The Red House. Derek Lambert
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ripe fruits of democracy. A patriot, sick of doctrinaire socialism, hesitating on the portals of freedom. Now he was lost for ever.
Walden had decided that Tardovsky was not the man to be courted with gifts, sleek-limbed girls on Delaware beaches, visits to perfect American homes with gentle and obvious persuasion over blueberry pie. So his honest, devious mind had considered other ploys. A doubter from the Soviet Embassy meeting a doubter from the State Department. Together they would renounce the duplicity of both great powers and seek refuge in some snowbound haven in Canada—where all the American trash found bolt-holes. But even if Tardovsky had ended up in Toronto or Montreal the defection would have occurred in the capital of the United States. A highly prestigious landmark on the road to The Final Solution: universal understanding of the Communist (and atheist) myth.
The F.B.I. had been pursuing the scheme energetically. A phoney State Department traitor had been established. Then apparently the C.I.A. had got wind of the stool-pigeon’s double-dealing and, never for one second allowing for the possibility of double, double-dealing, had arranged their own surveillance without confiding their plans.
Result: a fist fight in a men’s room in a dirty movie bar.
Thus, through the offices of bumbling incompetents, did tyranny survive. Thank God the K.G.B. was also served by incompetents who did everything by the book. If only I had the Mafia on my side …
Walden left the gaze of Jefferson, entered the spectrum of Lincoln and watched the children skating on the Reflecting Pool: it was their future he was fighting for. A jet rose heavily from the National Airport, keeping ominously low to restrict its noise, labouring over Lincoln’s Colorado marble shrine of freedom, justice, immortality, fraternity and charity. The qualities he had to preserve.
The grumbling line of traffic on Constitution Avenue opened at a red light and Walden crossed, heading for the State Department where he co-ordinated the various intelligence organizations behind a vague political title. That bum Costello! The heating in the lobby of this throbbing modern building, the laboratory of American influence, escalated his anger—a menacing, inexorable quantity not unlike the lurking hatreds of the intriguing Church dignitaries of history.
Walden summoned to his office that morning the heads of Security and Consular Affairs, Intelligence and Research, and Politico-Military Affairs. Also the deputy heads of the F.B.I. and the C.I.A.
‘Gentlemen,’ said Walden, handing around cigars, ‘a fiasco was perpetrated in our city last night. It is probably not necessary for me to say that, to an extent, we are all responsible.’
The ensuing silence did not imply unqualified agreement.
‘It is our joint responsibility, Goddammit!’ He picked up his pipe. ‘I’m sorry, gentlemen, but I’m disgusted at the way this operation has been handled.’
Jack Godwin from the C.I.A., a shifty egghead in Walden’s opinion, with an irritating habit of detaching morsels of tobacco from the tip of his tongue like a conjurer, ventured an opinion that, as the operation had been Walden’s brainchild, the failure was his responsibility. ‘Just like you would have accepted the plaudits if it’d been a success.’
Walden turned on him. ‘If you had kept me informed of your suspicions this foul-up would never have happened. Surely to Christ the C.I.A. is aware by now that its primary function is overseas intelligence?’
‘Sure we realize that,’ Godwin said. ‘But with practically every foreign country represented in Washington our job begins at home.’
‘You could co-ordinate with the Federal men. You could perhaps trust them to pass on to you any information they think you need.’
Godwin shrugged. ‘How do they know what we need?’
Arnold Hardin from the F.B.I. said, ‘It’s not outside our capabilities.’ A neat, late-middle-aged man, sarcastic and ingenious, as tidy as Godwin was unkempt.
The other three participants from the State Department kept their counsel. A secretary bearing coffee came into the aseptically chic office with its multiple telephones, maps of Moscow indicating the limits within which Americans could move, its photographs of the President, Vice-President and Secretary of State, its small battery of reference books which included The Bible.
The five of them stirred and sipped and waited.
Finally Gale Blair from Security and Consular Affairs said, ‘You shouldn’t take it so hard, Mr Walden. Think of all the successes.’ She was a smart, kindly woman.
They all thought hard.
Crawford from Politico-Military said, ‘The F.B.I. didn’t do too badly when they caught the Czechs trying to bug the office of Eastern European Affairs.’
‘Thank you,’ said Hardin, crossing elegant legs, flicking dust from a polished toecap. ‘But don’t forget to thank Frank Mrkua, the passport courier who made it possible by co-operating with us.’
‘And we should also be thankful to the F.B.I.,’ said Godwin, spilling coffee on his lived-in jacket, ‘for tapping the German Embassy and finding evidence of the Nazi-Soviet pact. In 1939,’ he added, timing it nicely.
Crawford, a diligent and enthusiastic man, said, ‘The F.B.I. also nailed Wennerstrom. They’ve got a whole bevy of defectors in the past couple of years. And what about this guy they caught making a drop under the railway bridge in Queens—he’s helped bust the Soviet network wide open. And the Soviets still think he’s working for them,’ Crawford supplied in case anyone present didn’t know.
‘Maybe he is,’ Godwin grunted.
Hardin sharpened his voice. ‘I sometimes wonder when they come to write the definitive history of the C.I.A. whether they’ll record the occasion when bugs were found inside the eagle the Soviets presented to the American Embassy in Moscow.’
Intelligence and Research spoke for the first time. ‘At least they were found.’ William Bruno, recognized as a shrewd nut; a reputation enhanced by his deep and golden silences. What went on in his Machiavellian mind during those contemplative periods? Bruno, thirty-fiveish with ambassadorial ambitions, was too shrewd a nut to tell anyone.
‘Jesus Christ …’ Godwin began.
Walden cut him short, ‘Let’s get back to the Goddam point before we start on Penkovsky or the U2.’ He stuck his pipe in his mouth. ‘We have to find a substitute for Tardovsky. He’s so scared now he won’t ask an American the way to the john. Any ideas?’ He turned to Hardin. ‘How are the infiltration stakes on 16th?’
Hardin made neat replies. ‘Pretty much the same as usual. A few bugs installed, most of them discovered. It’s tricky when all the manual work is done by Russians and even the cleaning’s done by the wives. But as you know or should know—‘he looked at Godwin—‘most of our approaches are made these days through other embassies. They work through the Cubans or Czechs, we use the Canadians and the British.’
Walden said, ‘But we could do with a good defector with all the inside dope. A name to make a splash like Dotsenko. Another Krotkov. And we need him in the United States, right here in Washington. We need something good and powerful to counter some of the lousy publicity our country has been getting lately. Don’t forget,’ he stared at them individually, ‘that it’s a war we’re fighting here. A war in which nearly the whole world’s involved—114 ambassadors, 2,500 diplomats. It’s a war more important even than World War II because the enemy is more powerful. It’s a war democracy has to win.’ His fingers reached out and touched The Bible.
Gale Blair said she understood perfectly and she was sure she spoke for everyone.
Walden swept on, massaging the greying stubble of his hair, pouring himself a cardboard cup of ice water. ‘The Communists have determined on an all-out bid to penetrate our intelligence agencies, our departments of State and Defence, our technological organizations, Congress itself—and I’m quoting from the forth-coming F.B.I. report Subversion from Abroad. It’s essential that we find a way of penetrating