Skeleton Key Read online

  The guard suddenly turned and saw Alex looking at him. It had happened very quickly and Alex was annoyed with himself for not taking more care. The guard didn’t stop talking but he shifted his body so that the arm with the tattoo was away from Alex’s view. At the same time, he covered the tattoo with his free hand. Alex smiled at him and gestured, as if he was waiting for the phone. The guard muttered a few more words and hung up. Then he put his jacket back on and moved away. Alex waited until he had gone back upstairs, then followed him. The guard had disappeared. Alex took his place on the bench outside the umpire’s office and considered.

  A telephone conversation in a crowded cafeteria. It shouldn’t have meant anything. But the strange thing was, Alex had seen the guard a short while before, about an hour before the Blitz/Lefevre game had begun. Alex had been sent over to the Millennium Building to deliver a racquet to one of the other competitors and had been directed to the players’ lounge. Climbing the staircase that swept up from the main reception, he had found himself in a large, open area with television monitors on one side and computer terminals on the other, and bright red and blue sofas in between. He knew he was privileged to be there. This was a private place. Venus Williams was sitting on one of the sofas. Tim Henman was watching a game on TV. And there was Jamie Blitz himself, getting a plastic cup of iced mineral water from the dispenser against the far wall.

  The guard had also been there. Alex had noticed him standing rather awkwardly near the stairs. He was watching Blitz, but at the same time he was using a mobile phone. At least, that was what it looked like. But Alex had thought at the time that there was something strange about him. Although the mobile was at his ear, he wasn’t actually talking. All his attention was on Blitz. Alex had watched as Blitz drank his water and walked away. The guard had walked off a few seconds later.

  What had he been doing inside the Millennium Building? That was the first question Alex asked himself now as he sat in the sunshine, listening to the thwack of distant tennis balls and the applause of an unseen crowd. And there was something else, more puzzling. If the guard had a mobile phone, and if that phone had been working just a few hours ago, why had he needed to make a call from the public telephone in the corner of the Complex? Of course, his battery could have gone down. But even so, why use that particular phone? There were telephones all over the club, up on the surface. Could it be that he didn’t want to be seen?

  And why did he have a red circle tattooed on his arm? He hadn’t wanted that to be seen. Alex was certain he had tried to cover it up.

  And there was something else. Maybe it was just coincidence, but the guard, just like the man who had broken into the All England Tennis Club to begin with, was Chinese.

  BLOOD AND STRAWBERRIES

  Alex didn’t make a conscious decision to follow the guard, but over the next few days he seemed drawn to him almost as if by accident. He spotted him twice more; once searching handbags at gate five and again giving directions to a couple of spectators.

  Unfortunately, it was impossible to keep track of him all the time. That was the one flaw in Crawley’s plan. Alex’s job as a ballboy kept him on Centre Court throughout much of the day. The ballboys and girls worked a rotation system, two hours on, two hours off. At best, he could only be a part-time spy. And when he was actually on court, he quickly forgot the guard, the telephone and the entire business of the break-in as he found himself absorbed by the drama of the game.

  But two days after Blitz had left Wimbledon, Alex found himself once again shadowing the guard. It was about half an hour before afternoon play was due to begin and Alex was about to report into the Complex when he saw him entering the Millennium Building again. That was strange in itself. The building had its own security staff. The public couldn’t get past the reception desk without a pass. So what was he doing inside? Alex glanced at his watch. If he was late, Walfor would yell at him and possibly even move him to one of the less interesting perimeter courts. But there was still time. And he had to admit, his curiosity was aroused.

  He went into the Millennium Building. As usual, nobody questioned him. His ballboy uniform was enough. He climbed the stairs, passed through the players’ lounge and into the restaurant at the other side. The guard was there, ahead of him. Once again he had his mobile phone in his hand. But he wasn’t making a call. He was simply standing, watching the players and the journalists as they finished their lunch.

  The dining room was large and modern, with a long buffet for hot food and a central area with salads, cold drinks and fruit. There must have been about a hundred people eating at the tables and Alex recognized one or two famous faces among them. He glanced at the guard. He was standing in a corner, trying not to be noticed. At the same time, his attention seemed to be fixed on a table next to one of the windows. Alex followed the direction of his gaze. There were two men sitting at the table. One was wearing a jacket and tie. The other was in a tracksuit. Alex didn’t know the first man but the second was Owen Bryant, another world-class player, an American. He would be playing later that afternoon.

  The other man could have been his manager, or perhaps his agent. The two of them were talking, quietly, intensely. The manager spoke and Bryant laughed. Alex moved further into the restaurant, keeping close to the wall. He wanted to see what the guard was going to do, but he didn’t want to be seen. He was glad that the restaurant was fairly crowded. There were enough people moving about to screen him.

  Bryant stood up. Alex saw the guard’s eyes narrow. Now the mobile phone was on its way to his ear. But he hadn’t dialled a number. Bryant went over to a water dispenser and pulled a cup out of the plastic cylinder. The guard pressed a button on his phone. Bryant helped himself to some water. Alex watched as a bubble of air mushroomed up to the surface inside the plastic tank. The tennis player carried the water back to the table and sat down. The manager said something. Bryant drank his water. And that was it. Alex had seen the whole thing.

  But what had he seen?

  He had no time to answer the question. The guard was already moving, heading for the exit. Alex came to a decision. The main door was between himself and the guard and now he made for it too, keeping his head low as if he wasn’t looking where he was going. He timed it perfectly. Just as the guard reached the door, Alex crashed into him. At the same moment, he swung an arm carelessly, knocking the guard’s hand. The mobile phone fell to the floor.

  “Oh – I’m sorry,” Alex said. Before the guard could stop him, he had leant down and picked up the phone. He weighed it in his hand for a moment before passing it back. “Here you are,” he said.

  The guard said nothing. For a moment his eyes were locked into Alex’s and Alex found himself being inspected by two very black pupils that had no life at all. The man’s skin was pale and pockmarked, with a sheen of sweat across his upper lip. There was no expression anywhere on his face. Alex felt the telephone being wrenched out of his hand and then the guard had gone, the door swinging shut behind him.

  Alex’s hand was still in mid-air. He looked down at his palm. He was worried that he had given himself away, but at least he had learned something from the exchange. The mobile phone was a fake. It was too light. There was nothing on the screen. And it had no recognizable logo: Nokia, Samsung, Virgin … nothing.

  He turned back to the two men at the table. Bryant had finished his water and crumpled the plastic cup in his hand. He was shaking hands with his friend, about to leave.

  The water…

  Alex had had an idea that was completely absurd and yet made some sort of sense out of what he had seen. He walked back across the restaurant and crouched down beside the dispenser. He had seen the same machines all over the tennis club. He took a cup and used its rim to press the tap underneath the tank. Water, filtered and chilled, ran into the cup. He could feel it, ice cold against his palm.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  Alex looked up to see a red-faced man in a Wimbledon blazer towerin
g over him. It was the first unfriendly face he’d seen since he had arrived. “I was just getting some water,” he explained.

  “I can see that! That’s obvious. I mean, what are you doing in this restaurant? This is reserved for players, officials and press.”

  “I know that,” Alex said. He forced himself not to lose his temper. He had no right to be here and if the official – whoever he was – complained, he might well lose his place as a ballboy. “I’m sorry, sir,” he said. “I brought a racquet over for Mr Bryant. I delivered it just now. But I was thirsty, so I stopped to get a drink.”

  The official softened. Alex’s story sounded perfectly reasonable. And he had enjoyed being addressed as “sir”. He nodded. “All right. But I don’t want to see you in here again.” He reached out a hand and took the plastic cup. “Now on your way.”

  Alex arrived back at the Complex about ten minutes before play began. Walfor glowered at him but said nothing.

  That afternoon, Owen Bryant lost his match against Jacques Lefevre, the same unknown Frenchman who had so unexpectedly beaten Jamie Blitz two days before. The final score was 6–4, 6–7, 4–6, 2–6. Although Bryant had won the first set, his play had steadily deteriorated throughout the afternoon. It was another surprising result. Like Blitz, Bryant had been a favourite to win.

  Twenty minutes later, Alex was back in the basement restaurant, sitting with Sabina, who was drinking a Coke Lite.

  “My mum and dad are here today,” she was saying. “I managed to get them tickets and in return they’ve promised to get me a new surfboard. Have you ever surfed, Alex?”

  “What?” Alex was miles away.

  “I was talking about Cornwall. Surfing…”

  “Yes, I’ve surfed.” Alex had learned with his uncle, Ian Rider. The spy whose death had so abruptly changed Alex’s life. The two of them had spent a week together in San Diego, California. That had been years ago. Years that sometimes felt like centuries.

  “Is there something wrong with your drink?” Sabina asked.

  Alex realized he was holding his Coke in front of him, balancing it in his hand, staring at it. But he was thinking about water.

  “No, it’s fine…” he began.

  And then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw the guard. He had come back downstairs into the Complex. Once again he was using the telephone in the corner. Alex saw him put in a coin and dial a number.

  “I’ll be right back,” he said.

  He got up and made his way over to the phone. The guard was standing with his back to him. This time he might be able to get close enough to hear what was being said.

  “…will be completely successful.” The guard was talking in English but with a thick accent. He still had his back to Alex. There was a pause. Then: “I’m going to meet him now. Yes … straight away. He’ll give it to me and I’ll bring it to you.” Another pause. Alex got the feeling that the conversation was coming to an end. He took a few steps back. “I have to go,” the guard said. “Bye.” He put the receiver down and walked away.

  “Alex…?” Sabina called to him. She was on her own, sitting where he had left her. He realized she must have been watching what he did. He raised a hand and waved to her. He would have to find some way to explain all this later.

  The guard didn’t climb back up to the surface. Instead he took a door which led to a long corridor, stretching into the distance. Alex opened the door and followed.

  The All England Tennis Club covers a huge area. On the surface it looks a bit like a theme park, though one whose only theme is tennis. Thousands of people stream along paths and covered walkways, an uninterrupted flow of brilliant white shirts, sunglasses and straw hats. As well as the courts, there are tearooms and cafés, restaurants, shops, hospitality tents, ticket booths and security points.

  But there is a second, less well-known world underneath all this. The entire club is connected by an underground maze of corridors, tunnels and roads, some big enough to drive a car through. If it’s easy to get lost above ground, it’s even easier to lose yourself below. There are very few signs and there’s nobody standing at the corner to offer you information. This is the world of the cooks and the waiters, the refuse collectors and the delivery men. Somehow they find their way around, coming up in the daylight exactly where they are needed before disappearing again.

  The corridor in which Alex found himself was called the Royal Route and connected the Millennium Building with Court Number One, allowing the players to make their way to the game without being seen. It was clean and empty, with a bright blue carpet. The guard was about twenty metres ahead of him and it felt eerie to be so suddenly alone. There were just the two of them there. Above them, on the surface, there would be people everywhere, milling about in the sunlight. Alex was grateful for the carpet, which muffled the sound of his feet. It seemed that the guard was in a hurry. So far he hadn’t stopped or turned round.

  The guard reached a wooden door marked RESTRICTED. Without stopping, he went through. Alex paused for a moment, then followed. Now he found himself in an altogether grimier environment, a cement corridor with yellow industrial markings and fat ventilation pipes overhead. The air smelled of oil and garbage, and Alex knew that he had arrived at the so-called Buggy Route, a supply lane that forms a great circle underneath the club. A couple of teenagers in green aprons and jeans walked past him, pushing two plastic bins. A waitress went the other way, carrying a tray of dirty plates. There was no sign of the guard and for a moment Alex thought he’d lost him. But then he saw a figure disappearing behind a series of translucent plastic strips that hung from the ceiling to the floor. He could just make out the man’s uniform on the other side of the barrier. He hurried forward and went through.

  Alex realized two things at the same moment. He no longer had any idea where he was – and he was there on his own.

  He was in an underground chamber, banana-shaped, curving round, with concrete pillars supporting the roof. It looked like an underground carpark and there were indeed three or four cars parked in bays next to the raised walkway where he was standing now. But most of the space was taken up by trash. There were empty cardboard boxes, wooden pallets, a rusting cement mixer, bits of old fencing and broken down coffee vending machines, thrown out and left to rot on the damp cement floor. The air smelled bad and Alex could hear a constant whine, like an electric saw, coming from a garbage compactor just out of his sight. And yet the area was also used for the storage of food and drink. There were beer barrels, hundreds of bottles of fizzy drinks, gas cylinders and, clustered together, eight or nine massive white boxes – refrigerators, each one carrying the label RAWLINGS REFRIGERATION.

  Alex looked up at the roof. It was slanting upwards and the shape reminded him of something. Of course! The raked seating around Court Number One! That was where he was – in the loading bay beneath the tennis court. This was the underbelly of Wimbledon all right. This was where all the supplies arrived and where all the trash left. And right now, ten thousand people were sitting just a few metres above his head, enjoying the game, unaware that everything they consumed throughout the day began and ended here.

  But where was the guard? Why had he come here and who was he going to meet? Alex crept forward carefully, once again feeling very alone. He was on a raised platform with the single word DANGER repeated in yellow letters along its edge. He didn’t need to be told. He came to a flight of steps and went down, moving into the main body of the chamber, on the same level as the refrigerators. He walked past a stack of gas cylinders, pressurized carbon dioxide. He had no idea what they were for. Half the things down here seemed to have been dumped for no good reason.

  He was fairly sure now that the guard had gone. Why would he want to meet anyone down here? For the first time since he had left the Complex, Alex played back the telephone conversation in his mind.

  I’m going to meet him now. Yes … straight away. He’ll give it to me…

  It sounded ridiculous, fake, like somethi
ng out of a bad film. Even as Alex realized this and knew that he had been tricked, he heard the screaming sound, saw the dark shape rushing out of the shadows. He was in the middle of the concrete floor, out in the open. The guard was behind the wheel of a fork-lift truck, the metal prongs jutting out towards him like the horns of an enormous bull. Powered by its forty-eight volt electric engine, the truck was speeding towards him on pneumatic tyres. Alex glanced up and saw the heavy wooden pallets, a dozen of them, balanced high above the cabin. He saw the guard’s smile, a gleam of ugly teeth in an uglier face. The truck covered the distance between them with astonishing speed then came to a sudden halt as the guard slammed on the brake. Alex yelled and threw himself to one side. The wooden pallets, carried forward by the truck’s momentum, slid off the forks and came clattering down. Alex should have been crushed, would have been, but for the beer barrels. A line of them had taken the weight of the pallets, leaving a tiny triangle of space. Alex heard the wood smashing centimetres above his head. Splinters rained down on his neck and back. Dust and dirt smothered him. But he was still alive. Choking and half blinded, he crawled forward as the fork-lift truck reversed and prepared to come after him again.

  How could he have been so stupid? The guard had seen him that first time in the Complex, when he had made his telephone call. Alex had stood there, gaping at the tattoo on the man’s arm and had thought that his ballboy uniform would be enough to protect him. And then, in the Millennium Building, Alex had clumsily knocked into him to get his hands on the mobile phone. Of course the guard had known who he was and what he was doing. It didn’t matter that he was a teenager. He was dangerous. He had to be taken out.