The Coldest War (11 page)

Gwendolyn frowned. “That was it, then?”

Her doubt elicited new pangs of guilt. “Yes. Why? Is something wrong?”

“I don't like you spending time alone with Cherkashin. I find him thoroughly unpleasant.”

Will laughed. “First poor Viola, now Cherkashin. My dear, if you're not careful, I'll begin to think you don't approve of anybody.” He meant it as a joke, but she was having none of it.

“He's KGB, you know.”

A bead of sweat tickled Will's widow's peak. He tucked into his tomato, hoping to hide his anxiety.
Soon,
he promised himself.
I'll tell you soon, love
. Gwendolyn would understand after he explained things carefully. Wouldn't she?

“Cherkashin? I think you're being a bit oversensitive. Not every cultural attaché is a KGB agent.”

“It virtually guarantees he's one of them. Did you see how quickly he scurried across the room when he saw the ambassador talking privately with us? I think he nearly elbowed Lady Spencer in his haste.” She shook her head. “He's a dreadful fellow. Be careful around him.”

“I give you my word,” said Will. But he couldn't bring himself to lie so baldly to his love and savior. Not after all she'd done for him. So he said, truthfully, “I shall avoid him as much as humanly possible.”

The caveat wasn't lost on her. Her lips twisted in a moue of disapproval.

Rain thrummed against the windowpanes. Will took up the paper. “Anything interesting today?” he asked.

Gwendolyn pulled the jar of lemon curd closer to her plate. Sounding bored, she said, “The president has declared martial law in the American South. Again.” She spooned curd on the last piece of toast. “Von Braun's cosmonauts have fallen silent; no transmissions since they returned to the Space Wheel. Cheltenham FC beat Hereford United three–one.” Lightning flashed outside, like a strobe. Over the booming reverberation of thunder, she added, “And today's forecast calls for rain.”

“I'll be certain to warn Aubrey, then.”

“Yes. Do.”

After breakfast, Will took up his briefcase, kissed his wife on the nose, and instructed his driver to take him to work. Within thirty minutes, he was stepping out of the Bentley and dashing up a flight of stairs to the lobby of a Georgian office building. Will paused in the lobby to remove his bowler hat and shake out the umbrella.

The North Atlantic Cross-Cultural Foundation occupied the fourth floor. The lift opened on a reception area with burgundy carpeting, walnut panels, brushed aluminum accents, and thoroughly sterile fluorescent lighting. From behind the reception desk his secretary, Angela, a brunette with a beehive hairstyle said, “Good morning, Lord William.”

She insisted on using his courtesy title. In return, he strove for scandalous informality.

“Morning, Angie.” Will hung his bowler and overcoat on a rack in the corner. “Messages?”

“Several. A busy start to the day, sir.” Will's young secretary flipped through her message pad. “His Grace called, via his assistant, requesting the final schedule for the Minister Kalugin's visit.” Flip. “A member of Ambassador Fedotov's staff called. They found a pair of lady's gloves after the gathering two nights ago; might they belong to your wife?” Flip …

Will glanced out the window while Angela spoke. He studied the arrangement of curtains on the windows across the street, and blinked. He missed the rest of the messages, contemplating the weather. It was, he supposed, the best time for a covert meeting. But he would have preferred not to go out in that. It was raining stair-rods. Perhaps that was a fitting punishment for flouting Gwendolyn's warning.

“Sir?”

He shook his head, clearing it. “Apologies. You were saying?”

“Shall I phone the embassy regarding the gloves?”

“Ah … Yes, please. Thank them for me, but let them know my wife hasn't misplaced anything. And then type up the new schedule, and have it couriered to my brother's staff after I sign off, won't you?”

“It's on your desk, awaiting your approval, sir.”

Will smiled as much as he could muster and inclined his head at her, acknowledging her efficiency. Only twenty-four years old, yet Angela was more collected than Will had been at thirty-four. When Gwendolyn had come along. When she had started to fix him.

Inwardly, Will flinched. Their breakfast conversation jangled his nerves like a toothache. He'd meant what he said, yet here he was not two hours later planning to violate the spirit of the thing if not the wording.

But on the other hand, the fact was that he
had
needed fixing. Because he'd been forced to do terrible things by despicable men. And, like the fairy-tale egg man, it had shattered him. Even now when he thought about the things they'd done, the atrocities they'd committed, he felt trapped and breathless. Sometimes the guilt lay so heavy upon him, it pressed the air from his lungs. And in the short term his decision to take the reins, to exorcise his demons, only made the guilt heavier. Because the only solution—arrived at after so many long years—meant betraying Gwendolyn. But if Will was to ever make proper reparation for the evil things he'd done, he'd have to shoulder the burden just a bit longer.

Yes, he had an obligation to his wife. And he'd adhere to the very letter of it.
I shall avoid him as much as humanly possible.
But he also had an obligation to make amends for the deeds of his past. The siren song of atonement was impossible to ignore.

Angela must have seen a hint of the anger playing across his face. “Sir?” She inched backwards; the casters on her chair squeaked. “Is something wrong?”

Will realized he'd been staring at her, staring through her, at events from long ago. He shook his head again. Lightly as he could, he said, “Lost in thought.”

This lessened the crease of worry between her eyes, but not the hint of frown at the corners of her mouth. If anything, Angela was perhaps too efficient and too perceptive. She was a good girl; Will regretted he wasn't the upright fellow she thought he was. In his youth, he would have found her just the right sort of bird to talk into vigorous but private indiscretions.

He approached the narrow double doors of his office. “Hold my calls, unless they're from His Grace, please.”

“Very good, sir,” she said.

He paused with his hand on the handle. “Oh, and Angela? Tea, when you have a moment.”

“On your desk, sir.”

And it was. Strong, hot, with a fan of lemon slices on the side. He poured a cup, then stood behind his desk, watching rivulets of rainwater trace and retrace patterns on the windowpanes. Water turned the streets below into streams, transformed surrounding rooftops into cataracts.

Two cups later, he hadn't moved. Nor had the storm. Nor had the arrangement of curtains across the street.

He gave the new schedule a cursory examination. It included his annotated changes from the other night. Will initialed it.

Typically, an office of this size, for a person of Will's standing, might have contained a well-stocked sideboard. But Will, who had no use for such things, had instead given the extra space to a two-drawer safe. A bright red potted nasturtium draped its leaves over the burnished steel. He opened the safe as quietly as he could manage, though it was difficult to hide the
clack-clang
of the thick steel door when he wrenched the handle. Will preferred that Angela not know he'd accessed his safe.

The top drawer contained a copy of the foundation's articles of investiture, and quarterly investment portfolios for its endowment. All duplicates of documents that Aubrey himself had in safekeeping.

But the contents of the safe were personal as much as professional. The bottom drawer held copies of Will's legal documents, including his last will and testament (everything to Gwen, thank you very much, except for a few cash disbursements to the help); his marriage license; and his own investment portfolios.

Tucked behind all of that sat a yellowed, wire-bound manuscript. Gwendolyn would murder him, if she knew he'd kept it. But it was necessary. A reminder.

An unmarked file folder lay hidden behind everything else. It was much thinner now than it had been when he'd first compiled the contents. All that remained in the folder were a single sheet of paper and a thirty-year-old photograph. The photo was a rare bonus; he'd had a devil of a time obtaining it. Most of the men he'd profiled had never been photographed, not once.

And this was the last.
Soon,
thought Will.
Soon it will be over, and I'll be free of the past
.

Will closed the safe (
clang-clack
) and spun the combination dial. He tucked the documents in the breast pocket of his suit jacket and exited the office.

“Angela, I'm stepping out for a bit.” He handed the initialed schedule to his secretary. She acknowledged this, but otherwise said nothing as he gathered his coat, umbrella, and bowler once more. By now she must have been accustomed to his comings and goings.

Will entered the Tube at South Kensington, and rode the District line to Kew Gardens. He wandered through the magnificent Palm House, that great Victorian cathedral of glass and iron. Not far away, placards announced the imminent rebuilding of the Waterlily House, which had been destroyed during the Blitz.

The rains kept the gardens nearly deserted. If not for Cherkashin—perched on a bench under the boughs of a walnut tree on the Broad Walk, puffing on a cigarette, looking rather soggy—Will might have had the gardens to himself. He tried to shove the guilt aside.

I am sorry, Gwendolyn. But this must be done. I owe it to the Missing. We all do.

Will checked his surroundings again, saw nobody, and sat. A long, tall shrubbery hid the bench from casual passersby. “I thought we'd agreed that
I
would contact
you
.”

Cherkashin flicked his cigarette butt to the ground. It hissed on the wet pavement. He crushed it under the toe of his shoe.

And a rather expensive shoe it is,
Will noticed. He knew every shop on Savile Row.
If Gwendolyn were here, she'd have something to say about that.
Thinking of his wife evoked another pang of guilt. He countered it by reminding himself of the evil things the warlocks had done to his countrymen and to him. They had turned him into a murderer. A man who bombed pubs. Derailed trains. Sank barges. All without fear of retribution or punishment.

“We agreed,” said Cherkashin, “that you would help us.”

“I can't do that hanging from the gallows, can I?”

Cherkashin looked amused. “You needn't worry about that. We can protect you.”

“Move to Moscow, shall I?” They rehashed this same argument every time they met. Will found it tedious, but Cherkashin never tired of trying to persuade him to leave Britain. “If you think that's even remotely a possibility, you don't know my wife.”

“She'd come with you. Even the most principled people will change their stances, when it's that or die.”

“You don't know Gwendolyn. For that matter, neither do you know me.”

A gust of wind swirled misty raindrops down Will's collar like a spectral caress. He shivered.

Cherkashin waved off the objection. “You're getting upset over nothing, my friend. It's clear to me that you would never be in any such danger. Your countrymen would never hang the brother of a duke. For you? Merely life in prison.” He produced a slim metal case from his raincoat. Will declined the proffered cigarette. Cherkashin shrugged.

“It's one of the benefits of your caste system,” he said. The orange flash from his lighter shone on his face. “For those at the top.”

Will stood. “I think we're done here.”

“Relax, relax.” Cherkashin patted the bench. “I apologize. My proud socialist upbringing occasionally gets the better of me.”

“I consider it a small mercy,” said Will, “that our arrangement comes to an end today.” He turned, inspected the surrounding grounds again. Satisfied the gardens were still deserted, and that they could conclude their meeting without witnesses, he sat again. “I won't miss this.”

Will produced the documents he'd retrieved from his safe, held them out to Cherkashin, and turned his head. For some reason, he always looked away during the actual handoff; he didn't know why.

“You have heroically fulfilled the tasks of the Motherland,” said Cherkashin. The documents disappeared into his coat as quickly as they'd appeared from Will's. “I still can't understand why you refuse compensation. We would be very generous.”

“It's not about that.” Will stood. “You could never understand.”

“As you wish.”

Will turned for the Palm House. But he paused before leaving. “The others. They've been brought to justice?”

Cherkashin smirked. “If you prefer to call it that.”

Satisfaction wrestled with nausea as Will made his way out of the gardens.

14 May 1963
St. Pancras, London, England

Marsh unclenched his jaw just enough to say, “Yes, sir.”

“For the Queen's sake,” said Mr. Fitch, “you're not a young man any longer, Raybould.”

“No, sir.” Marsh's fingers ached from squeezing the handle of a spade. It took a conscious effort to loosen his grip. He managed it by imagining a loop of piano wire digging into Fitch's fat neck.

“I'm not without sympathies.” Fitch hooked his thumbs into his belt. “You know, I was a bit rough, too, in my youth,” he said, hiking his trousers over his paunch. “But, by God, man, I left that behind in my twenties.”

Marsh and Fitch were nearly the same age. The difference was that Fitch didn't show up to his job with a black eye. He worked in a bank. Marsh was his gardener.

Thunder echoed. A cool gust blew the scent of Fitch's aftershave across the garden. The breeze soothed the dull heat of Marsh's bruised face. He looked up at the leaden sky, wondering if Fitch planned to lecture him until the deluge started.