A Prospect of Vengeance (8 page)

‘But you think you do know?’

‘No—not yet. But … it’s like, he’s often in the background of things, so far as I can make out so far. Like, with a collection of people in group photographs, when you keep seeing the same face somewhere in the back … Or, you’re not quite sure, because he’s always the one who’s partly obscured by someone else—or he’s moved just as the photographer pressed the button, so he’s blurred.’ She shrugged. ‘Like Reg said, he gives advice to people—to committees, and suchlike. But his name never appears.’

‘That isn’t so, according to John Tully. He’s listed in quite a few places—in
Who
’
s Who
, for a start. With a CBE in the early 1970s. And an honorary fellowship at King Richard’s.’

‘Oh yes.’ She wasn’t put off in the least. ‘But it’s all so vague—isn’t it? An “assistant-principal” here, in one place—Home Office, was it? Then a transfer to the Ministry of Defence. And writing those books … But, darling, it’s all got nothing to do with what he
really
does, of course—it’s all flumdiddle. Dear old Reg said it all, didn’t he? “Cloak-and-dagger”, is what he is. Only this time it was more like “dagger-and-cloak”, maybe.’

‘Reg also said “research”.’ There was something in her voice he hadn’t heard before, and couldn’t pin down now; almost a hint of underlying passion, of malevolence even. All he knew was that he had to argue against it. ‘”Advice and research”, was it? And the man must be close to retirement, damn it, Jen!’ But that hadn’t been all Reg had said, he remembered. And that weakened his resistance to her will. ‘If they retire in his line of work.’

‘Yes. And that’s interesting too.’ Her voice was back to normal: maybe he had imagined that hint of genuine feeling under the twenty-four-hour insatiable curiosity which powered her normally, without commitment to any cause other than the truth. ‘And particularly interesting to you, as it happens, Ian.’

‘To me?’ What he was going to get now was one of the arguments she had intended to use in support of the Scotch beef and the Chateau Haut-Brion (which she had surely known for what it was), in the event of his welshing on the deal.

‘Uh-huh.’ She gestured towards the Haut-Brion. ‘I think I may have some idea of what he does, actually.’

This was that source of hers again: a source she would never mention even as a source, unlike Reg Buller’s vague ‘There’s a bloke I know, in The Street/in the Met/ down the nick/down the pub/in the business’, or John Tully’s notated references to ‘Contact AB’ and ‘Contact XY’ in his reports, whose identities would all be in a little black book somewhere.

‘Go on, darling—don’t mind me. I’ve had more than my share.’

‘So you have.’ So she had. And if she’d been his, and he’d been hers, he might worry about that; though, as they never would be (which was the old familiar spear in his heart, twisting but never killing), and as she never seemed to change, no matter how much she’d drunk, except that she burned more brightly still, he had no right to worry.

‘I’ve got more—I bought a whole case, darling. And the little man gave me what he called a “case-price”, so our bottle was absolutely
free
—
‘

‘Jenny! For heaven’s sake—!’ He had to move, to block her passage towards her Aladdin’s cave. ‘Just sit down, and tell me about Audley, there’s a good girl—
sit down!
’

As he restrained her he thought …
and that
’
s another thing: when it comes to money, she
’
s got no bloody idea
! ‘Just tell me—eh?’

She sat down. ‘Oh … you are a bore, sometimes … Don’t you ever let your hair down—?’ To match the words, she tried ineffectually to recover some of the hair which was coming down all around her face.

He waited until she had done the best she could. ‘Audley?’

‘Yes—all right!’ She abandoned the pushing-and-poking process. There was this man Daddy knew, who was just
incredibly
high-powered … I mean, Daddy is
high
-powered—he is like
God
—
‘ She saw his face, and tried to rescue herself from the blasphemy ‘—I mean, he’s
kind
, even though he knows everything … ’ She trailed off, grimacing at him.

That was half her trouble—or maybe all of it: no one could compete against such opposition. And that was also his problem, too. But not just at this moment. ‘I don’t think I’m quite with you, Jen. This man … he was Audley?’

‘Good God, no! He was an acquaintance of Daddy’s, I’m trying to tell you. He’s dead now—but quite naturally, I think.’

Maybe she had had one glass too many. ‘I see. And high-powered with it. But not as high-powered as your father, eh?’

She frowned at him. ‘What?’

‘I was always taught there was only one God.’ It was odd to speak so lightly when one meant what one said. ‘So … like St Peter, say? Or St Paul—he was rather high-powered.’

She stared at him for a moment, then made a face. ‘Very clever.’ Then the face became serious. ‘Maybe a bit of both of them, actually. Although Daddy just called him “Fred”, as I remember. When I met him.’

‘”Fred”?’ At least this wasn’t one of her unacknowledged, unnamed sources, anyway. ‘I don’t think there is a “St Fred” in the calendar of saints. But never mind … You met this “Fred”—‘ It was on the tip of his tongue to ask her what Fred had to do with Audley. But then he looked directly into her eyes and caught himself just in time, knowing that he had been wrong just a minute before.

‘Yes, I did.’ The eyes were stony, not stoned. ‘I was eighteen—I was just going up to college. And he frightened me.’

‘Frightened you?’ It was so unexpected that he repeated the words. ‘How?’

‘He quizzed me. No—he
interrogated
me, more like … What I thought, what I was going to do … at Oxford, after Oxford … Why I thought what I thought—why I was going to do what … what I thought I was going to do.’ She stared at him. ‘He really took me apart. It was quite frightening.’

From her that was also quite an admission. Because there wasn’t much that frightened Jenny Fielding-ffulke. Or, anyway, nothing that wore trousers. And there was also something else that didn’t fit. ‘Your father didn’t stop him—?’

‘Daddy had a phone-call. He told me to entertain his guest—Mummy was at one of her meetings.’ Her eyes glazed slightly, as though she was no longer looking at him. Then they focused on him again. ‘He was
sharp
—
not
interrogated
, more like
dissected
: I felt like a poor bloody frog in a biology practical.’

‘Fred’ had been nothing if not memorable. And a faint whiff of her original fear travelled across the years in her imagery.

‘When Daddy came back … he said—
he
said, not Daddy—“We’ve had a most interesting chat, Jennifer and I”.’ She cocked her head slightly. ‘And then the bastard told Daddy what a clever daughter he’d sired, and bullshitted him so that I couldn’t decently have hysterics, or burst into tears … In fact, he even gave me his card, and told me that if I didn’t want to go on with my biochemistry when I’d graduated then I could always come to him for a job. And poor old Daddy positively glowed.’ She sniffed. ‘
Fat chance
!’

It was getting more interesting by the second—just as she’d promised it would do, although in another context. ‘So what did you do?’

She sniffed again. ‘I couldn’t say anything then—now, could I? Not to Daddy—not without appearing to be a wimp, anyway.’

‘But … what was on the card, Jen?’

‘God—I don’t know! I went to the loo, and had a good cry—and tore it up, and flushed it down the pan—‘ She stopped abruptly. ‘
Clinton
, though—that was the name:
Frederick Joseph Clinton
.’ Now she looked at him. ‘
Sir
Frederick Clinton—?’

That rang a bell from somewhere. But he couldn’t place it. But … the way she was looking at him, she expected him to place it. ‘Clinton?’

‘Yes.’ She nodded. ‘I found him in an old
Who
’
s Who
, but there wasn’t much about him.’ She drained the last dregs of her Haut-Brion. ‘He retired from the army as a brigadier in ‘47—no mention of any regiment … But the DSO was from 1940, Daddy said. So that fits in with a book he wrote, about Dunkirk, when we ran away from the Germans, and made a great victory of it.’ She almost banged her glass down. ‘And he got his “K” in ‘58, when he was supposed to be a permanent something-or-other in the Home Office—or one of the other ministries they had then, before it was the Ministry of Defence. But, of course, it’s just like Audley—all flumdiddle.’

Dunkirk
, of course: there had been that very curious book on Dunkirk, way back … with all sorts of elliptical references to high policy, both British and German, which the military historians had taken with a pinch of salt; he had bought a copy in a second-hand shop in Charing Cross Road as a schoolboy, for his grandfather (who had been there) because it had been signed by the author, with a great flourish (or, rather, because it had been dead-cheap, anyway). ‘
The Dunkirk Miracle
—
of course!’

‘What?’ She frowned at him again.

The book he wrote—
The Dunkirk Miracle
, Jen. But … how does he fit in with Audley?’

‘Audley?’ The name made her demote
Frederick Joseph Clinton
, so it seemed for an instant. Then she concentrated on him. ‘If what I’ve been told is right, Audley was his blue-eyed boy—his pupil, and his beneficiary … Only, it didn’t quite work out like that, apparently.’ The frown came back.

‘What d’you mean?’

‘I’m not quite sure yet.’ The concentration became almost disconcerting. ‘But I think we could—just
could
—
be on to something
rather
interesting in its own right, even apart from Dr David Audley … although he is part of it—very much part of it, in fact … ’

She trailed off, and this time he waited patiently, because he recognized that look from old. Normally, in their strange symbiotic partnership, she was the one who brought in the new information which could not be obtained by conventional and straightforward means, which she scavenged from all sorts of unlikely and—to him—inaccessible places and people; and it was his job not only to combine it with his own research and render it presentable and saleable, but also to crack its bones and extract the marrow within. But sometimes—rarely, but sometimes—she could do a lot more than that.

She looked at him suddenly. ‘Quite a lot of people know David Audley—and
about
him, too … in a way. And you know what they say, Ian?’

He knew what Reg Buller had said. But that had been private. ‘No—?’

She nodded. They say … “Oh he’s something in Intelligence, isn’t he?” Or even just “Old David, darling? In one of those MI-somethings—always popping down to that
awful
secret place at Cheltenham, with all those initials.”’ She paused, closing her eyes. ‘”But he does have
the
most delightful wife and daughter—both perfect
sweeties
, darling. Whereas, he’s a great
bear
of a man—a perfect
Caliban
, compared with them, don’t you know”.’

That sounded more like one of ‘Mummy’s’ friends than ‘Daddy’s’. But that, of course, was exactly what ‘they’
had
said, word for word, from memory. Given a notebook, Jenny would have either broken the lead in her pencil or supplied herself with a dead ball-point pen; or, if she hadn’t, then she wouldn’t have been able to decipher her hopeless handwriting. But the gods, to make up for that deficiency, had given her total recall of anything that was said to her, down to the last emphasis.

But she was looking at him again.

‘He was connected with that fearful man Clinton.’ The concentration was back. ‘That I know. And Clinton was “in” Intelligence—very much in. But he was never one of the directors of any of the big departments—MI5, or MI6, and all that. Because everyone knows who
they
were … Yet he was a bloody-big wheel—a power in the land. That’s for sure, too.’

Was that ‘Daddy’, being indiscreet long ago with his little darling? Or that source, being infinitely more indiscreet, for some other reason? But he could see that there was more to come.

‘Clinton got a successor, at all events. Name of
Butler
. Christian name
James
, but always known as “Jack”. Ex-career soldier in some little line regiment. And not too successful even in that, because he went on the General List as a major when he was quite elderly. Then he was made up to half-colonel, and in—
in
—
Intelligence, apparently. But not military intelligence: “one of Fred Clinton’s lot”, thereafter.’ Her face seemed to sharpen as she spoke. ‘”Nice chap, but rather dull”.’ Sharper still. ‘Which just could be an unreliable assessment, because he’s just got his “K”—
Sir
Jack now … Just like
Sir
Fred, before him.’ She nodded wisely. ‘Like you’re always saying, darling—
pattern
: “Look for the pattern” … okay?’

She wanted to be jogged—or maybe reassured? ‘So now he’s Audley’s boss—?’

‘Yes. But boss of what?’ Now she was really there. ‘So … remember what old Reg said—“research and advice”? And when Reg picks up vibes, then they’re usually right, aren’t they?’

She had asked him to remember. So, once again, he remembered what Reg Buller had said out of her hearing. ‘Reg is good—yes.’

‘But not quite accurate this time.’ Scoring a point always pleased her. ‘Because I think the official title of the Clinton-Butler organization is “Research and
Development
”
. Although, of course, that doesn’t really mean anything—it’s just a useful bit of jargon, to put you off. Because everyone’s got an “R & D” section now—it’s like having a “computer facility”, with a “systems manager”, even if you’re putting beans into tins—all flumdiddle, darling.’