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he had turned to another common source of consolation, alcohol, and it, at least, had ended his torment - by killing him. A fatality on the M602 near Salford. A lone driver, late at night, in a head-on collision with the central reservation. Straight through the windscreen. Not wearing his seatbelt. DUI, judging by the shards of broken bottle and the reek of whisky all over the upholstery. No other vehicle involved. Mahmoud had been on duty that night, and a colleague, having identified the victim by means of his wallet and recognising the name, had called her to the scene. She wished he hadn't.
    "What was lying across the bonnet of that car wasn't my dad," she told Sam. "It didn't even look like a person, not any more."
    The fatal pulmonary embolism Mahmoud's mother had suffered in her sleep a week later came as a direct consequence of the crash. The doctors had said it was merely a tragic coincidence, there was no medical correlation between the two events, it was something that had just been waiting to happen. A blood clot had been there all along, they said, lurking in her mother's artery, waiting for its moment to break free and make its catastrophic journey to her lungs. But Mahmoud knew better.
    "No boyfriend, no husband," Mahmoud said. "Friends don't come to see me. I scared them all away. I'm on a permanent sabbatical from the force. You could say I'm unattached."
    "Snap," Sam replied. "But we're not just unattached. We're totally detached. And I don't think we're alone in that here. Remember what Landesman said? 'Few burdens and even fewer emotional ties.' That's another reason why he wanted us, why he chose us."
    The other recruits paired off too. Hamel and Eto'o were often to be found in each other's company, speaking French, the first language for both of them. Harryhausen and Sparks established a rapport, united not least by the aplomb with which they took to using the suits. They were by far the most proficient and the most at-ease in the armour. Tsang and Chisholm seemed a mismatched duo but had in common the fact that they were by some margin the most cultured of the group, Tsang having received his higher education at one of Hong Kong's most prestigious and expensive private academies. Søndergaard and Barrington made for an even odder couple - the slim, reserved Scandinavian and the burly, coarse Antipodean - and their bickering became a fixture of bunker life, whether it was Søndergaard nagging Barrington over his habit of farting malodorously at all times of day and night, or Barrington having a go at Søndergaard for his fastidiousness when it came to room tidying and bed making. The mutual antagonism seemed real enough. It was just possible, however, that it masked a growing, grudging friendship.
    That left Ramsay, who had a room to himself and who, when it was pointed out to him how lucky he was not to have to share accommodation, said, "Yeah, but think about it. I'd have had to double up with that asshole Pugh. So it's only fair I get to sleep on my own, on account of the possibility of how bad it might have been." Which as an argument had no logic to it whatsoever but was still somehow perversely persuasive.
    Ramsay did his utmost to encourage Sam to keep trying with the suit. By the end of the fifth day he could see how frustrated she was. He invited her to come outside with him, take a walk round the island, explore. The night was cloudless, the moon full and the stars bright, so that everything was bathed in a pristine, icy brilliance. The mainland twinkled in the distance. They tramped along the shoreline, over pebble beach and smooth rocks, their breaths coming out in wispy white curls. Their journey took them past the locations of a number of security cameras, part of a host of such devices mounted round the island perimeter, all facing outward and mostly camouflaged or hidden, disguised to merge with the landscape. Landesman had said these were a precaution against an Olympian attack, which he