Albatross (22 page)

Now it was Charlie who frowned. ‘Doesn't it? Surely a spy matters very much.'

He shook his head. ‘It's not quite like that,' he explained. ‘When someone as high up as Albatross is supposed to be comes under suspicion, they stop operating at once. It's a well-known procedure. Philby went into purdah once he was questioned. He did nothing for two years till he got out of Beirut because the heat was on again. Maclean and Burgess ran for it. Osborn, the old head of the SIS, was generally believed to be sympathetic to the Russians if not actually working for them. Nothing happened to him. He retired and died in his bed in a nice little Sussex village. It's all done in a gentlemanly fashion and the rules are understood by everyone.'

‘I don't think much of them,' Charlie said suddenly. ‘I wouldn't let a person who'd betrayed their country slide out of it and pretend nothing had happened just because they'd stopped.'

‘Charlie,' he admonished her, ‘you sound like your sister. The trouble with women is they're naturally bloodthirsty. Men are much more realistic. All right, what would you do then?' He asked the question half joking.

Charlie's huge grey eyes grew narrow. ‘I'd shoot them,' she said.

Kidson was quite shocked to see that she meant it. ‘Not hang them?' he inquired.

‘All right, hang them. I'm sorry, John, but I can't take such a casual view of someone who turns traitor. Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but that's how I feel. As far as I'm concerned there's no excuse.'

‘Well,' he said and shook his head, ‘isn't it lucky that I'm not Albatross!'

‘Don't be silly, darling,' she laughed at him. ‘Let's get the bill. I feel like going to bed early.'

For a moment he looked at her and reached under the table, laying his hand possessively upon her knee. ‘So do I,' he said.

When they were alone and he reached out to undress her, she said unexpectedly, ‘You don't think it's Sir James, do you?'

Kidson came close and unhooked the back of her dress. ‘I don't know, and frankly at this moment I don't care. I love you.…'

She forgot about the other questions she had meant to ask him and gave herself up to the delights of being loved. He was a remarkably good lover; he was imaginative and exciting and he had taught Charlie that there was as much pleasure in giving as taking when she made love.

She had slept with a great many men, but John Kidson was the only one, including her two previous husbands, who was in full control in bed. She slept, exhausted and happy, with her arms round him and her face pressed against his cheek. He didn't even doze for a long time. His head was as clear as his body was satisfied and weary.

Humphrey Grant didn't want to go back to his flat and sit alone that night. He left the office in Anne's Yard and started to walk through St James's Park. The lake stretched like silver on his left, ducks planed in and landed, scattering a tiny spray. The flower beds were immaculate, dressed for the early summer, and the stands were going up on Horseguards Parade for the Trooping the Colour on the Queen's birthday. England, holding fast to her traditions, her ceremonies; unchanged at heart. Was that the secret? Humphrey wondered. To hold fast to things one believed in, to cling to the values, despite criticism and ridicule. To ignore the trends and the upheavals.

He walked slowly, his head thrust forward, a tall, thin man with hunched shoulders, a typical civil servant on his way home from one of the Whitehall ministries. Dark suit, conservative tie, even the unnecessary umbrella carried like a walking stick, brief case swinging from the left hand. He circled the park and came out by the splendid vulgarity of the Victoria Memorial at the head of the Mall. The usual crowd drifted round the Palace railings, hoping for what? Protected from the importunities of tourists, the guardsmen stood on sentry duty behind the railing. A policeman ambled by on a large chestnut horse on his way back to the stables in Hyde Park. It was a typical evening in May, when the fine weather was constant and people thronged the streets to walk and sightsee. Humphrey turned down Buckingham Palace Road. He thought of his austere flat and the sandwich supper waiting for him. He watched television sometimes; often he took work home. He read detective stories for relaxation. He lived a solitary life of total self-containment, and he had never rebelled against it before. It was from choice. He didn't need friends. He had his work. For the first time in many years, he turned into a pub off Victoria Street and ordered himself a glass of beer.

‘Mind if I sit here?'

He glanced up and saw the young man hesitating by the empty chair at his table.

‘No,' he said ungraciously. ‘It's not taken.'

‘Do you come here a lot?' The boy wanted to talk.

Humphrey decided to gulp his beer and go. ‘No,' he answered.

‘I haven't been here before; just come to London. Lonely place, isn't it?'

He didn't want to turn round and engage the boy in conversation, but he did. He was nice looking, somewhere in the early twenties. He had a lost look, eager for friendship like a puppy that's strayed. Suddenly Humphrey felt sorry for him. The word lonely had struck home. ‘Yes,' he agreed. ‘All cities are, I think. Where do you come from?'

‘Ipswich,' the boy said. ‘I came up here to see if I could get a job. Things are that bad at home.' He looked disconsolate for a moment, and then said, ‘No luck yet, but I keep trying. There must be something.'

‘Do you have a skill?' Humphrey asked him. There was a lot written and talked about the problem of unemployment for the young. He hadn't appreciated its significance until he saw the look on the boy's face.

‘I worked in the building trade at home,' he said. ‘There's nothing doing there, I can tell you. I'd take anything offered; I'm not one of those that wants to pick and choose.…'

He had finished his drink. The glass stood empty in front of him and Humphrey knew that he couldn't afford to buy another one. He got up. ‘I'm going to get myself a beer. Have one on me.' He walked over to the bar, with the boy's look of gratitude following him. Poor little devil, Humphrey thought, waiting to be served. No job, no prospects of getting one either. What the hell made him come to this bloody city? He'd only get caught up in some mess or other. He went back and sat down. ‘Where are you staying?'

There was an unmistakable hesitation. ‘With a friend. Here, have a fag –'

‘No, no.' Humphrey's face crinkled in disgust. ‘I can't stand the things, do you mind?'

‘Course not,' the boy said. ‘I don't have to smoke. Costs money too.' He grinned. ‘You don't mind me talking to you, do you? I've been walking round all day; it's nice to talk to someone.'

Humphrey put down his beer and leaned back a little in the chair. ‘Yes,' he said. ‘Yes, it is. Have you had anything to eat?'

‘Not yet,' he shrugged. ‘Beer fills you up anyway.'

‘Well, I haven't either,' Humphrey said decisively. ‘Why don't you come and have a bite with me? I've got nothing to do this evening. There's a place down the road.'

The boy hesitated, and Humphrey said kindly, ‘Look, it's my treat. Come on.'

They left the pub together, and spent the evening in the Steak House. Humphrey heard about the boy's family, his weeks looking for work at home until he'd come to London in desperation. He didn't whine, the young man, or complain. He had the directness of a child, a simple cheerfulness that Humphrey found touching and admirable. He felt warm being with him. He paid the bill and they stopped in the street outside. The boy shuffled his feet a little and then said, ‘Thanks very much. That was great. I won't see you again, I suppose?'

Humphrey had known from the moment he sat down. Twenty years I've been alone. Twenty years of killing everything in myself because I was ashamed. And at the end what has it brought me? He had made a decision once that had changed the course of his life. A decision to live a lie for the rest of his life. Now he made a decision that could change everything and suddenly he didn't care.

‘Look, Ronnie, if you've nowhere to go, why don't you come back with me? I've got a spare bed.'

The boy grinned his happy grin; he blushed slightly. ‘I was hoping you'd say that,' he said.

The jeweller's shop in Grafton Street had a flat above it. The business was established at the beginning of the nineteenth century; it was an old-fashioned family firm. It specialized in fine antique jewellery and select pieces of Irish Georgian silver. The father had died nine years before and the head of the firm was the eldest son. By origin they were Dutch Jews; in the last generation two sons had married Irish girls and ceased to be Orthodox. Their children had been brought up as Catholics. Dark-haired and olive-skinned, they spoke with a Dublin nasal brogue and the son who took over after his father's death was an ardent Nationalist and contributor to the IRA. His conversion to terrorism was a mixture of resentments and a yearning to belong to the country where he had been born. He had grown up hating the rich Anglo-Irish families who patronized his father and kept him waiting for his money because he was just an old Jew. He hated them for their contempt for the native Irish, his wife included, and the long history of wrongs suffered by the Irish people echoed the sufferings of the Jews. From the fringes of Nationalist activism Philip Gold graduated to the Marxism of the Provisionals and his commitment to them went far beyond contributing money and passing information.

He loaned the flat above his shop as a safe house. It was the ideal place to hide a fugitive, and many had lain low there while the hunt for them ranged through the poor Republican districts and the homes of open sympathizers. No one would have suspected an address in the smartest shopping street in Dublin; gunmen and bombers on the run had spent time there until they could be slipped out and back across the border. On two separate occasions Gold had driven wanted men openly onto the ferry in his Mercedes, and never raised an eyebrow. The flat was prepared for another guest. Gold asked no questions. A supply of food and drink and newspapers was laid on.

The day of the guest's arrival came and went and there was no ring on the door. Very early the next morning Gold took a telephone call. ‘Something's gone wrong. The parcel didn't come last night. I don't know when to expect delivery now.'

‘Never mind,' Gold answered. ‘I'll take it when it does come. Just let me know.'

The Dublin papers carried news items about the escape of a Soviet agent from an open prison. Questions were going to be asked in the House as to why a traitor should have been moved from a top-security jail. Gold read and drew his own conclusions. By the following evening the Dublin contact who was waiting to pick up Harrington informed his Soviet liaison that the link was broken and he couldn't spend another day hanging round the airport. The London end would have to take it up and find out what had happened. It was quite possible that their people had decided to lie low in England before getting to Dublin. It was possible, the official at the Russian Embassy agreed. Anything was possible. But not likely, especially as they hadn't sent a message cancelling the Irish arrangements. Gold was told to forget about a visit, the watch on the airport was abandoned, and an urgent message went to Stephen Wood.

He arrived at teatime on Sunday to be met by Sam's anxious wife. No, she said, she hadn't seen or heard from her husband since he left a week earlier. Yes, he had some job to do collecting a car in the north, but he always telephoned home and the last call she had was on the Monday, saying he expected to be back by Thursday morning. Since then not a word. She was thinking of going to the police.… Wood reassured her; there was no need to do anything drastic like that, he said. He just wondered whether her husband was at home, but since he was away on a job, he'd call round again. He gave a false name, stayed for tea and talked on and on about children and education and the effect the hard winter had had on people's gardens till she thought she was going to scream if he didn't get up and go. When he did, he told her not to worry once again, and suggested that Sam might be very angry if he found she'd gone to the police and made a fuss … As a result she delayed reporting him missing for another four days.

Wood took the tube home and telephoned while his wife was in the kitchen making supper ready. ‘The parcel has gone astray. Let head office know.' He hung up and went out to help his wife lay the table. He was a firm believer in sharing the household activities.

‘Now,' Davina said. ‘You've had a good night's sleep and something for the hangover. Let's get down to business.'

Peter Harrington looked up at her with reddened eyes. What a cow, he thought, feeling the headache thudding in a distance induced by two Veganin and black coffee. ‘I still feel pretty shaky,' he protested.

‘Not as shaky as you'll feel if Colin comes in and finds you've been playing for time,' she said quietly. ‘You haven't got time, Peter.'

‘What the hell does that mean?' he snarled at her wearily. ‘More threats? You're a real peach blossom, aren't you –'

‘You'll be reported missing by now,' Davina said. ‘Every KGB agent in London will be looking for you. Which is what you're gambling on, isn't it? Only it won't work to your advantage if they do find you.'

‘And why not?' he sneered at her, risking defiance because Lomax was out of the room.

‘Because you won't get out alive,' she said quietly. ‘Colin will see to that. Tell me what I want to know, and I promise to deliver you to your friends.'

‘Not in a million years,' he said. ‘You'd never do it in a million years. When you've milked me dry you'll turn me in to the police. I'm saying nothing.'

Davina lit a cigarette and handed it to him. He was put off by the gesture and hesitated. ‘I'll give you an hour to think it over,' she spoke quite calmly. ‘When I come back, either we start serious work on Albatross, or I'll pick up the phone and call the police in front of you.' She went out and he heard the sitting room door lock. He wished he'd gone easy on the whisky the night before. He felt queasy and his nerves were jumping at every sound. He'd been bluffing and she knew it. He called her vile names to relieve his feelings.