The Bear's Tears

'Oh, of course, if it's true.' Sir William's heavy eyebrows almost touched above his nose as he frowned at Massinger. The expression was a warning-off. 'Even so, very upsetting. As for the thought that one of our people… Still, this is not the occasion. Leave it to time, eh?'

'And Babbington?'

Sir William's eyebrows closed upon each other again. His eyes were hard as he shook his head slightly. 'We'll leave that. It's out of our hands, mm?' He watched Massinger over his glass. A gold-rimmed Venetian glass, a little florid for his own taste. Apparently, Castleford had bought a set in Venice before the war. There were four left. Sir William might almost have chosen it deliberately to further his arguments and threats.

The piano sounded in the next room. A soprano began a Schubert song, slow and delicate and moving. An der Mond, Goethe's song to the moon.

'We must lunch soon,' Sir William announced. 'My bank requires one or two new directors — fresh blood, and all that. I want men I can trust.' He smiled and patted Massinger's arm. What remained of the Aloxe-Corton in Massinger's glass stirred but refused to catch the light. An der Mond continued. One of the Covent Garden chorus singing, perhaps—? A small, sweet voice. The song became almost unearthly.

The noise in the room slowly stilled, as if every guest had been caught in the fine mesh of the melody — or because they wished to overhear the catalogue of Sir William's bribes.

'And that Royal Commission,' Sir William continued, 'just the sort of thing you should be seen to be doing at the moment.' He drained his glass and added: 'Schubert — overrated, I'm afraid. Far too flighty for me.' The bellicose laugh moved away with him, into the crowded room.

Massinger finished his wine, and listened. The room applauded as the song ended, and there were calls for others — Mozart arias which the singer would be wise not to attempt, Schubert again, Wolf, Victorian fireside ballards. Massinger propelled himself through his wife's guests in search of the Aloxe-Corton. A young man hired for the evening by Stephens, the butler, refilled his glass. He turned towards the sound of the soprano, now singing a modern pop song. The way we were. She followed Streisand's floating and swooping more than adequately.

The KGB Rezident at the Soviet embassy was standing in front of him, smiling and raising a glass of cognac in salute.

'Pavel!' Massinger exclaimed in surprise, almost with pleasure. Pavel, ostensibly the Russian Cultural Attache, was usually drunk at social gatherings, and often amusing. Massinger had found him attached, even bound, to Margaret's musical and cultural set almost from the time he had met her. Everyone seemed to know his real position. Massinger believed that Pavel used Margaret's parties and occasions not for intelligence-gathering but for relaxation, under the pretence to his masters, no doubt, that important people, people with secrets and with influence, frequented Margaret's salon.

'Paul, my good friend!' Pavel exclaimed thickly. It was evident that he was drunk again. Yet he was neither aggressive nor morose in his cups. Only louder; the Russian beneath the Party man.

The girl in the next room caressed past and present without touching them.

'You're enjoying yourself, Pavel?' Massinger enquired archly, nodding at the brandy balloon.

'Of course, of course! Your parties are always splendid — splendid! So good for spying!' He burst into laughter again. His English was good, cosmopolitan and assured like his slim figure and expensive clothes. He was urbane, amusing, passionate. His appearance was deceptive, and Massinger suspected the ambitious Party functionary beneath the silk shirt and the skin. Pavel drank more cognac, then passed his glass to the young man. It was generously refilled. More applause, then immediately another Schubert song, one of overblown romantic longing.

I have that, Massinger told himself. I have achieved what that song aches for. The sensation was warming, like drink. Pavel silently toasted Massinger once more then ostentatiously sniffed the cognac and sighed with pleasure. And I daren't risk losing it, Massinger added to himself.

'Did you enjoy the opera?' he asked.

'Enjoy — what is enjoy? It is — so pale, so Western, my friend. I lived it, lived it!'

'Good for you.'

'And this song is like the opera, mm? So unreal. A romantic dream.' Massinger had forgotten that Pavel spoke German as well as French and English. 'Operas of power interest me more. Like Wagner. Though I trust you not to report me to the Central Committee for my pro-Nazi sentiments!' He roared with laughter, creating little whirlpools of re-assumed conversation as guests were distracted from the singing in the next room.

'Power — yes,' Massinger murmured. Then he saw Margaret at the door, having detached herself from the party around the piano. Her finger made circulating motions in the air, and he nodded, smiling. He was neglecting his duties as host. Escort, he thought, might have been a more accurate description. Nevertheless—

'And falls from power,' Pavel added as Massinger was on the point of excusing himself. 'Like that of your poor friend Aubrey.'

He watched Pavel's eyes. Slightly glazed, the pupils enlarged. His trim figure was unsteady, beginning to rock with the current of the alcohol.

'Yes.'

'Tears, idle tears,' Pavel quoted.

'Quite.' Massinger's back felt cold, his mind as icy as the pendants of the chandelier above them. 'Maybe we ought to shed tears, even for an enemy?'

Pavel shook his head and spread his arms. Cognac slopped onto his wrist, staining the cuff of his white silk shirt. His face was red. Then he laughed.

'Not one,' he said, vehemently. 'Not one for him. These people here aren't crying. Why should I — why should we?' He laughed again. 'They've abandoned him, haven't they?'

'I'm afraid they have, Pavel.' Then Massinger said, quickly and lightly, 'But you should mourn him as one of yours — surely?'

Pavel's eyes cleared, hardened into black points. Then he laughed once more, with genuine amusement. 'I heard all about his arrest, you know,' he said. 'From my — colleague in Vienna. My opposite number there tells a most amusing story — quite anecdotal.' His features sharpened around his gleaming eyes. Massinger sensed triumph exuded like an odour. His arm waved his glass around the room. Massinger tensed himself for revelation. Pavel was on the point of indiscretion, already certain of Aubrey's fate. 'Aubrey has been gathered in like a good harvest,' he said. 'My colleague saw his face, at the moment of his arrest. Quite, quite crestfallen! It must have been so dreadfully embarrassing for poor Aubrey,' he added venomously.

'Yes,' Massinger said after a long silence. Why am I doing this? he asked himself. I have abandoned him, too.

Pavel raised his glass once more, and murmured something inaudible. He knows all about it, Massinger recited to himself. He knows. His — the Vienna Rezident was there …? He wanted to shake the truth from the Russian. Instead, he raised his own glass and left Pavel, who seemed complacent at his own indiscretion, unworried. His indifference had to spring from complete and utter confidence. And it was as if he had needed to tell, to boast of it to a man who had been Aubrey's friend… and, as Pavel must know, had abandoned him in company with everyone else. Massinger felt nausea rise into his throat.

If only I could make him talk, make him tell, Massinger thought. If only I could — he knows it's all faked, that it's a set-up — he knows what's going on… The Vienna Rezident saw it all.

He realised that he had left the party, glass in hand, and had walked through the dressing-room into their bedroom. He studied his glass, his reflection in the dressing-table mirrors, and his swirling thoughts, and decided he would not return to the drawing-room immediately. He sighed, and looked at his watch. A masochistic urge prompted him to turn on the portable television on the table opposite the bed. He sat down, hearing the slither of silk beneath his buttocks. Soft lights glowed upon silver brushes, crystal jewellery trays, pale hangings, deep carpet. A late news magazine programme bloomed on the screen.

He could not believe what he saw. Aubrey, in front of a monkey cage. A tall, bulky man standing next to him. Summer, blue sky. A distant, hidden camera.

'… film sold to RTF, the French broadcasting service, which purports to show the head of British Intelligence and his Soviet controller during one of their meetings. The French television service have refused to name the supplier of the film…' Massinger was stunned. He saw his blank face and open mouth in a mirror. An idiot's