Jeffrey Archer - Mightier than the Sword

“I bet it has something to do with Babakov’s book.”

“Damn that book,” said Emma. “What possessed him to take such a risk when he’d already been threatened with a jail sentence?”

“Don’t forget this is the same man who took on a German division armed only with a pistol, a jeep, and an Irish corporal.”

“And he was lucky to survive that as well.”

“You knew what kind of man he was long before you married him. For better or worse...” Giles said, taking his sister’s hand.

“But does he begin to understand what he’s put his family through during the last week, and just how lucky he is to have been put on a plane back to England rather than on a train heading for Siberia along with his friend Babakov?”

“I suspect there’s a part of him that will have wanted to be on that train with Babakov,” said Giles quietly. “That’s why we both admire him so much.”

“I’ll never let him go abroad again,” said Emma with feeling.

“Well, as long as he only heads west, it should still be all right,” said Giles, trying to lighten the mood.

Emma bowed her head, and suddenly burst into tears. “You don’t realize just how much you love someone until you think you might never see them again.”

“I know how you feel,” said Giles.

During the war, Harry had once stayed awake for thirty-six hours, but he was a lot younger then.

One of the many subjects no one ever dared to raise with Stalin was the role he played during the siege of Moscow, when the outcome of the Second World War still hung in the balance. Did he, like most of the government ministers and their officials, beat a hasty retreat to Kuibyshev on the Volga, or did he, as he claimed, refuse to leave the capital and remain in the Kremlin, personally organizing the defense of the city? His version became legend, part of the official Soviet history, although several people saw him on the platform moments before the train departed for Kuibyshev, and there are no reliable reports of anyone seeing him in Moscow again until the Russian army had driven the enemy from the gates of the city. Few of those who expressed any doubts about Stalin’s version lived to tell the tale.

With a ballpoint pen in one hand, and a slice of Edam cheese in the other, he carried on writing, page after page. He could hear Jessica remonstrating with him. How can you sit in an airport lounge writing someone else’s book, when you’re just a taxi ride away from the finest collection of Rembrandts, Vermeers, Steens, and De Wittes in the world? Not a day went by when he didn’t think of Jessica. He just hoped she’d understand why he had to temporarily replace Rembrandt with Babakov. Harry paused again to gather his thoughts.

Stalin always claimed that on the day of Nadya’s funeral, he walked behind the coffin. In fact, he only did so for a few minutes, because of an abiding fear of being assassinated. When the cortege reached the first inhabited buildings in Manege Square, he disappeared into the back of a car, while his brother-in-law Alyosha Svanidze, also a short, stocky man with a thick black moustache, took his place. Svanidze wore Stalin’s great coat so the crowd would assume he must be the grieving widower.

“Would all passengers...”

Mrs. Justice Lane released everyone from court number fourteen at four o’clock that afternoon, but not until she was convinced that the jury wouldn’t be able to reach a verdict that evening.

“I’m off to Heathrow,” said Emma, looking at her watch.

“With a bit of luck I’ll be just in time to meet Harry off the plane.”

“Would you like us to come with you?” asked Giles.

“Certainly not. I want him all to myself for the first few hours, but I’ll bring him back to Smith Square this evening, and we can all have dinner together.”

Taxi drivers always smile when a fare says Heathrow. Emma climbed into the back of the cab, confident she could be at the airport before the plane landed.

The first thing she did on entering the terminal building was to check the arrivals board. Little numbers and letters flicked over every few moments, supplying the latest information for each flight. The board indicated that passengers arriving from Amsterdam on BOAC 786 were now in baggage reclaim. But then she remembered that Harry had only taken a small overnight bag, as he hadn’t planned to be in Leningrad for more than a few hours, one night at the most. In any case, he was always among the first off the plane as he liked to be speeding down the motorway on his way back to Bristol before the last passengers had cleared customs. Made him feel he’d stolen time.

Could she have missed him, she wondered, as several passengers passed her, with bags displaying Amsterdam luggage tags. She was about to go in search of a telephone and call Giles when Harry finally appeared.

“I’m so sorry,” he said, throwing his arms around her. “I had no idea you’d be waiting for me. I thought you’d still be in court.”

“The judge let us go at four because it didn’t look as if the jury were going to reach a verdict today.”

Harry released her, and said, “Can I make the strangest request?”

“Anything, my darling.”

“Could we book into an airport hotel for a couple of hours?”

“We haven’t done that for some time,” said Emma, grinning.

“I’ll explain why later,” said Harry. He didn’t speak again until he’d signed the hotel register and they’d checked into their room.

Emma lay on the bed, watching as Harry sat at a little desk by the window, writing as if his life depended on it. She wasn’t allowed to speak, turn on the television, or even order room service, so, in desperation, she picked up the first chapter of what she assumed must be the latest William Warwick novel.

She was hooked from the first sentence. When Harry finally put down his pen, three and a half hours later, and slumped onto the bed beside her, all she said was, “Don’t say a word, just hand me the next chapter.”

Whenever I was required at the dacha (not that often), I always ate in the kitchen. A real treat, because Stalin’s chef, Spiridon Ivanovich Putin, would give me and the three tasters exactly the same food as was being served to Stalin and his guests in the dining room. That should hardly come as a surprise. The three tasters were just another example of Stalin’s paranoia, and his belief that someone must be trying to poison him. They would sit silently at the kitchen table, never opening their mouths except to eat. Chef Putin’s conversation was also limited, as he assumed that anyone who entered his domain — kitchen staff, waiters, guards, tasters — was almost certainly a spy, me included. When he did speak, which was never before the meal had been cleared away and the last guest had left the dining room, it would only ever be about his family, of whom he was inordinately proud, particularly his most recent grandson, Vladimir.

Once the guests had all departed, Stalin would retreat to his study and read until the early hours. A portrait of Lenin hung above his desk, a lamp illuminating his face. He loved reading Russian novels, often scribbling comments in the margins. If he couldn’t get to sleep he would slip out into the garden, prune his roses, and admire the peacocks that wandered through the grounds.

When he finally returned to the house, he didn’t decide which room he would sleep in until the last moment, unable to shake off past memories of being a young revolutionary, always on the move, never certain where he was going to rest. He would then grab a few hours’ sleep on a sofa, the door locked and his guards outside, who would never unlock the door until he called. Stalin rarely rose before midday, when, after a light lunch, no drink, he would be driven from his dacha to the Kremlin in a convoy, but never in the same car. When he arrived, he immediately set to work with his six secretaries. I never once saw him yawn.