Charlie M

(5)

The priority coded warning had come from the C.I.A. Resident at the Moscow embassy in advance of the diplomatic bag containing the full report, so the Director was already alerted and waiting when the messenger arrived at Langley.

He spent an hour examining the messages, then analysing the station head’s assessment, reading it alongside the report that had come in two days earlier from the agency monitoring station in Vienna, which had fed his excitement the moment the initial Moscow report had been received.

Finally he stood up, gazing out over the Virginia countryside, where the leaves were already rusting into autumn.

Garson Ruttgers was a diminutive, frail man who deliberately cultivated a clerk-like appearance with half-lens spectacles that always appeared about to fall off bis nose and slightly shabby, Brooks Brothers suits, invariably worn with waistcoats, and blue, button-down-collared shirts. He smoked forty cigarettes a day against doctor’s advice, convincing himself he compensated by an almost total abstinence from liquor, and was consumed by the ambition to become to the C.I.A. what Hoover had been to the F.B.I.

In a period that included the last year of the Second World War – when he had been a major in the O.S.S. – and then in the Korean conflict, he had killed (by hand because weapons would have made a noise and attracted attention) ten men who had threatened his exposure as an agent. Never, even in moments of recollection, had he reproached himself about it, even though two of his victims had been Americans whose loyalty he only suspected but could not disprove, and so had disposed of just in case.

That more people had not been killed with the same detachment was only because he had spent nearly eighteen years in Washington and the need had not arisen. He was, Garson Ruttgers convinced himself, a complete professional. A psychiatrist, knowing of his tendency to kill without compunction, would have diagnosed him a psychopath.

Ruttgers shivered, suddenly frightened by the information that lay before him. There could only be one conclusion, he judged. And the British, whom he regarded as amateurs, were bound to screw it up.

He dispatched a ‘most urgent’ classified instruction to the embassy, ordering the Resident back to Washington on the next civilian aircraft, guaranteeing the man’s presence in the capital at dawn the following day by arranging for a military plane to be specially available at the first airfield in the west.

Building a margin for any flight problems, he arranged the meeting with the Secretary of State, Willard Keys, at noon, cautioning in their telephone conversation that Keys might want to request an immediate meeting with the President.

From the computer in the Langley headquarters Ruttgers had within two hours a complete print-out on the man named in the report lying on his desk. It was very brief, as Ruttgers had anticipated: a man like General Valery Kalenin used anonymity like a cloak, he knew. Annexed to the print-out was the brief confirmation: ‘no photograph known to exist’.

It had to be right, assessed Ruttgers, summarily cancelling all appointments and meetings during the next week.

There had never been an opportunity like this, he reflected. If they could get involved, the Agency would wipe away all the post-Watergate criticism. Internal telephone tapping, the Bay of Pigs and the Rockefeller Commission would be laughed at. And Garson Ruttgers would achieve the awe that had surrounded Hoover.

That night Ruttgers broke his habit and had two brandies after dinner; without them, he decided, he wouldn’t be able to sleep. He looked upon the second drink as a celebration in advance.

William Braley’s cover as C.I.A. Resident in Moscow was as cultural attaché to the U.S. embassy. He was a puffyfaced, anaemic-looking man with a glandular condition that put him two stone overweight, pebble glasses that made him squint and the tendency to asthma when under pressure. He arrived in Washington at 10 a.m., delayed by fog at Frankfurt, gravel-eyed through lack of sleep and wheezing from apprehension.

Ruttgers would be furious if it transpired he had overreacted, he knew, thrusting the inhaler into his mouth in the back of the Pontiac taking him and the Director into Washington.

The prospect of meeting the Secretary of State terrified him: he wouldn’t be able to use the breathing aid at the meeting, he thought, worriedly. Keys might be offended. He was rumoured to have a phobia about health.

‘It could be nothing,’ Braley cautioned Ruttgers, hopefully. If he expressed doubt in advance, perhaps the recriminations wouldn’t be so bad.

Ruttgers shook his head, determined.

‘No way, Bill,’ dismissed the Director, who took pride in his hunches and knew this had the feel of a defection. ‘You got it right the first time. I’m proud of you.’

Keys was waiting for them in his office in the Executive Building, a taciturn, aloof man, whose careful enunciation, like a bored educationalist in a school for retarded children, concealed a word-stumbling shyness. He knew the shell of arrogance beneath which he concealed himself caused dislike, which exacerbated the speech defect when meeting strangers for the first time.

Ruttgers had submitted a full report overnight and it lay now, dishevelled, on the Secretary of State’s desk.

‘Don’t you think we’re assuming a lot?’ asked Keys, seating them considerately in armchairs before the fire. Braley remained silent, taking his lead from his superior sitting opposite. The fat man seemed unwell, thought the Secretary, distastefully. He hoped it wasn’t anything contagious.

‘I don’t think so, Mr Secretary,’ argued Ruttgers. ‘Consider the facts and equate them against the computer information.’

Keys waited, nodding encouragement. Ruttgers would think him obtuse, the Secretary knew, unhappily.

‘Until last week,’ explained Ruttgers, ‘there wasn’t a Western embassy in Moscow who had a clue what Kalenin looked like … no one even knew for sure that he existed. Then, without any apparent reason, he turns up at one of our own receptions, a party considered so unimportant that apart from our own ambassador, it was only attended by First Secretaries and freeloaders with nowhere else to go on a dull night.’

He nodded sideways to Braley, aware of the man’s apprehension and trying to relax him.

‘Thank God Bill was there, able to realise the significance.’

‘And what was that?’ asked Keys, seeking facts rather than impressions.

‘A man known only by an incredible reputation attends an unimportant function,’ he repeated. ‘He stays for two hours and makes a point of speaking almost exclusively to the British military attaché …’

Ruttgers grew discomforted at Keys’s complete lack of reaction.

‘… And if that isn’t odd enough,’ the Director hurried on, desperately, ‘a man of whom no photographs are known to exist, willingly poses for his picture to be taken …’

‘How do we know it is Kalenin,’ butted in Keys, ‘if there haven’t been any pictures.’

‘Known pictures,’ qualified Ruttgers. ‘We’ve had photographs compared with every Praesidium group taken over the last twenty years. The one established fact about Kalenin is his incredible survival … he appears in official pictures dating back two decades …’

Ruttgers waved his own file, like a flag. ‘… examine it,’ he exhorted the Secretary. ‘Six photographs of the most secretive man in the Soviet Union …’

Keys sighed. On amorphous interpretations such as this, he thought, the policies of a nation could be changed. It was little wonder there were so many crises.

‘All this,’ stressed Ruttgers, ‘just three days after one of the most vicious diatribes ever published in Pravda and by Izvestia about lack of State security … an attack that can only be construed as a direct criticism of Kalenin …’

Keys waved a hand, still unconvinced.

‘What do you think, Mr Braley?’ he asked. He was not interested, but it would give him time to consider what he’d read in the file and consider it against Ruttgers’s conviction.

‘It’s strange, sir,’ managed the fat man, breathily. ‘I know it appears vague. But I seriously interpret it as indicating that Kalenin is considering the idea of coming across. Which is what worries me …’

‘Worries you …?’

‘Our reception was the only Western diplomatic function that week … Kalenin used us, just to reach the British. As soon as we realised who he was, I and the ambassador tried to get involved. The man was positively rude in rejecting us.’

Keys pursed his lips, with growing acceptancy. On the other side of the desk, Ruttgers frowned, annoyed the Secretary wasn’t showing the enthusiasm he had expected. He gestured towards the dossier.

‘And don’t forget the Viennese reports,’ he continued encouragingly. ‘In Prague, according to our Austrian monitor, Rude Pravo have actually named Kalenin. No newspaper in the East does that without specific Praesidium instructions … the man’s being purged. There can’t be any doubt about it. He knows it and wants to run.’

‘To the British?’

‘That’s how it looks.’

‘I’d like more information upon which to make a judgment,’ complained Keys, cautiously. He’d use the antiseptic spray in the office when the two had gone: Braley looked as if he could be consumptive.

‘As far as Russia is concerned, sir,’ offered Braley, ‘the indications we’ve got so far and those which are in the last report, are amazingly informative.’

‘Have you tried the British?’

‘Of course,’ said Braley. ‘Their attitude encourages our conviction.’

Keys waited.

‘They’ve gone completely silent,’ reported Braley. He paused, like Ruttgers expecting some reaction. When none came, he added: ‘For a closed community like Moscow, that’s unheard of. We live so cut off from everything that embassy-to-embassy contact, particularly between ourselves and the British, is far greater than anywhere else. For the past five days, I’ve tried to encourage a meeting, on any level …’

‘And?’

‘The British Embassy is tighter than the Kremlin itself.’

‘It certainly looks unusual,’ conceded Keys, finally. ‘If Kalenin is thinking of coming over, for whatever reason, how close are we to the British for access?’

Ruttgers controlled the sigh of impatience. He wasn’t waiting until the British had finished, he had decided. That could take years.

‘That’s what made me request this meeting,’ said the Director. ‘The British have just had a major overhaul, throwing out nearly everyone.’

‘So?’

‘I don’t think they could properly handle something this big. It’ll go wrong.’

‘How important is Kalenin?’ asked Keys.

Ruttgers hesitated. At last, he thought, the doubtful son of a bitch is coming round.

‘I don’t think,’ he replied, slowly, ‘that I can think of a Russian whose defection would be more important in the entire history of communism … except perhaps Stalin.’

Keys sat back, bemused at the analysis. Ruttgers was absolutely convinced, he decided.

‘But surely …’ he started to protest.

‘… he’s lived through it all,’ insisted Ruttgers. ‘Stalin … Beria … Krushchev and Bulganin … Brezhnev … there is not one single Russian better able to tell us not only what happened in the past, but what might occur in the future. His value is incalculable.’

Ruttgers had been right in seeking the meeting, decided Keys. He’d tell the President at the afternoon briefing.

‘I agree,’ said the Secretary. ‘We’ve got to get involved.’

Ruttgers smiled and Braley found his breathing easier.

‘But be careful,’ added Keys. ‘If the shit hits the fan, I want us wearing clean white suits. Hand-shakes in space and détente is important at the moment.’

‘I know,’ assured Ruttgers. He paused, uncertain about the commitment at the final moment of making it. The risks were enormous. But then so was the chance of glory.

‘I thought I’d do it personally,’ he announced.

Keys stared at the C.I.A. chief, the words jamming in the back of his throat.

‘Do you think that’s wise?’ he queried, finally.

‘It’s got to be someone of authority … someone who can make decisions on the spot,’ argued Ruttgers.

Keys looked down at the photographs of Kalenin smiling up at him from the desk. Such an ordinary little man, he thought. Was he really worth it?

‘I think it’s very dangerous,’ judged Keys.

‘So do I,’ agreed Ruttgers. ‘But I think the potential rewards justify it.’

Keys nodded slowly, indicating Braley.

‘I think you should be seconded to it, as well,’ he said. ‘You’ve encountered Kalenin, after all. And if the need to go into Moscow arrives, your visa is valid.’

Braley smiled and felt his lungs tighten again.

The Secretary of State turned back to the Director.

‘Keep me completely informed … at all times,’ he instructed. ‘I don’t like it… I don’t like it at all.’

Kalenin crouched on the kitchen floor of his apartment, frowning at the tank displacement before him. He’d been fighting the Battle of Kursk for over a week now and it wasn’t going at all well. Unless there was a sudden change of luck, the Germans were going to reverse historical fact and win. He stood up, bored with the game.

What, he wondered, would be his worth to the West? It was important to calculate the amount to reflect his value, without being ridiculous. He smiled, happy at the thought. Five hundred thousand dollars, he decided. Yes – that was just about right.

The Customs inspector at Southampton located the second litre of brandy in Charlie’s overnight case and sighed, irritably. Why was there always a bloody fool? He held up the bottle, not bothering with the question.

‘Forgot,’ offered Charlie, shortly. ‘Bought it on the way out and forgot.’

‘Even though it’s wrapped in underwear you packed last night?’ accused the official. He made them unpack all their luggage, searching it slowly, so their departure would be delayed. If his dinner was going to be ruined, so would their homecoming.

‘It’ll cost you £4 in duty,’ he said, finally, surveying their wrecked suitcases.

It was another hour before they reached the M3 on the way to London.

‘Sometimes,’ said Edith, breaking the silence, ‘I really don’t understand you, Charlie.’

‘Bollicks,’ he said.