Free Visibility by Boris Starling Page B

seats along.
    It was this configuration that had given them away, for they had used the exact same one on the journey from Green Park to Leicester Square. Plenty of people had changed trains with him, but for the same three people to take up the same three positions in the same carriage as him on both occasions was beyond coincidence.
    He wondered where they were from. An espionage service was the most obvious possibility; Five, of course, given Stensness’ role, though the dead man’s political leanings meant that the MGB, Soviet foreign intelligence, could not be ruled out either. Or perhaps the followers were strictly criminal elements, come to protect a part of Stensness’ business about which Herbert as yet knew nothing. He wondered whether Elkington had found something at the destination, or whether old man Stensness was somehow involved. Though, if he was, it would not have been directly, assuming he had been telling the truth about looking after Lady Clarissa twenty-four hours a day.
    Questions, Herbert thought; questions.
    Of one thing, however, Herbert was certain: these were amateurs. Professionals would never have let themselves get burnt like that, especially so early in the surveillance; they could only have picked him up this morning because it would have been impossible to tail anyone in the fog last night.
    At least they did not seem to be togged out in pantomime get-ups such as false beards, which were not only more trouble than they were worth but also tendedto be easily detectable under the intense lights of a train or restaurant.
    At Highgate station, Herbert tore off the
Times
crossword, put it in his pocket, and disembarked as planned. He was relying for orientation on what he had memorized from the
A to Z
, and wanted to stick with what he could remember.
    The three men followed him off the train, all but signaling to each other as they moved. Whichever outfit they represented needed to buck up either their training or the quality of their recruits, and fast.
    God Almighty, Herbert thought; he was beginning to sound like de Vere Green.
    The cleanness of the air took Herbert by surprise. All of a sudden, it was a perfect winter’s day, cold and crisp. He gulped down lungfuls which felt impossibly pure after the filth of the smog.
    It was the height that was making the difference, rather than the distance from central London; visibility was no better at Kew than at Kingsway, after all. Highgate was several hundred feet above the river, and the fog was low-lying. The residents here, and round Parliament and Shooters Hills too, must have wondered what all the fuss was about.
    Herbert’s route took him down Archway Road, past a smattering of shops and cafés, and then right down Cholmeley Park, into a labyrinth of comfortable suburbia. He stayed on the left side of Archway Road until it was time to cross; not at the pedestrian beacons, which might have forewarned the trackers, and not until there was traffic approaching, which gave him a reason to take a long look both ways, and in doing so to size up what was happening behind him.
    A Hillman Minx and a Vauxhall Wyvern closed on him, and on each other, at slow speed. He looked up the hill, down the hill, and up again, giving himself enough time to see that his three escorts had arranged themselves in the classic pattern for foot surveillance—“going foxtrot” as the trade term had it.
    The first man was about twenty yards behind him, and would be designated “A” for Adjacent. Herbert mentally christened him Alf.
    A farther twenty yards behind Alf was “B,” Backup, whom Herbert called Bob.
    On the other side of the street, more or less level with Alf, was the third, “C” for Control—Charlie.
    It was the work of a few seconds for Herbert to fix their respective statures and gaits in his mind; their faces he had memorized on the train. Bob was the tallest and Charlie the shortest; Alf looked like he might be the most athletic.
    Herbert