Читать книгу Alec Milius Spy Series Books 1 and 2: A Spy By Nature, The Spanish Game - Charles Cumming - Страница 30

Standing easy against the fridge in the kitchen at Colville Gardens, Katharine sweeps hair out of her face and says, ‘Alec, I’m gonna take a shower, is that all right? I’m kinda hot after our walk. If the phone rings, the machine’ll pick it up. You be okay for a bit; watch TV or something?’

‘Sure.’

Her cheeks have rouged to a healthy flush after being outside in the fresh air of Battersea Park.

‘Why don’t you fix us a drink while I’m gone?’

I know what she likes: a fifty-fifty vodka tonic in a tall glass with a lot of ice and lemon.

‘You want a vodka and tonic?’

She smiles, pleased by this. ‘That’d be great. I’ve got olives in the refrigerator.’

‘Not for me.’

‘Okay. Leave ’em. They’re really for Fort. He eats them like candy.’

The kitchen is open plan, chrome, gadget filled. Their entire apartment is expensively decked out, but clearly rented, with no evidence of personal taste. Just a few photographs, some CDs, and an old clock on the wall.

‘You like a lot of lemon, don’t you?’ I ask as Katharine crosses to a cupboard above the sink. She takes down two highball glasses and a bottle of Smirnoff Blue and sets them on the counter. She is tall enough to reach up without standing on tiptoe.

‘Yeah. A lot of lemon. Squeeze it in.’

I move towards the fridge and open the freezer door.

‘That’ll be the best ice you ever had,’ she says from behind me.

‘The best ice? How come?’

‘Fort’s started putting Volvic in the tray. Says he read somewhere it’s the only way to avoid getting too much lead or something.’

I half laugh and retrieve the tray. By the time I turn round, Katharine has left the room. I break out two cubes and throw them gently into a glass. Then I pour myself a double vodka and sink it in a single gulp.

Gladiators is on ITV.

I look around the other three channels, but there’s nothing on, so I mute the sound and flick through a copy of Time Out. There’s a swamp of plays and films on in London that I will never get to see because of work. All that entertainment, all those ideas and stories just passing me by.

After about ten minutes, I hear a rustle at the sitting-room door and look up to see Katharine coming in. She is wearing a dark blue dressing gown over white silk pyjamas, her hair still wet from the shower, combed back in long, straight even strands. She looks up at me and smiles with softened wide eyes.

‘Good shower?’ I ask, just to disguise my surprise.

‘Great, thanks. Oh, are you watchin’ Gladiators?’ She sounds excited, picking up the remote control and putting the sound back on. The thin silk of her dressing gown flutters as she sits beside me, releasing an exquisite mist of warm lathered soap. ‘The British version of this show is much better than ours.’

‘You actually watch this?’

‘I find it intriguingly barbaric. She’s pretty, huh, the blonde one?’

The dour Scots referee says, ‘Monica, you will go on my first whistle. Clare, you will go on my second whistle,’ and before long two tracksuited PE teachers are chasing each other around the Birmingham NEC.

‘So, you hungry?’ Katharine asks, turning away from the screen to face me. ‘I’m gonna make us some supper.’

‘That’d be great.’

I am still getting over the pyjamas.

‘You wanna stay here or help me out?’

‘I’ll come with you.’

In the kitchen, Katharine goes to the fridge and takes out a tray of freshly made ravioli, which I make all the right noises about. Did you make them yourself? That’s amazing. So much better than the packaged stuff. The delicate shells are coated in a thin dusting of flour, and she sets them down beside the fridge. I help by putting a large pan of salted water on the stove, placing a lid on top, and turning the gas up high. The speed of the ignition makes me jerk my head back and Katharine asks if I’m okay. Oh, yes, I say, as the blue flames glow and roar. Then I sit on a tall wooden stool on the far side of the kitchen counter and watch as she prepares a salad.

‘I’ll teach you a trick,’ she says, crunching down on a stick of celery, like a toothpaste ad. ‘If you’ve got yourself a tired lettuce like this one, just stick it in a bowl of cold water for a while and it’ll freshen right up.’

‘Handy.’

I can think of nothing worthwhile to say.

‘You never had your drink,’ I tell her, looking over at the sink, where the ice in her vodka tonic has melted into a tiny ball.

‘Oh that’s right,’ she exclaims. ‘I knew there was something missing. Will you fix me a fresh one?’

‘Of course.’

The bottle of Smirnoff is still sitting out and I mix two fresh vodka and tonics as she washes a colander at the sink. This will be my third drink of the evening.

‘There you go,’ I say, handing it to her. Our fingers do not touch. She takes a sip and lets out a deep sigh.

‘God, you make these so good. How’d you know how to do that?’

‘My father taught me.’

She sets the glass on the counter and starts slicing up some tomatoes, a cucumber, and the sticks of celery on a wooden chopping board, throwing them gently into a large teak bowl. Steam has started to rise in thick clouds from the pan on the stove, rattling the lid, but rather than do anything about it, I say, ‘Water’s boiling, Kathy.’

‘You wanna get it, honey? I’m kinda busy.’

‘Sure.’

I remove the lid, twist the dial to low, and watch the water subside into little ripples.

Honey. She called me honey.

Katharine stops chopping and comes to stand beside me. She has a wooden spoon in her hand and says, ‘Let’s put the pasta on, shall we?’

And now very carefully, one by one, she lowers the ravioli pillows into the water on the wooden spoon, intoning, ‘This is the tricky bit, this is the tricky bit,’ in a low voice that is almost a whisper. I am beside her, watching, doing nothing, my shoulder inches from hers. When she is done I walk away from the stove and sit back down on the stool. Katharine brings out a large white plate, a flagon of olive oil, some balsamic vinegar, and a basket of sliced ciabatta. These she places on the counter in front of me. Still clutching the basket, she turns around to face the stove and the silk of her dressing gown rides up to the elbow. Her bared arm is slender and brown, the long fingers of her flushed pink hands crowned by filed white nails.

‘The trick is not to let the water boil too fast,’ she says, talking to the opposite wall. ‘That way the ravioli doesn’t break up.’

She turns back to face me and the sleeve of her gown slips back down her arm. Even with all the flavours and steam around us, the smell of her is lifting from her hair and shower-warmed skin.

‘You’ll love this,’ she says, looking down at the counter. She picks up the flagon of oil and pours it onto the plate in a thin, controlled line that creates a perfect olive circle. Then she allows tiny droplets of balsamic vinegar to fall into the green centre of the plate, forming neat black orbs that float loose in the viscous liquid.

‘Dip the bread in,’ she says, showing me how with a crusty slice of her own. ‘It tastes so good.’

I take a smaller chunk of bread from the basket and run it through the oil.

‘Try to get a little more of the oil than the vinegar,’ she says.

I swirl the bread around and leave cloudy crumbs amid the black and green spirals.

‘Sorry. Messy.’

‘Don’t worry,’ she says, licking her lips. I take my first mouthful, sweet and rich. ‘Tastes good, huh?’

We eat the ravioli sitting at the kitchen table, and consume the better part of a bottle of Chablis by quarter past nine. As Katharine is taking the plates to the sink, the telephone rings and she goes next door to answer it, padding there softly in bare feet. From the tone of the conversation, I presume that it’s Fortner. There’s no forced politeness in Katharine’s voice, just the easy familiarity of long-term couples. At no point does she mention that I am in the next room, though there’s a section of the conversation that I can’t hear owing to a car alarm triggering in Colville Gardens. When it is finally shut off, I overhear Katharine say, ‘You could say that, yes,’ and, ‘Absolutely,’ with a guardedness that leads me to assume they are talking about me. It will be past midnight in Kiev.

‘That was Fort,’ she says, breezing back into the kitchen a few moments later. ‘He says hi. Jesus, those fucking vehicle alarms.’

She wouldn’t ordinarily say ‘fucking’ unless she’d had a few drinks.

‘I know, I heard it.’

‘What’s the point of them, anyway? Nobody pays any attention when they go off. They don’t prevent car crime. Everybody just ignores them. You wanna coffee or something? I’m making myself one.’

‘Instant?’

‘’Fraid so.’

‘No, thanks.’

‘You’re such a snob about coffee, Alec.’

‘Nescafé is just an interestingly flavoured milk drink. You shouldn’t tolerate it. I’m going for a pee, okay?’

‘You do what you have to, sweetie.’

The bathroom is at the far end of the apartment, through the sitting room and down a long corridor that passes the entrance to the flat. The bathroom door is made of light wood with an unoiled hinge that squeaks like a laughing clown when I open it. I walk in and slide the lock. There is a mirror hung above the sink and I check my reflection, seeing tiny pimples dotted along my forehead, which can’t look good in the stark white light of the kitchen. The rest of my face is blanched and I push out my lips and cheeks to bring some colour back into them. Once a little red flush has appeared, I go back outside.

Walking towards the sitting room, I steal a look through the door of their bedroom, which Katharine has left open after her shower. This is the most basic sort of invasion, but it is something I have to do. There are clothes, shoes, and several issues of The New Yorker strewn on the floor. I walk farther inside, my eyes shuttling around the room, taking in every detail. There is a fine charcoal sketch of a naked dancer on the wall above the bed, and a discarded bottle of mineral water by the window.

I go back out into the corridor and hear the distant running of water at the kitchen sink. Katharine is washing up. There is another bedroom farther down on the right side of the passage, again with its door open. Again I look through it as I am passing, prying behind her back. An unmade bed is clearly visible on the far side, with one of Fortner’s trademark blue shirts lying crumpled on the sheets. An American paperback edition of Presumed Innocent has been balanced on the windowsill, and there are bottles of cologne on a dresser near the door. Is it possible that they no longer share a room? There are too many of Fortner’s possessions in here for him simply to have taken an afternoon nap.

I walk quietly back to the first bedroom. This time I notice that the bed has been slept in only on one side. Katharine’s creams and lotions are all here, with skirts and suits on hangers by the door. But there are no male belongings, no ties or shoes. A photograph in a gilt frame by the window shows a middle-aged man on a beach with a face like an old sweater. But there are no pictures of Fortner, no snaps of him arm in arm with his wife. Not even a picture from their wedding.

No noise in the corridor. On a side table I spot a heavy, leather-bound address book and pick it up. The alphabetized guides are curled and darkened with use, each letter covered in a thin film of dirt. I check the As, scanning the names quickly.

AT&T

Atwater, Donald G.

Allison, Peter and Charlotte

Ashwood, Christopher

AM Management

Acorn Alarms

No Allardyce. That’s a good sign.

To B, on to the Cs, then a flick through to R. Sure enough, at the bottom of the third page:

Bar Reggio

Royal Mail

Ricken, Saul

His full address and telephone number are there as well. I have to get back to the kitchen. But there is just time for M.

M&T Communications

Macpherson, Bob and Amy

Maria’s Hair Salon

Milius, Alec

Suddenly I hear footsteps nearby, growing louder. I shut the book and place it back on the table. I am turning to leave when Katharine comes in behind me. We almost collide, and her face sparks into rage.

‘What are you doin’ in here, Alec?’

‘I was just…’

‘What? What are you doing?’

I can think of nothing to say and wait for the wave of anger in her eyes to break over me. In the space of a few seconds, the evening has been ruined.

But something happens now, something entirely artificial and against the apparent nature of Katharine’s mood. It is as if she applies brakes to herself. Had I been anyone else, there would have been an argument, a venting of spleen, but the fury in her quickly subsides.

‘You get lost?’ she asks, though she knows that this is unrealistic. I have been to the bathroom in their flat countless times.

‘No. I was snooping. I’m sorry. It was an intrusion.’

‘It’s all right,’ she replies, moving past me. ‘I just came to get something to wear. I’m kinda cold.’

I leave immediately, saying nothing, and return to the sitting room. When Katharine comes back–some time later–she is wearing thick Highland socks and a blue Gap sweatshirt beneath her dressing gown, as if to suppress anything that I may earlier have construed as erotic. She sits on the sofa opposite me, her back to the darkening sky, and fills the silence by reaching for the CD player. Her index finger prods through the first few songs on Innervisions, and Stevie comes on, the volume set low.

‘Oh, that’s right,’ she says, as if ‘Jesus Children of America’ had prompted her. ‘I was going to fix us some coffee.’

‘I’m not having any,’ I tell her as she leaves the room, and even that sounds rude. She does not reply.

I should deal with this, do it now. I follow her into the kitchen.

‘Listen, Kathy, I’m sorry. I had no right to be in your bedroom. If I caught you looking around my things, I’d go crazy.’

‘Forget about it. I told you it was okay. I have no secrets.’

She tries to smile now, but there is no hiding her annoyance. She is clearly upset; not, perhaps, by the fact that I was in her room, but because I have discovered something intimate and concealed about her relationship with Fortner that may shame her. I do not think she saw me with the address book. Leaning heavily on the counter, she spoons a single mound of Nescafé into a blue mug and fills it with hot water from the kettle. She has not looked directly at me since it happened.

‘I need you to know that it doesn’t matter to me, what I saw.’

‘What?’

Katharine stares at me, her head at an angle, tetchy.

‘I think every married couple goes through a stage where they don’t share a room.’

‘What the hell makes you think you can talk to me about this?’ she says, straightening up from the counter with a look of real disappointment in her eyes.

‘Forget it. I’m sorry.’

‘No, Alec, I can’t forget it. How is that any of your business?’

‘It’s not. I just didn’t want to leave without saying something. I don’t want you thinking that I know something about you and Fort and that I’m jumping to conclusions about it.’

‘Why would I think that? Jesus, Alec, I can’t believe you’re being like this.’

We have never before raised our voices at each other, never had a cross word.

‘I shouldn’t have said anything.’

‘No, you’re right. You shouldn’t have. If I asked you personal stuff about Kate, you wouldn’t like it too much, would you?’

‘That was a long time ago.’

‘Was it? Does it feel that way? No. No it doesn’t. These things are our most private…’

I put my hands in the air defensively, moving them up and down in a gesture of contrition.

‘I know, I know.’

‘Jesus,’ she says, a rasp in her voice. ‘I don’t wanna argue with you like this.’

‘Neither do I. I’m sorry.’

Silence now, and the edge suddenly goes out of our rush of talk. We are left facing each other, quiet and spent.

‘Let’s just sit next door, she says, turning to pick up her coffee. ‘Let’s just forget all about it.’

We go into the sitting room, the breath of the fight still around us. Stevie is singing–ridiculously–‘Don’t You Worry ’Bout a Thing.’ Katharine flops down into one of the sofas and clutches her mug in both palms. She has the most beautiful hands. Eventually she says, ‘I hate fighting with you,’ as if we have done it many times before.

‘Me too.’

I sit on the sofa opposite hers.

‘Can we talk about it?’

She emphasizes the word can here as if it were a test of character. I do not know how to respond except with the obvious: ‘About what?’

‘About Fortner.’

His name balloons out of her as if he were sick.

‘Of course we can. If you want to.’

Her voice is very quiet and steady. It is almost as if she has prepared something to say.

‘We–Fortner and I–haven’t shared a bed for more than a year. For longer than you’ve known us.’

My pulse skips.

‘I’m sorry. I had no idea.’

I immediately regret saying this.

‘We’ll work it out,’ she says hopefully. ‘I just can’t be beside him in a bed right now. It’s not anyone’s fault.’

‘No.’

‘We’re just kind of going through this thing where we’re not attracted to each other.’

‘Or where you’re not attracted to him?’

She looks up at me, acknowledging with a softened expression that this is closer to the truth.

‘Have you talked about it? Does he know how you feel?’

‘No. He thinks he’s moved into the spare room because I can’t stand his snoring. He has no idea it’s because I don’t want to sleep with him.’

A brief quiet falls on the room, the lull after a sudden revelation. Katharine drinks her coffee and plays with a loose thread on her dressing gown.

‘There’s some history to it,’ she says softly, still staring into her lap. ‘When I met Fort, I was very vulnerable. I’d just come out of a long-term relationship with a guy I’d met in college. It ended badly, and Fort offered me the kind of support that I needed.’

‘Was he a rebound?’

Katharine doesn’t want to admit this either to herself or to me, but she says, ‘I guess so. Yes.’

She looks up at me, and I can only hope that my face looks receptive to what she wants to say.

‘Before I’d even really thought about it, we were married. Fort had been hitched before–kids, divorce, the usual pattern–and he really wanted to make it work this time. He hasn’t had access to his children for more than ten years. I was still kind of hung up on this guy, and Fortner knew that. He’s always known it.’

She takes a deep, possibly stagey breath.

‘I wanted to have kids, to make a family, but he was reluctant to start again. Fort’s daughters are your age, you know, and he doesn’t think it’s fair to children to become a parent when you’re close to fifty. But I didn’t agree with him. I thought he didn’t want to have kids because he didn’t really love me. That was the state my mind was in. And after my father died, I thought there was something almost reverent about being a parent, like if you had the chance to be one you shouldn’t throw that away. Maybe you felt that too after your dad passed away. But I was…I was…’

She is suddenly tripping over her thoughts, too scared to hear them come out.

‘Tell me.’

‘Alec, you can’t ever tell him that I told you this. Okay? There’s only a handful of people in the world who know about it.’

‘You can trust me.’

‘It’s just I wanted children so badly. So I did a terrible thing. I tricked Fort into getting us pregnant. I stopped using birth control, and then when I got pregnant, I told him.’

‘How did he react?’

‘He went crazy. We were living in New York. But Fort, you know, he’s totally against termination, so he agreed that I could keep her.’

There’s only one possible outcome to this story, the worst outcome of all.

‘But I lost her. Three months in, there was a miscarriage and…’

‘I’m so sorry.’

Katharine’s face is an awful picture of despair. In an attempt to appear resilient, she is struggling to bury tears.

‘Well, what can you do, huh?’ she says, with a shrug. ‘It was just one of those things. I was paying the penalty for deceiving him.’

‘Is that how you see it?’

‘It gives me a sort of comfort to see it that way. Maybe it isn’t true. I don’t know. Anyway, pretty soon after that, work brought us here to London, but it’s never been the same between us. Never. We just have the friendship.’

‘He’s Misstra Know-It-All’ comes on the stereo system, a song I like, and it distracts me. What I should properly be feeling now is a sense of honour at being made privy to the secrets of their marriage, but even as Katharine is relating the most intimate history of her relationship with Fortner, my mind is caught between the loyalty demanded of friendship and a growing desire to take advantage of her vulnerability. When she is speaking, I have tried to look solely at her eyes, at the bridge of her nose, but every time she has looked away I have stolen glimpses of her calves, her wrists, the nape of her neck.

‘You’ve repaired that?’

‘It’s a slow process. I was very honest with Fortner about how I’d gotten pregnant. I told him that it had been a deliberate act on my part. That was a mistake. It would have been better to lie, to blame the Pill or something. But somehow I wanted him to know, like an act of defiance.’

‘Sure, I can see that.’

‘It’s so good having someone who understands,’ she says. ‘I mean, you’ve had your heart broken, you’ve been through some tough times. You know how all this feels.’

‘Perhaps,’ I say, nodding. ‘But not to the extent that you’ve been through it.’

‘It’s not so bad,’ she says. She is attempting to come out of her contemplative mood into something more positive. ‘In a lot of ways, I’m lucky. Fort’s great, you know? He’s so smart and funny and laid-back and wise.’

‘Oh yeah, he’s great.’

‘Hey,’ she says.

‘What?’

‘Thanks for listening. Thanks for being here for me when I needed you.’

‘That’s all right. Don’t mention it.’

In a single fluid movement, she stands and crosses the room to where I am sitting, crouching down low in her thick Highland socks. Before I have had time to say anything, she has wrapped her arms around my neck, whispering, ‘Thank you, you’re sweet,’ into my hair. The weight of her is so perfect. I put my hand lightly on her back.

She stops hugging first and withdraws. Now we are looking at each other. Still on her haunches, Katharine smiles and, very softly, touches the side of my face with her hand, drawing her fingers down to the line of my jaw. She lets them linger there and then slowly takes her hand away, bringing it to rest in her lap. There is a look in her eyes that promises the impossible, but something prevents me from acting on it. This is the moment, this is the time to do it, but after all the thought-dreams and the longings and the signals coding back and forth between us, I do not respond. Before I have even properly thought about it, I am saying, ‘I should get a cab.’

It was pure instinct, something defensive, an exact intimation of the correct thing to do. I could not spend the night with her without jeopardizing everything.

‘What, now?’ She leans backward and her relaxed smile disguises well any disappointment she may be feeling. ‘It’s not even eleven o’clock.’

‘But it’s late. You’ll want to–‘

‘No, it’s not.’

I don’t want to offend her, so I say, ‘You want me to stick around?’

‘Sure. Relax. I’ll fix us a whisky.’

She gives my knee a squeeze and I simply can’t believe that I have just let that happen. Just kiss her. Just give in to what is inevitable.

‘Okay, then, maybe just a quick one.’

She stands slowly, as if expecting me at any moment to pull her down onto the sofa. Just the action of her moving releases that exquisite scent as she turns and walks into the kitchen. I hear Fortner’s frozen Volvic falling into glass tumblers, then the slow glug-glug of whisky being poured onto ice. The noise of her moving quietly around on the polished wooden floor fills me with regret.

‘You take water in it, don’t you?’ she asks, coming back in with the drinks.

‘Yes.’

She hands me a glass and sits beside me on the sofa.

‘Can I ask you something?’ she says, taking a sip of her whisky straightaway. It is as if she has plucked up the courage for a big subject while she was in the kitchen.

‘Of course.’

Tucking a loose strand of hair behind her ear, she tries to make the question sound as easygoing as possible.

‘Are you happy, Alec? I mean really happy?’

The question takes me by surprise. I have to be very careful what I say here.

‘Yes and no. Why?’

‘I just worry about you sometimes. You seem a little unsettled.’

‘It’s just nerves.’

‘What d’you mean nerves? What about?’

It was a mistake to say that, to speak of nervousness. I’ll have to shift the subject, work from memory.

‘I was joking. Not nervousness exactly. I’m just in a constantly fraught state because of Abnex.’

‘Why?’

‘Because of the pressure to do the best job that I can. Because of the feeling of being watched and listened in on all the time. Because of the demands Alan and Harry put on me. All that stuff. I’m so tired. It’s so easy to get locked into a particular lifestyle in London, a particular way of thinking. And right now all I seem to worry about is work. There’s nothing else.’

Katharine has tilted her head to one side, eyes welled up with concern.

‘You’ll get the job, won’t you?’

‘Probably, yes. They wouldn’t spend all that money training someone just to chuck them out after a year. But it still hangs over me.’ I take a sip from the whisky tumbler and a slipped ice cube chills my top lip. ‘The truth is I have this deep-seated fear of failure. I seem to have lived with it all my life. Not a fear of personal failure, exactly. I’ve always been very sure and certain of my own abilities. But a fear of others’ thinking that I’m a failure. Maybe they’re the same thing.’

Katharine smiles crookedly, as if she is finding it difficult to concentrate.

‘It’s like this, Kathy. I want to be recognized as someone who stands apart. But even at school I was always following on the heels of other students–just one or two, that’s all–who were more able than I was. Smarter in the classroom, quicker witted in the playground, faster on the football pitch. They had a sort of effortlessness about them which I have never had. And I always coveted that. I feel as though I have lived my life suspended between brilliance and mediocrity, you know? Neither ordinary nor exceptional. Do you ever feel like that?’

‘I think we all do, all the time,’ she replies, lightly shrugging. ‘We try to kid ourselves that we’re in some way distinct from everyone else. More valuable, more interesting. We create this illusion of personal superiority. Actually, I think men in particular do that. A whole lot more than women, as a matter of fact.’

‘I think you’re right.’

I have a longing for a cigarette.

‘Still,’ she says, ‘I gotta say that you don’t seem that way to us.’

‘Who’s us?’

‘Fort and I.’

‘Don’t seem vain?’

‘No.’

It’s good that they think that.

‘But are you disappointed to hear me say these things?’

She jumps at this: ‘No! Hell no. Talk, Alec, it’s fine. We’re friends. This is how it’s supposed to be.’

‘I’m just telling you what I feel.’

‘Yes.’

‘Like for a long time now I’ve thought that things are down to luck. Success has nothing to do with talent, don’t you think? It’s just good fortune. Some people are lucky, some aren’t. It’s that simple.’

Katharine tucks her feet under her thighs, curling up tight on the sofa, and she breathes out through a narrow channel formed between pursed lips. I can feel the wine now, the dissembling brew of vodka and whisky.

‘For example, I was predicted straight-A grades for university, but I got sick and took a string of Bs and Cs, so I didn’t get my chance to go to Oxbridge. That would have changed everything. Oxford and Cambridge are the only truly optimistic places in England. Graduates come out feeling that they can do anything, that they can be anybody, because that’s the environment they’ve been educated in. And what’s to stop them? It’s almost American in that sense. But I meet Oxbridge graduates, and there’s not one of them who has something I don’t, some quality I don’t possess. And yet somehow they’ve found themselves in positions of influence or of great wealth, they’ve got ahead. Now what is that about if it isn’t just luck? I mean, what do they have that I haven’t? Am I lazy? I don’t think so. I didn’t sit on my arse at university screwing girls and smoking grass and raving it up. I just didn’t get a break. And I’m not the sort of person who gets depressed. If I start feeling low, I tell myself it’s just irrational, a chemical imbalance, and I pull myself out of it. I feel as if I have had such bad luck, you know?’

Katharine brings her eyes down from the ceiling and exclaims, ‘But you’re doing such good work now, such important work. The Caspian is potentially one of the most vibrant economic and political areas in the world. You’re playing a part in that. I had no idea you harboured these frustrations, Alec.’

I shouldn’t go too far with this.

‘They’re not constant. I don’t feel like that all the time. And you’re right–the Caspian is exciting. But look at how I’m treated, Kathy. Twelve and a half thousand pounds a year and no future to bank on. There’s so little respect for low-level employees at Abnex, it’s staggering. I can’t believe what a shitty company it is.’

‘How are they shitty?’ This has caught her interest. ‘Tell me,’ she says.

‘Well…’

‘Yes?’

‘I’ve only just started admitting this to myself, but after what happened with MI6, Abnex was a bit of a rebound.’

‘MI6?’ she says, as if she’s never heard of it. ‘Oh yes, of course. Your interviews. How do you mean a rebound?’

‘Well, that was my dream job. To do that.’

‘Yes,’ she says slowly. ‘I recall you saying.’

I watch her face for a trace of deceit, but there is nothing.

‘Not for Queen and Country–that’s all shit–but to be involved in something where success or failure depended entirely on me and me alone. Working in oil is okay, but it doesn’t compare to what I would have experienced if I’d been involved in intelligence work. And I’m not sure that I’m cut out for the corporate life.’

‘Why’s that?’

‘Let me put it like this. Sometimes I wake up and I think: is this it? Is this what I really want to do with my life? Is this the sum total of my efforts so far? I so much wanted to be a success at something. To be significant. And I still resent the Foreign Office for denying me that. It’s childish, but that’s how I feel.’

‘But you are a success, Alec,’ she says, and it sounds as if she really means it.

‘No, I mean a successful individual. I wanted to make my own mark on the world. MI6 would have given me that. Is that too idealistic?’

‘No,’ she says quietly, nodding her head in slow agreement. ‘It’s not too idealistic. You know, it’s funny. I look at you, and I think you have everything a guy your age could possibly want.’

‘It’s not enough.’

‘Why not?’

‘I want acclaim. I want to be acknowledged.’

‘That’s understandable. A lot of young, ambitious guys are just like you. But do you mind if I give you a piece of advice?’

‘Go ahead.’

After a brief pause, she says, ‘I think you should relax a little bit, try to enjoy being young. What do you say?’

Katharine edges towards me, lending a bending emphasis to the question. For the first time since she returned from the kitchen, we find ourselves looking each other directly in the eye. We hold the contact, drawing out a candid silence, and I tell myself: this is happening again. She is giving it another try. She is guiding us gradually towards the bliss of an infidelity. And I think of Fortner, asleep in Kiev, and feel no loyalty to him whatsoever.

‘Relax a little bit?’ I repeat, moving towards her.

‘Yes.’

‘And how do you suggest I do that?’

‘I dunno,’ she says, leaning back. ‘Get out a bit more. Try not to care so much about what other people think about you.’

In this split instant, I fear that I have read the situation wrongly. Her manner becomes suddenly curt, even distant, as if by flirting with her I have broken the spell between us, made it explicit.

‘Easier said than done.’

‘Why?’ she asks. ‘Why is that easier said than done?’

‘I find it so hard, Kathy. To relax.’

‘Oh, come on,’ she says, tossing her face up to the ceiling. She finds my cautiousness disappointing.

‘You’re right…’

‘You know I am. I know what’s best for you. What about Saul? Why don’t you go out with him more?’

‘With Saul? He’s always busy. Always got a new girlfriend on the go.’

‘Yes,’ she says quietly, standing and picking up the two empty glasses from the table.

‘Let me give you a hand with those.’

‘No no, that’s okay.’ As she moves towards the kitchen she is shaking her head. ‘You’re so serious, Alec. So serious. Always have been.’

I don’t reply. It is as if she is angry with me.

‘You want another drink?’ she calls out.

‘No, thanks. I’ve had one too many.’

‘Me too,’ she says, coming back in. ‘I have to go to the bathroom.’

‘Fine.’

‘Be here when I get back?’

‘I’m not going anywhere.’

I had expected it. When she returns from the bathroom, Katharine is yawning, the elegant sinew and muscle on her neck stretched out in fine strands. She slumps down on the sofa and says, ‘Excuse me. Oh, I’m sorry. Must be tired.’

I take the cue. The hint is broad enough.

‘I should be going, Kathy. It’s late.’

‘No, don’t,’ she says, jerking up out of her seat with a suddenness that gives me new hope. ‘It’s so nice having you here. I’m just a little sleepy, that’s all.’

She rests her hand lightly on my leg. Why is she blowing so hot and cold?

‘That’s why I should be going. If you’re sleepy.’

‘Why don’t you stay the night? It’s Sunday tomorrow.’

‘No. You’ll want to be on your own.’

‘Not at all. I hate being alone. Strange noises. It would be nice if you slept over.’

‘You sure?’

‘Sure, I’m sure.’

‘Because that would be great if I could. I’d save the money on a taxi.’

‘Well there you go, then. It’s settled.’ She beams, lots of teeth. ‘It’ll be just me and you. You can look out for me. Be my protector.’

‘Well, if I’m going to do that, I should sleep on the sofa. See the burglars coming in.’

‘You won’t be all that comfortable.’

‘Well, where do you suggest I sleep?’

I put as much ambiguity into this as is comfortable to risk, but Katharine doesn’t pick it up.

‘Well, there’s always Fortner’s room,’ she says. ‘I can change the sheets.’

Not what I wanted her to say.

‘That’s a chore. You don’t want to be doing that at this time of night.’

‘No really. It’s no problem.’

I scratch my temple.

‘Look, maybe I should just get a taxi. Maybe you’d prefer it if I went.’

‘No. Stay. I’ll fetch you a blanket.’

‘You have one spare?’

‘Yeah. I got plenty.’

She twists up from the sofa, her left sock hanging loose off the toes, and walks back down the corridor.

‘There you go,’ she says, returning with a green checkered rug draped over her arm. She lays it on the sofa beside me. ‘Need a pillow?’

She yawns again.

‘No, the cushions will be fine.’

‘Okay, then. Well, I’m gonna get some sleep. Shout if you need anything.’

‘I will.’

And she leaves the room.

I am not sure that there was anything else I could have done. For a moment, sex was hovering in the background like a secret promise, but it was too much of a risk to make a move. I could not have been certain of her response. But now I am alone, still clothed, still wide awake, feeling cramped and uncomfortable on a Habitat sofa. I regret talking her into letting me stay the night. I only did it in the hope of being asked to join her in bed. I’d like to be on my way home, working back through the night’s conversations, thinking them through and noting them down. Now I am stuck here for what will be at least six or seven hours.

At around two o’clock, perhaps a little later, I hear the noise of footsteps in the corridor. A quiet tiptoe in the dark. I turn on the sofa to face out into the darkened room, eyes squinting as a light comes on in the passage.

I make out Katharine’s silhouette in the doorway. She pauses there, and the room is so quiet that I can hear her breathing. She is coming towards me, edging forward.

‘Kathy?’

‘Sorry.’ She is whispering, as if someone might hear. ‘Did I wake you?’

‘No. I can’t sleep.’

‘I was just gonna get a glass of water,’ she says. ‘Sorry to wake you. You want one?’

‘No, thanks.’

If I’d said yes, it would have brought her over here. That was stupid.

‘Actually, maybe I will have one.’

‘Okay.’

She turns on a side light in the kitchen and the low hum of the fridge compressor cuts out as she opens the door. A narrow path of bright light floods the floor. She pours two glasses of water, closes the fridge, and comes back into the sitting room.