before collapsing into bed. He closed his eyes, then heard Clara stepping into the room.
‘Why are you really moving to London?’ she asked quietly.
‘I told you,’ Danny replied. ‘General security.’
‘Is it dangerous, this “general security”?’
Danny sighed. ‘The extremists have had their fun, Clara. Atrocities like this come in ones. Look at 9/11. 7/7. They’ve stuck their heads above the parapets. Now they’ll be scurrying back down the holes they came from. Trust me.’
He rolled over and closed his eyes again. Seconds later, he was asleep.
Four
Tuesday. 06.00hrs
Sarim had never felt so nervous. Even before he and Jamal had detonated the Paddington bomb, he hadn’t been suffering palpitations like this. He hadn’t had this sensation of cold dread flowing through his lungs. Abu Ra’id could do that to you.
He coughed politely. Anxiously. ‘Ex. . . excuse me, ustath . He is ready.’
Abu Ra’id had his back turned. He was broad-shouldered and seemed too big for this room, even though the room itself was spacious. The furnishings were ultra-modern: gleaming white sofas, an enormous plasma screen against the far wall, colourful abstract art on the walls. In the corner there was a bar area, with a line of spirits on a glass shelf along the wall – untouched, of course, by the current occupant of this extravagantly luxurious apartment. On a glass table was a collection of framed pictures. They showed a Middle Eastern family in traditional dress – a man with a very crooked nose, a woman and three children. Sarim wondered who they were – the owners of the apartment, perhaps – but didn’t dare ask.
Two sides of the room were taken up by floor-to-ceiling windows, but these were covered up by internal electric blinds. Sarim understood why. From this penthouse apartment, more than two hundred metres high and in the heart of the Docklands, you could see for miles across the London skyline. But a gleaming glass tower like this required constant cleaning, and should the window cleaner in his ascending cradle happen to see inside, there was no chance he wouldn’t recognise Abu Ra’id, whose face had peered out of every newspaper in the past few days.
Abu Ra’id was not using any of the expensive lamps dotted around the room to light up the early morning darkness. Instead, a single candle burned on a low cabinet. It made the cleric’s shadow flicker against the wall as he walked over to a small sink behind the bar area. He washed his hands very carefully, and dried them on a white towel hung on a chrome bar to his left. Only then did he turn round.
He was, Sarim had always thought, a good-looking man. The pictures of him in the papers never did him justice. True, he wore the line of a permanent frown, but he looked much better than he ever did in print or on TV. The newspapers always tried to make him look as crazy as possible. In fact he looked anything but. Calm. Collected. Beneath the black beard that reached down to his chest, Abu Ra’id’s cheekbones were pronounced and his nose in perfect proportion. And when he smiled, he had a way of making you think that nobody else in the world mattered to him at that moment.
Abu Ra’id smiled now. ‘I don’t know what I’d do without you, Sarim. You are like a son to me.’
‘I owe everything to you , ustath .’
Abu Ra’id stepped over to the centre of the room where his prayer mat was unfurled on the floor. He had obviously just finished praying and had washed his hands, because to desecrate a prayer mat was a sin. He rolled it up carefully, then placed it on the cabinet next to the candle.
Sarim had no idea who paid for this apartment. He was sure it had to be just about the most expensive place to live in London, and a far cry from his own shoddy ground-floor flat in Hammersmith, or even Abu Ra’id’s large home in North Ealing where he had lived up until the day before the Paddington bomb, and where his wife still did. And
‘Why are you really moving to London?’ she asked quietly.
‘I told you,’ Danny replied. ‘General security.’
‘Is it dangerous, this “general security”?’
Danny sighed. ‘The extremists have had their fun, Clara. Atrocities like this come in ones. Look at 9/11. 7/7. They’ve stuck their heads above the parapets. Now they’ll be scurrying back down the holes they came from. Trust me.’
He rolled over and closed his eyes again. Seconds later, he was asleep.
Four
Tuesday. 06.00hrs
Sarim had never felt so nervous. Even before he and Jamal had detonated the Paddington bomb, he hadn’t been suffering palpitations like this. He hadn’t had this sensation of cold dread flowing through his lungs. Abu Ra’id could do that to you.
He coughed politely. Anxiously. ‘Ex. . . excuse me, ustath . He is ready.’
Abu Ra’id had his back turned. He was broad-shouldered and seemed too big for this room, even though the room itself was spacious. The furnishings were ultra-modern: gleaming white sofas, an enormous plasma screen against the far wall, colourful abstract art on the walls. In the corner there was a bar area, with a line of spirits on a glass shelf along the wall – untouched, of course, by the current occupant of this extravagantly luxurious apartment. On a glass table was a collection of framed pictures. They showed a Middle Eastern family in traditional dress – a man with a very crooked nose, a woman and three children. Sarim wondered who they were – the owners of the apartment, perhaps – but didn’t dare ask.
Two sides of the room were taken up by floor-to-ceiling windows, but these were covered up by internal electric blinds. Sarim understood why. From this penthouse apartment, more than two hundred metres high and in the heart of the Docklands, you could see for miles across the London skyline. But a gleaming glass tower like this required constant cleaning, and should the window cleaner in his ascending cradle happen to see inside, there was no chance he wouldn’t recognise Abu Ra’id, whose face had peered out of every newspaper in the past few days.
Abu Ra’id was not using any of the expensive lamps dotted around the room to light up the early morning darkness. Instead, a single candle burned on a low cabinet. It made the cleric’s shadow flicker against the wall as he walked over to a small sink behind the bar area. He washed his hands very carefully, and dried them on a white towel hung on a chrome bar to his left. Only then did he turn round.
He was, Sarim had always thought, a good-looking man. The pictures of him in the papers never did him justice. True, he wore the line of a permanent frown, but he looked much better than he ever did in print or on TV. The newspapers always tried to make him look as crazy as possible. In fact he looked anything but. Calm. Collected. Beneath the black beard that reached down to his chest, Abu Ra’id’s cheekbones were pronounced and his nose in perfect proportion. And when he smiled, he had a way of making you think that nobody else in the world mattered to him at that moment.
Abu Ra’id smiled now. ‘I don’t know what I’d do without you, Sarim. You are like a son to me.’
‘I owe everything to you , ustath .’
Abu Ra’id stepped over to the centre of the room where his prayer mat was unfurled on the floor. He had obviously just finished praying and had washed his hands, because to desecrate a prayer mat was a sin. He rolled it up carefully, then placed it on the cabinet next to the candle.
Sarim had no idea who paid for this apartment. He was sure it had to be just about the most expensive place to live in London, and a far cry from his own shoddy ground-floor flat in Hammersmith, or even Abu Ra’id’s large home in North Ealing where he had lived up until the day before the Paddington bomb, and where his wife still did. And
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