Angel Manifesto

by Michael Foot

  Copyright © 2018 Michael Foot

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, event and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination

  or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons,

  living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Matador

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  ISBN 978 1789012 965

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

  This book is dedicated to Gene Ludwig, a very good friend on whose innate optimism about life I drew whenever I hit a roadblock in writing this book.

  My thanks go to Canon Robert Wright. He created the cover of this book. You can see examples of his increasingly well-known abstract paintings on robertwrightartist.co.uk. He also kindly confirmed that I was not taking undue liberties with my excursion in the book into the theology of angels.

  I am also very grateful to Nicola and her colleagues in the Buckland Book Club. They persuaded me to tie up some important elements in the story and add 2 sections towards the end of the book.

  Contents

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  1

  Andrew Davies stepped quietly and unobtrusively into the street. It housed his bank’s HQ in the City of London, various coffee shops and fast food outlets, and a few offices for smaller firms. It was 5.30 p.m., and already the street was crowded with people using it as a short cut up to Liverpool Street for the evening commute. The bank’s exit was set back a little from the road and Andrew paused there a minute before heading against the main flow, towards Moorgate.

  It was a fairly early end of the day for him but he had been at his desk from just after 7 a.m.; and there were still members of his team monitoring the IT filters and dealing with the remaining ‘red flags’ from that day’s work. The New York office, of course, had been up and running for hours too; but in his bank it was the accepted rule that London sorted out the problems that had been generated in Europe; and so London staff could –if they wished and often if they did not wish – work into late evening.

  Normally, the end of his working day meant a 14 minute stroll back to the apartment he rented, down towards Tower Hill. (He would have called it a ‘flat’ when he was young but now understood that, to pander to the residents’ need for self-respect and sustain the price, it was an ‘apartment’.) The City’s decade of success (well, at least up to the screw-up of 2008 known more generally to the world as the Global Financial Crisis) had meant a growing number of refurbishments and new buildings like this one. Here he rented one of 109 apartments designed for professionals like him. They weren’t cheap to own or, as in his case, rent. But they were close to most of the evening activities necessary for the young City executive and they each came with an internal basement parking space. Most importantly for him, there was no catching the last train out of town or trying to find a cab at 2 a.m. to take him south of the river. So he was very happy with what he had.

  But tonight he was heading up to the Foreign & Commonwealth Office (FCO) in Whitehall. The chance of any of his work colleagues being around there and spotting his eventual entry, about 6.15, were almost zero; and, anyway, his cover story – for those work colleagues who did know something about his supposed background – provided a perfectly good excuse. The security at the gate took some convincing that he genuinely had an appointment outside normal office hours. When he was finally admitted, there was no Receptionist to show him into the Visitor’s Waiting Room. He would have to await the arrival of the secretary of the man he knew as ‘the Colonel’ to collect him.

  A slightly harassed and frumpy middle-aged woman came for him a few minutes later. Andrew had not met her before – indeed, he had only met the Colonel three times that he could recall. She wore what he thought were probably regulation clothes for secretaries at the FCO – ensuring that no personal feature good or bad should be particularly visible. In this spirit, she wore a shapeless long dress, topped with a woollen grey cardigan that had obviously seen many years’ service. In his own organization, he was used to secretaries with an average age of 25; and who highlighted any good feature they had, by dressing in as little as possible and/or in something tight. He could see there were some advantages to the FCO approach, especially as – unlike his own ‘secretary’ – he guessed this one could probably actually write and spell like an adult.

  She appeared through the door and, without raising her eyes to his for a second, held out her hand saying “I’m Sue, Mr. Mortby’s secretary. It’s very good of you to come so late. But Mr. Mortby spends so much of his time during the day in meetings; and, of course, we didn’t want to interrupt your work by asking you to come over during the day. Anyway, please follow me.”

  Andrew tried a little light conversation to make her relax (you never knew when a friendly secretary might be a useful asset) as they made their way to the Colonel’s office. The façade of the building was impressive, but as you went deeper into its recesses the effect became more of an elderly country house whose owners had seen better times. As they waited for a lift that looked as though it had been one of the first ever installed, he glanced out of the window and saw major excavation works all neatly sealed off and mournfully quiet at this time of night. “Having something major done there, are they?” he asked. For the first time she actually glanced at his face; “Oh no. They were digging to put in a small new security cabin and they found the base of a structure that was built for the Queen’s Jubilee – Victoria’s of course not Elizabeth’s. Now they’re trying to work out what to do with the ruins; and the environment lot won’t let us just tear them out.”

  Fortunately, by this time the lift had disgorged them into a quiet carpeted corridor, lined with scenes from the glory days of the Raj. Sue stopped outside the third door in the corridor, knocked quietly, waited and then opened it, ushering Andrew through before her. “Mr. Davies for you, Mr. Mortby.”

  The Colonel (as he obviously wasn’t known here) drew back his chair and leapt to his feet to shake Andrew warmly by the hand. “It’s been a shamefully l
ong time” he began. “Can I start to make amends with a very good dry sherry of my own that I bring in? The new rules don’t exactly encourage alcohol consumption on the taxpayer so it’s that or their ghastly tea. Come and sit down.”

  Andrew thought the chair was probably a good deal older than he was himself. But it looked comfortable and that, he thought, was what counted on a Thursday evening after a long day. “Yes, it has indeed been a long time – maybe 18 months. Should I call you Colonel by the way?” “Of course” his host replied “Everyone here calls me that – to my face and behind my back. Now, Sue” he went on, for she was still standing silent and unmoving by the door, “you get off home. Just leave my overnight papers in the usual briefcase on your desk; and I’ll catch up with you around 10 tomorrow.” Sue bobbed her head in quiet agreement, almost curtseyed as she left, and was gone.

  The Colonel sat himself down in a chair that matched Andrew’s and sipped his sherry. He was one of those men whose age it was impossible to guess accurately – Andrew thought he must be about 55. He had probably looked much like that ten years earlier. He was a man that Andrew had warmed to as soon as they had met. “No side” as one of his public school friends would have said. The Colonel certainly looked very comfortable in his own skin, very much in control of his life and work. Andrew had found him calming when they had first met, which was when Andrew had left the Army about five years ago and was about to join the bank he now worked for. Just as well, Andrew thought. If the man who was your controller – and thus a key figure in your life – was not relaxed and visibly in control, it would be pretty worrying.

  The Colonel looked steadily at Andrew for some seconds. “Andrew, you’ve probably and rightly guessed that we want something from you – to bring you out of retirement again. And, as this would only be the third time in five years, I hope that will be alright. This time, also, I think I can promise you some fun along the way.” Andrew muttered something conventional about always being available at need; after all, they did augment his salary by a modest but worthwhile amount each month. And, truth to tell, he had begun to find that his work at the bank was losing any intellectual or other attraction it might once have had for him.

  The Colonel went on. “What we’re asking you to do this time is a bit vague – at least it is now. To cut straight to the chase, we want you to make yourself ‘available’ to a group that interests us. We want you to try and get into what passes for their management structure and tell us whether or not we should be worrying about what is going on. You won’t know who; but we’ve already got a couple of people trying to do the same thing. But they’re not making much progress – their backgrounds aren’t attractive enough for the group. We think they will find you much more interesting. No danger for you, as far as we can see; and, as I say I think you’ll have fun.”

  “Sounds fine to me, as far as it goes.” Andrew rolled what had turned out to be a very nice Amontillado appreciatively round his mouth. “But who are we talking about? And why would I be of interest to them?”

  The Colonel paused so long that Andrew wondered if he should repeat his questions. Had the man heard? Just as Andrew was about to saying something, the Colonel did indeed respond. “We’re interested in the Angels. We think they are gearing up for a massive expansion in activity before the next Election. We know they are looking for able, well-educated and committed people with a business or at least project-management background. People like you. You are well-educated. You’ve held down a job that shows you can take responsibility and manage a project. Just as your Army background will appeal to them. They’ll wet themselves when they find you can speak some Arabic; and wet themselves again when they find that your dear old Catholic mother has produced a son who might understand half of the religious stuff they sometimes come out with among their own.”

  “Fine so far” replied Andrew. “But what are they doing that worries you? That in any way could carry the kind of threat to national security that I thought you guys are here to protect? From what I’ve read and heard, they are just a few hundred born-again Christians and left-wing drop-outs who offer love and consolation to anyone who will listen.”

  “That might have been true a year ago but things have moved on. A lot.” The Colonel reached over and refilled Andrew’s glass and then his own, without asking. As though no civilised person could possibly forgo a second glass at this time of evening. “They’re opening new offices faster than Costa Coffee can open new outlets. And in the big Northern towns. They’ve probably upped their spending on their drug rehab programmes by 100% at the same time. We hear they have reached some deal with the Muslim Angels for the two groups to work together. And their income” the Colonel slapped the arm of his chair to emphasise the point “is now £100 million or more a year. You can keep quite a show on the road with that amount of money. If they ever were, they’re no longer a bunch of religious do-gooders.”

  Andrew held up his hands, acknowledging the force of what the Colonel was saying. “OK. But what kind of cover story have you come up with for me? I don’t want to screw up my position at the bank if I can help it. And presumably you need some kind of story for the Angels about why I might now be interested in them- and why I suddenly have time to help them?”

  The Colonel smirked – it was the only way Andrew could describe it. “Yes, I think you’ll find we have been rather clever for once. As soon as you agree to do this, one of the Gulf States is going to request your bank to second someone who has just your qualifications to them. That State is one your bank has been bending every sinew to get on the right side of, as they still have plenty of oil money. The secondment will be for six months initially but that can be extended if need be. The deal will be that you train a couple of their central bank people in the latest anti-money laundering rules the Financial Action Task Force has brought in. Most of that training can take place over here, at the State’s London office; and I’m told you’d probably only need a day a week to supervise that. But the bank I’m sure will be happy to let you out full-time – so you’ll have plenty of time for what we want.”

  Andrew admitted “That is pretty clever. The bank will like it, providing the request comes from the Sheikh or one of his immediate coterie. I can do AML stuff in my sleep. Yes, I can get the Gulf secondees to work mostly by themselves. And everyone knows that the Gulf States all need to keep up with the latest international rules, especially now the Americans are so hot on catching international trading by Iranian companies. I shall need to spend a couple of weeks out in the Gulf at the start, to see how their current standards are applied. But then we should be away.”

  The Colonel finished his glass, “I hope you’ve got no emotional attachments you can’t walk away from. From all I hear about the Angels their social life is pretty full-on and time-filling. And what I hear about some of the women, I rather wish I were 30 years younger and free to take this on myself!”

  Andrew finished his own glass and stood up. “That all sounds like a good basis to start. I’m up for this. Life has been a little too predictable and dull for my taste, lately. There is no-one ‘special’. And I’ll go on trusting your calls – they’ve worked out fine for me so far. I’ll wait to hear from the bank. Tell your Gulf Prince to emphasise the urgency of the work, so the bank will be a bit quicker to react than they would normally.”

  “As always, a pleasure to see you” said the Colonel. “Sue will still be here I expect. She doesn’t trust me to lock up properly. I’ll get her to escort you out.”

  2

  It was actually three weeks before the secondment came through; and then two weeks while Andrew paid a visit to the Gulf to see for himself where they were already on Anti-Money Laundering. He used the time sensibly – clearing his diary and preparing training materials for his new charges. The latter was aided by the fact that the Financial Action Task Force had just produced two new volumes of rules and recommendations. While in the UK he also read al
l he could find on the Angels; and, as he thought about it, he could see that his proposed cover story would probably stand up very well.

  The more he read about the Angels the less clear was the organisation. Its public face was that of an active and wide-ranging charity, an example of the ‘Big Society’ that David Cameron had talked about some years earlier. It seemed to be split along three semi-autonomous lines. One was clearly aimed at single men and women under 25, with emphasis on social events and ‘life-style’ advice. A second was aimed primarily at mothers with young children, the emphasis here being on advice and support. A third was clearly aimed at the Saga generation, with lots of practical support on finance, ageing and health. Frequently, the offices of the three units– the Angels called them stores- were collocated in a town. After what had obviously been a rapid expansion in the last year, there now seemed to be a store in every major city in England, plus Edinburgh, Glasgow and Cardiff. There were few in rural areas.

  Very little was said on the Angels’ website about how the organisation was financed or administered, though it was apparent that much of the money came indirectly from two elderly brothers who, over the previous 20 years, had built up a major supermarket chain. Not only were they the source of the money but the chain, itself, which was nationwide, was also obviously used as a base for some of the Angels’ charity work. Andrew himself had never shopped there; but he knew that –insofar as supermarkets can get good press – they were thought of in the same bracket as say the Co-Op had once been.

  Andrew could also find relatively little on exactly what assistance individuals could expect if they made contact. Instead, there were numerous stories on social media from people claiming their lives had been transformed by their contact with the Angels. These came from drug addicts who described lengthy but successful cures; and mothers with young children who had found community, childcare and advice. Older people tended to focus on the health and finance aspects. There seemed to be a small network of medical experts with the organisation who came in for frequent electronic praise.