‘Thanks, I’ll stick with my pipe if you don’t mind. I like fags, but I smoke too many once I get going. Where did you find those things?’
‘There’s a specialist tobacconist in Glasgow, just off George Square. He sends them to me. I think I first bought them because of the advertisements in this sinful magazine.’
He showed me one: a miniature naked Vargas girl with tanning marks sat on the side of a cigarette packet, with another between her legs. It wasn’t exactly a subtle message.
I asked, ‘Do you genuinely believe in sin?’
‘It’s what I do, isn’t it, Mr Bassett? People commit sins we call crimes, and I detect the sinners and lock them up. Nothing like a bit of friendly sin to sell a few newspapers.’
‘I couldn’t help noticing you waited until we were in England before you opened your comics.’
He gave me a very straight look, and lifted his nose in disdain. Hundreds of years ago John Knox taught the Scots how to do that, and then they patented it.
‘It’s smut, Mr Bassett, dirty smut. We don’t approve of smut in Scotland. Would you care for a dram?’ He’d produced a half-bottle of Red Label from another of his capacious raincoat pockets.
‘Why not? Don’t mind if I do. You can call me Charlie, by the way.’
He magicked into existence two shot glasses to go with the whisky: he must once have been a Boy Scout. We drank the bottle inside half an hour, and I fell asleep. I don’t know what Angus did; probably went looking for more girlie magazines. I awoke when we were an hour from London. Angus was still giving me the look. He observed, ‘You talk in your sleep. Did you know that?’
‘What was I saying?’
‘Something about AWRE. People aren’t supposed to talk about that, it’s secret. The Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston, right? I should report what you said.’
‘And I should report your pockets full of dirty mags, and that you drink on duty. Don’t be such a twit, Angus. Lighten up a bit. We’re nearly at London. Sin City Central – you’ll love it. I can give you the name of a wonderful pub on the Old Kent Road that has striptease dancing at lunchtime.’
There was a long pause. A tune started to bounce around between my ears. Hoagy Carmichael was doing ‘My Resistance is Low’. Anyway, old Angus perked up.
‘Lunchtime, you said? That’s very decadent.’ Ah, well; he smiled in anticipation the rest of the way to Euston. A man, I thought, at peace with his right hand. I couldn’t wait to get rid of him.
Chapter Seven
Where the Hell is Loughborough?
‘Nice temperature at this time of year,’ CB told me. ‘Tight little island. Drink’s cheap, women and whisky galore.’
‘It’s on, then?’
‘Of course it’s on. Always was. Abernethy?’
We were in a small British Railways office looking down over the platforms, talking about Cyprus. He’d met me from the train, and signed for me as if I was a parcel. Commuters were forming orderly queues at the barriers. Why do we do that? Most of the trains were late.
‘Can you just do this?’ I asked him. ‘Take over someone else’s office? What do you do, wave a wand?’
‘Ask my brother usually. He’s the station superintendent. They don’t have stationmasters any more. Pity.’ He dipped his biscuit in his tea, lifting it out just before it disintegrated. It was something to do with the way he’d lifted his elbow; I’d seen that before. I said, ‘I know you.’
‘Of course you do. We chatted a couple of times a couple of weeks ago. Can’t you remember?’
‘No. I mean I’ve met you before that. Germany 1948.’
He gave me his cheesy smile.
‘Possibly, old boy. I got caught for National Service just like the rest of them. I spent eighteen months in Germany.’
‘You were an intelligence officer in the RAF.’
‘No, I was a cook. Army Catering Corps. Came out a stone heavier than when I went in.’
‘You had a pencil moustache, and wore tweeds.’
‘Hardly, old boy. You must be mistaking me for someone else. Not surprising – there were a lot of us about out there. I have enough cousins and brothers to form two cricket teams. We do, actually, most summers. Sure you don’t want a biscuit?’
I shook my head. He thought that meant no. It also meant that I didn’t believe him. I had stumbled into the hall of mirrors his kind inhabited years ago, and had never managed to completely find my way out.
I asked him, ‘Do you know what I’ve been doing for the last week?’
‘A little birdie told me, yes.’
‘Do you know more about the Americans I was with than I do?’
‘Probably.’
‘Who were they working for?’
‘Handel was working for himself. Civilian contractor – just like you will be when you get to Cyprus. Didn’t he tell you that?’
‘Yes. I didn’t believe him.’
‘There you go, Charlie. Appearances can be deceptive. We’ll hold him until he’s hopping about a bit more handily, and providing he cooperates we’ll deport him.’
‘And the woman?’ I hoped my face wouldn’t give anything away.
‘State Department. She’s a Hoover.’
‘She’s in the FBI?’ J. Edgar Hoover. Even I had heard of him.
‘No, a Hoover. She is a state department vacuum cleaner – she vacuums up diplomatic messes before they embarrass anyone. Very intelligent girl by all accounts, although she messed it up this time. She was running George. He didn’t know that, and was very offended when we told him.’
‘So, she’s in the clear. She said she probably had diplomatic immunity.’
‘She may have, but not yet. She’s sitting in a cell at Fort William in nothing but a prison gown – because her own
