Ian Rankin: Witch Hunt

Assimilate? There was too much to sift, never mind taking any of it in. Which was why this little story interested him. It was a fluke that it had come this far. The image that popped into his head was of a particular sperm breaching an egg. A fluke. This fluke called life: those very words were printed on a memo above his desk.

Well, this particular fluke did have its curiosity aspect. It would bear investigation. There was only one thing for it. Barclay would have to show it to his superior.

Michael Barclay did not think of himself as a spy. Nor would he even say he belonged to the secret service or the security service — though he’d agree security was at the root of much of his work. If pressed, he might nod towards the word “Intelligence.” He liked the word. It meant knowing a lot. And “Intelligence” meant knowing at least as much as and preferably more than anyone else. This was the problem with the word “spy.” It belonged to the old days, the Cold War days and before. Breaking and entering, sleeping with the enemy, microfilm and microphones in ties and tunnels under embassies.

These days, there was no black and white: everyone spied on everyone else. This was no revelation; it had always been the case, but it was more open now. More open and more closed. Spy satellites were toys only the very rich and paranoid could play with. The spying community had grown larger, all-encompassing, but it had also grown smaller, forming itself into an elite. All change.

He’d actually used the word “paranoid” in one of his selection board interviews. A calculated risk. If the service didn’t want to think of itself as paranoid, it would have to recruit those who suspected it of paranoia. Well, he’d passed the exams and the tests and the interviews. He’d passed the initiation and the regular assessments. He’d begun his own slow crawl up the ladder. And he’d seen that the world was changing.

No spies anymore. Now there were only the technicians. Take telemetry for example. Who the hell knew what all that garble of information meant? Who knew how to ungarble it? Only the technicians. Machines might talk to machines, but it took a wonderful human mind to listen in and comprehend. Barclay had done his bit. He’d studied electronic engineering. He’d been a dab hand with a few microchips and LEDs ever since his early teens, when he’d constructed his own digital clock. At sixteen he’d been building loudspeakers and amplifiers. And at seventeen he’d bugged the girls’ showers at his school.

At university he’d been “noticed”: that was the way they’d phrased it. His work on long-range surveillance had been noticed. His grasp of geostationary satellite technology had been noticed. His special project on miniaturization had been noticed. Fortunately, nobody noticed that he’d cribbed a lot of the project from early R&D done by Japanese hi-fi companies. A career path lay ahead of him, full of interest and variety and opportunities for further learning. A career in Intelligence.

Michael Barclay, Intelligence Technician. Except that he’d ended up here instead.

He didn’t need to knock at Joyce Parry’s door. It was kept wide open. There was some argument in the office as to why. Was it to keep an eye on them? Or to show solidarity with them? Or to show them how hard she worked? Most of the theories bubbled to the surface on Friday evenings in the Bull by the Horns, the frankly dreadful pub across the road from the office block. The Bull was a 1960s creation which looked no better for its 1980s refitting. In the ’80s, refitting had meant a lot of fake wood, eccentric ornaments, and books by the yard. The effect was kitsch Edwardian Steptoe and Son, with sad beer and sad graffiti in the gents’. But on the occasional Friday night, they managed somehow to turn the Bull into a cozy local, full of laughter and color. It was amazing what a few drinks could do.

Joyce Parry’s door was closed.

Unexpected refusal at first hurdle. Barclay, who had rolled the fax sheets into a scroll the better to brandish them, now tapped the scroll against his chin. Well, no matter. She was in conference perhaps. Or out of the office. (That was one thing: when Mrs. Parry wasn’t at home, her office door stayed firmly locked.) Barclay might do a little work meantime, so he could present her with not only the original item but with his notes and additions. Yes, why not show he was willing?

John Greenleaf had the feeling that somewhere in the world, every second of the day, someone was having a laugh at his expense. It stood to reason, didn’t it? He’d seen it happen with jokes. You made up a joke, told it to someone in a pub, and three months later while on holiday in Ecuador, some native told the joke back to you. Because all it took was one person to tell two or three people, and for them to tell their friends. Like chain letters, or was it chain mail? All it took was that first person, that someone who might say: “I know a man called Greenleaf. Guess who he works for? Special Branch! Greenleaf of the Branch!” Three months later they were laughing about it in Ecuador.

Inspector John Greenleaf, ex-Met and now — but for how long? — working for Special Branch. So what? There were plenty of butchers called Lamb. It shouldn’t bother him. He knows Greenleaf is a nice name, women keep telling him so. But he can’t shift the memory of last weekend out of his mind. Doyle’s party. If you could call twenty men, two hundred pints of beer, and a stripper a “party.” Greenleaf had debated skipping it altogether, then had decided he’d only get a slagging from Doyle if he didn’t go. So along he went, along to a gym and boxing school in the East End. That was typical of Hardman Doyle, who fancied himself with the fists. Raw animal smell to the place, and the beer piled high on a trestle table. No food: a curry house was booked for afterwards. There had been five or six of them in front of the table, and others spread out across the gym. Some were puffing on the parallel bars or half-vaulting the horse. Two took wild swings at punching bags. And the five or six of them in front of the table... They all muttered their greetings as he arrived, but he’d heard the words that preceded him:

“—eenleaf of the Branch, geddit?”

He got it. Nothing was said. Doyle, his smile that of a used-car salesman, slapped him on the back and handed over a can of beer.

“Glad you could make it, John. Party’s been a bit lackluster without you.” Doyle took another can from the table, shook it mightily, veins bulging above both eyes, then tapped the shoulder of some unsuspecting guest.

“Here you go, Dave.”

“Cheers, Doyle.”

Doyle winked at Greenleaf and waited for Dave to unhook the pull tab...

And Greenleaf, Greenleaf of the Branch, he laughed as hard as any of them, and drank as much, and whistled at the stripper, and ate lime chutney with his madras... And felt nothing. As he feels nothing now.

New Scotland Yard... Special Branch... this is supposed to be Big Time for a copper. But Greenleaf has noticed something curious. He has noticed the truth of the saying “It takes a thief to catch a thief.” Some of his present colleagues don’t seem so different from the villains they pull in. As narrow-minded as terrorists, as devious as smugglers. Doyle was a good example, though effective at his job. He just didn’t mind cutting corners. Doyle refused to see the world in black and white, as a sharply defined Us and Them, while Greenleaf did. For him there were the good guys and then there were the enemy. The enemy was out there and was not to be suffered. If it was useful as an informant, then fine, use it. But don’t reward it afterwards. Don’t let it slink away. Lock it up.

“John?”

“Sir?”