“You ran a network?”
“I was too young. I was a file clerk.”
“But you ran agents in London.”
“I had certain foreigners I kept contact with.”
“Who?”
“I am sure it is in my file. The foreign so-called freedom fighters who had taken refuge in London — the Poles, the Yugoslavs, the French.”
“Did you have contact with an Englishman named Pope-Ginna?”
“I had no contact with the English.” Tarp thought he had scored, however; for the first time there was an edge to Falomin’s voice.
“Did you know Pope-Ginna?”
“No.”
“But you had heard of him.”
“Perhaps. I have some recollection of the name.”
“In what connection?”
“A naval victory, I think. In a very cold place, I do remember that. Colder even than this tomb.” He looked at the gallery with distaste. “It amused me at the time. The English were astonished by stories of the ice. To a Russian it seemed commonplace.”
“I thought you had no contact with the English.”
“In the newspapers, I meant.”
“What you meant was, your English mistress was astonished.”
Falomin stared at him. He blinked. It was like seeing a rock blink, “it is in my file, I suppose,” he said slowly.
“You had a child in England, in fact.”
“It is in the file.”
“Have you ever seen her?”
“I have not left the Soviet Union since I returned in 1946.”
“Isn’t that odd, for a man who controls a worldwide department?”
“I don’t find it odd.”
Tarp was wearing a Russian overcoat, but he had no gloves. He had to keep his hands in the thick pockets, and even then his hands were cold. Outside, the sun was shining, but the museum was frigid. “You know what I am looking for,” he said.
“Naturally.”
“You are the perfect candidate for Maxudov, on paper. You have access to every embassy, every Soviet traveler. You have the organization to cover up a complex operation inside the Soviet Union.”
Falomin still looked like a rock. “What motive have I?” he asked in the same flat voice.
“I wish I knew.”
“Perhaps you would like to suggest some romance about my daughter in England. Or perhaps her mother — love, let us say. Is that what you want to suggest?”
“No.”
“No.” Falomin looked smug. “In fact, all that has been thoroughly checked. Yes? My old mistress has been dead for eleven years; my daughter married a professor and went to Australia in 1967. There is no romance. What is my motive, then?”
“Power.”
Falomin looked contemptuous. “Don’t talk about things you cannot possibly understand. It is a very American habit. You do not understand power. I respect you — I know your background, and I respect you — but I know that you are not a creature of the pack. You are a lone wolf. The creature alone does not understand power. Except his own power, and perhaps in that! envy you, for I have no chance at that. But real power is found only in the pack. Not alone. I am a wolf, too. We are all wolves here. When a wolf gets old or sick, the other wolves turn on him and eat him. Every wolf I eat increases my own power. Until one day I will be eaten. But do not tell me that I have made myself Maxudov in order to increase my power. Maxudov is outside the pack, like you.”
“Maxudov is a loner?”
“If he is one of us, he left the pack or was driven from it. That is Maxudov.”
“That’s an interesting idea.”
Tarp asked questions about plutonium and about submarines. Falomin had a very wide general knowledge and he seemed quite willing to talk. He was either very confident or very daring. The questions quickly became routine. When Tarp stopped to think, Falomin said, “Why did you ask me about the English admiral?”
“That’s my business.”
“I have another recollection of the name. He was adviser to the Argentine government when we sold it a submarine.”
“That wouldn’t seem to fall under your responsibility.”
“Oh, I know many things that don’t fall under my official responsibility. Every wolf in the pack does.”
“What else do you know about Pope-Ginna?”
“I may have a report on him somewhere.”
“I’d like to see it.”
“Only if the order comes from the director.”
“Why tell me about it, then?”
“To show you that I am a wolf.” Falomin unclasped his hands, took Tarp’s right arm in a powerful grip, and started to walk him up the long gallery. “I am not Maxudov. I am insulted that they think I could be, but I put up with these things; it is part of life. However, I am telling you I am not Maxudov, and I will not be made to feel guilty because I keep a lot of information to myself. Now, your time is up. I told the general secretary how much time I would give you, and your time is up. Leave me alone.”
They stopped at the door. Tarp put out his hand again, and this time Falomin took it. “You were wrong about me,” Tarp said.
“I would be very surprised if I was.”
“I am not a wolf. In Alaska the Eskimos dip a knife in blood and freeze the knife, hilt down, in the ice. A wolf comes along and begins to lick the blood; he cuts his tongue on the knife, and then he licks up his own blood, because it is so cold that he does not know he has cut himself. Soon, he cannot stand. Other wolves come along and eat him. While they are eating, the Eskimos shoot the wolves.” He looked at Falomin, unsmiling. “I am not a lone wolf. I am a lone Eskimo.”
“And Maxudov is a very smart wolf. I think he knows all those tricks.”
Chapter 30
Beranyi was the last on the list. Tarp expected him to be the toughest, although he wondered really what he had gotten from any of them. All would deny being Maxudov to their graves. He could hope to keep pressure on them all, perhaps, and so force the one to do something revealing or stupid.
“Your next interview will come for you at five,” the round-faced Guards man told him.
“Like the ghost of Christmas yet to come.”
“What is that?”
“Charles Dickens. You don’t read the Christmas Carol?”
“Charles Dickens, of course. The Cricket on the Hearth. It is a classic production of the Art Theatre. I took my daughter to see it.”
“In the Christmas Carol, a man waits for visitors he doesn’t really want to see. They keep coming at stated times. They’re more or less ghosts.”
“Ah.”
“My visitors are not ghosts.”
“No.” He laughed.
The last ones would take him somewhere to meet Beranyi. Saving the best for last. He wondered if it had been Beranyi’s insistence, or if they had drawn straws, or if there was some protocol at work he knew nothing of.
When he heard a car Tarp got up and began to dress. The days were warmer, but when dark came it was cold again. He put on the heavy overcoat, a wool scarf. “I still need gloves,” he said.
The Guards man snapped his fingers. “I knew I forgot something! Tomorrow, Comrade.”
“Maybe I won’t need them.” Tarp went out and found two men in the yard behind the old house. One was Oriental, probably Mongol; he looked distrustfully at Tarp. The other man looked like an American stage cop — beefy, middle-aged, red as if from drink. He looked tough and capable, the kind it would be better to run from than fight; with a ten-yard lead you could wear him out in a block, but if he ever caught you he’d commit murder.
“We were going to knock,” the big one said.
“1 saved you the trouble. Let’s go.”
They looked him over, then studied his identification. They produced their own. They were identified as guards attached permanently to Department V. Nice people.