Here Be Monsters

by Anthony Price

  Her Paul, again. Yet, for another inexplicable reason, she felt impelled to defend him now. ‘You do my Paul less than justice, I rather think. He’s very loyal to you, for a start, David.’

  ‘Loyal?’ He half-spluttered. ‘Loyal?’

  ‘Or … or protective, let’s say.’

  He said nothing for another mile, digesting her indiscretion; which must either have confirmed his guess or confused his certainty; and that seemed to be enough for him, too, for the time being.

  ‘Debrecen -‘ He rubbed both his knees simultaneously ‘—what the unspeakable Hungarian had given them, among other things, was names, Elizabeth. Not the traitors’ names, which he didn’t know … the names of the Russian top brass he’d welcomed, on behalf of Rakosi—he was one of Rakosi’s front-men. Rakosi was the Hungarian top man, Elizabeth.’ He half-apologized for assuming her ignorance of mid-twentieth-century history. ‘Because the Russians couldn’t ship in their top brass, to Debrecen, without going through the motions of trusting Rakosi, who was their front-man. Uh-huh?’ Pause. ‘So he was there with the red carpet, first for Shelepin, and then for Zhurkin, and also for Semichastny—all future KGB bosses, but also all top Komsomol youth leaders. And two of them genuine war heroes—Shelepin was a Hero of the Soviet Union, for his partisan work behind the German lines, and Zhurkin had flown Russian fighters all the way from the Spanish Civil War to Korea—he was a sort of “Red Douglas Bader”, with his tin legs … But they were all real heroes of the people’s revolution—even Semichastny, who was trained as a chemical engineer in the Ukraine—son of an illiterate mill worker, pre-revolutionary, whose umpteen children had all made the grade under the new regime: getting a handshake from them, and a pat on the back, and a “Right trusty and well-beloved” commission—which was to be filed in the archives of Dzerinsky Street, never to see the light of day—all that would have been like being tapped on the shoulder by Her Majesty, and blessed by the Archbishop of Canterbury … Or by the President of the United States—or bussed on each cheek by the President of the Republic—do you see, Elizabeth?’

  Or touched lightly by the Chancellor of the University, and gowned colourfully for excellence? Touched in the remote hope that the twin evils of ignorance and intellectual arrogance might forever be expelled?

  ‘You mean, it was just a morale-raiser?’ She heard her incredulity. ‘All that trouble? And the risk—?’

  ‘Ah … ’ The long legs bent again, and the knees came up for massage. ‘There was another reason—or two reasons … Because there was another name. And, if the Wise Men of Research and Development and the Pentagon had it right, it was the big name—the Name of Power, Elizabeth. Although you’ll never even have heard of it. Because if you punch the name on that wretched Beast of ours the thing will perform its two favourite actions: first, it will not answer your question, but will request your authorization instead; and second, it will sneak on you to the head teacher and master-at-arms, whether you have clearance or not.’ He let go of his knees and smiled at her. ‘But I am a different sort of beast. A human beast, am I. And I spit on the new beast—may it be visited with sudden extreme variations of temperature and floods of water from the sewers, and electronic illnesses hitherto unknown. And, most especially, I spit on the memory of its prophet and servant, Comrade Professor Kryzhanovsky—Kryzhanovsky.’ He pronounced the Name of Power without benefit of Russian sound, syllable by syllable, much as a Russian might have attempted Worcestershire. ‘Vladimir Ivanovitch Kryzhanovsky, Elizabeth.’

  This, again, was the authentic Audley: the Audley whom Paul loved to imagine-as casting himself as one character after another out of his beloved Rudyard Kipling.

  ‘I’ve never heard of him, David,’ she said meekly.

  ‘No, you wouldn’t have done. He’s long dead, thank God. And … hmm … and since it was natural causes maybe we should thank Him, blasphemy or not—‘ He stopped suddenly.

  ‘Yes, David?’

  ‘Hmm … ’ He growled the sound from the back of his throat. ‘I was just thinking that maybe the blighter’s had the laugh over us after all these years. Or, if he hasn’t, he has now, anyway.’

  If this was the authentic Audley, she might get more by letting him simply think aloud than by prodding him with questions. But the miles were slipping away towards their destination, and time with them. ‘Who was he, David?’

  ‘He was a psychologist, and by all accounts a damn good one. Moscow-trained, but cut his teeth in the Ukraine. Which was where he got to know Semichastny—and that was where Semichastny got in with Khrushchev, of course. But we didn’t get a line on him until ‘54, when the Petrovs defected—at least, not a line that put him right in the heart of the KGB reorganization, anyway … But he wasn’t just a psychologist, he was big on the whole new technology scene. Like, he was in on the beginning of the personnel selection in the space programme. One of the first papers of his we got was entitled The Symbiosis of Man and Machine: Future Trends—or something like that.’

  Elizabeth’s chuckle was only half-forced. ‘I can see why you don’t—or didn’t—like him, David. If he was a computer psychologist -‘

  ‘Ah—now that’s just where you’re wrong, Miss Clever-Clogs,’ Audley interrupted her quickly. ‘Or … not quite right, anyway. Because I think he was even more shit-scared of the computer than I am—or of its Fifth Generation, which he foresaw thirty years ago. Although he called it “The Fourth Evolution”—“evolution” was his codename for revolution, which caused him to skate very gingerly and obtusely round its edges, with impenetrable clouds of jargon.’

  A road sign arrested her attention momentarily. They were off the motorway now. The miles had flown, and time had flown with them.

  ‘When the machines start thinking for themselves—what a brave new world it will be,’ murmured Audley. ‘All the right answers supplied without asking! Our old capitalism will be in serious trouble—but his old Marxist/ Leninist-Communism will be a ridiculous, incompetent, irrelevant joke … that’s what he foresaw, I shouldn’t wonder. But he didn’t say so. He was sitting much too pretty for that.’

  The turn-off was only a few miles away. ‘What did he do at Debrecen, this … Kryzhanovsky, David?’

  ‘Season your impatience, Elizabeth. The one thing leads to the other. What Comrade Professor Kry-zan-off-sky saw was the rise of information technology. He was one of their experts on Bletchley Park, he made a study of it. Knew all about Ultra, he did—and said what idiots we were, not to build on it. He’d have made them all Heroes of the British Empire, with special perks and privileges. And kept ‘em all behind the wire for the rest of their lives.’

  ‘David -‘

  ‘Just let me finish, love. What he said—or is reputed to have said, because we’ve never had a sight of the document in which it was said, if there is one—was that as the machines were improved, so human intelligence-gathering of the old-fashioned variety would inevitably be downgraded. And, at the same time, methods of vetting would become more efficient.’ He sniffed. ‘Which is something I’ve yet to see, I must say—but you can’t be right all the time … Anyway, his blueprint for the future was technology at one end of the spectrum—satellites and computers and listening devices, plus a sort of super-GCHQ. Then a much-reduced conventional intelligence force in the field, mostly engaged in surveillance of the homeland—keeping that nice and tidy … with only a minimum of conventional foreign-based agents. But then, right at the other end, the new generation of Kry-zan-off-sky boys and girls, hand-picked in their own countries.’

  She was going to miss the turning for sure. ‘The deep-sleepers, you mean?’

  Audley didn’t answer immediately. ‘Well … that’s what some people thought. But that was pretty much old-hat.’ He fell silent again. ‘It’s possible he had a variation on the old theme.’

  There was a sign way ahead, at the bottom of the long hill they were descending. ‘A variation, David?’

  ‘Yes.’ Another silence. ‘How wo
uld you go about catching a traitor who never betrayed any secrets, Elizabeth?’

  ‘Who never—?’ It wasn’t the right name on the sign. She accelerated angrily. ‘Never betrayed anything?’

  ‘And never communicated with any control. He has no contacts, no drops—nothing. No connection at all, for years. And then only the very occasional, unscheduled, one-sided, one-off word from on-high. And then not to give information, but to do something—or to try not to do something—in the future.’ He looked at her. ‘Like, not being a spy in 10 Downing Street, reporting on the Prime Minister, but being one of her top advisers not reporting on her—just advising her.’ He shrugged slightly. ‘Or, better still, being the Prime Minister.’ Another shrug. ‘Or, say, being Oliver St John Latimer putting David Audley out of business—that would be a famous victory for the other side now, wouldn’t it?’

  There was another sign ahead.

  ‘That’s our turning up ahead, Elizabeth,’ said Audley conversationally. ‘”Fordingwell 5—Little Balscote 8” -we want Fordingwell, the King’s Arms, okay?’

  ‘You don’t mean it—‘ She was surprised at the steadiness of her voice ‘—do you?’

  ‘Huh!’ Audley harumphed scornfully. ‘Tut-tut, Miss Loftus—such lack of confidence in our admirable Deputy-Director! No, of course I don’t mean it. Oliver St John Latimer is a fat, self-satisfied, pen-pushing, button-pressing paperhanger. But, on the one hand, he’s a Clinton appointment from way back, and old Fred never erred. Meaning that he’s done more damage to the KGB in Britain over the years—and real damage, too -than … oh, than almost anyone.’ He grinned at her mischievously. ‘It was merely an illustration. Not that he may not be doing the devil’s work now, no matter how good his intentions. But that’s a minor problem.’

  He knew. But of course he knew. Only now, compared with Debrecen, that certainly was a minor matter. ‘An illustration of Debrecen?’

  ‘Uh-huh. At least, according to the Americans.’ He nodded. ‘Catch ‘em young—choose ‘em well. See ‘em just that once, on the home ground—one by one, with the full treatment, VIP treatment, to reassure ‘em that they’ll always be loved and honoured, even if only in secret—that was rated very important psychologically, since they’d be on their own ever after, right to the grave.’ He craned forward to study the road ahead, which had narrowed almost to single-track as they climbed away from the main road. The Americans were very hot on the psychological aspect of it, once the Comrade Professor’s name had been dropped—whispered in their ear by the Hungarian. Because they’d had their eye on the Comrade Professor for some time.’

  There was something not quite right about what he was saying. ‘The Americans? So what did you think?’

  ‘Oh … I never really went for it. Or not hook, line and sinker, anyway.’ He sat back. ‘Not far now. And I could do with a nice cup of tea and a big plate of sandwiches. It’s a splendid old place, the King’s Arms—you’ll like it, Elizabeth. Good meals, soft beds—good cellar. It’s an old coaching inn. And this evening we’ll meet our contact, who lives a few miles away, just the other side of Balscote.’ He smiled at her. ‘You’ll like him, my dear. He’s a sharp old swine.’

  Damn him! ‘Why didn’t you go for it?’

  ‘Too neat and tidy, in the first place. All the bits fitted too well—in theory. And there was no bloody way of confirming them.’

  ‘You mean, Debrecen had already been closed down—the place?’ As the car breasted the ridge she saw roofs ahead, down below in the next valley, where the coaches had once presumably forded Fordingwell’s stream. ‘Was that because of the Hungarian Rising?’

  ‘No. It was because of the Hungarian’s defection, more like. Plus Old Gorbatov.’ He made a face. ‘But all neat and tidy, like I said.’

  Elizabeth frowned. ‘But didn’t that compromise the whole operation—their defection?’

  ‘You think so?’ He sounded a little scornful. ‘So where should we start our counter-operation, just in case?’

  She slowed down to pass a farm tractor, which had courteously pulled on the verge for her. ‘You had those dates.’

  ‘That’s right—clever Elizabeth!’ He waved at the tractor-driver. ‘Two years before, certain persons—mostly young, or youngish, age not known exactly—certain persons—Anglo-Saxon, or maybe Anglo-American, nationality not known exactly—spent some days abroad in high summer, when half the likely lads in the Western World were stretching their wings: “There’s the haystack, Audley, my lad”, says old Fred Clinton. “Find me some needles”. Phooey!’

  They were among the first houses.

  ‘No computers, remember, Elizabeth. Just one temporary secretary and two researchers was all we could run to. Apart from which, it wasn’t at all the sort of job I’d expected to be doing—sweating over lists of names, and generally having to behave like a grubby divorce investigator.’ He sighed. ‘Delusions of grandeur.’

  ‘But—‘ She had to keep an eye open for the King’s Arms now ‘—it was important, surely—?’

  ‘Ah! Now was it?’ He gestured ahead. ‘It’s a bit further on … The Americans thought so. They had a whole team working on it. But I didn’t -I wasn’t so sure.’

  ‘Why not? If Kryzhanovsky was top brass, David. And Shelepin and the others?’

  ‘Oh yes—all big time stuff.’ He nodded. ‘But we only had the Hungarian’s word for it. Plus old Gorbatov’s dates. But suppose they weren’t on the level—what then, Elizabeth?’

  The road widened suddenly, into a miniature village square, with straggling uneven terraces of houses set back on three sides, and the church on her right, away beyond the churchyard and inevitable war memorial.

  ‘It could have been all pure disinformation, designed to divert us from more important things—as it damn well did, in fact, whatever it was. Over there—‘ He pointed across the square ‘—see the sign?’ , A coaching inn it certainly was, complete with an arched gateway to admit its coaches into a cobbled yard beyond. But there was another farm tractor labouring across her bows, towing a waggonload of baled straw.

  ‘Go under the arch,’ ordered Audley. ‘Or suppose it was half-genuine, eh? Like … if the Hungarian was kosher, so they’d thrown old Gorbatov at us, like a bit of over-ripe beef- strictly expendable, with the wrong dates—how’s that for size?’

  Elizabeth stared at the King’s Arms, computing both ends of the puzzle against its middle. The trouble was, though, it had more than two ends: because, although David was an expert on disinformation tactics, both Eastern and Western (and it was even his contention that every operation should have a disinformation cover built into it as its first line of defense), it was also the case that David was defending himself now against Oliver St John Latimer. So he had a vested interest in debunking Debrecen in 1984, even more than in 1958.

  ‘Go on, Elizabeth—‘ He pointed ahead again ‘—I’m dying for my cup of tea. And my sandwiches. And my pint. In that order, but with very short intervals between.’

  Wisps of straw from the bales lay in the street, and as she stared a faint breath of wind animated them as though they still had life in them.

  Delusions of grandeur, she thought: Audley’s then, back in the 1950s, but perhaps hers now, in the 1980s—and Paul had warned her about that, in so many words, risking his own professional skin in doing so.

  And … all those great names which Audley had casually dropped—great Russian Names of Power from the past, about which she had read during the last two years—Andropov and Ignatiev, Shelepin, Zhurkin and Semichastny—names not really so very different from those ruthless English Elizabethans about whom she had taught her history scholarship sixth formers, almost only the day before yesterday: William Cecil for Yuri Andropov, and Francis Walsingham for Alexander Shelepin—and Sir Thomas Gresham and Archbishop Bancroft, and all the rest of the Tudor sixteenth-century espionage apparat.

  But now she, little stupid Elizabeth Loftus, who had thought herself so clever, was here in her green M
organ outside the King’s Arms, Fordingwell, beside her own private Francis Walsingham, trying to out-think him—what foolishness was this?

  But then Father nodded at her, agreeing with her at last for once!

  ‘Come on!’ said Audley irritably, almost old-maidishly. ‘When you get to my age, young woman—then the creature-comforts begin to matter.’

  She looked at him. ‘If all that’s true—or any of it -then why did Major Parker go to see Squadron Leader Thomas—Dr Thomas? And why did someone push Parker off the Pointe du Hoc?’

  ‘What?’ He hadn’t expected her to bite back. But he was still her own Francis Walsingham, and didn’t like being bitten. ‘Jesus Christ, Elizabeth—you tell me! Or, better still, you ask Major Turnbull—our mysterious, equivocal galloping major—you ask him about the late Mrs Squadron Leader Dr Thomas—‘ He looked at his watch ‘—you ask him that in about fifteen minutes’ time, young woman … And then you ask me the same question—right?’

  She put the Morgan in gear. The square, was wide-open, and there was nothing coming left and right, so she went through the archway trailing an angry, irresponsible zroom, to halt one yard short of a trough of geraniums inside the yard with a jerk which would have put Francis Walsingham through the windscreen if he had not been wearing his seat-belt.

  ‘We’re booked in, I take it?’ If it had been Paul she might have added ‘And in two single rooms?’ But that was one thing she didn’t have to worry about with David Audley, because of his dearly-beloved Faith.

  ‘Yes—‘ He struggled with his safety-belt’—how d’you get this damn thing off?’

  She almost helped him, but then didn’t. If he was so clever he could get himself out of the car, she thought savagely.