The Friends, everyone knew and no one mentioned, were those enigmatic individuals who rooted around in the shadows of events like dogs raiding dustbins in a back alley, and came up with what they called, oxymoronically at times, intelligence. They were an inferior species to the true diplomats, inferior yet somehow enviable. It was hard not to have grudging admiration for the rather stout fellow who was their particular Friend, a man of no apparent consequence and even less significance, but who was here or hereabouts all the time, pretending to be responsible for cultural affairs while reporting not to His Excellency, Her Britannic Majesty’s Ambassador to the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic but rather to a man in Century House on the Thames in London, a man who was head of an organisation so secret that even its true name was secret, a man who himself was only ever known, in the manner of the worst spy thrillers, by a single letter – C.
‘This is, of course, most secret,’ Whittaker said, adding in one of his familiar parentheses: ‘I do so hate the word “secret”. It always sounds like an invitation to tell all.’
The stout man remained impassive. Others round the table smiled knowingly. ‘Just a straw in the wind, really, Eric,’ the man said. ‘Nothing to get too excited about. It seems that SIGINT has detected attempts by Russian forces to cut telecommunications from Prague to the outside world. Just brief moments of blackout. Probably trials.’
The little group, couched in its sealed room, was silent. Whittaker raised an eyebrow. ‘SIGINT?’
The man looked crestfallen. ‘An acronym, Eric. Sorry. Signals intelligence.’
‘Ah. An Americanism, no doubt.’
‘I fear so.’
‘But not really an acronym sensu stricto. More an abbreviation.’
‘I’m sure you’re right, Eric. Anyway, it seems possible that these blackouts are some kind of rehearsal. If the Warsaw Pact forces were to intervene—’
‘—invade.’
‘They would wish to move in beneath an electronic blanket.’
Whittaker nodded wearily. ‘So that is the background against which the Czechoslovak presidium is meeting with Brezhnev and his henchmen at’ – he glanced hopelessly at the papers in front of him – ‘Trainspotters’ Delight.’ There was more amusement round the table, the laughter of relief. ‘How do you divine the mood on the streets, Sam? You seem best equipped to give us the low-down. To use another Americanism.’
Sam thought of Lenka and her friends. ‘There’s a kind of bloody-minded insouciance about the activists. If they do invade, so what? Armies cannot defeat an idea whose time has come. That seems to be the general feeling.’
‘Sounds like flower power to me,’ the major said. ‘Armies cannot defeat a crowd of hippies. Unfortunately it’s not true. There could be a lot of blood.’
‘Somehow, I doubt it. The Czechs…’ Sam hesitated. It was the kind of statement that you made with caution. You needed to phrase it exactly right. People might quote him. ‘…are pragmatists. It’s not for nothing that Good Soldier Svejk is their hero. They know when not to kick against the pricks – but how to deflect them instead. Look at what happened in 1938. Or rather, what didn’t happen. Had they fought, the country would have been destroyed and this city would have been left in ruins.’
‘Not got the stomach for a fight,’ the major said briskly.
Sam turned on him, still thinking of Lenka, but now imagining her lying in the street with blood on that elegant Slavic face. ‘Look what happened to the ones who did fight. Look what happened in Warsaw during the war, or East Germany in fifty-three or Hungary in fifty-six.’
Whittaker sensed tempers rising. ‘Let’s hope common sense prevails,’ he said pacifically. ‘As always we must hope for the best and prepare for the worst. And to that end, I want to circulate this proposal for how we might look after the best interests of families and auxiliary staff in the event of a Soviet’ – he hesitated – ‘interference in local affairs. Contingency planning, that’s all. Just in case. Naturally, I wouldn’t like this information to get out of these four walls lest it cause more upset than circumstances deserve…’
The typewritten sheets went round the table. There was a hasty scanning, some suggestions, nods of approval. ‘And in the meantime we have our Members of Parliament doing the rounds. Where exactly are they now, Sam?’
‘I believe they are in Pilsen this morning. This afternoon it’s a glass factory.’
‘It’s always a glass factory.’
‘And then in the evening there is an informal party hosted by your kind self. And Madeleine, of course.’
After the meeting Sam searched out the stout little fellow who was everyone’s Friend. Harold Saumarez. Could he have a word? In strictest confidence?
Of course he could. Perhaps a breath of fresh air in the garden? Where, it was understood but never mentioned, they would be out of the hearing of any hidden microphones. So they strolled across velvet lawns where the ambassador held a summer garden party, assuming the weather was kind, to celebrate the QBP, the Queen’s Birthday Party, symbol of British insouciance abroad.
‘Just a word in your ear, Harold. In strictest confidence, of course.’
‘That’s the second time you’ve said that.’
‘Shows how important it is, doesn’t it? There’s a name I’d like to have checked out, you see. Someone I’ve met recently. One Lenka Konečková.’ As they walked they tried to keep their faces averted from the balustrade of the Castle high above where, so the rumour went, expert lip-readers attempted to oversee conversations in the gardens of the British embassy below and interpret what was being said. He even put his hand to cover his mouth as he spoke the name. ‘Twenty-five years old. Calls herself a student. Does some journalism, occasional work for the radio, so she says.’
Harold raised what were, by any standards, heavy eyebrows. ‘Personal interest?’
‘Professional.’
‘It’s hardly my job, you know.’
‘Of course it’s not, Harold. But you know as well as I do that security doesn’t know its arse from its elbow. Mr Plod the policeman, retired. Whereas our dearly beloved Friends…’
Harold sniffed, torn between wounded pride and flattery. ‘I’ll see what I can do. You don’t have a photo, do you?’
Sam produced the film cartridge and tucked it into the man’s top pocket as he might have tucked a cigar. ‘In there, right at the end. Perhaps your chaps can have it developed. I didn’t have any time. There’ll be a few snaps of little consequence – Steffie and me doing something silly – but the last one should show her. It’s a group photo, gathered round a table, late evening. Taken with a flash, so I’ve no idea how it’ll come out. Some of them will be making faces, but not her. She’ll be on the far left.’
Harold removed the item from his top pocket and secreted it elsewhere about his person, as though there was a correct place for such things. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’
‘I’d be most grateful.’
9
The Whittakers had a rooftop terrace. This elevated their apartment to a level appropriate to Head of Chancery. One reckoned one’s progress through the service by measures like that – the quality of posting, of housing, of furnishing – until finally you reached ambassadorial level and might live in a palace surrounded by furniture and artworks fit for a museum, at which point the time came for your K and subsequent retirement to that dull and unfamiliar bungalow in the Home Counties. But for the moment, as he showed his guests onto the terrace, Eric Whittaker was heedless of that. ‘Two messages are inherent in this apartment,’ he was explaining in his best academic manner. ‘One is that.’ He made a theatrical gesture to demonstrate what was obvious, the view before them, across the rooftops of Malá Strana to the river and the Charles Bridge. Beyond the river were the imposing buildings and pinnacles of Staré Město, the Old Town. On one building a red star glowed like a single, malevolent eye. ‘From that view you may appreciate that we are amongst the elite, rising above everyone else in the city, except’ – he turned in the opposite direction, backstage, to where a massive bastion rose up from the terrace like a cliff, blocking out half the night sky – ‘that lot up there.’