‘I’d feel a lot happier if I could solve the outstanding problem,’ said Bell. The inquiry had become so bogged down that there were some days when Andrews didn’t bother to come into the Factory at all any longer.
‘You’ll find him, darling,’ said Ann confidently. ‘I know you will.’
The following day Richard Axton sought a meeting.
‘So there is a link!’ said the Director General. ‘A connection.’
‘Whatever that might be,’ said Axton cautiously. ‘Davies, as he died, said Charles. Using that as the key – it was a one-time message pad again, incidentally – I’ve transcribed the message sent to London on the day Davies was shot to be: “Warn the Charles is blown.”’
‘It’s connected,’ insisted Bell. ‘It’s got to be. So we know that our traitor is codenamed Charles and that presumably he’s been warned that we are on to him. If only he knew how wrong that is!’
‘Perhaps he does. If he thought he was in serious danger, he’d have run,’ pointed out Axton.
Bell nodded, agreeing. ‘So he knows he’s still safe.’
‘Don’t you think there’s something odd, about that full message?’ pressed Axton, the man of puzzles to whom everything was important.
‘The Charles,’ picked out the Director General at once.
‘Yes,’ said Axton. ‘That’s not the way it would be written in English. There’s no reason for the at all. And it’s not Russian grammar, either.’
‘You mean it’s not the codename of a person, after all?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Axton. ‘I don’t know how to interpret it.’
The Director General sat quietly for several moments and then said: ‘I think I should know. I don’t – I mean I can’t think of it – but something in my mind tells me I should know!’
12
The Second Chance
The Director General was convinced that now, at last, he could find the traitor within the Factory: that he’d found the way to uncover him, at least. He was sure, he knew, that the intercepted Soviet message – Warn the Charles is blown – should have some significance to him: that it meant something. The problem was that Bell could not understand that significance. He felt like someone reaching out for an image reflected in a clear pool of water, trying to catch something shimmering in front of him which shattered into a thousand jumbled pieces the moment his fingers touched it, so that he lost the picture at the very moment it was becoming clear.
The clue had to be in something that had happened in the immediate past, something that had occurred during his personal search for the spy wrecking his organization. So where was it? Maybe it was linked to the failed traps he’d set, before calling in the outside investigators who remained as baffled as he was. Or maybe it was in one of the operations that had ended in disaster, the real indication that his department, the active branch of British overseas intelligence, had been penetrated by a Soviet mole eroding and destroying from inside, a cancer that couldn’t be found or diagnosed.
He had to examine everything, then.
He had to go back to the absolute beginning, to the occasion it had all started a year ago. And scrutinize everything, review everything, until the reflected image remained intact when he reached out for it. Until, hopefully, he saw that proper picture.
So much, thought Bell, viewing the task before him. There had been so many disasters and so many mistakes, dragging the department of which he had once been so proud down into chaos until it had now reached the point where no one trusted anyone else, no one considered the person next to him a friend. Even less than a friend: it had become so bad that people who had worked and existed together for years no longer regarded their neighbours even as colleagues.
The beginning, Bell reminded himself positively. So what did he regard as the beginning? He supposed it had to be the courier seizure as the man was leaving East Berlin after what should have been the simplest of pickups, the sort of job that had gone faultlessly a dozen times before. Jack Harding, remembered the Director General. A trusted professional, someone Bell had known well and liked, now with at least another eight years to serve in an East German jail. Proof, certainly, of the penetration within the Factory. But there was nothing in what had happened to Harding, either before or since, that Bell could think of to link with that all-important Soviet message: Warn the Charles is blown.
The Harding episode was significant only for being the beginning: the beginning of all his personal tests and trials through which he’d stupidly hoped to find out himself whoever was sabotaging his organization.
Upon honest and objective self-examination it had been stupid: stupid and naïve, pairing people together on missions kept secret from everyone else in the department so that a failure would isolate one or the other as the spy. What had it achieved, any of it? Nothing.
Except that he’d personally evolved the worst disaster of all, sending Anthony Marshall to a certain death, quite wrongly believing Marshall to be the traitor who’d identified himself by failing to guard his partner on an operation in Prague.
In the quiet solitude of his office Bell physically squeezed his eyes shut, as if trying to close out the memory of his error, an error that soon became horrendously obvious when the leaks continued after Marshall had been killed.
Not the only death, acknowledged the Director General, relentlessly continuing his analysis of all that had happened. What about William Davies, whom he’d infiltrated into KGB headquarters in Moscow, as the KGB had infiltrated London? Another appalling piece of mismanagement but at least a clue – or part of a clue this time – because William Davies had died with the name ‘Charles’ on his lips. So what the hell did it mean?
He was allowing his analysis to be sidetracked, corrected Bell. There was still more to examine. Like Alistair Deedes. What sort of torture had Deedes been forced to endure? Deedes, whom Bell admitted to himself he had knowingly and deliberately sacrificed to mislead the KGB under brutal interrogation into believing that London knew the identity of the British traitor. Bell had done so in the forlorn hope of panicking Soviet intelligence into some ill-considered move that would have revealed the man’s identity. But failed, yet again. Since Deedes’ arrest there had been at least three unfulfilled promises from Moscow to release the man, because there was insufficient evidence to prosecute him for anything. And Bell was sickened by what he believed to be the reason: that the interrogation had been so physically bad that the Russians were waiting until Deedes had at least partially recovered before setting him free.
Bell straightened behind the desk. It was impossible for him properly to make this a cold, detached review. Inevitably it was becoming a regretful reminiscence, personal guilt far outweighing any sensible objectivity.
Back to the beginning again, he told himself for the second time. East Berlin? Nothing. All his carefully laid traps? Nothing. Alistair Deedes? Nothing. The … started the Director General and then stopped abruptly.
Surely not! Yet it fitted! Or did it? Could it be as tenuous, as loosely connected as this? It was possible, merely by being so loosely connected, he supposed. Or was he trying too hard to make the connection? It was important, in his desperation, not to imagine an answer where no answer existed at all. A possibility, then. No more than a possibility. But most certainly one that he had to pursue, as determinedly and as hard as possible, because after so long and so much he had no more than this.
The head of the outside investigation team answered the telephone himself.
Bell said: ‘You’d better come. I think I’ve got something.’
‘You sure?’ demanded Andrews eagerly.
‘No,’ admitted the Director General. ‘I’m not sure at all.’
As he prepared for the encounter Samuel Bell decided it would be necessary at all times to convey the impression that he knew far more than he did, to obtain an incriminating confession. Because apart from one slender link he had absolutely no proof at all. Which meant he was taking an imm
ense gamble. But then, he thought in a balancing reflection, hadn’t that been what he had done for the previous year, taken immense, desperate and so far disastrous gambles?
As well as Andrews in the room there was an investigating police sergeant, and Samuel Bell was accompanied by Jeremy Thurlow. A table had been specially brought into Bell’s office for the stenographer. In addition to her note-taking equipment there was also electronic recording apparatus.
‘I’d welcome a better briefing on this,’ complained Andrews.
‘If I had more I’d tell you,’ said Bell.
‘It’ll never work,’ said the policeman.
‘It’s time something did,’ said Bell wearily.
Elizabeth Porter started to enter the room quite confidently, but faltered at the threshold, looking curiously around the assembled group. Then she actually hesitated and made as if to withdraw.
‘Come in!’ ordered Bell curtly. It had been agreed that he should conduct the opening interrogation. By intention there was no chair for the woman, so that she would know at once it was a formal inquiry.
Elizabeth came haltingly further into the room. She was a quiet, studious girl who wore spectacles that didn’t suit her. She was not particularly successful with makeup, either, often using colours that were too heavy. Her lipstick today was brighter than it should have been. Like so many of Bell’s operatives she had joined the Factory straight from university, where she had studied modern languages. She was fluent in Russian and four other Slavic languages.
She stopped about five feet from the Director General’s desk and said uncertainly: ‘I was told you wanted to see me?’
‘Are you surprised at my wanting to see you?’ began Bell.
‘I don’t understand that question,’ said the girl.
‘Don’t you?’ said Bell. He was already feeling hot, actually uncomfortably so, having to manoeuvre everything he said so that she was left in the position of having to lead the exchange.
Elizabeth shook her head. ‘No,’ she said.
Bell jerked his head quickly sideways, towards Andrews, and said: ‘Aren’t you surprised to see him here?’
She shrugged, appearing quite controlled, and said: ‘I don’t know what this meeting is about. I’m surprised at everything.’
‘What about the leaks that have been getting out of this organization? Are you surprised at those, too?’ Careful, thought Bell. He was coming dangerously close to overreaching himself.
Now it was Elizabeth Porter who indicated the policeman beside the Director General. ‘I have already been interviewed by him about that,’ she said. ‘There was no way I could help.’
‘Wasn’t there?’ pressed Bell.
She frowned. ‘Of course not!’ she said, her voice tinged with outrage. ‘How could there be!’
‘That’s what I want you to tell us, here today,’ said Bell. He was aware of Andrews shifting slightly beside him and realized he wasn’t doing particularly well. Without a full confession he’d have nothing, Bell told himself: so it would be another disaster, like all the others.
‘I really don’t know what you mean,’ Elizabeth said. Although she appeared calm the confusion seemed genuine.
Bell recognized that he had to do something to force the interview on. Dear God, he thought, don’t let me make any more mistakes. He said: ‘Did you choose the codename? Or was it given to you by Moscow?’
The girl blinked and grimaced slightly but that was all. A facial expression was not an indication of guilt, accepted Bell worriedly: it was not an indication of anything.
She said: ‘None of this makes the slightest sense to me.’
He’d abandoned the earlier resolution and started the attack so he had to go on with it, decided Bell. ‘It was a clever idea changing the sex. If the person who encoded the message from Moscow hadn’t put the in front of it I might still not have understood who Charles was, as I do now …’ The Director General paused, aware of how heavily he was perspiring and hoping she did not notice. He added, exaggerating: ‘And then all the other facts fell into place. But I still don’t understand why you did it: why you became a traitor and exposed us all.’
‘This is absurd!’ the girl protested forcefully.
‘No it’s not,’ challenged Bell. ‘It’s very clever, as it’s been clever all along. Clever of you, for instance, to realize as quickly as you did when I sent you to Prague with Anthony Marshall that it was a test, as well as a genuine mission. It would have been very useful for us to have received the material you picked up that day: the troop strength in Czechoslovakia would have been invaluable intelligence. You couldn’t let us get that, could you? It had to be destroyed. But in a thoroughly convincing way, because after all Marshall was watching, wasn’t he? It was quite brilliant switching suspicion completely away from yourself by having the Czechs and the Russians seal the bridge when you were on it, with Marshall actually able to see you simply drop into the river the information you couldn’t possibly bring out …’ Bell stopped talking, wanting a pause for his point to be made. ‘… Drop it from the famous Charles Bridge, the Prague landmark that everybody knows, with all those famous statues on either side. When you think about it, that was the only thing that wasn’t clever, giving you that Charles identification. Once we got that, it was inevitable that we would get back to you, eventually.’
Elizabeth Porter made her miscalculation then. If she had continued professing her ignorance there was little more that the Director General could have done – certainly hardly any further he could have taken his accusations because he’d practically come to the end of his bluff. But she didn’t go on professing her ignorance. Instead, practically defiantly, she said: ‘This is an illegal court. I demand legal representation!’
Bell saw his opportunity at once but just as quickly realized he still did not have his open admission. And if she were allowed legal representation, he would never get the confession – and the conviction – that he wanted. He said: ‘This isn’t a court hearing. It is an official interview, by senior investigating officers. And we know you’re guilty: that you are the person who’s been eating away at this department. And we can prove it. So you are going to go to jail, for a very long time. Long enough to think of all the harm and the damage you’ve caused. To think about all the people you’ve destroyed: the people whose deaths you’ve caused.’
Elizabeth Porter did not make any denial. Or protest her innocence. She simply shook her head, either in refusal or disbelief, swallowing very slightly. Come on! thought Bell, exasperated: I know that I’m right, that you did it. So come on and admit it, for God’s sake! He said: ‘Don’t think you will ever be exchanged, for some British agent in Russian custody. I won’t agree to any swap, ever. You are going to spend the rest of your life rotting in a British prison.’
Elizabeth Porter’s collapse was abrupt but absolute. One moment she was standing in front of them, quite composed. The next her face crumpled and she burst into tears and from that moment it was comparatively easy. They finally produced a chair and took turns in the questioning now, wanting to learn it all so that a proper assessment could be made of the full damage she had done. And that all-important, incriminating confession was sobbed out, the complete picture that Samuel Bell had wanted for so long but which, until now, had always eluded him.
It was very late – and the statement very long – before they finished. At Andrews’ insistence they adjourned but did not leave the Factory. He said: ‘That amounts to the only proper evidence we’ve got: I want her signature on it before anyone goes anywhere.’
‘I don’t think we’ll ever properly know the extent of what she’s done, complete though the statement appears to be,’ judged Andrews. There were just the two of them in the Director General’s office. There was no further need for the other two men, and Elizabeth Porter had been taken under escort to another room to wait while her statement was prepared for signature. For once Bell felt no embarrassment at bringing the whisky bottle from the
bottom drawer of his desk, deciding a celebration was justified.
‘She’s finally been caught,’ he said. ‘At last it’s over. Thank God.’ There was another feeling of relief, greater than before, a lightheadedness he’d sometimes known from drinking too much, which he wasn’t doing any more. And wouldn’t do again, he determined. Just two drinks a night now. And none during the day. And it wasn’t proving difficult for him to abstain, not as he’d thought it might be. Perhaps all the bad things were over.
‘You kept the intercepted message from me, so that you could solve everything yourself!’ accused the investigating policeman.
‘It was an interception that had no meaning, by itself: there was nothing to tell you until I linked it up with the Prague affair,’ defended the Director General easily. ‘And as soon as I did that, I called you in.’
Andrews looked at the other man doubtfully but could not continue the challenge. He said: ‘The department will take a lot of rebuilding.’
‘I can do it,’ insisted Bell confidently. He had been waiting for weeks but had now decided that there was not going to be the demand he had expected for his resignation. Everything appeared to be resolving entirely in his favour.
‘I wish you luck,’ said Andrews.
It turned out to be a thoroughly inappropriate remark for what happened immediately afterwards.
Neither of them heard anything: no shouts or screams. Their first indication of anything wrong was when the deputy Director thrust white-faced through the door without knocking and said: ‘Quick. Come quickly!’
The room to which Elizabeth Porter had been taken to wait for her statement to be prepared was on the sixth floor of the Factory, so there was a drop of over a hundred feet to the pavement. She had died instantly.
According to the escorts, a man and a woman both as white-faced from shock as Thurlow had been, Elizabeth Porter had sat very quietly on a chair she chose by the window from the moment she had entered the room, showing no sign of distress after the breakdown in the Director General’s office. She had accepted a cup of tea, but drunk little of it. She’d been asked if she wanted anything, any contact made with her family, for instance, and refused the offer. She’d appeared distracted, deep in thought.
The Factory Page 17
