Len Deighton - Spy Hook

'Brian Samson was my father, sir. My name is Bernard Samson.' The D-G put on his spectacles and for a moment he stared at me quizzically. This action disarranged his hair so that demoniacal tufts appeared above each ear. The lenses glinted in the light from the window. The frames were incongruously small for his long droopy face and did not fit properly upon his nose.

'Bernard Samson. Yes, yes. Of course it is.' He unlocked the box and opened it to get a glimpse of the papers. He was excited now, like a child with a box of new toys. Without looking up – and without much conviction – he said, 'If we can find that waiter we'll get you a cup of coffee… or a drink.'

'Nothing for me, thank you, Sir Henry. I must get back to the office. I'm going to Berlin this afternoon.' I reached out for the lid of the box and firmly and gently closed it.

He looked up at me in amazement. Such insubordination was like a physical assault, but I enjoyed the shining armour of the self-righteous innocent. He did not voice his anger. He was a luminary of the expensive end of the British education system which specializes in genial, courteous philistines. So, concealing his impatience, he invited me to sit down and take as long as I wished to tell him whatever I had to say.

There were plenty of stories that said the old man was non compos mentis, but any concern I had about explaining my worries to a potty boss were soon gone. I decided to leave out my visit to Dodo in Hampton Wick and my strange encounter with Jim Prettyman, If the Department said Jim was dead, then dead he would remain. As soon as I began Sir Henry was bright-eyed and alert. As I told him what I had discovered about the funds passed over to Bret Rensselaer's company, and what I could guess about the way in which the money had been moved from place to place before going to the Berlin bank, he interrupted me with pertinent comments.

At times he was well ahead of me, and more than once I was unable to understand fully the import of his questions. But he was an old-timer and too much of a pro to reveal the extent of his knowledge or the degree of his fears. This didn't surprise me. On the contrary I fully expected any Director-General stolidly to deny suggestions of treason or malfeasance, or even a possibility that any member of staff might be getting a second biscuit with their afternoon tea.

'Do you garden?' he said, suddenly changing the subject.

'Garden, sir?'

'Dammit man, garden.' He gave a genial smile. 'Dig the soil, grow flowers and shrubs and vegetables and fruit?'

I remembered Sir Henry's twenty-acre garden and the men I'd seen labouring in it. In his lapel he wore a small white rose, a mark of the rural Yorkshire upbringing of which he was so proud. 'No, sir. I don't garden. Not really.'

'A man needs a garden, I've always said so.' He looked at me over his spectacles. 'Not even a little patch?'

'I have a little patch,' I admitted, remembering the wilderness of weeds and nettles at the rear of Balaklava Road.

'July is my favourite month in the garden, Simpson. Can you guess why?' He raised a finger.

'I don't think I can, sir.'

'By July everything that's coming up is up. Some lovely things are ready for cropping: raspberries, red currants and cherries, as well as your beans and potatoes…'He paused and fixed me with his eyes. 'But if any of them haven't appeared above ground, Simpson. If your seeds failed to germinate or got washed out in the rains or frozen by late frosts…' His finger pointed. 'There's still time to plant. Right? July. Nothing you can't plant in July, Simpson. It's not too late to start again. Now do you follow me?'

'I see what you mean, sir,' I said.

'I love my vegetable garden, Simpson. There's nothing finer than to eat the crop you've planted with your own hands. I'm sure you know that.'

'Yes, I do, sir.'

' Our world is like an onion, Simpson,' he said with heavy significance, his voice growing hoarser by the minute. 'The Department I mean, of course. I told the PM that once, when she was complaining about our unorthodox methods. Each layer of the onion fits closely upon its neighbour but each layer is separate and independent: terra incognita. Follow me, Simpson?'

'Yes, Sir Henry.'

Thus reassured he said, 'Omne ignotumpro magnifico : are you familiar with that splendid notion, Simpson?' Characteristically unwilling to take a chance, he explained it in a soft aside. 'Anything little known is assumed to be wonderful. The watchword of the service, Simpson… at least the watchword of the appropriations wallahs, eh?' He laughed.

'Yes, sir,' I said, Tacitus, wasn't it?'

His eyes flickered behind the spectacle lenses; a glass-eyed old teddy suddenly come to life. He cleared his throat. 'Awww! Yes. Read Tacitus have you? Remember any more of it, Simpson?'

'Omnium consensu capax imperii nisi imperasset ,' I quoted and, after giving him a moment to digest it, I took a leaf out of his book and told him what it meant. 'Everyone thought him capable of exercising authority until he tried it.'

The watery eyes gave me a steady stare. 'Haw! A palpable hit! I take your point, young man. You're wondering if I am capable of exercising my authority. Is that it?'

'No, Sir Henry, of course I'm not.'

He scratched his nose. 'Exercising it forcefully enough to explore the substance of your fears and concerns.' He turned his head and coughed in a quiet gentlemanly way.

'No, sir.' I got to my feet to take leave of him.

He looked up at me. 'Have no fear, my boy. I'll act on your information, in root through every aspect of this matter until no shadow of a doubt remains.'

'Thank you, sir.' He heaved himself up to offer his hand in farewell and his spectacles fell off. He caught them in mid-fall. I suppose it happened to him a lot.

Once outside in Piccadilly I looked at my watch. I had more than enough time to pick up my case from the office, take the car to Ebury Street and pick up Werner, who'd been in London shopping and was booked on the same plane back to Berlin-Tegel. So I walked towards Fortnum's and the prospect of a cup of coffee. I wanted just a moment to myself. I needed time to think.

There were dark clouds racing over the tree tops of Green Park and the drizzle of rain had now become spasmodic heavy showers and gusting winds. Tourists trudged through the downpour with grim determination. On the park side of the street the artists who displayed their paintings there had covered them with sheets of plastic and gone to find shelter behind the colonnade of the Ritz Hotel. As I passed Green Park tube station a woman's umbrella was blown inside out, and a man's wide-brimmed felt hat went flying away into the traffic. The hat bounced, a car swerved to avoid it but a bus rolled over it and a man selling newspapers laughed grimly. There was a rumble of thunder. It was cold and wet; it was a thoroughly miserable day; it was London in winter.

For some there is a perverse satisfaction to walking in the rain: it provides a privacy that a stroll in good weather does not. Passers-by bowed their heads, and butted into the downpour oblivious of anything but their own discomfort. I recalled my conversation with the Director-General and wondered if I had handled it right. There was something curious about the old man's demeanour. Not that he wasn't concerned: I'd never seen him more disturbed. Not that he wasn't prepared to listen: he weighed my every word. But something…

I turned into Fortnum's entrance and went through the food store to the tea shop at the back. It was crowded with ladies with blue hair and crocodile handbags, the sort of ladies who have little white dogs waiting for them at home. Perhaps I'd chosen a bad time. I sat at the counter and had a cup of coffee and a Danish pastry. It was delicious. I sat there thinking for some time. When I finished that coffee I ordered another. It was then that I realized what I'd found odd about my conversation with the Director-General. No matter how outrageous my story and my theories might have sounded to him, he had shown no indignation, no anger; not even surprise.