Here Be Monsters

'Uh-huh.' He took another half-mile. 'Well, that's the million pound bingo question, Elizabeth.' He tried to stretch a leg again. 'It used to be the sixty-four-thousand dollar question, but we've had inflation since then.'

Another mile, tenth by tenth, almost empty and featureless, and boring now that there was nothing sniffing her British Racing Green tail across the Wessex countryside, which was opening up on either side. But she could still afford to wait for her answer.

'Our Three Wise Men were never 100 per cent convinced - just about 80 per cent.' About half a mile. 'And neither were the Americans.'

'Why not?'

'Why not?' Four-fifths of a mile. 'Deep down, they didn't want to believe that young Americans could betray 1950s America - even though they put a man on it who believed that everyone was guilty, until proved innocent. And even then probably not. He was a hard man - in some ways a monster.'

That led straight to the next question, but he continued before she could get it out. 'Our people had fewer illusions. Not because they were smarter, but because they had bitter recent memories. And also we'd just come down in the world - and down with a bump, after Suez. So we weren't just the poor relations - we were maybe the baddies. So what was there to betray? A British Dream, like the American Dream? What dream?' He glanced at her. 'So what was Debrecen? Our people weren't sure - but they knew they were on to something. And they reckoned there might be an American angle, and they needed to get in with the Americans again, after Suez. So they decided to offer them what they'd got as a present, in the hope of re-establishing co-operation.' He tossed his head. 'That was my first big job: carrying tribute to Caesar.' Then he shook his head sadly. 'I had no idea what I was getting into - no idea, poor innocent youth that I was!'

Elizabeth noticed that her speed had crept up to 85, but mercifully there was nothing behind her. And there was nothing of the truth in his last words, either: he had been a rich bachelor in his thirties in '58, and the reverse of innocent for sure, then as well as now. She dropped back to 70. 'What went wrong?'

'Hah!' He brightened perversely at the memory. 'Absolutely nothing - at first. In fact, when they knew what I'd got with me, it was all roses and violets. Because it was exactly what they wanted, so they thought -because they had their appalling Hungarian, you see. About dummy2

whom we didn't know, but who had given his half-ticket to them, so they had a much better idea of what Debrecen might have been than we did. They knew more - and they'd also had a look at the place, just like us. But with the same result. And they really didn't know what to do next, or even where to start.' The brightness remained, but it was as frosty as a short winter's day.

'And then in flew Sir Frederick Clinton's new star, with a warm Special Relationship smile on his face and the rest of the ticket in his briefcase. Roses and violets, Elizabeth.'

But dust and ashes to come, thought Elizabeth grimly. 'You had the dates Colonel Gorbatov gave you. But what exactly were these people doing in Debrecen? Why were they there?'

Audley gazed out of the car window at his side, as though he had suddenly found the rural view more interesting. 'You've read the record, haven't you?'

'Yes.' She waited for him to continue, but instead he went on admiring the Hampshire countryside. ''Hand- picked subjects, with good career prospects, psychologically equipped for deep-sleeping'.'

'Yes.' Audley nodded at a cow which, from its melancholy expression, looked as though it had heard all about the new EEC milk quotas. 'So?'

'So what was so particularly important about Debrecen?'

Audley turned towards her. 'Isn't that enough?'

It ought to be enough, thought Elizabeth with a deep-down shiver: the idea of long-term treachery, waiting to mature like wine, but cellared instead in the dark recesses of certain human souls. But somehow it wasn't. 'No, David.'

He smiled a sudden genuine smile, which cruelly reminded her of that smile of Latimer's.

'Quite right, Elizabeth. But how do you know?'

Elizabeth was torn between the two smiles. Because if Paul was right and Latimer was gunning for David… if it came to the crunch - whose side was she on? Whose side? The answer confused her horribly, it was so immediate. And she knew she must cover her confusion. 'Don't ask me how. I don't really know.'

'Of course! Who ever does, when it comes to instinct? Don't worry, my dear - be glad that you've got it, that's all.' He nodded. 'Everyone thinks they have it, but it's atrophied in most people - like the hunting instinct. I knew a troop-sergeant in Normandy who'd never dummy2

fired a shot in anger until we landed, but he always knew when there was an 88 waiting for us.' Nod. 'Your Paul hasn't got it - with him it's mostly reason and logic, plus a little experience and a lot of knowledge… all topped off by low cunning and an eye for the main chance. But most women have more of it than most men, anyway. So just be thankful.'

Her Paul, again. Yet, for another inexplicable reason, she felt impelled to defend him now.

'You do my Paul less than justice, I rather think. He's very loyal to you, for a start, David.'

'Loyal?' He half-spluttered. ' Loyal?'

'Or… or protective, let's say.'

He said nothing for another mile, digesting her indiscretion; which must either have confirmed his guess or confused his certainty; and that seemed to be enough for him, too, for the time being.

'Debrecen -' He rubbed both his knees simultaneously ' - what the unspeakable Hungarian had given them, among other things, was names, Elizabeth. Not the traitors' names, which he didn't know… the names of the Russian top brass he'd welcomed, on behalf of Rakosi -

he was one of Rakosi's front-men. Rakosi was the Hungarian top man, Elizabeth.' He half-apologized for