The Looking Glass War

by John le Carré

  Avery could remember it when the fog lingered contentedly against its stucco walls, or in the Summer, when the sunlight would briefly peer through the mesh curtains of his room, leaving no warmth, revealing no secrets. And he would remember it on that Winter dawn, its façade stained black, the street lights catching the raindrops on the grimy windows. But however he remembered it, it was not as a place where he worked, but where he lived.

  Following the path to the back, he rang the bell and waited for Pine to open the door. A light shone in Leclerc’s window.

  He showed Pine his pass. Perhaps both were reminded of the war: for Avery a vicarious pleasure, while Pine could look back on experience.

  ‘A lovely moon, sir,’ said Pine.

  ‘Yes.’ Avery stepped inside. Pine followed him in, locking up behind him.

  ‘Time was, the boys would curse a moon like this.’

  ‘Yes, indeed,’ Avery laughed.

  ‘Heard about the Melbourne test, sir? Bradley’s out for three.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ said Avery pleasantly. He disliked cricket.

  A blue lamp glowed from the hall ceiling like the night light in a Victorian hospital. Avery climbed the staircase; he felt cold and uneasy. Somewhere a bell rang. It was odd how Sarah had not heard the telephone.

  Leclerc was waiting for him: ‘We need a man,’ he said. He spoke involuntarily, like someone waking. A light shone on the file before him.

  He was sleek, small and very bland; a precise cat of a man, clean-shaven and groomed. His stiff collars were cut away; he favoured ties of one colour, knowing perhaps that a weak claim was worse than none. His eyes were dark and quick; he smiled as he spoke, yet conveyed no pleasure. His jackets had twin vents, he kept his handkerchief in his sleeve. On Fridays he wore suede shoes, and they said he was going to the country. No one seemed to know where he lived. The room was in half-darkness.

  ‘We can’t do another overflight. This was the last; they warned me at the Ministry. We’ll have to put a man in. I’ve been going through the old cards, John. There’s one called Leiser, a Pole. He would do.’

  ‘What happened to Taylor? Who killed him?’

  Avery went to the door and switched on the main light. They looked at one another awkwardly. ‘Sorry. I’m still half asleep,’ Avery said. They began again, finding the thread.

  Leclerc spoke up. ‘You took a time, John. Something go wrong at home?’ He was not born to authority.

  ‘I couldn’t get a cab. I phoned the rank at Clapham but they didn’t reply. Nor Albert Bridge; nothing there either.’ He hated to disappoint Leclerc.

  ‘You can charge for it,’ Leclerc said distantly, ‘and the phone calls, you realise. Your wife all right?’

  ‘I told you: there was no reply. She’s fine.’

  ‘She didn’t mind?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  They never talked about Sarah. It was as if they shared a single relationship to Avery’s wife, like children who are able to share a toy they no longer care for. Leclerc said, ‘Well, she’s got that son of yours to keep her company.’

  ‘Yes, rather.’

  Leclerc was proud of knowing it was a son and not a daughter.

  He took a cigarette from the silver box on his desk. He had told Avery once: the box was a gift, a gift from the war. The man who gave it to him was dead, the occasion for giving it was past; there was no inscription on the lid. Even now, he would say, he was not entirely certain whose side the man had been on, and Avery would laugh to make him happy.

  Taking the file from his desk, Leclerc now held it directly under the light as if there was something in it which he must study very closely.

  ‘John.’

  Avery went to him, trying not to touch his shoulder.

  ‘What do you make of a face like that?’

  ‘I don’t know. It’s hard to tell from photographs.’

  It was the head of a boy, round and blank, with long, fair hair swept back.

  ‘Leiser. He looks all right, doesn’t he? That was twenty years ago, of course,’ Leclerc said. ‘We gave him a very high rating.’ Reluctantly he put it down, struck his lighter and held it to the cigarette. ‘Well,’ he said briskly, ‘we seem to be up against something. I’ve no idea what happened to Taylor. We have a routine consular report, that’s all. A car accident apparently. A few details, nothing informative. The sort of thing that goes out to next of kin. The Foreign Office sent us the teleprint as it came over the wire. They knew it was one of our passports.’ He pushed a sheet of flimsy paper across the desk. He loved to make you read things while he waited. Avery glanced at it: ‘Malherbe? Was that Taylor’s cover name?’

  ‘Yes. I’ll have to get a couple of cars from the Ministry pool,’ Leclerc said. ‘Quite absurd not having our own cars. The Circus has a whole fleet.’ And then, ‘Perhaps the Ministry will believe me now. Perhaps they’ll finally accept we’re still an operational department.’

  ‘Did Taylor collect the film?’ Avery asked. ‘Do we know whether he got it?’

  ‘I’ve no inventory of his possessions,’ Leclerc replied indignantly. ‘At the moment, all his effects are impounded by the Finnish police. Perhaps the film is among them. It’s a small place and I imagine they like to stick to the letter of the law.’ And casually, so that Avery knew it mattered, ‘The Foreign Office is afraid there may be a muddle.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ said Avery automatically. It was their practice in the Department: antique and understated.

  Leclerc looked directly at him now, taking interest. ‘The Resident Clerk at the Foreign Office spoke to the Assistant half an hour ago. They refuse to involve themselves. They say we’re a clandestine service and must do it our own way. Somebody’s got to go out there as next of kin; that is the course they favour. To claim the body and effects and get them back here. I want you to go.’

  Avery was suddenly aware of the pictures round the room, of the boys who had fought in the war. They hung in two rows of six, either side of the model of a Wellington bomber, rather a dusty one, painted black with no insignia. Most of the photographs had been taken out of doors. Avery could see the hangars behind, and between the young, smiling faces the half-hidden fuselages of parked aircraft.

  Beneath each photograph were signatures, already brown and faded, some fluent and racy, others – they must have been the other-ranks – self-conscious and elaborate, as if the writers had come unnaturally to fame. There were no surnames, but sobriquets from children’s magazines: Jacko, Shorty, Pip and Lucky Joe. Only the Mae West was uniform, the long hair and the sunny, boyish smile. They seemed to like having their photographs taken, as if being together were an occasion for laughter which might not be repeated. The men in front were crouching comfortably, like men used to crouching in gun turrets, and those behind had put their arms carelessly over one another’s shoulders. There was no affectation but a spontaneous goodwill which does not seem to survive war or photographs.

  One face was common to every picture, right to the end; the face of a slim, bright-eyed man in a duffel coat and corduroy trousers. He wore no life jacket and stood a little apart from the men as if he were somehow extra. He was smaller than the rest, older. His features were formed; he had a purpose about him which the others lacked. He might have been their schoolmaster. Avery had once looked for his signature to see if it had altered in the nineteen years, but Leclerc had not signed his name. He was still very like his photographs: a shade more set around the jaw perhaps, a shade less hair.

  ‘But that would be an operational job,’ said Avery uncertainly.

  ‘Of course. We’re an operational department, you know.’ A little buck of the head. ‘You are entitled to operational subsistence. All you have to do is collect Taylor’s stuff. You’re to bring back everything except the film, which you deliver to an address in Helsinki. You’ll be instructed about that separately. You come back and you can help me with Leiser—’

  ‘Couldn’t the Circus take it on? I mean, couldn’t they
do it more simply?’

  This smile came slowly. ‘I’m afraid that wouldn’t answer at all. It’s our show, John: the commitment is within our competence. A military target. I would be shirking our responsibility if I gave it to the Circus. Their charter is political, exclusively political.’

  His small hand ran over his hair, a short, concise movement, tense and controlled. ‘So it’s our problem. Thus far, the Ministry approves my reading’ – a favourite expression – ‘I can send someone else if you prefer – Woodford or one of the older men. I thought you’d enjoy it. It’s an important job, you know; something new for you to tackle.’

  ‘Of course. I’d like to go … if you trust me.’

  Leclerc enjoyed that. Now he pushed a piece of blue draft paper into Avery’s hand. It was covered with Leclerc’s own writing, boyish and rounded. He had written ‘Ephemeral’ at the top and underlined it. In the left-hand margin were his initials, all four, and beneath them the word Unclassified. Once more Avery began reading.

  ‘If you follow it carefully,’ he said, ‘you’ll see that we don’t specifically state that you are next of kin; we just quote from Taylor’s application form. That’s as far as the Foreign Office people are prepared to go. They’ve agreed to send this to the local consulate via Helsinki.’

  Avery read: ‘Following from Consular Department. Your Teleprint re Malherbe. John Somerton Avery, holder of British passport no—, half-brother of deceased, is named in Malherbe’s passport application as next of kin. Avery informed and proposes to fly out today take over body and effects. NAS flight 201 via Hamburg, ETA 1820 local time. Please provide usual facilities and assistance.’

  ‘I didn’t know your passport number,’ Leclerc said. ‘The plane leaves at three this afternoon. It’s only a small place; I imagine the Consul will meet you at the airport. There’s a flight from Hamburg every other day. If you don’t have to go to Helsinki you can take the same plane back.’

  ‘Couldn’t I be his brother?’ Avery asked lamely. ‘Half-brother looks fishy.’

  ‘There’s no time to rig the passport. The Foreign Office are being very sticky about passports. We had a lot of trouble about Taylor’s.’ He had returned to the file. ‘A lot of trouble. It would mean calling you Malherbe as well, you see. I don’t think they’d like that.’ He spoke without attention, paying out rope.

  The room was very cold.

  Avery said, ‘What about our Scandinavian friend … ?’ Leclerc looked uncomprehending. ‘Lansen. Shouldn’t someone contact him?’

  ‘I’m attending to that.’ Leclerc, hating questions, replied cautiously as if he might be quoted.

  ‘And Taylor’s wife?’ It seemed pedantic to say widow. ‘Are you attending to her?’

  ‘I thought we’d go round first thing in the morning. She’s not on the telephone. Telegrams are so cryptic.’

  ‘We?’ said Avery. ‘Do we both need to go?’

  ‘You’re my aide, aren’t you?’

  It was too quiet. Avery longed for the sound of traffic and the buzz of telephones. By day they had people about them, the tramp of messengers, the drone of Registry trolleys. He had the feeling, when alone with Leclerc, that the third person was missing. No one else made him so conscious of behaviour, no one else had such a disintegrating effect on conversation. He wished Leclerc would give him something else to read.

  ‘Have you heard anything about Taylor’s wife?’ Leclerc asked. ‘Is she a secure sort of person?’

  Seeing that Avery did not understand, he continued:

  ‘She could make it awkward for us, you know. If she decided to. We shall have to tread carefully.’

  ‘What will you say to her?’

  ‘We shall play it by ear. The way we did in the war. She won’t know, you see. She won’t even know he was abroad.’

  ‘He might have told her.’

  ‘Not Taylor. Taylor’s an old hand. He had his instructions and knew the rules. She must have a pension, that’s most important. Active service.’ He made another brisk, finite gesture with his hand.

  ‘And the staff; what will you tell them?’

  ‘I shall hold a meeting this morning for Heads of Sections. As for the rest of the Department, we shall say it was an accident.’

  ‘Perhaps it was,’ Avery suggested.

  Leclerc was smiling again; an iron bar of a smile, like an affliction.

  ‘In which case we shall have told the truth; and have more chance of getting that film.’

  There was still no traffic in the street outside. Avery felt hungry. Leclerc glanced at his watch.

  ‘You were looking at Gorton’s report,’ Avery said.

  He shook his head, wistfully touched a file, revisiting a favourite album. ‘There’s nothing there. I’ve read it over and over again. I’ve had the other photographs blown up to every conceivable size. Haldane’s people have been on them night and day. We just can’t get any farther.’

  Sarah was right: to help him wait.

  Leclerc said – it seemed suddenly the point of their meeting – ‘I’ve arranged for you to have a short talk with George Smiley at the Circus after this morning’s conference. You’ve heard of him?’

  ‘No,’ Avery lied. This was delicate ground.

  ‘He used to be one of their best men. Typical of the Circus in some ways, of the better kind. He resigns, you know, and he comes back. His conscience. One never knows whether he’s there or not. He’s a bit past it now. They say he drinks a good deal. Smiley has the North European desk. He can brief you about dropping the film. Our own courier service is disbanded, so there’s no other way: the FO don’t want to know us; after Taylor’s death I can’t allow you to run around with the thing in your pocket. How much do you know about the Circus?’ He might have been asking about women, wary, an older man without experience.

  ‘A bit,’ said Avery. ‘The usual gossip.’

  Leclerc stood up and went to the window. ‘They’re a curious crowd. Some good, of course. Smiley was good. But they’re cheats,’ he broke out suddenly. ‘That’s an odd word, I know, to use about a sister service, John. Lying’s second nature to them. Half of them don’t know any longer when they’re telling the truth.’ He was inclining his head studiously this way and that to catch sight of whatever moved in the waking street below. ‘What wretched weather. There was a lot of rivalry during the war, you know.’

  ‘I heard.’

  ‘That’s all over now. I don’t grudge them their work. They’ve more money and more staff than we have. They do a bigger job. However, I doubt whether they do a better one. Nothing can touch our Research Section, for example. Nothing.’ Avery suddenly had the feeling that Leclerc had revealed something intimate, a failed marriage or a discreditable act, and that now it was all right.

  ‘When you see Smiley, he may ask you about the operation. I don’t want you to tell him anything, do you see, except that you are going to Finland and you may be handling a film for urgent dispatch to London. If he presses you, suggest it is a training matter. That’s all you’re authorised to say. The background, Gorton’s report, future operations; none of that concerns them in the least. A training matter.’

  ‘I realize that. But he’ll know about Taylor, won’t he, if the FO knows?’

  ‘Leave that to me. And don’t be misled into believing the Circus has a monopoly of agent running. We have the same right. We just don’t use it unnecessarily.’ He had restated his text.

  Avery watched Leclerc’s slim back against the lightening sky outside; a man excluded, a man without a card, he thought.

  ‘Could we light a fire?’ he asked, and went into the corridor where Pine had a cupboard for mops and brushes. There was kindling wood and some old newspaper. He came back and knelt in front of the fireplace, keeping the best pieces of cinder and coaxing the ash through the grate, just as he would in the flat at Christmas. ‘I wonder if it was really wise to let them meet at the airport,’ he asked.

  ‘It was urgent. After Jimmy Gort
on’s report, it was very urgent. It still is. We haven’t a moment to lose.’

  Avery held a match to the newspaper and watched it burn. As the wood caught, the smoke began to roll gently into his face, causing his eyes to water behind his glasses. ‘How could they know Lansen’s destination?’

  ‘It was a scheduled flight. He had to get clearance in advance.’

  Tossing more coal on to the fire, Avery got up and rinsed his hands at the basin in the corner, drying them on his handkerchief.

  ‘I keep asking Pine to put me out a towel,’ said Leclerc. ‘They haven’t enough to do, that’s half the trouble.’

  ‘Never mind.’ Avery put the wet handkerchief in his pocket. It felt cold against his thigh. ‘Perhaps they will have now,’ he added without irony.

  ‘I thought I’d get Pine to make me up a bed here. A sort of ops room.’ Leclerc spoke cautiously, as if Avery might deprive him of the pleasure. ‘You can ring me here tonight from Finland. If you’ve got the film, just say the deal’s come off.’

  ‘And if not?’

  ‘Say the deal’s off.’

  ‘It sounds rather alike,’ Avery objected. ‘If the line’s bad, I mean. “Off” and “Come off”.’

  ‘Then say they’re not interested. Say something negative. You know what I mean.’

  Avery picked up the empty scuttle. ‘I’ll give this to Pine.’

  He passed the duty-room. An Air Force clerk was half asleep beside the telephones. He made his way down the wooden staircase to the front door.

  ‘The Boss wants some coal, Pine.’ The porter stood up, as he always did when anyone spoke to him, at attention by his bed in a barrack-room.

  ‘I’m sorry, sir. Can’t leave the door.’

  ‘For God’s sake, I’ll look after the door. We’re freezing up there.’

  Pine took the scuttle, buttoned his tunic and disappeared down the passage. He didn’t whistle these days.

  ‘And a bed made up in his room,’ he continued when Pine returned. ‘Perhaps you’d tell the duty clerk when he wakes up. Oh, and a towel. He must have a towel by his basin.’