Jeffrey Archer - Cometh the Hour

“Our man has already tracked down several of her ladyship’s former employees, but none of them is prepared to say a word against her, either because they’re being paid to keep quiet or they’re simply terrified of her.”

“I was terrified of her too,” admitted Giles. “So I can’t blame them. But don’t give up on that front. She’s sacked an awful lot of people in her time and she certainly doesn’t believe in handing out farewell presents.”

“Cyrus is also terrified of her. But not Ellie May. She’s been trying to convince him to stop the payments and call Virginia’s bluff.”

“Virginia is not easily bluffed. She’s cunning, manipulative and as stubborn as the Democrat mascot. A dangerous combination that leads her to believe she’s always right.”

“What in God’s name ever possessed you to marry the woman?”

“Ah, I forgot to mention. She’s stunningly beautiful, and when she wants something, she can be irresistibly charming.”

“How do you think she’ll react if the payments suddenly dry up?”

“She’ll fight like an alley cat. But if Cyrus isn’t Freddie’s father, she couldn’t risk going to court. She would be well aware she could end up in prison for obtaining money under false pretences.”

“I can’t believe the earl would be pleased about that,” said Hayden, “and what about poor Freddie?”

“I don’t know,” admitted Giles. “But I can tell you, there’s been no sighting of the Hon. Freddie, or the formidable Mrs. Crawford, in London recently.”

“So if Cyrus did cut Virginia off, do you think Freddie would suffer?”

“I wouldn’t have thought so. But I have a speaking engagement in Scotland next week so if I pick up anything worthwhile I’ll let you know.”

“Thank you, Giles. But if you’re in Scotland, why don’t you just drive up to Fenwick Hall, bang on the front door and ask the earl for his vote?”

“Earls don’t have a vote.”

“Why haven’t I received this month’s payment?” demanded Virginia.

“Because I didn’t get mine,” said Trend. “When I called Cyrus’s lawyer he told me you wouldn’t be getting another red cent. Then he hung up on me.”

“Then let’s sue the bastard!” shrieked Virginia. “And if he doesn’t pay up, you can tell his lawyer that Freddie and I will take up residence in Baton Rouge, and we’ll see how they like that.”

“Before you book your flight, Ginny, I ought to tell you that I did call back and threaten them with every kind of legal proceedings. Their response was short and to the point. ‘Your client had better be able to prove that Cyrus T. Grant is Freddie’s father, and that she is even the boy’s mother.’”

“That will be simple enough to confirm. I have the birth certificate and am still in touch with the doctor who delivered Freddie.”

“I pointed all that out, but I couldn’t make head nor tail of their response. However, they assured me that you would understand all too well.”

“What are you talking about?”

“They told me that Ellie May Grant has recently employed a new butler and housekeeper for her home in Louisiana, a Mr. and Mrs. Morton.”

Comrade Pengelly was ushered into Marshal Koshevoi’s massive oak-paneled office. The KGB chief didn’t stand to greet him, just gave a dismissive nod to indicate that he should sit.

Pengelly was understandably nervous. You are only summoned to KGB headquarters when you are about to be sacked or promoted, and he wasn’t sure which it was going to be.

“The reason I called for you, comrade commander,” said Koshevoi, looking like a bull about to charge, “is that we have discovered a traitor among your agents.”

“Julius Kramer?” asked Pengelly.

“No, Kramer was a smokescreen. He is completely reliable and totally committed to our cause. Although the British are still under the impression he’s working for them.”

“Then who?” said Pengelly, who thought he knew every one of his thirty-one agents.

“Karin Brandt.”

“But she’s been passing on some very useful information recently.”

“And we have now discovered the source of that information. It was a tip-off from a most unlikely quarter that gave her away.” Pengelly didn’t interrupt. “I instructed Agent Kramer to inform Brandt that we wanted you to report back to Moscow.”

“And she delivered that message.”

“But not before she had passed it on to someone else.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Tell me the route you took to Moscow.”

“I drove from my home in Cornwall to Heathrow. I took a plane to Manchester, a coach to Newcastle—”

“And from there you flew to Amsterdam, where you took a barge along the Rhine, the Main and the Danube to Vienna.” Pengelly shifted uneasily in his seat. “You then traveled from Vienna to Warsaw by train, before finally boarding a plane to Moscow. Shadowed every inch of the way by a succession of British agents, the last of whom accompanied you on your flight to Moscow. He didn’t even bother to get off the plane before going back to London because he knew exactly where you were going.”

“But how is that possible?”

“Because Brandt informed her English handler that I had ordered you back to Moscow even before she told you about it. Comrade, they literally saw you coming.”

“Then my whole operation is blown apart and there’s no point in my returning to England.”

“Unless we turn the situation to our advantage.”

“How do you plan to do that?”

“You will return to England by an equally circuitous route, so they think we have no idea that Brandt has betrayed us. You will then go back to work as usual but, in future, every message we send through Kramer to Brandt, the British will be confident they have intercepted.”

“It will be interesting to see how long we can get away with that before MI6 begin to wonder which side she’s on,” said Pengelly.

“The moment they do, it will be time to dispose of her, and then you can return to Moscow.”

“How did you find out she’s switched sides?”

“A piece of luck, comrade commander, that we nearly overlooked. There’s a member of the House of Lords called Viscount Slaithwaite. A hereditary peer who would be of no particular interest to us, except that he was a contemporary of Burgess, Maclean and Philby at Cambridge. Once he joined the university’s Communist Party, we no longer considered recruiting him as an agent, although he’d like you to believe he’s the sixth man. Over the years Slaithwaite has regularly passed on information to our embassy which, at best, was out of date and, at worst, planted to mislead us. But then, without having any idea of its significance, he finally came up with gold dust. He sent a note to say that Lord Barrington’s wife — he has no idea that she is one of our agents — was seen regularly in the House of Lords tearoom in the company of Baroness Forbes-Watson.”

“Cynthia Forbes-Watson?”

“No less.”

“But I thought MI6 pensioned her off years ago?”

“So did we. But it seems she’s been resuscitated to act as Brandt’s handler. And what better cover than tea in the House of Lords, while Lord Barrington toils away on the front bench.”

“Baroness Forbes-Watson must be eighty—”

“Eighty-four.”

“She can’t go on for much longer.”

“Agreed, but we’ll keep the counteroperation running for as long as she does.”

“And when she dies?”

“You’ll only have one more job to carry out, comrade commander, before you return to Moscow.”

There was a hesitant tap on the library door. The second in the past seven years.