Our Game (28 page)

"... We come home from Kazakhstan. That's a long walk, but we make it, even if some of us arrive a bit late. My mother dies on the way, and I swear to her that I shall bury her in her homeland. But when we arrive, the doors of our houses are locked against us and Ossetian faces look out of our windows. We are beggars, sleeping in our streets, poaching in our fields. Never mind that the law says the Ossetians have got to go. They don't like the law. They don't recognise the law. They recognise guns. And Moscow has given the Ossetians many guns and taken away ours."

There had been much debate on the Top Floor, I remembered, about whether on the strength of this meeting we should make a pass at Checheyev and try to obtain him as our source. After all, he had broken half the rules in the KGB book. He had blown his own cover, vented anti-Soviet sentiments, and beaten the forbidden ethnic drum. But in the end my impassioned reasoning prevailed, and the barons reluctantly agreed that our most important asset was Larry and we should contemplate no move that might endanger him.

I was standing at the centre of my priesthole again, beneath the overhead light, studying the remnants of a folder of printed pamphlets issued by the BBC monitoring service. Key words, those that had survived, were highlighted with green marker pen. The idiosyncratic spelling of the transcribers had been left untouched.

North Osetia rela . . . calm on fl..versary of conflict.

ITAR-TASS news agency World Se ... Mosc in Russian 1106 gmt 31 Oct 93

Text of rep ...

Vladikavkaz, 31 October: The sad anni ... of the tragedy of 31 October 1992, whe ... armed confrontation

began in the zon... t . . . Oset . . . Ingush conflict . . . be

softened by a....

The tragic tally [for ... conflict]: 1,300 killed . . . sides, more than 400 . . . houses destroyed and ... homeless.

I turned a couple of blackened pages. The highlighting continued: Emma's or Larry's, it made no difference, since I knew now that they shared the same madness:

. . . mass disorder and inte . . . conflicts accompanied by the use of force, weaponry, and combat vehicles . . . the , refugee situation ... catastrophic, with more than 60,000 . . . situation is a tragedy which has befallen a people needed by no one . . . Russian troops operating in the state of emergency area on the territory of North Osetia and Ingushetia have been ordered to eliminate bandit gangs which fa ... authorities, said General ... the interim administration in the Osetian–Ingush conflict zone.

But in the left-hand margin, in angry capitals, Larry had written the following words:

FOR BANDIT READ PATRIOT

FOR GANG READ ARMY

FOR ELIMINATE READ KILL, TORTURE, MAIM, BURN ALIVE.

I was in spasm.

In spasm, but overcontrolled.

I was standing, and my back was screaming murder at me and I was screaming murder in reply, but I had found the file I was looking for. LP: LAST DEBRIEFINGS, I had written on the cover, in capitals in my bureaucratic hand. Yet for all my eagerness, I had to punt myself along the wall like a wounded cow in order to carry it to the trestle table.

I was squatting in a chair and leaning low over the table, taking as much weight off my spine as I could. My left elbow was pressed onto a cushion, as Mr. Dass had taught me. But the pains in my back were nothing compared with the shame and anguish in my soul as I stared at the accumulating evidence of my culpable blindness:

Asked LP whether he could decently duck the Caucasus trip that CC is so keen on. I didn't say so, but customer interest in region v. low and already oversupplied by satellite, humint, sigint, and a flood of reports from US oil companies operating or prospecting in the region. LP not receptive.

LP: I owe it to him, Timbo. I've promised him for years and never gone. They're what he cares about. They're who he is.

Licking my fingertips, I clawed painfully through the pages till I came to my account of the debriefing three weeks later:

LP has violently overreacted to Caucasus trip—predictably, in his present menopausal mood. Nothing in scale for him, everything a first and last. Saddest, most exciting, most moving, tragic experience of my career; etc., masses to report, seething unrest, balloon will go up again any minute, ethnic, tribal, and religious tension everywhere, Russian occupiers total oafs, plight of Ingush archetypal for plight of all small oppressed Muslim nations in region, etc. . . .

Footnote to source report: H/Evaluation Ex-Sov target told me off the record she was unlikely to file.

But Cranmer had filed.

Cranmer had filed and forgotten.

Cranmer in his criminally negligent myopia had consigned the cause of the Ingush people to the dustbin of history, and LP with it, then buried his stupid head in the sweet earth of Somerset—even though he knew that nothing, absolutely nothing in Larry's life, or Cranmer's own pathetic imitation of it, ever went away:

. . . because I've seen them, in their little valley towns and in their mountains. . . . In life, as we both know, it's the luck of the draw, who you meet and when and how much you have left to give, and the point at which you say, To hell with everything, this is where I go the distance, this is where I stick.

A picture postcard. Torn once vertically. Addressed to Sally Anderson in Cambridge Street and showing a dressed couple lying in a field. Postmark: Macclesfield. The artist: one David Macfarlane. The description: "Silent Noon 1, 1979, mixed media 18" x 24"." Provenance: Emma's wastepaper , basket.

Emm. Crucial. AM needs 50,000 in his account by Friday noon. Miss your beautiful eyes. L. PS. Henceforth he's Nutty as in f' cake, nuts-in-whenever, tough Nutty to crack.

I made a brief mental pause, as other old memories began to wake inside my head. AM who is Nutty, who is tough to crack. Nuts in May; who speaks like Mr. Dass and has a new telephone in his car. The memories stirred, ordered themselves, and were set aside to wait their turn.

I took up a sheet of yellow legal pad, crumpled by Emma and unfolded by myself. Provenance: her kneehole desk at Honeybrook.

Emm. Vital. I'm seeing Nutty at 10 tomorrow in Bath. CC has sent the shopping list by bearded friend, and it's awaiting my collection IN LONDON, at the Royal Automobile Club in Pall Mall. Call the Club. Tell them you're my secy. and they must mail the letter EXPRESS to me here, for tomorrow. These are the best days of my life. Thank you for the days, thank you for life. Nutty says we have to calculate around twenty percent in bribes. Auden says we must love one another or die.

L.

A fresh folder of reports from the BBC monitoring service, this time intact, and the marked extracts like the crematorium music of every border war across the globe:

Combat operations in Prigorodnyi raion continued 1 November.... The fire points of the Ingush irregulars are being suppressed.... Many casualties, both killed and wounded, have been registered in many villages.... Exchanges of fire continue in conflict zone.... Airborne regiments meeting stiff resistance.... Rocket artillery used against Ingush villages.... Russian premier rules out review of existing borders.... Russian armoured column moves into Ingushetia.... Ingush refugees take to mountains.... Onset of winter fails to temper conflict....

Tim Cramner, you prize, prizer, prizest fool, I thought.

How about your purblind innocence—you who used to pride yourself on never missing a trick?

Perhaps it was this anger with myself that made me lift my head in such a hurry. I lifted my head and listened, and what I heard I don't know, but I heard it. Clutching the wall, I embarked on another laborious cripple's tour of my six arrow slit windows. The thunderclouds had fled. A half-moon draped with cloud cast a grey glow over the surrounding hills. Gradually I made out the shapes of three men placed at intervals around the chapel. They were fifty yards apart and eighty yards away from me. Each stood like a sentry halfway down his own hill. As I watched, the man at the centre took a stride forward and was imitated by his comrades either side of him.

I looked at my house. By the porch light I saw a fourth man standing by my car. This time I didn't panic. No rushing upstairs or forgetting telephone numbers. Panic, like the pain in my back, was a thing of the past. I glanced at the turmoil of papers on the floor, at my trestle table, at my makeshift archive in disarray, my school tuckbox spilling over with files. Resisting a ridiculous impulse to tidy them, I made a swift collection of essential documents.

Bairstow's escape briefcase stood open beside the door. I stuffed the documents into it, together with some spare ammunition, then slipped the .38 into my waistband. As I did so, an instinct reminded me of Zorin's letter nestling in my pocket. Returning to the tuckbox, I delved until I came upon a folder marked PETER. I removed Zorin's personal particulars sheet and added it to the essential documents in the briefcase. I switched off my light and took a last look outside. The men were converging on the chapel. Briefcase in hand, I groped my way down the spiral staircase to the vestry. Closing the cope cupboard behind me, I grabbed a box of matches and stepped into the church.

I was ahead of them. With the moonlight to help me, I unlocked the south door, then made swiftly for the pulpit, which is Norman and finely carved. I climbed the four creaking wooden steps and set the briefcase out of sight against the front panels, where a preacher's feet would be if one were standing there. I went to the altar and lit the candles. Calmly. No shake. Choosing a pew on the north side, I knelt down, put my face in my hands, and, for want of a closer definition of what was going on inside my head, prayed for my deliverance, if only so that I could deliver Emma and Larry from their insanity.

In good time I heard the throaty clunk of the south door as it was opened from outside; then the screech of the hinges that I had always been careful not to oil since they provided such an excellent early warning system for anybody working in the priesthole. And after the screech I heard one pair of feet—wet boots, rubber soles—advance a couple of steps and pause; then splash towards me down the aisle.

There is a protocol about praying in such circumstances, and I must have thought about that too. You don't, simply because somebody has barged into your private church at two o'clock in the morning, ask him what the devil he thinks he's doing here. But neither do you behave as if worship has rendered you stone deaf. My best course, I decided, was to fidget my reborn back, draw up my shoulders, and bury my face more deeply in my hands to show that I was striving for greater piety in the teeth of boorish behaviour.

But such fineness was wasted on my intruder, for the next thing I knew was a heavy weight descending unceremoniously onto the kneeling board at my left side and a pair of raincoated elbows thumping onto the ledge next to my own, and Munslow's truculent face glowering at me from just a couple of inches away.

"All right, Cranmer. What's this God bit suddenly?"

I sat back. I allowed a sigh to escape me. I passed a hand across my eyes as if the intensity of my meditations were still upon me.

"For pity's sake," I whispered, but this only annoyed him further.

"Don't give me that crap. I've checked. There's not a whiff of God on your file. What are you cooking up? Got someone tucked away here, have you? Pettifer? Comrade Checheyev? Your little lady friend Emma that nobody can find? Six hours you've done down here so far tonight. The bloody Pope doesn't do that much."

I preserved my weary, inward tone. "I've got things on my mind, Andy. Leave me alone. I won't be interrogated about my faith. By you or anyone."

"Oh, yes you will. Your old employers would like very much to interrogate you about your faith and a few other things that are troubling them. Starting tomorrow eleven a.m. and continuing for as long as it takes. Meanwhile you've got yourself a few houseguests in case you take it into your head to do a runner. Orders."

He stood up. His knees were close to my face, and I had a ridiculous urge to break them, though I am sure I had forgotten how. There was some hold they had taught us at training camp, a kind of rugger tackle that bent legs the wrong way. But I didn't break his legs or try to. If I had done, he would probably have broken mine. Instead I dropped my head, passed my hand across my brow again, and closed my eyes.

"I need to talk to you, Andy. Time to get it off my chest. How many are you?"

"Four. What's that got to do with it?" But there was greed in his voice, and excitement. At his feet he saw the kneeling penitent who was about to make his reputation for him.

"I'd rather talk to you here," I said. "Tell them to go back to the house and wait for us."

Still on my knees, I listened to him bark graceless commands over his intercom. I waited till I heard an acknowledgement before I drew my gun and thrust the barrel into his groin. I stood up until our faces were very little distance apart. He was wearing a communications harness. Reaching inside his jacket, I switched the microphone to "off." I gave my instructions singly.

"Give me your jacket."

He did so and I laid it on the pew. With the gun still at his groin, I pulled the communications harness from his chest and put it with the jacket.

"Put your hands on your head. Take one step back." He again did as I asked.

"Turn round and walk towards the door."

He did that, too, and watched me while, with my spare hand, I locked the south door from the inside and removed the key. Then I walked him to the vestry and locked him into it. It's a fine door to the vestry. The key is as splendid as any to the church, but unlike most vestries this one has no door to the outside, and no window.

"If you yell, I'll shoot you through the door," I told him. And I suppose the fool believed me, because he kept quiet.

Hastening to the pulpit, I drew the briefcase from its hiding place and, leaving the altar candles burning, let myself out of the north door, which I locked from the outside as a further precaution. The pale brush strokes of a new dawn lit my way. A bridle path ran out of sight along the vineyard wall to the home farm, where our calking and bottling were done. I followed it at a trot. The air smelled of mushrooms. With a key from my chain, I unlocked the double doors to the tithe barn. Inside stood a Volkswagen van, property of Honeybrook Estates and my occasional runabout. Since my tryst with Larry, I had kept the petrol tank full and a spare jerry can in the back, together with, a suitcase of sensible spare clothes, for there is nothing worse, when you are on the run, than being short of decent clothes.