A young woman, a slim redhead of twenty or so, peeked out from Roger’s bedroom with a sheet wrapped around her. She did not look like Roger’s steady mistress, Kathleen.
‘Darling? What is going on?’
Roger followed Rachel up the stairs, tightening the sash of his gown.
‘Listen, Rachel, this is not on, you can’t just barge in here—’
‘Your Watchers violated my privacy by listening to a call with my mother, so I am violating yours. You there,’ she said, giving the girl a sharp nod. ‘Get out. Government business.’
‘Viola, don’t listen to her, she is crazy. I am going to get rid of her!’
Rachel folded her arms. ‘Are you, Roger? I am only flesh and blood, after all. But I can tell you from experience that it is much harder to get ghost spies out of your house. They are worse than rats.’
She turned back to the redhead. ‘Viola, is it? If you are not on your way in two minutes, dear, you will find yourself under investigation by Special Branch for seducing a key government official—although it pains me to include Roger here in that category.’ She flashed her SIS identity card at the girl.
Viola’s eyes widened and she scrambled to gather up her clothes.
* * *
Roger whispered a hasty goodbye to Viola in the hallway, but the girl was in tears.
‘There was no need to do that,’ Roger said when she was gone.
Rachel studied the Nelson bust. It appeared to be a genuine antique.
‘Oh, I think there was.’
‘What do you want?’
‘I want to know why you are having me Watched. I want to know which Court you really work for.’ She sat down on the couch. ‘And while you are at it, I would not mind some tea.’
‘I have questions for you, too, Rachel.’ Roger stifled a cough and folded his arms. ‘What were you doing in St Albans yesterday evening? And what about all those meetings with Peter Bloom? The phone calls to Max Chevalier?’
A headache thundered in Rachel’s skull. She should have been more careful.
‘Would you believe that Max and I discuss the care and breeding of Gouldian finches?’ she said.
‘No, I’m afraid not.’
‘He does know an awful lot about them. Tell me, Roger, who do you work for in the Summer Court? Who gave you access to the Watchers?’
Roger studied her and narrowed his eyes. ‘Symonds,’ he said. ‘I know you are running an off-the-books operation, Rachel. I want in.’
‘Why should I let you?’
‘Because otherwise I will go to Sir Stewart with what I have, and that will be the end of what remains of your career in the Service.’
‘Symonds,’ Rachel said. ‘Well, that is just dandy.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Bloom is the mole. Symonds is his best friend, and is probably trying to protect him. Or Symonds could be compromised as well. How do you know you are not actually working for the Soviets?’
‘That’s ridiculous.’
‘How has getting evidence on Bloom been working out so far?’
‘God, I need a drink,’ Roger said. He opened a cupboard in his small kitchen and took out a bottle of single malt.
‘Two fingers, please.’
Roger poured and handed her a glass. She swirled the amber liquid back and forth and took a sip. Flavours of honey and pecan blossomed in her mouth and made her head buzz. She would almost certainly have a hangover in the morning, drinking this on top of all that gin in St Albans. Maybe there was a correlation between her hangovers and Bloom, she thought.
‘What do you have on Bloom?’ Roger asked.
‘So far, nothing. Everything he’s done with me could be just like what Symonds has been doing with you—grooming an unofficial source inside the Winter Court. But earlier this week he asked me for some confidential files. Those could serve as a barium meal. I got the files from St Albans and went over them. I think we can safely use them: most of them are in cipher. If we are quick enough, he won’t be able to crack them before we have him.’
‘This is very dangerous, Rachel.’
‘Of course it is. But if we catch Bloom in a meeting with his handlers, he’s ours.’
Roger paced back and forth. ‘I don’t think I can bring the Summer Court Watchers into this. Do you have any assets on the Other Side?’
‘That is what Mr Chevalier is for.’
Roger sat down across from Rachel. There was a glass table between them and their reflections ghosted on its surface. He looked tired and worn out. There were lines around his mouth, dark bags under his eyes. She was an indistinct, blurry shape on the shiny surface, her face a pale oval in the darkness of her coat.
‘All right,’ he said at last. ‘We do it together. I run interference on the Summer Court side and help with the collar. The story is that we’ve been doing this together from the start and fully share the credit.’
‘Deal,’ Rachel said and emptied her glass. ‘I hope you enjoy the Summer Court, Roger. Although from what I hear, pretty secretaries are harder to come by there. And certainly less substantial. If that is possible.’
Neither of them spoke for a while.
‘Why are you so angry with me, Rachel?’ Roger finally said.
This is not for England, Rachel thought. It is for Joe.
She got up and walked over to him. Delicately, she touched his face, ran her fingers down his unshaven jawline, past the dour corners of his mouth.
‘Because you make me feel guilty,’ she said and set her glass down on the table. ‘And, believe it or not, right now that is exactly what I need.’
Peter Bloom spent the day following his meeting with Rachel in nervous anticipation.
He rode out the long hours at work on autopilot, working on the post-mortem of the Dzhugashvili operation and attending briefings given by Hill. The Summer Court was preparing for wartime footing, and Royal Aetheric Force officers in their geometric armour were a frequent sight in the corridors.
He ran into Noel and told him about his Blenheim visit, and how he had discreetly mentioned the Old Library route to a few eager undergraduates visiting from Cambridge. They shared a nice laugh over that.
He found it difficult to rest, and whenever he tried to settle into the meditative state that replaced sleep in Summerland, the aether in the room began to boil and twist, a miniature nightmare storm that only subsided when he went out and thought-travelled to the borders of the city and back, exhausting his vim and willpower until deep, dreamless oblivion claimed him.
* * *
The next morning, a messenger spirit left an ectomail from Rachel White on his desk, with an ectophone beacon code and a contact time. Two hours later, Peter visualised the four-dimensional combination of polygons and colours in his mind and thought-travelled to it right from his desk, sparing no vim. The aether blurred into thick liquid and carried him to the glowing shape of the ectophone circuit.
Rachel was alone. Her thought-forms were calm and smooth and blue, although the edges of her self were strangely blurred. He touched the ringtone wire in the circuit, like plucking the taut cord of a harp, and after a moment, Rachel’s voice was there in the vibrations of the aether.
‘Peter? My apologies if the line is bad. This is our old ectophone at home. The only advantage is that the tubes get so hot you can actually warm up next to it in the winter.’
There was an echo on the line. Her tone was light. Peter was surprised by how much he had been looking forward to hearing her voice, and he told her so.