The Ghost

confident,” Lang said to me, “certainly not defensive—that would be fatal. But I shouldn’t be cocky, either. No bitterness. No anger. But don’t say I’m pleased at this opportunity to clear my name, or any balls like that.”
    “So,” I said, “you’re not defensive but you’re not cocky, you’re not angry but you’re not pleased?”
    “That’s it.”
    “Then what exactly are you?”
    Surprisingly, under the circumstances, everybody laughed.
    “I told you he was funny,” said Ruth.
    Amelia abruptly held up her hand and waved us to be quiet. “I have Adam Lang for Sidney Kroll,” she said. “No, I won’t hold.”

    I WENT DOWNSTAIRS WITH Alice and stood behind her shoulder while she sat at a keyboard, patiently waiting for the ex–prime minister’s words to flow from my mouth. It wasn’t until I started contemplating what Lang should say that I realized I hadn’t asked him the crucial question: had he actually ordered the seizure of those four men? That was when I knew that of course he must have done, otherwise he’d simply have denied it outright at the weekend, when the original story broke. Not for the first time, I felt seriously out of my depth.
    “I have always been a passionate—” I began. “No, scrub that. I have always been a strong—no, committed —supporter of the work of the International Criminal Court.” Had he been? I’d no idea. I assumed he had. Or, rather, I assumed he’d always pretended he had. “I have no doubt that the ICC will quickly see through this politically motivated piece of mischief making.” I paused. I felt it needed one more line, something broadening and statesmanlike. What would I say if I were him? “The international struggle against terror,” I said, in a sudden burst of inspiration, “is too important to be used for the purposes of personal revenge.”
    Lucy printed it, and when I took it back up to the study I felt a curious bashful pride, like a schoolboy handing in his homework. I pretended not to see Amelia’s outstretched hand and showed it first to Ruth (at last I was learning the etiquette of this exile’s court). She nodded her approval and slid it across the desk to Lang, who was listening on the telephone. He glanced at it silently, beckoned for my pen, and inserted a single word. He tossed the statement back to me and gave me the thumbs-up.
    Into the telephone he said, “That’s great, Sid. And what do we know about these three judges?”
    “Am I allowed to see it?” said Amelia, as we went downstairs.
    Handing it over, I noticed that Lang had added “domestic” to the final sentence: “The international struggle against terror is too important to be used for the purposes of domestic personal revenge.” The brutal antithesis of “international” and “domestic” made Rycart appear even more petty.
    “Very good,” said Amelia. “You could be the new Mike McAra.”
    I gave her a look. I think she meant it as a compliment. It was always hard to tell with her. Not that I cared. For the first time in my life I was experiencing the adrenaline of politics. Now I saw why Lang was so restless in retirement. I guessed this was how sport must feel, when played at its hardest and fastest. It was like tennis on Centre Court at Wimbledon. Rycart had fired his serve low across the net, and we had lunged for it, got our racket to it, and shot the ball right back at him, with added spin. One by one the telephones were reconnected and immediately began ringing, demanding attention, and I heard the secretaries feeding my words to the hungry reporters: “I have always been a committed supporter of the work of the International Criminal Court.” I watched my sentences emailed to the news agencies. And within a couple of minutes, on the computer screen and on television, I started seeing and hearing them all over again (“In a statement issued in the last few minutes, the former prime minister says…”). The world had become our echo chamber.
    In the middle of all this, my own phone rang. I jammed the receiver to one ear and had to put my finger in the other to hear who was calling. A faint voice said, “Can you hear me?”
    “Who is this?”
    “It’s John Maddox, from Rhinehart in New York. Where the hell are you? Sounds like you’re in a madhouse.”
    “You’re not the first to call it that. Hold on, John. I’ll try to find somewhere quieter.” I walked out into the passage and kept following it round to the