The Christmas Pudding Lie

by P. B. Phillips

  Anna struggles inwardly. ‘Dear God, was Dodd responsible for my exile?’ She can’t contain her reserve any longer. She goes on the offensive.

  “Dodd I know of what you speak. I won’t deny it. But I tell you that it was a young thing’s thinking out loud. I was half joking, really.”

  Dodd moves in closer to Anna. He offers his hand. Anna is angry that she is apologizing. She is not anywhere near forgiving and forgetting.

  Dodd advances, “Cara mia, I know that what I say next will sound at first as a betrayal. But I pray that you will judge me as a friend.”

  Anna thinks ‘oh my god where is this going? I am so lost here.’ She wants nothing more than to wake up in Aromas at this point. But surprisingly she attacks,

  “I was exiled for a foolish slip of the tongue. I was forced into a life of a fool. I hope that you realize this before you think about making excuses, if that’s what you are about.”

  Dodd proceeds, “Shall I tell you the side of the story that was never available to you?”

  He moves on without a pause, “Special Relations deemed that this last action on your part to be… how shall I put it… as a mortal sin! The consequence of which is death to the informer for blowing the cover of a spy. For in the world of spies this is tantamount to an execution.”

  Anna finds this all too ludicrous. Her nervous giggle returns, she asks, “What? Are you all crazy? Murder…? I thought that I was a conspiratorial fanatic but you have me beat with this one. Really guys, this is not funny.

  Oh wait I get it now. This is a farce after all. This must be the British version of a reality show ‘You’ve been Spooked!’

  I give up. You can all laugh out loud now at my forever naïveté. JB and Ada must have nominated me, I’m sure of that. I have to admit that I am the perfect candidate for such antics.”

  Dodd’s heart at this moment sinks. He knew that his side of the story would be hard to bear. But Anna’s continued attempts to dismiss her life as a joke shows him that he underestimated the hurt within her. He looks over to Sherlock for a reaction to Anna’s refusal to see things as they are. Sherlock raises a finger for Dodd to hold his tongue. Sherlock knows that Anna’s reaction is merely an attempt to stall for time.

  Anna struggles to fit this latest piece of information into the mystery that has been unfolding in her head since her last days at the beach. She needs time to read between the lines, connect the dots, and reposition her focus. She stares back at the four sets of eyes that beseech her to catch up for the dominoes are falling fast.

  Anna clings to the need to treat this matter lightly, she says “Sorry Dodd do go on. Just in case you’ve lost your place on the page, let me remind you. There was a contract out on me. ”

  Dodd taps his fingers on the table with its delicious remains of brunch. Anna quickly looks about the faces of the Holmes gang to see if this is a signal or code. But their eyes are glued on her. Dodd then takes measure of the growth of his fashionable five o’clock shadow. He looks hard on Anna,

  “The vetting of MI 6’s guy compounded your earlier transgressions and contraventions.”

  Anna falls back onto the defense. She demands, “I can’t believe that you are turning this on me! What transgressions… contraventions?”

  Dodd keeps his eyes lowered but pushes on with determination,

  “You jumped the line over and over. You were one of the early candidates recruited for the position of Lady Banks. But after repeated attempts to find a Lord Banks that you would accept for any amount of time, we concluded that you were the exception to the rule. We missed the depth of the rebel in you. Your neat blue gabardine suit with gold buttons marked you as a conventionalist. But you were more, so much more. You were a rebel indeed and the worst kind.”

  Anna cocks her head to challenge this last assessment. Dodd explains, “You, Anna, are the quintessential fifties ‘rebel without a cause.’ To the Yanks and the Brits you were a live wire. You need to be shorted.”

  Anna bites her upper lip hard. She knows that a kingpin in not in place. She interrupts, “I’ve known for some time now that I was exiled for my inability to keep my affairs kosher. And from what has been revealed so far and the fact that I am alive, I presume that there is a key player yet to be put into play on the board. ”

  Dodd relaxes a bit. He takes comfort, maybe irrationally, that Anna is still with him on this matter. He proceeds cautiously still, “When I got word that you were in trouble I petitioned one of my oldest allies in MI 6 to allow me to settle the matter. I would make sure that you were no longer a threat to their security.”

  Anna can’t take in the breath and depth of this lie. She looks with horror and pain at Dodd. As angry as she is with him, she is angrier with herself. How could she have allowed herself to be so manipulated? She, who tried over and over to stand on her own two feet, finds, now in the last chapter of her life, that nothing in her life was true.

  She demands, “What the bloody hell Dodd…are you my executioner or savior? Get on with it man. The New Year approaches. ”

  Dodd, more serious than Anna has ever seen him, explains, “I tried to find you a safe house. I called in every mark accumulated over the years in special service. But every one refused. Your reputation preceded you, cara mia. You were bad news.

  Then one day a frail looking cinnamon brown man walked into my office.”

  Anna knows now where this is going. In fact, she skips ahead many pages. She exclaims with dismay, “Of course, the Little Prince.”

  Anna and the Little Prince, her last husband, shared a rough twenty odds years together. But she has spoken to no one about those years. They were too hard. How this foreigner came into her life has been a complete mystery to her all these years later.

  And now Dodd is somehow connected. She refuses to say a word. She merely waves her hand for Dodd to go on with his revelations.

  He does, “You are the only one who calls him ‘The Little Prince.’

  Anna thought the name captured the very being of the man. He was a living, larger than life, enigma.

  Dodd continues, “Your Little Prince is known as Indigo.”

  The dark recesses of Anna’s pupils widen. Her lower lip quivers.

  Dodd continues, “In exchange for my marker, Indigo offered to keep you under his guard and beyond the reach of Special Relations.”

  Anna is aghast. Her head reels. Her jaw falls. Her mouth parches. Her ears ring. She challenges Dodd,

  “So that chance meeting in your London office before our departure to the Dark Continent’ was the hand off.”

  Dodd bows his head low.

  Anna is furious. She can’t express her indignation strong enough or fast enough.

  “Oh fa!” is all she can say. She blurts out, “Damn you how could you? Did you know what you were getting me into? You thought so little of me, what a fool I am!”

  Dodd’s head hangs lower yet. With eyes shut he tries to speak. But words desert him. He can only shake his head ‘no.’ His cool blue eyes burn red. He knows that no excuse or apology will suffice. Yet he must say something. It’s too late to retreat as he has in the past. He must go forward.

  He offers, “Anna, Indigo was the only card on the table. Special Relations wanted you out of the picture permanently. I knew that if you were to get through you would need his cover.”

  Dodd anticipates Anna’s question, “Every Intelligence Agency defers to Indigo. As…”

  Anna holds up her hand to stop Dodd right there. She is at her boiling point. She tries to lower her voice thereby avoiding a full out shouting match. She needs to make a stand. But she is so baffled by the unabashed expose of lies upon which she has based her story that she doesn’t know if she has any ground left to her.

  In a modest tone, she tries again, “Tell me this if I was trouble why did Indigo agree to your scheme?”

  Dodd hoped that he could avoid this ugly truth. But she asks. If he hopes to keep her as a friend he knows that she deserves an answer.
“You were his spy catcher.”

  Anna’s jaw drops. Her brows furrow as her whole countenance cringes. Before she can ask Dodd anticipates her question “In the world of spooks you became known as Mis-Information. Indigo used this. He used your keen nose for sniffing out spies. Not only that but he used you to feed misinformation to them.”

  Anna whole sense of self implodes. She can’t believe this story. She asks, “Are you saying that I was used to pass on misinformation?”

  Dodd can’t look her in the eyes now. Even though he was never involved in this spy game he knows that his failure to warn her was his sin of omission. He nods yes slowly as if his head is too heavy for his shoulders.

  Anna is frozen. She can’t process the depth and breath of Dodd’s words. All she can think of is to run. How will she disentangle herself from this clutch of spies? With false calm she announces, “So Indigo is one more spy ring. As far as I am concerned the Little Prince is dead. He is out of my life forever. I don’t dare call his name lest it call him back. I can never convey to you how profoundly confounding those years were for me.

  It’s all so absurd when you think about it. There you were Dodd thinking that you were saving my life. I lost every lifeline; family, friends, and work.

  When I got free of the Little Prince, I vowed that never again would I get caught up in another’s storm.”

  Anna goes silent. She takes in a deep breath. She shakes her head to free up her energy. She knows by the pounding in her heart that she will need every wit about her if she is to get out of this, whatever this is. She is still confused why Dodd comes forth now. She demands sharply, “What’s the point of all this now? You must know that this puts an end to us. You are now like all the rest, just another lie, if you like, a mere figment of a young girl’s fancy. Thank god that girl is dead as well. ”

  Dodd is charged by Anna’s vindictive outburst. It ignites his will to engage her completely. He comes forth invigorated,

  “Be as it may. I will be forever saddened if we can’t get back to where we were. But I am ever so happy to see that the fire in your belly rages on.”

  Dodd takes in a long breath. He is ever so grateful that they have gotten to this point and remain talking. He is about to answer Anna’s smarting question of ‘why now?’ when she looks sympathetically into his eyes and asks with a broken cadence,

  “Where does this leave us Dodd? I keep losing my place. Please spare me the details. Just get to the part where it matters to me, please?”

  Dodd answers, “There is no easy way to say this. So I’ll just ‘tell it like it is’ as you yanks say. Indigo has called in my marker.”

  Anna can’t see the connection. She asks, “But why go to such lengths to tell me a cock and bull story about a book about a foolish woman you call Lady Banks whose life was never her own?”

  Anna continues to question the whole affair. “I don’t understand. I’m sorry.”

  She halts suddenly. She shakes within. All she can muster is a trembling mutter,

  “Damn you! It can’t be so! You’re going to sell me out again? Surely I’m no longer a threat? ”

  She stumbles here, “Damn it man, you’re not serious?”

  Dodd rushes in, “It is most serious, cara mia. Indigo required that I peel away the many levels of deception that have shadowed your existence.”

  He swallows hard. He knows that he must get Anna to come around. He proceeds, “You shall know the truth and the truth will set you free.”

  Anna recognizes the words from St. John’s gospel. But she has no faith. She asks with much gravity in her voice, “What is that suppose to mean?”

  Dodd doesn’t know if Anna is being deliberately naïve or hostile. He looks sadly and speaks softly, “if you can live with the truth of the past, then and only then, will you be up to the challenge of the future.”

  Anna’s conspiratorial mind jolts her. Get out. The Little Prince is not only the Ghost of Christmas Past but Christmas Yet to Be. That pit in Anna’s stomach gets caught now in her throat. Feelings of being trapped constrict her vocal cords again. She grows breathless. She tries to disengage herself from this whole matter. She taps her left foot. She taps her right foot.

  “My future? Surely you joke. Your invention Lady Banks turned my life to ashes long ago. I am but a living ghost of a memory of a woman who never was.

  So get this straight, if you are suggesting that Indigo is my future, you can forget about it. I pass. I don’t want to hear another word. You’ll have to settle up with the Little Prince some other way. What could the man be thinking?

  Really, by your own implication, he has access to any and all intelligence networks. Thus he is not wanting for bodies.

  Doddie, you may owe him. But for sure I don’t. I was foolish yes. And I have had to pay a dear penance. But I tell you that my business with the Little Prince is ended. We have no business with one another. He knows that I’m sure.”

  Sherlock intervenes unexpectedly thereby putting Anna off balance, “Finished? Then how do you explain the ‘ANANCYS’ in Paris?”

  Anna, totally turned inside out asks, “What do you mean Nancy? I don’t know anything about …”

  These last words barely blow off her tongue when Anna remembers where she first heard the word ‘anancy.’ In Indigo’s morality tales it is the name given to a sinister spider that assumes any and all manner of disguises to trip up his prey.

  Suddenly she breaks out in a fit of laughter. The four before her are bewildered. They look one to the other for an explanation. Harriet fears that Anna is breaking down. She is about to speak when Anna stops her,

  “A spider fable is mixed up in this? Oh no are you suggesting that the ‘Anancy’ is a secret agent, a spy?”

  Dodd offers a silent nod yes. But no speaks. Each waits on the other. In the cold silence Anna gets a bit hysterical. She tries in vain to suppress her laughter. In between her spurts of laughter, she tries to explain, “Shall I tell you the joke?”

  The four remain mute. Their silence is like a splash of ice water on her burning cheeks. She stifles her giddiness. She begs their indulgence,

  “I’m sorry, truly. But you can appreciate how utterly absurd this all is. You see it’s like this. There is a running joke in my family. It’s about my conspiratorial spy obsession. I call a spy ‘Spyder-Man.’ And now here I am in this foreign land of ice and snow and you are telling me that spyder-man is real. He works for Indigo and he goes by the name ‘Anancy.’ Damn that’s rich.”

  She gets the giggles again. She can’t wait to tell this story to her brother and sister. But then she has another thought. Is this part of JB’s joke? It could be. JB could have concocted this whole story about the Anancy, the spider and the spy. She looks to the rooks to give up the hoax. But all she sees on their faces is worry. Within a nano second she sobers up. There is complete and utter silence.

  She tries again, “You have to laugh really. What is a Caribbean spider, the ANANCY, doing so very far away from home? Can’t you just see it; an ‘ANANCY’ outfitted with eight skies flip flopping in the deep snow?”

  Still there is no response from the others. Anna feels so utterly foolish now. She knows that the matter at hand has somehow gone from serious to nefarious. Anna must make a move in a flash before she freezes. “I just want out.”

  Anna goes silent. In her mind the puzzle is upended once again. This time, however, she is ready and willing to leave things in a muddle.

  Dodd solemn and composed says. “I see. But I must warn you that if you refuse to return to Indigo there will be consequences.”

  Anna’s temper boils. She argues, “You’ve got to be kidding! What are you talking about? Please spare me the speaking in tongues.”

  With eyes fixed on her, Dodd reaps the courage to proceed, “For starters, if you refuse, you will lose your Diplomatic Immunity.”

  Anna jumps up with startling speed. For a scant second she surprises herself.

  “My what…? Are you all cr
azy? ‘Diplomatic Immunity’… Have you all gone mad? There is only one reality here and that is ‘House Arrest’!”

  She turns to Dodd, “Who are you guys?”

  Utter and complete silence floods the cavernous room. The heaviness in the air forces her to sink back into her seat. She looks longingly to Dodd. He stares deeply into her dark chocolate eyes hoping to move her soul in his favor. Anna knows that the proverbial moment of truth is before her. If she falters now it may never come again. She is about to challenge Dodd but her spirit lags. She doesn’t give a rat’s ass whoever they are.

  “Damn, I was thinking that you were rooks but in reality you are all crooks.”

  Dodd totally exhausted knows that there is no point in a defense. To get into the matter of who they are will require great effort and concentration on all their parts. And as it is all are wanting. The last few days have taxed their energies to empty. Dodd feels the limits of his age. And he knows Anna has become an immovable force. He rises, places a kiss on her soft silken hairs,

  “Fair enough…! But I am the only crook. My mates are innocent. Still, cara mia, I beg you to believe me one more time. I am not the enemy. ”

  Anna looks up at Dodd in total disbelief, “You’re kidding, right?”

  She raises her hand immediately before he can speak, “Don’t say another word. I never knew you Dodd. I want out. I’ll never understand why someone would subject a young life to such treachery. You stole the light of my soul and left me in the dark forever. Your Lady Banks affair wasted me. For more than forty years I’ve blamed myself for not being able to form a meaningful relationship. Not a one, mind you!

  I can’t believe it. The biggest conspiracy in my life and I missed it. That’s really the ultimate joke I guess!