Smiley's People

by John le Carré

  “Who’s with him?”

  “Skordeno and de Silsky on foot, a back-up car behind, two more ahead. One team’s heading for the Cathedral Close right now. Do we go, George, or don’t we?”

  For a moment, Toby was aware of that disconnection which seemed to afflict Smiley whenever the operation gathered speed: less indecision, then a mysterious reluctance to advance.

  He pressed him: “The green light, George? Or not? George, please! We are speaking of seconds here!”

  “Is the house still covered for when Grigorieva and the children get back?”

  “Completely.”

  For a moment longer Smiley hesitated. For a moment, he weighed the method against the prize, and the grey and distant figure of Karla seemed actually to admonish him.

  “The green light, then,” said Smiley. “Yes. Go.”

  He had barely finished speaking before Toby was standing in the telephone kiosk not twenty metres from the pavilion. “With my heart going like a complete steam engine,” as he later claimed. But also with the light of battle in his eyes.

  There is even a scale model of the scene at Sarratt, and occasionally the directing staff will dig it out and tell the tale.

  The old city of Berne is best described as a mountain, a fortress, and a peninsula all at once, as the model shows. Between the Kirchenfeld and Kornhaus bridges, the Aare runs in a horseshoe cut into a giddy cleft, and the old city roosts prudently inside it, in rising foothills of medieval streets, till it reaches the superb late-Gothic spire of the Cathedral, which is both the mountain’s peak and its glory. Next to the Cathedral, at the same height, stands the Platform, from whose southern perimeter the unwary visitor may find himself staring down a hundred feet of sheer stone face, straight into the swirling river. It is a place to draw suicides and no doubt there have been some. It is a place where, according to popular history, a pious man was thrown from his horse and, though he fell the whole awesome distance, survived by God’s deliverance to serve the church for another thirty years, dying peacefully at a great age. The rest of the Platform makes a tranquil spot, with benches and ornamental trees and a children’s playground—and, in recent years, a place for public chess. The pieces are two feet or more in height, light enough to move, but heavy enough to withstand the occasional thrust of a south wind that whips off the surrounding hills. The scale model even runs to replicas of them.

  By the time Toby Esterhase arrived there that Sunday morning, the unexpected sunshine had drawn a small but tidy body of the game’s enthusiasts, who stood or sat around the chequered pavement. And at their centre, a mere six feet from where Toby stood, as oblivious to his surroundings as could be wished, stood Counsellor (Commercial) Anton Grigoriev of the Soviet Embassy in Berne, a truant from both work and family, intently following, through his rimless spectacles, each move the players made. And behind Grigoriev stood Skordeno and his companion de Silsky, watching Grigoriev. The players were young and bearded and volatile—if not art students, then certainly they wished to be taken for them. And they were very conscious of fighting a duel under the public gaze.

  Toby had been this close to Grigoriev before, but never when the Russian’s attention was so firmly locked elsewhere. With the calm of impending battle, Toby appraised him and confirmed what he had all along maintained: Anton Grigoriev was not a fieldman. His rapt attention, the unguarded frankness of his expressions as each move was played or contemplated, had an innocence that could never have survived the infighting of Moscow Centre.

  Toby’s personal appearance was another of those happy chances of the day. Out of respect for the Bernese Sunday, he had donned a dark overcoat and his black fur hat. He was therefore, at this crucial moment of improvisation, looking exactly as he would have wished had he planned everything to the last detail: a man of position takes his Sunday relaxation.

  Toby’s dark eyes lifted to the Cathedral Close. The get-away cars were in position.

  A ripple of laughter went out. With a flourish, one of the bearded players lifted his queen and, pretending it was a most appalling weight, reeled with it a couple of steps and dumped it with a groan. Grigoriev’s face darkened into a frown as he considered this unexpected move. On a nod from Toby, Skordeno and de Silsky drew one to either side of him, so close that Skordeno’s shoulder was actually nudging the quarry’s, but Grigoriev paid no heed. Taking this as their signal, Toby’s watchers began sauntering into the crowd, forming a second echelon behind de Silsky and Skordeno. Toby waited no longer. Placing himself directly in front of Grigoriev, he smiled and lifted his hat. Grigoriev returned the smile—uncertainly, as one might to a diplomatic colleague half-remembered—and lifted his hat in return.

  “How are you today, Counsellor?” Toby asked in Russian, in a tone of quiet jocularity.

  More mystified than ever, Grigoriev said thank you, he was well.

  “I hope you enjoyed your little excursion to the country on Friday,” said Toby in the same easy but very quiet voice, as he slipped his arm through Grigoriev’s. “The old city of Thun is not sufficiently appreciated, I believe, by members of our distinguished diplomatic community here. In my view it is to be recommended both for its antiquity, and its banking facilities. Do you not agree?”

  This opening sally was long enough, and disturbing enough, to carry Grigoriev unresisting to the crowd’s edge. Skordeno and de Silsky were packing close behind.

  “My name is Kurt Siebel, sir,” Toby confided in Grigoriev’s ear, his hand still on his arm. “I am chief investigator to the Bernese Standard Bank of Thun. We have certain questions relating to Dr. Adolf Glaser’s private account with us. You would do well to pretend you know me.” They were still moving. Behind them, the watchers followed in a staggered line, like rugger players poised to block a sudden dash. “Please do not be alarmed,” Toby continued, counting the steps as Grigoriev kept up his progress. “If you could spare us an hour, sir, I am sure we could arrange matters without troubling your domestic or professional position. Please.”

  In the world of a secret agent, the wall between safety and extreme hazard is almost nothing, a membrane that can be burst in a second. He may court a man for years, fattening him for the pass. But the pass itself—the “will you, won’t you?”—is a leap from which there is either ruin or victory, and for a moment Toby thought he was looking ruin in the face. Grigoriev had finally stopped dead and turned round to stare at him. He was pale as an invalid. His chin lifted, he opened his mouth to protest a monstrous insult. He tugged at his captive arm in order to free himself, but Toby held it firm. Skordeno and de Silsky were hovering, but the distance to the car was still fifteen metres, which was a long way, in Toby’s book, to drag one stocky Russian. Meanwhile, Toby kept talking; all his instinct urged him to.

  “There are irregularities, Counsellor. Grave irregularities. We have a dossier upon your good self which makes lamentable reading. If I placed it before the Swiss police, not all the diplomatic protests in the world would protect you from the most acute public embarrassment. I need hardly mention the consequence to your professional career. Please. I said please.”

  Grigoriev had still not budged. He seemed transfixed with indecision. Toby pushed at his arm, but Grigoriev stood rock solid and seemed unaware of the physical pressure on him. Toby shoved harder, Skordeno and de Silsky drew closer, but Grigoriev had the stubborn strength of the demented. His mouth opened, he swallowed, his gaze fixed stupidly on Toby.

  “What irregularities?” he said at last. Only the shock and the quietness in his voice gave cause for hope. His thick body remained rigidly set against further movement. “Who is this Glaser you speak of?” he demanded huskily, in the same stunned tone. “I am not Glaser. I am a diplomat, Grigoriev. The account you speak of has been conducted with total propriety. As Commercial Counsellor I have immunity. I also have the right to own foreign bank accounts.”

  Toby fired his only other shot. The money and the girl, Smiley had said. The money and the girl are all you have to
play with.

  “There is also the delicate matter of your marriage, sir,” Toby resumed with a show of reluctance. “I must advise you that your philanderings in the Embassy have put your domestic arrangements in grave danger.” Grigoriev started, and was heard to mutter “banker”—whether in disbelief or derision will never be sure. His eyes closed and he was heard to repeat the word, this time—according to Skordeno—with a particularly vile obscenity. But he started walking again. The rear door of the car stood open. The back-up car waited behind it. Toby was talking some nonsense about the withholding tax payable on the interest accruing from Swiss bank accounts, but he knew that Grigoriev was not really listening. Slipping ahead, de Silsky jumped into the back of the car and Skordeno threw Grigoriev straight in after him, then sat down beside him and slammed the door. Toby took the passenger seat; the driver was one of the Meinertzhagen girls. Speaking German, Toby told her to go easy and for God’s sake remember it was a Bernese Sunday. No English in Grigoriev’s hearing, Smiley had said.

  Somewhere near the station Grigoriev must have had second thoughts, because there was a short scuffle and when Toby looked in the mirror Grigoriev’s face was contorted with pain and he had both hands over his groin. They drove to the Länggass-strasse, a long dull road behind the university. The door of the apartment house opened as they pulled up outside it. A thin housekeeper waited on the doorstep. She was Millie McCraig, an old Circus trooper. At the sight of her smile, Grigoriev bridled, and now it was speed, not cover, that mattered. Skordeno jumped onto the pavement, seized one of Grigoriev’s arms, and nearly pulled it out of its socket; de Silsky must have hit him again, though he swore afterwards it was an accident, for Grigoriev came out doubled up, and between them they carried him over the threshold like a bride, and burst into the drawing-room in a bunch. Smiley was seated in a corner waiting for them. It was a room of brown chintzes and lace. The door closed, the abductors allowed themselves a brief show of festivity. Skordeno and de Silsky burst out laughing in relief. Toby took off his fur hat and wiped the sweat away.

  “Ruhe,” he said softly, ordering quiet. They obeyed him instantly.

  Grigoriev was rubbing his shoulder, seemingly unaware of anything but the pain. Studying him, Smiley took comfort from this gesture of self-concern: subconsciously, Grigoriev was declaring himself to be one of life’s losers. Smiley remembered Kirov, his botched pass at Ostrakova and his laborious recruitment of Otto Leipzig. He looked at Grigoriev and read the same incurable mediocrity in everything he saw: in the new but ill-chosen striped suit that emphasised his portliness; in the treasured grey shoes, punctured for ventilation but too tight for comfort; in the prinked, waved hair. All these tiny, useless acts of vanity communicated to Smiley an aspiration to greatness which he knew—as Grigoriev seemed to know—would never be fulfilled.

  A former academic, he remembered, from the document Enderby had handed him at Ben’s Place. Appears to have abandoned university teaching for the larger privileges of officialdom.

  A pincher, Ann would have said, weighing his sexuality at a single glance. Dismiss him.

  But Smiley could not dismiss him. Grigoriev was a hooked fish: Smiley had only moments in which to decide how best to land him. He wore rimless spectacles and was running to fat round the chin. His hair oil, warmed by the heat of his body, gave out a lemon vapour. Still kneading his shoulder, he started peering round at his captors. Sweat was falling from his face like raindrops.

  “Where am I?” he demanded truculently, ignoring Smiley and selecting Toby as the leader. His voice was hoarse and high pitched. He was speaking German, with a Slav sibilance.

  Three years as First Secretary, Commercial, Soviet Mission to Potsdam, Smiley remembered. No apparent intelligence connection.

  “I demand to know where I am. I am a senior Soviet diplomat. I demand to speak to my Ambassador immediately.”

  The continuing action of his hand upon his injured shoulder took the edge off his indignation.

  “I have been kidnapped! I am here against my will! If you do not immediately return me to my Ambassador there will be a grave international incident!”

  Grigoriev had the stage to himself, and he could not quite fill it. Only George will ask questions, Toby had told his team. Only George will answer them. But Smiley sat still as an undertaker; nothing, it seemed, could rouse him.

  “You want ransom?” Grigoriev called, to all of them. An awful thought appeared to strike him. “You are terrorists?” he whispered. “But if you are terrorists, why do you not bind my eyes? Why do you let me see your faces?” He stared round at de Silsky, then at Skordeno. “You must cover your faces. Cover them! I want no knowledge of you!”

  Goaded by the continuing silence, Grigoriev drove a plump fist into his open palm and shouted “I demand” twice. At which point Smiley, with an air of official regret, opened a note-book on his lap, much as Kirov might have done, and gave a small, very official sigh: “You are Counsellor Grigoriev of the Soviet Embassy in Berne?” he asked in the dullest possible voice.

  “Grigoriev! I am Grigoriev! Yes, well done, I am Grigoriev! Who are you, please? Al Capone? Who are you? Why do you rumble at me like a commissar?”

  Commissar could not have described Smiley’s manner better: it was leaden to the point of indifference.

  “Then, Counsellor, since we cannot afford to delay, I must ask you to study the incriminating photographs on the table behind you,” Smiley said, with the same studied dullness.

  “Photographs? What photographs? How can you incriminate a diplomat? I demand to telephone my Ambassador immediately!”

  “I would advise the Counsellor to look at the photographs first,” said Smiley, in a glum, regionless German. “When he has looked at the photographs, he is free to telephone whomever he wants. Kindly start at the left,” he advised. “The photographs are arranged from left to right.”

  A blackmailed man has the dignity of all our weaknesses, Smiley thought, covertly watching Grigoriev shuffling along the table as if he were inspecting one more diplomatic buffet. A blackmailed man is any one of us caught in the door as we try to escape the trap. Smiley had arranged the layout of the pictures himself; he had imagined, in Grigoriev’s mind, an orchestrated succession of disasters. The Grigorievs parking their Mercedes outside the bank. Grigorieva, with her perpetual scowl of discontent, waiting alone in the driving seat, clutching the wheel in case anyone tried to take it from her. Grigoriev and little Natasha in long shot, sitting very close to each other on a bench. Grigoriev inside the bank, several pictures, culminating in a superb over-the-shoulder shot of Grigoriev signing a cashier’s receipt, the full name Adolf Glaser clearly typed on the line above his signature. There was Grigoriev, looking uncomfortable on his bicycle, about to enter the sanatorium; there was Grigorieva roosting crossly in the car again, this time beside Gertsch’s barn, her own bicycle still strapped to the roof. But the photograph that held Grigoriev longest, Smiley noticed, was the muddy long shot stolen by the Meinertzhagen girls. The quality was not good but the two heads in the car, though they were locked mouth to mouth, were recognisable enough. One was Grigoriev’s. The other, pressed down on him as if she would eat him alive, was little Natasha’s.

  “The telephone is at your disposal, Counsellor,” Smiley called to him quietly, when Grigoriev still did not move.

  But Grigoriev remained frozen over this last photograph, and to judge by his expression, his desolation was complete. He was not merely a man found out, thought Smiley; he was a man whose very dream of love, till now vested in secrecy, had suddenly become public and ridiculous.

  Still using his glum tone of official necessity, Smiley set about explaining what Karla would have called the pressures. Other inquisitors, says Toby, would have offered Grigoriev a choice, thereby inevitably mustering the Russian obstinacy in him, and the Russian penchant for self-destruction: the very impulses, he says, which could have invited catastrophe. Other inquisitors, he insists, would have menaced, raised th
eir voices, resorted to histrionics, even physical abuse. Not George, he says: never. George acted out the low-key official time-server, and Grigoriev, like Grigorievs the world over, accepted him as his unalterable fate. George bypassed choice entirely, says Toby. George calmly made clear to Grigoriev why it was that he had no choice at all: The important thing, Counsellor—said Smiley, as if he were explaining a tax demand—was to consider what impact these photographs would have in the places where they would very soon be studied if nothing was done to prevent their distribution. There were first the Swiss authorities, who would obviously be incensed by the misuse of a Swiss passport on the part of an accredited diplomat, not to mention the grave breach of banking laws, said Smiley. They would register the strongest official protest, and the Grigorievs would be returned to Moscow overnight, all of them, never again to enjoy the fruits of a foreign posting. Back in Moscow, however, Grigoriev would not be well regarded either, Smiley explained. His superiors in the Foreign Ministry would take a dismal view of his behaviour, “both in the private and professional spheres.” Grigoriev’s prospects for an official career would be ended. He would be an exile in his own land, said Smiley, and his family with him. All his family. “Imagine facing the wrath of Grigorieva twenty-four hours a day in the wastes of outer Siberia,” he was saying in effect.

  At which Grigoriev slumped into a chair and clapped his hands on to the top of his head, as if scared it would blow off.

  “But finally,” said Smiley, lifting his eyes from his notebook, though only for a moment—and what he read there, said Toby, God knows, the pages were ruled but otherwise blank—“finally, Counsellor, we have also to consider the effect of these photographs upon certain organs of State Security.”

  And here Grigoriev released his head and drew the handkerchief from his top pocket and began wiping his brow, but as hard as he wiped, the sweat came back again. It fell as fast as Smiley’s own in the interrogation cell in Delhi, when he had sat face to face with Karla.