Brian Freemantle - Charlie M

‘So who will be driving?’ asked Wilberforce.

‘I had thought of Muffin,’ said Cuthbertson.

‘He’s too valuable: he’ll have to travel on with Kalenin,’ protested Ruttgers.

‘You’re right, of course,’ accepted the British Director. ‘It’ll have to be somebody else.’

‘There’s Cox, currently attached to our Moscow embassy,’ offered Ruttgers, remembering his annoyance at the man’s inability to detect Charlie’s entry into Russia. ‘His involvement would be very natural. And he speaks Russian, which gives added validity for his secondment.’

‘A11 right,’ agreed Cuthbertson, carelessly. ‘Let’s use him.’

Wilberforce stood studying both men, wondering if cither was really medically sane. He supposed the sacrifice of one life was justified, but he would have expected some distaste from those making the decisions: Ruttgers and Cuthbertson appeared almost to be enjoying it.

‘Our debriefing team will be arriving in London next week,’ reported Ruttgers, avoiding looking directly at Cuthbertson.

‘Yes,’ said the ex-soldier. He still hoped to persuade the Cabinet to retract permission for the interviews with Kalenin to be Anglo-American.

‘We’ve houses available here?’ asked Ruttgers.

‘Four,’ replied Cuthbertson. ‘Each is as secure as the other. They’re all in the Home Counties.’

‘We’d like to examine them first,’ said Ruttgers.

The clerk-like American had been born out of his time, decided Wilberforce. He would have enjoyed bearbaiting or cock-fighting, watching animals gradually tearing themselves to pieces.

‘A pointless precaution,’ defended Cuthbertson, holding his temper. ‘I will not have that sort of interference.’

Ruttgers smiled. ‘I’d still like to be satisfied,’ he said.

‘I’ll raise it at the Cabinet meeting,’ undertook Cuthbertson, trying to avoid the commitment. ‘They might, object, too.’

‘They won’t,’ predicted Ruttgers. ‘But if you need authority,’ he continued, ‘go ahead.’

Ruttgers was an easy man to dislike, thought Wilberforce.

‘There’s one other thing,’ said the American.

Cuthbertson concentrated upon his map positions, appearing disinterested.

‘I thought one of us should go to Vienna personally to meet him.’

Cuthbertson frowned, off-balanced by the suggestion.

‘We’ll both go,’ insisted the Briton, anticipating what Ruttgers was going to say and determined not to be upstaged by the other man.

‘It’s an American house,’ protested Ruttgers, who had wanted the opportunity to begin his persuasion upon the Russian.

‘But a joint operation,’ reminded the former soldier, definitely.

Ruttgers nodded in curt agreement. He’d blown it, he decided, annoyed at himself.

Charlie Muffin relaxed happily in his former office, with space in which to move and its pleasant view of Whitehall. Like a child who has had its ball returned from a neighbour’s garden, he smiled at Braley. He liked the man, he decided. Braley was a professional, which always gained his esteem: little else did, reflected Charlie.

They had finished the public laundering of the money the previous night, one day before each departed for Prague under embassy cover. The debriefing with Ruttgers and Cuthbertson had been easy and almost perfunctory, both Directors preoccupied with their pinned and flagged series of maps.

There had not, anyway, been any reason for a lengthy meeting, remembered Charlie. The operation had gone perfectly and had been identical in the casinos of Vienna, Monte Carlo, Nice and the Clermont and National Sporting Clubs in London.

Each night for the previous two-and-a-half weeks they had entered the high game rooms and changed fifty thousand dollars into gambling chips. After three hours mingling with the gamblers but never playing, they returned to the caisse, changed the chips back into unmarked currency and left the casino. The mornings of each day had been spent taking sample records, Charlie selecting notes at random and dictating their numbers to Braley, who had operated the pocket recorder.

The American was bent over it now, making the final calculation.

‘According to my figures, we’ve a trace on fifty-five thousand dollars. That’s twenty thousand in sterling, fifteen in French francs and twenty thousand in Austrian Schillings.’

‘Sufficient,’ judged Charlie, dismissively.

‘It was very necessary though, wasn’t it?’ he added.

Braley nodded, positively. In Vienna, Braley had identified two known K.G.B. operatives and Charlie had located a third in Monte Carlo. For that number to have been seen meant the surveillance on Charlie had been absolute, they had decided at their meeting with the Directors.

‘At least Kalenin knows we’re following his stipulations to the letter,’ said Braley.

‘He knows exactly what we’re doing,’ agreed Charlie. ‘What bothers me is that I haven’t a clue about him.’

‘Still apprehensive?’ queried Braley.

Charlie nodded. ‘Very,’ he admitted.

The man’s nervousness was unsettling, thought the American. He wondered how the Englishman would behave if things went wrong in Czechoslovakia.

Charlie spent the day before his Prague flight in Rye. He had telephoned from London, so when he arrived at the station, Wilkins, who had been manservant and chauffeur to Sir Archibald throughout his directorship of the department and retired on reduced pension rather than work for another man, was there to meet him.

They had known each other for twenty years, but Wilkins greeted him formally, allowing just the briefest, almost embarrassed handshake, before opening the car door.

It was a magnificent Silver Shadow, maintained by a chauffeur who adored it in a condition of first-day newness.

‘Car looks as good as ever,’ complimented Charlie.

‘Thank you, sir,’ said Wilkins, steering it from the parking space.

‘If ever Sir Archibald fires you, come and drive for me,’ invited Charlie, attempting what had once been a familiar joke between them.

‘Thank you, sir,’ replied Wilkins. He’d forgotten, thought Charlie, sadly. The response should have disparaged a Ford Anglia, a troublesome vehicle that Charlie had once owned.

‘Sir Archibald was sorry he couldn’t come to the station,’ recorded Wilkins.

‘Isn’t he well?’

‘He’s waiting at the house,’ avoided the chauffeur.

‘Isn’t he well?’ repeated Charlie, but Wilkins didn’t reply and after several minutes Charlie relaxed against the shining leather, knowing the conversation was over.

No, thought Charlie, as he hesitantly entered the lounge of Sir Archibald’s home, darkened by drawn curtains against the summer brightness. Sir Archibald wasn’t well. It was incredible, Charlie thought, remembering his last meeting in Wormwood Scrubs with Berenkov, how quickly people collapsed. The former Cambridge cricket blue who had captained his county until his fiftieth birthday and who, three years before, had been an upright six-foot-three who could command attention by a look, was now a bowed, hollowed-out figure, with rheumy eyes and a palsied shake in his left hand. He’d developed the habit of twitching his head in a curious, sideways motion, like a bird pecking at garden crumbs apprehensive of attack, and he blinked, rapidly and constantly, as if there were a permanent need for clear vision.

‘Charlie!’ he greeted. ‘It’s good to see you.’

The blinking increased. He was very wet-eyed, Charlie saw.

‘And you, sir,’ replied Charlie. Odd, he thought, how instinctive it was to accord Sir Archibald the respect he found so difficult with Cuthbertson.