A Spy by Nature - Charles Cumming [109]
More than anything else, I think, Saul was astonished by the speed with which it had finished. They had been together, on and off, since school. To my knowledge she was the first girl he had ever slept with.
What he needed then was for me to keep my mouth shut and just drink a beer with him. But I felt some sort of obligation to cure and began bombarding him with half-baked advice and banalities. I tried to tell him that all of his fears and insecurities were not worth worrying over, that he should try to ignore and shut out all the mental pictures of her infidelity. I told him that the anguish we feel in the immediate aftermath of heartbreak only dissipates in time into prejudice and misinformation. Best to ignore it. None of this seemed to make any impression on him; he looked at me almost with pity. I wanted, absurdly, a transcript of the advice he had given me to read out to him.
The truth of that situation was that he had already made up his mind what to do. He had stopped loving her the moment she had told him about her affair: very quickly she had become reprehensible to him. Saul’s numbness gave way to a strange kind of relief in a matter of days, as if he was pleased to be rid of someone who was so devoid of basic decency. This strength astonished me. I had thought it would be years, literally, before he got over her, that the break-up would be something from which he would never properly recover. But I was wrong.
This memory is in my head for the best part of an hour, all the sides of it, the implications. Then I review the night’s events once again, unable to shut them out, unable just to put it all to one side.
I do not once look at my watch - I learned that long ago - but it must be after four when I finally manage a few hours’ sleep.
Early next morning I call Hawkes at his house in the country from a telephone box in Barons Court.
‘Could I speak to Paul Watson, please?’
‘You have the wrong number,’ he says, following procedure. Then he calls back immediately, using a secure line.
‘Alec. What is it?’
He sounds remote, detached.
‘I needed to ask you something.’
‘Yes.’
‘Did you ever get caught up in the drama of it?’
‘What do you mean?’ he says, as if the question were ridiculous.
‘Did you ever do things in the course of your work that you didn’t really need to do? Did you make things more difficult for yourself because you were deceived by the glamour of espionage?’
‘I’m sorry, I’m not following.’
‘Let me give you an example. Last night, I made the first drop…’
‘Yes,’ he says nervously. He has always been wary of who may be listening in. His has been a lifetime of paring words back, of bending them into ambiguities and codes.
‘I was only following instructions, but the Americans seemed to have made things more complicated, more risky than was necessary. Maybe it was a test. I brought a briefcase to Saul’s flat…’
‘Alec, we can’t talk about this.’
‘What do you mean?’ I ask, and my voice must sound petulant and spoiled. Like the game is over.
‘It is not advisable for us to speak any more.’
‘Since when?’
‘I’m going to be out of contact for some time. You’ll be all right. Just retain anonymity. You’ve been told what to do in an emergency: go to Lithiby. Do not contact me again. You’re doing fine, Alec. You must learn how to do this thing on your own.’
24
Final Analysis
The year draws to an end.
There are four more drops, one roughly every month, for each of which I am paid ten thousand pounds sterling, deposited