by Alan Judd
‘I suppose the SIA lawyers felt obliged to bring you in.’
‘Came from higher than that.’
Charles feigned surprise. ‘Not CEO level, surely?’
Freckles glanced at Corduroy, who nodded. ‘Almost,’ he said. ‘Mr Measures himself, no less. Quite a coincidence, your lawyer being his wife. Could that be a problem for him?’
‘Not really.’
‘Give her something to talk about over dinner when she gets home, I suppose.’
They drew up next to the Bristol. ‘Never seen one of these before,’ said Corduroy. ‘Seen photos, but never in the metal.’
Charles offered the keys. ‘Take it round the block.’
Corduroy wrestled with temptation. ‘Better not. All hell to pay if I crash it when I’m on duty.’ The three of them spent a further five minutes discussing the car before shaking hands.
‘So where will you look now for Mr Wytham?’ asked Charles.
‘You tell us. Any ideas?’ said Freckles.
You could start with Nigel Measures himself, Charles wanted to say. But that door opened onto issues he wanted to resolve himself.
‘I’ll let you know if I have.’
The flat was as he’d left it, except that his laptop was missing and some of his research papers on Francis Walsingham had been moved. If Walsingham’s searchers had done the job he’d never have seen his papers again. Nor, perhaps, would anyone have seen him, save for his gaolers in the Tower; a fate different in quality, but not kind, from what Nigel Measures intended.
He made a mug of tea and opened the french windows onto the balcony. The rain fell steadily now, spattering on the metal table and sounding like rushing water on the leaves of the plane trees dominating the garden at the rear of the flats. His balcony looked straight into their tops, worlds of their own, unnoticed by groundlings. He leaned with his tea against the door-jamb, forcing himself to slow down, to think, not to ring immediately.
When he did he got straight through.
‘Are you all right?’ she asked.
‘A free man, and hungry. When and where?’
They settled on an Italian restaurant in Pimlico. That gave him time for a quick shower and to consider, yet again, what to say and what to hold back. He might need to tell all to get her cooperation; he wanted to, anyway, always had, but it might have the opposite effect. In which case, not only would Gladiator’s case remain unresolved but he would be left for the rest of his life with the sense of something incomplete, an unfinished conversation. There would never be a better time or better reason to tell her everything, but there was also the rest of her life, and he had done enough to that already. By the time he set off he was late, and feeling as if he were taking a loaded gun to the meeting.
8
Until that afternoon in the custody suite, the last time he had seen Sarah had been in Dublin. The file recorded the meeting but not, once again, the whole story. The essence of that was recorded but elsewhere.
The clue was a handwritten list inside the front cover of the first volume. It gave the numbers of related files, some of them general subject or policy files; others the personal files of terrorists on whom Gladiator reported. Among them was a file numbered in a series of general files on operational techniques, but which was in fact an RS annex. RS – refer to security – meant that any request to see it would go to the head of security, who would reply blandly that it referred to old operational techniques or equipment developed specifically for that case and no longer applicable. The annex itself was further protected by an access card saying that only the Chief, the head of security, Sonia and Charles could have or grant access to it.
Charles, going through the list, recognised the number. He knew what it contained, having written most of it, and decided to send for it only later, as a memory check. He intended a painstaking excavation of the past, careful neither to destroy nor rudely awaken. But his arrest changed that.
Sarah had arranged Charles’s first meeting with the student, Martin Worth, for early one evening in her Dublin teaching room. She was to tell Martin – not yet honoured with his codename – that her husband had suggested he should talk to someone who worked on terrorism. Charles was to rehearse the meeting with Sarah in her room beforehand, then leave and reappear after Martin arrived.
She answered his knock almost too promptly and was standing by her desk when he entered.
‘Sorry if I’m early.’
‘I was only marking papers.’
Both smiled because they had spoken at once. She made tea while he sat and took a pristine A4 pad from his briefcase. She had to ask whether he took milk or sugar. He couldn’t recall whether she did, either.
‘I’ll use another name with Martin,’ he said.
‘Why?’
‘In case he changes his mind and goes and tells the IRA.’
‘Well, he knows mine and I’m as deeply implicated as you. I have a job here. They could knock me off anytime.’
‘I know. I didn’t want to but my office is insisting.’
‘It’s too late. I’ve already told him your name.’
‘That’s fine, then. We’re in it together.’
She paused, holding the kettle. ‘Sorry, I should’ve thought. Is it really all right? I don’t want to be responsible for your murder. Would your office want you not to meet him, if they knew?’
‘They might. They’re incurably cautious. If they knew.’
Over tea he went through with her what he would say to Martin – the need for understanding and knowledge, for mutual confidentiality, insistence that this could not be any sort of exchange or negotiation, arrangements for future contacts not involving Sarah.
‘It would be ideal if you could leave us alone for five minutes while I arrange to see him again. It would help distance you from me.’
‘Wouldn’t that look contrived?’
‘Not if we don’t contrive it. I’ll simply ask.’
‘I hadn’t really thought about danger until you mentioned it. Could it be dangerous for Nigel, too?’
‘Not if Martin’s as you described. Swinging back the other way would mean repudiating the death of his army friend.’ Assuming that were true. There was still no answer from the Ministry of Defence on the background of the dead officer; also, tracing of Martin himself was incomplete. There was still no proof that he was who he said he was.
‘He might change his mind if the army killed one of his IRA friends.’
‘True.’
‘How are your parents and your sister?’ she asked after a pause.
‘My parents died, my father first. But my sister thrives. Married, three children.’
‘I’m sorry about your father. I was rather fond of him.’
‘And he of you. I think he fancied you. You raised my status in his eyes.’
He was about to ask after her parents when she said, ‘Did you ever tell them – your parents?’
He was surprised she mentioned it, having decided he wouldn’t this time, that he would keep to business. ‘No, nor my sister.’
He did not add that they had clearly hoped that you were it, that you were the one, that we would marry. Their reticence had been eloquent when he told them it was all over. He remembered his mother was sitting by the fire and had just put on her reading glasses when he announced it, as if merely in passing, while looking for his copy of Exchange & Mart.
His mother took off her glasses and stared at him. ‘Oh dear, Charles. That’s very sad.’
He didn’t trust himself to continue. ‘I’m sure I was reading it in the kitchen, but it’s not there.’
‘It’s very sad, it really is. She’s such a lovely girl. I thought she was very fond of you.’
‘Maybe I left it in the bathroom.’
She saw through his affected casualness, of course, and for weeks afterwards he could feel her silently longing for him to talk about it, but he never said any more. He had always been good at not talking. Too good, perhaps.
‘Your parents were very understanding about it, weren’t they?’ he said to Sarah. ‘More than. Are they still alive?’
She nodded. ‘Just about. Dad’s beginning to get a bit doddery. It’s only as I’ve got older that I’ve appreciated how understanding they were. Of course, attitudes have changed and things are much easier now, but then it was different. I’m sure their religion helped. They believed – believe – in forgiveness and in helping others. I’d quite forgotten – it was probably seeing you the other week that reminded me – that they offered to bring him up. That was a big thing then.’
‘Big thing to forget, too.’ There was another pause. ‘Theirs has been a good marriage, hasn’t it?’
Her eyes widened, as if surprised at the thought, or surprised that he should say it. ‘Yes, it has, I think it has,’ she said. ‘They’re very gentle, very devoted.’
He felt he ought to get the conversation back to the professional. ‘You’re sure you’re okay about Martin, happy with it all?’
She sipped her tea. ‘Happy if you are. Hadn’t you better be going soon? He’s due in fifteen minutes.’
For half an hour he walked the streets of Dublin, noting brush contact sites, meeting places, anti-surveillance routes, while trying to decide what he thought about the city. It had been a forbidden city when he had been in Belfast with the army, and therefore an alluring imagined playground of Georgian squares, dark elaborate Victorian bars, foaming black and cream pints of Guinness, wonderful talk from Ulysses and, somewhere, somehow, a beautiful, exciting and magically attainable actress from the Abbey Theatre.
That was then. The real Dublin, the contemporary Dublin, seemed to be a place of tourists, chain stores and sturdy beggars. Many of the Georgian squares had been vandalised by developers and there were estates as uninviting as any in London. He forgot to imagine the actress.
As he knocked on Sarah’s door Charles was filled with the familiar reluctance to re-engage, the desire to prolong floating and dreaming that always, with him, preceded action. It no longer bothered him; he knew it would evaporate as soon as he opened the door.
Martin Worth was taller than Charles, with thick hair the colour of rust, grey-green eyes and freckles. He wore the usual student uniform of jeans, a jumper and a drab shapeless jacket. He stood to shake hands, his grip firm and brief.
Charles went through the introductory remarks he had planned, then the warning London insisted upon about the need for confidentiality because of how their contact could be construed.
Martin cut him short. ‘You mean my friends would think I was spying for the British.’
Charles had not mentioned spying. Some agents thrilled to the word, others would never confront it. He looked Martin in the eye. ‘That’s exactly what they’d think. And if they thought it was true they’d torture and murder you.’
‘And how would you describe what I was doing?’
It was an unusual question, so early on. Sarah sat motionless, side-on to her desk. They should not really be talking like this before her but he noticed Martin glancing at her once or twice, as if to make sure of her witness. ‘That depends on what we do. If our meetings are secret and you tell me secrets then you are my agent or spy and I am your case officer.’
‘And who are you exactly – James Bond and M and MI5 and George Smiley all rolled up together?’ Martin smiled as if to soften his mockery, but not very much.
Declaring yourself as MI6 in your own name, without approval, in an allied country in which you were operating without the knowledge of the government, to a virtually unknown putative agent whose loyalty was not established, was forbidden. Anything which might embarrass Her Majesty’s Government required Foreign Office approval and being caught operating in Dublin would certainly be construed as embarrassing. It had happened some years before and the MI6 officer was released only after prime ministerial intervention. Charles knew very well what his response should be: confirm nothing and refer back for advice.
‘MI6,’ said Charles.
‘Not sure I know the difference.’
Later, Charles dutifully recorded all this for the file. Since all went well and HMG was not embarrassed, no-one scolded him. What the file did not record was the impression Martin made of someone more mature, more decided, less impulsive than the young man Sarah had described. At one point her questioning eyes indicated the door. Charles shook his head. If Martin was prepared to be so frank before her, he probably wanted her there. Unless it was a set-up and he was secretly recording them both. But it was too late to worry about that.
‘Why do you want to spy for the British?’ Charles asked.
Martin shook his head and pushed his hair back. ‘I don’t want to spy for the bloody British. I don’t even like them. Well, institutionally, if you know what I mean. Individually, I’ve no problem. I’m half British myself. But it’s the Brits in Ireland I don’t like.’
‘So why spy for them?’
‘You trying to persuade me not to?’ He glanced again at Sarah. ‘There was an incident a while ago which made me think a bit. You may have heard about it.’
‘In outline. Tell me.’
He described meeting his school-friend at the checkpoint, then the reactions of his colleagues to his friend’s death. He spoke without dramatisation, indicating rather than dwelling on his own feelings. ‘Jokes about legless Brit stiffs in two-foot coffins and all that. Then the breaking of the ceasefire. Got me thinking.’ He concluded with a statement that sounded prepared: ‘I do not approve of British occupation of or control over any part of the island of Ireland, but nor do I believe violence is the way to end it. I therefore want to do what I can to increase mutual understanding, so that the republican movement and the British government can talk to each other and sort something out.’
‘I can’t engage in any sort of negotiation.’
‘And I can’t promise to answer all your questions. There are things and people I’m not prepared to talk about.’
‘So long as you tell me, that’s fine. If you don’t know something, or don’t want to talk about it, just say. Don’t mislead.’
They stared at each other.
Sarah stood. ‘Sorry, must go to the loo.’
While she was out Charles took Martin’s contact details, gave him a London number and suggested they meet the following week in the bar of Jury’s, where he’d met Sarah. ‘I take it we’re not likely to run into any of your friends? So long as you can think of a plausible reason for being there.’
‘No problem.’
‘What reason? What would it be?’
‘You’re very thorough, Mr Thoroughgood.’
‘It’s your life.’
‘Yours too. I’d say I was meeting my British uncle who’s over here on business.’
‘Okay. We’ll agree on what my business is when we meet.’
This much the file recorded. There was a good deal of minuting between Charles’s account of their first meeting and his account of their second a week later. The A desk queried the extent of Martin’s access, his genuineness and the security of running him in Dublin. There were unanswered questions about his background, as full tracing details were still awaited. His offer of service was suspiciously complete, the security officer commented, but willing agents with access to the republican leadership in Dublin were not two-a-penny. The case could go ahead.
After that first meeting, Charles rang Sarah’s study from his hotel but there was no answer, and he did not have the number of the friend with whom she stayed. The phone rang when he was in his bath. He jumped out to get it, dripping, assuming it was the office.
She sounded nervous. ‘I’m sorry. You don’t mind me ringing you? Only you gave me this name and number. It’s all right, is it? It’s okay?’
‘Of course, of course it’s okay.’
‘I thought you’d want to hear how he was after you left. He thought you were a typical British army officer type. His words. He asked whether you’d been in
the army and I said I didn’t know. Was that right?’
‘Am I typical?’
‘Well.’ She laughed. ‘I doubt he’s very familiar with them, despite his friend.’
‘I’ve never thought of myself as typical.’
‘Don’t lose sleep over it. You’re the same as you always were, even before you joined the army.’
‘I guess that’s all right, then.’
‘Not necessarily.’
Martin seemed content with the meeting. He had said nothing about his arrangement with Charles for the following week, which was good. ‘But he did say one slightly surprising thing,’ she continued. ‘He asked how long we’d known each other. I was evasive and just said we’d met at Nigel’s request. That was right, wasn’t it? But I’m not sure he believed me.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because then he said, “Funny, I had the impression you already knew each other.” I don’t know what made him think that.’
The thought pleased Charles. ‘Intuition.’
‘Yes, but – anyway, it’s not a problem, is it?’
‘Not at all.’ His answer hung in the air. He felt that neither of them knew how to end the conversation. ‘How about dinner?’
‘Sorry. Work. Papers to mark.’
She sounded decided. He took her friend’s number, needlessly adding ‘for future reference’, which made him feel that the conversation ended on an unwelcome official note. He dined alone in the hotel.
9
Walking briskly towards Pimlico after his release that evening, Charles tried not to think any more about what he would say to Sarah. Successful meetings – even those that were purely social, which this was not – usually went the way of those who knew what they wanted, who planned and rehearsed, who prepared their spontaneity. He didn’t want to do that with her, yet he knew that what he wanted to tell her, and what he wanted of her, meant using her, meant calculation. It made him uncomfortable.
He had chosen to walk because walking was better for thinking, but his thoughts were about the past, about everything that led up to what he was about to do. It was a form of preparation, but at least it was not planning.