When Peggy Kinsolving had done her research on the background of the various employees in UCSO’s two offices, she hadn’t bothered with UCSO’s Chief Executive, David Blakey. She knew he was an ex-MI6 officer and had left it at that. After all, no one could say that MI6 was casual about its recruitment and he certainly wouldn’t have been employed there if there had been any doubt about his background.
But Peggy hated loose ends and the loose ends in Blakey’s case were the five years since he’d left MI6. So really just to satisfy herself, she decided to put him under her investigative microscope.
Her friend Millie the Moaner was now working in the Personnel Department of MI6 – or Human Resources as even MI6 called it now – and she got permission for Peggy to see Blakey’s file. It recorded his recruitment, after he’d been talent-spotted while working on a postgraduate Politics thesis; his various postings; his marriage to Dorothy, who had been his secretary in Copenhagen, and their separation and divorce. It was clear from the confidential reports by his various Heads of Station that his performance had been acceptable if never outstanding. But there was something about Blakey that was frequently mentioned; his relationships with women, both before and after his marriage. He had been warned repeatedly that his behaviour was not compatible with his secret work, and eventually his blatant relationship with a woman from the German Foreign Office, whom he met when he was posted to Berlin, had caused the break-up of his marriage, and ultimately his departure from the Service.
Peggy thought she now had a pretty clear idea of the sort of man David Blakey was, but she did not immediately see how that could be relevant to the goings on in the UCSO office in Athens. In any case, he might have changed; it was more than five years since the last page in his file had been added – the reference the Service had written in support of his application for the post he now held in UCSO. But Peggy was like a bloodhound once she was on the trail, and she decided to take a closer look at Mr Blakey.
David Blakey lived in a flat north of Baker Street. It was an area that had once been a mixture of working-class housing and quiet middle-class mansion blocks, a neighbourhood that had never been chic – until the last ten years, when prices for even a studio apartment topped £400,000 and many property owners found themselves, on paper at least, millionaires. When a newsagent’s closed, or the local ironmonger’s, it was replaced these days by an estate agent or a smart flower shop. Like all Londoners, Peggy looked at the affluent area and wished she had bought something there when she first came to London six or seven years before; though, like most Londoners her age, she hadn’t had the money then to buy property of any sort.
She stopped at the corner nearest to Blakey’s flat, and took a clipboard out of her briefcase; fastened to it were a few official-looking forms she’d had run up by Printing. She pushed her glasses higher on her nose, buttoned up her jacket, and walked purposefully up to the door of the mansion block. She rang the bell of 2C, which her researches had told her was on the same landing as Blakey’s flat, 3C. After a moment a woman’s voice said, ‘Yes?’
‘Mrs Goodhart? I’m from the Electoral Register,’ Peggy said, holding up to the entry camera a quite realistic-looking identity card, also run up by Printing. ‘I’m confirming current occupancy in this block. May I have a word, please?’
‘All right,’ the woman said resignedly, and buzzed her in.
Inside, the entrance hall was deserted. Peggy ignored the brass cage lift and took the stairs, arriving on the second-floor landing only slightly out of breath. The door of 2C was on its chain, open just a crack, but the sight of Peggy apparently reassured Mrs Goodhart and she took off the chain and opened the door.
To Peggy’s eyes, Mrs Goodhart looked as if she had dressed for a wedding – smart silk suit, golden hair swept tightly back into a knot at the nape of her neck. ‘Will this take long? I’m going out for lunch and I need to leave in five minutes.’
‘No. I just have a few questions,’ said Peggy, flashing her a charming smile. ‘Only one side, you see,’ she added, holding up her clipboard.
The woman laughed. ‘Come in then. It’s a bit bleak standing out here on the landing.’
Peggy followed her into a sitting room that seemed to be crammed with furniture. Georgian side tables covered with china ornaments jostled with silk damask-covered chairs and sofas. Peggy found herself staring at a large portrait of a cavalry officer on a horse, which dominated the far wall. ‘My great-grandfather,’ the woman said simply, and motioned her to sit down.
Perched on one of the pristine chairs, Peggy held her clipboard upright on her knee. ‘If I could just check some details, Mrs Goodhart,’ she began.
Peggy asked a series of questions in her version of the bland tones of officialdom: what was her name, her address (with a laugh), was she over seventy, the names and details of any other occupants of the flat – ‘I have lived alone here since the death of my husband,’ Mrs Goodhart answered stiffly.
When she got to the end of her questions, Peggy slid her pencil through the metal rung of her clipboard and stood up. ‘Thank you very much,’ she said, and started towards the door. Then stopped, as if she’d thought of something else.
‘Yes?’ asked Mrs Goodhart.
‘Sorry, I was just wondering… I’ve been trying to check the present occupants of Flat 3C.’ She waved vaguely across the landing. ‘But no one ever seems to be in.’
‘Ah, that’s David Blakey. He works during the day but he’s usually at home in the evening.’
‘Oh, yes, that’s the name I’ve got – and Mrs Blakey?’
Mrs Goodhart gave her a knowing look. ‘There isn’t a Mrs Blakey. But there is a lady there who – well, as you might say, keeps him company.’ She looked down, suitably abashed by her own candour.
Peggy let her eyes widen to display mild surprise. ‘Is this lady… uh… resident with Mr Blakey?’
‘I think they say “cohabitant” nowadays, my dear. I don’t think she’s moved in. It’s strictly a nocturnal arrangement, if you see what I mean.’ Mrs Goodhart emitted a small snort, as if to say, Men! ‘She is attractive. Not young, you know, forty if she’s a day and I don’t think the blonde hair is completely unaided by the bottle. But Mr Blakey is utterly smitten, according to Howson.’
‘Howson?’ asked Peggy politely, looking at her list. ‘Does she live here too?’
‘Oh, no. She’s my daily and she does for David Blakey too. A nice woman, if a little prone to gossip,’ said Mrs Goodhart with a small sniff. Then, perhaps realising the hypocrisy of this, added briskly, ‘Is that all, because I must be going now?’
‘Oh, I’m so sorry. I hope I haven’t made you late.’ But Peggy wasn’t sorry at all. She’d learned rather more than she’d expected.