Smearing Fife, a cynic not working (10)

I believe the answer is:

inefficacy

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'working' is the definition.
Although both the answer and definition are singular nouns, I can't see how they can define each other.

'smearing fife a cynic' is the wordplay.
'smearing' indicates anagramming the letters (I've seen 'smeared' mean this).
'fife'+'a'+'cynic'='fifeacynic'
'fifeacynic' is an anagram of 'INEFFICACY'.

'not' is the link.

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I've seen this clue in The Times.

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