The Monster At Home, Chapter Three
Juliet can't just drop by Section D unannounced anymore. Instead, she has to make appointments. It's not nearly as informative or as diverting: nothing quite entertains like impromptu inspections of Harry's flock in their native habitat.
This time, she makes do with a meeting in a conference room on a lower floor of Thames House. Officially, her purpose is to convey the latest policy directives; in reality, she simply wants to know what they're up to. As is her custom when she has no particular agenda in mind, she lobs random insults to see what sort of reaction she can spark. And as is their custom when they have nothing in particular to hide from her, Harry answers with exasperated scowls, Adam with macho posturing, and the others, unless directly called upon, don't answer at all.
Throughout the meeting, Juliet makes a point of observing Ros. The body language is telling: her colleagues respect her, but they don't like her. Ros, in turn, pretends she doesn't care.
How intriguing. Ros doesn't belong in Section D. She doesn't really belong anywhere, as far as Juliet can tell. But she wants to. Yearns to. Perhaps more than she even realises herself. She's empty; she's a cipher; she's a vacuum that craves being filled.
The meeting concludes with a flurry of shoved-back chairs and beeping mobiles. As Juliet rounds the table and wheels towards the door, she catches Ros's eye and bestows a broad smile.
***
Only a few months after Juliet's return to work, she composes her resignation letter. Yalta's projects have progressed to the point where it's wise to sever her ties to officialdom, and so, after an entire adult life spent in service to Her Majesty's Government, sever them she does. She'll lose her security clearance, inconveniently enough, but that's a necessary sacrifice: when the Americans inevitably realise what's happening, she'd prefer not to be the first person under scrutiny.
That same afternoon, she invites Harry to meet her at a modestly fashionable bistro. She insists on an outdoor table with a shady umbrella; it's not quite the same as their old riverside walks, but it comes close.
"You're buying me lunch," he says, after the waiter takes their order and whisks away the menus. "An expensive lunch, no less. To what do I owe this dubious pleasure?"
"I may as well come right out with it. I'm resigning, effective next month. I thought I owed you the news in person."
"Resigning?" He sets his glass down, his expression wary. "Is there some scandal I should be aware of?"
She waves a hand in laughing denial. "No, no, nothing like that. I've simply decided it's time to move on."
He frowns, clearly puzzled. "You're still young, Juliet. I expected you to be terrorising hapless Cabinet Ministers for many years to come. What prompted this?"
"Truthfully? I'm tired. This job has taken, well, rather a toll."
She doesn't elaborate. She doesn't need to.
"I see." An uncomfortable shadow crosses his face. "I'm very sorry to hear that."
"Oh, please. You'll be popping the champagne cork as soon as you get back to the Grid."
He shakes his head. "They'll only replace you with someone worse. Better the devil you know, as they say."
"I'm sure you'll manage."
He sits back in his chair, and something in his demeanour changes -- visibly relaxes -- as if her announcement has wiped away whatever traces of awkwardness still hung between them. Decades-old guilt, rivalry and recriminations, faded but lingering, finally slide into oblivion. Will there be new recriminations later? Probably. But for today, she can pretend they're gone forever.
"So, what on earth are you going to do with yourself?" he asks, openly curious, but no longer on guard. "Somehow I can't see you in a country cottage doing crosswords by the fire."
"Charitable work, I think." At his snort of disbelief, she smiles. "Don't scoff, Harry. For all you know, I might just bring peace to the Middle East someday."
***
She buys the property in Norfolk using a Yalta shell company and a Caribbean bank account. The house is isolated and inconspicuous, without actually being very distant from anything at all. It's near enough to the sea to allow flight by motorboat in an emergency; when the wind is right, she can smell salt in the air from the bedroom window.
The wiring is worse than primitive, so it takes several weeks to install the security system and satellite uplinks. The prior owners left behind unwanted furniture and fixtures strewn from room to room: an out-of-tune piano, dusty books piled on tables, brass candelabras, even a gong. The effect is spartan with a veneer of lost opulence; it suits her current tastes, so she leaves it as it is.
She moves in with a single suitcase and a cadre of armed guards for company. Other Yalta members come and go -- albeit discreetly, and never for long -- but it's her new home, and they respect it as such.
As for the wheelchair, she puts it in storage. She hasn't needed it in over a month, but she can't bring herself to get rid of it. It's like an outer skin that she shed, the husk of an earlier self sloughed off after metamorphosis into an entirely new creature. She keeps it as a memento of what once was.
Her present incarnation is better, stronger, more resolute. She prefers not to think about what qualities may have died with the old.
***
Eventually -- no, inevitably -- Juliet decides to target Ros for recruitment.
She has her excuses. They're even quite logical. Without Juliet's security clearance, they need a new way to monitor Section D's activities and ensure that there's no threat to Yalta's operations. Planting bugs in Harry's office is no assignment for the timorous, but if there's anyone with the right combination of talent and recklessness to pull it off, it's Ros Myers. That's what Juliet tells her colleagues, at least, and maybe they even believe her.
However, she can't truly pretend there's not an element of the personal involved. Ros is an irresistible temptation, a trophy to be won -- not just from Sir Jocelyn, but from Harry Pearce himself. If she can bring Ros into the fold, give her that place to belong she's been seeking, replace that chilly cynicism with faith in a cause, she will have been able to accomplish what they could not.
The idea teases, then intrigues, then tantalises, then obsesses. It's no longer enough that Sir Jocelyn is rotting in prison; it's no longer enough that Harry languishes in happy but ineffectual ignorance while Yalta saves the world under his nose: Juliet has to take away the one thing that used to belong to both of them. It makes her smarter, more talented, more deserving; it makes her right, because winning over the unwinnable is the ultimate proof.
It won't be easy. But that only makes Ros all the more desirable a prize.
***
They start with an initiation. They'll tell Ros afterwards that it was all just a test, but there's no way she can possibly fail. Whatever she does, however she reacts, they'll express amazement and pseudo-grudging approval -- then dangle the prospect of something even more rewarding on the horizon. Punishment, praise, then promises: the induction sequence of secret societies since the dawn of time, and with good reason. However, the ritual needs to be customised for optimal effect.
"Tell her the story about your father in Hungary," Juliet urges Sholto before he leaves for London. "Be maudlin, if you like."
"Why?" he asks. He's an intelligent man, in his own understated way, but he lacks Juliet's instinct for jabbing at the emotional jugular.
"She has Daddy issues," she explains. "We can exploit that."
It works better -- and faster -- than she'd even expected. When it comes time to set up the next rendezvous between Ros and Magritte, Juliet can't resist writing the coded letter to Ros herself. I hope this letter finds you well, she begins, then fills the page with invented reminiscences, chatty descriptions of prison life, and hopeful-sounding predictions of an eventual Myers family reunion that Juliet has made sure will never, ever happen.
She signs "Love, Daddy" with a flourish.
***
When the nuclear trigger arrives safely in Tehran, Juliet opens some vintage champagne she's discovered in a corner of the cellar. Sholto's still in London, scrubbing away any evidence that can be traced directly back to them, so Juliet and Magritte finish the entire bottle themselves.
"To a better world," Juliet says, raising her glass.
"And our role in it," adds Magritte.
They drink, and the champagne bubbles stream down Juliet's throat. It's a cool evening, so they've set a fire on the hearth across the room. Dancing flames glint orange in their glasses; a log pops and sizzles.
Alcohol and several stressful days without sleep are a potent combination. Just as Juliet starts to nod off in her chair, Magritte breaks the silence.
"What's to become of Ros?" she asks. "We don't really need her anymore." It's hard to read her expression in the subdued light, but her voice sounds oddly constricted.
"You don't like her, do you?"
"I don't trust her. She might turn against us now that she knows we lied to her."
She might indeed. But the fact that her loyalty isn't so readily held, that it can spill from one's grasp like droplets of mercury, is part of her allure.
Magritte won't understand that, so Juliet simply shrugs. "We'll see. She might still be of use."
Magritte's jaw tightens, and she turns her head away to stare into the fire. She's jealous, Juliet realises with a mix of amusement and disdain. She's worried that her place in Yalta's hierarchy is threatened.
She may be right.