Goodbye to an Old Friend (8 page)

He was Foreign Secretary because the government needed a man of wealth to capture the intellectual right wing of the party. Sir William was aware of it, but he knew his worth and was prepared to be used by an ambitious prime minister because it had been the role of his family for three centuries to serve their country. History, hoped Sir William, would correctly assess his contribution to be as great as that of any of his ancestors.

Ebbetts had decided upon bluntness.

‘What the hell's going on?' he demanded, looking at Adrian. ‘Don't like the way this debriefing is going, don't like it at all.'

Sir William reserved judgment by failing to pick up the end of the sentence.

‘What don't you like?'

Adrian felt the glance of Sir Jocelyn at the lack of respect and mentally shrugged it aside. He
was
right about Pavel. He knew he was. And he knew that time would prove him correct. He hoped he could maintain his attitude throughout the meeting.

‘You're handling the man wrong, all wrong,' said Ebbetts. ‘He's hostile. And we haven't got time to muck about. Speed is the element here.'

‘… element here,' intoned Sir William.

‘But why?' queried Adrian. ‘I'm sure Sir Jocelyn has made it clear that speed is just the thing to avoid in a debriefing. Answers have got to be checked, then crosschecked, then analysed …'

‘Rubbish.' The Premier cut him off with a wave of his hand. ‘Is Bennovitch genuine?'

‘Yes,' replied Adrian, ‘I believe he is.'

‘Is Pavel genuine?'

‘Depends what you mean by genuine,' countered Adrian.

‘Don't play with me, Dodds,' said Ebbetts, irritably. ‘Say what you mean.'

‘I believe the man who defected to our embassy in Paris and whom I have spent two days debriefing in Sussex is Viktor Pavel, who, with Alexandre Bennovitch, forms Russia's most important space team,' replied Adrian, formally. He was irritated by the posturing of the other man and determined not to be pressured.

‘What then?' asked the Premier and Sir William came in with ‘What then?'

‘I am suspicious of the man …' began Adrian, but the Premier cut him off. ‘I know, I know. I've heard from Binns all about your impressions that don't have an ounce of evidence to back them up.'

Adrian sighed, feeling that the Premier had made up his mind on a course of action before the meeting began.

He tried again. ‘In any defector, the impressions, the feelings, if you like, that you are dismissing so quickly are important. Often men who are anxious to get asylum give the impression that their importance is far greater than it is …'

‘For God's sake, man, Viktor Pavel is probably the cleverest space scientist Russia has ever produced … the cleverest man there's been for years. He'd make Einstein look like a fifth-former. Bennovitch is important, but even he doesn't compare. You've said that yourself. We can't begin to challenge Pavel's knowledge because we haven't got anyone in this country, or in the West for that matter, on the same level. What the hell's all this talk about “impressions of importance”?'

Adrian experienced a wave of nervousness and tried to subdue it. This meeting could decide his future with the department.

‘I'm sorry,' he said. ‘I'm expressing myself badly, but I meant to go on, beyond that. I'm not questioning Pavel's brilliance. I'm not questioning, either, the incredible value he could have for Western space advances. I'm unsure of the motives of the man in coming across.'

‘What other motives can a man have when he runs to the embassy of a foreign country and begs asylum?'

‘I don't believe Pavel wants to defect,' Adrian blurted out, accepting the stupidity of the words as he uttered them, desperation moving his tongue ahead of his thoughts.

‘Wants to defect?' queried the Prime Minister and when Sir William echoed ‘Wants to defect?' the incredulity indicated greater feeling than he usually expressed.

‘What Dodds means, I think,' said Sir Jocelyn, trying to come to his assistant's aid, ‘is that some uncertainty has arisen in Pavel since he crossed over. You've read the transcripts. The uncertainty is obviously there.' The nerve irritated under his eye.

‘Any uncertainty that has arisen in Pavel is the direct result of the way he's been treated, in my opinion,' snapped Ebbetts.

‘… way he's been treated …' came from Sir William.

Adrian laid his hands flat on the table, looking down for concentration. The meeting was falling away from him. He was appearing a rambling fool.

‘Please,' he said, the desperation edging in again. ‘Please let me speak, for a moment, without interruption, so that I can try and communicate completely what I feel.'

He paused. The other men stayed silent. Even in complete silence, Ebbetts seemed to be challenging him.

‘Certainly it's possible,' he began, ‘for a defector – for Pavel – to experience a change of heart. In fact, it is ridiculous for him to expect and for us to expect that some doubt, some homesickness or guilt, won't arise. Bennovitch said, as you'll have heard from his recordings, that he felt guilty and had some regrets. But for him it was easy, because he had no family upon whom he knew retribution would be carried out. Pavel protected his sister. Any defector with a family knows that they will be made pariahs in the Soviet Union. Pavel is an intelligent man, someone who deeply loves his family. According to Bennovitch, Pavel's only interest, apart from his work, was his wife and two children. Imagine what's going to happen to that woman now – first her brother, then her husband, together the two most important men in the Russian space programme. It will be a miracle if she doesn't face trial …'

‘I've tried to be patient,' burst in Ebbetts, ‘but I can't see the point you're trying to make. Of course we all know what is likely to happen to Pavel's wife … that it will probably be far worse than what happens to relatives of most defectors …'

‘And that's exactly the point,' said Adrian, with the vehemence of a man who has scored an advantage in a debate. ‘Pavel
knows
what will happen to her. And he knew it before he even considered coming across. Is that the action of a man deeply devoted to his wife? Would such a man abandon a woman he loves to a life sentence in a labour camp at Potma?'

‘But he
has
,' pointed out Ebbetts. ‘I accept the point you're making and I agree that if this had been a hypothetical discussion on the likelihood of Pavel following Bennovitch, then I would have agreed completely with you and dismissed as ludicrous the merest suggestion that Pavel would defect. But he
has
defected. You're arguing philosophy. I'm arguing facts.'

‘Wait,' pleaded Adrian. ‘Please wait. Knowing, upon your acceptance of my point, that his wife would be punished, Pavel goes ahead and defects. And then, belatedly, becomes covered with remorse. You've seen the reports of the men guarding him, you've read the transcripts of the conversations he has had with them …'

Ebbetts staged a theatrical sigh.

Adrian hesitated, then forced himself on. ‘I've rarely known a more painstaking man. He flies into a rage if a cleaner so much as moves a hair-brush an inch from where he's decided it should rest. Twice he's carried out an entire inventory against the list he's prepared and always has with him of what he's been allowed to keep in his room …'

Another sigh. ‘Get on with it, man,' implored Ebbetts.

‘It's an analytical mind,' said Adrian. ‘He thinks, considers, makes notes and refers to them … he's painfully old womanish, if you like. But the point is he calculates everything
before
he moves, not afterwards. For Pavel to become concerned about what effect his defection will have upon his wife and family
after
he's come across is so out of character and unreal as to be suspicious.'

‘Psychological poppycock,' dismissed Ebbetts.

‘And there's more,' went on Adrian. ‘I believe Sir Jocelyn has told you about the man's attitude …'

‘Resulting from your own. A man reacts in attitude to the way he's treated,' interrupted the Premier, quoting elementary Dale Carnegie.

Adrian was breathing heavily, losing ground. He could feel perspiration rivering beneath his shirt.

‘No, that's not it,' he said. ‘Listen to the first tape again, please. Pavel's attitude was formed from our first word. Over-confident and protective …'

‘Protective.' Ebbetts seized the word, rushing in like a ferret. ‘That's just it. Wouldn't you be protective, wouldn't you be afraid but try not to show it if you'd defected to Moscow? I'm amazed, I really am. I'd had the highest regard for your ability, Dodds, until now. You've had courses in psychology and according to what Binns tells me, one of the commonest indications of fear or inferiority is a show of shallow self-confidence.'

‘But Pavel's self-confidence isn't shallow. I've debriefed defectors before who've shown the symptoms you talk about. I can recognize that sort of confidence within minutes. And it usually evaporates within the first hour of the initial meeting. Pavel
is
confident.'

‘And why the hell shouldn't he be?' asked Ebbetts. ‘He's a genius. And he knows it. He can look upon this initial debriefing as a formality, the necessary form-filling, like taking out a television licence at a post office …'

Ebbetts paused and smiled. ‘No disrespect to your role, of course, but that's what it is. He knows our technical men are dying to get their hands on him and he'll know the Americans feel the same way. Usually your defectors are frightened, unsure of their worth. That's exactly the reason Pavel isn't frightened. He's led a pampered life in Russia for nearly twenty years which tells him just how valuable he is. Good God man, you've heard of prima donnas, haven't you? That's what Pavel is, a conceited prima donna.'

Yes, thought Adrian, I've heard of prima donnas. He shook his head in disagreement with Ebbetts's opinion, but said nothing. Ebbetts knew he had destroyed the other man's argument and carried on, the bully emerging at the recognition of a weaker character.

‘All right,' he said. ‘Let's examine your points.'

He stood up and splayed his fingers, like a schoolmaster addressing a backward class.

‘Point one – Pavel adores his family and would never leave them behind for harassment by the Russians. Answer – he has. I don't care if it's out of character. I don't care if Pavel makes notes of everything, even about going to the lavatory before he does it. The fact which cannot be ignored is that Pavel deserted his family. Point two – he's not nervous, but just the opposite, insufferably self-confident. Answer – he's got every right to be.'

A heavy silence settled in the room. Adrian sat, realizing his objections had been reduced to nonsense. He'd lost. Again.

Ebbetts continued in the role of politician, winning back a man he'd just defeated.

‘Let's face it, Dodds,' he began, his voice placatory now. ‘People don't run on train lines, starting out from one spot in their character and then continuing in a straight, predictable line. That's what human nature is, people behaving in an unexpected way. You're surprised that Pavel has come across and can't accept it. I'm surprised he's come across and I can accept it. And the facts as we know them at the moment indicate that my assessment is right, don't they?'

Adrian refused to give up without a struggle. ‘On the facts as we know them at the moment,' he said.

Ebbetts frowned, angrily. He had been walking up and down the small office, an unsettling trick he had perfected, so that people had to move their heads back and forth, like a Wimbledon tennis audience. He stopped, leaning across the table towards Adrian, the determination to crush obvious.

‘All right,' he said, his voice over-controlled. ‘Let's argue your objections to their ultimate, illogical conclusion. If you're convinced that Pavel is here for some underlying reason, then you must have decided what that reason is. Are you suggesting that Pavel is here in the role of an assassin, to liquidate a former partner?'

‘No, I …'

‘What then?'

Ebbetts was being quite merciless, enjoying it even. Adrian wondered how much training it needed to develop the hardness, the disregard of everything except the need to win every discussion and point, no matter how trivial.

‘What then?' echoed Sir William and Adrian looked at him in surprise. He'd almost forgotten his presence.

Adrian shrugged. ‘I don't know,' he said.

Ebbetts used that sigh again, the sneer more eloquent than any words.

‘Right,' he said. ‘Now we've dispensed with any doubt about Pavel, let's start thinking objectively.'

He had resumed his pacing back and forth, but now he stopped, sitting down immediately opposite the debriefing team.

‘I know all about your usual procedures for debriefing, but this is an unusual case, a very unusual case, so we're going to have to depart from routine.'

‘… depart from routine,' came from the Premier's right.

‘We're under pressure, intense pressure,' continued Ebbetts. ‘To hear the Russians talk, you'd think they're going back to Berlin and the Cold War. I thought the Lyalin case was bad enough, but it was child's play compared to this. Trouble is, the Americans seem to be backing the Soviets. Washington is very attracted by the Baikonur bait. If we don't move quickly, there'll be a major shift in friendships and we don't want that.'

‘What do you want?' asked Binns. Adrian realized how quiet the Permanent Secretary had been throughout the meeting. By his refusal to help, Sir Jocelyn was obviously expressing his agreement with the Prime Minister over the Pavel assessment.

‘I want Pavel debriefed quickly, more quickly than you've ever processed anyone before. I want the two men, Pavel and Bennovitch, thrown together. They're friends. It'll be a great psychological move, make them feel more relaxed, more ready to help …'