‘Of course you do,’ agreed Eduard. ‘Just be quick, OK?’
For a moment Natalia stood looking down at Eduard. Then she turned, quickly, and followed Kapitsa out. Once inside his office, the man lit yet another cigarette and said: ‘It’s difficult to know what to do: what to suggest. I can’t see how we can take him out of the case and still proceed against the others. That’s my problem.’
Natalia decided that Kapitsa was honest according to the convoluted standards of bygone Russian bureaucracy, disdaining blatant bribery but prepared to compromise and make deals with people he considered to be in the same business, linked by a professional freemasonry. She halted at the thought. Was it really a bygone time? Or still the way Russia operated, despite the supposed second revolution? ‘I need time. There is a lot to consider: to be worked out.’
‘I can leave it to you, to come up with something?’ The man sounded relieved.
Natalia nodded. ‘Have you filed an official Militia report?’
Now Kapitsa smiled, believing he understood the significance of the question. ‘Only provisionally. No identities. Technically the investigation is continuing.’ He examined the end of his lighted cigarette, as if it were important.
‘So there are no names, on any official document?’ persisted Natalia.
‘No.’
‘Could I have a copy?’
‘Of course.’ He burrowed into the paper mountain, producing a case report surprisingly quickly.
‘I’ll be in touch very soon,’ promised Natalia. ‘It must be handled properly: to everyone’s satisfaction.’
‘That’s exactly what I want,’ assured Kapitsa.
Natalia slumped in the back of the Zil returning her to Yasenevo, head forward on her chest, totally absorbed in the new crisis, but thinking beyond it. How good was Tudin’s personal spy network? A question she couldn’t answer. But she’d taken an official car to the Militia headquarters. And very openly announced it to her secretariat, as she left. So she had to assume he would learn about it from those sources, if he had no others. Which he probably did. She would have liked to have somebody else with whom to talk it through: somebody whose mind would have been less cluttered by conflicting loyalties and doubts.
The reflection inevitably brought her thoughts to Charlie, who’d had the quickest and most analytical brain she’d ever known. Charlie, who’d always been able to consider things from every angle: see the dangers that no one else could… The reminiscence was never finished, blocked by something else.
The memory was abrupt and totally illogical – a bizarre trick of her mind – and physically startled her into coming bolt-upright from the way she had been sitting. But it was there: all she wanted. The unformed recollection that had refused to come after her conference confrontation with Fyodor Tudin filled her mind with utter and complete clarity. She could remember the words: even what she’d been wearing and what they had been doing. It had been here, in Moscow, long before he’d had to leave, disappointing her for the first time. It had been a caviare celebration, at Mytninskaya, for no better reason or excuse than their happiness together. Perhaps it was the association of Eduard and Mytninskaya that had finally prompted the memory. Or the fact that they’d eaten caviare, because it was that which caused Charlie’s seemingly innocuous conversation. About his mother being in a home for the elderly near the most famous salmon-fishing river in England: in England, not Scotland. And he’d recounted an anecdote of English privilege, about a fishing club so exclusive it had first call upon the town’s best hotel, ahead of the general public.
Natalia became aware of the driver’s attention, in the rear-view mirror, and settled back upon the cushions again.
She had it, she told herself. The way to find him, providing his mother was still alive. And she’d already put in place the operation to make it happen.
Which still left the crisis of Eduard.
John Gower did not, after all, venture out into Beijing on the fourth day, remembering the edict about escape routes.
Airline reservations need not be in the names recorded on the passport, so under false identities Gower made confirmed bookings on direct London flights for the sixth day, leaving the intervening twenty-four hours to contact the priest. As protective insurance against any additional delay that he could not, at that moment, anticipate he repeated the reservations, under other different names, on the two succeedings days.
It had been the uneventful visits to the Forbidden City and Coal Hill that convinced him it would be pointless going to the Taoist temple without activating the system: not to do so would be putting the positive commitment off, which practically amounted to cowardice. The next day he’d trigger the signal and then fill the already chosen lion figure on the hill, to complete the routine.
And wait for Snow to come to him at the embassy.
According to the London briefing, Snow had been told to check at three-day intervals, but Gower didn’t have a starting-point for his count, so he had to allow that full period for the priest to respond. He remained momentarily unsure whether he could chance the reservations so soon or whether to extend over several more days. No need for an immediate decision, he decided: if Snow didn’t appear, bookings could still be made. For the moment he could leave things as they were.
That night he accepted the dinner invitation from the Nicholsons. Jane agreed at once and enthusiastically to shop for the cheongsam. After an animated discussion, he chose blue for the colour and said he thought her sizing would fit Marcia. He hoped Marcia’s underwear wouldn’t be quite so obvious if she ever did wear it.
Jeremy Snow grew increasingly frustrated as he monitored the constantly empty signal spot by the temple, until finally he began to think London had taken him at his word and withdrawn, ending their relationship.
Most frustrating of all was the acceptance that there was nothing he could do, to restore things as they had been before; as he wanted them to be again. Walter Foster had gone and London had clearly not appointed a successor. Which left him in a vacuum, with no one at the embassy he could approach to try to put things right. His very dilemma showed the stupidity of the system that London had insisted upon, and Foster adhered to, so rigidly.
Snow followed the too familiar route by the temple, seeking the signal that wasn’t there, and afterwards walked almost for a further hour before going back to the mission to rid himself of the anger. He still got there before noon.
‘Have you seen the People’s Daily ’? greeted Father Robertson. ‘The dissident arrests have started in Beijing.’
Snow took the offered newspaper, at first not properly concentrating. And then he did. There was a photograph of three manacled men being led from a police van. One of them was Zhang Su Lin, his underground information source and English-language student until a year ago.
For the first time Snow felt a bubble of genuine uncertainty. It became difficult for him to breathe properly, although not bad enough for any medication.
Thirty
‘You could have done something with yourself, you could. Been a doctor. Went to grammar school, didn’t you!’
‘Yes, mum.’ Charlie was surprised how well she was holding on to reality today. And had been, for weeks now.
‘What do you do? I forget.’
‘Clerk, in a government office.’
‘Girl’s job,’ dismissed the woman, scornfully. The rear of the bed had been cranked up, to put her in a sitting position. She wore the knitted bedcoat Charlie had bought the previous Christmas over her nightdress, and one of the nurses had carefully crimped and prepared her hair she way she liked it done. She smelled of lavender, her favourite. He’d have to remember that, next Christmas.
‘Get a lot of holidays,’ said Charlie, letting the conversation run, most of his mind elsewhere, conducting the private debate about his Regent’s Park discovery.