‘Redefecting would be a damned charitable way of putting it, I’ll tell you that for nothing,’ Alleline retorted, back at the paper before him. ‘Listen to me. Listen exactly, and remember. Because I’ve no doubt that like the rest of my staff you’ve a memory like a sieve, all you prima donnas are the same. Danny and her mother are travelling on fake British passports in the name of Poole, like the harbour. The passports are Russian fakes. A third went to Tarr himself, the well known Mister Poole. Tarr is already in England but we don’t know where. He left ahead of Danny and her mother and came here by a different route, our investigations suggest a black one. He instructed his wife or mistress or whatever’ – he said this as if he had neither – ‘pardon again, Mo, to follow him in one week, which they have not yet done, apparently. This information only reached us yesterday so we’ve a lot of footwork to do yet. Tarr instructed them, Danny and her mother, that if by chance he failed to make contact with them, they should throw themselves on the mercy of one Peter Guillam. That’s you, I believe.’
‘If they were due three days ago what’s happened to them?’
‘Delayed. Missed their plane. Changed their plans. Lost their tickets. How the hell do I know?’
‘Or else the information’s wrong,’ Guillam suggested.
‘It isn’t,’ Alleline snapped.
Resentment, mystification: Guillam clung to them both. ‘All right. The Russians have turned Tarr round. They’ve sent his family over – God knows why, I’d have thought they’d put them in the bank – and they’ve sent him too. Why’s it all so hot? What sort of plant can he be when we don’t believe a word he says?’
This time, he noticed with exhilaration, his audience was watching Alleline; who seemed to Guillam to be torn between giving a satisfactory but indiscreet answer, or making a fool of himself.
‘Never mind what sort of plant! Muddying pools. Poisoning wells, maybe. That damn sort. Pulling the rug out when we’re all but home and dry.’ His circulars read that way too, thought Guillam. Metaphors chasing each other off the page. ‘But just you remember this. At the first peep, before the first peep, at the first whisper of him or his lady or his wee daughter, young Peter Guillam, you come to one of us grown-ups. Anyone you see at this table. But not another damn soul. Do you follow that injunction perfectly? Because there are more damn wheels within wheels here than you can possibly guess or have any right to know…’
It became suddenly a conversation in movement. Bland had plugged his hands into his pockets and slouched across the room to lean against the far door. Alleline had relit his pipe and was putting out the match with a long movement of his arm while he glowered at Guillam through the smoke. ‘Who are you courting these days, Peter, who’s the lucky wee lady?’ Porteous was sliding a sheet of paper down the table for Guillam’s signature. ‘For you, Peter, if you please.’ Paul Skordeno was whispering something into the ear of one of the Russians, and Esterhase was at the door giving unpopular orders to the mothers. Only Mo Delaware’s brown, unassuming eyes still held Guillam in their gaze.
‘Read it first, won’t you,’ Porteous advised silkily.
Guillam was half through the form already: ‘I certify that I have today been advised of the contents of Witchcraft report No. 308, Source Merlin,’ ran the first paragraph. ‘I undertake not to divulge any part of this report to other members of the service, nor will I divulge the existence of Source Merlin. I also undertake to report at once any matter which comes to my notice which appears to bear on his material.’
The door had stayed open and, as Guillam signed, the second echelon of London Station filed in, led by the mothers with trays of sandwiches: Diana Dolphin, Lauder Strickland looking taut enough to blow up, the girls from distribution and a sourfaced old warhorse called Haggard, who was Ben Thruxton’s overlord. Guillam left slowly, counting heads because he knew Smiley would want to know who was there. At the door, to his surprise, he found himself joined by Haydon, who seemed to have decided that the remaining festivities were not for him.