ruefully, like a man embarrassed by all the attention.
'Well, Furniss, I don't know what the devil you've been up to since we last saw you. I expect it will make a superlative story and one which the Prime Minister will not want to see published, dear me, no, but you'll dine with us when you're up to snuff, I do look forward to that. Messages of deep esteem from Downing Street. Should have said so at once. And Mrs Furniss. I expect you'd like to put through a call before you leave here. Snow, arrange that will you? Then you'll be off to Albury for a day or so, Furniss, just to get it all off your chest, but you know all about that.'
'My field agents…?'
'Steady down, old chap. You worry about yourself, leave the others to us. Carter's coming down, he'll tell you what you need to know about your agents. It's been a wonderful show, Furniss. I said you would surprise us all. But I mustn't keep you from the telephone… . Well done, Furniss, first class. The Service is very proud.'
From the road outside they could hear the telephone ringing.
The telephone had rung three times while Parrish and Park had sat in the car.
It was ringing again as the woman drove past them and then swung sharply to pull into the drive at the side of the cottage.
And as soon as she had her door open she was hearing the telephone ringing, because she was out of her car like a rabbit, and she hadn't bothered to close the car door, and she'd left her keys in the front door.
Park started to move, but Parrish's hand rested lightly on his arm.
'Give her a moment.'
It had been Parrish's initiative, the drive to Bibury. No warning, just pitching up at Park's address, waiting for Ann to leave, then coming to the door. Park had already started on the spare bedroom ceiling, and he hadn't been given time to clean the paint off his fingers.
'We'll just give her time to answer. I'm out of line, but I might just be past caring. It's all too ambiguous for a simple soul like me. I have a direct order that Tango One is not to be lifted, and yet I am ordered to maintain a low level surveillance on him – I don't know what that adds to… I am told that we will get no help in locating Mr Matthew Furniss but the ACIO is not telling me that I cannot approach Furniss. If it adds up to anything it is that on the top floor of the Lane they haven't a clue what we're supposed to be doing. I'm pushing my luck, David, because I don't appreciate being pissed on. So, if I get my wrist slapped, and you get your butt kicked, then it's all in a good cause… Come on.'
They stepped from the car.
'I'll do the talking,' Parrish said. 'You can give her the keys.'
He smiled, a real hangman's smile. He reached for his wallet in his inside pocket. When he knocked on the door he had the wallet open so that his identification card was visible.
She came to the door.
She was radiant.
Park handed her the keys, and Parrish showed the ID and she grinned at the keys, like a small girl.
'Mrs Furniss?'
'Thrilling, isn't it? Do come in. It's quite wonderful. I suppose they sent you down when I wasn't answering the phone.
I've been at my elder daughter's… You've come all the way from Century, a wasted journey? You'll have a cup of coffee before you go, of course you will. I suppose really I should be opening the champagne, the DG said that he opened champagne last night. He said the whole Service was proud of Mattie, that's a splendid thing to have said of your husband… '
'When will Mr Furniss be home?'
'You will have coffee, I'm so excited, do come inside…'
She had stepped aside, then stopped, spun. 'You should know when he's coming home.'
Parrish asked calmly, 'Did you look at my ID?'
'You're from Century, yes?'
'Customs and Excise, ma'am, Investigation Division.'
Her voice whispered, 'Not Century?'
'My name is William Parrish, and I am investigating heroin trafficking from Iran. My colleague here is Mr Park.'
Her hand was across her mouth. 'I thought you were from my husband's office.' She stiffened. 'What did you say you want?'
'I'd like to know when I can interview your husband.'
'What about?'
'In connection with a guarantee given by your husband to a man now under investigation.'
She barred their path. 'We don't know anyone like that.'
'Your husband knows a Charles Eshraq, Mrs Furniss. It's about Eshraq, and your husband standing guarantee to him that we've called.'
She stared up from her eyeline that was level with the knot of Parrish's tie. 'Have you been through Century?'
'I don't have to go through anyone, Mrs Furniss.'
'Do you know who my husband is?'
Park could have smiled. Parrish wasn't smiling. He would be later, right now he had his undertaker's calm.
'Your husband is the guarantor of a heroin trafficker, Mrs Furniss.'
'My husband is a senior civil servant.'
'And I serve my country too, Mrs Furniss, by fighting the importers of heroin. I don't know what threat your husband safeguards us from, but where I work the threat of heroin coming into the UK is taken pretty seriously.'
She was shrill. 'You come here, you barge into my house, you make preposterous allegations about a boy who is virtually a son to us, on the morning that my husband has just returned home after breaking out of an Iranian torture gaol.'
'So he's not here at present?'
'No, he isn't here. I should think he will be in hospital for a long time. But if he were here, Mr Parrish, you would be terribly sorry you had had the disgraceful manners to break into this house.. .. '
Parrish said, 'Maybe it's not the best time… '
She went to the hall table. She picked up the telephone.
She dialled fast.
Her voice was clear, brittle. 'This is Harriet Furniss, Matthew Furniss' wife. I want to speak to the Director General… '
Park said, 'Come on, you disgraceful person, time we barged out.'
They left her. When they were at the gate they heard her voice rise in anguished complaint. They reached the car.
'Shall I serve my country and drive?'
'I tell you what, Keeper, that wasn't one of my happiest initiatives, but we did shake the nest.'
He had spoken to the Prime Minister, and the Prime Minister had asked after Mattie Furniss and said he must be a quite remarkable man, and the DG bathed in reflected glory. He looked forward rather keenly to the first of the debrief papers that would be coming through in a couple of days, and he would certainly send a digest across to Downing Street. Now he was making a tour, being seen, as he put it to Houghton.
They were in that section of the third floor occupied by Assistance (Photographic) when he was passed a telephone by Ben Houghton. For a moment he was puzzled. He had spoken to the woman at breakfast time.
He listened.
'No, no, Mrs Furniss, you were quite right to reach me
… intolerable behaviour. Rest assured, Mrs Furniss, you won't be troubled again.'
The four wooden packing cases and the two cardboard boxes were the first items to be loaded into the container. The lorry had backed into Herbert Stone's driveway. He gave the driver a manifest for the packing cases that listed Machine Parts for Agricultural Equipment. Later the container would be filled with more machine parts for
