The almonds arrived. Lamb scooped a grubby handful almost before they were placed on the table, and poured most into his mouth. His gaze remained on Whelan throughout.
Who said, “Well, you’re here. I was planning on speaking to you anyway. So this saves us both time.”
“Good to know. When I’ve saved enough, I’ll put the clocks back.”
“You took a call on Monday afternoon.”
“‘Took a call?’”
“Answered your office phone.”
“Doesn’t sound like me.”
“The call lasted two minutes thirty-seven seconds.”
“Can’t have been a dirty one,” said Lamb. “My stamina’s shot to pieces these days. I’ve had sneezes last longer.”
“I see you haven’t changed.”
The waitress brought their drinks. Lamb kept his gaze on Whelan, but Whelan gave her an appreciative look.
“Seems like I’m not the only one,” Lamb said.
Wherever he was going with that, Whelan wanted none of it. He said, “Sophie de Greer.” Lamb’s expression didn’t alter. “The name of the woman who called you.”
“I’d say you were well informed,” Lamb said. “If you weren’t full of shit.”
“This won’t help.”
“I’m not trying to help. I’m hoping you’ll fuck off and injure yourself.”
“Help you I mean.” Whelan reached for his glass. He’d rather be reaching for a weapon, he thought, ridiculously: When had he ever held a weapon? But there was something about Lamb: even facing him across a table felt like facing him across a trench. “All I’m doing is establishing the facts. And if you carry on being obstructive, my report will reflect that.”
“And I’ll get my wrists slapped.”
“Treat it like a game, that’s fine. But this is coming from all the way upstairs. If you don’t cooperate, things will get uncomfortable.”
Lamb lifted his glass and examined it for a moment. He’d asked for very large, which was what he’d been given, in bar terms. But if he’d poured this amount for himself, anyone watching would assume he was on the wagon. Without drinking, he said, “So tell me about this Soapy Gruyere.”
“Congratulations, you’re half right. She’s Swiss.”
“Someone has to be.”
“And a political appointee. As you well know.”
“I may have come across the name,” Lamb conceded. “Isn’t she Number Ten’s new weather girl?”
“The term you’re reaching for is ‘superforecaster.’”
“‘Superforecaster.’” Lamb shook his head in an exaggerated lament. “Still, I suppose the Swiss had to diversify from their more traditional pursuits. Chocolate, cuckoo clocks. Gay porn.”
“. . . Gay porn?”
“Well what did you imagine a hard-on collider was?”
He was going to have to take charge of this conversation before Lamb turned it into a lads’ night out. “She’s disappeared.”
“Wonder if she saw that coming?”
“And you’re the last person she called before it happened.”
Lamb shrugged, and used his free hand to help himself to more almonds. The ones that didn’t reach his mouth scattered, some falling into Whelan’s lap.
Whelan said, “You were in your office all afternoon?”
“Usually am.”
“And Ms. Standish takes your calls when you’re not there.”
“Does she? I’ve often wondered what she gets up to when I’m out.”
“How did you come to know Dr. de Greer?”
“I didn’t.”
“Because there’s some suspicion that the Service is involved in her disappearance. And the fact that she called you rather lends weight to that notion.”
Lamb balanced a nut on a thumbnail and flicked it into the air. Whelan expected it to drop into his mouth, but Lamb apparently didn’t: the almond disappeared somewhere behind him. “So your main item of evidence is something that didn’t happen. Dream this one up in your mother’s basement, did you? Because it has all the hallmarks of a conspiracy theory. And the sad bastards who fall for conspiracy theories always see more than what’s really there.” He leaned forward. “It’s like that fable about the blind men who think they’ve found an elephant. When what they’ve really got is a length of rope, a wall and an old umbrella stand.”
“I think we’ve heard different versions of that.”
“And what you’ve got, Claude, is several handfuls of crap you imagine adds up to an elephant.”
“You haven’t asked how I know about the phone call.”
“I don’t need to.” He smiled, unless it was a leer. “The Park’s always had an unlimited supply of elephant shit. Comes from being so close to the zoo.”
All of this, and the drink still untasted in his hand.
Whelan took a sip from his G&T. “Whatever’s going on, I plan to get to the bottom of it.”
“Save your strength for getting into that waitress’s knickers. I mean, you’ve no chance of that either, but at least you won’t get too badly hurt.” Lamb paused. “On the other hand, hassle my joes and I’ll take it as a declaration of war.”
A spurt of anger cascaded through him, as hot and wet as a stomach bug. “Joes? Your ‘joes’ are a bunch of wrecks. That Wicinski character should be behind bars if what I’ve heard’s true. As for what’s her name—Dander?—it’s not treatment she needs, it’s a padded cell. Slough House isn’t a department. It’s a psychiatric ward.”
If his outburst shook Lamb, he didn’t show it. “As ever, you’re missing the big picture. It’s my psychiatric ward. And it’s off-limits. Whatever you think your jurisdiction is, it runs out well before it reaches mine.”
“Is that a threat?”
“Only arseholes and idiots make threats. And I’m not an idiot.” Lamb got to his feet with a suddenness belying the weight he carried. Not to mention the glass in his hand: the surface of his whisky trembled, but no liquid sloshed over the sides. “Dander’s treatment’s none of your business. But thanks for the drink.” It barely resembled a drink, the way he put it away; it might have been a thimbleful. And then he was gone.
As it turned out, it was the fourth gin and tonic that was actually the key. Because by the time Whelan had drunk it, by the time the frightening bill arrived, he had replayed the encounter several times over in his head, and come to the firm conclusion that Lamb had been lying about the phone call.
And while he wasn’t entirely certain that Lamb had also caused Sophie de Greer to vanish, he had an inkling of where he might have put her if he had.
If the regularity of Diana Taverner’s meetings with the PM suggested a stable relationship between Number Ten and the Service, such stability was of the kind a folded-up beermat beneath a wonky table offers—it would do at a pinch, but sooner or later you’re going to need tools or a new piece of furniture. If this crisis point had lately seemed closer at hand, that, Diana suspected, was due to Anthony Sparrow, whose own position seemed secure enough. The prime minister makes me look like Greyfriars Bobby, Peter Judd had once told Diana, and it was true that the PM’s sense of loyalty was most observable in its application to his own interests, but it was also the case that he had, in the past, defended Sparrow against the slings and arrows of an outraged media. Loyalty, then, was not beyond him, even if most observers reckoned this had more to do with his belief that The Godfather was a guidebook than adherence to a principle. Whatever the cause, Sparrow seemed a fixture, his untouchability reinforced by the fact that, unlike cabinet ministers, he didn’t rely on the electorate’s approval, so the PM could be reasonably sure that irrelevancies like public opinion and the national good weren’t unduly skewing his advice.