“Oh, really? That was rather sudden. I heard he’d done rather well at C1(A).”
Sir Nigel felt no need to inform Banks that he had met Preston at the JIC meetings or that he had used him as his personal ferret in South Africa. Banks knew nothing of the Berenson affair, nor did he need to know. For his part, Banks wondered what the Master had in mind. So far as he knew, Preston had nothing to do with Six.
“Very sudden,” Banks replied. “In fact, he was only at C1(A) for a few weeks. Up till the New Year he was head of F1(D). Then he must have done something that upset Sir Bernard—or, more likely, Brian Harcourt-Smith. He was booted out of there and into C1(A). Then last month he was given the heave-ho again.”
Ah, thought Sir Nigel. Upset Harcourt-Smith, did he? Suspected as much. Wonder why. Aloud, he said, “Any idea what he could have done to annoy Harcourt-Smith?”
“I did hear something, sir. From Preston. He wasn’t talking to me, but I was close enough to hear. He was in the bar at Gordon at the time, about two weeks back. He seemed a bit upset himself. Apparently he spent years preparing a report, and submitted it last Christmas. He thought it was worth attention, but Harcourt-Smith NFA’ed it.”
“Mmmmmm. F1(D) ... that’s Extreme Left activities, isn’t it? Look, Barry, I want you to do something for me. No need to make a song and dance about it. Just quietly. Find out the file number on that report and draw it from Registry, will you? Put it in the bag and send it over here, marked for me personally.”
Banks found himself back on the street and heading north toward Charles at just before ten.
The Aeroflot crew had a leisurely breakfast and at nine-twenty-nine First Officer Romanov checked his watch and went to the men’s room. He had been there before and ascertained the cubicle he was to take. It was the second from the end. The one at the end already had its door closed and locked. He went into the adjacent one and locked the door.
At nine-thirty he placed a small card, on which he had written the prescribed six figures, on the floor next to the partition. A hand came under the partition, withdrew the card, wrote something on it, and placed it back on the floor. Romanov picked it up. On the reverse side were the six figures he had been expecting.
With identification established, he placed the transistor on the floor and the same hand drew it silently into the next cubicle. Outside, someone was using the urinal. Romanov flushed the toilet, unlocked the door, washed his hands until the urinal user had left, then followed him out. The minibus for Heathrow was at the door. Courier One had delivered.
Barry Banks phoned Sir Nigel just before the hour of noon. It was an internal line and very secure.
“It’s rather odd, sir,” he said. “I secured the file number of that report you wanted and went to Registry for it. I know the file clerk pretty well. He confirmed it’s in the NFA section. But it’s out.”
“Out?”
“Out. Withdrawn.”
“By whom?”
“A man named Swanton. I know him. The odd thing is, he’s in Finance. So I asked him if I could borrow it. That’s the second odd thing. He refused, said he wasn’t finished with it yet. According to Registry, he’s had it three weeks. Before that, it was out to someone else.”
“The lavatory attendant?” asked Sir Nigel wryly.
“Almost. Someone in Administration.”
Sir Nigel thought for a while. The best way to keep a file permanently out of circulation was to keep it on permanent withdrawal to oneself or to one’s proteges. He had little doubt Swanton and the other man were Harcourt-Smith’s own men. “Barry, I want you to find out Preston’s home address. Then meet me here at five o’clock.”
General Karpov sat at his desk that afternoon at Yasyenevo and rubbed his stiff neck. It had not been a restful night. He had lain awake most of it, with Ludmilla sleeping by his side. By dawn he had come to a conclusion, and further thought in the moments he could snatch from his daily work had not altered it.
It was the General Secretary who was behind the mysterious operation being mounted in Britain, but despite his pretensions to read and speak English, he had no knowledge of the country. He would have relied on the advice of someone who did. There were many such—in the Foreign Ministry, the International Department of the Central Committee, the GRU, and the KGB. But if he was avoiding the KGB, why not avoid the others as well?
So, a personal adviser. And the more Karpov thought, the more the name of his own bete noire kept cropping up. Years ago, as a young man making his way in the service, he had admired Philby. They all had. But with the passing years he had risen while Philby had fallen. He had also watched the English renegade deteriorate into a drunken wreck.
The fact was, Philby had not been near a British classified document (except those shown to him by the KGB) since 1951. He had quit Britain in 1955 for Beirut and had not even been in the West since his final defection in 1963. Twenty-four years. Karpov reckoned that by now
There was more, Karpov knew that during the time the General Secretary had been at the KGB he had in some way become impressed by Philby, by his Old World mannerisms and tastes, his affectation of the English gentleman, his dislike of the modern world with all its pop music, motorcycles, and blue jeans—tastes that mirrored the General Secretary’s own. Several times, to Karpov’s certain knowledge, the General Secretary had had recourse to Philby’s advice as a sort of backup to the counsel he received from the First Chief Directorate. Why not now?
Finally, in Karpov’s catalogue, there was the tip that once—just once—Philby had let something slip, something extremely interesting. He wanted to return home. For that, if for nothing else, Karpov did not trust him. Not one inch. He recalled the lined, smiling face across the table from him at Kryuchkov’s dinner party before the New Year. What had he said about Britain then? Something about her political stability’s being overestimated here in Moscow?
There were pieces, and they were beginning to fit together. Karpov decided to check out Mr. Harold Adrian Russell Philby. But he knew that even at his level things were noted: withdrawals from Registry, official requests for information, phone calls, memoranda. His investigation had to be unofficial, personal, and, above all, verbal. The General Secretary was a very dangerous man to antagonize.
John Preston had arrived on his own street and was a hundred yards from the entrance to his apartment house when he heard the hail. He turned to see Barry Banks crossing the street toward him.
“Hello, Barry, small world. What are you doing here?” He knew that the man from K7 lived up north, in the Highgate area. Perhaps he was going to a concert at the nearby Albert Hall.
“Waiting for you, actually,” said Banks with a friendly grin. “Look, a colleague of mine wants to meet you. Would you mind?”
Preston was intrigued but not suspicious. He knew Banks was from Six, But not who might want to meet him. He allowed Banks to guide him across the street and a hundred yards down. Banks stopped at a parked Ford Granada, opened the back door, and gestured to Preston to look inside. He did so.
“Good evening, John. Do you mind if we have a couple of words?”
In surprise Preston climbed in beside the seated figure in the greatcoat. Banks closed the door and wandered away.
“Look, I know it’s an odd way to meet. But there we are. Don’t want to cause any waves, do we? I just felt I had not had a decent opportunity to thank you for the work you did down in South Africa. It was a first-class job. Henry Pienaar was most impressed. So was I.”
“Thank you, Sir Nigel.” Now, what on earth did the wily old fox want? It certainly wasn’t merely to compliment him. But C seemed lost in thought.
“There
