The Midnight Swimmer (16 page)

‘The ideal situation, William, would be for you to get approached by the Russians to find out what you were doing for Mischa.’

‘That’s why you sent me to pick up those photos from Norma?’

Bone smiled wanly.

‘You want to use me as a dangled double?’
It was an espionage ploy whereby a loyal agent pretends to be willing to work for the other side.
It was a means of passing on disinformation – as some suspected HERO was doing.

‘You’ve always been the ideal candidate.’

‘We tried it before, Henry, and someone was killed – someone I cared a great deal about.’
Catesby looked away and realised that he could no longer say her name.

‘That was sad, but you’re still under a cloud of suspicion – at least as far as the Americans are concerned.
Which is perfect cover.
You’re our best ploy since Philby.’

Catesby was on his feet.
‘Don’t compare me to Kim Philby.
I’m not a traitor.’

‘And neither is Kim.’

‘Oh, shut up.
You know he is.’

Catesby sat back down, still fuming.
The Philby issue was a
festering
sore.
They had argued about it before.
The suspicion of treachery in the ranks did as much damage to an intelligence service as the treachery itself.
It was poison.

‘Have you calmed down, William?’

‘Just explain what you want me to do.’

‘I want you to tidy up things in Berlin before you go to Cuba.’

‘That’s definite?’

‘Yes, but not a permanent posting.’
Bone polished his glasses and looked across his desk.
‘Don’t you see, William, how we’re trying to use you?’

‘Please explain.’

‘We need to portray you as someone who is loathed by the
Americans, the quintessential duplicitous British lefty – which to a certain extent is what you are by nature.’

‘I’m not like you, Henry, I’m not duplicitous.’

‘I said to a certain extent.
In any case, we want to present you as someone whom the Sovs think they can trust, who understands their situation.’

‘I am not going to be used as a dangled double and fake defector – we’ve already tried that.’

‘I never said we were.
Try listening instead of jumping to conclusions.’

‘And, Henry, you can try to explain things more directly for a change.’

‘Fair point, I’ll try.
We’re entering an incredibly dangerous
international
situation.
Both sides now need back-channel diplomats just as much as they need spies.
The problem is that such diplomats need to foster a close rapport with the opposition that some may regard as treasonous – that’s the risk you’ll be taking.’

Catesby knew that at a certain level nothing was straightforward: everything became grey and ambiguous.
If governments never compromised their loudly stated principles – often secretly – there would be few treaties and a lot of war.
But when did compromise become betrayal?

‘And, by the way,’ said Bone, ‘our man in Havana has confirmed that Yevgeny Ivanovich Alekseev is now KGB
rezident
and that his wife is with him.’

Catesby often wondered how Alekseev’s wife, Katya, had taken the death of her lover.
Whether she had pined or simply found a new man.

‘You know,’ said Bone, ‘that there’s a very tragic story concerning Alekseev?’

‘I’m not sure that having an unfaithful wife qualifies as tragedy.’

‘She loves him, but that love can never be fulfilled.’

Catesby was surprised.
He had never heard Bone talk of ‘love’, except dismissively.

‘Alekseev was very badly wounded in the last days of the war.’

‘Katya doesn’t seem very lucky with her men.’

‘You’re becoming awfully hardboiled, Catesby.’

‘This isn’t a job for sentimentalists.’

Bone shook his head and looked away.
‘Maybe it should be.’

T
he visit to the US Officers Club at Harnack House was Gerald’s idea.
He reckoned it was the classiest club the Americans had in Berlin.
It was located in Dahlem, a leafy part of the city with lots of parks and tennis courts.
Harnack House was a large white
building
with red roof tiles punctuated by dormer windows where you expected to see
Hausfraus
hanging
Fetterbetts
out to air.
Before and during the war it had been used for high-level science conferences.
Harnack House was where in 1942 the Reich’s top scientists decided against pursuing an A bomb programme.

‘You’ve got to meet these guys,’ said Gerald, ‘I think you’ll find them an education in transatlantic culture.’
He was referring to the US officers from the 7771st Document Center and the 7782nd Special Troops Battalion.
They were Gerald’s colleagues in searching Soviet Army training areas for the letters, supply chits and pages of field manuals.
The ones that Soviet soldiers used as toilet paper.

‘You find them strange?’
said Catesby.

‘Completely barking.’

At first Catesby thought the young lieutenants were drunk on alcohol, but then he realised they were drunk on being Americans in a foreign country.
One of the most expansive was a tall lanky officer with parachutist wings and a ranger tab.
His name was Redhorn and he spoke with an extreme Deep South accent of long diphthong vowels.
The softness of his voice made it all the more sinister.
‘
Eisenhower
,’ said Redhorn, ‘was a pussy wimp.
He gave up in Korea and then he let the communists take over in Laos.
I know, I been there and seen it.’

‘And you think,’ said Catesby, ‘that Kennedy’s going to be different?’

‘Goddamn fucking A.
And the first thing we’re going to do is burn off Castro’s beard and hang up the
hijo de puta by
his
pelotas
.’

The other lieutenants began to call out Spanish phrases too: ‘Hey Fidel, tell your sister to
chupa mi pila
.’
‘What does it taste like Che,
la concha de tu madre
?’

Catesby suspected that the officers had been on a language
training
course – with an interesting line of vocabulary – and were showing off.
He didn’t think it boded well for Cuba – or for the rest of Latin America.
Meanwhile, Gerald handed him a beer.
‘It’s free,’ he said.

‘Who’s paying?’

Gerald nodded towards Redhorn.
‘He says Limeys are too poor to pay their own way.’

‘Then why don’t the Americans write off the war loans?’
A
constant
moan of Catesby’s generation was that defeated Germany was rebuilt with the Marshall Plan while Britain’s economy was hobbled with the repayment of the US loans.

Redhorn sat down next to Catesby and looked at him as if he were from a different planet.
‘Where you from?’

‘Lowestoft.’

‘What’s that?
Never heard of it.’

‘It’s a town in the east of England.’

‘No,’ said Redhorn, ‘I meant what’s your job?’

Catesby knew that in the context his threadbare diplomat cover was going to sound more ridiculous than usual.
‘I’m the Berlin rep of the Cultural Attaché.’

‘No, shit.’
Redhorn’s eyes sparkled.
He turned to another
American
officer.
‘Hey Donnie, this dude’s a culture man.’
Then back to Catesby, ‘Come on, educate us, recite some Limey poetry.’

‘I don’t like being taunted.’
Catesby was tempted to take a swing at the American, but realised that Redhorn was wearing glasses.
Without the voice and uniform Redhorn could have passed for an academic.
It occurred to Catesby that a lot of the bravado was an act.

Donnie suddenly joined in, ‘He’s telling you a load of bullshit, Red, he’s Gerald’s honcho.’

‘You’ve been telling fibs,’ said Redhorn.

‘You’re getting on my nerves,’ said Catesby.
He wouldn’t have minded a fight.
The banal mockery was grating.
But before they could square up, someone else had joined the group.
There was a sudden silence as if the headmaster had just entered an unruly
classroom
.
The newcomer wore the two-star insignia of an American major general.

‘I want every American officer to stand to attention.’
The general had a full glass of beer in his hand.
He looked at each of the lieutenants
who had chins and tummies tucked in and shoulders thrust back in the rictus of parade ground correctness.
Then he pointed at Catesby.
‘I assume that you are drinking with that man because you do not know who he is.
He may not wear a hammer and sickle on his lapel, but he certainly wears those emblems of oppression on his heart.
That man is an enemy of the United States of America and
everything
our beloved country under God stands for.
Beware of enemies posing as allies.’

The general than raised his glass of beer.
For a second Catesby thought that, incongruously, he was about to be toasted.
But instead, the general emptied his drink on the floor.
The other officers
followed
his example.
The general then turned smartly on his heel and marched out of the club with the others in step behind him.

‘Well,’ said Gerald, ‘I’ve never seen you empty a pub so quickly.’

‘But I’m still here.’
The voice sounded drunk and came from the shadows in a far corner.
A chair scraped and a figure carrying a glass clinking with ice came towards them.
‘May I join you?’

‘There’s plenty of room,’ said Catesby, ‘please do.’

‘Hi, my name’s Paul.’

‘I’m the anti-Christ,’ said Catesby extending a hand, ‘careful you don’t burn yourself.’

‘Nice to meet you, Anti, I’ve heard so much about you.’
Paul was wearing the gold oak leaves of a US army major on his shoulders and the twisted snakes caduceus of the medical corps on his lapels.
His tie was loose.
Otherwise, he sounded more crumpled than he looked.

‘I hope you don’t get in trouble for not following the others.’

Paul raised his glass.
‘No way am I going to throw away good Scotch.
In any case, that asshole won’t be here much longer.’

‘Who is he?’
said Gerald.

‘You mean you haven’t met him before?’

Catesby had, but kept mum.

‘That was Edwin Walker.
I don’t how he gets away with it.
Walker’s
been handing out right-wing pamphlets from the John Birch Society – and even tells his soldiers how to vote.
There’s a rumour that Washington is going to transfer him to somewhere in the Pacific where he’ll be less of an embarrassment.’

‘He seems to have quite a following,’ said Catesby.

Paul squinted and looked thoughtful.
‘That is worrying, very
worrying.
But Walker only survived because he had a protector in a very high place.’

‘Who was that?’

Paul smiled and whispered, ‘Lyman Lemnitzer, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.’

Catesby smiled bleakly.
Another ball cannoned across the green baize of his mind and clicked neatly into its pocket.
Bone was never wrong.
Catesby had all the right enemies in all the right places – and Moscow would know it too.
He was the perfect dangled double.

‘I suppose,’ said Paul downing the rest of his drink, ‘I’d better get some shut-eye, I’ve got a VD clinic in the morning.’

Gerald watched him leave and said, ‘There are good Americans.’

‘Just like there used to be good Germans in the thirties – and look what happened to them.’

‘If you don’t mind my saying so, sir, you can be a little ray of sunshine.’

‘Thanks,’ said Catesby.-