Comrade Charlie

43

There were varying degrees of shock from almost everyone in the room, the two unnamed men showing it most. Charlie, who’d caused it, wasn’t shocked: he’d half expected something like this and thought he was a long way towards comprehending what had happened or was happening. Most of it anyway.

‘Sure?’ demanded Wilson, still gazing down at the drawing around which they were all grouped, on Witherspoon’s evidence table.

‘No,’ admitted Charlie, although for accuracy, not to reassure them. ‘All I can say is that it resembles drawings I was shown by the project leader when I made the Isle of Wight investigation.’

It had taken four hours to get the official search warrant authorized by a magistrate, locate the afterhours address of the managing director of the safe deposit company, persuade the man of the urgency of cooperating at once and finally to retrieve the blueprint from King William Street. While they waited – Charlie finally being allowed to sit – there had been sandwiches and coffee but little conversation. No one had spoken at all to Charlie until the drawing was unrolled and Charlie had announced its possible source. A disjointed, competing babble erupted the moment Charlie responded to the Director General’s question, with the Whitehall official with the Welsh accent fractionally in the lead. ‘Good God!’ said the man, aghast. ‘Have you any idea of the implications of this! The Foreign Office must be told: the Foreign Secretary himself …!’

The persistent, determined Harkness was already trying to make his point before the first man finished. ‘… The key!’ he tried, in fresh triumph. ‘The key found in Muffin’s flat fitted the safe deposit facility. And Muffin investigated on the Isle of Wight!’

‘… This is a disaster!’ endorsed the second official. ‘This will end any technological cooperation between us and the United States for years…a disaster…!’

‘…I think…’ began his colleague but Wilson cut him off, trying to restore some order. ‘Please be quiet!’ he said. He didn’t shout but despite the frailty there was authority in his voice and everyone stopped talking at once. The Director General looked around the room and said, more forcefully: ‘Let’s stop behaving like a lot of frightened chickens with a fox in the henhouse! I want to understand what we’ve got here, not listen to a bunch of hysterics!’

There was some embarrassment in the silence that settled. Harkness said: ‘I do not think the observation I made should be ignored.’

‘Nothing is being ignored,’ said Wilson, and on this occasion Charlie was convinced there was a note of weariness in the Director General’s tone towards the other man. He was aware of Wilson looking at him ‘Charlie?’ he invited.

‘Like you said,’ supported Charlie. ‘Don’t panic. The first thing to do is confirm that it is something from the space project.’

‘It means delay…’ the Welshman began to protest.

‘…no it doesn’t,’ corrected Charlie. ‘The Isle of Wight is less than an hour away, by helicopter. The factory even has its own landing pad. We already know Springley’s address: the local police can have him there waiting for us before the machine arrives…’

‘Yes,’ accepted Wilson at once, nodding towards Witherspoon. ‘Organize that now.’

‘Blackstone,’ insisted Harkness. ‘The man has to be arrested!’

‘No, he doesn’t!’ said Charlie, as Witherspoon left the room accompanied by Abbott, the second Special Branch officer. ‘And for the same reason as before: we don’t know yet if there’s a cut-off warning system in operation. We’ve got to take things in their proper order.’

‘Your accomplice…’ started Harkness, and Charlie exploded.

‘For Christ’s sake!’ he shouted, so loudly that Harkness actually stepped back and Smedley started forward from his guard position at the door before stopping again.

‘Listen!’ implored Charlie, more controlled. ‘Just listen and think. You want to argue that I received that drawing from Blackstone, put it in the safe deposit facility and then told Moscow, correct…?’

Harkness blinked back at him, saying nothing.

‘How?’ demanded Charlie. ‘Tell me – tell us all – how! And why! The bloody drawing is dated, isn’t it! With what is almost yesterday’s date. You know to the second where I’ve been for the past three, almost four days: that I haven’t been anywhere near the Isle of Wight to make any pick-up. You now who I’ve met, so you’re equally well aware that Blackstone hasn’t come to London, to give me anything. According to what you’ve said in this very room, I was actually under arrest when the message was intercepted to Moscow saying King William Street had been filled. So it couldn’t have been me who filled it, could it! Or sent the message, because you’ve also told us the transmission and receiving point is inside the Soviet embassy in Kensington Palace Gardens. And why was that message sent at all? Just to go on fooling you, like it’s fooled you all along. Why should the Soviet embassy receiving material from a dead letter box in King William Street alert Moscow before they pick it up! Surely even you can see the nonsense in that. Standard procedure – the only procedure – is to empty a box and then advise what you’ve got, if you want to, although that doesn’t make a lot of sense either…’ Charlie had to stop, breathless. He said: ‘You were fed the numbers-for-letter code, like you were fed everything else…the dead letter drop that got you an arrest…the courier against whom you couldn’t move. What did they amount to, either of them? Think about it! They didn’t matter a damn. It was just the bait, for you to swallow. Which you did. Moscow has sucked you up and blown you out in bubbles. That code is Boy Scouts’ stuff: senior Boy Scouts, maybe, but little more. It should never have been relied upon…had importance attached to it.’

‘I think that’s enough,’ halted the Director General. ‘I will say, however, that at this stage I agree with what has been said. It would seem to me that we are dealing with two separate things here. And for the moment the overwhelmingly important one is the discovery of a British document carrying the highest security classification being where it has no right to be. I want that run to ground first: everything else can wait.’

Harkness discernibly sagged. His immediate, concerned concentration focused upon the Whitehall officials and Charlie became even surer that they were in some way connected to the all-important Joint Intelligence Committee.

Everyone settled down to another period of waiting, for the arrival of Robert Springley. Harkness returned to the evidence table – although to the folders, not the drawing. The two Whitehall men withdrew pointedly to a part of the room where they could not be overheard and at once started an intense, head-bent conversation. The stenographer and the recording operator sat back, stretching, grateful for the temporary rest. The stiff-legged Wilson was the first to stand. The Director General caught Charlie’s eye, jerking his head, and Charlie crossed to where the man was, beyond the half-moon table.

Wilson said: ‘I think you’ve publicly made your point with sufficient forcefulncss for the moment. No more.’

‘Yes, sir,’ accepted Charlie.

‘I still want a further explanation.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘For Christ’s sake stop parroting “yes, sir” at me!’

‘I’m pretty sure the drawing is from the Isle of Wight.’

‘You’re in deep trouble if it came from a man you let run.’

‘I accept that.’

‘Why the hell did you let it go on!’

‘I thought I’d closed him off: that the risk was justified.’

Wilson snorted, in impatient anger, nodding in the direction of the intensely talking government officials. ‘They’re right, you know. If something involving America’s Strategic Defence Initiative has reached the Russians from one of our places the shutters are going to come down with a sound we’ll hear all the way from Washington. The Americans would actually have to consider abandoning it: starting all over again.’

‘I realize that, too.’

‘Christ!’ said Wilson again but more to himself than to Charlie. ‘I can’t think of a comparable disaster! Nothing!’

They both turned, at movement from the door. Witherspoon entered first, followed by Springley. The white-haired project chief had had time during the flight to recover from being roused from his bed but he was still blinking in bewilderment. He was wearing a carelessly put on tweed jacket over a roll-neck sweater. The man frowned around the room in continuing confusion, his face breaking slightly at recognition of Charlie Muffin.

When he spoke it was to Charlie. He said, complaining: ‘No one will tell me anything, except that there’s some sort of crisis: that this is a security committee. What is it? What’s happened?’

Wilson said to Charlie: ‘You might as well take him through it. He knows you.’

Harkness didn’t hear the exchange but his look was one of undisguised hatred – and without caring that it was undisguised – as Charlie went to the project chief, to lead him back to the table where Harkness still stood. Charlie ignored the deputy Director. He picked up the flimsy drawing, offered it to Springley and said: ‘Can you identify that?’

Springley only looked at it briefly, for no more than seconds. After which his gaze came up, first to Charlie and then more widely, out into the room. He was smiling slightly, the smile of someone completely baffled but who imagines they are having some incomprehensible trick played upon them. He said: ‘What is this?’

‘That’s what I am asking you, Mr Springley,’ said Charlie, cautious against giving the man any lead or guidance.

‘One of the drawings,’ said the project chief, spacing the words in growing disbelief. ‘The final drawing of the planned sidescreen moulding, with the process description. Where did it come from?’

There were several sounds of audible reaction throughout the room but Charlie didn’t see who made them. He said: ‘That’s what we want you to tell us.’

‘Blackstone!’ interrupted Harkness foolishly. ‘It was stolen by Blackstone, wasn’t it!’

There was another audible sound, one of annoyance, and Charlie knew this time it was from the Director General.

‘No,’ said Springley, shaking his head. ‘It’s one of the drawings from the project but not the drawing. It’s a completely accurate copy…’

‘By Blackstone!’ said Harkness again, but it was not the deputy’s interjection that caused the project manager to stop in mid-sentence. Springley went back to the drawing, looked up and said: ‘Dear God! Oh dear God what’s happened?’

Charlie thought that if God responded on each occasion he’d been called upon already it was going to be a busy night for all concerned. Encouragingly he said: ‘What?’

‘Krogh!’ said Springley weakly. He shook his head once more. ‘It has to be. I even thought…it actually crossed my mind…not very strongly, you understand…but I did…I thought it was strange…’

‘I’m not following you,’ said Charlie. ‘Who’s Krogh?’

‘The chairman of the main American manufacturing company,’ said Springley. ‘He approached us weeks ago: said he wanted to visit to ensure that what we were making and what his plant were constructing were compatible…’ The man trailed off, lost.

‘The American manufacturer came to you!’ prompted Charlie.

‘Over a fortnight ago now,’ confirmed Springley. ‘The company checked his bona fides, of course. He had the topmost clearance. He said he wanted to study our drawings and he did, for days. Told me once that he was glad he did, because he’d thought for a while that there had been an incompatibility. There wasn’t, it turned out. That’s what he said, anyway… Oh God, what a mess!’

‘He saw everything?’ pressed Charlie.

‘Everything there was. All of it.’

‘How many drawings?’

‘Twenty-four.’

‘Shit!’ said Charlie, not talking to anyone but looking at what the project chief still held in his hands, which were shaking now. Charlie said: ‘When did he leave…the last day he was with you?’

Springley shrugged uncertainly. ‘Over a week ago. Maybe nine or ten days.’

‘It’s important!’ said Charlie. ‘Be precise.’

‘I can’t be, not exactly,’ apologized Springley. ‘Eight days, I think: yes, eight days.’

‘Where is this American firm based?’ It was the Welshman, from behind.

‘California,’ said Springley at once.

‘We’ve got to tell America now! At once!’ said the Whitehall official. ‘It’s still only afternoon there. They can pick him up at once.’

‘He’s not there, is he!’ said Charlie, not bothering to turn. ‘We’ve already seen that the drawing’s dated, with what is now yesterday’s date. And it was found here, in England. So that’s where he’s working, somewhere here in England.’ And I bet I know where, Charlie thought.

‘This gets worse…appalling…’ said the Welshman. ‘We must alert the embassy here, then. They’ve got security secondment in Grosvenor Square. FBI as well as CIA.’

Charlie moved slightly away from the project chief, gazing down contemplatively. When he looked up it was to Wilson. ‘It is a disaster,’ he said. ‘An unmitigated one. If this man Krogh has been here, copied all twenty-four drawings, then it can only mean he’s already passed over, long ago, everything there was to have from his plant in California.’

‘Yes,’ agreed the Director General at once. ‘And it doesn’t matter a damn, in the end, that strictly speaking it’s not our leak, either.’

‘But that drawing is our responsibility, isn’t it!’ demanded Charlie suddenly. ‘I mean we could argue that we’ve got the right of decision over it?’

Wilson frowned, head to one side, then looked for guidance to the other two men: Harkness was not included. First the Welshman, then the other official shrugged. Wilson said: ‘What’s the question about, Charlie?’

‘Desperation,’ admitted Charlie. ‘Absolute, utter desperation.’ He went back to Springley, gesturing to the drawing. ‘Explain that to me. Completely. Every detail.’

‘Like I said, it’s a drawing of the sidescreen moulding,’ began Springley hesitantly. ‘More to explain the process, really. We got the contract for our reinforced resin system because it’s more resilient than monoset carbon fibre. It performs better in the atmospheric vacuum of space, too.’

‘Performs better how?’ queried Charlie, needing everything.

‘It doesn’t give off vapour, like monoset: lenses, mirrored reflective detection devices, surfaces like that won’t get fogged.’

‘What’s resilience got to do with it?’

‘If monoset carbon fibre is struck, by space debris for instance, it shatters. Thermoset – our system – might be penetrated but the overall structure remains intact.’

‘You called it reinforced resin?’

‘The resin is made from polyetheretherketone: it’s an oil by-product of petrol distillation. We construct a laminated matrix of resin and carbon fibre: in this case the complete lamination is twelve sheets in thickness.’

It wasn’t coming, realized Charlie. Maybe it had been naive – really desperate – to imagine that it would. He said: ‘So you lay sheets of carbon fibre, interspersed with the oil-based resin, one on top of each other?’

Despite the seriousness of the situation Springley smiled at the simplicity of the question. ‘No,’ he said. ‘It’s got to be created quasi-isotropic: meaning that it can carry loads in all directions. So as each layer is added it is laid at a different angle to that of the sheet beneath it…’ The man hesitated. ‘We call it a weave and it’s very much like that. A sheet of carbon fibre is composed of many fine threads, all running in the same direction: as each sheet is laid one on top of the other those threads criss and cross to provide the strength of the final, composite sheet, very similar to weaving cloth. Only hundreds of times stronger.’

‘We need to follow this, Charlie,’ cautioned Wilson.

‘I haven’t got it yet,’ freely admitted Charlie. To Springley he said: ‘What about how it’s made?’

Springley shrugged once more. ‘In a moulding bay…’ He indicated the process specifications, alongside the drawing. ‘There are temperature and cleanliness requirements, of course…’

‘What!’ seized Charlie abruptly.

Springley continued to take Charlie through the drawing itemizing the points as he got to them. ‘Constantly maintained temperature, at twenty degrees centigrade. Fifty per cent humidity…’

‘…what are all these?’ demanded Charlie, going ahead of the man. ‘Dimethicones…magnesium sulphate…lanolin…camphor…salicylic acid… phenol…what’s the importance of these things…?’

‘I don’t really see the point of singling out those particular ingredients,’ conceded Springley. ‘There are many more, after all. We might just as well say any cream.’

‘For what?’ said Charlie, beginning to feel a tingle of hope.

‘Every two or three laminations have to be pressed down to consolidate the vacuum,’ said Springley. ‘We’ve obviously got to be careful of voids.’

Charlie smiled. It wasn’t perfect by any means – desperate, in fact – but it was an effort, at least. And still all might be a waste of time and effort. ‘Especially in an expanding vacuum,’ he agreed. ‘How long would it take you to redraw that drawing? Exactly as it is, with just two lines omitted? And one inserted in their place?’

Springley turned down the corners of his mouth. ‘No time at all,’ he said. ‘It’s already there, complete. All I’d need to do is a simple copying job.’

‘And you could match the lettering, by tracing that already there?’

‘Yes.’

‘When are we going to get this, Charlie?’ asked the patient Director General.

‘Now,’ said Charlie. And told them.

‘Ridiculous!’ rejected the Welsh official at once. ‘Preposterous and ridiculous.’

‘And do I need to remind you that a diplomatic bag is sacrosanct?’ asked his companion.

‘No,’ said Charlie, unperturbed. ‘Or that it could very well be preposterous and ridiculous and achieve nothing. But we’ve been sitting around here for hours, using words like disaster and catastrophe and bemoaning the demise of any future technological exchange with the United States of America. We’ve agreed the Russians must have everything from California and certainly twenty of the British plans…’ He waved the blueprint they had, for emphasis. ‘…because Krogh appears to have been numbering them and this is twenty-one. So what have we got to lose, apart from our time tonight and Mr Springley’s time tonight, and one simple, diplomatically illegal act…?’ He swivelled to the project chief. ‘You prepared to give us that time, Mr Springley?’

‘Of course I am,’ said the man.

To the others in the room Charlie said: ‘OK, let’s have another idea better than the desperate, preposterous, ridiculous one that I’ve put forward?’

No one volunteered immediately. Then the Director General said: ‘We’re grateful for your cooperation, Mr Springley. Tell us what materials you want and we’ll get them for you immediately.’

Determined not to misunderstand, Springley said to Charlie: ‘Dermatitis?’

Charlie nodded in agreement: ‘Severe dermatitis.’

‘Mr Springley,’ stopped the Director General. ‘Where did this man Krogh stay in London? There must have been a hotel? A telephone number at least.’

‘I don’t know,’ said the project chief. ‘I don’t remember his giving me one.’

It was approaching dawn, fingers of light already feeling through the darkness, before everything was completed, although the revised drawing of the moulding and the carbon-fibre preparation process was back in the safe deposit facility long before that because Springley worked remarkably quickly. When the project chief did finish there was a tired repeated objection from one of the Whitehall officials, which Harkness tried to support, but Wilson brusquely overrode both. Abruptly Charlie dropped his earlier objection to Blackstone’s arrest, because there was a purpose now, and orders were given for the man’s detention, initially by the local police to await the arrival, by helicopter again, of a Special Branch escort back to London: pointedly Wilson avoided giving the job to either Smedley or Abbott. Springley was still in the room, so he overheard the planning and asked that the company chairman be awakened and brought to London as well to be told what had happened, and Wilson agreed at once. The duty officer at the American embassy was contacted and arrangements made for a seven o’clock breakfast meeting with the local station chiefs of America’s Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Central Intelligence Agency. While all the calls were being made Charlie wandered across to where the files lay, sorted through, and located the telephone number and address of the Kensington house that William French, from the Technical Division, had identified from it. No one tried to stop him: Witherspoon was flustering in and out of the room obeying the instructions of the Director General and Harkness remained dully at the half-moon table, staring down sightlessly and seemingly unaware of all the activity. Towards the end Wilson stumped over to Charlie and said: ‘Well?’

‘We’ve forgotten the Kensington house,’ said Charlie.

‘Fix it,’ agreed Wilson at once. Suddenly, depressed, he said: ‘I’m going along with everything but I don’t think it’ll achieve anything.’

‘It’s an attempt, at something,’ offered Charlie.

‘I’d like you to take the meeting with the Americans.’

He’d been yelled at and vilified by everyone else so why not them as well, thought Charlie. ‘All right,’ he said.

‘Let’s try to get some rest and put our thoughts in order,’ suggested Wilson. ‘It’s almost five in the morning.’

By then there had been some changes at the Kensington safe house. When they’d finished that night, much earlier than the English group, Losev had agreed to the dismantling of the photographic gear, because there only remained the last, duplicate drawing to be redone, and they already had the photograph of that. So only the drawing materials remained. And Yuri Guzins, on his makeshift cot in a small side room. He was awake that morning, at five, knowing that he was finally going home. Emil Krogh was also awake, with the same thought. And so was Natalia Fedova, thinking not of going home but of leaving it, for ever.

Outside the Kensington house the arrest squads began to assemble, with orders to await instructions.