Free A Good Day To Die by Simon Kernick

and rang off.
    I stood there for a moment, still holding thephone while I thought things through. It seemed that Tomboy hadn't given Pope my real name, but what if he'd described me? I couldn't believe that the bastard - someone I'd known for years, someone I had to admit that I trusted - had blown my cover. Maybe he was frightened I'd hurt Pope and cut off what was obviously turning into quite a lucrative little sideline. Or maybe I was being cynical, and he was just looking out for me. By telling Pope what I intended, he might just be trying to get things straightened out before they went too far, and get me back on the plane to Manila without anyone coming to any harm.
    Either way, though, he'd betrayed me, and I couldn't forget that. It's funny how people you think you know can react when the going gets a little tough. I tried his number, but it was early in the morning and he wasn't answering. I didn't leave a message, but instead tried the lodge in the hope that someone on night duty might pick up. But no one did, and eventually I hung up, hoping that the start I was having wasn't the shape of things to come.

9

    First thing the next morning, I walked over to the Edgware Road and bought myself a thick waterproof coat with too many pockets. I then wandered round until I found a stationer's shop that printed personalized business cards. I ordered a hundred (the minimum number) in the name of Marcus Kane, private detective, from the old guy behind the counter. He said that he'd never met a private detective before and asked me what kind of work I did.
    I told him missing persons. 'I've just come back from a case in the Bahamas,' I said, and when he asked for more details, spun him a cock-and-bull story about a runaway wife and her young lover fleecing the husband of all he owned before escaping to the Caribbean. I explained that I'd got them both arrested by the local authorities and they were now awaiting extradition. He said that it served them right, and that the cards would be ready by Monday.
    By the time I walked out of the shop it was quarter past nine and I needed to get moving if I was to make the rendezvous. I'd thought about not turning up at all, since it wasn't immediately obvious what I was going to get out of it, but I guess curiosity got the better of me. I wanted to see what Les Pope looked like in the flesh and hear what he had to say.
    I caught the Circle Line from Paddington station to King's Cross, the journey being less crowded than I remembered, probably because it was a Saturday, then walked the length of the Pentonville Road from west to east, through my old stamping ground, marvelling at how much things had changed in the past three years. The porn shops at the start of Pentonville Road were all boarded up now, and scaffolding covered the grime-stained buildings. Huge cranes towered across the skyline above the station and beyond. I'd heard somewhere that they were going to make King's Cross station the main terminal for the Eurostar rail service linking London to Continental Europe, and it looked like the powers that be were doing their utmost to clean up the area, so that those stepping off the trains from Paris and Brussels for the first time would get a good initial impression of Britain's capital. There was still a long way to go, and the place definitely had a mid-construction feel about it, but on the surface at least it looked better than it had done when I'd been a copper here.
    All the way to my destination, I kept my eye out for anyone suspicious, but the pavements were quiet, as they always were in this part of town. Nothing much happens on the Pentonville Road, the only activity tending to be the steady flow of traffic heading between the West End and the City, and that's because there's really nothing on it, bar a handful of shops, the odd pub in need of refurbishment, and the occasional luxury apartment complex. It had a real windswept feel - you half expected to see a pile of