Legacy

by Alan Judd

  ‘I should go. It’s too risky for you. If something goes wrong –’

  ‘No, Charles, we go. I have directions. If I am not going, you cannot because you do not know where.’

  Charles argued but knew he would have to give in. Leaving Viktor in his room, he hurried through silent corridors to Rebecca’s. It was gone half past two and there was still a moon. He knocked once, twice, three times, called her name softly then, fearing to wake others, tried the door. It was unlocked. He crept in, sat on the edge of her bed and touched her gently on the shoulder. ‘Rebecca, it’s me, Charles, wake up.’

  She woke, and sat up quickly. ‘Thank God it’s only you.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  She switched on the bedside light, rubbing her eyes. ‘I must look awful. Where – why at this time –?’

  ‘Viktor’s in my room. I’ll explain. D’you always sleep in hotels with your door unlocked?’

  ‘Depends.’

  He paused, but there was no time. He described what had happened. ‘So I guess we should wake up Dogsbody and tell HO.’ There was nothing in terms of SV or permission that the duty officer could organise in the time available but Charles’s developing bureaucratic instinct was to report anyway, even though it made no difference to what they were about to do. Reporting provided partial cover against future criticism. ‘And if Viktor will give us the directions in advance HO will at least have a record of where it was in case it blows up or something.’

  ‘If it blows up it’ll be only too clear where it was, won’t it? D’you mind getting off the bed and letting me out?’

  He stood. ‘Well, yes, but you know what I mean. I think we should at least tell them.’

  ‘See if you can prise directions out of Viktor while I get Dogsbody on air.’

  When he returned she was in jeans and jumper and sitting at the dressing-table with Dogsbody open before her. There was a keyboard, some switches, green and white lights and a quiet beep when she tapped. ‘London’s up. The DO’s been summoned to the comcen so he’ll see it as it comes off the machine and can reply immediately. What do you want to say?’

  He was not used to dictating, particularly when there was no chance of correction, and Rebecca typed faster than he spoke. It was important to make clear that he was informing, not seeking permission. When he had finished she pressed a button, typed a five-letter group, pressed the button again and sat back. ‘I’ve told them we’re awaiting immediate response.’

  After a pause, the answer came quickly, with chattering and whirring from the machine. She tore off the page and handed it to him. Paragraph one simply ‘noted’ Charles’s proposal. Paragraph two asked whether C/Sovbloc and the Security Service needed to be informed at once or whether it could wait till early morning.

  ‘If you say inform them now, the DO might suggest you wait for their responses. You know what HO is like, always on the side of caution,’ Rebecca warned. ‘If you want to do it, we just do it.’

  ‘Tell them to inform Hookey at 0700. He can decide what to tell MI5.’ He waited while she did it. ‘Would you mind coming with us to watch while we search, in case the agent turns up? It’ll be vital to identify him, or at least his car. And there’s no point in waiting here to communicate with London because there’ll be nothing to communicate till we get back. And you probably wouldn’t be able to get to sleep anyway.’

  She was closing down Dogsbody. ‘Do I look as if I need persuading? I’ve been dying to meet Viktor.’

  They left by the front door, telling the surprised night porter that they couldn’t sleep and felt like a moonlit drive and walk, while Viktor slipped out the back. He hid under cover of the arch leading into the street from the rear car park. When they picked him up he squeezed himself onto the floor and Charles threw his coat over him. Rebecca drove, heading inland for Reydon and the A12. When they were out of sight of the hotel Charles pulled the coat off. ‘This is Rebecca. Tell us where we’ve to go.’

  Viktor leant between the seats to shake hands. ‘Good evening, Rebecca, I am delighted to meet you. You are much more beautiful than the paintings of your ancestors.’

  ‘Thank you, Viktor. That’s more than Charles has said.’

  They drove for some minutes with the interior light on so that he could read his notes. His translation of terms such as road, track and path were interchangeable. When nearly at the A12 they had to turn round and head back towards Southwold, eventually pulling off the road just before the town where a footpath led through sandy hillocks and scrub down to the marsh.

  ‘From the footpath sign,’ Viktor read haltingly, ‘we must take one hundred and fifteen paces along the path. On the right is a thorn tree. Go behind the thorn tree and walk fifty-six paces along the gully that leads down to the marsh. At the bottom is the concrete floor of an old building. Turn to the near left hand corner of the floor and face the two willow trees growing out of the bottom of the bank. The distance between the trees is seven paces. The cache is half way between them.’ He looked up. ‘It is not far. I will read the rest when we get there.’

  ‘How? We have no torch.’

  ‘The moon is bright.’

  Rebecca parked the car some way up the road and rejoined them. She was to hide somewhere off the footpath in a spot that would give a view of anyone approaching and time to warn them. ‘Glad I brought my coat,’ she said. ‘I take it the office will pay for any damage or cleaning?’

  ‘If MI6 won’t, KGB will,’ said Viktor. ‘I will find a way. So, you see, you have to meet me again, Rebecca.’

  They found the thorn easily, from which there was a view back along the path. She would hide behind it and slip down to them if she heard or saw anything. ‘What about a spade?’ she whispered. ‘You’ll need something to dig it up with.’

  Viktor turned to Charles. ‘You see, Charles, women always make problems. It is same in KGB. That is why our officers are men. If she were not here we would not have this problem until we get there.’

  Charles was annoyed with himself for not having thought. Not that thinking would necessarily have produced one, unless they had broken into the gardener’s shed at the hotel. ‘You two wait here behind the tree,’ he said. ‘I’ll get the jack handle and wheel brace from the car. If we can’t dig with them we might be able to feel where the box is and dig with our hands.’

  Viktor’s febrile excitement recalled something of his mood during the escapade on the Thames and Charles was half prepared to find, on return, that he had been trying it on with Rebecca. However, she seemed relaxed and Viktor now seriously concerned with what they were doing. ‘This place is good,’ he whispered as he got up. ‘We could hear your steps before we saw you so Rebecca should have more time to warn us. And the earth is soft. I could dig with my fingers.’

  They left her and headed down the gully. The cracked and broken square of concrete at the bottom looked like the remains of a wartime gun emplacement or pill-box. The two willows loomed as dark masses against the night sky. They knelt between them, feeling the earth. The ground was grassy and uneven, softened by rain.

  ‘Must be cows here,’ said Charles, wiping his hand on the wet grass.

  ‘KGB cow. It marks the spot. The Centre thinks of everything.’

  Charles prodded with the screwdriver he had brought with the other tools. He soon felt something hard but not extensive; the screwdriver slipped off it.

  ‘A bottle and a piece of metal pipe have been put above the cache to warn you when you are getting to it and to show if it has been disturbed,’ said Viktor. ‘The mouth of the bottle should face east with the pipe at right angles. We should dig now.’

  They peeled back the turf, then began the slow work of loosening the earth with the tools and scooping it by hand. ‘The agent will surely realise it’s been interfered with before he gets to the box,’ said Charles.

  ‘So much the worse for Rhykov.’ Bottle and pipe came out easily. ‘Dig carefully now. We must feel for a wooden board on top of a metal containe
r. It has a hole in it for the handle of the container, which we must not move yet.’

  The moonlight was just sufficient to see by, now that their eyes were accustomed. ‘You don’t need your notes for this?’ asked Charles.

  ‘I know this sort of container. We have used them in many other countries.’

  They paused when they heard a car pass. The only sound afterwards was the munching of nearby cattle. They exposed the board and lifted it carefully off, over the T-shaped handle which was like that of a tap. Below it they could just make out the metal top of the container, about a foot square.

  ‘Don’t touch,’ said Viktor. He took from beneath his jersey a battery and two lengths of wire which he attached to the terminals. ‘You see, I come prepared, even if no torch or spade. This is from my big personal radio that I bought, what you call ghetto-blaster. I hope the battery is strong enough.’

  ‘Booby trap?’

  He nodded. ‘Molniya system. It means “lightning”. I know this system. Screwdriver, please.’ He scratched the top of the container, then held one wire end above the scratched part and the other over the lock. ‘Now, listen carefully, please.’

  The cattle munched, a distant dog barked twice. There was a faint background murmur that might have been the sea. Slowly, Viktor bent and put the ends of the wires against the scratched part of the container top and the lock. ‘Did you hear something?’

  ‘A click.’

  ‘Good. Me too. Now it should be okay.’ He put the screwdriver into the lock and banged sharply with the wheel brace. ‘That should be enough. These are cheap locks, for children really. Now, all we must do is turn the handle and lift the lid.’

  ‘You’re sure it’s disarmed?’

  Viktor raised his hands. ‘I think so, yes.’

  ‘You only think?’

  ‘If it is not, we shall never know. We can only know if we are right, as with the Christian belief in the after life. That is comfort for us. Would you like to turn, or shall I?’

  Hookey’s statement on the unlikeliness of there being small nuclear devices seemed less reassuring. The much greater likelihood of sabotage equipment – detonators, primers, explosives – was hardly more reassuring. ‘Look, if there’s the faintest chance that it’s not, it makes sense for only one of us to be here to do it. It could be double-booby-trapped. No point in both of us being blown up. The other should go back to Rebecca.’

  ‘Go, then.’

  ‘You go.’

  ‘After you, please, your honour.’

  ‘This is absurd, Viktor.’

  ‘You English are so sensible. You do not appreciate absurdity, therefore you are even more absurd than Russians who have better understanding of the value of life and death. High value or low value, what does it matter? Goodbye, Charles, it is nice to have known you.’ He bent quickly over the box and turned the handle, then slowly straightened and grinned. ‘Hello, again. Still here, you see. Life continues. How absurd.’

  Inside were two parcels wrapped in greaseproof cloth, one larger and heavier than the other. The smaller felt as if it contained more than one thing. Viktor held it up. ‘Documents,’ he said.

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I have filled such things myself, in other countries. Probably money, too.’ He took the heavier parcel. ‘This I am not sure but probably it is a radio.’ He unwrapped the smaller parcel with practised expertise, laying out the contents on the wooden lid of the container. There were sterling notes, a cheque book, driving licence, cheque card, passport and other papers which it was hard, in the moonlight, to identify. Charles could just make out the name Evans on the passport but could make nothing of the photograph. ‘Alias documentation,’ said Viktor. ‘Whoever is coming must need to change his identity, or disappear, or travel, or get a job somewhere interesting, or something.’ He was more careful with the other parcel, only partially opening it. ‘Receiver. Not one I am familiar with. Perhaps he needs it to overcome his communications problem.’

  It was a dilemma. The clear intelligence interest was in identifying the agent and the best way to do that was to note all they could of the documents, re-bury them and wait for them to surface in use somewhere; passport details would go on the watchlist at all ports and airports. But that would do nothing to ensure Viktor’s safety, which needed a disturbed or empty DLB to reinforce suspicion of Rhykov. Charles peered again at the passport.

  ‘It could simply be that the documents are becoming out of date,’ said Viktor, taking it from him and peering at it himself. ‘They must be replaced sometimes. Or perhaps they were for another agent who cannot use them and so this one is retrieving them.’

  Perhaps the original agent died unexpectedly of a heart attack, thought Charles. He looked at the man near him, keen, young, full of life. It wasn’t a difficult dilemma. ‘We’d better take them. Come on, we haven’t much time.’

  It took longer than they thought to replace the earth and its contents on the container and they then spent some minutes searching for the screwdriver. The sky was just lightening over the sea to the east as they made their way back to Rebecca, crouching behind the thorn. ‘All right?’ Charles whispered.

  ‘Frozen.’

  A car approached, slowed, reversed, stopped. ‘Up here.’ Charles led them farther up the track, away from the road and into the bushes. They crouched and waited, hearing nothing. After some time Viktor whispered, ‘I must not be long. I must be back.’

  There had been no opening and closing of doors, no footsteps. Keeping away from the track, they crept through the bushes towards the road. It was slow, frustrating and uncomfortable, also impossible to be completely silent. Eventually, they reached a point near the road some way up from the footpath sign. A Morris Minor van was parked by it, backed off the road. ‘Anyone got pen or pencil?’ asked Charles. No one had. ‘We’ll have to remember the number, then.’

  ‘What is he doing?’ asked Viktor. ‘What is that thing in the window?’

  ‘It’s a courting couple,’ said Rebecca. ‘That’s her leg.’

  ‘The agent won’t come while they’re here,’ said Charles. ‘This could be the saving of Rhykov. Not so good for you, Viktor.’

  ‘We could go and watch, then they would leave.’

  ‘He might have been already. We should get you back.’

  They dropped him beneath the hotel arch where they had picked him up. Afterwards, Charles discreetly unlocked the back door and let him in. There was no time for a parting because they heard the porter coming down the corridor, probably on his way to the Gents’. Charles grabbed Viktor’s hand. ‘You sure you’ll be all right? You can still –’

  Viktor gripped him firmly. ‘I think so, I think so.’ He took the stairs three or four at a time.

  Rebecca had set up Dogsbody. ‘We’re up. London is waiting.’

  Charles reported the bare facts, plus the car number, adding that they would close down while they slept. It was gone six. ‘Not that we’ll get much sleep now.’

  Rebecca yawned. ‘I shall, if I can ever get warm again. Join SIS and spend your Friday nights in a thornbush. Who’d have guessed. ’Night.’

  ‘ ’Night.’

  12

  Charles was awoken early by noises in the car park below. From his window he watched the Russians board their minibus. There was confusion about their luggage, involving rapid simultaneous talk and gesticulation on the part of all except Tanya and Rhykov, who stood silently apart. Viktor, to judge by a repeated two-handed gesture as if he were holding down a blanket, seemed to be calming everyone. The radio news was of the possibility of further oil crises, of east-west confrontation in Angola and of the likely scale of the Sizewell demonstration. He bathed and went for a sea-front walk before breakfast.

  It was Saturday and traders were already setting up their stalls in the small market square outside the hotel. There was a blue sky, a fresh breeze and high, puffy white clouds. A few people walked their dogs on the beach and a solitary elderly man, wear
ing a deerstalker and a long raincoat of the sort that 1930s motorcyclists were pictured in, stood barefoot in the surf, his trousers rolled up to his knees, his shoes in one hand and an open umbrella in the other. Charles had a faint memory of his father wearing such a coat at one time. Like all such memories now, it bubbled up unexpectedly and already tainted. He examined them all for a sign, a hint, anything that would help explain, but to no avail. It was like another bereavement, as if his father had died twice. Away to the south the sun glinted on Sizewell.

  Nevertheless, some sort of conclusion had been reached in the early hours of the morning, some sort of line drawn. With luck, Viktor would survive, and Claire would stay quiet. MI5 would get on with their investigation. Anna would stay married to Hugo. And Charles would leave, his sense of honour – or self-myth, or pride, or all three – intact. It felt like an act of revenge, though it wasn’t clear upon whom – his dead father, the past, unpalatable reality, the world in which this sort of thing happened? What was clear, was that he alone would suffer.

  Back in the hotel, he glanced into the dining room, saw no woman by herself, and was about to withdraw when a hand was raised at the far end. Sitting at a window table, near where the Russians had been, their features at first masked by the morning sun, were Rebecca and Hookey. Beside them was a bottle of champagne in a silver bucket.

  ‘Been waiting ages,’ said Hookey. ‘Didn’t want to drink a toast until you were here but we’ve ordered the full works breakfast for you. Stop hanging around and sit down.’

  The sun was bright on cutlery and clean linen. Hookey wore a ragged blue Guernsey, a meticulously pressed pair of cricket flannels and polished brown shoes. He looked ruddier than in London, and slightly nautical. Rebecca was laughing. A waiter appeared, whom Hookey called by name, and opened the champagne. ‘We still have a house here,’ explained Hookey. ‘Didn’t tell you in case you thought I’d be snooping on you. And no, it wasn’t the gym mistress in the marshes for me, I’m afraid, much as I’d’ve welcomed her. Bloody war saw to that, like everything else when I was young.’