Brian Freemantle - Kings of Many Castles

“All good for the CV,” said Charlie. “Better to let Anne and I handle it, though, don’t you think?”

“I’ve the ranking authority!”

It was an embassy car, with the ambassador’s chauffeur. Charlie was surprised the pompous prick hadn’t insisted on flying the British pennant from the bonnet masthead. “What’s the book say you’ve got to do.” There’d be a guidance book. There always was.

“Ascertain the full facts. Establish the nationality is genuinely British, obtain the passport number if possible. Offer consular assistance. Obtain all United Kingdom residency details to advise next of kin. Make clear any repatriation advance is a loan that has to be repaid and get the applicant’s signature to that agreement,” quoted the man.

Anne covered her mouth with her hand and looked determinedly out of the window at the glued-together traffic.

Jesus! thought Charlie. “Let’s work our way through all that. London’s already established he’s British, with a British registered birth, although he doesn’t hold a British passport as such. There aren’t any United Kingdom residency details and I don’t think, whatever happens, we’ve got to think about repatriation. Agree with me so far?”

“Yes,” said Brooking.

“Ascertaining all the facts is what Anne and I are here to do, right?”

“Right,” accepted Brooking.

“So there we are!” said Charlie, triumphantly. “All you’ve got to do is offer the consular assistance, tell him Anne and I are it, and leave the rest to us.”

“It doesn’t sound much,” said the man, doubtfully.

“It’s your being there, as the ranking diplomatic representative, that’s important,” urged Charlie.

“Yes, of course.” Brooking still sounded doubtful.

Charlie said, “It’s all a great deal more uncertain-more complicated-than it seemed to be at first?”

“Yes,” agreed Brooking.

“Everything’s going to be recorded, that’s part of the cooperation agreement.”

“I understand that.”

“I’m not trying to teach you your job, of course-heaven forbid! — but on something that’s going to be circulated around the highest levels of the Russian and American government it might be better if you waited to ask about anything that’s not immediately clear from our questioning, rather than putting it on tape at the time.”

“Quite! Good thinking.” Brooking smiled, relieved. “All quite straightforward really, isn’t it?”

“The best way’s always straightforward,” sighed Charlie.

“My feelings exactly,” said the man.

One of the several reasons for Charlie’s early morning trip to the centralized incident room had been to ensure with Olga Melnik their acceptance at the Burdenko hospital. They were fifteen minutes ahead of the agreed time but the first security check point was at the ground floor reception. Brooking hurried into the lead, producing his Russian diplomatic credentials and standing vaguely to attention to be compared against an identification photograph that Charlie had given Olga, and in the temporary separation Anne squeezed Charlie’s hand and whispered, “That’s my dinner table anecdote: you try to steal it, I’ll serve an injunction.”

Charlie said, “There’ll be more.”

Virtually as he spoke the protest erupted ahead of them-“I am an accredited representative of Her Majesty’s government, I must not be physically touched!”-and Charlie turned to see Brooking pushing away an attempted body search.

Softly, for only Anne to hear, Charlie said, “Oh fuck, what did I tell you!” Louder Charlie said, “If there’d been that sort of security five days ago, people wouldn’t be dead and maimed and we wouldn’t be here.”

More quietly Anne said, “It’s still not diplomatically permissible.”

The awareness seemed to be registering at the checkpoint. Therewas a huddled conversation and Brooking was ushered through, untouched. There was no attempt to body search either Charlie or Anne, although all their documentation-as well as their photographs-was compared and their briefcase contents examined. There was an insistence upon testing the tape recorder to confirm that’s what it was. To get further into the hospital they had to pass through an airport-style electronic, metal-detecting frame.

When they caught up with him Brooking said, “That was outrageous! I’ll file a protest!”

“What’s the point?” pleaded Charlie. “They’re doing their job!”

“Authority is the point.”

“It might well be,” acknowledged Charlie, with a meaning Brooking didn’t comprehend. “There are times usefully to invoke it and there are times when you are going to fuck everything up, like now …”

“I don’t think …” broke in Brooking, in fresh outrage, only to be interrupted in turn by Anne Abbott.

“I do, Richard! If this all degenerates any worse and I’m asked why, I’m going to have to say you weren’t any help at all. In fact, that you got in the way. And we’re having a row within the hearing of Russians one, if not more of whom, I am sure speaks very good English. I’d also expect there to be CCTV cameras, with sound, and for every moment of this totally unnecessary nonsense to be recorded. Which I deeply regret, as I’m sure Charlie regrets. I thought we’d talked about this, on the way here.”

Brooking’s face burst crimson. “I …” he started, then abruptly stopped, his eyes searching the vestibule and the corridors leading from it for the threatening cameras.

“My name is Badim,” said a voice, behind Charlie. “Nicholai Iliach Badim. I am the surgeon-administrator. I can escort you, if you’re ready?” He spoke English.

“And I am Guerguen Semonovich Agayan, psychiatrist-incharge,” said a second man. He spoke English, too.

“We’re ready,” said Charlie. Fucked up before we start, he thought. Then he thought, no I’m not. It was unsettling to realize he’d begun to think of himself as part of a team, although while he was in England it had obviously been necessary to designate theeagerly accepting Donald Morrison as the local British contact with the now supposedly centralized investigation and to duplicate all the Russian witness interviews. Perhaps, for once, there needed to be a team.

The photo-comparison and briefcase check was repeated outside the guard-blocked ward but there was no attempt at body searching.

“Strictly half an hour,” said Badim. “We’ll stay with you.”

Brooking nodded in smiling agreement. Charlie thought how fortunate his earlier visit to the American embassy had been and said, “This is officially a British embassy interview, without the presence of any foreign nationals. We respect, of course, your medical restrictions. Which we’ll observe. But you cannot remain with us. Everything that is said is being recorded and will be made available to your authorities.”

Brooking made no move to speak.

Anne said, “That’s international law, once you’ve agreed he’s medically and mentally capable of being interviewed. Which you have.”

Badim said, “I’ll register a protest, as I did yesterday.”

“So will I,” threatened Agayan. “We’ll be directly outside, from where we can see the patient.”

“And we’ll abide to your time stipulation,” undertook Anne. Charlie wished she hadn’t, standing back for Anne and Brooking to go into the cramped room ahead of him. There were again four men inside, all of whom looked expressionlessly at them but made no move to leave. The gray-bandaged George Bendall lay gray faced on his gray bed, eyes closed.

Charlie said, “We’ll be half an hour.”

A surprisingly slight, bespectacled man said, “Our instructions are to remain at all times in the room with the prisoner.”