The Double Bind of Mr. Rigby (17 page)

For the next week or two, everything was quiet. I went about my daily newspaper business. With the help of Mark I covered a City story. A small but highly successful company that specialised in mobile phone handset repairs had been trying a reverse takeover of a German company on the verge of bankruptcy. Our British company had its shares suspended for a couple of months while the negotiations took place. In the end, the venture failed and the German firm went to the banks for a temporary solution to its problems. That news met with an extremely bad reception on the German exchange and the City thought that in a short while the reverse takeover bid would be renewed. I interviewed the chairman of the British company, saw immediately that he was dynamic and determined, wrote a profile of him for our sister Sunday paper, and composed a story for the
Journal
that could be picked up and developed later.

On several occasions I spoke to Mark about the director’s Myrex plan and his intended role for me. Mark considered it all highly dangerous, was apprehensive but at the same time excited. He wanted to be involved.

‘You know,’ he said, ‘that I’d go to any lengths to make sure you’re safe. Once they turn up the pressure, which they are bound to do if they seriously want you, you must never lose touch with me. I have to know where you are and what you’re doing. I’ll monitor you. Of course, you know you can rely on me. If you’re in a red alert area, I’ll be watching carefully. Remember St John, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends”. But, on the whole, I’d rather not.’

‘Thanks, Mark. Terrific. I must say, I’m more confident about this affair with you standing by than with anyone else.’

During those two weeks, I talked with Rovde once or twice on the phone, and took the opportunity of mentioning Paul to him. Since we were talking on the telephone I referred obliquely to what I thought Paul’s role might be; but Rovde knew what I meant. I had spotted someone who should be useful to him and the Agency. Paul was positioned with Myrex, a subject of extreme interest to Rovde in the Baltic, he was civilised, sensitive and well educated, he ought to make an invaluable contact, if not active agent, for Rovde. Additionally, I felt much more secure when I thought of Rovde in Estonia. If I was going to be in trouble, at least I was known to someone in the Agency. It was inconceivable that Rovde, or one of his assistants, was not watching what I was doing. In a similar way, although probably not quite so efficiently, I was keeping Willy informed of what I thought Rovde was doing.

Rovde spoke in conventional business code, ‘I’ll have his references checked out. He sounds a great guy. He may need a change. It sounds as though we could do with him. We must have him on our books.’

Rovde told me that Arne was back in Tallinn. He had been seen in the minimalist Italian restaurant one evening, dining with a distinguished-looking man accompanied by an exotic younger woman. By his description of them, it sounded as though Raoul and Roxanne had been in Tallinn town. I had not been able to talk with Roxanne although I had rung her two or three times. She had been travelling with Raoul. Rovde’s news accounted for her whereabouts. I resolved to ring her again that evening.

As it turned out, I did manage to speak to her. I rang about nine that evening. Again, a young man’s voice answered in Spanish. I apologised for speaking English and asked if Roxanne was there. He switched to near-perfect English and said he would fetch Roxanne. I could hear muffled and whispered voices in the background. Had I interrupted Roxanne in a tryst with a young Spanish lover? At once I felt disturbed and angry. At the same time, I knew I was being ridiculous. There was no reason why she should not enjoy herself. There was no agreement between us that governed fidelity. Why should there be? Ours was not that sort of relationship. And yet still the old passions and jealousies arose in me. I had to consciously suppress them. Roxanne came to the phone.

‘Who is that?’

My voice slightly edgy, I said, ‘Roxanne, it’s me.’

‘Pel! How nice. I was thinking of you earlier on. Are you all right? Is there anything wrong?’ She had detected something in my tone of voice.

‘No, I’m fine.’ I could not resist asking, ‘Who was that who answered the phone?’

Immediately Roxanne knew what was wrong. ‘Look. Stop worrying. He is just one of Raoul’s handsome young men. He’s not my kind. You’ve no need to worry.’ I was reassured.

‘So, what have you been doing?’ I asked. ‘I’ve been trying to get hold of you over the last couple of weeks. No luck.’

‘We’ve been on the move. We were most of last week in Tallinn. What a lovely old city. If only we could meet up there. Raoul seems to be increasing Myrex’s business there. From what I gather, he sees Tallinn as the gateway to Russian trade. There’s a lot of stuff coming out of Russia that he can find markets for in the West; and you know he’s recruited lots of IT people in Estonia. Apparently their superior technical expertise comes cheap. But I’m not really interested in all that. It’s just that the lifestyle’s good.’

I thought to myself, ‘Always the hedonist,’ but did not say it. She liked to enjoy herself, make the most of her comforts, maximise whatever she could from the contract she had made with Raoul. I wondered if they ever had sex with each other any more. I assumed they once did. Maybe I was wrong, and she did still enjoy him. Roxanne was not the sort to disregard any pleasure that Raoul could provide. On the other hand, she would certainly exploit him for what she wanted, which I hoped was just me. I often wondered, too, if I was her only lover. Perhaps there were more, although I doubted it. There was something about the way in which she treated me that made me believe that, at the time, I was her sole lover. I concluded that she would continue to answer Raoul’s sexual demands whenever exacted, but that her real indulgence and fulfilment came from me. I calculated that Raoul’s needs were probably minimal because he had his seductively handsome retinue of young men: they could tease, please and enjoy him as much as he wanted. Additionally, he could and did have a succession of short affairs with beautiful women. That was why he found my relationship with Roxanne acceptable. I knew that when he tired of the arrangement, my safety would no longer be secure.

We talked for some twenty minutes or so. I told her how much I missed her. She insisted on telling me what she would like to do with me. I tried to stop her vivid fantasy, but she would have none of it. Was this the telephone sex she had suggested the last time she had spoken to me from Spain? It must have been what telephone sex is like, or at least something close to it. Had we both been in the appropriate responsive mood, I am sure, because of her enthusiasm, we could both have accomplished some sort of immediate sexual fulfilment. I was not in the mood. There was too much on my mind. I resolved to talk to her about telephone sex the next time we met face to face.

I mentioned to her that I expected to be back in Tallinn soon. Perhaps she would be going there again with Raoul. Or perhaps she could persuade him to take her to London again. She told me to keep her informed about my Tallinn visit, and said that she would work on Raoul about London: she had enjoyed herself enormously the last time.

We hung up, both of us reluctant to stop talking, but looking forward to our next tryst.

About two and a half weeks after my short meeting with Willy’s director, the opportunity for my return to Tallinn cropped up. The financial pages editor of the
Journal
told me that there was going to be a conference in Tallinn of Finnish, Swedish and Estonian computer and IT experts, to discuss the total wiring up of Estonia to the new technology. The plan was to make Estonia, a small country, entirely operative and reliant on computer service. All government departments, all public services, all business, would work according to the facility afforded by the computer. Estonia would lead the way. It would pioneer a novel way of running a country. The Finns and the Swedes would help provide the technical expertise. Estonian government ministers, those young MBA intellectuals, wanted as much publicity as possible: the press was more than welcome. I spoke to my editor, who spoke to the financial editor, and after a brief discussion on what we might be able to do with a story that might arise from the conference, it was generally thought a good idea that I should attend.

I immediately rang Mark. He was not in his office. I managed to raise him on his mobile. He had just come out of the House of Commons where he had been talking with an MP about City financial regulation. The MP was an influential member of the select committee that was discussing financial regulation and was a great advocate for London defending its role as the world’s leading financial centre. Mark asked me when I was going.

‘Well, the conference convenes next weekend. There are preparatory discussions on the Saturday and Sunday, and then everything starts properly on the Monday. That’s when the press is invited. I intend to go out there on Saturday.’

Mark said, ‘That sounds OK. Next week’s good for me. Whatever I have to do, I can arrange to do on the net and by phone. I’ll probably go out on the Monday. Presumably you’ll be in touch with Arne.’

‘Exactly. This gives me the ideal opportunity to respond to his Myrex offer. And obviously I don’t want to do that unless you are within range. I need you as one of my minders. I’ll get in touch with him and try to arrange a meeting late on Saturday or sometime on Sunday.’

All that was reassuring. To know that Mark would be out there with me settled my mind. Needless to say, I was nervous. I felt deep within me that I was approaching a crucial point in my career, indeed in my life. There was no doubt that I was about to tread on dangerous, uncharted ground. I knew more than most about Estonia, and particularly about Tallinn, but I knew little about Myrex. Arne, although pleasant and friendly, had an aspect of clinical efficiency to his general bearing and behaviour that made me somewhat anxious. He reminded me of a Nazi: he should have played a bit part as an SS officer in a war film. He was not someone I could instinctively rely on. Myrex could rely on him. They paid him large sums of money, no doubt. I had no means to ensure his loyalty to me. I was very conscious of the need for Mark to be around in Tallinn while I was there, and I found comfort in the knowledge that Rovde, too, hovered in the background.

It was not a good idea to ring Willy at the St James’s house. Telephone calls to that destination had to be kept to a minimum for obvious security reasons. Although the place was full of anti-bugging devices, and was constantly scanned for eavesdroppers, you could never be too sure. Everyone knew that technology moved so fast that you could never be too careful. I decided to walk down there and hoped that Willy would be in.

As I passed by the East India and Sports Club, I met an old friend from my university days coming out. He was a prominent paediatric surgeon and I was always surprised that he was a member of the East India. His reason was that he was an amateur historian of the East India Company and he felt at home there. I kept on proposing that I should put him up for membership of my club: it had many medics of one sort or another. Professionally, it might have been to his advantage. Yet he would always riposte that it was the very reason why he did not want to join. He did not wish to be surrounded by others of his profession when he was trying to relax.

We spoke briefly. He told me that he had bought some second-hand books in Chepstow, volumes he had been looking for over a period of fifteen years. They completed a set of government documents to do with Calcutta. He was excited about his coup. I reckoned that he possessed the biggest private library of books on the history of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century India in the country. We both agreed that we should meet for dinner within the month. I explained that I was going to Estonia for a week at least, and said that I would ring him when I returned.

As I made my way across the square, I thought what an entirely different sort of uncomplicated life he led compared with mine. He went about his professional, surgical life, with care and efficiency; and then he devoted his spare time and energies, with the blessing of an indulgent wife, to his Indian hobby. He was not called upon to be secretive, evasive, devious, ambiguous, to risk his own life and maybe put others’ lives on the line to possible destruction. His vocation was to save lives actively. Our professions converged at the point where we both thought we were making life better for most people, but we did it in such very different ways.

Fortunately Willy was there. I explained to him what I had learned and what I planned to do. He agreed, was delighted that Mark found no difficulty in being in Tallinn at the same time, said that he would alert our people in Latvia and Lithuania, and in Russia to be on the safe side, and reckoned that the director would be similarly delighted that matters were moving so swiftly.

That Saturday morning, I was on the Estonian Air flight to Tallinn. Again, I lodged in one of the recently refurbished rooms of the Gloria. I was beginning to feel at home there. When I first arrived, I showered and used the small personal sauna attached to the bathroom. I felt refreshed and invigorated. I rang Rovde’s mobile. He answered immediately. He was somewhere in the new town walking in the street. He was pleased to hear that I had landed safely. I asked him how Mo was. He said she was fine and, revealingly, that he lived most of his time in Tallinn in her flat. We arranged to meet at the hotel where the conference was taking place. Rovde explained briefly that he had secured a place at the conference through the American economic representative in Tallinn. He thought it a good idea to be close to whatever Myrex was involved in. That I found reassuring: Rovde would be at even closer quarters to me than I had anticipated.

The conference hotel was one of those modern concrete palaces that could have passed as an office block. It had a hundred and fifty bedrooms, a vast dining room, a number of reception rooms, and a range of seminar and discussion rooms. It reminded me in many ways of those big London law firms that always provide plenty of private space for discussion and negotiation. When I arrived, there were one or two people strolling around, others sitting in the bar, but I discovered that the majority of the delegates were in a plenary session discussing the parameters of the following few days’ debate. At about a quarter past five a number of people, some by themselves, others in small groups started appearing in the vestibule and atrium. It was clear that the meeting had broken up. I rose from the armchair in which I had been sitting, put to one side the newspaper I had been glancing at, and went towards the lifts from where everyone was emerging. I thought I would seek out any Myrex representatives and make myself known to the administrators of the conference. As I reached the lifts, a lift descended, its doors opened, and out came two women and Paul. I was surprised and pleased. I called to him.

‘Hi, Paul. Good to see you.’

‘Well, extraordinary. Great to see you too.’

‘I had no idea you would be here. This is a definite bonus. How are you?’

‘Good, good. What are you doing here? You can’t be with Myrex. I’d have known. Arne would’ve told me.’

I explained that I was there as a pressman.

‘But what are you doing here?’ I returned his question. ‘What’s your role?’

‘Well, I seem to have become Arne’s permanent PA, which suits me. It’s interesting stuff and I’m travelling. I’m often Arne’s public front. I don’t get to see what goes on in the boardroom though. And Arne’s a very private man.’ He added jokingly, ‘I can’t tell you what goes on in his bedroom.’

‘Is he here?’ I asked.

‘Not today. He’s in Moscow, but back tomorrow lunchtime. He said he wants to be around as much as possible after that. He reckons it’s essential to find out what other interests are doing and planning here. Our work in the old Soviet IT labs is very important for people here in the wired-up world. I’m instructed to be additional eyes and ears for him.’

We went to the bar. Paul ordered a vodka Martini, and I had a whisky and soda.

‘I can’t tell you how nice it is to find you here. I have someone intelligent to talk to. I really enjoy your company. Look, I must introduce you to a countryman of yours, an American friend here, Uri Rovde. He’s a really nice guy. You’ve got to meet him. He’ll be here on Monday.’

Paul said, ‘I’d love to. If I’m to keep on coming back here, I’d like to get to know people here. What does he do?’

I explained as best I could that he was part of a team on a US commercial mission to the Baltic states. I reckoned that Paul could work out for himself what Rovde really did, and would find out soon enough in any case when Rovde approached him to do his duty for the Stars and Stripes. I mentioned Mo as well. I thought they would find each other interesting.

‘You must also meet another friend of mine from London who’s over here next week. You’ll love Mark. If you like me, you’ll like him.’

‘What luck that you’ve turned up. My social life in Tallinn is made. I look forward to these introductions.’

‘So. What’s Arne’s private life like?’ I asked. ‘What does he do in his spare time?’

‘Not much,’ Paul said. ‘He’s an ascetic, so far as I can see. He’s very disciplined. I think he practises meditation. I don’t think he’s got a woman.’

‘Perhaps he goes after good-looking boys. That ascetic type often does.’

‘No, I don’t think so. Anyway, I haven’t seen any evidence. He’s like a secular monk, if you can have such a thing.’

The conference hotel was not particularly hospitable in atmosphere. It was too business-like, too trimmed to its conference tasks. It was like having drinks at some firm’s head office. There was no lack of anything, but it was all too organised and provided for the one effect of supporting or doing business. I suggested to Paul that we departed and took ourselves off to the old town.

‘What about supper in the cellar of the Gloria? That’s where I’m staying. It’s very good and the waitresses are nice.’

He agreed. We collected our coats – he had a huge fleece-lined mountaineer’s windbreaker – and we walked out into the evening air. It was bitterly cold because a keen wind was blowing. I turned up the collar of my overcoat and pulled my beret down firmly over my eyes. Paul had put on a baseball cap that proclaimed Pebble Beach on the front. He nearly lost it to a gust of wind, so he pulled the hood of his parka over his cap and head. The new town near the docks was dreary, excessively so in that sort of weather, and the place seemed deserted. We started walking on the pavement of a wide treeless boulevard towards the rise of the old city: we could see clearly the illuminated Orthodox cross on top of the cathedral in the distance. Fortunately it was not far. Twenty minutes brisk walking saw us at the doors of the Gloria. We had both warmed up and, as we took off our coats, we were exhilarated by the sudden, contrasting warmth felt against the cold skin of our faces hands and faces. I ordered a bottle of Rhone wine and we were found a table close to an open fire. We both decided to have roast belly of pork, with sauerkraut and mashed potatoes. There must have been something like celeriac mixed in with the mash because it had an agreeable, rather addictive aniseed flavour.

‘Where are you staying in Tallinn?’ I asked him.

‘The Myrex house, which I think you visited once, has some accommodation. They’re excellent rooms, en suite, and very comfortable. Myrex looks after us. I certainly have no complaints. There’s a permanent housekeeper and, when people are staying, a guy who acts as butler comes in.’

‘I envy you that facility – far better than a hotel, even if you’re a regular client.’

Paul had been to Helsinki and Riga. He talked about them, how they differed, and what the people were like. He spoke in generalisations and was aware of that, but, as he said, he hoped to grow to know both cities better in time. Myrex was giving him opportunities that he had never expected. He was extremely grateful, particularly to Arne whom he saw as a patron. He spoke warmly of Arne, admired him and showed considerable awe of him. His enthusiasm for Arne made me anxious. I was not sure about Arne but something inside me dictated that I should be on my guard against him, certainly until I knew him better. Arne gave nothing away. It was not exactly that he was inscrutable. That was the wrong word to use. He was reserved, private. I wondered if anyone knew him really well. My personal conclusion was that I had to be careful about him. Paul’s fully committed loyalty to him made me distinctly uneasy. I decided to raise a warning signal.

‘Look, you should tread carefully with Arne. He’s strictly a professional. You work for him. He’s your employer. You’re extremely useful to him – at the moment. He’s not a friend. The relationships are quite different. OK, be grateful, but don’t overdo it.’

‘Well, he treats me in a companionable way. I like that. It’s not just an employer relationship: it’s more than that. He’s a nice guy.’

‘You say that, but you don’t really know him. I reckon if you ceased to be useful for the cause, he’d ditch you without hesitation. I’ve never come across anyone quite like him before, but I know his type. He’s thoroughly ruthless. I guarantee it. If it were necessary for Myrex, he wouldn’t have any second thoughts about metaphorically cutting your throat.’

‘I’m not sure I’m with you on this one, but I read your lips, I hear what you say.’