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  ‘You mean, do I know anyone here who spy for KGB?’ He smiled and shook his head. ‘I told you, I am not familiar with their secrets. I know people in the organs of state security, I can tell you about them, but they do not tell me their secrets.’

  ‘But you’ll tell me if they do?’

  He stood and came over to Charles, patting his shoulder paternally. ‘Do not worry, Mr Thoroughgood. If you give me new heart, I give you all I can.’

  They agreed future contact arrangements. Charles was to get details of a heart consultant whom MI6 trusted, Federov was to ring the operational number for the details, then contact the consultant himself and arrange to come out again.

  As he walked back along the silent corridor, Charles was still unsure. Security Branch would say it was all too easy, too pat; everything known about Federov suggested a man prepared to betray anyone and everyone, he would have no compunction about leading on MI6 to get what he wanted while simultaneously reinsuring himself with the KGB. They in turn would probably be happy to play him back, using him to find out what we wanted to know, where our gaps were. They had a rich history of double-agent operations dating from Lenin’s time and, unlike Western services, were prepared to play them long. They would give their DAs real intelligence rather than the obvious chickenfeed which Western agencies gave to theirs. This was, after all, a culture that had sacrificed tens of thousands of soldiers during the Second World War in order to persuade the Germans that their star agent was loyal, rather than the KGB double agent he really was. Federov might get a new heart, Security would say, but his head would stay the same and he would have to deliver very significantly to persuade Security Branch that that had changed. They would not yet consider him an agent.

  Chapter Ten

  The Present

  Dinner with Melanie was not at her flat but in a crowded Italian restaurant near Notting Hill underground, where the staff knew her. She and James were there already.

  ‘I just couldn’t get away in time to do anything, so hope you don’t mind it’s not chez nous,’ she said, presenting her cheek for Charles as if they were old friends. Her perfume was strong and her hair smelled as if it needed washing. She shook hands with Sarah. ‘I’ve been longing to meet you, having read so much about you. You’re easily the most talked-about couple in the intelligence community.’

  They shook hands with James, who did not stand. His handshake was warm and limp. Charles could have passed him on the street without knowing him. He had lost most of his hair and put on considerable weight. His features – the snub nose, the delicate eyebrows, something about the mouth – were recognisable, reminiscent of his sister’s, but his face had widened and his skin coarsened. He was fashionably unshaved. His manner with them both was at first almost diffident, lacking the vociferous angry sarcasm of the youthful Jam, but as the meal went on diffidence came to seem more the contemptuous reserve of one who feels that contributing is beneath him.

  ‘Long time since we last did this,’ said Charles.

  ‘Not sure we ever did, did we?’

  For most of the first course Melanie interrogated Sarah about her job, showing some insight and affecting great interest in the foibles of private client work. James answered Charles’s questions about his sister without resistance or enthusiasm. They didn’t see much of each other, she’d married her American banker in London, had given up her job to return with him to New York, had two children, came over now and again to see their widowed mother, seemed OK. ‘Got the kind of life she wants.’

  ‘And what have you done since those days?’

  James shrugged as if the question were beneath him. ‘This and that. Crusading for a fairer and more equal world. Not the sort of thing that would interest you.’ He half smiled. ‘But you probably know all about what I’ve been doing, being where you are now.’

  ‘Not my business. Nor anyone else’s in my world. We don’t do British politics.’

  ‘Not even the SNP? Breaking up the United Kingdom and all that? That’s a threat to national security, surely?’

  ‘Not even the SNP. Anyone who submits themselves to the ballot box, unless they’re doing something illegal, is off our radar. But you’re not SNP, are you? They’re not radical enough for you, are they?’

  ‘Hypothetical example. Not a drop of Scottish blood in the Micklethwaites.’ His tone became more aggressive. ‘Must be interesting, the stuff you see, hard to resist, trawling through everyone’s texts and emails, listening to their calls. Listen to mine, do you?’

  This was wearily familiar territory. ‘No, Jam, I don’t. I’m sorry to say, you’re of no intelligence interest, like ninety-nine-point-nine-nine-nine per cent of mankind. In fact, I don’t listen to anyone’s calls or read anyone’s emails. And even if we were interested and legally permitted and had several hundred thousand staff to read and listen to them all, we’d be driven mad with boredom.’

  ‘But you still have the power to listen to those you want to listen to.’

  ‘Not without legitimate reason.’

  ‘And who says it’s legitimate?’

  ‘The independent overseers, judges.’

  ‘But how do we know you’re not fooling them, making it up?’

  Charles shrugged. The impossibility of proving negatives was something that came with the job. ‘Too many people would know. It would be bound to come to light and someone would blow the whistle.’

  ‘You could have them killed, stuffed in a sports bag in Pimlico to make it look like some kinky accident.’

  He knew James to be an intelligent man who in any other area of life would be sceptical to the point of cynicism, but he was one of those for whom the supposed activities of British intelligence agencies prompted an immediate suspension of disbelief, a naïve credulity that countenanced anything discreditable while denying anything good. What concerned Charles was whether this assumption of ill-will in others would justify, for James, acts as crass as those he imputed to the forces of evil.

  He smiled and shook his head. ‘That’s like me assuming you’re tunnelling under Downing Street to blow up the cabinet because you can’t prove you’re not.’

  James smiled in return. ‘That might be more justifiable.’

  They were interrupted by the arrival of the main course. Melanie turned her attention to Charles. ‘Any further news of office moves? We’ve heard nothing. Peter – Home Sec Peter – thinks the Treasury may be trying to put the kybosh on office moves unless they can be shown to save money.’

  She focused on any man she spoke to as if there were no one else in the room, especially women. Her attention concentrated like a searchlight, leaving Sarah in darkness. James also ignored Sarah, absorbed in his lasagne; Charles remembered now that he never had been one for speaking while eating, stopping mid-sentence when food was placed before him and resuming only when his plate was clean. His own efforts to address both women did nothing to diffuse Melanie’s concentrated beam. She finished every question or remark with a smile, regardless of subject. After ten minutes of probing his opinions of Whitehall personalities, by which time Sarah had finished her Caesar salad and James had emptied the last of the wine into his own glass, Charles felt fed up and reckless enough to fire off a flare to see if anything moved.

  ‘How about MI5’s investigations into Triple A? Any serious subversion or just the usual political stuff, tax-and-spend-our-way-to-paradise?’

  ‘They don’t do subversion. It says so on the website. Subversion’s Cold War old hat.’ This time there was no smile.

  ‘Except for those still fighting it,’ said James.

  ‘I got the impression from Michael Dunton that he was worried about the outer fringes of Triple A, people plotting direct action, that kind of thing.’

  ‘What do you mean by direct action?’ asked James. ‘What kind of thing?’

  Charles saw Melanie glance warily, almost anxiously, at him. ‘I don’t know. Anything from occupations and riots, the usual thing, to acts of sabotage,
maybe, or kidnappings.’

  ‘Public-order stuff, police stuff, nothing to do with us,’ said Melanie. She held up her hand for more wine. ‘Now tell me how you two got together. Is everything I’ve read about it true?’ The smile returned.

  Over coffee and more wine they rehearsed the expurgated-for-public-consumption version of their story: of their early relationship as students, Sarah’s marriage to their mutual friend who became Chief of the short-lived Intelligence Services Agency, his disgrace and death, their subsequent marriage and Charles’s surprise appointment as Chief of the reinstated MI6. Neither liked having to do it but both accepted it as an inevitable consequence of remaining in the Whitehall world.

  ‘All worked out pretty well for you both, then?’ said James. ‘Convenient, too, having a lawyer in the family, given Charles’s job.’

  ‘Sorting out the wills and estates of the rich is not much use to Charles, I’m afraid,’ said Sarah.

  ‘How are you finding the world of counter-terrorism?’ Charles asked Melanie. ‘Plenty of work about?’

  ‘I think they – we – seem to have things pretty much under control at present. It was a surprise to me how much goes on. But anything can happen, of course.’

  ‘And one day it will.’

  ‘What makes you say that?’ asked James.

  ‘Because things do, that’s all. Not always what we think or in the way we think.’

  James stared for a few seconds, then folded his arms, sat back and gazed around the room with apparent indifference. They discussed trends in terrorism until the bill came. The hubbub in the restaurant rendered lowered voices unnecessary and impractical, but even so Melanie’s clear and energetic high-pitch carried. She thought the main threat was no longer home-grown but would come from what she called transcontinental incomers. ‘We’re too hung up on spying on our own people. We must steer clear from legitimate protest and place our shields according to where the arrows come from.’ She insisted on paying.

  They lingered on the pavement outside. Charles and Sarah had to explain that they had come by car because they were heading off to Sarah’s Cotswold house.

  ‘Very nice,’ said James. He pointed to a blue Bentley parked carelessly, one front wheel on the pavement. ‘That’s yours, is it?’

  ‘If only,’ said Charles. ‘We’re in Sarah’s Golf.’ He didn’t mention his Bristol garaged in Westminster. He chanced another small flare. ‘You like deep blue, do you?’

  There was a flicker of watchfulness in James’s eye, a fractional hesitation. Because he was looking for it, Charles feared he might have imagined it. But he was fairly sure. ‘I don’t like cars of any colour,’ said James. ‘Never have.’

  They didn’t speak until they were approaching the M40. Sarah was driving. ‘One word,’ said Charles, ‘for the evening, what would it be?’

  ‘Brittle.’

  ‘Good word.’

  ‘She went through the motions with me but she couldn’t get enough of you, could she? Is she like that with all men?’

  ‘Reputedly.’

  ‘She’s trouble, that one. I’d steer well clear if I were you. He’s not exactly a bundle of fun, either.’

  ‘I think he’s up to something. There’s something going on.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Not sure yet.’

  ‘Wasted evening, then.’

  ‘Not entirely.’

  On the Sunday morning, they were sitting with their coffees on the terrace overlooking the Windrush, grey and sluggish that day, when Robin Cleveley rang.

  ‘Have you seen the Sunday Times? . . . Well, you should. You’re all over it, both of you. Page four, with a taster on the front page. Whitehall’s most famous spy coupling, the woman behind successive Chiefs of MI6, an unofficial legal resource for MI6 black operations, coincidental death of disgraced predecessor of Charles Thoroughgood, lack of a knighthood for Thoroughgood continues to puzzle observers. Bylined Sunday Times reporters. Any ideas?’

  They walked into Burford and read the story over a bar lunch in the Lamb. Sarah was more surprised and upset than Charles, whose expectations of humanity were generally lower. ‘How could they? All this personal stuff about how we got together, which we’d only told them because they asked, it’s outrageous. And all this pure invention about my job. God knows what they’re going to say about it in the office, they hate this kind of publicity. So will some of my clients. As for the implication that there was anything mysterious about Matthew’s death and that we might have been somehow responsible for it – well, it’s not quite actionable but I wish it were. God, I’m inclined to ring that woman and give her a piece of my mind. As for a return match, she can forget that.’

  ‘It was probably Jam rather than her. He has form for this sort of thing. Although they’ve dressed it up as new there’s actually nothing there that hasn’t been in the media already.’

  ‘She was complicit. She will have known he was doing it. And isn’t it damaging for you? What will people at work think?’

  ‘They expect this sort of thing.’

  As they picked their way back through the cow-patted meadows, she said, ‘And what about this knighthood business? Is that another invention? Matthew didn’t have one.’

  ‘He hadn’t been in post long enough. Neither have I. No one gets one on appointment. We’re on the Foreign Office list and it usually comes when you’re about halfway through. In MI5, they’re on the Home Office list and it usually comes along when they leave. Though the last two have peerages, not sure why. Probably because there haven’t been any recent bombs in London.’

  ‘Will this mean you’re less likely to get it? Not that I dream of being Lady Thoroughgood. Sounds like some bewigged trollop in a Restoration comedy.’

  ‘No idea. They’re trying to cut down on automatic honours, anyway.’ He regarded the honours system as harmless, benign and usefully cost-effective. But it wasn’t that part of the story he was thinking about. It was a paragraph alleging past episodes of MI6 ‘unseen and unaccountable’ manipulation of the law through sympathetic lawyers to stymie legitimate protest and frustrate international links between concerned groups. It cited incidents in the Cold War when student leaders and other radicals were arrested and accused of minor criminal offences in order to silence protest, implying that Charles had been involved and that his marriage to Sarah meant he still was. It was largely untrue but there was a germ of truth that few apart from James could know about.

  ‘I suppose we’ll never be free of this, our back story,’ she remarked later. ‘In one version or another. It’s got everything, hasn’t it? Young love, a love triangle, rejection, ambition, career rivals, betrayal, love renewed, sudden death convenient to career advantage followed by marriage made in heaven. The only thing missing is Martin, which is just as well. They’d have a field day with him.’

  Their adopted son – their dead son – was rarely mentioned between them, though he remained a presence. ‘The past is the price we pay for the present,’ said Charles. ‘We wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for that.’

  ‘Very profound, m’lud.’

  Chapter Eleven

  The Present

  During the drive back to London that night he resumed his mental reassembly of those periods of his own past featuring Deep Blue. It was best done chronologically; otherwise, uncorrected by context, scenes and incidents could warp narrative.

  The 1980s

  He had reported to Hookey after his meeting with Federov, then written up the encounter in Hookey’s outer office – which, for the time being, was as far as the report would travel. The following day he had resumed his desk in the EC liaison section.

  ‘Broke my personal best while you were away,’ said Mike. ‘Four minutes thirty. Would have been better if the cleaners hadn’t moved the waste bin, which meant I had to stretch right across from my safe to yours. Harold was muttering about that EC threat-warning strategy paper again. If you don’t crack on with it I’ll get lumbered and I’m
going on leave. God knows how Freddie Farquarson managed three fifty-nine.’

  ‘Harold said there was no hurry about the paper when I spoke to him last week.’

  ‘There wasn’t then. But if we don’t get something in we won’t get invited to the next lux freebie. Doesn’t matter what’s in the paper because no one pays any attention and MI5 are bound to do some earnest bit of work anyway. Pity we can’t crib from theirs.’

  ‘I wonder if we could.’ Charles was thinking of Sue, whom he would see the next day when the tech-op was due to go into the Melburys’ flat. ‘I’ll see if we can borrow it. Where is Harold?’

  ‘Liaising.’

  Harold drifted in some time after lunch. Charles popped his head round the door. ‘Ah, the secret squirrel returns,’ Harold said, as if he had been at his own desk all the time. ‘Master Race let you go at last?’ The Master Race was what people sometimes called the Sovbloc controllerate, not always affectionately. Harold held up his hand before Charles could reply. ‘It’s all right, don’t tell me. Not prying. Need to know.’

  ‘I was wondering about this EC threat-warning strategy paper.’

  ‘Have you finished it?’

  ‘Not quite. I thought—’

  ‘Freddie – Freddie Farquarson, before your time, wonderful chap, very good officer – got away two years running with submitting the same paper. Went on jollies to Geneva and Vienna on the strength of it. You could dust his off and use it. So long as you change the date, which he forgot to do, second time.’

  ‘I was wondering about cribbing the MI5 one if I can get hold of a draft.’

  ‘Splendid idea. Highest tradition of the Service. By the way, have you heard who’s going to be our new master, the new C/Europe? Angus Copplestone, your recent boss. Ambitious chap, isn’t he? Bit of a shit?’

  ‘He won’t be pleased to find me here.’

  Harold leaned back with his hands behind his head, gazing out over south London. ‘When I joined ambition was a dirty word, second worst thing you could say about anyone after disloyalty. What people said about Philby. Shouldn’t worry about Copplestone, though. Bosses come and go. Just make yourself scarce. That’s what I do.’