The Secret Pilgrim by John le Carré Read Free Book Online Page B

for?” I asked
    â€œOh, I don’t know. What kind of stamina would one need for running twice as fast as everyone else in Berlin? A double ration of nerves, I suppose—always a strain. A doubly good head for alcohol— and where women are concerned—never easy.”
    â€œI’m sure he’s got whatever it takes,” I said loyally.
    Smiley hung his teacloth on a bent nail which looked like his own addition to the kitchen. “Did you ever talk politics, the two of you?” he asked as we took our whiskies to the drawing room.
    â€œNever.”
    â€œThen I’m sure he’s sound,” he said, with a sad little laugh, and I laughed too.
    Houses always seem to me, at first acquaintance, to be either masculine or feminine, and Smiley’s was undoubtedly feminine, with pretty curtains and carved mirrors and clever woman’s touches. I wondered who he was living with, or wasn’t. We sat down.
    â€œAnd is there any reason why you mightn’t have sent Ben to Berlin?” he resumed, smiling kindly over the top of his glass.
    â€œWell, only that I wanted to go myself. Everybody wants a Berlin break. It’s the front line.”
    â€œHe simply disappeared,” Smiley explained, settling back and appearing to close his eyes. We’re not keeping anything from you. I’ll tell you what we know. Last Thursday he crossed into East Berlin to meet his head agent, a gentleman named Hans Seidl— you can see his photograph in Neues Deutschland. It was Ben’s first solo meeting with him. A big event. Ben’s superior in the Berlin Station is Haggarty. Do you know Haggarty?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œHave you heard of him?”
    â€œNo.”
    Ben never mentioned him to you?”
    â€œNo. I told you. I’ve never heard his name.”
    â€œForgive me. Sometimes an answer can vary with a context, if you follow me.”
    I didn’t.
    â€œHaggarty is second man in the Station under the Station Commander. Did you not know that either?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œHas Ben a regular girlfriend?”
    â€œNot that I know of.”
    â€œIrregular?”
    â€œYou only had to go to a dance with him, they were all over him.”
    â€œAnd after the dance?”
    â€œHe didn’t brag. He doesn’t. If he slept with them, he wouldn’t say. He’s not that kind of man.”
    â€œThey tell me you and Ben took your bits of leave together. Where did you go?”
    â€œTwickenham. Lord’s. Bit of fishing. Mainly we stayed with one another’s people.”
    â€œAh.”
    I couldn’t understand why Smiley’s words were scaring me. Perhaps I was so scared for Ben that I was scared by everything.Increasingly I had the feeling Smiley assumed I was guilty of something, even if we had still to find out what. His recitation of events was like a summary of the evidence.
    â€œFirst comes Willis,” he said, as if we were following a difficult trail. “Willis is the Berlin Head of Station, Willis has overall command. Then comes Haggarty, and Haggarty is the senior field officer under Willis and Ben’s direct boss. Haggarty is responsible for the day-to-day servicing of the Seidl network. The network is twelve agents strong, or was—that is to say, nine men and three women, now all under arrest. An illegal network of that size, communicating partly by radio and partly by secret writing, requires a base team of at least the same number to maintain it, and I’m not talking about evaluating or distributing the product.”
    â€œI know.”
    â€œI’m sure you do, but let me tell you all the same,” he continued at the same ponderous pace. “Then you can help me fill in the gaps. Haggarty is a powerful personality. An Ulsterman. Off duty, he drinks, he’s noisy and unpleasant. But when he’s working he’s none of those things. He’s a conscientious officer with a prodigious