The Factory (12 page)

Not London, thought Bell: from the traitor within his own department. He said at once: ‘I'll book out now. Come back to London with you.'

‘No!' protested Ann desperately. She knew the reason for her lover being in the health farm and did not want him to abandon the self-imposed cure.

‘It's all right,' said Bell. ‘I've stopped. It's not a problem any more. I can't stay away from the office, not now this has happened.'

It was early evening before they got back to the Factory, where Bell at once launched an inquiry into the courier attack. Almost without thinking, as he worked, he poured himself a whisky from the bottle he kept in his desk.

It was snowing when Walker arrived in Zurich. Neither his suit nor his topcoat was sufficiently warm and Walker, who was a warm-weather man, began to shiver at once. The appointment had been arranged with authority from the Prime Minister's office, to enforce the written authority Walker already carried to persuade the Swiss banking authorities to relax their usually unbreachable secrecy regulations. The bank director, Henri Dupont, was small and very thin and moved in quick, sharp movements, like a bird. All the transactions over the Dixon account had been conducted by letter: the man had never personally visited the Zurich office. It had been opened a year and a half before, and deposits arrived by London-postmarked mail every three months, always cash. A deposit had been expected the previous week but it had not arrived. The bank suspected it was because of the sensation that had been caused by the newspaper revelation of the account's existence. Part of the bank's strictly maintained security was limiting the number of people handling each account, which made it easy to investigate the possibility of a leak. Only three people dealt with Robert Dixon's affairs: each had been thoroughly interrogated and the denials of each that they had leaked the bank statement had been accepted by the bank authorities. Walker was allowed to question all three, as well, and he concluded by believing them too.

‘How were the statements sent to Dixon in London?' Walker asked the bank director.

‘They weren't, not to London,' corrected Dupont. ‘Our instructions were to send them to a post office box number, here in Zurich.'

‘Here!' exclaimed Walker. ‘Is that usual?'

‘No,' admitted Dupont. ‘But our clients sometimes insist upon extraordinary precautions to protect their anonymity. The envelope containing Dixon's statement was not addressed to him personally, for instance.'

‘Let me understand this!' demanded Walker. ‘You're telling me that the bank statements of Dixon's secret account were sent to a post office box number here in Zurich addressed to another name?'

‘Yes,' said Dupont.

‘What name?'

‘Derek Penn,' disclosed the director.

Walker was impatient to question the post office staff but had to wait until the following morning because it required another approach from the British Prime Minister's office to the Swiss postal authorities to support the intelligence man's written authority. The postal staff responsible for receiving and holding mail for personal collection was quite extensive and Walker located four, all men, who had handled letters addressed to Derek Penn. Walker showed each a photograph of the British Prime Minister. Each was quite adamant that the man who picked up the bank envelope was not Robert Dixon. When Walker asked about any discernible accent, two said the man was English and two thought he might have been American. Because the collection was always on the same day of the month – the fourth – it was easy for Walker to check past bookings from airline computer records. A Derek Penn had flown to Zurich on all the matching dates. Every flight had begun and ended in London.

Walker was granted a meeting with the Prime Minister immediately he returned to London. As soon as he was admitted the intelligence man said: ‘Do you know anyone called Derek Penn?'

‘Of course,' said Dixon. ‘He's my principal secretary.'

That week the investigatory pressure became intense upon Dixon. In Parliament the Conservative opposition initiated a debate of no confidence in the man, and his own party had a series of meetings to consider his remaining leader. Afterwards there was a lot of leaked information from which it was obvious that Dixon was to be pressed to resign. The police responded to demands for a statement by saying their inquiries were incomplete but that preliminary findings confirmed the signature on all the incriminating correspondence proved scientifically to be Robert Dixon's. They anticipated having to take a formal statement from the Prime Minister.

Derek Penn was a fresh-faced, nervous man who'd been the Prime Minister's principal secretary for two years. He denied emphatically making any regular visits to Zurich on the Prime Minister's behalf or of knowing anything about the secret bank account until he read about it in the newspapers. He agreed eagerly to accompany Walker back to Switzerland. There, the following day, each of the four Zurich postal workers separately confronted the man. Each was quite definite that the secretary was not the man they knew as Derek Penn, who had collected the bank letters.

‘I'm more bewildered now than I was when it began,' complained Samuel Bell on the morning that Walker returned to the Factory to give a progress report. Bell was trying hard to limit his drinking and was quite proud of his control so far: he only had the slightest of headaches.

‘He didn't do it,' insisted Walker, the man who always thought the worst about anybody. ‘All the evidence is
too
convincing.'

‘You must be the only person in England who doesn't believe he's guilty,' said Bell. ‘I don't think he's got any alternative to resignation.'

‘I'm going to find one,' said Walker determinedly. He took an underground train back to the Prime Minister's official residence. As he emerged from Westminster station, directly in front of the Houses of Parliament, he was abruptly aware of the loud traffic sound. From the River Thames, to his left, came a warning blast from the hooter of a river tug, towing two barges upstream.

At Downing Street Derek Penn, relieved at being cleared of any complicity and anxious now to help, said: ‘What can I do?'

‘I want to see how things work around the Prime Minister,' said Walker.

*

The pace was incredible. Incoming correspondence was opened and sorted before seven in the morning and Dixon began reading it just after. He studied a digest of newspapers at eight and by eight thirty began dictating responses to the mail he had already considered. Derek Penn's secretarial role was that of organizer. Below him Penn had two senior secretaries, both women, who in turn controlled eight stenographers who worked for periods divided throughout the day. The system, which Walker followed in minute detail, enabled the majority of the dictated letters to be typed for Dixon's signature just before he left for Parliament. There, apart from appearances in the debating chamber, there were meetings and committee conferences to attend and more correspondence and dictation to complete, with a fresh team of secretaries under the authority of the two senior women. Derek Penn accompanied the Prime Minister at all times. So, on alternate days, did one of the two senior female secretaries. One was named June Asher. The other was Patricia Hall.

Both were in their middle thirties and one – Patricia – more attractive than the other. Both were unmarried. And both were reserved and vaguely suspicious towards Walker, whose intelligence function was never explained to them. Walker was also conscious, too, of a reserve between the two women and Penn, which he thought unusual among people who had at all times to work so closely together.

‘Has the Prime Minister always worked to this routine?' Walker asked Patricia towards the end of the first week.

‘Yes,' said the woman. She was blonde and petite, very well spoken. She did not appear to welcome the approach.

‘How long have you been with him?'

‘From the very beginning,' she said proudly. ‘More than ten years. What's happening is terrible.'

‘You believe him innocent then?'

‘Of course he's innocent,' said Patricia indignantly. ‘You wouldn't ask a question like that if you knew him like I do!'

‘So how did it happen?'

‘That's what the police are trying to find out,' she said. ‘Are you a policeman?'

‘Not really,' avoided Walker.

‘You've been given a lot of personal power by the Prime Minister.'

He supposed it was obvious she would know of the authority letters which Dixon had provided. He said: ‘I'm looking into certain aspects of what's happened.'

‘He's not a greedy crook,' said Patricia.

Walker looked at her for several moments. Then he said: ‘No, I don't believe he is.'

That evening Dixon summoned Walker to his private office in the Houses of Parliament. The man was grey-faced with worry, his movements jerky and uncertain. He said: ‘When are you going to find something! Do something! The police say they want to take a formal statement from me and advise that I have a solicitor present to protect my interests!'

Walker had been remaining around the man until he finally went home to Downing Street, to sleep. But that night Walker left the Houses of Parliament early. He did not go far, however. And was glad.

For the next few days Walker did not go anywhere near the Prime Minister or Parliament. Early on the first day he contacted the Technical Division at the Factory and just after nine teamed up with two expert photographers in their specially equipped surveillance car. They worked throughout the day but were not as successful as Walker had hoped they might be. They had better luck the next night. The following day Walker flew back for the third time to Switzerland and on this occasion all four postal workers at once identified as Derek Penn the man whose photograph Walker carried with him. Walker telephoned the Director General from Zurich, for a guarded conversation.

Samuel Bell said: ‘I'll have arranged the conference with everyone by the time you get back.'

There were so many people that they had to reassemble in a committee room at the Prime Minister's residence. As well as Dixon, Derek Penn and Patricia Hall, the Director General attended, together with the detective inspector in charge of the police investigation. They were all there when Walker entered. The Prime Minister said: ‘I think you'd better explain.'

Walker looked at the woman. Patricia stared back, showing no expression although her hand moved, picking nervously at the hem of her jacket. Walker was tempted to make a direct accusation but he didn't. Instead, addressing everyone in the room, he announced: ‘There has been an attempt by America, by the CIA station based at the American embassy here in London, to disgrace the Prime Minister.'

‘What!' exclaimed Dixon, incredulous.

‘It's for you, the politicians, to find out why. I'd guess it was to destroy a socialist politician and statesman whose relationship with Russia they resented …'

Patricia Hall was staring white-faced, rigidly controlled.

Walker said: ‘From the beginning it was obvious that there had to be the most intimate and detailed knowledge of the inner workings of the Prime Minister's secretariat. I got the first indication from the bank manager here, Birchett. As soon as he reads an incoming letter he initials it, as proof of receipt. The letter that the police have – which had to be received by the bank for the entrapment to look genuine –
is
initialled. The photostat reproduced in the newspaper is not. Because it was copied
before
it was sent to the bank. And the journalist, Sergeant, talked of hearing a lot of traffic noise and a ship's hooter sounding, when the person – a woman – called to tell him he was going to receive some sensational information …'

There were shifts as men in the room turned to look at Patricia Hall. She remained stiff, like a statue.

‘… There's a lot of traffic noise around Parliament Square,' resumed Walker. ‘The sounds of tug sirens off the Thames: I've heard them myself …'

He hesitated again. ‘The journalist told me something else. That the woman told him the Prime Minister was a greedy crook. Someone else used that expression to me, a few days ago. In denial this time, but the same phrase. It's an odd thing, about being rehearsed to say something. Words and phrases stick in the mind and are then repeated automatically. That's what happened to you, didn't it, Patricia?'

‘I don't know what you're talking about,' said the woman.

‘I think you do,' said Walker. ‘I think you made the calls to the newspaper, after slipping the letter into the mass of correspondence that the Prime Minister deals with every day and which he signs without reading. And I know he doesn't read it because I've watched how he works: how he trusts his staff.'

‘You're mad!' hissed the woman.

‘Has Harry Myers promised to marry you?' demanded Walker. ‘Or is it just an affair?'

‘Who's Harry Myers?' asked the Prime Minister, confused.

‘The CIA station chief in London,' said Walker. From his briefcase he produced the photographs taken by the surveillance team. ‘The first set are of Myers alone,' said Walker, offering them around. ‘I was led to him after waiting outside Parliament and following Patricia Hall to a meeting with the man …' He offered a second batch. ‘And these are of Myers and Patricia on a subsequent evening, together. The post office staff in Zurich positively identify him as someone they knew as Derek Penn, who always collected the bank statements.'

At last the woman broke down, burying her head in her hands and starting to cry softly.

‘Did you suggest the Derek Penn name?' Walker asked her. ‘Was it to make the story even more convincing? Or was it jealousy, Patricia? Did you think you should have had the top secretarial job, after ten years' loyal service?'