“While using the fact that he didn’t catch the virus as a character issue?”
“Well, his opponent did.”
“It was a virus, Peter. Anyone could get it.”
“And as I’ve just pointed out, his opponent did.” His tone was the familiar one of a patient bully explaining the obvious. “I’m not saying it’s a sign of moral probity. But if it was, Desmond won.”
“And if it had been the other way round . . .”
“I’d be pointing out what a survivor he is. And not a pampered, scaredy, mask-wearing chicken.”
“You realise some idiots believe the pandemic was caused by gay marriage? This is no better than that.”
“Yes, well, once we established we’ve no time for experts, it’s open season, isn’t it?”
“Not really, no. Let me be quite clear. No way in hell am I supporting your candidate for mayor. And if he stands for anything else, I won’t support him for that, either. Not for worst-dressed rabblerouser. Not for seediest looking sockpuppet. All understood?”
“I’ll put you down as an undecided. Meanwhile, how’s business your end? Any more special operations planned?”
“The Service currently has its hands full maintaining equilibrium. Like most other organisations. So your cabal—”
“Our cabal.”
“—will have to content itself with the quiet life.”
“I do hope you’re not expecting us to fade into the background. You’ve opened a door that won’t easily shut. You can’t pretend you didn’t know what you were doing.”
“I don’t have to pretend I wasn’t aware of your dark passengers, Peter. You’re the one brought them on board.”
“We both know how much protection that will offer you should our arrangement become public. Which there’s no need for, obviously. As things stand.” The implicit threat hovered a while, underlined by Judd’s leavetaking: “What was it Fu Manchu used to say? ‘The world shall hear from me again.’”
She dropped her phone into her bag as the car arrived at Downing Street.
Where the small, irregularly shaped room she was shown to was a drab brown chamber, its walls bare save for various versions of the queen’s portrait, ageing in ten-year jumps. These were spaced at uniform intervals, making it hard not to notice there was no room for another, unless it was to be hung on the door. In the centre of the room, two long-backed chairs sat either side of a coffee table, on which was a cafetiere, freshly made, and two cups. Diana filled one, knowing she’d be waiting a while yet, the PM being one of those who believed that punctuality shows weakness. On the mantelpiece, a carriage clock ticked, its noise curiously elongated between the not-quite parallel walls. Downing Street was more than the warren it was labelled; there was a physics-bending aspect to it. Take it apart, room by room, and there’d be no way of putting it together again: you’d have spaces left unfilled, leftover rooms too big to fill them. Though those empty spaces would be handy for sealing up unwanted occupants . . . When the door opened to admit Anthony Sparrow, Diana thought, for a blurred moment, that she’d summoned the devil.
He grunted a greeting. “The PM’s got something on. You can brief me on his behalf.”
“‘Something on’？”
“It happens. He’s running a country.”
“This isn’t party business. Are you sure you’re an appropriate standin?”
“A petty distinction,” he said, pulling a chair back and flinging himself into it. “I’m taking this meeting, end of. Start talking.”
Sparrow was a scruffy dresser, and this evening wore jeans and a red T-shirt under a sandy-brown combat jacket. He carried satchel rather than briefcase, and as with many aspects of his behaviour seemed to dare anyone to comment on it. While Diana ran through the weekly business—the threat-level checklist; budgeting issues; whispers of a hushed-up cyber-attack on a German bank; more budgeting issues—he stared at the nearest portrait of ER, the tenor of his thoughts suggested by the curl of his lip. He had, as an unkind sketch writer once commented, a face only Wayne Rooney’s mother could love: faintly squashed, as if he’d spent years pressing it against a window. On the other side of the glass now, he was making up for lost time. Anyone who thought power was about anything other than settling scores hadn’t been paying attention.
When she’d finished, he said, “That it?”