Sabbathman

by Hurley, Graham

  Kingdom sat down on the side of the bed. She’d always loved his hands, the way he used them, the way he sometimes touched her face, and she caught one of them now, trying to draw him down to her, making a big warm space for them both beneath the duvet.

  ‘Alan?’

  He felt stiff and cold and wooden. He didn’t move from his perch on the side of the bed. Visitors did that, she thought. When you were sick.

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  Kingdom shook his head, not answering.

  ‘Is it your dad again?’

  ‘No, I told you, he’s OK.’

  ‘You said he was upset.’

  ‘He is. Yeah. But …’ He shrugged. ‘It’s not that.’

  ‘What is it then?’

  Kingdom stared down at her. His hair was beginning to grow again, a dark, bristly shadow across his scalp. ‘It’s you,’ he said.

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Yeah.’ He reached down for her at last, tracing the line of her cheekbone.

  She smiled again. ‘You look very solemn,’ she said. ‘I thought we might …’ She nodded at the waiting bottles of body oil. ‘Whatever you want.’

  ‘You. I want you.’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Yes. You. All of you.’

  ‘Terrific. Help yourself.’ She paused. ‘Alan?’

  He was upright again, back on the edge of the bed, the candlelight shadowing his back.

  ‘Listen,’ he began, ‘there are one or two things we ought to talk about.’

  ‘I know. You get me wrong sometimes. I’m not just wanton. I know you think–’

  ‘I didn’t mean that.’

  ‘No?’

  ‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘I just don’t want to see you hurt.’

  ‘Hurt? How? You and me? That kind of hurt?’

  Kingdom smiled for the first time and she reached up for him again, frightened of another gap, another gulf, more misunderstandings. Words, after all, had their uses.

  ‘Look,’ she said, ‘don’t get the wrong idea about all this. I might not say the things … you know … the things you want to hear, but that doesn’t mean I don’t …’ She slipped under the duvet and pulled him in beside her. ‘You understand what I’m saying?’

  ‘Yes. But it’s not that.’

  ‘I know. But that’s important, believe me, much more important than the rest of it. The rest of it I can handle. It’s this that really matters.’ She paused. ‘Isn’t it?’

  They were very close now, nose to nose. He looked at her for a long time and she could see the conflict in his eyes, his need for her, his fears for her.

  Finally he nodded. ‘Yeah,’ he said softly, ‘it is.’

  ‘OK.’ She touched his lips with the tips of her fingers. ‘So what would you really like? Go on, be honest, tell me.’

  ‘I’d like to spend the rest of my life with you. I’d like to put you and this and all of it into some huge time warp. I’d like it to stay like this forever. Exactly this. Exactly now. Nothing else. Just this.’

  ‘You’re crazy.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘It doesn’t work that way.’

  ‘I know. Your fault. You asked.’

  ‘I did,’ she kissed him, ‘I did.’

  She looked at him for a long time, the face beside her in the half-darkness, the candle nearly out. Then she began to kiss him again, very softly, exploring his mouth with her tongue, the gentlest of blessings. Then she nestled against him, folding the long hollows of his body around hers. The stiffness and the chill had gone. Whatever he’d wanted to say, whatever had taken him to the sofa and the file, had been forgotten. They were back where they’d always been, in the limitless space they’d made their own, a world of infinite possibility.

  She reached for him, cupping his face in her hands. The question was a long time coming, and afterwards she sealed it with a kiss.

  ‘The answer’s yes,’ she said softly, ‘and I’ve loved you from the start.’

  NINE

  Annie found Francis Wren on the top deck of the number seven tourist bus, exactly as he’d described. It was a glorious day, windless, warm, not a cloud in the sky, and Wren was sitting at the back, a folded cardigan on his knees, reading a copy of The Times.

  Annie sat down beside him. He’d been in touch an hour earlier from a pay phone. He’d asked her to join the bus at a particular stop on the Chelsea Embankment and he’d given her a time to be there. When she’d asked why, he’d said something vague about a change of scenery. She’d made no comment but she’d suspected at once that the phrase referred to anything but geography. Wren had something to tell her. Something that he wouldn’t risk on the phone, or even within the security of his own office.

  The bus rumbled east, towards Westminster. The plane trees beside the river were scarlet with autumn and on the water a lone sculler was pulling hard against the ebbing tide. There were three other passengers on the top deck, all orientals. They huddled together near the front, trying to match the Japanese commentary to passing landmarks. Annie smiled, watching them. If you wanted somewhere confidential for a chat, a busful of foreigners wasn’t a bad choice.

  Annie glanced at Wren. He looked like someone up from the country, enjoying the first months of a well-earned retirement.

  ‘Thanks for the transcripts,’ she said lightly. ‘I didn’t want to embarrass you.’

  ‘You didn’t. Amusement would be closer. I always wondered why we bothered with procedures. With people like you on board.’

  Annie blushed, recognising the reprimand for what it was. On occasions, like the Eton housemaster he’d very nearly become, Wren could be very stern indeed. Not that it mattered any more.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said quietly, ‘I apologise.’

  Wren didn’t answer. His copy of The Times was carefully folded at the features section. Annie could see Devereaux’s name beneath the half-page article. Since last night, to her surprise, she’d barely given him a thought. Wren tapped the article.

  ‘You’ve read this?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘But you knew about it?’

  ‘Yes. Cousins told me.’ She smiled. ‘What does it say?’

  Wren was looking out at the view. Across the river, workmen were putting the finishing touches to MI6’s new headquarters.

  ‘It says that our little excitements down in Fishguard may be more important than they seem. It says there’s blood on the walls at the Yard, and Moet by the crateload in Gower Street. It implies the war’s over.’

  ‘Do you think he’s right?’

  ‘No, I think he’s being less than objective. In fact I’d put it even more strongly. I’d say he’s being mischievous.’

  Annie looked down at the paper, remembering Devereaux and Cousins at the pub in Carmarthen. Strictly speaking, she knew she should read the article but right now she didn’t much want to. Kingdom had been right. Whichever way you looked at it, the thing was ludicrous, a waste of time and effort, a war within a war.

  ‘So what’s your view?’ Annie said. ‘You think we’re winning? You think any of it matters?’

  ‘Yes,’ Wren nodded, ‘I do.’

  ‘Yes, we’re winning? Or yes, it matters?’

  ‘Both. The game’s fixed, anyway. We all know that. It suits our masters nicely to put us in the driving seat. Saves them a great deal of anguish. We don’t have to answer to anyone. We’re effectively beyond reach. Now that’s a very nice situation. From where the politicians sit.’

  ‘And us?’

  ‘We get on with it.’ He smiled grimly, ‘and we’re duly grateful.’

  ‘But aren’t we more effective? Doesn’t that matter?’

  ‘Depends.’

  ‘On what?’

  ‘On what we’re asked to do, and why we’re asked to do it. It used to be simple. Queen and country. Even I could understand that. Now?’ He shrugged, answering his own question. ‘God knows. It’s happened to the rest of the civil service. Why not us?’
<
br />   The bus had stopped to pick up more passengers. Traffic was streaming over Lambeth Bridge. Wren put his hand briefly on Annie’s knee, an almost fatherly gesture.

  ‘A word in your ear about Cousins,’ he said, ‘while we’re on the subject.’ He glanced across at her. ‘Lobby terms?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Good.’ He studied her briefly as the bus began to move again. ‘Cousins and I are chalk and cheese. You doubtless know that. It’s probably self-evident. Age, background, philosophy, all of it, really. But don’t think I’m bitter or vindictive because I’m not. If it was as simple as that we wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t have asked you and even if I had, you wouldn’t have come. The dullest noise in the world is an old man having a moan. So believe me, this isn’t a moan.’ He paused. ‘Cousins was in Belfast during the eighties. He was a major in 22 SAS and he spent a year or so trying to sort out some of the problems with 14th Intelligence. You’re probably aware of all that.’

  Annie nodded. She hadn’t known the exact details but after the conversation with Cousins in the car she’d worked most of it out for herself. 14th Intelligence was an elite reconnaissance unit. It had been developed to give the Army its own intelligence source in Northern Ireland and it specialised in deep surveillance. It had taken a beating in the late eighties and the SAS had put in a couple of officers to stiffen morale. Cousins had evidently been one of them.

  Wren had his head back now, letting the sunshine bathe his face. ‘Cousins was a great fan of hard arrest. It’s one of the reasons they put him into 14th. As long as the intelligence was good, as long as everyone was sure, then he saw no point in bothering with all the legal bits and pieces. You might say he favoured the bullet rather than the witness box. Saved a lot of time and money. Rather eighties, don’t you think?’

  Annie smiled at the way Wren phrased it. The language was harsh but she recognised the picture he was trying to paint. Cousins was a true product of the Thatcher years, a real ultra, fuelled by self-belief and a certain smiling arrogance. She’d seen it in him yesterday, the way he’d humiliated Allder, landing him with a press conference about which he’d known virtually nothing.

  Wren was watching her now, his head still back against the seat, one eye open.

  ‘Hard arrest was policy,’ Anne reminded him, ‘not something Cousins invented.’

  ‘I know that. But he was an enthusiast. Undeniably. And good at it, too.’

  The bus drove into shadow and Annie felt a sudden chill in the air. Wren offered her the cardigan but she shook her head. Hard arrest was the Army’s euphemism for shooting to kill. The SAS in Northern Ireland had perfected the art, ambushing suspected terrorists and cutting them down with overwhelming firepower. Time after time, they’d acted as judge, jury and executioner. The one item they never carried was a pair of handcuffs.

  Annie glanced across at Wren. Towards the end of the eighties hard arrest had gone out of fashion, partly because of Operation Flavius, the Gibraltar debacle.

  ‘So what happened to Cousins,’ she asked, ‘after the SAS?’

  ‘He came to us.’

  ‘In Belfast?’

  ‘No, here, in London. He wrote position papers for the Directorate. They think very highly of him. They like the liberties he takes. They like his style, his lack of inhibition. They think he’s slightly exotic, a creature from another planet. The phrase you’ll hear in the executive dining room is force majeur. Our friend specialises in force majeur. It’s one of the reasons he needs stopping.’

  ‘Stopping?’ Annie blinked. She’d never heard Wren speak this way before, declaring his hand with such quiet vehemence. He was looking ahead now, towards the Houses of Parliament, the Gothic stonework warm and honey-coloured after the recent renovations.

  ‘Lawyers use force majeur when they mean an Act of God,’ he said. ‘In Cousins’ case, the nuance is entirely appropriate.’

  ‘You mean he thinks he’s almighty?’

  ‘Yes.’ He nodded. ‘And I suspect that’s one of the reasons they’re so frightened of him.’

  ‘Frightened? Who?’

  ‘The Directorate. Cousins comes with a certain reputation. They know where he’s been, what he’s done. They know the company he keeps too, the connections he uses, the way he plugs himself in …’

  ‘Connections?’

  ‘Friends,’ Wren said. ‘The man’s a deeply political animal.’

  ‘Friends where?’

  Wren hesitated a moment, eyeing a covey of television technicians assembled around a tripod on the pavement. ‘You could start with Tory Central Office,’ he said at last, ‘and keep going up.’ He paused, still watching the TV people. ‘That’s what makes him so useful.’

  ‘To whom?’

  ‘To “T” Branch. That’s where he pitched his tent, the moment he came back from Belfast. “T” Branch is rough trade, of course. We all accept that. And in my heart I suspect it needs someone like Cousins. But even so …’ He picked at a loose end in his cardigan. ‘There are limits.’

  Annie nodded. ‘Your job’s up for grabs,’ she said, ‘and I gather he’s favourite.’

  ‘You gather correctly.’ He offered her a chilly smile. ‘But no decision’s been taken. Not yet. Nothing final. Nothing binding.’

  ‘So why are you telling me all this? Or is it rude of me to ask?’

  Wren studied her a moment. He looked tired round the eyes and his face was slightly puffy. Poor diet, Annie thought. And not enough sleep.

  ‘Are you asking me what’s in it for you?’ he said. ‘Is that what you mean by “rude”?’

  ‘Yes,’ Annie nodded, ‘crudely put, but yes.’

  Wren said nothing, turning away. The usual queue had formed outside the House of Lords, foreigners mainly, marshalled by tour guides in gay blazers. Wren watched them as the bus inched past, stuck again in a traffic jam.

  ‘You’re young and you’re highly thought of,’ he said at last.

  ‘Just like Cousins.’

  ‘Yes.’ He glanced across at her. ‘And you’re also a woman.’

  ‘You think that’s relevant?’

  ‘Yes, I think maybe it is. These things go in cycles, of course, but just now it helps to wear a skirt.’ He paused. ‘There are great opportunities, that’s all I want to say.’

  Annie looked away. They were in Parliament Square and the bus had stopped again. Beside Great Palace Yard, two young policemen were bent over an old tramp. The tramp was sitting on the pavement, playing a jig on a battered tin whistle. Despite the noise of the traffic, Annie recognised the tune. ‘The Wild Colonial Boy’ she thought, one of Kingdom’s favourites.

  ‘Cousins is a fighter,’ she said quietly. ‘He doesn’t take prisoners.’

  ‘Precisely. That’s what makes him so dangerous. That’s why I’m here, talking to you.’

  ‘Have you said anything to anyone else? Officially or otherwise?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because there’d be no point. Once you’re out of the loop, you’re dead and buried. Make a fuss, raise your voice, and the whole thing just gets worse. So why compound grief with further insult? Why do that?’

  ‘Grief?’ Annie stared at him. ‘Is it that bad?’

  Wren offered her a bleak smile. Then he produced a small, silver-embossed card. On it was his home address and telephone number. ‘I’m having a few people round,’ he said, ‘people I’ll miss. People I’ll treasure. Quite a small gathering. Nothing extravagant.’ He touched her lightly on the arm. ‘Might you come?’

  Before Annie had a chance to say yes, he stood up. The bus was on the move again, turning onto the Embankment, pulling up outside the Norman Shaw building.

  Annie gazed up at him. ‘You’re getting off?’

  ‘Yes. Lunch appointment, I’m afraid.’ He nodded towards the House of Commons. ‘Good luck in Dublin, though.’

  ‘What?’

  Wren had turned and was making his way up the aisle. Annie caugh
t him by the stairs.

  ‘Where?’ she said.

  ‘Dublin.’ Wren frowned, checking his watch. ‘Hasn’t anyone told you?’

  Kingdom’s flowers had arrived at Gower Street by the time Annie returned to her desk. The lady who patrolled with the tea trolley had brought them up and they were already in water, neatly arranged in a hideous brown vase. A card propped in her printer read ‘Time warps for no man. Except me’.

  Annie picked the card up, fingering it, surprised and touched. Kingdom had never sent her flowers before. That kind of gesture just wasn’t in his repertoire. Quite what it meant she didn’t fully understand but she was still grinning when the phone began to trill. She recognised the voice at once, Cousins’ secretary, over at Euston Tower. She sounded brisk.

  ‘I’ve been calling for the last two hours.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I’ve been out.’

  ‘So I gather.’ She paused, then suggested Annie get a pen.

  The Fishguard seizure had evidently raised a diplomatic storm. Ulster Unionist MPs were accusing the Irish government of gun-running, and journalists on both sides of the Irish Sea were busy stirring the pot. The Taoiseach’s office had spent most of the morning on the phone to Downing Street and were insisting that someone from British Intelligence be sent to Dublin to monitor the Garda’s investigation. The invitation was pressing. It was an opportunity that ‘T’ Branch would be foolish to ignore.

  ‘Of course,’ Annie said, ‘Hugh should do it.’

  ‘Mr Cousins is in Belfast.’

  ‘I know. Dublin’s down the road. He could be there in a couple of hours.’

  ‘Quite.’ The secretary sounded icy now. ‘But he’s disappeared as well. I suggest you call here on the way to the airport. There’s a full brief due anytime from the Home Office, and I’ve sorted out some extra numbers in Dublin. You’re booked on the Aer Lingus flight. Half-past five.’ She paused. ‘Unless, of course, you’d prefer someone else to go.’

  *

  Annie got to Heathrow with five minutes to spare. She was last onto the aircraft and they were airborne before she had a real chance to take stock. At Euston Tower, she’d run into Andrew Hennessey, the head of Special Projects at Tory Central Office. He’d been sitting behind Cousins’ desk, reading one of the Bairstow files that still formed a neat pile beside the blotter, yet another breach in the wall that was supposed to separate MI5 from the world of the politicians. Annie had already spent nearly an hour on the computer at Gower Street, updating herself on incoming source reports, and because time was now so short Hennessey had offered to brief her en route to Heathrow.