––––––––
There was no going back, was there? It was that urgent, bloody secure meeting site she’d asked him for. He’d had to go and get one in a hurry from Simpson and that made it undeniable. He forced his brain to work harder. Maybe if he said ... perhaps he could ...
He pressed the button, the door opened and Gloria came in.
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Have you any aspirin, Gloria?’
‘Of course. I’ll get you one.’
‘Make it two. In fact bring the box, will you.’
Gloria left and went to her desk. It must be some bloody balls-up. He looked like death warmed up and there was already an empty glass on his desk. It must be something to do with what was going on. The whole place was buzzing. She hadn’t seen anything like it for years. It was like the old days again, when they’d lost someone in Soviet territory. She got the aspirins out of a drawer and went back into the office. He was at the drinks cabinet pouring himself what looked like a stiff one.
‘Do we know what’s going on yet, sir?’
He turned. ‘Going on? What do you mean, going on?’
‘The flap, sir. Do we know what the flap is all about? Is someone in the field in trouble?’
He put the bottle back and closed the cabinet. ‘What flap? What do you mean, flap?’
He came back to his desk and sat down, took a small sip of his drink then picked up a folder and held it open as if he was reading it. It was upside down, but he had been looking at it for about ten seconds before he noticed, blinked a couple of times and put it down. It was the yellow three-star folder. Costello’s folder. She held out the box of aspirin.
‘Not too many, sir. Not with alcohol.’ He took the box.
‘Of course ... I, er ... of course.’
She turned and left. She wasn’t inclined to stay and chat. He wasn’t a pretty sight. She closed the door after her, went back to her desk and picked up the phone.
‘Hello. He’s got a box of aspirins and he’s drinking ... yes, it’s a full box ... whisky, it looked neat and a big one ... well, you told me this morning to keep an eye on him, sir, and if there was anything that I thought you should know ...’ She listened. ‘Very well, sir.’
She put the phone down and went back to work. A few minutes later a man came into her office. He took a chair, put it by the door, sat down and folded his arms. She didn’t recognise him. They ignored each other. After about ten minutes the office door opened and Gloria looked round.
‘Yes, sir? Do you want something?’
He stopped dead in the doorway when he saw the man sitting by the door, a look almost of horror on his face. He had his overcoat on.
‘Er, I was going out. I was ... I was going to go out. I had something that needed ... but it will keep. I’ll do it later.’
The office door closed. The man continued to sit and Gloria resumed work.
Sod it, this meant a new boss. She hated it when she had to break in a new boss. They were all desk pilots these days, men or women who could arm-wrestle the software and the paperwork, were Olympic-class ladder-climbers who had no field experience. She wondered how long her present master had; there were things that needed a signature. She glanced at the man sitting by the door. By the look of things, no time at all. It must have been the mother and father of all balls-ups.
In another part of London a BBC news presenter was preparing to go on air. The producer waited while the presenter settled again. In a way, and for the first time, she was almost impressed. She never thought he had it in him.
‘Just read the words, Nigel, just read the bloody autocue.’
Nigel read the autocue.
‘News is coming in of the murder today in Lübeck, Germany, of an English tourist.’
Nigel stopped looking at the autocue.
‘For God’s sake, Linda, an English tourist? Why not say it’s an English secret agent. Why piss about with this tourist rubbish? Why should we be lying for them?’
‘Because, Nigel darling, we are not reporters, this is the BBC news, we read what we’re told to read. Somewhere, a reporter who knows all about real news will, as we speak, be trying to get the full story. When that happens, it will be filed and the gods upstairs will get what clearances they can and, in the fullness of time, you will read to a public who don’t give a shit what it has been deemed fit for them to know. Which, if previous form is anything to go by, will be precious little because it’s Intelligence-related. For the moment, she is an English tourist brutally murdered by Johnny Foreigners – better still, Germans. And as the clock is ticking its inexorable way to air-time can you just read the words, darling, and stop wasting everyone’s fucking time?’
Nigel began reading the words. ‘News is coming in ...’
The man by the door stood up when the Director came in. The Director ignored him, walked past Gloria into the office and closed the door behind him. The man at the door sat down again and Gloria made a small note to buy a replacement box of aspirin.
The Director sat down and motioned for the man at the desk, who had risen on his entry, to sit down. The man tried to smile but it died at birth. The Director got straight into it.
‘We’re not barbarians. Nor do we go in for extraordinary rendition. But our American cousins are and do. And today I feel I can see the advantages of their approach. They’re screaming for you and I don’t see how we can avoid letting them have you. If we don’t, they may come and get you and that must not happen at any cost.’ The man felt his bladder control slipping. ‘They say the CIA woman you used, the one from their Berlin office, was injured in a car crash yesterday. In many ways I hope for her sake she was but I think the likelihood is that she’s already been shipped to one of their foreign holding and interrogation units, after which she will stay without trial in some other place of irregular confinement until they decide what to do with her. There is of course no question of a trial in your case either. I will try and get the best deal I can, not, I hasten to add, for your sake but to salvage anything I can for the reputation of this department. Personally I would like you to be taken to some nice, soundproofed cell and have the man sitting by the door outside beat you to death with his bare hands. That would give me some small satisfaction, give him some useful practice, and help erase you from sight and memory. You have, after all, betrayed the Service and your country, which is treason.’
The man lost the battle with his bladder and felt a warmness spreading inside his shorts.
‘Thanks to your insane delusions we have lost Costello. The Americans and Israelis rightly blame us for it.’ The Director gave a wintry smile. ‘Just as a matter of academic interest, psychological not professional, what on earth did you think you were doing?’ The Director waited for a moment but the man in the damp trousers was asking himself the same question. He had been asking it ever since she had stopped calling in, hadn’t answered her phone and he hadn’t been able to contact Bronski. ‘You misused department funds and personnel to mount an unauthorised field action which involved subverting a US agent, eliciting top-secret material from her, and involved handing over to her a man you had specifically been ordered to terminate. What on earth did you stand to gain by it?’
Yes, it was a good question he only wished he had a good answer. His pants were turning cold and he had the distinct impression he was going to be sick or faint, or both. On balance probably both.
The Director stood up.
‘I did not enjoy breaking this to the Prime Minister. He took it badly. I take a small comfort that after a rare example of his masterful decision-making which initiated this ill-starred cock-up, at least he will now go back to dithering where Service matters are concerned and not make any more decisions. If I can take only that much from the mess, it will be something. I will also gain what comfort I can over the coming months from the knowledge that, after what I’m sure will be a rigorous interrogation by the CIA, you will begin a number of years rotting in some American secure facility. If I am asked, I will suggest somewhere for the criminally insane would be appropriate. It won’t be much, but time and the thought of it may yet heal the wound I bear from ever having agreed to your getting this desk in the first place. A desk, which it has become obvious during your tenure, was well beyond your competence. You will wait here until arrangements can be made to escort you out of the building and pass you on to our American friends.’
The Director stood up, turned and left the office, walked past Gloria and the man standing at the doorway and left. He didn’t close any doors behind him. Once he was gone the man at the door closed it quietly, sat down and folded his arms. Gloria carried on with her work. She was submitting her master’s expenses chits, as she knew now, for the last time. God, he was a cheeky bugger, he scrounged almost as much in expenses as she earned. From the office there was the sound of someone vomiting, followed by a moan, then of a heavy body falling to the floor. The man sitting at the door stared sightlessly ahead of him and Gloria continued work on submitting the chits. Life had to go on, expenses chits had to be submitted through the proper channels even ‘midst shot, shell and almighty cock-ups’. The only true survivor, she had learned in her many years in the Service, was the admin, which never died, faded away or got the bullet. She tapped the keys on her keyboard and the man by the door sat and stared into space. It was nothing to do with either of them. Whatever had fallen to the floor of the inner office would be taken away and disposed of and life would go on. As the BBC used to say in the old days when things went wrong – normal service would soon be resumed as soon as possible.