‘A wonderful piece of foresightedness, Gerry.’
‘I know it’s all part of your technique,’ said Hart. ‘I know you are trying to irritate me but I’m not going to be irritated.’
‘I’m delighted to hear that,’ I said.
‘But there is a time factor,’ he said. ‘And if you don’t give me a tentative “yes”, shortly followed by a suitable piece of paper, I’m getting to my feet and walking out of here.’
‘Yes, well, don’t forget to pay for the sandwiches,’ I said.
‘There’s nothing in this for me personally,’ said Gerry Hart. ‘I’m trying to prevent a foul-up between two separate investigations.’
‘Why don’t you make an official report?’
‘You’ve got to be joking,’ said Hart. ‘It will take weeks to go through and at the end …’ he shrugged.
‘And at the end they might decide that Major Mann is right.’
‘There’s nothing in this for me,’ said Hart again.
‘You’re too modest, Gerry. I’d say there was a lot in this for you. You tell me that Greenwood doesn’t know you are up to the neck in a CIA investigation of the 1924 Society. You’re too smart to hazard the main chance in search of a little career-garnish. I’d guess you keep your boss fully informed. And I’d say that you plan to come out the other side of this one having demonstrated what a powerful man you are, and what important connections you have with the CIA and how you can mangle its policies if you feel inclined. If Greenwood was impressed with that – and we both know that he might be – you could wind up in Congress, or maybe in the White House. Now don’t tell me you didn’t think of that possibility.’
‘Don’t you ever get depressed?’ he asked. ‘You always talk like everyone is on the make. Don’t you ever get depressed?’
‘I do, Gerry. Each time when I turn out to be right, which is practically always.’
‘Do you hate me so much? Would you prevent Mrs Bekuv joining her husband just in case I get some political mileage out of it?’
‘You’re not talking to a junior cipher-clerk, Gerry. I’ve been there; and I know how the wheels go round, when jerks like you press the buttons …’
‘Now, I’ve heard …’
‘I’ve listened to you through a Bloody Mary, a club sandwich and a cup of coffee, Gerry. Now you listen to me. I’m not preventing Mrs Bekuv making a journey anywhere because I’ll put my pension on an old underwear button that Mrs Bekuv has already made her journey. She’s in Manhattan, right, Gerry?’
‘We’ve got a leak, have we?’
‘No leak, Gerry,’ I said. ‘Agents in the Soviet Union – the ones that survive there – don’t send messages to guys like Gerry Hart explaining what kind of travel arrangements they might be able to get for the Mrs Bekuvs of this world – they see an opportunity open up, they make a snap decision, they act on it, and disappear again.’
‘I suppose so,’ said Hart.
‘And I picture Mrs Bekuv as a hard-nosed Party-worker, as smart as Stalin but only half as pretty. I see her pushing her absent-minded husband into his high-paid, top-secret job, in spite of his theories about flying saucers. I don’t picture her as the sort of woman who hands over her wedding rings to some strange creep who might be a KGB man who likes a little hard evidence. No. But she might loan them out … for an hour or two.’
Gerry Hart didn’t answer. He poured cream into the last little drop of his coffee and drank it slowly.
‘We’ll take her off your hands, Gerry,’ I said. ‘But no pieces of paper, and I can only advise Mann about the 1924 Society: no promises.’
‘Do what you can,’ he said. For a moment the bottom had dropped out of his world but, even as I watched him, I saw him coming up at me again as only soft rubber balls and politicians know how to bounce. ‘But you’re wrong about Mrs Bekuv,’ he said. ‘Wait until you see her.’
‘Which of you asked for the check?’ the waitress said.
‘My friend asked for it,’ I said.
7
Gerry Hart and I were both right. He delivered Mrs Bekuv to us within five days and had to be content with Major Mann’s worthless assurance that any investigation of the 1924 Society would be conducted by men wearing velvet gloves. But I was wrong about Mrs Bekuv. She was in her middle thirties, a cheerful strawberry blonde with a curvacious figure that no one would ever persuade me to classify as plump. It required a superhuman faith in departmental files to believe that she’d been an earnest fourteen-year-old Young Communist, and had spent eight years touring the Soviet Union lecturing on fruit-crop infections. Gerry Hart was right – Mrs Bekuv was quite a surprise.
Elena Katerina, like her husband Andrei, had prepared her shopping-list long before her arrival in New York. She was complete with a caseful of Elizabeth Arden creams and lotions, and a complete range of Gucci matching luggage containing a wardrobe that would cope with any climate and a long time between laundries.
Sitting up front in Mann’s Plymouth station-wagon, in suede pants-suit and white silk roll-neck, her blonde hair gleaming in the lights of the oncoming traffic, she looked more American than Bessie Mann or Red Bancroft sitting at the back each side of me.
Mrs Bekuv was wide awake but her husband’s head had tilted until it was resting on her shoulder. Mann had left it too late to avoid the Christmas Eve traffic build-up and now it seemed likely that we would arrive late.
‘Should we call them, honey … tell them to save some dinner?’ said Bessie.
‘They know we’re coming,’ said Mann. He pulled out and took advantage of a sudden movement in the fast lane. Bekuv had found a radio station in Baltimore that was playing Latin American music, but Mann reached over and turned the volume low.
‘They say Virginia is like England,’ said Red Bancroft trying to see into the darkness.
‘I’ll let you know, when it gets light,’ I said.
‘Anyone wants to drive,’ offered Mann, irritably, ‘and they’ve only got to say so.’
‘And see where it gets them,’ said Bessie Mann. She leaned forward and patted her husband on the head. ‘We all have great faith in you, darling,’ she cooed.
‘Don’t do that when I’m driving.’
‘When shall I do it, then? It’s the only time you turn your back.’
Red Bancroft said, ‘Whenever my father asked my mother what she wanted for Christmas, she’d say she wanted to go away to a hotel until it was all over. But we never did spend Christmas in a hotel.’ Red lit up one of the mentholated cigarettes she liked to smoke and blew smoke at me. I pulled a face.
‘Because of all the work,’ said Mann over his shoulder. ‘She wanted to get away from all the cooking and the dishes.’
‘Men see through us every time,’ said Bessie Mann, feigning admiration.
‘That’s what she meant,’ insisted Mann.
‘Of course it is, darling,’ she leaned forward to touch his cheek, and he took her fingers so that he could kiss the back of her hand.
‘You two hide a torrid affair behind these harsh exchanges,’ I said.
‘Hold it, Bessie,’ said Mann urgently. ‘We’ve got two romantic kids in the back.’
‘Why is it called Virginia?’ said Mrs Bekuv suddenly. Her English was excellent, but she spoke it in a curiously prim voice and with poor pronunciation, like someone who had learned from a text-book.
‘Named after England’s virgin queen,’ said Mann.
‘Oh,’ said Mrs Bekuv, not sure if she was being mocked.
Mann chortled, and changed down for the steep hill ahead.
It was certainly a remarkable hide-out: an old house set in four hundred acres of Virginia countryside. As we came up the potholed road our headlights startled rabbits and deer, and then through the trees we saw the hotel, its windows ablaze with yellow light and the façade strung with coloured bulbs like a child’s Christmas tree.
Parked in the metalled space alongside the barn, there was a bus. It was a shiny metal monster, le
ft over from the days before buses got tinted windows and air-conditioning. Alongside it there was another car, and as we came to a stop our headlights caught the shiny bodywork of a vintage Packard convertible, reconditioned by some enthusiast.
Mann switched off the lights and the radio. ‘Well, here we are,’ he said. ‘Plenty of time for supper.’
‘Eight twenty,’ said Bessie Mann. Bekuv yawned, and his wife eased her shoes on and opened the car door.
‘Happy Christmas,’ I said, and Red kissed me on the ear.
‘You’ll love this place,’ said Mann.
‘We’d better,’ said Bessie, ‘or I’ll never believe you again.’
As I climbed out of the warm car the cold of the open countryside bit into me. ‘Isn’t that beautiful,’ said Red. ‘It’s been snowing.’
‘Is that like home, Professor Bekuv?’ Bessie asked.
‘I was born in the desert,’ said Andrei Bekuv. ‘I was born in a region more desolate than the Sahara – the USSR is a big place, Mrs Mann.’
‘Is your home in the desert too, Katerina?’ said Mrs Mann.
Mrs Bekuv wrapped herself in a long red cape and pulled the hood up over her head to protect her from the chilly wind. ‘America is my home now, Bessie,’ she said. ‘I loved New York. I will never leave America.’
Mann was locking the doors of the car and I caught his glance. Any fears we’d had about Mrs Bekuv’s conversion to capitalism seemed unfounded.
‘Just take your pocket-books, and the cameras,’ Mann told anyone who was listening. ‘They’ll send someone out for the baggage.’
‘You always lock the car,’ said Bessie Mann. ‘He’s so suspicious,’ she announced to a world that already knew.
We went into the lobby of the hotel and I thought for a moment that Mann must have chosen it to make the Bekuvs feel at home. The furniture was massive and there were old-fashioned floral cushions and cracked lino on the stairs. Behind the reception counter there was a framed photo of Franklin Roosevelt and a litho reproduction of US Marines raising the flag on Iwo. The receptionist might have been chosen to match: she was a cheerful little woman with carefully waved grey hair and a chintzy dress. ‘There’s still time to catch the second half of the movie,’ she said.
Mann picked up the menu from the desk. ‘I think we’d rather eat,’ he said.
‘He changes the reel at the half-hour. The lights go on; you’ll not disturb the show.’
‘You want to send some food up to the rooms?’
‘Whatever you say,’ agreed the old lady.
‘The home-made soup and steak – rare – and salad,’ said Mann. ‘And give us a bottle of Scotch and a bottle of vodka and a few mixes and ice.’
‘I’ll do it right away. Everyone the same?’ she smiled. ‘There’s an ice-box in your rooms.’
We mumbled agreement, except for Mrs Bekuv who wanted her steak well done.
‘The best steak this side of Texas,’ said the old lady. ‘That’s what they all tell me.’
The two single rooms, booked for Red and me, were at the far end of the corridor. One had a shower and the other a bathroom. ‘Shower or bath?’ I asked as we looked into the rooms.
‘I hate showers,’ she said going into the room that was equipped with it. ‘Especially these tin-sided contraptions. They make such a racket.’
She went over to the single bed and prodded it to see if it was soft. Then she pulled the blanket back and pummelled the pillows. ‘No,’ she said coming back to where I was standing and putting her arm through mine. ‘I think we’ll use the room with the tub.’ She took me to the other room.
She sat on the bed and pulled off the silly little woollen hat she liked to wear. Then she undid the buttons of her dress. Her long red hair tumbled down over her pale shoulders. She smiled. She was the most beautiful creature I’d ever seen and her happiness warmed me. She kicked off her shoes. I picked up the phone. ‘Can I have a bottle of champagne? Yes, French champagne. On second thoughts, better make that two bottles.’
It was a long time before we got back to the sitting-room that the Bekuvs shared with the Manns. There was a boy in starched apron and black bow-tie smoothing the tablecloth and setting out the cutlery.
‘Thought you two were hungry enough to give dinner a miss,’ said Mann archly.
‘Mickey!’ said his wife. ‘You haven’t ordered the wine.’
‘You got red wine?’ Mann asked the young waiter.
‘Only Californian,’ said the boy.
‘I like Californian,’ said Major Mann. He put a flattened hand over his heart, as if swearing to it.
The proprietor’s wife had fixed dinner. The homemade soup was clam chowder and the steaks were delicious. Mann praised the buttered corn. ‘You can keep all that lousy French chow,’ Mann offered. ‘You give me American cooking every time.’
Mrs Mann said, ‘You like it; you got it.’ The Bekuvs smiled but said nothing.
From downstairs the louder parts of the film’s soundtrack were sometimes audible. We heard exploding bombs and wartime melodies.
I suppose Bekuv must have been anticipating the pep-talk that Mann decided was due. When Mann produced a box of cigars and suggested that we smoke them down the hall, rather than wake up to the aroma of stale tobacco, Bekuv readily agreed, and I went with them.
The lounge was furnished in the same downbeat way that the lobby had been. There were several large sepia photographs of men with goggles, standing round old racing cars and grinning at each other. I guessed that Pierce, the proprietor, was a vintage-car freak, and probably owned the finely preserved Packard outside, and maybe the vintage bus, too.
Bekuv chose the dilapidated sofa. Mann leaned over him to light his cigar. ‘There have been a lot of new developments since you arrived Stateside,’ said Mann.
‘What kind of developments?’ said Bekuv cautiously.
‘At first we were asking you to tell us about the scientific data you were handling before you defected.’
‘And I did that,’ said Bekuv.
‘Up to a point you did it,’ said Mann. ‘But you must have realized that there was another motive too.’
‘No,’ said Bekuv, drawing on his cigar and facing Mann quite calmly.
‘For God’s sake, Bekuv! You must see by now that our work on masers is way ahead of anything being done in the Soviet Union. We don’t need you to tell us about masers.’
Bekuv had no intention of admitting anything like that. ‘Then why ask me?’
‘No one can be as dumb as you pretend to be at times,’ said Mann.
I interrupted them before Mann blew his top. ‘We know that American scientific data is being betrayed to the Soviet Union.’
Bekuv turned to look at me. He frowned and then gave a despairing shrug. ‘I don’t understand,’ he said. ‘You will have to explain.’
‘We are hoping to recognize the form in which you recall the material. It might help us to trace the source of it. We might be able to find where it’s coming from.’
‘Much of it came from published work,’ said Bekuv.
‘Now don’t get smart,’ said Mann. He stood up, and there was a moment when I thought I was going to have to step between them. ‘We are not talking about the kind of stuff that Greenwood and his committee are giving away. We are talking about military stuff.’
‘What began as a scientific leak has now become a flood of material,’ I said. ‘Some of it is intelligence data. There is British material too, which is why I am involved.’
‘I wondered about that,’ said Bekuv.
‘I’m being squeezed,’ said Mann, ‘and when I get squeezed, you go through the wringer.’
‘I’m giving you the material as fast as I can recall it,’ said Bekuv.
‘And that’s not fast enough,’ said Mann. There was an element of threat there.
‘I can’t go any faster,’ said Bekuv. I watched his face. Perhaps this was the time he started to realize that his assistants at NYU had been
trying to interrogate him.
Mann straightened and threw his head back. He held the cigar to his lips and put the other hand in the small of his back. It was a gesture both reflective and Napoleonic, until he scratched his behind. He strode slowly across the carpet in front of the log fire, staring all the time at the ceiling and puffing smoke. ‘It was July of ’seventy-one. Berlin was stinking hot … you know the way it can get in that town. We’d included one of our kids in a party of trade union officials who were being given the treatment: that apartment block on the Allee that they pretend is full of workers’ families, and the crèche near the Wannsee and the banquet where they drink the dudes under the table with endless toasts to the unity of the proletariat. Silly to put one of our boys into a scrum like that. It was an American trade union lawyer from Pittsburgh who reported him to the Russians. When we got him back, his arse was raw with untreated cigarette burns, and his bloodstream was full of pentathol. We flew him back to the best surgeon in the States but he never got the full use of his right hand again …’ Mann smiled one of his cold smiles at Bekuv.
Bekuv had never taken his eyes off Mann as he paced up and down. Now he said, ‘It’s not so simple to recall the details.’
‘I was trying to help,’ said Mann.
‘I need more time,’ said Bekuv.
Mann smiled again. He consulted his watch. ‘Just look at the time. We’d better finish these cigars and join the ladies.’ He threw his cigar away and ushered us out.
‘It’s a beautiful place,’ said Red Bancroft. She was looking out of the window, cupping her hands to keep out the reflections. ‘The moon is coming out. It is a wonderful evening for a walk.’
‘It’s freezing,’ I said.
‘Wrap up well, Pop,’ she said scornfully. ‘You can put on that nice new leather overcoat.’
I nodded my agreement, and I saw Red and Mrs Mann exchange the sort of knowing look with which women greet the downfall of a male.
The film show ended at ten minutes past ten. Red and I were walking through the cobbled yard at the rear of the house to get a closer look at the vintage bus and the old Packard. We’d heard ‘Smoke Gets in Your Eyes’ and ‘Change Partners’ coming faintly through the heavily curtained room where the movie was playing. As the finale music swelled, the back door opened, and some men came out into the cold air. One of them coughed and another slapped his back helpfully. Two more of the men lit cigarettes.