So Llewelyn was definitely Middle East; it had been on the cards from the moment Audley had been involved.
'I can't think how I didn't meet up with him much earlier. He must have kept very quiet until he was sure the power was in his hands.
Then – wham! I think he damn near convinced the J.I.C. diat I was an Israeli agent.'
Rumour had said that too: Audley had worked far too closely with the Israelis.
'I did a little quiet research on
dummy2
'Outwardly he's all empiricism and pragmatism, outsmarting the Russians and the Chinese. But inwardly he's a raving idealist. I think he dreams of becoming a political Lawrence of Arabia – or at least getting back to the U.N. partition lines of '47 if he can't undo 1920. An admirer of all things Arab, anyway – providing they fit in with his dream of the new Middle East.'
'Would you say there's any substance in his dreams?' Butler asked.
'There's something in it, certainly. He wants to underwrite the new nationalisms, and that would seem to be backing a winning streak.
But he thinks that deep down the Arabs would rather deal with us than with anyone else because we're the only ones who have had any sort of love affair with Arabia.
'The trouble is that the real Lawrence types always seem to turn up on the wrong side – like those bright characters in the Yemen. And he tried to stop them.'
Audley gave Butler a sidelong glance, as though it had suddenly dawned on him that he was being drawn. 'Anyway, that was why I was – promoted: my advice didn't always fit his scheme of things.
And admittedly I'm not exactly anti-Israeli.'
There was a lot left unsaid there, thought Roskill. If Llewelyn was a schemer, so was Audley. In fact Audley could probably be as bloody-minded and obstinate as anyone when it came to the crunch, for all his air of donnish reasonableness.
But for the rest, it made sense. The great powers might be chary of blowing up each other's civil servants, but some of the smaller powers were much less inhibited, particularly the Middle Eastern dummy2
ones. There were harassed bureaucrats in Washington and Moscow who sweated without great success to curb such tendencies. The Israelis; went their own remorseless way, apparently regardless –
and some of the Arab guerrilla groups were both uncontrollable and unpredictable ...
'But if he doesn't approve of you, darling, why does he want your help now?' Faith asked. 'And why doesn't he ask you straight out?'
'It would stick in his throat. But I suppose he thinks I've got some useful private contacts.' Audley shook his head. 'He's wrong of course.'
'He doesn't think so,' said Butler. 'The truth is, Mrs. Audley, your husband was the sharpest man in the group, and they know it. And he had his own grapevine.'
' 'Had' is right. I haven't got it now. I've been out nearly a year, and that's a lifetime – I'm out of touch completely. They should know that I can't pick up the threads just like that. It won't do – it simply won't do – and I'm surprised Llewelyn ever thought it would.'
'He's seen the driver's seat in his car, Dr. Audley,' said Butler harshly. 'He's frightened.'
'Frightened? You're damn right he's frightened. So am I – and so should you be. But he'll put himself on ice and expect me to go poking around. And I'm not going to! I'm not equipped to deal with maniacs.'
'You don't have to. Just get a line on the who and the why – that's all.'
dummy2
Audley gestured abruptly. 'No! It's not on. Besides, I've got Faith to think of now. So even if I could, I wouldn't. You can tell them I'm just not interested.'
Not interested – that would be the heart of the matter for a man like Audley in anything that involved choice. Only because of that would he allow other, weightier reasons to become decisive.
Butler pushed back his chair and stood up.
'I'll tell them just that. But on your head be it then, Dr. Audley.'
'Not on my head, Major Butler. That's a hat I don't choose to wear.
It doesn't fit.'
Butler's eyes shifted momentarily to Roskill, and then back towards Audley, calculation naked in them now.
'If it's not yours then it's Hugh's, whether it fits or not – spare me a moment outside, Hugh – so I'll see myself out, Mrs. Audley. And I'm sorry to have troubled you.'
Roskill followed Butler to the square of cobbles in the angle of the old house, in the pool of light from the porch lantern. It didn't help to be dragged out like this – Audley would know very well what he would be up to – but if there was anything to be salvaged now he had to know more.
'Don't ask me to go straight back and convince him, Jack. It won't do any good now. You've botched it – you've bloody well botched it. It'll be damn difficult now.'
Butler faced him, relaxed and without a hint of apology.
'I warned them. I told them he'd tumble to it. But Stocker reckoned he might quit if they tried to force him – he's got just enough dummy2
money of his own to do it – and Fred would play merry hell if that happened. So they seemed to think they'd got
