Dr Berlin (33 page)

He had watched Marion throughout the evening. He had seen her changing moods, vivacious one moment, solemn the next, diplomatically seeing to her guests while supervising first the drinks and then the dinner. He admired her energy and sparkle. Most of all he had been beguiled by her eyes, by those wonderful if rare moments when she took off her glasses to smile reassuringly across the table at him. It was as if they had already established their own private language of conspiracy.

Towards midnight, when only a few guests remained, she asked if he wanted a taxi to take him back: he must be exhausted by his ordeal. No, he replied. It was a lovely night. He preferred to walk. The exercise would do him good. He had dearly wanted to ask if he could accompany her home, but he was never alone with her for long enough.

‘You’ve made a lot of friends tonight,’ she said, resting her hand on his arm. Once more he felt that sense of conspiracy between them. ‘An exhausting but wonderful evening. I haven’t been as nervous as this since the day I took my finals. It’ll all be much easier next time. I hope you’re pleased.’

‘How could I be otherwise? I am overwhelmed by your kindness. Everyone’s kindness.’ He was aware that a small group had gathered round him. The prospect of intimacy with Marion vanished. ‘Goodnight to you all. Thank you. Thank you.’

He bowed to them and they burst into spontaneous applause. For one terrible moment he thought he might cry.

*

He opened the window and gazed out. Milton Court was in darkness, the college asleep. It was a still, warm night: there was no movement, no sound. He looked up at the stars, tiny specks of icy light flickering in the darkness – it was the same sky that looked down on Moscow, but how different its context. In this quiet, contented landscape there were no secret terrors. Even so, he was unable to relax. Where was British Intelligence? Why had he heard nothing from them? He had been in the country for four days, and there had been no approach. Perhaps they would never contact him. Perhaps they had dismissed him as an academic who could say nothing of importance.

He had voiced his concerns to Gerasimov, who denied them. ‘For two, maybe three days, there will be silence. They will watch you from the moment you arrive. They will read the interviews in the press, listen to the radio, attend your lectures and study what you say for clues. At first they will reject the possibility that you have anything of value for them. Why would we employ someone like you to bring a message to the West? They will think about it and slowly, carefully, they will change their minds.’

How could Gerasimov be certain that that’s what would happen? Berlin had asked.

‘I know them,’ had been his enigmatic reply. Did he mean the British, or Merton House? ‘Sometimes I think I know them better than they know themselves.’

If it was meant to be helpful, it was having the opposite effect now. Why hadn’t someone contacted him? What was he doing wrong?

Andrei unlocked the door to his father's studio and went in. The morning light poured in through the tall windows, illuminating the huge plaster head that, two or three times life-size, was like a monument from an ancient civilisation. The details were instantly familiar: the thick hair
en
brosse
, the narrow forehead, bushy eyebrows, full moustache, forceful chin, the expression ‘caring and purposeful' as the leader of his Pioneer Group had once described it, and the eyes staring ahead at the golden path that led to the distant horizon that only he could see. These were the unchanging features of wisdom and foresight of the ‘Man Sent to Lead'.

To his right he recognised a ‘Kindly Father'. Here the eyes of the Great One were lowered so that, when the bust was joined to the torso, a hand would rest on the head of a smiling child on whom the Great One's expression would be fixed, an affirmation that the task of the Momentous Undertaking would be inherited by the next generation. Next was a ‘Great Leader', a massive bronze structure, ready for transportation to the main square of a provincial city. Now the eyes looked sternly ahead as the People's Leader pointed the way to the future, the uncompromising image stating clearly that the journey into the glorious unknown could follow only one direction.

Did the Great Leader look like that? The sculpted version of his face was no different to all the photographs Andrei had ever seen – eternally youthful, defiantly ageless. Was his skin smooth and unmarked, his face unlined? Was his hair as thick
as a young man's? Was he made so differently to the rest of us that he never got old?

Finally to his left were two ‘Friendship Monuments', each featuring a worker holding a hammer aloft and a woman with a sickle in one hand and a child in the other, greeting a Soviet soldier. One group was dressed in winter clothes, wrapped up against the ice and snow, the other in the lighter clothes of summer. The woman wore a full skirt, her hair flowing behind her; the peasant's sleeves were rolled up, his cap set at the back of his head. The joyous moment when the people of the world met their Russian saviours, where one journey ended, and another began, had been caught for ever in bronze. These images were popular in the more distant parts of the communist world, so his father had told him, where the people liked to be reminded of how they had been rescued by the Soviet Army from enslavement to their own leaders and their mistaken, error-ridden philosophies.

He examined the portrait of the woman. The inspiration for her face, indeed for all the faces of all the women his father had ever sculpted, was his mother. It always gave Andrei a great sense of pride when he looked at a sculpture in a public place and recognised that beautiful face so faithfully reproduced. His father's early portraits of her were more than just a likeness, though the likeness was striking. What they showed was his mother's innocent beauty, her open and trusting nature, and above all her unhesitating belief that the future would be better than the present. It was that hopeful, confident expression that his father's loving hands had captured so well. He looked for the familiar inscription. On the base of the sculpture, beside his father's signature, he read the words, ‘The Radiant Years'.

There was a bitter irony about the title now. The figure his father had made was anything but radiant. The woman was no longer beautiful; she was coarse, hardened, hollow, devoid of destiny. Where was that special beauty, where was the bloom of her skin, where was the lustre in her thick hair that in some
miraculous way his father had found in all his early pieces? Where was the youthful hope that he had captured in clay when he first set eyes on her?

What Andrei saw now, cruelly cast in bronze for all the world to see, was his father's fading memory of his mother. How frightening, he thought, that the intensity of your feelings can fade so fast, that you should care so little that you no longer even bother to conceal your lack of interest. Was that what happened when you grew older? Was love not meant to last? But even if love did die – an idea he found hard to understand – even if his father's heart was no longer in his work, couldn't the hands that moulded the clay still honour the beauty that had faded throughout her life with him? Wasn't that a justifiable lie?

He found another door smeared with plaster marks and pushed it open. This room was dominated by a single huge plaster statue of the ‘Father of the People', surrounded by platforms that allowed his father and his assistants to work on it. Scattered all over the floor were spare hands and feet: the hands holding a machine-gun or a rifle, outstretched or bent in salute; the feet always in boots, huge boots, boots for all weathers, boots worn and scarred by years of activity guarding the state and the lives of all those who lived within it.

Andrei climbed the ladder that had been tied to one of the platforms, and found himself level with the Great One's eyes. The irises had yet to be cut in the plaster. This figure was neither watchful nor vigilant – it was blind. Andrei was suddenly aware of its vulnerability, its ordinariness. He felt neither awe nor fear in its presence. Blindness robbed the statue of its power. It gave Andrei a freedom he had not felt before in the presence of the Great One. He looked at the statue, his vision shorn of the myths that up to now he had accepted without question. The Great Leader aged because he was a man like any other. His face became lined, his hair thinned, his shoulders sagged. His father could allow his images of women to show that he had tired of his mother, but
he lacked the courage to sculpt a Leader who was growing old. Suddenly he saw his father's work as a continuous lie.

A huge anger rose up within him. He wanted to strike back at his father, to hurt him for the terrible things he had done to his mother's beauty and youth, for bruising her face, for leaving her sobbing helplessly on the bed, for sticking his red bobbing thing into that ugly girl, for all the ways in which his cruelty had driven the spirit out of her, and for portraying the Great Leader with lies and not with truth. Suddenly he was in the grip of an irresistible force that told him what he had to do. He snatched a chisel and went to work.

Cross eyes, wall eyes, wandering eyes, lines on the face, pock-marks on his cheeks, furrows on the brow, tears on the cheeks of the women –
no more lies
, he shouted out loud as he ran from statue to statue in the studio, defacing his father's work.

Then, using the wet clay he found wrapped in a sheet, he stuck enormous hooded things onto every torso and into every hand he could find.

Only
the
truth,
he shouted into the empty room.
From
now
on,
only
the
truth.
Witnesses to his desecration, the damaged statues neither stirred nor spoke.

‘Dr Berlin, sir.’ The porter hurried after him. ‘There was a man asking for you this morning, sir, when you were out. Wouldn’t leave his name. Very insistent about that, he was.’

‘What kind of man?’ Berlin enquired.

‘Youngish man, sir. Not an undergraduate. Thirties, I’d say, though it’s hard to tell these days. They all look alike when you get to my age.’

‘Was he English?’ How absurd the question sounded.

‘He wasn’t a foreign gentleman, sir. He was English all right. Quite tall.’

‘Did he say when he would call again?’

‘No, sir. Nothing like that.’

‘Thank you—’ He realised he had no idea of the porter’s name.

‘Wilkins, sir.’

‘Thank you, Wilkins. If he comes back, I’ll be in my room.’

‘I’ll let you know at once, sir. Don’t you worry.’

British Intelligence had called – who else could it be? – and he had missed them. He cursed his luck. He’d have to wait now – surely they wouldn’t give up after one attempt? He was desperate to be rid of his burden. He disliked responsibility, and the weight of his mission oppressed him. He was sure that was the reason for the nightly hauntings that dragged him down into the mire of his life. When his message was delivered, he would be free of these terrible memories, able to
enjoy to the full these glorious days in Cambridge, this beautiful Indian summer, as he had learned to call it.

*

A knock at his door awoke him with a start. ‘Dr Berlin, sir?’ It was Wilkins, the porter.

‘Yes?’

‘Your visitor, sir. He’s back.’

Berlin opened the door. ‘My visitor?’ For a moment he was perplexed.

‘He came this morning, sir. Remember? Wouldn’t leave his name. Shall I show him up?’

‘Please.’

A youngish man, mid-thirties, with bushy fair hair, looking fresh-faced and eager came in, carrying a newspaper. He wore a tweed jacket with leather patches on the elbows, baggy grey trousers and battered suede shoes.

‘Hello. I’m Hugh Hart,’ he said smiling.

‘I am Andrei Berlin.’ They shook hands.

‘Yes,’ Hugh Hart said. ‘I know who you are.’

‘How did you find me?’ Berlin asked.

Hart smiled. ‘You can’t keep a secret in this place longer than you can hold your breath. Isn’t it the same in Moscow?’

No, in Moscow we keep our secrets to ourselves because to betray them might mean imprisonment or death. But I would not expect you to understand that.

‘Well, now you have found me, what can I do for you?’

He felt an overwhelming sense of relief. His ordeal was nearly over. An hour, perhaps two, surely no more. Then he would be free.

‘It’s a beautiful day, very unexpected for this time of year. We should make the most of it while we can, don’t you think? I wondered if you’d care for a walk.’

And what shall we talk about, Mr Hart? Berlin wanted to ask, but Hart was already out of the door. All Berlin could do was follow him.

*

‘Am I allowed to ask a question?’

‘Please,’ Hart said. ‘Fire away.’

‘Why have you come to see me?’

‘It’s very simple, really. We were wondering if you had anything to tell us.’

‘I am a history teacher and you, I assume, are an intelligence officer.’

‘In a manner of speaking.’

‘What would you expect me to tell you?’ Don’t blurt out what you have to say too soon, Gerasimov had instructed. Make them work for their prize, then they will value what you tell them more highly.

‘That’s up to you,’ Hart said.

‘Why do you think I have a message?’

‘You’re the only Russian visiting these isles at the moment. Given present circumstances, it was worth a try. Call it a hunch.’

‘A hunch?’

‘An idea. An instinct that you might have brought something with you.’

Berlin walked on in silence. This was it. This was the secret moment when he played his part in history, when the message that he brought was passed from one side of the Iron Curtain to the other so that an unnecessary war might be avoided, human lives might be saved and evidence of European civilisation preserved. His own part in the drama would never be recorded. If he were to claim it for himself, it would be denied. He didn’t care. It was enough to know what he had done, and that because of his action, there was a greater possibility that life – the lives of many people in many countries – might have a chance of survival. This single act would redeem the years of betrayals.

‘Your instinct is correct,’ Berlin said.

‘I’m pleased to hear that.’

Berlin saw no excitement on the man’s face. It was as if he had offered him a cigarette and he had accepted it.

‘How do I know I must give my message to you?’ Berlin asked.

‘You want my bona fides, do you?’

‘I’m sorry. I don’t understand.’

‘You want to know who I am. My official status.’

‘Some form of verification. Yes, that would be helpful.’ Be careful whom you give your message to, Gerasimov had warned. Status confirms authority. If you give it to the wrong person it will never reach those who make the decisions, it will get lost in the undergrowth of bureaucracy and our efforts will have been wasted.

‘Will this do?’ Hart pulled a card out of his wallet and showed it to Berlin. His name, his job title – Senior Controller, what was that? – and his Department, ‘Ministry of Supply Resources Management’.

‘Call this number if you want to. They’ll confirm who I am. There’s a phone box over there. I’ve got some pennies if you need them.’

‘It is not your identity that concerns me,’ Berlin said. ‘I must trust you because I have no other option. It is your position. How can I be sure that you are powerful enough to be listened to? How can I know that you will pass my message upwards to the appropriate people?’

‘It’s that important, is it?’

‘I bring a message from Marshal Gerasimov, commander of the Red Army. You may have heard of him.’

‘Last time I saw him, he was standing on a podium in Red Square applauding your spaceman and looking pleased with himself.’

‘You have not answered my question.’

‘Any communication from Marshal Gerasimov will be sent to the Cabinet Office.’

‘This Cabinet Office – is it powerful?’

‘It’s the committee that reviews all intelligence in this country. It reports to the Cabinet, and the Prime Minister chairs the Cabinet.’

‘You understand my concerns,’ Berlin said. ‘I am not familiar with your country.’

‘That is why I came to Cambridge to see you. Now, what’s the great man got to say for himself? I trust he’s as well as can be expected, given his age.’

The news that Medvedev had been appointed the new head of the Directorate came without warning, and filled Koliakov with foreboding. He had heard nothing while he had been in Moscow. Had his usual contacts failed him? Or was the reason more sinister – that they knew more than they dared tell him? He waited anxiously. Four days later he received a letter from Medvedev ordering him to return to Moscow within fourteen days, where he would be reassigned to ‘other duties’, though as to what those other duties might be he was given no clue. His successor in London was named, a man he didn’t know, presumably one of Medvedev’s placemen. He was not wrong about the hostility between them. Medvedev had wasted no time in getting his revenge for his failure to support him all those years before.

He experienced a feeling of bleakness at the prospect of leaving London. He liked the freedom of his role, how it took him close to the heart of power in this strange country where political leaders believed that, shorn of empire but supported by the weight of history, they could still exercise influence on a world that had long moved past them. Were they arrogant, blind or misguided? He would never know. The British disease, he thought, was too strong a belief in their own past – a past they could never shake off because it surrounded their
present, like a cloak around their shoulders. How self-conscious they were about the distinction of their old buildings, the value of their institutions, the permanence of their monarchy, the importance of their aristocracy. How they adored their capacity for ceremonial pageant. Did they truly imagine that these historical tableaux were an alternative to the vast technological power that lay at the heart of the two great systems whose life-or-death struggle divided the world? Foolish, self-deceiving and arrogant the British might be, but he had come to have an affection for them. Their faults were born of innocence, not of terrible violence and cruelty towards their own kind. Such a verdict could never be delivered in his own country.

The more he thought about his impending departure, the more his anger rose, and symptoms he had not experienced for years returned. He developed a permanent headache, a searing pain behind the eyes that no analgesic could mollify. His eyes became sensitive to bright light, forcing him to wear dark glasses. Light once more was his enemy – its purpose was to melt his eyeballs, to blind him.

He had suffered like this once before, in Budapest in 1956 after the fighting had ended, the day he learned that Eva had gone missing. In his obsession to find her, his connections with the reality of his daily life had become flimsy, insubstantial. The world he inhabited no longer belonged to him but was peopled by hostile presences that he had to outwit. For days he felt he had lost his identity, that his mind was governed by forces he neither welcomed nor understood, but whose demands he was unable to resist.

He searched for Eva everywhere. He watched them clear the streets and houses of bodies, he asked questions about the identities of the corpses, were they male or female, young or old, did they have a name? He stood by as they dug them out of the rubble. He visited the mortuaries and hospitals, checking the lists of the dead and wounded. He saw the pain in the faces of parents searching for their lost children, but
despite the human devastation he had witnessed, he felt no pity for them. He had no doubts about the rightness of what had happened, about the violent suppression he had witnessed. The idea of a satellite state securing its own freedom from Soviet control was unthinkable. Any means were justified in keeping the Soviet empire intact. What had been done was necessary.

Wherever he looked, the answer was the same. Eva and her daughter Dora had not been heard of since the fighting began. Her apartment remained deserted. When the schools re-opened, Dora’s absence went unexplained. Martineau, too, he learned, had disappeared, but there was no word from the British Embassy about a missing diplomat. Twice Koliakov attempted to make contact with Hugh Hart but each time his approach was ignored. What could have happened? How could three people vanish? Looking at the ruined city, it was only too clear. It might be weeks or months before their bodies were discovered – if they were dead. That was his predicament. He had to know the truth. Against all advice, he hung on long after the time for leaving was past.

He took to wandering the streets by night in the vain hope that he might come across Eva. How many times he thought he’d seen her, only to be disappointed. His behaviour was reckless and out of character. If his colleagues were aware of what he was doing, they were too preoccupied to report his strangeness. If he knew it – and by now he hardly recognised himself, so deep was his obsession – he didn’t care. His life had one purpose. The days after the end of the uprising became a time of madness.

Then from one his agents came a rumour that the Hungarians knew he had sent the signal to Moscow that had led to General Abrasimov’s arrival in Budapest and his brutal suppression of the uprising. Koliakov had been betrayed by someone in the embassy, though by whom he never knew. He was advised to leave. He ignored the warning. He would
not be seen to run because he had received a threat against his life. His visible contempt for those who threatened him concealed the fact that he still had unfinished business in Budapest.

Only a chance encounter with a member of the Soviet Embassy who lived in the same block of flats saved him from certain death. He fled from those who lay in wait for him. For three days he disappeared into the ruins of Budapest before he was able to get word to Abrasimov and arrange for a flight to Moscow on a military aircraft. What happened during those three days he never told anyone, not even the psychiatrists at the KGB sanatorium to which he was sent on his return. He hated his time in hospital but he never gave way to impatience. Survival, he knew, depended on his ability to convince his doctors that he had recovered sufficiently so they could release him. Then he would be able to resume his search. He turned the interviews and the treatment into a secret game. He would outwit the specialists. After four months he was allowed to return to normal duties. In Moscow he scanned the lists of the Hungarian dead. He never found Eva’s name. Discreet enquiries at the Budapest Embassy confirmed that her flat remained unlived in. She was not dead, but she was not alive. He was mystified. But he learned nothing about Eva’s fate, either then or later. He forced himself to accept that she was dead. He shut her out of his mind. The madness retreated. He knew it had not left him. It was biding its time, lying in wait, ready to seize him once more when it chose to.

*

His eyes hurt from the lights in his bedroom. He turned them all off except for the bedside lamp. How bleak this room was. There was nothing in it to suggest his presence. It was as anonymous as he was. Perhaps that was why Eva had never noticed him – there was nothing to notice. In a world of
colour and movement, he was transparent, invisible. Perhaps he didn’t exist.

He packed a small leather holdall that he kept under his bed with a change of clothing and the envelope with money he had put by for just such an emergency. Over the months he had marked out the boarding houses he would use if he needed to: one in Pimlico, one in Kentish Town, one in White City, inconspicuous places where he could hide for a day or two under an assumed identity. He knew where he would be going even if he was unsure what he would be escaping from – but escape he must. His enemies were once more loose on the streets, and they were looking for him.