Mambo by Campbell Armstrong

wondered. The Irish had their own gangsters.
    From Battersea to Wandsworth. In a prim semi-detached house a lovely young Czech woman, who had been arrested once for her membership in a gang of terrorists that had made an elaborate attempt to bomb the Russian Embassy in Bonn, brewed cups of herbal tea and denounced Gunther Ruhr for “excessive violence”. She didn’t know where to find him, nor had she any idea who had rescued him. In pursuit of the quiet life, she’d lost touch with her former associates. Now she grew organic vegetables and consulted the I Ching and breast-fed a baby that had begun to cry in an adjoining room. Like everyone else encountered during this strange tour of Pagan’s London, she knew nothing, heard nothing. All was blind silence and frustration. Houses in Camberwell and White-chapel, inhabited by Lebanese and Palestinians respectively, brought similar results. Absolutely no information about Gunther Ruhr or his employers or his rescuers made the underground circuit. Final.
    On the way back to Golden Square Pagan said, “A waste of bloody time.”
    â€œAt least you put the word out,” Foxie said.
    â€œA fat lot of good, Foxie. Whoever employs Ruhr works in complete secrecy. And the rescue operation might have been carried out by phantoms. Nobody knows a damn thing.”
    Pagan and Foxworth rode in the lift, an ancient iron coffin that clanged and rocked up to the second floor. Inside his office Pagan had another small taste of Auchentoshan and settled down behind his desk. He was out of breath. He’d gone beyond mere fatigue. He was in another world where you couldn’t quite trust the evidence of the senses. It was like jet-lag magnified, almost as if you saw the world reflected in bevelled mirrors. He stared at the darkened window, listening to the faint whirring of the three computers on the floor below. It was just after midnight and the silence of the streets accentuated the noise of the electronics, which were sinister to Pagan because he had no affinity with them.
    I got up from my deathbed for you, Ruhr, he thought. I got up and I walked. You could at least provide me with a hint. You could at least tell me how much time I have left before you do something monstrous. The time factor! It was unsettling to be adrift on a planet whose only clock belonged to Gunther Ruhr.
    Foxworth came into the office with a computer print-out. “This is what you wanted. Our computers analysed all four hundred and seventeen names on the Home Office list, all people who arrived in the United Kingdom in the last month. Out of that lot, there are twenty-nine on whom we have active files of our own.”
    Pagan scanned the sheets with blurred eyes. Twenty-nine match-ups. That was practically a crowd. He had only eight investigators at his disposal. It wasn’t possible to conduct twenty-nine investigations simultaneously. Even if he managed it somehow, by borrowing men from other departments, how could he be sure he wasn’t wasting manpower and time? Since it was almost a certainty that neither Ruhr nor his associates had entered the UK legally, the names on the list would yield nothing. Twenty-nine!
    â€œI think I’ll stretch out on the sofa,” he said. “Get some of the weight off my feet.”
    Foxworth frowned. “Wouldn’t you be better off going home, Frank? Happy to drive you.”
    Pagan shook his head.
    Determined bastard, Foxie thought. Frank had to have the constitution of a Clydesdale.
    Pagan walked very slowly to the couch in the corner of the office. It was an old horsehair piece, overstuffed and creaky and cratered. Even though he lay down with great care, a shaft of pain pierced him and he moaned slightly. When you thought you had it silenced for the night, back it came just to remind you you’re no longer master of your own system.
    â€œI’d like a map,” Pagan said. “A decent one that covers the whole