‘Put me down and let me die,’ said Ferdy.
‘Listen, Ferdy,’ I said. ‘You’d better pull yourself together, or I’ll do exactly that.’
‘Put me down,’ said Ferdy, and he gave a long groan of pain and weariness.
‘Left, right, left, right, left, right,’ I called loudly. He couldn’t do much about the rights, but with a bit more nagging I was able to persuade him to take his weight on his left foot now and again.
I was kidding myself, if I thought that I could get as far as we could see. And there was no submarine nearer than that. I stopped. But just holding Ferdy upright took more of my strength than I could spare.
‘Schlegel will be searching for us,’ I said.
Ferdy groaned, as if to indicate that he’d rather be left there than rescued by the dreaded Schlegel.
‘Left, right, left, right, left, right,’ I continued.
Sometimes the wet grey mist wrapped itself round us so completely that we had to stop and wait for the wind to find us a path through it.
‘For God’s sake, Ferdy, take some of your weight.’
‘Cinnamon toast,’ said Ferdy.
‘Damn right,’ I said. ‘It’s all that bloody cinnamon toast.’
Sometimes I stopped even when the mist did not force us to. I stopped to recover my breath, and, as time went on, the stops became more and more frequent. But at least Ferdy was not demanding to be abandoned in the Arctic wastes. It was a good sign, I thought, perhaps not unconnected with thoughts of cinnamon toast.
It was getting darker and darker all the time and I was frightened of losing my sense of direction as already I had lost all track of time.
Once I thought I heard the sound of whistles. I stopped. ‘Listen Ferdy: whistles.’
But it was just the shriek of the wind, playing the sharp fluted ice.
‘Left, right, left, right.’
By now I was croaking the time for myself, more than for Ferdy. I was commanding my own feet to crunch down into the unending snow. As it got darker I was more and more often blundering into ice ridges that came out of the mist at us, for all the world like ships steaming through a fog. ‘Here’s another, Ferdy,’ I said. ‘Left, right, left, right, left, right. No slackening of pace. You’re doing well, old son.’
And so when I saw the bright-red flares ahead of me, it was just another ship in the convoy. ‘Left, right, left, right, left, right.’ And the whistles were just the wind. So Ferdy and I pressed on through them, even when the ice ridges steered two points or more to ram us, or those icy ships were tearing at our clothes. ‘Left, right, left, right. Pick your bloody feet up, Ferdy, you bastard, and take a bit of your two hundred pounds of cinnamon toast on your good ankle, for a change.’
Slabs of up-tilted ice – as big as man – were on every side of us. It was difficult to pick a way through them. I used an outstretched hand to steady myself, as in the half-light the ice seemed to place itself in our path.
‘Not much farther now, Ferdy,’ I coaxed him. ‘I can almost smell that damned toast.’
‘Are they both crazy?’ It was the Captain’s voice.
‘Left, right,’ I said, pushing my way past the ice but snagged upon it, I felt myself stamping the same piece of snow.
‘Help me with the big fellow.’ It was the voice of the doctor. ‘Dead – done for long since.’
Schlegel’s voice said, ‘No goggles – snow blind and concussed. Have you got a needle with you, Doc?’
Somewhere nearby there was another signal flare and I could see that all right. I struggled to get free.
‘Wasted effort,’ said the voice of Schlegel. ‘Carrying him all that time – what a state he’s in.’
‘Probably wasn’t dead when they started.’
‘Maybe not, Doc.’
‘Let go of Foxwell.’ It was Schlegel shouting again, and this time his face was only inches from me. ‘You stupid bastard, let go of him, I say!’
21
PRINT-OUT (pink sheet total) is the end of game. Subordinate, aggregate and continuous play not included in PRINT-OUT are not part of the game.
RULES. ‘TACWARGAME’. STUDIES CENTRE. LONDON
Several times I had almost awakened into a hazy snow-white world of ether and antiseptic. Through the window bright sun shone on a world of dark-green pine forests, the trees sagging under layers of snow.
Someone lowered the blinds so that the room filled with soft shadowless light. There was a table with fruit, flowers and newspapers on it. The newspapers were in some unreadable script. At the end of the bed sat a man I recognized. He wore a dark suit and his face was elderly and slightly blurred.
‘He’s waking up again.’
‘Pat!’
I groaned. And now another figure came into view, looming over the end of the bed like a sun rising over the Arctic wastes. ‘Wake up, sweetheart, we’ve got other appointments.’
‘I’ll pour him some tea,’ said Dawlish. ‘There’s nothing so reviving as a nice cup of tea. Probably hasn’t had a proper one since coming in here.’
‘Where am I?’ I said. I didn’t want to say it but I wanted to know where I was.
Schlegel smiled. ‘Kirkenes, Norway. A Norwegian chopper brought you off the submarine a few days ago.’
‘Is that right?’ I asked Dawlish.
Dawlish said, ‘We were worried.’
‘I can imagine you were,’ I said. ‘I carry about ten thousand pounds in government insurance.’
‘He’s getting better,’ said Schlegel.
‘If you’d rather we went …’ Dawlish offered.
I shook my head very gently in case it rolled under the bedside cabinet and we had to prod it with sticks to get it out. ‘Where’s Ferdy?’
‘You know where Ferdy is,’ said Schlegel. ‘You did your best for him – but Ferdy’s dead.’
‘What for,’ I said, ‘what the hell for?’
Dawlish smoothed out his English newspaper. The headline said: GERMAN TALKS END WHEN RED KATYA WALKS OUT.
Dawlish said, ‘Stok’s people arrested Remoziva’s sister yesterday morning. Only thing they could do really.’
I looked from Schlegel to Dawlish and back again. ‘So that’s what it was all about – the German reunification.’
‘They’re cagey blighters,’ said Dawlish. ‘They weren’t convinced that the Admiral was coming over to us until they saw that corpse you took out there. They’re cynics I suppose, like you, Pat.’
‘Poor Ferdy.’
‘It was only thanks to Colonel Schlegel that you were saved,’ said Dawlish. ‘He thought of using the radar, and bullied the Captain into using it so close to their monitors.’
‘Bad security, Colonel,’ I said.
‘We brought some fruit for you,’ said Schlegel. ‘You want a grape?’
‘No, thanks,’ I said.
‘I told you he wouldn’t want it,’ said Schlegel.
‘He’ll eat it,’ said Dawlish. ‘In fact, I wouldn’t mind a grape myself.’ He helped himself to two, in rapid succession.
‘You encouraged them to snatch Ferdy,’ I accused Schlegel.
‘These grapes are good,’ said Dawlish. ‘Must be hothouse at this time of year but they’re awfully sweet.’
‘You bastard,’ I said.
Schlegel said, ‘Ferdy was deep into Toliver’s set-up. He needn’t have gone on the trip at all, but he insisted.’
‘So you two have been conniving all down the line?’
‘Conniving?’ said Dawlish. ‘Sure you won’t try a grape? No? Well, I mustn’t eat them all.’ But he helped himself to another. ‘Conniving isn’t at all the word I’d choose. Colonel Schlegel was sent to help us sort out the Toliver complication – we appreciated his help.’
‘… got it,’ I said. ‘Use Colonel Schlegel to beat Toliver over the head. Then if Toliver complains to the Home Secretary you say it’s the CIA doing it. Neat, but not gaudy.’
‘Toliver came near to knocking you off,’ said
Schlegel. ‘Don’t shed any tears for that bastard.’
‘Well, I’m sure he’ll be taken care of, now.’
‘He’s discredited,’ said Dawlish. ‘That’s all we wanted.’
‘And all the hard work is being done by Russian security,’ I said. I picked up the newspaper.
TWO JOIN SOVIET POLITBURO, THREE OUSTED.
Moscow (Reuters)
The first Politburo shake-out since the ousting of Nikita Khrushchev was announced at the end of a two-day meeting of the Central Committee.
According to observers here the new line-up means the end of all hopes for the German treaty of federalization.
I pushed the paper aside. The stop press said the D Mark had already begun falling against the dollar and sterling. So that was it. A united Germany would have upset the status quo. Its agricultural East would make French agriculture suffer, with a resulting gain for the French communists. Meanwhile Germany got a share in the Common Market’s agricultural share-out. Germany’s contribution to NATO – something like a third of all NATO forces – would certainly have to be dismantled under the treaty’s terms. US forces in Germany would not be able to withdraw to France, which wasn’t a member of NATO. And this was timed for a period when the USA would be changing to an all-volunteer force. It would inevitably mean US withdrawal from Europe. Just as Russia had completed its big five year military build-up. Yes, worth a couple of operatives.
They both watched me as I finished reading. ‘And the Russians arrested all the Remozivas just on the basis of us meeting that chopper?’
‘Sippenhaft. Isn’t that what the Germans call it?’ said Dawlish. ‘Collective family responsibility for the actions of one person.’
‘Don’t you care that you’ve helped to frame completely innocent people?’
‘You’ve got it wrong, haven’t you? It wasn’t British policemen who went out arresting everyone named Remoziva the other morning, it was Russian communist policemen. And the people they arrested were working very energetically to strengthen, improve and expand this system that arrests people in the middle of the night on the grounds that they might be an enemy of the state. I don’t intend to lose any sleep over it.’
‘Just to foul up the reunification, eh?’ I said.
‘They’ve got an analog computer at the Foreign Office, you know,’ said Dawlish.
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘It’s not supposed to mean anything. It’s a fact. They put the German reunification on it and didn’t like the scenario one little bit.’
I helped myself to one of my fast disappearing grapes. Dawlish said, ‘You are bound to feel a bit depressed for a while: it’s the drugs. You were in a bad way, you know.’
‘Does Marjorie know I’m here?’
‘I’ve been trying to get hold of her, Pat. She’s left the hospital.’ It was a softer voice he used. ‘She seems to have cancelled the bread and the milk deliveries.’
‘Did she go to Los Angeles?’
‘We’re not sure,’ said Dawlish, trying to break it to me gently. ‘We’ve only just got her family’s address in Wales. Quite a tongue-twister, it is. She might be there.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘Forget it.’
I turned away from my two visitors. For a moment I saw the wallpaper that I never did replace and heard Marjorie greet me as I returned from a trip. The bookshelves would now be cleared of those damned anaemia books but I’d go on finding hairpins down the back of the sofa.
Self-pity reached in and grabbed my breakfast. It hurt, and if you want to say it was nothing but a self-inflicted wound, I can only reply that it hurt none the less because of that. Ferdy had gone and Marjorie too: the comfortable little world I’d built up since leaving the department had disappeared as if it had never been.
‘Are they treating you well in here?’ said Dawlish.
‘Pickled fish for breakfast,’ I said.
‘The reason I ask,’ said Dawlish, ‘is that we have a bit of a problem … It’s a security job …’
I suppose I might have guessed that a man like that doesn’t fly to Norway to bring anyone grapes.
Acknowledgements
The author would like to acknowledge the help and assistance of Major Berchtold, US Army (retired), and the staff of the institute of War Studies, London, and in particular the permission given for the inclusion of extracts and quotations from the Institute’s previously unpublished confidential reports and private papers. All such extracts are subject to full copyright protection provided by the Berne Convention and the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988. No part of these extracts may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or stored in any form or by any means, either electronic, electrical, chemical, mechanical, optical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owners.
Cover designer’s note
Documents from the Cold War period in which Spy Story is set were invariably produced on a manual typewriter. It was therefore an obvious choice, to me, to use the typewriter keys to spell out the book’s title. An unintentional bonus is that their circular shape is reminiscent of portholes, which suits the nautical element of the story.
Extending that theme further, I have included silhouettes of a pair of nuclear submarines, whose dark outlines look as though they have come straight out of a wartime spotter’s guide. A map of the war games area depicted in the book fills the submarines, which sail through a red sea that leaves no doubt in the reader’s mind that Communist USSR looms large in this story.
On each front cover of this latest quartet, I have placed a photograph of the eyes of the bespectacled unnamed spy, in this instance overlaid with a submarine periscope’s graticule. Is our hero in the sights of a Soviet submariner? Or is he inside one of the vessels and spying on us?
Readers who have been faithfully building their collection of these reissues will by now have become familiar with my use of a linking motif on the spines of the books. Being the final foursome in the entire series of reissues, and books in which violence is never too far away, I thought it a good idea to ‘go out with a bang’, as it were. This quartet’s spines accordingly display a different handgun, as mentioned in each of the books’ texts. The example here is a Russian Tokarev TT pistol, developed in the 1920s and still popular with Soviet military police forty years later.
Another recurring feature in this quartet, to be found within each back cover’s photographic montage, is a pair of ‘our hero’s’ glasses, which look suspiciously like those worn by ‘Harry Palmer’ in The Ipcress File and other outings …
Also featured in the montage is a King George Vl Coronation mug, souvenir of a simpler time, which becomes the receptacle for the hero’s glasses. Completing the contents of the mug is a Savoy Hotel matchbox and a rubber stamp, the latter perhaps the archetypal symbol of dull bureaucracy so railed against by our hero. In front of this, a packet of Players cigarettes props up an arctic Soviet submariner’s badge.
A quarter-inch magnetic tape suggests that surveillance of some form is taking place, though of whom and why remains to be discovered. This tape’s secrets are in actual fact a recording of a Radio Luxembourg commercial that I produced with Mick Jagger, promoting one of The Rolling Stones records. A lead toy submarine completes the arrangement, with all items sitting on a copy of a Pravda newspaper.
Arnold Schwartzman OBE RDI
Hollywood 2012
About the Author
Len Deighton was born in 1929. He worked as a railway clerk before doing his National Service in the RAF as a photographer attached to the Special Investigation Branch.
After his discharge in 1949, he went to art school – first to the St Martin’s School of Art, and then to the Royal College of Art on a scholarship. His mother was a professional cook and he grew up with an interest in cookery – a subject he was later to make his own in an animated strip for the Observer and in two cookery books. He worked for a while as an illustrator in New York and
as art director of an advertising agency in London.
Deciding it was time to settle down, Deighton moved to the Dordogne where he started work on his first book, The Ipcress File. Published in 1962, the book was an immediate success.
Since then his work has gone from strength to strength, varying from espionage novels to war, general fiction and non-fiction. The BBC made Bomber into a day-long radio drama in ‘real time’. Deighton’s history of World War Two, Blood, Tears and Folly, was published to wide acclaim – Jack Higgins called it ‘an absolute landmark’.
As Max Hastings observed, Deighton captured a time and a mood – ‘To those of us who were in our twenties in the 1960s, his books seemed the coolest, funkiest, most sophisticated things we’d ever read’ – and his books have now deservedly become classics.
By Len Deighton
FICTION
The Ipcress File
Horse Under Water
Funeral in Berlin
Billion-Dollar Brain
An Expensive Place to Die
Only When I Larf
Bomber
Declarations of War
Close-Up
Spy Story
Yesterday’s Spy
Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Spy
SS-GB
XPD
Goodbye Mickey Mouse
MAMista
City of Gold
Violent Ward
THE SAMSON SERIES
Berlin Game
Mexico Set
London Match
Winter: The Tragic Story of a Berlin Family 1899–1945
Spy Hook
Spy Line
Spy Sinker
Faith
Hope
Charity
NON-FICTION
Action Cook Book
Fighter: The True Story of the Battle of Britain
Airshipwreck
French Cooking for Men
Blitzkrieg: From the Rise of Hitler to the Fall of Dunkirk
ABC of French Food
Blood, Tears and Folly