Lyons shrugged.
“Wells, answer the man’s question, damn you? What’s the Gay-Pay-Doodah?”
Wells stared at Duranty coldly but he, too, said nothing.
“Mr Fischer?”
Fischer opened and shut his mouth, a goldfish out of his bowl. The two women stared at the floor. Oumansky gazed fixedly out of the window. Framed against the last rays of the sun, a stallion galloped alongside the train, its mane on fire.
The illusion was broken when the train crossed a bridge over a swollen river. Below the train tracks, two men, monolith-still, were lost in their fishing. In the dying light the pasture gave way to a forest of silver birch, bone pale, continuing without end.
Duranty studied Oumansky’s absorption in the coming darkness and then, winking at Jones, said, “it seems you’ve asked the very best kind of a question, one that no-one wants to answer.”
“And, you, Duranty,” said Jones, “if I were to ask you point blank what the GPU is, what would say?”
The carriage lights, small but beautifully cut chandeliers, came back on.
“Out loud I’d tell you it’s like the Mothers’ Union,” he said, his voice a languid drawl.
Jones smiled straight back at Duranty and said, “Like the Mother’s Union, eh? I see.”
That was the first moment when Duranty had a glimmer that this young man might be trouble. “Little Owl, are you making mischief with me?”
“Not at all,” said Jones. Outside, the silver birches marched into the night – but, caught in the reflection from the window, he saw Evgenia’s eyes flash in delight.
“I’d still like to know about this GPU,” said Jones.
Duranty’s voice dropped a register. “I’ll answer your question. First, during the Revolution, Lenin’s armed fist was called the Cheka, short form for the Extraordinary Commission. Cheka, in English, would be Exco, a nice cold hard ring to it. They mean business and some. In the early ‘20s, after perhaps too many people got shot, they rebranded the Cheka the Gay-Pay-Oo, the State Political Directorate. Now, officially, it’s the OGPU. It stands for the Joint State blah-blah, but everybody still calls it the Gay-Pay-Oo or the Three Letters – or, best of all, because it’s never really changed, the Cheka, the officers the Chekists. They’re the political police and their job is to keep the Soviet show on the road while every capitalist on the planet is out to wreck it. They’re based in the Lubyanka. In the old days, under the Tsar, it was an insurance company. Now they insure against the defeat of Communism. They can be rough, too rough, but the way they see it, they’re fighting a war and one they have no certainty of winning.” His eyes narrowed a fraction. Then he donned his sardonic mask again and his voice returned to normal. “But have you come all this way to pick holes in the great Soviet experiment, Little Owl? Two thousand miles from London is a long way to travel just to play the bourgeois wrecker, no?”
Jones turned back from the silver birch and shook his head. “No. I was a reporter in the valleys when the mineworkers struck for months in 1926. The Conservatives were cruel, Winston Churchill a total bastard.”
The engine whistle blew sorrowfully, mourning the dusk.
“In Maerdy pit they lasted until 1927. The pit village was so left wing, the hatred for the mineowners so strong, the locals called it Little Moscow. The day they tried to go back to work,” Jones continued, “it soon became apparent that the mine bosses had played a dirty trick. Most men could return. But some had lost their jobs for good. Naturally, there was trouble, not just from the men who’d gone back to work only to discover they’d been sacked. A young lad, no more than fourteen, he found a steel pole and tried to jam it in the wheel of a police van. Somehow, he slipped. The police van stopped because others were throwing stones at it. It started to reverse. The young lad didn’t stand a chance. He couldn’t get out of the way in time and it ran him over… There and then, I decided to read Das Kapital. After that, I knew I had to come to Big Moscow, to the Soviet Union, to see this noble experiment for myself.”
“You mentioned Churchill, Jones,” said Duranty, softly. “He sent British soldiers to join the Whites in 1918 to crush the revolution, to help the counter-revolutionaries. That’s why the Soviet Union has got to have the Cheka or something like it. You can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs. And I’m afraid to say, you can’t break eggs without the use of force.”
Jones nodded. The train slowed down to something approaching walking pace, allowing a man and a woman on a horse-driven cart to overtake them. Duranty gestured to the cart riding alongside.
“Progress, Jones, means the railway over the horse and cart. But progress can be painful.” He smacked his left leg below the knee and it gave off a soft wooden thunk. “Lost my leg below the knee in a train wreck. Hurts like hell sometimes, especially in the cold and wet. But that’s how life is. No pain, no progress.”
Swigging back the last of his champagne with a flourish, he poured himself a fresh glass and topped up Jones’. Outside, the cart pulled off on a diagonal tack and slid into the night.
“That said,” Duranty continued, “these people here are fighting like tigers to make the world a better, fairer place and there are so many powerful forces out to stop them. It goes against the grain to watch them bullied out of their dream. Perhaps going to Harrow makes me want to help Stalin & Co. Something about cricket, fair play, makes me stand up for the Soviet experiment. I’m not a passionate believer. But I’m on their side.”
The train went over some roughly-laid track. Swaying, they sipped their champagne in a comradely silence, broken only by a tinkling from the chandeliers.
“Jones, you were asking about the Cheka,” said Duranty. “You’ve had the theory, now here’s the practice.”
With a very slight tilt of his head, he gestured towards two men coming down the carriage towards the party. The first was roughly the same age as Jones, shorter than average, shaggy-haired, wearing a blue suit, white shirt and red tie. In poor light, Jones and the newcomer could easily be mistaken for each other.
The second was the fat officer who had, scant hours before, pointed his revolver at Jones.
Jones’ double introduced himself as “Colonel Leonid Ivanovich Zakovsky.” His voice was high-pitched, the squeal of a piglet on the run from the butcher’s knife. Turning to his deputy, he introduced him as Kapitan Genrikh Samoilovich Lyushkov. Zakovsky then squeaked a long speech in Russian which Evgenia translated, her head askance. “Colonel Zakovsky would like to tender his apologies to you, Mr Jones, for the unfortunate misunderstanding at Kursk station today. But he says you gave the impression that you were a saboteur and he says his deputy Kapitan Lyushkov was right to place the security of Professor Aubyn and the other members of the Moscow press corps first and foremost. We are most grateful to Mr Duranty for his assistance, and Kapitan Lyushkov would like to say that he’s pleased that no harm came to you.”
Lyushkov’s voice was a low rumble. He kneaded the pale dough of his face into a smile.
“He doesn’t sound very pleased that no harm came to me,” said Jones, unhelpfully. “What did he say exactly?”
“It was by way of an apology,” replied Evgenia, guardedly. Duranty chuckled to himself. Now Zakovsky was squeaking again and Evgenia translated. “Colonel Zakovsky says that you, Mr Jones, are most welcome to the Soviet Union and he hopes that your time in our great country will be fruitful for both parties.”
As Zakovsky moved forward, Jones stood up and the two men shook hands. Then Zakovsky spoke some more, his tone less friendly. Jones waited for the translation.