forged signature. It might not fit in.'
'I do not see that we have much to lose.'
'What have you got to win?'
'If the money has been drawn, which I agree is doubtful, we shall know where the agent was on a certain day. That seems to be a useful thing to know.'
'You're dreaming. You'll never find him, Fiedler, not on that kind of information. Once he's in the West he can go to any consulate, even in a small town and get a visa for another country. How are you any the wiser? You don't even know whether the man is East German. What are you after?'
Fiedler did not answer at once. He was gazing distractedly across the valley.
'You said you are accustomed to knowing only a little, and I cannot answer your question without telling you what you should not know.' He hesitated: 'But Rolling Stone was an operation against us, I can assure you.'
'Us?'
'The GDR.' He smiled. 'The Zone if you prefer. I am not really so sensitive.' He was watching Fiedler now, his brown eyes resting on him reflectively.
'But what about me?' Leamas asked. 'Suppose I don't write the letters?' His voice was rising. 'Isn't it time to talk about me, Fiedler?'
Fiedler nodded. 'Why not?' he replied, agreeably.
There was a moment's silence, then Leamas said, 'I've done my bit, Fiedler. You and Peters between you have got all I know. I never agreed to write letters to banks—it could be bloody dangerous, a thing like that. That doesn't worry you, I know. As far as you're concerned I'm expendable.'
'Now let me be frank,' Fiedler replied. 'There are, as you know, two stages in the interrogation of a defector. The first stage in your case is nearly complete: you have told us all we can reasonably record. You have not told us whether your Service favors pins or paper clips because we haven't asked you, and because you did not consider the answer worth volunteering. There is a process on both sides of unconscious selection. Now it is always possible—and this is the worrying thing, Leamas—it is always entirely possible that in a month or two we shall unexpectedly and quite desperately need to know about the pins and paper clips. That is normally accounted for in the second stage— that part of the bargain which you refused to accept in Holland.'
'You mean you're going to keep me on ice?'
'The profession of defector,' Fiedler observed with a smile, 'demands great patience. Very few are suitably qualified.'
'How long?' Leamas insisted.
Fiedler was silent.
'Well?'
Fiedler spoke with sudden urgency. 'I give you my word that as soon as I possibly can, I will tell you the answer to your question. Look—I could lie to you, couldn't I? I could say one month or less, just to keep you sweet. But I am telling you I don't know because that is the truth. You have given us some indications: until we have run them to earth I cannot listen to talk of letting you go. But afterwards, if things are as I think they are, you will need a friend and that friend will be me. I give you my word as a German.'
Leamas was so taken aback that for a moment he was silent.
'All right,' he said finally, 'I'll play, Fiedler, but if you are stringing me along, somehow I'll break your neck.'
'That may not be necessary,' Fiedler replied evenly.
A man who lives a part, not to others but alone, is exposed to obvious psychological dangers. In itself, the practice of deception is not particularly exacting; it is a matter of experience, of professional
Aware of the overwhelming temptations which assail a man permanently isolated in his deceit, Leamas resorted to the course which armed him best; even when he was alone, he compelled himself to live with the personality he had assumed. It is said that Balzac on his deathbed inquired anxiously after the health and prosperity of characters he had created. Similarly Leamas, without relinquishing the power of invention, identified himself with what he had invented. The qualities he exhibited to Fiedler, the restless uncertainty, the protective arrogance concealing shame, were not approximations but extensions of qualities he actually possessed; hence also the slight dragging of the feet, the aspect of personal neglect, the indifference to food, and an increasing reliance on alcohol and tobacco. When alone, he remained faithful to these habits. He would even exaggerate them a little, mumbling to himself about the iniquities of his Service.
Only very rarely, as now, going to bed that evening, did he allow himself the dangerous luxury of admitting the great lie he lived.
Control had been phenomenally right. Fiedler was walking, like a man led in his sleep, into the net which Control had spread for him. It was uncanny to observe the growing identity of interest between Fiedler and Control: it was as if they had agreed on the same plan, and Leamas had been dispatched to fulfill it.
Perhaps that was the answer. Perhaps Fiedler was the special interest Control was fighting so desperately to preserve. Leamas didn't dwell on that possibility. He did not want to know. In matters of that kind he was wholly uninquisitive: he knew that no conceivable good could come of his deductions. Nevertheless, he hoped to God it was true. It was possible, just possible in that case, that he would get home.
14
Letter to a Client
Leamas was still in bed the next morning when Fiedler brought him the letters to sign. One was on the thin blue writing paper of the Seller Hotel Alpenblick, Lake Spiez, Switzerland, the other from the Palace Hotel, Gstaad.
Leamas read the first letter:
