Secret Kingdom (15 page)

He’d passed the postbox in Weiner Leo Street three days running but there was nothing on it, no sign at all. He was worried, but it wasn’t a crisis. Vardas had been late before but he’d always delivered, he could rely on him for that. On the fourth day, as he was driving Christine to the embassy for the ambassador’s birthday party, he saw the double chalk mark, two horizontal lines meaning ‘meeting urgent’ – not the sign he wanted, the single line that meant ‘delivery ready’. He looked at his watch. Half past six. He’d have to get away from the party by seven-thirty if he was to make the first emergency meeting point by eight. If he missed that the next was at midnight.

Archie Randall was at the door of the Counting Room, ‘counting everybody in’, he said with a rousing laugh. The embassy was housed in a building that had been built a hundred years before for a British bank. Over the door to each room was a plaster plaque, its fine lettering, entwined with vine leaves, announcing the function of the room.

‘Good to see you, Bobby.’ A quick handshake. ‘Christine, how are you?’ A light kiss. ‘Go on in, you know everyone. Make yourself at home. Rachel’s in there somewhere.’

The room was not crowded. Small groups, departments clinging to each other, stood around with glasses of wine while Hungarian waiters with brilliantined hair and white aprons moved among them with trays. Randall’s celebrations of his birthday and Christmas always heralded an exercise in democracy which the ambassador ignored for the rest of the year. ‘Get the chaps to mix a bit, break down the social barriers, rustle up some
esprit
de
corps,
that’s what it’s about, isn’t it?’

It never worked. Nothing Randall could do dispelled the chill air
of embarrassment as twice a year he conducted his social experiment, mixing chauffeurs with counsellors, cooks with First Secretaries, the administrative staff with the executive. If he knew of the derision such an exercise created, he ignored it.

‘Come and meet my new man,’ Martineau said. He had spotted Hart refilling his glass. ‘You’ll like him.’

It was the only introduction among the familiar greetings, the only new face. Christine, knowing her duty, smiled graciously and asked how Hart was enjoying Budapest. Wasn’t it a lovely city? But so hot in summer. Did Hart manage to get away for weekends? They were lucky, Bobby’d found a place above Lake Balaton, so much cooler up in the hills, wasn’t it, darling? Turning to Martineau and touching his arm. He must come and stay. Get Bobby to bring him one weekend. How she wished she could retreat there in May and return in September. The heat in this city made one so languid, didn’t it?

Martineau checked his watch. Seven-fifteen. How long before Archie gave his speech? How he hated Archie’s speeches. Whatever happened, he must contrive to get away by seven-thirty. He’d excuse himself from the dinner. He’d have to warn Archie.

‘Bobby, your glass is empty.’ Randall, beaming down through his half-moons, brushed away his forelock to reveal a sweating brow. ‘That won’t do.’

‘Do you have a moment?’ Martineau asked.

‘I have three precious minutes before I say my piece. Hateful responsibility, but one can’t duck out, the chaps expect it.’

‘I’m going to have to disappear. Something’s come up.’

‘Will you be back for dinner?’

‘Unlikely.’

‘Damn. That will ruin my
placement
.’

‘I’m sorry about that.’

Randall pondered the question for a moment. ‘Ask your young man to join us, will you? I imagine he knows how to hold his knife. He can keep Christine happy in your absence. Right. That’s settled then. Time I addressed the troops.’

Martineau stayed for the speech, the same old text wheeled out year after year, with slight variations; sang happy birthday to the bemused accompaniment of a gypsy band Archie had hired from some restaurant he’d been to recently, and had a quick word with
Hart: ‘One of my Borises is having a crisis. Archie says will you join them for dinner, look after Christine. We’ll speak tomorrow.’ Then on to Christine, deep in conversation with Rachel Randall: ‘Darling, a bit of business has come up, I’m going to have to slip away. Hugh’s kindly said he’ll look after you, and I’ve fixed everything with Archie.’ False smiles, no kisses and no time to argue, and then it was out into the steaming night.

He drove across the Danube, leaving the lights of Pest for the brooding streets of Buda. The river was the frontier in his life; Pest the surface of his existence, the cover story, Buda the secret kingdom where he retreated to meet his Borises under the eye of the enemy, where the real business was done. This was the territory he loved, the world of shadows and darkness, of secrets and whispers, where you pitted your skills against those of the enemy, an undercover war which would not end until the evil of communism was destroyed and what remained was no more than an archaeological curiosity.

He turned left under the lee of the hill topped by the Soviet Freedom Memorial, an angel figure holding a palm leaf above her head that gazed down on the illuminated city (how hypocritical can you get?) and then, just before the Gellert Hotel, swung sharp right and on up the steep incline as Minerva Street twisted around the hill. Pest was below him now, and at odd moments through the trees he glimpsed the tide of buildings pushing out into the Hungarian plain and the Danube disappearing into the smoky distance. He drove on, the winding road taking him past the Swedish and Finnish embassies and the now deserted mansions of the once rich of pre-communist Budapest. He passed the bus stop, counted to a hundred and pulled over to the kerb.

He looked at his watch. Seven fifty-seven. Three minutes to go.

This was the time he hated, the long minutes hardly daring to breathe, waiting for Vardas to appear, worrying in case the signal he was responding to was a set-up because Vardas had been caught by the AVH. Suddenly armed men would emerge from the bushes and he’d be sitting there, his hands above his head, knowing it was all over. Either that, or Vardas was watching him from his hiding place off the road – always different, always impossible to detect – waiting until he was sure he had not been followed, that his car was empty, once more displaying the formidable caution that had kept him alive for so long.

The car door opened quietly and a familiar face smiled at him. Vardas had never once failed to keep an appointment. He looked at his watch. Eight o’clock exactly.

‘My friend.’

They’d got away with it once more. Fleetingly he asked himself, how much longer can this last? Then his sense of self-preservation took over and the moment for introspection was gone. Martineau drove on up the hill in silence, and turned down the deserted and unkempt drive of an unoccupied villa which was slowly falling to pieces. (This was the city in microcosm, Martineau thought. Couldn’t the regime see what they were destroying? Or didn’t they care?) He came to a halt out of sight of the road under some trees. For a moment they sat in silence, straining for the sounds of other vehicles coming up the hill.

‘I am glad to see you.’ Vardas was nervous. He hadn’t seen him like this before. ‘Thank you for coming so quickly.’

‘What’s up?’

‘I would give you a precise answer if I were able to,’ Vardas said in his careful English. Martineau had always wanted to know who had taught him the language, but had never liked to ask. ‘There are too many signs of unusual activity to be ignored but there are few facts at present. However, I have not got you away from your ambassador’s birthday celebration on a wild-goose chase. General Abrasimov has arrived in Budapest and that has only one possible interpretation.’

‘Who’s Abrasimov?’ Martineau asked. ‘He’s a new one on me.’

Not a lot was known about him, Vardas said. He was a tank commander who had been seconded to the Kremlin two or three years before to work on ‘counter-revolution strategy’, what to do when the occupying power needs to suppress the locals. He’d caught the approving eye of his superiors some years before when he’d been involved in the brutal suppression of a student revolt in Vilnius. He was now one of a younger group of generals who were being groomed for power. If the reactions to his arrival Vardas had witnessed were anything to go by, his presence meant that the Soviets were preparing for the worst.

‘He’s here to keep the Soviet lid on the country tightly nailed down, I take it?’

Vardas nodded gravely. ‘Marxism tells us that every uprising is a
counter-revolution organized by the agents of fascist imperialism who must be taught a lesson. In the communist handbook, a lesson is brutal repression of the guilty followed by even more brutal reprisals against the innocent
pour
encourager
les
autres.
’

‘Is Abrasimov’s presence a precautionary measure, or should we read more into it?’ Martineau asked.

‘His arrival is a signal that Moscow’s patience is running out,’ Vardas said. ‘If there is a rebellion, Abrasimov guarantees that we are in no doubt about the nature of the Soviet response.’

‘Would he order Soviet troops into the city if there was some kind of uprising?’

‘He will not give the order himself. That must come from the Politburo. But he is the Kremlin’s man. What he recommends will not lightly be ignored.’

Vardas spoke quietly and unemotionally but what he said had the force of an explosion. In his imagination Martineau conjured up horrific images of the familiar streets of Budapest laid waste by Soviet tanks, littered with the bodies of the dead and dying, torn fragments of the Hungarian flag clenched in their hands. He shivered despite the heat of the evening.

‘What are the odds on an uprising now?’

‘I am not a betting man, my friend. Officially, of course, none whatsoever. Our Government maintains the fiction that everything is under control and messages to that effect are sent regularly to the Kremlin, wrapped up in the usual fraternal greetings. Abrasimov’s presence in Budapest shows these messages are not believed. Both we and the Soviets know that it only needs one event, one small incident, perhaps of no significance in itself, to light the fire.’

The Opera House, Martineau wanted to say, but nothing had happened since. How strange this country was, a fire waiting to be lit, but the obvious firelighters didn’t appear to work. The incident that did finally set the place alight would probably be something quite unexpected.

‘The Soviets are terrified that public anger could lead to the sudden defeat of the government they control. That is a situation they cannot contemplate. A small state defying a world power, even for a day, sends out an unacceptable message. Hence Abrasimov. I have no doubt that when the moment comes his orders will be to extinguish the fire with all the means at his command.’

‘He sounds a nasty piece of work.’

For a moment Vardas looked at him as if he didn’t understand what Martineau had said, and Martineau cursed his thoughtlessness. English understatement didn’t travel. When he smiled it was to show comprehension, not amusement. ‘He is a man greatly to be feared. He has a nickname. He’s known as the knifeman.’

‘Why is that?’

‘There are stories that he likes to cut the throats of his enemies himself.’

*

They talked quietly in the dark for an hour about other evidence of the growing Soviet response to the possibility of an insurrection. With a map on his knee, Vardas showed Martineau how quickly the 6th and 126th armoured divisions could be dispersed around the country.

‘It is a significant military force, highly mobile. They have many tank transporters. The loyalty of the troops may be suspect but their commanders will terrorize them into action.’

‘What can you put up against a force like that?’

‘A few students and workers with rifles, Molotov cocktails. Militarily, nothing. Any planner would tell you the battle is lost before it is begun. Such a judgement ignores our sense of ourselves as a nation, our patriotism, our refusal to accept what we believe to be wrong. The people here yearn for freedom. That is a powerful emotion. A small incident could ignite a fire that might spread quickly across the country. Thousands of citizens will come out in the street, of that I am certain, with the flag of Hungary in their hands. They will demand their freedom, the restoration of democracy, the right to self-determination.’

When he’d first heard the argument soon after his arrival in Budapest, Martineau had dismissed it as hopeless romanticism. As he came to know the proud Magyar nation, his response had become one of admiration, even envy that such deep nationalistic feelings could still exist after so many decades of servitude to one regime or another. If a sense of patriotism could survive that kind of history, then one day it must triumph.

Vardas looked at Martineau, his eyes shining in the gloom. ‘Perhaps the desperate sound of our voices will travel outside our country
and someone will hear us. That is the gamble our people will have to take.’

‘Isn’t that a risk?’ Martineau asked, wondering how far he could go. ‘Can you be sure the world will listen?’

‘Would you betray those who are prepared to die for ideals you share?’

It was still light outside and getting hotter. Though the car windows were open Martineau felt oppressed. Idealism was flourishing in Hungary because the political situation was so extreme. How do you convey that message to the West, where the same pressures did not apply? Where other crises, other policies, called for your attention? This man had no knowledge of that kind of indifference. He had a simple faith that those who believed as you did would come to your aid in time of need.

‘Is this the endgame?’ Martineau asked.

‘I fear it is the beginning of the final chapter, yes. How long that chapter will last I cannot say. But I have an unhappy feeling that I know what the ending will be.’

He touched Martineau’s hand. ‘Thank you, my friend, for your faith in me. I trust I have repaid it.’

Then, as silently as he had appeared, he was gone.

*