Bearpit

by Brian Freemantle

  Yuri planned for it to be dark by the time he reached 53rd Street, which had the benefit of concealment but the disadvantage of enveloping the interior lobby in complete blackness. He groped out, locating the time switch, and was actually inserting the first of the apartment keys into its separate lock when the voice said: ‘Hi!’

  The surprise grunted from Yuri as he jerked around, seeing the girl.

  ‘I made you jump,’ she laughed. ‘I’m sorry.’

  She had, and it irritated Yuri. Not because it was so immediately obvious that he’d been startled but that he had been unaware of her, so close: his training was supposed to make that impossible. Automatically he looked down, seeing the rubber-soled training shoes visible beneath the cuffs of some sort of baggy trousers. Still no excuse. He said: ‘You certainly did.’

  ‘So you’re one of our mysterious writers, coming and going like ships in the night!’

  ‘I’m moving around on assignment, yes,’ agreed Yuri. Who the hell was she! And how did she know the cover by which he was using the apartment? She had not been behind him in the street: he was sure she hadn’t. But then he’d not been conscious of her when she was directly behind him. Writers, she’d said: more than one. How did she know more than one person used it? He said: ‘You live here?’

  She thrust her hand out and said: ‘Caroline Dixon. I’ve got the apartment directly above yours …’

  His door open and he clicked on the light. She looked beyond him, into the room and said: ‘… and it’s identical.’

  Yuri remained in the doorway, his uncertainty a comparison to her smiling self-assurance. Becoming involved with anyone in the apartment block was positively precluded, for every obvious reason. But to shut the door in her face risked her becoming curious as well as affronted. Mysterious, she’d said. So she was already curious. Yuri took the offered hand and said: ‘Bell, William Bell.’

  ‘Bill? Or William?’

  Before he could reply the time switch went off, plunging the hallway into darkness. Positively forbidden, he thought. Despite which he said: ‘Why not come in for a drink?’

  ‘It’s really too late to jog anyway,’ she accepted, at once. ‘So what is it?’

  ‘William,’ said Yuri, donning the false persona as he would put on a familiar jacket. ‘I guess it sticks from having the name on the articles in the magazines.’ He gestured to the table, realizing as he did so that uppermost were the hard and soft porn publications he’d carefully arranged as a warning if the apartment were entered in his absence.

  ‘You write for skin mags!’

  ‘No,’ he said quickly, hot with discomfort. He collected up Hustler and Penthouse and Playboy and said: ‘It’s a company apartment. These were left over by someone else. Not mine.’

  ‘It’s not a crime to read them,’ she grinned, aware of his embarrassment.

  Yuri was aware of it too. He was surprised, because it was strange that he should be, but not unhappy, because it might be the sort of reaction she would expect. Forbidden though such encounters might be, Yuri realized that the soft-walking Caroline Dixon, whose jog-suit top bulged most interestingly, would be a useful and necessary test, like all the others he had set himself. At the United Nations he was identifiably Russian, at the Washington lecture he had been identifiably Russian, and during the flight to and from the Soviet Union William Bell had been nothing more than a false name to which he responded. Which made this the first time he had been in any sort of situation where he really had to be William Bell: to act out a passing social encounter without for one second it appearing to be an act, to avoid the silly, small mistakes that he’d been taught were invariably those which lead to discovery. He picked up the Dutch magazine and said: ‘I work for this. Travel. Nature stuff. That sort of thing.’

  Politely she took them and Yuri studied her more closely as she flicked through. Sufficiently confident to confront a stranger without any make-up, her face actually shiny, the blonde hair he guessed to be about shoulder length caught up under some wrap-around band. She looked as if she really had been setting out to jog. She smiled up and said: ‘I can only just detect it.’

  ‘Detect it?’

  ‘The accent,’ said the girl.

  Definitely a useful test, Yuri decided, feeling the apprehension rise. He said: ‘I didn’t think I had one.’

  ‘It’s hardly discernible,’ she said. ‘You’re not offended?’

  ‘Of course not,’ he said. The training schools would be, though. Quickly he added: ‘I’m not getting you that drink, am I?’

  ‘You got anything else?’

  The query seemed a pointed one and he didn’t know how to respond: he felt the perspiration forming along his back, glueing his shirt, and hoped it was not showing on his face. He said: ‘I’ve been on the road for quite a while. I need to get things in.’

  She said: ‘I thought you might carry but then I guess it could be difficult, in and out of airports.’

  Yuri was baffled by the conversation, the apprehension lumping in his stomach. What did carry mean? Floundering, he said: ‘I will try to be more prepared next time,’ and she picked him up at once and said, coquettish and enjoying his discomfort, ‘Next time so soon!’ and Yuri recognized he was floundering more than he realized. This had been a ridiculous experiment, contravening every rule and instruction, and he had a stomach-wrenching awareness that the ice beneath his feet was thin and melting. Melting fast. He decided to utilize the embarrassment she was enjoying, adopting the pose of the hapless and ingenuous innocent. He said: ‘So what can I get you?’

  ‘I’ve got some,’ said the woman. ‘It’ll take me a minute.’

  She was gone without any further explanation, leaving the door ajar, and almost at once Yuri thought he heard her go into her own apartment. Only a minute, she’d said. He wanted more than a minute: he wanted … what did he want? Yuri realized the ice was sagging, about to give way: and there was a very real danger of his disappearing over his head into the cold water of suspicion. So what about all the lectures from the supposed experts, the precautions against just such a thing happening? Apart from the slight accent not their fault, he answered himself rationally. The training had been to infiltrate and assimilate gradually. But in his conceit – the conceit he had imagined he’d lost – he had not thought he needed any infiltration or assimilation to be gradual: that he knew it all. Not just a spoiled brat but an over-sure, conceited one as well. But with a separation. There had not been any personal danger in being spoiled, as a kid. But he was no longer a kid and no longer under his father’s protection in Moscow and he feared there was a very real danger of his being caught out in his encounter with this discomforting woman.

  When she re-entered the apartment Yuri saw that Caroline had taken down her hair, which did reach to her shoulders, and only bothered with the minimal amount of make-up, just a suggestion of lipstick. She held out her hand and he saw the kit and Yuri felt the pop of relief at his belated understanding. It still should not have taken him so long, so maybe the training school were to blame.

  ‘I don’t,’ he said.

  ‘You tried it?’

  ‘Sure,’ he lied.

  ‘Why not, then?’

  ‘Just doesn’t do enough for me.’

  ‘It does enough for everybody.’

  ‘Not me.’

  ‘Mind if I do?’

  ‘Go ahead.’

  Yuri appeared to concentrate upon preparing his drink, busying himself with getting ice into a bucket and then making his choice of liquor, all the time intent as the woman chopped the lumps out of the tiny pile and from it made ready her line with the razor’s edge. Balancing his most recent thought, Yuri supposed there were some things never to be learned at a spy college. He hoped the accent would flatten out with his constant exposure and use of English.

  ‘You sure?’ she said.

  ‘Positive.’

  She took a thin metal tube from its fastenings in her case, which was chamois, blocked
off her left nostril to inhale half the line and then changed, gently breathing out between times, to complete the line in her right nostril. Almost at once she said: ‘Whee!’

  Caroline was pressed back into the chair more directly in front of the ineffectual television, her eyes closed, but as Yuri carried his drink – Wild Turkey again, which he’d taken without interest or particular choice – to the adjoining seat she opened them and smiled at him. She appeared bright and alert, not soporific as he thought she might have been: more gaps in the training. Anxious to settle other uncertainties, he said: ‘How did you know I was one of the mysterious writers?’

  ‘Everyone knows,’ she said.

  The concern settled deeper in Yuri’s stomach. ‘It’s hardly a big deal,’ he suggested, pleased with the way the sentence formed.

  ‘No big deal at all,’ she agreed. ‘Someone learned from the janitor that a Dutch publishing house were the leaseholders. I’ve only been here two years but there’s been quite a few of you guys through: the one before you was a miserable bastard, ignored everybody …’ She looked across at the rearranged magazines. ‘Just imagine what he got up to in here with that stuff!’

  Yuri gauged it to be the normal sort of gossip, within an apartment block like this, but it would unquestionably require a warning to Moscow. Disconcerted though he had been – and could still easily be again – it definitely had not been a mistake to invite her in. Sat as she was, the sweatshirt was tighter, emphasizing her figure: he guessed her tits were easily as good as Inya’s. He said: ‘That’s the problem. We’re moving around so much there’s rarely the chance to be friendly.’

  ‘You’re being friendly,’ she said archly.

  ‘I’m glad we met,’ said Yuri, with mixed feeling.

  ‘So am I,’ she said.

  A silence developed and Yuri didn’t want silence, he wanted to know what else was gossiped knowledge within the block. Calling upon his legend and his early concentration on American morning television he said: ‘I’ve just finished an assignment in Yellowstone Park. Never saw Yogi once.’

  ‘I’d be interested to read some of your stuff some time.’

  So would I, thought Yuri. He said: ‘You get to know any of the other guys?’

  Caroline shook her head. ‘That’s what makes this apartment so interesting: a place of strangers.’

  Too much curiosity, thought Yuri at once. ‘Not any more,’ he said, to carry the conversation on.

  ‘Do you want to know something?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I hid,’ admitted the woman. ‘When I heard the door open downstairs and the hall light went on I actually hung back on the stairs hoping it was someone from this apartment.’

  ‘Why?’

  She shrugged and said: ‘Just because.’

  The idiom didn’t mean anything to him but Yuri decided against challenging it. A safe house with a nosy neighbour living directly above (the smallest of drills, the most imperceptible microphone or lens) hardly qualified for the description of safe house. Except that the microphone or lens would hardly capture anything embarrassing, unless it focused on the lavatory where Granov hunched over his magazines. He said: ‘What would you have done if it had been the miserable bastard before me?’

  ‘Probably still said hello.’

  Would Granov have been crept up upon so easily? That he hadn’t detected her still irritated Yuri. Time for curiosity of his own. He said: ‘We’re spending a lot of time talking about mysterious writers, who aren’t really mysterious at all. Just hacks. How does Caroline Dixon earn a living?’

  She was in advertising, actually on Madison Avenue, completely responsible for five accounts and senior consultant on an additional four. ‘You know the ad where the plants don’t get fed the proper fertilizer so they all pull up their roots and walk to the next-door garden?’

  ‘No,’ said Yuri blankly. It would be necessary to confirm that Caroline Dixon did work for the Madison Avenue agency and was responsible for some nonsense involving walking plants. And not just a Caroline Dixon: this Caroline Dixon.

  She seemed disappointed. ‘I got nominated for an award for it.’

  ‘I’ll watch out for it,’ promised Yuri.

  ‘You’re going to be here a while then?’

  Yuri was instantly cautious, unsure of an answer sufficient to account for his infrequent use of the place. He said: ‘Away tomorrow. I don’t know for how long. But I’m assigned to America for the moment, so this is going to be my base.’

  ‘It’ll be nice, knowing my neighbour at last.’

  Was the ice beginning to creak again, for different reasons? What real, positive danger was there? No schooling, no matter how intense, could properly equip him undetectably to mix as he was mixing now into the sort of Western environment in which he had to merge if he were to survive. Surely more advantage than danger, then? And he was sure those breasts would be spectacular. He said: ‘Are you in any hurry to go anywhere?’

  ‘No,’ she said at once, almost too quickly.

  ‘I’ve only just got back, so there’s nothing in,’ he apologized. ‘We could go out to eat, if you’d like.’

  She smiled and said: ‘I think I’d like that very much …’ She looked down at her jogging outfit and said: ‘I’ll need fifteen minutes.’

  ‘Take as long as you like.’

  Before she returned Yuri unpacked his carry-on case and positioned the William Bell passport again in such a way that he would know if it were tampered with while he was out of the apartment. This time he rearranged the magazines with the Dutch publications uppermost, in a recognizable way, but left the other signals as he had set them before. Finished, he considered another Wild Turkey and decided against it. The effect of the cocaine upon Caroline had not been as he expected; there had appeared no loss of control or lack of awareness at all: the opposite, in fact.

  She wore pumps and jeans and a tighter sweater that confirmed Yuri’s impression, with a short jerkin jacket over it, and her hair was held back by a simple band. She still had not bothered with anything more than lipstick. ‘Didn’t need fifteen minutes,’ she said. ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘I don’t know Manhattan particularly well,’ he said. There was protection is playing the role of a stranger and it would not be a difficult part.

  ‘My choice?’

  ‘Your choice.’

  In the street outside Caroline slipped her arm familiarly through his and although it surprised him he gave no reaction, actually cupping his hand over hers. Were all women in the West as immediately friendly as this? On Second Avenue she hailed the cab and he heard ‘Brooklyn’, but no more, so when he was inside he said: ‘Where are you taking me?’

  ‘Tourist stuff,’ she said.

  Utilizing her earlier friendliness, Yuri put his arm along the back of the seat behind her, the movement enabling him to check through the back window for any pursuit. He didn’t detect any but the road was thick with vehicles so it was impossible to be completely sure: certainly the taxi appeared a genuine vehicle, not some counter-intelligence mock-up. Caroline maintained a constant babble of conversation, pointing out landmarks, insisting he lean forward for a better view of the skyscraper when they went by the United Nations, which he did in apparent straight-faced interest.

  ‘Costs millions and is complete crap,’ judged the woman. ‘Just a lot of supposed diplomats living tax free of the fat of the land telling countries to stop fighting each other and being given the straight middle finger in reply.’

  What did ‘supposed’ mean? Thinking of his own country’s use of the organization, Yuri said: ‘It must serve some purpose.’

  ‘Yet to be discovered,’ Caroline insisted.

  When the car started to cross the bridge, Yuri said: ‘We’re going to eat in Brooklyn?’

  ‘Wait,’ she insisted.

  The driver was unsure so she leaned forward to give directions before they left the bridge, gesturing for the immediate right turn, which again enabled
Yuri to look back. There was still no indication of any following vehicle but the packed road made it as difficult as before to be sure.

  ‘The River Café,’ she announced when the car stopped. ‘Recognize anything?’

  ‘Not at once,’ said Yuri doubtfully.

  ‘Better inside,’ she said.

  Yuri followed her into the restaurant, intent on everything around him, straining for the recognition she apparently expected but unable to find it.

  ‘There!’ she announced, when they reached the bar.

  Yuri looked across the river to the illuminated skyline of Manhattan, at once relieved and then thankful at last for the training-school videos and the television. ‘The famous view,’ he said.

  ‘Isn’t it great!’

  ‘Terrific,’ agreed Yuri. Caroline had to be too ingenuous to be any sort of counter-intelligence plant!

  ‘Just the beginning,’ she said.

  He imagined they were going to eat there but she said they’d only come to drink, matching him martini for martini and then guiding the new cab driver back across the bridge and downtown to a Mexican café in Greenwich Village, which was an area of the city he had not explored. Ordering nearly became a problem because Caroline announced she would defer to an experienced travel writer: he recognized tacos and chilli on the menu and chose for both of them and was lucky, too, with Margueritas, which she declared to be a drink she liked. Yuri was confident she had not detected his hesitation. Caroline continued to lead the conversation and Yuri was happy to let her: it gave him the opportunity to study her, seeking the slightest hint to warn him that she was part of some entrapment operation. She talked of a San Francisco upbringing and of a Berkeley education and a marriage that lasted two years (‘we woke up one day and couldn’t understand why we’d done it in the first place; we send each other Christmas cards’) and of coming to New York to make a clean break and of loving advertising (‘you sure you haven’t seen the advert with the walking plants!’) and slowly Yuri began to relax. He offered scraps of his carefully prepared legend, improvising a Dutch father for his English mother to account for the newly discovered accent and of never having had time to get married, aware as he talked of Belov’s wisdom in choosing a European background to account easily for any further slight mistakes he might make.