Harry Fielding is close to cracking up, but that's his business. He has been hiding out in Spain, but now Clements, his controller, is calling him home. He is to be rewarded for his loyalty and his presence of mind in an MI5 operation that saw himself and Johnny Weeks, his former apprentice, catastrophically betrayed. With a heavy heart Harry takes up a dubious post as Clements' personal assistant. Harry is to be rehabilitated. He begins to think like a spy again. He doesn't like it any more than he likes the new brooms and cocky 'characters' he encounters in the corridors of power. He waits in his empty office for the unspecified brief, with little to do but reflect on the final break with his estranged wife, Juno, and his affair with his Spanish lover, Catalina. In the domain of deception and misplaced attentions, brooding over loved ones is dangerous. Then news comes that Johnny Weeks has surfaced and is looking for revenge. Against Harry's better judgement they join forces - and the fearless Johnny becomes both a friend and a catalyst for Harry's rebellion.
As he turns against the wheels of the MI5 machine, and begins to employ the techniques he has always abhorred, life for Harry Fielding - the misfit with integrity - becomes a deadly business indeed.
- ISBN10 0224071173
- ISBN13 9780224071178
- Publish Date 12 January 2006
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 11 September 2008
- Publish Country GB
- Publisher Vintage Publishing
- Imprint Jonathan Cape Ltd
- Format Paperback
- Pages 256
- Language English