Brian Freemantle - Kings of Many Castles

“So who are his friends?”

“He’s never told me … no one ever came …”

“But he did have friends?”

“He went out.”

“Where?”

“I don’t know.”

“You asked him?” accused Olga.

“He wouldn’t tell me. Said none of it was my business. Just his.” There was a pause. “Is he badly hurt?”

“Is he political?” demanded Olga.

Vera Bendall shook her head, refusing to answer.

“I could take your apartment away. And your pension. Have you expelled, sent back to England.”

“He wasn’t right!”

Olga needed to pause. “How-what-wasn’t he right?”

The woman hesitated, uncertain. “He hates Russia. Everything.”

“Was he political?” Olga repeated.

“He read a lot of books when he was younger … books about England.”

“Did he go to meetings?”

“He went out. I told you …”

“And he stayed away?”

“Yes.”

“Often?”

“Yes.”

“That wasn’t what you told me earlier?”

Her lips quivered. “I’m sorry … I’m confused.”

They were deviating, Olga realized. “I don’t understand what you mean by saying he wasn’t right?”

“He was in the army, had to be, of course. Went to Afghanistan in the beginning but they wouldn’t let him stay. He had to leave. Sometimes he gets very angry.”

“You mean he’s mad?” demanded Olga, intentionally brutal. It wasn’t such a personally advantageous case if Bendall was mentally ill.

“He loses his temper very easily. Particularly when he drinks.”

“Does he see a doctor? Take medication?”

“He told me he was seeing a doctor recently. Not a medical doctor.”

“Who!”

“I don’t remember a name. I don’t think he told me.”

“Does he drink a lot?”

“Yes.”

“Every day? Every night?”

“I suppose so.”

“Peter, your husband, worked for the KGB when he came to Moscow?”

“Yes.”

“Doing what?”

“He lectured for some years, in a scientific institute. In the last few years he used to read reports … English scientific magazines. Give an opinion about them.”

“From an office in those latter years? Or from your apartment?”

“Both. Mostly from an office near GUM but sometimes from the apartment.”

“So KGB people came to the apartment sometimes?”

“Sometimes.”

“Did George ever meet them?”

“He would have been there when they came.”

“How did George get on with his father?”

“Not very well. They argued.”

“What about?”

“Everything. George said it was Peter’s fault that we were here.”

“What about you and George? How do you get on?”

“Quite well, except for when he gets angry.”

“What does he do when he gets angry?”

“I told you, he fights.”

“You mean he’s violent.”

“Yes.”

“Has he ever hit you?”

“No. I’ve thought he was going to, sometimes. But he hasn’t.”

“Why didn’t your husband take Russian citizenship? He chose communism, after all.”

“No,” denied the faded woman, strength in her voice for the first time. “He didn’t do what he did for political ideology. He was ashamed of what he’d done-helped do-developing the West’s nuclear capability. He gave it away to make things even.”

Olga supposed there was some rationale in the convoluted justification. “But he used a Russian name?”

“No. That was George. He said he didn’t want to have the name Bendall. He chose Gugin.”

“Did George ever fight with his father?”

Vera Bendall looked down into her lap. “Sometimes. In the end George was bigger, stronger, than Peter.”

Olga Melnik had expected more-a lot more-and the irritation was a combination of frustration and disappointment. She couldn’t believe-didn’t want to believe-the Bendalls’ story could be as banal as this. “I’m not satisfied, Vera. Not at all satisfied.”

“Please,” implored the woman. “I’ve answered everything I can. I just don’t know !”

“His friends, Vera. You’ve got to remember who his friends were. He must have said something, sometime. Given you some idea where he went. That’s what you’ve got to remember and tell me … And the name of the doctor?”

Vera Bendall looked down at her drooped breasts. “Can I havemy underwear back … my laces and belt. It’s uncomfortable …”

“You’re not going home, Vera. You’re going to stay here, until you help me properly. Stay downstairs, in the cell that doesn’t have a window … where a lot of other people have stayed, before you …”

“No … please …” begged the woman.

“Think, Vera. You’ve got to think very hard. Remember what I want to know and then tell me.”

Charlie assembled video footage from America’s NBC and CBS, Britain’s BBC, Canada’s CBS and Moscow’s NTV to compare with CNN’s unique and unparalled film. And worked with total concentration to parallel it, second for second, frame by frame. He did so muffled in earphones, stopwatch in hand, well aware even then he was not technically qualified to reach any conclusion. Which, being Charlie, he did. He was right: one hundred and one percent, fuck the doubters, diamond-hard right. The copies-the copies upon copies which Anne Abbott had protested to be illegal-were already in the diplomatic bag on their way to London for the scientifically provable tests Charlie specified but he was already personally sure he didn’t need their confirmation.

What he wasn’t so personally sure about was where in the name of Christ and His dog his conviction complicated an investigation already more than complicated enough.

As totally absorbed and externally soundproofed as he was, Charlie was initially, briefly, unaware of Anne Abbott easing herself beside him, physically starting at her touch on his arm.

“Shit, you frightened me!” admitted Charlie, who didn’t like admitting fear or being startled. He depressed the remote control to stop the transmission as he took off the earphones.

“I’ve been looking for you!”

“What is it?”

Anne frowned at the obvious irritation. “I was hoping for an update.”

“What’s yours?” There hadn’t been any contact messages from Donald Morrison or the head of chancellery when he’d got back from the American embassy.

“I’m to arrange legal representation-be part of whatever is set up-when we’re allowed consular access.”

“Has it been asked for?”

“You didn’t know?”

“No.”

“Brooking’s already made the application. Maybe he had the same trouble finding you as I did.”

“Maybe,” dismissed Charlie.

“You got anything I should know about?”

Friend or foe? wondered Charlie, wearied that he had to pose the question. She’d have to be the first to know, if he were technically proved correct. He explained what he wanted her to listen for in advance of handing over the sound-enhancing earphones and gave her his clipboard and stopwatch, for her to make her own time comparisons.

Anne Abbott stopped after only twenty five minutes-only a third of the time Charlie had taken-and looked to him in astonishment. “You could be right!”

“So?”

“So I don’t know what to say.”

Olga Melnik snapped off the tape recording of her insufficient encounter with Vera Bendall and for several minutes the room was silent apart from the rewind whirr.

General Leonid Zenin said, “No one can be that unknowing. She’s lying.”

“She’s of a type,” balanced Olga. “A permanent victim.”

“You believe her!”

“Not yet.” On the recording her interview had sounded worse-unproductive, unprofessional-than she’d personally admitted it to be at the time.