Secret Asset

25

Patrick Dobson was spending a few days at home. He had fractured his wrist falling from a ladder in the garden while pruning a wisteria. Liz had decided that she and Peggy would call on him rather than wait for him to return to work. She had found from experience that there was a lot to be picked up about a person from their home, and she was hoping the journey would not be a waste of time.

On their drive down, Peggy and Liz had almost got lost, finding themselves following a seemingly endless maze of avenues and drives, each lined by large suburban houses with big leafy gardens.

At last they came to the Dobson residence, a thirties mock-Tudor house of brown brick, with white plaster gables and beams. Peggy said, “I hadn’t realised MI5 paid so well.” Sometimes with Peggy it was difficult to distinguish innocence from irony, but this time there was no mistaking her tartness.

Liz laughed. “I think you’ll find,” she said, “that there’s been another source of funds into the Dobson household.”

Patrick Dobson was not even forty years old, but his home seemed strangely middle-aged. What Dobson grandly called his drawing room had a formality that seemed completely out of keeping for a still youngish MI5 officer. It was panelled in oak and had a large mock Elizabethan fireplace and leaded windows. The sofa on which Liz and Peggy sat was chintz-covered and pillowy soft, the chairs were mahogany, and the carpet was a dull sage green. On the walls hung a mixture of family portraits and watercolours of nineteenth-century colonial scenes—a procession of elephants in Delhi under the Raj, and an antique hand-coloured map of the Imperial City of Beijing.

“What a beautiful room,” said Peggy Kinsolving admiringly.

If you like that sort of thing, thought Liz caustically.

Now Dobson thanked Peggy for her compliment, adding, “This was my wife’s parents’ house. Her father was in the Colonial Service. My wife inherited it after they died.”

That explains it, thought Liz. She knew about his father-in-law from the file. He had been a district officer in Uganda. Thank God, she thought to herself, we’re not going to have to try and find out how he comes to live in such affluence. There had been a CIA agent in Washington who claimed that his lifestyle was funded by a wealthy wife, when as it turned out it was funded by the KGB, but she did not think they were into that sort of situation with Patrick Dobson.

Dobson sat, neat and upright in a comfortable armchair across from them. He was a short, pie-faced man, with blond hair combed straight back. Wearing a blue blazer, grey flannels, and what looked to be a college tie, he was a model of politeness. But stiff.

Liz decided she had better kick things off, lest they get bogged down in Dobson’s efforts to rewrite his past. “This shouldn’t take long, Patrick,” she said cheerfully, in an effort to make things less formal.

They reviewed the bare facts of his CV—his boyhood in South London, his schooling (a scholarship to Alleyn’s School in Dulwich), his time at Oxford, followed straightaway by entry into MI5. Dobson gave only short answers at first, but gradually became more expansive, especially when they arrived at his current job in DG’s office. He spoke so animatedly about this, explaining what a wonderful perspective he got on all the Service’s operations, that for over five minutes Liz was unable to ask a single question.

She was about to interrupt when a knock at the door did the job for her. A woman came in with a tray—a pot of coffee, cups and saucers, and a plate of biscuits. She was dressed for a smart lunch, wearing heels and a floral frock.

“Ah, Teresa. These are the colleagues I told you about.”

She nodded politely, and came forward with the tray. Dobson made introductions, but it was obvious his wife did not want to linger. “I won’t intrude,” she said with a forced smile, looking only at her husband. “I’m just off to the church to do the flowers before the Women’s Institute lunch.”

“Of course, darling. See you later.”

Liz sat back down with her coffee, discomfited. If she didn’t take charge, she felt she would soon be lost in this safe suburban world. “If I could just go back to your time at Oxford,” she said. “You were very religious as an undergraduate, I gather.”

For the first time she sensed Dobson’s antennae quiver. “Only by the standards of the other students,” he said defensively. “I went to chapel every week. I still do—go to church that is. My wife attends as well. I don’t think there’s anything peculiar about it. Do you?”

Liz said mildly, “Of course not. My cousin’s a deacon and one of his daughters is hoping to be ordained.” Technically, a cousin’s husband had been a deacon, and their daughter’s calling had lasted only until she’d managed to get a boyfriend, but Liz wasn’t going to tell Dobson that.

He relaxed slightly. “I imagine you’ve seen the chaplain at Pembroke. When I first applied, he said he’d been asked about me. How is he these days?”

“Fine. At least he seemed that way to me.” However caustic Hickson had been about his ex-pupil, Liz was happy to admit she’d seen him.

“Was he sober?”

Liz looked at Dobson impassively. “He was when we talked.”

“That makes a change,” Dobson said, regaining his confidence. He hadn’t touched his coffee.

Liz gave a diplomatic smile. “He said you were a Young Conservative at Oxford.”

“I was interested,” said Dobson with a shrug. “Don’t tell me that’s unusual, too?” For the first time there was an edge to his voice.

Liz shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s probably me who was unusual.” She said, half confidingly, “I was a bit of a leftie at university. I’m surprised I got through the vetting.” She laughed. “It wasn’t the sixties, I grant you, but it was quite a political time. Everyone was worked up about the Palestinians.” She paused. “And Ireland, of course.”

But Dobson didn’t bite. “The big issue in my day was rent increases,” he said dryly.

“I see.”

Peggy had been a non-participant in the interview so far, studiously taking notes. Now she looked up for the first time. “But you’ve got Irish blood, haven’t you?” she asked brightly.

Dobson stared at her coldly. “I believe one of my grandmothers was Irish,” he said slowly.

“Did she emigrate here?”

“Emigrate? What a grand word—I imagine she’d have said she came here for work. The story was,” he said, distancing himself, “that she was ‘in service’ in Galway for an Anglo-Irish family. When they moved back to London she came with them. She met my grandfather, and married him.” He added pointedly, “He was English. Owned a string of garages in South London.” This was said, Liz decided, to disabuse them of any idea that his grandfather had been “in service” too.

“She must have had quite a story to tell,” gushed Peggy. Liz, who was beginning to admire Peggy’s skill at drawing people out, sat back and watched. “Did you know your grandmother?” Peggy asked.

“A bit,” he said reluctantly. “She died when I was a boy.”

“She must have missed Ireland,” said Peggy sympathetically. “Did she ever go back?”

“I imagine she went back sometimes.” He hesitated, almost imperceptibly. Liz imagined he was calculating what they already knew, and what they could find out. He’d be surprised, thought Liz, thinking of the day before, when Peggy had proudly shown her a genealogical chart of the Dobson maternal line. It was of almost byzantine complexity, its branches spread out like the limbs of a monkey puzzle tree. That’s when Liz had suggested Peggy ask the questions about the family.

“Actually,” Dobson admitted, “I went with her once. To Connemara. That’s where she was from.”

“Family still there?” asked Liz as casually as she could, trying not to trigger a defensive reaction.

Dobson shrugged. “I would think so. It was a typically Irish set-up—my grandmother was one of seven children.”

Peggy interjected. “Your grandmother’s maiden name was O’Hare, wasn’t it?”

Dobson began to nod, then stopped suddenly. “How did you know that?”

Peggy ignored him, and looking at her notes continued: “And her eldest brother was named Sean, yes?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “He moved north to Londonderry, before the War—if I’ve got things right he was quite a bit older than she was. He had two sons, the eldest named Kieran, and Kieran himself had one son—Patrick. Same name as yours. And he was—is, I should say—your second cousin.”

Dobson stayed completely silent until Peggy finished. Then ignoring her, he stared at Liz. She couldn’t tell if it was fear or anger in his eyes. “Yes?” he asked neutrally.

“Well,” said Liz, sounding matter of fact, “your second cousin was detained and spent twelve months in the Maze. Applicants to MI5 are asked to declare any relative who has been convicted of a crime, spent any time in one of HM’s prisons, or been charged with subversive activity. Yet Patrick O’Hare was not on your form. Can you tell me why?”

Outwardly Dobson stayed impressively calm. “Is there a point to this?” he asked quietly.

“We have to be thorough,” she said firmly.

Dobson looked irritated. “I knew nothing about this cousin of mine. How could I? For goodness sake, I was five years old when it happened.”

“Of course,” said Liz, and moved quickly on to another topic, to Peggy’s mystification.

“So what do you think?” asked Liz, as they joined the M3. Peggy liked the comfort of the Audi, but was a little unnerved by the zippy way Liz drove it.

“I don’t believe he didn’t know about his cousin.”

“Why not?”

Peggy pondered this. Dobson hadn’t liked any of the questions about his mother’s Irish roots. Initially Peggy put this down to snobbery—presumably a pig farm in Galway didn’t sit easily for a man now accustomed to a wing chair in Surrey. Yet though it was conceded reluctantly, he had acknowledged his background. Whereas he’d flatly denied any knowledge of his IRA relative.

And Liz had backed off. Why? Peggy said tentatively, “Weren’t you surprised he didn’t know his second cousin?”

“It seems a pretty remote connection,” said Liz, staring fixedly at the motorway.

“Does it?” asked Peggy with genuine surprise, for she had a vast extended family she knew well—too well, she often thought, as she trekked towards yet another wedding, or christening, or family reunion. “I thought everyone knew who their second cousin was.”

“Not necessarily,” argued Liz. “And anyway, on the application it’s immediate family they’re most interested in. He didn’t have to declare his second cousin even if he knew about him.”

“Doesn’t matter,” said Peggy, sticking to her guns. “I still think he was being economical with the truth.”

Liz smiled, checking the rearview mirror. “Actually, so do I,” she said.

“Really?” Peggy was surprised. Perhaps Liz had been playing devil’s advocate.

“No, I don’t think he told the truth,” said Liz, as she merged onto the M4, cutting over quickly into the fast lane. “But it’s nothing to do with his family tree.”

“What then?”

“Dobson said he was only five when his cousin was interned.”

She paused as she changed lanes, and Peggy did a mental calculation. Patrick Dobson had been born in 1968; his namesake cousin had been interned in 1973. “But Dobson was only five,” Peggy said, then held her breath, trying not to gasp as Liz accelerated around an enormous HGV.

“I’m sure he was,” said Liz crisply. “But internment lasted four years. So how did Dobson know which year his cousin was put in the Maze? I didn’t tell him; you didn’t either. And yet think of his exact words. He didn’t say ‘I was just a kid when this man I never knew got put away.’ He was very specific: ‘I was five years old when it happened.’” She flashed a sideways smile at Peggy. “So no, I don’t believe him either. But what we don’t know is whether he lied for a purpose, or just because he’s got a hang-up about his forebears.”