Gentleman Traitor

by Alan Williams

  At four o’clock Cayle went to the travel bureau on the first floor of the Hotel Intourist and collected an envelope with his name typed across the front and containing a first-class sleeper reservation on the Red Arrow Express to Leningrad that night. On his way out he looked into the bar, the two restaurants and the coffee-lounge, to see if there was any sign of Maddox; then took a taxi back to the Aeroflot, where he was told that there had been no messages for him.

  He spent the next three hours drinking tea and Russian beer, and reading a free pamphlet entitled ‘Progressive Culture in the German Democratic Republic’ over a dinner of borscht, pirotchki and beetroot. He also checked every half-hour at the desk to see if Maddox had called. He had not.

  At 9.00 that evening Cayle left the Aeroflot Hotel for the last time; and half an hour later returned to the Hotel Intourist, where he was half-tempted to call Room 1727; but an instinct warned him not to force the pace. Instead, he went to the Beriozka, the foreign currency shop, where he bought a half-litre bottle of Osoboya vodka for the journey. Next to him a group of young Americans were discussing a road accident near the Bolshoi. Cayle gathered that the victim had been a Westerner, killed outright by a hit-and-run driver. He went out to the lobby and asked one of the girls at Reception about it; she said she’d heard something, but did not know the details.

  Ten minutes later, punctually at 9.30, his car arrived. The driver was an old man with a face like broken rock, who drove out into the traffic without looking to left or right. Cayle kept his eyes closed for most of the journey, until they stopped at a low ill-lit building with a damp red slogan draped across the entrance, and a bleak booking-hall littered with cigarette ends and squashed paper cups. A very pretty girl with apple cheeks surrounded by a halo of white fur was licking an ice-cream by the refreshment kiosk. Otherwise there were few people about.

  Cayle’s driver insisted on carrying his case through the barrier, despite the fact that he had a bad leg. The platforms were in the open, covered only by well-trampled snow. The train had not yet arrived. The old man had taken charge of Cayle’s ticket, and after pondering over the reservation slip, began limping up the platform, counting his footsteps aloud to himself; then finally stopped and gave Cayle a steel-toothed grin. Cayle tried to pay him, but he shook his head vigorously and asked for an American cigarette. Cayle gave him a cheroot instead, took one for himself, lit them both, and the two of them stood alone on the platform, puffing in silence.

  Cayle wanted to return to the booking-hall, for a beer and perhaps another look at the pretty girl in the white fur hat; but when he made a move, the old man grabbed his arm and started a garbled speech in Russian in which the words ‘stally mattoo!’ were repeated several times, while he kicked his good leg savagely at the snow. It was only when he mentioned the word ‘futbul’ that Cayle realized he had been talking about Stanley Matthews. He didn’t look like routine KGB material, but he was certainly determined that Cayle should catch the train.

  Cayle threw away the stub of his cheroot and was stamping his feet with cold when he saw the girl in white fur coming down the platform towards them, carrying a large battered suitcase. She stopped a few yards away, sat down on the suitcase and lit a cigarette. A few minutes later there was a low moan and a bright red eye crept towards them out of the darkness.

  The train’s wide-gauge carriages were dark and solid, with wheels of polished iron, windows drawn with white lace curtains, the roofs glistening with fresh snow. It clanked to a halt, and Cayle now saw why the old man had been counting his steps. The door of the first-class compartment, whose number corresponded with the one on Cayle’s reservation slip, had stopped opposite them both.

  Again the old man insisted on lugging his cases aboard, down the varnished corridor to a compartment with four bunks. He checked Cayle’s reservation again, then lifted the lower bunk and was fitting his luggage inside when Cayle saw the girl standing in the corridor outside, holding her suitcase in both hands.

  The old man had straightened up and seized Cayle in a brutal handshake, then turned and pushed past the girl and disappeared down the corridor. Cayle stepped forward and said, ‘Please!’ in Russian. She responded with a bright smile as he took hold of her suitcase, and had begun to carry it along the corridor when she directed him back into the compartment, pointing at the lower bunk opposite his own.

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ she said in English, with an accent so pure that it was almost affected, except for the broad Russian vowels. ‘You are English, yes?’ she added. ‘Or perhaps you are from America?’

  ‘From Australia,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, but that is like English, I think, because you have the same Queen?’ She giggled and threw her white fur hat down on the bunk and began unbuttoning her long woollen coat.

  Cayle helped her off with it, noticing that she was small and plump, with a fringe of dark-brown hair above wide matching eyes. She sat down on the bunk opposite him, smoothed her dress over her knees and said, ‘I am Galina Valisova. I am pleased to meet you.’ They shook hands across the floor, and Cayle told her his name.

  ‘Cay-eel? I have not heard such a name before,’ she said, and stared at the teak and mahogany wall, with the brass fittings and little red lampshades over each bunk. ‘Did you perhaps see The Forsyte Saga on your BBC television?’ she said suddenly.

  ‘I think I saw a couple of episodes,’ Cayle said, slightly confused.

  She nodded. ‘I watched all the episodes except the last one when my mother was sick. They were beautiful and most interesting. Do you smoke?’

  ‘Only these, I’m afraid,’ he said, bringing out his depleted packet of cheroots.

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘Please do not smoke them in here. They make a bad smell.’

  He put them away in his pocket and wondered what the next gambit would be. He decided to take the initiative, and got the bottle of Osoboya vodka out of his case under the bunk. He sat down again and had finished peeling the foil cap off the top of the bottle, when she said, ‘You like vodka?’

  ‘It’s great for the cold,’ he replied, with an uneasy grin. ‘And this is the best vodka in the world.’

  She shook her head, ‘I do not like vodka. It makes people go crazy.’

  He looked at her glumly, wishing he’d bought some Georgian champagne instead. ‘The trouble is, I haven’t got a cork for it,’ he said at last. ‘And I can’t just throw it away, can I?’

  ‘You will drink it all only when I am asleep,’ she said firmly, then unsnapped the catches of the suitcase beside her, and after rummaging under a pile of clothes, pulled out a wad of coarse cotton wool. ‘This is your “quark”!’ she cried gleefully, as she grabbed the bottle out of his hand and screwed a tuft of wool into the neck, then stood up and placed it on the table under the window.

  ‘You know Swir Valta Squat?’ she added suddenly.

  ‘You mean Walter Scott?’

  ‘Yes, Squat.’ She smiled. ‘I do not say it very well?’

  Just then the door slid open and a young man with a thin beard came in carrying a rucksack. He stood for a moment in the doorway studying his ticket and the two upper bunks, then mumbled something in Russian and slung his rucksack on to the bunk above the girl’s head. He was wearing a windjammer over a denim tracksuit with the inverted Y-sign of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament printed in white across his chest.

  The girl was saying, ‘I like very much this Squat. His books are very historic and interesting.’

  The young man said, ‘You both speak English?’

  ‘Yes we do,’ said the girl.

  ‘That’s great. I haven’t spoken English for six weeks. I’m American,’ he added: ‘Don Passmore. Glad to meet you both.’

  ‘I am Galina Valisova,’ the girl said, leaping up and grabbing the American’s limp hand. Cayle just nodded. Galina was now showing Passmore where the step-ladder was, folded under the table.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Passmore, propping it against his bunk and testing it for st
rength. He was very thin. ‘I started off from San Francisco to Yokohama two months ago,’ he added, ‘and got sick in Vladivostok. Acute hepatitis. I was in hospital out there for six weeks. I was real sick.’

  ‘They look after you well in Soviet hospitals,’ said Galina Valisova.

  ‘Yeah, well.’ He started awkwardly up the ladder. ‘I didn’t have to pay anything. Only as soon as I was well enough to get out of bed, they made me help clean up the ward.’ He climbed on to his bunk and began arranging his blankets and pillow. ‘I guess we undress when the train gets started and they turn the lights down?’ he added.

  Galina Valisova laughed. ‘You can undress now. It does not matter.’ As she spoke, the door opened again and a porter struggled in with two large white leather suitcases and a wicker basket covered with a napkin. He was followed by Charles Pol, who was only just able to squeeze through the open door, swathed in soft heavy vicuna. ‘Je m’excuse,’ he muttered, and glanced up at the bunk above Cayle’s. ‘Ah merde!’

  ‘Can I help you?’ Cayle said in French.

  ‘Thank you. It is only that I am not, as you see, very athletic.’ Pol grinned and began to haul off his vicuna coat, while Cayle stood up to let the porter stow the two suitcases under the bunk.

  Reluctantly, because it would place him out of easy reach of Miss Galina Valisova, Cayle surrendered his lower bunk to the Frenchman, who bowed with a creak of silk and thrust out a fat pink hand with fingers like fresh-peeled shrimps. ‘Merci, monsieur! Je suis Charles Pol. Enchanté.’

  ‘I am Barry Cayle,’ Cayle replied, still in French; then added, po-faced: ‘I do not think that you require my passport details?’

  Pol moved his hands in a gesture of Gallic delicacy. ‘No, it is not necessary, Monsieur Cayle. In Moscow one has so few secrets.’ He winked and took Cayle’s arm in a surprisingly firm grip. ‘I regret the inconvenience,’ he murmured.

  ‘It is no matter. I expect I would have slept badly anyway.’

  Pol lifted an eyebrow. ‘You always sleep badly on trains? You should have gone by air, my friend.’

  Cayle smiled: ‘Yes, I should have gone by air. But as you know, Monsieur Pol, it is so much easier to become acquainted on a train than an aeroplane.’

  Pol patted his elbow and said, ‘We will talk later. There will be plenty of time before we reach —’ he chuckled — ‘St Petersburg.’

  Someone came down the corridor clanking a hand-bell. Galina Valisova jumped up and cried, ‘That is the samovar lady! You would like samovar?’ she asked Cayle.

  ‘You have samovar,’ he said, ‘I prefer something stronger.’ He saw her frown disapprovingly, as he unplugged the cotton wool from the vodka bottle and took a swift drink. At the same moment, Passmore’s pale face peered down from the top bunk and he called: ‘Could someone get me a glass of water, please? I feel kinda tired after climbing up here.’

  Galina Valisova nodded and skipped out into the corridor. Cayle offered the Osoboya to Pol who stayed his hand. ‘I have something rather more special, my friend.’ He leant down, almost splitting the back of his jacket, and lifted the napkin off the basket on the floor. Underneath was the slim neck of a magnum of Dom Perignon standing in a vacuumed ice-bucket, with four tulip glasses tucked into the corners.

  Galina Valisova had returned with a steaming glass of tea in a silver filigree holder, and a paper cup of water which she handed up to Passmore. He thanked her with a weary nod and lay back on his pillow. Galina Valisova now saw the champagne and gave a squeak of excitement. ‘It is real champagne? French champagne?’ she cried, and touched both hands together as though in prayer.

  Pol said, ‘It is the only champagne,’ and began easing out the cork.

  Galina Valisova left her tea on the floor, and began jumping up and down in her little seal-skin boots, her plain black dress discreetly concealing her plump calves. Pol popped the cork and caught the froth skilfully in her glass, when there was a jolt and they began to move.

  They touched glasses and drank to the journey ahead. Cayle was watching Galina Valisova carefully, unable to make out whether she spoke French or not. She drank her champagne as though it were lemonade, and Pol gave a little clucking noise like a hen each time he refilled her glass. ‘I should have brought a whole crate!’ he cried. Galina Valisova smiled and drank.

  By the time the overhead light was turned off, the magnum was empty. Galina Valisova was stretched out fully clothed on her bunk, with her face lit up in a circle of pink light from the red-shaded reading lamp. Above her, Passmore was taking advantage of the dark to get undressed. Cayle nodded to Pol, with a glance at the girl, and they both moved out into the corridor.

  ‘Very chic,’ said Cayle.

  ‘You mean the little one?’

  ‘I mean the whole operation. Chic and competent,’ Cayle said, still in French.

  Pol wedged his toes and shoulders against the swaying sides of the corridor. ‘I am pleased that you appreciate it, my friend.’

  ‘Can we speak English?’ said Cayle.

  ‘My English is not good,’ Pol said.

  ‘That’s fine. It’ll give me the advantage.’

  Pol nodded slowly, watching the squares of light rippling across the snow outside. ‘You have many advantages in this country, Monsieur Cayle,’ he said, in English.

  ‘Only I seem to be depending too much on too many people. And none of them are my employers in London.’

  Pol shunted his colossal buttocks down the mahogany wall and gave a noisy belch. ‘Ah, merde! Champagne and whisky — it never agrees with me. One of the great tragedies of life, I find, is that the older one gets, the greater become one’s appetites.’

  ‘When I first got to Moscow,’ said Cayle, ‘someone told me you were a Marxist.’

  Pol giggled: ‘Not a Russian, I hope? No, the Russian authorities have a deep and sensible distrust of Western businessmen with Utopian ideals.’

  ‘It was an Englishman,’ said Cayle; he was watching closely for Pol’s reactions, but found none. ‘Someone I met on the plane from London. It may have been a coincidence. But since then he’s been showing a great deal of interest in me.’

  ‘Interest?’

  ‘He’s been trying to sell me a story. A story that was going to cost my newspaper five thousand dollars.’

  ‘It must be a very good story,’ Pol murmured, ‘or the man is an idiot.’

  ‘You’re in the best position to judge that,’ said Cayle.

  ‘Comment?’ Pol gave him an innocent stare.

  Cayle hesitated; then decided that he owed no special loyalty to Leonard Maddox. ‘The man works for you — or claims to. Little fellow called Maddox.’

  Pol sunk his chin into the voluminous folds of his silk cravat. ‘Did you accept his offer?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I didn’t have the chance. He was supposed to call me this evening at my hotel, and didn’t. He promised to tell me something. Something about a fellow-Englishman living here in Moscow.’ He glanced up and down the corridor. They were alone, except for a man in a vest shaving with an electric razor. ‘An Englishman who could mean bad trouble, Monsieur Pol.’

  ‘Trouble?’

  ‘The man is considered in his own country to be a major criminal. A traitor.’

  ‘Traitor?’ Pol repeated. ‘It is a useless word. Who are the great traitors? Pétain? Salan? De Gaulle? Perhaps your Mister Smith in Rhodesia?’ He gave a massive shrug and stood gripping the brass rail under the window.

  Cayle said nothing.

  ‘Things have been arranged for you in Leningrad,’ Pol went on. ‘There, I promise you, you will find a most amusing story for your newspaper. What is more, it will not cost you a centime.’

  ‘That’s nice of you. But what happens to poor Maddox and his five thousand dollars?’

  ‘Bah! Maddox was an idiot, he was not serious. He was also as bent as a mountain road, though he had his uses, I admit.’

  ‘Was?’ said Cayl
e.

  ‘Quoi?’ Pol was staring out the window, his great body absorbing the rhythm of the train, and Cayle could detect no concern in his face, except that he was sweating.

  ‘You spoke of Maddox in the past tense, Monsieur Pol. What’s happened to him?’

  Pol turned and gave him a quick warning glance. A couple of large men in open shirts were swaying down the corridor towards them, carrying soap and towels. Pol waited until they had struggled past him, then said: ‘My dealings with Monsieur Maddox have always been of a strictly business nature. They are therefore confidential.’

  ‘I think that Maddox was not only trying to peddle information to me — he was also passing it to British Intelligence.’

  ‘You have proof of this?’

  ‘Just an inspired guess. Somehow he found out I was coming to Moscow — or was told by someone — and managed to get a seat on the same plane. He also made it clear that first evening that he knew I’d come over to see Philby.’

  Pol touched a forefinger to his cherry-lips: ‘Sh! Here we talk only of Monsieur Kim. Never his family name, please!’ He leant back and closed his eyes again, his pink domed forehead now bright with sweat. ‘I confess that Monsieur Maddox has been a great problem to me,’ he added. ‘But now the matter is happily terminated.’

  Cayle grinned: ‘Terminated with extreme prejudice?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘It’s a favourite expression of the CIA. It means to “kill somebody”.’

  Pol sighed. ‘You are a very presumptuous man, Monsieur Cayle. But of course, in your profession you are accustomed to making presumptions, no doubt? However, you are also a man who speaks his mind, and fortunately for you, that is something I appreciate. But perhaps I may also offer you a word of advice. It is always wise to temper directness with discretion.’

  ‘Thank you. But I’m going to leave that advice for the moment, and ask you a very indiscreet question.’