"Spy Sinker" - читать интересную книгу автора (Deighton Len)

18

London. November 1983.

Bret Rensselaer was overplaying his hand. In trying to make Fiona Samson secure he'd even thrown suspicion on to Bernard Samson, suggesting that he might have been an accomplice to his wife's treachery. It was an effective device, for the Department was just as vulnerable to rumours, and whispered half-truths, as any other organized assembly of competitive humans. The trouble came because opinions were divided about Bernard Samson's integrity, and so a rumour started that another 'mole' was at work within the Department. An unhealthy atmosphere of mistrust and suspicion was developing.

The discovery of the murdered Julian MacKenzie in a Department safe house in Bosham gave further impetus to the gossip. Thanks to what Miranda Keller had told him, Bret knew that it was a case of mistaken identity: the KGB had been after Bernard Samson. But Bret took no action in the matter before getting Samson into the number 3 conference room and admonishing him in the presence of suitable witnesses. Samson shouted back, as Bret knew he would, and Bret ended up by telling everyone who would listen that Bernard Samson was 'beyond suspicion'.

But spinning the web of deceit that he deemed necessary for Fiona's safety was taking its toll of Bret Rensselaer. He was by nature an administrator: brutal sometimes, but sustained always by self-righteousness. Running the Economics Intelligence Section had been a task for which he was ideally fitted. But Sinker was different. His original plan to target the East German economy by draining away skilled workers and professional people was not as easy as it once seemed. Fiona had supplied him with regular information about the East German opposition and other reform groups but they could not unite. His overall problem was that keeping Sinker such a close secret meant telling ever more complex lies to his friends and colleagues. It was vital that none of them could see the whole plan. This was demanding in a way he did not relish. It was like playing tennis against himself: criss-crossing the centre line, leaping the net, wrong-footing himself and delivering ever more strenuous volleys that would be impossible to return.

And this double life left him very little time for relaxation or pleasure. Now, at lunchtime on Saturday, a time when he might have snatched a few hours relaxing with friends at the sort of weekend house-party he most enjoyed, he was sitting bickering with his wife about the divorce and her wretched alimony.

It was typical of Nicola that she should insist upon having lunch at Roma Locuta Est, a cramped Italian restaurant in Knightsbridge. Even the name affronted him: 'Rome has spoken' was a way of saying no complaints would be listened to, and that was exactly the way Pina ran her restaurant. Pina was a formidable Italian matron who welcomed the rich and famous while ruthlessly pruning from her clientele those of lesser appeal. It had become a meeting place for the noisy Belgravia jet-set, a group which Bret assiduously shunned. This being Saturday they were at their most insufferable: table-hopping and shouting loudly to each other, ordering their Anglicized food in execrable Italian. Bret's lunch was not made more enjoyable by discovering that just about everyone here seemed to be on first-name terms with his wife Nicola.

'You really believe it,' she was saying. 'Jesus Christ, Bret. You say you're poor; and you really believe it. If it wasn't so goddamned sneaky, it would make me laugh.' Nicola had obviously taken a lot of trouble with her clothes and make-up, but she was out of his past and he felt no attraction to her.

'You don't have to tell everyone in the room, darling,' said Bret softly. Knowing the sort of place it was, Bret had made appropriate sartorial concessions. He was wearing a suede jacket and tan-coloured silk roll-neck. His normal attire, a good suit, would have looked out of place here on a Saturday lunchtime.

'I don't care if all the world knows. I'll shout it from the house-tops.'

'We've been through all this, before we were married. You saw the lawyers. You signed the forms of agreement.'

'I didn't read what I was signing.' She drank some of her Campari and soda.

'Why the hell didn't you?'

'Because I was in love with you, that's why I didn't.'

'You thought separating would be like it was in old Hollywood movies. You thought I would go to stay in my club and you'd have the house, and the furniture and the paintings and the Bentley and every other damn thing.'

'I thought I might own half of my own home. I didn't know my home was owned by a corporation.'

'Not a corporation: it's owned by a trust.'

'I don't care if it's owned by The Boy Scouts of America: you let me think it was my home, and now I find it never was.'

'Please don't tell me that you gave me the best years of your life,' said Bret.

'I gave you everything.' She stirred her drink so that the ice rattled.

'You gave me hell.' He looked round the dining room, 'I can't think why that woman Pina allows dogs in here: it's unhygienic.' He lookout a handkerchief and blew his nose. 'And animal hair affects my sinus.'

'It doesn't affect your sinus,' said his wife. 'You get your sinus and then you look round for something to blame it on.'

Bret noticed that the demonstrative Pina was making her rounds. She liked to take her customers in a bear hug and scream endearments into their ear before discussing their food. 'Yes, you gave me hell,' said Bret.

'I told you the truth, and you found it hell.' With quick agitated movements Nicola opened her handbag to get her cigarettes. Under the handbag there was a copy of Vogue and a book called Somebody Stole My Spy. On the cover it said 'Better than Ludlum' in letters bigger than the author's name. Bret wondered whether she was really reading the book, or had brought it here as some kind of provocation. She liked to make jokes about his 'career as a spy'.

When Bret leaned forward and lit the cigarette for her, he noticed that she was trembling. He wondered why. He found it difficult to believe that he could cause anyone to become so distressed. 'Jesus!' said Nicola and blew smoke high into the air so that it made little clouds in the plastic vines that hung from the ceiling.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw Pina coming. Bret detested her and decided to flee to the toilet but he was too late. 'And you know my husband,' Nicola was already saying, her voice strangled as she was enveloped in Pina's beefy arms, and drowned by a babble of Italian chatter.

Bret stood up and edged sideways to keep the table between them and nodded deferentially. Pina looked at him, rolled her eyes and yelled in Italian. Bret smiled and gave a little bow to acknowledge what he thought was some flowery Roman compliment but it turned out to be Pina shouting for more menus.

When they'd ordered lunch, or more accurately when they had agreed to the meal that Pina decreed they should have, Nicola went back to talking about the settlement.

'Your lawyer is a bastard,' she said.

'Other people's lawyers are always bastards. That comes with the job.'

Nikki shifted her attack. They do what you tell them.'

'I don't tell them anything. There's nothing to tell. The law is explicit.'

'I'm going to California. I'm going to sue you.'

'That won't get you anywhere,' said Bret. 'I don't live in California and I don't own anything in California. You might as well go to Greenland.'

I'm going to take up residence there. They have communal property laws in California. My brother-in-law says I'd do better there.'

'I wish you'd start using your brains, Nikki. The money my father left me is in a trust. We're not really a part of the Rensselaer family. My grandmother married into it late in life: she changed her children's name to Rensselaer. We never inherited the Rensselaer millions. I just have an allowance from a small trust fund. I told you all that before we were married.'

She waggled a manicured finger at him. 'You're not going to get away with this, Bret. I'll break that damned trust fund if it's the last thing I do. I want what I'm entitled to.'

'Dammit, Nikki. You left me. You went off with Joppi.'

'Leave Joppi out of this,' she said.

'How can we leave him out of it? He's the third party.'

'He's not.'

'Nikki, dear. We both know he is.'

'Well, you prove it. You just try and prove it, that's all.'

'Don't drag it all through the courts, Nikki. All you'll do is make lawyers rich.'

'Who's having the insalata frutti di mare? yelled the waiter into their ears as he bent over the table.

'I am,' said Bret.

'You want the sole off the bone, madam?' the waiter asked Nicola.

'Yes, please,' she said.

Bret looked down at the mangled lettuce upon which sat four cold damp shrimps and some white rubber rings of inkfish, and he looked at Nicola's delicious filleted sole. 'Melted butter?' said the waiter, 'and a little Parmesan cheese?' Nikki always knew what to order: was it skill or was it luck? Or was it Pina?

Bret noticed that the bejewelled woman at the next table was feeding pieces of her veal escalope to a perfectly brushed and combed terrier at her feet. 'It's like a damned zoo in here,' he muttered, but his wife pretended not to hear him.

Nikki abandoned her sole fillets and put down her knife and fork. 'I gave you everything,' she said again, having thought about it carefully. 'I even came to live in this lousy country with you, didn't I? And what did I get for it?'

'What did you get? You lived high on the hog, and in one of the most beautiful homes in England.'

'It wasn't a home, Bret, it was just a beautiful house. But when did I ever see my husband? I'd go for days and days with no one to talk to but the servants.'

'You should be able to cope with being alone,' said Bret.

'Well, old buddy. Now you'll be able to find out what it means to be alone. Because I won't be there when you get home, and no other woman will put up with you. You'll soon discover that.'

'I'm not afraid of being alone,' said Bret smugly. He pushed the shrimp salad aside. His wife was always complaining of being alone and today he had an answer ready: 'Lots of people have been: Descartes, Kierkegaard, Locke, Newton, Nietzsche, Pascal, Spinoza and Wittgenstein were alone for most of their lives.'

She laughed. 'I saw that in the letters column of the Daily Telegraph. But those people are all geniuses. You're not a thinker… not a philosopher.'

'My work is important,' said Bret. He was put out. 'It's not like working for a biscuit factory. A government job is a government job.'

'Oh, sure, and we all know what governments do.'

'What do you mean by that?' said Bret, with an uncertainty that was almost comic.

'They make the rules for you, and break them themselves. They hike your taxes and give themselves a raise in pay. They take your money away and shower it on all kinds of lousy foreign governments. They send your kids to Vietnam and get them killed. They fly in choppers while you're stuck in a traffic jam. They let the banks and insurance companies shaft you in exchange for political campaign money.'

'Is that what you really think, Nikki?' Bret was shocked. She'd never said anything like that before. He wondered if she had been drinking all morning.

'You're damn right it's what I think. It's what everybody thinks who hasn't got a hand in the pork barrel.'

Alarm bells rang. 'I didn't know you were a liberal.' He wondered what the security vetting people had made of her. Thank goodness he was getting rid of her; but had any of this gone down on his file?

'I'm not a goddamned Democrat or a Liberal or a Red or anything else. It's just that smug guys like you doing your "important work for governments" make me puke.'

There's nothing to be gained from a slanging match,' said Bret. 'I know you must be disappointed about the house but that's outside my control.'

'Damn you, Bret. I must have somewhere to live!'

He guessed that Joppi was getting rid of her: suddenly he felt sorry for her but he didn't want her back. 'That apartment in Monte Carlo is empty. You could lease it from the trustees for a nominal payment.'

'Lease it from the trustees for a nominal payment,' she repeated sarcastically. 'How nominal can you get? Like a dollar a year, do you mean?'

'If it would end all this needless wrangling, a dollar a year would be just fine. Shall we agree on that?' He waved a hand to attract a waiter, but it was no use. The staff were all standing round a table in the corner smiling at a TV newsreader who was being photographed cuddling a smooth-coated chihuahua. 'Do you want coffee?'

'Yes,' she said. 'Yes to both questions: but I want furniture – good furniture – in the first, and cream and sugar in the second.'

'You've got a deal,' said Bret. He was relieved. Had Nikki resolutely pressed for the Thameside house it would have put him in a difficult position. He would have had to resign. There was no way that the Department would have tolerated him getting into a divorce action, and the risk of its attendant publicity. And yet if he resigned, where would that leave Fiona Samson? He was the only person who knew the whole story, and he felt personally responsible for her mission. There were many times when he worried about her.

Bret looked up to see his chauffeur Albert Bingham easing his way through the crowded dining room. 'What now?' said Bret. Nicola turned round to see what he was looking at.

'Good afternoon, Mrs Rensselaer,' said Albert politely. He reasoned that ex-wives sometimes resumed their authority as employers, and should not be slighted. I'm sorry to interrupt you, sir, but the hospital came through on the car phone.'

'What did they say?' Bret was already on his feet. Albert wouldn't interrupt the lunch unless it was something very important.

'Could you be early?'

'Could I be early?' repeated Bret. He found his credit card in his wallet.

'They said you would know what it was,' said Albert.

'I'll have to go,' said Bret to his wife. 'It's an old friend.' He flicked the plastic card with his fingernail so that it made a snapping noise. She remembered it as one of his many irritating habits.

'That's all right,' said Nicola, in the brisk voice that proclaimed her annoyance.

'Let's do it again,' said Bret. He bent forward – the hand holding his credit card extended like a stage magician palming something from the air – and kissed his wife on the cheek. 'Now it's all settled, let's do it again.' He heard the terrier growl as he trod too near its food.

She nodded. He didn't want to have lunch with her again, she could see that as clearly as anything. She saw how relieved he was at this opportunity to escape from her. She felt like crying. She was pleased to be separating from Bret Rensselaer but she found it humiliating that he seemed pleased about it too. She got out her compact and flipped up the mirror to look at her eye make-up. She could see Bret reflected in it. She watched him while he paid the bill.

Bret's original appointment with the Director-General had been for drinks at six o'clock at his house in the country. Now the Director-General had phoned to suggest that they meet at Rensselaer's mews house in London. That was the call on the car phone that Albert had reported. The Department's calls were always described by Albert as being calls from an anonymous hospital, school or club, according to Bret's company and the circumstances in which the message was delivered.

'Are you sure he said the mews house?' Bret asked his driver.

'Quite sure,' said Albert.

'What a memory he has,' said Bret with grudging admiration.

Back at the turn of the century, the mews house had been the stables and coach house for Cyrus Rensselaer's grand London home. The first time Bret saw the big house in the square it was an Officers' Club run by the American Red Cross. After the war it had been sold but the uncomfortable little mews house had been retained. Just a couple of rooms with kitchen, bathroom and garage, it was used by various members of the Rensselaer family, and sometimes by lawyers and agents coming to London on the family's behalf. But because Bret lived in England, he had a key and, by the generous consent of other members of the family, he could use it when he wanted. In return Bret kept an eye on the place and had the leaky roof fixed from time to time. He hadn't slept there for years.

Bret was surprised that the D-G should remember that he had access to the house and was annoyed that he should suggest it for their meeting. He had no consideration; the place was terribly neglected now that there was no permanent tenant to maintain it. 'Go to the mews right away,' Bret told his driver. 'We'll try and get it straightened out before Sir Henry arrives.'

'We'll have half an hour or so,' said Albert, 'and Sir Henry might be late: he said that.'

'It's just as well I remained in London,' said Bret. 'You never know where Sir Henry will turn up.'

'No, sir,' said Albert Bingham.

Bret settled back in the leather seat of his Bentley. He had been tempted to spend the weekend with some horsy friends near Newmarket, and make a sidetrip to the D-G's house in Cambridgeshire. Then his wife had insisted that they met for Saturday lunch and he'd stayed in town. It was just as well. A sudden dash back to London at short notice, just to satisfy the old man's whim, was the kind of thing that gave Bret indigestion pains.

'I'm sorry if this was an inconvenient meeting place,' said Sir Henry Clevemore when he arrived in the tiny upstairs room above the garage. He had knocked his head against the door frame but now, having fitted his huge bulk into a big, somewhat dilapidated armchair, he seemed quite content. 'But it was a matter of some urgency.'

'I'm sorry that it's not more comfortable here,' said Bret. The room was dusty and damp. There were fingermarks on the mirror, unwashed milk bottles in the sink and dead flowers on the bookcase. The only festive note was provided by the carpet, which was rolled up, stitched into canvas and garnished with bright red plastic packets of moth repellant. Used by transients as a place to sleep, the house was sadly lacking in any sort of comfort. Even the electric kettle was not working. What a shame that Nikki was so difficult. This place would really benefit from a woman's touch.

Bret reached down to see if there was hot air coming from the convection heater. He'd put on the electric heating as soon as he arrived, but the air was musty. He resolved to do something drastic about refurbishing the place. He'd write to the lawyers about it. He opened a cupboard to reveal some bottles. There is a bottle of whisky…'

'Stop fussing, Bret. We needed somewhere to talk in private. This is ideal. No, I don't want a drink. My news is that Erich Stinnes is flying here from Mexico City together with young Bernard Samson. I think we've done it.'

'That's good news, sir.' He looked down to see where the D-G's black Labrador was sprawled, Why had the old man brought that senile and smelly creature up into this little room?

'It's going to be your show, Bret. Let Samson do the talking but keep a tight control on what's really happening. We must turn Stinnes round and get him back there.'

'Yes, sir.'

'But it occurred to me, Bret…' He paused. 'I don't want to interfere… It's your show. Entirely your show.'

'Please go on, sir.' Bret flicked the dust from a chintz-covered chair and sat down very carefully. He didn't want to get his clothes dirty.

The D-G was lolling back with his legs crossed, oblivious of the shabbiness of the room. The gloomy winter light coming through the dusty window was just enough to describe the old man's profile and make spots of light on the toes of his highly polished shoes. 'Should we collar this damned fellow Martin Pryce-Hughes?'

'The communist. Ummm.'

Bret's tone was too mild to satisfy the D-G. "That little tick who was the contact between Mrs Samson and the KGB hoodlums,' he said forcibly. 'Shall we collar him? Don't say you haven't given it any thought.'

'I've given it a lot of thought,' said Bret in the strangled voice that was his response to unjust criticism.

'You cautioned against pulling him in too soon after Mrs Samson went over. But how long are we going to wait?'

Bret said, 'You see, sir…'

The D-G interrupted him. 'Now with this fellow Stinnes arriving here, we have to consider to what extent we want Moscow to link Stinnes and Pryce-Hughes. If Stinnes is to go back there, we don't want them to think that he betrayed Pryce-Hughes to us, do we?'

'No, sir, we don't.'

'Well, for the Lord's sake, man. Spit it out! What is on your mind? Shall we grab Pryce-Hughes and grill him or not? It's your decision. You know I don't want to interfere.'

'You are always very considerate,' said Bret, while really thinking how much he would like to kick the D-G down the narrow creaking stairs and watch to see which way he bounced off the greasy garage floor.

'I try to be,' said the D-G, mollified by Bret's subservient tone.

'But another dimension has emerged. It is something I didn't want to bother you with.'

'Bother me with it now,' said Sir Henry.

'In the summer of 1978…' Bret paused, deciding how much he should reveal, and how he should say it. 'Mrs Samson… formed a relationship with a Dr Harry Kennedy.'

When Bret paused again, the D-G said, 'Formed a relationship? What the devil does that mean? I'm not going to sue you for defamation, Bret. For God's sake, say what you mean. Say what you mean.'

'I mean,' said Bret, speaking slowly and deliberately, 'that from about that time, until she went over there, she was having a love affair with this man.'

'Oh my God!' said the D-G with a gasp of surprise upon which he almost choked. 'Mrs Samson? Are you quite sure, Bret?' He waited until Bret nodded. 'My God.' The black Labrador, sensing its master's dismay, got to its feet and shook itself. Now the air was full of dust from the dog's coat: Bret could see motes of it buoyant on the draught coming from the heater.

Bret got his handkerchief to his nose just in time before sneezing. When he recovered he dabbed his face again and said, 'I'm quite sure, Sir Henry, but that's not all. When I started digging into this fellow Kennedy's past, I discovered that he has been a party member since the time he was a medical student.'

'Party member? Communist Party member? This fellow she was having it off with? Bret, why the hell didn't you tell me all this? Am I going mad?' He was straining forward in his chair as if trying to get up and his dog was looking angrily at Bret.

'I appreciate your concern, sir,' said Bret in the gravelly American accent that he could summon when he needed it. 'Kennedy is a Canadian. His father was a Ukrainian with a name that couldn't be written on an English typewriter so it became Kennedy.'

'I don't like the smell of that one, Bret. Are we really dealing with a Russian national wielding a Canadian birth certificate? We've seen a lot of those, haven't we?'

'Ottawa RCMP have nothing on him. Served in the air force with an exemplary record. Medical school: postgraduate and so on. The only thing they could turn up was an ex-wife chasing him for alimony. No political activity except for a few meetings of the party at college.' Bret stopped. The fact that the fellow was being chased for alimony payments made Bret sympathize.

'Well, don't leave it like that, Bret. You're not trying to break it to me that Mrs Samson might have been…' The D-G's voice trailed away as he considered the terrifying complexities that would follow upon any doubts about Fiona Samson's loyalties.

'No, no worries on that account, Sir Henry. In fact they are both clear. I have no evidence that Dr Kennedy has been active in any way – in any way at all – during the time he was seeing Mrs Samson or afterwards.'

'How do you know?'

'I've been keeping an eye on him.'

'You personally?'

'No, of course not, Sir Henry. I have had someone keeping an eye on him.'

'Someone? What someone? A Department someone?'

'No, of course not, sir. I arranged it privately.'

'Yes, but not paid for it privately, eh? It's gone on the dockets. Perhaps you didn't think of that. Oh, my God.'

'It's not on any dockets, Sir Henry. I paid personally and I paid in cash.'

'Are you insane, Bret? You paid personally? Out of your own pocket? What are you up to?'

'It had to be kept secret,' said Bret.

'Of course it did. You don't have to tell me that! My God. I've never heard of such a thing.' The D-G slumped back in the chair as if in collapse. 'What kind of whisky have you got?' he said finally.

Bret reached for a bottle of Bell's, poured a stiff one into a tumbler for the D-G and gave it to him. After sipping it, the D-G said, 'Confound you, Bret. Tell me the worst. Come along. I'm prepared now.'

"There is no "worst",' said Bret. 'It is as I told you. There is nothing to show any contact between Kennedy and the Soviets.'

'You don't fool me, Bret. If it was as simple as that you would have told me long ago, not waited until I faced you with collaring Pryce-Hughes.'

Bret was still standing near the bottles. He had never been a drinker, but he poured himself a tiny one to be sociable, took it to the window and nursed it. He wanted to get as far away from the dog as he possibly could. The smell of the drink was repulsive and he put it down. He pressed his fingers against the cold window-pane. How well he knew this little house. Glenn Rensselaer had brought him here while still wearing the uniform of a US Army general. Glenn had been someone Bret had loved more than he could ever love the pathetic alcoholic who was his father.

'It's no more than a hunch,' said Bret, after a long time of just looking down at the cobbled mews and the shiny cars parked there. 'But I just know Kennedy is a part of it. I just know he is. I'm sure they put Kennedy in to run a check on Mrs Samson. They met at a railway station; I'm sure it was contrived.' He let a little whisky touch his lips. 'She must have got through whatever test he gave her, because the signs are that Dr Kennedy is in love with her and continues to be. But Kennedy is a bomb, ticking away, and I don't like it. I kept an eye on Pryce-Hughes because I hoped there would be some contact. But it's a long time ago: I guess I was wrong.'

'Too much guessing, Bret.'

'Yes, Sir Henry.'

'Facts trump the ace of hunches, right?'

'Yes, of course, sir.'

'You'll collar Pryce-Hughes?'

'I'd rather leave that a little longer, Director. I tried to provoke him into a response a few years back. I had someone produce an elaborate file that "proved" Pryce-Hughes was working for London Central. It was a magnificent job – documents, photos and all sorts of stuff – and it cost an arm and a leg. I went along when it was shown to him.'

'And?'

'He just laughed in our faces, sir. Literally. I was there. He laughed.'

'I'm glad we had this little chat, Bret,' said the D-G. It was a rebuke.

'But the file I compiled to incriminate Pryce-Hughes could be very useful to us now, sir.'

'I'm listening, Bret.'

'I want to have the whole file revised so it will incriminate this KGB Colonel Pavel Moskvin.'

'The thug who murdered that lad in the Bosham safe house?'

'I believe he's a danger to Fiona Samson.'

'Are you sure this is not just a way of using that damned file?'

'It will cost very little, sir. We can plant it into the KGB network very easily. That Miranda Keller woman would be perfect in the role of Moskvin's contact.'

'It would be a bit rough on her, wouldn't it?' said the D-G.

'It's Fiona Samson we have to think of,' said Bret.

'Very well, Bret. If you put it like that I can't stop you.'