"He's on his way here now. I'll stay with you till he arrives."

I hitched myself up again, feeling weak and furious and afraid. "Listen, they didn't go for you, or Tilson, or anyone else out there. Only me."

"They recognised you. They know you as one of our field executives. They might have thought you'd be replacing Sinclair."

My skin crawled.

"Am I?"

Impatiently he said, "Someone's got to."

We don't like doing it. We're made superstitious by the life we lead, outside society and often isolated, often in danger and often afraid. We don't like the feel of a dead man's shoes.

"Did you have me down," I asked him, "for this one?"

"That's academic now. You're not fit enough."

There was an edge to his tone and I knew he blamed me for what had happened. I shouldn't have let them get at me like that; I should have been more alert. But they hadn't come up on me from behind, because I always know what's in the mirror; they must have come at me at a right angle from Dolphin Square, because the other side was the river; they must have come at me on my blind side and very fast but he was right: I should have heard them, and done something.

"Give me a couple of days," I told him.

If they had a mission lined up, I wanted it. I wanted to go back into that strange limbo and find out who they were, and hit them, and hit to kill. Then I'd be safe again.

"Time is too short," Chandler said.

The throbbing in my rib cage reached my skull, hammering there.

"One day, then. Give me one day, you bastard." But he and his shadow were tilting against the wall, dancing together weirdly into the dark.

2: Croder

"I'm not refusing the mission. I'm refusing Croder."

He didn't ask why.