Not much more than a paragraph, was Taverner’s considered opinion. The details of Harkness’s last UK appearance, shortly after the Westacres bombing, were still under wraps—not so much buried in the files for thirty years as left blowing in the wind, to be scattered for all time—and while Nash was entitled to be fully briefed, he was wise not to press the point. Deniability was next to Godliness in Westminster’s corridors, and Godliness itself second only to Unassailable Majority. And the last time anyone had seen one of those, the resulting messiah complex was still being grumbled about in The Hague.
But Nash was an ally, so here was something he could do: sit on a piece of information and make sure it never hatched.
“He worked liaison, between Langley and the Park. Only a little, and a long time ago. But afterwards, once he went freelance, he made use of certain . . . assets.”
A tray was brought in, and Nash’s mood improved.
“It turned out he’d helped himself from our dressing-up box before putting certain events in train,” Taverner continued when they had the room again. “Which made bringing charges a tricky business. It could so easily have looked like we’d been incompetent.”
Than which, as both knew, there were few looks more damning. It was a rare historical car crash that forensic reconstruction couldn’t make seem a successful emergency stop. And as in any line of business, a succeeding CEO who couldn’t make a bygone cock-up look like an opportunity missed wasn’t fit for management, and should take her retirement package, her annual bonus, her golden handshake and her non-disclosure kickback and tiptoe from the boardroom in disgrace. So no, Taverner wasn’t worried that she might seem incompetent; Claude Whelan had been in charge during the Westacres atrocity, and the associated buck had been branded with his initials long before it came to a halt. What Taverner would prefer not to become public was the nature of the deals she’d made to ensure that that particular deceleration didn’t inflict whiplash on her too.
Nash reached for a second Hobnob, making quite a good fist of looking like he was doing this unconsciously, his mind on other things. “And is that coming back to bite us? Because I don’t want to wake up tomorrow and find nasty headlines on my iPad. I didn’t much like it when they came neatly folded on good old-fashioned broadsheets.”
“No editor’s going to print that St. Len’s is the Spooks’ Chapel,” she said. “Not unless they want to find out what it’s like having their own mobiles monitored. So no, a minor brouhaha at a family event is all that happened. It’ll stay that way.”
“And Harkness?”
“Wheels are in motion.”
“Just so long as they don’t come off.” Nash leaned back in his chair. Were it not for the smudge of chocolate on his upper lip, he’d have looked the model of an executive decision-maker. “Because the Service isn’t in good odour at present. Too many missteps, too few triumphs. While acknowledging that your own tenure’s still in its infancy, the PM isn’t convinced that a corner’s yet been turned.”
“She’s rejected my working paper,” Taverner said flatly.
“It’s not a good time, Diana. The cupboard is bare. Now is not the moment for a root-and-branch overhaul of operational practices, however crucial you feel that might be.” He glanced at the plate of biscuits, but successfully glanced away again. “Between ourselves, playing wait-and-see might be no bad thing. The PM’s stamp of approval hardly comes with a lifetime guarantee. It’s no secret she wasn’t so much made leader as handed a janitor’s uniform. Once Brexit’s been finalised, and her job looks less like an excrement baguette, someone more competent will step into her breeches. Then, perhaps, the ball will be back in your court.”
“Our court, don’t you mean?”
“I’m on your side, Diana. You know that.”
“Good to hear. But we don’t just need new balls, we need our racquet restrung. I’m trying to safeguard the nation, Oliver. That’s not a good area to penny-pinch on. And it’s not as if we’re currently standing shoulder to shoulder with our sister services.”
“Our European allies aren’t going to throw us to the wolves just because we’re looking for trading partners elsewhere.”
“Maybe not. But nor are they going to let us sit at their tables if they think we’re best buddies with China, or Kazakhstan, or whoever we end up swapping glass beads with. The borders have shifted. We need good, old-fashioned, on-the-ground intelligence, backed up with the appropriate hardware. We can’t be keeping our fingers crossed that the neighbours’ll lend us theirs when the chips are down.”
“The people have spoken, Diana.”
“Did they speak? Or just scream in frustration?”
“Save it for a dinner party. The government of the day, elected by the people, indicates the path we have to tread. Currently, that’s the path of make and do.”
“And the government of the day doesn’t always choose the wisest route.”
