She laughed at this.
‘I’ll hold you to that. You see if I don’t.’
‘It’ll be my pleasure.’
He was beginning to enjoy this little game, signaling as it did the end of his evening’s work. At the same time, however, Latchkey was taking a long time, considering that he had a friend waiting for him outside, and when the door of the gentlemen’s toilet opened and Latchkey’s dark suit, white shirt, and pale tie emerged, the man wearing them was not Latchkey.
Aghast, Miles recalled that a bearded businessman, a little the worse for drink, had entered the toilet before Latchkey, and that the same bearded businessman had emerged during his conversation with the girl. Something was very, very wrong, for it was that bearded businessman who now wore Latchkey’s clothes.
Miles rose to his feet a little shakily, the girl forgotten, and walked quickly from the bar. Phillips was seated in the foyer, flicking uninterestedly through a newspaper. When he saw the look on his superior’s face, he jumped to his feet.
‘What’s wrong?’
‘Everything. We’ve been sold a dummy. There was a bearded man, a bit drunk, gray suit, glasses. Did you see him leave?’ Miles felt queasy. It had been an old trick, fairly clumsy in execution. Nevertheless, it had caught him dead.
‘Yes, he left a couple of minutes ago, but he looked as sober as the proverbial judge to me.’
‘I’ll bet he did. It was Latchkey. And there’s a ringer in the bar just now wearing Latchkey’s clothes.’
‘Hook, line, and bloody sinker. Where would he be going?’
‘Well, you can bet he’s not off for a late-night fitting in Jermyn Street. Has someone taken the contact?’
‘He’s being tailed.’
‘Right, stay here and keep a tab on the one still in the bar. I’d better phone in with the happy news.’
‘OK. Anything else?’
‘Yes. Pray that nothing happens in London tonight. Not a bombing or a break-in or a single solitary mugging, because if it does, we’re all in trouble.’ He looked back toward the bar. ‘Double bloody trouble.’
As the whirligig of his thoughts slowed and began spinning in the right direction, Miles saw how perfectly everything had been underplayed by the Arab. His own error had been in under-estimating every single move. Would a younger man have done that? Probably. What he could not deny, however, was that his mind had been on other things throughout. He had been only half interested. And there was something else, something at the edge of his vision. What was it? It had something to do with the girl. Yes, she had approached just as Latchkey was disappearing into the toilet, and Latchkey had turned and, seeming to sum up the situation, smiled toward him. No, not toward him, directly at him. There could have been many reasons for that smile. The most obvious now was that Latchkey had known who Miles was. He had known.
And he hadn’t even bothered to hide the fact.
Three
All in all, thought the Israeli, it had been a successful if not an enjoyable evening. He did not enjoy mixing with people. They could be such treacherous animals, their claws hidden by smiles and bows, handshakes and pats on the back. A pat on the back usually heralded some conspiracy or other, one’s opponent touching one for luck. The alcohol had been very pleasant, however, and Nira had been there, flaunting her beauty as though she were a display case and it her precious diadem. Ah, but she would not believe that he could know such words as ‘diadem,’ or have such cultured thoughts. His outward appearance bespoke a large, earthy, and vaguely unpleasant appetite, and this had aided him in his life’s work, if not in love. He might be all things to all women, if only they would allow him the opportunity of pleasuring them. He knew the most intricate paths of delight, but to taste them alone was to taste nothing.
The taxi dropped him at the end of his street so that he could catch a few gulps of brisk night air before retiring. There had been talk tonight both during and after dinner which he should file in his memory before going to sleep, but it could wait until morning. Not an interesting night then, but successful insofar as he had met Nira again, and had spoken with her alone for a few moments, and had registered in the strongest terms his interest in her. She had been embarrassed, of course, and had walked away at the first possible and excusable moment, but it was done. He could afford to take his time over such a challenging seduction, when the prize would be so wondrously sweet.
He was fumbling for the bunch of keys in his trouser pocket when, staggering backwards, he began to choke, his tongue swelling to fill his throat, brain squeezed with blood. The professional within him knew in a final moment of lucidity that he did not have time to resist the wire that now melted through his neck. Spinning toward a blackening vertigo of spirit, he hoped instead for heaven and redemption.
The Arab, job done, did not even smile this time.
Sheila Flint rose early, not surprised to find that she had been sleeping alone. She found Miles still at his desk in the downstairs study, his head lying across folded arms. September sun, milk-warm, poured through the window. Sheila stood in the doorway, watching him sleep, his face puffy like that of a well-fed child, his breath quiet with stealth.
He had always been something of a mystery to her, even in sleep. She had been attracted to him in the beginning because his long silences and half-aware eyes had betokened some kind of inner calm and, even, genius. But he had quickly shown her another face, brawling with other students after drinking binges, fiercely jealous of her other friends. Well, he had changed over the years, had come to have a genius only for passivity, and for a decade and a half she had pretended to herself that she too liked the quiet life. Then she had set about educating herself in life, going to night classes, attending the cinema and the opera — alone, or with Moira, her clever, trustworthy, and only slightly too good-looking ally — and enrolling for Open University courses that kept her mind moving. Miles showed little interest. Nothing, it seemed, could push him back into his younger self. He was growing old, and oh God, she was growing old too.
She liked her job in the civil service, but hated London. To her continual surprise, it did not hate her back. It seemed to her a city without love or compromise, and she was forever finding examples of both to confound her feelings. The same ambivalence existed in her marriage. Despite a lack of real communication and, at times, even animosity, Miles and she had lasted longer than any of the other couples they had known, and they had a son who had grown into a normal, mistrustful, and unloving young man. People called theirs ‘the perfect marriage.’
Watching Miles now as a trickle of saliva left the corner of his mouth, she was reminded of Jack as a baby, spluttering food and monosyllables, tying her to him with chains of guilt and dependence. She remembered, too, that Jack was due home in the next week or two, gracing them with his presence for a few days until university term started.
On the wall above Miles’s desk was mounted the certificate from London Zoo reminding him that he was the adoptive parent of a dung beetle. Jack’s gift had infuriated her, for it showed that even he knew more about Miles than she did. Miles had been delighted with the present. So original, so unusual. I’m original, too, she had wanted to cry, as father and son had burrowed deep into each other’s embrace. I want to be part of your bloody little conspiracy. She had a mind, didn’t she? She had inspired ideas. Everyone at work came to her with their problems, thinking her a genius at lateral thinking. She would have liked to tell Miles this, to have him see her more clearly, but they never talked about work. Miles bloody Flint and his ‘internal security.’ She knew who he worked for; he worked for the Ministry of Euphemisms.