noise and I am rendered incapable of speech. His gaze intensifies. He will not speak until I have done so. Say something, Alec. Don’t blow it now. His mouth is melting into what I perceive as a disappointment close to pity. I struggle for something coherent, some sequence of words that will do justice to the very seriousness of what I am now embarked upon, but the words simply do not come. Lucas appears to be several feet closer now than he was before, and yet his chair has not moved an inch. How could this have happened? In an effort to regain control of myself, I try to remain absolutely still, to make our body language as much of a mirror as possible: arms relaxed, legs crossed, head upright and looking ahead. In time—what seem vast, vanished seconds—the beginning of a sentence forms in my mind, just the faintest of signals. And when Lucas makes to say something, as if to end my embarrassment, it acts as a spur.
I say, “Well…now that I know…I can understand why Mr. Hawkes didn’t want to say exactly what I was coming here to do today.”
“Yes.”
The shortest, meanest, quietest yes I have ever heard.
“I found the pamphl—the file very interesting. It was a surprise.”
“Why is that exactly? What surprised you about it?”
“I thought, obviously, that I was coming here today to be interviewed for the Diplomatic Service, not for SIS.”
“Of course,” he says, reaching for his tea.
And then, to my relief, he begins a long and practiced monologue about the work of the Secret Intelligence Service, an eloquent, spare résumé of its goals and character. This lasts as long as a quarter of an hour, allowing me the chance to get myself together, to think more clearly and focus on the task ahead. Still spinning from the embarrassment of having frozen openly in front of him, I find it difficult to concentrate on Lucas’s voice. His description of the work of an SIS officer appears to be disappointingly void of macho derring-do. He paints a lusterless portrait of a man engaged in the simple act of gathering intelligence, doing so by the successful recruitment of foreigners sympathetic to the British cause who are prepared to pass on secrets for reasons of conscience or financial gain. That, in essence, is all that a spy does. As Lucas tells it, the more traditional aspects of espionage—burglary, phone tapping, honey traps, bugging—are a fiction. It’s mostly desk work. Officers are certainly not licensed to kill.
“Clearly, one of the more unique aspects of SIS is the demand for absolute secrecy,” he says, his voice falling away. “How would you feel about not being able to tell anybody what you do for a living?”
I guess that this is how it would be. Nobody, not even Kate, knowing any longer who I really was. A life of absolute anonymity.
“I wouldn’t have any problem with that.”
Lucas begins to take notes again. That was the answer he was looking for.
“And it doesn’t concern you that you won’t receive any public acclaim for the work you do?”
He says this in a tone that suggests that it bothers him a great deal.
“I’m not interested in acclaim.”
A seriousness has enveloped me, nudging panic aside. An idea of the job is slowly composing itself in my imagination, something that is at once very straightforward but ultimately obscure. Something clandestine and yet moral and necessary.
Lucas ponders the clipboard in his lap.
“You must have some questions you want to ask me.”
“Yes,” I tell him. “Would members of my family be allowed to know that I am an SIS officer?”
Lucas appears to have a checklist of questions on his clipboard, all of which he expects me to ask. That was obviously one of them, because he again marks the page in front of him with his snub-nosed fountain pen.
“Obviously, the fewer people that know, the better. That usually means wives.”
“Children?”
“No.”
“But obviously not friends or other relatives?”
“Absolutely
I say, “Well…now that I know…I can understand why Mr. Hawkes didn’t want to say exactly what I was coming here to do today.”
“Yes.”
The shortest, meanest, quietest yes I have ever heard.
“I found the pamphl—the file very interesting. It was a surprise.”
“Why is that exactly? What surprised you about it?”
“I thought, obviously, that I was coming here today to be interviewed for the Diplomatic Service, not for SIS.”
“Of course,” he says, reaching for his tea.
And then, to my relief, he begins a long and practiced monologue about the work of the Secret Intelligence Service, an eloquent, spare résumé of its goals and character. This lasts as long as a quarter of an hour, allowing me the chance to get myself together, to think more clearly and focus on the task ahead. Still spinning from the embarrassment of having frozen openly in front of him, I find it difficult to concentrate on Lucas’s voice. His description of the work of an SIS officer appears to be disappointingly void of macho derring-do. He paints a lusterless portrait of a man engaged in the simple act of gathering intelligence, doing so by the successful recruitment of foreigners sympathetic to the British cause who are prepared to pass on secrets for reasons of conscience or financial gain. That, in essence, is all that a spy does. As Lucas tells it, the more traditional aspects of espionage—burglary, phone tapping, honey traps, bugging—are a fiction. It’s mostly desk work. Officers are certainly not licensed to kill.
“Clearly, one of the more unique aspects of SIS is the demand for absolute secrecy,” he says, his voice falling away. “How would you feel about not being able to tell anybody what you do for a living?”
I guess that this is how it would be. Nobody, not even Kate, knowing any longer who I really was. A life of absolute anonymity.
“I wouldn’t have any problem with that.”
Lucas begins to take notes again. That was the answer he was looking for.
“And it doesn’t concern you that you won’t receive any public acclaim for the work you do?”
He says this in a tone that suggests that it bothers him a great deal.
“I’m not interested in acclaim.”
A seriousness has enveloped me, nudging panic aside. An idea of the job is slowly composing itself in my imagination, something that is at once very straightforward but ultimately obscure. Something clandestine and yet moral and necessary.
Lucas ponders the clipboard in his lap.
“You must have some questions you want to ask me.”
“Yes,” I tell him. “Would members of my family be allowed to know that I am an SIS officer?”
Lucas appears to have a checklist of questions on his clipboard, all of which he expects me to ask. That was obviously one of them, because he again marks the page in front of him with his snub-nosed fountain pen.
“Obviously, the fewer people that know, the better. That usually means wives.”
“Children?”
“No.”
“But obviously not friends or other relatives?”
“Absolutely