John Carré - A Delicate Truth

‘But he didn’t take you with him?’

‘No, Giles. He didn’t. Not this time.’

‘He carted you around Europe with him. Why not Washington?’

‘That was then. Before he started making his own arrangements without consulting me. He went to Washington alone.’

‘You know he was alone?’

‘No, but I surmise it.’

‘You surmise it why? He went without you. That’s all you know. To Washington proper, or the Suburb?’

For ‘Suburb’ read Langley, Virginia, home of the Central Intelligence Agency. Again Toby has to confess he doesn’t know.

‘Did he treat himself to British Airways First Class in the best traditions of Scottish frugality? Or slum it in Club, poor chap?’

Starting to yield despite himself, Toby takes a breath:

‘I assume he travelled by private jet. It’s how he went there before.’

‘Before being when exactly?’

‘Last month. Out on the sixteenth, back on the eighteenth. On a Gulfstream. Out of Northolt.’

‘ Whose Gulfstream?’

‘It’s a guess.’

‘But an informed one.’

‘All I know for a fact is he was driven to Northolt by private limo. He doesn’t trust the Office car pool. He thinks the cars are bugged, probably by you, and that the chauffeurs listen in.’

‘The limo being the property of –?’

‘A Mrs Spencer Hardy.’

‘Of Texas.’

‘I believe so.’

‘Better known as the mountainously wealthy Miss Maisie, born-again benefactress of America’s Republican far right, friend of the Tea Party, scourge of Islam, homosexuals, abortion and, I believe, contraception. Currently residing in Lowndes Square, London SW. One entire side of it.’

‘I didn’t know that.’

‘Oh yes. One of her many residences worldwide. And this is the lady, you tell me, who supplied the limousine to take your nice new master to Northolt airport. I have the right lady?’

‘You do, Giles, you do.’

‘And in your estimation it was therefore the same lady’s Gulfstream that conveyed him to Washington?’

‘It’s a guess, but yes.’

‘You are also aware, no doubt, that Miss Maisie is the protectress of one Jay Crispin, rising star in the ever-growing firmament of private defence contractors?’

‘Broadly.’

‘Jay Crispin and Miss Maisie recently paid a social call on Fergus Quinn in his Private Office. Were you present for those festivities?’

‘Some of them.’

‘With what effect?’

‘I seem to have blotted my copybook.’

‘With Quinn?’

‘With all of them. There was talk of asking me aboard. It didn’t happen.’

‘Consider yourself fortunate. Did Crispin accompany Quinn to Washington in Miss Maisie’s Gulfstream, do you suppose?’

‘I’ve no idea.’

‘Did the lady herself go?’

‘Giles, I just don’t know . It’s all guesswork.’

‘Miss Maisie sends her bodyguards to Messrs Huntsman on Savile Row to have them decently dressed. You didn’t know that either?’

‘Actually, no, I didn’t.’

‘Then drink some of that Calvados and tell me what you do know for a change.’

Rescued from the isolation of half-knowledge and suspicions that until now he has been unable to share with a living soul, Toby flops back in his armchair and basks in the luxury of confession. He describes, with growing indignation, his sightings in Prague and Brussels, and recounts Horst’s probings in the garden of Café Einstein, until Oakley cuts him short:

‘Does the name Bradley Hester sound familiar?’

‘I’ll say it does!’

‘Why the humour?’

‘He’s the Private Office house pet. The girls adore him. Brad the Music Man, they call him.’

‘We’re speaking of the same Bradley Hester, I take it: assistant cultural attaché at the US Embassy?’

‘Absolutely. Brad and Quinn are fellow music nuts. They’ve got a project going – transatlantic orchestral exchanges between consenting universities. They go to concerts together.’

‘Quinn’s diary says so?’

‘When last seen. Used to,’ Toby replies, still smiling at the recollection of tubby, pink-faced Brad Hester with his signature shabby music case chatting away to the girls in his queeny East Coast drawl while he waits to be admitted to the presence.

But Oakley doesn’t warm to this benign image:

‘And the purpose of these frequent visits to the Private Office is to discuss musical exchanges, you say.’

‘They’re written in stone. Brad’s the one date of the week that Quinn never breaks.’

‘Do you handle the paperwork that results from their discussions?’

‘Good Lord, no. Brad takes care of all that. He has people. As far as Quinn’s concerned, their project is extramural, not to be done in office hours. To his credit, he’s quite particular about it,’ Toby ends, slowing down as he meets Oakley’s frigid stare.

‘And you accept that preposterous notion?’

‘I do my best. For want of any other,’ Toby says, and grants himself a cautious sip of Calvados while Oakley contemplates the back of his left hand, turning his wedding ring, testing it against the knuckle for looseness.

‘You mean you really don’t smell a rat when Mr Bradley Hester, Assistant Cultural Attaché, marches in with his music case or whatever he brings? Or you refuse to?’

‘I smell rats all the time,’ Toby retorts sulkily. ‘What’s the difference?’

Oakley lets this go. ‘Well, Toby, I hate to disillusion you, if that’s what I’m doing. Mr Cultural Attaché Hester is not quite the amiable clown you appear determined to take him for. He’s a discredited freelance intelligence pedlar of the far-right persuasion, born again, not to his advantage, and grafted on to the Agency’s station in London at the behest of a caucus of wealthy American conservative evangelicals convinced that the Central Intelligence Agency is overrun with red-toothed Islamic sympathizers and liberal faggots, a view your nice new master is disposed to share. He is notionally employed by the United States government, but in practice by a fly-by-night company of defence contractors trading under the name of Ethical Outcomes Incorporated, of Texas and elsewhere. The sole shareholder and chief executive officer of this company is Maisie Spencer Hardy. She, however, has devolved her duties to one Jay Crispin, with whom she is having a ball. Jay Crispin, besides being an accomplished gigolo, is the intimate of your distinguished minister, who appears determined to outdo the militarist zeal that informs his late great leader, Brother Blair, though not, it seems, his luckless successor. Should Ethical Outcomes Incorporated ever find itself supplementing the feeble efforts of our national intelligence agencies by mounting a privately funded stealth operation, your friend the Music Man will be tasked with supplying the offshore logistics.’

And while Toby is digesting this, Oakley, as so often, changes direction:

‘There’s an Elliot somewhere in the mix,’ he muses. ‘Is Elliot a name to you? Elliot? Carelessly dropped? Overheard at the keyhole?’

‘I don’t listen at keyholes.’

‘Of course you do. Albanian-Greek renegade, used to call himself Eglesias, ex-South African Special Forces, killed some chap in a bar in Jo’burg and came to Europe for his health? That sort of Elliot? Sure?’

‘Sure.’

‘ Stormont-Taylor? ’ Oakley persists, in the same dreamy tone.

‘Of course!’ Toby cries in relief. ‘Everyone knows Stormont-Taylor. So do you. He’s the international lawyer’ – effortlessly evoking the strikingly handsome Roy Stormont-Taylor, Queen’s Counsel and television idol, with his flowing white mane and too-tight jeans, who three times in the last few months – or is it four? – has, like Bradley Hester, been warmly received by Quinn before being spirited behind the mahogany door.