John LeCarre - A New Collection of Three Novels Part 25

"What is it?"

"Do you think you could give Magnus a message for me--a friendly one?"

"What is it?"

"Tell him any time--when it's over--any place. I'll be there as his friend."

With a nod Brotherhood climbed into the taxi and rode away before Lederer could hear his destination.

What Lederer did next should go into history, if not into the larger history of the Pym affair then at least into his own exasperating personal chronicle of seeing everything with perfect vision and being repeatedly dismissed as an unwelcome prophet. Lederer struggled into a phone box intending to call Carver, only to discover he had no English coins. He dived into the Mulberry Arms, fought his way to the bar and bought a beer he did not want in order to have change. He returned to the phone box to find it didn't work, so he pelted back down the road in search of his driver, who, having watched Lederer march by with Brotherhood, had a.s.sumed he was no longer required and had driven home to Battersea where he had a friend. At nine o'clock, Lederer burst in upon Carver at the U.S. Emba.s.sy, where Carver was drafting a signal on the day's events.

"They're lying!" Lederer shouted.

"Who are?"

"The f.u.c.king Brits! Pym's flown the coop. They don't know where he is from the man in the f.u.c.king moon. I asked Brotherhood to pa.s.s him this totally subversive message and he sweet-mouthed me to keep me off the track. Pym jumped ship at London Airport and they're looking for him the same way we are. Those Czech radio transmissions are kosher. The Brits are looking for him, we're looking for him. And the f.u.c.king Czechs are looking for him all over. Listen to me!"

Carver had listened. Carver continued to listen. He took Lederer through his conversation with Brotherhood and concluded it should not have taken place and that Lederer had exceeded his competence. He did not say this to Lederer but he made a note of it, and later that night in a separate telegram to the Agency's personnel people he took care that this note was added to Lederer's file. At the same time he accepted that Lederer might well have stumbled upon the truth, even if by the wrong route, and said this also. Thus Carver covered his back all ways, while at the same time knifing an unpleasing interloper. Never bad.

"The British are not playing this straight," he confided to people he knew at the top. "I am going to have to watch this very carefully."

The Headmaster's study smelt of killing bottles. Mr. Caird, though he hated violence, was a pa.s.sionate lepidopterist. A grim portrait of our founder G. F. Grimble glowered down on cracked leather chairs. In one of them sat Tom. Brotherhood sat opposite'him. Tom was looking at the photograph from the Langley folder on Petz-Hampel-Zaworski. Brotherhood was looking at Tom. Mr. Caird had shaken Brotherhood's hand and left them to it.

"That the one who walked your dad round the cricket ground in Corfu?" said Brotherhood, watching Tom.

"Yes, sir."

"You weren't far wrong with your description then, were you?"

"No, sir."

"I thought you'd be amused."

"I am."

"He doesn't limp in the photograph, so he doesn't look so hobbly. Had any more letters from your dad? Phone calls?"

"No, sir."

"Written to him?"

"Don't know where to send it, sir."

"Why don't you give it to me?"

Tom delved inside his grey pullover and unearthed a sealed envelope with no name or address on it. Brotherhood took it from him and took back the photograph too.

"That inspector fellow hasn't been back to trouble you, has he?"

"No, sir."

"Anyone else been?"

"Not really, sir."

"What does that mean?"

"It's just so odd you coming tonight."

"Why?"

"It's maths prep," said Tom. "It's my worst thing."

"I expect you'd like to get back to it then." He took Pym's crushed letter from his pocket and handed it across the gap. "Thought you might like this back, too. It's a fine letter. You should be proud."

"Thank you, sir."

"Your dad talks there about an Uncle Syd. Who's that? 'If you're ever down on your luck,' he says, 'or if you need a warm meal and a laugh or a bed for the night, don't forget your Uncle Syd.' Who's Uncle Syd, when he's at home?"

"Syd Lemon, sir."

"Where does he live?"

"Surbiton, sir. By a railway."

"Old man, is he? Youngish?"

"He looked after Dad when he was small. He was a friend of Granddad's. He's got a wife called Meg but she's dead."

They both stood up.

"Dad's still all right, isn't he, sir?" said Tom.

Brotherhood's shoulders stiffened. "You're to go to your mother, d'you hear? Your mother or me. No one else. That's if things get tough." He pulled an old leatherbound box from his jacket pocket. "This is for you."

Tom opened it. A medal lay inside with a piece of ribbon attached to it--crimson with narrow dark blue stripes on either side.

"What did you get it for?" said Tom.

"Sticking out dark nights alone." A bell was ringing. "Now run along and do your job," said Brotherhood.

The night was foul. Gusts of rain tore across the windscreen as Brotherhood negotiated the narrow lane. The car was a souped-up Ford from the Firm's pool and he had only to stroke the accelerator for it to lunge towards the hedge. Magnus Pym, he thought: traitor and Czech spy. If I know, why don't they? How many times, in how many ways, do they need the proof before they act on it? A pup loomed suddenly out of the rain. He pulled into the forecourt and drank a scotch before going to the phone. Call me on my private line, old boy, Nigel had said expansively.

"The man in the picture is our friend from Corfu. No question about it," Brotherhood reported.

"You're sure?"

"I'm sure. The boy's sure. I'm sure he's sure. When are you going to give the order to evacuate?"

A m.u.f.fled crackle while Nigel put his fist over the mouthpiece the other end. But not, presumably, the earpiece.

"I want those Joes out, Nigel. Get them out. Tell Bo to get his head out of the sand and give the order."

Long silence.

"We're tuning in at 0500 tomorrow," said Nigel. "Come back to London and get some sleep." He rang off.

London was east. Brotherhood headed south, following the signs to Reading. In every operation there is an above the line and a below the line. Above the line is what you do by the book. Below the line is how you do the job.

The letter to Tom was postmarked Reading, he rehea.r.s.ed. Posted Monday night or first thing Tuesday morning.

He rang me on Monday evening, Kate had said.

He rang me on Monday evening, Belinda had said.

Reading station resembled a low redbrick stable set at one end of a tawdry square. A poster in the concourse gave the times of coaches to and from Heathrow. That's what you did, he thought. That's what I'd do. At Heathrow you put up your smokescreen about planes to Scotland, then you hopped a coach to Reading to keep things nice and private. He considered the coach stop, then cast a long slow look around the square until his eye fell at last on the ticket kiosk. He wandered over to it. The clerk wore a small metal wheel in the b.u.t.tonhole of his jacket. Brotherhood put five pounds in the tray.

"I'd like some change, please, to telephone."

"Sorry, mate. Can't do," the clerk said, and went on with his newspaper.

"You could do it last Monday night though, couldn't you?" The clerk's head came up fast.

Brotherhood's office pa.s.s was green with a red diagonal line drawn in transparent ink across his photograph. A notice on the back said that if found it should be returned to the Ministry of Defence. The clerk looked at both sides of it and gave it back.

"I haven't seen one like that before," he said.

"Tall fellow," Brotherhood said. "Carried a black briefcase. Probably wore a black tie as well. Well spoken, nice manner. Had a lot of calls to make. Remember?"

The clerk vanished, to be replaced a minute later by a tubby Indian with exhausted, visionary eyes.

"Were you on duty here Monday evening?" Brotherhood said.

"Sir, I was the man who was on duty on Monday evening," he replied warily, as if he might not be that man any more.

"A pleasant gentleman in a black tie."

"I know, I know. My colleague has acquainted me with all the details."

"How much change did you give him?"

"Good heavens above, what does that matter? If I elect to give a man change, that is my personal preference, a matter for my pocket and my conscience that has nothing to do with anybody."

"How much change did you give him?"

"Five pounds exactly. Five he wanted, five he got."

"What in?"

"Fifty p's exclusively. He wished to make no local calls at all. I questioned him about this and he was entirely consistent in his answers, I mean where is the hardship in this? Where is the sinister element?"

"What did he pay you with?"

"To my recollection, he gave me a ten-pound note. I cannot be completely certain but that is my imperfect recollection: that he gave me a ten-pound note from his wallet, accompanied by the words 'Here you are.'"

"Did the ten pounds cover his rail ticket too?"

"This was totally unproblematical. The price of a second-cla.s.s single fare to London is four pounds and thirty pence exactly. I gave him ten fifties and the balance in small change. Now have you further questions? I seriously hope not. Police, police, you know. If it's one enquiry a day, it's half a dozen."

"Is this the man?" said Brotherhood. He was holding a photograph showing Pym and Mary at their wedding.

"But that is you, sir. In the background. I think you are giving the bride away. Are you sure you are engaged in an official enquiry? This is a most irregular photograph."

"Is this the man?"

"Well I'm not saying it is not, put it that way."

Pym would take him off perfectly, thought Brotherhood. Pym would catch that accent to a tee. He stood at the barrier studying the timetable of trains leaving Reading station after eleven o'clock on a weekday night. You went anywhere except to London because London is where you bought your ticket to. You had time. Time to make your maudlin telephone calls. Time to write your maudlin letter to Tom. Your plane left Heathrow at eight-forty without you. By eight o'clock latest you had done your turnaround. By eight-fifteen, according to the testimony of the airport travel clerk, you had put up your little smokescreen about planes to Scotland. After that you hightailed it to the Reading-bound coach, pulled down the brim of your hat and said goodbye to the airport as quickly and quietly as you knew how.

Brotherhood walked back to the coach timetable. Time to kill, he repeated to himself. Say you caught the eight-thirty from Heathrow. Between nine- and ten-thirty there were half a dozen trains in both directions out of Reading but you caught none of them. You wrote to Tom instead. Where from? He went back to the square. In the neon-lit pub there. In the fish-and-chip shop. In the all-night cafe where the tarts sit. Somewhere in this dowdy square you sat down and told Tom what to do when the world ended.

The telephone box stood at the station entrance, under a bright light that was supposed to deter vandals. Smashed gla.s.s and paper cups cluttered the floor. Graffiti and promises of love defaced the awful grey paint. But it was a good telephone, for all that. You could watch the whole square from it while you said your goodbyes. A mail box was let into the wall close by. And that's where you posted it, saying whatever happens, remember that I love you. After which you went to Wales. Or to Scotland. Or you popped over to Norway to watch the migration of the reindeer. Or you hightailed it to Canada and prepared to eat out of tins. Or you did something that was all these things and none of them, in an upstairs room with a view of the church and the sea.

Reaching his flat in Shepherd Market, Brotherhood was still not quite done. The Firm's official police contact was a Detective Superintendent Bellows at Scotland Yard. Brotherhood rang his home number.

"What have you got for me on that enn.o.bled gentleman I mentioned to you this morning?" he asked, and to his relief detected no note of reservation in Bellows's voice as he read him out the details. Brotherhood wrote them down.

"Can you do me another one for tomorrow?"

"It'll be a pleasure."

"Lemon, believe it or not. First name Syd or Sydney. Old chap, widowed, lives in Surbiton, close to a railway."

Reluctantly Brotherhood phoned Head Office and asked for Nigel of Secretariat. Belatedly, and in the teeth of more larcenous instincts, he knew he must conform. Just as he had conformed this afternoon when he poured scorn on the Americans. Just as in the end he had always conformed, not out of slavishness but because he believed in the fight and, despite everything, the team. A lot of atmospherics followed while Nigel was located. They went over to scramble.

"What's the matter?" said Nigel rudely.

"The book Artelli was talking about. The a.n.a.logue, he called it."

"I thought he was perfectly ridiculous. Bo is going to take it to the highest level."

"Tell them to try Grimmelshausen's Simplicissimus. On a hunch. Tell them to be sure to use an early text."

A long silence. More atmospherics. He's in the bath, thought Brotherhood. He's in bed with a woman, or whatever he likes.

"Now how are you spelling that?" said Nigel warily.