I read through the rest of the article. It dragged up a number of left-wing remarks made by Lines during the course of his career, analysed his Cambridge education and the left-wing society with which he mixed at the time, and attempted to link the situation with the Philby/Blunt affair of 1980 but without actually producing any concrete evidence. I looked up at Fifeshire.
‘There’s more to come,’ he said.
‘Tell me.’
‘Whisky?’
I nodded assent and we sat down with hefty tumblers of Scotch: Glenfiddich, what else?
‘I received a telephone call from a gentleman with whom you are familiar,’ he said, ‘one Harold Wetherby. He’s involved in this whole thing up to his neck and wants to bargain a lot of knowledge he claims to have in return for a pardon. He’s terrified he’s about to be bumped off at any moment. I’ve had a word with the Prime Minister; no one’s happy about granting any pardons since all the flak of that business of the Blunt affair, and I’ve told him so. Anyhow, he’s flying over to London tonight to tell all and to throw himself at our mercy.
‘This is really the most extraordinary affair. The one man I just do not understand is Unwin: I can’t believe he’s mixed up in this but the way the muck’s going to hit the fan during the next few days we’re all going to have to brace ourselves for a lot more shocks yet.’
‘Unwin’s innocent,’ I said. ‘He was murdered. I’m certain of that; and I’m responsible. I knew there was at least one mole in Washington but I didn’t know who for sure. I suspected both Wetherby and Hicks. I telephoned Unwin and gave him a message that wouldn’t have made much sense to him. I told him I was going to reveal the identity of the Pink Envelope to the press unless I was paid 100,000 dollars in cash at a secret rendezvous. I figured that Unwin would be bound to discuss this message with Hicks and Wetherby, along with the other members of his senior staff. To make sure, I leaked the news of my message to Moscow. I knew that the mole in Washington was in regular communication with the Pink Envelope and I was sure that in the light of everything that had been going on, the Pink Envelope wouldn’t leave it to anyone else to deal with the matter this time, but would come over himself. The Envelope obviously instructed someone at Washington to bump off Unwin before he could have a chance to talk too much and to ensure he didn’t show up in New York himself. I was certain that the Envelope was Scatliffe and I don’t understand what Lines was doing in New York.’
‘Lines and Scatliffe went over together. They took different flights but met up when they got there. Both were scared witless and wouldn’t let the other out of sight any more. Wetherby told me. You’ll also be interested to learn that Hicks has disappeared. Scatliffe, Wetherby and Lines went to a call box together to call the blackmailer — presumably you — and then Lines insisted ongoing off to the meeting with the blackmailer alone. When Lines didn’t return, Scatliffe got scared and bolted.’ He paused. ‘Why did you kill Lines?’
‘I thought he was Scatliffe. I set the trap for Scatliffe and Lines walked into it. I could have stopped him but I’d gone so far I felt I had to go on.’
‘I don’t follow,’ said Fifeshire.
‘Somebody’s tried to kill me most days for the past couple of weeks — I told you that when we met in the Clinic. I was certain that Scatliffe was at the back of it but I had no evidence. I was certain too that Wetherby was involved, and others, possibly many others, but I didn’t know who. After I left you I found out more evidence; you were the only person I could trust to tell it to but if I’d gone back to you, your next step would have been to have reported the matter to your superior: and that would have been Lines, and you and I would be 6 feet under right now — unless Lines was innocent.’
‘Both Scatliffe and Lines have the sterling equivalent of 50,000 dollars each missing from their bank accounts. Both withdrawals were made on Friday. Lines wasn’t innocent. Go on.’
‘Right, the only thing I could do was to try and flush out the Pink Envelope, get him to turn up with some evidence to implicate him. Having done that, I would have to kill him if I was to have any chance of ever getting back alive to tell the tale. And in my heart of hearts I felt that by killing him I might just start off a chain reaction.’
‘That you have certainly done. But you took one hell of a risk.’
‘You don’t have to tell me, sir,’ I smiled — for the first time in a long time.
‘The next few days are going to be interesting, very interesting,’ said Fifeshire.
‘There are two mysteries I want to resolve: the first concerns Orchnev; and the second, the girl I was going out with who just suddenly disappeared off the face of the earth.’
‘Could her name be Mary-Ellen Joffe?’ Fifeshire grinned.
‘How the hell do you know?’
‘I’ll tell you in a minute. Tell me what you want to know about Orchnev; he started this whole damn thing off, or so it seems.’
‘He did, certainly. What I haven’t told you accurately, sir, is how he died.’
‘I understand you shot him — thought he was an intruder — that’s what you told the New York police at any rate.’
‘Right. But I didn’t shoot him. He shot himself.’
Fifeshire looked puzzled and I told him the story of exactly what did happen. At the end of it he nodded his head. ‘It makes sense,’ he said.
‘I’m glad it does to someone,’ I replied, ‘because it’s been baffling the hell out of me. He came to see me because someone must have told him to come and see me — but that’s as far as I can get. Going back historically, Orchnev originally wrote to you. Scatliffe, Hicks and Wetherby between them intercepted these letters and they never reached you. They didn’t want you to know Orchnev wanted to defect because they didn’t want him spilling any beans and blowing open the whole communications system between the KGB and the US. So they tried to kill you to get you out of the way; they didn’t succeed in killing you but they disabled you sufficiently so that you were no longer a threat. But why did they send Orchnev along to me and why did he kill himself in front of me?’
‘Orchnev was in New York eighteen months ago. He went over on a holiday; being a senior Party member he was trusted enough to be allowed to holiday alone. He had access to information vital to an operation MI6 were planning so they thought they’d have a go at him while he was in the States. They set a girl up as bait and he went for her. They dated a few times, she seduced him, but instead of her getting anything out of him, he went and fell madly in love with her. The only thing that stopped him defecting in order to live with her right there and then was his wife and three children in Russia. So very reluctantly he returned to Russia.
‘Six months later his wife and children were wiped out in a car crash. It appears to have been a genuine accident — we don’t think he fixed it. A couple of months passed, then this girl started to receive passionate love letters from him. She was instructed to respond equally passionately. She did. Her letters prompted Orchnev to make his decision to defect. He had nothing to live for in Russia any more; he had this gorgeous girl who was head-over-heels in love with him in New York. So he wrote to the head of the Soviet division of the CIA and sent the letter via a courier friend at the British Embassy, who passed it to MI6.
‘Having got their hands on the letter, MI6, who wanted Orchnev themselves, faked a reply to Orchnev from the CIA telling him that the CIA were not interested in his deal because they were scared of damaging some delicate negotiations they were having with Moscow, but said they had discussed the matter with the British who would be prepared to accept him, subject to being satisfied that he could and would provide worthwhile information. He agreed to this on the proviso that he could firstly come to New York and that there was some hope that at a later date the US might permit him residency. So MI6 wrote him a fairly standard letter offering him a new life in exchange for worthwhile information and agreeing to his visiting New York prior to coming to England. It was at this point that the Home Secretary was informed, since when Orchnev arrived in England he would be placed in the hands of MI5. Lines should of course have then immediately instructed me to handle the matter. Lines and Scatliffe should have told the Russians what was happening so that the Russians could prevent Orchnev from leaving, but this would have given the game away that there was a leak our end. It would be much easier for them if I was out of the way and they saw this as a good time to get rid of me. They would let Orchnev reach New York then bump him off before he had a chance to talk to anyone.