Spy Story

‘Plastic,’ said Schlegel. ‘Real thatch harbours vermin. Plastic is cleaner, quicker and longer lasting.’

Mrs Schlegel said, ‘Gee, Chas, you should have told me. I was only doing BLTs for lunch.’

‘BLTs, Helen! You want to send him into a state of shock? These Brits strike into roast beef with all the trimmings for Sunday lunch.’

‘A bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich will be fine, Mrs Schlegel.’

‘Helen, call me Helen. I sure hope Chas hasn’t been too rude about our English landlord.’

The Southern United States – its climate and terrain so suitable for training infantry and aviators – has played a part in moulding the character of American military men. And it is there that so disproportionately many of them met their wives. But Mrs Schlegel was no Southern belle. She was a New Englander, with all the crisp assurance of that canny breed.

‘He’d have to be a lot ruder before he could hope to offend me … er … Helen.’ The sitting-room had a big log fire perfuming the centrally heated air.

‘A drink?’

‘Anything.’

‘Chuck made a jug of Bloody Marys before going to meet you.’ She was no longer young, but you could have prised that snub nose and freckled face out of a Coke commercial. The teenager’s grin, the torn jeans and relaxed hands-in-pocket stance made me happy to be there.

‘That sounds just right,’ I said.

‘You Englishmen … that cute accent. That really gets to me. Do you know that?’ she asked her husband.

‘We’ll go into the den, Helen. He’s brought me some junk from the office.’

‘Take the drinks with you,’ said Mrs Schlegel. She poured them from a huge frosted glass jug. I sipped at mine and coughed.

‘Chas likes them strong,’ said Mrs Schlegel. At that moment a small child came through the sitting-room. He wore a Che Guevara sweatshirt, and, with arms outstretched, dumped small clods of garden earth upon the carpet while emitting a steady high-pitched scream.

‘Chuckie!’ said Mrs Schlegel mildly. She turned to me. ‘I suppose here in Britain any mother would beat the daylights out of a child for doing that.’

‘No, I believe there are still a few who don’t,’ I told her. We could hear the scream continue out into the garden and around the back of the house.

‘We’ll be up in the den,’ said Schlegel. He’d downed half of his drink and now he poured himself more and added some to my glass too. I followed him through the room. There were black timber beams across the ceiling, each one decorated with horse brasses and bridle fittings. I hit my head on the lowest one.

We went up a narrow wooden staircase that creaked at each step. Off the passage at the top of it there was a small box room with a ‘Do not disturb’ label from the Istanbul Hilton. He pushed the door open with his elbow. The screaming child came nearer. Once inside Schlegel bolted the door.

He sat down heavily, and sighed. He had a rubbery face, well suited to his habit of pummelling it with his hands, pushing at his cheeks, bending his nose and then baring his teeth, as if to be sure that all the muscles were in working order. ‘I hate lords,’ he said. He fixed me with an unwinking stare.

‘Don’t look at me,’ I said.

‘Aw, I don’t mean that,’ he said. ‘Hell, no one would take you for a lord.’

‘Oh well,’ I said, trying to sound indifferent.

From Schlegel’s den there was a view of the surrounding country. A clump of poplar trees were bare, except for bunches of mistletoe, and the birds that rested there before coming down to join in the feast of holly berries. The gate to the next field was open, and the cart tracks shone with ice all the way round the side of the hill over which the steeple of Little Omber church could be seen. Its bell began striking twelve. Schlegel looked at his watch. ‘Now that damned village clock is fast too,’ he said.

I smiled. That was the essence of Schlegel, as I was to find out.

‘Bring good stuff this time?’

‘I’ll let you know when we see the analysis.’

‘Can’t you tell when you’re out there monitoring it?’

‘One trip last year they found the Russians working a new Northern Fleet frequency. The monitor leader got permission to change the cruise route to get cross-bearings. They brought in forty-three fixed-position Russian radio stations. There was talk of some kind of citation.’

‘And … ?’ said Schlegel.

‘Buoys. Meteorological stations, some of them unmanned.’

‘But it wasn’t you.’

‘I’ve always been on the cautious side.’

‘It’s not a word you’d want on your fitness report in the Marine Corps.’

‘But I’m not in the Marine Corps,’ I said.

‘And neither am I any longer – is that what you were about to say?’

‘I wasn’t going to say anything, Colonel.’

‘Drink up. If your new stuff is anything like the analysis I’ve been reading, I want to War Game the results and submit them for next summer’s NATO exercises.’

‘It’s been suggested before.’

‘It’s a hardy annual, I know that. But I think I might do it.’

If he was expecting a round of applause he was disappointed.

He said, ‘You’ll see some dough pumped into the Centre if they agree to that one.’

‘Well, that’s just fine for the controller of finance.’

‘And for the Studies Director, you mean?’

‘If we ever use the stuff we’re picking up on these trips as a basis for NATO fleet exercises, you’ll see the Russians really light up and say tilt.’

‘How?’ He bit into a cigar and offered them. I shook my head.

‘How? For starters the C-in-C will recognize the NATO movements as their alert scheme, and he’ll guess that these sub trips must be collecting! He’ll hammer the First Deputy who will get the War Soviet into a froth … bad news, Colonel.’

‘You mean this is all something we should be at pains to avoid.’

‘Then you are reading me correctly,’ I said. ‘They’ll know for certain that we have subs on the ocean floor outside Archangel, they’ll surmise about the Amderma and Dikson patrols. And then maybe they’ll guess what we are doing in the River Ob. Bad news, Colonel.’

‘Listen, sweetheart, you think they don’t already know?’ He lit the cigar. ‘You think those babies aren’t sitting on Norfolk, Virginia, taping our signals traffic from under our water?’