Stella Rimington: Rip Tide

But he interrupted her, reaching across the table to hold her hand. ‘Let me speak first, if you don’t mind. I have been thinking too. When I asked if you would consider moving to Paris and coming to live with me, I thought it was an offer you couldn’t refuse.’ He smiled wistfully. ‘But that was very selfish of me, I see it now. Love is not always about the other person; it is all too often about one’s self.’

‘You’re the least selfish man I know.’

‘That is very kind of you to say, but sadly untrue. However, a man can make amends,’ he said lightly. ‘And in my case the situation can be recovered. Even an old dog like me can learn a new trick or two. And I have come to realise, my dear Miss Carlyle,’ he said now, gently stroking her hand, ‘that fond as you may be of me, there is another love in your life.’

‘What do you mean?’ she asked. Could he really think she was seeing someone else?

He shook his head. ‘I don’t mean another man. Much as Geoffrey Fane might like to play that role.’ He smiled. ‘I was thinking of your career. Only the proper word, I believe, is vocation. It is not just important to you, Liz, it is part of you. If I kept nagging at you then possibly you would be willing to give it up – we are all sometimes tempted to quit, ours are not the easiest jobs in the world. But that would not only be selfish of me, but very wrong – and I would know, however happy we were together, that I had taken you away from something you hold tremendously dear.’

He let go of her hand and leaned back in his chair, a look of wry amusement on his face. ‘You know, I practised that speech a hundred times, and still it came out different from the way I’d intended.’

‘It came out very well, Martin,’ Liz said, touched by what he had just said. He was not the first man in her life to have understood how important her work was to her – but he was the first to swallow his disappointment, accept the way things had to be for them, and continue to offer her his love and support.

‘Thank you,’ she said, as his arms came around her and she rested her head against his shoulder. She remembered what her friend Elaine, an ex-researcher in the Service turned Hampstead housewife and mother, had once told her: ‘Life is about love and work. If neither’s right, you’re in trouble. If one’s right, you’ll probably be okay. But for a truly fulfilled life, you need them both to be in order.’

Liz could see the truth in that. It was a difficult balance and one she hadn’t so far managed to achieve. Might she be able to with this patient man who, for now at least, was prepared to put her needs ahead of his own? Martin said softly, ‘I do hate having the Channel between us. But thanks to Eurostar I can just about put up with it. I only hope you can as well.’

Liz looked at Martin. ‘Of course I can.’

Then, with a grin, she said, ‘Tell you what: let’s buy each other season tickets for Christmas.’

Dame Stella Rimington joined the Security Service (MI5) in 1968. During her career she worked in all the main fields of the Service: counter-subversion, counter-espionage and counter-terrorism. She was appointed Director General in 1992, the first woman to hold the post. She has written her autobiography and five Liz Carlyle novels. She lives in London and Norfolk.