Alexander McCall Smith - The Dog Who Came In From The Cold

“Well,” continued Marcia, “I heard from a catering friend that MPs have developed a racket in wine. There’s a group of them who call themselves the Parliamentary Committee on Sustainable Receptions and go round at the end of these occasions, pour all the dregs from the glasses into large containers and then rebottle it. Yes! They pour it back into bottles and re-cork the bottles. Then, when it comes to the next reception, they serve the dregs and take the full, untouched bottles for themselves.”

William was appalled. “I thought we’d heard the end of all that,” he said. “What if the Telegraph got hold of this?”

Marcia shook her head. “This story will never end up in the Telegraph.”

“But that’s dreadful!” William exploded. “And it’s not just because I’m a wine dealer. Think of all the bits and pieces – the crumbs, the lipstick … It’s disgusting. It’s … it’s beyond belief.”

“Precisely,” said Marcia. “And do you know something? They’re all members of one party.”

William frowned. An all-party scandal was one thing, a single party scandal quite another. “Which one?”

Marcia waved a hand in the air. “Oh, I can’t remember, I’m afraid. They all seem so alike these days.”

Of course William knew what Marcia would say about his meeting with MI6; she had already said it. He owed these people nothing; they had no right to make any demands of him. They were playing games, these espionage people – that’s what they did, and there was no difference, no difference at all between what they did and what boys, mere boys, did when they played in the playground. William knew that, didn’t he? He had been a boy, hadn’t he? (Absurdly distant prospect.) It was ridiculous, all this cloak and dagger business in the middle of London in broad daylight!

But as he walked back to Corduroy Mansions, he tried to put Marcia’s voice out of his mind. You are not my mother, he muttered. And Marcia, or the idea of Marcia, looked askance at him, as if to disclaim any such notion. “Why on earth should you imagine that I think of myself as your mother?” He shook his head; it was too complex even to begin to explain, but every son knew instinctively what the problem with mother was. It was mother who fussed; who told you what you could or could not do; it was mother who was always there … providing love, and security, and solace; who was prepared to stand up for you whatever you did. He sighed. That was the problem: mother provided all that, but at the same time a boy wanted to be free of his mother, wanted to go out into the world and do things on his own account, to lead his own life. Mother and freedom, then, stood in contradiction to one another.

“I’m sorry, Marcia,” he said to himself. “I’m very sorry, but this is something that I’m going to decide myself.”

The virtual Marcia smiled in a rather self-satisfied way. “Then why ask me in the first place?”

“Because I need to talk to somebody. And I like talking to you.”

“Some consolation! You like talking to me, but you don’t want to listen to my advice, do you?”

This internal conversation might have continued for some time, had William not been distracted by Freddie de la Hay, who, having picked up the scent of a squirrel, was straining at his lead. William checked Freddie, and as he did so he came to his decision. He would say yes. He would telephone Sebastian Duck immediately and tell him that he was prepared to go along with what had been suggested and lend Freddie de la Hay to them.

He reached into his pocket and took out the card that Duck had given him. He scrutinised it for a moment, as if the number itself might reveal something. It was one of those very easily remembered mobile numbers, unlike one’s own: a sequence of 123 and 666 at the end – 666, whose number was that? The Devil’s, of course. William laughed. What nonsense! He would be imagining the smell of sulphur next.

William dialled, and Sebastian Duck answered immediately.. “Duck,” he said

“It’s William French.”

“Of course. Well, I enjoyed our meeting. Such a nice day. And you’re still in the park, making the most of it.”

“Yes. I thought that my dog might enjoy …” William stopped. How did Duck know that he was still in the park? The question presented itself, but was quickly dismissed; Duck and his colleagues might be paranoid, but he would not be.

“I’ve given the matter a bit of thought,” said William. “And the answer is yes. I’ll do what you people want.”

Sebastian Duck’s pleasure showed in his voice. “Well, that’s very good indeed. Thank you. Should we make the arrangements right now?”

William asked what there was to arrange. Did he have to sign something? The Official Secrets Act, if that was what they still called it?

“No, nothing so formal. A waiver form – that’s all. Standard procedure.”

“All right.”

“Then we’ll take him right now, if you don’t mind. And I might add that he’ll be terribly well-looked after. We use the Met’s dog-handler people. One of them will be specially assigned to this case. They’re very experienced.”

William looked about him. “Right now? When I get back to the flat?”

“No. Here and now. In the park, if you don’t mind. One of our people is not far from you, you see. She’ll take Freddie.” Duck paused. “Or F as we’ll call him for the purposes of this operation.”

William spun round. A short distance away there was a young couple, obviously immersed in one another, walking arm in arm; another man with a dog, walking in the opposite direction; a teenager carrying a skateboard under his arm; and … He became aware of a woman approaching him along the path.

“Somebody’s coming,” said William. “Is this …”

“That’s her,” said Duck. “When she comes up to you, she’ll engage you in conversation. She’ll say, ‘Nice weather,’ and you’ll say, ‘Of course, but it could change.’ Got that?”

William wanted to laugh out loud. This was a comedy, and a weak one at that. Would his next set of instructions be tucked away in a hollow tree? he wondered.

The woman, who was somewhere in her late thirties, was attractive and she smiled brightly at William as she reached him on the path. “Nice day, Mr French.”

William found himself momentarily confused by the deviation from the agreed code. Did it matter? And what had he been meant to say? Could change?

“Yes,” he said. “I mean, nice weather. Er.”

The woman’s smile broadened. “Oh, don’t worry about all that. Ducky is a little … how shall we put it? Melodramatic. He’s read too many John le Carré novels, I think. This is Freddie?”

She bent down and stroked Freddie gently behind the head. The dog looked up at her with undisguised affection.

“He loves that,” said William.

“Don’t we all?” she said, as she stood up.

William looked into her eyes. For a moment he entertained a wild, impossible hope; that this attractive, vivacious woman might be just the person he was looking for. There had been stranger meetings, after all; people who met their life partners in lifts or in the queue for tickets to the Tutankhamun exhibit, or on jury service in a murder trial. There was no end to the strangeness of the circumstances in which we encounter those whom we love and who love us, so why should he not meet somebody like this in a place like this, on an errand as absurd and ridiculous as this? Why not?

Saturday was Caroline’s day for a long lie-in, but not that Saturday. She had not slept well the previous night, having gone to bed in a state of intense anger. Never let the sun set on your wrath – that was the motto in one of those preachy needlework samplers that her mother liked so much. Dignified with an ornate Victorian frame, it had hung in her room at home until, at the age of sixteen, she had hidden it in a cupboard and denied all knowledge of its whereabouts. Well, on Friday night, she had certainly forgotten the adage, or at least left it mentally sequestered in its cupboard, as she switched out her light in a state of unambiguous wrath, all of it directed against James.