Nodding to the recording equipment, Charlie said, “It’s my ass in the air! Everything’s being doubly recorded, so none of you are endangered. You’re here to expose and arrest an inside source, and I think I know who that source is. You still want me to leave, I will. Your choice, being visually and audibly recorded, as you make it.”
The unknown man to Robertson’s right came quickly sideways for a whispered exchange, which concluded with a nod of permission for the man to leave the room. Coming back to Charlie, Robertson said, “We’ll hear what you have to tell us.”
“But not with me participating,” refused Fish, rising to follow the other departing man.
The hurriedly leaving investigator was on his way to speak to London, Charlie knew: Fish probably intended to cover his ass, too. Deciding that he needed, belatedly, as much professional protection as possible, Charlie said, “My instructions from London, personally from the Director-General, were not to discuss with you anything concerning the investigation in which I am involved. Nothing I intend to tell you reflects in any way whatsoever upon that. Is that understood and accepted?”
“We’re waiting to hear what you have to tell us,” said Robertson.
“And I’m waiting to hear the answer to my question,” returned Charlie, hoping he wasn’t coloring as obviously as the equally furious Robertson. Robertson shifted in his chair but didn’t speak and Charlie stood, shrugging.
“Your choice and you blew it. I’ll tell the Director-General and he can tell you, and we’ll all keep our fingers crossed that nothing else goes wrong while you piss about.”
“Wait!” called Robertson, when Charlie was almost at the door. “We understand what you’ve said, that nothing you’re going to tell us will compromise your purpose here.”
Charlie took his time walking to the seat and settling himself. Robertson’s face remained puce. The anonymous woman had colored, too. Charlie said, “A few nights ago I went out socially with people from the American embassy, accompanying Paula-Jane Venables. One of the Americans was William Bundy, an acknowledged CIA expert on Russian affairs, who has been reassigned here for a third tour of duty, after running the Agency’s Russian desk for a number of years. I was on station here during one of his earlier assignments. During that period we knew each other but were never friends. Nor did we liaise, operationally, in any way whatsoever. The most recent evening ended with Bundy suggesting that he and I get together while I was here. No arrangements were made. The following day a voice-mail message from Bundy was left upon the temporary telephone number allocated to me, here at the embassy. I had not given Bundy that number. I responded to Bundy’s call. We lunched, yesterday. During that lunch, Bundy made a remark about listening devices having been installed within the telephone systems of the ambassador. To my understanding no mention has been made in the media coverage, either in English, American, or Russian newspapers, of the precise location of any of the devices that were discovered by Harry and his team. . ”
Charlie paused at the reentry into the room of the man who’d left after his earlier whispered conversation with Robertson, and didn’t continue until after another hand-shielded exchange between the two men.
“When I returned from that lunch, I confronted Paula-Jane Venables about the disclosure of my telephone number and of the undisclosed location of the bugs. She admitted providing my number but categorically denied passing on anything about the listening devices, insisting she didn’t know where they were placed. I know she has already appeared before you. I consider that from the conversation I have just recounted there is sufficient cause for her recall and reexamination before you.”
An echoing silence descended upon the room. It lasted several full minutes before Robertson said; “You believe Paula-Jane Venables to be the traitorous source within this embassy?”
“I believe the indiscretion that I have personally experienced justifies her being questioned further,” replied Charlie.
“Apart from Harry and me and a very limited number, you were one of the few to know about the devices,” reminded the other man.
The threat churned through Charlie. He said: “Perhaps you should take that remark further.”
“We intend to,” said the same panel member. “You are to go at once to the communications room to speak personally to the Director-General.” The man indicated the recording assembly at the side of the room. “He will instruct you, leaving no doubt of the authority, to return here to undergo a polygraph test to establish the truth of what you have just told this committee and to eliminate you from the investigation in which we are currently engaged-”
“A polygraph test that your colleague, Paula-Jane Venables, underwent yesterday and passed to the complete satisfaction of the technical examiners and the members of this panel,” completed Robertson.
“How the hell can I be involved in things that happened before I even arrived here?” demanded Charlie. So angry was he that Charlie failed to detect the approach of the outside office guardian until the man was behind him.
“Shall we go, sir?”
Charlie Muffin was the foremost exponent of the credo never to panic but he found rational thinking difficult as he was humiliatingly escorted along linking corridors to the basement descent. He managed it-just-precisely because of his need to keep the secret that no one could learn. Charlie knew all about lie detector tests; he hoped that he could remember how to defeat the supposedly undefeatable machine that distinguishes lie from truth by measuring breathing rate, pulse, and perspiration flow.
Robertson’s investigation was restricted solely to uncovering a traitor within the embassy. Which should keep the questioning well away from anything risking Natalia. But would it? Couldn’t he, by the strictest interpretation of the word, be regarded a traitor, secretly married as he was to a senior analyst in the Russian Federation’s internal counterintelligence organization? Not if he were able to argue semantics. But he wouldn’t be, restricted to yes or no. What the fuck were the rules, the protection from being exposed by the machine? Remain calm, allow no anger or agitation, he remembered. Easy enough advice-easily followed advice-in a simulated situation where there was no anger or agitation, the total opposite from how he felt now. Keep what is not to be disclosed firmly out of mind, Charlie further recalled. He’d thought that particular mantra a complete load of bollocks at the long-ago training school and hadn’t changed his mind since.
The unsympathetic Ross Perrit was waiting expectantly among all his electronic paraphernalia, the door to the first cubicle in the supported box already open. “The DG’s waiting on the line.”
“What the hell’s going on?” demanded Smith, the moment Charlie identified himself.
“I tried to report things I believed relevant to Robertson’s inquiry, things that had no bearing upon what I’m doing here.” From the tone of the Director-General’s unusually harsh voice, Charlie decided that the prevailing political wind was blowing slap into his face.
“What things?” The man listened without interruption to what Charlie had earlier told the inquiry panel and did not speak for several moments after Charlie finished. Then Smith said: “Venables underwent a polygraph examination. There were no difficulties.”
“I know. But at the time the panel was unaware of Bundy’s knowledge of where the listening devices were found. The examiner wouldn’t have been prompted to ask her.”
“She was specifically asked about her associations with the Americans,” disclosed Smith. “A liaison was suspected with a married CIA officer, John Probert.”
Charlie felt the first stirrings of unease. “And?”
“I told you,” said the man, irritably. “She passed the polygraph without any doubts arising.”
“Who suspected the liaison with Probert?”
“You’ve interfered in something from which I categorically barred you,” refused Smith. “All I’ve got so far as the result of your being in Moscow are official complaints from the forensics and technical divisions being asked to manufacture evidence that can be exposed as fake with a schoolboy science kit.”
“We’ve discussed the need for what I want,” reminded Charlie.
“You cause any more public embarrassment by what you’re doing, this will be your last assignment. You hear what I’m saying?”
“I hear,” said Charlie. “I also hear that I have got to undergo a polygraph myself?”
“It’s been requested.”
“I wasn’t even
