Albatross (43 page)

‘Davina looked well, I thought,' James White remarked to his wife. ‘A bit tired after her trip to Washington.'

Mary poured out the remains of the coffee. ‘Damn, I'll have to make some more – don't talk nonsense, dear, she looked utterly miserable. Now, you can tell me why she came to see you. She's never liked you, so it must be something very urgent.'

‘Not very,' he smiled at her, ‘because I'd already foreseen it and the thing is in hand. She doesn't know, of course.'

Mary looked at him. ‘You're retired,' she said. ‘But nobody would think so. Anyway, you can tell me about it.' While he was head of the SIS she hadn't asked a single question concerning his work. As soon as he became a private person, his wife's curiosity was insatiable. She asked him about everything, even the most insignificant detail. What was in his mail, who was that on the telephone, why was he so long in the village …? It must have been a great strain keeping silent all those years, he reflected, and he loved her for it.

‘You remember that advertising chap, Tony Walden?'

‘The one with the yacht and the stupid blonde wife?'

‘That's right. He and Davina have been having an affair for quite some time.'

‘Good Lord!' she exclaimed. ‘I am surprised. I can't think of him as her type.'

‘There's no accounting for women's taste in men,' he answered. ‘That's what makes them such bad security risks. It appears that the wealthy jet-setting Mr Walden is being blackmailed by the KGB. I don't have to fill in the details for you, dear, but it's put Davina in a very difficult position.'

‘You can give me the details in a minute,' his wife said firmly. ‘Just let me make some more coffee.'

When he had finished, she frowned, thinking hard. ‘What a blow for the poor girl,' she said at last. ‘She's had so little happiness. What will she do about it?'

‘I hope she'll take my advice,' he answered, ‘if she's tough enough, and I believe she is.'

Mary White got up. ‘By tough, James dear, you mean heartless. And there you're wrong. The heartless one is the sister. It's quite late, look at the time. Let the dogs out and lock up, will you?'

‘You say that every evening,' he remarked gently, ‘knowing I always do both.'

The call from Paris was reported to him direct. He listened, nodded, smiled and said, ‘Good. Better than we hoped. Make certain ‘France' is psychologically ready and that all the details have been finalized. This is one of our most important targets; impress that on her.'

The assurances came through. He remembered the file on the girl Hélène Blond. Repressed, feelings of profound inferiority and aggression, brutally ill-treated as a child, a personality geared towards megalomania. She had been found like a jewel among the dross that came to them. And, like a jewel, she would soon shine among the Company of Saints. He put the telephone down. If anything went wrong, there was a fail-safe: the nothingness that all were sworn to embrace rather than betray their organization.

Those who killed had to be prepared to kill themselves. It was a logical conclusion to the disturbances they all had in common. A hatred of life and of themselves transposed into a hatred for others. Death was the solution to all problems. They were taught to accept that, even to enjoy the acceptance. He felt refreshed and optimistic. His plans were going well, and in spite of other setbacks, other anxieties, his Saints were giving praise.

It was 1 a.m. in Sydney. The dinner given in honour of Walden by his Australian associates had finished early by local standards. He was booked into the Caravelle, a vast, glittering glass-fronted hotel with breathtaking views over the harbour. The diners had all been male, and in different circumstances Walden would have enjoyed every moment of it. Australian hospitality was as rich and individual as the national sense of humour. The dinner was uproarious: his two partners were in excellent spirits, and the fifteen guests, all very substantial clients, talked business and sport and would happily have extended the party to a nightclub.

Walden laughed and talked, giving every appearance of enjoying himself. He was careful not to match his companions drink for drink. He needed a clear head that night. Watching him, no one would have guessed that every nerve was taut and a headache of symphonic proportions battered his brain. When the dinner broke up, he excused himself. ‘I have an important call to make.' His smile was conspiratorial.

‘The lovely lady, eh?' The manufacturer of Australia's best-selling lager nudged him and grinned. ‘Pity she isn't with you this trip.'

‘Next time. She made me promise,' Tony Walden said. They had met his wife two years ago. So blonde and beautiful, so stupid that she passed for being delightfully feminine. She had made many conquests among the robust Antipodean males. He had a call to make and a caller to see. But neither had anything to do with Hilary Walden. At this time, nearly eleven on a Sunday morning in England, his wife would be waking up in the country mansion he had bought her, with her boyfriend sharing the breakfast tray. Walden didn't think of her for more than a few seconds.

He had a suite on the eighth floor, overlooking the harbour and the Opera House that had once caused such a furore. That night, looking out over the harbour fiery with lights and flanked by glittering high-rise buildings, Tony Walden tried to find an answer to his life. He had achieved every goal, but success hadn't been easy. He knew what failure meant, and disappointment. Grinding anxiety was just as familiar as the exhilaration of success. Two marriages, two sons, money, a tremendous business bursting with expansion. And Davina Graham.

There was a knock on his door. It was so soft and the thudding of that dreadful headache was so loud. He opened the door. The man outside didn't say anything; he just walked past Walden through the hallway and to the sitting room. He stared at the view for a moment and then turned round. He was smaller than Walden, thin, with a beaky face and bright blue eyes.

‘That's bloody spectacular, isn't it?' The man spoke with a broad Australian accent.

‘Yes,' Walden said.

‘How did your party go?'

‘Well. They enjoyed themselves.'

The man looked round him. ‘You keep any booze up here?'

Walden said, ‘Help yourself. I won't be a minute.' He went to the bathroom and took two painkillers. His face looked sallow and lined in the mirror.

His visitor made himself at home. He had a glass of whisky in his hand and was perched on the edge of the sofa. ‘Any news for me?'

‘No,' Walden said. ‘I'm putting a call in later tonight. But you can report back that I don't think it's going to work. I never did think so, and I want to make sure you understand. The whole scheme is a bloody waste of time.'

‘But that's your problem. It's up to you to make it work. Nobody gives a shit for opinions, old sport. It's action we want. You better get cracking.' The man finished his drink and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He grinned at Walden, showing uneven teeth, with a gold crown glinting in the cavern of his mouth. ‘You look a bit worn – we work and play hard over here. Find the pace a bit hot, eh?'

Walden ignored the remark. He had hated the snide little bastard the first time they made contact. A dockside rat come up in the world. God knew what he'd had to do to get there.… ‘I've booked a call,' he said. ‘I want you out of here before it comes through.'

‘Okay. Keep your pants on. You know my room number?'

‘I know it. I'll be in touch before I go to Melbourne.'

‘Okay,' the man said, and grinned again. He let himself out.

Walden looked at his watch. He sat down beside the telephone and waited. Nothing eased the headache. At 1.20 his phone rang. He picked it up. The operator said, ‘I'm trying your call to London, Mr Walden.' Amazing how clear it sounded, he could have been calling from across the road. Amazing how good the lines were. Phoning Italy was like dialling Mars by comparison. ‘I'm sorry,' the operator's voice cut in. ‘There's no reply.'

He said, ‘Never mind. Good night.' Davina had been due back from Washington on Saturday morning. He'd calculated the time changes, and allowed for her stress after a gruelling session with the Americans and a night flight. She didn't sleep on planes, as he well knew. She would need the whole of Saturday and a good night's rest. Sunday morning she ought to have awakened to his call. But she wasn't in the flat. He should have cancelled the Australian trip, but he'd never ducked out of a business commitment in his life. He couldn't change a schedule that had been worked out three months ahead.

He checked his watch again. He'd rung at a stupid time, too late to catch her if she'd woken and decided to slip out. He undressed slowly, asked the operator to try the number again in an hour, and lay on the bed waiting. The headache had lost its thunder. The painkillers were working. There was no answer when they tried the second call.

He shrugged aside his fears. She hadn't come back from Washington. As soon as he decided that, he fell asleep.

While the telephone shrilled in the empty flat, Davina drove down to the village with Sir James to fetch the Sunday papers. ‘Did you have a good night? Mary thought you looked tired,' he said.

‘I slept very well,' she answered. ‘I always do, when I've seen my way clear.'

He glanced quickly at her, and then switched back to the road. ‘And what have you decided? About your friend Walden?'

‘I've decided to take him at his word.' The car stopped outside the village papershop. The days of delivery were long past. ‘I'll get the papers.' Davina opened the car door.

‘They're ordered and paid for,' he called out. Take him at his word. How irritating of her to say that and then go into the shop, while he had to wait outside. Irritating and yet enjoyable, like a tooth that threatened to ache. Retired be damned, he was still sharper than any of them. And in due course he'd let his clever protégée find out exactly how much.

‘
Telegraph, Times
and the
Mail on Sunday
. There. One colour supplement missing, I'm afraid.'

‘That won't worry me,' he retorted. ‘I never read them. They're full of rubbish pretending to be bargains. Mary's an absolute child when it comes to this mail-order thing. She sends off for saucepans and electric waffle toasters and God knows what. Do you ever read the
Mail?
'

‘No.
Telegraph
and
Times.
'

‘Don't be such a snob, my dear. It's very lively. And I wouldn't miss Ivor Herbert on racing for anything. What do you mean, take Walden at his word?'

They stopped in the front drive and Davina got out. They walked into the house together, Sir James calling to his wife, ‘We've brought the papers, where's the sherry?'

‘In the decanter.' The voice sounded tartly from the kitchen. ‘And don't sit there hogging it, James. Bring one out to me!'

‘Now,' he said pleasantly, eyes shrewd under their thatch of white, ‘now tell me.'

Davina sipped her sherry. ‘Tony said if I resigned there'd be no problem.'

‘Good God, what a bloody cheek!' Two red spots flared on his cheeks.

‘It makes sense if you think about it for a second,' she said. ‘If he's being blackmailed to get information out of me, then the best solution is my giving up the job. Surely that's true love's answer?'

‘You can call it what you like,' he said shortly, ‘but I call it a bloody impertinence. Resign? Just to keep him? It's the most conceited thing I've ever heard in my life.'

‘He said he'd divorce his wife and marry me,' Davina went on. ‘I'm going to take him at his word, Chief. If he's genuine he'll jump at it. If it's a bluff, I'll have called it. That way I'll know.'

‘It is a bluff,' James White insisted. He frowned, tapping his fingertips together. ‘But it can work two ways. He can play it back to you. You realize that?'

‘Of course – but not for very long. I know him – he's not the type for a siege situation. If he's what you think, he'll back away, and pretty quickly. Then I'll know.'

‘And no investigation?' he inquired softly. ‘Why not let Humphrey get his people in Germany to dig a little?' He paused and coughed slightly. ‘I can suggest it for you, if you'd find it awkward. That way it doesn't have to go on the records. You don't want to be implicated on file.'

Davina nodded. ‘I'll tell him myself, thanks, Chief.'

James White let a silence develop. She had given him a bad shock for a moment. His whole life had centred round intelligence, from the time he was a young officer after the war. His twenty years at Anne's Yard were the happiest in his career. He loved the Service, and it filled him with rage to suspect even for a moment that his successor could value her private life more. A bad fright, but not for long. He sighed with relief. He hadn't made a mistake when he broke with precedent and recommended Davina Graham over the heads of experienced men. She had been shaken the night before, but she was quite recovered now. He relaxed. He would ring Humphrey up as soon as she had gone and forewarn him. Life would be full of interest in the coming weeks. ‘Changing the subject,' he said, ‘what is the CIA view of that affair in Venice?'

‘The same as mine,' Davina said. ‘Borisov's people took Franklyn out. Just to chuck a spanner into American relations with Europe. To stir up a political storm in the States and get a very able opponent out of the way.'

‘If they start using left-wing groups to do their killing for them, it's going to cause a lot of problems,' he remarked. ‘I don't see Borisov's hand in this myself.' He paused for her reaction.

‘Nor did Humphrey,' Davina answered. ‘But the attempt on the Pope was Soviet-inspired.'