Sir Henry Clevemore was in the otherwise unoccupied writing room when I took his document box to him. He always chose this room, which was on the ground floor. It is different to all the other rooms in the Club, for it can be entered from the street without passing through the main entrance and answering questions from the men behind the desk. Here were stored cocktail party chairs and a billiard table that the committee didn't want to throw away. The room smelled of ancient leather and scented polish and Sir Henry was alone there. There were no cocktail parties to be heard, only the sound of buses crawling along the rainswept street outside. Sir Henry was sitting before a writing desk at the window, with a frantic wide-nostrilled charger of the Light Brigade thundering through the oilpaint above him. Beneath the vivid painting – framed and reverently positioned – there were pressed flowers collected from the 'Valley of Death' and a lock of hair from Wellington's favourite charger.
'Oh, it's you,' said Sir Henry vaguely, his arms extended to take the document box.
'Yes, Sir Henry,' I said as I handed it to him. 'I was hoping that you'd grant me a few minutes of your time.'
He frowned as I put the box on the table in front of him. It was not done of course. Decent chaps didn't bamboozle their way into a fellow's club and then corner them for a chat. But he managed a brief and mandatory smile before reaching into his pocket and bringing out a key on a long silver chain.
'Of course, of course. Splendid! My pleasure entirely.' He was still hoping that he'd misheard, that I would say goodbye, and go away and leave him to his paper-work.
'Samson, sir. German Desk.'
He raised his eyes to me and rubbed his face like a man coming out of a deep sleep. Eventually he said, 'Ummmm. Brian Samson. Of course.' He was a strange old fellow, a gangling, uncoordinated emaciated teddy bear, the bruin-like effect heightened by the ginger-coloured rough tweed jacket he was wearing, and his long hair. His face was more wrinkled than I remembered and his complexion had darkened with that mauvish colour that sickness sometimes brings.
'Brian Samson was my father, sir. My name is Bernard Samson.' The D-G put on his spectacles and for a moment he stared at me quizzically. This action disarranged his hair so that demoniacal tufts appeared above each ear. The lenses glinted in the light from the window. The frames were incongruously small for his long droopy face and did not fit properly upon his nose.
'Bernard Samson. Yes, yes. Of course it is.' He unlocked the box and opened it to get a glimpse of the papers. He was excited now, like a child with a box of new toys. Without looking up – and without much conviction – he said, 'If we can find that waiter we'll get you a cup of coffee… or a drink.'
'Nothing for me, thank you, Sir Henry. I must get back to the office. I'm going to Berlin this afternoon.' I reached out for the lid of the box and firmly and gently closed it.
He looked up at me in amazement. Such insubordination was like a physical assault, but I enjoyed the shining armour of the self-righteous innocent. He did not voice his anger. He was a luminary of the expensive end of the British education system which specializes in genial, courteous philistines. So, concealing his impatience, he invited me to sit down and take as long as I wished to tell him whatever I had to say.
There were plenty of stories that said the old man was non compos mentis, but any concern I had about explaining my worries to a potty boss were soon gone. I decided to leave out my visit to Dodo in Hampton Wick and my strange encounter with Jim Prettyman, If the Department said Jim was dead, then dead he would remain. As soon as I began Sir Henry was bright-eyed and alert. As I told him what I had discovered about the funds passed over to Bret Rensselaer's company, and what I could guess about the way in which the money had been moved from place to place before going to the Berlin bank, he interrupted me with pertinent comments.
At times he was well ahead of me, and more than once I was unable to understand fully the import of his questions. But he was an old-timer and too much of a pro to reveal the extent of his knowledge or the degree of his fears. This didn't surprise me. On the contrary I fully expected any Director-General stolidly to deny suggestions of treason or malfeasance, or even a possibility that any member of staff might be getting a second biscuit with their afternoon tea.
'Do you garden?' he said, suddenly changing the subject.
'Garden, sir?'
'Dammit man, garden.' He gave a genial smile. 'Dig the soil, grow flowers and shrubs and vegetables and fruit?'
I remembered Sir Henry's twenty-acre garden and the men I'd seen labouring in it. In his lapel he wore a small white rose, a mark of the rural Yorkshire upbringing of which he was so proud. 'No, sir. I don't garden. Not really.'
'A man needs a garden, I've always said so.' He looked at me over his spectacles. 'Not even a little patch?'
'I have a little patch,' I admitted, remembering the wilderness of weeds and nettles at the rear of Balaklava Road.
'July is my favourite month in the garden, Simpson. Can you guess why?' He raised a finger.
'I don't think I can, sir.'
'By July everything that's coming up is up. Some lovely things are ready for cropping: raspberries, red currants and cherries, as well as your beans and potatoes…'He paused and fixed me with his eyes. 'But if any of them haven't appeared above ground, Simpson. If your seeds failed to germinate or got washed out in the rains or frozen by late frosts…' His finger pointed. 'There's still time to plant. Right? July. Nothing you can't plant in July, Simpson. It's not too late to start again. Now do you follow me?'
'I see what you mean, sir,' I said.
'I love my vegetable garden, Simpson. There's nothing finer than to eat the crop you've planted with your own hands. I'm sure you know that.'
'Yes, I do, sir.'
'Our world is like an onion, Simpson,' he said with heavy significance, his voice growing hoarser by the minute. 'The Department I mean, of course. I told the PM that once, when she was complaining about our unorthodox methods. Each layer of the onion fits closely upon its neighbour but each layer is separate and independent: terra incognita. Follow me, Simpson?'
'Yes, Sir Henry.'
Thus reassured he said, 'Omne ignotumpro magnifico: are you familiar with that splendid notion, Simpson?' Characteristically unwilling to take a chance, he explained it in a soft aside. 'Anything little known is assumed to be wonderful. The watchword of the service, Simpson… at least the watchword of the appropriations wallahs, eh?' He laughed.
'Yes, sir,' I said, Tacitus, wasn't it?'
His eyes flickered behind the spectacle lenses; a glass-eyed old teddy suddenly come to life. He cleared his throat. 'Awww! Yes. Read Tacitus have you? Remember any more of it, Simpson?'
'Omnium consensu capax imperii nisi imperasset,' I quoted and, after giving him a moment to digest it, I took a leaf out of his book and told him what it meant. 'Everyone thought him capable of exercising authority until he tried it.'
The watery eyes gave me a steady stare. 'Haw! A palpable hit! I take your point, young man. You're wondering if I am capable of exercising my authority. Is that it?'
'No, Sir Henry, of course I'm not.'
He scratched his nose. 'Exercising it forcefully enough to explore the substance of your fears and concerns.' He turned his head and coughed in a quiet gentlemanly way.
'No, sir.' I got to my feet to take leave of him.
He looked up at me. 'Have no fear, my boy. I'll act on your information, in root through every aspect of this matter until no shadow of a doubt remains.'