Absolute Friends (30 page)

"I think you have a bad throat, Teddy," he hears Sasha say severely. "Maybe with these excellent Communist lozenges you will sing better."

In return, Mundy passes Sasha a chrome hip flask made in England and remade in the Professor's workshops, then stuffed with fabrications made in Bedford Square and photographed by Mundy Two. A hundred yards behind them, the gloomy sentinel Manfred stands hands in pockets at the water's edge, staring out to sea.

"The Professor is terrified," Sasha whispers excitedly below the rattle of the wind. "Fear! Fear! His eyes are like marbles, never resting!"

"Why? What does he think will happen?"

"Nothing. That is why he is terrified. Since all is illusion and propaganda, what can go wrong? The Professor's Great Director himself returned only yesterday from Moscow with the firmest assurances that nothing whatever is happening. _Now__ can you imagine how afraid he is?"

"Well, I only hope he's right," says Mundy doubtfully, concerned that Sasha's high hopes will once more be dashed. "Just remember Hungary 'fifty-six and Czecho 'sixty-eight and a couple of other times when they put the clock back." He is quoting Amory, who is quoting his masters: _Don't let him grab at straws, Edward. Gorbachev may be changing the window, but he's not selling the store.__

But Sasha will not be discouraged.

"There _must__ be two Germanys, Teddy. Two is a minimum. I love Germany so much I wish there were ten. Tell this to your Mr. Arnold."

"I think I told him a few times already."

"There must be no annexation of the GDR by the Federal Republic. As a first condition of constructive coexistence, the two Germanys must expel their foreign occupiers, the Russians and the Americans."

"Sasha, listen to me, will you? 'Her Majesty's Government believes that German reunification should only take place as part of an overall European settlement.' That's the official line, and it's been that way for the last forty years. Unofficially it's stronger: Who needs a united Germany? Thatcher doesn't, Mitterrand doesn't, a lot of Germans don't, West as well as East. And America doesn't care."

Sasha might not have heard him. "As soon as the occupiers have departed, each Germany will call free and fair elections," he continues breathlessly. "A key issue in both will be the creation of an unaligned bloc at the heart of Europe. A federation of the two separate Germanys is only possible if there is total disarmament on both sides. With that achieved, we shall offer alliances to Poland and France on the same terms. After so many wars and divisions, Central Europe will become the crucible of peace." He stumbles and collects himself. "No _Anschluss__ by the Federal Republic, Teddy. No Grossdeutschland under the domination of either superpower. Then we can finally drink to peace."

Mundy is still searching for a soothing answer when Sasha seizes his arm in both hands and stares imploringly up at him. His words come in gulps. His whole body is shaking. "No Fourth Reich, Teddy. Not before there is disengagement on both sides. Until then, the two halves stay sovereign and separate. Yes? Say yes!"

Sadly, almost wearily, Mundy shakes his head. "We're talking about something that isn't happening," he says, kindly but emphatically. "The glacier's moving, but it's not melting."

"Is this the ridiculous Mr. Arnold you are quoting again?"

"I'm afraid it is."

"Give him my greetings and tell him he's an arsehole. Now take me indoors and get me drunk."

Mundy and Kate have agreed to talk the whole thing through as adults. After eleven years, that's the least they owe each other, says Kate. Mundy will take a day off work and make a special trip to Doncaster, Kate has looked up the trains for him. She will meet him with the car, they'll drive to the Troutstream for lunch, which is out of town and private and, unless Mundy's tastes have changed recently, they both like trout. The last thing either of them needs, she says, is to bump into local press people, or worse still someone from local party headquarters. Quite why she should be so nervous of being caught in flagrante with her husband is obscure to Mundy, but he takes her word for it.

And when they've had their talk, and agreed guidelines, she says, it would be nice if Ted came back to the house in time to kick a ball about with Jake in the garden, and perhaps Philip will drop by casually for a drink, as he often does, to talk party policy. And, when Philip sees the game going on, he can join in, says Kate. That way, Jake can see for himself that there's no atmosphere. Things may have changed a little, but we're all good friends together and Jake is our first priority. He will have two happy homes instead of one, which is something that rationally, in the long term, he'll learn to accept. Because the one thing we're all totally agreed about, says Kate, is that there will be no tug-of-war for Jake's affections.

In fact, so much is agreed in advance by the time Mundy boards the train at King's Cross that he can't help wondering whether--with all Eastern Europe on the boil and Sasha needing to report twice as often as Mundy can get to him--his journey is strictly necessary. But to his surprise it is. Mulling it all over on the train, he realizes that he agrees without reservation to everything she wants.

Adamantly. Passionately.

Jake's love for his mother is more important to him than any love in the world. He will do anything to preserve it.

And as soon as he climbs into the car, that's what he tells her. As ever a useless negotiator in his own interest, he begs her, beseeches her, to allow him to take the entire blame for the failure of the marriage on his own shoulders. If keeping a low profile for the first few months of the separation will help, he'll keep one. If kicking a ball about in the back garden with the Labor Party's latest apostle of the New Direction is going to convince Jake that his mother has made a sound career choice, Mundy will kick it till he drops. And that isn't altruism. That's survival. His own as much as Jake's. No wonder that even before they sit down to lunch, Mundy feels more postcoital than postmarital.

"We're doing it really well," Kate assures him over the avocado and crab starter. "I just wish other people could be so civilized."

"Me too," says Mundy heartily.

They talk about Jake's schooling. In Jake's case _only,__ Kate is _half__ decided to waive her objection to private schools. Jake's turbulent nature is crying out for individual attention. She has discussed this with Philip, of course, and with her constituency, and everyone's agreed that provided it's a special need, and there's no obvious local alternative, and no unfortunate publicity, they can live with it. Mundy detests private schools but assures her that, if Jake really wants it, he'll come up with the fees.

"I'm just so sorry about the Council," she says, over her trout with almonds and green salad. "It really upsets me, how little they seem to appreciate you."

"Oh, don't blame the poor old Council," Mundy exclaims gallantly. "They've been good to me in their own way. It's not their fault."

"If you'd just been able to stand up for yourself."

"Oh, I know, I know," says Mundy wearily, in their old spirit of togetherness.

They talk about what Kate refers to as _access,__ which to Mundy has a different connotation, but he quickly readjusts.

"Philip's got a book coming out in the spring," she tells him over apple crumble and custard.

"Super. marvellous."

"Nonfiction, of course."

"Of course."

They talk _grounds__--or Kate does. As a prospective parliamentary candidate she obviously can't consider admitting to adultery. If Ted thinks he should go that route, she'll have no option but to drag up mental cruelty and desertion. How about settling for irretrievable breakdown?

Irretrievable breakdown sounds great, says Mundy.

"You have _got__ someone, haven't you, Ted?" Kate demands a little sharply. "I mean, you can't have been sitting in London all these years with _nobody.__"

Pretty much, that's exactly what Mundy has been doing, but he is too polite to admit it. They agree it's wiser not to discuss money. Kate will find herself a lawyer. Ted should do the same.

_A lawyer is always an arsehole.__

"And I thought we'd wait till after Philip's new job has been confirmed, if it's all right by you," says Kate over a terminal coffee.

"To get married?" Mundy asks.

"To get divorced."

Mundy calls for the bill and pays it out of Amory's brown envelope. What with the rain and everything, they agree it's probably not the right evening for soccer with Philip. On the other hand, Mundy wants to see Jake more than he's ever wanted to see anyone in his life, so he says maybe he'll just come back home and give him a game of checkers or something, then grab a taxi to the station.

They arrive at the house and, while Kate puts on a kettle, Mundy waits in the sitting room feeling like an insurance salesman and peering at the places where he would put flowers if he were still resident, and at the clumsy arrangement of the furniture that wouldn't take five minutes to fix if Jake just gave him a hand. And he reflects that he possesses too many of the domestic concerns that Kate manages perfectly well without, but then Kate grew up with a family whereas Mundy was always trying to invent one. His thoughts are still running in this direction when the front door flies open and Jake marches into the room accompanied by his friend Lorna. Without a word he storms past his father, switches on the television and crashes onto the sofa with Lorna at his side.

"What are you doing back from school so early?" Mundy asks suspiciously.

"Sent," says Jake defiantly, without turning his head from the screen.

"Why? What have you done?"

"Teacher says we're to watch history in the making," Lorna explains smugly.

"So we're watching it, anything wrong with that? What's for tea, Mum?" says Jake.

Teacher is right. History is indeed being made. The children watch, Mundy watches. Even Kate, who doesn't regard foreign policy as an election winner, watches from the kitchen doorway. The Berlin Wall is coming down, and hippies from both sides are jumping about on what's left of it. Hippies from the West have long hair, Mundy notices in his numb state. Newly liberated hippies from the East still wear it short.

At midnight Mundy's train delivers him to King's Cross. From a phone box he calls the emergency number. Amory's voice tells him to leave his message _now.__ Mundy says he hasn't got one, he's just wondering whether there's anything he should be doing. He means, he's frightened stiff for Sasha, but is too well trained to say so. He gets an answer of sorts when he arrives at Estelle Road, but it was left on the machine six hours ago. "No squash tomorrow, Edward. Courts are being renovated. Sit tight and take lots of water with it. _Tschüss.__" He switches on the television.

_My__ Berlin.

_My__ Wall.

_My__ crowds vandalizing it.

_My__ crowds storming Stasi headquarters.

_My__ friend locked inside, waiting to be mistaken for the enemy.

Thousands of Stasi files being flung into the streets.

Wait till you read mine: Ted Mundy, Stasi secret agent, British traitor.

At 6 a.m. he goes to a phone box in Constantine Road and again calls the emergency number. Where does it ring? In the Wool Factory? Who's bothering to deceive the Stasi anymore? At Amory's home--where's that? He leaves another meaningless message.

Back in Estelle Road, he lies in the bath listening to North German radio. He shaves with enormous concentration, cooks himself a celebratory breakfast but has no appetite for it and leaves the bacon on the doorstep for nextdoor's cat. Desperate for exercise, he sets off for the Heath but ends up in Bedford Square. His front-door key works, but when he presses the bell to the inner bailey, no nice English girl wearing her father's signet ring welcomes him aboard. In an unscripted fit of frustration, he gives the door a violent shake, then hammers on it, which sets off an alarm bell. A blue light is flashing in the porch as he steps outside and the din of the bell is deafening.

From a public telephone in Tottenham Court Road tube station he again calls the emergency number and this time gets Amory live. In the background he hears Germans shouting and assumes his call has been patched through to Berlin.

"What the fuck do you think you were doing at the Factory?" Amory demands.

"Where is he?" Mundy says.

"Disappeared from our screens. Not at his office, not at his apartment."

"How d'you know?"

"We've looked, that's how. What do you think we've been doing? We've checked his flat and frightened his neighbors. The consensus is, he saw the way the wind was blowing and got out before he was clubbed down in the street or whatever the hell's going on."

"Let me look for him."

"marvellous. Do that. Bring your guitar and come and sing outside the prisons till he hears your golden voice. We've got your passport in case you've forgotten. Ted?"

"What?"

"We care about him too, all right? So stop making a martyr of yourself."

It's a full five months before Sasha's letter arrives. How Mundy passed them is afterwards unclear to him. Soccer afternoons with Jake in Doncaster. Soccer afternoons with Jake and Philip. Ghastly threesome dinners with Philip and Kate which Jake refuses to attend. Dismal weekends with Jake alone in London. Films Jake needs to see and Mundy loathes. Spring walks on the Heath with Jake trailing two paces behind. Hanging around the British Council as the blessed day of Early Retirement by Mutual Consent draws near.

The same old handwriting. Blue airmail paper. Postmarked Husum, North Germany, and addressed to Estelle Road, NW3. How the hell did he know my address? Of course--I put it in my visa application a thousand years ago. He wonders why Husum is familiar to him. Of course--Theodor Storm, author of _The Rider on the White Horse.__ Dr. Mandelbaum read it to me.

_Dear Teddy,__

_I have reserved two luxurious suites in your name at the Hotel Dreesen in Bad Godesberg for the night of the 18th. Bring everything you possess in the world, but come alone. I wish neither to say hullo nor goodbye to Mr. Arnold, who can go fuck himself. I came to Husum in order to confirm that the Herr Pastor is truly buried. I regret so much that he is not alive to witness the exalting sight of Our Dear Führer annexing East Germany by means of God's Almighty Deutschmark.__