attempts to maintain an open line of communication were constantly broken, with a flurry of questions some of which his messages had already answered and some of which were beyond answer at all. Aware, despite being so far away, of the growing inquest, Blair repeated Orlov’s concern about any approach to Harriet being made and asked for a categoric assurance that the agreement had been kept and that no KGB watch squad could have themselves become aware of the American surveillance. The apparent guarantee came but Blair thought it was muted and decided he’d made a telling point. He bet that Harriet Johnson was as sanitised and isolated as any goldfish-bowled astronaut on a moonwalk. And bet further that any intelligence operator worth his salt could have picked the observation up in five seconds flat, allowing for natural blinking.
Brinkman timed perfectly his arrival at the public kiosk on the Ulitza Gor’kova, its possible use the only uncertainty. It was empty, so even that wasn’t a problem. Brinkman hadn’t bothered to evade what he still believed to be only the normal embassy personnel attention, because having established his undetectable contact routine, evasion simply wasn’t necessary. Professional to the letter, he made the pretence of seeking a coin at the moment of entry and snatched the telephone from the rest at the beginning of the first ring, so successfully that Sokol’s radio van, with its directional pistol microphone, failed to pick up that it was an incoming call. Orlov hadn’t managed to get a delegation and Brinkman had nothing to say except that he would be at the subsequent kiosk at exactly the same time the following week. Brinkman succeeded in covering the exchange against any outside interest by fumbling with the rare and tattered directory until Orlov disengaged and then calling his own number, coin ready in the slot, finally – again for external observation if there was any – slamming down the headpiece, a man frustrated at being unable to make a connection.
Although outwardly Brinkman maintained the annoyed pretence, he left the telephone box hot with excitement, seeing Orlov’s contact the proof that the Russian had come over to the British and that he’d snatched the prize right from beneath Blair’s nose. The first prize, Brinkman told himself. There was another to follow, when Ann made her decision.
The telephone visit was recorded in the account of the observation upon Brinkman but so casual and quick was it that no specific importance was attached and Sokol did not single it out as anything of relevance, either.
Chapter Thirty-Four
It took every extreme of will-power and concentration that Pietr Orlov possessed – and then some the Russian didn’t know he had – but knowing that everything he wanted depended upon it he cleared his mind of a woman he loved called Harriet Johnson and an American he tolerated called Blair and an Englishman he despised called Brinkman and devoted himself entirely to the agricultural policy he recognised to be the passport for what he wanted. He rewrote and re-worked and then rewrote again the passages that had offended Sevin – rightly offended the man, Orlov acknowledged, because they were careless. – and when he got them right he started again until finally he was confident they were perfect.
Which Sevin assured him they were, accepting them practically without correction. Still Orlov forced himself, determined to maintain the standard, and Sevin remained congratulatory, angry at himself for displaying an old man’s lack of judgement and reflecting a lifetime’s suspicion, accepting the temporary distraction had after all been the disruption of a broken marriage.
The chance came – sooner than he expected it to – on the fourth week. Orlov evolved from the beginning a system of monitoring everything that was happening elsewhere – the work of the other committees and the other groups – involved in the agronomy review and into the net in exactly a month the system brought the memorandum from the central working committee discussing the delegation visit to Europe.
Orlov felt hollowed by the initial flood of excitement: at the quickness of its happening and his luck in discovering it and the thought of it all – everything – being settled. There was fear, too. As great as excitement. He hoped so much that he wouldn’t fail. He’d be all right, naturally, if things went smoothly. It was of the unexpected that Orlov was frightened. On the day the memorandum reached him, his hand positively trembled, so that he had difficulty in reading the words and had to put it down upon the unmoving desk and bend over it. France first – the inviting country – and then Denmark, to study their dairy system. A full fifteen days’ tour: starting in just three and a half weeks’ time.
Orlov prepared his approach to Sevin with the consummate care that he knew everything now required – the sort of care he’d taken over the embassy visit when he’d made contact with the American – getting approval for his latest section of his report first and then letting the conversation between them ramble into generalities before mentioning, in an apparent aside, the proposed European visit. When Sevin seized upon it, as Orlov guessed – and hoped – he would, the younger Russian said, more direct than before, ‘I thought I should be part of the delegation…’ He nodded towards the papers on Sevin’s desk. ‘All that is being written and compiled from previous reports and statistics. I’d be better able to argue innovations and change if I’d personally seen the methods of other, more advanced countries.’ What right had he had to question morality with Brinkman? thought Orlov.
‘The names will have already been selected,’ pointed out Sevin.
‘I realise that,’ said Orlov, increasingly an astute Kremlin operator. ‘I wonder why the visit wasn’t made generally known in the first place?’
The reaction of Sevin, who had lived through a lifetime of plot and counter-plot, was as predictable as Orlov expected it to be. ‘You think it was kept from us!’
‘I’ve no way of knowing that,’ said Orlov, honestly but prepared. ‘Was it ever brought up at any meeting you attended?’
‘No,’ said the old man.
‘Nor at any in which I’ve sat,’ said Orlov. Playing the best card last he said, ‘Comrade Didenko is on the central working committee.’
Sevin’s face tightened. ‘You think he is trying to exclude us!’
‘I’ve no way of knowing that, either,’ said Orlov.
Four days later Sevin announced to Orlov that he would be forming part of the Soviet delegation to France and to Denmark.
The pressure from Washington upon Eddie Blair was of a ridiculous degree, so ridiculous that Blair recognised it and tried as best he could to stop it spreading over into his already strained private life. But that was difficult because the demands kept him late at the embassy and required his early attendance in the morning and the workload created greater tension between himself and Ann. He studiously kept the Friday assignations and when Orlov failed to show up on the fourth occasion, three of the insistent questions came from the Washington headquarters signed personally by the Director, which was practically unheard of, and Blair recognised his replies clearly showed his contempt. He sent them anyway, irritated by the panic. He was as uncertain as they were – more so, because they were safe and protected back at Langley and it was still his ass displayed and waiting to be shot off – but it was still only four weeks and there could be the simplest of explanations why Orlov needed to keep away. This wasn’t Sunday brunch at the Mayflower, for Christ’s sake! As the thought came to Blair the cipher machine stuttered into life again and he transcribed as it printed, reading that Langley had succeeded in getting visas for two men who would be arriving in advance of the next scheduled meeting. There was nothing whatsoever they could do – less now that Orlov had severed contact – but Blair realised it enabled Langley once more to be able to imagine they were doing something active and positive. Blair realised, too, that it indicated their belief in his inability successfully to continue with the operation. So maybe it would be he who was brunching soon at the Mayflower in Washington; he hadn’t thought it was possible for things to develop as they had, quite so quickly.
It was the following Tuesday that Brinkman took the telephone call at the public kiosk on Leninskiy Prospekt and Orlov told him of the place on the delegation to France.
‘You’re free!’ promised Brinkman, at once.
‘I wish I were,’ said the Russian. ‘You’ve no idea how I wish I were.’
The breathing of Aleksai Panov seemed more difficult than usual, his shoulders lifting and falling with the effort, but despite his illness the inevitable tubed cigarette was in his hand when Sokol entered the chairman’s office, on the seventh floor of Dzerzhinsky Square. The wheezing man indicated a chair, without any greeting and Sokol took it. From where he sat he could look out over the huge piazza and actually see the statue to the founder
