Making Enemies by Francis Bennett Read Free Book Online

Now the chairman thanks him for his useful contribution, reminding all present that the purpose of all their actions, especially those under discussion today, is the ultimate defeat of their enemies in the West who threaten the Soviet Union.
    ‘I would like the permission of this meeting to present a plan for consideration in seven days.’ That is Andropov’s request.
    Ruth imagines the glances exchanged, the whispered murmurings, head bent to head, the nods, the hierarchical process of agreement where underlings wait for their seniors to declare their opinion before nodding furiously themselves.
    ‘Four days, Comrade Andropov. The Committee will hear your plan at a special meeting in four days’ time.’
    Four days later, Andropov will have submitted his plan and the same absurd process of evaluation and discussion will have occupied another day in the glorious history of the Soviet Union, at the end of which the chairman will have turned to Andropov and nodded his assent.
    And because of that nod she is sitting here now in this room in the Lubyanka, listening to Andropov resurrect her affair with Stevens all those years ago.
    Sixteen years. They have waited sixteen years and now she will be made to pay for this single indiscretion of her life.
    Andropov waits for a sign that she has understood fully what he is telling her.
    ‘I am your target,’ she says.
    ‘No, Comrade Marchenko. You are my instrument. Professor Stevens is my target.’

4
MONTY
    Corless takes his seat in the only armchair in the room. Cups of tea are hastily drained and pushed into the centre of the table. Crumbs from Rich Tea biscuits are surreptitiously swept on to the floor. We stop talking.
    ‘All present and correct, Arthur?’
    ‘All present and correct, Rupert. Yes.’
    Arthur Gurney looks round the table to double-check. The weekly ritual has begun.
    ‘Shall we take the minutes then?’
    The minutes of the last meeting are solemnly read in silence to ensure they are a true record of a meeting none of us can be bothered to remember. Arthur Gurney hands the top copy to Corless who asks, ‘May I sign?’ To which none of us ever answers, so Corless signs, Arthur dates and then blots ostentatiously as if his life depended upon it.
    ‘Any matters arising not covered?’
    No one says anything as Corless knows they won’t, and so on we go to what Corless cheerfully describes as ‘the work of the morning’. He glances down at the agenda that he has set himself and feigns surprise. ‘Three items, I see.’
    None of us is ever taken in by this element in the ritual. The agenda seldom changes. It would be a shock if it did.
    ‘Sweet, but not, I suspect, short.’
    That is the signal for the business to begin.
    Colin Maitland hands Corless the Peter file. There has been a bitter scrap over this, Arthur Gurney demanding the right of first access to what he insists on calling ‘source Peter’ but Maitland, an old hand at departmental politics, has got to Corless first and put Gurney’s nose seriously out of joint. Maitland is the guardian of thePeter file. Dislike seethes between them like electric static between two poles.
    ‘The decrypt of the latest message from Peter was only completed at six this morning,’ he informs us (‘A problem with the teleprinter from Moscow,’ we are told), so none of us has seen it yet.
    Whatever attitude we may adopt, each of us is secretly excited by every new piece of intelligence from Peter. There is nothing like an association with a major secret to give you an enhanced sense of your own importance.
    ‘You’ll receive your copies in the usual way after the meeting. Will you summarize its contents, Colin?’
    This request underlines Maitland’s role as Rupert’s deputy. He, alone of all of us, has already seen the decrypt, a privilege that separates him from his rivals in the room. He opens the folder slowly and surveys the papers, making the most of the moment.
    ‘We are the target of renewed