‘He might have been good once,’ agreed Kalenin. ‘But not any longer: he’s collapsed pretty badly during the last year.’
Berenkov laughed, a short, humourless sound. ‘He was right about the stick,’ he said.
‘Stick?’
‘A remark he made at the last meeting we had, in prison,’ remembered Berenkov. ‘He said he always got the shitty end of the stick.’
Charlie filled the bath with cold water, rolled up his trousers and perched carefully on the edge, easing his feet in with a sigh of relief. Rubber-soled suede wasn’t good for hot weather: and now his feet hurt like buggery. He flexed his toes, thinking of the ride back to Rome.
Had there been a Lancia following? He’d only been aware of it for part of the journey and when he’d slowed it had overtaken naturally enough. But he hadn’t been going fast in the first place, so why had it crawled along behind?
Maybe he was being over-cautious. By going out to Ostia Charlie had avoided any contact with the embassy, so there couldn’t be the slightest chance of detection. He would have to be careful he didn’t imagine danger where none existed.
There was a knock at the door. It came again, more insistently, as he dried his feet. He padded across the room, without bothering to roll down his trousers.
‘Going to the beach?’ said Clarissa Willoughby.
‘Just as soon as I knot my handkerchief,’ said Charlie.
‘You don’t seem pleased to see me.’
‘I’m not sure that I am.’
9
Clarissa sat in the middle of the bed with her knees drawn up beneath her chin, so that her skirt gaped, revealing too much leg. Charlie moved a crumpled shirt from the only chair in the room to sit down, wanting to distance himself from her. Charlie was annoyed. At Clarissa, for being so sure of herself. And at himself, for the excitement he felt.
‘This is stupid,’ he said.
‘I don’t think so.’
‘I do.’
‘It’s fun.’
She meant it, Charlie knew. People like Clarissa did things simply because they were fun. Like boarding aircraft at dawn in the previous night’s party clothes because breakfast at Focquets seemed fun, or like deciding it was fun to look at a friend’s villa in Acapulco right after lunch at San Lorenzo. Clarissa must worry about her passport like he worried about his feet.
‘What about Rupert?’
‘He thinks I’m somewhere off the coast of Menton, on a yacht.’
‘I didn’t mean that.’
‘Rupert didn’t seem a problem for you in America. What’s so different now?’
‘Look at me,’ said Charlie. ‘I’m a worn-out old bugger at least ten years older than you. If you took me to the house of any of your friends they wouldn’t let me past the kitchens.’
‘You’re an inverted snob!’
‘Would they?’
‘I don’t intend finding out.’ She looked around her. ‘This is a pretty crappy room, Charlie.’
‘I wasn’t expecting to share it.’
‘Are you going to?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Yes you do.’
‘Isn’t this a bit too much slam, bam, thank you, ma’am?’
‘Being a prissy hypocrite doesn’t suit you.’
‘Flashing your arse doesn’t suit you.’
A flush of anger picked out on her cheeks but she remained smiling. ‘You thought it was a nice enough arse last time.’
This was how it had been in New York. He hadn’t felt so emasculated by the approach then.
‘We’re the same,’ Clarissa continued. ‘Not quite, but almost. That’s why it was so good. And will be again.’
He’d forgotten the disarming way she looked at anyone she was talking to, with those unnaturally pale eyes. He wanted her like hell. And she knew it.
‘Go away Clarissa,’ he said weakly.
‘I’ve had a long journey,’ she said. ‘I’m tired and I want to go to bed.’
‘They’ve probably got rooms.’
‘I’m in one.’
‘Stop it Clarissa!’
‘Do you want me to?’
‘Yes.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
‘This is like…’ Charlie waved his hands, as if he were trying to feel for the expression. ‘… it isn’t real.’
‘It’s real enough for me.’
‘Perhaps I haven’t had the practice.’
‘You’re being a bore. You were never that, Charlie.’
‘I was never raped, either.’
‘I was once: it was fun.’
‘Jesus!’ said Charlie.
‘I never knew his name. He was a chauffeur, in Spain. Being raped is a common female fantasy, you know?’
Clarissa rolled off the bed on the opposite side from him and said. ‘Help me with the covers, Charlie.’
He hesitated. Then he got up from the chair and pulled them back on his side. She came over to him. ‘And now unzip me.’
When the dress parted he saw she was not wearing a bra. She faced him as the dress fell to her feet and her hardnippled breasts pushed up for attention. She reached for him and pulled his face to her. ‘You didn’t kiss me when I came in,’ she said.
He did now, biting at her and she came back at him, just as anxiously. She brought her head back, panting and said, ‘See! Just the same.’
‘You make it seem as if you’re trying to prove something.’
‘Come to bed and prove something to me,’ she said.
For Charlie it had been a long time and he was nervous, so he finished too quickly. She let him rest, holding him against her breast and gently stroking his head. Then she pushed him down and said, ‘Now do it properly.’
He coaxed her gently, with his hands and mouth, holding back until she was almost ready before pushing into her. She strained up to meet him, head taut back for the groan that went on and on. When she spoke, the words quivered. ‘ That was properly,’ she said.
He turned onto his side, but didn’t part from her and she held him tightly, to make sure he didn’t.
‘No point in all that posturing, was there?’ she said.
‘No.’
‘Guilty?’
‘Yes.’
‘Sorry?’
‘No.’
‘Neither am I,’ she said. ‘But then I knew I wouldn’t be.’
‘What about all those animals you were supposed to be looking after?’
‘I’ve found a hobby I like better,’ she said.
Sir Alistair Wilson stood before the easels, comparing the photographs of Henry Walsingham and Richard Semingford. Ordinary, unremarkable people, he thought. But spies and traitors always looked like ordinary people, with mortgages and bills and kids at school and cars that went wrong.
The director turned at Harkness’s entry.
‘The replies are in,’ announced the deputy, before he sat down. ‘Thrown up a couple of things about Semingford.’
‘What?’
‘He’s overdrawn, by about five hundred pounds. And there’s an affair.’
‘Don’t these damned people ever think of blackmail before they take their trousers down?’ said Wilson. ‘Who is she?’
‘Lady Billington’s secretary, a girl named Jane Williams.’
‘Background?’
‘Admiral’s daughter, from Devonport. Unmarried. Excellent grades in her civil service examinations.’
‘How old?’
‘Thirty.’
‘How old is Semingford?’
‘Forty-two.’
‘The middle-aged wish to be young again: that’s familiar too,’ said the director. ‘What about the security man?’
‘Walsingham’s financial affairs seem okay.’
‘And the Australian inquiry?’
‘Jill Walsingham’s mother had a hysterectomy,’ reported Harkness. As an afterthought, he added, ‘It appears to have been successful.’
‘Semingford’s the most likely then?’
‘I’ve told the people in Rome to concentrate upon him,’ said Harkness. ‘But it’s not much, is it?’
The other man’s caution was justified, conceded Wilson. ‘Not really,’ he agreed.
‘Going to tell Naire-Hamilton?’
‘No,’ said Wilson. ‘I’ll wait until there’s something firmer.’ He looked back at the photographs. ‘It’s taking longer than I expected.’
‘It’s only been three days.’ Harkness was surprised at the remark. ‘And this is how it’s got to be done, if they want discretion.’