Smiley's People

by John le Carré

  “Yet you spoke without inner conviction?” Smiley suggested, looking up again and pausing in his writing.

  “That is so.”

  “Why?”

  At first, Grigoriev seemed unsure why. Perhaps he had never before been invited to speak the truth about his feelings.

  “Did you perhaps not believe the priest?” Smiley suggested.

  “The story had many inconsistencies,” Grigoriev repeated with a frown. “No doubt in secret work this was inevitable. Nevertheless I regarded much of it as unlikely or untrue.”

  “Can you explain why?”

  In the catharsis of confession, Grigoriev once more forgot his own peril, and gave a smile of superiority.

  “He was emotional,” he said. “I asked myself. Afterwards, with Evdokia, next day, lying at Evdokia’s side, discussing the matter with her, I asked myself: What was it between the priest and this Ostrakov? Are they brothers? Old comrades? This great man they had brought me to see, so powerful, so secret—all over the world he is making conspiracies, putting pressure, taking special action. He is a ruthless man, in a ruthless profession. Yet when I, Grigoriev, am sitting with him, talking about some fellow’s deranged daughter, I have the feeling I am reading this man’s most intimate love letters. I said to him: ‘Comrade. You are telling me too much. Don’t tell me what I do not need to know. Tell me only what I must do.’ But he says to me: ‘Grigoriev, you must be a friend to this child. Then you will be a friend to me. Her father’s twisted life has had a bad effect on her. She does not know who she is or where she belongs. She speaks of freedom without regard to its meaning. She is the victim of pernicious bourgeois fantasies. She uses foul language not suitable to a young girl. In lying, she has the genius of madness. None of this is her fault.’ Then I ask him: ‘Sir, have you met this girl?’ And he says to me only, ‘Grigoriev, you must be a father to her. Her mother was in many ways not an easy woman either. You have sympathy for such matters. In her later life she became embittered, and even supported her daughter in some of her anti-social fantasies.’”

  Grigoriev fell silent a moment and Toby Esterhase, still reeling from the knowledge that Grigoriev had discussed Karla’s proposition with his occasional mistress within hours of its being made, was grateful for the respite.

  “I felt he was dependent on me,” Grigoriev resumed. “I felt he was concealing not only facts, but feelings.”

  There remained, said Grigoriev, the practical details. The priest supplied them. The overseer of the clinic was a White Russian woman, a nun, formerly of the Russian Orthodox community in Jerusalem, but a good-hearted woman. In these cases, we should not be too scrupulous politically, said the priest. This woman had herself met Alexandra in Paris and escorted her to Switzerland. The clinic also had the services of a Russian-speaking doctor. The girl, thanks to the ethnic connections of her mother, also spoke German, but frequently refused to do so. These factors, together with the remoteness of the place, accounted for its selection. The money paid into the Thun bank would be sufficient for the clinic’s fees, for medical attention up to one thousand francs a month, and as a hidden subsidy for the Grigorievs’ new life-style. More money was available if Grigoriev thought it necessary; he should keep no bills or receipts; the priest would know soon enough if Grigoriev was cheating. He should visit the clinic weekly to pay the bill and inform himself of the girl’s welfare; the Soviet Ambassador in Berne would be informed that the Grigorievs had been entrusted with secret work, and that he should allow them flexibility.

  The priest then came to the question of Grigoriev’s communication with Moscow.

  “He asked me: ‘Do you know the courier Krassky?’ I reply, naturally I know this courier; Krassky comes once, sometimes twice a week to the Embassy in the company of his escort. If you are friendly with him, he will maybe bring you a loaf of black bread direct from Moscow.”

  In future, said the priest, Krassky would make a point of meeting Grigoriev privately each Thursday evening during his regular visit to Berne, either in Grigoriev’s house or in Grigoriev’s room in the Embassy, but preferably his house. No conspiratorial discussions would take place, but Krassky would hand to Grigoriev an envelope containing an apparently personal letter from Grigoriev’s aunt in Moscow. Grigoriev would take the letter to a safe place and treat it at prescribed temperatures with three chemical solutions freely available on the open market—the priest named them and Grigoriev now repeated them. In the writing thus revealed, said the priest, Grigoriev would find a list of questions he should put to Alexandra on his next weekly visit. At the same meeting with Krassky, Grigoriev should hand him a letter to be delivered to the same aunt, in which he would pretend to be writing in detail about his wife Grigorieva’s welfare, whereas in fact he would be reporting to the priest on the welfare of the girl Alexandra. This was called word code. Later, the priest would if necessary supply Grigoriev with materials for a more clandestine communication, but for the time being the word-code letter to Grigoriev’s aunt would do.

  The priest then handed Grigoriev a medical certificate, signed by an eminent Moscow doctor.

  “While here in Moscow, you have suffered a minor heart attack as a consequence of stress and overwork,” said the priest. “You are advised to take up regular cycling in order to improve your physical condition. Your wife will accompany you.”

  By arriving at the clinic by bicycle or on foot, the priest explained, Grigoriev would be able to conceal the diplomatic registration of his car.

  The priest then authorised him to purchase two secondhand bicycles. There remained the question of which day of the week would be best suited for Grigoriev’s visits to the clinic. Saturday was the normal visiting day but this was too dangerous; several of the inmates were from Berne and there was always the risk that “Glaser” would be recognised. The overseer had therefore been advised that Saturdays were impracticable, and had consented, exceptionally, to a regular Friday-afternoon visit. The Ambassador would not object, but how would Grigoriev reconcile his Friday absences with Embassy routine?

  There was no problem, Grigoriev replied. It was always permissible to trade Fridays for Saturdays, so Grigoriev would merely apply to work on Saturdays instead; then his Fridays would be free.

  His confession over, Grigoriev treated his audience to a swift, over-lit smile.

  “On Saturdays, a certain young lady also happened to be working in the Visa Section,” he said, with a wink at Toby. “It was therefore possible we could enjoy some privacy together.”

  This time the general laughter was not quite as hearty as it might have been. Time, like Grigoriev’s story, was running out.

  They were back where they had started, and suddenly there was only Grigoriev himself to worry about, only Grigoriev to administer, only Grigoriev to secure. He sat smirking on the sofa, but the arrogance was ebbing from him. He had linked his hands submissively and he was looking from one to the other of them, as if expecting orders.

  “My wife cannot ride a bicycle,” he remarked with a sad little smile. “She tried many times.” Her failure seemed to mean whole volumes to him. “The priest wrote to me from Moscow: ‘Take your wife to her. Maybe Alexandra needs a mother, also.’” He shook his head, bemused. “She cannot ride it,” he said to Smiley. “In such a great conspiracy, how can I tell Moscow that Grigorieva cannot ride a bicycle?” Perhaps there was no greater test of Smiley’s rôle as the responsible functionary in charge, than the way in which he now almost casually transformed Grigoriev the onetime source into Grigoriev the defector-in-place.

  “Counsellor, whatever your long-term plans may be, you will please remain at the Embassy for at least another two weeks,” he announced, precisely closing his notepad. “If you do as I propose, you will find a warm welcome should you elect to make a new life somewhere in the West.” He dropped the pad into his pocket. “But next Friday you will on no account visit the girl Alexandra. You will tell your wife that this was the substance of today’s meeting with Krassky.
When Krassky the courier brings you Thursday’s letter, you will accept it normally but you will afterwards continue to maintain to your wife that Alexandra is not to be visited. Be mysterious towards her. Blind her with mystery.”

  Accepting his instructions, Grigoriev nodded uneasily.

  “I must warn you, however, that if you make the smallest error or, on the other hand, try some trick, the priest will find out and destroy you. You will also forfeit your chances of a friendly reception in the West. Is that clear to you?”

  There were telephone numbers for Grigoriev to ring, there were call-box to call-box procedures to be explained, and against all the laws of the trade, Smiley allowed Grigoriev to write the whole lot down, for he knew that he would not remember them otherwise. When all this was done, Grigoriev took his leave in a spirit of brooding dejection. Toby drove him to a safe dropping point, then returned to the flat and held a curt meeting of farewell.

  Smiley was in his same chair, hands clasped on his lap. The rest of them, under Millie McCraig’s orders, were busily tidying up the traces of their presence, polishing, dusting, emptying ashtrays and waste-paper baskets. Everyone present except himself and Smiley was getting out today, said Toby, the surveillance teams as well. Not tonight, not tomorrow. Now. They were sitting on a king-sized time bomb, he said: Grigoriev might at this very moment, under the continued impulse of confession, be describing the entire episode to his awful wife. If he had told Evdokia about Karla, who was to say he would not tell Grigorieva, or for that matter little Natasha, about his pow-wow with George today? Nobody should feel discarded, nobody should feel left out, said Toby. They had done a great job, and they would be meeting again soon to set the crown on it. There were handshakes, even a tear or two, but the prospect of the final act left everybody cheerful at heart.

  And Smiley, sitting so quiet, so immobile, as the party broke up around him, what did he feel? On the face of it, this was a moment of high achievement for him. He had done everything he had set out to do, and more, even if he had resorted to Karla’s techniques for the purpose. He had done it alone; and today, as the record would show, he had broken and turned Karla’s hand-picked agent in the space of a couple of hours. Unaided, even hampered by those who had called him back to service, he had fought his way through to the point where he could honestly say he had burst the last important lock. He was in late age, yet his tradecraft had never been better; for the first time in his career, he held the advantage over his old adversary.

  On the other hand, that adversary had acquired a human face of disconcerting clarity. It was no brute whom Smiley was pursuing with such mastery, no unqualified fanatic after all, no automaton. It was a man; and one whose downfall, if Smiley chose to bring it about, would be caused by nothing more sinister than excessive love, a weakness with which Smiley himself, from his own tangled life, was eminently familiar.

  26

  To every clandestine operation, says the folklore, belong more days of waiting than are numbered in Paradise, and for both George Smiley and Toby Esterhase, in their separate ways, the days and nights between Sunday evening and Friday seemed often numberless, and surely bore no relation to the Hereafter.

  They lived not so much by Moscow Rules, says Toby, as by George’s war rules. Both changed hotels and identities that same Sunday night, Smiley decamping to a small hôtel garni in the old town, the Arca, and Toby to a distasteful motel outside the town. Thereafter the two men communicated between call-boxes according to an agreed rota, and if they needed to meet, they selected crowded outdoor places, walking a short distance together before parting. Toby had decided to change his tracks, he said, and was using cars as sparingly as possible. His task was to keep the watch on Grigoriev. All week he clung to his stated conviction that, having so recently enjoyed the luxury of one confession, Grigoriev was sure to treat himself to another. To forestall this, he kept Grigoriev on as short a rein as possible, but to keep up with him at all was a nightmare. For example, Grigoriev left his house at quarter to eight each morning and had a five-minute walk to the Embassy. Very well: Toby would make one car sweep down the road at seven-fifty exactly. If Grigoriev carried his brief-case in his right hand, Toby would know that nothing was happening. But the left hand meant “emergency,” with a crash meeting in the gardens of the Elfenau palace and a fall-back in the town. On the Monday and Tuesday, Grigoriev went the distance using his right hand only. But on the Wednesday it was snowing, he wished to clear his spectacles, and therefore he stopped to locate his handkerchief, with the result that Toby first saw the brief-case in his left hand, but when he raced round the block again to check, Grigoriev was grinning like a madman and waving the brief-case at him with his right. Toby, according to his own account, had “a total heart attack.” The next day, the crucial Thursday, Toby achieved a car meeting with Grigoriev in the little village of Allmendingen, just outside the town, and was able to talk to him face to face. An hour earlier, the courier Krassky had arrived, bringing Karla’s weekly orders: Toby had seen him enter the Grigoriev residence. So where were the instructions from Moscow? Toby asked. Grigoriev was cantankerous and a little drunk. He demanded ten thousand dollars for the letter, which so enraged Toby that he threatened Grigoriev with exposure then and there; he would make a citizen’s arrest and take him straight down to the police station and charge him personally with posing as a Swiss national, abusing his diplomatic status, evading Swiss tax laws, and about fifteen other things, including venery and espionage. The bluff worked, Grigoriev produced the letter, already treated, with the secret writing showing between the hand-written lines. Toby took several photographs of it, then returned it to Grigoriev.

  Karla’s questions from Moscow, which Toby showed to Smiley late that night in a rare meeting at a country inn, had a beseeching ring: “. . . report more fully on Alexandra’s appearance and state of mind. . . . Is she lucid? Does she laugh and does her laughter make a happy or a sad impression? Is she clean in her personal habits, clean finger-nails, brushed hair? What is the doctor’s latest diagnosis; does he recommend some other treatment?”

  But Grigoriev’s main preoccupations at their rendezvous in Allmendingen turned out not to be with Krassky, or with the letter, or its author. His lady-friend of the Visa Section had been demanding outright to know about his Friday excursions, he said. Hence his depression and drunkenness. Grigoriev had answered her vaguely, but now he suspected her of being a Moscow spy, put there either by the priest or, worse, by some other frightful organ of Soviet Security. Toby, as it happened, shared this belief, but did not feel that much would be served by saying so.

  “I have told her I shall not make love to her again until I completely trust her,” Grigoriev said earnestly. “Also I have not yet decided whether she shall be permitted to accompany me in my new life in Australia.”

  “George, this is a madhouse!” Toby told Smiley in a furious mixture of images, while Smiley continued to study Karla’s solicitous questions, even though they were written in Russian. “Listen, I mean how long can we hold the dam? This guy is a total crazy!”

  “When does Krassky return to Moscow?” Smiley asked.

  “Saturday midday.”

  “Grigoriev must arrange a meeting with him before he leaves. He’s to tell Krassky he will have a special message for him. An urgent one.”

  “Sure,” said Toby. “Sure, George.” And that was that.

  Where had George gone in his mind? Toby wondered, watching him vanish into the crowd once more. Karla’s instructions to Grigoriev seemed to have upset Smiley quite absurdly. “I was caught between one total loony and one complete depressive,” Toby claims of this taxing period.

  While Toby, however, could at least agonise over the vagaries of his master and his agent, Smiley had less substantial fare with which to occupy his time, which may have been his problem. On the Tuesday, he took a train to Zurich and lunched at the Kronenhalle with Peter Guillam, who had flown in by way of London at Saul Enderby’s behest. Their discussio
n was restrained, and not merely on the grounds of security. Guillam had taken it upon himself to speak to Ann while he was in London, he said, and was keen to know whether there was any message he might take back to her. Smiley said icily that there was none, and came as near as Guillam could remember to bawling him out. On another occasion—he suggested—perhaps Guillam would be good enough to keep his damned fingers out of Smiley’s private affairs? Guillam switched the topic hastily to business. Concerning Grigoriev, he said, Saul Enderby had a notion to sell him to the Cousins as found rather than process him at Sarratt. How did George feel about that one? Saul had a sort of hunch that the glamour of a senior Russian defector would give the Cousins a much-needed lift in Washington, even if he hadn’t anything to tell, while Grigoriev in London might, so to speak, mar the pure wine to come. How did George feel on that one, actually?

  “Quite,” said Smiley.

  “Saul also rather wondered whether your plans for next Friday were strictly necessary,” said Guillam, with evident reluctance.

  Picking up a table-knife, Smiley stared along the blade.

  “She’s worth his career to him,” he said at last, with a most unnerving tautness. “He steals for her, lies for her, risks his neck for her. He has to know whether she cleans her fingernails and brushes her hair. Don’t you think we owe her a look?”

  Owe to whom? Guillam wondered nervously as he flew back to London to report. Had Smiley meant that he owed it to himself? Or did he mean to Karla? But he was far too cautious to air these theories to Saul Enderby.

  From a distance, it might have been a castle, or one of those small farmsteads that sit on hilltops in the Swiss wine country, with turrets, and moats with covered bridges leading to inner courtyards. Closer to, it took on a more utilitarian appearance, with an incinerator, and an orchard, and modern outbuildings with rows of small windows rather high. A sign at the edge of the village pointed to it, praising its quiet position, its comfort, and the solicitude of its staff. The community was described as “interdenominational Christian theosophist,” and foreign patients were a speciality. Old, heavy snow cluttered fields and roof-tops, but the road that Smiley drove was clear. The day was all white; sky and snow had merged into a single, uncharted void. From the gatehouse a dour porter telephoned ahead of him and, receiving somebody’s permission, waved him through. There was a bay marked “DOCTORS” and a bay marked “VISITORS” and he parked in the second. When he pressed the bell, a dull-looking woman in a grey habit opened the door to him, blushing even before she spoke. He heard crematorium music, and the clanking of crockery from a kitchen, and human voices all at once. It was a house with hard floors and no curtains.