Charlie’s Apprentice

Chinese looked quite a pleasant-faced man. But then so had some photographs of Hitler and Stalin.

Charlie had finished his reading and was sitting in deep contemplation when Walter Foster entered, looking around in obvious and immediate disappointment. ‘I was hoping this would be about a new assignment but it isn’t, is it?’

‘Afraid not,’ said Charlie. ‘But I know how you feel.’

‘Have they got Snow yet?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘They will. The man was an idiot.’

‘Tell me about him. Everything about him.’

Foster frowned. ‘There’s not going to be another attempt to get him out?’

‘I wouldn’t have thought so,’ avoided Charlie, smoothly. ‘Far too dangerous. I’ve just got to write one of those reports: you know how bureaucratic everything is.’

‘It’s going to end in disaster,’ insisted Foster.

‘I hope not,’ said Charlie, mildly. It really was time people thought of a different way to describe what the outcome was going to be.

Forty

It did not take Charlie long to form an opinion about Walter Foster and it confused him, as quite a lot in the files and records had confused him. Despite insisting that he wanted every detail – he actually used the word debriefing – Charlie had constantly to interrupt the former liaison man to clarify or bring out points Foster seemed to consider unimportant: it quickly became an account to justify himself. The priest, Charlie decided, had been handled very badly. Which added further to the confusion.

‘You dictated the contact procedure?’ queried Charlie.

‘Not me,’ said Foster, instantly defensive. ‘London’s orders. Standard stuff: the usual separation from the embassy.’

‘Couldn’t you have adjusted it?’ Charlie wondered if that was what Gower had tried to do.

‘Snow wanted too much: virtually meetings every week. That would have been dangerous.’

‘Your decision?’

‘Following orders.’

‘How often did you meet?’

‘Regularly enough, when there were things at the embassy that the British community came to. And then when we needed to, just the two of us.’

‘How often were the embassy occasions?’ persisted Charlie.

Foster shrugged. ‘Once a month, I suppose. Sometimes a little longer. That was the benefit of how we worked: there wasn’t a pattern that could be identified.’

‘Why couldn’t you meet Snow as often as the man wanted?’

‘For exactly the objection I’ve just told you!’ insisted Foster, indignantly. ‘It would have created a pattern that could have been picked up.’

‘Snow’s not well?’

‘He suffers from asthma,’ qualified Foster.

‘Badly?’

‘Sometimes.’

‘Wouldn’t it have been the perfect way for Snow to have met you whenever he liked, coming to the embassy for medication or to see the resident doctor?’

From the surprise obvious on Foster’s face, Charlie guessed the opportunity hadn’t occurred to the other man.

‘The instructions were always that there had to be no provable embassy link. That was always how I had to work.’

‘How did you feel about him, personally?’ Charlie was curious how Foster would explain the breakdown between himself and the priest.

The man coloured slightly, heightening the sandstorm of freckles. ‘He was arrogant.’

‘So you didn’t get on?’

‘That’s not important.’

‘I would have thought it was, in a place like Beijing.’

‘We had a working relationship. It was satisfactory.’

It very definitely hadn’t been, thought Charlie. It had been obvious that he should talk to the man who had been the priest’s Control, but he wasn’t learning at all what he’d expected. He wasn’t sure, at that moment, exactly what he was learning. ‘How were things between Snow and the other priest, Father Robertson?’

Foster shrugged again. ‘Not particularly good, I don’t think. Robertson was very worried about upsetting the Chinese and getting the mission closed down.’

Charlie frowned. ‘Snow told you that?’

‘Several times. He called Robertson an old woman.’

‘What did you think of him?’

‘I only met him a few times, at embassy things. He seemed nervous but I always thought that was understandable, after being jailed like he was.’

‘Did he talk about that?’

‘Not to me. It was something we all knew about, at the embassy. It made him kind of a celebrity.’

They didn’t know yet how Gower had been arrested, Charlie remembered. ‘Apart from the occasions when he could visit the embassy for some event, you always signalled Snow for a meeting? Or he signalled you?’

The other man nodded. ‘Usually he signalled me. Like I said, he wanted too much contact.’

‘You always met in public places? Never went to the mission?’

‘Never!’ Foster seemed appalled at the suggestion.

‘You read about Gower’s arrest?’

Foster nodded. ‘I guessed he was ours.’

‘I was wondering if he tried to do things differently from you. Tried to make a direct approach.’

‘If he’d done that, they’d have picked up Snow as well, wouldn’t they?’

Charlie nodded. ‘I suppose you’re right.’

‘None of this would have happened if he’d done what I told him.’

‘I thought there was some problem about leaving without his Order’s authority.’

‘An excuse, that’s all,’ insisted Foster. ‘He wouldn’t listen.’

‘It can’t have been easy.’

‘Beijing isn’t easy. People don’t realize.’

‘That’s true,’ sympathized Charlie. ‘People never do.’

‘I hope I’ve helped.’

‘You have,’ assured Charlie. ‘A lot.’

‘You’re sure you haven’t heard where my next posting is to be?’

‘Sorry,’ said Charlie.

‘I didn’t like Beijing very much.’

‘I guessed,’ said Charlie. ‘It’s all behind you now.’

‘Thank God.’

Why was it, wondered Charlie, that things dumped upon him so often didn’t make any sense at all?

Julia had said she did not want to eat out, so she cooked at home, and Charlie quickly decided it was a mistake for him to have accepted. He tried very hard but she barely responded to anything he said. She pushed her plate away virtually untouched.

‘This isn’t exactly the last supper!’ he protested, still trying.