The Dark Chronicles (46 page)

I read the last line several times, my temple throbbing. It seemed this idiot had been incapable of accepting that I might have been telling the truth. I was even more shocked to see that his report had been counter-signed by Stalin himself, who in the margin had even scribbled ‘Иссдедуйте дадее’– ‘Investigate further’. It took me several moments to take it in, and I realized my hands were shaking. After the whole rig marole they had gone through to recruit me, the extraordinary organization and time and resources that must have gone into that operation, after all the meetings in London and the precautions taken, and all the files I had passed over and reports I had written… After all of that, Uncle Joe hadn’t believed I was a genuine double agent! Flicking forward, it wasn’t
until November 1951 – over two years later – that they had finally given me the all clear:

Thinking back, I realized that this coincided with Sasha’s arrival in London. After several frustrating years of intermittent contact, I finally had a regular handler again, and he had pumped me for information in a way Georgi had never done. But, it seemed, to very little purpose. I searched in vain for reports on the operations I had betrayed at that time. It looked like Sasha had decided not to pass any of it on. But why on earth not, if I had been cleared? One reason immediately sprung to mind. Even in the Service, information that inconveniently contradicted a widely held theory – especially if it were also held by a Head of Section – was sometimes skimmed over or quietly dropped for fear of the messenger being shot. It looked like that might literally have been the case for Georgi: a brief note at the top of a file from 1949 explained that he had been classified as an ‘undesirable’. He had been recalled and sent to the gulags, of course – perhaps Sasha didn’t want to make the same mistake.

I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. So it had all been for nought, or as near as dammit. My recruitment and handling hadn’t been some grand game of chess, but a muddle of crossed wires, paranoia and office politics. I’d spent twenty-four years deceiving everyone around me, but it seemed that for several years the men I had thought I was serving hadn’t even been given the information I had obtained, let alone used it.

I straightened up. Did it matter, ultimately, that they had failed to take advantage of the material? Did I really need a tally of my own treachery, a count of the dead men? No. I had done it. I was a traitor, no matter what the cost had been.

But a terrifying thought suddenly occurred to me. The analyst Panov would have vanished from the scene long ago, of course, no doubt sent to the gulags himself for not having tied his shoelaces the right way. But his way of thinking had been accepted for two years, and clearly something of it had survived because it looked like much of the information I’d handed over subsequently still hadn’t been passed up the ladder. What sort of an organization could have allowed that to happen? What if there was a new Panov in Moscow, or a group of them even, and they had decided that my actions in Nigeria proved I’d been a triple agent all along? After all, they had lost two long-serving agents at my hand. Could
that
be why I had been targeted? Yes, of course it bloody could.

I looked at my watch again. I’d been in here nearly an hour already, and Pyotr would soon be boarding a tram on his way back. I took the file and chocolate box and walked over to the desk by the window. There was an old Olivetti typewriter on top of it. I lifted the cover, took a sheet of paper from the drawer and rolled it into the machine. I began typing.

A couple of minutes later I scrolled the paper out, folded it, and placed it in my jacket pocket. I walked back to the bookcase and replaced the chocolate box, then glanced around the flat again, checking that everything was in order, picked my file from the desk, turned off the lights and quietly closed the door behind me.

*

I took the lift back down and thanked the landlady for her assistance. I warned her that I might return with some of my colleagues, but that whatever she did she should give no signal to Signor Valougny that he was under suspicion. She promised heartily to uphold her patriotic duty.

I went back into the bar across the street and asked for the lavatory. The barman pointed down a flight of rickety stairs. Once there, I locked the door and tore each page of my file into strips before feeding it into the bowl. Then I flushed it all away. There
would be copies in Moscow, of course, but this would do for the time being. And there was a strange sense of satisfaction in watching the words dissolve and disappear. A plan of action had started to form in my mind. I went over all the scenarios I thought it could lead to, and decided that, while it was certainly a risk, it was one worth taking. Or perhaps I simply no longer cared.

I went upstairs again and asked if I could use the telephone. The barman looked at me, and nodded his head imperceptibly to the left. I gave him 100
lire
, received two tokens and ten
lire
in change, and walked over to the machine. Severn picked up on the first ring.

‘Where the hell are you? You’ve been gone over three hours, and Zimotti just called to say a body has been discovered in the museum—’

‘It’s Barchetti,’ I said. ‘But I’ve got him. I’ve got the bastard…’

‘Slow down. Got who?’

‘The man who arranged Farraday’s assassination. The head of Arte come Terrore. Barchetti was scared at the meet, insisted I follow him into a dark room at the end of the gallery. But by the time I got in there, someone had already strangled him.’

There was a short silence, and I imagined Severn’s face turning paler.

‘Did you manage to get anything from him at all? What about his European lead?’

‘Nothing. But I saw this chap leaving the museum in a hurry and he looked fishy, so I trailed him and he came running back to a flat in Trastevere. I waited until he left, and broke in. It’s him,’ I said. ‘He’s our man. Call Zimotti and tell him to bring a few of his men around to Viale Trastevere as fast as he can. Then jump in your car and come here yourself. I’m in a bar called’ – I picked up a menu from the top of the telephone set – ‘
La Maddalena
, about halfway up the street. I’ll tell you about it when you get here.’

‘I demand to see a lawyer.’

Zimotti offered him an insincere smile. ‘I’m afraid we can’t extend you that right,
signore
.’

Pyotr glared back with contempt. I didn’t blame him: his flat was suddenly looking rather cramped.

Severn had arrived in his race car fifteen minutes after my call, accompanied by his wife. Hot on their heels had been Zimotti, who had arrived with a couple of black Lancias containing two of his men, nasty-looking brutes in leather jackets and jeans. I had explained the situation in the back of the bar and shown them the note: Severn and Zimotti had glanced at each other in grim acknowledgement. Almost as if on cue, Pyotr had stepped off the tram, walked up the street and unlocked his front door.

And we’d pounced. The landlady had fretted over what the neighbours would think, but one of Zimotti’s men had taken her to one side and explained that she was performing a great service for the republic, and her massive chest had risen with pride at the thought and she had waved us through, almost in tears. Pyotr had been brewing himself a cup of coffee when we’d broken the door down. He’d protested, of course, strenuously and in fluent Italian, but there wasn’t a lot he could do about it: he didn’t have diplomatic cover.

I looked over at Severn, who was standing by the door watching Zimotti at work. ‘Let’s get him,’ was all he had said in the bar. Now
he looked equally calm, but his jaw was clenched tight and he was drumming his fingers against his thighs. He sensed my gaze and looked across at me, then smiled unconvincingly. It sent a shiver through me. Woe betide anyone who got on the wrong side of Severn. For a moment, I almost felt sorry for Pyotr.

Almost.

Sarah Severn was standing next to her husband, smoking her third cigarette since we’d arrived. I wished to God Severn hadn’t brought her along. She was a radio officer; there was no need for her to see any of this. She also seemed to be under the illusion that I’d been some sort of a hero in London, and I didn’t like having to go through this grotesque charade in front of her. But go through it I would, of course.

We’d only been here a few minutes, but the flat was already halfway to a shambles. Zimotti’s men had removed the drawers of the desk and shaken the contents onto the carpet, and they were now attacking the chairs, removing the cushions and tearing off the covers. Pyotr began objecting again and Zimotti pulled him up short, leaning over him and yelling at him to sit down. Pyotr glanced at the heavies and decided to do so.

‘Will someone please tell me what is happening here?’ he said, pouting like a child.

Zimotti smiled. ‘
Va bene
. We are representatives of the Servizio Informazioni Difesa, and we are here because we suspect that you are engaged in activities that may be harmful to the interests of Italy, Great Britain and its allies.’

‘Only them?’ said Pyotr with a sneer.

Zimotti ignored it. ‘Specifically, we suspect that you are involved in terrorist activity, or are in contact with people who are. I am now going to hand you over to this man,’ – he nodded at me – ‘who is a very senior member of British intelligence. He has some questions to put to you.’

I stepped forward.

‘Hello. My name is Paul Dark. Could you tell me yours, please?’

He didn’t answer, just glared dully at me.

‘The quicker you cooperate,’ I said, ‘the quicker we are going to get through this. If you are not involved in the way we think you are, we will soon clear this up and leave you in peace. You can have that coffee you were looking forward to.’

I tried to keep the tone relatively light, and glanced at Zimotti several times while I was talking. I wanted to hook Pyotr into believing that the Italians had somehow caught onto him but that I had engineered my way into handling the situation and was going to extricate him from it. That I was his friend, essentially.

There were a few seconds of silence, and then:

‘Pierre Valougny.’

Hooked.

‘Nationality?’

‘Swiss.’

‘Occupation?’

‘I run a small printing company between here and Geneva.’

Someone had opened a window to let the air in and I walked over to it. The noise of the traffic drifted up. I strained to make out other sounds: birdsong, a dog barking, a fountain trickling in the
piazza
. I turned back to Pyotr.

‘Edoardo Barchetti,’ I said. ‘Recognize the name?’

‘No. I have absolutely no idea what any of this is—’

‘He contacted us recently, concerning a small group he was a member of here: Arte come Terrore.’

No reaction, but there was no reason for there to be, yet.

‘I say “was”. A couple of days ago we learned that members of this group were planning a series of attacks in Europe. I went to meet him a few hours ago at the modern art museum to find out more, but I didn’t get very far. Care to guess why?’

His nose twitched, but his eyes were glued to me. He didn’t know where I was heading, but his instincts were telling him it wasn’t the right way.

‘Because by the time I reached him, Edoardo Barchetti was dead. However, I saw
you
leaving the museum in a hurry, so I followed you here. I’d like to know why you killed him.’

I didn’t like myself for saying the last part, but in a way it was true. He had forced me into it, and now I was going to make him pay the price.

‘I am a printer,’ he said. ‘My company prints art magazines. I was interested in the exhibition—’

‘Is that an attic you have?’ I said, glancing upwards. He made to stand up and I stepped forward and pushed him back down into the chair. I walked over to the bookcase and pulled out the ladder. Zimotti nodded at one of his men and he began climbing up.

I looked back at Pyotr. He was starting to realize the situation. The Italians hadn’t caught onto him; I had framed him. His anger was rising and he was desperately trying to keep a lid on it. He was furious with himself for letting me get the upper hand on him. He’d wanted to play the big man with the compromised agent, and I’d responded by doing the unthinkable and he hadn’t seen it coming. He was holding up well, considering, but I knew that he would go to the ends of the earth to pay me back if I didn’t manage to pull this off. It was him or me now, and if he’d had no problem in blowing my cover earlier, he would now be itching to do it.

There was a noise from upstairs, and I knew the Italian had found the transmitter. A couple of minutes later and it was sitting on the desk, along with the magazines and gallery invitations. Zimotti and Severn both walked over and peered at the untidy-looking heap. Severn started leafing through the notes, his face set.

‘How do you explain these items?’ I said to Pyotr.

‘The money is for emergencies – we Swiss are prudent people, and I always keep some at home, in all currencies.’ He smiled sweetly, almost in recognition of his cleverness.

‘And the transmitter?’

‘I have a passion for amateur radio.’