For the Good of the State Read online

  It didn’t make sense—

  The solidity of the wall at his back was comforting, but it was the only thing that was. Because everything else was incomprehensible now.

  It was his room, and someone was inside it now. But the key was in his pocket, and it couldn’t be any visiting chambermaid or under-manager, looking to his creature comforts at this hour, close to midnight—

  Even, it had almost seemed a foolish conceit, to make this present night-round after he had seen Audley safely locked into his little room, with such precautions advised as could be made, and Audley contemptuous of them, replete as he had been with the late-night smoked salmon sandwiches and profiteroles which had been all the hotel had offered, together with the hugely expensive wines Audley had chosen to go with them (which had perked up the hotel management almost comically, but which had at least confirmed their estimation of ‘Sir Thomas’ as he’d ordered them, which had taken a knock when they’d got their first sight of Sir Thomas as he was)—

  ‘They’re offering Beaumes de Venise by the glass, Tom. But if they bought that at Sainsbury’s, or M and S, or wherever … that’s a bloody rip-off, isn’t it? So … if we had that nice Chateau Climens instead, maybe?’

  Tom had wondered for a moment what Henry Jaggard would make of the Green Man bill, as a departmental expense, with Thomas Arkenshaw in the Princess Diana Suite and David Audley into the Chateau Climens: and then he’d thought the hell with Henry Jaggard!

  And, later on, he’d thought: I’d better make some sort of night-round, to check the lie of the land, after I’ve put Audley to bed; although, for all the good it will do in total darkness, and with no one else watching our backs, it will be no more than giving me a breath of air before I turn in—

  And he’d said to the barman/under-manager, who’d been hovering: ‘I’ll just take a walk outside, for a few minutes … to blow away the cobwebs before I turn in.’ And the barman/under-manager had said: ‘Well, you’d better take a torch, Sir Thomas. It’s very dark outside—or, it will be when I switch off the outside lights … And I’d better give you a key to the outside door, too.’

  And now he felt the solidity of the wall at his back, which had been built, stone and mortar and rough plaster, before Lorna Doone had met John Ridd, back in the deeps of fictional Exinoor. And, with no back-up out there in the night—no back-up because neither bloody Henry Jaggard nor bloody David Audley appeared to have any interest in professional protection—the bloody wall at his back was all he had, in the way of safety, now. But, more to the point, it simply didn’t make sense—Because this wasn’t the moment to search his room, at this time of night, when the room would be occupied (and when there wasn’t anything in the room worth looking at, anyway)—that didn’t make sense—

  And … maybe there was back-up, out there in the night, which Henry Jaggard hadn’t told him about: the ceaseless watch-and-ward of the old Royal Navy, of those storm-tossed ships which the safely-guarded English never saw, but simply took for granted—because Jaggard’s attitude didn’t make sense otherwise, by God!

  He pushed himself away from the wall, suddenly irritated by his own crass irresolution, to stare again at the darkened facade of the hotel. The only thing he knew for sure about Henry Jaggard was that he was a tricky bastard—almost as tricky as Audley. But the only thing he knew for sure about his present situation was that someone was in his room, and this was no time to make pointless pictures about anything else—

  Mercifully, the night-key turned easily in its well-oiled lock, with only the slightest of clicks.

  He closed the door carefully behind him and then stood, listening to the silence. After the pitch-blackness of the night behind him the reception area had seemed bright at first, but now the feebleness of its minimum lighting returned. More pronounced after the clean moorland air were all the stale night-smells of the hotel, dominated by tobacco and alcohol from the bar on his right and the more acceptable hint of wood-smoke from the huge open fire in the residents’ lounge on his left, where the last log of the day sat on its huge pile of ash.

  Tom exhaled the smells and was conscious also that he was mixing them with a self-pitying sigh. He knew that he was tired now, and that he had a right to be tired after so long a day, which had started so fairly and had developed so foully, and which had nevertheless kept its last, more dangerous moment to its very end, when he fell least able to cope with it.

  Then, from his hidden reserves, he summoned up self-contempt to drive out self-pity. Looked at from the opposite direction (and, just for this final moment of reflection, forgetting Willy), this had been a damn good day—even a lucky one: because Henry Jaggard, faced with an emergency, had chosen Tom Arkenshaw to handle it; and Audley’s would-be assassin had missed; and now someone, up in his room, had been careless—

  He reached inside his coat, to settle the .38 in its holster, letting the weight of it comfort him: now someone had been careless—but this time Poor Tom wasn’t defenceless!

  Two tip-toe steps to the left, and he was off the flagstones and on thick carpet, and on his way silently—

  Memory flowed smoothly. The under-manager had led the way, through that door in the corner—this door—up the narrow (but still carpeted) private staircase to the Princess Diana suite—this stair, these stairs, two at a time and soundless now—

  The short passage above was empty, and five silent steps took him to the door, back safely to the wall and the .38 in his hand, pressed to his chest.

  There would be no sound inside, but he would listen anyway—

  Sound — ?

  He straightened up again, back to the wall, frowning.

  For Christ’s sake! That was … ? Radio One—Radio Three—whichever was the all-night pop music station—?

  Ear to the door again, to confirm the impossible truth that someone was listening to pop music in his room, after midnight, in the Green Man, Holcombe Bridge—for Christ’s sake!

  All inclination to wait vanished in that instant. And, as his free hand hovered for a second over the room-key in his pocket, that inclination also evaporated. Instead, the hand tried the door-handle, and felt the door yield, inviting him to fact the music and the uninvited music-lover—

  The smell hit him first, in the first millisecond of entry, out of that most ancient of human senses, which must once have made all the difference between being the hunter and the hunted, but which had already been activated down below by stale beer and tobacco, and wood smoke, and a menu full of faint cooking smells garnished with a hint of floor-polish—

  But—not so much a smell as a fragrance—an unforgettable, unforgotten fragrance—Chanel, Lancôme, whoever—

  ‘Darling honey—where the hell have you been?’ Willy raised herself on one elbow, all honey-gold and freckled and frilly silken white on the brocaded rugger-field of the great bed.

  Tom felt the warmth of the room on his face, registering another sense, after sound and smell and impossible sight as she flexed one slender leg at the knee, cascading the cobwebbed silk down in a movement so characteristic—so well-remembered from last night, and other nights—that it tore his heart with its reality.

  ‘Willy—?’ He heard his own voice try to make a question of her, although he knew she was unquestionable—although he knew, as he knew that, that she was real at last, and that everything that he had had before had been an illusion. ‘Hullo, Willy.’ He wanted to keep the defeated unsteadiness out of his voice, but he couldn’t. ‘Well … this is a … a very pleasant surprise, I must say.’

  ‘Uh-huh?’ She moved slightly, letting the thick glossy page of her magazine spring back, brushing one perfect breast as it did so, and closing both the magazine and their friendship at the same time. ‘Is it, Tom? Is it?’

  Grasping at a straw of comfort, he started to read sadness and regret into her expression. But that was a luxury he could no longer afford: he had to reject the past, as resolutely as that last log on the fire had refused to burn in the fireplace b
elow. Henceforth he must lie on the ashes of their relationship, charred and scorched, but still substantially unburnt. ‘Well, maybe not pleasant, Miss Groot.’ Certainly not pleasant; because there were still things he couldn’t work out, in that relationship, now that her cover was off. But they would have to wait until he had better and sharper weapons to hand. ‘But a surprise—I must admit that—’ Simultaneously, he felt the weight of the weapon in his hand and saw her eyes fix on it. ‘I was expecting someone else … I’m not quite sure who, to be honest … But not you, Miss Groot.’ He slid the .38 back into its holster, settling it comfortably with elaborate unconcern under his own breast as though to emphasize that he could see very clearly that she carried no such weapon under hers. ‘Not you, Miss Groot.’

  Then he looked round the room. Its three other doors were all ajar, but he somehow felt that they concealed no back-up, either CIA or KGB. And there was really very little point in confirming his instinct, anyway.

  So he came back to her, with the best smile he could manage. ‘Or, as you would say, Miss Groot … “I sure as hell took him—you should have seen his face when he came in”.’ As he looked at her, and saw a muscle twitch on her cheek, he had to force himself to believe that the smile wasn’t hurting her. Because, whatever else she was, she was damn good at her job, he must believe. ‘Okay. So you took me, Miss Groot. So what next?’

  She reached across herself to adjust the too-revealing lace. ‘It’s no good my saying that you’re one-hundred-per-cent wrong, I guess—?’

  No!

  ‘Not the slightest good, my dear.’ What made it worse—or worst—was that he had never been taken like this before. ‘You take me once … that’s because you’re good at your job. But you take me twice … then that’s because I’m stupid. So please don’t insult me by pulling the other one—okay?’

  She considered that for all of half a minute before replying. Then she felt under her pillow and threw a little automatic pistol on the green brocade. ‘Okay, Tom. So you put that somewhere on your side, and come to bed—okay?’

  It was one of the new .22s he’d heard about, but had never seen. ‘I get a freebie, do I? For old times’ sake?’

  Now she was beginning to hate him. And he liked that more than anything since he had caught that treacherous fragrance. ‘Okay. You get a freebie. Just this once.’

  He wanted her to hate him, he realized. ‘I’m not sure I’m in the mood. Crawling round Ranulf of Caen’s ditches … and trying to look after David Audley … and driving all the way down here.’ A weird thought struck him suddenly. ‘You didn’t come down in a big black Cadillac, by any chance—? With CD plates?’

  The dead look behind her eyes flickered questioningly for an instant, enabling him to turn away victoriously towards the hanging cupboard. With his back to her, he took off his coat, and then the harness of the .38, and then his tie, hanging each up in turn. Then he began to unbutton his shirt.

  ‘Did you?’ The quite appalling truth was that he was in the mood, in spite of everything: he wanted her with an anger and a self-loathing which ought to have revolted him but didn’t. ‘A black Cadillac?’ He moved slightly so that he could see her in one of the dressing-table mirrors. She was still on that same elbow, but was busy adjusting one shoulder-strap as though to make herself hallways decent, as she had never thought to do before. ‘Was that yours?’

  She looked up suddenly, straight into the mirror. ‘Uh-huh.’

  Strangers in the mirror, thought Tom. Last night we were lovers, but now we’re worse than enemies, we’re strangers. He moved again, staring at himself. And here’s another stranger, too!

  He sat down on the dressing-table stool and began to take off his shoes, half-fearful that he might find cloven-hooves in them, with the toe-caps filled with devil’s oakum, as in the old Polish fairy-tale Mamusia had told him years ago. ‘But it isn’t in the hotel car park, is it?’

  ‘They gave me a Metro, Tom.’

  They? ‘Yes. I suppose a Caddy would have been a bit obvious, at that.’ Now he was down to his trousers. But, very strangely, the brutal stranger inside him was embarrassed, as the old Tom had never been—just as the stranger on the bed had been embarrassed about her slipped shoulder-strap.

  ‘You’ve been checking out the place, then?’

  It was a curiously innocent question, delivered in a voice which had suddenly become curiously shaky, ‘Not well enough, apparently.’ There had been a Metro in the car park: a silver MG Metro, B-registered. But there had been no Wilhemina Groot in the hotel register to match it, of course.

  ‘W-what took you … so long?’

  He remembered his pyjamas—the pyjamas he hadn’t worn last night. Mamusia’s Christmas-tree present from last year, still in their festive wrapper: Christian Dior, Midnight Blue, finest silk. They were the natural partners of the thing the blonde stranger on the rugger pitch was wearing. And they were in his case in the dressing-room. ‘I was checking the place out—not well enough—’ He threw the words over his shoulder as he found Mamusia’s unopened present ‘ —I just told you.’

  They? he thought again. The odds said CIA, but he couldn’t take that for granted. All he knew was what Audley had already concluded, that too many people already knew too much.

  ‘I mean—’ She threw the words back at him, out of the bedroom ‘—what took you so long to the hotel, Tom honey?’

  He ripped the wrapper savagely—ridiculous things—

  (‘They’re lovely, Mamusia dear. But you know I don’t wear pyjamas.’)

  (‘But you should have them nevertheless, my darling. Whenever you go away … if there is a fire. Or a husband knocking on your door. Or … on your wedding night, my darling … there is a moment of delicacy—’)

  ‘There was a pile-up on the motorway, just before the Taunton intersection, Miss Groot.‘ Mamusia cherished a long love-hate relationship with the idea of her only son’s hypothetical marriage: she didn’t want to be a mother-in-law, but she wanted a daughter-in-law to dress and dominate; and she didn’t want to be a grandmother, but she dearly wanted a grandchild to mould, having failed with Tom himself. ’We were held up for an hour or more.‘ What twisted his heart now, as the silk slid up his legs, was that of all the possibles, Willy Groot (the former occupant of the stranger on the rugger pitch) would have resisted Mamusia best, both as a wife and a mother. But that was water under the bridge, now and for ever. ’As a matter of fact, I wondered whether it was your Cadillac which had piled up.‘ The memory of Mamusia’s ambitions and his own was swallowed up in the more recent and far more horrific image of obscenely mangled metal, and the false fairyland of flashing blue and red lights, as the fluorescent-coated policemen had at last flagged him from one clogged motorway lane to another with angry urgency on the edge of the disaster area. ’Because you came by me like a bat out of hell.‘ The coincidence of the Cadillac vanished as he thought about it: there was only one road westwards, so they had both taken it, quite naturally; the only questionable unresolved coincidence was Willy Groot’s relationship with Tom Arkenshaw, which now must be questioned and resolved. ’If that was your Cadillac, Miss Groot, I take it?‘

  No answer. So he surveyed himself in the full-length Princess Diana bridal mirror in the emptiness of her silence—

  Yes … well, in Mamusia’s custom-built pyjamas, at least he looked like he was taking the bridegroom’s role, if not Hamlet’s father’s—

  ‘Such was the very armour he put on—’

  It was like Peter Beckett had said in Lebanon, that last time: everyone knew the big Hamlet speeches, but the part most people knew, and the lines, were those of Horatio—

  ‘So frown’d he once, when, in angry parle,

  He smote the sledded Polack on the ice—’

  ‘It probably was.’ Her voice came to him almost in a whisper from the bedroom. ‘We had a Marine captain driving us, from the embassy guards, who said he’d driven in the Indianapolis race.’

  At least it hadn’
t been that bloody USN fellow! thought Tom. Not that this poor frowning Anglo-Polack needed to worry about that now.

  ‘He did drive rather fast,’ the small voice concluded.

  Tom dismissed himself from the mirror. Whichever self that was, it didn’t matter—it didn’t matter any more than who had got her here, Navy man or Marine, one jump or two ahead of him. Why she was here, and to what CIA end, was all that mattered. And it wasn’t one of Mamusia’s ‘moments of delicacy’ now, either.

  He switched off the dressing-room light and re-entered the bedroom, squaring his shoulders in preparation for what had to be done.

  She had moved, but only slightly, to face him from her pillows. The glossy magazine had disappeared, but the disgusting little pistol still lay where she’d thrown it. And now she was biting her lip, as though readying herself mentally for that freebie, with which they’d each insulted the other. And she also looked much smaller, and heart-rendingly less confident, than the tough Wilhemina Groot he’d left this morning on Ranulf’s defences.

  ‘Okay, then.’ The old Tom would have been into that inviting bed faster than light. But Tom the Stranger had other fish to fry first, and merely sat on the end of it. ‘So why was I one-hundred-per-cent wrong, Willy?’ Almost to his surprise, he discovered that Tom the Stranger wasn’t stupid.

  She stopped biting her lip, but he could see that she hadn’t expected him to go back to an answer he’d already scornfully rejected: she looked as though she’d expected to get raped while thinking of America, and George Washington, and the Statue of Liberty, and whatever else good little patriotic American girls thought of when Queen Victoria had been thinking of England in the same missionary position. So now it required one hell of an effort to adjust her thoughts to a more demanding intellectual challenge, as opposed to the less demanding physical one for which she’d arranged herself.

  Or, alternatively, she was damn good, he reminded himself quickly.