U.G.L.Y. Part 9

*Well, well, well a '

*h.e.l.lo, Evie.'

* a and there's you fresh from consorting with the Prime Minister. I am honoured.'

*You watched it, then?'

*Of course. Thatcher's a baleful old witch but she's still a cla.s.s act.'

McCall followed her indoors. She nodded to a campaign chair. He sat down as she went into the kitchen. A tape deck clicked on. Goldberg Variations. That brought back their first night. She had sat across him, hands clasped behind her head, baring b.r.e.a.s.t.s like bee stings and moaning till she came. He left before dawn next day, fading from her life like they'd never met, leaving no proof they ever had.

Evie returned with two heavy cut gla.s.s tumblers and a bottle of rare Bruichladdich. She poured the malt then folded herself into the corner of a low sofa.

*So, McCall...looking for a bed for the night, are we?'

Both grinned across the bare expanse of varnished floorboards between them. Nothing more needed saying. It was possible McCall could get to love Evie's smile a slightly asymmetrical but true and honest. Not all those who had smiled at him were that. But this was risky territory. It was safer to talk of terrorism.

*Your lot must be on high alert.'

*No more than usual.'

*Come off it, Evie. The IRA just nearly murdered Thatcher and all her cabinet.'

*Don't start fis.h.i.+ng, McCall.'

*And what about all this industrial unrest - the miners fighting it out with the police on the streets. The country's at war with itself.'

*Maybe it is.'

*So the spooks can't just be watching from the sidelines.'

*You know better than to ask.'

*Just this once a '

*You're crossing our line, McCall.'

* a but Thatcher says we're under attack. You must be hearing something.'

*Only the sound of a lot of people praying.'

Bea sat profiled at the dressing table, brus.h.i.+ng out her hair for the night. She tilted her head in the mirror, making the best of what remained and pouting the lips so many men once craved to kiss...and some had succeeded in doing.

In a silver-framed photograph by her pots of lotions and creams was a bitter sweet reminder of all that had gone. She had been arriving at some society reception, glittering in diamonds and fur like a movie star with Francis on her arm in all the pomp of his military attache's uniform. How glamorous and young they looked, how they shone in those dull days of post war austerity. Even the spies of their opponents were mesmerised. Such times they were...all bluff and double cross and combat to the death back then but lost in unwritten history now.

Francis came in searching for a collar stud box he had misplaced - like much else recently.

*We are going to see him, aren't we?'

*Who, dear '

*The boy...for Christmas.'

*Mac? Of course we are. I've told you already.'

*Is he bringing Helen?'

*No, Francis. Do try to remember these things. That's all over long since.'

*Oh, right. Such a pity. She was jolly good fun, was Helen.'

She might have been a yet she had still betrayed them all. But Helen was not the only one guilty of committing that particular crime.

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