The Madness of July (44 page)

‘Maria?’ said Paul. ‘She keeps popping up. We must meet.’ He managed a laugh.

‘It’s beautiful.’ Flemyng was powering on, his eyes closing as he laid it out, piece by piece. ‘And Manson threatened to wreck it. Maria knew he was going a little nuts and understood far too much. She was terrified about him blurting out to Ruskin – or me, or Forbes or Brieve or anybody – that Bendo was being used to send us off in a hundred different directions, a conduit for disinformation. Their hold on us would be broken; we’d have held out to keep our super-source to ourselves.Difficult for her, far worse than our embarrassment in admitting what we did with Bendo in the first place. That was the worry. She didn’t care about a randy ambassador. Who does? It wouldn’t be the first time.

‘That’s why Manson was so dangerous with his loose tongue. He could have made us all look stupid, and screwed up the American plan. Politics would have gone haywire – here, in Berlin and Bonn, in Washington, other places where we have to be careful with the Yanks. Not out there’ – a wave to the street – ‘but where it matters.’

Paul sat swirling a glass of claret.

‘Do we tell Abel that we know?’ he said. Practical to the end.

Flemyng sat down beside him and picked up his own glass. ‘Leave that to me. The answer is no, for now. There’s no advantage to it. The deal goes ahead because there is no way back now, the letter is read and approved in Washington, the channel to our source is opened up. Bendo disappears. What’s done is done.

‘Nothing will look different, although everything will change.’

He timed it perfectly, taking a long sip of wine, allowing a few seconds to pass, and resuming with gusto to lighten the atmosphere.

‘And change for us too,’ he said, smiling, eyes searching for confirmation that Paul might already be there. He was happy to do this together.

Paul put both hands on the table, and leaned forward. Flemyng was certain now that he knew, and shared the tingle of expectancy that had returned. Journey’s end.

‘You realize, don’t you, that there is a big prize in this for us, despite everything?’ Flemyng said. ‘I was slow. It only came to me when I was with Abel this afternoon. He said he would be leaving something behind.’

Paul waited, allowing him the honour of moving the last piece on the board, getting them home.

Flemyng picked up. ‘We both know that there was a moment when this whole business turned inside out. Someone came to your office and told you about the rape accusation. We put it together with Manson, knew why he’d come to London and – maybe – why he was killed. You and I both understood then that in the middle of this puzzle was raw emotion. Manson’s and someone else’s. Not politics. Pure passion.

‘Everything flowed from that visitor’s message, and it’s why we’re here now. The word was passed on, but I think it contained a second warning that we were meant to work out for ourselves, of which the messenger had to be unaware, because it touched on him and his role in our lives. What he’s been up to. We’d understand who had sent him, and what it implied about their relationship – know why he was chosen for the task and what it revealed about him. That second message was, I think, even more important than the first.

‘Who?’ Flemyng said.

Paul was smiling. ‘When we spoke about my visitor at the time, I said “a colleague”, didn’t I?’

‘You certainly did.’

‘Can you guess?’

‘Forbes.’

Their eyes locked. A few beats of silence followed.

Paul made a gesture of acquiescence. ‘After he told me his story, I drew my own conclusion about his source, knowing that Abel was in town and might want to get information to us, somehow, and without using you because that’s off limits. Forbes told me that he had been passed the story deliberately; it was no casual discovery, something overheard. He stopped short, for once, of boasting about his sources. You and I can see why. He didn’t know who Manson was, nor that he was in London, let alone that he was dead, so he couldn’t know the significance of the story and its danger for him – what it would tell us about him and his connections, what he’s been doing, maybe for a long time. Who he’s worked for. His loyalties, if I can put it like that. And I assume he still doesn’t know, which is important.’

Flemyng said, ‘The other part he doesn’t know is just as important. Abel and me. We’ll keep it like that, shall we?’

Paul smiled. ‘You can be sure of that from my end. You know, I think he’s the first… of his kind… that we’ve been able to nail properly. Rumours a few years ago about someone – not far from your office – but nothing solid. Plenty of small stuff from time to time, loose talk, lots of people a little too free and easy with sensitive stuff when they’re in Washington. But Forbes tilts the scales in a big way. We’re lucky, I suppose, though it’s going to be hell to handle.

‘You told me, Will, that you’d picked up hints of a security panic. I knew nothing of it. But after Forbes came to see me, I talked to your old friends. Sure enough, there had been talk. It’s very tight, they’ve kept this one to themselves, but they’ve had an eye on him for a little time, feeding things and waiting for them to be regurgitated in Washington. A black entertainment.

‘But they had no proof. Until now.’

Flemyng could see Sam in his mind’s eye, the friend who’d wanted to warn him, his arms flying and his story speeding up. A minister… an alarm… surveillance. Except that it wasn’t the bastard Flemyng, but the bastard Forbes. He smiled and thought of Abel and Maria, their decision, their offering.

‘Let’s call it a brother’s gift,’ he said, and, because they had to set the seal on it somehow, they shook hands in a solid grip. ‘We can deal with him, now that it’s over. Ruin, but no one will know why. I think we know that it was from him they learned about our source in Germany, maybe Bendo too. And after that, his work was done.’ Paul shook his head.

‘A painful journey, and through a storm, but you can help. You’ve been here before.’

*

The six days in July were over. Together they spoke of days of freedom ahead, and Paul confessed his weariness. ‘We’ve both aged,’ he said. ‘Has this changed you?’

Flemyng tuned in to his more intimate tone. ‘No. Just confirmed me in my thoughts.’

Ruskin’s confession had hit Flemyng hard, made him review friendships and times of trust, and the tragedies of Ruskin and Forbes had forced him to walk again the boundary between loyalty and deceit that years ago he’d been trained to recognize and navigate. ‘Sounds strange, but I’m restored. A friend behaves badly, lets people down, threatens a colleague’s sanity, then he kills. There’s more betrayal, and I feel the flames burning at my feet. But it’s the life I’ve chosen, and for good. Maybe I’ve thought all this inevitable, and I feel justified in seeing it all played out.’

After a moment or two, Paul said, very quietly, ‘I know.’ Then his voice rose. ‘I think I should tell you this. Mungo rang me yesterday, and he’s never done that before. He’s been worried about you. I said you needed this life. He said he’s come to understand that, and I think he wanted reassurance that he was right. So he got it.’

Flemyng’s head was down, and his words to Paul were spoken softly, as if he were alone. ‘I love the life, want the wheel to keep turning. The price is too high, but I know I’ll always pay it. I just have to accept that with the good there’s a touch of the terrible. Madness, too, and nearer the surface than we think. That’s the truth I’ve learned.’

His hands were locked together. ‘I can tell the wild emotions are there, almost feel them.’

‘And Abel?’ said Paul.

‘Balancing loyalties, of which I’m one. But this business has given us energy and we’re closer. He feels alive. We know we’ve been keeping things back, and always will, but we can cope with that because it’s our choice from long ago. Trust and deceit, lifelong companions. I used to think I’d accepted that.’

He stood up, and Paul recognized his impulse to find a place to be alone. Excusing himself, Flemyng said he’d go outside for a few minutes. When he went down the steps he found it busy in the warm darkness, theatre crowds heading homeward and a string of orange lights stretching from nose to tail of a winding crocodile of taxis that filled the length of the street. He dodged the rattling traffic and took cover in the dog-leg of the cobbled lane that led to the opera house, where Francesca would be managing a post-performance party. On a quiet corner, half in shadow, he seemed a man apart. He was the only person standing still in the late-night flow, looking forward to a deeper darkness and the silence of the early hours. A passer-by felt a stab of recognition at his profile and nodded a friendly greeting. Flemyng raised an arm, but no words passed between them. On the opposite corner, a jumble of young men tumbled out of a pub, and he heard the bell behind the bar ringing for time. As Paul had known, he was searching for a place of solitude to think of friends – one dead, one facing the end of his career – and had found it in the anonymity of the street, where no one knew anything. An observer asked to describe Flemyng in these minutes, framed in the brick arch of a darkened doorway, would have noted that his head was up and his shoulders back. Confidence was coming back – there was strength in a moment of loneliness, even refreshment.

The consolation that he got from solitude had a physical effect. He recovered his balance in those few minutes, leaning back against the arch without the tautness that Abel had felt in his shoulders, crossing one foot over the other as if posing for a picture and showing off his ease. The night was a veil for the transformation that was required and that he had known would come, even as he prepared for the fall of his friends. His expression didn’t change, the dark clefts on his cheeks framing a serious face, and his eyes were down. But when he did stir from his seclusion his tread was decisive and his head was up.

When he retraced his steps and climbed the steps of the club, he saw Mungo crossing the hall to return to their private room. Catching up with him from behind, Flemyng placed a hand on his shoulder. ‘I’m sorry that this celebration has been touched by a tragedy.’ They paused at the door, and he whispered, ‘We’ll survive.’

Paul and Abel were sitting together, leaning back from the table, displaying relaxation at a melancholy moment. They were both smiling, and Flemyng saw that Paul had removed Ruskin’s letter, wiping away the bloodstain. Mungo exploited his status as outsider to officialdom and briefly assumed the role of host. ‘We’re going home tomorrow,’ he said, raising a glass. ‘To a new day.’

Paul joined the toast and then, standing up, prepared to leave for his office and the management of another death. ‘I’m afraid this one has to be horribly public,’ he said. ‘But easier, despite everything. No one out there will know why. They so seldom do.’

He raised both arms and dipped his head in a gesture of farewell, recovering his natural balance. ‘I must away.’ In the corner, he pulled tight the buckles on his briefcase, patted his pockets and looked over the table, taking in the scene at the moment of farewell.

Flemyng was standing to one side, against the wall. He was keeping his thoughts close, and remained apart. On his face there was a trace of relief that had been absent for days – some of the dark lines were softening now – and it was obvious to his brothers, watching him from the table, that he had recovered some of the physical confidence that had seemed to be threatened in the rush of events. But still, he decided for the moment to stand alone, and said nothing.

Abel rose, and he and Paul touched hands to say goodbye as if a pulse were being transmitted between them. ‘We kept the show on the road,’ Paul said, in a serious tone. ‘Thank you.’ Abel put out his hand, as a gesture to accept the compliment. Flemyng watched his eyes. They were warm, and understanding. As his brother turned, he caught Flemyng’s own look and smiled. Then he sat down, knowing it was not a time for words.

Paul turned away and the door clicked shut behind him. Abel moved to Mungo’s side and put an arm across his shoulder. Their glasses touched, and Mungo’s eyes glistened.

No sound disturbed the stillness of the moment. They kept silence in the half light, and treasured the quiet they had recovered at the end of the day.

Flemyng’s thoughts were far away, by the woods and the water. Tomorrow, at least, no more madness.

We hope you enjoyed this book.

Will Flemyng is back in James Naughtie’s next gripping book,
Paris Spring
, released in Spring 2015

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