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There must be somebody, Gaunt mused, to clean his flat, wash up, and do the laundry. A charlady, perhaps. But no one ever asked, and no one was ever told.
“Surely you could take one of the jobs,” said Gaunt. “It would cut the ground right out from under their feet.”
“Denis,” replied McCready gently, “I am not a schoolteacher, I am not an accountant, and I am not a bloody librarian. I’m going to make the bastards give me a hearing.”
“That might swing it,” agreed Gaunt. “The board won’t necessarily want to go along with this.”
The hearing inside Century House began as always on a Monday morning, and it was held in the conference room one floor down from the Chief’s office.
In the chair was the Deputy Chief, Timothy Edwards, immaculate as ever in a dark Blades suit and college tie, the man the Chief had picked to ensure the required verdict. He was flanked by the Controller of Domestic Operations and the Controller for Western Hemisphere. To one side of the room sat the Director of Personnel, next to a young clerk from Records who had a large pile of folders in front of him.
Sam McCready entered last and sat in the chair facing the table. At fifty-one, he was still lean and looked fit. Otherwise, he was the sort of man who could pass unnoticed. That was what had made him in his day so good, so damned good. That, and what he had in his head.
&nbs
p; They all knew the rules. Turn down three “unattractive employments,” and they had the right to require you to take premature retirement. But he had the right to a hearing, to argue for a variation.
He brought with him to speak on his behalf Denis Gaunt, ten years his junior, whom he had raised over five years to the number-two slot under himself. Denis, he reckoned, with his brilliant smile and public school tie, would be able to handle them better than he could.
All the men in the room knew each other and were on first-name terms, even the clerk from Records. It is a tradition of Century House, perhaps because it is such a closed world, that everyone may call everyone by first names except the Chief who is called “Sir” or “Chief” to his face and “the Master” or other things behind his back. The door was closed, and Edwards coughed for silence. He would.
“All right. We are here to study Sam’s application for a variation of a Head Office order, not amounting to redress of grievance. Agreed?”
Everyone agreed. It was established Sam McCready had no grievance, inasmuch as the rules had been abided by.
“Denis, I believe you are going to speak for Sam?”
“Yes, Timothy.”
The SIS was founded in its present form by an admiral, Sir Mansfield Gumming, and many of its in-house traditions (though not the familiarity) still have a vaguely nautical flavor. One of these is the right of a man before a hearing to have a fellow officer speak for him, a right that is often invoked.
The Director of Personnel’s statement was brief and to the point. The powers-that-be had decided they wished to transfer Sam McCready from Dee-Dee to fresh duties. He had declined to accept any of the three on offer. That was tantamount to electing early retirement. McCready was asking, if he could not continue as Head of Dee-Dee, for a return to the field or to a desk that handled field operations. Such a posting was not on offer. QED.
Denis Gaunt rose.
“Look, we all know the rules. And we all know the realities. It’s true Sam has asked not to be assigned to the training school, or the accounts, or the files because he is a field man by training and instinct. And one of the best, if not the best.”
“No dispute,” murmured the Controller for Western Hemisphere. Edwards shot him a warning look.
“The point is,” suggested Gaunt, “that if it really wanted to, the Service could probably find a place for Sam. Russia, Eastern Europe, North America, France, Germany, Italy. I am suggesting the Service ought to make that effort, because ...”
He approached the man from Records and took a file.
“Because he has four years to go to retire at fifty-five on full pension.”
“Ample compensation has been offered,” Edwards cut in. “Some might say extremely generous.”
“Because,” resumed Gaunt, “of years of service, loyal, often very uncomfortable, and sometimes extremely dangerous. It’s not a question of the money, it’s a question of whether the Service is prepared to make the effort for one of its own.”
He had, of course, no idea of the conversation that had taken place the previous month between Sir Mark and Sir Robert Inglis at the Foreign Office.
“I would like us to consider a few cases handled by Sam over the previous six years. Starting with this one.”
The man of whom they were speaking stared impassively from his chair at the rear of the room. None present could guess at the anger, even despair, beneath that weathered face.
Timothy Edwards glanced at his watch. He had hoped this affair could be terminated within the day. Now he doubted it could.
“I think we all recall it,” said Gaunt. “The matter concerning the late Soviet general, Yevgeni Pankratin. ...”
