Okay, he thought, feeling nicotine course through his veins. That’s the downside. But let’s adjust this picture, shall we? It was always possible that, instead of a victim, he was in fact a hero, who had single-handedly forced everyone else into a corner:
the prime minister was scared of him, so
he was being picked on by the Secret Service, which meant
they thought his brilliant plan would work, so
… they’d make him a laughing stock.
Fuck.
He reached into his breast pocket, where something with sharp corners was digging into him: the photograph from Dancing Bear. Ancient history, but he’d had happy times there – and was that a crime? Nobody could look at this photo, surely, and not see past the ill-applied blusher (okay, that had been unwise) to the joy behind. Yes, he was wearing a dress; yes, elbow-length gloves – but so what? Was he hurting anyone? The only damage being done was to his own future, and since he couldn’t have known that at the time, even that was an innocent injury. He had known Dodie then, but they weren’t married, and it wasn’t until years later that he had confessed to her this aspect of his personality. So: all this photo showed was a single man, happy in the company of like-minded fellows. A little bit of dressing up – have we not come far enough, as a society, to accept that? He could feel himself slipping into speech mode. This, this: this was normal English manhood, letting off steam. Hadn’t Mick Jagger once declared that no Englishman needed encouragement to dress up as a woman? And look at Eddie Izzard – he was popular; beloved, even. So why shouldn’t Dennis Gimball receive the same treatment?
It’s not like he was gay, for God’s sake.
So he could be a pioneer. Could break the mould.
And – once it was known he was being persecuted for who he was – he could be the poster-boy for a whole new politics. The sanctity of personal choices, that would be his banner. Identity, selfhood, fiscal responsibility, strong borders, and a ground-up rethink of the benefits system. What’s not to vote for?
A scorching sensation at his fingertips warned him he’d finished his cigarette. He ground it out on the terracotta pot and buried the stub in its soil. His speech would need a new shape: how the Secret Service had tried to prevent him telling the truth about Zafar Jaffrey with blackmail threats. How they had tried to destroy Dennis Gimball with their bully-boy tactics. And how he was not a man to allow any citizen, himself included, to be ground beneath the Establishment’s boot …
He would be carried from the hall shoulder high, he decided. His people’s cheers would echo through the nation; his name would ring between the very stars.
Taking one last look at the photograph, he tucked it carefully away in his pocket.
And wished he could see the look on Claude Whelan’s face when the spook realised he’d been outmanoeuvred.
Most of the crew had departed Slough House: Cartwright with a reluctant Coe; Louisa Guy with an oddly subdued Shirley Dander. Catherine worried about Shirley; would have worried less if she’d spent the months since Marcus’s death kicking holes in walls and throwing desks through windows. It was when a bomb stopped ticking that you should be nervous.
J. K. Coe, too: Catherine couldn’t read him at all. It wasn’t that he was a bad person; more that bad things had happened to him, and there were bound to be consequences. Plus, of course, he might be a bad person. No point pretending otherwise.
Probably, though, who she ought to be worrying about was herself.
Lamb had disappeared into the toilet, having loudly announced that this time was for real, and he’d be taking no prisoners. ‘No offence,’ he’d added to Emma Flyte, still handcuffed to a chair. And this was the main reason Catherine should be worried: Lamb had kidnapped the Head Dog and sent the horses on a madcap errand which, if it turned out not madcap after all, demanded seventeen times the number of agents and a hell of a lot more resources if they weren’t to make a bad situation worse. Which, as someone had once pointed out, was their specialist area. So why did it all have a just-another-day-at-the-office feel? She must have been here too long.
She said to Emma, ‘Tea?’
‘You’re kidding, right?’
‘I wasn’t, actually. I’m having some. But it’s up to you.’
‘Do you have the key to these things?’
‘There used to be one somewhere. I hope Shirley didn’t lose it.’
Catherine went and made tea, and when she came back Emma didn’t appear to have moved at all; hadn’t hopped around the room on the chair, battering it against the walls, hoping to break it in pieces. That wasn’t a great sign. Situations like these, you were probably better off if your hostage wasn’t calm, cool and calculating.
She had to hold the cup to Emma’s lips so the woman could sip her tea. It was a potential Hannibal Lecter scenario, but passed without dental assault. When Emma had had enough, Catherine put her mug on the desk, sat down too and smiled gently. ‘When he’s in a specially grim mood, Lamb likes us to come up with mission statements,’ she said. ‘I’ve always thought “Apologies for the inconvenience” had a ring to it.’
‘How about “Fucking up the parts other fuck-ups can’t reach”?’
‘I’ll add it to the list.’
‘Are you really happy to see your career flatline because your lord and master had a rush of blood to the brain?’
Catherine said, ‘I really don’t know where to start with that. Career, lord and master, or brain.’
‘Even if you’re right, even if Coe’s onto something, how can you stop it by yourselves? Those four … I mean, seriously? Louisa’s got her head screwed on I’ll grant you, but the other three are dangerous. And not in a good way.’
‘River’s better than that. It’s not his fault he was assigned here.’
‘That’s what makes him dangerous. He’s got too much to prove.’
‘Maybe we could just agree to differ.’
‘Let me go. We’ll take your theories to the Park. The worst that could happen, you’re proved wrong. And if you’re proved right instead, well. It could turn all your careers round. But not if you go about it like this.’
Catherine said, ‘This is Slough House. We could produce a signed affidavit from whoever’s running Daesh today, outlining their plans for the next twelve months, and Di Taverner would screw it up and bin it before she’d act on it.’
‘People might die,’ Emma Flyte said.
‘People already have,’ Catherine said. ‘And whatever you think of Jackson, take it from me. If he can stop another Abbotsfield happening, he will.’
I’m very nearly positive about that, she thought.
Flyte opened her mouth to reply but before she could do so, he was back in the room: their supposed lord and master.
‘I didn’t hear a flush,’ Catherine said suspiciously.
‘No,’ said Lamb. ‘The Guinness Book of Records people might want a look first. I feel about two stone lighter.’
‘And you thought being handcuffed was cruel and unusual,’ she said to Emma.
Lamb scooped up the bag of Haribo Shirley had abandoned and collapsed onto a chair: his usual challenge to the office furniture. Which sooner or later would surely rise up and smite him, but this didn’t happen today. ‘So. Has she confessed yet?’