Thunder in the Blood (4 page)

After a while, he enquired whether I’d like tea. I asked for coffee instead and he grunted, smiling at my usual obduracy, lifting the phone. When he put it down, he opened a drawer and took out a file. It was a red file. Red files, at Curzon House, are subject to internal restrictions. He slid it across to me.

‘Read it,’ he said. ‘I’ve got some biscuits somewhere.’

I opened the file. Inside was a thin sheaf of source reports. The numbers on the tops of the pages weren’t consecutive. I was only getting part of the story. I read the first report. It quoted at length from a letter which had been received a week and a half earlier. It was on House of Commons notepaper and signed by an MP called Lawrence Priddy whose name I recognized from the papers. I glanced up.

‘Tory? Somewhere in the West Midlands?’

‘Yeah.’

I nodded, returning to the file. Priddy had received a visit from a constituent, a woman called Beth Alloway. She’d come, in strictest confidence, because she was worried about her husband. Clive Alloway was a businessman. He ran a small consultancy in the engineering field. Priddy had evidently met him on a number of occasions and described him in the letter as ‘a minor player’.

There was a tap on the door and the coffees arrived. I began to close the file but Stollmann signalled for me to read on. I did so, dunking the first of his stale digestives in the thin black liquid, committing the information to memory, brick by brick, the way I’d been taught. Clive Alloway sold high-tech tooling, much of it for export. In consequence, he spent a great deal of time abroad, winning orders, doing deals, troubleshooting hiccups. For the last year or so he’d been in Iraq a lot, often for weeks at a time. In ways that only a wife can recognize, these trips appeared to have changed him. He’d become secretive, evasive. He wasn’t sleeping well at nights. Strange calls on the house phone had begun to disturb him.

Beth Alloway had answered one or two of these calls herself when her husband wasn’t at home and it had always been a foreign voice at the other end, polite enough but never offering a name or a number for a return call. This had made her wonder a bit but then, very recently, she’d been readying one of his jackets for the dry cleaners and she’d found a plain brown envelope, unsealed, in one of the pockets. Inside the envelope was a thick wad of fifty-pound notes. She’d counted them. They came to £2450. Astonished that he should be carrying so large a sum when she’d been told repeatedly that times were hard, she’d confronted her husband with the money, wanting to know more, wanting to know where it had come from, wanting to find out what it was that had changed him so much. Brusque and defensive, he’d dismissed her questions, demanding the money back, accusing her of ‘meddling’. There were some things, he told her, he simply couldn’t discuss. Not with her. And not with anyone else.

After some thought, Beth Alloway had decided to search the house. Under the desk in her husband’s tiny office she’d noticed a loose floorboard. Under the floorboard she’d found a revolver.
With the gun was a box of bullets. She’d put them both back and not told her husband, but she’d known then that she needed help. Going to colleagues would have been disloyal. A psychiatrist, though tempting, would simply enrage him. So in the end, half convinced she already knew the answer, she’d put the question to her local MP, a man whom her husband seemed to count as a personal friend. What was happening to Clive? Why was he going off his head? Who was getting at him?

I looked up. Stollmann was sipping his coffee, watching me over the cup.

‘Well?’ I said. ‘Who
is
getting at him?’

‘We are. And the Iraqis.’

‘Why?’

‘Because he’s selling them the goodies they’re after.’

‘What goodies?’

‘Arms-making equipment. Lathes. Computers. State of the art stuff. The kind of gear they need just now.’

I nodded, fingering the next report in the file. Iraq was still at war with Iran. They’d been at it for years and they were getting through a lot of everything: shells, mines, military hardware of every description. Much of the equipment had once come from the Soviets, but now the Iraqis wanted to make it for themselves. For that, they needed the right tooling, and you didn’t have to have a business degree to see the openings for men like Clive Alloway. I frowned.

‘I thought it was illegal,’ I said, ‘exporting lethal equipment to Iraq? I thought we’d given up all that? I thought there was an embargo?’

‘There is.’

‘Then who gave this guy the go-ahead?’

‘The DTI.’

‘But aren’t they supposed to police it? Issue the licences? Make sure everyone stays in line?’

‘Yes.’ Stollmann nodded. ‘Of course they are.’

I gazed at him. Around Whitehall, the Department of Trade and Industry had a reputation for a certain maverick independence, though I wasn’t aware it extended to sanctions-busting.

‘They really let him get on with it?’ I said. ‘Help the Iraqis on their way? Despite all the other guff?’

Stollmann didn’t answer for a moment. Then he shrugged. ‘That’s not the point,’ he said. ‘Licences are only as good as what you put on them. It’s a question of how you phrase it. You can stretch and bend these things. Call the stuff dual-use. Say you’re building tractor parts. Happens all the time.’

‘Then what
is
the point?’

Stollmann looked at me for a long time. Then he leaned forward, putting the cup carefully to one side, and I sensed at once that our conversation was about to change gear. My days at the computer keyboard were numbered. Thank God I’d sent the bloody form.

‘Alloway’s working for Six,’ Stollmann said quietly. ‘They debrief him regularly. Every time he comes back.’

I nodded. ‘And us? Are we interested?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why?’

‘Because the Iraqis are making moves here, too. They’ve targeted certain firms. Alloway’s is one of them. Small though he is.’

‘Targeted?’

‘They want to buy him. Plus others. Build a network …’ He shrugged. ‘The DTI call it foreign investment. It’s music to their ears.’

‘And us?’ I said again.

‘We keep tabs on the Iraqis. See what they’re up to, who they’re talking to, what they’re spending money on.’ He paused. ‘Helps keep things neat and tidy, knowing what they’re about.’

‘And Alloway?’

‘He knows what they’re about. He’s advising them.’

‘And does he tell us?’

‘So far, yes.’

‘Why?’

‘Patriotism.’ Stollmann shrugged. ‘His word, not mine.’

‘I see.’ I nodded, glancing down at the file again. Mrs Alloway had a point. Sandwiched between MI5, MI6 and Baghdad, her husband was doubtless finding life extremely uncomfortable. I looked up again. ‘So what next?’ I said. ‘What do you want me to do?’

There was another silence. Stollmann reached across for the
file and extracted a photograph from a pocket at the back.

‘Mrs Alloway,’ he said.

I looked at the photo. Beth Alloway had a nice smile, a small shy grin, revealing slightly crooked front teeth. I glanced up. Stollmann was flicking through the digest of the MP’s letter, his finger racing down each page.

‘So far she’s only gone to Priddy,’ he said carefully. ‘It would be a shame if she went anywhere else.’

‘What’s he told her?’

‘Nothing.’

‘How much does he know?’

‘Quite a lot.’

‘But he doesn’t want to be compromised?’

‘Exactly.’

I nodded, turning over the photo, reading the scribbled message on the back. The message had been for Clive Alloway. The photo was evidently a relic from happier times. I glanced up. ‘You want me to go and talk to her?’

‘Yes.’

‘On the quiet? Tell her not to rock the boat? Talk about…’ I paused, ‘the national interest?’

‘Yes,’ Stollmann said, ‘and take a look at Priddy, too.’

4

Stollmann let me photocopy three of the documents in the file. I read them on the train to Wolverhampton the following afternoon. I felt very odd, clattering through the trading estates north of London, trying to work out how Whitehall would ever square the circle: making lots of money out of the Iraqis while denouncing them to all and sundry. There was doubtless a logic in it somewhere, but from where I sat it looked like simple hypocrisy. What was I going to say to Mrs Alloway? How was I going to put it?

The MP, Lawrence Priddy, met the train at Wolverhampton. I’d phoned him from London on Stollmann’s advice. He was younger than I’d expected, tall, slightly stooped, with a careful parting and a mirthless smile. He stood on the platform, looking me up and down, a physical appraisal no less disgusting for being so frank. I’d dressed carefully for this occasion – sensible skirt, high-necked sweater, minimum make-up – but there are bits of me it’s hard to disguise.

‘Sarah,’ he said at once, offering a cursory handshake. ‘Welcome.’

We drove to a nearby hotel, a gloomy, red-brick Victorian establishment. Priddy ordered tea at reception and led me through to a small parlour. The staff were immensely respectful. Evidently, he came here often.

In the parlour, we settled into a couple of uncomfortable mock-leather armchairs, Priddy immediately in command, the kind of facile, effortless charm that comes with a five-figure majority and a promising career. Overnight, I’d done a little research. The man was bone dry, right of centre and had recently become parliamentary private secretary to one of the junior ministers at
the DTI. His constituency was out in Shropshire, a comfortable forty minutes from the ghettos of the black country. Clive and Beth Alloway lived there too, though I fancied in rather less style.

A waitress brought cakes and a tray of tea, and I played mother while Priddy told me a little more about Clive Alloway, not bothering to hide the fact that he had little regard for the man. He was, he said, one of the smaller cogs in the West Midlands machine tools sector, running his consultancy partly from home, partly from his car phone and partly from a seedy two-room office somewhere in the depths of Walsall. He’d been acting as an agent for a handful of local firms and although he appeared to have done well enough, there’d been recent rumours that he’d overstretched himself. In his line of business, Priddy suggested drily, that wasn’t difficult. The man would have big overheads: airline tickets, city-centre hotels, hospitality and the incessant need to keep up appearances. If the orders dried up, he could quickly find himself in real financial trouble. And that, it seemed, was what had happened.

I nodded, watching him reach for his third cake. ‘How do you know?’ I said.

Priddy looked up, surprised. Like many men, he excelled at being patronizing, scarcely bothering to conceal his amusement. My mother always said it came from insecurity or a deep hatred of women. Watching Priddy, I wasn’t sure about either. ‘My dear,’ he licked a curl of cream from one finger, ‘how do you think I know? The man’s a mess. His marriage is on the skids. His business is up the chute. His poor bloody wife’s a basket case. And his bank manager’s threatening to foreclose. We call that a disaster in my trade.’ He smiled. ‘What’s your word for it?’

I said nothing, favouring him with a smile of my own.

After a moment or two, he bit deeply into a chocolate éclair, savouring it, then wiped his mouth with a corner of his napkin. ‘I suspect you owe me a proper briefing,’ he said at last, brushing the crumbs from his lap. ‘And I suspect now isn’t the time.’

‘No?’

‘No.’ He shook his head, leaning forward, his elbows on his knees. ‘I’m in London after the weekend. I have a little place round the back of Dolphin Square.’ He paused. ‘Lunch or dinner? Your choice.’

By the time we got to the Alloways’ place, it was nearly dark. The cottage was beside a river. The lights were on upstairs and the empty bottles were already on the step for the milkman. I stood in the road for a moment, listening to the sound of water over rocks.

Priddy’s window purred down. ‘Alloway’s abroad,’ he said briefly, ‘as I expect you know.’

I nodded, glancing down at him. ‘Are you coming in?’

‘Briefly. To pay my respects. Then you’re on your own.’

Beth Alloway opened the door at the second knock. I’d left it to Priddy to make the arrangements for my visit and I could tell at once that she didn’t like the man. She offered him a brief nod and invited us in, a small, busy woman, strands of greying hair escaping from a badly secured bun at the back of her neck. She was wearing a thick jumper and a pair of paint-stained tracksuit bottoms. One knee had a hole in it. I stood by the door while Priddy did the introductions. I liked her on sight.

Priddy, his camel coat carefully buttoned against the cold, turned to go. He was already treating me like an old friend, as if we’d known each other for years.

‘Sure about the taxi back?’

‘Yes, thanks.’

He looked at me a moment, one eyebrow arched, then kissed me lightly on the cheek and walked out into the night. We were still standing beneath the tiny porch, watching the lights of his Rover disappear round the bend, when I decided there was little point not voicing the obvious.

‘What a terrible man,’ I murmured and glanced at Beth.

‘Yes,’ she said, turning back into the house.

I stayed at the cottage most of the evening. Downstairs, the place was a mess, piles of ironing on a chair beside the fireplace, bundles of rhubarb in a bucket of water under the table, dog biscuits scattered around a bowl behind the door. A fire was laid but unlit and the room felt cold enough for me to regret taking off my coat. While Beth hurried from room to room, apologizing for not being ready, I looked around for family photos, clues to the way the marriage had started, snaps of the kids I knew she’d had, but the only photo on display was a small black and white shot of the wedding itself, carefully mounted in a cheap wooden
frame. The couple were standing, arm in arm, outside a registry office. Clive Alloway, much younger, looked pleased with himself. Beth, under the short skirt, had nice legs.

I was still looking at the photo when Beth finally joined me, shutting the door at the foot of the stairs and stooping to the fire. She lit it with an old candle end, then broke open a bottle of sherry and poured two large glasses. ‘Mr Priddy says you’re from London.’

‘Yes.’

‘Something to do with …’ She frowned, a totally artless pause, genuinely perplexed.

‘Intelligence,’ I said quietly. ‘I work for intelligence.’

‘Oh?’

Beth looked alarmed, as if her worst nightmare had come true, and I wondered for a moment what on earth Priddy had told her. He’d made it quite plain in the hotel that his own involvement was to be minimal. ‘Arm’s length’ was the phrase he’d used.

‘I work for MI5,’ I said. ‘You should know that.’

‘Isn’t that… secret?’

‘Yes.’ I smiled. ‘You and me.’

‘And Clive?’

‘No.’ I shook my head. ‘Not Clive.’

‘Ah.’

She looked away, reaching for her sherry, and I could tell at once that she was relieved. One less secret to share. One less scene to risk. I reached for my own glass and invited her to tell me how things were. She did so, deciding to trust me, an instinctive thing, woman to woman, her other options quite obviously exhausted. She talked in a low, slightly hesitant voice, rueful, saddened by what ambition and the lure of big business had done to the man she’d married.

She’d never wanted him to be rich. She’d no real interest in money. In fact she and Clive had both been happier, much happier, when he was still in the world of education, teaching day-release courses in engineering. They’d lived in Walsall, then. They’d had two kids in quick succession, both grown-up now with homes of their own. Laura, who was in bed with flu upstairs, had been an afterthought, a brief burst of sunshine between the squalls. After a while, she got to the point of the story. Her husband had
changed beyond recognition. The bills and the business were driving him mad. But there was more to it than that. She knew it.

I nodded. The bottle at her elbow was two-thirds empty. ‘Is there anyone else?’ I said.

‘No.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes. I asked him. It was one of the first things I thought of but—’ She shook her head, emphatic. ‘No.’

She gazed at me for a moment. The light from the fire danced on her face. She looked utterly miserable. ‘I think he’s frightened,’ she said at last. ‘He must be. But I don’t know why.’ She paused again, looking at me. ‘He’s never had a gun in his life. He wouldn’t know what to do with it. He hates violence. We both do. I just hope to God—’ She broke off again, shook her head and began to cry.

There was a box of tissues on the table. I took a handful and gave her one. She shut her eyes and blew her nose. When the question came, I barely heard it.

‘Is it to do with you?’ she whispered. ‘Your lot? Is that why you’re here?’

I gazed at her for a moment. ‘Yes,’ I said.

‘Is he in danger? Will they…?’

‘No.’

‘None of them? Not you? Not…’ she opened one eye, ‘whoever else it is?’

‘No.’

‘Are you sure?’

I hesitated, balling the Kleenex in my hand, pressing very hard. The woman needed help, real help, not platitudes. She was looking at me again, the eyes wide, an old face, ravaged by grief.

‘It’s not that I’d be alone,’ she said. ‘It’s not that. I can cope with that. I’ve thought about it and I’d hate it, but it’s not that. No. It’s…’ She began to cry again, reaching out for another tissue, shaking her head, trying to dislodge some awful thought. ‘He’s a good man, a truly good man. He doesn’t deserve all this, whatever it is, whatever’s going on. It shouldn’t have happened, not to him.’ She paused, watching me, wanting answers, her life out of control. ‘How
can
it happen?’ she said at last. ‘How come we’ve ended up this way? What’s he
done?’

I stayed another hour, before phoning for a taxi that took an age to appear. I asked her about Priddy, the kind of relationship he’d had with her husband, trying to determine what she hadn’t told me, but the deeper I probed, the more I realized that she knew very little about Priddy and probably cared even less. Her real concern was Clive. Her husband’s safety. Her husband’s sanity. When I tried to assure her that he was in no danger, she shook her head.

‘He’s spying,’ she said flatly.

‘He’s giving us information. Keeping his eyes open. Keeping us in touch. If I tell you he’s a brave man, you’ll get the wrong idea. He isn’t at risk. He’s simply doing …’ I hesitated.

‘He’s spying,’ she said again. ‘He’s a spy.’

‘OK.’ I nodded. ‘He’s a spy.’

Beth was silent for a moment, staring at the wall. ‘And me?’ she said at last, then, gesturing upstairs: ‘Us?’

‘You’re his wife. You come before everything.’

She nodded, gazing round the room, thinking about it, her eyes moist again. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘I think that’s his problem. If I didn’t love him, it wouldn’t matter.’

The taxi arrived soon afterwards. I stood in the pool of light beneath the porch, thanking Beth for her time, looking back at the chilly chaos that was all she had left of the marriage. The rapport we’d established earlier had somehow gone. I was, by the evening’s end, just another messenger from that other world that had taken her husband away.

Turning up my collar against the driving rain, I fumbled in my pocket and scribbled the number of my Fulham flat. It wasn’t much, but it was the closest I could get to telling her that I really wanted to help. In truth, I hadn’t a clue about the small print, about what her husband was really up to, but in the parlance of my new trade, that was strictly irrelevant. What mattered, in professional terms, was trying to insulate her against further contacts. I hoped that I’d done that. I hoped she wouldn’t talk to the media, or discuss it with friends. More important, I hoped she trusted me and would feel confident enough to pick up the phone if things got really bleak.

‘My home number,’ I said, giving her the already sodden piece of paper.

She looked at it for a moment, quite blank, then mumbled her thanks. I kissed her on the cheek, wished her luck and ran to the waiting taxi. Looking back, starting to wave, I was surprised to find the front door already shut. As the taxi began to move away, I looked back again, watching her shadow move across the curtains, reaching for the light switch, returning the cottage to darkness and the rain.

I was back in Stollmann’s office three days later. Getting an appointment had been far from easy.

‘She’s frightened witless,’ I said. ‘She thinks he’s going mad.’

Stollmann looked at me woodenly. His eyes were blacker than ever. ‘We knew that,’ he said.

‘But she’s half mad herself. Truly. She’s out of her mind with it. Worrying about him.’

Stollmann nodded and reaching for one of his Biros added a line to a list of notes on a pad. I wondered for a moment whether the note had anything to do with Beth. Somehow I doubted it.

‘She going to talk to anyone else?’ he said at last.

‘No.’

‘You sure?’

‘As I can be.’ I nodded. ‘Yes.’

‘How do you know?’

‘I told her she’d be putting him in danger,’ I lied. ‘I told her it wouldn’t be a clever thing to do.’

Stollmann said nothing for a moment. Then he looked up. ‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘It wouldn’t.’

There was a long silence. Stollmann’s eyes were back on the pad. Our conversation was evidently over. I got up. Then sat down again.

‘About Priddy,’ I began. ‘Remember you asked me to take a look at him?’

Stollmann glanced up. ‘Yes?’

I shrugged. ‘What did you have in mind? Exactly?’

Stollmann ducked his head a moment. ‘I just wondered how you got on, that’s all, you know…’ He was uneasy, even embarrassed. ‘Chemistry? Would that cover it?’

‘Did I like him? Is that what you’re asking?’

‘Yes.’ He nodded. ‘More or less.’

I stared at him a moment, remembering the touch of Priddy’s
hand on my arm, the way he modulated his voice for certain questions, an interest all the more insulting for being so obvious.