Charlie M

(3)

Charlie Muffin wedged the saturated suede boots beneath the radiator, then spread his socks over the metal ribs to dry. There was a faint hissing sound.

The bottoms of his trousers, where the raincoat had ended, were concertinaed and sodden and he felt cold, knowing his shirt was wet where the coat had leaked. It was the newer of the two suits he possessed and now it would have to be dry-cleaned. It wouldn’t be long before it started getting shiny at the seat, he thought, miserably.

Charlie wondered if he would catch influenza or a cold from his soaking: it would provide an excuse to stay away from the office for a few days. He stopped at the hope. The last time he’d had such a thought he had been a fifth former, trying to avoid an English examination at Manchester Grammar School.

‘Steady, Charlie,’ he advised hilself. ‘Things aren’t that bad.’

He would have kept drier, he reflected, had he caught a taxi back from Wormwood Scrubs, instead of travelling by bus and underground from Shepherd’s Bush. The sacrifice had been worth it, he decided. It meant an expenses profit of £2 and a bottle of wine for tonight.

‘Aloxe Corton,’ he reminded himself. ‘Mustn’t forget the name.’

The dye had come out of his boots, staining his heels and between his toes a khaki colour. Barefoot, he padded into the lavatory opposite his office, from which he could always hear the flush and usually the reason for it, filled a water glass with hot water and returned towards his office, pausing at the door. He’d only occupied it for three months, since Cuthbertson had decreed that the room adjoining his own suite and in which Charlie had worked during home periods for the past twenty years was big enough for two men. So Snare and Harrison had got the airy, oak-panelled room with its views of the Cenotaph. And Charlie – ‘as a senior operative, you’ll have to be alone, old boy’ – had been relegated to what had once been the secretaries’ rest room, overlooking an inner courtyard where the canteen dustbins were kept. On the wall by the window there was still a white outline where the sanitary-towel dispenser had been: Janet had identified the mark and Charlie refused to have it painted over, knowing it offended Cuthbertson.

He entered the cramped room, sitting carefully at the desk, which was wedged tight against one wall. The wet trousers clung to his ankles and he grimaced, unhappily. Even with two men in it, he remembered, his old office was still bigger than that he was now forced to occupy. And it had had an electric fire, too, where he could have dried his trousers.

He stripped some blotting paper, soaked it in the glass and began sponging his feet, reflecting on his meeting with Berenkov. Had the Russian meant to tell him so much? he wondered. It could hardly have been a mistake; he wasn’t the sort of man to allow errors. He’d been caught, contradicted Charlie. That had been a mistake. Or had it? Had Berenkov been incredibly clever, accepting his self-confessed fear and manœuvred the whole thing, confident of repatriation as a hero after sentence?

He paused, left ankle across his right knee. Were his feelings for Berenkov admiration or envy? he wondered, suddenly.

‘Good God!’

Snare stood at the doorway, gazing down at him.

‘What the hell do you think you are doing?’ demanded the younger man.

‘Washing my feet,’ retorted Charlie, obviously. Snare’s expressions of horror were encompassing the entire religious gamut, Charlie thought. He was embarrassed at being caught by the other man.

Snare leaned on the doorpost, knowing the discomfort and enjoying it.

‘Very biblical,’ mocked Snare. ‘Can you do miracles, too?’

‘Yes,’ said Charlie, irritably. ‘I can come back from the dead out of burning Volkswagens.’

The smile left Snare’s face and he moved away from the doorway. The bastard had known, Charlie decided, even before they’d gone into East Berlin.

‘The Director wants to see you,’ said Snare. Quickly he added, wanting to score, ‘With your shoes on.’

‘Then he’ll have to wait,’ said Charlie. A faint mist was rising from his drying socks and shoes. And there was a smell, realised Charlie, uncomfortably.

‘Shall I tell him ten minutes?’

‘Tell him what you like,’ said Charlie. ‘I’m waiting for my socks to dry.’

He was ready in fifteen minutes, but was delayed another ten by comparing two sheets in the Berenkov file.

‘Charlie boy, you’re a genius,’ he assured himself.

They were waiting for him, Charlie saw. Snare was standing at the window, appearing preoccupied with the view below. Harrison was sitting by the small table containing the newspapers and magazines, his back to the wall, determined to miss nothing. Wilberforce was in the leatherbacked lounging chair to the side of Cuthbertson’s desk, disembowelling a pipe he never seemed to light, with a set of attachments that retracted into a single gold case. The second-in-command was a slightly built but very tall, finefeatured man with fingers so long they appeared to have an extra joint and of which he was over-conscious, frequently making washing movements, covering one with the other, which drew attention to their oddness. He invariably wore gloves, even in the summer, and had a predilection for pastel-shaded shirts that he always wore with matching socks. Probably dryer than mine, thought Charlie, who still felt damp. He decided Wilberforce carried the pipe as a symbol of masculinity.

‘More comfortable now?’ greeted Cuthbertson, heavily.

The new Director was a very large but precise man, with a face permanently reddened by a sub-lieutenant’s liking for curry at the beginning of his career in Calcutta, and a later tendency to blood pressure on the British General Staff. He had a distressingly phlegmy voice, which meant he bubbled rather than spoke words. Charlie found this offensive. But then he found most things about Cuthbertson offensive. The man’s family was provably traceable back to Elizabethan times and there had been generals in it for three hundred years. It was with that rank, plus a D.S.O. and the inherited baronetcy originally conferred by George III, that Cuthbertson had left the Chief of Staff to head the department. His outlook and demeanour were as regimented as his brigade or Eton tie, the family-crested signet ring and the daily lunch at Boodle’s. Which was precisely why he had been appointed, a government experiment to improve by strict discipline and army-type order a department that had suffered two humiliating – and worse, public – mistakes in attempting to establish systems in Poland and Czechoslovakia.

Charlie wondered how long it would take before they suffered their biggest mistake to date: not long, he decided, confidently.

‘Much more comfortable, thank you, sir,’ replied Charlie. The term of respect sounded offensive. No one offered him a chair, so he stood casually at ease. On a parade ground, he thought, Cuthbertson would have put him on a charge.

‘Which is more than I can say for myself,’ said Cuthbertson, softly. It was an affectation never to be seen to lose his temper, so it was impossible to gauge any mood from the gurgling tone in which the man spoke.

‘Sir?’

‘It has been my misfortune …’

He paused, gesturing to the others in the room.

‘… and the misfortune and embarrassment of my colleagues, to have listened to a tape recording that many people might construe as being almost treasonable …’

He stopped again, as if expecting Charlie to speak, but the man remained silent, eyes fixed on the Director’s forehead. If he wriggled his toes, Charlie discovered, he could make a tiny squelching sound with his left boot.

‘Psychologically,’ continued Cuthbertson, ‘today was the ideal time to interrogate Berenkov … bewildered and frightened by the severity of his sentence, cut off from life and eager to exchange every confidence with someone conducting an examination in a proper, sympathetic way …’

Charlie wondered at the text-book from which Cuthbertson would have read that thesis. It was probably a do-it-yourself paperback from W. H. Smith’s, he decided. Snare turned away from the window, wanting to see Charlie suffer.

‘Instead,’ continued the former army officer, ‘we got the meanderings of two men play-acting for the benefit of the recorders … recorders that Berenkov could only have learned about from you …’

It would have been a severe exercise of will to maintain the monotone, thought Charlie. He wondered why the man never cleared his throat. A nerve in Cuthbertson’s left eyelid began twitching, indicating his anger. The man felt on his desk for a transcript.

‘… The Russian made a remark about age,’ said Cuthbertson, apparently reading. He’d rehearsed this part, Charlie realised.

The Director stood up, trying to hold Charlie’s eyes.

‘For you, it was a prophecy,’ declared Cuthbertson. ‘I’ve already sent to the Minister a copy of the transcript and my appreciation of it, together with my recommendation of your immediate, premature departure from any position of authority in this department … I don’t want traitors working with me, Muffin.’

Snare and Harrison were smirking, Charlie saw.

Silence settled like frost in the room. Charlie stayed unmoving, wanting Cuthbertson to finish completely, with no opportunity for retreat. What idiots they all were, he thought.

‘Have you anything to say?’ demanded Wilberforce, still rummaging into the bowl of his pipe. He would find it impossible to confront directly anyone being disciplined, Charlie realised. The permanent civil servant had waited a long time for this scene, Charlie knew. Why, he wondered, did Wilberforce hate him so?

‘Does that mean I’m fired?’ he asked, hopefully. He purposely omitted the ‘sir’.

‘It does not,’ said Cuthbertson. ‘I want you under constant supervision, where I can ensure you don’t forget the terms of the Official Secrets Act by which you’re bound for a lifetime but which, judging from this morning’s performance, you have forgotten.’

‘Demotion?’ asked Charlie.

‘As far down as I can possibly achieve,’ confirmed Cuthbertson.

‘So my allowance and salary will be cut?’

Cuthbertson nodded.

‘And you’ve suggested all this in the letter to the Minister?’ demanded Charlie. He was enjoying himself, he realised.

‘That’s an impudent question,’ said Cuthbertson huffily. ‘But yes, I have.’

‘Oh dear,’ said Charlie. ‘That was a silly thing to have done.’

The silence this time was far more oppressive than that of a few moments before when Cuthbertson had announced his decision on Charlie’s future. Wilberforce had stopped working on his pipe, but remained staring fixedly at it, as if he expected to find a clue in the blackened bowl. Harrison shifted uncomfortably in the chair, as if he wanted to use a lavatory, and Snare looked hurriedly from person to person, seeking a clue from the others on what reaction to make. The lobes of Cuthbertson’s ears flushed and the nerve in his eye increased its tic.

‘Impudence will not gain the dismissal to get whatever redundancy pay you imagine is owed you,’ rejected Cuthbertson, haughtily.

For the first time, Charlie lowered his eyes from the man’s forehead, staring directly at him. Cuthbertson appeared to realise Charlie was not scared and blinked, irritably. It was very rare for Cuthbertson to encounter somebody not in awe of him, Charlie guessed.

He’d make them suffer, he decided: he had very little to lose. Nothing, in fact. Their decision about Charlie Muffin had been made months ago. He supposed he should consider himself lucky he was still alive.

‘There is a procedure,’ he began, slowly. ‘Innovated by your predecessors … a procedure that the Minister likes followed because it has shown such success in the past …’

‘… but one which was overlooked in the Polish and Czechoslovakian disasters,’ tried Snare, eager to impress his mentor.

Charlie turned to him, frowning.

‘I’m sorry?’ he said, knowing the effect would be destroyed if the man were forced to repeat it.

‘Nothing,’ said Snare. ‘Just a comment.’

‘Oh,’ said Charlie. He still waited, as if expecting Snare to repeat himself. Wince, you bastard, he thought. At last he looked back to Cuthbertson.

‘I’m sure it will be followed in the case of my interview with Berenkov,’ he continued. ‘Once established, procedures are rigidly followed. And you’ve decreed that, of course.’

Cuthbertson nodded, cautiously. The left eye twitched and Charlie thought he detected Wilberforce looking surreptitiously at him.

‘What are you talking about?’ demanded the Director.

He was beginning to become unsettled, Charlie decided, happily, detecting the apprehension in that unpleasant voice.

‘The detailed analysis,’ said Charlie. ‘By psychological experts, not only of the tapes but of the film that was shot in the interview room.’

‘What about it?’

‘Your reaction to the meeting and your recommendation was made without waiting for the results of that analysis?’

‘There was no need to wait,’ defended Cuthbertson.

‘As I said,’ reminded Charlie. ‘A silly thing to have done.’

They were all frightened, he knew, without being able to appreciate their mistake. It was time to change his approach, he determined.

‘My meeting with Berenkov was one of the most productive I can remember having had with a captured spy,’ asserted Charlie, brutally. ‘And the analyst’s department will confirm it …’

He paused, deciding to allow himself the conceit.

‘… they always have in the past,’ he added.

Wilberforce was back at his pipe but the other three were staring at him, unmoving.

‘Close examination of the transcript,’ continued Charlie, hesitating for another aside, ‘… much closer than you’ve allowed yourselves … will confirm several things. Berenkov admitted his nerve had gone. If he knew it, then Moscow certainly did. And the Kremlin would have acted upon that knowledge. A replacement would have been installed in London, long before we got on to Berenkov. He’s important, certainly. But because of what he’d done in the past, not for what he might have done in the future. We haven’t broken the Russians’ European spy system. I estimate his successor will have been here for a year, at least … so you’ve got to begin all over again …’

The vibration in Cuthbertson’s eye was now so severe he put his hand up to cover it.

‘There are a number of his existing network whom we haven’t caught, either,’ enlarged Charlie. ‘Consider the film and watch the facial reaction when I announced, quite purposely, that we have caught five. Slow the film: it will show a second’s look of triumph, indicating there are some still free …’

Charlie stopped again, swallowing. They were so innocent, he thought, looking at the four men. Wilberforce was like them, he decided, institutionalised by training according to a rule book and completely unaware of what they should be doing.

‘… And he told us how to find them,’ Charlie threw out.

He waited. They would have to crawl, he determined.

‘How?’ asked Cuthbertson, at last.

‘By boasting,’ explained Charlie. ‘Letting them have their wine wholesale wasn’t a smart, throw-away remark. It was exactly the grandiose sort of thing that an extrovert like Berenkov would have done. And he would have kept scrupulous records: a spy always complies with every civil law of any country in which he’s operating. Check every wholesale outlet against income tax returns and you’ll find the rest of the network. The five we’ve got are all on it – I checked while my socks were drying.’

He looked carefully at each man, allowing his head to shake almost imperceptibly.

‘I’m really sorry that the meeting was regarded by you all as such a failure,’ he insisted, straining for the final insult. ‘And I’m sure the Minister will be surprised when he considers your views against those of the detailed analysis. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll clear my desk …’

He drew almost to attention, coming back to Cuthbertson.

‘Have I your permission to leave, sir?’

The Director seemed intent on the papers lying before him and it was several minutes before he spoke.

‘We could have been a little premature in our assessment,’ he conceded. The words were very difficult for him, Charlie knew. He noted the pronoun: within the day, the mistake would be shown not to be Cuthbertson’s but someone else wrongly guiding him.

Charlie said nothing, knowing that silence was his best weapon now.

‘Perhaps,’ continued the Director, ‘we should re-examine the tape and discuss it tomorrow.’

‘Re-examine the tape by all means,’ agreed Charlie, deciding to abandon the ‘sir’: Cuthbertson didn’t deserve any respect. ‘I’m sure the Minister will expect a more detailed knowledge of it at the meeting you will inevitably have,’ he added. ‘But tomorrow I’m going on leave … you’ve already approved it, you’ll remember?’

‘Of course,’ said Cuthbertson, groping on the desk again, as if seeking the memorandum of agreement.

‘So perhaps we’ll discuss my future in a fortnight?’

Cuthbertson nodded, half concurring, half dismissing. His presence embarrassed them, Charlie knew. They would welcome the two-week gap more than he.

‘I can go?’ pressed Charlie.

‘Yes,’ said Cuthbertson, shortly.

Outside the office, Charlie turned right, away from his own room, feeling very happy. Janet was sitting expectantly at her desk, solemn-faced.

‘I’ve been dumped,’ announced Charlie.

‘I know,’ said Cuthbertson’s secretary. ‘I typed the report to the Minister. Oh Charlie, I’m so sorry.’

‘So are they,’ said Charlie, brightly. ‘They’ve made a balls of it. Tonight still okay?’

The girl stared at him, uncertainly.

‘Does it mean you won’t be demoted to some sort of clerk?’

‘Don’t know,’ said Charlie. ‘Seven o’clock?’

She nodded, bewildered.

Whistling tunelessly, Charlie wandered back to his cramped room. The affair with Janet had only begun four weeks ago and still had the excitement of newness about it. Pity the holiday would intrude: but that was important. Edith needed a vacation, he decided, thinking fondly of his wife.

And so did he, though for different reasons.

General Kalenin pushed aside the file containing the questionable plans for Berenkov’s release, lounging back in his chair to look over the Kremlin complex. Most of the office lights were out, he saw. How different it had been in Stalin’s time, he remembered, when people remained both day and night at their desks, afraid of a summons from the megalomaniac insomniac.

He looked back to the unsatisfactory dossier. He was more apprehensive now than he had ever been then, he decided. The Berenkov affair could topple him, Kalenin realised. It wasn’t the purge and disgrace that frightened him. It was being physically removed from the office in the Lubyanka buildings in Dzerzhinsky Square. Without a job, he would have nothing, he thought. He’d commit suicide, he decided, quite rationally. It wasn’t the first time he’d thought of such a thing and there was no fear in the consideration. A revolver, he determined. Very quick. And befitting an officer.

He sighed, hearing midnight strike. Slowly he packed the papers into his personal safe, trying to arouse some anticipation for the war game he had prepared when he got to his apartment.

Tonight he was going to start the Battle of Kursk, the greatest tank engagement in history. But his mind wouldn’t be on it, he knew.