The Hidden Man - Charles Cumming [22]
Taploe sensed Keen before he saw him, a sudden intimation of good taste and disdain moving through the room. He was wearing a long, darkovercoat and carrying a small white cup of espresso in his right hand. Taploe was reminded of a Tory grandee.
‘Christopher,’ he said.
‘Stephen.’ Taploe’s view of his joe was already coloured by the basic antipathy that existed between the organizations to which both men had dedicated the bulk of their working lives. But the sense Keen gave off of living in an infallible bubble of privilege added a particular hostility to his contempt.
‘Did you find the place all right?’ he asked.
‘No problem at all. But it’s bloody cold outside. They say it might snow.’
‘Well, thankyou for agreeing to the meeting at such short notice.’ Taploe sipped at his coffee but found that it was still too hot to drink. ‘I hope we didn’t put you out.’
‘Not at all. I have a dinner engagement in the West End at nine o’clock. The timing was rather convenient.’
Slowly, Taploe drew the tips of his fingers across the wooden surface of the table. It was an unconscious manifestation of his anxiety, and he was irritated with himself for showing it.
‘Can I get you anything from upstairs?’
Taploe could not think why he had asked the question. Keen simply lowered his eyes and indicated his espresso with a downward nod of the head.
‘Oh yes, of course.’
There was an embarrassed silence that Taploe eventually broke.
‘This shouldn’t take long,’ he said. ‘It was just to find out about your enquiries.’
Keen could see a Japanese student poring over notes held in a loose-leaf folder to the right of his chair. If Taploe considered this a secure environment in which to talk, he would take that on trust, but keep his remarks general to the point of being obtuse. Christian names. No specifics. Operational shorthands.
‘My view is very straightforward,’ he said. ‘If the lawyer is involved to any extent with the Russian organization then my son knows nothing about it. That would indicate to me that this is something that is happening only at the very highest level within the company. That is to say, only Thomas and perhaps Sebastian know anything about it.’
‘What makes you so sure?’
‘Body language. A certain openness about the way he answered my questions. No obvious nerves. As our American friends might put it, Mark is out of the loop.’
By his expression, Taploe seemed unconvinced.
‘What did he say about the lawyer?’ he asked.
‘Nothing that you won’t already know. Bit of a chancer, man about town. Taste for what certain people regard as the finer things in life. Champagne, oysters, bliads.’
Keen assumed correctly that Taploe would recognize the Russian slang for prostitute.
‘Is that right?’ He pursed out his lips. ‘To what extent is he involved in that when he’s in Russia?’
‘Happens mostly in Moscow, by the sound of it. You know the form. They hang around the hotel lobbies and mezzanine floors, looking for businessmen with a wedding ring…’
Taploe essayed an exaggerated frown, as if the moral implications of Macklin’s behaviour had briefly overwhelmed him. He looked visibly disappointed.
‘And is Mark involved with them as well?’
‘Good God, no.’
Keen’s reply was abrupt and Taploe wondered if he might have offended him. He found himself saying ‘Of course, sorry,’ and then again resented his own awkwardness. A clatter of schoolgirls came down into the basement bearing tall beakers of coffee. One had a lit cigarette in her hand and was smoking it without skill, like someone sucking on the end of a pencil.
‘Is that an area you’re investigating?’ Keen asked. ‘Women being trafficked from eastern Europe, Russia and so on?’
Taploe’s eyes flicked across to the Japanese student who was still engrossed in his notes. Next to him, about three feet away, sat a vast man in his late thirties - surely American - dressed head to toe in Reebok sportswear. He was slowly typing an email using only the index finger of his left hand.
‘It’s certainly a possibility,’ he said, and swallowed a long intake