'You think I'm wrong about him, don't you?' Ballard pressed. When Cripps didn't reply, Ballard leaned across the table. 'You do, don't you?'
'I'm just saying there's reason for caution,' Cripps said. 'If we finally choose to take him on board the Russians are going to be very distressed. We have to be sure the deal's worth the bad weather that comes with it. Things are so dicey at the moment.'
'When aren't they?' Ballard replied. 'Tell me a time when there wasn't some crisis in the offing?' He settled back in the chair and tried to read Cripps' face. His glass eye was, if anything, more candid than the real one.
'I'm sick of this damn game,' Ballard muttered.
The glass eye roved. 'Because of the Russian?'
'Maybe.'
'Believe me,' said Cripps, 'I've got good reason to be careful with this man.'
'Name one.'
'There's nothing verified.'
'What have you got on him?' Ballard insisted.
'As I say, rumour,' Cripps replied.
'Why wasn't I briefed about it?'
Cripps made a tiny shake of his head. 'It's academic now,' he said. 'You've provided a good report. I just want you to understand that if things don't go the way you think they should it's not because your appraisals aren't trusted.'
'I see.'
'No you don't,' said Cripps. 'You're feeling martyred; and I don't altogether blame you.'
'So what happens now? I'm supposed to forget I ever met the man?'
'Wouldn't do any harm,' said Cripps. 'Out of sight, out of mind.' Clearly Cripps didn't trust Ballard to take his own advice. Though Ballard made several discreet enquiries about the Mironenko case in the following week it was plain that his usual circle of contacts had been warned to keep their lips sealed.
As it was, the next news about the case reached Ballard via the pages of the morning papers, in an article about a body found in a house near the station on Kaiser Damm. At the time of reading he had no way of knowing how the account tied up with Mironenko, but there was enough detail in the story to arouse his interest. For one, he had the suspicion that the house named in the article had been used by the Service on occasion; for another, the article described how two unidentified men had almost been caught in the act of removing the body, further suggesting that this was no crime of passion.
About noon, he went to see Cripps at his offices in the hope of coaxing him with some explanation, but Cripps was not available, nor would be, his secretary explained, until further notice; matters arising had taken him back to Munich. Ballard left a message that he wished to speak with him when he returned.
As he stepped into the cold air again, he realised that he'd gained an admirer; a thin-faced individual whose hair had retreated from his brow, leaving a ludicrous forelock at the high-water mark. Ballard knew him in passing from Cripps' entourage but couldn't put a name to the face. It was swiftly provided.
'Suckling,' the man said.
'Of course,' said Ballard. 'Hello.'
'I think maybe we should talk, if you have a moment,' the man said. His voice was as pinched as his features; Ballard wanted none of his eossip. He was about to refuse the offer when Suckling said: 'I suppose you heard what happened to Cripps.'
Ballard shook his head. Suckling, delighted to possess this nugget, said again: 'We should talk.'
They walked along the Kantstrasse towards the Zoo. The street was busy with lunchtime pedestrians, but Ballard scarcely noticed them. The story that Suckling unfolded as they walked demanded his full and absolute attention.
It was simply told. Cripps, it appeared, had made an arrangement to meet with Mironenko in order to make his own assessment of the Russian's integrity. The house in Schoneberg chosen for the meeting had been used on several previous occasions, and had long been considered one of the safest locations in the city. It had not proved so the previous evening however. KGB men had apparently followed Mironenko to the house, and then attempted to break the party up. There was nobody to testify to what had happened subsequently - both the men who had accompanied Cripps, one of them Ballard's old colleague Odell - were dead; Cripps himself was in a coma.
'And Mironenko?' Ballard inquired.
Suckling shrugged. They took him home to the Motherland, presumably,' he said.
Ballard caught a whiff of deceit off the man.
Tm touched that you're keeping me up to date,' he said to Suckling. 'But why?
'You and Odell were friends, weren't you?' came the reply. 'With Cripps out of the picture you don't have many of those left.'
'Is that so?'
'No offence intended,' Suckling said hurriedly. 'But you've got a reputation as a maverick.'
'Get to the point,' said Ballard.
'There is no point,' Suckling protested. 'I just thought you ought to know what had happened. I'm putting my neck on the line here.'
'Nice try,' said Ballard. He stopped walking. Suckling wandered on a pace or two before turning to find Ballard grinning at him.
'Who sent you?'
'Nobody sent me,' Suckling said.
'Clever to send the court gossip. I almost fell for it. You're very plausible.'
There wasn't enough fat on Suckling's face to hide the tic in his cheek.
'What do they suspect me of? Do they think I'm conniving with Mironenko, is that it? No, I don't think they're that stupid.'
Suckling shook his head, like a doctor in the presence of some incurable disease. 'You like making enemies?' he said.
'Occupational hazard. I wouldn't lose any sleep over it. I don't.'
'There's changes in the air,' Suckling said. 'I'd make sure you have your answers ready.'
'Fuck the answers,' Ballard said courteously. 'I think it's about time I worked out the right questions.'
Sending Suckling to sound him out smacked of des- peration. They wanted inside information; but about what? Could they seriously believe he had some involvement with Mironenko; or worse, with the RGB itself? He let his resentment subside; it was stirring up too much mud, and he needed clear water if he was to find his way free of this confusion. In one regard, Suckling was perfectly correct: he did have enemies, and with Cripps indisposed he was vulnerable. In such circumstances there were two courses of action. He could return to London, and there lie low, or wait around in Berlin to see what manoeuvre they tried next. He decided on the latter. The charm of hide-and-seek was rapidly wearing thin.
As he turned North onto Leibnizstrasse he caught the reflection of a grey-coated man in a shop window. It was a glimpse, no more, but he had the feeling that he knew the fellow's face. Had they put a watch-dog onto him, he wondered? He turned, and caught the man's eye, holding it. The suspect seemed embarrassed, and looked away. A performance perhaps; and then again, perhaps not. It mattered little, Ballard thought. Let them watch him all they liked. He was guiltless. If indeed there was such a condition this side of insanity.
A strange happiness had found Sergei Mironenko; hap- piness that came without rhyme or reason, and filled his heart up to overflowing.
Only the previous day circumstances had seemed unendurable. The aching in his hands and head and spine had steadily worsened, and was now accompanied by an itch so demanding he'd had to snip his nails to the flesh to prevent himself doing serious damage. His body, he had concluded, was in revolt against him. It was that thought which he had tried to explain to Ballard: that he was divided from himself, and feared that he would soon be torn apart. But today the fear had gone.
Not so the pains. They were, if anything, worse than they'd been yesterday. His sinews and ligaments ached as if they'd been exercised beyond the limits of their design; there were bruises at all his joints, where blood had broken its banks beneath the skin. But that sense of imminent rebellion had disappeared, to be replaced with a dreamy peacefulness. And at its heart, such happiness.