Henby exhaled through pursed lips. 'I hadn't thought about that.'

'You've got to have the back story prepared,' said Sharpe. 'If someone asks and you stand there scratching your b.a.l.l.s they'll smell a rat.'

'Football?'

'I'm a Rangers fan and you support Millwall. How would that have happened?'

Henby looked crestfallen and Sharpe chuckled at the younger man's obvious discomfort. 'Tell you what, the old betting shop is a safe bet. Where do you live?'

'Clerkenwell.'

'You bet the horses?'

Henby shook his head.

'Okay, so you went in to bet on a game. There's plenty of bookies in Clerkenwell, you can be vague about that. I was in putting money on the horses and I gave you a sure thing. A twelve to one shot at Newton Abbot. I convinced you to put a bet on and you gambled twenty quid and won two hundred and forty. That's the sort of thing to forge a friendship, right?'

'Name of the horse?'

'Say it was Missie something. You're not a horse nut so why would you remember? I've given you a few other tips since and we've had a few drinks in the pub.'

'Which pub?'

'What's your local in Clerkenwell?'

'The White Hart. And the Slug and Lettuce.'

'Okay, both of them, and here. But we're mainly betting-shop buddies. During one of our pub chats I pa.s.sed a racist comment or two so you asked me if I wanted to come along to an England First meeting.'

Henby nodded. 'Sounds good.'

'If in doubt, keep it vague,' said Sharpe. 'Most people have pretty c.r.a.p memories, but if you tell a lie it can come back to haunt you.'

'Got it,' said Henby. He looked at his watch. 'I've got to go,' he said. 'I'll pick you up outside the pub tomorrow. Anything else before I head off?'

'Just one more question?'

'Fire away.'

Sharpe jerked a thumb at Henby's hands. 'The tattoos? They real?'

Henby held up his right hand and bunched it into a fist. He grinned at the blue letters on his knuckles. 'Yeah. Of course.'

'b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l,' said Sharpe. 'Talk about deep cover.'

'They'll come off,' said Henby. 'The new inks don't go too deep, a couple of laser treatments and they'll be gone.'

'Even so, that shows... commitment.'

'You have to if you want to get close to these guys,' said Henby. He drained his gla.s.s. 'They don't take prisoners if your cover does get blown they'll put you in ICU before you can say, "I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here." That's if you're lucky. They killed an undercover cop last year. Kicked him to death. These aren't criminals you're dealing with, they're fanatics. They don't care about the consequences of what they do. They really believe that they're part of the master race and that down the line they'll be ruling the world. Killing a cop, even a white cop, wouldn't worry them in the slightest.' He stood up. 'See ya tomorrow night, yeah? I'll pick you up outside. And wear a decent shirt.'

'This is a Lacoste,' said Sharpe.

'It's a fake Lacoste,' said Henby. 'And these guys can spot a phoney a mile off.'

Shepherd left Hereford after lunch on Sunday. Liam had been subdued as he always was when his father was about to leave on an a.s.signment. Sat.u.r.day had been more relaxed. Shepherd had gone to see Liam play football: his son's team had won 31 and Liam had come close to scoring twice. Shepherd had shouted himself hoa.r.s.e and afterwards they had celebrated at Burger King. In the evening they had gone into town to watch a movie that Liam wanted to see. Shepherd had enjoyed spending time with his son it was a rare treat but he was all too well aware that he was packing in as much as he could because he was going away for weeks, possibly longer.

Sunday was different, because Liam knew that his father would be leaving, so there had been tension in the air. They'd kicked around a football in the garden, eaten lasagne prepared by Katra and afterwards taken Lady for a walk, but they'd both been aware of the clock ticking in the background. Liam had played with his Wii while Shepherd had packed his bag, and he had walked with him to the BMW. Shepherd had given Liam a hug and promised to phone as soon as he got to London. Liam put on a brave face but there was no hiding the fact that he wasn't happy his father was leaving. He had gone back into the house before Shepherd had driven off.

Shepherd's mobile rang when he was an hour outside London. He took the call on hands-free. 'How's it going?' asked Sharpe.

'I'm on my way to London,' said Shepherd. 'I start with the TSG tomorrow.'

'Yeah, well, don't crack too many skulls.'

'It's not like that any more,' said Shepherd. 'It's about controlling situations, not about breaking heads.'

'You don't want to put too much store by the manual,' said Sharpe. 'They killed a guy at the G20 demos, remember?'

'He had a heart-attack,' said Shepherd. 'What do you want, Razor?'

'Just calling to let you know that I'm off to an England First meeting tonight. Hopefully I'll be meeting up with Dawson. Are you around for a drink later?'

'Maybe during the week. Let me settle in.'

Shepherd ended the call. He drove through north London, using his sat-nav system to guide him to the house that Charlotte b.u.t.ton had fixed up for him. It was a two-bedroom end-of-terrace in a run-down part of Kilburn. To the right there was a wooden gate that had been sprayed with graffiti. He parked in front of the house, picked up his bag and rang the doorbell. Seconds later a woman with curly blonde hair, wearing blue jeans and a blue denim shirt, opened the front door. It was Jenny Lock. It had been a good six months since he'd last seen her so he gave her a hug and a peck on the cheek. 'Welcome to your new home,' she said.

'Salubrious,' said Shepherd, as he walked into a cramped hall that smelt of damp. The wallpaper was basic woodchip that had been painted with pale green emulsion. A bare light bulb hung from the ceiling.

'It's what you'd be able to afford as a single cop,' she said. 'Met officers get a hefty London allowance but it doesn't go far. Even after the slump, property still isn't cheap here. This is about right for your pay scale.' She showed him through to a small sitting room where there was a fake leather sofa and a chunky television set.

'I don't even get an LCD?'

'The set comes with the flat,' said Lock. 'The sort of rent you're paying, you're not going to get top-of-the-range appliances.'

'Couldn't you fix me up with a pretty barrister wife and a house in Mayfair?'

Lock laughed. 'That's funny.'

'I'm serious.' He smiled. 'Sort of.'

'I'm not sure that Charlie would run to another operative,' she said. She handed him a rental contract. 'The name and phone number of the landlord and the agent are on our database, so leave this around if you have visitors. You've got a year's lease, paid monthly from a Barclays account in your name.' She handed him an envelope. 'A Barclaycard in the name of Terry Halligan, and an ATM card. You'll need to put your signature on them both, and sign the rental contract. And there's a warrant card, too.'

'Pa.s.sport?'

'If you think you'll need to travel, let me know and I'll get you one within six hours. But there's a driving licence in there. Now, so far as your work legend goes, we've used your army background and given you five years with the Paras. Then you joined West Mercia Police.'

'My local force,' said Shepherd. 'That's convenient.'

'I don't just throw these things together,' said Lock, primly. 'They cover the fourth largest geographical area in England and Wales and they only have two and a half thousand officers so they're pretty spread out. We've put you based in Hereford because you've got local knowledge, but our main reason for choosing West Mercia is that no one in the TSG has ever worked for them.'

'And why am I transferring to the Met?'

Lock smiled. 'That's where we've been clever,' she said. 'We've given you a disciplinary caution for slapping around a drug-dealer. We've used another SOCA operative as the dealer so it'll stand up if anyone ever follows it up, and it's down on your record. You tell everyone that you wanted to try big-city police work but if anyone checks up they'll get the real reason you wanted to leave West Mercia.'

'Nice,' said Shepherd.

'We aim to please,' she said. 'Now, choice of vehicle. You've got a motorcycle licence and we thought we might make use of that, get a man-of-action thing going. We've put a BMW bike in your name since 2008. Did you see the side gate as you came in?'

Shepherd nodded.

'I've a key for that. It leads to the yard at the back of the house where you can leave it. We've kept it registered to an address in Hereford so if anyone runs it through DVLA at Swansea it'll check out. Ditto with your licence. We've given you a speeding conviction on the bike you were caught doing sixty in a forty area, snapped by a speed camera outside Hereford. It's an HP2 Sport, fourteen and a half grand new but you bought it for ten grand when it was a year old.'

'I don't have a car?'

'We thought a bike fitted the profile better. Single, never married, heavy into sports and bikes makes you one of the lads right from the start. Plus one of the TSG sergeants at Paddington Green is a bike nut, which will give you an in with him. What are you planning to do with your car?'

'I'm not sure,' said Shepherd. 'I don't fancy taking the bike to Hereford so I'm going to need it.'

'You can get the Tube to Paddington and the train from there to Hereford,' said Lock. 'But if you wanted to keep your car here I'd suggest you keep it some distance away. I could see about arranging a lock-up if that would help.'

'Let's see how I get on,' said Shepherd. 'I might end up leaving the car in Hereford and using the train like you say. So, what hobbies have you given me? Do I support a football team?'

'I've left that up to you,' said Lock. 'Come on, I'll show you around the bedrooms.' She went up the stairs and Shepherd followed her. There was a large bedroom and a smaller one, separated by a small bathroom. 'I've put an exercise bike and a rowing machine in the spare room,' she said.

'I'm more of a runner.'

'I doubt you'll be doing much running around Kilburn,' said Lock. 'There's not much green s.p.a.ce nearby and it's not the safest of areas. Anyone running in Kilburn is probably being pursued by a policeman. But it's more to add to your image if you have visitors.' She went into the main bedroom. There was a framed photograph of a couple in their sixties on the dressing-table. 'I gave you a mum and dad, but no siblings.'

'Pretty accurate,' said Shepherd.

There was a wardrobe with a mirrored sliding door. She opened it. There were a dozen shirts, half polos and half long-sleeved, and several pairs of jeans and chinos on hangers. 'I bought most of the clothes from stores in Hereford and had them washed a couple of times. There's two suits and a couple of sports jackets, with a Hereford tailor's labels in them. Your motorcycle gear is downstairs in the kitchen. Leathers from a bike shop in Hereford.'

'You don't think the Hereford connection is going to start alarm bells ringing?'

'Your SAS background? I don't think so. You're quite an exception, going from the SAS to SOCA. And we did think we had to choose a place that you're very familiar with.'

They went downstairs and back into the sitting room. Shepherd went over to a cheap pine bookcase filled with paperbacks, mainly well-thumbed thrillers and crime novels. There were a couple of framed photographs of Shepherd in desert camouflage gear, one of him standing in front of a tank, the other in a group of soldiers. 'These are good,' he said, picking up the group picture.

'We've a girl who's a wizard at faking them,' said Lock. 'It all adds to the legend, gives you an opportunity to tell a few war stories if you want.'

'We're really pushing the action-man image, aren't we?'

'If these are vigilante cops, they're not going to be drawn to shrinking violets,' said Lock. 'We haven't faked up any police pictures we thought that might be pushing our luck. But we have got you on the West Mercia Police staff list and you're hidden-flagged so we'll know if anyone goes looking for you.'

'It all sounds great, Jenny, as always.'

She smiled. 'It's funny, but you do look like a Terry,' she said. 'I never saw you as an Eddie, but Terry definitely suits you.' She went over to the dining-table where she'd left her briefcase and took out a Nokia N95 mobile. 'This is registered in the Terry Halligan name and goes back two years. It's a Vodafone contract, still registered to the Hereford address. We've set up a complete false record of calls, all to numbers in our database, including text messages. If anyone does check up on your number it'll all look kosher but, more importantly, we'll know immediately that someone has been looking at you.' She gave the phone to him. 'There's a GPS tracker in there, but no eavesdropping facility.'

'There are no microphones in the house?'

'Charlotte didn't think it was necessary,' she said. 'I gather the intention is to catch them in the act rather than to inveigle a confession.'

'That's a pity because I'm good at inveigling.'

'So I hear.' She looked around the room. 'I think we're all set,' she said. 'Can you think of anything else?'

'Nothing I can think of,' said Shepherd.

'I'll be off, then. If anything springs to mind, give me a call. I know how difficult it can be investigating cops, so I'm there when you need me, whatever it is.'

Jimmy Sharpe turned up the collar of his coat and stamped his feet. There was a chill in the air and Ray Henby was already fifteen minutes late. Two men with shaved heads and diamond earrings, wearing Millwall shirts under denim jackets, walked into the pub. The sound of men drinking and laughing billowed out and just as quickly died as the door closed behind them. A car horn sounded off to his right. It was Henby in a blue Vauxhall Astra. Sharpe jogged over and climbed in. 'Sorry I'm late,' said Henby. He was chewing gum and offered Sharpe his pack of Wrigley's.

Sharpe took a piece, unwrapped it and popped it into his mouth. 'So, where are we going?' he asked.

'Pub in Tower Hamlets,' said Henby. 'They don't tell you where the meetings are until a few hours before because if the lefties find out there'll be pickets and the cops will turn up and it all turns to s.h.i.t.'

'There's a lot of that goes on, yeah?'

'Yeah the Searchlight people keep trying to get spies into England First but they usually get rooted out. They want confrontations because it's good for raising their profile. The cops turn up supposedly to keep the peace but really they're there to show that they're politically correct. They protect Searchlight and the Socialist Workers Party and intimidate England First. Tonight is a fund-raising event and they don't want a confrontation so we call a special number a few hours before the off and we're given the address.'

'Like with raves,' said Sharpe.

'Yeah, I guess that's where they got the idea from, but there'll be no Ecstasy there tonight. Just booze and f.a.gs and racist banter.'

'Sounds like a good night out,' said Sharpe. 'You go to a lot of them?'

'Only since I was asked to look at Dawson,' said Henby. 'To be honest, the football hooligans aren't that into the racism thing. You hear the chants and that at matches but it's more to do with taking the p.i.s.s out of the team. They're not into firebombing immigrant families or beating up asylum seekers they're more interested in kicking the s.h.i.t out of other fans, no matter what colour they are. Lenny Brennan took me to my first meeting. He's a computer whiz and helps them with their website.'

'He'll be there tonight, yeah?'

'Definitely. He wants to talk about the Millwall match next week.'

'Will Dawson be there?'

'I guess so he goes to most of the fund-raisers. I'll introduce you to Brennan and if you stick with him he should introduce you to Dawson. Then it's up to you.'

'Sounds good, Ray. Thanks.'

'Now it's my turn to give you some advice,' said Henby. 'Don't go overboard on the racial thing. Agree with what you hear but don't start throwing in "kill all Pakis" or anything like that. That how the infiltrators give themselves away. Too enthusiastic. You'll hear some pretty outrageous stuff but don't join in, not until you've been accepted.'

'Less is more?'

'Pretty much, until you've been accepted. Just nod and smile and throw a few quid into the bucket when it gets pa.s.sed around. You'll be fine.'

'I appreciate your confidence,' said Sharpe.