The anxiety I feel in the pit of my stomach reminds me of the summer of ’39 when we knew war was coming with Hitler. I was young enough then to manage on only a few hours’ sleep. Beer and sunshine with friends in the afternoon, night shift at the Daily Mirror, where one of the paper’s old boys tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I would be interested in special work. The day before the declaration of war I was invited for a little chat with Marjorie at the St Ermin’s Hotel on Broadway, and after a routine background check I became a spy. I learned later that Guy had put in a good word for me.
On the anniversary of that day twenty-six years ago I walk to St James’s Underground station and buy a ticket for a Circle Line train to Temple. I’m dressed for meetings with people who care about these things in a light summer jacket and open-neck shirt, and I’m carrying the battered leather briefcase that used to belong to my bank manager uncle. Poor old Rhodri wanted me to be ‘a steady fellow’. I remember him saying so the day my father left me in his sister’s care.
Mr James Simpson is by reputation a radical, or what passes for one among the barristers of the Inner Temple. I guess he’s in his early thirties but he exudes the cast-iron confidence of one who has followed a straight path from boarding-school cloister to Oxbridge and the Bar.
‘The House?’ I say, nodding to his print of Christ Church College, Oxford.
‘Yes. You?’
‘New College.’
‘Before my time, I suppose,’ he observes, with a cruel smile.
‘So, Mr Simpson,’ I say, ‘I have a friend who works in the Foreign Office, and my friend is going to break the law.’ He sits a little straighter. ‘Perhaps we should have some coffee.’
I tell Mr Simpson my friend’s story, and clever Mr Simpson isn’t fooled for a minute. George Blake represents the worse scenario, he says, because he was sentenced to forty-two years for spying. Politicians and newspapers turn cases like these into a circus, and in those circumstances justice isn’t as blind to public opinion as it is supposed be. There’s a sherry-party rumour that the judge in the Blake trial telephoned Number 10 Downing Street for advice before passing sentence.
‘Blake was a Soviet spy,’ I say, ‘and my friend would be acting in the national interest.’
‘That’s as may be,’ he says, ‘but Blake was convicted of breaking the Official Secrets Act – and your friend would be too.’
From Temple I walk into the City, and in a banking hall on Poultry I purchase a security box. An assistant manager shows me into the vault and from Uncle’s briefcase I take two rolls of film and some handwritten notes. As the manager slides my box back I wonder at the wealth hidden in those stainless-steel walls and how many of the other key-holders are breaking the law. The assistant manager leads me back to the main banking hall where the green marble pillars and grey marble floor, the footfall echo and hushed voices put me in mind of a great church. Uncle Rhodri wouldn’t have credited such a place. Uncle Rhodri was chapel.
Roger Hollis worked for a bank in China and then a tobacco company. There’s a note from Martin in the papers in front of me: Recruited to the Security Service 1938. Assessment carried out by Dick White and Jane Archer. Jane Archer retired to a thatched cottage in Dorset years ago and is almost seventy, but her name is spoken with awe by those who encountered her in the Service. She was Five’s first female officer, some say its most able, and, in the years she spent with us at MI6, our leading expert on Communist counter-intelligence.
‘I know why you’ve rung,’ she says, ‘and I’ve spoken to Arthur Martin already.’
‘All the same, can I come down to see you?’
‘No need. John and I are in London. Seven o’clock tomorrow?’
‘Fine. And, Jane, keep this to yourself.’
The telephone crackles and hisses and I picture her holding it away from her face. ‘All right, Harry,’ she says at last. ‘For now.’
Wright takes the Thursday meeting up two floors again, so we can discuss the director general along the corridor from his office. Today’s Times tells me Pakistani jets have attempted a raid on New Delhi, and the Indian Army is pushing towards Karachi. Thousands of men are engaged: thousands may die in the hours the members of our committee spend in conclave, considering the mistakes of the past. Terence Lecky has something new to offer us: Hollis took the Trans-Siberian railway home from China in 1936 and might have broken the journey in the Soviet Union. I ask how long he was there for, and what we know of his stay, but Lecky cannot say. So, for now this new piece floats in the corner of our great jigsaw: we don’t know where it goes or even if it belongs, but my colleagues seem confident it will fit a picture of Roger, the master spy ELLI. Only we’re not to call him Roger any more. The small office in B Branch responsible for allocating MI5’s cover names has given us DRAT. Philby is our PEACH, Mitchell is PETERS, and now the director general of the Security Service is DRAT, which makes him as good as guilty.
I point out again that Roger’s an Oxford man, and the profile we have from Jim’s favourite defector – Golitsyn – suggests the Ring of Five were at Cambridge.
‘Well, H-H-Harry, Oxford is not above suspicion,’ says Wright. ‘ELLI may have belonged to another circle – an Oxford circle.’
‘Sorry to be a bore, but can I ask for some evidence?’
‘Well, you know, H-H-Harry, from Blunt and Pool.’
I want to press him but he’s pushed his chair away and is rising from the table. The meeting is to break early so he can catch a flight to Washington. ‘Jim’s arranged for me to have a word with SNIPER,’ he says. ‘I’m hoping SNIPER will offer us more on the middle-grade agent in the Service … if he isn’t too sick.’
‘Really?’ I push my chair away too. ‘Bloody marvellous, I’m sure.’
‘H-Harry’s against, of course.’ Wright inspects his fingernails. ‘Anyone else?’
Lecky turns to me. ‘It’s worth a try, Harry. Why not?’
‘You’ve changed your tune, Terence. Why not? Because SNIPER’s convinced he’s the last Tsar of Russia. He’s mad. You said so yourself.’
My colleagues look uncomfortable but they won’t speak against Wright. I swear we’re lost in a dark forest with madmen, holy men, crooks and tsars for our guides.
I watch from my office window as Wright climbs into a cab, and ten minutes later I do the same. I go in search of quiet reason.
Jane Archer greets me on the doorstep of her friend’s house in Chelsea and shows me into a dark sitting room. ‘We have half an hour alone,’ she says. ‘Is that enough?’ She’s dressed in sensible shoes and a thick tweed skirt, as if she’s just returned from arranging the flowers in her village church. She reminds me of Margaret Rutherford in the Miss Marple story Murder, She Said, only younger and with finer features, and if it’s possible to judge superior intellect in a face, that’s what I see.
‘Is this official?’ she asks.
‘Unofficial.’
‘You want to ask me about Hollis.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Well, I can only tell you what I told Arthur.’
‘You helped to recruit him.’
‘In ’thirty-eight. The director general – it was still Vernon Kell – was impressed by Roger but he wanted another opinion. “Meet him, Jane. Is he for us?” he said. So I arranged a tennis match – mixed doubles. Dick White was my partner. I remember Hollis didn’t cut much of a figure at first – shy, awkward, he had a hopeless backhand – but as the game progressed, well, he fought hard, demonstrated grit and a cool head under pressure. He lost the match to us but he impressed, and that was that. He was as good as in.’
Jane looks down at her hands, resting neatly in a nest of tweed. ‘That’s how things were done in those days.’
‘I remember.’
She raises her head slowly. ‘Well, are you going to ask me?’
‘I’m not sure …’
‘You want to know if I think he’s a spy.’
‘Did Arthur ask you?�
��
‘No, the science boffin.’
‘Peter Wright’s spoken to you?’
‘Obviously. He asked me: Mitchell or Hollis, or both? I said, “Neither.” I don’t think either of them is capable enough, but if there is one, Hollis is the more likely.’
I nod slowly. ‘Difficult question – difficult times.’
‘Of course, I may be wrong,’ she says, rising smartly. ‘I have been before.’
She must be thinking of Philby, whom she worked with after the war.
‘Not often, Jane,’ I observe with feeling.
‘Harry?’
‘In here,’ I shout to Elsa. ‘Come and make love to me.’ I hear the thump of her bag on the tiles in the hall and the clicking of her heels. She must be wearing the black slingbacks she bought last weekend.
‘Drink?’ I swing my feet off the couch before she can complain that I’m wearing my shoes. ‘I’ve just seen Jane Archer …’
No reply.
‘… and she sends her regards to you.’
Still no reply.
‘Elsa? Where are you?’
‘I’m here.’ She’s standing in the shadow beneath the door frame, as perfect as a painting by Vermeer in her grey satin dress and short black cardigan, but I can see that she’s tense, and something is wrong.
‘What? Is it something at work?’
‘No.’
‘You’re cross. With me?’
‘It doesn’t always have to be you, Harry,’ she says, stepping into the room.
‘Right.’ I try to rise but she pushes me back on to the couch.
‘Aaagh! You’re all so stupid,’ she shouts in frustration. ‘Playing your silly games.’ A strand of hair falls in front of her face and she whips it back behind her ear. God, I love her, although it isn’t the time to say so. She spins away to the drinks cabinet and pours four fingers of gin. The tonic’s warm and flat; she doesn’t care. ‘It’s Wright,’ she says, her back still turned to me.
‘Peter Wright?’
‘For God’s sake, Harry, how many others do you know?’ She turns to face me. ‘Sorry.’
‘Come here, will you?’ I take her hand with the gold band I gave her when I promised to love and protect her. ‘Tell me.’
‘Jenifer Hart came to see me. Just turned up at the ministry. That bloody man is making their lives a misery. He’s accused her of giving secrets to the Russians when she was a civil servant and he’s grilled poor Herbert, too: “Did you know your wife was a Communist? Did you tell her about your work with MI5?” She left the Party before the war, Harry, but Wright won’t let it go.’ She takes a swig of gin. ‘They’ve dropped her from her post on the Civil Service Selection Board, and there’s trouble at the university now – rumours. A journalist called Pincher turned up at her college. She’s strong, she can cope, but she’s worried about Phoebe, because Wright and his chum …’
‘Who?’
‘Someone from Special Branch.’
‘Go on.’
‘Phoebe’s in a terrible state. You know how fragile she is, and this pressure …’
‘Where?’
‘She’s in the psychiatric wing at the Middlesex.’ Elsa squeezes my hand and turns to look at me. I want to comfort her, kiss her, but she breaks away as soon as our lips touch. ‘There’s something else. Wright showed Jenifer a list of suspects – the old crowd. I don’t know what she was thinking. She picked out Sir Andy Cohen at the Foreign Office, Arthur Wynn at Technology, Dennis Proctor, permanent secretary at the Ministry of Power, and Floud – Bernard Floud MP. And, Harry … me. She picked out me.’
‘She picked out you. How bloody stupid. Why, annwyl?’
‘I don’t know,’ she says, a little too vehemently. ‘Harry, I’ve nothing to hide, you know that, don’t you? But it’s Phoebe. Jenifer says this may tip her over the edge.’ She squeezes my hand hard, her ring against the knuckle of my little finger. ‘Harry, it might kill her. Can’t you stop it?’
‘Jenifer should have kept her mouth shut.’
‘I know. She knows.’
I kiss her again and stroke her hair. ‘Look, don’t worry.’ I should wait, leave it until the morning. I should leave it altogether. ‘I have to go out. Don’t wait for me. Have a hot bath, then go to bed. We’ll talk again in the morning.’
‘What are you going to do?’
‘There’s someone I must see.’
*
Anthony Blunt’s assistant tells me he’s at dinner and isn’t expected home before eleven, so I unlock the gates to the Portman Square garden with a piece of wire and a pen, select a bench and sink into my coat. My mind is buzzing like a swarm of bees and I’m soaked before I realise it’s raining and have the sense to shelter.
At last a cab draws up in front of the institute and I watch Anthony disappear beneath its porch. I imagine him climbing its fine classical staircase – the finest in London, some say – then kicking off his Italian shoes to sprawl like a spider on his walnut and satin chaise longue. A commissionaire opens the door and tells me it’s too late to disturb the director. I show my police calling card and ‘No, I won’t wait on the step.’
Anthony pads down in his slippers. He looks exhausted, gaunt. The lines that fall in an arch from his nose to his jaw are deeper, as if the year since we last met was closer to ten. ‘Can’t this wait, Harry?’ He glances at his watch.
‘I’m afraid it can’t, Anthony.’
‘But Peter was here only yesterday’ – he passes a hand across his brow – ‘for three hours!’
‘Yes, well, I want to talk to you about that.’
‘All right.’ He sighs. ‘You’d better come up to the flat, then.’
‘Hang on.’ I catch his arm. ‘Is there somewhere else?’
He hesitates. ‘Why on earth …?’ then smiles his effete smile. ‘Oh, but they’re your colleagues, Harry.’
‘That’s right,’ I say, ‘but this is between you and me.’
So he leads me down to the basement and through swing doors into the kitchen and I wait in the darkness while he fumbles for a light switch. At last he finds it and I’m momentarily dazzled by the gleaming stainless-steel surfaces. ‘I do believe this is the first time I’ve set foot in here,’ he says.
‘Spoken like a true socialist.’
‘That’s the sort of snide remark Peter likes to make.’ He leans against a worktop and I hoist myself on to the one opposite. The kitchen’s small but expensively equipped with racks of French knives and top-of-the-range cooking implements. Bright and clinical, like an operating theatre when the blood of the last patient has been washed away.
‘Does Peter talk to you about me?’ He lifts a trembling hand to his temple. ‘I’ve told him all I know but he does insist on coming back. I think he enjoys it, that it’s some sort of therapy for him.’
‘You may be right, Anthony. I expect you know him better than I do.’
‘He can’t understand why we made the choices we did all those years ago. He says we knew nothing of the working class, and he keeps returning to his own life – the time he spent as a farm boy in Scotland. He wants sympathy, and all I want is for him to leave me alone. He can be very mean, you know.’
‘I believe you. But it’s Phoebe Pool I want to talk about, not you.’
Blunt’s misty green eyes drift away from me. ‘Poor Phoebe.’
‘Wright says you used her as a courier. Is that true?’
‘Oh dear.’
‘Is it true?’
‘Not really. She’s never shown any interest in politics. I didn’t get to know her properly until ’forty-seven or ’forty-eight and I’d left MI5 by then.’
‘That’s not what Wright says.’
‘I may have implied she helped out every now and then – the odd message.’
‘Why?’
‘Because Peter kept pressing me.’
‘Looking after number one, were you? You selfish bastard.’
He flinches. ‘Once Peter has an idea a
bout something …’
‘And Proctor? Dennis Proctor, the permanent secretary at Power?’
‘No.’
‘Proctor was your friend, Guy’s friend. Wright says you told him Proctor was a spy.’
‘I said I didn’t think so but I didn’t know.’
‘Phoebe Pool gave Wright Jenifer Hart’s name.’
‘I know.’
‘Who else?’
‘Sir Andrew Cohen.’
‘Who else?’
‘The Floud brothers – the MP, Bernard, and Peter. Peter was a curator at the Victoria and Albert Museum, but he’s dead.’
I slip from the work surface. ‘That’s all?’ I step towards him. ‘No one else from the Courtauld, for instance, or from Pool’s student days at Oxford?’
‘Harry, please.’ He looks at me imploringly. ‘I told him Phoebe wasn’t well, that he should leave her alone.’
‘No one else?’
‘Nothing about you, if that’s—’
‘Shut up – this doesn’t concern me. Friends before country, you said. Well, I don’t want innocent people dragged into this and, Christ, Blunt, nor should you.’
‘Your wife? I’ll do all I can—’
‘You’ve done plenty already,’ I say. ‘Too much.’
He covers his face with his bony hands. ‘Because it’s intolerable,’ I hear him mutter. ‘Wright won’t leave me alone.’
I grab his wrist and pull his hands away. ‘Stop it, Anthony. Stop playing. Stop it! Tell me, who else have you dropped in the shit?’
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