“Yes, I’m sure Jackson Lamb would sympathise with your loss,” said Lady Di. “Though I doubt he’d tell you what he did with the body.”
“That’s the way Seb would have wanted it,” said Judd philosophically. “A nice professional job. No prolonged farewells.”
“Whatever you think of the electorate’s short-term memory,” she said, “I think you can confidently expect Lamb to harbour a grudge. And I’m not sure he’ll be happy to see you back in the high life.”
“Lamb can be dealt with, if perhaps less . . . extremely than was attempted last time. I’m sure he has skeletons in his closet.”
“You have more faith in his discretion than I do. I expect Lamb has skeletons at his breakfast table. But that doesn’t mean he rattles easily.”
Judd waved an airy hand. “He’s a detail. One of many. Meanwhile, I’m eating a lot of rubber chicken. The political returnee’s equivalent of humble pie. And calling in favours, of course. As I said before, no network like a college network. And our new Prime Minister is—well. Let’s just say we go way back.”
Something about the wide-eyed innocence of this statement triggered Taverner’s shag-dar.
“. . . You’re kidding.”
“It never ceases to please me how women who like to appear so in charge in public like nothing better than to be supplicant behind closed doors.”
“Oh god.”
“Mind you,” he added thoughtfully, “we don’t hear the phrase strong and stable leadership anything like as often as we used to. Most of her public appearances, she looks like a woman who’s forgotten her safe word.”
The food was arriving. She held her tongue while the plates were set in front of them, and suffered Judd’s polite harassment of the waitress—definitely waitress in this context—before speaking again.
“And that’s why you invited me to lunch? To let me know you’re on the comeback trail? Frankly, Peter, however that goes, I can’t see our professional futures being entwined any time soon. And as for private encounters, well. I’m as sentimental as the next girl, but there are some primrose paths best trodden only once, don’t you think?”
“And yet I’m sure I’ll be scaling those blue remembered hills, in memory at least, for years to come.” He picked up his fork. “But no. No, my dear. I alert you to my career intentions only because you’ll find out about them anyway, and long before the press gets its boots on, I’ve no doubt. No, I had other things in mind. Something you need to hear.”
“Our opinions as to what I do and don’t need are likely to differ,” Diana said. “But speak your mind. And then I’ll decide whether I’m going to have a second glass of this rather ordinary white before I return to work.”
“Forthright as ever.” He kept his eyes on her as he dug his fork into the mashed potato topping of his pie. “In the first instance, I’m here to demonstrate my bona fides,” he said, unable to resist stressing the word:
“What kind of activity?”
“The kind that falls within your remit, I’m afraid. Yes, national security would be involved. Ideally in a blanket-dropping sort of way.”
“You’re going to have to use plain English.”
“In plain English,” said Peter Judd, “it seems that some rather bad people are about to commit naughty deeds on your patch. Perhaps you’d like me to continue?”
She nodded, and he did.
The barn was old, and gaps between its slats ensured a steady draught. It contained a stew of ancient smells too—rotted animal waste and mulched down hay—and through a hole in its roof a twirling pillar of snow descended, as if a snowman were attempting to rise from the hard-earth floor. But Anton Moser had slept in worse, and there was no reason to suppose he wouldn’t sleep in worse again.
They’d arrived—himself, Lars Becker, Cyril Dupont—the day before, having spent the previous night in Stevenage, awaiting instructions. Secret agent bullshit, but Anton had worked for an actual secret service in the past, and knew better than to complain. Besides, he’d take a Travelodge over a barn any night, especially in the snow. All around the landscape was altering, hills smoothing out to a series of uninterrupted mounds, above and behind which the sky loomed huge. On the map the barn was a tiny square by a scrabbly patch of woodland; in reality it had fallen into disuse years ago. The oil patches by the door had dried up, and the few bits of equipment still in evidence, a pitchfork and a pair of shovels, were rusty souvenirs. The ladder to the loft was missing rungs. This hadn’t stopped Anton bedding down there, where the animal smells were less pronounced. Probably fewer rats too, unless rats could climb faulty ladders. Anton didn’t know. Animals were a closed book.
