A Spy by Nature. Charles Cumming

encumbered by the social ineptitude of the fabulously intelligent.

      ‘Is this B3?’ he asks. His hair is unbrushed.

      ‘Yes,’ Ann says, keenly.

      He nods, clearly heavy with nerves. A hobbit of a man. He shuffles into the room and sits across from me in an armchair that has sponge pouring out of its upholstery. Ann seems to have decided against coffee, moving back toward the window at the back of the room.

      ‘So you’re either Sam or Matthew,’ she asks him. ‘Which one?’

      ‘Matt.’

      ‘I’m Alec,’ I tell him. We are near each other and I shake his hand. The palm is damp with lukewarm sweat.

      ‘Nice to meet you.’

      Ann has swooped in, bending over to introduce herself. The Hobbit is nervous around women. When she shakes his hand, his eyes duck to the carpet. She fakes out a smile and retreats below a white clock with big black hands that says half past eight.

      Not long now.

      I pick up a copy of The Times from the low table and begin reading it, trying to remember interesting things to say about Gerry Adams. Matt takes a cereal bar out of his jacket pocket and begins tucking into it, oblivious of us, dropping little brown crumbs and shards of raisin on his Marks & Spencer blazer. It has occurred to me that in the eyes of Liddiard and Lucas, Matt and I have something in common, some shared quality or flaw that is the common denominator among spies. What could that possibly be?

      Ann looks at him.

      ‘So what do you do, Matt?’

      He almost drops the cereal bar in his lap.

      ‘I’m studying for a master’s degree at Warwick.’

      ‘What in?’

      ‘Computer science and European affairs.’

      He says this quietly, as though he is ashamed. His skin is fighting a constant, losing battle with acne.

      ‘So you just came down from Warwick last night? You’re staying in a hotel?’

      She’s nosy, this one. Wants to know what she’s up against.

      ‘Yeah,’ he says. ‘Not far from here.’

      I like it that he does not ask the same question of her.

      A young man appears in the doorway. This must be Sam Ogilvy, the third male candidate. He has an immediate, palpable influence on the room that is controlling. He makes it his. Ogilvy has a healthy, vitamin-rich complexion, vacuous turquoise eyes, and a dark, strong jawline. He’ll be good at games, for sure, probably plays golf off eight or nine; bats solidly in the middle order and pounds fast, flat serves at you that kick up off the court. So he’s handsome, undoubtedly, a big hit with the ladies, but a drink with the lads will come first. His face, in final analysis, lacks character, is easily forgettable. I would put money on the fact that he attended a minor public school. My guess is that he works in oil, textiles, or finance, reads Grisham on holiday, and is chummy with all the secretaries at work, most of whom harbour secret dreams of marrying him. That’s about all there is to go on.

      ‘Good morning,’ he says, as if we have all been waiting for him and can now get started. He has broad athletic shoulders that manage to make his off-the-peg suit look stylish. ‘Sam Ogilvy.’

      And, one by one, he makes his way around the room, shaking hands, moving with the easy confidence of an £80,000 per annum salesman used to getting what he wants–a closed deal, a wage increase, a classy broad.

      Ann goes first. She is reserved but warm. It’s a certainty that she’ll find him attractive. Their handshake is pleasant and formal; it says we can do business together.

      The Hobbit is next, standing up from the armchair to his full height, which still leaves him a good five or six inches short. Ogilvy looks to get the measure of him pretty quickly: a bright shining nerd, a number cruncher. The Hobbit looks suitably deferential.

      And now it’s my turn. Ogilvy’s eyes swivel left and scope my face. He knew as soon as he came in that I’d be the one he’s up against, the biggest threat to his candidacy. I knew it, too. Ann and Matt won’t cut it.

      ‘How do you do? Sam.’

      He has a strong, captain-of-the-school grip on him.

      ‘Alec.’

      ‘Have you been here long?’ he asks, touching the tip of his tanned nose.

      ‘About ten minutes,’ Ann replies behind him.

      ‘Feeling nervous?’

      This goes out to anyone who feels like answering. Not me. Matt murmurs ‘mmmm,’ which I find oddly touching.

      ‘Yeah, me too,’ says Sam, just so we know he’s like the rest of us, even if he does look like Pierce Brosnan. ‘You ever done anything like this before?’

      ‘No,’ says Matt, sitting down with a deep, involuntary sigh. ‘Just interviews for university.’

      Matt picks up a Sisby booklet from the table and starts flicking through it like a man shuffling cards. For a moment, Ann is stranded in the middle of the room, as if she was on the point of saying something but decided at the last minute to remain silent on the grounds that it would have been of no consequence. Sam smiles a friendly smile at me. He wants me to like him but to let him lead. I stand up, a sudden attack of nerves.

      ‘Where are you off to?’ Ann asks, quick and awkward. ‘If you’re looking for the toilet it’s down the hall to the right. Just keep on going and you’ll come to it.’

      She stretches out a pale arm and indicates the direction to me by swatting it from left to right. A ring on her middle finger bounces a spot of reflected sunlight around the common room.

      The loo is a clean, white-painted cuboid room with smoked-glass windows, three urinals, a row of push-tap basins, and two cubicles. Half-a-dozen other candidates are crowded inside. I squeeze past them and go into one of the cubicles. It is 8:40 A.M. Outside, one of the candidates says, ‘Good luck,’ to which another replies, ‘Yeah.’ Then the door leading out into the corridor swishes open and clunks shut. Somebody at the sink nearest my cubicle splashes cold water onto his face and emits a shocked, cleansing gasp.

      I remain seated and motionless, feeling only apprehension. I just want to focus, to be alone with my thoughts, and this is the only place in which to do so. The atmosphere in the building is so at odds with the princely splendour of Lucas’s and Liddiard’s offices as to be almost comic. I put my head between my knees and close my eyes, breathing slowly and deliberately. Just pace yourself. You want this. Go out and get it. I can feel something inside my jacket weighing against the top of my thigh. A banana. I sit up, take it out, peel away the skin, and eat it in five gulped bites. Slow-burn carbohydrates. Then I lean back against the tank and feel the flush handle dig hard into my back.

      The water has stopped running out of the taps on the other side of the cubicle door. I check my watch. The time has drifted on to 8:50 A.M. without my keeping track of it. I slam back the lock on the door and bolt out of the cubicle. The room is empty. The corridors, too. Just get there, move it, don’t run. My black shoes clap on the linoleum floors, funneling down the corridor back to B3. I reenter, trying to look nonchalant.

      ‘Right, he’s here,’ says a man I haven’t seen before who obviously works in the building. He has a strangulated Thames Valley accent. ‘Everything all right, Mr Milius?’

      ‘Fine, sorry, yes.’

      Leaning against the window in the far corner of the common room is the fifth and last candidate, Elaine Hayes. I don’t have time to have a proper look at her.

      ‘Good. We can make a start then.’

      I find a seat between Ogilvy and Matt on one of the sofas, dropping down low into its springless upholstery. One of them is wearing industrial-strength aftershave