name, I don’t have an email address, I don’t even have a phone number or a IFEC account in my name. So they can crank up their search engines until they cannae take the strain, but they’ll never find me. And as long as they can’t find me, I’m invincible.’
Anji’s phone started to ring.
Baskerville looked down at her bag.
Anji looked embarrassed. ‘I’m not expecting a call.’ She fished it out of her bag and pressed it to her ear.
A moment later, she handed it over to him.
‘It’s for you.’
Baskerville’s face fell.
* * *
‘Baskerville, it’s Cosgrove. I hope I’m not interrupting anything?’
‘Er… no.’
‘I hear you’re dealing with the Americans, now.’
‘I…’
‘There’s no use denying it, old chap, we’ve got you monitored, now. You’re on a yacht in the Med, about fifty miles out from Athens. I’m in Athens myself, right at the moment.’
‘Yes…’
‘Now… you’re meeting the President of the United States in Istanbul tomorrow. I will be there, bidding on behalf of His Majesty’s Government. I can give you access to the ULTRA.’
‘Is there anything you don’t know about me?’
‘I know where to aim the smart missile. In my experience, that’s all you ever need to know about a person. Now – you’ve met the Doctor, I believe?’
‘Yes. I killed him.’
‘No you didn’t.’
‘I threw him off the top of an office block, that usually does the trick.’
‘It didn’t in this case. Now, don’t worry, I’ll sort out the Doctor problem. Think of it as a goodwill gesture. I’ll see you tomorrow in Istanbul. Good bye!’
* * *
Baskerville handed Anji back her phone.
‘Where were we?’ Anji asked sweetly.
* * *
Every alarm in the museum was ringing.
The huge entrance hall was knee deep in water – you took half a dozen steps down from the street to get in, and so the whole ground floor had acted as a reservoir for the floodwater.
The Doctor and Malady waded through.
‘Where are we headed?’ Malady asked.
‘In here, Cosgrove’s lot can’t use surveillance satellites or helicopters to locate us. And Jaxa and Roja won’t be able to hit us with sniper fire, they’ll have to get closer. They’re trained, but – well, the boy didn’t last long fighting hand‐to‐hand, did he?’
Malady still felt guilty about beating up a child. She had his raygun in her hand, and he had been firing at her – she had no doubt she’d be dead now if she hadn’t. But there was a basic belief hardwired into her brain that you don’t hurt children.
She hadn’t hesitated last time. She hoped she wouldn’t hesitate next.
They were wading towards a large staircase at the end of the entrance hall,