Kremlin Conspiracy

by Brian Freemantle

  Behind the Polish contingent Lydia could see the advisers jabbing at calculators and scribbling notations on their pads.

  ‘It’s still not feasible,’ said Opalko quietly. ‘Attractive though the suggestion might appear upon surface examination, it’s still not feasible.’

  ‘Why not?’ demanded Lydia. After so long there couldn’t be anything she had overlooked; certainly nothing that this man could have realized after such a short period!

  ‘The money already borrowed wasn’t correctly channelled,’ conceded the central bank chairman. ‘We have insufficient ore smelters. Our farm equipment is obsolete. So is our mine equipment. For the scheme that you suggest to work properly there would have to be massive re-investment. Which would mean further borrowing. I don’t imagine Western banks would advance us the capital required,even if we could afford to pay for it. Which we can’t.’

  Imperceptibly, Lydia relaxed. Opalko was making it as easy for her as Moczar had done earlier. ‘That’s been taken into account,’ she said. ‘We’re prepared to enter aid agreements for all capital and machinery investments you might need, to re-equip and re-tool.’

  ‘At what per cent?’ demanded Moczar.

  ‘One over LIBOR,’ said Lydia. They’d have to borrow to finance and that would require a margin of at least half a per cent.

  Some of the people behind the Polish group were leaning forward, offering calculations, and there were further head-bent conversations between Moczar, Opalko and Siwicki.

  ‘Your interest terms are too high,’ protested Moczar.

  ‘They’re practical,’ rejected Lydia. ‘Apart from the Chase Manhattan Bank, who linked their loan to an ore-smelting plant, Poland was allowed to borrow without specification. I’ve already said that we would require strict controls. Money advanced would be for definite projects and because of the risk that my country would be undertaking, we would insist upon proper, profitable returns. We wouldn’t permit a rouble to be wasted. Further, to make this scheme work, we are offering import credits from the Soviet Union. With your exports high and import commitments low to the West, you could be in balance of payments surplus within a five-year period. Our interest might appear high at the moment, but that is because of the size of your external debt. With that indebtedness vastly reduced and moving on to the point of being settled, your terms with us would be well within your finance capability.’

  ‘You make it sound remarkably simple,’ repeated Siwicki.

  ‘Because it really is simple,’ insisted Lydia. They were moving towards agreement, she decided: reluctantly, perhaps, but nevertheless moving in the right direction. It was time to impose more pressure. ‘You’ve applied to rejoin the International Monetary Fund,’ she said.

  ‘It seemed prudent,’ said Moczar.

  ‘Every country in the last ten years that has found itself on the brink of financial collapse has gone to the IMF, to bail them out,’ said Lydia. ‘And always the cure has been the same. Control and deflation. You’ve removed the figurehead of Lech Walesa and hopefully capped the Solidarity movement for the moment, but just how long do you think the people of this country would accept deflation beyond that which already exists?’

  ‘It would be difficult for us to impose severe restrictions,’ admitted Moczar.

  ‘The limitations we are proposing are financial ones, they don’t affect the people directly,’ said Lydia, aware once more that she was advancing an alien capitalistic argument. ‘Our proposals are geared to create more jobs, higher earnings, not the opposite.’

  ‘These are very wide-ranging proposals,’ said Moczar. ‘There would need to be detailed study. And higher consultation.’

  ‘Of course,’ accepted Lydia. She decided it had gone extremely well.

  ‘When do you intend returning to Moscow?’

  ‘Personally almost at once,’ she said. ‘With me I have brought people from every relevant ministry who are prepared to remain here in Warsaw long enough to satisfy any query.’

  ‘On behalf of my government I would like to thank you for the consideration and the breadth of all you have proposed,’ said the junior finance minister, formally.

  ‘Our ideology is one of comradeship and friendship,’ recited Lydia, in return.

  Chapter 5

  The weekend exodus into Virginia and Maryland combined with the rush hour and Tom Pike moved slowly along the George Washington Parkway with the Potomac to his right, wondering why he hadn’t tried a more direct route to the Beltway around the city. The answer came at once. Because he wasn’t in any hurry, that’s why. He guessed there would be a full house party of guests after the IMF meeting, but he still wasn’t looking forward to the visit. If Jane Rosen had accepted the invitation to let him show her New York, he’d have cancelled out altogether. He should have hardly been surprised at her refusal. It was a presumptious suggestion, more to assuage his rejected pride than anything else. Still a pity, though: she’d been an attractive girl. He didn’t like even one getting away.

  When he was young, before he’d been sent away for proper schooling and had been able to spend most of his time on the Virginia estate, Pike had thought of the house as his stockade. He’d created elaborate games and battles, repelling in make-believe the attacks of marauding Indians he was sure the stern-faced, bewigged ancestors who stared down from their frozen pictures in the hallway had confronted, two hundred years before. There’d been flint-locks and muzzle-loaders as well as the portraits and what would they have been used for, if not to fight off Indians? There had been other preserved memorabilia, chain-linked metal anklets and a register where people seemed to have only one name and separate quarters. The line of tiny houses set away from the mansion had long ago been converted into grain-storage and tackle-sheds for the horses. It had been during one of the later school holidays that Tom suddenly appreciated the connection between the the ownership register and the quarters. He’d asked his father about it, still not quite believing that only two hundred years before his family had owned slaves. It was the first time he’d heard the expression ‘demands of a market economy’.

  The gate was much bigger than it had been when he was young, matching in size the electronically guarded surrounding wall which was also a recent innovation. Pike identified himself into the mouth-grille set into a side pillar and almost at once the ribbed metal barriers clicked apart to admit him.

  Elms stood rigidly to attention beside the looping driveway, sentries to the paddocks that rolled away on either side; polished thoroughbreds grazed unconcerned at his progress past them. It was a gradual incline, leading up to a proper hill at the top of which the house was proudly displayed, a monument both to the durability of colonial architects and the historic Pike family. As he approached, Pike saw the official cars, with their pennants and diplomatic insignia; he thought they looked like some insect swarm, settling to forage. Who would be feeding from whom during this weekend?

  Carlton was as efficient as always, opening the front door in greeting before Pike had time to switch off the ignition. Pike took his own bag from the vehicle and when the butler reached him stretched out to shake the man’s hand.

  ‘Good to see you again, sir,’ said the butler. The man appeared embarrassed at the greeting.

  ‘And you,’ said Pike. He indicated the other cars. ‘Looks like quite a party.’

  ‘Biggest we’ve had for a long time,’ agreed Carlton. ‘Every bedroom occupied.’

  ‘Am I in the outhouse?’ asked Pike. There was a guest annexe, beyond the old slave quarters.

  ‘Of course not,’ said Carlton. ‘You’ve got your usual room.’

  Pike let the man take his grip and followed him into the house: the rigid portraits lined the hall like a receiving line. Even though Carlton was white and English, Pike supposed the man was still a slave. At least he wasn’t shackled with an anklet. Still a single name though.

  ‘Your father has gone riding with some of the other guests.’ said the butler. ‘Your mother is in
the arbour room.’

  It was at the rear of the house, named after the flowered, hedged walkway that had been laid a hundred years earlier. The verandah windows were open on to it, and as Pike entered he saw there were a lot of people, predominantly women, around the pool at the far end. Further on, both tennis courts appeared to be occupied. His mother rose to meet him. Pike kissed her on both cheeks and then allowed himself to be held at arm’s length, to be examined.

  ‘Stranger,’ she said.

  ‘How are you?’ said Pike, ignoring the accusation.

  ‘Fine,’ she said. ‘Just fine. We’ve a wonderful house party but I’ve escaped for five minutes, to see you by myself.’ She sniggered girlishly. ‘I said there were dinner arrangements to make.’

  Escape was probably an apposite word, thought Pike, who didn’t believe his mother would regard this many people in the house at one time as wonderful. His parents’ marriage had been based on an implicit understanding, as they had intended his to be, but the Burcote family had then been a minor and were now an extinct banking lineage. Pike always suspected that his mother was slightly in awe of financiers with the reputation and the prestige of the Rockefellers or the Morgans or the Stillmans. It was an attitude she succeeded in concealing from everyone behind a publicly haughty, almost chilling exterior: she’d even been described as matriarchal in the social columns of the Washington Post and the Daily News, and although she feigned annoyance – in keeping with the public demeanour – Pike knew her to be secretly pleased. It proved the protection was working.

  ‘From the numbers of cars outside I thought the IMF swapped meeting places,’ he said.

  ‘That’s practically true,’ she said. His mother paused and then said, ‘I wanted to see you by myself. To warn you.’

  ‘Warn me?’

  ‘Janet’s here.’

  ‘Janet!’ Pike looked out towards the pool but couldn’t locate his ex-wife: the tennis courts were too far away, if she were there.

  ‘Do you mind?’ she said.

  ‘It’s your house,’ said Pike.

  ‘I don’t want you to be embarrassed.’

  ‘There’s no need for us to be,’ said Pike. ‘We’re still friends.’

  ‘She came back East to visit her parents. Your father invited the family down for the weekend and she came as well: her father asked yours at the conference, apparently, and he said it would be all right.’

  He could have used it as an excuse not to come, Pike realized. Perhaps that was why his father hadn’t mentioned it: there’d been enough opportunity. ‘What is her husband like?’

  ‘She’s by herself.’

  It would have been two years, Pike calculated. His mother didn’t seem as embarrassed as he would have expected.

  ‘How is she?’

  ‘Seems wonderful.’

  ‘It’ll be good to see her again.’ How would it be, after so long?

  ‘You’re by yourself?’ said his mother.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Would you mind being her escort then? For dinner and things like that?’

  He looked at her quizzically. ‘Isn’t that a bit gauche?’ he said.

  ‘I’ll re-arrange it, if you’d like.’

  ‘That would be even more ridiculous,’ he said.

  ‘You’re annoyed.’

  ‘Surprised,’ he conceded. ‘Did she know I’d be coming?’

  ‘I told her when she arrived, of course,’ said his mother. ‘She said she assumed you’d be here; that she was looking forward to seeing you again.’

  ‘I’m only staying tonight,’ he said.

  ‘Oh,’ she said, obviously pained.

  ‘I always intended to go back to New York tomorrow; I’ve been away almost a fortnight.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, not believing him. ‘Your father should have discussed it with me. Or you.’

  ‘It’s nothing to do with Janet.’

  ‘Why don’t you come more often?’

  ‘The Fed keeps me busy,’ he said uncomfortably.

  ‘Not at weekends: it’s only an hour on the shuttle.’

  ‘Things to do,’ he said.

  ‘I still don’t see why you had to leave the Chase.’

  ‘For experience,’ he said easily. ‘We discussed all this before.’

  ‘I felt comfortable, knowing you were at your father’s bank.’

  It was like the poetry, thought Pike, lines recited by rote. To break the stanza he said, ‘Still enjoying the IMF?’

  She gave a shy smile. ‘All the travelling gets boring,’ she said. ‘Which sounds an awful thing to say. I like Paris: there’s a lovely apartment there.’

  ‘What about father?’

  ‘He adores it. I think he’ll be sad when his term ends.’ She looked out into the grounds and said, ‘I suppose we should be getting back.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ he agreed. If he were going to be the cabaret, shouldn’t he be wearing a baggy suit and a false nose?

  Pike followed his mother along the flowered walkway, entering the ritual of polite introductions to as many people as his mother could remember. There had to be at least thirty people around the pool and his initial impression that the majority were women was confirmed. Not all were in costumes and Pike recognized the demarcation, between old and young. He was sorry to see that the men who were there didn’t seem so concerned about the sag of age: bankers didn’t look like bankers with varicose veins cording their legs and indulged bellies bulging their boxer shorts: kings needed uniforms, if they didn’t qualify for crowns. He moved slowly and politely through the group, pausing at the mobile bar and staring around while the waiter mixed a martini. Janet was further down the pool, reclining on a lounger, and he knew she had been looking at him before he saw her. She waved and he waved back and when the drink was ready he walked down towards her.

  ‘Hello Thomas Hamilton Pike,’ she said brightly.

  ‘Hello Janet.’

  ‘How’s my ex-husband?’

  ‘Pretty good. You?’

  She tried to make a rocking motion with her hand and spilled some of her drink. She dipped her finger against the spill on her thigh and licked what she collected. ‘Surprised I came?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said.

  ‘Not sure now why I did. Angry?’

  ‘Of course not.’ There was a lot of difference, from what he remembered. The brown hair was still shoulder-length and the teeth brace-straight and the freckles she’d once worried about and used too much make-up to conceal patterned her nose, as they always would. But there wasn’t the roundness he associated with her. And that wasn’t just the physical appearance, although her body had an edged sharpness that had also changed since the shorts-and-halter-top trips on her father’s yacht.

  ‘You look good,’ he said.

  ‘You’ ve got too many clothes on for me to judge how you look,’ she said.

  He’d forgotten her tendency to strive for doubles entendre: the sex had always been good for them, ever since high school. ‘It’s too late to change,’ he said.

  ‘Sit down at least. I’m getting a headache staring at you through the sun.’

  Pike pulled another lounger nearer and said, ‘How’s things?’

  She gave a breast-wobbling shrug. ‘OK, I guess.’

  ‘California?’

  ‘America’s crucible state for the future is like it always is,’ she said. ‘Sometimes hot, sometimes smoggy but always anxious to initiate another trend.’

  Was this how he’d sounded to Jane Rosen, all stand-up hip on Sunset Strip? He hoped not. ‘How long are you back for?’

  She shrugged again and Pike realized he hadn’t remembered either how full her breasts were. ‘Open ticket,’ she said.

  ‘Is your husband joining you?’

  The gesture this time was dismissive. ‘Term doesn’t end for some time yet.’ She looked pointedly at her empty glass and Pike gestured to the waiter. When he came she indicated the measure with her thumb and forefinger. As he lef
t to fill the order, she said, ‘Even that won’t hit the spot.’

  ‘Something wrong?’ he said.

  ‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘Should there be?’

  ‘You seem to have changed,’ he said openly. ‘Changed a lot.’

  ‘How about you, Thomas Hamilton Pike?’ she said, avoiding the question. ‘Word on the rarefied grapevine is that the Federal Reserve still can’t believe their luck in getting you.’

  Pike wished there were a way for him to discover if the enthusiasm were genuine or generated by his father’s influence. ‘It’s an extension from the sort of banking I was used to,’ he said. ‘I’m enjoying it.’

  ‘The act’s still good, darling.’

  ‘Act?’

  ‘Apparent modesty beneath the apparent confidence; always was a winner.’ She accepted the drink from the returning waiter, lifted it towards him and said, ‘Cheers, bastard.’

  ‘Yours has improved,’ he said. ‘More Hollywood gloss. Cheers.’

  ‘With anyone?’

  ‘Not for very long,’ he said.

  ‘That’s still the same as well then?’

  ‘You’re the one who fell in love.’

  ‘Maybe I got fed up competing.’

  ‘We’d never get fed up with that, Janet. We’re brought up on it, remember?’

  ‘How is your father?’ she said.

  ‘Running half the world,’ he said. ‘How’s yours?’

  ‘Running the other half.’

  ‘There aren’t any more races for them to run are there?’

  ‘They’ll find one,’ she predicted. ‘I gather we’re being paired.’

  ‘To make the numbers balance,’ he qualified at once. ‘I’m sorry about that.’

  She gave a bouncy shrug. ‘Why? No problem.’

  There were some shouts from behind and then a general movement towards the edge of the rise upon which the pool was constructed as everyone shifted to look down and see the galloping return of Pike’s father and the rest of the bankers who had gone riding. The old man was leading as they burst finally from the straggled trees on the far side of the valley, with Henry Amberson only a head behind. Knowing the land better than his guests, Pike didn’t try to ascend up the main path but cut sideways along a parallel gully, gaining on his rival, and won by a length.