MI5 had turned against him. They wanted him dead, or if not dead at least so discredited that his work on the Elesmere-Elliott case would be worthless.
‘I didn’t write that note, Sergeant,’ he said as quietly and as sensibly as he could. He looked the policeman straight in the eye. ‘I know you’ll find that hard to believe, Sergeant, but it’s perfectly true.’ He stood up and stretched. ‘Now, if you don’t mind, I think I might try and get some sleep.’
The sergeant seemed disinclined to move. ‘I’m not sure you should be left alone, sir,’ he said. ‘I wonder if it might not be better for you to come along to the hospital with us. Just for the night, sir, for your own good.’
Malcolm sighed. ‘Look, Sergeant – if I had wanted to kill myself, would I have struggled out of the water and reported this whole business to you? Wake up, man, I’m not suicidal. Not now, at least. Even if you don’t believe me about the note, you must see that I’m quite sane now.’
The sergeant scratched his head, then seemed to make up his mind. ‘I’m going to ask Constable Peterson to stay outside your door for the remainder of the night,’ he said. ‘Just in case you do need help. You’re not going out again tonight sir?’
‘I’m going to have a long, hot bath and then I’m going to sleep for eight hours,’ Malcolm said, trying to sound as normal and as reasonable as he could. ‘I appreciate Constable Peterson’s presence. I was attacked, Sergeant, whether you believe me or not, and I will feel better that there’s going to be a policeman in Hanover Gardens.’
He drew a hot bath, and then stretched himself out with half a packet of Radox in the water and a cigar between his lips. The heat and the cigar helped thaw him out a little but not much. Deep inside he still felt frozen, as if his bones had been turned into ice. The coldness was perhaps more psychological than physical. He felt profoundly betrayed. D Branch, which he admired and had aspired to join, was trying to kill him. And why? Presumably because he had done his duty all too well, and unmasked a traitor.
He lay back in the hot water trying to relax, but his mind was now churning with a hundred different thoughts, each one wilder than the one before. Had someone brought so much pressure on the organisation that it had been forced to turn against its own? Had the whole of MI5 turned traitor? Had the Labour Government itself stripped off its socialist mask and turned rank Communist?
Stupid thoughts. Insane thoughts. He could suddenly stand them no longer and reared up out of the bath, grabbing at his towel and rubbing himself down with almost manic vigour. He caught sight of his face in the mirror, tense and dark, his eyes staring. Steady on, he told himself. This won’t do, will it? This way leads to madness.
Madness. Just saying the word calmed him immensely. He had been like this once before, he remembered. Mind racing, adrenaline pumping, all sorts of weird thoughts pouring through his head. It had been just before his nervous breakdown in Malaya. The memories of that awful time came back to him in vivid detail. Storming into the District Commissioner’s office after a sleepless night, shouting accusations. Calling anyone and everyone a Communist spy. Screaming out obscenities, and being wrestled to the ground by Malay orderlies. The psychiatric ward at the Alexandra, seen through a haze of sedatives. Being shipped off to England to recover.
Perhaps worst of all the snide, mock-sympathetic looks from fellow officers on his return. The sense of utter humiliation and powerlessness.
It must never happen again, he told the face in the mirror. Calmness, composure, cold calculation. He took a huge breath. Then another. He waited until the beating of his heart had steadied, then pulled on his pyjamas and combed his hair.
Always comb your hair, he reminded himself. A man with wild hair is halfway marked a nut case before he even opens his mouth.
He sat down at his desk and splashed whisky into a glass. Think, he told himself. Think. That’s what separates the actions of men from the instinctive actions of beasts. The ability to think things through, draw rational conclusions, act on those conclusions.
First premise: MI5 had tried to kill him. Test that premise. His fingers drummed on the desk. The premise had two elements. First element: that someone had tried to kill him. Second element: that it was MI5.
Had someone tried to kill him? Certainly, he had been knocked senseless and chucked into the Thames. Certainly he should have drowned. But he hadn’t, had he? A man with a boat had saved him.
A man in a boat in exactly the right place at exactly the right time.
Malcolm got up suddenly and went into the hall where the police had left a washing bag full of the wet clothes he had been wearing. He pulled out the overcoat the man had given him and shook it out. It was an army greatcoat, a ‘warm’. The first thing that struck him was that it was brand new. It even had the price tag still sewn onto one sleeve. He felt in all the pockets but of course they were empty.
The coat had quite obviously not been stolen from a luxury cruiser tied up on the Embankment. It had been bought from a disposal store for a specific purpose.
To keep him warm after he had been fished out of the Thames. Not only had his assailants not intended to kill him, they had even taken care that he not catch cold!
White-hot anger flooded through Malcolm’s body, twisting his insides, washing through his mind like corrosive acid. It was now very, very clear. Just when he thought he had won, when all the humiliations of the past were about to be buried in the laurel leaves of victory, Denis Elesmere-Elliott had come along with his battleships and blown him out of the water with contemptuous ease.
As Denis had blown him out of the water time and time before.
Malcolm wrung his hands in anguish. Ever since they had first met at the Selangor Club twenty years before, Denis had been his bête noire. Malcolm had been an earnest, brilliant young Oxford Blue destined for the highest ranks in one of the Empire’s most prestigious services. Denis had been a casual, smiling planter, a decent shot and a sportsman, but without background or prospects.
And yet it had always been Denis who had won the laurel wreaths, ended up with the girls, become the local hero. And at each step it had been Malcolm who had lost out, been left behind. Denis had been made captain of the Selangor First XV, cheating Malcolm of an honour he had thought already his. Denis had captained the Selangor First XI, again supplanting Malcolm, who had captained Clifton, and King’s College. Denis had stolen Nona from him, whisking her away with false promises when Malcolm would have given her the world.
And when Malcolm had tried to fight back, Denis had brought in his battleships. He had tried to warn Nona where Denis was leading her, and been thrown out of KL for his trouble. He had found out that Denis had sold out Malaya to the Communists – and been thrown out of Malaya for his trouble. Now he had found out that Denis had sold out England to the Russians, and they’d thrown him into the Thames for his trouble.
It was so beastly unfair.
Malcolm went into his bedroom and brought down the shoebox he kept behind a shortened drawer in his wardrobe. They had not found it – he could tell that immediately by the weight. He took the box across to the bed and opened it. Cash – about a thousand pounds in fifty pound notes – covered the top of the box and he took the lot, counting the notes and slipping the thick wad into the pocket of his dressing gown. He would keep the money on his person from now on.
Underneath the money was a set of identity documents – passport, international driver’s licence, birth certificate – all in the name of Arthur Smith. Not the real things but pretty good all the same. They had been made up for him by a man called Ibrahim Sekar, a Malay forger who had been an informer during his time with the FMS Police. He would keep these on his person as well from now on, so that he could step into another life at the drop of a hat.
He hadn’t been a policeman and a secret agent for twenty years for nothing.
The last thing in the box was a pistol, a shiny black German Walther PPK 9 mm automatic with two spare clips of ammunition. ‘I’m
going to have to use you, I’m afraid,’ he said almost regretfully. He took the pistol out of the box and checked the mechanism, sliding open the breech a couple of times and squinting down the short barrel. It needed a drop of oil, but that was all.
The pistol was the most necessary item of all. Not even a battleship could stop a well-aimed 9 mm bullet once it was in flight.
Chapter Forty-Three
Occasionally in this life disaster can appear unheralded out of a clear blue sky and threaten your very existence. A doctor tells you, fingers steepled under a lugubrious chin, that you may have a serious cancer, or that your heart is likely to stop, and for a while you walk in the shadow of the valley of death. At those times your values are reversed. You see things you thought important for what they are, trumpery and insignificant, and you grieve for the real things you too often took for granted.
And then the test results come back, and you find you are as fit as a fiddle and likely to live to be a hundred. I am always surprised just how quickly things revert to normal. Within a day or so you are back in the thick of life, squabbling about baubles you cannot have, squandering the treasures all around you, forgetful of the wisdom that had so recently been yours.
And so it was after our trip to London, and my confrontation with Stewart Menzies. Within a day or so I caught myself arguing with Sykes about where he had planted next spring’s daffodils, irritated because Denis and I wouldn’t be able to see them from our bedroom window.
When but for the will of God we might never have seen another English spring again.
I’m glad to say I had the grace to blush, and smile at poor Sykes, and say that I was sorry. And then I went up to my sewing room and said a little prayer, and thought about that extraordinary day. The day I’d taken on the head of MI6 and beaten him at his own game.
Actually, the exultation I’d felt when I had flung my arms around Denis in John Gillaume’s office had worn off quickly. ‘You realise,’ Denis had said soberly when we were on our way back to Dorset, ‘that Malcolm might well be for the high jump?’
We were just outside Basingstoke at the time, spinning through evening shadows with the sky like a purple bruise in front of us. It chilled me, hearing the words, but in truth I had realised the danger Malcolm must be in. He would, after all, be a permanent threat to Menzies while he was alive. But I owed Malcolm nothing. He had twice tried to have Denis hanged as a traitor, and in my book he had brought his troubles on himself.
‘If Malcolm had had his way we would have been for the high jump,’ I said almost angrily. ‘So I’ve got no qualms whatever.’
Denis had smiled and taken my hand. ‘You did what you did for all of us, and I admire you for it.’
Nevertheless we stopped in Basingstoke and Denis called Menzies at his home in St Anne’s Gate. I stood in the telephone booth with him, determined that he not say anything that would jeopardise the arrangement Stewart and I had reached. Denis dialled the number and propped himself against the glass wall, a lighted cigarette held negligently in his fingers but his face closed and serious. ‘Stewart,’ he said without preamble. ‘It’s Denis. Norma has just told me of your decision to stop the MI5 investigation. Fine as far as it goes, but I won’t have Bryant bumped off. Do you understand?’
I heard Stewart’s quick reply: ‘Perfectly. It will be as you say.’ And then he had rung off.
I suppose I should have felt relieved that Malcolm’s life was safe, but I didn’t. The tiger in me had been fighting for its kin, and when a tiger fights, it is not used to giving any quarter.
The ambiguous autumn days drifted into the certainty of winter, with clear, cold mornings and crackling fires at night. Denis and I went to the party at Kingston Lacy, and enjoyed ourselves as much as I had hoped we would. The next day I took Frances to her Pony Club, and watched her with pride as she trotted under the stark, bare oaks, her cheeks red and her golden hair escaping from her riding helmet. And then Kathleen and I had driven up to Blandford and spoken at a meeting of the Historical Society, bringing the Okeford Child back to life with our research and speculation.
It was after our talk at the Historical Society that Kathleen had reached impulsively across to me as I sipped a cup of tepid tea, and given my hand a companionable squeeze. ‘I’m so glad it all worked out,’ she said, and for a second I didn’t know what she was talking about.
We forget so quickly. A philosopher once said that forgetfulness is the most precious gift that the gods have bestowed on suffering humankind. In London, Malcolm Bryant remembered all too well. He remembered how it had been in Malaya after his breakdown. The sudden silences when he went into a room full of colleagues. The evasive smiles from his closest friends. The gentle way they gave him orders, chary of refusing him even when he needed to be refused. As if he were an unstable child in need of humouring.
He was frightened it would start again, and his heart was pounding as he went into the lobby at Leconfield House and joined the crowd around the lift. But so far so good – a casual nod or two, a gruff word of greeting, a sigh from someone wrapped up in his own problems.
But of course nobody arriving on this grey Monday morning could possibly know anything, even if the powers that be had commenced the process of undermining him.
His office looked curiously empty, and then he noticed that Ann Last’s desk had been cleared and the small vase she kept for flowers removed. There was a note on Malcolm’s desk and he snatched it up.
Malcolm. Sorry I can’t say goodbye in person but I have to start a French course on Monday at the Institute of Modern Languages. Wish me luck! I have had a promotion – to D Branch – and I will be going to Paris. Will catch up. Regards, Ann.
It could be legitimate, he told himself. After all, Ann was due for a move and perhaps a promotion. But his heart was beating hard again. It simply didn’t sound right. Ann had been going to F Branch, which did worthy but boring work keeping an eye on trade union leaders and the like. The sudden change to D Branch – with travel thrown in – had all the earmarks of a bribe. It would keep Ann away from Leconfield House, and her mind on something other than the Elesmere-Elliott case.
He tried to open his safe, fingers suddenly clumsy with nerves and slippery with sweat. This really was the acid test. If there were a psychiatric mark against him, they would have withdrawn his security clearance. Someone would have been in early to clear his safe.
But surely they couldn’t work that fast? He’d been chucked into the Thames only three days before, on the previous Friday.
Of course they could work that fast.
Four turns left, three turns right. His fingers stumbled and slipped as he worked, the dial on his safe suddenly stiff and unfamiliar under his hands. The final half-turn left and pull . . .
The door of the safe didn’t budge. They had changed the combination!
So it had started. He was breathing heavily as he sat down at his desk, beads of perspiration standing out on his face as if he had been running. Soon there would be the jangle of his telephone, the solemn invitation to see the Director-General. Or perhaps it wouldn’t even go that high. Hollis would call him in, smile with mock sympathy, and tell him that he would have to see a psychiatric board. ‘Routine, old chap,’ Hollis would say, avoiding his eye. ‘You’ll be back on deck as soon as we’ve cleared up this attempted suicide business. We had to act, of course. The police have been around, you see . . .’
But it wasn’t like that at all. All morning Malcolm sat at his desk. Without access to any of his papers, he had absolutely nothing to do. Mollie came around with his tea and a biscuit at ten thirty, the Registry girl dropped in punctually on the hour to check his empty out-tray, and someone even bothered to clean his window.
All the time his nerves grew tighter and tighter. Until by lunchtime he could stand it no longer and phoned Roger Hollis.
‘Mr Hollis is not in today,’ Moira said blandly. ‘Can I tell him that you called?’
He took a walk in Green Park, and
tried to eat his sandwiches sitting on a bench beside the lake. But his mouth was dry and he couldn’t eat a thing, the bread almost choking him. Eventually, he broke up the neat triangles and threw pieces to the ducks.
It was dreadful having to go back into Leconfield House. This time a couple of his colleagues did seem to move away from him in the lift, and the girl from Registry looked straight through him as they passed in the corridor. He sat at his desk, fists balled in front of him, and tried to calm his nerves. This was deliberate, of course. This was a tactic designed to keep him on tenterhooks, to crank up the tension until he could stand it no longer and did something foolish.
So he would play them at their own game.
He phoned Security. ‘Who authorised you to change the combination on my safe?’ he asked abruptly.
There was a long pause, and then Bob Thwaites, the SO himself, came on the line. ‘Sorry, who is this?’
‘You know damned well who it is,’ Malcolm snapped. ‘How many combinations did you fellows have to change over the weekend?’
There was another pause. ‘Malcolm? I’m sorry, old man, I didn’t recognise the voice at first. What’s all this about changing the combination on your safe?’ Bob Thwaites sounded genuinely puzzled. But it didn’t fool Malcolm for a second. It was all part of the cruel game.
‘Security changed the combination of my safe over the weekend. I want to know who authorised that. There are papers in my safe. I need to work on them. I am being paid to work on them.’ He spoke slowly, with laboured patience, as if talking to a backward child.
‘I’ll come around, Malcolm. As far as I’m aware, nobody changed your combination.’ Bob sounded slightly annoyed as well as puzzled now. Still part of the treatment, of course.
Bob brought one of the technicians around with him, a thin, sardonic man who wasted no time. ‘What is your combination, sir?’ he asked, dropping onto one knee beside the safe.
In the Mouth of the Tiger Page 94