“Don’t what?” Lockhart’s face is as unreadable as a professional poker player’s.
I’m on my feet and leaning over his desk; I don’t remember standing, and I am so damn angry that I’m shaking: “You’re setting me up! You’re going to spin it as a rogue operation with no oversight and if anything goes wrong—”
“Calm down, Mr. Howard!”
I’m not sure quite what it is about his tone, but his words are like a bucket of cold water in my face.
“You are not being framed. Quite the opposite. Your role in this operation is to monitor and report on BASHFUL INCENDIARY’s officially unauthorized and unsanctioned activities; nothing more and nothing less. You will have…noticed…that at no point did I instruct BASHFUL INCENDIARY to act on our behalf. In fact I have no authority over her. What Ms. Hazard chooses to do next is entirely up to her. It is not impossible that she will decide to occupy herself with the Grand National and the Chelsea Flower Show instead. Or to emigrate to Brazil, or paint herself orange and join a Buddhist nunnery. The point is, she is not under our control. Not under yours or mine. You don’t have command authority; your job is to keep an eye on the external asset, not to direct it.”
“But”—I begin to slow down: the implications are sinking in—“with what she knows, what if she’s a threat?”
Lockhart looks at me grimly. “I think that is very unlikely, Mr. Howard, otherwise I would not have mentioned our little problem to her. However, in the hypothetical case that the loose cannon were to explode in our faces, your job would be to deal with the consequences as you see fit. If you happen to be one of the survivors.”
“I”—squeak—“survivors?” It wouldn’t be the first time an operation has blown up under me with fatal consequences, but I really hate the way this is shaping up, with Hazard carrying the detonator and me trailing along with bucket and spade. But Lockhart evidently misunderstands the nature of my reservations.
“This is not a game, Mr. Howard. Your new pay grade comes with strings attached; I am not referring to the management training. Further advancement as an officer within this service will put you in situations where you will be responsible for whether other people live or die—this is inevitable as we move closer to CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN. Worse: it is likely that you will encounter situations where you must choose who to save and who to cast adrift, answerable only to your oath of service and your conscience. I understand from your personnel file that you have been placed in situations where you have been required to use lethal force in self-defense. This is not the same.” He fixes me with a gimlet stare. “There is a huge difference between returning fire in personal self-defense and ordering an artillery strike on an inhabited civilian settlement suspected of harboring enemy forces. Do you understand?”
I sit down. My mouth is dry. Lockhart’s gaze is directed through me, almost as if he’s talking to a younger version of himself. Military background, I think. It’s his personal metaphor. Nightmare, whatever. Then I have a flashback of my own, to a buried temple: writhing bodies, hungry revenants in the surrounding darkness, a sacrifice of souls. “I’m afraid I do,” I say slowly. “Too bloody well.”
“Good.” His shoulders relax like an over-wound spring. “I trust that you were not suffering from the misconception that your promotion was directed towards a routine management role.”
“This doesn’t sound very routine to me.” As a joke, it falls flatter than a Brick Lane chapati.
The caterpillar twitches. “Ninety-eight percent of management work in this organization is routine. The other two percent is a tightrope walk over an erupting volcano without a safety net. Congratulations: here’s your balance pole.”
I lick my lips. “So what exactly am I managing?”
“Trouble.” Lockhart glances at his wristwatch. “Hmm. Well, I must be going—I have a meeting at four. I suggest you take the rest of the day off. Go home, check your go-bag, that kind of thing.” He looks at me again. “Make sure to wear a suit tomorrow.”
“What?” The phrase wear a suit does not fill me with joy.
“Be here tomorrow morning, nine thirty sharp. We’ll start by collecting your new passport. They’ll need to photograph you. Then we have a field trip.”
“New passport?”
“In all probability this operation will require you to travel outside the country.” Lockhart picks up the BASHFUL INCENDIARY file and bends over his office safe, putting his back between me and the keypad. “In which case you will need a passport with a diplomatic visa. In my experience, when pretending to be a diplomat working for the Foreign Office it usually helps to look the part.” He glances over his shoulder at me. “Well? What is it?”
I put my brain back in gear. “Where am I going?”
“Probably the United States, because that is where Schiller’s Golden Promise Ministries is headquartered—but in any event, wherever Ms. Hazard leads you. Remember: economy class on flights of less than six hours duration. Oh, and don’t forget to write.” He flicks his fingers at me. “Shoo.”
I shoo.
I AM IN THE BEDROOM PACKING MY GO-BAG WHEN MO GETS home.
There is a clattering from the front hall, then more noises from the kitchen—cupboard doors, the fridge, a dirty coffee mug rattling in the sink. Finally a loudly pitched question mark: “Bob?”
“Up here.” Five pairs of socks, six, or hit M&S for a new one-week pre-pack? I hear footsteps on the stairs.
“Who died?” she asks from the doorway.
“No one,” I say, straightening up. She’s seen the suit.
Actually, I own two suits these days. The other one is a black-tie job for formal bashes like the Institute of Chartered Demonologists’ annual ball. This one is my Reservoir Dogs Special. It does duty for all occasions that require a suit—court appearances, weddings, graduation ceremonies, funerals, and those situations when work absolutely requires something other than a tee shirt and jeans. It’s the kind of suit that is worn at arm’s length by a suit refusnik; the kind of suit that trails a screaming neon disclaimer overhead, saying: the occupant of this garment is clearly alive only because he wouldn’t be seen dead in one of these things; the kind of suit whose afterlife is destined to be spent surrounded by mothballs in a charity shop window display. I did not buy it willingly: when it became half past obvious that I needed one, Mo dragged me round the shops for seven solid hours until I finally surrendered.
“They’re sending you somewhere,” she says. “Diplomatic cover?”
“Er—”
Laundry employees are not supposed—in fact, not allowed—to discuss their work with civilians. But Mo is not a civilian. And (I don’t think Lockhart knows this) she and I have a special waiver to our binding geas to allow us to vent on one another’s shoulder. But this business with Raymond Schiller and BASHFUL INCENDIARY is a cut above the ordinary, and I’m not even sure she knows about Externalities and Lockhart’s little sideline.
While I’m vacillating over how much I can tell my wife, she works it all out for herself and nods, briskly: “Well, if they’re running you under FO cover they’ll want you to look like a junior FO staffer, and that won’t do. Let me see what you’ve got so far, then we can work out a shopping list to fill in the gaps.”
“A shopping—”
“Oh Bob.” She looks amused. “What do you think they pay me for?”
“Personal shopper?” It’s a bad joke; of course I know what they pay her for. Mo owns several suits, because part-time university lecturers are expected to look the part—and when she isn’t teaching, or researching, she’s traveling on business with one of the aforementioned diplomatic visas.