Albatross (2 page)

‘Humphrey thinks it'll be him,' James White went on. ‘He's never said anything but he knows the time is coming. He's been deputy for too many years. He wants to step into the spotlight.' Again he chuckled. ‘Not a good way of describing my particular role – what do you think of him, John? Would he do the job?'

John Kidson didn't answer for some moments. James White waited while he considered and under the thick white brows his pale eyes watched the younger man as if he were examining an insect under a microscope. If you want to find out about a man's ambitions, ask his opinion of another man's promotion. The brigadier loved making up and collecting dictums of human behaviour. One day he might publish a little book. Handbook for a spy. He liked the title. It appealed to his sense of humour.

Kidson looked at him. ‘I don't think that's a fair question. I've worked too closely with Humphrey to give an objective opinion.'

Clever, James White observed. He's damned him without saying a word. ‘I can give one, though,' he said aloud. ‘And I've been with him longer than anybody. He's a marvellous administrator, brilliantly intelligent, and apart from his unhappy resemblance to Robespierre, he
is
incorruptible. But has he that flair for leadership? I'm not boasting, my dear chap, when I say that this has been my real contribution to the job. Getting other people to do the work for me.'

‘I'd rate it higher than that, Chief,' Kidson smiled.

James White poured them both coffee. ‘Black, no sugar? Then, of course, there's yourself, John.'

John Kidson said quietly, ‘Yes, I suppose I'm in the running. But Humphrey won't take it. He'll resign, and I wouldn't blame him.'

‘I don't agree,' the brigadier countered. ‘He'll sulk, and you could have a difficult year to settle in, but he's essentially loyal to the Service. He'd work with you. And then, of course, you'd work with him, wouldn't you?'

‘You know I would,' Kidson answered. James White put down the brandy glass and leaned a little towards him. ‘There is one other alternative I've been considering for some time. It might be possible to tempt Davina back.'

This time Kidson was caught unprepared. ‘To take over from you? Good God!'

‘You don't like the idea?'

‘I don't like or dislike it. It's just a shock, that's all. She's finished with the Service for good. She's set up in a flat with Colin Lomax and she's got a job in an advertising agency. I think you can forget her, Chief.'

‘Pity,' White murmured. ‘I can't see her wasting her time selling deodorants or dog food or whatever.'

He saw Kidson stiffen. ‘It's a two-hundred-million-a-year business,' he said. ‘American-owned. There's practically nothing we use that they don't help to promote.'

‘That's right,' he answered amiably. ‘Arlington Agency, isn't it? The chairman's a very impressive chap. Tony Walden. I should think he keeps Davina pretty busy. But she must find it rather tame.'

‘If you knew all about it, Chief,' John Kidson said quietly, ‘why didn't you say so at the start?'

‘Because I thought you might have some fresh news about her. Amazing how Colin recovered, isn't it? Wonderful what the doctors can do these days. He was only expected to last for a few months.'

‘Apparently the operation's been a complete success.' Kidson followed the change of direction. ‘It'll take time before he's completely back on his feet, though.'

‘I'm surprised he and Davina haven't got married,' White remarked.

‘So am I,' Kidson said. ‘But Charlie says they're better as they are, and she's annoyingly good at summing up that sort of situation.'

‘She'd know her sister better than you or I in that context,' James White said. ‘It would be a pity for Davina to get married and sink into some domestic role. A terrible waste. Rather like working in advertising. Good Lord, it's nearly three! I'll get the bill.'

John Kidson walked back to his office, leaving the brigadier to set off in his car. It was a fine day, and St James's Park was full of tourists and children wandering along beside the lake feeding the ducks. It was a walk that Kidson had loved since he was a child; like the children in their jeans and sneakers, he too had stood by the water's edge and proffered bits of stale bread. Then, as now, the bolder ducks had waddled forward and snatched the crusts, and a cohort of chirping sparrows had surrounded the park benches where office workers ate their sandwiches during the lunch hour. They had gone back to their desks; weary tourists rested in their place; young couples, arms linked round each other, strolled along the paths, and in the distance the towers and roofline of Whitehall gleamed like a mirage through the trees.

James White was due to retire. Part of Kidson believed it, the part that wanted to succeed, that quickened in excitement at the chance of heading the Secret Intelligence Service. But his experience of James White enjoined caution. Not just caution but positive disbelief. Nothing was as it seemed with the man who had controlled British Intelligence for nearly twenty years. At times he played with his own people as if they were opponents – or puppets was a better word. He loved to manipulate, to jerk the string without warning and see a subordinate dance. He hadn't taken Kidson out to lunch to talk about his successor. The appointment would be made by the Prime Minister when the time came, and White's recommendation would decide it. He hadn't wanted Kidson's opinion of either his own or Humphrey Grant's ability for the role.

He wanted to find out something about Kidson's sister-in-law, Davina Graham. That was the purpose of the lunch at the Garrick Club. Kidson crossed the bridge that spanned the lake. She had left the Service. She was living with Colin Lomax and working in a highly paid, demanding job. A waste, James White had said. He wanted her back; she had defied him and turned her face against her old profession and her old colleagues. She had avoided John, meeting her sister Charlie for an occasional lunch, deliberately putting up barriers between herself and anyone connected with her past. Kidson had been puzzled, a little resentful, and then shrugged his feelings aside. Davina was difficult. His parents-in-law had implied it, without actually saying anything critical about their eldest daughter. Charlie, his wife, had never needed to assert herself or resort to mild aggression even. Her beauty and her charm secured her everything she wanted, and always would. After nearly six years of marriage, Kidson was more passionately in love with her than ever. He crossed over Birdcage Walk and turned up the unobtrusive side street that led to his office.

‘He was in place when I changed sides,' Peter Harrington said. Davina had a portable tape recorder on the table between them. It made a tiny whirr, like a butterfly beating against a window pane.

‘How do you know?'

‘Because my contact in West Germany let something slip,' he said. He stroked his thin hair with one hand, his eyes half closed in concentration. ‘I was playing hard to get – putting the price up by talking about my conscience and all that crap – isn't it great to talk to someone like you, Davy, who understands what it's all about? There's a bloody parson in here that keeps trying to get me to pray with him. Keeps saying he knows why I did it and I mustn't go on blaming myself. Jesus Christ, the only thing I blame myself for is getting caught!'

‘Stick to the point,' Davina said. ‘Get back to the contact in West Germany. What exactly did he say?'

‘Let me think,' he insisted. ‘Let me get it right. I said, “I don't like your side” – that's it, I remember now. He was a big fat bastard, very persuasive. “You don't know anything about it. You think you're being loyal to your country by living on a dirty little salary while others are selling out and getting rich. You talk about sides as if it were a football match. Grow up, Mr Harrington.” That's what he said. “Others are selling out and getting rich.” I picked him up on it, all indignant. I wanted to
know
, Davy, if he had someone in mind or if it was just a comment made to encourage me. I called him a liar. I said nobody in the Service would last five minutes if they were playing that game. I said I wouldn't either. I gave him a come-on and he took it. “Your Service is the best friend we have. That's why you've nothing to worry about. Just do what we want and watch yourself get rich.” I was certain then that he meant the SIS had been penetrated good and proper.' He flattened his sparse hair again and shrugged. ‘I joined, as you know.'

‘And you didn't think about it again? You didn't try to find out whether it was one man or a general penetration on several levels?'

‘I didn't want to know,' he said flatly. ‘I got on with my end of it. But all the time I had the feeling that there was some kind of back-up behind me.'

Davina changed the tape. Harrington helped himself to another of her cigarettes and lit it with the lighter she had left on the table. Lomax had given it to her. She hated seeing it in Harrington's hand.

‘When was the first time you had that feeling?'

He puffed out smoke and inhaled again greedily.

‘Difficult to say. In the States mostly. I felt I was being moved around, like a bloody pawn on a chess board. But I wasn't sure by which side. I had two contacts, remember? One Rumanian, one East German?'

Davina nodded. She remembered only too well. Meeting him in the corridor when she came up to make her weekly report on the most important defector to leave Russia since Penkovsky changed sides. Peter Harrington, back in London after a posting to America. Demoted, shunted into Personnel. Shabby and hangdog. She had felt sorry for him. They went out to the corner pub and had a drink.…

‘Yes,' she said. ‘Go on.'

He hesitated and then said quietly, ‘You're not going to get everything for nothing, Davy. I want to see something in this for myself before I spill out any more.'

She reached out and stopped the tape. ‘Fair enough. I'll go back and think this over. You can do some thinking too. You can work out exactly how long you'll be in here if you
don't
cooperate. I'll contact the governor when I'm coming again.' She scooped up the lighter. ‘You can keep the cigarettes.'

He mumbled a crude obscenity which she ignored. Then he stuffed the packet into the breast pocket of his denim jacket. ‘Who gave you the lighter?'

She could see the malice in his face. He needed to hurt her if he could, to give himself some self-respect. She decided to let him do it. ‘A man friend,' she said. ‘Why? What do you care what I got for Christmas?'

‘Just curious.' He had a little grin on his mouth. ‘You got over Ivan then?'

‘It's been some years now,' Davina answered. She wore her calmness well; he couldn't sense the angry beating of her pulse.

‘What's he like, then? Still go for the Russian bear type, do you?'

‘He's not like anyone you'd ever know,' Davina said. She walked to the door and opened it. The warder stepped inside the room and closed it. Along the corridor with its yellow paint, the creeping acrid smell followed her as she went down in the lift and signed herself out at the private entrance. In the open air she took a deep breath; the streets were busy with traffic and people, the shops bearing the ubiquitous and rather tattered sale notices that were the flag of recession. She had parked her car on a meter some distance from the grim prison façade. A ticket was folded under the wiper, fining the driver for exceeding the two-hour limit. She got in, and on an impulse of senseless irritation, crumpled up the paper in its sliver of cellophane and threw it into the road. Let them bloody well find her if they wanted the money. Two hours was not time enough. Not time enough to peel back the dirty layers of treason and deceit that had been laid down over many, many years. She would be back to see Peter Harrington again, and Peter Harrington would tell her a little more.

When she came up in the lift to her flat in Marylebone, she couldn't find the key in her bag. Lomax would be in. Lomax would be waiting. Thank God. She pushed the bell and the door opened.

‘Hello, my darling,' he said. ‘I've missed you.'

‘I've missed you too,' she answered and put her arms round his neck to kiss him.

‘How did it go today?' They were sitting side by side on the small sofa, and Lomax's large body took up most of the space. He held her firmly inside his arm, and one hand played with a strand of the dark red hair that hung over her collar.

‘Better than I expected,' she said.

‘It didn't upset you to see him again?'

‘I felt rather sick to start with; I remember opening a cheese once and finding it crawling – it felt like that when he walked in. But he wants to get out, Colin. He wants it very, very badly. And he'll talk to me. Not like today, just tossing a few crumbs, but properly. He knows a lot more than he pretends.'

‘Do you want a drink? I'll get you one.'

‘Not yet. Later, when I've had a bath. That place smelled, I'm sure it's come out with me.'

Lomax turned her face towards him. ‘It did shake you, didn't it?'

Reluctantly Davina nodded. ‘A little. How did you get on with the physio?'

‘Very well. We did quite a lot of hard work. She says I'll be half fit in about six weeks. I'm to increase my walk to a mile at the end of the month. No jogging; just a steady strong exercise at walking pace. Plus all the rest.'

‘You're very patient, Colin. I never thought you would be.'

‘I never thought I'd have the option,' he reminded her. ‘Besides, I'm not having you marry a crock. I don't mind you going round talking to people like Harrington, but you're not getting into anything serious till I'm ready to go along with you.'

‘I won't argue with that,' Davina said gently. ‘Now I'll have my bath and you can get a nice whisky and soda ready for me so I can have it while I'm cooking.'