Secrets and librarians

'I hope you won't quote me on this, but it would be possible for the world of the intelligence agent to meet the world of the librarian'

I read last week of the death of John Sumsion, the man who ran PLR (Public Lending Right), which is the government scheme under which Catherine Cookson became even richer than she was before and the rest of us authors had to borrow as many of our books from the library as possible just to earn 10p at the end of the year.

I never met John Sumsion and had certainly not realised until I read his obituary that, before he was hired to clean up the library business, he was a big wheel at K Shoes, which may explain the fact that on the one occasion I talked to him he was less than forthcoming about his background. When someone asks you what your qualifications are for running a nationwide book service, you don't say: "Well, I may not know much about books but I do know a lot about shoes..."

I say I talked to him but never met him, by which I mean that I was once, years ago, hired by the Central Office of Information (COI) to do a telephone interview with him for their magazine.

I couldn't make out what his background had been for this job, and he didn't tell me. All he told me was that it wasn't a library background.

"I suppose you could describe me as a sort of civil servant," he said.

"Are you actually a civil servant?"

"No," he laughed, as if the idea were funny. "Although I have signed the Official Secrets Act, so I suppose that does make me some sort of civil servant."

"The Official Secrets Act?" I goggled. "But why on earth would someone in charge of authors' lending rights have to sign the Official Secrets Act? How could the act of lending a book ever be hush hush?"

"Well..." and I remember he hesitated here, "I hope you won't quote me on this, but it would be possible for the world of the intelligence agent to meet the world of the librarian."

"How?"

"Well, let us suppose that an agent was being established under a false identity, which of course is what happens to all agents, whether they are masquerading as a trade adviser to an embassy or an import/export businessman. But imagine that an intelligence agent is being given a false identity as a writer. It's a good front for an agent, because writers can go all over the place without having to explain what they are doing or why they are going there. And so can someone masquerading as a writer. On the other hand, someone on another side might decide to investigate this 'writer' to see if he was genuine. And they would pretty soon find out that the 'writer' had not actually written any books."

"Right..."

"Well, to guard against that you would have to invent some books which the 'writer' had written. Titles, dates of publication, etc. And then you would have to register them for PLR. So I would find myself having to create dossiers of lending and borrowing for books that did not exist and had been invented to protect one of our agents. Which would justify me having to sign the Official Secrets Act."

"I see. Does this sort of thing happen very often?"

"I am not saying it has ever happened. I am merely sketching out a situation that would justify me signing the Act."

I didn't put any of this in the interview, and I only mention it now that his passing reminds me of it. I still have no idea why he told me all that – whether it was a little secret he itched to tell someone; whether it was a real idea that had never got off the ground; or whether he was cleverly pulling my leg.

True or not, it is an appealing scenario, and I especially like the idea that somebody somewhere actually may have had to get down to producing real books as part of an agent's front.

After all, you need more than a PLR listing to prove you have written a book. You really need a physical book as well. And there is something very post-modern or Douglas Adamsish or something in the idea of someone having to write a whole real book to support a fake writer. Especially as you would have to make sure the book wasn't very good. I mean, it's all very well writing a pot-boiler as a fake front for an intelligence agent masquerading as a writer – but what would happen if the book became a best-seller by accident?

And the "writer" had to go on TV to publicise his book?

He'd refuse, of course.

"I never give interviews," he would say.

You do occasionally come across writers who refuse to give any interviews. But had it ever occurred to you that this is because they are really spies?

Don't look now, but I think we've got a whole new thriller plot here.

Thank you, Mr Sumsion.