A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain (the red fox clan .TXT) 📕

Marcos leaned across, checking Monroe’s pulse with her fingers, as if not believing the machine beside her that showed his heart rate on the screen.

‘You have? Why?’ Declan was surprised at this. ‘I thought you didn’t get on with her?’

‘I saw her when she thought Monroe was in trouble,’ Doctor Marcos explained. ‘She felt guilty for letting him get into that situation. I’m hoping that guilt still exists, because God knows we could use someone needing to prove themselves right now.’

Declan nodded, looking back to Monroe.

‘I can take over for a bit?’ he asked. Doctor Marcos shook her head.

‘I’ll do it,’ she said, watching Monroe as she spoke.

‘Does he know?’ Declan rose from the chair.

‘Know what?’

‘How you feel about him.’

‘Go home you silly boy,’ Doctor Marcos chided, but Declan saw the hint of a smile as she spoke. ‘I’ll let you know if anything happens.’

Declan patted Doctor Marcos on the shoulder before walking out of the room. He stopped however at the door.

‘The moment anything does,’ he reminded her. ‘Make me the first call.’

Doctor Marcos nodded absently, already forgetting that Declan was even there. Realising that there was nothing left to do in the ward, Declan nodded once more and left.

He was so busy thinking about Monroe and Doctor Marcos, that he didn’t see the shaven headed man on the other side of the ward corridor door, watching him, and taking a note of the time in a journal.

7

Pocket Parks

Kendis Taylor knew she was being followed. She didn’t know who he was, but she pretty much could guess who he worked for, and why he was there. Rattlestone were getting spooked, and they wanted to know who her source was. They wanted her discredited; that was pretty clear by the note passed through her door that day, and this apparent file that had been created and sent to Alex Monroe’s desk, right before they attacked him.

Having left Nasir and Declan in the cemetery, presumably to decide which one of them was more loyal to her, she’d exited through the south entrance, turning left up the Fulham Road. She’d stopped at a bagel shop opposite the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, partly because she was hungry, but also to see who changed their rhythm behind her and saw a man, stocky and balding, in jeans and a brown leather bomber jacket turn and enter a creperie on the corner of Hollywood Road, making the cardinal sin for anyone secretly following of continuing to watch out of the window at their target rather than pretend to look at the menu. She smiled, waved to the man and moved into the road, waving again to stop a black cab as it passed. Leaping in and giving directions, she watched the balding man run back onto the street, frantically making a call, most likely trying to remember the registration number of the cab as he hunted for one for himself to follow. Turning out of sight on Redcliffe Road, Kendis quickly paid the driver a tenner and leapt out, popping into a stationery store on the corner and waiting until a second black cab passed, the balding man sitting in the back as he spoke into a phone.

The threat now passed, Kendis walked back onto the Fulham Road and crossed over, heading south down Limerston Street to the King’s Road, leaping onto an 11 bus to Liverpool Street. She knew she’d made a mistake the moment she tapped her Oyster card to the reader; that careless error meant that now they’d see she used it, and they could follow the bus. This was easy to fix however and, after carefully watching the passengers of the bus, she sat across from a teenager in a shell suit, letting her Oyster card accidentally fall out onto the seat, rising and moving to exit through the middle doors as the bus arrived at Victoria Coach Station. She wasn’t looking directly at him, but through the window reflection she saw the teenager move past the seat, pausing momentarily to pick up the travel pass. He didn’t move to give it back though, and she smiled. There was about twenty quid on the Oyster and he was welcome to it all, as long as he took a few journeys that day. It would lead anyone following the card on a wild goose chase, while Kendis carried on with her business, heading eastwards down side roads towards Vauxhall Bridge Road, walking against the traffic on Rutherford Street and turning down Horseferry Road. She hadn’t seen anyone following her for a while now, so finally she relaxed, making her way to the meeting place.

She wouldn’t have relaxed, however, if she’d known that Nasir Gill was already waiting for her.

Malcolm Gladwell was the MP for Woodley, in Reading, but he didn’t travel home that much when Parliament was in session, instead preferring to stay in a small apartment in Westminster, at the junction of Page Street and Marsham Street. He felt a sense of nostalgia coming here; at one time it had been a Star Trek themed bar that he remembered attending in his early twenties before it closed, but he’d mainly picked the apartment because of the great running routes that were around there. Because of this, he’d often walk home for brief breaks between sessions, passing Westminster Abbey and the giant monstrosity of a building that housed the Home Office. Today was no exception; he had an eight pm reading on a Justice Bill addendum in the Commons, so had grabbed a late lunch, or rather a slightly early dinner at the apartment, while waiting for his guest to arrive.

However, as he walked up to the apartment block’s entrance, he spied a piece of white paper taped to the door.

Window Cleaning Half Price

There was no number on it, but it didn’t need one for Gladwell to understand what it meant. He’d only created the meeting drop idea the night before, after all. Glancing around, ensuring that