Joe Country полностью

Every fifteen minutes a nurse came in and assessed the situation. She brought River a cup of tea and a sandwich, patted his shoulder. Are you the only family? How long have you got? There was a mother, Isobel Dunstable, née Cartwright, who had given the Old Bastard his name, and meant it; and a father, the renegade American spook Frank Harkness, who had seduced Isobel not for love, nor even for pleasure, but to bend the O.B. to his will, perhaps the only time in his life the O.B. had been outfoxed. And never spoken a word of it, either. By the time River came to learn the truth, the old man had been lost in the twilight, unable to tell the difference between trees and shadows.

Meanwhile, Frank was in the wind, and his mother hadn’t spoken to her father in years.

I just want him to be unhappy, she’d told River once. Behind the brittle levity, he’d sensed a wound still pulsing.

He dozed, so that when at last it happened, it happened without his knowing. His eyes had closed, and the images that scampered through his mind were a confused welter of loss and unhappiness. It was a noise from the corridor that brought him back, a jostled trolley, and he started at the sound, his heart hammering. It was another moment or two before he realised that the machines had changed their tune, and instead of charting progress, were transmitting the news from the other side. His grandfather had crossed the border.

River rose and kissed the old man’s forehead moments before the nurse arrived.

Emma said, “You’re kidding, right?”

“Do I look like I’m kidding?”

“No offence, but it’s hard to tell.”

This was true. It wasn’t that Lady Di was a stoneface, and if she ever took to pulling the legs of her subordinates it would likely be in controlled conditions, with the subject fixed to a rack, but in the time Emma Flyte had been running the Dogs, she’d heard a lot of instructions that might easily have been a piss-take. It turned out that in the governance of a nation’s security, many absurd situations had to be worked around: a toxic clown in the Foreign Office, a state visit by a narcissistic bed-wetter, the tendency of the electorate to jump off the occasional cliff. So sometimes a First Desk would outline an agenda and your first thought would be Yeah, as if.

But not this time.

“I’d have thought Slough House was on your list,” she said.

“I have a list?”

“Oh, I think we both know you have a list. And Slough House has been a thorn in your side for years, right? So here you are at last, top of the monkey puzzle tree, I’d have thought your first move would be to raze that place to the ground.”

And sow salt where it had stood. You couldn’t be too careful, where Jackson Lamb was concerned.

“And instead, you’re embracing its potential—oh, don’t tell me. You made a deal with Lamb.”

“I’m First Desk, Ms. Flyte. I don’t have to make deals with anyone.”

“And I used to be a copper, Ms. Taverner, and I recognise bullshit when I hear it. That’s how you got rid of Whelan, isn’t it? You had Lamb’s help, and in return Slough House is off the hook.”

She only had to say the words aloud to recognise their truth. Backroom politics was Diana Taverner’s natural habitat, and as for Lamb, he’d deal with the devil if circumstances required. Whether the devil would shake hands with Lamb was a different question. Even Satan has standards.

Lady Di had leaned back. Not a great sign. Taverner was a prowler. When someone else was in charge, she’d move around rather than sit in one place; ever-conscious, Emma supposed, of how warm flesh could be a target.

She was speaking now. “Let’s just say,” she said, “that the higher up you move, the more your perspective changes. Slough House has been a nuisance in the past, yes. And may be again in the future, in which case I won’t hesitate to trim its sails. But for the time being—let’s call this a transitional phase—there are certain uses to which it can be put. Not least of which is, solving the problem of your career trajectory.” For a moment, her gaze shifted; she was looking beyond Emma, through the glass wall, at the boys and girls on the Hub. A target-rich environment, Emma assumed. There were so many ways you could disappoint Diana Taverner, some of which you wouldn’t know about until your head was rolling on the sand. “So yes, as you put it, I’m embracing its potential. That’s what leaders do.”

Emma shook her head.

“Something to add?”

“The Met was bad enough,” said Emma. “But this, Jesus. You’d burn a city down to save face.”

“It would depend on the city.”

“I wish I thought you were joking.”

“This meeting seems to have become all about my sense of humour. If it’ll save you time, here’s my tell. When I think something’s funny, I laugh. With me?”

“You remind me of someone from my old job.”

“The Commissioner, I hope.”