Famie bustled her way back to her desk. If Carlo Peretti, the global head of news, was involved, their fear must be that the agency was being targeted worldwide.
Famie slumped at her desk. More missed calls. Berlin and Rome this time.
‘Nothing like mass murder to bring old friends to life,’ she said.
5
THE STORY OF 22 May was soon being told in a series of images that came to appal and fascinate the world. They followed in sequence. The first victim had fallen just short of Euston’s main entrance. Three different Twitter accounts had posted their shock and outrage accompanied by graphic images of her blood-soaked clothes and twisted, tangled body. The Kentish Town ‘coffee and blood’ shot, with Thomas’s body sprawled across several steps, became the front-page picture of that day’s London Evening Standard. The Hussain video showed a slumped man on a zebra crossing and a livid, smeared blood trail marking his crawl to the kerb. The 259 bus pictures were considered the most disturbing – few news outlets ran the images of a woman who had been virtually decapitated – but within hours the video had been shared millions of times. There was grainy footage of running passengers at Pimlico followed closely by a man and woman bleeding into a grass verge. By eleven a.m., despite police appeals, it was possible to watch an edited online montage of London’s bloodiest rush hour since 7/7.
Famie’s shift was barely three hours old.
6
FAMIE WAS PERSUADED to relinquish the Slot chair at midday. She’d argued to complete the shift but her trembling hands had given her away. She’d snapped fifty-three stories, and all but one were about the IPS attacks. The link between the murders was established quickly and when armed police appeared outside the Peterson-IPS building the connection was confirmed. Andrew Lewis’s statement, when it finally came, paid tribute to the astonishing bravery and professionalism of the journalists who had died. There was no mention of the Investigations team.
Lewis, his face candlewax-grey and beaded with sweat as he walked into the office, was the first to offer support. As Famie prised herself from the chair he held out his hand. ‘A tour de force, Famie. Exemplary.’
She took his hand briefly. ‘We played catch-up, Andrew. All morning. That’s the truth. And I did what anyone else would’ve done. Just don’t offer me any fucking counselling and I’ll be fine.’
Lewis dredged up a grin. ‘I wouldn’t dream of it.’
She looked around the acre of newsroom, now packed with journalists, security and police. ‘Always wondered how you report the news when you are the news.’ She answered her own question before her boss could open his mouth. ‘And the answer is, you just report the news.’ She felt the beginnings of a headache nagging at the back of her skull. ‘Being Slot was easy, Andrew. That’s the truth of it. But now it’s all real. Everything I snapped is real. It’s all true. It feels like the worst fucking shit show of all time.’
Lewis bowed his head slightly. ‘That’s really what my statement was aiming to convey. You have, as ever, expressed it more … succinctly.’
His bulldog appeared and pointed at a policewoman four desks away, heavily braided cap again under her arm.
‘Excuse me, Famie.’ He raised an acknowledging hand at the Assistant Commissioner. ‘And thank you again for this morning.’
She touched his arm, holding him back.
‘Is it over?’ she said. ‘Is that it?’ She knew it was a dumb question, embarrassed and surprised she’d even asked it. How could he possibly know? She let it hang between them anyway and Lewis seemed to deflate in front of her. For a moment she thought he was about to cry, but instead he mumbled ‘I need to talk to the Assistant Commissioner’ and walked away, the bulldog at his heels.
Famie joined Tommi, Sam and the crowd of end-of-shift workers by the large tinted windows. The plaza was empty. Canary Wharf tube station was still closed, the bike stalls and cafés deserted.
‘They’ll have to let us out soon,’ said Sam. ‘Whatever level of threat there is, we can’t all stay here.’
‘Smells bad enough already,’ said Tommi.
Famie realized she’d been sweating profusely. ‘I smell bad enough already.’
‘And we can hardly all be escorted home,’ said Sam.
Their conversation was muted, one of many huddled discussions happening along the length of the windows.
‘So maybe we have to sleep here.’
Famie’s eyes closed and she pressed her forehead against the glass. Her guts churned.
‘I know what you’re thinking,’ whispered Sam.
‘I’m sure you do, Sherlock,’ she whispered back, ‘I’m sure you do.’ She took a breath. He knew, but she was going to say it anyway. ‘When I didn’t get on that team, I was so pissed off …’
‘We remember,’ said Sam. ‘Boy, do we remember.’
‘I had everything they said they were after. I had Pakistan, I had Iraq, I had crime …’
‘Well, whatever it was you didn’t have,’ said Sam, ‘thank God you didn’t have it.’
‘I think I might, Sam. Every day.’ Her breath briefly fogged up a few inches of window.
Famie thought of her daughter and the ten-year-old photo of her running through waves in Cornwall. The straw hat. The blue and white swimsuit Charlie loved so much. That was a good holiday. She thought of her parents – that hadn’t happened for a while – how they’d wanted to come and help when Jim had walked out. And how she’d refused, determined to manage it herself.
What a selfish cow, she thought.
Then the Twitter and YouTube images of the seven dead played again and she saw Seth’s blood smeared over the road. The white of the zebra crossing, the red of Seth Hussain. She fought the nausea, pressing her forehead against the cold glass.
Over the newsroom chatter, they heard Jane Hilton’s clipped tones. Sam and Tommi turned to watch. Standing in front of a permanent, fixed camera she was answering questions from some unseen TV anchor.
‘Shocked and devastated of course,’ she said. ‘The journalists we lost today were some of our finest.’
Famie snorted. ‘Bet she couldn’t name any of them,’ she said to the window. ‘Not one.’
Hilton was nodding at the interviewer’s question. ‘It’s too early to speculate, of course. For the moment we just need to stand with our fallen colleagues.’
‘Oh please spare us the bullshit,’ said Famie. ‘Say how sad you are and get the fuck off the screen.’
Tommi smiled. ‘Just a little too loud, Fames. Heads are turning.’
‘Think I’ll cope,’ she said.
Lewis and Assistant Commissioner Creswell returned then and Sam tapped Famie on the shoulder.
‘Here we go.’
The bureau chief led Creswell to a point in the middle of the newsroom and again, within a few seconds, they had all the quiet they could need. All around the periphery people stood, a few even clambering on to chairs. Lincoln Jeffers, one of the newest subs and the current Slot, spun his chair, then stood too. The AC took a step forward. Mid-forties, short silver hair, broad shoulders. She did a three-sixty sweep of the room.