friends.
“What is it?”
“Interview with the departmental assessor.”
“Rouse? He’s a straight-talker. You’ll like him.”
“What about you? What do you have?”
“Just the shrink. Four thirty.”
“Nice way to finish off. Get to talk about yourself for half an hour.”
“You’ve had her?”
“Yesterday. Very cozy. Like one of those fireside chats on Songs of Praise. ” Elaine stands up, smoothing down her skirt. “We’re all going to the pub later. Sam’s idea.”
“He’s a leader of men, isn’t he? Takes control.”
Elaine smiles at this. She agrees with me.
“So meet you back here around five fifteen?”
I don’t feel like drinking with them. I’d rather just go home and be alone. So I ignore the question and say, “Sounds all right. Good luck with your interview.”
“You too,” she replies.
But in Dr. Stevenson’s office I fall into a trap.
There are two soft armchairs in the corner of the hushed warm room. We face each other and it is as if I am looking into the eyes of a kindly grandmother. Stevenson’s face has such grace and warmth that there is nothing I can do but trust it. She calls me Alec—the first time that one of the examiners has referred to me by my first name—and speaks with such refinement that I am immediately lulled into a false sense of security. The lights are dim, the blinds drawn. There is a sensation of absolute privacy. We are in a place where confidences may be shared.
Everything starts out okay. Her early questions are unobtrusive, shallow even, and I give nothing away. We discuss the format of Sisby, what improvements, if any, I would make to it. There is a brief reference to school—an inquiry about my choice of A levels—and an even shorter discussion about CEBDO. That these topics go largely unexplored is not due to any reticence on my part. Stevenson seems happy simply to skirt around the edges of a subject, never probing too deeply, never overstepping the mark. In doing so she brokers a trust that softens me up. And by the time the conversation has moved into a more sensitive area, my guard is down.
“I would like to talk about Kate Allardyce, if that would be all right?”
My first instinct here should have been defensive. Nobody ever asks Alec about Kate; it’s a taboo subject. And yet I quickly find that I want to talk about her.
“Could you tell me a little bit about the two of you?”
“We broke up over six months ago.”
“I don’t understand,” she says, and then, with sudden horror, I remember the lie to Liddiard. “I was led to believe that she was your girlfriend.” She looks down at her file, staring at it in plain disbelief. Mistakes of this kind do not happen. She moves awkwardly in her seat and mutters something inaudible.
It was a throwaway deceit. I only did it to make myself appear more solid and dependable, a rounded man in a long-term relationship. He asked for her full name, for a date and place of birth, so that SIS could run a check on her. And now that the vetting process is over they want to square their deep background with mine. They want to know whether Kate will make a decent diplomatic wife, a spy’s accomplice. They want to hear me talk about her.
My left hand is suddenly up around my mouth, squeezing the ridge of skin under my nose. It is almost funny to have been caught out by something so crass, so needless, but this feeling quickly evaporates. The humiliation is soon total.
Out of it, I knit together a shoddy retraction.
“I’m sorry. No, no, it’s my fault. I’m sorry. We just…we just got back together again, about three months ago. Secretly. We don’t want anybody to know. We prefer things to be private. I’m just so used to telling people that we’re not back together that it’s become like a reflex.”
“So you are together?”
“Very much so, yes.”
“But no one else knows?”
“That’s correct. Yes. Except for a friend of mine. Saul. Otherwise,
“What is it?”
“Interview with the departmental assessor.”
“Rouse? He’s a straight-talker. You’ll like him.”
“What about you? What do you have?”
“Just the shrink. Four thirty.”
“Nice way to finish off. Get to talk about yourself for half an hour.”
“You’ve had her?”
“Yesterday. Very cozy. Like one of those fireside chats on Songs of Praise. ” Elaine stands up, smoothing down her skirt. “We’re all going to the pub later. Sam’s idea.”
“He’s a leader of men, isn’t he? Takes control.”
Elaine smiles at this. She agrees with me.
“So meet you back here around five fifteen?”
I don’t feel like drinking with them. I’d rather just go home and be alone. So I ignore the question and say, “Sounds all right. Good luck with your interview.”
“You too,” she replies.
But in Dr. Stevenson’s office I fall into a trap.
There are two soft armchairs in the corner of the hushed warm room. We face each other and it is as if I am looking into the eyes of a kindly grandmother. Stevenson’s face has such grace and warmth that there is nothing I can do but trust it. She calls me Alec—the first time that one of the examiners has referred to me by my first name—and speaks with such refinement that I am immediately lulled into a false sense of security. The lights are dim, the blinds drawn. There is a sensation of absolute privacy. We are in a place where confidences may be shared.
Everything starts out okay. Her early questions are unobtrusive, shallow even, and I give nothing away. We discuss the format of Sisby, what improvements, if any, I would make to it. There is a brief reference to school—an inquiry about my choice of A levels—and an even shorter discussion about CEBDO. That these topics go largely unexplored is not due to any reticence on my part. Stevenson seems happy simply to skirt around the edges of a subject, never probing too deeply, never overstepping the mark. In doing so she brokers a trust that softens me up. And by the time the conversation has moved into a more sensitive area, my guard is down.
“I would like to talk about Kate Allardyce, if that would be all right?”
My first instinct here should have been defensive. Nobody ever asks Alec about Kate; it’s a taboo subject. And yet I quickly find that I want to talk about her.
“Could you tell me a little bit about the two of you?”
“We broke up over six months ago.”
“I don’t understand,” she says, and then, with sudden horror, I remember the lie to Liddiard. “I was led to believe that she was your girlfriend.” She looks down at her file, staring at it in plain disbelief. Mistakes of this kind do not happen. She moves awkwardly in her seat and mutters something inaudible.
It was a throwaway deceit. I only did it to make myself appear more solid and dependable, a rounded man in a long-term relationship. He asked for her full name, for a date and place of birth, so that SIS could run a check on her. And now that the vetting process is over they want to square their deep background with mine. They want to know whether Kate will make a decent diplomatic wife, a spy’s accomplice. They want to hear me talk about her.
My left hand is suddenly up around my mouth, squeezing the ridge of skin under my nose. It is almost funny to have been caught out by something so crass, so needless, but this feeling quickly evaporates. The humiliation is soon total.
Out of it, I knit together a shoddy retraction.
“I’m sorry. No, no, it’s my fault. I’m sorry. We just…we just got back together again, about three months ago. Secretly. We don’t want anybody to know. We prefer things to be private. I’m just so used to telling people that we’re not back together that it’s become like a reflex.”
“So you are together?”
“Very much so, yes.”
“But no one else knows?”
“That’s correct. Yes. Except for a friend of mine. Saul. Otherwise,
Similar Books
