The Art of Deception

by The Art of Deception (retail) (epub)

  ‘So who came on Friday night?’

  Two, no three. One came after dinner, for brandy. The first two I’d never seen before. They’re Americans, Latinos, very smoothy, with long, thick, black oiled hair and big belt buckles. I don’t think Anatoli knew them. They were all very tentative.’

  ‘No, he wouldn’t have met them before. It was all set up in a complicated way through third parties. They’re not principals in any case.’

  ‘I could tell. They talked about anything. They tried cars; that was all right for half an hour, but there is a limit. Then they did sport; football. That kept them going through two courses. Every football team in the world: Marseilles, Munich, Moscow, Olympic, Dynamo, Ajax. They were so enthusiastic that they ate. At first they were just picking at their food, rather nervously, but when they started on goal-scoring averages they shovelled it in. I wondered whether I had allowed enough.’

  ‘And what were they like, the two who came for dinner. Not what did they look like, what were they like?’

  ‘But what they look like is what they’re like. They were very similar, not twins, but as if they had been put in the same mould and come out not quite matching. Late thirties, early forties. The smaller one was older and the leader; the other looked at him all the time, to assess his reaction. Little sideways glances.’

  ‘They’re cousins,’ Igor stated. ‘From Colombia. They always do business together. They work for an uncle and he’s developed them as very efficient aides. They are both loyal to him and a check on one another. They work as a team, but he handles them separately, so they’re never tempted to be independent.’

  ‘They wanted to be pleased. And they had the same physique as Anatoli, square and muscled, and I always think people like people who look like them. So they were instinctively prejudiced in his favour.’

  ‘What about the Chinese?’

  ‘You know everything already. Why do you bother to ask me?’

  ‘You thought I’d be surprised?’

  ‘I was surprised. I wasn’t expecting him. He really is Chinese?’

  ‘Of course.’

  Well, he didn’t look like any Chinese I’ve ever met before. He was tall and thin, like you. You see, you’d have got on with him, according to my theory. He didn’t have one of those round jolly Buddha faces. It was a long, flat oval, like a mask with slits cut for his eyes, and the ridge of his nose barely rose from his face, but it was sharp and curving, not flat and squashy.’

  ‘You’re obsessed with appearance, Julian. How did he behave?’

  ‘But don’t you get a sense of him from what I say? I’m trying to give you an impression.’

  ‘OK, go on. Not a cheerful type. Sinister. I’ve got all that. Like me.’

  ‘Yes, so far you’ve understood. He was a groper too, a knee-squeezer and within five minutes of sitting at the table.’

  Igor was caught by this detail. ‘And what do you do with a knee-squeezer? Do you slap his face in the traditional way of outraged virtue?’

  ‘No, I move my knees.’

  ‘Do you tell Anatoli?’ He was genuinely interested, distracted from his main purpose, as if he was not sure what her answer would be.

  ‘No, I tell you.’

  ‘OK, go on.’

  ‘Oh, the Chinese. He arrived when dinner was almost finished and they stopped laughing at once. No more football. He had a brandy, but he didn’t eat anything. No pudding, no fruit, no petits fours. You see, just like you. Then they moved to sit by the fire. They were all drinking brandies, huge glasses, but they sobered up, the more they drank. They didn’t do business, whatever it is. It was all testing. Talks about talks. There was a lot of travel chat. You know, have you been to… Do you know… The best time of the year… Fabulous hotel… Even better. So they’re going to meet again somewhere in the Far East, the Mandarin, the Raffles.’

  ‘And how was Anatoli that evening?’

  ‘What do you mean, how was he? He hasn’t been ill has he?’

  ‘Forget it. There was obviously nothing wrong if you noticed nothing.’

  ‘Can Dyadya travel east to Singapore and Hong Kong?’

  ‘It depends. Hong Kong, no. Singapore, Bali, Phuket, perhaps. Anatoli should take you. You’d enjoy some sunshine. It only ever rains here.’

  ‘Why the Far East?’ Julian asked. Every change she probed to discover what it meant for Anatoli and for herself.

  ‘New routes. Russia doesn’t just face west; it faces east as well. Vladivostok is another world. If s a long way from Moscow there. Dyadya has some let’s call them colleagues there and he’s interested in all kinds of possibilities. In the east they look to Japan, to Hong Kong, to the west coast of America. Cars, for example. In Moscow you only see European cars, but in the east it’s Japanese ones. It’s natural. Not that they buy them. They have the same stolen car scam with Japan that they have in European Russia. You know about it? You’ve got something wrong with your car and you can’t afford to have it fixed, so you make an arrangement to have it stolen. The car disappears to Vladivostok, you claim on your insurance. Everyone’s happy. The system’s so finely developed in Russia that you can order the make, model, colour of your car and they’ll get it for you.’ He was laughing at the classical efficiency of the criminal market and then saw Julian’s face.

  ‘Don’t worry. This isn’t our business. I promise you, Dyadya is a big man and we only do big things. We don’t get involved with car scams, prostitution, protection. Nothing so innocent.’

  Did she know what business was being done between Anatoli and the Latinos and the mask-faced Chinese? She must have known, but refused to understand. She conveyed this to me in the half-stated terms of the stories of her conversations with Igor, of the dinners she gave for Anatoli, which had no point, except for what wasn’t said. She was not supposed to know about what was traded, always referred to as ‘goods’, whether it was aluminium or arms. Even Igor, who explained about the aluminium works, the transport systems, the arms factories that had fallen under Dyadya’s control, did not make explicit what was being negotiated here. But it was clear that her refusal to acknowledge what Anatoli did, was profoundly irritating to him, an irritation that finally burst out one weekend when he was in London.

  * * *

  They went for a walk in Richmond Park, about as far towards the countryside that Julian was prepared to go. The day was fine; they had had an amusing lunch and she began the walk through the park cheerfully, linking her arm in his. So it was all the more strange that things went badly wrong between them so quickly.

  Igor, relaxed by a day with Julian entirely to himself, was unguarded enough to make some criticism of Anatoli.

  ‘Anatoli plays at being the gentleman banker, like the others here. They take on the manners of the aristocrats they’re not.’

  ‘Give it a rest, Igor. Go back to Moscow and join the Communist party. Why shouldn’t he enjoy the money he’s earned in any way he likes and in any company he likes. You don’t have to spend your time here if you don’t want to.’

  Igor seized her arm. ‘I don’t mind how Anatoli spends his time, his money, his life. I just don’t like him to kid himself, or you, that he gets his money like anyone else.’

  ‘He works for it, like anyone else.’

  She turned away from him to end the conversation, to continue the walk, but she was held back by Igor’s thin hand gripping her upper arm so tightly that his thumb nail seemed to pierce the muscle through her soft jacket.

  ‘Anatoli isn’t one of these people; he’s busy corrupting them. You should know what he is doing. He is pretending to be one of them, OK, but he fools himself and you, too, when all the time…’

  Julian pulled away and raced down the hill. Soon she was out of control, slithering on the soft earth, with Igor pounding behind her.

  ‘Stop, Julian. You’ll break an ankle.’ As she reached the turn in the track, Igor caught up with her. He grabbed her hair, holding it in a tail at the nape of her neck, so
that her chin jerked up.

  ‘Who do you think they are, the business associates that Anatoli brings to your dinner table? Do you ever ask yourself about our Latin American friends? Do you think they’re exporters of baby food via Vladivostok?’

  If Julian wanted to know and not to know, Igor wanted to tell and not to tell. He had worked himself sufficiently into a rage to speak and then caution got the better of him. He released her hair and gave her a little push. Without looking back at him, she walked ahead down the path. She could see a dog, a black English cocker, foolishly chasing some birds; a child threw a stick for it. When Igor rejoined her, she knew nothing more would be said that day.

  25

  In only one case did Julian admit to more intimate knowledge of the workings of the Bank. This involved a trip she made with Anatoli and Igor to Istanbul.

  The week before, Anatoli was in London for the weekend, eating breakfast, devouring ham and cold meats with the vigour of someone about to go and play golf who needed to be fortified in advance against the cold and the wind. Julian watched him over the rim of her coffee cup as he put down his fork and wiped his lips under his thick brown moustache.

  ‘Have you ever been to Turkey?’ he asked.

  ‘Turkey? No.’ She had, in fact, hardly travelled at all. She had never liked discomfort, so she had not backpacked as a student. Since then France, Italy or America had been the limit of her journeys, usually for a weekend in a grand hotel.

  ‘I’m going to Istanbul and I thought you might like to come.’

  ‘I should love to. How long for?’

  ‘I’m not sure, a few days. We leave on Tuesday.’

  She knew that whatever the purpose of the visit, it would not be tourism. Anatoli hated sightseeing and could barely be persuaded to glance at St Paul’s from a taxi window. She was his holiday and when he went elsewhere it was only for business. The fact that he had invited her on this trip suggested that he needed some kind of amusement while he was there.

  She looked forward to the visit, but, as Anatoli had no enthusiasm for the project, she guessed that it must be an expedition ordered by the Uzbek, one that Anatoli did not like but could not avoid. Her assessment was confirmed when they arrived at their hotel in the early evening to find Igor sitting in the foyer playing chess on his pocket computer.

  Anatoli was making his way purposefully towards the reception counter.

  ‘There’s Igor, Anatoli. You didn’t say he was coming too.’ As she said Igor’s name she caught sight of Anatoli’s look of surprise, fury and even fear. It was so fleeting that she could convince herself she had not seen it.

  ‘Didn’t I? I must have forgotten to mention it.’ He continued on his way, only raising his hand causally to Igor, as if he had been expecting him.

  Leaving Anatoli to check in, she walked over to Igor. He did not lift his eyes from the little screen.

  ‘Who’s winning?’ she asked. She realised her tone was ingratiating. She had been frightened by Anatoli’s fear.

  ‘I am, of course.’

  ‘Because you handicap the programme.’ She spoke more scornfully this time, to compensate.

  ‘That’s the rule: make sure your opponent can’t win. Then you can’t lose.’

  ‘Put it away, Igor. What are you doing here?’

  ‘I’ve always wanted to see a harem and the finest is to be found at the Topkapi Palace, apparently. Interesting to see how the sultans kept all those women. Polygamy has always seemed to me a rather demanding system for men, quite apart from its unfairness to women. But some people say that women like it. What do you think, Julian?’

  They left him to go to their room. Anatoli was soon busy with the telephone and Julian sat on the sofa with her heels propped on the coffee table, pretending to read her book, trying to work out what was happening. Anatoli had been reluctant to come; he had not expected Igor to be here. Igor must have been sent by the Uzbek to watch Anatoli. The lack of trust between them was nothing new, but Igor’s role was. He had never sided with Dyadya before.

  That night they were joined for dinner by a Russian couple. Igor was not with them. The next morning, however, he made his way through the dining room at breakfast time and came to sit at their table. He carried a guide book which he opened and read at he drank his coffee.

  ‘Santa Sophia, I think, to begin with, don’t you? It seems the obvious place.’ To her astonishment Anatoli made no protest and they set off together.

  Igor and Anatoli had been unanimous in rejecting a guide, and they wandered around the mosque’s emptiness disconsolately. They obediently raised and lowered their eyes, directing their glances to whatever Julian pointed out to them, as she read from the guide book. They were tourists of form, not even very convincing ones, making the visit because this is what every foreigner in Istanbul must do. Only when she was reading a section on the Orthodox Church did Anatoli’s attention sharpen into interest.

  ‘Whatever it is fashionable to say now,’ he commented, ‘the Soviet empire worked well in binding people together with one language and one culture. The Russians united central Asia and freed people from all this…’ He looked disdainfully at the Muslim decoration which overlaid the Christian structure. Igor’s hands were joined behind his back, as if to stop them from involuntarily twitching from nicotine deprivation, or from punching Anatoli.

  ‘Anatoli, don’t give me that nationalistic crap. We brought them all the benefits of civilisation and look how grateful they are.’

  Anatoli faced his partner. ‘Russian rule was a force for good. It gave order and structure and protection. It’s now fashionable to take up western ideas and say it was colonialist exploitation and all that, but people will soon see what the removal of Russian control will mean. They’ll fall apart, all those new states, in political chaos and social backwardness.’

  ‘You’re an old apparatchik, Anatoli.’ He did not speak affectionately.

  ‘You continue to mouth the same old excuses, as if no one had shown you the camps and the corruption.’ He stopped himself, as if there were no point in even beginning the list of the iniquities of the old system. ‘It’s a new world out here. You can’t sit around and regret your lost glories like the old emigres after the Revolution. You’ve got to adapt.’

  Anatoli did not seem particularly annoyed by this outburst. ‘I think I’ve adapted. What about you?’

  There was no further discord that morning, but Julian expected Igor to break away from them as soon as he could. However, he returned with them to the hotel where they had decided to lunch. The meal passed without incident and plans were made to continue their sight-seeing with a visit to the Topkapi Museum that afternoon.

  ‘The museum?’ she said in dismay, looking at Anatoli. He ignored her appeal.

  ‘We thought the museum would be interesting. Then we’ll go to the souk.’ Igor was nodding, as if the programme, pre-set, had been correctly memorised by Anatoli.

  Towards the end of the afternoon they sat down in a cafe to drink cups of sandy, sweet Turkish coffee. Julian unwrapped several little objects she had bought, laying them out on the table for admiration. She caught a glance passing between Igor and Anatoli. Igor’s head barely moved, as he glanced at the backs of two men in leather jackets, sauntering down the alley of the bazaar. This was it, she thought. This explained their uncharacteristic desire to see Santa Sophia and the museum and the bazaar. They were waiting for someone to make contact.

  They waited. Returning, the leather jackets swerved into the cafe, drawing up two more chairs to their table. Julian wondered what the signal had been, and then realised that she was, in all probability, the identifier: a girl in a fur. For it was clear that the men had never met one another before. They shook hands across the table in the awkward fashion of large men in cramped spaces, staring at one another in an assessing manner.

  They had long, lugubrious faces and thick dark moustaches, a seriously projected masculinity. She had time to make this judgement in the disc
oncerted pause in which no one spoke. Then the older of the two men said in Russian, ‘Let’s go.’ The other stood up and said to his companion, ‘The girl?’

  Anatoli was on his feet by now. ‘She comes with us,’ he said.

  They led the way out of the cafe, walking some distance to a side street where they unlocked an elderly Mercedes, untidily tipped on the narrow pavement over the gutter. Julian was placed in the back between Anatoli and Igor so she could see the road in front of them, the endless traffic, the clouds of diesel exhaust. They drove their way to nightfall and she fell asleep. When she woke they were talking quietly in Russian. She kept her eyes closed and concentrated on picking up what was said. She soon realised it was only football. The car slowed, turned and finally halted and when they emerged numbly into the darkness, the air had a sharpness that suggested they were near the sea.

  They were led up the steps of a large house with a Grecian portico and into an entrance hall of a villa of some grandeur. They were expected, a man was waiting for them at the foot of the stairs. He shook hands with Anatoli and Igor and, seeing Julian, shouted over his shoulder, making no effort to greet her. A woman came out of the door behind them and shepherded Julian out of the men’s way.

  She was tall and strongly built, wearing a tightly gathered skirt, reaching to mid-calf, a broad red cummerbund around her waist and on her head a black silk scarf which hid her hair. She held open the door of the room and said, ‘Please, go ahead,’ with the unmistakable accent of Boston. Julian obeyed.

  The room they entered was a curious combination of western and eastern, as if a family of nomads had abandoned their tents and installed themselves in an empty house. The structure was western, but the floor was covered with overlapping rugs, which were also draped over a divan and a chest, the only furniture, pulled up close to the warmth of the logs burning in the fire place. Julian took in her surroundings before looking once again at the woman who had invited her in. She could now see that the clothes were not a traditional costume but more like fancy dress, and had been put together for effect, political as much as aesthetic.