Kit stared out the window. The glass, smeared with rain and road grease, turned London into one of Cauldwell’s dark unfinished impressionist paintings. The Thames was just an empty abyss. The taxi slowed for a right-hand turn into St George’s Square. ‘Which number?’ said the driver.
‘Twelve.’ Kit gave the driver a note and waved away the change.
Kit walked up to number twelve and pretended to ring a bell. When the taxi had driven off, he set off towards Cauldwell’s actual address – which was a few hundred yards away. If anything went wrong, he didn’t want the cabbie blabbing to the cops about a fare he had dropped at the crime site. Kit stopped briefly in a dark alleyway to screw an adapted silencer on to the barrel of the Smith & Wesson. He knew that silencers were shit with revolvers. They didn’t muffle the shot completely; silencers were designed for .22 automatics. But if worst came to worst and he had to plug Cauldwell and Knowles, he wanted to make the killings look like home-grown crime. A lot of London criminals used .32 calibres, but a .22 – and no shots heard by the neighbours – would point to the security services.
Kit emerged from the alley and continued walking in the light rain. The enhanced .32 was now heavy and awkward in his overcoat pocket – bouncing against his thigh like a gross penis. What frightened Kit most of all was the knowledge that he was capable of killing. If you don’t have that knowledge – that grotesque self-confidence – then your threats are hollow and your bluff will be called. It’s pointless to wave a gun in someone’s face if they know that you don’t have the balls to pull the trigger. They won’t respond to your threats. Why should they? On the other hand, if they know you are crazy enough to do it, they’ll do anything you ask. Fear of death, thought Kit, is the worst shit – it takes away all your dignity. He looked at his watch: it was ten past two.
The mortise lock was easy to pick. Kit managed it with a skeleton key and a strong wrist. Lock picking was an art like playing a stringed instrument. You need strong fingers and wrists, but also an extremely sensitive touch – and a thorough knowledge of the inner mechanisms and quirks of the lock you are picking. The Yale was more difficult because of the spring tension, but soon yielded to a fine pick and file.
Kit eased the door open a crack, waited and listened. There were no lights and no sounds – not even a ticking clock. Kit felt around in the darkness. There were coats hanging from hooks and an umbrella stand – he knew that he was in a small vestibule that was probably under the staircase of the upstairs flat. He pushed open a panel door and stepped into what he assumed was the sitting room. There was a front window that looked out on the street. A tiny sliver of light from the street protruded from where the heavy velvet curtains had been pulled together – otherwise the room was black. Kit tried to orientate himself. He guessed that the door to the bedroom would be opposite the window, but there would also be other doors leading to other rooms. Kit stepped carefully into the centre of the room. Then there was a sound – ever so faint, but real and alive. He froze and waited. Something was touching him, rubbing against him. Kit reached down and stroked the cat behind the ears. The tabby was purring so loudly that he was afraid it would wake the others.
Kit took the battery torch out of his holdall and switched it on. The torch was fitted with a hood that cast a thin direct beam. He spotted side tables and plant pots that needed avoiding. There were three doors leading from the sitting room. He assumed the middle one led to the bedroom. He made his way to the door on his hands and knees to distribute his weight and lessen the chance of creaking floorboards. It also enabled him to use his hands to feel for any board that was loose. The floor was covered in a blue Chinese carpet: it seemed very old, but very fine. In the centre was the ideogram representing happiness and long life.
When he got to the door, Kit put his ear near the bottom and listened. There was the measured breathing of a sound sleeper. He listened for a second breath. If Cauldwell was alone, the visit was pointless and he would have to retrace his steps. Kit waited. The measured breathing stopped and turned into a cough. He could hear someone stirring beneath the covers. The coughing continued. Then there was a voice, ‘Are you all right?’ It was an English voice.
‘Is the water on your side?’
Kit listened as Cauldwell drank and the other said something too soft to make out. For some reason the nocturnal sounds reminded him of his parents. The muffled late-night sound of their voices from behind the bedroom door – his father insomniac and his mother trying to soothe. It was that bad time after the war when nothing could soothe or make him sleep soundly again. Kit waited for Cauldwell and Knowles to settle. When all was quiet, he stood up and placed his hand on the door handle. He waited another ten seconds, pushed the door open hard and loud – then stood still in the dark.
‘Who’s there?’ It was Cauldwell’s voice.
Kit heard the bedsprings creak as the other sat up. ‘What’s going on?’ The voice was full of refined public-school indignation.
Kit switched the torch on and shone the beam on Henry Knowles’s face. He squinted against the light. There was no fear in his eyes, only annoyance at having been disturbed. He then played the beam on Cauldwell who was blinking and trying to block the light with his hand. ‘What do you want?’ he said.
Kit dropped the torch and took the gun out of his pocket. He groped against the wall with his free hand until he found the light switch and flicked it on. The overhead light was clothed in a Chinese lantern decorated with the symbol for ‘happy home’. It was composed of the ideogram for ‘house’ containing the ideogram for ‘woman’. Kit remembered that the symbol for unhappy was a house with two women. He wondered what a house with two men represented and aimed the pistol at the bed. Cauldwell squinted hard trying to make out who was in the room.
‘It’s me,’ said Kit.
Cauldwell grabbed his spectacles from the bedside table and put them on. He gaped at Kit. ‘It is you. Why are you here? What’s the gun for?’
‘To make sure you follow instructions.’
Meanwhile Knowles, stark naked, was out of the bed. ‘What’s the meaning of this?’
Kit pointed the gun at the Englishman. ‘Stay where you are.’
Knowles ignored him, picked up a decanter half-full of water to use as a weapon. ‘Get out of here now.’
Kit pulled the trigger and the decanter shattered. The silenced shot sounded like a heavy shoe dropping on a carpeted floor.
‘Do as he says,’ said Cauldwell, ‘he will kill you. He’s one of those.’
‘Get back in the bed,’ said Kit, ‘and throw the covers off – and mind the broken glass.’
Knowles removed a shard from his pillow as Cauldwell gathered the blankets and threw them on the floor. Both men were now lying naked side by side. Kit shifted the gun to his left hand, picked up the camera and took two snaps. ‘Is that all you wanted?’ said Cauldwell as if he had half expected the visit.
‘No, put Henry’s penis in your mouth – and then reverse positions.’
Kit put them through the entire repertoire of same sex male love and continued taking pictures until the film and flashbulbs were used up. He then put the camera back in his holdall, all the while keeping them covered with the pistol. Kit could see that Knowles was a brave bastard. Cauldwell grabbed a blanket. ‘Do you mind? We’re cold.’
Kit nodded.
‘I don’t suppose, Kit, that these snapshots are intended for your own erotic gratification.’
‘What do you think?’
‘Who put you up to this? The DCM? Or was it that FBI shit in the basement? I don’t suppose I’m important enough to involve E Street or the Seventh Floor.’
‘You’re fishing, Jeffers. I’m not going to tell you anything and you know it.’
‘I think,’ said Knowles, ‘the wise thing to do would be to destroy that film. You’ve been badly advised. Blackmail is a criminal offence in this country. Why not just hand the film to me? Otherwise, I’m going to ring the police as soon as you�
��ve gone.’
Kit suspected Knowles was bluffing. He pointed to a phone on the bedside table. ‘Ring them now. As soon as they finish booking me for unlawful entry, they can arrest you and Jeffers for sodomy.’
Knowles picked up the phone and started to dial. Cauldwell reached over and stopped him. ‘Don’t, Henry, it’s not a good idea.’ The phone went back on its cradle.
‘Instead of calling the cops,’ said Kit, ‘why don’t you make some coffee. None of us is going to get any sleep tonight.’
As Cauldwell ground the coffee beans and prepared the cafetière, Kit tried to engage Knowles in conversation – at the same time cradling the pistol in his lap. He wondered if the DCM had told him everything about the Englishman – or just filled him in on a ‘need-to-know’ basis. Kit’s instinct sensed that Knowles was a missing piece in a jigsaw that was only half complete. He tried light talk. ‘Have you ever played at the Aldeburgh Festival?’
‘Several times. It’s a regular venue.’
Cauldwell poured three coffees and sat down. Something in his manner suggested that the Aldeburgh question was an awkward one. ‘You know that Henry is giving up concert playing, at least temporarily. He’ll be standing for parliament at the next election. I’m sure the DCM didn’t leave that one out.’ It was obvious that Cauldwell was trying to steer the conversation away from Aldeburgh.
Kit ignored the remarks and addressed Knowles directly. He remembered a name that Jeffers had passed on during an office chat. Kit assumed that Cauldwell was merely bored and wanted to get in on the ‘cloak and dagger’ stuff. At the time, Kit hadn’t taken the information seriously, but he did now. ‘I don’t suppose that you know a Russian cellist named Natalya Voronova?’
The Englishman looked as if he had just swallowed glass. He glanced across the table at Cauldwell. Cauldwell looked away and reddened. A heavy silence filled the kitchen. Bingo, thought Kit, bingo, bingo. Kit opened his holdall and took out the camera. He then opened the camera, removed the film and offered Knowles the undeveloped roll. ‘You can have this, if you tell me everything you know.’
For a second Knowles looked at the film as if he were a Knight Templar being offered the Holy Grail in exchange for desecrating a crucifix. Then the Englishman looked straight at Kit without blinking. ‘I have nothing to tell you. I only know Voronova as a name in a string section.’
The other photographs arrived at the embassy late the next afternoon. Those photographs – the ones taken by the U2 flight – were hot stuff too. Too hot to be despatched in a diplomatic pouch. They were sent via a military courier who carried the photos in a locked briefcase that was handcuffed to his wrist. The courier, a bespectacled Signal Corps second lieutenant with acne, was sitting outside Kit’s office with a marine guard. The marine was chewing gum; the courier was reading the poems of William Carlos Williams.
Kit spread the aerial reconnaissance photographs on his desk and read the NSA analysis that came with them. It was the most highly classified intelligence material that he had ever been allowed to see. He felt his fingers tingle and burn when he touched each glossy print. It was the first over-flight of the Soviet Union using the new Kodak cameras. The target of the spy flight was an installation in the Central Volga region five hundred kilometres north-east of Moscow codenamed Arzamas-16, a city so secret that it didn’t even appear on the map.
The photos were of such high quality that Kit could actually see the multiple barbwire fences, the watchtowers and distinguish the different types of Soviet Army trucks. He looked again at the NSA commentary: outer defensive ring is twenty-five miles from centre and guarded by Russian Army paratroopers … inner defensive rings patrolled exclusively by Minister of Interior troops. In other words, KGB. The installation itself was so secret that even crack Soviet soldiers were not allowed access. The spaces between the multiple fences are plowed and patrolled regularly. The ploughing – ‘plowing’ – was a nice security touch. It enabled patrols to easily detect footsteps and a breach of security. ‘How,’ said Kit, ‘how the fuck did they do it?’ He went through the photos again. The area was heavily wooded and there was considerable evidence of logging. Kit wondered what happened to the logs. Were they used for fuel? Pulped for paper – or milled for building material? A picture started to form in Kit’s mind. Or were the logs …? How much, after all, did it matter? Then Kit remembered the last thing that Vasili had said to him: ‘We are soldiers in an inhuman war.’
Jennifer met Kit at Wickham Market station; she was driving a new car, an Austin Devon A40, and wearing a white linen skirt. She looked pretty fine: pregnancy made her blossom even more. Kit put his bags into the boot: the door opened downwards and formed a neat platform. ‘It makes a handy picnic table,’ said Jennifer.
‘What happened to the Hillman?’
‘It was wrecked.’
‘Who was driving?’
‘That information is classified.’
Something in Jennifer’s voice told Kit that there was more to it, an awkward side she didn’t want to talk about. He let it go. ‘I’m looking forward to getting out on the river. I hate being cooped up in London when the weather is like this.’
‘What have you been doing?’
‘Selling secrets to the Russians and blackmailing homosexuals.’
Jennifer laughed and gave her cousin a little slap on the hand.‘Can’t you ever be serious?’
‘Half serious, maybe.’
‘The problem with you, Kit, is that we never know which half to believe.’
‘Maybe I should start taking transparency pills so you can see into my mind. But could you endure such horrors?’
‘Nonsense, you’re all sweetness and poetry. You have no dark secrets – it’s just a front you put on.’
‘Let’s make a deal, Jennie, I’ll start taking those transparency pills if you do too.’
Kit sensed something tighten in his cousin. Then she laughed again. ‘I’m not sure it would be a good idea. I wouldn’t want to hurt anyone.’
Kit looked out the car window. The lane was blowing white with the fine lace of cow parsley; just before the forest there was a field scarlet mad with poppies. Kit watched a roe doe flee from the poppy field by leaping over a wire fence into the tangled darkness. ‘Not wanting to hurt,’ he said, ‘is not the same as not hurting.’
‘Sorry, Kit, I didn’t quite catch that.’
‘It’s nothing. I was just mumbling inanely to myself – like my mom when she can’t find her reading glasses. How’s Brian?’
‘He’s been very busy lately. There seems to be a big problem on the island – I think there’s a construction project behind schedule.’
Kit suddenly flashed back to the briefing he had received from S2 intelligence at Bentwaters airbase. It was about the strange things that the Brits were building on Orford Ness Island. How had the aerial photo analyst described them? These structures are not meant to withstand a nuclear strike from the outside, but they are meant to … Vasili’s melancholy story was starting to make sense. Poor Boris.
Jennifer dropped Kit at Orford Quay and tried to help him carry his bags to the pram dinghy he used as a tender. ‘Don’t,’ he said, ‘you’ll get all muddy.’
‘I like mud.’ She kicked off her shoes and started to hitch up her skirt to undo her stockings.
‘Don’t, Jennie, people are looking. Think of Brian’s reputation.’
She let her skirt down. ‘I’m glad you didn’t say mine. But you will take me for a sail sometime.’
‘Any time.’ Kit sat on the boot door to pull on his wellies and watched a heavy lorry laden with cement roll on to one of the landing barges that ran as ferries between the quay and Orford Ness.
‘The locals don’t like it,’ said Jennifer, ‘all that construction work means a lot of heavy traffic through the villages. Brian gets some strange looks when he goes to the pub.’
‘Maybe it’s his Mancunian accent.’
‘You’ve noticed? Not many Americans pick up the
differences. They think all the English speak either Cockney or posh.’
‘It’s my job to know one native tribe from another.’
‘And you love it. Peter admired the way you picked up languages. In one of his letters he wrote about how you entertained your Vietnamese hosts by telling a funny story in their language and imitating the local peasant accent.’
‘But Peter didn’t tell you that I practised the story for an hour beforehand with an interpreter. It was all an act to make the British general think we knew the local situation better than we did. Just another cheap trick of the trade.’
‘I wish you weren’t so self-critical. I’ve always admired you.’
Kit felt his temples throb and his face turn red. The late-morning sun was high in the sky, the river behind her a blinding silver frame. He wanted her so much that he thought his chest would burst. He finished doing up his sea boots and carried his bags to the dinghy. When he had finished stowing his things, he turned around. Jennifer was still standing by the car. He went back. ‘I think,’ he said, ‘my dinner jacket and shirt are going to be a bit crushed.’
‘Let me do some ironing for you.’
‘No, I prefer going to these things looking like a tramp. I like looking worse than the Russians. It gives me a chance to tease them about aping capitalist manners.’
‘And not getting it right.’
‘What a snob you are, Jennie.’
‘I get it from you.’
‘You get it from your mom.’ Kit kissed his cousin, went back to the dinghy and pushed it into the water. Jennifer was still there waving as the tide swept him past the quay. Three more cement lorries rumbled down to the slipway hiding her in their shadows.
Kit thought that sailing to an Aldeburgh Festival concert by yacht would be a pretty classy way to arrive. In the early evening, after he had picked up a mooring near Slaughden Quay and started changing into black-tie dinner dress, he saw that others had the same idea. There were four other yachts with distinguished gentlemen who all looked like Harold Macmillan. Each of the Macmillans was struggling to do up a bow tie. Whenever someone they knew sailed past they called out, ‘Air, hair lair.’ Kit loved it – and every time he spotted a champagne cork arcing over the moorings, he called out, ‘Air, hair, lair,’ too.
The Envoy Page 20
