Spy Who Jumped Off the Screen : A Novel (9781101565766) (14 page)

Chapter Thirteen

Philip had encountered Rhys
Llewellyn once or twice before but had not recollected how stolid he was. The earnest Welshman arrived just before lunch, which, on the advice of their office's Czech liaison, they took far from the center of things, at the Huang Hue in Vršovice. This was a corner restaurant, in style as simple as its neighborhood, but the food, fusion with an emphasis on the Asian, was superb. Philip ordered Szechuan fish, Rhys garlic chicken, and they shared several other dishes between them as Philip briefed his successor on both Nunn-Lugar's and the Nuclear Threat Initiative's projects-in-progress. That Llewellyn had been chosen to follow him both pleased and irritated Philip. It pleased him because his vanity could not suffer the indignity of being supplanted by an equal and irritated him because he had valued his former position more highly than he ever could Rhys's talents.

They drank water instead of wine, took random trains on the metro, spoke only banalities in the taxi they shared back to the Jewish Cemetery, where more than twelve thousand worn or crumbling stones were crammed into a pitiful hollow at the center of the Old Ghetto, and which, from the Middle Ages to the Enlightenment, had been the only burial ground permitted to Jews. Generations of bodies, perhaps one hundred thousand of them, lay layers deep, the last interred in 1787 according to one semiofficial guidebook.

Philip bought their tickets even after the docent had advised that it would soon be closing time. The few other tourists in the disturbingly bucolic glen were plainly oblivious to them, drifting trancelike from the Old-New Synagogue or past the walls of the Pinkas Synagogue, which were inlaid with memorials to the dead of the Holocaust.

Rhys looked up from the Pinkas Memorial, his questions many but slow, his voice mellifluous and soft, as if the stygian gloom could somehow be dispelled by conversation.

By the time the new man had set off for his inaugural round of talks with defense and security officials from the Czech Republic, Philip felt satisfied he had provided Rhys as comprehensive and confidential a debriefing as possible and was thereby concluding his short diplomatic career as he had begun it, with a flourish that put him beyond reproach or comparison.

He was pleased with the way things had fallen into place. He had wanted to sp
e
ak in person to Sven in order to assure himself that Sven harbored no suspicions and was withholding nothing from him. Sven had just happened to be in Prague on business of his own. And Prague, because it was neutral territory and in high season a destination that could be open to an almost infinite number of explanations, had seemed an advantageous place to conduct the other, more important business before him. When the fates aligned, Philip mused, success came almost too easily, but when they didn't, even the most heroic efforts could not always prevent calamity. For this reason he had always gone to great lengths to deny fate room to maneuver.

By example Ian had taught Philip his technique of conducting the most sensitive conversations in public, on the move, and in venues that no one who might have an interest in overhearing them could predict. If at first Philip had found the notion counterintuitive, by now he had long since come to see the wisdom in it. Not only did it handicap potential surveillance, it allayed suspicion.

Later, as the sun slipped below a deepening cover of cloud and Philip stood fast against a cloister wall of the Clementinum waiting for Andrej, he thought back to his handover meeting with Rhys Llewellyn and savored the delicious irony that he had taught the government the very tradecraft he'd learned from Ian.

Andrej, who as usual had preferred to spend his idle time in proximity to books, emerged from the former Jesuit monastery, now the National Library, wearing a guarded smile. With no more than a nod of recognition, Philip, staying just to his collaborator's right, assumed the Russian's pace. In the street the percussion of their soles against the paving stones echoed through the shallow urban canyons.

They walked with apparent aimlessness until at the end of Liliova Street they found themselves gathered into the crowd of tourists by the Old Town Bridge Tower. Borne left into Karlova Street, with the sanctuaries of the Clementinum to their right and the Palace of the Lords of Kunstat to their left, they continued toward the eastern gate of the Charles Bridge.

“For almost four hundred years, this was the only crossing of the Vltava,” Andrej remarked as they came through the tower arch. “Charles IV commissioned it in 1357. Peter Parler, one of the most famous Czechs ever, built it. And do you know why it's so strong? Because they mixed the mortar with eggs.”

“I thought this was your first time in Prague.”

“First time in a long time,” Andrej corrected, “but I have been here before.” Then for a few seconds he went silent. He had been, he thought, to most capitals and also many tucked-away places in the near abroad. Once upon a time, his work at the GRU, the main intelligence directorate of the Russian armed forces, had required it. “Anyway,” he continued, “there's great history to the statues. For the first couple of centuries, the crucifix, third up on the right, stood all alone. Then I think the one of St. John Nepomuk was the next after that. He was a great hero to the Jesuits, vicar-general of the archdiocese, but he'd angered King Wenceslas IV over some point of church politics, and so they tortured him and threw his body off the bridge. There was a lot of that sort of thing.”

“Everywhere,” Philip added.

“Sadly,” Andrej concurred. “One supposes it is simply a virus that must run its course.”

“Through different civilizations at different times,” Philip added.

“Precisely,” Andrej agreed. “Do you see those gilded words on the crucifix? They say ‘Holy, Holy, Holy Lord.' But the church didn't pay for them, and neither did the king. They made one of the Jews do it to punish him for blasphemy.”

“Alas,” Philip said with a laugh, “we've been consulting the same travel guide.”

On the distant hill, Prague Castle and Hradcˇany glistened, backlit by the declining sun. They walked toward it, losing themselves in the tide of students and tourists. Several young men they passed wore billboards advertising concerts in the Old Town. By the statue of St. Augustine, a young woman sold cut daffodils. Farther along another offered silk scarves, stylishly displayed through small holes in a white-enameled easel that rested atop a weathered pantechnicon. A gentleman in a frayed coat and a wool tie hawked postcards, film, assorted sundries.

Now, at last, they walked deliberately, still away from the Old Town, all the way to the steps to Saská Street by the Judith Bridge Tower and from there to the Malá Strana, the Little Quarter that sloped beneath the castle.

Finally Philip said, “This seems as good a place as any to do business.”

“It does,” Andrej agreed.

“Your message was cryptic.”

“Of necessity,” Andrej replied in a carefully modulated voice. “As I suggested, one has the feeling there are questions being asked.”

“What sorts of questions?” Philip replied.

“Banal on the surface, but they are questions with implications. In my experience those are the most dangerous kind.”

When Philip made no response, Andrej continued. “How could Zhugov have afforded such a large suite at the Palace Hotel in St. Moritz, for a month no less? Or to take that villa every summer in the hills above Monte Carlo? How could he have afforded the casino, to play at the tables and for the stakes and with the women he did? He must have known that an eye is kept on such things. So perhaps there is an innocent explanation after all. But the difficulty with explanations is that they prompt further questions, don't they? Was he in bed with an oligarch? If so, since when, and which oligarch, and on what deals? Let's face it: Everyone knew he traded a bit on the side. It was a perk of office. But to live so well, he would have to have traded more than seems seemly.”

“Can you pinpoint the source of these questions?” Philip asked.

“No,” Andrej said, “but they have been raised and repeated within the walls of Main Directorate Number Four. That much I do know. Could be it's jealousy and no more than that.”

“Could be,” Philip repeated, “although it's rare to be jealous of the dead.”

“From what I hear, the supposition is that he may have profited from his friendship with your friend Santal.”

“He wouldn't have been the first to have done so.”

“No, I'm sure.”

“Do the questions stop there?”

“Yes, so far.”

“How can this be?”

“Are you asking if your name has surfaced? The answer is no, not yet—and, honestly, I doubt it will.”

“Why shouldn't it? I am known to be close to Ian Santal.”

“So are many others who remain above suspicion. But come on, you are on a different plane. As the people who evaluate such things would view it, you are there to legitimize him. He has sought you out for that reason, all the more credit to you! Nor do you concern yourself with the kind of boring, questionable but profitable material in which he might sometimes trade. You are ridding the world of danger. Eliminating, not adding to, its perils. The fact is that by its very conceit our operation lies beyond the imagination of the bureaucrats. The numbers are all in perfect order, and as long as that's the case, they cannot conceive of theft on the scale we've achieved. After all, nothing's missing!”

Philip mulled Andrej's reasoning. “I hope you're right,” he said.

“I am right,” Andrej said, “but I thought you should know.”

“Thank you. It was the correct decision.”

“It's the fear of guilt by association that protects you,” Andrej added obliquely. “Having lived with it so long that it has become part of our nature, we Russians are wary of invoking it. If it were once more to become our standard, everyone would be in the gulag. So in a strange way it is your shield rather than your vulnerability.”

By this time they had crossed the Certovka, the Devil's Stream. On the northern side of Grand Priory Square, undisturbed since the eighteenth century, stood the former palace of the grand prior of the Knights of Malta. Across from it the baroque masterpiece Buquoy Palace was now the French embassy. In this tranquil square, Philip stopped abruptly and surprised Andrej, who had not realized that their conversation was over, by offering his hand. “It's a comforting thought,” Philip declared, almost in a whisper, before he hailed a taxi that had just discharged its passengers. He waited until the old Audi had progressed to the far end of the square before announcing his destination as the Powder Tower by Prague Castle.

“Closed at this hour,” the driver said.

“Never mind, I'm to meet someone nearby.”

When the taxi reached the vicinity, Philip kept his eye out for tourist restaurants, then, settling on a pleasant, crowded one at random, instructed the driver to stop. As if in search of the party with whom he was to rendezvous, he shot his glances left, right and behind, making certain he had not been followed. Finally, with an air of exasperation, he advanced past the packed outdoor tables into a quieter, half-full interior of dark pine. Opera posters, many of them old but still colorful, had been placed into identical baroque frames and were spotlighted at intervals along three walls. In the distance, beyond the service bar, he spied the public telephone for which he'd been searching. There he carefully tapped in the number of a small hotel in Naples.

“Estensione
tre-due-sette,”
Philip told the operator without mentioning a name. When that extension was answered, he switched into matter-of-fact English. “We spoke sometime ago,” he said. “Do you remember?”

“Yes.”

“Good, because there has been a slight change of plan, nothing serious. For the time being, we've decided to go with the second option.”

“The
second
option?”

“Exactly.”

“You may consider it done.”

“Grazie,”
Philip said.

Chapter Fourteen

When Philip returned to
the street, he walked east for several minutes until, satisfied that he was alone at the edge of the Ledebour Garden, he hailed another taxi.

“The Still Life restaurant in Liliova Street,” he told the new driver, who found their way to the restaurant through a dimly lit maze of brightly repainted façades.

Aromatic with thyme and paprika, alive with conversation and laughter, the Still Life was a sequence of simply furnished rooms whose ecru walls were hung with oils and watercolors by local artists. Now, in the middle of dinner, it exuded that buzz that Philip had always preferred in restaurants. His table was waiting in a cheerfully lit corner

“I'm expecting a guest,” he told the waiter.

“She has just arrived,” the waiter said, gesturing toward the corridor that led to the ladies' room. When she emerged, Philip's eyes came alight.

Ordinarily, in Rome or London, anywhere he shared territory with Isabella or might have been recognized, Philip would not have dined with a prostitute in public, but Prague felt more hospitable to such a risk, as if its ancient shadows and centuries-old layers of intrigue supplied a perfect disguise. He could almost hear a haunting zither as he stood, with a kind of mock graciousness, to pull back his guest's chair. She was just right, as they all had been since he'd struck up his arrangement with Dieter Albanese, the fashion photographer who found them for him. Were he to be discovered with her, he would have only to introduce her as a colleague from this or that government or organization. He had no doubt she would pass.

He'd had his first whore at seventeen, having tagged along to Paris to stay with a school friend during the Christmas holidays, as his own father had been occupied elsewhere. The brothel to which his friend had introduced him, allegedly descended from the fabled Madame Claude's of a couple of generations before, had been located in a slim house in the seizième, not too far from the Champs-Élysées. The Corsican who'd admitted them had exuded a phony bonhomie, and the parlor had smelled of fresh paint. Finally a party of dewy ingenues had descended from the stairwell to join them. They might have been the boys' slightly older sisters, from similar backgrounds, bound for similar futures. Their deceptiveness had enhanced their allure. Philip had gone off with the redhead, the memory and even the taste of whom flashed back to him now, because until Dieter that Parisian adventure had set the standard.

“Paulina,” the new girl whispered, putting forth her hand with assurance. “Dieter said he thought I'd meet your expectations.”

“Ah, yes, Dieter,” he repeated, “indispensable Dieter!”

“To so many of us, in so many ways,” observed Paulina.

“He's very thorough.”

“He is in love with beauty, that's all. What's wrong with that?”

“Nothing in the least, but it is not only beauty he loves.”

“Everyone needs money—everyone who doesn't have it. To Dieter, people are works of art. Well, certain people, the ones whose genes have managed to express themselves in a way that's pleasing to the eye. And there is no more shame in trafficking in their beauty, before it perishes, than there would be in buying or selling photographs of them.”

“Interesting,” Philip said, “although I wouldn't beat the idea to death. You're Czech?”

“Isn't it obvious?”

Philip gave a grudging nod. “And how old?” he asked. “Don't lie.”

“Twenty-two.”

“And still a student?”

“Part-time,” Paulina said. “I also work in a government office.”

“Doing what?”

“Not much. I file a lot of paperwork for people trying to get back property that was appropriated by the Communists, sometimes by the Nazis. I distribute forms.”

“And how did you find your way to Dieter?”

“He found me.”

“I'm not surprised.”

“Thank you.”

“I'm sure Dieter told you the rules.”

“Has he ever failed to?”

“Never,” Philip said.

“He told me you would establish them.”

“That is correct. You must accept it. Do you?”

“Yes, in your case.”

“Because?”

“Like you, I suspect, I enjoy testing my limits.”

“Is Paulina your true name? Never mind, what does it matter?”

“It doesn't.”

“We dine as though we are two professionals, acquainted but not intimate. I don't enjoy eating alone.”

“Who does?”

“Afterwards we shall return separately to my hotel. You will have a key card and precede me to the suite. Everything you will require will be there. From that moment forward, you will do as I ask, submit to my will in every respect, then leave before dawn, making no disturbance when you do. You will not ask any questions whatsoever. Should you be asked with whom you dined this evening, you will say that I was a man with Czech roots who wondered if he might be able to lay claim to something or other. Make up a name, the less precise the better. Out of loneliness or brazenness—who are you to say?—I asked you to dinner, after which you've never seen me again.”

“What if we actually should see each other?” Paulina ventured.

“We behave as we would with any stranger, but the chances of such an encounter are low.”

“I've heard of men who will only fuck a girl once.”

“It would be wrong to take it personally,” Philip said.

They chose the same dinner from the menu. With it they drank a bottle of Ryzlink rýnský 2000. It was a sweeter wine than Philip might have chosen elsewhere, but he was determined to taste whatever was authentically Czech.

“I
am
impressed with how the great families have managed to reassemble their fortunes,” he said idly, “especially the princely ones, the Lobkowiczes, for instance, with their wonderful palaces here and in the country.”

“It
is
impressive,” Paulina agreed.

“And also ironic,” Philip said, “since it is possible only because you Czechs were never strong enough to defend yourselves from your neighbors. Too weak to make a stand, you had no choice but to surrender and bide your time.”

Outside, in the distance, a solitary French horn blew the two-four rhythm of Ravel's
Boléro
into the night. Halting after the first bars, the horn repeated itself.

“It must be difficult to imagine.” Paulina sighed. “Isn't it?”

“What's that?”

“Being rescued from Hitler by Stalin!”