The Human Factor (11 page)

‘Oh well, it's not urgent. Nothing in Africa ever is. Changes come slowly and are generally impermanent. I wish the same were true of Europe.' He gathered his papers and slipped quietly away, like a host who feels that a house party will get on much better without him.

‘It's odd,' Percival said, ‘when I saw Davis the other day his crackers seemed to be in good shape. Said he never had any trouble with them. No sign even of tartar. By the way, Castle, you might get me the name of his dentist. Just for my medical files. If he's having trouble we like to recommend our own men. It makes for better security.'

PART THREE

CHAPTER I

1

D
OCTOR
Percival had invited Sir John Hargreaves to lunch with him at his club, the Reform. They made a habit of lunching alternately at the Reform and the Travellers once a month on a Saturday, when most members had already gone into the country. Pall Mall, a steely grey, like a Victorian engraving, was framed by the long windows. The Indian summer was nearly over, the clocks had all been altered, and you could feel the approach of winter concealed in the smallest wind. They began with smoked trout, which led Sir John Hargreaves to tell Doctor Percival that he was now seriously thinking of trying to stock the stream which divided his park from the agricultural land. ‘I'll need your advice, Emmanuel,' he said. They were on Christian-name terms when they were safely alone.

For a long while they talked of fishing for trout, or rather Doctor Percival talked – it was a subject which always appeared a limited one to Hargreaves, but he knew Doctor Percival would be quite capable of enlarging on it until dinner. However, he was shifted from trout to another favourite topic by a chance diversion to the subject of his club. ‘If I had a conscience,' Doctor Percival said, ‘I would not remain a member here. I'm a member because the food – and the smoked trout too if you will forgive me, John – is the best in London.'

‘I like the food at the Travellers just as much,' Hargreaves said.

‘Ah, but you are forgetting our steak-and-kidney pudding. I know you won't like me saying so, but I prefer it to your wife's pie. Pastry holds the gravy at a distance. Pudding absorbs the gravy. Pudding, you might say, co-operates.'

‘But why would your conscience be troubled, Emmanuel, even if you had one – which is a most unlikely supposition?'

‘You must know that to be a member here I had to sign a declaration in favour of the Reform Act of 1832. True, that Act was not so bad as some of its successors, like giving the vote at eighteen, but it opened the gates to the pernicious doctrine of one man one vote. Even the Russians subscribe to that now for propaganda purposes, but they are clever enough to make sure that the things they can vote for in their own country are of no importance at all.'

‘What a reactionary you are, Emmanuel. I do believe, though, there's something in what you say about pudding and pastry. We might try out a pudding next year – if we are still able to afford a shoot.'

‘If you can't, it will be because of one man one vote. Be honest, John, and admit what a hash that stupid idea has made of Africa.'

‘I suppose it takes time for true democracy to work.'

‘That kind of democracy will never work.'

‘Would you really like to go back to the householder's vote, Emmanuel?' Hargreaves could never tell to what extent Doctor Percival was really serious.

‘Yes, why not? The income required for a man to vote would be properly adjusted, of course, each year to deal with inflation. Four thousand a year might be the proper level for getting a vote today. That would give the miners and dockers a vote, which would save us a lot of trouble.'

After coffee they walked, by common consent, down the great Gladstonian stairs out into the chill of Pall Mall. The old brickwork of St James's Palace glowed like a dying fire through the grey weather, and the sentry flickered scarlet – a last doomed flame. They crossed into the park and Doctor Percival said, ‘Returning for a moment to trout . . .' They chose a bench where they could watch the ducks move with the effortlessness of magnetic toys across the surface of the pond. They both wore the same heavy tweed overcoats, the overcoats of men who live by choice in the country. A man wearing a bowler hat passed them; he was carrying an umbrella and he frowned at some thought of his own as he went by. ‘That's Browne with an e,' Doctor Percival said.

‘What a lot of people you know, Emmanuel.'

‘One of the PM's economic advisers. I wouldn't give him a vote whatever he earned.'

‘Well, let's talk a little business, shall we? Now we are alone. I suppose you are afraid of being bugged at the Reform.'

‘Why not? Surrounded by a lot of one man one vote fanatics. If they were capable of giving the vote to a bunch of cannibals . . .'

‘You mustn't run down cannibals,' Hargreaves said, ‘some of my best friends have been cannibals, and now that Browne with an e is out of earshot . . .'

‘I've been going over things very carefully, John, with Daintry, and personally I'm convinced that Davis is the man we are looking for.'

‘Is Daintry convinced too?'

‘No. It's all circumstantial, it has to be, and Daintry's got a very legalistic mind. I can't pretend that I like Daintry. No humour but naturally very conscientious. I spent an evening with Davis, a few weeks ago. He's not an advanced alcoholic like Burgess and Maclean, but he drinks a lot – and he's been drinking more since our check started, I think. Like those two and Philby, he's obviously under some sort of strain. A bit of a manic depressive – and a manic depressive usually has that touch of schizoid about him essential for a double agent. He's anxious to get abroad. Probably because he knows he's being watched and perhaps they've forbidden him to try and bolt. Of course he'd be out of our control in Lourengo Marques and in a very useful spot for them.'

‘But what about the evidence?'

‘It's a bit patchy still, but can we afford to wait for perfect evidence, John? After all we don't intend to put him on trial. The alternative is Castle (you agreed with me that we could rule out Watson), and we've gone into Castle just as thoroughly. Happy second marriage, first wife killed in the blitz, a good family background, the father was a doctor – one of those old-fashioned GPs, a member of the Liberal Party, but not, please note, of the Reform, who looked after his patients through a lifetime and forgot to send in bills, the mother's still alive – she was a head warden in the blitz and won the George Medal. A bit of a patriot and attends Conservative rallies. Pretty good stock, you'll admit. No sign of heavy drinking with Castle, careful about money too. Davis spends a good deal on port and whisky and his Jaguar, bets regularly on the tote – pretends to be a judge of form and to win quite a lot – that's a classic excuse for spending more than you earn. Daintry told me he was caught once taking a report from 59800 out of the office. Said he meant to read it over lunch. Then you remember the day we had the conference with MI5 and you wanted him to be present. Left the office to see his dentist – he never went to his dentist (his teeth are in perfect condition – I know that myself) and then two weeks later we got evidence of another leak.'

‘Do we know where he went?'

‘Daintry was already having him shadowed by Special Branch. He went to the Zoo. Through the members' entrance. The chap who was following him had to queue up at the ordinary entrance and lost him. A nice touch.'

‘Any idea whom he met?'

‘He's a clever one. Must have known he was followed. It turned out that he'd confessed to Castle that he hadn't gone to the dentist. Said he was meeting his secretary (it was her day off) at the pandas. But there was that report you wanted to talk to him about. It was never in the safe – Daintry checked that.'

‘Not a very important report. Oh, it's all a bit shady, I admit, but I wouldn't call any of it hard evidence, Emmanuel. Did he meet the secretary?'

‘Oh, he met her all right. He left the Zoo with her, but what happened in between?'

‘Have you tried the marked note technique?'

‘I told him in strict confidence a bogus story about researches at Porton, but nothing's turned up yet.'

‘I don't see how we can act on what you've got at present.'

‘Suppose he panicked and tried to make a bolt for it?'

‘Then we'd have to act quickly. Have you decided on how we should act?'

‘I'm working on rather a cute little notion, John. Peanuts.'

‘Peanuts!'

‘Those little salted things you eat with cocktails.'

‘Of course I know what peanuts are, Emmanuel. Don't forget I was a Commissioner in West Africa.'

‘Well, they're the answer. Peanuts when they go bad produce a mould. Caused by
Aspergillus flavus
– but you can forget the name. It's not important, and I know you were never any good at Latin.'

‘Go on, for heaven's sake.'

‘To make it easy for you I'll concentrate on the mould. The mould produces a group of highly toxic substances known collectively as aflatoxin. And aflatoxin is the answer to our little problem.'

‘How does it work?'

‘We don't know for certain about human beings, but no animal seems immune, so it's highly unlikely that we are. Aflatoxin kills the liver cells. They only need to be exposed to the stuff for about three hours. The symptoms in animals are that they lose their appetites and become lethargic. The wings of birds become weak. A post mortem shows haemorrhage and necrosis in the liver and engorgement of the kidneys, if you'll forgive me my medical jargon. Death usually occurs within a week.'

‘Damnation, Emmanuel, I've always liked peanuts. Now I'll never be able to eat them again.'

‘Oh, you needn't worry, John. Your salted peanuts are hand picked – though I suppose an accident might just possibly happen, but at the rate you finish a tin they are not likely to go bad.'

‘You seem to have really enjoyed your researches. Sometimes, Emmanuel, you give me the creeps.'

‘You must admit it's a very neat little solution to our problem. A post mortem would show only the damage done to the liver, and I expect the coroner would warn the public against the danger of over-indulgence in port.'

‘I suppose you've even worked out how to get this aero –'

‘Aflatoxin, John. There's no serious difficulty. I have a fellow at Porton preparing some now. You only need a very small quantity. Point 0063 milligrams per kilogram bodyweight. Of course I've weighed Davis. 0.5 milligrams should do the trick, but to be quite sure let's say .75. Though we might test first with an even smaller dose. One side advantage of all this, of course, is that we should gain valuable information on how aflatoxin works on a human being.'

‘Do you never find that you shock yourself, Emmanuel?'

‘There's nothing shocking about this, John. Think of all the other deaths Davis might die. Real cirrhosis would be much slower. With a dose of aflatoxin he'll hardly suffer at all. Increasing lethargy, perhaps a bit of leg trouble as he doesn't have wings, and of course a certain amount of nausea is to be expected. To spend only a week dying is quite a happy fate, when you think what many people suffer.'

‘You talk as though he were already condemned.'

‘Well, John, I'm quite convinced he's our man. I'm only waiting for the green light from you.'

‘If Daintry were satisfied . . .'

‘Oh, Daintry, John, we can't wait for the kind of evidence Daintry demands.'

‘Give me one piece of
hard
evidence.'

‘I can't yet, but better not wait for it too long. You remember what you said that night after the shoot – a complaisant husband is always at the mercy of the lover. We can't afford another scandal in the firm, John.'

Another bowler-hatted figure went by, coat collar turned up, into the October dusk. The lights were coming on one by one in the Foreign Office.

‘Let's talk a little more about the trout stream, Emmanuel.'

‘Ah, trout. Let other people boast about salmon – gross oily stupid fellows with that blind urge of theirs to swim upstream which makes for easy fishing. All you need are big boots and a strong arm and a clever gillie. But the trout – oh, the trout – he's the real king of fish.'

2

Colonel Daintry had a two-roomed flat in St James's Street which he had found through the agency of another member of the firm. During the war it had been used by MI6 as a rendezvous for interviewing possible recruits. There were only three apartments in the building, which was looked after by an old housekeeper, who lived in a room somewhere out of sight under the roof. Daintry was on the first floor above a restaurant (the noise of hilarity kept him awake until the small hours when the last taxi ground away). Over his head were a retired businessman who had once been connected with the rival wartime service SOE, and a retired general who had fought in the Western Desert. The general was too old now to be seen often on the stairs, but the businessman, who suffered from gout, used to get as far as the Carlton Club across the road. Daintry was no cook and he usually economized for one meal by buying cold chipolatas at Fortnum's. He had never liked clubs; if he felt hungry, a rare event, there was Overton's just below. His bedroom and his bathroom looked out on a tiny ancient court containing a sundial and a silversmith. Few people who walked down St James's Street knew of the court's existence. It was a very discreet flat and not unsuitable for a lonely man.