Goodbye to an Old Friend

by Brian Freemantle

  Everyone else was held while he disembarked, walking alone down the steps that had been run especially into the front of the aircraft.

  There were a few militiamen around the car and Pavel saw he was to get a motorcycle escort into the capital. Everything is back to normal, he thought. A driver respectfully held the door open for him. Back in his accustomed environment, Pavel nodded curtly and handed his luggage to the man, then got into the gleaming black Zil without speaking. He stopped, half in, half out, still crouched.

  Kaganov lounged in the back, in the far corner.

  ‘Welcome back,’ said the chairman.

  Pavel completed his entry, wedging himself into the opposite corner. He did not return the greeting.

  The driver turned, looking to Kaganov rather than Pavel for guidance. The chairman, who was wearing military uniform unmarked by any insignia, nodded and the car pulled out and a convoy formed around it.

  ‘Welcome back,’ repeated Kaganov. ‘And my congratulations. You were very accurate. Everything went as planned.’

  ‘You hardly thought I’d fail, did you?’ snapped Pavel. He wore arrogance like an overcoat, a protection against the cold.

  ‘No,’ agreed Kaganov, pleasantly. ‘We didn’t think you’d fail.’

  ‘What about my family?’ asked Pavel.

  ‘They’re perfectly all right,’ assured Kaganov. ‘Just as we promised you they would be.’

  ‘And Georgi?’

  ‘He was brought back from the Chinese front two days ago. He’s attached to the Kremlin now. He’ll be home with you every weekend until he finishes his service.’

  ‘I have your word?’

  ‘I told you before you went,’ rebuked Kaganov, mildly. ‘If you kept your side of the bargain, we’d keep ours. Your family are in perfect health and looking forward to your return.’

  The car was in the city now. They went by Krasnaya Ploshtchad and Pavel looked at the Kremlin beyond. It’s beautiful, he thought. Beautiful and peaceful. Only people are ugly. They crossed Kammeni Bridge and turned right. Pavel looked into the park, where the trees were weeping their leaves at the thought of winter. A little month and it will be autumn, he thought. Everything will be dead, just like Bennovitch back there, all alone, in England.

  ‘I’m interested in the person who debriefed you.’

  Kaganov broke into the reverie and Pavel turned to him.

  ‘What?’

  ‘The man who debriefed you.’ He made the pretence of taking a notebook from his greatcoat pocket and checking the name. ‘Dodds, Adrian Dodds. According to what our people can gather at the embassy, the English regard him rather highly.’

  Pavel remained looking across the car, saying nothing.

  Kaganov reached into his briefcase at his feet and pulled out six photographs. Three were blurred, but the remainder were of good quality, although they had all obviously been taken by hidden cameras.

  ‘What do you want me to do?’

  ‘Identify him, if he’s any of the men pictured here,’ said Kaganov.

  ‘What for?’ asked Pavel, aware of the answer.

  Kaganov laughed and Pavel saw his false teeth were made of steel, dull and grey looking. They made laughter a horrifying grimace. Many Russians had had them made like that during the war, Pavel remembered, but only a few had kept them, for affectation. It gave Pavel another reason for despising the man.

  ‘Well,’ said the chairman. ‘It occurred to me that there might be some other misguided fools in the future who might think like your brother-in-law … people who might find in Dodds just the sort of sympathy and understanding to unburden themselves …’

  He laughed again.

  ‘… So I thought we might safeguard ourselves by arranging an accident for Comrade Dodds, if we could discover what he looks like …’

  He splayed the photographs out, like a poker player revealing a winning hand. Adrian stared at Pavel from the second picture, one of the better ones. He was shown getting out of a taxi, looking smarter than Pavel remembered him, wearing a suit that was crisp and well-pressed and with well-polished shoes.

  ‘Take your time,’ coaxed Kaganov. ‘There’s no hurry. Some of them aren’t very good quality, but you’ll understand that they weren’t exactly taken under ideal circumstances.’

  Dutifully Pavel went from print to print, then completed another survey, remaining expressionless. Then he looked up at Kaganov.

  ‘He’s not one of these men,’ he said.

  The other man frowned. ‘Are you sure?’ he said, quizzically.

  ‘Are you doubting me?’ the scientist demanded, refusing to be intimidated. ‘I was with the man constantly for over a week. Is it likely I wouldn’t be able to recognize him?’

  ‘But the embassy were sure …’

  ‘Then the embassy are wrong,’ snapped Pavel. ‘And how can they be sure if they have to send six different pictures?’

  Kaganov accepted the rebuke. Slowly he stored the photographs back into his case.

  ‘Pity,’ he said, mildly.

  ‘Hardly a great loss,’ said Pavel.

  The chairman looked at him, curiously.

  ‘The English might regard Dodds highly, but I thought he was a fool.’

  ‘Really.’ Doubt still tinged Kaganov’s reactions.

  ‘He accepted my defection completely, never doubting me for one moment,’ lied Pavel. ‘He can speak perfect Russian, certainly, but he’s very naive. He’s little more than a clerk, reciting questions that the experts have set, with little awareness of what they mean. Deviate from the list and he’s completely lost.’

  ‘Not worth killing, you mean?’ said Kaganov.

  Pavel stared at him. ‘You are the man who decides who should live and die,’ he said, ‘not me. But I think you’ve overestimated Dodds.’

  It wasn’t much, Pavel decided. If Kaganov were determined, then it was even a stupid gesture. But he was not going to be responsible for any more deaths. He’d struck a bargain with Kaganov and he’d kept it. There was no need for him to go beyond what he’d already done.

  ‘All right,’ sighed Kaganov. ‘You’re the one who should know the man’s worth.’

  ‘Have you finished with me now?’ asked Pavel. He made no effort to keep the sneer out of his voice.

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘We’re finished with you.’

  The car pulled up outside his apartment and they both sat there.

  ‘She’s waiting for you,’ said Kaganov, after a while. He tapped the partition and the driver got out and opened the door.

  Pavel leaned across, squeezing by the other Russian.

  ‘Pavel.’

  The scientist turned. Kaganov was holding out his hand.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘And goodbye.’

  Pavel looked at the offered hand and then up into the man’s face. Then he turned, without saying anything and walked away from the car.

  The concierge smiled a greeting at him, but Pavel swept by, anxious now to get to the apartment. The lift made its usual reluctant ascent and Pavel stood, drumming his fingers against the varnished sides, impatient at its slowness.

  He hesitated outside the door, preparing himself. It took several minutes. Then, quickly, he twisted the key in the lock and went in.

  Valentina was standing in the middle of the room waiting for him. She looked nervous and he thought she had been crying.

  ‘Hello,’ she said.

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘I looked out of the window and saw you arrive.’

  ‘Oh.’

  They stood two feet apart, looking at each other. A wisp of hair, the grey part that she was self-conscious about, had slipped out of the band with which she had tied it back and flopped over her ear. Gently he reached out, brushing it back into place. She bent her head, trapping his hand and he kept it there.

  ‘My darling,’ he said.

  She came forward and he held her, feeling her shake. He kissed her several times, waiting for the emotion to s
ubside, then held her away from him, looking into her face.

  ‘I missed you,’ she said, softly.

  ‘And I you …’ he said, speaking with difficulty.

  ‘I was so worried.’

  ‘Why?’

  She humped her shoulders, finding it hard to express herself.

  ‘You didn’t come back when the show ended,’ she said. ‘I met Dymshits’s wife in the market and she said you had stayed on, for a special reason. But no one knew what it was.’

  She nodded to the corner of the room and he followed the gesture. His battered leather case stood there, still locked, near the display case showing his awards. Still junk, he thought, worthless junk.

  ‘It came back, several days ago,’ she said. Suddenly her control went and she burst into tears and he held her again, stroking her head, trying to calm her.

  ‘I thought you had defected,’ she sobbed, ‘I thought you had followed Alexandre and abandoned me.’

  He went on stroking her hair. ‘Abandon you? You knew better than that.’

  ‘I know. I know it was silly and I kept telling myself that, but I couldn’t think of any other reason for your not coming back. I tried to find out. I asked people, but no one knew. Or wanted to know.’

  ‘There was nothing to know … no secret …’

  ‘Oh dear.’ She put her hand to her mouth and flushed, embarrassed, as if he’d surprised her doing something wrong.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Oh God, how selfish of me. How can you forgive me?’

  ‘Forgive what?’

  ‘I’m so excited that I forgot the most important news. Georgi is back. He’s got a surprise posting and he’s back here in Moscow. We can be together again, like a whole family.’

  She burbled on. ‘And then I thought if you’d defected, then Georgi’s posting would be cancelled and he’d be sent back. And we’d be arrested …’

  She started crying again.

  ‘But I kept thinking of you. Of never seeing you again … oh darling, I couldn’t bear the thought of that …’

  She turned away, ashamed to face him.

  ‘That’s all I really thought about … us … just you and me. I didn’t even consider the children … am I so bad … so selfish …?’

  She turned back to him, nervously.

  ‘Do you know what?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I had determined … if you had defected that is … I’d made up my mind to kill myself. I was going to forget the children and kill myself. May God forgive me.’

  He held her again and, hidden from her view, fought to control his own tears. She pushed him away, smiling.

  ‘But now you’re back. Now you’re back and we’re a family again and Georgi is home. Tonight you’ll see him.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘And nothing will split us up again.’

  ‘Promise me?’ she asked.

  He recognized the importance of the question to her.

  ‘I promise,’ he said. Then, remembering his arrival that morning, he added, ‘I’ll never go away again.’

  She smiled, holding both his hands in hers. ‘Forgive me, my darling,’ she said, ‘I’m so concerned with myself that I’m ignoring you. You must be tired. Would you like some tea?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Yes, that would be nice.’

  He followed her, as he always did, into the kitchen and watched as she brewed the samovar. Occasionally she glanced up and their eyes met and they smiled, complete without conversation.

  An hour later Valentina arrived home from the academy and he spent thirty minutes reading the latest reports of her prowess with the violin and then, as it was getting dark, Georgi arrived, roughened by life in the barracks, wearing his coarse uniform, slapping his father on the back, swearing occasionally to record the fact that he was an adult.

  They had a celebration dinner, with Georgian wine and borsch, with mutton dumplings, and occasionally Pavel’s wife cried with happiness and the children laughed at her, believing she was a little drunk.

  They made love that night, unhurriedly and with great tenderness, two people treading a well-established path, and she cried again, but this time from pleasure.

  He was almost asleep when she spoke and he struggled back from the edge of exhaustion, concentrating on what she was saying.

  ‘Viktor.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I know I shouldn’t ask … that because of what you do it could be none of my business … but I was so worried …’

  ‘What?’ he said, holding her head against his chest. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Where were you? Why didn’t you come home, like the others?’

  He lay quietly in the darkness, breathing deeply. So long did he take to reply that Valentina thought he had fallen asleep.

  Then he said, ‘I was allowed to make a visit, a special trip, to someone who helped me once …’

  Again there was a long pause. Then he added, ‘I had to say goodbye to an old friend.’

  A Biography of Brian Freemantle

  Brian Freemantle (b. 1936) is one of Britain’s most prolific and accomplished authors of spy fiction. His novels have sold more than ten million copies worldwide, and have been optioned for numerous film and television adaptations.

  Born in Southampton, on the southern coast of England, Freemantle began his career as a journalist. In 1975, as the foreign editor at the Daily Mail, he made headlines during the American evacuation of Saigon: As the North Vietnamese closed in on the city, Freemantle became worried about the future of the city’s orphans. He lobbied his superiors at the paper to take action, and they agreed to fund an evacuation for the children. In three days, Freemantle organized a thirty-six-hour helicopter airlift for ninety-nine children, who were transported to Britain. In a flash of dramatic inspiration, he changed nearly one hundred lives—and sold a bundle of newspapers.

  Although he began writing espionage fiction in the late 1960s, he first won fame in 1977, with Charlie M. That book introduced the world to Charlie Muffin—a disheveled spy with a skill set more bureaucratic than Bond-like. The novel, which drew favorable comparisons to the work of John Le Carré, was a hit, and Freemantle began writing sequels. The sixth in the series, The Blind Run, was nominated for an Edgar Award for Best Novel. To date, Freemantle has penned fourteen titles in the Charlie Muffin series, the most recent of which is Red Star Rising (2010), which brought back the popular spy after a nine-year absence.

  In addition to the stories of Charlie Muffin, Freemantle has written more than two dozen standalone novels, many of them under pseudonyms including Jonathan Evans and Andrea Hart. Freemantle’s other series include two books about Sebastian Holmes, an illegitimate son of Sherlock Holmes, and the four Cowley and Danilov books, which were written in the years after the end of the Cold War and follow an odd pair of detectives—an FBI operative and the head of Russia’s organized crime bureau.

  Freemantle lives and works in London, England.

  A school photograph of Brian Freemantle at age twelve.

  Brian Freemantle, at age fourteen, with his mother, Violet, at the country estate of a family acquaintance, Major Mears.

  Freemantle’s parents, Harold and Violet Freemantle, at the country estate of Major Mears.

  Brian Freemantle and his wife, Maureen, on their wedding day. They were married on December 8, 1956, in Southampton, where both were born and spent their childhoods. Although they attended the same schools, they did not meet until after they had both left Southampton.

  Brian Freemantle (right) with photographer Bob Lowry in 1959. Freemantle and Lowry opened a branch office of the Bristol Evening World together in Trowbridge, in Wiltshire, England.

  A bearded Freemantle with his wife, Maureen, circa 1971. He grew the beard for an undercover newspaper assignment in what was then known as Czechoslovakia.

  Freemantle (left) with Lady and Sir David English, the editors of the Daily Mail, on Freemantle’s fiftieth birthday. Freemantle was foreign edi
tor of the Daily Mail, and with the backing of Sir David and the newspaper, he organized the airlift rescue of nearly one hundred Vietnamese orphans from Saigon in 1975.

  Freemantle working on a novel before beginning his daily newspaper assignments. His wife, Maureen, looks over his shoulder.

  Brian Freemantle says good-bye to Fleet Street and the Daily Mail to take up a fulltime career as a writer in 1975. The editor’s office was turned into a replica of a railway carriage to represent the fact that Freemantle had written eight books while commuting—when he wasn’t abroad as a foreign correspondent.

  Many of the staff secretaries are dressed as Vietnamese hostesses to commemorate the many tours Freemantle carried out in Vietnam.

  The Freemantle family on the grounds of the Winchester Cathedral in 1988. Back row: wife Maureen; eldest daughter, Victoria; and mother-in-law, Alice Tipney, a widow who lived with the Freemantle family for a total of forty-eight years until her death. Second row: middle daughter, Emma; granddaughter, Harriet; Freemantle; and third daughter, Charlotte.

  Freemantle in 1999, in the Outer Close outside Winchester Cathedral. For thirty years, he lived with his family in the basement library of a fourteenth-century house with a tunnel connecting it to the cathedral. Priests used this tunnel to escape persecution during the English Reformation.

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.