‘The groups have been dustbinned, George,’ Strickland said. ‘The lot of them. Orders from on high. No contact, not even arm’s length. The late Vladimir’s death-and-glory artists included. Special two-key archive for ’em on the fifth floor. No officer access without consent in writing from the Chief. Copy to the weekly float for the Wise Men’s inspection. Troubled times, George, I tell you true, troubled times.’
‘George, now steady,’ Lacon warned uneasily, catching something the others had not heard.
‘What utter nonsense,’ Smiley repeated deliberately.
His head had lifted and his eyes had turned full on Lacon, as if emphasising the bluntness of his contradiction. ‘Vladimir wasn’t expensive. He wasn’t an indulgence either. Least of all was he uneconomic. You know perfectly well he loathed taking our money. We had to force it on him or he’d have starved. As to inflammatory – anti-détente, whatever those words mean well, we had to hold him in check once in a while as one does with most good agents, but when it came down to it he took our orders like a lamb. You were a fan of his, Oliver. You know as well as I do what he was worth.’
The quietness of Smiley’s voice did not conceal its tautness. Nor had Lacon failed to notice the dangerous points of colour in his cheeks.
Sharply, Lacon turned upon the weakest member present : ‘Mostyn, I expect you to forget all this. Do you hear? Strickland, tell him.’
Strickland obliged with alacrity : ‘Mostyn, you will present yourself to Housekeepers this morning at ten-thirty precisely and sign an indoctrination certificate which I personally shall compose and witness!’
‘Yes, sir,’ Mostyn said, after a slightly eerie delay.
Only now did Lacon respond to Smiley’s poine ‘George, I admired the man. Never his Group. There is an absolute distinction here. The man, yes. In many ways, a heroic figure, if you will. But not the company he kepe the fantasists, the down-at-heel princelings. Nor the Moscow Centre infiltrators they enfolded so warmly to their breasts. Never. The Wise Men have a point and you can’t deny it.’
Smiley had taken off his spectacles and was polishing them on the thick end of his tie. By the pale light now breaking through the curtains, his plump face looked moist and undefended.
‘Vladimir was one of the best agents we ever had,’ Smiley said baldly.
‘Because he was yours, you mean?’ Strickland sneered, behind Smiley’s back.
‘Because he was good!’ Smiley snapped, and there was a startled silence everywhere, while he recovered himself. ‘Vladimir’s father was an Estonian and a passionate Bolshevik, Oliver,’ he resumed in a calmer voice. ‘A professional man, a lawyer. Stalin rewarded his loyalty by murdering him in the purges. Vladimir was born Voldemar but he even changed his name to Vladimir out of allegiance to Moscow and the Revolution. He still wanted to believe, despite what they had done to his father. He joined the Red Army and by God’s grace missed being purged as well. The war promoted him, he fought like a lion, and when it was over, he waited for the great Russian liberalization that he had been dreaming of, and the freeing of his own people. It never came. Instead, he witnessed the ruthless repression of his homeland by the government he had served. Scores of thousands of his fellow Estonians went to the camps, several of his own relatives among them.’ Lacon opened his mouth to interrupt, but wisely closed it. ‘The lucky ones escaped to Sweden and Germany. We’re talking of a population of a million sober, hard-working people, cut to bits. One night, in despair, he offered us his services. Us, the British. In Moscow. For three years after that he spied for us from the very heart of the capital. Risked everything for us, every day.’
‘And needless to say, our George here ran him,’ Strickland growled, still somehow trying to suggest that this very fact put Smiley out of court. But Smiley would not be stopped. At his feet, young Mostyn was listening in a kind of trance.
‘We even gave him a medal, if you remember, Oliver. Not to wear or to possess, of course. But somewhere, on a bit of parchment that he was occasionally allowed to look at, there was a signature very like the Monarch’s.’