Part 22 (1/2)

William said nothing. He feared that Eddie was right. He was not fit, and he felt miserable about it.

Chapter 67: In Farmer Brown's.

Eddie stormed out, leaving his father profoundly shaken. For a few minutes after his son's departure, Eddie's final words of condemnation ringing in his ears, William stood quite still in the middle of his entrance hall, staring at the pattern on the rug beneath his feet. He had never expected that Eddie, his f.e.c.kless and inconsiderate son, would berate him in quite such a way and with such clear justification. Eddie was in general in no position to criticise anybody, but on this occasion William had to acknowledge that he was absolutely right. Yes, he had behaved with complete disregard for Freddie de la Hay's feelings; yes, he had let the trusting dog down. He had handed him over without any enquiry as to provisions for his welfare, taking instead the vaguest of a.s.surances as to how he would be looked after. And all the time his head had simply been turned by two female agents of MI6. What a fool he had been! Of course they would use women to deal with him they must have known his susceptibility. And Tilly Curtain, who had seemed so attractive and interested in him, was probably laughing behind his back all along, thinking how easy it was for her to trap this middle-aged wine dealer (well, only just fifty, late forties really) into a harebrained scheme to listen in to the gossip of Russian gangsters in Notting Hill.

William turned round and went back into his sitting room. Eddie had brought a newspaper with him and he had left it lying on the floor even as a visitor, thought William, he leaves the place untidy. He picked up the paper, and grimaced; it was just the sort of paper that Eddie would read a salacious, hectoring mixture of indignation and populist diatribe. He glanced at a headline: ”Espionage Boss found in River”. He read the few lines beneath the heading: the unfortunate espionage boss in question was French and had nothing to do with MI6, but still the story filled him with alarm. Was this the fate awaiting Freddie de la Hay, or was it the fate that had by now been doled out to him? Was Freddie already floating in the Thames somewhere, or possibly lying in the mud on the river bottom, a block of concrete tied to his collar? William closed his eyes. He could not bear the thought that it was he who was responsible for this. It was his fault.

He reached into his pocket, taking out the piece of paper on which he had jotted Tilly Curtain's telephone number. They had parted on frosty terms, having barely managed to complete their dinner together. There had been no mention of a further meeting, and all the MI6 agent had promised to do was to telephone William if there was any news of Freddie de la Hay. Well, that was not good enough, he thought. If this is my fault which it is then I am going to be the one to do something about it.

He picked up the telephone and dialled the number. ”I want to see you,” he said when she answered.

There was a brief silence at the other end of the line. ”I'm afraid I've got no further news.”

”That's neither here nor there,” said William. ”I want to see you. I insist.”

She agreed reluctantly and suggested that they see one another at Farmer Brown's, a cafe on a small street off St Martin's Lane. William knew the place; he had occasionally dropped in for a cup of coffee or for lunch. They agreed to meet in forty minutes and rang off.

Tilly was already there when he arrived. Although her manner on the telephone had been distant, it struck William as he sat down at the table with her that there was something different now a sympathy, perhaps, that he had not witnessed at their last meeting.

”I'm very sorry about ... about what happened at dinner,” she said. ”And I've been thinking about it.”

William made a non-committal gesture. He was waiting to see what she would say.

”I was acting on instructions, you see,” she said, her voice lowered. ”I was told that I was not to say anything to you. Or at least not to say anything significant.”

He leaned forward. ”Oh?”

Tilly lowered her voice further, although there was n.o.body who could overhear them. The cafe was virtually empty, apart from a couple of stage designers from a nearby theatre sketching something out on a paper napkin.

”Yes,” said Tilly. ”What I was not allowed to tell you is this: Freddie de la Hay is alive. And we know where he is.”

William's heart gave a great leap. Instinctively he reached out and took her hand, clutching it tightly. ”Oh, that's marvellous, marvellous news. Where is he? And when will he be coming back?”

Tilly frowned. ”Well, I don't actually know. When I said we know I meant that the service knows. Ducky does I'm sure of that. But I don't know personally.” She paused. ”And I shouldn't really be telling you any of this.”

William looked puzzled. Ever since he had started having dealings with MI6, he had felt that he had wandered into a maze of some sort a garden of twisting paths and pa.s.sages, with no signs to show one the way and n.o.body to ask for directions. He was pleased that Freddie de la Hay was alive, but he wondered whether this was the same thing as being safe. One could be alive and yet at the same time very unsafe, and perhaps that was the position that Freddie was now in.

”All right,” Tilly went on, her voice now barely a whisper. ”Listen to me, William. Freddie de la Hay has been set up. They knew all along that the transmitter in his collar would be discovered. They knew it.”

William stared at her. ”Why ...”

He did not finish. She raised a finger to silence him. ”Ducky wanted to find out where their other place was. He knew that they had somewhere else in London, but we could never find it. He thought that if they discovered Freddie was working for us, they would take him there. And so he fitted a small locating transmitter under Freddie's skin. It's been sending out homing signals loud and clear.”

William sat back in his chair, stunned by this disclosure. ”We've got to find him,” he said weakly.

Tilly looked down at her cup of coffee. She's ashamed, thought William. She's every bit as ashamed as I am.

”You could try speaking to Ducky,” she said. ”You could appeal to him. Try to get through to his better nature. Ask him to tell you where Freddie is and how to get him out of the cold.” She sighed. ”I don't think he will, of course. But you could try.”

Chapter 68: Going Home.

”This is such fun,” said Jo, as she and Caroline settled themselves into their seats on the train from Paddington.

Caroline looked about her. She was so used to this train, which she thought of simply as the train home, that she never really took much notice of it. For most of the pa.s.sengers, who were commuters, she imagined that this would hardly be fun either: it would be a journey to be endured, something that one did, Monday to Friday, in a state not far off suspended animation.

Or it could be, she thought, that Jo was referring to the fact that they were going to Cheltenham to spend a weekend with Caroline's parents. Again, she would not have described that as fun, although Jo, of course, had yet to meet her host and hostess. Not that they were particularly bad, as parents went; it was just that, well, they were her parents, with all that this entailed. Parents were very rarely just right, no matter how fond one might be of them. For instance, her father, Rufus Jarvis, was extremely conservative in his outlook; she only hoped that the conversation would not stray on to politics. What would Jo think? Or was she used to it? After all, she had parents back in Western Australia, and they no doubt had views of their own.

”Yes,” she said, in delayed answer to Jo's observation, ”it is going to be fun.”

”It's good of you to invite me,” Jo said, as the train began to pull out of the station. She looked at Caroline quizzically. ”Did you ever take James back to meet them?”

Caroline winced. ”Not a success.”

Jo smiled at this. It was what she had expected. ”Maybe James is not ideal material to take home,” she said.

Caroline said nothing. James was her friend. Kind, amusing, stimulating James was still her friend. And that was all, she thought ruefully. Jo was right: it was time for her to abandon her expectations for that relations.h.i.+p. It was to be friends.h.i.+p, and nothing more.

”What about you?” she asked. ”Did you take anybody home?”

She realised immediately after asking the question that she might be venturing into awkward territory for Jo. Her flatmate had never been explicit about her private life and Caroline was as a result uncertain about where Jo's real interests lay. She had talked in the past about a boyfriend, but Caroline had not been sure whether she meant a boyfriend in the sense in which she herself sometimes talked about girlfriends: a friend who was a boy. James was a boyfriend, but not her boyfriend ...

And now, as she looked at Jo in the seat facing her, she thought: it's the clothing that makes one speculate; the rather masculine-looking jacket. And the short hair. And the boots. But one should not jump to conclusions, she reminded herself, and it could be something to do with coming from a rather sporty family in Perth.

”Oh yes,” said Jo. ”I took boys back. Quite a few, actually.”

Well, thought Caroline; that settles that.

”Not that I wanted to marry any of them, of course,” Jo went on.

And that unsettles that, Caroline decided.

The journey pa.s.sed quickly. Jo dropped off to sleep, and Caroline read, and looked out of the window, and reflected on her life. Now that she had let go of the idea of James, it seemed to her that everything had become much less complicated. She had a job; she had somewhere to live; she had a home to go back to if London became too much which it was unlikely to do. She could meet somebody now, somebody who would suit her rather better than James poor James did. Where was the problem? There was none. That was the answer. There was nothing holding her back.

They took a taxi from the station to the house. Rufus answered the door and embraced Caroline warmly. He smelled so familiar; he put bay rum on his face after shaving, and it lingered. It was one of the smells of childhood that she loved. He smelled of bay rum and newspapers, and sometimes of smoke, when he had been making bonfires in the garden, which he liked to do.

He shook hands with Jo. She saw his eyes flicker and move quickly to hers but she did not meet his glance. Then Frances, her mother, arrived, dusting her hands as she came out of the kitchen. Frances looked at Jo before she turned to her daughter, and then the same thing happened a quick exchange of glances. Did Jo notice this, Caroline wondered. She guessed not; Jo was patting Patrick, the aged dog, who had come to sniff arthritically at her boots.

They went upstairs to put their bags in their rooms. The guest room had been prepared for Jo, and there were flowers in a vase near the window. A small tin of biscuits had been placed on the bedside table, and a bottle of mineral water. The comforts of home, thought Caroline. These little touches.