'My driver and his mate.'
'Were they Russian or Polish?’
'Russian, I think. I didn't really know them.'
'Then you're too late now.'
They were no use as hostages and I hadn't given any specific instructions about what should be done with them afterwards, happened in the courtyard, you've got a flat tyre, and they'd got out to look. A night for flats but we were still running all right, making good time.
'I can get you a reduced sentence, you know. I've quite a lot of influence.'
'Oh balls.'
The bridge was clear, stuff crawling in both directions, a hole in the balustrade where the Mercedes had spun, the gravel making dirty brown streaks on the late snow. Foster said something, ought to be sure what I was doing, something like that, but I wasn't listening because there was so much to think about and I didn't want to make a mistake although with a set-up this sensitive a mistake was almost guaranteed and it wouldn't have to be a big one, just a slip and she'd blow.
There were some police cars when we reached the Commissariat and the steps were cordoned off. Just before we pulled up I said:
'Don't forget the situation, will you?' He didn't answer but sat there squinting at me and I got a bit worried that he'd do something awkward simply because this wasn't his kind of terrain; for instance you can't stop a charging bull by pointing a gun at it because it doesn't know what the thing is. 'You've got to look after Voskarev and the only way you can do it is to look after me.'
He leaned forward, the alcohol on his breath. 'There are so many aspects you haven't considered. They make it all so dangerous for you. So impossible.’
'Just be careful. For his sake.' I opened the door and he followed me out. 'Get those bods out of here. Tell them it was a false alarm.'
He stood perfectly still.
'Was it?'
'Of course.'
He looked so relieved that I think he would have done whatever I asked just from gratitude. One of them came up to us, captain's insignia, and Foster showed him his card absolute assurance incorrectly informed, no explosives, personal responsibility, so forth. Then we passed through the cordon and went into the building and the contusions started throbbing again because the very acute fear that he might chance it and hand me over had dominated physical pain.
When, we were going up in the lift I heard the bomb-disposal team in the basement being told to pull out. Foster stood idly watching the wall sliding downwards on the other side of the gates. His breathing had become heavy, the only sign that he was disurbed. There was a city-wide search going on and he'd just passed me through a cordon and he hadn't liked that.
It was the big double-windowed room at the end of the third floor and he used his key and I told him to go in first, then I followed.
Define, infiltrate, destroy. I had defined and was now infiltrating.
I picked up the phone and told them the situation was in hand and that I'd be phoning at fifteen-minute intervals.
Foster got his keys out but I took them from him: there could be a gun in a drawer and I was going to be too busy to stop him playing about.
'We really ought to discuss the position you're in, old boy. You'd thank me, later.'
'Take that chair over there and sit on it.'
Three reasons for utmost haste: Given enough time I knew that Foster could out-think me. The sector was still bright red until I could get him to my own base. Merrick or the guard at the Hotel Cracow might telephone the Commissariat to ask if things were all right and if I answered their call they'd want to speak to Foster and I'd have to let them or they'd know things weren't all right and he'd use an alert-phrase and I wouldn't be able to stop him.
The safe came open with the two keys on the separate ring of Voskarev's bunch and I began with the top metal drawer because it was logical to file recent and current material highest.
Most of the stuff was in Russian but none of it encoded and I went for main headings and serial numbered collations and found one specific document summarising the whole of the operation under sections Preliminary Evidence — Prima Facie — Integration of Testimonies — Dossier of Accused — Summary of Charges.
The name N. K. N. Voskarev appeared throughout with the title of Chief of Enquiry and the name of Colonel A. S. Foster began appearing on the reports dated later than January 16 which was the day he'd flown in from Moscow. Two other names were featured.
My senses were atrophying to a slight degree: the sound of the traffic seemed muffled and the light in here was keyed lower. Quite normal, the effect of sudden concentration as the typed symbols jumped and the mind span, incapable of containing this scale of significance.
Movement and my eyes flicked but he was only crossing his legs. In reflex I said softly:
'Sit still.'
I was looking again at the document.
So here it was: the programme I'd sensed was running in the silence and in the dark, smooth and massive and perfectly engineered, designed to protect the East-West talks from abortive collapse in the event of insurgence by the people of Poland and subsequent control of the capital by armed force under the provisions of the Warsaw Pact.
Precis: a special tribunal to be convened in Moscow for the immediate trial of a Western agent sent into Warsaw for the express purpose of activating the interests of an international imperialist conspiracy. Indictment: inciting dissension and revolt, providing clandestine liaison with Western factions, conveying assurances of diplomatic support from capitalist powers.
The trial to be attended by international correspondents with all facilities required to make manifest the guilt of the accused and the gravity of his acts.
A show trial on the Garry Powers scale with a scapegoat dragged into the limelight and butchered on the block of political expedience. A man with two names.
P. K. Longstreet, alias Karl Dollinger.
'There's nothing,' I heard Foster saying, 'you can do about it. Because you can't leave Poland.'
I went through the rest of the drawers.
He was standing behind me.
'Get over there and sit down, damn you.'
Angry because I'd let him move without my seeing him. Postpone all thoughts about the document until the sector was green, otherwise highly dangerous.
'I'm not going to do anything, old boy.' But he couldn't get his tone right. ‘We're alone here, and there might not be another chance like this. We can talk the whole thing over and do a deal on the quiet. I'll accept your word and you can accept mine. Give me a brief confession and I can arrange that you won't get more than three years, good conduct, special remission, you know the drift. Otherwise it's for life. Now do be sensible.'
I tugged at the last drawer but it was locked and I had to open it with one of Voskarev's keys. Then they were in my hand: 35mm strip of negs and a set of prints. I'd always thought it was how they'd done it, with photographs.
The streets looked different but not because of the new snowfalclass="underline" there weren't so many people about and the traffic was thinning; between Praga and the city centre there was a darkened car standing at almost every intersection. Those who didn't want to be involved were keeping indoors and those who were waiting for midnight were lying low.
No one stopped us: the car carried police-plates.
There'd been a briefcase in the office and I'd cleared it out and refilled it with the stuff I wanted and it was on the carpeted floor with Voskarev's. The main document was on my lap and I leafed through it because there might be a chance to summarise the key facts in signals before I had a go at breaking a frontier. That would be when they'd get me, if I reached that far. Voskarev was working satisfactorily as a hostage but there was a deadline on that: he and Foster weren't officially involved in the counter-insurgent operations but they were in liaison with the police divisions and they'd be reported as missing, any time now.