Gerald Seymour - The Contract

Mawby paused, let that sink in. Johnny looked across at Henry Carter and saw the trace of a wry smile.

'Otto Guttmann is now an old man, close to his seventieth birthday. We can assume that if the Soviets did not regard his work as of the foremost importance they would have pensioned him off. They have not done so, nor are there any signs that before this present programme is completed he will be permitted to retire. The British interest in Dr Guttmann is quite straightforward. We are about to launch the building programme for the new Main Battle Tank of the late eighties. It involves a minimum of a thousand vehicles, at an average cost per weapon of half a million pounds. Thousands of jobs are tied into the manufacture process. In the event of conventional hostilities in Europe that tank will have to face the weapon currently being pre- pared by Doctor Guttmann at Padolsk in the Soviet Union. I think I make myself clear.' It wasn't a question, but there was a faint mutter of assent from Smithson and a drawled acknowledgement from Pierce. Carter toyed with his wed- ding ring as if nothing had been said that was new to him. Johnny sat very still. It was coming closer to him, the tide on its way to his sand castle, sneaking nearer.

'Willi Guttmann managed his defection with a brilliance that those of us who have had dealings with him here find hard to credit. He sought to protect his father from having a son who had betrayed his adopted country, so for his escape the boy feigned a drowning accident. From what we have been able to discover subsequently the hoax was successful. Both his father and the Soviet authorities apparently believe that Willi Guttmann drowned in Lake Geneva. Willi Guttmann was close to his father, it was a loving parent and child relationship.

'Willi has told us that each year his father takes a two-week holiday in his former home city of Magdeburg in the German Democratic Republic. Magdeburg is 48 kilometres, that's 30 miles, from the Inner German Border. Half an hour's drive down the autobahn. Dr Guttmann will be slaying at the International Hotel on Otto von Guericke Strasse from Sunday the first to June the 15th. It is our inten- tion while he is in Magdeburg to persuade Otto Guttmann to take advantage of escape facilities that we shall provide and so follow his son to the West.'

A hundred questions, a thousand negatives, bounced in |ohnny's mind.

Only difficulties, only problems, only dangers. But that was the way of' '

I ' Corps; always to fling ice water over any new plan.

'We've read all we can about you, Johnny. On Friday afternoon I spoke to as many people as I could reach who had commanded you during your time in the army. The reports are very good, it's a series of commendations… We would like you, Johnny, to go to Magdeburg, to persuade Dr Guttmann to take the opportunity to rejoin his son, to deliver him to the pick-up. That's the proposition.'

Johnny sighed, drew the air deep into his lungs, wanted to look around him, but they would all be gazing at him, and he stared instead at the carpet, tried to concentrate on its pattern while his mind reeled and lurched and his heart. thumped.

'You wouldn't be involved in the actual transfer, Johnny, you've no worries on that score, it'll be taken care of.'

Johnny Donoghue back on the inside, lining out on the team.

'Your job will be strictly the approach and persuasion in Magdeburg.

It goes without saying that coercion is not involved.'

Almost a time for tears. Almost a time to leap up and grab these men, wrap his arms around them and hold them close to him and thank them, thank them from the deep depths.

'You'll learn more as the days pass, but that's the broad outline and there will be a big team working on the details. There'll be all the support you need.'

Too easy, wasn't it? Slow down, Johnny. It can't be that simple. Don't look up. If it looks easy, it isn't. The only piece of advice he ever had from his father. So where's the catch?

'We're reacting to events, Johnny. The authorisation for us to set this running came just 48 hours ago. That doesn't bother us, we have the capability, we have the expertise, and for a critical part of the plan we want you.'

Was this the time to remember that his country had kicked him… in the groin, in the crutch, kicked him bloody hard and bent him double?

No, you have to forget that, Johnny, because if you don't forget it where is the future? Is it for ever Cherry Road and German classes at the Technica College?

'Whatever happened in Ulster, Johnny, doesn't matter. As far as every one of us here is concerned you start with a clear sheet and a damn fine record behind you.'

Turn your back now, Johnny, and you're away back tc Cherry Road.

Just as you were a year and a half ago. Home in the shame, back into the shadow.

'I'd like to give it a go.'

He lifted his head and Mawby was beaming at him, Pierce shook his hand, Carter with evident pleasure and welcome on his face waited his turn and Smithson slapped him on the hack. George, with an eye on Mawby, stayed still and distant.

Working from an office temporarily provided for him at headquarters on Dzerzhinsky Street, Valeri Sharygin wrote in longhand what he hoped would be his final report on the disappearance of Willi Guttmann. No, not the disappear- ance, the drowning… The KGB major frowned privately, his head turned away from the typist by the window. The absence of the interpreter's body irritated him, but he could wait no longer. Leave beckoned before the departure of the delegation to the United Nations in New York for the summer session of the Conference.

Perhaps before he flew to the United States he would telephone Foirot in Geneva.

He had been thorough in the writing of the report. Thorough enough to have visited personally the mes- senger from the Foreign Ministry who had taken the Guttmann possessions to his father's flat. Thorough enough to have registered the bitter swell of bereavement that had greeted the messenger.

What could he achieve by further delay? He anticipated that while he took his fortnight at Sochi the corpse would drift to Lake Geneva's surface.

It was peculiar that it had not already done so.

Lizzie Forsyth ran up the two flights of stairs to the flat of the British Consul. She rang the doorbell, and heard the muffled whisper of a door opening deep inside and the murmur of annoyed voices. Who came on Sunday evening to do busi- ness with the Consul? He'd be placating his wife, saying he wouldn't be long, wondering what matter could not wait till the morning. Lizzie reordered her hair, raised herself hand- some on her heels and waited.

'Yes?'

Lizzie smiling. 'You remember me, Lizzie Forsyth?' Lizzie radiant, a grin and white teeth. 'I wanted to see you.'

He had started back, as if exposed to danger. The Consul; remembered Lizzie Forsyth. Not every day that he played host to a Soviet defector, that he entertained a man from Intelligence in his drawing room. He would not forget Lizzie Forsyth and her shivering boy and the quiet competence of the man who had taken him away. Unhappily he gestured her inside and led the way to his office, calling to a closed door on the way that he would not be long.

'What can I do for you, Miss Forsyth?'

She spoke with the fervour of a gale at an open window.

'I've just had the most marvellous thing happen. Just like that and without warning… my period's come. I'd given up hope, resigned myself to it, having the baby, and now it's come. God knows why I was as late as that. Well, it's come now… so the problem's over.'

'You're not…'

'I'm not pregnant, isn't it marvellous? I want to tell Willi I didn't know how to write to him. Where to send a letter.'

'You're not pregnant?'