Quiller KGB

'Moscow.' He sounded quietly pleased. He should be. 'I asked them outright who they'd take in exchange.'

And they'd said Komoroff and Bulgin, who weren't all that much of a catch anyway. We knew about that one — everybody did.

'Nice work,' I said.

''Thank you. It wasn't that difficult.'

'You've got some good friends in Moscow.'

''They're all right. They want watching.' Quick smile.

I made a mental note to ask Cone to hit the computers in London with a question: Who handled the Ericson swap? Pollock could be lying in his teeth. But from what he was telling me and the idiom he was using I knew at least that he was either in DI6 or liaising with them from some other official department.

'So what made you go off the rails?'

His hands stopped playing. 'I wouldn't quite put it like that, if you're talking about Trumpeter.'

'How would you put it?'

He didn't answer for a second or two and I knew why. I'd told him I was going to open up this operation of his and look at it very hard, and I'd told him that if he didn't cooperate I'd throw them all to the KGB to do it for me. The only thing he could do now was to appear to tell me everything and at the same time try to tell me nothing.

And the very best of luck.

'Trumpeter,' he said, 'is an operation that's going to change Europe, and — ' he gave a little apologetic smile '- I hope this doesn't sound too dramatic — and change the geopolitical world, overnight.' He must have remembered what I'd just told Cone over the phone, because he said, 'You can't judge the size of an operation by the furniture.'

'Touche.'

'There's only one thing wrong with Trumpeter.' His voice had gone terribly quiet, and I noticed his hands were unsteady.

'I've blown it,' I said.

'That's right.'

23: MORNING

A big man, big-bodied, not overweight, his head totally bald and pear-shaped, widening downwards to a heavy face, his eyes very alert indeed, especially now, his mouth fleshy and pink, his ears flattened against his balloon-smooth head, his neck thick, with a double chin, his flushed skin shining from the top of his head to his collar, washed, polished, giving him a baby's glow.

He came down the steps quickly.

Melnichenko.

And stopped. Wrinkles developed across his forehead as his eyes moved to take in the scene. To me, in German with a Russian accent, 'That was you, wasn't it, in the building?'

He got an A for that: he could only have caught a glimpse of me as I'd run for the elevator. I didn't answer.

'You were in my office?'

I didn't say anything. Pollock had got out of his chair and the pilot, Schwarz, was on his feet too.

'Aleksy,' Pollock said, 'this is Mr Ash.' To me: 'Commandant Melnichenko, GRU.'

I said good evening. He inclined his head, his pale blue eyes engaged. Then a glance to Pollock.

'I was in the middle of dinner.'

I didn't know whether he resented the interruption or was excusing himself for not getting here sooner.

Pollock ignored it, anyway. 'Mr Ash wants to ask us some questions.' He glanced at Schwarz. 'Jurgen, would you mind getting another chair down here?'

'Make it two,' I told him.

Then someone else came down the steps with a big pewter tray and Pollock told him to get a bottle of Smirnov too and a shot glass. It was very busy for a bit and I noticed Melnichenko trying to pick up whatever he could from Pollock's expression, which was strictly non-committal, the spook's language for extreme caution, his eyes deliberately not meeting the Russian's but just looking casually all over the room.

The two extra chairs and the bottle of vodka arrived and Pollock was nice enough to pour me a cup of tea and I held my hands round it because it was so bloody cold in here.

'Commandant,' I said, 'I'm in British intelligence and I'm out here to assist the KGB, at their request. I want to know everything about Trumpeter. If you won't answer me, you'll have to answer the KGB.'

Lovely hot tea.

'What is the exact position?' he asked Pollock in Russian.

Jesus Christ, that wasn't very clever.

'The exact position,' I said in Russian, 'is that you've got to do what I tell you, because I've blown Trumpeter and you might as well face up to it and co-operate.'

But I was only feeling my way. In this situation anything was possible: Pollock was running a rogue operation, but the GRU could be working with him unofficially but with direct orders from someone extremely high in the Kremlin.

'I feel it is a little too early.' He'd switched back to German.

'Too early to cooperate?'

'Well, yes. I would require official assurances, for instance, as to your bona fides.' His chubby smile was like Pollock's, an automatic reflex.

'You're not in a position to require things,' I told him. 'Your only hope is to assist me — and my government — to the point where you might save yourself from the high displeasure of the Kremlin.'

I waited. Pollock's hands were restless again; he couldn't keep them still, because when he stopped playing with them I could see they were shaking.

'Aleksy,' he said quietly, 'I can vouch for what Mr Ash has said. He is in fact an agent in British intelligence.'

'Then we can conduct discussions on an official level.'

I decided to give him five more minutes, because in those five minutes I might get him to fall with his pink polished face flat in the doo-doo, which would give me a real kick because these people had handled me as if I'd been a bloody amateur, guns in my guts and all that.

'If you were in a position to conduct discussions on an official level, Commandant, what are you doing in a freezing cellar underneath a club run mostly for the top brass in the black market?'

I suppose Pollock had thought I hadn't noticed, when we'd had lunch together; but he wasn't worried about that now. I'd got Melnichenko into a corner and he knew it and he was smart enough to try another gambit.

'The thing is, we don't see why you should be taking an interest in Trumpeter at all. It's basically a Soviet operation.'

'I'm taking an interest because it's patently clandestine and there's an Englishman "coordinating things" — as you put it — from this centre and that man Bader will shortly be up on a murder charge because I'm going to see that he is, and the objective of my own mission is the protection of General-Secretary Gorbachev and I haven't got the slightest assurance that Trumpeter is not in point of fact aimed at him. And if what you're doing is liable to change Europe and the geopolitical world then my department is going to inform the Prime Minister very quickly indeed.' I took another swig at the tea. 'And you know what she's going to do? She's going to get Mr Gorbachev on his private line and make absolutely certain he's informed.'

Melnichenko was very good; he could keep his eyes blanked off and he could keep his hands perfectly still but he hadn't got any control over his parasympathetic nervous system and the beads of sweat were gathering on his naked head and glistening under the light, and it was cold enough in here to emasculate a brass monkey.

But he made an attempt. 'I was called here at short notice, as you know. Perhaps if you'd give me a day or two before we meet again? I can then confer with my contacts in Moscow.'

Couldn't learn.

Pollock came in at me fast — 'Look, you've talked about getting the KGB in on this, but we're not at all sure you can do that. I mean frankly, both sides need assurances, don't you agree?'

They'd had their five minutes and I finished the tea in my cup and poured some more and got up and went across to the telephone.

Cone picked up on the first ring.

I asked him, 'Is Yasolev with you?'