Albatross (23 page)

He puffed on the cigarette, got up and moved restlessly round the room. He had thought of escape, and dismissed the idea. He had no money, no place to hide. He didn't know where Stephen Wood lived. His photograph was all over the morning papers. He'd be picked up by the first policeman who took a good look at him. He finished the cigarette, stubbed it out and then threw it into the grate where it lay under the electric fire, catching the eye in a very tidy room. It was a stupid, petty gesture, but it was his last act of defiance and he knew it. Albatross. Very well, he'd give the bitch the information. Enough to let her find the quarry for herself. At least he could hold back the clue he'd worked out for himself. She could make the final deduction if she was sharp enough. He decided to act positively, to assert himself and drop the passive role of prisoner. He went to the door and called her, using the nickname he knew she hated. ‘Davy!'

She came into the little hall. ‘Yes?'

‘Let's get on with it,' Harrington said. ‘And I could do with some more coffee.'

He talked into the tape; his headache had gone and he felt relaxed, almost confident. Indecision was the curse of the imprisoned. Now that he had made up his mind, his spirits rose. He began to enjoy himself, threading through the maze that protected Albatross. ‘I joined in '63,' he said. ‘And I changed sides ten years later. He was well established then. The impression I got in Switzerland was that he had been in place for a long time. Which brings us to the previous head of SIS, old man Osborn. He was a definite sympathizer, one of those remnants from the war when the idea of Russia being our ally clung on long after the Cold War started. I don't think he actually dealt with the opposition, but you could help as much by shutting your eyes to things, or just not taking action when you knew you should.… I think he was a kind of fellow traveller, rather than an active double agent. That's when I think Albatross got in.'

‘With Osborn's knowledge?' Davina interposed. ‘You realize you're putting the Chief in the clear for a start?'

‘Yes, I know I am,' Harrington answered. ‘But you mustn't let your personal prejudices influence you, Davy dear. Much as you'd like it to be him, I don't believe it is. I think Albatross was introduced in Osborn's time. A nice, liberal-minded chap, could have been a bit on the queer side –' He paused. ‘Humphrey joined too late for that, didn't he,' he said. ‘How about your brother-in-law, Kidson? Wasn't he a bright young man from university who went to the Foreign Office?'

‘Yes,' Davina said. ‘He was. But you're basing all this on no evidence at all, just a personal opinion.'

‘That's right. But you can check it out, can't you? You've got the details of Humphrey's enrolment and the Chief's – see if I've missed anything.'

‘When do you see Albatross showing his hand for the first time?'

‘When Sasanov defected. Earlier on there are indications, principally the loss of our Rumanian network in '71. Humphrey had a hand there, so did Kidson. Humphrey recruited a Rumanian exile and sent him back in. Kidson debriefed him when he came home. The Chief decided to chance him a second time. He was arrested after a tip-off, and the whole clutch of our agents were picked up. I see Albatross at work there. But,' he shrugged, ‘it could be any one of the three. Sasanov was different. That's where we can identify a kind of handwriting. We all have our signatures in this job, don't we, Davy? I could tell your work anywhere. I got my instructions in the States: get yourself recalled in disgrace. I did, if you remember.'

‘I remember,' Davina answered.

‘Well, who decided I should be transferred to Personnel? I know it's one step towards early retirement, a total career dead end, but it also brought me smack into contact with you. Which was what I was waiting for. Who decided to bring me to London instead of sticking me in some backwater out of the way or kicking me out altogether, which is what should have happened? That's Albatross. You find out who recommended that posting, not who
authorized
it, but who recommended it. That will be your first big pointer.'

‘Supposing they're one and the same person?'

‘The Chief again, eh?' He grinned maliciously at her. ‘You could be right. But it could just as well be Humphrey or Kidson who put in the word. The Chief didn't make all the minor decisions, and what to do with a drunk who'd made an ass of himself could easily have been left to either of the other two. And then, we have our friend Spencer-Barr. My replacement in Washington.'

Davina looked at him. ‘What's he got to do with it?'

‘Why didn't he get the minder's job with Sasanov? Have you ever really asked yourself that?'

‘No,' she admitted. ‘The Chief made the decision. He felt a woman would suit Ivan better. He gave me the job. Which knocks the first hole in your other theories, doesn't it? If that appointment has a bearing, then it was James White and no one else. Humphrey was dead against my doing it. I don't think John Kidson was even consulted.'

‘You don't know,' Harrington pointed out.

‘The fact remains that Spencer-Barr was working for the CIA. If Albatross suspected that, he'd have moved heaven and earth to stop him getting his hands on Sasanov. And he wouldn't have exposed him either; double dealing between the Allies is always good for the opposition.'

The tape finished and Davina changed it for a new one.

‘I can't understand you, Peter,' she said. ‘You talk about the opposition as if you hadn't been part of them. You were an officer in the KGB. Yet you talk as if you were on the other side.'

‘If you want an answer to that,' he said, ‘don't switch on the tape. I'm not on any side but my own. They paid and I delivered.'

‘I see.' She reached out to press the record switch.

‘No, you don't,' Harrington snapped. ‘You don't see anything. You think everything in life is black and white, don't you? The good guys against the baddies, like an old Western where the outlaws always wore black. You're a clever little piece, I'm not denying that, but you've never got rid of the
Girl's Own
attitude to life. You think that because I went over to Moscow, I must be a Communist? Some high ideals burn in this ignoble frame, isn't that it?'

‘No, it isn't,' she said coldly. ‘There's nothing in you, Peter, but a mess of selfishness and greed. I wondered how you saw yourself, that was all. Not one of them, that's obvious. Not one of us either. A sort of non-person. Shall I switch on how?'

‘Go to hell,' he snarled at her.

The tape whirred and for a while there was silence. A non-person. That had stung, as she intended it should. Make the bastard angry now and again, Lomax had advised her. He'll let something slip if he's off guard.… ‘Right,' she started briskly, ‘Apart from Spencer-Barr, what else? The fire that was meant to kill us both? That was your doing alone, wasn't it?'

He nodded, still seething. ‘I pinpointed where you were hiding. The action group did the rest. Albatross wouldn't have risked meddling with that one. But he meddled with something else.' He paused and Davina waited.

‘I think,' he said, ‘that where he really showed his hand was in Australia. If you want to find him, Davy dear, look for whoever pinned the flag on the map for you and Ivan.'

She had blushed a little; Harrington knew that he had scored. She didn't like references to that. Didn't want to talk about the night the car blew up and Ivan Sasanov died in her arms.… ‘You mean that Albatross told them where we were?' she asked him.

‘No other way they could have found you,' Harrington insisted. ‘You were shopped from home. I can see the way your mind's working; who knew besides the Chief?'

‘Nobody,' Davina said flatly. ‘The files prove that. Nobody knew, not Humphrey, and not John either. Only the Chief.' She paused and then said in a low voice, ‘He'd hardly tip them off because of the risk to himself if anything went wrong. I accused him of not looking after Ivan; in fact he did as much as possible, certainly from the London end, to keep us hidden.'

‘So you take one step near him and another back,' Harrington pointed out. ‘You say he protected you from the London end – what about security in Australia?'

‘Nothing,' she said bitterly. ‘Not a bloody thing. That's why I've held him responsible for what happened. We had no guard, no special precautions round the house, nothing! They just moved in when they were ready. And the man who masterminded it was made head of the KGB as a reward!'

‘That I didn't know,' Harrington remarked. ‘He won't be too pleased about what happened to me – I wonder how long it'll take him to pick up the trail?'

‘Let's hope it's long enough to get this sorted out,' Davina answered. ‘Australia – you think someone knew besides the Chief?'

‘Either White waited till he thought it was safe and then tipped off the KGB, or somebody else found out. An interesting problem, isn't it?'

‘Yes,' Davina said slowly. ‘You've given me the best incentive in the world for finding out. I'll play this back and we'll see if we've missed anything.'

The news reached Borisov as he was about to leave his office. Harrington had disappeared en route for Manchester Airport. So had his companion. The other men involved had gone to ground. Efforts were being made to find them. Results would be telexed through to Moscow within the next twenty-four hours, if possible. Borisov telephoned his wife. He would not be home till late, he said. The whine at the other end made him wince. How late – and how did she really know he was working? He slammed the phone down. The ache for Natalia waited like an attacker in the shadows. He didn't think of her death, or the reason for it. He remembered nothing but the warmth of her body and the skill of her love-making; above all the sense of sharing his work with her. He longed for the companionship even more than sex. Sex he could and did command, but it left him empty and lonely when the woman had gone. His hatred for Rudzenko had a deeper motive than before. He owed Rudzenko for sending him Natalia, for giving him happiness and then, because she was corrupt, forcing him to cut her out like a cancer.…

He sent a series of coded telexes to the embassy in London. The instructions were brief: find the men who had helped their agent carry out the operation. They must be questioned. Put an immediate watch on Davina Graham. Alert Albatross. Report progress on the plan to substitute the replacement. He added an angry postscript to the senior KGB officer in the London embassy, expressing his displeasure at the slowness of their reaction. If Harrington was not recovered and British Intelligence had frustrated the escape, Borisov would hold the officer personally responsible. After he had sent the telexes, he called for his new secretary. A man this time, a young lieutenant who had been in his service since he became head of the KGB. No danger of a Rudzenko spy here. But not Natalia either. Sometimes, when he was working late, he thought he heard her voice or the soft step approaching his chair. He didn't believe in ghosts or in any aspect of the supernatural. But she haunted him. Rudzenko would put another spy in her place; Borisov was waiting for that move. Perhaps one already there would somehow slip into promotion.…

But not Alexei. Alexei was his man. He was not a good secretary but he had other skills. One day they would be called upon. But till then, there was nothing he could do but go home. When the present crisis was over, and the larger crisis that the autumn promised had been resolved, he would get a divorce. That hope made his return to the luxurious Moscow apartment easier to bear.

Sam's two recruits were found the following day, one in the morning and the second a few hours later. They were found, not by the KGB, but by the underworld. It was a simple method of detection. Word went to the gang bosses of Sam's neighbourhood that his men had to be dug out, or serious consequences for the drugs and prostitution and burglaries they controlled would follow. Nobody asked questions; past experiences proved that the threat came from a quarter capable of carrying it out. Their own people found Sam's men, and the questioning was done by them with an observer in the background. It took only a little violence to extract the truth. Both men supplied the details as clearly as the agony of a broken arm and a shin cracked in three places would permit. The snatch had gone wrong, Sam had been killed, and the quarry spirited away. They were held in the basement room of a derelict house in Hackney while the dump of wrecked cars was found and someone persuaded the crane driver to lower him to the van. The rotting corpse was smelled before they opened the door. The crane brought him back to ground level. Nothing was said. The men in the basement knew too much. The observer watched while they were shot in the head. The information was passed through from the embassy to Moscow. And with it went a rough description of the man who had knocked out the driver of the van and taken his place. It went into the computer at the Lubyanka offices in Dzerzhinsky Square. The computer came up with several possible identities. Three were of known international agents: one of them was British; two were actual Soviet citizens who were not in Europe, least of all London; and the one which the computer suggested, without being able positively to identify from the few details, was Major Colin Lomax.

Colin kept in the background. At Davina's insistence he stayed away from the flat while she and Harrington were working together. He made a date with his old SAS comrade and once more they met in the pub where the plan to pull Harrington out of Shropwith had been discussed. Captain Fraser didn't ask for reasons when Lomax telephoned originally and cancelled the arrangements. He saw the newspaper reports and decided to wait. A convicted Soviet spy had escaped from the very place his old friend Lomax had mentioned as the venue for his plan. Someone had got there first. Bad luck on Lomax. He wasn't the kind to take being outmanoeuvred with a good grace. When they met that evening, Fraser was surprised at how cheerful his friend seemed for someone who had had his quarry grabbed under his nose. They drank and chatted for a while, and then he said, ‘No names, no pack drill, but any connection between that business up in Lancashire and your little caper?'