David Oldman - Dusk at Dawn

‘How did you find me?’

‘It wasn’t easy,’ Paul admitted reverting to English. ‘Not that I’ve been looking for long.’

‘What are you doing here?’

‘I might ask you the same question.’

The dim light in the hall lit some decent paintings hanging on the walls and a good carpet on the floor. There was a hall table and a stand for umbrellas and canes. Beneath a coat rack a suitcase stood against the wall. Paul looked at it and smiled at Valentine then walked down the corridor towards a lit room.

‘Well, what are you doing here?’ Valentine repeated.

He hobbled after Paul and stood in the doorway of the drawing room. Lit by table lamps, it looked a comfortable room with a sofa and armchairs placed around a fireplace where a coal fire burned. Oriental rugs covered the floor and books lined a glass-fronted case. A scattering of newspapers and journals lay on an occasional table. The room, Paul thought, displayed taste and some degree of affluence, even if its prosperity was looking a little faded. But then much of Prague looked the same way.

‘I had some business here,’ Paul said, taking off his coat and laying it over the back of a chair. ‘In Prague, I mean.’

‘Business?’

‘Oh, you know, the usual thing.’

Valentine limped towards the fire and dropped into an armchair with a grunt.

‘Drinks,’ he said. ‘On the sideboard.’ He waved his cane towards a tray and decanters. ‘Help yourself. Mine’s a cognac, and a big one. You’re a bit of a shock, I don’t mind telling you.’

‘Did you think I was dead?’

‘Had no idea either way.’

‘I rather thought you were.’

‘Oh?’

Paul poured two drinks, a large one for Valentine and a smaller one for himself. He carried them back to the fire, handed Valentine his glass and sat in one of the other armchairs.

‘I found your coat and hat, you see,’ Paul said. ‘After the train wreck outside Omsk. There was blood on it. Besides, no one voluntarily abandons a decent coat in that weather.’

‘Didn’t have much say in the matter,’ said Valentine, gulping down the cognac. ‘Woke up after the crash on one of the trains without it. That’s where I got this.’ He tapped his leg with the cane. ‘It wasn’t too bad to start with. Getting worse the older I get. Tends to play up in cold weather.’

‘Heading for warmer climes, are you? I saw the suitcase.’

Valentine ignored the question. ‘The doctors say there’s still some metal in there. It’s moving around. A memento of Siberia, you might call it.’

‘There’s a rumour that says that’s not the only metal memento you brought out of Russia,’ Paul said.

Valentine stiffened. ‘What do you mean by that?’

‘Don’t worry. That’s not why I’m here.’

‘Oh? Just why are you here? You still haven’t told me.’

‘Looking up old friends,’ Paul said.

Valentine eyed Paul over the top of his glass. ‘You’re still in the business, aren’t you?’

Paul placed his cognac with deliberation on the side table.

‘Good God,’ said Valentine with a guffaw. ‘Who’d have thought it? I was never sure you had it in you. Nor was C for that matter, but he was in a bit of a fix at the time.’

At this distance, Paul found that observation a little rich. If they hadn’t thought he had had it in him, why the devil hadn’t they left him where they’d found him? He might not have been very professional to begin with but it hadn’t been him who had broadcast to all and sundry that he was going to Russia.

Paul was almost certain now that the leak to the Bolsheviks had come through Arthur Ransome. On getting back Paul found that even at the time some at home had suspected the journalist of Bolshevik sympathies. Whether Ransome had deliberately betrayed him, though, or whether he had simply been careless with whom he had talked, Paul was never able to discover. Basil Thompson, the Assistant Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police had arrested and interrogated Ransome but had uncovered no hard evidence against him. Paul thought he hadn’t looked hard enough. Ransome had married Shelepina, Trotsky’s secretary, and she, beyond any doubt had worked for the Comintern. She had even brought jewels out of Russia to help finance its operations.

All water under the bridge now; that most useful of phrases. Too late for recriminations. Ransome, living somewhere in Cumberland, had carved himself a niche in the English character as a writer of children’s books. Beyond reproach.

‘He’s long dead now, I suppose?’ said Valentine.

‘Who?’

‘C.’

‘Cumming? Yes, he dead now. We’ve still got a “C” though, and the ink.’

‘The what?’

‘The green ink.’

When had Cumming died? 1923? A bad heart, they said. Paul saw him after he had got back and he hadn’t looked well then. Not at Whitehall Court, either. What had that steward at his club called the place? The Liberator Building ? It seemed a lifetime ago now. Then he supposed it was. He recalled he’d had the devil of a job finding the SIS office after he’d discovered it was no longer at Whitehall Court. That was the trouble with secret organisations — if they move without telling you, how on earth are you supposed to find them? He’d enlisted Ward’s help in the end and, a few days after their meeting at the House of Commons, Paul had been summoned to a house in Melbury Road in Holland Park. A much more modest establishment than Whitehall Court had been. But that was post-war austerity for you.

He rather suspected Cumming had forgotten who he was. Browning had gone by then and so had Cumming’s secretary, Dorothy Henslowe. The Old Man had cottoned-on quick enough though, and had even managed to drag out Paul’s file and the few desultory pages it held on him. Not much for the best part of three years’ service, he remembered thinking at the time. But then he’d never actually managed to send any information back. He assumed they’d be disappointed with his performance. To the contrary, after several debriefing sessions, they had seemed rather pleased. He’d had to answer all manner of questions on subjects one would have thought of no importance whatsoever, no topic had been too small to pass unmentioned. By the time it had all been noted down, his file had swelled to quite a respectable size. It might even have justified the expense of sending him out in the first place.

Money hadn’t been as readily available by the time Paul returned. In fact Cumming had been obliged to scale down all his operations. The thought of finding himself some mundane job in the City had not appealed to Paul one bit, and earlier he had toyed with the idea of staying in the army. That decision, he found, was not his to make. He may have been a far better soldier in 1922 than he had been in 1918, but he still wasn’t the kind the East Surreys wanted back. Nor any other regiment come to that. With the prospect of a long peace ahead of them, they were all retrenching. Paul had been fortunate that his one area of expertise was Russia. The Bolsheviks being the only prospective enemy on their horizon, Cumming thought he might still be of use. Only bureaucratic work to begin with — trawling through Soviet publications and signal intercepts and the like, compiling reports and assessments… But it had kept the wolf from the door. They had even been able to earn a little extra when Cumming put some translation work Sofya’s way. Just as well since, as he had feared, his mother had managed to work her way through most of the money Cumming had deposited in her account on Paul’s behalf.

‘Did you manage to see any?’ Valentine asked, putting another shovel of coal on the fire.

‘Old friends? Oh, one or two. You know how things are.’