The Russian Interpreter

33

The suggestion embarrassed Konstantin. He tore off his spectacles and began to wipe them on the lining of his cap all over again. He coughed, and muttered so rapidly that Manning found it still more difficult to catch what he was saying.

‘Excuse me,’ he said, ‘that’s not formally true…. Sorry to say…. A certain basic misunderstanding….’

‘What?’ said Manning.

Konstantin cleared his throat and pulled the wires of his glasses back round his ears.

‘Look,’ he said. ‘Let me explain what Raya was doing for the old man with the sciatica.’

‘She was stealing Gordon’s belongings.’

‘By no means.’

‘What?’

‘Well, of course not. Do you really suppose the security services of the second most powerful nation on earth would have to resort to methods of such crudity?’

‘But we both know what happened….’

‘You’re letting yourself be dazzled by the obvious. Raya was exchanging Gordon’s belongings. She reported to the old man what presents Gordon had in his room. He supplied her with replicas which she put in their place. Then she took the originals to the office.’

‘But, Kostik …’

‘First it was the model university, the Spassky Tower, and the rest. Then the various Russian books Proctor-Gould had been given. Then they had six tins of Nescafé flown over from England. Imagine that! Picture our agent in London. Taken off stealing the plans of submarines, and told to go out and buy six tins of Nescafé! Next they began to have copies of the English books flown in.’

‘But, Kostik, I don’t understand this at all. Raya was stealing those things. We found the books and the Nescafé in your apartment.’

Konstantin sighed.

‘Private enterprise,’ he said. ‘Characterized by all the signs of haste and compromise that go with lack of adequate resources and proper central planning. Like many Soviet citizens, Paul, we were attempting a little private speculation over and above our commitments on behalf of the state. Result: poor quality of production. Only thing to be said in its favour – it worked, and the state enterprise didn’t.’

‘You were stealing the stuff unofficially?’

‘Exactly. And of course we followed the usual habit of speculators – we gave priority to our private efforts. That’s to say, we stole the goods first. If there was no reaction from Gordon we knew they were harmless. In which case we’d pass them on to the public sector. So we come to the books, which we estimate are not harmless. Now we have two possibilities. Either we can turn them over to the state like all the rest of the stuff. Or else we can forward not Gordon’s books at all, but the books Raya was given to replace them with. That would be more likely to promote Proctor-Gould’s continued prosperity. Which we do, of course, depends on Proctor-Gould.’

‘How much are you asking, Kostik?’

‘A lot, Paul. An opportunity like this doesn’t arise every day.’

‘How much is that in roubles?’

Konstantin wrinkled up his nose.

‘What makes you think the price is in roubles?’ he asked. ‘Money isn’t the only thing that people want. Some people value contentment above wealth. Some power. Some fame. Some obscurity. Also it depends what’s in short supply. There are commodities in shorter supply than money in this country.’

Manning studied Konstantin’s face in silence.

‘I told you earlier,’ Konstantin went on, ‘that Raya came from a very grand family. My family was honourable as well – once. A celebrated Bolshevik family, Paul, and very proud. My maternal grandfather was one of the members of the Moscow Soviet who voted for Nogin in 1917. My paternal grandfather lost an arm fighting against Kolchak in Siberia in 1919. Then in the thirties the family was trampled into the ground. Nothing unusual. A normal phenomenon at that time. My maternal grandfather was arrested. He died in prison before he could be brought to trial. My paternal grandfather was sent to a camp. He died there. My father I can’t even remember. He was called up in 1941, when I was three, and killed in the battle for Kharkov two years later.

‘I was brought up by my mother and my maternal grandmother. My grandmother was a proud woman, Paul. They would have murdered her in 1936 as well as her husband, but they were ashamed to touch anyone so erect and forbidding. So my mother always believed, anyway. Grandfather’s death didn’t change her views at all, in any direction.

‘“If you believe in the Revolution,” she used to say, “remain loyal to it, however its name is disgraced.” And the other thing she used to say was: “Know the truth, even if it goes with you in silence to the grave.” She used to sit bolt upright on a hard chair, and when she said these things she would tremble slightly, like tempered steel under load. People like that – not our generation, Paul. She didn’t speculate, as we must, whether the killing, and the lies, and the darkness were all inevitable once the violence had begun, and society had been unmade.

‘So I was always brought up to distinguish the truth, and to value it, without regard to its expediency. As a result I have a craving for it. I’m like a gourmet in a chronically starving land. I hunger not just for the mass of random facts with which some starving people stuff themselves until their brains are swollen. I want information that’s relevant to our condition. I want disinterested interpretations, honest commentaries.

‘Don’t think I reject my country, Paul. Or even reject what it has become. We can overcome our famine. I’m not cynical about Gordon’s activities. If I thought they would harm Russia in any way whatsoever I should do everything in my power to destroy him. But thorough mutual espionage is a blessing to both sides. How can we politick safely against each other unless we can be sure that our true strength and intentions are known?

‘Not that espionage works out quite so well in practice. The information that spies steal is always vitiated by the possibility that its sources are corrupt. Where the source of information is not open to inspection, the possibility always exists that the selection of material is deliberately misleading. Information on its own is not enough; one always needs to know its origin. Stolen secrets either confirm what their recipients already know, or they’re not believed.

‘And that’s the position that we are in, too. The supply of information is controlled in this country. The selection we get is distorted. So the value even of the information that does get through the filter is diminished. We know nothing worth knowing about what goes on outside our frontiers. Worse – we know very little more about what goes on within them. Beyond the light of one’s own personal experience – darkness. What are people thinking? What are they feeling? How do they behave? Messages of reassurance or exhortation come through. One reads between the lines. Friends pool their knowledge. But in general we live like animals, in ignorance of the world around us.

‘So in despair those of us who can do so turn to the West to learn about ourselves. We use our academic status to read Western publications in the closed sections of the libraries. Visitors smuggle us books. Such information as I get hold of is seen not just by Raya and me. It’s passed to a whole circle of trusted friends we have built up over the years. Our aims aren’t subversive, Paul. Don’t think that. Not one of us who isn’t a pure Leninist. There must be dozens of similar circles in Moscow alone.

‘What we’re always looking for is a regular channel for information from the West. Raya and I have approached a number of regular foreign visitors – journalists, businessmen, diplomats. None of them would help. They were all frightened of damaging their standing with the Soviet authorities.

‘All right, then. A man who can’t get food honestly must get it by other means. Necessity can’t afford scruples. So we resort to exploiting Proctor-Gould.

‘I want him to expand his activities, Paul, and act as a courier for us as well. On every trip he makes to Russia I shall want him to bring certain designated books and documents. I shall also expect him to use his own initiative in finding additional material. Since he has the confidence of the Soviet authorities he can help us with very little risk to himself. And I shall hold that suitcase of books as a warranty for satisfactory service.’

Manning gazed out of the window at the hurrying dark wall of the tunnel. It evaporated suddenly into the echoing white tiles of a station. Krasnopresnenskaya. They were on their second go round.