Charlie’s Apprentice

some metal-voiced Foreign Office robot with the usual load of bollocks. But convinced as much as possible that everything is being done to help the man she thought she was going to marry!’ said Charlie, irritated.

The smile was brief but with neither humour nor sympathy. ‘Didn’t you tell me once that you’d never let any personal feelings intrude?’

Bugger her, thought Charlie. ‘Gower might appreciate it. He’s probably doing his best for you at the moment.’

‘Let’s hope it’s better than he’s done so far.’

‘How did it go?’ demanded Peter Miller.

‘He practically bit my hand off,’ said Patricia. She’d gone immediately next door after Charlie Muffin’s departure, nervously surprised there’d been nothing from Miller before the encounter. The previous night Ann had been due at the Regent’s Park penthouse, her first visit since they’d spent the week there together.

‘Nothing you didn’t expect?’ The voice, as usual, was blandly neutral.

Patricia didn’t respond at once, although the hesitation was not to consider the question. She shouldn’t show any expectation: certainly not apprehension. ‘Not really, although he wasn’t quite as overwhelmed as I thought he would have been. Very quickly began making demands.’

‘Difficult ones?’

She forced a smile. He should have said something by now! Miller didn’t smile back. ‘He wants to avoid the embassy at the beginning. And he asked for a decoy to be sent.’

‘What did you say?’

Maybe his wife hadn’t come after all. Or maybe – although hard to believe – the perfume hadn’t been discovered yet. Against which was the fact that he hadn’t made any move to kiss her, which he normally did, when they met for the first time in the day. She desperately wished now that she hadn’t left the bottle: taken the risk. ‘Agreed to his being solo, at first. Left the decoy idea for us to think about.’

‘It’s not a bad idea.’

When was he going to talk about something other than about this damned assignment interview, which he should know without asking would have gone quite satisfactorily? ‘He wants to talk to Foster.’

The Director-General came forward over his desk, hands steepled before him. ‘What did you say to that?’

‘Agreed. What else?’ Was she imagining the brittle-ness in his voice? Why had she done it?

Miller nodded. ‘No reason why he shouldn’t, I suppose.’

‘Every reason why he should: it’s an obvious thing to do.’

‘You tell him we’re sidelining Foster?’

The perfume couldn’t have been found yet: that was the only explanation. She nodded to the question. ‘There were some wisecracks: except they weren’t very wise. He made himself look stupid. And realized it, too.’

‘That’s a word that’s been in my mind overnight,’ said Miller.

Patricia looked at him, in apparent incomprehension. At last! ‘What word?’

‘Stupid.’

‘I don’t understand.’ She wished he hadn’t called it that, although she supposed that was how it would have seemed.

Without taking his eyes from her, Miller reached sideways into a drawer. He lifted out the half-used bottle of Chanel and placed it on the desk between them. ‘Yours.’ It was an announcement, not a question.

Patricia, who believed she’d prepared herself for whatever he might say but now wasn’t sure, about anything, half lifted and then dropped her hands, in a gesture of helplessness, and said: ‘Yes, but … I don’t … where …?’

‘On Ann’s dressing-table.’

‘That’s not possible! I tidied everywhere!’

‘Right in the very middle of Ann’s things. As if it had been placed there.’

‘That’s not right … I mean I’m not saying it wasn’t there … what I’m saying is I couldn’t have left it … I’m sure I couldn’t …’

‘Didn’t you miss it?’

Her hands rose and fell again. ‘No. It’s not the only bottle I have … another at Chiswick … it just never arose …’

Miller looked steadily, blankly, over the desk.

Say something! she thought. Say something, please, something I want so much to hear: shout even, if you’re angry, although you never shout, no matter how enraged you get, do you? When he still didn’t speak, she said: ‘Was it bad when she found it?’

‘She didn’t find it,’ announced the man, calmly. ‘I did.’

No! The failure wailed so despairingly through Patricia’s mind it was as if she could hear her own voice moaning it. The smile was practically impossible, like what she had to say. ‘Thank God!’

‘I always check, after we’ve been there. Before Ann comes.’

‘Always?’ It was right that she should show some affront.

‘Always,’ he echoed.

‘What does that mean?’ she demanded, disappointment fuelling the annoyance. ‘That you don’t trust me?’

‘It means I’m extremely careful. Fortunately.’

‘Would it have been so bad if Ann had found it?’ Wrong! The word, a warning this time, reverberated through her mind like the earlier despair. She knew it could harden any suspicion he might have, but at the same time she wasn’t sorry she’d said it, either.

‘Did you intentionally leave it, Patricia?’ There was no anger in his voice: no emotion in the way he was speaking at all, which she found more unsettling than if he’d raged at her.

‘NO!’ She knew she was reddening but that didn’t matter because it could have been in anger at the accusation. ‘How can you ask me a question like that?’

‘It seems perfectly valid, to me.’

‘I don’t think so! I thought there was trust between us. Love, too. Maybe I was wrong.’ Patricia realized she was coming dangerously close to the edge, confronting him more forcefully than ever before. And he’d avoided her question, as he always avoided her question.

‘This isn’t the way Ann is going to be told.’

‘How is it going to be?’ she demanded, not able to hold her anger. Why? Why did he have to be so bloody careful! Why couldn’t the precious, cosseted, protected Lady Ann have been the one to find it?

‘Properly. Calmly. With my telling her.’ The voice droned, the man utterly in control of himself and his feelings.

‘After the boys finish at university! Or has some other schedule arisen I don’t know about yet?’

‘You’re putting a strain on things, Patricia.’

‘Is that a threat?’ Of course it was! Back off: she had to back off! She couldn’t risk losing him!

He shook his head. ‘A statement of the obvious.’

Oh no! He wasn’t ending it: surely he wasn’t doing that! The fear surged through her, far worse than the despair and disappointment and anger, so that she felt physically sick. Don’t let him end it! She didn’t have anyone else: any chance or hope of anyone else. She’d trusted him, relied upon him: given up other friendships that might have led to something. What little she had of Peter Miller was all she had, of anyone. ‘It was a mistake, the perfume. I honestly didn’t realize I’d left it. I’m sorry. And glad it hasn’t caused the upset it could have done.’

Miller pushed the bottle further towards her, across the table. At last he smiled. ‘You’d better take it, hadn’t you?’

Patricia did so, slipping it into her pocket to conceal it as she went between their two offices. It bulged, too noticeably, so she took it out again, covering it in her hand.

‘Let’s do it my way,’ he said.

‘All right.’ Which was how they’d always done everything. His way. To his convenience. And always would, she supposed, miserably.