All the Colors of Darkness

door locked, his alarm system on and his ears open at home that evening. After a Marks & Spencer’s beef Wellington washed down with a 1998 Eight Songs Shiraz, he decided to give up on the bookcase and settled down to an evening’s reading of Stephen Dorril’s book about MI6 instead, with John Garth’s cello concertos playing quietly in the background.

The fire had been over three years ago now, Banks recalled, and the rebuilding, with the addition of the entertainment room, extra bedroom and conservatory, had taken the best part of a year. Whereas before he had lived in the kitchen or the front room, occasionally enjoying an evening on the wall by the beck, now he spent most of his time in the conservatory at the back, or in the entertainment room, using the kitchen mostly just for cooking —reheating might be more accurate—and the front room as a kind of study-cum-sitting room, where he kept his computer and a couple of battered old armchairs.

MI6’s history proved to be complicated and tough going, hardly like the Ian Fleming novels he remembered from his teenage years, and after a couple of chapters, he wasn’t sure that he knew much more than when he had started. He also still had many chapters to cover to get up to the present.

A L L T H E C O L O R S O F D A R K N E S S

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The phone rang shortly after half past nine. It was Sophia. He was more than relieved for the interruption to his reading.

“Have a good journey home?” Banks asked.

“Fine. Just boring, that’s all. I think I’ll take the train next time. At least then I can get some work done, read a book.”

He thought he could hear her stif le a yawn. “Tired?”

“Long day. Sometimes I think there’s just one arts festival after another.”

“How’s your week shaping up?”

“More of the same. Lots of interviews. A fifteen-minute special on that new James Bond book by Sebastian Faulks, including a few comments from Daniel Craig.”

“Don’t tell me he’s coming to the studio.”

“Don’t be an idiot. But a girl can always dream.”

“Hmph. Right. Well, I hope to be down your way in a day or so.

Could you maybe give Daniel Craig a raincheck and find a bit of room in your busy schedule to fit me in? I can easily get a hotel, if . . .”

“Of course I can, you idiot. You’ve got a key. Just come over. It’ll be great to see you. If nothing else, at least we’ll get to sleep together.”

Banks couldn’t help but feel his heart glow at the genuine pleasure in her voice. “Great,” he said. “I’ll ring you.”

“Is this trip business or pure holiday?” Sophia asked.

“A bit of both, really.”

“What sort of business?”

“Same as before.”

“That murder-suicide case?”

“That’s the one.”

“The one you were quizzing Dad about, with all the spooks?”

“One of the victims was an MI6 agent, that’s all.”

“How exciting,” Sophia said. “With you around, who needs Daniel Craig. Bye.”

Always, at the end of their telephone conversations, Banks was tempted to say, “I love you,” but he never did. The “l” word hadn’t been mentioned yet, and Banks got the feeling that it would only cause complications at this point. Best go on as they were and see 1 5 4

P E T E R R O B I N S O N

where it led. There would be plenty of time for the “l” word later.

He kept the receiver off the hook a bit longer than usual, listening for that telltale click he had heard so often in spy movies. Then he chastised himself for being such a fool and put it down. With today’s technology, you could be damn sure a tapped telephone didn’t go

“click” when you finished your call. Besides, he should have thought of that earlier. He would have to be more careful what he said over the landline from now on.

When he hung up, he turned on the TV for News at Ten, poured another glass of wine and sat through the usual lead stories on greedy politicians caught out in a lie, the upcoming American elections, a twelve-year-old schoolgirl gone missing on her way home from a piano lesson, famine and genocide in Africa, war in the Middle East and more trouble in the old Russian satellite states. His ears pricked up at a story about the Hardcastle-Silbert case.

The presenter stopped short at announcing that Silbert had worked for MI6, mentioning only that he was Edwina Silbert’s son, had been a civil servant, and that he lived with his gay lover, “the son of a West Yorkshire coal miner,” in an “exclusive” and “desirable” residential suburb of Eastvale. Typical southern nonsense, Banks thought. As if Eastvale had suburbs. And Barnsley was in South Yorkshire, not West.

The segment also stressed that police were satisfied it was a tragic case of murder-suicide, and then went on to refer to details of similar cases over the past twenty years or so. At the end, Detective Superintendent Gervaise appeared on camera looking cool and professional.