Bill Granger - The November Man

Denisov had cut off two of Ivers’ fingers before Ivers learned to talk. To tell Denisov about his various errands for Perry Weinstein. Ivers had exceeded his authority and Ivers was in disgrace; worse, he was going to prison. The thought of prison terrified Alexa when Denisov explained what would happen to Ivers.

But Alexa had been drawn to Denisov that night in the room in the motel outside Alexandria. He had been utterly cold, ruthless, and without any compassion at all. He was cruel without pleasure.

It had given her great pleasure to see his power over Ivers.

She had slept with him. She had made love to him with great skill. She had done so many things to please him and he had come awake to her. She needed him so desperately because he was like her in this damned and strange and hostile world. She felt sadness because Russia was denied them and all the Moscow nights she had yearned for as a child—when she had wanted to count the stars—were over. She needed Denisov, the Russian words, the shared remembrances. If Denisov left her, she would be utterly alone and she could not stand that.

And Denisov, sitting across from her, his eyes mild and kindly behind the rimless glasses, understood her need. It very nearly frightened him.

Rita Macklin unsnapped her seat belt when the plane hit the runway with a thump. The airlines all caution you not to do this. Old travelers always do. She was so damned tired of traveling. The story hadn’t been in the Far East at all.

She reached under her seat for the travel bag that had been home, office, comforter, and dresser for four weeks. She thought she wanted a bath and then about three or four days of sleep. But she had only a day here and then it was back to Europe.

Back to him.

Because she was thinking of him being in a place that was not here in the bright and sterile concourse of Dulles Airport, she didn’t see him at first. And then she realized what it must have meant, his being here. She felt a coldness rise inside her.

She crossed the terminal to him.

She stood apart from him for a moment. She was so damned tired and she didn’t look her best. Her short red hair was mussed and she hadn’t worried about lipstick. Her wide green eyes took him in. Nothing ever changed in him, she thought.

“Where are we going?” she said.

“I got you a room.”

“All right.”

It was all they said. They had too much to say to each other. He wanted to touch her. He took her bag instead and led her to the waiting car.

“Are you back?” she said, getting in the car. Her voice was dull, tired.

“Yes. In a way.”

“That’s the end of it,” she said.

“I want to talk to you,” he said.

And she did not answer him.

Rita Macklin slept in the afternoon and into the evening. When she woke up, in the darkened bedroom, she was alone. She stumbled to the bath and took a long shower to ease the coldness that pressed between her shoulders. She held her sharply etched face up to the shower and let the water stream down on her. The water did not warm her.

She dressed in her “press conference” clothes. The skirt was washable—everything was washable and unwrinkleable—and so was the blouse. They were blue. He liked the way she looked in blue, though he never said these things to her.

She wasn’t angry with him. She was just saddened.

She put on earrings. She brushed her hair. Her body was tanned by the Oriental sun. He had spoiled everything by being here, in Washington. She had wanted him so much. Not words, not tears, just touch and tasting. To be next to him when they slept. To have his arm draped over her shoulders. To burrow into him. To go to sleep with the smell of him next to her and awake and lick him awake. My God, she just had wanted him and not words and this stupid conversation that was going to have to be finished.

The note on the desk said he was sitting in the lounge off the lobby.

“Why?”

“Because they woke me up. Killers. Come to kill me in Switzerland. It was just a mistake. They made an error in judgment.”

“I want a beer,” she said.

She sat next to him at the end of the long, weekday-empty bar. It was nearly nine at night. She was wide awake.

He started at the beginning and told her everything. She didn’t ask any questions. She drank beer and listened and after a while she looked at him.

“What about the girl?”

“Margot? She went back to Chicago.”

“You used her,” she said.

He waited.

“You’re good at using people.”

“When there’s no other way.”

“But do you know what everything means, everything you told me?”

“Yes.”

“Nothing,” she said. “It doesn’t mean a damned thing. All that maneuvering, all the dirty tricks and betrayals and murders and all this booga-booga spy stuff you pretend you don’t love… it comes out not meaning a damned thing. I go halfway around the world and I hear the same leaders, the same revolutionaries, all the same words. The rhetoric never changes, the stupid lurching from one disaster to another. There isn’t enough suffering to satisfy humanity. Death isn’t horrible enough, there have to be varieties of death. Babies cry but it’s not enough—we have to drop napalm on them to increase their tears. Someone I never heard of who’s a ninth-rate bureaucrat becomes a Soviet agent and then gets found out by our man November—hurrah, hurrah!—and blows his face off and what the hell does it mean? Tell me one thing it means.”

But he was silent. He watched her. He watched her eyes and saw pain at the corners of her pretty green eyes.

“Everything that happened didn’t mean a damned thing to the world,” she said at last.

Silence was a bond. They were the only people at the bar. She finished her beer and stared at the glass, at the foam coating the inside of the empty tumbler. She thought about the first time together, when she had slept with him in that old motel room on Clearwater Beach. He had slept with her only to use her and when she knew it, it wasn’t enough to leave him. Use me. I’ll do anything for you, Devereaux. You bastard.

Damnit, she thought. Why was there always pain between them?

“Is it finished? I mean, is it finished?”

“I can’t finish it,” he said.

“I thought you could do anything.”

“I thought I could. I thought I could say no and walk away from it. With you.”

“Make it finished,” she said.

“I can’t. Not anymore. Not in the way I wanted. The way we wanted it.”

“Make it finished,” she said again.

“I can’t force you to agree to anything. I told you everything. I told you the truth.”

“Is that right? Did you tell me everything? Did you tell me you love it? Tell me that. Tell me you love it. The trade, the business, whatever you call it. The spy who goes into the cold because it’s the only thing that amuses him. Tell me.” Her voice was bitter and her eyes were wet. “Tell me you love it.”

“No.”

Waiting. Quiet.

“I’m good at the trade, that’s part of satisfaction, I suppose.” He saw his face reflected in the mirror behind the bar. “No. I don’t love it.”

“Do you love any goddamn thing in the world?”

“You.”

“What about Philippe? You saved his life. You took him off that island. What about that little boy?”

“No. I don’t love Philippe.”

“You cold son-of-a-bitch.”

“I pitied him.” He would not touch her. She had to understand him and the truth of things without tricks. “Perhaps I pitied myself. When I saw him. When I heard him plead. Pity is not such a small thing, Rita.” He wanted to touch her, to smell her. But this conversation had to be finished now; it had been suspended between them for too long. “Pity is a good thing to feel as well.”