Inside Enemy (12 page)

‘It’s MI5 I want to talk to. Could you get me the DG? And find out whether he has a secure phone at home.’

‘He does. I’ll call you back on yours when I’ve got him, sir, and put you through.’

‘Thanks, Derek. And let me know if you hear anything more about Frank Heathfield.’ Charles waited. He was still getting used to being called ‘sir’ again, the first time
since he had left the Army many years ago. His predecessor had abolished the practice, insisting that everyone should call him Nigel but Charles had reverted to the old MI6 tradition under which
everyone was on first-name terms with everyone else except when addressing the Chief, who was called ‘sir’ or CSS. Charles favoured it not because it enhanced his importance but because
it emphasised his difference. As Chief he could be friendly but no-one’s friend; it was part of his job to sack or censure people.

‘This is a bit keen, isn’t it? In the office on a Sunday? What can I do for you?’

The secure phone made Michael Dunton sound as if he were shouting in Charles’s ear. ‘You can tell me whether I’m being a paranoid fantasist,’ said Charles. He described
Viktor’s death.

‘Oh Christ.’

‘And now there’s Frank Heathfield, too. Have you heard about that? Our duty officer has it from your duty officer who had it from the police that Frank was murdered in pretty much
the same way but with his wife in the house and at night. Knock on the door, he answered, a single shot – shotgun again – then the sound of a disappearing motorbike. She didn’t
see anything.’

Michael said nothing for a moment. ‘I knew Frank from when I was in CE. Nice man, kind man, very shrewd. You think there’s a connection? Hard to believe there isn’t, but
what?’

‘Peter Tew.’

‘Go on.’

‘Four people were responsible for unmasking Peter: Matthew Abrahams, who died while Peter was in prison, Configure, murdered since Peter’s escape, Frank, ditto. And me.’

‘Jesus. I’d better come in.’

‘No need. Nothing to be done just now, apart from check on the police hunt for him.’

‘I’ll do that and make sure you’re kept informed. The police need to know about this. We’ll raise it at the emergency COFE this afternoon. You know about that,
don’t you?’

‘No.’

‘I did hear they were having trouble getting hold of you. Your mobile was off and no-one seems to know where you live. The meeting’s not about this but there may be a connection. It
was you he confessed to, wasn’t it? Tew, I mean.’

‘Me plus the other two. It was my question that provoked his confession but that was by chance. I wasn’t the main inquisitor. Then we spent the weekend together, he and I, walking
and talking. He told the whole story. Then we handed him in.’

‘Wouldn’t happen like that now. Better watch your step.’

Charles sat for a while, gazing out of the window at the Sunday morning traffic that seemed to manage perfectly without traffic lights. With the computer system down he couldn’t check
whether Peter’s file had been preserved in paper form or whether it had been digitised or, worse, microfilmed.

Not that he needed it to recall Peter’s interrogation, boldly coloured in his memory. A Thursday and Friday were set aside for it in a panelled room in the Carlton Gardens house the Office
then used as a front office, overlooking the Mall and St James’s Park. There was an ancient polished table with three leather-padded captain’s chairs on one side and one on the other.
On the table were a water jug and four glasses, a heavy circular glass ashtray, three white blotting pads with plain notepaper and pencils and several fat, buff, red-striped files. There were no
telephones or screens. On a smaller table to the side, near the stone fireplace, were cups and saucers with a milk jug, tea, coffee, kettle and a plate of custard creams. Embedded in the walls and
ceiling were concealed microphones operated by a button on the underside of the desk. Downstairs, in one of the green brick basement offices which recalled wartime austerity, were two large tape
recorders, two black telephones and a built-in cupboard of radio communications kit. There were four grey metal desks, two with microphones, manned by a man and a woman. They too had tea and
coffee, but plain biscuits.

When Matthew Abrahams, Frank Heathfield and Charles reassembled in the panelled room on the Friday morning the air was still stale with cigarette and pipe smoke from the day before. Smoking,
already discouraged in the office, was not actually banned and Peter Tew was a regular smoker. For most of Thursday he had not smoked but towards the end of the day, when Matthew handed him a paper
from the top red-striped file, he opened the packet of Gauloises he had put on the desk before him not long after they began. The paper was a four-page top-secret report with a distinctive blue
border.

‘Do you remember this report?’ Matthew asked as he pushed it across the desk. ‘And could you explain how the Russians came to have it?’

Peter read quickly and smoked slowly. When he finished he laid the paper on the desk, flicked his ash, sat back and stared at Matthew. ‘What am I supposed to say? Of course I remember it.
I wrote it. It’s one of P24029’s early reports from New York, one of his best. He’s always good on Security Council machinations. I was his case officer at the time. But
I’ve no idea how the Russians got hold of it. Nor how you can be sure they have?’ He raised his eyebrows.

Matthew ignored the question, speaking slowly. ‘What puzzles us, Peter, is how they come to have that copy and not another. Because that is the telegraphic version you sent from New York
station back to the Requirements officer in London. She made one or two stylistic alterations to your text and added a paragraph of R desk comment. It was her version that was circulated to
customers, including the Americans and your own ambassador and other CX readers in New York. But the first version – your own unedited version – was seen by very few people: you, your
head of station, your secretary and the R desk here. And that’s the version the Russians have.’ He paused. Peter said nothing. ‘If you were in our shoes, Peter, confronted by this
problem, where do you think you might start?’

Peter shrugged. ‘I think I would start where you have, with the New York station.’

‘I’m glad you agree.’ Matthew laid one hand on the file. ‘Especially as this is not the only New York station paper that found its way to the Russians.’

‘Although there’s always the R desk. The leak could be from there.’

‘We considered that. But the R desk gets reports from all Western hemisphere stations, none of which is known to have leaked. And the leaks from New York began, we now know, not long after
your arrival and stopped about when you left.’

The only sounds were the traffic on the Mall and the ticking of the oval clock on the mantelpiece. Peter stubbed out his cigarette, staring at Matthew, ignoring Frank and Charles. ‘I do
see you have a problem.’

‘Think, Peter, about what you would do in our position.’ Matthew paused again, then surprised everyone by saying, ‘Meanwhile, I think we should call it a day.’

The Thursday morning had started quite differently. Peter arrived in Carlton Gardens having been told by Personnel in Head Office that some interviews were temporarily relocated due to building
alterations. When he saw who his interviewers were and it was explained that this was an informal board of inquiry seeking his help, he was at first puzzled, then irritated. As they shook hands he
said to Charles, ‘Didn’t know you had security interests. Career move or here for the fun?’

‘I was asked to help out.’

‘Kind of you.’

He faced them with his legs crossed and an expression of polite scepticism. Matthew explained that this was a general inquiry into a leak of information. It was not necessarily related to him
but they hoped he might be able to cast light on the context and on other individuals who might in due course be interviewed. It was not part of any legal proceedings. They then took him through
his career, post by post, seeking his opinions on those he had worked with and issues he had dealt with. Matthew concentrated on subjects he had reported on, Frank Heathfield, with his Cornish
burr, on how he felt the Service treated staff and agents and on his own professional relationships. Charles said nothing.

Peter relaxed as the morning went on, perhaps because he was talking about others rather than himself. They adjourned for lunch on an almost jocular note, with Peter saying, ‘I suppose it
wouldn’t do for me to invite you to join me in the Savile?’ His eyes danced across all three, resting very briefly on Charles. ‘No, I see it wouldn’t. You might be accused
of frivolity. Important to maintain seriousness of purpose.’ He put on an exaggerated frown.

Followed up to Brook Street and the Savile Club, he gave no indication of suspecting surveillance. ‘Perhaps he assumes it,’ said the woman in the basement ops room who was in radio
contact with the team on the ground. ‘They can’t follow him into the club so we’ve got no idea who he might be talking to or ringing from there.’

In the afternoon session Matthew and Frank moved on to Peter’s time in New York, without at that stage referring to the leak from New York station. They did not focus on Peter himself but
sought his opinion on why anyone in MI6 – assuming it was a human source, not technical – might in the post-Cold War era wish to spy for the Russians.

‘It puzzles me,’ said Matthew. ‘The old ideology, the communist ideal that motivated the likes of Philby and co., and George Blake, is busted. The Russians themselves
don’t believe it – never did, really, it was always primarily a Western illusion. The press seems to have taken its place – MI5 had Shayler going public, we had Tomlinson, the
Americans of course Wikileaks and Snowden. But what, in your opinion, could possibly motivate someone to spy for the RIS now?’

Peter twiddled the then unopened Gauloises packet on the desk before him. ‘Anti-Westernism, anti-Americanism in particular, the fact that the Russians still provide an alternative for the
protest vote. Money – they still pay, I imagine? Then there’s admiration for the people, their stoical endurance of suffering and all that sentimental wartime legacy stuff. Then love of
their literature – still a Dostoevsky fan, Charles?’

Charles nodded.

‘But that’s not enough to make Charles spy,’ said Frank.

‘No, but it might help set him on the road. It’s a gradual process, I suppose. I have some sympathy with it.’

‘You do?’

‘Imaginatively speaking.’

‘Then there’s MICE, of course,’ said Matthew. ‘Beloved by the Americans. Money, ideology, compromise, ego. Not bad but something of an oversimplification, I’ve
always thought. What do you think, Peter?’ His tone was gentle and he paused for what seemed a long time but Peter did not respond. ‘What puzzles me, Peter, is what would make someone
in the New York station start spying at that time?’

There was another pause. ‘If they did.’

‘If they did.’

They continued in hypothetical mode for most of the afternoon. Peter agreed that anyone in MI6 who spied for the Russians would know that the consequences for Russian agents he betrayed would be
lengthy imprisonment at best, possibly death. He agreed too that this might weigh heavily on his conscience, that conceivably he might even welcome discovery or the chance to confess, especially if
he had been pressured into spying. But such a person should still be punished, he thought. He should not be excused punishment because he had been put under pressure or because he had confessed.
Questioned several times on this, Peter insisted: however understandable, or for whatever motives, betrayal was wrong. There were always alternatives. The session seemed to Charles more a seminar
on agent motivation that an investigation but that, he realised as Matthew and Frank circled ever lower like leisurely red kites above his native Chiltern hills, was what they wanted.

It was only when Matthew showed him the leaked report that Peter showed signs of tension, not only by taking up his cigarettes at last but in slower, more studied and precise articulation. He
also moved less, as if each movement had to be thought about in advance.

Surveillance covered him to his flat in Marylebone that evening. He stopped only to buy milk and provisions and stayed in all night, receiving two telephone calls and making
none. Matthew, however, rang Charles at home.

‘Tomorrow. Tomorrow we deploy you. We stay in hypothetical mode with me suggesting he was blackmailed into doing it and you suggesting that that would be forgivable reason. He won’t
want your sympathy, he’s too proud, but it might provoke him. We will also imply the possibility of immunity from prosecution in return for a full confession.’

‘Can we offer that?’

‘Of course not. It’s only ever been done with the blessing of the DPP once everybody’s sure there’s no hope of evidence for conviction. So we won’t be offering it.
We’ll be talking about a hypothetical individual and whether it would be right that he should escape prosecution. Our friend has a strongly developed, if somewhat distorted, moral sense.
This, allied with his pride, may tempt him to confess by asserting his superiority of motive.’

‘If he’s got any sense at all he’ll just stonewall. He could walk out and there’s nothing we could do, nothing that would hold up in court.’

‘If he had sense he’d never have done it in the first place. He’d have simply resigned. Then he could have done and said what he wanted, lived as he wanted.’

‘You’re sure he did do it?’

‘Of course I’m sure. There’s no doubt. What we know from your source of what Guk and Wolf said in Vienna, from the FBI about his cottaging in New York and from the CIA that the
Russians have copies of reports he sent is more than enough to nail him in reality, if not in law. We can also now see the pattern in the carpet of his time in New York – initially open about
his dealings with the Russians, all fully reported, then an abrupt stop. Apparent stop. That was when he was recruited. I suspect they discovered his sexual predisposition when he was a student in
Moscow and when he appeared on their radar in New York the SVR residency traced him with Moscow and came up with that useful little nugget. So they exploited it. Not having doubts, are you,
Charles?’