The Cambridge Theorem (42 page)

“Derek, will you tell me what's going on?”

“Did you understand the directions?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“Okay. I'll be there in ten minutes. Get ready.”

After he hung up the phone on Lauren he dialled his sister Denise's house. It was almost one thirty, but when her husband Neil picked up the phone, he sounded as if it was the middle of the afternoon. Neil always sounded like that; Smailes guessed that salesmen had to.

“Derek, long time. How've you been?”

“Pretty good, Neil. Is Denise there?”

“I think she's asleep. Just a minute. Denise. It's your brother.”

Denise had come on the line with all her predictable resentment and ill will. “Derek, for bleedin' hell, what do you mean calling at this time of night?”

“Can I come out and stay in the box room tonight, Denise? It's important, otherwise, I wouldn't have called.”

“Are you all right? Are you in trouble? Derek, what's going on?”

“I'll explain tomorrow, okay? There'll be two of us. Just throw a couple of blankets and sheets on the bed. We'll make it up.”

“Aw, Derek. I'm layin' out a frock. You know I use it as a sewing room.”

“Can't you move your stuff? It's just for one night.”

“I suppose so, but you've got a nerve. It's not that American piece you're bringing over, is it? I still talk with Yvonne, you know.”

“You'll meet Lauren tomorrow. She's not a piece. She's an engineer. Leave the front door on the latch, will you?” He rang off.

He kept trying alternatives for the two jokers in the Rover but still had no plan when he pulled into Lauren's street. He could see the Rover parked across the road, about twenty yards from Mrs. Bilton's gate. He pulled up outside with no attempt to disguise his arrival. This is where I wish the British police were armed, he said to himself. Still, he doubted the characters in the Rover knew, one way or the other. He reached inside the glove compartment and pulled out his heavy, police flashlight. He shoved it into his raincoat pocket and got out of the car. He crossed the street with his hand on the torch, the butt raised and protruding through the fabric of his coat. Just like a gun, he hoped. He walked slowly towards the Rover, which was facing away from him. He saw the driver's neck jerk as he followed him in the rearview mirror. He was tall, balding. He seemed to say something to the figure next to him, who was shorter, older. Smailes was almost parallel with the rear bumper when the engine started and the car pulled away, slowly at first, then picking up speed. Smailes kept the butt of the flashlight pointed at them through his pocket until they were gone. Then he exhaled slowly. He walked quickly back to the house and flashed the light through the window. Lauren ran out and into his arms.

“Derek, I saw you drive up. Who was in that car? Did you speak to them?”

“No, they didn't seem to want to socialize.”

“What were you pointing at them? A gun?”

“I wish.” He grinned and held up the flashlight. “Let's go.”

On the trip to his sister's house in Histon Lauren had told him falteringly about Giles Allerton's disappearance the previous night. He had not shown up to meet Maggie, his new girlfriend, his bed had not been slept in, and he hadn't been seen all day. Lauren had told the head porter at the end of the day when he still hadn't turned up, and then had tried to call Derek. She wanted to know where Derek had been.

“I'll be able to tell you soon, okay, Lauren. By tomorrow night, I hope.”

“Is it about Simon? Was he murdered?”

“Looks like it.”

She had buried her face in her hands and sobbed a little. Then she looked at him. “Derek, this is so creepy. Who was in that car?”

“I don't know,” he answered truthfully. Someone from the Ministry of Defense, he felt like saying. “Where are we going?”

“To my sister's.”

“Why?”

“We're invited.”

“Derek, this isn't fucking funny.”

“I know. I'll tell you everything tomorrow. I promise.” They let themselves into his sister's house quietly and climbed the stairs without switching on lights. They turned right on the landing and Smailes led her down the hall to the end room. He walked to the bed and turned on the lamp. There was a pile of sheets and blankets on the bed. On a folding table Denise had her sewing machine and a number of pieces of fabric with paper patterns pinned to them. There was a chair, but nothing else in the room.

“She has two boys,” whispered Smailes. “They share a room.”

They made up the bed wordlessly and then Smailes snapped out the light and they undressed quickly. The room had no curtains.

Smailes climbed into the small bed next to Lauren and she clung to him silently for several minutes. Then they made love fitfully, Smailes anxious that the bed would creak, distracted by the surroundings, but excited despite himself by Lauren's quick sexuality. She fell asleep immediately and he felt the soft rhythm of her breath against his shoulder. He lay on his back and dozed but knew he would not sleep. The hours passed slowly. As it grew light he stiffened with fear as the outline of a goat's head came slowly into perspective just a few feet from his face. He grinned ruefully when the gathering light revealed the shape as his sister's sewing machine.

He shook Lauren lightly. “Let's go,” he said. “You can meet the family another time.” They dressed, used the bathroom, and left before seven, before Denise or her boys were up. Smailes knew he would catch hell from his sister for his rudeness, the sheets, the unmade bed. He had driven Lauren to the college in silence, and given her her instructions for the day, promised he would find her that night. Then he had made the decision to go home.

It had been a mistake. The front door had been jimmied, and the inside door to the flat had been simply kicked off its hinges. The place had been destroyed. The furniture in the sitting room was slashed and broken, the books thrown over the floor. The bedroom was worse. The mattress had been disembowelled like a butchered animal, drawers upturned, the mirrors on the wardrobe doors and the dresser smashed. He walked back down to the hallway to the bathroom and found the ultimate insult. Someone had taken his Tony Lama's, thrown them in the toilet pan, and pissed in them. They certainly had not been concerned about noise, but then their surveillance had told them the landlord was never there. There had been no danger. But at least they didn't have the ribbon, Smailes told himself. He could still feel that in the inside pocket of his jacket. The Bowles file was gone, of course, but that was no matter. That was not what they had been looking for.

He managed to change his clothes and shave, despite the wreckage. He wondered abstractly as he left for the station how he would explain the damage to Les, his landlord.

He had been lounging at his desk for forty-five minutes before the call from Dearnley came through. He was trying to read Ted's report on the Sikh lorry theft, but could not concentrate on it. It had a gloating tone that was irritating. Swedenbank had come in around nine and had obviously been surprised to find Smailes sitting at his desk, reading the paperwork in his in-tray. He had said something about the weather and Smailes had responded with a grunt. He let the phone ring three times before he picked it up, to show Swedenbank there was nothing unusual in his behavior.

“Smailes,” he said.

“Could you come up, Sergeant Smailes?” said George's voice. It was obvious there was a stranger in his office. Smailes was never Sergeant Smailes except in front of strangers. He understood the gesture towards professionalism, however, and straightened his tie as he left the office. His palms felt sweaty on the rail as he mounted the two short flights to George's office. His eyes felt scratchy from lack of sleep. He wondered how much sleep George had had the night before. It had been something after one when he had handed him the transcript, the most extraordinary document George had ever handled in his long career, that was for sure. Two people had been murdered to suppress its contents, Smailes was fairly convinced.

Gloria kept her eyes down on her desk as Smailes walked past her into Dearnley's office. He wondered how much she knew. Enough to keep her head down, clearly.

He stepped into the office and closed the door behind him. George was seated behind his desk, and to his right sat a man of slender build, with fair hair brushed back from a high forehead. He had pale blue eyes and a pointed face like a whippet, and gave the impression of complete relaxation. His long legs were crossed and his hands rested in his lap like birds. In front of him on the corner of Dearnley's desk were two file folders, one orange and one manila.

“Have a seat, Sergeant,” said Dearnley. He swung his massive shoulders to his right. “This is Commander Standiforth of the Special Branch.”

And I'm Broderick Crawford of the Highway Patrol, Smailes said to himself. Even if he had not already known Standiforth's agency and rank, he would not have mistaken him for a Special. The Specials were cops, after all, and this guy had the dark pinstriped suit and manicured nails of the civil service. He bristled at the patronage. Who did they think he was? Standiforth made no movement to offer his hand so Smailes took the vacant chair in front of Dearnley's desk.

“Are you all right, Sergeant?” asked George. “You look a bit shaken up. Did you stay with your mother?”

“I stayed with Denise.” He had decided to leave all mention of Lauren Greenwald out of these proceedings.

“This fellow Allerton's missing.”

“No kidding,” said Smailes. He wondered whether George had known last night, whether that was why he had insisted he not go to his flat. “Probably on a binge somewhere. He's a lady's man. Likes the horses.”

“Doubtful. He missed some meeting with a tutor day before yesterday and no one's seen him since. Family hasn't heard from him.”

“Could be he was picked up by the same zombies did my place last night,” he said offhandedly. Standiforth leaned forward slightly in his chair, and clasped his hands around his knee.

“What do you mean?” asked George, a trace of alarm in his voice.

“After I left Denise's this morning I went home to change. The place had been taken apart. Maybe they were looking for the ribbon. They took the Cambridge files, that's all.”

“What Cambridge files?” asked Standiforth, in a voice that indicated he'd been to the right schools.

“Bowles' files on the links between Cambridge University and Soviet espionage. I lifted them from his room before his sister cleared out his things. At least, I lifted what was still there. I think our man must've got back in there, Wednesday night, to remove what he thought was most incriminating. A file on Bletchley Park, at least, maybe more.”

George Dearnley looked winded and passed his hand in front of his face. He looked painfully at Standiforth and then said to Smailes, “How come I knew nothing of this?”

“Couldn't be sure, George. No physical inventory, see.”

“It's a little irregular, to go removing evidence like that, Sergeant,” said George.

“I had the sister's permission,” said Smailes. He turned to Standiforth. “Nothing much in there that wasn't already in the record. Some original stuff on activities in the thirties that he had dug out of the library, here and at Oxford. Some interesting speculation.”

“Such as?”

“He was asking himself, ‘Who flagged the files from Bletchley?' I guess he solved that one, didn't he?”

Standiforth said nothing. Smailes reached into his inside pocket. “Whoever they are, these clowns have been tooling around in a custom Rover, rented out from a local wide boy.” He produced the photocopy of Fowler's paperwork. “Says they're with the Ministry of Defense. I guess this is your department, Commander. Know any Stanley Hicks?”

“Let me see that,” said Standiforth. He looked at the contract and made a little noise of disgust. “This is one of our friends' sour little jokes. So that if they're spotted and the car is traced, we might waste some time chasing our tails. No, the Ministry of Defense has no need to rent cars from garages in Ely, believe me. I hear a Post Office van was used also? That's fairly simple to explain. Some comrade in the postal union, a vehicle booked in for repairs, loaned out for a few weeks. Believe me, officer, you were quite fortunate you were not at home. That was a KGB assassination team that visited your flat. In fact, they were more than that. They were a Sorge team, only the second group that has ever ventured onto British territory, to our knowledge.

“We were alerted that they had come in through Prestwick two weeks ago, but we lost the trail. You see, we do know a little about the cover they use.”

“Sorge team?” said Smailes, trying to sound interested.

“The Sorge Institute is an elite facility outside Leningrad. Named for the Soviet Union's most famous spy. The agents trained there are the most skilled and dangerous the Soviets can deploy, and therefore the least often used.” Standiforth pronounced the word “orfe-ten.”

“Yes, I wondered when they came through that it might involve Conrad.”

“Conrad?” interrupted Smailes. Dearnley's face was impassive.

“The cryptonym of a very high-ranking agent. We've known of his existence for many years. Except it seemed probable he was either dead or retired, by now. And all the evidence pointed to Whitehall. The consensus was that Cambridge was clean.

“No doubt they were summoned because Conrad thought this man Bowles might get too close to his identity. They didn't kill him, however. They would never have made such a simple mistake as leaving a typewriter ribbon. In fact, they must have realized the oversight, which led to the break-in at the sister's. When they found they still did not have the original, they visited you. You were not home. Unfortunately this man Allerton was not so lucky. A friend of the dead man, I understand. Did he know anything?”