Agent 6 ld-3

by Tom Rob Smith

  Yates watched as Jesse reached down and took hold of Anna’s hand. Was that a way of reminding him that they were together despite everything he and his colleagues had thrown at them – including rumours about adultery and accusations that he’d molested white girls? Those allegations had been easy to manufacture. There were plenty of photos of Jesse after concerts, surrounded by admirers, most of them female, some of them young. He was a tactile man, always putting his hands on people’s shoulders, wrapping arms around pretty young girls. The dirt had stuck. Enough newspapers had run with the story, enough girls had come forward claiming he had behaved inappropriately. Of course, they’d only done so after a little encouragement from Yates’s men, a nudge, a threat, worried they’d be accused of being a Communist sympathizer. Anna had never wavered, calling them liars every chance she’d got, publicly pitying them for not having the moral courage to stand up to the FBI. If only she’d been a weaker person, if only she’d left Jesse then he would’ve been broken for sure. She’d stayed true, steadfast and constant – values a woman should show to her husband. Still in love, still by his side, still holding his big hand as if it could protect her. She needed to get real: those big gentle hands hadn’t protected her, they’d done more damage to her than if they’d slapped her. Jesse and Anna were so proud of their love, so proud of their relationship, that it was as though someone had told them about Yates’s useless, crazy wife. Speaking his thoughts aloud, Yates said:

  – Who fucking cares?

  They both looked at him like he was as strange as he was scary. Yates liked the idea that he was scary.

  He felt his pocket for cigarettes. They were in the car. He realized he was still a little drunk from the night before.

  – Big Old Jesse, tell me, you got any plans to hook up with your Soviet friends while they’re in town? They’ve been trying to make contact with you, over and over again. Letters, invites… We intercepted them but there’s always a chance one or two slipped past. Or maybe they sent someone in person?

  Jesse’s face was blank. In the absence of a cigarette, Yates took out a match, picking his teeth.

  – Come now, no games, you and me go back too far. You trying to tell me you don’t know about a bunch of Soviet Communist kiddies singing their hearts out at the UN tonight? They’re singing about peace and world harmony and all the things we know Communists love. I thought I’d stop by, see if you were going to make an appearance.

  Anna replied:

  – We don’t know anything about that.

  Yates turned his face close to hers, forcing her to step back into the apartment.

  – You don’t?

  Jess answered:

  The- No, we don’t. You have no right to interfere with our mail.

  Jesse had answered but Yates kept his eyes on Anna.

  – I normally find you attractive when you’re being coy, Mrs Austin. Might even have worked twenty years back, when you strutted around town with your long fake eyelashes, attending galas and making the magazines. I might have fallen for it. I’m a sucker for a pretty lady. I would’ve struck a deal with the Devil and fucked you just to take the heat off your husband. I bet you would’ve enjoyed it but told yourself, as your nails scratched my back, that you were doing it for him.

  Yates noticed Jesse’s fist was clenched. Anger was bringing the old man to life. He didn’t move, didn’t dare step closer. Yates said:

  – Go ahead, Jesse. Stand up for her. Be a man. Take a swing. Might even make up for this shit-hole apartment you’ve forced her to live in.

  Jesse’s face quivered with hatred, like a cello string being plucked. He managed to keep his cool, just about, repeating what Anna had already said:

  – We no longer have any contact with the Soviet authorities. We know nothing about their arrival here, or their plans.

  Yates nodded condescendingly.

  – You don’t even read the papers? You probably don’t even know where Russia is, am I right? Soviets singing? What could be more your taste, Jesse, than a bunch of pretty young Communist girls singing songs? Am I right in thinking you used to sing? Didn’t you used to do something along those lines?

  – I used to, Mr Yates, you put a stop to that.

  – Nothing to do with me. It’s no crime to sing a song. Just so happens that some songs are popular and some songs, your Communist-loving songs, don’t seem to get any audience these days. Times change, tastes change: people are forgotten, don’t you find, Jesse? It’s sad. Don’t you find it sad? I could cry a river, there’s so many sad things going on in the world. Careers coming to nothing, talent going to waste, sad, sad, sad, so very fucking sad.

  Anna flinched, her eyes on Jesse, sensing that her husband might say something imprudent. Yates certainly hoped so. She said:

  – Why are you here, Mr Yates?

  – I could almost be offended. I don’t think you’re listening to me very carefully. The Soviets have invited you to this concert. We might have intercepted a couple of their attempts to make contact but they don’t give up easily. They want you there. I want to know why. It’s my job to keep an eye on men like you Jesse interrupted:

  – And what kind of man is that?

  Yates grew tired of the playfulness.

  – What kind of man am I talking about? A man who went on record saying that he’d refuse to fight for America if war broke out with the Soviets, a man who lives in this country and expresses his disloyalty to it every chance he gets. What kind of man am I talking about? A Communist, that’s the kind of man I’m talking about.

  Yates lookd down at Jesse’s shoes. They were old, worn, but excellent quality, maybe Italian, or something fancy, another relic from the days when he earned a lot of money, more money in a year than Yates would earn in his life. But who would know it now? Still looking at the shoes, he said:

  – Jesse, you know what really makes me angry?

  – I’m sure a lot of things make you angry, Mr Yates.

  – That is true. A lot of things get me hot under the collar. But more than anything else, it’s people who have done well in this country, people like you, coming from nothing, making all this money, having all this success, people who turn around and get into bed with another regime. The Soviets have given you nothing. They can’t even feed their own people. How can you love them and not us? How can you sing about them and not about us? You’re the American dream, Jesse: don’t you get it? You’re the American fucking dream. And what a shame that is.

  Yates wiped his brow. His heart was thumping hard. This wasn’t fun any more. He breathed deeply.

  – So hot in here, I don’t know how you sleep. I don’t know how you breathe. Must have different sort of lungs.

  Anna replied, her voice soft:

  – We breathe the same as you do, Agent Yates.

  Yates curled his lip, as though he wasn’t convinced.

  – Your last place had air conditioning? You must miss that.

  Neither of them replied and Yates lost interest in goading them further.

  – Listen, I’m done here. I’m going to leave you two alone. Before I go, I have a final question, a philosophical question, for us all to think about. In the Soviet Union do you think there must be people who hate their country? Don’t you think the world would be a whole lot simpler if those people lived here and you went and lived there?

  Jesse said immediately:

  – Mr Yates, insult me any way you want. But you can’t tell me this country isn’t my home as much as yours. It’s Yates interrupted, turning to leave.

  – Not only am I going to tell you that, Jesse, I’m going to make you understand it too. And take it from me: you’d be smart to keep far away from that concert. You’d be really smart.

  Manhattan

  Same Day

  To stop her hands from shaking, Elena clenched her fingers into a fist. Her heart was pounding in her chest, double beats to the second. She needed to calm down. The first part of their plan had worked. She’d slipped ou
t from the hotel without being seen. Her lover, Mikael Ivanov, had studied the layout of the Grand Metropolitan, identifying a vulnerable area: the pool and outside sundeck on the fifth floor, monitored only from the main entrance. The American secret police had wrongly assumed there was no other way out.

  The cab passed by the top of Central Park, heading into the north of the city. Part of her appreciated that she snk thered take in the sights around, the park, the apartment towers, the people on the sidewalk, but she was too distracted, unable to concentrate, the city passing in a blur. She looked through the rear window to see if anyone was trailing the cab. She’d never experienced traffic like this, an incredible number of cars. Few were official: the majority seemed to be privately owned. She would’ve marvelled at the experience if she hadn’t felt so sick and dizzy. Surely it was due to the motion of the vehicle. She hated the idea that it was her nerves. Throughout her life she’d been the weaker, younger sister – quiet and well behaved, the sister who never caused any trouble. In contrast, her older sister Zoya was independent, strong-willed, impressive. She’d made decisions for both of them. Her authority was unquestionable. Elena had always been compliant, deferring to her sister’s judgement. Their relationship had followed this pattern for as long as she could remember. But Elena was her own person. Now was the time for her to emerge from her sister’s shadow and find her own identity. For the first time in her life she’d been entrusted with a matter of great importance. It had taken someone outside of her family to recognize her potential. Mikael had selected her. He considered her an adult and an equal. Even before they’d fallen in love, he’d never spoken down to her, choosing to confide in her the real reason that he’d been assigned to this trip.

  Mikael worked for a secret department within the Propaganda Ministry called SERVICE.A. As he’d explained to Elena its purpose was to promote the positive differences between Communism and capitalism overseas, to point out the institutionalized inequities of capitalism, to make a case for Communism that didn’t depend on military might or the use of fear – an attempt to rejuvenate an ideology that had been tainted by excessive measures against their own population. Hearing about the murder of Elena’s biological parents by the Soviet secret police, Mikael accepted that the party had made mistakes. He believed those mistakes obscured their ideological superiority. Communism was about racial and gender equality, an end to economic hardship for the many and lavish luxury for the few. Persecution and prejudice were issues Elena cared passionately about. Presented with an opportunity to make a difference, she’d agreed to play her part. She had lost so much under Stalin’s rule, including her parents, yet believed that the murderous excesses of one tyrant should not end the dream of a fair society. She would not allow it to make her cynical as it had Leo.

  SERVICE. A operated only what Mikael referred to as passive protocols, such as funding publications and subsidies to sympathetic figures. They were a non-violent organization that stimulated dissent. They had recruited American academics and journalists to report honestly on the flaws within a capitalist society, founding a publishing house that accepted controversial manuscripts no other publisher would touch. Their backlist included a book about how Kennedy had been assassinated by extreme right-wing figures, a cabal of arms and oil magnates. The publishing house had found less commercial success, although a great deal of academic renown, with its feminist texts. But examining the response to these essays on gender inequality it proved impossible to imagine that there was any realistic chance of changing America through direct appeals to women. As a result of the relative failure of the feminist texts, selling only a hundred or so copies, it was accepted that a revolution was unlikely to be spearheaded by a gender-orientated manifesto and SERVICE. A changed direction, focusing its attention and resources on the issue of race. Pamphlets rather than books were given away for free on street corners in targeted cities such as Atlanta, Mely on, Oakland and Detroit. The pamphlets were intended to provoke, with a series of shock headlines: AVERAGE BLACK MAN EARNS $4000! AVERAGE WHITE MAN EARNS $7000! BLACK CHILD THREE TIMES MORE LIKELY TO DIE THAN A WHITE CHILD! BLACK FAMILY THREE TIMES MORE LIKELY TO LIVE IN SQUALOR!

  Elena and Mikael would lie in bed, talking for hours about how Communism had neglected the heart of its appeal – its very reason for existing. She’d found his passion beguiling and was flattered to be involved. In contrast to Mikael’s beliefs, none of her immediate family seemed to possess any ideology. Raisa never spoke about politics beyond issues that directly affected her school. Leo was silent on the topic, as if it were prohibited. Elena pitied him: he’d been forced to work for a tyrant and his idealism had been corrupted. For him, there was no going back. He had lost his sense of hope. Outside of his family, he didn’t believe in anything any more. Just because he was disillusioned didn’t mean that she had to be too. Mikael was a man she believed in. Her older sister had once confided in her about the experience of falling in love. Elena had never fully understood the feelings her sister had described until she’d met Mikael. Love was admiration and devotion; love was doing anything for him because she knew he would do anything for her.

  The cab had just passed West 120th Street – approaching her destination, on West 145th Street.

  Bradhurst Harlem West 145th Street

  Same Day

  As Yates walked down the stairs, he passed the same good-for-nothing young men slouching in the corridors. He nodded at them:

  – Busy day, gentlemen?

  They didn’t reply. Yates laughed. He doubted whether any of them could name a single song that Austin used to sing. ‘Big Red Voice’ had once played to audiences in the millions and now he was forgotten by Negroes and white men alike, forgotten by the rich and poor. He doubted if these men in these hallways even realized who the old man on the top floor was. Certainly no one younger than thirty would have any recollection of his success. Jesse was no longer played on the radio. His records weren’t in stores. His words were no longer printed in newspapers, nor was he interviewed in glossy magazines. So weakened was he that he didn’t even have the strength of heart to stand up for his wife when she was insulted in front of his face. It was one thing to smash a man’s career: that was relatively straightforward. It was quite another thing to break a man’s spirit. Having watched Jesse move, seen how his body stooped, slumped in the doorway, barely able to argue back, Yates was sure he was close to that particular victory.

  It puzzled Yates why the Soviets had made so many attempts to contact Austin, imploring him to attend the concert tonight. What did they expect him to do? They would never secure permission to have him enter the United Nations. He was certain Austin was lying when he said he knew nothing and Yates could sene something was wrong – something he’d missed, an agenda he couldn’t see. He’d worked too hard, for too long, to allow Jesse to have any kind of final flourish in the limelight.

  Feeling considerably less hung-over, he stepped out of the apartment building, checking his pockets for cigarettes, again forgetting that they were in the car. There was another group of young men to his side, perched on the steps, two sitting down and two standing up. For a group of nobodies they were comically overdressed, with neat shirts tucked in, waistcoats and jackets, and two even had ties, as if they worked in a bank. They were smoking roll-ups. Yates walked up to them:

  – Would any of you gentlemen be so kind as to roll one for me?

  It wouldn’t have been difficult to fetch his own from the car but this was more fun. The men exchanged glances, silently weighing up his request. They knew he was law. They hated him. And yet they couldn’t say no. Repeat after me: Your hatred doesn’t matter.

  It was a thrill to watch, these tough young men totally powerless, full of swagger and attitude yet obedient and servile, suppliant before him, like the most limp-wristed of men.

  The youngest man produced tobacco and rolled a perfect cigarette. He took care over it, making sure Yates had no reason to be annoyed. He was smart: understanding that ev
en the slightest sign of defiance would inflame Yates. When it was finished, he offered it. Yates accepted, but did not take out his matches, even though he had them in his pocket.

  – I prefer my tobacco to burn a little before I smoke it.

  A different man lit a match, holding the flame steady in front of Yates. Yates dipped the end of the cigarette into the flame, lighting the cigarette and inhaling, smiling his gratitude.

  – Been a while since I’ve tasted tobacco this cheap. Reminds me of when I first started to smoke as a kid. You men have a productive day. Enjoy the sun.

  The man extinguished the match with an angry flick of his wrist – the closest he dared to a display of his emotions. Yates sucked deeply on the cigarette, savouring this moment – a sublime moment, on a beautiful sunny day.

  *

  The taxi came to a stop. Elena looked out the window. This must be the place – West 145th Street. The street was busy in a very different way from 44th Street. Some people were busy: many were hanging about. She was worried at how conspicuous she’d appear, a seventeen-year-old Soviet girl dressed unfashionably, with no sense of this city, this neighbourhood or its culture. She didn’t have much time, little more than an hour before she’d be missed at the hotel. The group was due to meet at lunch, before the dress rehearsal, when Raisa returned from her preliminary visit to the UN Headquarters. She checked her watch. The cab ride had taken over thirty minutes, longer than they’d calculated for. The delay meant that she didn’t have long to find and talk to Mr Austin. She’d been told that he’d become a recluse, no longer performing, rarely leaving the apartment, unemployed, his spirit downtrodden by the oppressive measures used against him›