Charlie’s Apprentice cm-10

by Brian Freemantle

  ‘The only reaction to that – from them all, not just Eduard – was shock. Two tried to hit out, but it wasn’t anything like a fight. The others were actually angry at him: they thought he had made a mess of the bribe negotiations. We’ve had to put him in a separate cell.’

  ‘Here?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Can I see him?’ To see him would give her time to try to think what she had to do. She desperately needed time.

  Kapitsa hesitated, uncertainly. ‘I thought we might decide how to handle things first.’

  ‘I’d like to see him,’ she insisted.

  The investigator spoke briefly into a telephone almost drowned under a wash of put-aside papers, and as they walked side by side down the corridor said to her: ‘I’m having him put into an interview cell, away from the detention block. It’s not very pleasant. No reason for you to be embarrassed. Or upset.’

  ‘You really are being most considerate.’ Sasha. That’s who she had to think about, above and beyond everything else. Only Sasha: keeping Sasha safe.

  ‘I’ve got children,’ said Kapitsa. ‘Two boys. I’m terrified they might go wrong some day.’ There was the familiar shrug. ‘It’s the job, I suppose. Seeing it happen every day.’

  The interview room was still in the basement, but sectioned off from the main detention area behind a thick wall into which just one barred communicating door was set. Smell and noise permeated out: to Natalia it sounded like the rumbled shuffling of animals herded together, which she supposed was a fairly accurate description.

  There were two solid metal doors on either side of a central corridor, each with a round Judas-hole at head height. The holes were covered from the outside by a swivelling metal plate. Kapitsa led her to the first door directly to their right, nodding as they approached an officer sitting at a bare desk just inside the communicating entrance to the main cell block. At once the man rose, sorting through keys on a large ring attached to a body chain around his waist. As the officer found the right key Kapitsa said: ‘I’ll leave you here. Just call for the officer when you want to come out.’

  ‘No!’ said Natalia, quickly. ‘I think you should be with me.’

  ‘What?’ The investigator stood looking at her, face creased in bewilderment.

  ‘It’s a Militia responsibility: we’re virtually colleagues, as you said.’

  ‘But …’

  ‘I think it’s best. It’s what I want.’

  The door swung open and Natalia hesitated before pushing forward into the cell. Had she not known it was Eduard, Natalia would not have recognized the man as her son. When she had last seen him his hair had been shorn tight to his skull, making him almost bald. Now it was very long, practically shoulder length, and waved, which she couldn’t remember it being even before the army, when he’d been at university. His face was stubbled, not with an attempt at a beard but where he had been denied shaving material. There was a gold band in his left ear. If he wore an ear-ring there would be more jewellery. She guessed everything else would have been taken away, along with all the other personal possessions, when he was received into the jail. All his clothes, which she supposed he’d been allowed to retain because he had not yet been formally charged, appeared to be from the West: Levi jeans, leather loafers, an expensive-looking leather jacket and a wool shirt, open at the neck.

  Eduard was at a table chained to the floor, in the very middle of the room. There were chairs either side of the table, also chained down, but still with some movement, which he was using as much as possible, going back on the rear legs and rocking slightly back and forth, easily confident. He didn’t attempt to get up when his mother entered.

  Instead he smiled up from the tilted chair and said: ‘At last! I thought you’d forgotten me!’

  Kapitsa gestured politely towards the facing seat, but Natalia didn’t take it. Even from where she stood she could detect the sour smell that she’d earlier got from the main detention block minutes before.

  ‘It wouldn’t have been difficult to forget you.’

  Eduard’s expression faltered, but only slightly. Looking pointedly at the investigator near the door but still addressing Natalia he said: ‘We need to talk. Just the two of us.’

  ‘I’ve asked him to stay.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It isn’t going to be a problem.’

  Eduard came forward at last, settling his chair. ‘You sure about that?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘Good!’ he said. The smile came into place.

  My flesh and my blood, she remembered. She wished she could feel more: feel anything. Still her flesh and blood. ‘How long have you been back in Moscow?’

  ‘It must be over a year.’

  ‘You did not contact me?’

  There was a passing attempt to look serious. ‘Meant to. Decided to get established first. Got busy, you know how it is.’

  ‘You’re in a hell of a mess.’

  The seriousness now was genuine, Eduard’s eyes going between Natalia and Kapitsa. ‘I’d really like to talk to you alone.’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘I need your help!’

  For the first time the complacent arrogance slipped, and Natalia was unsure whether Eduard’s anguish was at having openly to plead or at having allowed the fear to show. From the look he directed at her, she guessed it was a combination of both. ‘There are things to think about.’

  ‘What things?’

  ‘It’s not that easy.’ She heard Kapitsa shift behind her.

  ‘You’re still in the KGB or whatever it’s called these days?’

  Natalia hesitated. ‘Yes.’

  The smile returned. ‘You’d be surprised at the effect it had when I told him’ – Eduard nodded towards Kapitsa – ‘your name. You know what I think? I think you’ve climbed even higher up the ladder than when you and I were last together.’

  ‘Much higher,’ Natalia conceded.

  ‘That’s good.’

  ‘Is it?’

  ‘Things must be easy for you.’

  Now Natalia gestured behind her, to the investigator. ‘It’s not just a matter for me. There’s the Militia position to consider.’

  ‘What about my position to consider?’

  ‘That’s what I’m doing,’ said Natalia. Adulterated medical drugs kill sometimes. Or maim. The investigator’s words echoed in her mind, loudly, like an announcement with the volume turned up. My flesh and blood, she thought: Eduard is my flesh and blood.

  The expression was sly now. ‘We don’t want any embarrassment, do we?’

  ‘I’m not sure I understand that.’

  The back and forth chair came down squarely again. ‘You’re obviously very important now: much more than before. Everything’s public in Moscow these days: openness is the official policy …’ There was a hesitation, staged and theatrical. ‘… Very easy for people in important positions to be embarrassed: damaged by the embarrassment even …’

  The noise of Kapitsa shifting behind her was louder. ‘All of that is very true.’

  Eduard sighed. ‘So we’d better get this problem cleared up, before it goes any further. I’ve been in this shit-hole for five days.’ There was a nod in Kapitsa’s direction. ‘Why don’t you have a talk?’

  She had to estimate how exposed she was. ‘You’re with a Mafia gang? The Lubertsy?’

  Eduard sniggered. ‘Don’t be melodramatic! I work with businessmen.’

  ‘What sort of business?’

  Eduard’s shoulders went up and down. ‘All sorts. Providing what people always want.’

  Natalia used his ambiguity. ‘When you formed your consortium with these Lubertsy businessmen, did you tell them I had a rank and influence in what was then the KGB?’

  Eduard’s smirk was conspiratorial. ‘It’s normal business practice, to provide references. Assure colleagues of one’s good standing.’

  Natalia guessed he would have seen every Western gangster film to be shown i
n Moscow: the attitude and the words were virtually a parody. ‘Is that why you were appointed an organizer: put in charge?’

  ‘Recognition of natural ability.’ There was another disparaging head movement, towards Kapitsa. ‘The offer I made still stands, if the money hasn’t already vanished from wherever it’s supposed to be safeguarded here. No reason for anyone to lose out. Everyone stays happy. OK?’

  Natalia gestured again to the man behind her. ‘We have to talk. See what can be done to make everything work out right.’

  ‘Of course you do,’ agreed Eduard. ‘Just be quick, OK?’

  For a moment Natalia stood looking down at Eduard. Then she turned, quickly, and followed Kapitsa out. Once inside his office, the man lit yet another cigarette and said: ‘It’s difficult to know what to do: what to suggest. I can’t see how we can take him out of the case and still proceed against the others. That’s my problem.’

  Natalia decided that Kapitsa was honest according to the convoluted standards of bygone Russian bureaucracy, disdaining blatant bribery but prepared to compromise and make deals with people he considered to be in the same business, linked by a professional freemasonry. She halted at the thought. Was it really a bygone time? Or still the way Russia operated, despite the supposed second revolution? ‘I need time. There is a lot to consider: to be worked out.’

  ‘I can leave it to you, to come up with something?’ The man sounded relieved.

  Natalia nodded. ‘Have you filed an official Militia report?’

  Now Kapitsa smiled, believing he understood the significance of the question. ‘Only provisionally. No identities. Technically the investigation is continuing.’ He examined the end of his lighted cigarette, as if it were important.

  ‘So there are no names, on any official document?’ persisted Natalia.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Could I have a copy?’

  ‘Of course.’ He burrowed into the paper mountain, producing a case report surprisingly quickly.

  ‘I’ll be in touch very soon,’ promised Natalia. ‘It must be handled properly: to everyone’s satisfaction.’

  ‘That’s exactly what I want,’ assured Kapitsa.

  Natalia slumped in the back of the Zil returning her to Yasenevo, head forward on her chest, totally absorbed in the new crisis, but thinking beyond it. How good was Tudin’s personal spy network? A question she couldn’t answer. But she’d taken an official car to the Militia headquarters. And very openly announced it to her secretariat, as she left. So she had to assume he would learn about it from those sources, if he had no others. Which he probably did. She would have liked to have somebody else with whom to talk it through: somebody whose mind would have been less cluttered by conflicting loyalties and doubts.

  The reflection inevitably brought her thoughts to Charlie, who’d had the quickest and most analytical brain she’d ever known. Charlie, who’d always been able to consider things from every angle: see the dangers that no one else could … The reminiscence was never finished, blocked by something else.

  The memory was abrupt and totally illogical – a bizarre trick of her mind – and physically startled her into coming bolt-upright from the way she had been sitting. But it was there: all she wanted. The unformed recollection that had refused to come after her conference confrontation with Fyodor Tudin filled her mind with utter and complete clarity. She could remember the words: even what she’d been wearing and what they had been doing. It had been here, in Moscow, long before he’d had to leave, disappointing her for the first time. It had been a caviare celebration, at Mytninskaya, for no better reason or excuse than their happiness together. Perhaps it was the association of Eduard and Mytninskaya that had finally prompted the memory. Or the fact that they’d eaten caviare, because it was that which caused Charlie’s seemingly innocuous conversation. About his mother being in a home for the elderly near the most famous salmon-fishing river in England: in England, not Scotland. And he’d recounted an anecdote of English privilege, about a fishing club so exclusive it had first call upon the town’s best hotel, ahead of the general public.

  Natalia became aware of the driver’s attention, in the rear-view mirror, and settled back upon the cushions again.

  She had it, she told herself. The way to find him, providing his mother was still alive. And she’d already put in place the operation to make it happen.

  Which still left the crisis of Eduard.

  John Gower did not, after all, venture out into Beijing on the fourth day, remembering the edict about escape routes.

  Airline reservations need not be in the names recorded on the passport, so under false identities Gower made confirmed bookings on direct London flights for the sixth day, leaving the intervening twenty-four hours to contact the priest. As protective insurance against any additional delay that he could not, at that moment, anticipate he repeated the reservations, under other different names, on the two succeedings days.

  It had been the uneventful visits to the Forbidden City and Coal Hill that convinced him it would be pointless going to the Taoist temple without activating the system: not to do so would be putting the positive commitment off, which practically amounted to cowardice. The next day he’d trigger the signal and then fill the already chosen lion figure on the hill, to complete the routine.

  And wait for Snow to come to him at the embassy.

  According to the London briefing, Snow had been told to check at three-day intervals, but Gower didn’t have a starting-point for his count, so he had to allow that full period for the priest to respond. He remained momentarily unsure whether he could chance the reservations so soon or whether to extend over several more days. No need for an immediate decision, he decided: if Snow didn’t appear, bookings could still be made. For the moment he could leave things as they were.

  That night he accepted the dinner invitation from the Nicholsons. Jane agreed at once and enthusiastically to shop for the cheongsam. After an animated discussion, he chose blue for the colour and said he thought her sizing would fit Marcia. He hoped Marcia’s underwear wouldn’t be quite so obvious if she ever did wear it.

  Jeremy Snow grew increasingly frustrated as he monitored the constantly empty signal spot by the temple, until finally he began to think London had taken him at his word and withdrawn, ending their relationship.

  Most frustrating of all was the acceptance that there was nothing he could do, to restore things as they had been before; as he wanted them to be again. Walter Foster had gone and London had clearly not appointed a successor. Which left him in a vacuum, with no one at the embassy he could approach to try to put things right. His very dilemma showed the stupidity of the system that London had insisted upon, and Foster adhered to, so rigidly.

  Snow followed the too familiar route by the temple, seeking the signal that wasn’t there, and afterwards walked almost for a further hour before going back to the mission to rid himself of the anger. He still got there before noon.

  ‘Have you seen the People’s Daily’? greeted Father Robertson. ‘The dissident arrests have started in Beijing.’

  Snow took the offered newspaper, at first not properly concentrating. And then he did. There was a photograph of three manacled men being led from a police van. One of them was Zhang Su Lin, his underground information source and English-language student until a year ago.

  For the first time Snow felt a bubble of genuine uncertainty. It became difficult for him to breathe properly, although not bad enough for any medication.

  Thirty

  ‘You could have done something with yourself, you could. Been a doctor. Went to grammar school, didn’t you!’

  ‘Yes, mum.’ Charlie was surprised how well she was holding on to reality today. And had been, for weeks now.

  ‘What do you do? I forget.’

  ‘Clerk, in a government office.’

  ‘Girl’s job,’ dismissed the woman, scornfully. The rear of the bed had been cranked up, to put her in a sitting position. She wore the knitted
bedcoat Charlie had bought the previous Christmas over her nightdress, and one of the nurses had carefully crimped and prepared her hair she way she liked it done. She smelled of lavender, her favourite. He’d have to remember that, next Christmas.

  ‘Get a lot of holidays,’ said Charlie, letting the conversation run, most of his mind elsewhere, conducting the private debate about his Regent’s Park discovery.

  ‘No money, though, is there?’

  ‘Not a lot.’

  ‘That’s why you’re a bloody tramp!’ she said, triumphantly.

  ‘Yes, mum.’ It was an accusation made on average at least once during every visit. His mother had always been extremely clothes-conscious. Ironically, considering his constant concern for his painful feet, her particular delight had been shoes: he could vaguely remember the floor of a bedroom closet completely covered with pairs that overflowed from a shoe-rack. He hadn’t expected Julia to notice the effort he’d made, with new shoes. They were settling in now but they really had hurt like hell at first.

  ‘No wonder you never got married.’

  ‘No, mum.’ She’d forgotten Edith and there seemed no purpose in reminding her. Charlie wondered what Julia was preparing for that evening: she’d invited him to eat in her house for the first time.

  ‘Your dad was a smart man.’

  ‘I’m sure he was.’

  ‘Give me my handbag! There! Under the cabinet.’

  Charlie did as he was told, watching her fumble with veined hands through a bag crammed with long-ago letters, most still in their tattered envelopes.

  ‘There!’ she said, in further triumph. ‘There’s your dad. Officer in the navy: lieutenant or something. Always smart, he was.’

  Charlie took the picture. It had to be the sixth she had produced of a man she claimed to be his father. He had not seen this one before. It was of a stiffly upright, unsmiling officer in an army uniform. He wondered where she got them all from: he supposed they had all been men whom he’d been told to call uncle when he was young. He definitely couldn’t remember this one. ‘Good-looking man,’ he agreed.