Ivory Nation, Andy Maslen [e manga reader .txt] 📗

the greatest of respect, we can’t let their murders go unpunished. Surely you can see that?’

‘I’ll tell you what I see.’ A beat. ‘Nick, I see a middle-aged white man displaying a rather unattractive, neo-colonialist attitude. Treating me, a woman of colour, like a servant, demanding action to redress his own failings as a commander.’

‘No! That’s completely misrepresenting what I said. The point is—’

‘I’ll tell you what the point is, Colonel,’ she said, her voice as hard as a gun barrel. ‘This ministry, this corrupt, imperialist, war-mongering machine is under scrutiny, finally, for its misdeeds. We intend to re-engineer it until it’s fit for purpose. And I can tell you that military adventurism is not on our list of priorities.’

The levee broke.

‘Adventurism? Those boys were helping the Botswanans defeat ivory poachers. Offering highly skilled, selfless and courageous assistance. They died doing their duty. It’s our duty to find and punish their killers.’

He was leaning forward, heart bumping painfully in his chest. He knew he’d lost the battle before she spoke.

Smiling, and with no outward sign that she was doing anything more radical than ordering a cup of coffee, she said, ‘As you will learn over the coming days, a great many changes are coming that will radically transform Britain’s armed forces from an engine of conflict and neo-imperialism into a domestic security apparatus designed to protect the citizenry. No more adventurism,’ she leaned heavily on the repeated word, ‘no more military assistance to repressive regimes, and definitely no more self-glorification by attention-seeking commanders who should know better. Your request is denied.’

Somehow, without quite realising how, Acheson found himself outside the MOD building on Horse Guards Parade. A sudden shower had greyed the sky, and the building’s sleek Portland Stone now looked dim and greasy. His heart was racing and sparks were shooting in random spirals in the periphery of his vision. Trying and failing to calm himself, he pulled out his phone and called his predecessor at the head of the Paras.

‘Hello, Nick. How are you?’

‘Not good, Don. Not bloody good at all. Are you in town or at Rothford?’

‘Town. Been in meetings with Six at Vauxhall Cross all day. What’s going on?’

‘I’d rather tell you face to face.’

Acheson walked briskly to his club on Jermyn Street, swinging his tightly furled umbrella and jabbing its brass-ferruled tip at the pavement with every other step. Two green-haired climate change protestors sniggered as he passed them. He suppressed the urge to beat their heads to a pulp against the pavement.

He nodded to the doorman, outfitted in a splendid royal-blue frock coat and top hat. ‘Morning, Raymond.’

‘Morning, Colonel.’

Don was waiting for him in the reception area, sitting, legs crossed, in a burgundy leather armchair. He stood as soon as he spotted Acheson.

‘Nick, old boy, what’s up?’ he said, advancing towards his younger colleague and shaking hands.

‘Let’s get a drink and I’ll tell you.’

Five minutes later, with large gin and tonics sitting on a mahogany table between them, Acheson took a pull on his drink. He looked around. The room hadn’t changed, he imagined, for several hundred years. A new coat of buttercup-yellow paint on the walls every now and then, he supposed, and new upholstery and curtains.

But the wood panelling, much like that enclosing the new secretary of state for defence in her fiefdom, the heavy, old fashioned armchairs, the glass-panelled book-cases with their collections of leather-bound military histories, journals and classics, and the equally venerable gentlemen sitting alone, in pairs or quartets, chatting in low murmurs: these, he felt, represented the DNA of the place.

Beyond these four walls, though, change was happening. Oh, yes. It was definitely bloody happening.

Not entirely trusting himself to speak without his voice cracking or trembling, he began.

‘The lunatics have taken over the asylum, Don,’ he said.

Don raised an eyebrow.

‘Our new government, you mean?’

‘In the person of Tracy Barnett-Short.’

The older man nodded and took a slow sip of his drink, regarding Acheson over the rim.

‘This about your boys in Botswana?’

‘Yes it bloody is!’ Acheson said, unable to control the volume of his voice and earning a handful of disapproving stares from beneath bushy white eyebrows, or over the lowered pages of the Times or the Daily Telegraph. ‘I’ve just come from the MOD. Asked her to look into the massacre and the bloody…’ he paused to sigh out a breath, ‘woman basically accused me of incompetence. Sent me packing like a naughty schoolboy. Jesus, Don, I wanted to kill her, I was so angry.’

Don nodded, then wrinkled his nose.

‘Not sure offing the big boss would exactly smooth your path to the general staff, Nick, if I may say so.’

Acheson burst out laughing. He glared back at the retired army officers staring at him.

‘No,’ he said, when he’d recovered himself, ‘you’re probably right. But, Don, what the hell is going on?’

Don shrugged his shoulders. To Acheson, he looked old. His hair was all grey now, and receding at the temples.

‘I think,’ he said finally, ‘people like us may be heading for a period of retrenchment. Our new political masters seem bent on creating a People’s Republic of New Britain. They’ll want an army, those kinds of people always do. But I dare say their focus will be on suppression of dissent at home, or support for their left-wing friends abroad, rather than anything more, what shall we call it, glorious.’

‘How are things with your outfit?’ Acheson asked.

‘Not good, if I’m honest. We’re governed by the Privy Council, as you know, so there are friendly opposition voices in the discussions, but the new PM and his cronies are intent on, what did he say to me? “Root and branch reforms of the security apparatus”.’

‘So you’re still active?’

‘Very much so. Took out an Islamist terror cell last month, as a matter of fact. Very satisfactory outcome.’

‘Don,’ Acheson said, leaning forward and dropping his voice, ‘can you help me?’

Don smiled, leaning in towards Acheson.

‘I thought you’d never ask,’ he murmured. ‘Want me to put a team together?’

‘You can do that? Without alerting