The room had been freshly painted, and he liked its simplicity, the way it said, I am a place of detention, not to be imprinted with the personalities of my occupants.
‘We can’t even get a name out of him,’ he heard someone say.
‘Never mind that. We’ve checked the stuff in his wallet. He’s quite an important fish, as it happens. Something in the Home Office. Somebody’s coming from there to pick him up.’
‘What? At this time of night? He must be important.’
The officers seemed like humanoids made out of nuts and bolts, creaking their way toward the dawn like tired old machines. The station itself was run like a garage. Who would fetch him, Mowbray or Denniston? Had he blown another case? He supposed he had. But why should a bunch of terrorists need a groundskeeper, and why did a groundskeeper let his garden go to weeds?
‘Do you want a cup of tea or something?’
‘Yes, please. Milk and no sugar.’
The young constable had become less frosty upon hearing that Miles was such an ‘important fish.’ The tea was placed before him, a spoon sliding against the rim of the mug. Old stains mottled the circumference, as if the machine that washed the crockery was running down.
‘All right, sir?’ This was a detective, suited and with rather an awkward brown and green tie hanging limply around his neck. He seated himself opposite Miles, spreading sheets of paper before him, paperwork to be checked and filed.
‘You don’t pay your parking fines very often, do you, sir? But then you don’t need to. It’s better than diplomatic immunity what you buggers have got.’
‘I specifically asked for sugar in my tea,’ Miles said calmly. ‘This tea doesn’t have sugar in it.’
‘Constable, fetch our guest here another cup of tea, will you?’
‘But sir, he didn’t—’
‘Just do it, laddie.’
Peeved, the constable picked up the mug and left, much to Miles’s satisfaction. He studied the detective now.
‘Are you Scottish, officer?’
The detective nodded, lighting a cigarette for himself and offering one to Miles, which, after debate, he declined.
‘How did you know? I didn’t think I had much of an accent left.’
‘I’m sure you don’t. It was your use of the word “laddie.”’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘I’m Scottish myself. From the east coast.’
‘I’m from the west.’ The detective was growing edgy. The conversation was slipping away from professional matters. He shuffled his papers together and cleared his throat. ‘What were you doing in that garden?’
‘That’s classified,’ said Miles.
There was nothing for him to fear, nothing save the grilling he would receive from his own people. But he could invent excuses enough for the purpose. He had seen something suspicious, and, having no contact with base, had decided to move in closer. Arrested by mistake. It had happened to watchmen before.
‘Classified?’
‘Under a Home Office directive.’ But of course they knew who he was anyway: it’s better than diplomatic immunity what you buggers have got.
‘I see,’ said the detective.
‘There’s a phone number I can write down. You could pass it to Special Branch.’
The detective nodded, seeming bored all of a sudden. He shuffled his papers again. They were playing a little game now, weren’t they, a waiting game, of no consequence.
Just then the door opened. There was someone outside. The detective seemed relieved, smiling at Miles as he left the room. The door closed again and Miles was alone with himself. He felt mildly drunk, as though coming out of a heavy session. He knew that he had messed things up. Something had snapped inside him in that empty house. He had become feral.
He had slipped up.
Again.
It was not lost on him that this might be just what the old boy needed in order, politely of course, to get rid of him. He was becoming a thorn in the old boy’s side, and a public one at that.
The door opened again. Billy Monmouth was standing in the doorway.
‘Come on, Miles,’ he said matter-of-factly. ‘Let’s go.’
Fifteen
It was one of the firm’s cars, another Rover, or perhaps the same one that had taken Jeff Phillips and him to the Doric. Billy seemed preoccupied with the perils of night driving in London. Unmarked police cars jockeyed for position in outside and inside lanes, trying to intuit the villains and the drunks. Security bells rang out all around like old-fashioned alarm clocks.
‘There’s been another bombing,’ said Billy finally.
‘Oh? Where?’
‘In an underground car park. We think they were trying to hit a knight of the realm.’
‘I see. I didn’t get you out of bed, did I?’
‘I was in the office when the message came through. I asked to be the fetcher.’
‘Why?’
‘I’m not sure now. It seemed like predestination.’ He laughed a quick, haunted laugh, a reconnaissance into the no-man’s-land between them. ‘How are you, Miles?’
‘Oh, I’m fine, just dandy, thank you for asking.’
‘Sheila and I haven’t met, you know, not since... Well, it’s all over. But listen, Miles, nothing happened between us. All she wanted was someone who would listen to her. I was the listener. That was all. Oh, I daresay that in time we might have...’ Seeing the look on Miles’s face, Billy shut his mouth. Miles had noticed that his speech was a bit stiff, as though the blow from the exhibition catalog had done some lasting damage.
‘But you told her?’
‘I telephoned. Cowardly, don’t you think? I telephoned that night and told her.’
All she wanted was a listener. Sure, but why Billy Monmouth?
‘We’re going to a small hotel near King’s Cross,’ Billy said at last.
‘I think I know the one,’ said Miles. ‘For debriefing?’
‘It’s routine in cases of arrest or identification. Do you want to tell me what happened?’
‘Do you want to tell me what happened?’ asked Miles, sensing Billy flinch from the question. A palpable hit.
‘Miles, what do you want me to say?’
‘I don’t know. What do you want me to say?’
‘For Christ’s sake, Miles!’
A car flashed past them, pursued by a brilliant orange and white police car, its blue flashing light reminding Miles of the garden and the soft voices of the policemen coming to him from far away.
He had experienced a short, sharp night of the soul, but he had come out of the other side in one piece, hadn’t he? He did not want to drill a hole in Billy’s head, and he did not particularly want to hit him. He was torn between wanting to understand and wanting simply to put the whole thing behind him and make a ‘new’ start.
‘Who’ll be debriefing me?’
‘I’ve no idea. It may even be wonder boy Phillips.’
‘I thought he was Cynegetics?’
‘The title covers a multitude of sins.’
The car turned into Bloomsbury. Office cleaners were waiting to gain entry to their buildings, and a few scattered souls had begun to queue at bus stops. Another dawn, another dolor. The sky was gray like a dead face, the city’s flesh caught in its final posture.
‘There hasn’t been much happening,’ Billy said. He was parking the car outside the same hotel in which Miles, Partridge, and the old boy had taken tea, and in which Miles had encountered Felicity. Ah, he had forgotten about her, forgotten, too, that she had confirmed his suspicions about Latchkey. He had to remember that. He had to. It seemed curious, though, that she should be allowed to operate in one of the firm’s hotels. They were usually so circumspect about things like that...