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as long as possible.
    ‘Or you could just call my mobile,’ he replied slowly. ‘Do you have the number?’ His voice was deliberately bored. ‘It’s printed on my card.’
    The man was now thirty metres behind them, standing beside a two-door BMW. Keen heard the double sonics of central locking and registered amberhazard lights flaring briefly in the backwindow of a nearby van. Then he heard the driver’s door clunk shut as the man climbed inside.
    It was safe to continue.
    ‘The answer to your question, Mr Taploe, is that I cannot tell you very much.’ Keen sounded assured, imperial. ‘I have neither seen nor spoken to Thomas Macklin in over two months. Whom he chooses to hold meetings with in Moscow, London or Timbuktu is his business, not mine. Ditto any strange bankac-counts. Obviously you suspect money laundering…’
    ‘Obviously,’ Taploe said quickly. ‘The thing is, we can’t make an arrest until we know the source of the cash. Macklin could realistically claim that he had no knowledge of handling dirty money, or say that he was acting as a lawyer for Viktor Kukushkin and planned to use the funds to buy real estate. But we’d be interested in what you could tell us about your early contact with Libra.’
    Keen noted the use of the plural pronoun: making it a point of honour, a duty to the old firm. However, rather than answer immediately, he asked a question of his own.
    ‘How did you find me?’
    Taploe was looking down Augustine Road towards Brook Green. He rubbed his cheek.
    ‘Your name was recognized when it came up during preliminary research into Divisar.’
    Keen sounded a sarcastic note.
    ‘So - what? - you found out I was in the Office,thought it was your lucky day and ran me as a trace request through the ND? Is that how it still works over there?’
    Taploe hesitated. ‘Something like that.’
    ‘Was there anything Recorded Against?’ Keen asked, employing the Service euphemism. ‘I’d love to know.’
    Taploe ignored the question.
    ‘Why don’t we just talkabout your initial contact with Libra?’
    Keen sighed, loathing the dryness of bureaucracy.
    ‘Very well. This is what I know, although I can’t thinkwhy it will be of any use to you. Thomas Macklin approached Divisar about six months ago. I’d have to checkthe file to be more precise. He was sharp and efficient and he came as Roth’s representative, which is often the way in our business. If push comes to shove, those boys want as much distance between us and them as they can manage. It was a simple job, of the sort I do all the time. Libra were interested in setting up operations in Russia and Macklin had a lot of very sensible questions that needed answering. Due diligence on real estate and freeholders. Wanted to know how to go about recruiting staff, finding suppliers, who Libra’s competitors would be and so forth. I remember he was slightly obsessive about the tax and licensing position. Above all, he needed to know about the roof. What palms needed to be crossed and how much silver.’ To amuse himself, Keen added, ‘You know what a roof is, don’t you, Mr Taploe?’
    ‘I’ve been working organized crime for two years,’ he replied. ‘Of course I know about the roof.’ It irritated Taploe that Keen was not as concerned by his line of questioning as he might have been; but then that was the birthright of the upper classes, the lizard-thickskin of the FCO. ‘So did Divisar put Libra in touch with the appropriate organizations?’ he asked.
    ‘That’s not how it works. Kukushkin would have come to them. He’s one of the new-style mobsters, the avtoritet . Less regard for tradition than the older vors and a lot more unpredictable when it comes to things like chopping people’s fingers off. But, yes, I pointed them in the right direction, told Macklin who the main players were. Divisar did what we were paid to do.’
    Taploe listened to this and decided that it was time to play his trump card.
    ‘And how