The Knives (35 page)

‘Obviously the point of having an Independent Inspector is that he will shed light where there has been darkness. Where there are problems it is better we know about them … We are charged with serious duties, things do go wrong but there must be accountability …’

‘And where, in your view, does the buck stop?’

Phyllida glanced at Blaylock. He felt only irritation now.
Go on, strike the fucking blow, it’s what you’ve waited for.

Tallis re-entered the room with the clerk, who approached Hawley just as Tallis went to Blaylock’s side, there to whisper hotly in his ear. ‘David, a police officer’s been killed.’

Hawley was nodding gravely. He snapped his folder shut.

Out in the corridor he walked abreast with Phyllida, since they would share a car back to Shovell Street. Once they were together as two in the lift to ground, he addressed her without looking at her.

‘Whenever this business is done – whichever way it falls out – it’s clear, isn’t it? One of us must go.’

‘Yes. For once we are in complete agreement.’

‘You agree, if, by whatever miracle, I’m still here next week – then you would need some very compelling reason to be here too?’

‘It would be impossible for me to continue, given my opinion of you.’

Nodding, he invited her to exit the lift first.

He reached Shovell Street to be told the havoc was over, the damage done, for Billy Darrow, too, was dead, his body en route by emergency ambulance under police escort to University Hospital
North Tees. It was all now just a reckoning of the cost of the rampage.

Blaylock listened gravely to the account of what he had missed. Darrow had gone to the gated rural home of an ex-boss of his, a building contractor, but found him not at home. Police Constable Christopher Tweddle had then arrived at the scene in response to radio reports. Unarmed, he had been shot fatally by Darrow through the windscreen of his vehicle. Darrow again fled but shortly thereafter an armed response vehicle was on his tail, whereupon he dumped his car and went on foot into woodland, carrying his shotgun. The police formed a hasty cordon, got marksmen into position, and made forlorn shouted efforts at dialogue with Darrow before he put the shotgun barrel in his mouth and fired.

The BBC’s anoraked live reporter stood summarising on Blaylock’s office screen.
‘I’m sure the officers are relieved it’s over, the whole community will be. But the deep sadness, the tragedy that innocent people have died and a police officer has fallen … And the questions will begin – how could this have happened and could it have been avoided?’

Blaylock sat at his desk, paralysed. In a moment he would get on to the Chief Constable, offer his condolences, thank him and ask him to thank his men. His conscience sat uneasy. But he was already resolving to think no more of it, never to speak of it – otherwise he would never hear the end of it, it would surely be the end of him, after so many thwarted attempts. Still, the idea that anything in his own livelihood was truly ‘at stake’ now felt accusingly emptied of meaning.

‘Well,’ Lord Orchard offered with a heavy, practised sigh, ‘I am the devil on your shoulder but tomorrow you will be off the front page.’

Such were the manners Blaylock expected from his old associate as they passed around the chutneys and sipped their lagers with a near-ceremonial solemnity. They had both been of the view
that Andy Grieve should sit and eat with them, but Andy was tucking in like one who only ever permitted himself ten minutes to pack away a feed.

‘What if I’m back on the front pages come Friday?’

‘No matter how big the fuss, it is forgotten as soon as the public move on. Usually within a week. You’ve had a bad, what, three days?’

‘I’m still getting hammered. And I can’t change the channel.’

‘I know, it’s like the weather, isn’t it? You have the PM’s support?’

‘Who knows? I’m supposed to go to his place on Sunday, I still don’t know if I’m welcome.’

‘I agree if it dragged into the weekend … you may need to think hard.’

‘If I could just – get my hands on the leaker. Draw a line. Stop the flow. But I don’t know who it is that’s bleeding me.’

‘You’ve really got no useful intelligence?’

‘All I can think is I just haven’t ever made enough friends.’

‘Don’t rule out the possibility that people you thought were your friends became disaffected. People you didn’t give enough hugs to. Or people you may have hugged too close, when they were never really with you?’ Orchard set down his lager with a look of hangdog emphasis. ‘Could it be your mistake was of that larger order?’

He lay on top of his bed and watched Billy Darrow’s life unpicked on the nightly news: his form for assault, the alienation of his former friends, the gun licence he held on account of his ten-year membership of a rifle and pistol club. A member of the public told the BBC’s man in an anorak that she had been nearby when the police were bawling for him to drop his gun, and she had heard ‘animal-like’ wails. The tragedy, Blaylock knew, was going to be turned over and wrung endlessly.

At 10.37 Mark called, sounding almost medicated in his heaviness.

‘They’ve got emails of yours,
patrón.
Emails that I typed, obviously. The ones where you, I, we, say that you’re afraid of negative media coverage. The public shouldn’t know about this, it’ll be “open season” on the Home Office …’

Blaylock no longer knew what to think. Overhearing his name on the television he turned the sound back up.

‘… and the Home Secretary did make clear in a statement that gun licence laws will be looked at in light of this but that he didn’t think the arming of police needed review. Now, how long this will be David Blaylock’s concern …?’

‘Indeed, Tom, what’s the latest, will he go?’

‘Nick, one backbencher told me tonight that he is
amazed 
David Blaylock is still there. There are three reasons I think he
may
stay. He seems – I stress “seems” – still to have the Prime Minister’s support. Two, as bad as things look at the Home Office right now, some will say he needs to stay to sort the mess out. And, three, the Home Secretary himself is known to be a fairly robust character. However, I just wonder – it may be that David Blaylock himself, reflecting on the pressure he’s facing, which tonight shows no sign of abating – he himself may decide that the right course is to walk.’

The crispness of the morning and its lukewarm sun made plain the turn of autumn into winter: Blaylock skidded on the frost-coated pavement on his way into Downing Street by the back entrance. He found Vaughan awaiting him in the Cabinet Room, and kept his coat on.

‘I’ve not stopped feeling concerned that my continuing in this job has gotten to be a distraction from the government’s work. I remain willing to see it through, but if you feel I should leave …’

Vaughan was either deeply thoughtful or giving his politician’s impersonation of thoughtfulness. He stood up, went to the window, pondered the cluster of hardy red roses.

‘No Prime Minister wants to lose a Home Secretary. People told me I should have had a more pragmatic sort in the job. But I’ve had cause to be glad of your … grit. The trouble now – part of it, anyway – is that you don’t quite seem yourself to me, David.’

Blaylock considered this. ‘I have … yeah … felt the strain.’

Vaughan returned to sit by him. ‘Look, we want the same thing. And I believe it’s what the public want. Properly enforced borders. Proper vigilance. Deporting every illegal who’s deportable. Right?’

‘If we call ourselves a nation, yes.’

‘If you stay, do you believe you can turn things round?’

‘Can we power through some great revamp of immigration systems? No, Patrick. We’ve not got the resources. The costs are too high – for the times we’re in, anyway.’

‘We have no other.’ Vaughan smiled slightly. ‘So, can we call it the devil’s share? Do some other things that are a bit cheaper but still effective? By legislation?’

‘We can make it harder for immigrants to get a job, rent a flat … We can make Britain seem a grimmer place to live, sure, yeah. Arguably, over time, you’ll see a deterrent to people coming here. What Caroline and Jason feel about that, of course … And then, ID cards … not cheap, but I do believe they will help.’

‘Okay. If you still believe you can win that argument, fine. If you think you can’t, maybe we should cut our losses.’

The Captain stood again, evidently finished with this particular piece of captaincy. ‘You need a hard think. You need the fight back in you – the old David, eh? Otherwise it’s pointless. I’ll give you two hours. I have to make a statement to the House at 11.30 about the awful business in Durham. If you’re ready to fight on then I need you to have given me the nod before then, okay?’

He repaired to his office, sat at his desk, pushed aside a pile of the morning’s sorry press cuttings, and stared sightlessly at Geraldine’s trusty A4 page of engagements by his muted computer. He contemplated the impotence of backbench life; and what Thornfield would think of him as ‘just’ their MP. He wondered, for what seemed to him the first time since the army, what he ought to be doing with his life. The sense of emptiness amazed him.

He plucked a sheet of letterhead from a sheaf in a tray, took up a pen, and mentally rehearsed an opening gambit – ‘
Dear Prime Minister: It has been my privilege to serve
…’ – then set down the pen again, oppressed by the moment and all that would follow if he simply succumbed to it.

The top of the cuttings pile caught his eye – another
Correspondent
sidebar to his woes, for which they had dug up some more of his private and personal failings. If one rat had made trouble for him initially, more of them, clearly, had followed in its stead.

He had to laugh at the sheer dullard pettiness – as if he were at it all the time. Wasn’t a man permitted a sewer-level gag at certain low moments, among friends who knew him better? He could remember perfectly well the trifling instances that some humourless berk had seen fit to make a song and dance about.

It was then he felt the curious childlike sensation of a puzzle solved silently in his head. It was almost elating.

‘I’ve got him,’ he said aloud, feeling himself suddenly flooded by the charged possibilities of deceit and connivance, a state in which he took up the pen again and absently etched ‘FUCK YOU’ in big neat blocky capitals across the letterhead page.

Suppressing a chuckle, his brain now fully a-whirr, he folded the sheet of foolscap into a Conqueror envelope, then dialled the nearby Hilton and reserved a room, and then called Abigail Hassall, who answered with an exquisite wariness.

‘Listen, I saw the Prime Minister this morning.’

‘So … I hear. You were snapped leaving by the back onto Horse Guards Street.’

‘Of course. He’s going to make a statement later this morning. I’d like to talk to someone first. Someone I can talk straight to. Tell my side. All things considered I’d prefer it to be you. If you can keep a secret.’

‘
Gosh
…’ She went silent, her instinctive caution clearly not so easily bought off.

‘Bring your tape recorder, eh?’

She duly placed her recording device on the low glass table between them and smiled wanly. ‘Okay, so we agree you won’t
have me shot for this?’

He merely tossed the Conqueror envelope onto the table beside the digital recorder.

‘That is …?’

‘This morning the PM and I agreed I ought to write a letter. That’s what I wrote.’

‘You’ve resigned?’

‘I am resigned – to my fate.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘I can’t really blame you, you understand. But you must have known it was coming. It was the point of the whole pursuit, right? For your paper?’

She shrugged. ‘Maybe I’m still a bit green on these things. Obviously I was kind of hoping you would, y’know … muddle through.’

‘Within the department, the atmosphere is …’ He shook his head. ‘I know now how many bitter enemies I’ve got. The leak was so calculated. At least I figured it out. Who the leaker is?’

Abby twitched slightly, though her eyes invited him to continue.

‘My Security Minister, Paul Payne? Ever since he got that job he’s been totally brazen about his disagreements with me. Over this whole crisis he’s been open about wanting me out. Maybe I’ve earned it, but … the way he’s gone about it has been bang out of order. And I’ll be telling him that to his face before today’s done, quite forcibly, I expect. So there’s another story for you, okay?’

Abby winced. ‘David. It wasn’t that guy. Don’t waste your time.’

‘You know better?’

‘Yeah. I do.’ Her eyes flicked downward. ‘It was Ben, your special advisor.’

‘You what …?’ Privately Blaylock had expected some grim satisfaction, yet to hear it now confirmed was to feel there were worse things than heartbreak. ‘You’re sure? I thought it wasn’t your story?’

‘It wasn’t but … I guess I helped it to happen. Back when I wrote that profile of you? I’d asked around, and I got introduced to Ben. He was an interesting guy, clearly conscience-stricken. He said the smartest things out of everyone, I thought. Then, later, he got in touch with me, said he’d just … oh, got disillusioned with you, the more he knew you? He didn’t know about you and me … and I didn’t want to be in that position, but I agreed to make the connection for him, to a colleague.’

Blaylock studied her composure, finding at long last that he disliked her deeply. ‘He wasn’t the only one disillusioned? It seems like I don’t inspire much loyalty …’

She sighed. ‘I had to be objective. It was a story … Look, a spark is a spark, David. I was very drawn to you, at the start. You were definitely different. Hard to get, my god. Most men in your position, even the worst nerds, they do rather take it as their due that women find them irresistible. I had thought about you, a lot. I wanted to know what you were like.’

‘But you didn’t like what you found?’

‘Oh … some of it was just having to watch you going about all the petty deceits of politics … But, look, you can be, I have to say, pretty disagreeable. Being with you in a real way is – a challenge. I sort of imagined myself up in Teesside every weekend, being shouted at. Made me wonder how it was for your wife. Forgive me if that’s … too far?’

‘It’s alright, Abigail. You’re entitled to your opinion.’

She leaned back assuredly in the low sofa. ‘See, the anthropologist in me – I’ve never believed humans are innately aggressive, it’s socially learned, I’m sure of it. I think aggression is mainly a predictable reaction to frustration. What’s problematic is if it never brings any catharsis … You’re a damaged person, I think, David.’

‘Aren’t we all?’ It sounded a lame riposte to him, but unimportant, as he was now simply playing with time, despite the ticking
clock. Perhaps she was right. And if he had given her insufficient room to talk when they were together, she was extracting some recompense now.

‘The fact your father died when you were young … I’ve had a few thoughts about that. Do you want to talk about it?’

This much he rated unacceptable, but he feigned a chuckle. ‘I intend to, one day soon. But, that’s another engagement.’ He stood up, offered his hand. All her wariness resurfaced instantly.

‘Where are you going?’

‘Back to work. Much to do. People to see.’

His trap was sprung, and he had clearly succeeding in stunning her, though it felt to him now like a small-time move.

‘What about your letter?’

‘Just one more petty deceit, Abigail. No, the letter’s for you.’

He noted her perplexity with minor satisfaction, then turned and made for the door.

From the Shovell Street atrium he took the stairs, not the lift, and as he hurdled two at a time he felt his breathing grow irregular but his body get set for confrontation, adrenalin coursing.

On Level Three he strode past the offices, past some curious looks, to the open plan area where Deborah sat with her hand on her brow, espresso by her side. She, too, beheld him with some surprise.

‘Where’s Ben?’

‘Uh, he went to one of the work pods?’

Blaylock spun and strode off around the central lifts to the long side aisle where the pods were lined up. He could feel his fists, indeed his whole person, clench and unclench.
Keep a lid on
, he muttered to himself.

The first two pods were occupied by studious seated females. The third stood empty, door wide, to Blaylock’s massive frustration – and then he saw Ben come round the other side of the lifts
from the kitchen, bearing his pint mug of tea. Blaylock advanced and saw alarm spike in Ben’s eyes, the spad setting his mug aside as if to protect it.

Blaylock jerked a thumb at the empty pod. ‘In there, now.’

Ben stood his ground and raised a pacifying hand that Blaylock found incensing. ‘Take it easy, David, alright? Let’s—’

He grabbed Ben by both lapels and swung him about and through the pod door, advanced and shoved him against the black inner wall of the pod, then pulled the door behind them with a shuddering slam. Turning in the tight space he saw Ben was chewing his lip, breathing hard, clearly frightened. Blaylock cautioned himself to get a grip.

‘You’ve gotta calm down, okay?’ Ben ventured.

‘Aye, sure, first you tell me this. Why did you do it? Eh? Tell me. Why’d you go and do this pointless fucking thing?’

‘Not pointless. There was a point. I’d had enough.’

‘Enough of what, Ben? What?’

‘Of just doing the easiest fucking thing and talking tough about it, and dodging out of the consequences when it went wrong. Kidding yourself everybody else is incompetent … It’s just a job to you, David, but people’s
lives
are affected, man.’

‘You think I don’t know that? Who d’you think you’re
talking
to?’

‘I don’t know. Really, I don’t. Not a clue who you are any more. I just know what goes on here isn’t good enough and I was sick of being part of it.’

‘Sick of working for me? Why didn’t you fuck off somewhere else then? Was it because I’m your
patrón
? No one else would have you? Or did you get a bit soft on Abby Hassall? Don’t be bashful, bonny lad, so did I. How bad is my judgement of people, eh?’

Blaylock felt calmer now by degrees, the confrontation done, as he saw it – though Ben, as if emboldened, stared back at him hotly.

‘Nothing more to say for yourself, Judas? You could try “Sorry”. Eh? How about that?’

‘No one gave us thirty bits of silver, David. I never got
nowt
. That’s not what it was about. It’s about how much goes on round here is bullshit. You think you’re some sort of reformer, you don’t change a
thing
—’

‘Alright, that’ll do,’ Blaylock snapped. ‘Howay with me to see Phyllida and let’s get this done.’

Ben didn’t move. Blaylock seized his arm.

‘Don’t put your hand on me or I’ll make a proper complaint.’

Blaylock studied his erstwhile protégé with real scorn. ‘Oh, now that would be a
good
one, son.’

He swung open Phyllida’s office door, to her clear consternation, and bade Ben enter.

‘Right, Phyllida, you can call off the master spies, Ben here is our leaker, he’s freely admitted it. No need for the police. Just a straight sacking, gross professional misconduct.’

He left them to it and strode round to the open plan area where Deborah and Mark, having stood in stunned conference, now peered at him somewhat aghast. He pulled a chair, sat down and looked straight back at them.

‘Then there were two.’

Mark looked about him, anxious. ‘
Patrón
, you know, in glass houses …’

‘Yeah yeah. Deborah, I need to speak to your pal Gavin Blount. I’ve a job for him.’

Blaylock reached the Commons Chamber by 11.27, just in time to take his seat on the frontbench between Caroline Tennant and Dominic Moorhouse, who moved aside smartly as he bore down. The Captain glanced up from his notes in respect of Police Constable Tweddle, saw Blaylock and raised his eyebrows over the top of his reading glasses, an enquiry Blaylock answered with a nod.