The Long Room (18 page)

‘Unless it’s a double-bluff,’ Damian says quietly, but Solly isn’t listening; he’s asking Charlotte concerned and kindly questions about the baby. ‘Open-heart surgery,’ she says. ‘Poor little thing. She has to be fed through a horrible tube.’

They take their drinks and sit at the table by the door. After Charlotte leaves, Stephen buys a second round but the other two do not stay long: Solly has to get home to his wife, and Damian, as always, has mysterious arrangements of his own. Stephen, left alone, decides he might as well have another pint of lager; what else is there for him to do tonight?

What is this quintessence of dust? Stephen, on Tuesday morning, woke from a dream in which he faced a firing squad, to those words hissing in his ear. It had been a haunted night, after his solitary evening. Returning to his flat he had felt as if he had been away for longer than two days; time was taking new, distorted shapes and the person who had left on Saturday seemed strange to Monday’s man. I am growing old by leaps and bounds, he thought, and weary. Nothing tethers me to the ground; I am the spaceman lost in space, trapped in a tiny capsule, and doomed to circle round and round in the starlit blackness until his heart stops beating and his lungs no longer fill with breath.

He had stayed in the Fox and Grapes for a long time, drinking lager and then whisky. The rain was falling hard on his way home. Having transferred the tapes in their envelope from his jacket to his coat pocket, he did not take his hand off it until he reached his own front door.

Later he had fallen asleep to Helen’s voice on his portable machine. Helen on the pillow next to him, whispering to him from Sunday afternoon. But it had not been her voice solely, for although Stephen tried to shut it out there had been Jamie’s too, and they were making love.

In his dream the leader of the firing squad tied a bandanna round his head to close his eyes.

What is it that exists between a husband and a wife? Marriage is confounding. Stephen is intimate with Helen’s and yet he does not understand it. How can a man and a woman slide between dispositions as swiftly as shadows moving on wind-blown water, how do they forgive? He knows that Helen is unhappy. Helen cries alone at night. Her husband is unkind to her; he tells her to fuck off. Her in-laws are contemptuous and cold. But out of the blue on Sunday, inexplicably, her mourning turned to dancing. Why? Why? Living with Helen and
PHOENIX
over the past two days has been like watching clouds fast-skimming over stormy skies and Stephen does not like it. Listening to the pair of them is giving him a heartache, making his head spin; it hurts to be always on the outside looking in. Why is Helen so easily deceived? Stephen can sympathise with early infatuation. But to allow herself repeatedly to be seduced after God knows how much time with him? Surely by now the scales should have fallen from her eyes to lie like flakes of old confetti trodden into dirt. Is the answer in that word ‘seduced’ – is that what keeps her captive?

Seduction, seducer. Even the sounds of the noun, of the verb, are sordid in their sibilance, like those other slithery words: espionage and blasphemy. And here’s a key. She does not know that her husband is a traitor. If she did, her flesh would crawl and she would shrink from him instead of making love.

Making love. He would rather pluck out his own eyes than think of that. But the images are so much more disgusting now he knows who
PHOENIX
is, and so much harder to banish from the blank screen of his mind. Dark head hovering over golden one; flesh against soft flesh.

What is this quintessence of dust? Half a man, an incomplete
thing, a man who is afraid of going to his grave unloved. No. No. These were words heard in a dream, they have nothing to do with waking life, or with the man who knows exactly where he’s going.

This hunger is exhausting, though. Is it too much to ask: to love and to be loved?

On arriving at the Institute at nine o’clock that morning Stephen met Rollo Buckingham by the lifts.

‘Glad I’ve bumped into you,’ Rollo said. ‘Was just about to give you a buzz. About time for a conference, don’t you think? Should we aim for the Cube at two – meet me there unless you hear from me before?’

In the long room Louise was looking worried. ‘Ah, there you are, Stevie,’ she said. ‘Muriel wants you. She’s lost a tape and she thinks it’s one of yours.’

A gush of fear sluiced through Stephen, followed by a wave of heat. But surely Muriel could not be searching for the tapes he took last night? He had left them both at home this morning, which might have been unwise. Then he recalled that other tape from days ago, which cracked when he hurled it at a metal cabinet. It is still in a drawer, with his socks and handkerchiefs, at home. He had somewhat vaguely thought that as it had been paired with an orange-label tape, Muriel might have accounted for the two together. ‘I’ll go and see her,’ he assured Louise.

Muriel was in her scented cubbyhole, with her arcane ledgers spread open on the desk. She raised her head when Stephen knocked on the half-open door. ‘Ah, honeybun!’ she said. ‘Now,
PHOENIX.
The tapes from 9 December, Thursday. The afternoon delivery – 12.00 to 24.00. I logged the
orange-label coming back but not its usual companion. I must have thought that you were still working on it, although I know that usually the non-specials in this investigation don’t take long to process. But that was on Monday last week: have you still got it in your cupboard? I’m checking because we’re due a Security inspection any minute now.’

Stephen looked surprised. ‘Offhand I really can’t remember what was happening on the tenth, but I’ll have a look at the duplicate report sheet, if you like. Oh, except that I’ve probably put that one out already for your pending files. I’m absolutely up to date.’

Muriel got tiredly to her feet. ‘I’ll find it,’ she said. She unlocked the cabinet in which, as Stephen knew, she kept the safe-box, and pulled that box towards her by its handles. ‘Allow me,’ said Stephen. ‘That looks very heavy.’

‘I can manage,’ Muriel said. ‘But it is a bloody nuisance having to hoick it out.’

‘Aren’t this month’s duplicates in the current pending file?’

‘Not this one,’ Muriel said.

He watched her fingers closely as she spun the lock on the box but her fingers were nimble and he could not read the code. She saw him staring and looked at him askance. He tried to seem indifferent to what she was doing but could not resist craning to see what the box contained. Muriel held the lid at such an angle that it hid the papers inside. There was evidently more than one file in it for she had to flick through several to find
PHOENIX.
It looked exactly like any other Individual Case File, except that its dun-coloured cover bore in red the words:
TOP SECRET X LIST EYES ALONE
.

She opened the file, turned a couple of pages and extracted
the duplicate report sheet. ‘Here it is.’

‘Oh yes, now I remember. Obviously there was nothing on that tape that needed to be saved. I would have cleared it for wiping and re-use. I’m quite certain that I would have put it in my out-tray with the rest. I’m always extra-careful about
PHOENIX
.’

‘So am I. About it and all the other X lists. That’s why I am especially worried about the tape.’

‘Could I have a look through that?’ Stephen asked, holding his hand out for the file.

‘No,’ she said. ‘Do you need me to find another report?’

‘No, it’s all right. I’ll check my casebook. But, it has just occurred to me, you know what might have happened? As there was nothing at all important on the tape and it was a no-label, I wonder if I might just conceivably have had a moment’s inattention and put it in with
ODIN
? I seem to recall that I had a lot to do with him that week.’

‘But then I would have seen there was one extra,’ Muriel objected.

‘You’re an absolute wonder,’ Stephen said. ‘To keep track of all those tapes and all those sheets of paper every single day, in and out, it must sometimes feel like counting grains of sand. I’m pretty sure that I bundled several of
ODIN
’s no-labels in one
envelope last week and that the missing tape was with them.’

Muriel did not seem entirely convinced. She’d have to report it to Security, she said, but the fact that it was only a no-label would hopefully be enough to save her bacon.

Stephen said he hoped so too. ‘When’s your birthday?’ he asked as he was leaving the room.

‘May the seventeenth,’ she said. ‘Why do you ask?’

‘Because today I’m going shopping!’

Muriel laughed.

Back at his desk, off the hook and pleased by having got away with the borrowed tapes, Stephen fabricated the weekend for
PHOENIX
on a new report sheet. He alluded to the real argument on Sunday morning but omitted all the detail. He claimed that Mrs
PHOENIX
was absent from the flat for several hours and that while she was away the subject of interest left it briefly. He reported an incoming call from Wednesday evening’s male visitor, still identified by his first name only: Michael.
Call made from a call-box. Thanking subject for dinner.
He accurately described the subject’s intended movements from now until 27 December, with an extra twist of his own.

There had indeed been a telephone call from Michael Bennet-Gilmour on the unlabelled tape that Stephen had quickly run through yesterday. He had called at 11.59 on Sunday morning to say thank you and how pleased he was that they were back in touch. ‘What happened then was a long time ago,’ he said. ‘It should be forgotten now.’ Greenwood made a sound of assent, with perhaps a note of hesitation in it, but said nothing to shed light on his friend’s puzzling remark. Stephen let it pass. It did not add to the picture he was making.

Other telephone calls, and conversations between Jamie and Helen on Sunday afternoon, were festering like thorns in Stephen’s memory. Listening to them in bed last night had made them all too vivid. Whatever her temper when she left silently on Sunday morning, Helen came back at 12.22 apparently restored. ‘Hello!’ she called from the front door. Jamie must have been in the bedroom, for his response was indistinct and then she too faded out of earshot for a time. When they were within hearing again, he was saying: ‘I know that you were tired. We both were. We shouldn’t have stayed out so ridiculously late.’

‘Let’s go back to bed,’ she said.

Afterwards they cooked and ate cheese omelettes. They went for a walk by the river. It was dusk: silver-blue light, seagull cry, scent of cold grey water. They walked home through the park holding hands. White flowers on black branches, winter-sweet; the voices of children playing their last games before being called inside. A father swings a baby high into the air to make her laugh and Helen laughs with them. When he kissed her he felt how chill she was from the evening mist. On their return he made hot chocolate with cream.

While Helen was in the bathroom getting dressed to go out to supper with her godmother – a long-standing engagement – Greenwood rang his parents. His mother answered the telephone. ‘We’ve sorted it out,’ he told her. ‘I’ll definitely make the meet.’

Stephen had listened to what Jamie said on both sorts of tape and therefore as one-sided conversation and as dialogue. ‘But not for Christmas?’ Lady Greenwood asked.

‘No. I’m sorry, Mamma. Helen feels that we must go to
Joan’s. Yes, it’s true we spent last Christmas there as well, but that’s the thing when you are an only child.’

‘But you did tell her that Joan would be most welcome here?’

‘Yes, of course I did. But she didn’t think that would really work. She’s tired, she’s a bit under the weather – I didn’t want to make an issue of it. In any case, I don’t suppose Joan would have changed her mind at such short notice. But I mean the main thing is we will be there. We’ll get up early in the morning and drive down.’

‘How long will you stay? And for New Year?’

‘Only until Wednesday. Because then we are going away.’

‘Just like that? All of a sudden? Where are you going to go?’

‘I don’t know yet. Paris, maybe. Or Vienna. Somewhere scenic and romantic. Venice. Biarritz. Somewhere with a really good hotel. It’s a surprise for Helen, a Christmas present.’

‘And a surprise for you, apparently. Do you intend to turn up at the airport and take the first available flight?’

‘No! It’s not quite that last-minute. I’ll go and see the nice little man at Thomas Cook. The one you always use. He’ll recommend a good hotel and he’ll make the bookings.’

‘Dear Mr Railton! He’s been there so long; he must be about to retire. Where would Helen like to go?’

‘I haven’t asked her. I told you, it’s supposed to be a surprise. Of course she knows that we’re going to have a few days away, just the two of us, but she’ll be expecting Norfolk or the Lakes.’

‘Well then, don’t forget to pack her passport. You know, Jamie, very good hotels can be very expensive.’

‘Yes, but you only live once and anyway Claudio has given me some money.’

‘Really? What for?’

‘A late wedding present is what he said.’

‘He told me he wanted you to have a painting.’

‘Well, maybe he’ll give us one another time.’

‘
Allora, tesoro mio
, you are quite sure about the Boxing Day? You will be here? You will come home for that?’

‘
Ma certo, Mamma; te l’ho promesso
. Look, I have to go now, Helen’s finished in the bathroom – she might hear me talking. I’ll telephone you from Joan’s.’

‘Who were you talking to? And why did you have to hang up in case I overhead?’

‘It’s Christmas, darling! It’s the season of secrets! I was talking to Mamma.’

‘Oh yes, right, I will phone mine.’

Helen’s mother, Jamie’s mother – so unalike they might as well belong to different species. They must have things in common: they were mothers, in sorrow had they brought forth children, but there resemblance ended. Jamie’s mother with her operatic voice, her marked emphases, her swooping intonation, her implied inverted commas and something exotic in her speech, like the reverberation of a plucked string beneath the sharp notes of her precise enunciation, and Helen’s with the soft tones she had passed down to her daughter, breath indrawn in the slightest of sighs, a way of listening, as if she were a piano tuner waiting for the silences between each separate note. In her voice the echoes of another land, much further west than the place where she now lives. Stephen was suddenly flooded with nostalgia for somewhere he had never been: a place where curlews cry and saints pray on lonely outcrops, listening to wild seas and the saddest of laments.