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player with touch-screen monitor and GPS. There was almost ninety thousand on the clock, which seemed a lot. Belsey switched on the satnav and scrolled through recent journeys stored. Most started or ended at Heathrow. A lot involved central London hotels. Belsey read it as a rental vehicle but couldn’t think why Devereux would be driving a rental. He checked the glove compartment and found a manual, a dust cloth and some Prada shades.
    A button on the wall lifted the garage door. The front gates opened a second later. Belsey eased up the ramp into the city.
    It took Belsey a moment to get used to sitting above the early-morning traffic in the SUV. He expected resentment from those navigating the narrow roads of Hampstead but people pulled aside for him, respectfully. It was like being police. Belsey drove to Camden, parked behind the Buck Street market and walked to a twenty-four-hour convenience store with a jumble of souvenirs and cheap hardware at the back. The staff were sleepy and careless. He knew the store let you sign for card payments—they were always calling Hampstead trying to report fraudulent transactions. For the same reason, he also knew their CCTV was permanently broken. After a minute’s browsing Belsey selected a bottle opener, a Zippo lighter and a penknife that said “London.” Start small. He found the silver Visa and slid it out of Devereux’s wallet, moving his fingers over the raised letters of the name.
    “Do you have a gift-wrapping service?” he asked the girl on the till.
    “No.”
    “OK.”
    She looked at the credit card, turned it in her hands, swiped it and stared at the machine.
    “It says I should contact the card issuer.”
    “Really?”
    “Yes.”
    “Why would that be?” Belsey watched her eyes slide to the phone and back. He knew why it would be: something had been flagged on the system. Maybe it was a new card, or Devereux had changed addresses, or had been travelling abroad. He should just choose another credit card. He watched the shop floor and couldn’t see any security. A door in one corner led to fire stairs; a back exit would lead to Camden High Street and there was an alley from there to the crowded market.
    She shrugged. “Sometimes it says that.”
    “OK.”
    “Do you have any ID?”
    Belsey showed Devereux’s business cards and his club membership.
    “I’ll have to make a call,” the girl said. She had a memo stuck to the till with the relevant phone numbers, called Visa and read out the security code and Devereux’s name. Belsey counted his breaths. “Yes,” she said. “He’s here now. Yes. OK,” and to Belsey, “It’s OK.”
    “Can you ask them how much credit is left?” Belsey said.
    “How much credit is there?” she said. “Fifty? Thank you.” She hung up. “Fifty thousand,” she said.
    “Fifty?”
    “That’s right.”
    Belsey chose a greetings card that said “Good-bye” and bought that as well.
    H e drove through the Square Mile, parked on Tower Hill and checked Devereux’s business card: AD Development, St. Clement’s Court, EC4 . He wanted to know a little more about the man before he borrowed his money. He wanted to know if he was dead or alive.
    A colder wind blew through the City these days, but Belsey still felt a thrill when he entered the place: the sense of grind, the sheets of glass and bone-coloured stone; austere, baroque, loaded. He loved the churches stranded among all the finance like ships run aground. He used to do some church sitting in the City, a few years ago. There was an organisation that sat in churches to keep them open. He’d got the idea off a heroin addict he’d decided not to arrest, and it had appealed to him for a while—he had just started at Hampstead and was trying to clear his head. Until then, he had barely spent two minutes in a place of worship, had never received a moment’s religious instruction. He thought he’d start with the real estate. It had been a phase, the same distinct