Fife-Simpson responded by sagging into Meg’s arms. She and the director transferred the limp form to a sofa on one side of the room. “I’m afraid he’ll be out for half an hour or so,” the director said.
“Oh, good. I can use the rest,” Meg said.
The director received a capped syringe from his assistant and handed it to Meg. “Stick him with that when you’re ready to have him back. It works quickly on any part of the body and can be administered through clothing.” He went back to work, and Meg sat down on the unused end of the sofa, glad for some rest from the brigadier.
Lance arrived at Windward Hall from London as evening fell. Stone and Rose came out the front door to greet him. Stone introduced Rose to Lance. “We’re just going down to fetch Dame Felicity,” he said. “Come with us.”
They got into the golf cart and drove the quarter mile to the dock, where her boatman was just making fast the boat’s lines. Stone helped Felicity ashore, and since everyone now knew everyone, introductions were unnecessary.
Back at the house, Geoffrey served them drinks.
“Thank you for taking the brigadier off my hands for a bit,” Felicity said to Lance.
“Speak of the devil,” Lance said. “I had a call a few minutes ago saying that Fife-Simpson was just rendered unconscious in our technical service department by a sting from a hypodermic disguised as a fountain pen — inadvertently, of course.”
“Of course,” Felicity replied.
“They’ll bring him around soon.”
They were called to dinner, and an old claret was uncorked, tasted, decanted, and poured.
“You said on the phone that you had met Fife-Simpson before?” Felicity asked.
“Yes. The first instance occurred in the casualty ward of a Belfast hospital. I had been observing the work of the Army and Royal Marines in the city and received a superficial bullet wound for my trouble, and while I was being treated, Fife-Simpson — a lieutenant at the time — was brought in. He had been badly beaten, and a friend, another lieutenant, was very concerned. The friend told me that he and a squad of military policemen had extracted young Roger from the clutches of an IRA scrum. The lieutenant said that Fife-Simpson had asked to be taken to a gay bar, but there was a mix-up. The lieutenant, by the way, was to become Admiral Sir Timothy Barnes, now serving as the First Sea Lord.”
“Oh, is the brigadier gay?” Felicity asked.
“I don’t think so. Rather, he is a gay basher, or, as some say, a gay trasher, who has helped along his career in the military by forming friendships with homosexual officers. Then, when it suited him, to gently blackmail his way into better fitness reports and promotions.”
“That is disgusting,” Felicity said.
“Do you know, Stone,” Rose suddenly interjected, “the brigadier asked me if you were gay.”
Felicity and Lance burst out laughing.
“Don’t worry,” Rose said, placing a hand on Stone’s arm, “I’ll give you a good report.”
More laughter.
25
They were on port and Stilton when Lance surprised Stone, and possibly everyone else, by asking Felicity, “Do you wish the brigadier returned to your service in one piece?”
“My desires conflict with my duty,” Felicity said without missing a beat, “as it is seen to be by my betters.”
“You surely must not wish to have your service used as a dumping ground for the unsuitable,” Lance said.
“Certain members of the government find us useful for that purpose, at least on this occasion. What would you do in my position, Lance?”
“My service would regurgitate that man into the lap of whoever sent him to me.”
“We British are less direct,” Felicity said, “especially when dealing at the ministerial level.”
“Do you suspect the foreign minister? Specifically, I mean, not as part of a group.”
“I would not be shocked to find his fingerprints on the transfer document.”
“Put another way: Do you think the FM has something to fear from his freshly minted brigadier?”
“The FM has been married to the same woman for more than thirty years, and during that time, has bestirred himself to sire a single son and heir, now twenty-eight, a chinless wonder who is employed in the nether ranks of his ministry, as a kind of greeter and handler of visiting dignitaries from beyond Calais.”
“And what has been scribbled in the margins of your file on the FM over the years?”
“Let me put it this way,” Felicity said. “There have been no rumors of women in his life.”
“I see.”
“I expect you do, Lance.”
Lance sipped his port and nibbled at his cheese. “Is there a member of his staff who has outlasted all the others over time?”
Felicity thought about it. “There is,” she replied. “One Sir Ellery Bascombe, a baronet, who was in the FM’s class at Eton — and who has personally attended him ever since the fourth form. I’ve heard them referred to, once or twice, as ‘the old married couple.’”
“And does Sir Ellery have any naval connections?”
“After Eton, the young man was not able to find a place at a suitable university, so the family sent him off to Dartmouth, where he was a classmate of Timothy Barnes — and Roger Fife-Simpson. He graduated, after a fashion, but was not commissioned, so the FM, then a party functionary, took him in. He has been a body man to his mentor, now the FM, in one form or another, since that time.”
“Does he travel with the FM?”
“Nearly always.”
“Ah,” Lance said. “Perhaps you have found your way to the heart — or the jugular — of the foreign minister.”
26
Stone was enjoying an upward view of Rose while on his back in bed, when her mind seemed to wander.
“Why, do you think,” she asked, in the midst of regular movements, “that Lance Cabot would speak as he did about the brigadier in our presence?”
“Yours and mine?” he asked.
“Yes. I can well understand why he would make those remarks to Felicity in private, but why also to you and me?” She stopped moving.
“Pardon me,” Stone said, “but may we delay the discussion of Lance’s motives, which are always obscure, for a few minutes?” He gave her a little thrust to bring her mind back to the business at hand.
“Of course,” she said, responding to his action. She concentrated her mind until they had both reached the peak of their desire and then descended rapidly.
“Now,” she said, tucking her head into his shoulder, “where were we?”
“Lance’s motives,” Stone replied, still panting.
“Which are always obscure?”
“Always. I think it’s the nature of his work that causes him not to want anyone to know all of what he is thinking at any given moment.”
“What do you think he was thinking?” she asked.
“First,” Stone said, “I think he wanted to give Felicity the ammunition she might need to deal with the brigadier.”
“Obviously. And beyond that?”
“Beyond that is the no-man’s-land of Lance’s consciousness.”
“I think Lance knows the brigadier much better than he has admitted to us,” she said.
“That’s an interesting observation,” Stone admitted.
“After all,” Rose said, “he did offer to dismember the man.”
“I think that was most probably metaphorical.”
“Do you think Lance incapable of cutting someone into pieces?”
“Personally? Probably not. I do think him capable of ordering someone else to do it, though in the subtlest sort of way.”
“So do I,” Rose replied.
“On such short acquaintance?”