The Crossing Read online

  6

  Molody stood looking across the street at the hotel. Somehow it didn’t look like the photographs he had been shown. But it was the right name and the right address: Hotel Latham E. 28th Street. He couldn’t remember what made it seem different and he walked across the road, into the hotel lobby and took the elevator to the seventh floor. And then walked up the stairs to the eighth.

  For a moment he hesitated as he looked at the number on the door. 839. That was the room number all right. And the name on the card was the name he expected—Martin Collins. He looked both ways up the corridor and then pressed the bell.

  The man who opened the door was thin-faced and balding and he recognised him straightaway. He had been shown photographs of the man in Moscow. The man recognised him too, nodded impassively and stood aside to let him in.

  For a moment, after the door was closed, they stood looking at each other. They had never met before or communicated in any way, but they were Russians in a strange, dangerous country and instinctively their arms went round each other and they kissed cheeks like old friends meeting.

  Collins looked at the younger man, his observant eyes taking in the details of his face, his hands still on the young man’s shoulders.

  “How long are you staying in New York, my friend?”

  “As long as necessary, as short as possible.”

  “There are a few people I want you to meet while you are here. They could be useful to you some day if things go wrong over here.”

  “Are you expecting trouble?”

  “No.” Collins smiled. “But after ten years you bear it in mind. Have you eaten today?”

  “Yes, comrade, but I’d appreciate a drink.”

  Collins would have preferred vodka but he always kept to whisky, Jamiesons, to go with his Irish name. He poured them generous glasses before he sat down.

  Molody looked around the large almost empty room. A single bed, a heavy, wooden artist’s easel alongside a small table and a stool and canvases leaning against the walls.

  Molody looked back at his companion. “Does it make you a living?”

  Collins frowned. “It is my living, comrade, I’m an artist. Anything else I forget. My name is Collins, my father was Irish and I’m a New Yorker.” He shrugged. “You have to be convinced. If I don’t believe it why should others believe it? It’s the most important thing you can remember.”

  “You mean having a good cover?”

  “No. I mean never having a cover.” He waved his hand at the room. “This is not cover. This is me. My life. It’s real. Neither you nor anybody else could convince me otherwise. This is reality. If there is anything else then it is a small secret in my mind. Like a married man with a mistress or a man who likes being whipped. Anything else is a small secret vice in the back of my mind. You must work out for yourself what you want to be and then be it. Every minute of every day.” He put down his glass. “What do you want to be?” He smiled. “Fulfil your dreams my friend.”

  Molody laughed. “A millionaire.”

  “So be it, comrade, make money, be a businessman. It’s no more difficult than being an artist. Do it as if that is the only thing you care about. Don’t pretend. Be a tycoon.”

  “Who are the people you want me to meet?”

  “Do you know Jack Sobell?”

  “I don’t know him. I’ve seen his file.”

  “And?”

  “Moscow instructed me to avoid him. He’s under suspicion.”

  “So I understand. But he had two people working for him before he fell out of favour. A married couple. The Cohens. First-class agents. Experienced, disciplined and committed. The man was a teacher here in New York. Had an excellent record, but Moscow moved them from Sobell’s control to another ring that was eventually exposed. When the Rosenbergs were betrayed I managed to warn the Cohens in time for them to go underground. They are intending to go to England. I’ve kept them back so that you could meet them.”

  “Would Moscow approve?”

  Collins smiled. “You are independent now, comrade. It is up to you to decide. All that Moscow wants from you is results. How you get them is up to you. Who you use is up to you. You cut the cord with the Centre when you boarded the ship in Murmansk.”

  “When can I meet them?”

  Collins looked at his watch. “In an hour. You know the zoo in Central Park?”

  “No. But I can find it.”

  “Fine.”

  Collins gave him a password, pointed out the meeting point on a large-scale map and instructions on how he should be contacted again if the chalk mark was on the wall of the toilet at the cinema. He was to check for the mark every day.

  7

  Sir Peter Clark’s office was the only deliberate reminder in the building of their connection with the mandarins of Whitehall and the Foreign Office. Panelled and finished in the highest Civil Service good taste, it acknowledged that the Director-General of MI6 was still a servant of the Foreign Secretary despite his privilege of direct contact with the Prime Minister if he felt it necessary. And “necessary” usually meant when some MP was heading for something worse than a domestic scandal, something that could affect national security. The old-fashioned and rather ornate office was neither typical of the man’s character nor a sign of self-importance but an overt symbol of the D-G’s awareness of his political masters.

  Once a top Civil Servant himself in the Ministry of Defence when it was called more frankly the War Office, Sir Peter knew where the levers of Whitehall lay and how to operate them. Tall and lean, he looked like something out of P.G. Wodehouse but it was totally deceptive. A double-first at Balliol, a blue for boxing and a brain that had won him the respect of both the soldiers and the politicians.

  He looked across at his deputy, Hugh Morton, one of the organisation’s old China hands who had survived the swings and roundabouts of MI6’s turbulent fortunes because he was a wise assessor of both men and situations. Sir Peter pointed at the file that lay on his desk between them.

  “What did you think of that little lot?”

  Morton shrugged. “Looks more like a job for Five and Special Branch to me.”

  “Why? Because Maguire-Barton’s an MP?”

  “Yes.” He had smiled. “And a government MP to boot.”

  “Maybe that’s why Five have suggested that we handle it.”

  “Did they give any reason why they suggested that?”

  “Yes. They see Grushko, the Russian, as the one who really matters. Not Maguire-Barton. They think he’s just a stooge.”

  “I’d agree that Grushko is the one who really matters but I don’t see Maguire-Barton as a stooge. He’s too sly and too ambitious for that.”

  “What’s his rôle then?”

  “Who knows? Agent of influence maybe.”

  “Influence in what area?”

  “We’ll know more when we’ve looked them over. He’s got influence in the House. Cultivates journalists. Appears on chat shows and TV. He’s got plenty of opportunities for pushing the Soviet view either openly or covertly.”

  “Who’ll you get to handle this?”

  “Shapiro.”

  Sir Peter pursed his lips. “Is it important enough for Shapiro to handle?”

  Morton smiled. “You don’t like him do you?”

  Sir Peter shrugged. “Like, maybe not. Admire, yes. He knows the Soviets inside out, but when an MP’s involved I wonder if somebody less obsessed might not be more suitable.” Sir Peter paused. “But I leave it to you.”

  “Any comments on our submission for an increased budget?”

  “Plenty. Most of them unfavourable. The opposition hate our guts and there are plenty on the government side who’d like to cut us down to size. The only consolation I ever have at the budget meetings is that they give Five even more stick than they give us.”

  “Why do you think this is?”

  “It’s a combination of two things in my opinion. It’s popular with the media to denigrate our int
elligence services and on the other hand they’re scared of what we know about them.” He laughed softly. “Of what they think we know about them. When I hear them talking on the budget committee I can hear the skeletons rattling in their cupboards.” He shrugged and stood up slowly. “Thank God it’s only once a year. I don’t mind the criticisms but the sheer hypocrisy angers me.” He paused. “Keep me in touch from time to time about Maguire-Barton.”

  “Is it urgent?”

  “I don’t know, Hughie. We won’t know that until Shapiro and his chaps have found out a bit more.”

  Harris, sitting at his desk, wore a faded blue denim shirt and twill slacks to mark the fact that it was a Saturday morning. Chapman wore a light-weight grey suit and a dark blue cravat instead of a tie. There was some sort of emblem or coat of arms on the cravat. Hand-embroidered.

  “Tell me what you’ve been doing since you came into SIS.” *

  “All the way back?”

  Harris nodded. “It’s not all that way back. But yes.”

  “I did the basic three-month training course and then six months at St. Antony’s on the history of the Soviet Union and the organisation of the KGB and the GRU. I got Beta-minus on both. Then I worked for Lowrey for a few months on surveillance.”

  “What kind of surveillance?”

  “The Oxford Group and Jehovah’s Witnesses.”

  “On your own or with Lowrey?”

  “Both. About half and half.”

  “Go on.”

  “I did surveillance as part of a team on the Czech Embassy and then I did solo on two suspected KGB safe-houses.”

  “Which ones?”

  “The small one in Highgate and one in Kensington.”

  “Who did you report to?”

  “Joe Shapiro.”

  “Tell me about Joe Shapiro. What kind of man do you think he is?”

  “I didn’t really get to know him. He’s a bit high up for me.”

  “You must have got some sort of an impression. What was it?”

  Chapman hesitated. “He won’t be told what I say, will he?”

  Harris raised his eyebrows in obvious disapproval of the question. “No. And I doubt that he’d be interested anyway.”

  “I found him a very strange man. Absolutely dedicated. Any crumb of information about the KGB or the Soviet Union was pounced on as if it might be vitally important. He wanted to know every detail. What they wore. Did they look pleased or unhappy. Had they had their hair cut since I last saw them. If they ate out he expected to know everything they ate.” Chapman smiled uncertainly. “He even said that he wondered if lip-reading ought not to be part of our training.” Chapman paused, hesitating. Then he went on. “He made me feel that he was very like a KGB man himself. More than just dedicated … fanatical.”

  Harris’s face was non-committal. “Go on.”

  “I guess that’s about it. I admire him. His knowledge and his expertise. But … you know, when he was de-briefing me I felt that he got a kick out of knowing every little detail. I’d talked to men who he knew all about. He didn’t seem much concerned that I’d made a cockup of the surveillance or that I’d blown my cover-story.” He hesitated. “I found him a bit odd.”

  “Did they brief you on what you might be doing with me?”

  “No. They said you’d tell me.”

  “Tell me about yourself.”

  Chapman smiled. “I’m sure you’ve checked my ‘P’ file.”

  “Maybe. But you tell me.”

  “I’m thirty next October. I went to Eton and Oxford. Played a bit of tennis. Messed about in France and Germany for a couple of years. Doing odd jobs. Tour agency’s courier and that sort of thing.” He shrugged. “I guess that’s about it.”

  “Tell me about your father.”

  Chapman looked uneasy for the first time. “He runs an engineering outfit in Stafford. He’s pretty good at it.”

  “Why don’t you work for him?”

  Chapman smiled. Rather wanly. “He never asked me to.”

  “Why not? Your brother works for him.”

  Chapman looked away towards the window and when he looked back at Harris he said quietly, “He doesn’t think much of me.”

  “Why not?”

  “I’m not sure. I think he thinks I’m rather feckless, and not commercially minded.”

  “What did he say when you told him you were in SIS?”

  Chapman laughed softly. “He wasn’t impressed. Said it was a bunch of academics and queers.”

  “Sounds quite a charmer.”

  “He had to fight his way up the ladder. He’s not so bad.”

  Harris reached for the two files. “I’ve got them to free an office for you. Number 431, two doors down the corridor. Read these and come and see me at three.”

  When Chapman had left, Harris sat thinking about what Chapman had said. His assessment of Joe Shapiro had been very perceptive for someone who couldn’t know anything about his background. Not that he knew all that much himself.

  And Chapman hadn’t mentioned that his father had a knighthood and he hadn’t mentioned that he was Chairman of Carlson Engineering who employed about eight thousand people and was the biggest firm of its kind in the north Midlands. Maybe it wasn’t modesty, maybe he took it for granted that everyone knew that he was the son of Sir Arthur Chapman, who paused grim-faced for the TV cameras as he walked into some Ministry or harangued some meeting of the CBI on how the country should be run. His donations to the Liberal Party were as acceptable as his membership was frequently an embarrassment. Nobody could understand why he had joined the party when he was so obviously a right-wing Tory in word and deed. But he added a touch of reality to party conferences and committees, and at election times canvassers discovered that his views were shared by many old-fashioned working people. They too thought that taxes were too high and that blacks should go home unless they played for Arsenal or Lancashire County Cricket Club.

  There was one other thing that Chapman had said that registered with Harris, but he didn’t recall it when he was going over their conversation in his mind. But subconsciously it had made him change his attitude to taking on Chapman. He’d at least give him a fair run for his money.

  * * *

  * Secret Intelligence Service (MI6)

  8

  A lot of people thought that Shapiro looked remarkably like Spencer Tracy in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner. His face had the same topography and his hair was white and luxuriant. His eyes too had that same speculative, disbelieving, wary look. Only a handful of people knew what his responsibilities were, and any questions on the subject were treated with evasion or outright condemnation of the questioner for indulging in idle curiosity. But everyone knew that he had been with MI6 for longer than any serving officer could remember. Joe Shapiro was part of the fabric of the organisation. They knew he had been an officer in MI6 well before World War II. And they knew that he had a hand in almost all operations concerning the KGB. But that was all. There were rumours of an unhappy marriage that surfaced from time to time but there was virtually nothing known of his domestic life.

  He was talking on the phone when Harris knocked and came in and Shapiro pointed to one of the chairs in front of his desk. When Shapiro finished talking he hung up and turned to look at Harris.

  “I’ve told Morton that if we’re to do this job properly we’re going to need at least four or five more bodies.”

  “Did he agree?”

  Shapiro shrugged. “He agreed. But that doesn’t mean we’ll get ’em. I gather you’ve taken on young Chapman.”

  “Yes. There wasn’t a great deal of choice.”

  “Any suggestions of how to tackle this thing?”

  “I thought maybe I should cover Grushko and let Chapman cover Maguire-Barton. Until we get more people.”

  “There’s not much in either file that’s of any real use. Gossip column stuff about Maguire-Barton and four or five days of random surveillance of Grushko. But they’ve met on a
dozen or more occasions in the last twelve months. Not always in this country. Two so-called parliamentary visits to Prague, one to Sofia. A trade fair in Dresden and a few sponsored jaunts to East Berlin. Ostensibly exchanges of views on East-West relations and general arms reductions. The usual crap.”

  “How often do you want me to report?”

  “Every day. A written summary every week.”

  “Can I use your secretary?”

  “You’re out of date, laddie. I haven’t had a secretary for two years. Use the pool and if there’s any delay I’ll deal with it. You just let me know.”

  Three days after seeing Shapiro, Harris met Chapman at Victoria Station and they walked together to Harris’s rooms.

  “Tell me what you’ve got.”

  “I’ve divided my time between Maguire-Barton and Grushko. But I haven’t got much.”

  “Tell me about Grushko. I’ll be taking him over myself and you can concentrate on Maguire-Barton.”

  “Grushko’s got a flat off Kensington High Street in Adam and Eve Mews. It’s over a garage where an antique dealer keeps some of his stock. He’s got a special lock on the door and a rather primitive light-cell and an old-fashioned pressure alarm under the mat inside the door. It’s quite a pleasant flat and a woman from the embassy cleans it every other day. A good collection of classical cassettes and a Jap hi-fi. A lot of books. A few Russian but mainly English and American. Novels, poetry, social history. I’ve made a list.”