by Paul Gallico
Relief once more coursed through the heart region of Anatole Pavlovich Agronsky. The feet which for a moment had begun to take on a certain clay texture had now altered and hardened again to pure gold. Mrs Harris was asking for something once more not for herself but for her friend. And, thought Agronsky, if anyone ever deserved such a thing it was this poor, quivering jelly of a woman so completely out of her element.
‘Very well,’ he said. ‘Your friend, Mrs Butterfield, shall have her fur coat.’
Mrs Butterfield pulled herself together now sufficiently to say, ‘Oh, thank you, sir. That’s ever so nice of you but we ain’t really done nuffink to deserve …’ Out of the corner of Mrs Harris’s lips slipped the two words, ‘Shut up’.
Mrs Butterfield shut.
Agronsky looked at his wrist and said, ‘Well, if I’m to produce a passport and visa by eleven tomorrow morning I’d best be about the business.’ To Liz he said, ‘Will you give me your identification card and all of your papers? I shall be needing them.’
Liz looked up in alarm. A Russian without a variety of officially stamped cards and papers upon him or her became an ‘unperson’ who no longer existed.
Ada said, ‘Do wot ’e asks, Liz. I trust ’im.’
The girl arose, opened her handbag and turned over the papers. Anatole Pavlovich Agronsky felt as though he had been knighted. He shook hands with Liz and said, ‘Good luck,’ and with Mrs Butterfield, but with Mrs Harris he leaned over and kissed the side of her wrinkled cheek before he turned and passed out through the door leaving the room highly charged emotionally which Sir Harold felt he’d better break up. He said, ‘Second Act curtain. Intermission, Third Act to come. There are two rooms upstairs where you ladies can make yourselves comfortable, but under no circumstances are you to leave this building or for that matter even show yourselves at a window or approach the door.’
Mrs Harris said, ‘Sir, excuse me, but would it be possible for me to send a cable?’
‘Where to?’
‘Only London. I’ll pay for it.’
‘Yes, yes, of course, Mrs Harris. We’ll be glad to do it for you if you’ll just write it out,’ and he handed her a scratch pad and pen.
Mrs Harris wrote on the pad. The diplomat glanced at it and saw nothing in it which, under the circumstances, did not appear to be quite justified and put it out of his mind with, ‘We’ll send this off immediately for you.’ He had, of course, no idea of the final sacrifice to the ending of a dream that it entailed. What he was really wondering was how the Third Act was going to turn out.
17
The approach and farewell at the departure of British Airways Flight 801 Moscow/London the next midday from the standpoint of Mrs Harris and Mrs Butterfield was everything that could be desired in the way of smoothness, comfort and dispatch. Sir Harold Barry was there to see them off. So was Anatole Pavlovich Agronsky. They carried bouquets of flowers for each of the women. The great airport seemed to be more crowded than ever and Mrs Harris was aware of a curious feeling of undercurrent and excitement but put this down to the wonderful joy and satisfaction she was experiencing at actually having brought off the impossible. She was taking Liz with her out of Russia.
The formidable formalities of departure, examination of papers, immigration, police, customs, all seemed to go with a wave and a nod. Nor did Mrs Harris feel any astonishment that, after they had passed the last barrier and were trooping across the tarmac to the aircraft, both Sir Harold Barry and Agronsky accompanied them. Also, there seemed to be rather a larger contingent than usually boarded an aircraft, and amongst them, mainly men, some very hard-looking customers. The three women mounted the stairs, turned for a moment at the entrance to the plane, waved and received a friendly return from the two diplomats. There were then a great many of these tough-looking characters left over on the ground who were not making the flight and now as the door of the jet slid shut and the engines began their eager-to-be-off whine they all turned and trooped their way back to the airport building.
The aircraft trundled to the top of the runway, poised itself there for a moment and then, as its three giant engines whooped it up, flung itself into the sky.
Curtain to Act Three, Sir Harold thought to himself, took out a handkerchief and caught a few drops of perspiration that were about to drip from his moustache. His heart was filled with affection at that moment for his friend and enemy, Anatole Pavlovich Agronsky, who had kept his word.
This is not to say that all of the Soviet Union might have exploded into civil war from an incident at Sheremetyevo Airport that noon, though many such in past history have been fired by less, but to one extent there is a simplicity to the politics of power. If one side has more muscle than you have you don’t start anything. The KGB had the airport loaded with the force to prevent Lisabeta Nadeshda Borovaskaya from departing the Soviet Union, but the Foreign Office, which the Presidium knew dealt with matters often of the greatest delicacy and secrecy, had a pipeline to the head of the group of special police known as the militia. There were twice as many militiamen at the airport as there were KGB. There was peace. British Airways Moscow/London Flight 801 vanished into the Western sky.
Anyone who failed to share in the reunion of Mr Geoffrey Lockwood and Liz at Heathrow Airport via television, film, radio, newspaper or magazine features got it viva voce from those who had. Somehow, a public relations man had got wind of the impending drama, probably from the telegraph operator, and when Lisabeta Nadeshda Borovaskaya came tripping down the steps of the aircraft and into the waiting arms of Mr Lockwood there was such a popping of flash-bulbs, flaring of television and film floodlights, pushing and crowding and shoving of microphones towards their faces as the old landing field had not seen in years. Microphones registered the cries of joy that went up, film and tape absorbed every tear that flowed not only from the eyes of Liz, Geoffrey, Mrs Harris and Mrs Butterfield, but officials, spectators and even hardened newspapermen as well. One of the finest pictures to result was Mr Lockwood crushing not his lady love but a wizened little old charwoman to his breast and looking down upon her with such an expression of love and happiness and gratitude upon his countenance as had rarely been seen before.
The cortège of happy celebrants moved from the tarmac, where the most touching and exciting pictures resulted, to the VIP lounge. Someone produced lashings of champagne and the celebration of the reunion of two faithful lovers at last united really went into high.
Fortunately no one inquired into the reason for the sudden release of Lisabeta to join her lover in British asylum, but then the Russians were notoriously unpredictable in their behaviour, and one of the unexpected by-products over which Vice Foreign Minister Anatole Pavlovich Agronsky had a considerable chuckle were several fulsome editorials in important British journals praising the Russians for their generosity in this case which would undoubtedly have favourable results upon the détente.
By the time that Lockwood had expressed his gratitude and wonderment to Mrs Harris for the thousandth time, Ada and Violet finally managed to break away, hail a taxi and reach their homes. An hour later they were sitting in Mrs Harris’s flat in Number 5, Willis Gardens, in old comfortable clothes, Ada filled with the richness of the happiness she had created, both slightly tiddly, having their evening cup of tea.
‘I say,’ said Mrs Butterfield, ‘ ’ow did that there Mr Lockwood know Liz was on the plane? I thought ’e was goin’ to ’ave a surprise, you a-knockin’ at ’is door, ’im openin’ it, and there you’d be.’
‘I cabled ’im,’ replied Ada. ‘What I’d had about knockin’ on ’is door was the dream of a silly old woman and enough to give a man who wouldn’t be expectin’ of it a ’eart attack. That would ’ave been nice, wouldn’t it of? “ ’Ere’s your sweetie, Mr Lockwood”, and ’e drops down dead – or,’ and here she paused for a moment – ‘suppose he’d got fed up wif the ’ole bloomin’ business and was entertainin’ a young lady.’
‘Ada,’ said Mrs Butterfield, ‘
you’re wonderful. You always do the right fing, don’t you? It was beautiful. I cried me eyes out.’ Then, ‘Let’s see what’s on the telly since we’ve been away.’
What resulted was the same blizzard as before even though they had had it repaired before their departure. No picture appeared. Instead the screen was streaked with what looked like the heaviest snowfall in the Hebrides. Suddenly Violet Butterfield let out a string of oaths which while printable today are not particularly attractive and ended up with, ‘The bloody barstids!’
Ada looked at her friend in surprise. A television set not working after a repairman had been at it was nothing all that unusual and she said, ‘Why, Vi, whatever … ?’
‘The bloody barstids,’ repeated Violet. ‘They forgot me fur coat. They promised me one. All that there that looks like snow reminded me of it.’
‘Oh dear,’ said Ada. ‘That’s so. In the excitement of leaving and getting away with Liz I never … Oh, Vi, it’s all my fault.’
Violet was immediately up defending her friend. She said, ‘No, it isn’t, and when it comes to it, I wasn’t really expecting to get one. Anyone’s a fool to think they’re goin’ to get anyfink that’s promised. Look ’ere, we got out wif Liz and what’s more we got out wif our lives and sittin’ in that there perlice station I wasn’t so sure if we would.’
‘You were marvellous there,’ Ada praised. ‘The way you let ’em ’ave it. I didn’t know you ’ad it in you.’
‘They got me dander up,’ said Vi, and so as they began to reminisce over the adventure through which they had just passed the evening drew to a close and they went to bed. Next day they were back at their labours.
* * *
Four weeks later Mrs Harris’s doorbell went mad at 8 a.m., and when she opened the door she found Mrs Butterfield on her doorstep trembling and holding a rather outsized and highly official-looking envelope with the crest of the Soviet Embassy upon it. Entering she cried, ‘Ada, I’m frightened. Look wot’s come, delivered by ’and. Do you suppose they’re after me?’
‘Silly,’ said Mrs Harris, her own curiosity highly aroused, ‘why don’t you open it and see?’
They did. There was a card inside which read, ‘His Excellency Valery Zornyn, Ambassador from the USSR to Great Britain, begs the attendance of Mrs Violet Butterfield at the Embassy at 4 o’clock this afternoon.’ At the bottom, handwritten, was a little note, ‘She may if she likes bring her friend, Mrs Harris, with her.’ For the rest there was only the address of the Embassy at Kensington Palace Gardens, w8.
Mrs Butterfield was all atremble. ‘See, I told you so. They’ll take me and send me back there.’
But Mrs Harris who had been studying the card with steadier nerves said, ‘Don’t be stupid, Vi. If they were going to do anything like that they wouldn’t ’ave said I could accompany you. We go.’
In Moscow during l’Affaire Harris-Butterfield, Sir Harold Barry had made a little speech to his opposite number, Anatole, about the vagaries and curiosity of Russian behaviour in which sentimentality and cruelty seemed to alternate. He had spoken the truth. Probably no more strange and mixed-up humans walked the planet. They were capable of the most dreadful horrors and also the most enchanting hospitality and generosity.
It was His Excellency the Russian Ambassador himself, standing by an exquisitely inlaid marquetry table on which reposed a large cardboard box, who made the following little speech: ‘Madam Butterfield, during your visit to our country, the details of which I am not familiar with, I have been given to understand that a promise was made to you. The Russian Government and its people always fulfil their promises and it is therefore with the greatest pleasure that I present you with …’ and here an assistant raised the cover of the cardboard box, a second scrabbled tissue paper out of the way and a third raised from it, fluffed up and spread out, probably the most magnificent rich, brown sable coat ever to have covered the backs of Soviet sables. ‘Allow me to present you with it. You need not worry. There will be no duty or customs difficulties. The coat has entered the country legally as a part of the Soviet Diplomatic Pouch. It is free and clear.’
Pale, shaking with excitement as well as astonishment, Mrs Butterfield was enveloped in the coat and there stood Yogi Bear only twice as huge as though expanded with a bicycle pump. She looked about as impossible as it was for anyone to look wrapped in such an exquisite garment. It was gorgeous, it was heavenly, it was the best ever, but it wasn’t Mrs Butterfield. Ada Harris was too touched at the Russians having remembered their promise, and delivered with such grandeur, to laugh, but she wanted to. It fitted all right. It was Mrs Butterfield’s size, but the nature of the long nap of the fur itself made her look like something that had just toddled away from the Regent’s Park Zoo.
The Ambassador smiled benignly, his job done. The secretary replaced the coat in the box and Mrs Butterfield and Mrs Harris emerged unscathed from the Soviet Embassy.
Unscathed? Hardly. For now it weighed upon them both.
‘Wot’s it worth?’ Violet asked at one of their evening sessions.
‘About ten thousand quid,’ Ada replied.
‘Oh lordy, lordy, we’ll all be robbed and murdered in our beds for it.’
‘Not as long as nobody knows we’ve got it,’ replied Ada.
‘But what am I to do with it? I carn’t wear the bleedin’ fing. It makes me look like a bloody helifant.’
‘Well, not exactly a helifant,’ Ada said, ‘though it does round you out a bit.’
‘ ’Ow am I going to show up at the Paradise Club for cleaning out lavatories, ’andin’ out ’airpins and wipin’ off lipstick wearin’ a ten thousand quid Russian sable coat? I’d better give it back to ’em.’
‘You carn’t. They’d be insulted. We’ve got to fink.’
She went into her thinking pose, chin in hand and suddenly she leaped up and cried, ‘Oh my gawd, what’s ’appened to me brynes, and why didn’t I fink of it before? Except I thought you might be wantin’ to keep it. We flog it.’
‘Flog it?’ said Violet, wide-eyed. ‘Flog it to who? You know we don’t want no questions arsked. ’Oo’s goin’ to give ten thousand quid?’
‘I wouldn’t say exactly ten,’ replied Ada, ‘but near enough. That’s why I say there’s somefink the matter wif me brynes. We sell it privately for a bit less but you’ll ’ave a fortune for your old age. It just came to me mind.’
‘But ’oo?’ queried Mrs Butterfield.
‘Lady Corrison,’ replied Ada.
‘Wot?’ exclaimed Vi. ‘The one ’oos ’usband tried to diddle your election?’
‘Just the type,’ replied Ada. ‘Them kind is always lookin’ for a bargain but it’s the size that matters. I just remembered Lady Corrison is built, well – somewhat along your lines and it would fit ’er perfect. And once when I was doin’ the cleanin’ there I ’eard Lady Corrison badgerin’ ’er ’usband to buy ’er a sable coat and ’im sayin’ ’e’d be ’anged if ’e’d put out nine or ten thousand quid for a bit of hide. But if we let ’em ’ave it as a bargain ’e might soon enough think different. We could let ’er ’ave it for seven. She could work ’er ’usband for that. You buys your musquash coat at Arding and Hobbs, the best one they got, and puts the rest into stocks and shares or better still you pays off the mortgage on yer ’ouse and never ’ave another worry for the rest of yer life.’
‘Oh lordy,’ said Mrs Butterfield, practically overcome. ‘Do you fink she would? ’Ow would she explain?’
‘Explain, nuffink,’ said Ada. ‘You ’eard the Ambassador say the coat come in all regular and legal and if there was any kind of a fiddle needed, Sir Wilmot Corrison’s the man to do it. ’E’s an expert. It’s as good as done.’
‘Ada,’ said Vi, ‘I don’t know what in the world I would do wifout you or what I could do to thank you if you could manage to get the fing out of me ’ouse at even ’arf the price.’
But she did know in one way how to thank her friend who managed to squeeze £6,500 out of t
he Corrisons for the exchange and before another day had passed Mrs Butterfield was proud and happy in her musquash coat and the rest, or almost the rest, of the money safely stowed away. For one evening, a week or so later, returning home from her labours to her living-room, Mrs Harris found to her surprise and ecstatic delight that the old television set was gone and in its place in a stately cabinet reposed a magnificent, giant screen £450 colour television set. A moment later Mrs Butterfield appeared and was hugged and kissed and given the rounds of ‘You shouldn’t have done it,’ ‘Oh, Vi, isn’t it beautiful?’ ‘But, you spent so much money on it,’ ‘I ain’t never been so thrilled in me life,’ ‘You carn’t know ’ow much I’ve wanted one, but how on earth did you get it in ’ere?’
‘I nipped yer spare key last night,’ Mrs Butterfield replied. Then with moist kisses and hugs added, ‘We’ll both enjoy it, dearie, and you ’ad it comin’ to you. If it ’adn’t been for you I’d never of got me musquash and all that money in the bank. Let’s try it. The ’Umbolt Family is coming on now on ITV. The other programme is just finished.’
‘Loverly,’ echoed Mrs Harris, ‘I’m dyin’ to see it work. Which button do you push? ’Ere, this one, I s’pose. It says “ON”.’ She pushed it and the voice spoke before the picture and was saying, ‘British Airways Special Tour contest just for you.’
Then the picture, in glorious colour, bloomed on to the screen and as the two women stared unbelieving, they were back in Red Square, the Kremlin, St Basil’s, a glimpse of the great cannon and bell and over it the plummy voice announcing, ‘British Airways package holiday tours offer YOU a chance to win two free tickets for five days in glorious Moscow. Send to British Airways, Heathrow Airport, for our brochure, fill in the coupon and post it to us and you may be the lucky one. Or, for further information, telephone 231–6633 and make sure of this opportunity for this magnificent prize.’