Whispers of betrayal tg-3

by Michael Dobbs

  She takes his glass of whisky, raises it to his lips, teases him with its taste, begins to dribble it down his chin. The raw amber liquid flows off the point of his chin down his neck, feels cold, then begins to trickle down his chest, following a hesitant path across the folds and planes of his body until it is nearing his navel and threatening to run beyond, where he knows it will burn with an ice fire that makes him already gasp in apprehension. But her lips and tongue are pursuing the whisky down, down, down, it trickles faster, then slows, but always her lips follow, running down, racking him between fear and anticipation, tearing him between pain and excruciating pleasure, until the last threads of his breath unravel in one emaciated cry that seems close to agony.

  When he is able once more to engage his brain and open his eyes, it is dark, for the candles have exhausted themselves, as has he, and he has forgotten all those silly things that have been worrying him.

  – =OO=OOO=OO-= When Goodfellowe opened his eyes early the following morning, he found himself gazing at the gentle olive ridges of Elizabeth's back. Right now, in this place and at this quiet time of day, he seemed to have everything he wanted. But he knew it wouldn't last – couldn't last. Today was Thursday.

  For a start he'd have to get home and change. His trousers were hanging over the back of the dining room chair with creases that seemed like the work of a student of Picasso. Love may be beautiful but there was always a price, and at very least a dry-cleaning bill.

  Damnation. Now he remembered last night, and what it was about, and still he didn't want her to go.

  Her bed seemed to be the place for so many decisive moments in his life – the place where so often he laid bare not simply his body but also the inner man. This was where the course of his life had begun to change, to turn away from the past and poor, mind-stolen Elinor, towards something new. It was the place where he had dug down deep into his very English psyche and admitted to passions he'd been brought up never even to acknowledge, let alone indulge. It was here, between these sheets, that he had come once more to embrace ambition. He was excessively English about that, too, for admitting to ambition left him feeling self-conscious and even a little grubby. Perhaps that was why he remembered the moment so well. Elizabeth naked, bringing him breakfast. With toast crumbs and a wrinkled newspaper. Oh, and the letter from his old school chum Amadeus. Pity they'd never got round to having that drink, and now perhaps they never would, not once he had become a member of the very Government Amadeus despised so much.

  Elizabeth rolled over, in the last throes of sleep. How much he wanted her, and how much he desired her not to go to Paris. 'If there were any other way,' she had said. And, with the clarity that morning brings, maybe there was. Something he had overlooked. Something that, if he got his trousers back on and went for it, might even stop her needing to go to Paris.

  He had wanted to steal half an hour in her arms this morning, claiming her, possessing her, before she went off to Paris, but now he didn't have time. He'd have to skip breakfast today.

  – =OO=OOO=OO-= The time of Cabinet has been brought forward to nine o'clock. There is little formal business, a deck-clearing operation designed to leave as much time as possible to deal with whatever might lie ahead. Bendall is brisk and the rest of those gathered around the table are demure to the point of invisibility.

  'Any comments on this last matter?' Bendall enquires, but there are none. He closes his folder with a peremptory snap, and prepares to rise from his chair. 'Fine. Thank you. Any other business?'

  It is a throw-away line, he is anxious to get on. Already his hands are on the arms of his chair levering himself upward.

  Then the Lord Chancellor coughs, as though a fly has flown into his mouth and he doesn't have the balls to spit or swallow.

  'Prime Minister, I have something, if you please.'

  Bendall sits back in his chair, awaiting another expression of solidarity. Good old Frankie, always ready to give support. There's a security briefing in five minutes but I can make time for this. Then get Woolly to leak it to the midday news.

  'As you know, Prime Minister, we are all great personal friends of yours around this table

  Bendall lowers his eyes.

  '… and we owe our positions here to you personally. There can be no doubting the intense loyalty we all feel to you.'

  A muted rustle of approbation from around the room. Yet good old Frankie is finding it difficult to continue. He has thought about these words throughout a sleepless night, has rehearsed them with colleagues, yet still they stumble in his throat. His hands are clasped together in front of him, knuckles cracking, as though at confession.

  'We are your friends. We also have a public duty as Ministers of the Crown. Sometimes those roles sit sadly alongside each other

  But not today, not today, dear Frankie. Today we are four square against bloody terrorism. Four square behind bloody me.

  'I hope it might be said that you have no greater admirer around this table than myself, Prime Minister

  A demure Prime Ministerial smile of gratitude.

  '… and I have taken it upon myself over the last twenty-four hours to consult every one of your colleagues whom you see here. We are unanimous.'

  Inside, Bendall trembles with relief. One hundred per cent. The whole bloody lot. Perhaps the rumours that one or two of them have begun to get their braces in a twist are wrong, nothing more than press hysteria. Perhaps old Frankie has whipped them into line. Dear old Frankie. He's about as useful as balls on a cardinal but, by heaven, no one can question his loyalty. Which is more than can be said for many of them around this table. Too many. Still, get through the afternoon, then start a little threshing. Chaff from the wheat, and all that.

  'We are united in our determination to beat the scourge of terrorism.'

  Alleluia!

  'But in the process of defeating terrorism, we cannot contemplate the destruction of the City of London and the devastation that would cause to the entire country. No man, no matter how great, is worth such a price.'

  What the hell…?

  'Which is why all of us, every one, believes that if this threat is not lifted you must resign. By the deadline of three p.m. this afternoon.'

  Bendall doesn't hear all the rest, homilies about hearts full of distress and a place of honour in the annals of our times. He is too busy searching for options. Yet as he looks around the table, no one will meet his eye. They are all against him.

  He has less than six hours.

  And no matter how furiously he searches, he can't find a single bloody option.

  – =OO=OOO=OO-= Goodfellowe knew none of this because he was cycling around Shepherd's Bush Green and rejoicing. It was an unlikely location for a celebration, not a part of London he knew well or wanted to get to know any better, but for the moment it was all he had. Moreover, it was no ordinary celebration, for the touch of inspiration that had brought him here from Elizabeth's bed had worked. Worked! And now, surely, there was no need for her to go to Paris. The good guys had won and he was desperate with impatience to tell her so and to claim his reward. Trouble was, Elizabeth wasn't answering her phone. Must be busy packing. It made him all the more impatient, so he decided to proceed directly to The Kremlin.

  He called Mickey to let her know he would be late in the office.

  'Where are you? Off stroking our beloved leader's ego again?'

  'No, I'm in Shepherd's Bush. Woman business.'

  'You didn't have to go that far. I could have set you up right here in the House of Commons.'

  'Elizabeth business, idiot.'

  'Oh… And the Bendall business?'

  He hadn't forgotten about Bendall, but the matter with Elizabeth had pushed other things out of the way. Anyway, what the devil was he supposed to do? He couldn't work miracles. Mickey was telling him of lurid rumours, about how the press conference called for three that afternoon wasn't simply an opportunity for Bendall to issue another ringing cry of defiance. There was to be the s
pilling of much blood, so it was being said. Resignations. Ah, the start of the reshuffle, Goodfellowe mused, feeling exhilarated. But no, Mickey was insisting, the whispers around the corridors were of Bendall's own resignation.

  Bendall? Resigning? If Bendall were to resign it would be the end of all Goodfellowe's hopes. No Cabinet post and, without that, how would he be able to hold on to Elizabeth? Everything of importance in his life had somehow got round to depending on Bendall. The thought made him queasy. No, it couldn't be, Bendall wasn't the resigning type. He dismissed it as idle gossip.

  It was as he listened to Mickey turning the rumour mill that Goodfellowe's eyes wandered around the telephone box in which he was standing. It carried that antiseptic odour of very recent cleaning, yet already it was covered once more in the lurid tits-and-bums cards of the good-time girls offering everything from Swedish lessons to something called Ethiopian aerobics. Goodfellowe scratched his nose but it didn't help. He still didn't understand Ethiopian aerobics. Yet even in this place of squalor the forces of righteousness were not to be denied. A little black-and-white card had been inserted amidst the moral debris. 'If you are tired of Sin, read John 3:17,' it proclaimed stubbornly. Beneath it someone had scribbled: 'If you're not tired of sin, ring Tray-cee after 3.30 on…' Scribblers had been busy elsewhere, too. One lurid card sought new converts: 'Bored out of your knickers? Get rid of your old M amp;S, get into a little S amp;M. Ring Sadie for a stimulating new position…' Beside which somebody had scrawled 'Dyslexics need not apply.'

  In the jumble of notions that were stirring inside his head, one suggestion more irrelevant than all the rest snagged upon the card and its grubby message. That of his old school chum. Poor old Amadeus, he wouldn't be able to play. Couldn't spell, so not invited to the party.

  'Shut up!' he ordered.

  'What…?'

  'Be quiet a minute. Let me think. There's something…' He collided with the thought yet again.

  Amadeus. Couldn't spell. Not invited to party. Seriously pissed off. Couldn't spell. Couldn't spell any more than, it seemed, could Beaky…

  It was preposterous. Amadeus? But suddenly his schoolfriend had both motive and mucked-up means.

  'Mickey, darling, need something in a bit of a hurry. Our friend Amadeus. What's his address?' But Mickey only had a telephone number. She offered to call it. 'No, don't call him, call up the Telegraph's letter page instead, they'll have the address. Find out where the hell he lives, will you? In a hurry.'

  – =OO=OOO=OO-= Goodfellowe was cycling back down the Bayswater Road in the direction of Marble Arch, getting soaked in foul-smelling fluid from the windscreen washers of some moron's passing car, when his pager stirred. He wobbled dangerously as he attempted to read and ride.

  Oh, save us all.

  Shakespeare Tower.

  In the Barbican.

  The heart of the City of London.

  Amadeus is inside the ring of steel.

  TWENTY

  Betrayal. Not so much an absolute concept as an art form, a point of view, and one that is constantly being updated. Life tells us we should expect betrayal, yet somehow it always succeeds in taking us by surprise. We never learn.

  Betrayal can't exist on its own, in isolation, for in the end it's nothing more than the twisted reflection of feelings such as passion, and love, and that strange thing called honour. Betrayal is a mirror-image in which everything becomes confused. What for one man may seem little more than an innocent or idle word can be taken by a friend as a grotesque obscenity, and what, for a woman, may be a practical course of action, is to her lover the most unpardonable offence. It all depends upon the mirror.

  Yet unlike the reflection of a mirror, betrayal lingers, eats away at us all like anorexia of the soul. And when we have been betrayed by those we loved and once trusted, it seems as if there is nothing left for us in the whole world.

  Except revenge.

  Amadeus had woken that morning feeling numb. He had shared his fitful dreams with Scully and all those others he had known who had died for honour and love of their country, and who demanded that they not be forgotten.

  He hated this place, this city of dark weathered facades they called the Barbican, a universe of concrete poured into the middle of Wren's great city. Barbican. It meant a Roman fortress. An appropriate place for a final defence of honour.

  He had remained inside his apartment since Monday evening, not venturing out, not willing to run the risk of being stopped and questioned by those who searched for him. No one knew he was there. He had lit no lights, sounded no sounds, made no music other than on his Walkman, and then only Mozart and his Requiem.

  'Day of wrath and doom impending, David's word with Sybil's blending, heaven and earth in ashes ending

  Not that there was anyone left in Shakespeare Tower to hear. The city was inhabited by ghosts. The people had fled.

  Now he would ensure they did not return.

  – =OO=OOO=OO-= The Barbican was little more than two miles from Marble Arch. As he pedalled Goodfellowe tried to maintain a steady pace to quench the alarm that was rising inside him, but failed miserably. His suspicions were ludicrous, extravagant, entirely inappropriate, yet with every turn of the wheels he had this appalling fear that nevertheless they might be correct. His collar was beginning to grow damp and discomforting as he passed the department stores and boutiques of Oxford Street. They stood unnaturally quiet, some firmly closed, others cheerfully advertising an End of the World sale. 'Everything must Go! Before We Get Going!!' Almost twenty past two. Push on!

  Goodfellowe knew his fears were preposterous, but nevertheless he knew he ought to share them with others. Filled with misgivings, he pulled over at a callbox and dialled Downing Street, knowing he was about to make an utter fool of himself. He was almost relieved when he got an engaged tone. He tried half a dozen times, same result. The world was about to end and the entire system of government was being overwhelmed by concern. Goodfellowe made up his mind to try again in a few precious minutes but, as he clambered back onto his bike, the appalling truth of his circumstances struck him. The last thing he could afford to do was to tell anyone about Amadeus. For Peter Amadeus was his friend. Amadeus was the man he had invited for drinks inside the House of Commons even as London was being torn apart in search of him. Even more disastrous, Amadeus was the man for whom he had gained vital time by telling COBRA they were a gang of four, not five. They were going to say it was all his fault. Even part of the plot.

  Suddenly, being wrong and being taken as a fool seemed the least of Goodfellowe's concerns. Being right about Amadeus would be far, far worse, for in that event they would simply drag him away as a conspirator and each of the security services would take turns in tearing him to pieces. He would never be able to escape the suspicion of collusion, his career would be dead.

  No, he could tell no one. He'd have to sort it out by himself.

  Onward, driven by lurid imagination and more than a little fear. He was beginning to sweat freely as he passed Red Lion Square. He was making good time, there was little other traffic, and none of it heading towards the City. All the lights seemed to be standing at red, demanding that he stop, but he ignored them, pushing on, pushing on. Up ahead he could see the Tube station at Chancery Lane. He found it shuttered, its mouth gaping empty and black, and this was as far as he could go, for the Tube station stood at the City limits. Beyond it he could see a blockade of barriers, guarded by an elderly constable, and behind him a patrol of camouflaged soldiers, standard-issue SA80s at the ready, thirty high-velocity rounds in the mag. Goodfellowe knew a little about the weapon, a fragment of absurd and amusing clutter he'd picked up at a Select Committee hearing. Apparently the SA80 wasn't all that it might be, since the mosquito repellent issued to the British Army had the effect of melting the weapon's plastic sheathing and turning it into something resembling superglue. The knowledge gave him precious little comfort, however, since this wasn't the jungle. It was Chancery Lane, and the weapons
were pointing directly at him.

  He came to a stop with his front wheel resting against the first line of defences. The constable, his uniform adorned with the gold insignia of the City of London police force, took one look at the perspiring and crumpled figure in front of him and reached for the obvious conclusion.

  'Not today, sunshine.'

  'Oh, hell, here we go again.'

  'What was that?'

  'It's not what it looks like. Constable,' Goodfellowe puffed.

  'Why's that, then?'

  'I'm a Member of Parliament.'

  'Sure. Makes no difference. You could be Claudia Schiffer but you'll not get through here today.'

  Goodfellowe reached into his pocket and waved a plastic photographic pass, a pink and grey ID with an encoded metal strip on the reverse that he was forced to carry in order to be allowed into the Cabinet Office and COBRA. He'd always found its colour scheme ridiculous and rather resented having to carry it, until now.

  'I'm part of this operation, constable, part of COBRA. You know what COBRA is? And you must let me through.' Part of COBRA, indeed. Well, true up to a few days ago. It seemed a small exaggeration in the circumstances.

  The constable took the pass for inspection, then examined Goodfellowe still more carefully before retiring a few paces to seek guidance from his radio. The instrument at his shoulder spat and sighed as he consulted higher authority, while Goodfellowe was left to wonder at the strangeness of this place, normally a maelstrom of traffic and congestion yet now as quiet as any backstreet of Chernobyl. Even the pigeons were scratching around in puzzlement.

  As was the constable. He had crossed to two of the soldiers on duty and muttered something while nodding in Goodfellowe's direction. All three then advanced upon Goodfellowe in a manner that was undeniably smothered in menace.

  'We've got that sorted, sir. So I tell you what we're going to do. If you're who you say you are, you'll know the password and I'm instructed to let you proceed.'