Comrade Charlie

four-hour watch maintained upon it by British counter-intelligence. Petrin went instead to the hotel where Krogh was booked, remaining only long enough to register in and unpack. Professionally cautious, Petrin rejected the idea of a taxi. Instead he indulged himself by circling the block to go through Grosvenor Square and past the US embassy to reach Hyde Park, walking its full width to the bisecting park road before cutting up towards the restaurant overlooking the Serpentine lake. He made several checks as he did so, ensuring there were no followers.

In the restaurant he did not take a seat, although confirming there was a table reservation. Instead he stood at the bar until Losev entered, staying expressionless until the man reached him. Petrin thought he detected a reserve in the other man’s greeting, but conceded at once it could have been a misconception.

‘The beer’s warm,’ Petrin cautioned.

‘It frequently is in England,’ said Losev. ‘You get used to it. There wasn’t any need for the precautions you took getting here: you were protected.’

Petrin was curious at the other man’s need to boast of the guarding observation: annoyed, too, that he hadn’t detected it, which he should have done. He said: ‘That’s comforting to know.’

‘How’s your man?’

‘Shaky,’ admitted Petrin. ‘Showing signs of the strain, which is pretty considerable.’

‘He’s not going to collapse, is he?’

‘I don’t think so: he knows what would happen if he did. There’s a lot to be done before he arrives.’

A support role, thought Losev at once, bitterly: the other man’s attitude was very much superior to subordinate. He said: ‘Like what?’

‘I want the equivalent of a complete drawing office: all conceivable equipment and instruments and a place where he can work without interruption. Can you manage that?’

I want, isolated Losev. And can you manage that, like it was some junior initiative test. He said, with some exaggeration: ‘Of course. We have a completely secure house unknown to the British authorities quite near here, in Kensington.’

‘What about equipping it?’

‘Do you know precisely what he’ll need?’

Instead of replying Petrin handed over the list he had composed at the beginning of the overnight flight, before sleeping.

Losev glanced at it, hot with irritation. He thought: Run, little messenger boy, run. He said: ‘I’ll organize it today.’

‘Any change in the situation of the man you’ve got inside the factory here?’

It was a gloating question, decided Losev. Exaggerating again, he said: ‘Now he’s been cleared there’s the possibility of a transfer. Moscow consider him important.’

‘How soon is the transfer to be?’ punctured Petrin at once.

‘There’s no date,’ Losev was forced to admit, discomfited.

‘It would be good to have the insurance of a second source,’ said Petrin objectively.

A waiter advised that their table was ready and both men sat and ordered before picking up the conversation. Petrin asked for the details of travelling to and from the Isle of Wight and what the factory was like, and asked Losev to inform Moscow of his arrival: everything really was politely requested but Losev inferred them as demands and felt further antagonism, giving short, clipped responses. They agreed to communicate daily through the number that Blackstone had, which was to a telephone in the safe house Losev intended setting up as Krogh’s drawing office, and Losev said he would forward any queries from Moscow to Petrin’s hotel using the same route.

Towards the end of the meal Petrin was sure he had not been mistaken about Losev’s initial reserve or about the later hostility. Finally he said: ‘Is something wrong?’

‘Wrong?’

‘I have the impression I’ve offended you in some way.’

‘No,’ denied Losev. ‘I’m not offended about anything. How could I be?’

‘That’s what I couldn’t understand.’

‘Maybe you’re tired after the flight.’

Petrin gazed steadily at the London station chief across the tiny, window-side table. ‘Maybe I am,’ he agreed. Then he said: ‘I don’t think anything should be allowed to endanger what we’ve got to achieve, do you?’

‘That remark is incomprehensible to me.’

‘It means that we should work together,’ said Petrin.

‘I don’t imagine it being any other way,’ said Losev stiffly.

‘Good,’ said Petrin. ‘I wouldn’t like it to be any other way.’

Charlie caught Laura on the pavement outside the office. As soon as she saw him her face opened into a smile but Charlie didn’t smile back. Bluntly he said: ‘I’m going to have to back out of the arrangement we made on Sunday. I’m sorry.’

Laura’s expression faded. She said: ‘Why don’t we rearrange something for another evening?’

‘Maybe not for a little while.’

‘Oh,’ she said. ‘I see.’

‘I think it would be best.’

‘I told you a long time ago there wasn’t any danger of it getting out of hand. Not on my part anyway.’

‘I remember,’ said Charlie.

‘Is it anything I’ve done? Or said?’

‘No.’

‘So why?’

‘I just think it’s best, that’s all.’

‘I think I deserve an explanation at least.’

‘I can’t give you one, not yet. Maybe after I get back from holiday.’

‘Or until you want to learn something you can’t get from anyone else!’

He’d deserved that, Charlie accepted. He still wished she hadn’t said it. ‘I’m sorry,’ he repeated.

‘Me, too,’ said Laura, turning abruptly and hurrying into the building.

Charlie gave her time to get the lift to the floor high above his office and then followed her in. Would he ever be able to give her an explanation, he wondered.

‘He gave no reason?’ demanded Harkness, who’d been disappointed for weeks with the titbits of gossip Laura passed on.

‘None,’ said the sad-faced girl.

‘Maybe after he gets back from holiday,’ repeated Harkness reflectively. ‘What could that mean?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Laura.

‘But I’m going to try to find out,’ said Harkness positively.

26

Natalia started to prepare herself for England a long time before the scheduled departure date, realizing practically at once the mistake she had made. She should have followed far more closely the lead of the other women on the previous overseas trips and better spent the allowance she received on Western clothes. She could have bought far more than she had that one shopping day in Washington and she hadn’t bothered at all in Australia or Canada. And she was anxious to be chic all the time: chic and cosmopolitan, not insular and dowdy.

Like a child denying that a hoped-for event could ever occur in the fervent belief that the opposite would happen, Natalia told herself as she had since getting her new appointment that there was no chance of her encountering Charlie. All the old arguments paraded through her mind in the weeks leading up to the trip, the fors and the againsts, her own private search for a conclusion different from any she’d reached before. To start with Charlie was an overseas operative, not internal counter-intelligence, so it wouldn’t be his department who monitored the Russian visit, as all Russian visits were monitored. So there was no way he could know of her