Gavin Lyall - The Crocus List

When Maxim hoped he had finished, Lomax glanced at Agnes, then said: "They brought up the Rules of Engagement business, then? I don't see how it concerns them."

Agnes answered before Maxim could think of anything. "Question of our Harry's vulnerability. Is he looking to clear himself? I fancy that's what bothers them about a possible American end: whether Harry's going to do any investigation of his own ideas over here."

"Why should he? What ideas?"

Agnes smiled. "Why and what indeed? If there was somebody dolled up as a copper at the Abbey, you've got a conspiracy, and it's only if there was a conspiracy that the Secret Service is really interested, because that means there's at least one bod floating loose who presumably still wants to kill the President. If we believe Harry, then therewas a conspiracy. But since the alternative is that he's just a banana-brain who makes things up, he's got a natural bias towards proving a conspiracy-hasn't he? What should we conclude, Jerry?"

The question turned off Lomax's interest like a tap that realises it had flooded itself into deep water. "Good Lord, we're just required to report what he told them, no question of…" But there was doubt in his voice. He looked quickly at his watch. "It looks as if I'll make that damned dancing class after all. Harry, if you're still around, we must…"

When he had gone, Agnes lit a cigarette, slumped in her chair and grinned broadly at Maxim. "Well, are we a little banana-brain after all?"

"Thanks for bringing it up."

"It's what the Steering Committee's trying to prove, isn't it? And knowing you, I doubt very much you're standing still for it. So let's hear what jolly japes you and George have been up to since then."

Maxim considered. "What are you going to tell your Service?"

"I can't make any promises."

"Okay. Let's see, now. I spent that Sunday at Little-Hampton; on the Monday I dined at one of George's clubs-"

"Bugger you, Harry Maxim. I want to know what you've done."

He nodded placidly. Anger didn't suit her friendly snub face, making her seem out of place in that aloofly cut suit -and he realised he was mentally taking it off her. He nodded once more and tried to remember that this was, dammit, the British embassy.

"I told the D-G of your Service what I thought, once. At the Steering Committee."

"That old fart."

"May I quote you?"

A snap glance of fury, then a tired little laugh. "Yes, it has come to that, I suppose. So you're out on a limb. And I bet you're further out than anybody realises. I know you, chum. And George, too. But what do I tell my Service?" She took time to think about that, then lifted the telephone. "Algar. I'm off now, going downtown. I'll check in-okay?" She looked back at Maxim. "You heard me. Off-duty. Let's have that drink."

"No," Maxim persisted. "You either tell your Service or you don't."

She stood up, reaching for the desk lamp. "You like your orders cut and dried. Well, I don't blame you, after… All right: from here on you're totally off the record. Do you believe me?"

"Yes."

"Or one day… I wouldn't want you for an enemy, Harry. You take loyalty seriously. God help me, I hope I still do"-she clicked off the light-"where I can still find it. I'm beginning to need that drink."

They sat in thick wickerwork chairs on an open balcony atop one of the older hotels, close to the floodlit shaft of the Washington Monument. Beyond it, the mild night sky was busy with lights arrowing down into National airport and jinking up away from it, following the curls of the river so that if one fell, it would fall into that. Agnes had brought him there for the view, but it was impossible not to watch just the aircraft lights, perhaps macabrely hoping one would lose its grip. They reminded him of what the city was really about, more so than the near-deserted streets below, dominated by monuments and government buildings that themselves became monuments after dark.

Agnes listened carefully and without interruption except to clarify a name or time. They were halfway through their second round of drinks when he finished; she leaned away so that-sitting beside him-she could peer back at him through the dimness. "Golly, you do live, don't you? Those you run into may not, but you soldier on. Literally."

"Do you believe all this?"

She gave that only a moment's thought. "A lot of it's still guesswork by you and George, but the rest, yes. If something like that were going to happen, now would be the time. And you say my Service doesn't believe it?"

"George didn't want to put the business at the cottage to them, you can see why, and it's pretty clear they don't want to believe in a conspiracy anyway, even when they knew about the Reznichenko Memorandum. "

"That smelled bad even from here, but now you say they had proof it was phoney and didn't tell the Home Sec? That means they didn't even tell the D-G. My God, it's come to that pitch already. This is the sortofthingmy mob is supposed to be ironing out and they daren't admit they've even been involved-except by whispering to people like Sprague. Sprague. "

"You know him?"

"Met him." She snatched a gulp of her drink and banged the glass on her teeth. "And the Bravoes seem to believe it… They shouldn'thave a team like that in Britain, acting so openly. It shows how safe they feel; six months ago they wouldn't have dared… And I believe you when you say you killed one of them. I might not have believed it if you'd said you hadn't."

"The world is full of people I haven't killed."

"So far. And you had George along with you on that? Poor man. His blood pressure must be stratospheric. But the Bravoes aren't going to like that, you know. There'sno rules in our business, but there's more or less a convention that we don't kill each other. Once that gets started, you don't know where it could end."

"They must have been planning to kill Miss Tuckey."

"Oh yes, they've killed people in Britain before. Usually their own defectors and so on… but outsiders, not professionals. I know it sounds crazy to you, but that's the convention. At the moment. Now you've broken it… well, let's hope they count Miss Tuckey as a pro and call it quits. If not, you could be a target."

"Just me?"

"Just you. You're thinking of your boy? No. That's more or less another convention-and they don't want to send you berserk, doing God-knows-what more damage. It'll be you personally, but nothing personal, if you see what I mean. Just getting across the message that 'Oi, there's a convention about these things, remember? Now we've squared it up, we can start again from scratch.' I should keep your back to the wall."

"I'll try and remember."

Looking at his face, calm in the faint glow of the awning lights, Agnes felt a flush of exasperation at failing to get her message across. In fact, Maxim had listened and believed: she knew far more of that world than he did. But his own world had stretched to the hinterland of the Gulf states, where a mixture of religion, politics and blood feuds made death a beginning rather than an end. There were families and organisations out there which had sworn to kill him far less cleanly than the KGB would, and he had learned to live with that. Not exactly with courage, which is a wasting asset, but with a soldier's fatalism that if it happens, it will be tomorrow and not today.

"All right," Agnes said resignedly, "so what it boils down to is that, despite your assurances to the White House Protective Detail, you're sneaking off to do a little sleuthing on your own?"

"If we can identify this Person Y… it seems the only thing to do."

"Sure. But you'd better do it carefully. Grow a long-lost cousin in Missouri, or something. Have you booked anything? Then don't until I've done a little looking up.