The Night Manager (32 page)

A wave of self-recrimination swept over Goodhew. Palfrey warned me, but I didn't take him seriously: Darker is launching a putsch to recover his lost territories, Rex, Palfrey had said. He's proposing to go in behind the American flag.

"Rex," Barbara Vandon bellowed, so stridently that Goodhew braced himself in his chair, "what we have here is a major geopolitical power shift happening in our own backyard, and it's being handled by amateurs who are not qualified to play in this league, who are running with the ball when they should be passing it, who are out of touch with the issues. The cartels pushing dope, that's one thing. It's a dope problem, and there are people out there whose job it is to deal with that problem. We've lived with that, Rex. We've paid a heavy price for that."

"Oh, top dollar, Barbara, from all one hears," Goodhew agreed gravely. But after four years in London, Barbara Vandon was gun-deaf to irony. She forged on.

"The cartels pushing pacts with each other, Rex, making nice to each other, buying themselves big-time materiel, training their boys, getting their act together--Rex, that's a different ballpark. There just aren't that number of people in South America who do that stuff. In South America, getting your act together is power. It's as simple as that. This isn't an assignment for Enforcement. This isn't cops and robbers and shooting yourself in the foot. This is geopolitics, Rex. And what we have to do here is, we have to be able to go to the Hill and say, 'Guys, we accept the imperatives in this. We have spoken with Enforcement, Enforcement have gracefully backed off, Enforcement will do their own thing in the fullness of time, which is their right and duty as cops. Meantime this is geopolitical, this is sophisticated, this has a lot of angles and is therefore an agreed Pure Intelligence responsibility, we have the way clear for sophisticated input, by tried and trusted professionals in Pure Intelligence, acting to a geopolitical brief.' "

She had evidently finished, for like an actress pleased with her performance, she turned full face to Marjoram as if to ask, How was I? But Marjoram affected a benevolent disdain for her fighting words.

"Well, I do think there's a lot of substance in what Barbara says," he remarked, with that decent, straightforward smile he had. "Obviously, we wouldn't stand in the way of a revision of responsibilities between the services. But then the decision is hardly up to us."

Goodhew's face was set in stone. His hands lay lifelessly before him, refusing to participate.

"No," he agreed. "It is not up to you at all. It's up to the Joint Steering Committee and no one else."

"Of which your master here is chairman and you, Rex, are secretary, founder and principal benefactor," Marjoram reminded him with another collegial smile. "And, if I may say so, moral arbiter."

But Goodhew would not be mollified, not even by someone as patently conciliatory as Neal Marjoram. "A revision of responsibilities, as you call it, is in no circumstances within the gift of rival agencies, Neal," he said sternly. "Even assuming that Enforcement were prepared voluntarily to quit the field, which I gravely doubt, the agencies are not empowered to carve up their responsibilities among themselves without reference to Steering. No side deals. That's one of the things Steering stands for. Ask its chairman"--with a pointed nod at his master.

For a moment nobody asked anybody anything, until Goodhew's master emitted a kind of slurrying grunt which contrived to indicate doubt, irritation and a touch of indigestion at the same time.

"Well, obviously, Rex," he said, striking that nasal whinny peculiar to the Conservative front benches, "if the Cousins are going to take over the Limpet case on their side of the pond, willy-nilly, we here on this side are going to have to take a cool position about whether to follow suit. Aren't we? I say I, because these are informal discussions. Nothing's come through on the formal net so far. Has it?"

"If it has it hasn't reached me," Goodhew said icily.

"The pace these bloody committees work at, we wouldn't get an answer this side of Christmas, anyway. I mean, come on, Rex, we've got a quorum. You, me, Neal here? Thought we might swing it on our own."

"It's your call, Rex," Marjoram said amiably. "You're the lawgiver. If you can't turn it round, who can? It was you who drafted the like-to-like deal: enforcers play with enforcers, spies with spies, no cross-fertilization. The Lex Goodhew we called it, quite right too. You sold it to Washington, won the war of Cabinet, gunned it through. 'Covert Agencies in the New Era': wasn't that the title of your paper? We're only bowing to the inevitable. Rex. You heard Barbara. In a choice between a graceful shimmy and a head-on collision. I go for the shimmy every time. Don't want to see you hoisted on your own petard, or anything."

Goodhew was by now usefully angry. But he was too downy a bird to let his temper get the better of him. He spoke in a reasoned voice, down the table into Neal Marjoram's honest face. He said that the Joint Steering Committee's recommendations to its chairman--another nod at his master--were made in full session, not by an ad hoc quorum. He said it was the Steering Committee's recorded view that the River House was over-extended and should shed more of its responsibilities rather than attempt to win back old ones, and that hitherto the minister as chairman had concurred--"unless you've changed your mind over lunch, of course," he suggested to his master. who scowled through his cigar smoke.

He said that speaking for himself, he would prefer to expand Enforcement so that it could meet its challenges effectively; and he ended by saying that since they were off the record, he personally regarded the activities of the Procurement Studies Group as inappropriate to the new era and derogatory to parliamentary authority, and that at the next meeting of the Steering Committee he intended to move formally for an examination of its activities.

Then he put his hands together in a churchy way as if to say, I have spoken, and waited for the explosion.

None came.

Goodhew's master fished a bit of toothpick from his lower lip while he studied the front of Hazel Bundy's dress. "Right. Okay," he drawled, avoiding everybody's eye. "Interesting. Thanks. Point taken,"

"Food for thought indeed," Gait agreed brightly. And smiled at Hazel Bundy, who didn't smile back.

But Neal Marjoram could not have appeared more benign.

A spiritual peace had settled over his fine features, reflecting the moral worthiness that was so clearly the man.

"Got a moment, Rex?" he said quietly as they left.

And Goodhew, God help him, was pleased to think that after a bit of healthy give-and-take, Marjoram was bothering to stay behind and make sure there were no hard feelings on either side.

Goodhew generously offered Marjoram his office, but Marjoram was too considerate for that. Rex, you need air to cool you down; let's take a stroll.

It was a sunny autumn afternoon. The leaves on the plane trees shone pink and gold, tourists dawdled contentedly on the Whitehall pavements, and Marjoram bestowed a paternal smile on them. And yes, Hester was right, the Friday rush hour traffic was pretty heavy. But Goodhew's hearing was not affected by it.

"Old Barbara gets a bit wound up," said Marjoram.

"One wonders who by," said Goodhew.

"We told her it wouldn't cut much ice with you, but she would have a go."

"Nonsense. You egged her on."

"Well, what were we supposed to do? Come to you cap in hand and say, Rex, give us Limpet? It's only one case, for goodness' sake." They had reached the Thames Embankment, which seemed to be where they were heading. "It's bend or snap, Rex. You're too holy by half. Just because like-to-like is your baby. A crime's a crime, a spy's a spy and never the twain shall meet. Too black-and-white is your trouble."

"No, Neal. I don't think so. Not black-and-white enough, I fear. If I ever write my autobiography, I shall call it Half Measures. We should all be stronger. Not more flexible."

The tone on both sides was still entirely comradely: two professionals, sorting out their differences beside the Thames.

"Picked your moment, I'll grant you," Marjoram said approvingly.

"All that new era talk earned you a lot of Brownie points around the halls. Goodhew the open society's friend. Goodhew the devolver. Makes you sick. Still, it's a nice bit of turf you carved out for yourself, one must admit. Quite right not to give it up without a fight. So what's it worth to you?"

They were standing shoulder-to-shoulder, staring at the Thames. Goodhew had his hands on the parapet, and rather absurdly he had put on his cycling gloves, because he had recently been suffering the effects of poor circulation of the blood. Not understanding the thrust of Marjoram's question, he turned to him for enlightenment. But all he saw was the saintly profile shining its benediction upon a passing pleasure boat.

Then Marjoram turned too, and they were face-to-face and not twelve inches between them, and if the noise of traffic was troublesome, Goodhew by now had no awareness of it at all.

"Message from Darker," Marjoram said through his smile.

"Rex Goodhew is in over his head. Spheres of interest he can't know about, doesn't need to, matters of high policy, top people involved, the usual crap. Kentish Town, isn't it, where you live? Squalid little terraced house with net curtains?"

"Why?"

"You've just acquired a distant uncle living in Switzerland. He always admired your integrity. The day the Limpet case is ours, your uncle suffers an untimely death, leaves you three quarters of a million of your own. Pounds, not francs. Tax-free. It's an inheritance. You know what the boys say in Colombia? 'You have the choice. Either we make you rich or we make you dead.' Darker says the same."

"I'm sorry. I'm a little dense today," Goodhew said. "Are you threatening to kill me as well as bribe me?"

"Kill your career, for a start. We can reach you, I should think. If we can't, we'll have to think again. Don't answer now if it's embarrassing. Don't answer at all. Just do it. Action before words: the Lex Goodhew." He smiled sympathetically.

"Nobody would believe you, would they? Not in your circles. Old Rex is losing his marbles... been going on a long time... didn't want to say anything. I shan't send you a memo, if you don't mind. I never said a thing. Just a nice stroll by the river after another boring meeting. Have a nice weekend."

Your premise is absurd, Goodhew had told Burr six months earlier, over one of their little dinners. It is destructive, it is insidious and I refuse to countenance it, and I forbid you ever to speak of it to me again. This is England, not the Balkans and not Sicily. You can have your agency, Leonard, but you are to renounce for all time your Gothic fantasies about the Procurement Studies Group being run as a multi-million-pound racket for the benefit of Geoffrey Darker and a caucus of bent bankers, brokers and middlemen and corrupt intelligence officers on both sides of the Atlantic.

Because that way lies madness, he had warned Burr. That way lies this.

For a week after talking to his wife, Goodhew kept his secret locked up in his head. A man who does not trust himself trusts nobody. Burr telephoned from Miami with the news of Limpet's resurrection, and Goodhew as best he could shared his euphoria. Rooke took over the reins at Burr's offices in Victoria Street. Goodhew bought him lunch at the Athenaeum, but did not confide in him.

Then one evening Palfrey called by with some garbled tale about Darker taking soundings with British arms suppliers about the availability of certain high-tech equipment for use in a "South American type of climate," end user to be advised.

"British equipment, Harry? That's not Roper. He's buying foreign."

Palfrey writhed and sucked his cigarette and needed more Scotch. "Well, it could be the Roper, actually, Rex. I mean, if he was covering his backside. I mean, if they're British toys--well, no limit to our tolerance, if you know what I mean. Two blind eyes and head in the sand. If they're Brit. Naturally. Flog 'em to Jack the Ripper, if they're Brit." He sniggered.

It was a fine evening, and Palfrey needed movement. So they walked as far as the entrance to Highgate Cemetery and found a quiet bench.

"Marjoram tried to buy me," said Goodhew, straight out ahead of him. "Three quarters of a million pounds."

"Oh, well, he would," said Palfrey, quite unsurprised. "That's what they do abroad. That's what they do at home."

"There was a stick as well as a carrot."

"Oh, yes, well, there usually is," said Palfrey, delving for a fresh cigarette.

"Who are they, Harry?"

Palfrey wrinkled his nose, blinked a few times and seemed mysteriously embarrassed.

"Just a few clever chaps. Good connections. You know."

"I don't know anything."

"Good case officers. Cold heads left over from the Cold War. Scared of being out of a job. You know, Rex."

It occurred to Goodhew that Palfrey was describing his own predicament and didn't like doing so.

"Duplicity trained, naturally," Palfrey continued, volunteering his opinion, as usual, in a series of torn-off, shop-worn sentences. "Market economy chaps. Peaked in the eighties. Grab it while you can, everybody does it, never sure where the next war's coming from. All dressed up, nowhere to go... you know. Still got power, of course. Nobody's taken that away from them. Just a question of where to put it."

Goodhew said nothing, and Palfrey obligingly continued. "Not bad chaps, Rex. Mustn't be too critical. Just a bit marooned. No more Thatcher. No more Russian bear to fight, no more Reds under the bed at home. One day they've got the world all carved up for them, two legs good, four bad. Next day they get up in the morning, they're sort of--well, you know...." He finished his premise with a shrug. "Well, nobody likes a vacuum, do they? Not even you like a vacuum. Well, do you? Be honest. You hate it."

"By vacuum you mean peace?" Goodhew suggested, not wishing in the least to sound censorious.

"Boredom, really. Smallness. Never did anyone any good, did it?" Another giggle, another long drink from the cigarette.