by Daniel Kemp
Joseph carried my excuses, blaming tiredness and weight of responsibility as reasons for my absence, but really I was being selfish. I wanted to be alone and to rationalise my thoughts towards the future and those around me, including Tanya and George. If there was only one thing that I had learned from all of this, it was that I did not want the uncertainty to continue. I wanted a quieter, more settled life. I filled a glass from the office decanter and, with a packet of cigarettes in hand, went to find a degree of solitude in the courtyard beyond my office doors, watching the pairs of armed police patrol around this old house of mine. I felt a heavy load of responsibility.
The persistent drizzle turned quickly to rain, with a distinct smell of salt pervading the air. The strong pelting raindrops bouncing on the cobblestones seemed to me to resemble small people, like broken matchsticks, hurrying away, where to or where from, I wasn't sure, but I pictured myself running from here.
George was my main concern. I could only marvel at how he was still standing after all the revelations of the past week, combined with the knowledge that he was next on the list. If it had been me…well, I'm not sure what I would have done. Then Tanya, thrown into the mix at the time of life when lawn green bowls was the highlight of the week. I was mulling over the thought of turning Eton Square over to them, and how everyone else there would react when my third and immediate problem appeared. I had wanted to put her to the back of my mind; she was, if I'm honest, why I had not joined them all at dinner.
“Would you like some company, Harry?”
“The stone seat might be a mite uncomfortable for your skinny bum, but yes, why not?” I just could not help myself, using the derision that came so quickly and easily to my tongue as a shield against what I was trying to hide.
“Ha ha. Look, Harry, I've not come to fight you. I've come to…well…to say sorry, really. I've been hard on you these past few days and for that I'm sorry. You've been the admirable Paterson in all of this, and I salute you. I can't imagine what's being going on inside that mind of yours, losing two close family members and then discovering three you never knew about hidden away by the man you so revered, and now facing up to it all. George is a friend of yours and the thought of him being used as a coconut at a fairground can't be easy, despite the precautions. We'll catch him, Harry. Paulo seemed confident of that.”
“Seemed, Judy. Got nothing more positive than that to reassure us? I know that no one's coming here on Sunday with guns blazing in George's direction. I'm not silly. In some way, I wish they would…at least then it would be over and done with, and this lot might get a clear shot and get in first. No, I doubt it will play out that way. Whoever it is wants a sighter; they want to taste the kill before the revenge is fully satisfied.”
“Then what's bothering your size twelve feet, H? They're twitching…it's a habit I've noticed you've got when you're not comfortable with what you're about to say.” She said, nodding towards my dangling right foot.
“Perhaps I'm just going through the male menopause, or got a gnat bite with all this rain around.”
“Don't shut me out, Harry. Over the days we have spent together, I've come to like you around. You've grown on me. At first, I meant to be demanding, but somehow I just carried on being a bit of a cow, when I didn't have to be. You got under my skin, I think, but in an affectionate way. Otherwise, I would never have told you of Tony. You're a friend now, Harry, and friends tell each other what's on their mind.”
I had never felt as close to a women as this in all my life amongst them, and I had no idea how to express my feelings. What would happen if I suddenly announced “I love you, Judy,” would she hit me, or just laugh? I had never finished the book on women, only getting as far as how to make their acquaintance and what to do to satisfy mine, and on occasions their lust. The end, from what I had seen of it, looked boring, finishing in separation or divorce. My right foot was now firmly against the stone floor, but this stability did not improve my situation, or my confused thoughts. I decided that perhaps I was wrong in the interpretation of my emotions, and time for a re-examination was needed. I took the cowardly approach, and said nothing of them.
“No, it's nothing…it's just me. I'm a bit weary, that's all. I guess I've been trying to think of too many things at the same time. I'm having one more drink, then turning in. Would you like to join me, and then I'll go through what will happen tomorrow?”
* * *
Saturday arrived, with the doom that hung over me reflected in the dark rain-laden clouds blowing in from the moors.
“It never seems quite fitting, a funeral or a wake in the sun, my Lord,” Joseph offered solemnly on greeting me in the breakfast room. The two caskets were due to arrive from the funeral directors at 3 pm and placed, opened, in the family chapel for the visitation starting at 4. Flowers were already being collected at the Gatehouse to the Hall.
“There has been an unexpected amount delivered so far, my Lord. It may be wiser to place only the immediate family floral tributes inside the chapel, and perhaps line the path with the others? I have had the remembrance book placed at the lichgate. There it can be signed before, rather than after respects, easing the passage around the coffins. Shall I see to the flowers, Sir?” It was a woman's soft step that I heard after Joseph's departure, but not those of my dilemma. Tanya was as early as I this morning. She greeted me with a bearlike hug, as though we had known each other all our lives.
“Hello, Harry. You know, the more I see of you, the more I see of Maudlin. He was a brick of a man, a tower of strength in a crisis, just as you are now.” I didn't feel much like a tower of strength; more like a whimpering idiot with thoughts of stupid love floating around my mind, clouding every feeling I had this morning. Without Joseph, I didn't know where I would be.
“George acts so strong, Harry, but he's as worried as hell about today and the internment tomorrow. He wants to be a pallbearer, as he has said, but thinks that will be when it happens, you know…gets killed. He feels exposed out there. He admires you and looks up to you. Do you think you could persuade him to step down? I'm sure if you could think of a reason he would, but it must come from you, he won't listen to me.”
She too was a small eater, reminding me of Judy as she sat with her single slice of plain toast and black coffee. I shook my head, involuntarily trying to remove all thoughts of stick insects.
“Are you all right, Harry?” Tanya asked, with genuine concern.
“Yes, I'm fine. I'm sorry. I'll have a word, but I don't know if it will do any good. He was firmly set on doing it when he asked, he said it was not only his duty, but his privilege and honour. I'll do my best Tanya.” I replied, but held no belief in the success of my efforts nor in being able to rid myself of my distraction. It was Tanya's turn for confession.
“He feels alone, abandoned and, I suppose, betrayed. He's feeling a bit raw round the edges, and I can certainly understand that. The cosy world he lived in has been turned upside down by people he trusted. Take Maudlin, for example. Okay, he looked after George financially, but being his grandfather and never saying? How would you react to that? How would any of us? Then there's his father. He saw him for what…an hour or two in Switzerland? Then he disappears, leaving him facing a killer, out for some sort of Russian revenge with no real explanation other than that Paulo saved the world. So he's a superman, but won't stay around to save his son!
Strike that one up to experience, eh? Now, we come to me, his mother, who swore an oath to the man who abandoned him and for fifty-four years leads him to believe she's his aunt. Very maternal, wouldn't you say? Understandable to you and your lady friend because you know the facts, but George doesn't…not all of them. How could he in two hours, with Paulo and then me trying to justify what I can't? Lastly, there's you. You've been complacent at best, and at worst you've been downright disgraceful towards him. He grew up looking out for you, playing at being your elder brother when he was your uncle. I'm no genealogist, but maybe he should be Lord Paterson an
d not you. Have you thought about that, Harry? As of yet it hasn't crossed George's mind, but it will do. It's bound to.” Thinking her coffee may be ready to taste, she stopped her analysis. Giving me time to reflect.
* * *
Wrapped up in my own self-interest, I had been neglectful about George with all that had happened in his indirect life, and how the revelations must have affected him. I had given him little or none of my time to help him adjust to the changed situation he was in. The last thing I could remember was asking Judy what she thought Paulo meant by saying that George had somehow let his father down in Berlin, and since then inconsequential things had driven him out of my thoughts. There had been opportunities, if I had wanted to take them on the plane, for example, to ask about that and how he was dealing with matters but I hadn't taken them, and now I felt guilty, deserving of Tanya's rebuke. There was not long before I had other things to consider. Tanya had finished her coffee and was back on track, speaking of her son.
“Has he shown you the letter Paulo left him yet, Harry, or have you hidden yourself far enough away from him, so that he hasn't been able to find you? Last night he was too worried about your lack of sleep to wake you. Do you know that he wouldn't wake you when he found it, even though I told him he should? That's my George for you…considerate to a fault. He was always that way with me when he thought that I was just his aunt. Where's your consideration Harry, to the family name, or that auntie woman, eh?” The seventy-four years of her far-from-normal life had not dulled her perception or awareness, something I was sure she always had, after seeing that box of hers.
Leaving a simplistic “I'm sorry,” hanging in the air, I left immediately, determined to find George and his letter, but it was Judith who I first encountered coming from his room.
“If I were you I'd leave him, Harry. He's very confused. He will work it out, I'm sure of it. He's trying to think back to something, trying to remember a face from years ago. If you have to, just poke your ugly one around the door and say hello, then leave him, H. I have to tell you about his letter.” Superfluous came back to haunt me, and with a nervous knock, I did what I was told. “I'll sort it all out, George, believe me. I'm going to talk to Judith now about that letter. When you're ready, come and find me. I could use the help of a friend…bit thin on the ground, aren't they?” Without waiting for a reply I closed the door on him, but not the gaping hole in my heart.
* * *
“He took his jacket off when he went to Paulo's room for their get together on Thursday night. Last night he was hanging it up and checking through his pockets, when he found it: his father's final attempt for a reprieve in his son's opinion of him. Paulo has told George that when he went to Berlin for a chance meeting with his father, the man that had come to see Paulo is the man behind the murders, and now he's trying to remember what he looked like. The name he gave George was Geoffrey Rowell, and he said he was head of the company you work for, H. Know him?” Judy asked, eyes bulging in expectation whilst jumping from foot to foot. That stopped on my reply.
“Never heard of him, I'm afraid. I didn't get invited much into the elevated realms of the top flight premier management of the company…I simply sat at my microscope and ran errands for SIS in my spare time. Nobody told me anything.” Her excitement had not completely disappeared.
“You should read it. Skip past the first bit it's Paulo-speak for — I'm an asshole please forgive me for being one. It's the second part that you'll find interesting.” Those skinny arms and hands of hers, once my bête noire, were gesticulating in all directions, holding fast to that letter that I so dearly wanted to share.
I never had that chance, Judy summarised it for me. “Alexi told Paulo everything he had memorised from Willis and Howell; how they had been instrumental in the pursuance of government policy towards the chemical industry, and how easy it was to convince them into the takeover. They had used private funding to conceal HM involvement from audit companies answerable to parliament. The real purpose was to pass on, to interested parties in Russia, current work and direction in bio-fuels, and spin-off enterprises being developed in what was fast becoming the leading company in those fields in the world. Maybe that was your doing, eh, Harry? No don't answer that one, I'll take a stab at it later. Anyway, Willis and Howell's interest was purely monetary, however, Alexi believes that your company is only a cover for a wider operation run by this man in London, set up to avert attention away from his major operations. Bio technology in the pharmaceutical industry is the main interest, but the man has a finger in many pies, including telecommunications and armaments manufacture.
Paulo was in charge of the repatriation of all the state owned Russian assets when the Federation of Soviet States broke up. He imagined that this would be directed at military equipment and the like, and he came across the same project codename many times. In the portfolio that he was given, were several laboratories that had to be retrieved, along with scientists and technicians and an enormous amount of stock, this, too, carried the same coding of Pasha. Paulo offers no explanation to any of this. He suggests that these portable laboratories were simply operating for profit in supplying the markets that Russia dominates in several African countries, along with its own neighbours and the emerging markets of Brazil and India. However, he added a sinister overrider. He made tentative investigations into the stock held at these sites and came up with mostly conventional medicines and vaccines along with mainstream research, some of which he could trace to the same name. But, when he tried to look deeper, he was blocked out of their system. Even he could not access the data. The only thing he can testify to is that there had been regular shipments of material classified as 'Pharmaceutical Compounds' to very volatile Middle Eastern countries: Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon. He put this with his knowledge of those regions, and came up with biological weapons as being another explanation. He leaves it hanging like the sword of Damocles suspended over our heads, Harry.” Judy left me to find George, a computer and a safe line to Sir David Haig passing me the beige envelope stamped Hotel Baur Au Lac, bearing the Swiss flag.
I found no rest that day, unlike the eternal rest found by my father and youngest brother, laid in their opened caskets in the chapel. A part of me envied them the peace that had been thrust upon them, but whatever small piece of sanity was left to me, wished them well in a safe part of heaven; far away from the hell I now dispatched my memories of Maudlin to.
Chapter Forty-One: Mystical Garden Light
The intense two-year affair that was mutually enjoyed by Rudi Mercer and Ceran English ended when Mr English was recalled to London to be awarded the KCMG and retirement from his distinguished time spent in diplomatic service to his country. At the age of sixty it was considered that he had done enough good deeds for the Crown, and could now be released to spend his time and influence elsewhere. He joined a leading pharmaceutical company as a market advisor, lent his name to less well-known charities, and saw out the remainder of his days coercing former associates, and their friends, into opening doors that would normally be closed to his multinationally financed corporation. He gave lectures and after luncheon speeches, shunning the after-dinner circuit to spend time with his son whenever the term ended; or, when time allowed, at the rooms he took in Cambridge, sharing his evenings with Iggy, discussing their mutual future. The lack of clarity of Igor's background curtailed a career in the diplomatic corps, to which the doors were only open to those of at least ten generations of upstanding British descendants, but the antecedents of his benefactor opened many others for him, including the one hiding the British Intelligence safe.
At university, Igor had been studying mathematics and history in the period he had spent there before Mr English and Ceran arrived from America. He had fared well, but had not excelled in his studies. His talents lay in being like Ceran: noticeable. He had produced and starred in many productions for the Footlights Company of comedy shows, touring at Christmas time with the King's College Choir. The tendency that
Ceran had for dressing him up had stayed with him, and now, with the addition of makeup and the limelight, he had found a place for one side of his diverse private life. He did not hide his sexual orientation nor did he display it wantonly, but it was there for those who possessed the same traits to notice. Mr English could not be counted amongst that number.
For the holder of the Knight's Cross of St Michael and St George, sex seemed a troublesome thing to be avoided and left unspoken of. He had seen many lives ruined by it, marriages and prospects ended by indiscretions committed in the cause of what? he had wondered. Ten minutes spent uncomfortably in the back of a car or worse, a series of sweaty nights like the ones he had endured with Ceran when they had first married? He had dismissed the idea of satisfying her passions when not even two nights had passed of their honeymoon period, retreating to a separate bed and setting the pattern for the rest of their life together. He did not blame her for his inadequacies or offer lies in his defence. On the contrary, he spoke the truth to her disconsolate questioning eyes. As a diplomat, he was well versed in words of deception and vagueness, or variances of truths. The outright truth was a commodity rarely used between practitioners in verbose and reportage speech, but Mr English was a principled man, and knew when honesty was the best policy.
“My dear, I don't want you to be offended…but, you see, I'm not a very sexually driven man. I never have been. Mildred was not like you in that department. She was more timid than I was, if that was possible. It was the first time for both of us and, well, it was awkward, so to speak. If it hadn't been for our parent's wishes, I doubt we would have done it. They expected a grandchild to carry on the name, and we were lucky that the child was a boy. If it hadn't been, then heaven knows what might have happened. How can I put it? Mildred was not keen to try often and it would not be a lie, as far as I am concerned, to say that what I hadn't enjoyed, I didn't find the need to repeat. I hope you understand!”