The Double Bind of Mr. Rigby (7 page)

Well, Arne did not scare me. I was used to, and knew, the risks. I felt that he suspected I was not there in front of him in his Tallinn office just for an ephemeral newspaper story; and, indeed, one of the reasons no doubt for meeting with me was to find out a little more of my purpose in the city. We were like bridge players. We each held fairly good hands and we were trying to work out the cards each other had, simultaneously trying to conceal our own master cards. I reckoned the information he had revealed about himself was open knowledge in Tallinn: it belonged to the past. What I needed to know was what Estonians thought of him now. Perhaps Rovde would be able to bring me up to date on his activities and reputation. Then again, I thought, even Uri might want to withhold crucial information from me. That is the trouble with the intelligence game: you never know what is the whole truth. Often important details are withheld and, more often, disinformation given.

I had the uneasy feeling, after a moment’s reflection, that Arne had mentioned Belmont in order to give me a warning. The more I thought about it, the more I was sure that it was a coded signal. He was telling me not to do anything stupid, watch out, take care: the forces operating in that arena were powerful and ruthless. No matter who you were, if you got in the way, you were expendable.

I asked him if it were possible to be taken round the main Myrex lab at Paldiski. Surprisingly he said I could be taken there and be shown some of the installation. Refitting had not progressed very far, but there were one or two parts of the lab that I might be interested in.

Arne asked me where I was staying, although I found it difficult not to believe that he already knew. ‘Are you here by yourself or are you travelling with anyone?’ Now, I thought, it was his turn to ask the leading questions. I knew it was pointless to deceive him about Mark. Tallinn is such a small community that, after a day or two, it would be generally known that Mark and I were in some way connected. After all, we had arrived on the same flight. Arne’s KGB credentials alerted me to what I should tell him.

‘Well, in a sense I am on my own, although I flew in with an old friend who is here looking for investment opportunities. As you must be aware, most merchant banks and venture fund groups are currently interested in this part of the world.’

Arne looked at his watch. The time must have been approaching a quarter past one.

‘Look it’s lunchtime,’ he said. ‘Have you an arrangement? If not, would you like to join me for sandwiches? That’s all I usually have unless I have a business lunch.’

‘That’s very kind. May I join you?’ I thought it an opportunity to get to know him better. He was an enigmatic figure, obviously not given to excess, and someone very much with his mind on whatever job was in hand. He picked up the telephone and spoke in Estonian to a secretary or aide.

After a minute or two we went into a room with a long table in the centre with nine chairs round it: one was at the head of the table and then four were placed at each side of it. The room was obviously used for board meetings or meetings with company delegates from abroad. At the head of the table was a silver tray of sandwiches, a bowl of olives, and a plate with cheese and coarse black bread on it. There was a jug of still water with slices of lemon floating in it, and a dark blue bottle of sparkling water next to two glasses. Arne set the glasses right way up and poured half a glass of still water. Then he stopped, apologised and asked me which sort of water I would like. I said I would prefer the fizzy kind. He poured it and said, ‘I can’t offer you any alcohol. Unlike most businesses we don’t keep any wine or beer on the premises. Our only exception is champagne should there be some important visiting delegation. Otherwise we are, how do your Quaker countrymen put it, “dry” here?’

Over our sandwiches I asked him if he lived in Tallinn. He said he had an apartment in a recently renovated set of luxury flats in the old town, but that he also owned a house in Switzerland, in Geneva, where he liked to go whenever he could. He was not married, but, in the course of conversation, revealed that he was godfather to his sister’s son. She and her family lived in Riga. I found it difficult to imagine him as any sort of a family man. He belonged to an organised world of business and finance. I could not help commenting at one stage that I was surprised, with his KGB background, that he could work successfully in business.

‘I took some time out in the days of transition to attend Stockholm University’s business school. I have their MBA for what it’s worth.’

I remarked that a friend of mine, who was a main board director of the world’s biggest pharmaceutical company, refused to employ anyone he interviewed who had an MBA. He commented, without humour, that there was some sense in that policy. He looked at his watch again and I thought it time to make my departure. I did not want to outstay my welcome as, I calculated, it was on sufferance anyway.

I said, ‘Look, I really ought to leave you. I’m sure you’re busy. I should certainly love to look round your Paldiski labs, whenever convenient.’

‘Of course. I’m afraid it won’t be for a couple of weeks. I shall have to get in touch with you. I’m abroad for some days. Presumably I can reach you at your newspaper office.’

I gave him my
London Journal
phone number and my mobile. It would be necessary to speak to each other, I thought, and not just communicate through intermediaries. With the best of good manners he escorted me downstairs and out of the house. We shook hands at the double doors and as I went down the steps on to the pavement, he stood there for some time and I felt his gaze scrutinising my back as I went away down the street.

I did not trust him. As he said, he was a diplomat. I had only scratched the surface of Myrex affairs in speaking to him. He had a tough veneer, a hard varnish, about him. It was impossible to work out what was going on in his mind behind those pale blue eyes shielded by the rimless glasses. He was giving nothing away. I might just have well accessed Myrex on their website, or looked up articles on their Baltic interests in my newspaper’s archives. Nevertheless, to go inside the Estonian labs would be a signal achievement. That I looked forward to.

Mark was not in his room at the Gloria. I searched the two public rooms but he was not there either. I went to my room, kicked off my shoes and stretched out on the bed. I lay there, my hands behind my head, and thought carefully. There was little point staying in Tallin any longer. It would be better to change my return flight to the following day. If Mark agreed, he could keep his booking for the day after that. Our separate returns might succeed in making it look less likely that there was collusion between us. I would broach it with him when we met later.

In the meantime, I decided to take a siesta. The room had a kettle, some instant coffee and some teabags. I made a cup of tea and, from a miniature bottle of aquavit, I poured in a tot. The hot tea and the spirit rushed through my digestive tract and left me with a balmy, warm, tired sensation and I was soon dozing. Arne hovered in my mind, and then Roxanne. I could see an image of them, both semi-naked, preparing themselves in a hotel bedroom to go to bed together. My dream’s camera shifted to the outside of their hotel so that I was looking in through a tall sash window. The hotel was the restored Myrex office building in which I had just met Arne. Roxanne, in my mind’s eye, took off her bra and stepped out of her pants just as a strip artiste does. Looking back over her shoulder towards Arne and beyond him to me looking in, her expression changed from eager anticipation to anguish, and back again, within a second. I recognised in that momentary look that she was with Arne under duress. She had signalled me to help her. I could sense that Arne was sexually aroused as he took off his briefs. I tried to see his sexuality that, in the circumstances of the dream, both threatened Roxanne and me. It was impossible. Just as I thought I was about to glimpse, what I imagined would be, his satyr-like erection, he turned slightly and it was obscured from view. He got into bed and under the sheets. He was the active partner and too quickly it seemed, Roxanne was moaning with pleasure. At that point there was a loud knock at the door. I awoke from my dozing and realised that the insistent knock was at my door. The vision of Roxanne and Arne had evaporated.

‘Hold on,’ I called. I collected my thoughts, raised myself from the bed, loosened my shirt collar and went to the door. When I opened it, I found Mark standing there.

‘Ah, there you are,’ he said. ‘I’ve been looking for you. The last place I thought you would be was here. I went to he English Café and looked in at the bar of the Italian hotel. I finally came back here.’

‘I’ve just had the most ghastly dream,’ I said. ‘I was having a little snooze. My subconscious came up with a nasty little picture of Roxanne and Arne cavorting sexually in a hotel that looked very much like the Myrex offices.’

‘Well, I hope you didn’t join in and make it a threesome,’ he joked.

‘There was no chance of that. I sensed jealousy and anxiety. They don’t make for good sex. Anyway, come in. Let me make you some coffee.’

We finished off the aquavit in our drinks and I told him about my visit to the enigmatic Arne. Mark was intrigued. I told him of my plan to return to London the next day and that he should then follow as already planned. He agreed. He had arranged one or two meetings that he did not want to break.

‘I’ve discovered there are some hefty financial dealings going on here. There’s a lot of illegal money, mostly Russian, being laundered here in banks and businesses; but it’s not just the Russians. There are other mafias concerned, if you can call them that. There are Italian money men here all the time and one of my banking contacts said that the Estonian authorities are not too happy about Myrex Corporation. They suspect it of handling illegal funds and enforcing contracts by blackmail. They don’t like its presence here but can’t pin anything on them. Arne is a smooth operator and leaves no chinks in Myrex’s armour.’

‘I can appreciate that,’ I said. ‘I can’t imagine Arne neglecting details and opening up his employers to EU investigation.’

Mark reminded me that Italian money, millions of illegally profited euros, had recently been laundered in Switzerland. The cigarette market was the source: huge profits had been made from undercut prices charged on smuggled goods. A vast amount of money had been made in Iraq by selling an American brand. That clearly broke international sanctions.

‘It’s a common thing to do,’ he said. ‘It makes a lot of people very rich quickly; and it’s more than likely that Myrex is involved in something like that. I’m sure I’ll get wind of it if they are up to something.’

That evening Mark and I dined together. We went to a new restaurant, all dim lights and Scandinavian furniture. The chairs and tables looked good but were uncomfortable to use, typical of that austere sort of design. By chance, Rovde and Mo were at another table. We greeted them both and chatted when we went in, but we kept to our separate tables. The two were getting on fine. I said to Mark that I thought that relationship might be going places. Mo looked happy and radiant. Her usually stooped posture had opened up like a flower in sunshine. Rovde’s orbit was doing her good.

I said to Mark, ‘Rovde’s a great guy. He’s quite a tonic, bluff and cheery. He’d do anyone good. Mo’s a lucky girl.’

Mark waved across the room to another man seated at a corner table with someone who looked Japanese and a smartly dressed European woman. They were drinking champagne. Mark explained that his acquaintance was one of his banking contacts in Tallinn.

‘You’ll probably find that Arne shows up,’ Mark said.

‘I don’t think so. I reckon he’s ascetic. He keeps out of the way and probably only drinks water.’ As an afterthought, I said, ‘I’m going to have difficulty the next time I see him. I shall have that vision of him in his underpants, taking advantage of Roxanne. In cold daylight, I can’t imagine him doing anything like that. It’s going to be hard to dispel the image though.’

Arne did not appear. Mark and I talked mostly about architecture, and about art back in London. Tate Modern was hosting a show by Barnett Newman. The Turner Prize was about to be awarded. Julian Opie’s Warhol-like picture of the pop group Blur, now hung in the National Portrait Gallery. There was no doubt, we concluded, London was the cultural centre. At that time, it had eclipsed Paris and New York. It was no wonder that the number of French people moving to London had increased recently, despite their national prejudice against the perfidious English.

As we left the restaurant, Rovde and Mo were still deep in conversation. We said goodnight. I told Rovde that I would return to London the next day but that I would undoubtedly be back in Tallinn soon. He told me that he was staying there for at least another month. Mark and I walked through the crisp, cold night back to the Gloria. We passed on the corner of a neighbouring street to the hotel, a fashionable, newly opened, Max Mara shop. I though of Roxanne: it was a designer shop where she bought many of her clothes. It boasted its presence in London, Paris, New York, Rome, and now it was here in tiny Tallinn. Tallinn had come of age and was with its bigger brothers and sisters.

Mark had a breakfast meeting the following morning so it was unlikely that I would see him before I left. We hugged each other and said goodbye. I was reluctant to see him go. I hoped that my night’s sleep would not conjure up renewed images of a libidinous Arne. As it turned out, I slept deeply that night: I remembered nothing of my dreams.

My London life immediately took over the moment I landed at Gatwick. There was little chance of a swift return to Estonia. My mobile phone signalled a text message. My editor wanted me to talk to him at the soonest opportunity. I picked up my old Xantia, drove into London, dumped it where I usually managed to find a parking spot. Since I was in luck, I was back in the house within an hour and twenty minutes of leaving the Gatwick terminal. I rang my editor. A contact in the States had given the
Journal
some information on a serial killer who had been periodically shooting individuals in the Washington suburbs. His victims were randomly chosen. There was no logic to the choice. It was big news in the States. A tenth person had been picked off. The marksman was using a sniper’s Armalite. The editor thought I should go out to DC, talk to our contact and do some snooping. As soon as I had written something about Estonia, I should re-pack my bags and go. Lorel, our secretary, would book my ticket and make the necessary arrangements. I said I would stay at the Cosmos, a club that had a reciprocal agreement with my Pall Mall club.

I knocked out an article of seven hundred and fifty words on commercial and industrial development in Estonia, hinted at dark deeds and dirty work by shady foreign business interests, mentioned laundered money, and hinted at Myrex’s plans for taking over old Soviet installations without naming them. The time had not come for that. I told Lorel to get me to America the following day.

Before I left, I thought I should keep Willy informed of what had happened in Tallinn. I phoned his mobile and we agreed to meet in the Brooklands brasserie of the RAC club that evening. I almost prefer the RAC to my own club because of its vastness and its Turkish bath, swimming pool and squash courts. It provides for so many types of interest and, additionally, has an excellent chef. I gave Willy the gist of what I had found out so far in Tallinn, told him that Rovde was the American presence so far as I could make out, and that there was much that needed watching. A smart game was being played there. Willy felt the Brits needed to join in. He intended to consult his superiors about the Estonian situation. In the meantime he suggested that I should maintain a discreet communication with Rovde and anyone else I thought trustworthy.

I left for Washington at lunchtime the next morning on a direct flight. At Dulles airport, I shared a minibus with six other people going in to the city centre. We stopped in K Street close to the Carlton hotel and I took my travelling bag to the Metro station at Farragut North and hopped one station to the Dupont Circle. Then it was a short walk to the Cosmos. There I relaxed. My room was spacious and grand. When Lorel had rung, the only rooms that they had available were double ones in the annexe. These I always preferred anyway: they were more luxurious than those in the main building. I stripped and showered, turned on the American television and caught up with CNN news. The programme showed a prevalence towards business news and the fluctuations of the New York Stock Exchange, and the usual unstable state of the Middle East. I flicked through the channels and found a BBC production of
Pride and Prejudice.
It was bizarre to be staying in the heart of the US watching a Jane Austen dramatisation. When I had dressed and gathered my thoughts, I went down to the bar and ordered a Dry Martini. It was perfect and was what I had been looking forward to for the last couple of hours. The blood sugar level rose in my constitution and I felt ready for anything. I decided that, before thinking what to do about dinner, I should establish contact with the
Journal
’s informant about the serial killer. I returned to my room.

I rang the number I had been given and a recorded voice told me to try a mobile number. That I did. Surprisingly – I had not been told – the informant proved to be a woman, a freelance journalist, who clearly kept herself extremely well briefed on what was going on in DC. Her interests covered mostly crime, finance and politics. We agreed to meet for breakfast. I invited her to join me at the Cosmos. Since she lived in an apartment up in Kalorama Heights, she thought it a brilliant, convenient idea. She was to be with me at nine o’clock.

The rest of that evening I spent alone. I walked some way along Massachusetts Avenue to Scott Circle, down 16th Street to the Capitol Hilton, along L Street, and then back up Connecticut Avenue to Dupont Circle. I did not hurry and it took me about fifty minutes. Once back in the Cosmos, I sat alone in the restaurant and ordered dinner.

I ate some splendid prawns in a garlic and ginger mayonnaise, followed by a juicy fillet steak that I would never have dared to eat had I been ordering in England. From the wine list, I managed to find a half bottle of decent 1996 Californian Merlot that I hoped the
Journal
would not quibble paying for. The trouble with dining alone on expenses is that, unless you buy a bottle of wine and consequently drink too much, your choice is limited by the small range of half bottles. It is therefore always better to have dinner with companions.

There were a few other people dining that evening, small groups at tables scattered around the large dining room. I imagined they were senators, writers, doctors, representatives of the core of citizens who worked at the heart of the US governmental machine. I did not recognise anyone, and I was anonymous.

Back in my room in the annexe, I watched CNN repeating news that I had seen earlier. I decided to ring Roxanne but realised that it was too late to do so. It would have to wait until the morning.

Eventually I gave up the awful television and went to bed. I slept deeply to begin with and then fitfully until around six o’clock when I decided to put the call through to Roxanne.

It was not something I usually did. We communicated by email, or when she was in London we would meet. If we coincided in some foreign city as we had done in Seville, then again we would have an assignation. There was nothing frantic about our relationship. We knew we were there for each other whenever possible. It was a relationship controlled by the necessity of a reality imposed and dominated by her husband.

I dialled her Spanish number. The phone rang for some time before a young man’s voice answered and asked in Spanish who was speaking. I thought it was probably one of her husband’s secretaries or aides. That is what Roxanne said they were: I suspected them of being his bodyguards or enforcers. I told him it was an old colleague of Roxanne’s and asked if she was there. I do not know whether he believed me, but I did not like his presence there and his officious answering of the phone. It made me uneasy. He told me in English to hang on. A minute or two later Roxanne spoke to me.

‘Sorry. Who is that?’ she asked.

‘It’s OK. It’s just Pel.’

‘Oh Pelham. How nice. I didn’t expect it to be you. Where are you?’

‘In Washington. Another
Journal
assignment. I just wanted to hear your voice.’

‘You silly old romantic,’ she said. ‘It’ll only make it worse. You’ll have bad dreams about me. I don’t want you in trouble because of me. We could try telephone sex though. What do you think?’

‘Come on, Roxanne, that’s not the problem. I just want to hear that you’re all right. Talking’s fine: the rest can wait.’

We chatted on, about nothing very important, but just to converse with her reassured me. She told me that soon she would be able to see me.

‘Raoul is going to Helsinki and Tallinn, probably in the next two weeks as I suspected. I have suggested I stop off in London while he attends to his business. So long as you are there, it’ll be great.’

I rarely heard her mention her husband’s name. It was usually as though she could not bring herself to use it. She must have been momentarily exhilarated by his agreement and the prospect of the trip. It certainly gave me something to look forward to.

I told her that I would do everything I could to be there when she was in town. ‘I do have to go to Tallinn again pretty soon; but I doubt it’ll coincide with your husband’s visit.’

She asked me about Washington, a city that she liked. She urged me to spend time in the National Gallery and the Phillips Collection. Since the Phillips is almost next door to the Cosmos, I thought I might go there later in the day: it would depend on whatever leads my informant would give me and how her intelligence would control my time.

As it happened, the whole business evaporated. When she arrived at nine o’clock precisely, a story was just breaking that the sniper had been captured. He had made the mistake of sleeping in his car overnight in the car park of a shopping mall. The misted-up windows and out-of-the-way position of the car had excited the curiosity of a local police patrol. They had searched the man outside his car and found his Armalite in the boot. So that was the end of the story. Anyway she was a nice girl and someone who might be useful in the future. My journey was not a complete waste of time.

We enjoyed our breakfast at leisure. Under large tureens there were bacon, hash browns, mushrooms and sausages. A kitchen chef cooked your eggs to order on a spirit stove. An endless supply of excellent coffee and toast was provided at each table. She filled me in on much background detail to the chain of killings that I did not know about. Afterwards I rang my editor back in London. He had already picked up the latest developments, was glad to hear that I had made contact with the girl as a future source of American news, and said that I should just write a comprehensive summary article on the madman’s atrocities that he would print under a by-line of ‘our Washington correspondent’. After I had emailed it, I should return as soon as possible. I told him that I would talk to an old friend who was a BBC correspondent in Washington and find out if there was anything he knew that might give an interesting slant to the story.

The girl and I got on very well. She was well dressed, neatly turned out, brisk and efficient. She knew the Washington cultural scene and read contemporary fiction. She thought about moral questions in life and had views. I liked her and would have enjoyed spending time with her. When I said goodbye to her on the steps of the Cosmos, I kissed her on both cheeks. There was a certain responsive warmth I could detect. I knew that if there had been more time for the two of us, we could have established an agreeable relationship. She told me that she did not intend to move from Washington in the near future. So, I held hopes that we might meet again. I was sure she would want a physical relationship. I could sense her willingness and eagerness. I could tell that she knew we were both on the same wavelength. There was a natural magnetism between us that you did not have to speak about: the communication was through the senses. I knew she would stay in my mind; but the promise of her might be another inspiration for me and she was someone whose presence I could spend time anticipating.

So, for the moment, I had someone else on my mind as well as Roxanne. It was not unpleasant. On the contrary, and I wondered what I should think about if I did not have these beautiful women to contemplate. I fulfilled my task for the
Journal
and dutifully sent off my email. I fixed my flight back to London for the following day. The late afternoon I spent in the Phillips. The evening stretched ahead of me: naturally I thought of my breakfast companion.

There was little hesitation. I had her mobile number. I rang her.

‘Lena?’ Her name, she told me, was Helena, but she preferred that diminutive. I could tell from the tone of her voice that she was startled.

‘Yes. Who is it?’ she asked.

‘It’s me, Pelham. Look, I wondered if you are doing anything this evening. I’m sure you are. It’s a stupid question. I have to hang about until tomorrow and I thought we could do something, go to the flicks, have dinner, whatever. Really stupid, though. You’re probably going out with your boyfriend.’

‘Well, I do have a boyfriend, but I’m not going out with him. He’s away in Argentina for a week. You could be in luck, or, rather, we could be in luck.’

‘Wow. There you are. It’s always worth asking. What shall we do?’

‘I’m on the Metro as you can no doubt hear. I’ll go home, tidy up and, if you like, come down to the Cosmos.’

‘I certainly do like. What? About an hour?’

‘Fine. See you then.’

Suddenly the evening that might have been stretching out tediously had the prospect of not being long enough. I went to my room, relaxed and showered. At about a quarter to seven I went down to the vestibule, sat in one of the armchairs, from one of the low glass-topped coffee tables took a copy of the
Washington Post
, and glanced through it. I noted in its business section that Myrex was one of half a dozen companies tipped as a good investment in the old Eastern bloc countries. Within ten minutes Lena arrived. I took her coat, a wind-breaking ski jacket clearly making a fashion statement, and revealed a smart, chic, freshly made-up Lena underneath. I took both her hands in mine and kissed her on her cheeks. Her perfume was the familiar Chanel Number 5, familiar because Roxanne often wore it. Its fragrance was at first confusing, then comforting for its familiarity. What I noted when we touched, when we were in close physical contact, was that we were both completely at ease. We had only known each other for that day and yet everything seemed right. There was no awkwardness in our meeting or being together.

I took her into the bar and we each had a Dry Martini. We talked about what we had been doing that day since we had breakfasted together. She told me she had been interviewing for a newspaper profile the deputy director of the School of Advanced International Studies. The School, an advanced research institution of Johns Hopkins University, stands not far from the Cosmos in Massachusetts Avenue, and trains many future government officials and NGO administrators. It has its own bases abroad, a centre in Bologna, another in Beijing. When I visited the Bologna centre on one occasion, it struck me that it might be a command post for the CIA. If you caught sight of the roof of the building, you could see that it bristled with radio masts and satellite dishes. I meant to ask Rovde about it; although he might not tell me the truth.