A Delicate Truth A Novel - By John Le Carre Page 0,60

to discuss,’ he replied loftily, avoiding her eye.

‘And you’re not able to discuss it with Mum either. Right?’

‘Yes, it is right, Em, as it happens. And I’m not enjoying it any more than she is. Unfortunately, it’s a matter of considerable official secrecy. As your mother is aware. And accepts. As perhaps you should.’

‘My patients tell me their secrets. I don’t go handing them around. What makes you think Mum will hand yours around? She’s silent as the grave. A bit more silent than you are sometimes.’

Time to mount his high horse:

‘Because these are state secrets, Emily. Not mine and not your mother’s. They were entrusted to me and no one else. The only people I can share them with are the people who know them already. Which makes it, I have to say, rather a lonely business.’

And on this fine note of self-pity, he rose, kissed her on the head, stalked off across the stable yard to his improvised office, locked the door and opened up his computer:

Marlon will respond to your personal and confidential inquiries.

*

With Sheba riding proudly in the back of the nearly new Land Rover that he had acquired in exchange for his aged camper, Kit drives purposefully up Bailey’s Hill until he arrives by design at a deserted lay-by with a Celtic cross and a view of the morning mist rising in the valley. His first call is foredoomed, as he intends it to be, but Service ethic and some sense of self-protection requires him to make it. Dialling the Foreign Office switchboard, he gets a determined woman who requires him to repeat his name clearly and slowly. He does, and throws in his knighthood for good measure. After a delay so long that he would be justified in ringing off, she informs him that the erstwhile minister Mr Fergus Quinn has not been at his post for three years – a thing Kit well knows but this doesn’t stop him from asking – and that she has no number for him and no authority to pass messages. Would Sir Christopher – finally, thank you! – care to be connected with the resident clerk? No thank you, Sir Christopher would not, with the clear implication that a resident clerk wouldn’t match up to the level of security involved.

Well, I tried, and it’s on record. Now for the tricky bit.

Extracting the piece of paper on which he had written down Marlon’s telephone number, he touches it into his cellphone, turns the volume to maximum because his hearing’s going a bit, and swiftly, for fear of hesitation, presses green. Listening tensely to the number ringing out, he remembers too late what time of day it is in Houston, and has a vision of a bleary Marlon groping for his bedside phone. Instead, he gets the sincere voice of a Texan matron:

‘We thank you for calling Ethical Outcomes. Remember: at Ethical, your safety comes first!’

Then a blast of martial music, and the all-American voice of Marlon on parade:

‘Hullo! This is Marlon. Kindly be advised that your inquiry will always be treated in the strictest confidence in accordance with Ethical’s principles of integrity and discretion. I’m sorry: there’s nobody around just now to take your personal and private call. But if you would care to leave a simple message of no more than two minutes in duration, your confidential consultant will get right back to you. After the signal, please.’

Has Kit prepared his simple message of no more than two minutes in duration? During the long night, he evidently has:

‘This is Paul and I need to speak to Elliot. Elliot, this is Paul, from three years ago. Something pretty unpleasant has cropped up, not of my making, I may say. I need to talk to you urgently, obviously not on my home number. You’ve got my personal cellphone number, it’s the same old one as before, not encrypted, of course. Let’s fix a date to meet as soon as possible. If you can’t make it, perhaps you’d put me in touch with somebody I’m authorized to talk to. I mean by that somebody who knows the background and can fill in some rather disturbing blanks. I look forward to hearing from you very soon. Thank you. Paul.’

With a sense of a tricky job well done in under two minutes, he rings off and sets out along a pony track with Sheba at his heels. But after a couple of hundred yards his sense of achievement deserts him. How long