Page 84 of The Other Woman

“That MI6 knew about her from the beginning. That you turned her around and have been playing her back against Moscow Center. That she is the greatest double agent in history.”

“If only it were true.” Seymour was staring at the photograph, almost in disbelief.

“Is it her?” asked Gabriel.

“You’ve never met her in any professional capacity?”

“I’ve never had the pleasure.”

“It’s her,” said Seymour after a moment. “A younger version, of course, but it’s definitely Rebecca Manning.”

It was the first time he had spoken her name.

“Did you ever—”

“Suspect she was a Russian spy? The illegitimate daughter of Kim Philby?”

Gabriel said nothing.

“One makes lists at a time like this,” said Seymour, “rather like when one suspects one’s wife of being unfaithful. Is it him? Or him?”

“What abouther?” said Gabriel, nodding toward the photo.

“I was the one who made Rebecca our Head of Station in Washington. Needless to say, I had no qualms about her loyalty.”

Keller was staring into the Bayswater Road, as though unaware of the two spymasters confronting one another over the laminated coffee table.

“Surely,” said Gabriel, “you must have reviewed her file thoroughly before giving her the job.”

“Of course.”

“Nothing recorded against?”

“Her personnel file is spotless.”

“What about the circumstances of her childhood? She was born in Beirut, and her mother was a French citizen who disappeared from her life when she was a child.”

“But Robert Manning was from the right sort of family.”

“That’s why Philby chose him,” interjected Gabriel.

“And her tutors at Cambridge thought very highly of her.”

“Philby chose them, too. He knew how to pull the levers to get Rebecca a job at MI6. He’d done it once himself.” Gabriel held up the birth certificate. “Did your vetters never notice that her mother’s name appeared in your father’s telegrams from Beirut?” He recited the relevant passage from his prodigious memory. “‘The other woman’s name is Charlotte Bettencourt. I am reliably informed Mademoiselle Bettencourt is now several months pregnant.’”

“Obviously,” said Seymour, “the vetters didn’t make the connection.”

“A simple blood test would do it for them.”

“I don’t need a blood test.” Seymour stared at the photograph of Rebecca Manning at Cambridge. “Hers is the same face I saw at the bar of the Normandie when I was a boy.”

“Her mother remembers you, by the way.”

“Does she?”

“She remembers your father, too.”

Seymour tossed the photograph onto the coffee table. “Where is she now? Still in Seville?”