Chapter 6: Closer Encounters

Fiona Lansing, Her Majesty’s Secretary of State for Home Affairs, took a deep breath, turned to face the door, and tried to remember how to smile. She had had a few stressful days and the last thing she needed was to meet a grabby, old lush like Sir Lionel Bartram.

The man’s a bloody dinosaur, she thought. And God, if he brings that tarty little girlfriend of his I may hurl.

A gofer opened the door and Sir Lionel walked in. He responded to the Home Secretary’s smile with one of his own and held out a hand. When she took it, he gave a firm, if slightly perfunctory shake. She also noticed that he did not look her up and down, as he had on every previous meeting. What’s more, his eyes seemed clear and focused.

Is he on an AA course or something?

“Good to see you again, Fiona,” he said, looking at her face rather than her chest. “Shall we get started?”

“Your assistant is not with you?” Lansing asked, looking past him.

“Oh, no, Timandra’s got a spot of flu, I’m afraid,” said Bartram, airily. “But I think I can manage without her.”

The Home Secretary exchanged a glance with a senior adviser, who had been waiting discreetly by her desk. Normally she wanted an ally in the room when she was with Bartram. He sometimes said bizarre, offensive things that were worth noting for future use. But today she felt a witness might not be needed.

“I think we can make this an informal chat,” she said.

“Quite so!” Bartram said as the adviser left, closing the door silently behind him.

They sat down on opposite sides of the ornate Regency fireplace and Lansing tried to make some small talk. As usual, jockeying for position within the government concerned her more than running the country. Lansing and Bartram were in rival camps within the party, but today he seemed willing to agree with her on every issue. He seemed to have also lost his old condescending manner, and if anything, seemed keen on becoming her ally.

“You must be reading my mind, Lionel!” she exclaimed at one point.

“Great minds think alike, Fiona,” he responded.

If this is a personality transplant, she thought, maybe we can get the rest of the cabinet done.

“All right,” Lansing said. “Let’s get this over with. I have to make a statement on this terrible business in the West Country.”

Bartram raised an eyebrow, expressing polite curiosity.

“A couple have been killed by some sort of maniac,” she went on. “Their kids are missing. Nightmare for us, of course. I’ll have to say something vaguely reassuring, but of course it’s the local plods who are trying to deal with it. Surely you’ve seen the news?”

“Ah yes,” Bartram said, nodding. “Terrible business. But I’m sure you’ll manage to combine efficiency with compassion.”

The comment was so close to what she wanted to hear that Lansing looked sharply at her subordinate. His expression was bland, innocent. She decided to move on to informal briefing.

“About the Romola Foundation,” she said. “I understand you’ve actually looked it over?”

Bartram nodded, gave a self-deprecating laugh.

“Yes, indeed, and quite an experience it was. I don’t claim to be an expert on the paranormal of course...”

He gave another laugh, and she smiled politely.

“But I can’t help thinking we have granted a little too much latitude to what is essentially a crackpot outfit.”

“Crackpot?” she said, alarmed. “The prime minister was quite explicit about our support for Romola. She seems to think that these hostile beings—what do you call them?”

“Interlopers,” said Bartram. “That’s what they call these hypothetical creatures. Not very imaginative, in my opinion. But it speaks volumes about the amateurishness of the entire set-up.”

Lansing frowned, glanced up at the row of paintings above the fire. Every single one showed a long-dead, male politician gazing down on her with what seemed like thin-lipped disapproval. She looked back to Bartram, who was sitting with folded hands, looking every inch the reasonable man.

Has he lost weight? Lansing thought.

“I was saying,” Bartram went on, “they claim that these creatures from another dimension—preposterous idea in itself—are killing people right and left. But if you look at the evidence, it’s pretty flimsy. There’s good reason to believe that the Malpas affair was in fact a serial killing by these two rather shady Americans. They were present at Machen, too.”