Charlie’s Apprentice

There was a passing attempt to look serious. ‘Meant to. Decided to get established first. Got busy, you know how it is.’

‘You’re in a hell of a mess.’

The seriousness now was genuine, Eduard’s eyes going between Natalia and Kapitsa. ‘I’d really like to talk to you alone.’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘I need your help!’

For the first time the complacent arrogance slipped, and Natalia was unsure whether Eduard’s anguish was at having openly to plead or at having allowed the fear to show. From the look he directed at her, she guessed it was a combination of both. ‘There are things to think about.’

‘What things?’

‘It’s not that easy.’ She heard Kapitsa shift behind her.

‘You’re still in the KGB or whatever it’s called these days?’

Natalia hesitated. ‘Yes.’

The smile returned. ‘You’d be surprised at the effect it had when I told him’ – Eduard nodded towards Kapitsa – ‘your name. You know what I think? I think you’ve climbed even higher up the ladder than when you and I were last together.’

‘Much higher,’ Natalia conceded.

‘That’s good.’

‘Is it?’

‘Things must be easy for you.’

Now Natalia gestured behind her, to the investigator. ‘It’s not just a matter for me. There’s the Militia position to consider.’

‘What about my position to consider?’

‘That’s what I’m doing,’ said Natalia. Adulterated medical drugs kill sometimes. Or maim. The investigator’s words echoed in her mind, loudly, like an announcement with the volume turned up. My flesh and blood, she thought: Eduard is my flesh and blood.

The expression was sly now. ‘We don’t want any embarrassment, do we?’

‘I’m not sure I understand that.’

The back and forth chair came down squarely again. ‘You’re obviously very important now: much more than before. Everything’s public in Moscow these days: openness is the official policy …’ There was a hesitation, staged and theatrical. ‘… Very easy for people in important positions to be embarrassed: damaged by the embarrassment even …’

The noise of Kapitsa shifting behind her was louder. ‘All of that is very true.’

Eduard sighed. ‘So we’d better get this problem cleared up, before it goes any further. I’ve been in this shit- hole for five days.’ There was a nod in Kapitsa’s direction. ‘Why don’t you have a talk?’

She had to estimate how exposed she was. ‘You’re with a Mafia gang? The Lubertsy?’

Eduard sniggered. ‘Don’t be melodramatic! I work with businessmen.’

‘What sort of business?’

Eduard’s shoulders went up and down. ‘All sorts. Providing what people always want.’

Natalia used his ambiguity. ‘When you formed your consortium with these Lubertsy businessmen, did you tell them I had a rank and influence in what was then the KGB?’

Eduard’s smirk was conspiratorial. ‘It’s normal business practice, to provide references. Assure colleagues of one’s good standing.’

Natalia guessed he would have seen every Western gangster film to be shown in Moscow: the attitude and the words were virtually a parody. ‘Is that why you were appointed an organizer: put in charge?’

‘Recognition of natural ability.’ There was another disparaging head movement, towards Kapitsa. ‘The offer I made still stands, if the money hasn’t already vanished from wherever it’s supposed to be safeguarded here. No reason for anyone to lose out. Everyone stays happy. OK?’

Natalia gestured again to the man behind her. ‘We have to talk. See what can be done to make everything work out right.’

‘Of course you do,’ agreed Eduard. ‘Just be quick, OK?’

For a moment Natalia stood looking down at Eduard. Then she turned, quickly, and followed Kapitsa out. Once inside his office, the man lit yet another cigarette and said: ‘It’s difficult to know what to do: what to suggest. I can’t see how we can take him out of the case and still proceed against the others. That’s my problem.’

Natalia decided that Kapitsa was honest according to the convoluted standards of bygone Russian bureaucracy, disdaining blatant bribery but prepared to compromise and make deals with people he considered to be in the same business, linked by a professional freemasonry. She halted at the thought. Was it really a bygone time? Or still the way Russia operated, despite the supposed second revolution? ‘I need time. There is a lot to consider: to be worked out.’

‘I can leave it to you, to come up with something?’ The man sounded relieved.

Natalia nodded. ‘Have you filed an official Militia report?’

Now Kapitsa smiled, believing he understood the significance of the question. ‘Only provisionally. No identities. Technically the investigation is continuing.’ He examined the end of his lighted cigarette, as if it were important.

‘So there are no names, on any official document?’ persisted Natalia.

‘No.’

‘Could I have a copy?’

‘Of course.’ He burrowed into the paper mountain, producing a case report surprisingly quickly.

‘I’ll be in touch very soon,’ promised Natalia. ‘It must be handled properly: to everyone’s satisfaction.’

‘That’s exactly what I want,’ assured Kapitsa.

Natalia slumped in the back of the Zil returning her to Yasenevo, head forward on her chest, totally absorbed in the new crisis, but thinking beyond it. How good was Tudin’s personal spy network? A question she couldn’t answer. But she’d taken an official car to the Militia headquarters. And very openly announced it to her secretariat, as she left. So she had to assume he would learn about it from those sources, if he had no others. Which he probably did. She would have liked to have somebody else with whom to talk it through: somebody whose mind would have been less cluttered by conflicting loyalties and doubts.

The reflection inevitably brought her thoughts to Charlie, who’d had the quickest and most analytical brain she’d ever known. Charlie, who’d always been able to consider things from every angle: see the dangers that no one else could … The reminiscence was never finished, blocked by something else.

The memory was abrupt and totally illogical – a bizarre trick of her mind – and physically startled her into coming bolt-upright from the way she had been sitting. But it was there: all she wanted. The unformed recollection that had refused to come after her conference confrontation with Fyodor Tudin filled her mind with utter and complete clarity. She could remember the words: even what she’d been wearing and what they had been doing. It had been here, in Moscow, long before he’d had to leave, disappointing her for the first time. It had been a caviare celebration, at Mytninskaya, for no better reason or excuse than their happiness together. Perhaps it was the association of Eduard and Mytninskaya that had finally prompted the memory. Or the fact that they’d eaten caviare, because it was that which caused Charlie’s seemingly innocuous conversation. About his mother being in a home for the elderly near the most famous salmon-fishing river in England: in England, not Scotland. And he’d recounted an anecdote of English privilege, about a fishing club so exclusive it had first call upon the town’s best hotel, ahead of the general public.

Natalia became aware of the driver’s attention, in the rear-view mirror, and settled back upon the cushions again.

She had it, she told herself. The way to find him, providing his mother was still alive. And she’d already put in place the operation to make it happen.

Which still left the crisis of Eduard.

John Gower did not, after all, venture out into Beijing on the fourth day, remembering the edict about escape routes.

Airline reservations need not be in the names recorded on the passport, so under false identities Gower made