No matter what happens in there, Jenny Frobisher told herself, remain calm. This is the supreme test of your professionalism. By all means let him know you’re disgusted, tell him Jess Medcalf was your friend, show him you’ve got a good mind to go above his head if his answers aren’t spectacular. But remain in control.
She was calm as the embassy guard passed her Hermes handbag through the X-ray machine. She was composed at reception. She was even unruffled when Waits himself appeared, cupping her right hand in both of his.
“Jenny. Thanks so much for coming.”
Waits led her to a windowless room in the basement, so like the Vauxhall cell where she was first dragged into this insanity. A table, two chairs, a watercolour of Margate. There was a knock on the door. Evelyn Parr, Jenny guessed – but it opened to reveal an elderly woman with bottle-bronze hair who manoeuvred a trolley into the room.
“Tea or coffee, dears?”
“I’ll have a tea, thank you.” Jenny forced a smile.
“And you, sir?”
Waits didn’t look up. “Coffee with cream.”
Jenny stared at him; beneath the table her right knee began shaking uncontrollably. Waits met her gaze, blinked and settled on Margate. His mouth opened and closed – there was something so self-satisfied about the way his jowls settled. The tea lady was footling around with milk and a plate of bourbons. Jenny realized she was jabbing an index finger into her palm.
“There you are, dear.”
The cup and saucer shook in Jenny’s hands as she took them. “Thank you, that’s lovely,” she said.
The tea lady placed the biscuits in front of Waits and rotated out of the room, trolley jangling all the way. The door shut.
“You bastard!” Jenny screamed.
God that felt good. But Waits merely leaned back and folded one leg over the other; the little shit was imperturbable.
“You knew we were going into danger, but you sent us anyway.”
Waits remained silent.
“You knew my team weren’t trained for hot work, but you didn’t care.”
The spymaster smiled with irritation and flicked a forelock from his eyes.
“You sent us in blind and ignorant. And now a damn good agent is dead and another’s injured and we’ve got a serious diplomatic incident on our hands.”
Waits took a sip of coffee.
“And for what? For some ridiculous inscription? What the hell is going on here, Charlie?”
He had another sip of coffee.
“Say something!” she shrieked.
Waits gestured to her chair – it had been sent skittering across the room – and Jenny realized she was on her feet. She sat, and something about the action served to deflate her ire. She waited for him to talk.
“I want you to know that I don’t hold that little outburst against you in the slightest,” Waits began. “In fact I’d be worried if my agents didn’t show any emotion when something awful, something awful like this has happened.”
Jenny could feel heat pumping from her cheeks.
“But you must understand that we had absolutely no clue about what was going to happen,” he said. “None whatsoever.”
“Who were they?” she pleaded. “Who killed Jess?”
“They could be any number of people. We just don’t know.” Waits took a biscuit.
“What’s this all about, Charlie? Why are we even here?”
Her handler didn’t reply, and Jenny’s temper rose once more.
“If you don’t tell me I’ll go as high up the chain of command as it takes,” she said coldly. “Asking the same questions again, and again, and again.”
“Do your job!” he screamed, gripping the table with both hands. “Do your job! Do your job! Do your job!”
Jenny had gone white.
“Do your job, Jennifer Frobisher,” Waits commanded again in a voice now turned hoarse. “Do what Her Majesty’s government pays you for, and remember the absolute and unfailing discretion we expect and for which you were selected for this assignment.” He produced an orange handkerchief and dabbed at both temples.
“I will do my job,” said Jenny. “But please, Charlie, I have to know what was worth Jess’s life. Perhaps if you told me I would understand. Perhaps … perhaps we didn’t throw her away for nothing.”
Waits fixed her with one eye, as if peering through a telescope. Then he produced a silver hipflask and swigged deeply, contemplating the nightmare this operation was becoming.
“We don’t believe it’s true, of course,” he said at last. “We don’t believe it works. But there are others who do. Britain’s enemies. The feeling has always been that if we could obtain some of it – let them know we’ve got it – perhaps we could unsettle their decision making. Lead them into rash and unprofitable choices.”
“Believe what’s true? Believe what works?”
“What Jake and Florence have been looking for. The Disciplina Etrusca. The set of rules for the correct interaction between mortals and powers of a higher sphere.” A whimsical smile settled on the spymaster’s lips. “The power to predict the future, my dear.”