“How often does he put in a refugee report?”
Leclerc shrugged. “I don’t see all his stuff,” he said. “Your people should know. The market’s dwindling, I suppose, now they’ve closed the Berlin border.”
“They only put the better reports up to me. This must be the first I’ve seen from Hamburg for a year. I always imagined he had some other function.”
Leclerc shook his head. Haldane asked, “When does his contract come up for renewal?”
“I don’t know. I just don’t know.”
“I suppose he must be fairly worried. Does he get a gratuity on retirement?”
“It’s just a three-year contract. There’s no gratuity. No frills. He has the chance of going on after sixty, of course, if we want him. That’s the advantage of being a temporary.”
“When was his contract last renewed?”
“You’d better ask Carol. It must be two years ago. Maybe longer.”
Haldane said again, “You talked about putting a man in.”
“I’m seeing the Minister again this afternoon.”
“You’ve sent Avery already. You shouldn’t have done that, you know.”
“Somebody had to go. Did you want me to ask the Circus?”
“Avery was very impertinent,” Haldane observed.
The rain was running in the gutters, tracing gray tracks on the dingy panes. Leclerc seemed to want Haldane to speak, but Haldane had nothing to say. “I don’t know yet what the Minister thinks about Taylor’s death. He’ll ask me this afternoon and I shall give him my opinion. We’re all in the dark, of course.” His voice recovered its strength. “But he may instruct me—it’s in the cards, Adrian—he may instruct me to get a man in.”
“Well?”
“Suppose I asked you to form an operations section, make the research, prepare the papers and equipment; suppose I asked you to find, train and field the agent. Would you do it?”
“Without telling the Circus?”
“Not in detail. We may need their facilities from time to time. That doesn’t mean we need tell them the whole story. There’s the question of security: need to know.”
“Then without the Circus?”
“Why not?”
Haldane shook his head. “Because it isn’t our work. We’re just not equipped. Give it to the Circus and help them out with the military stuff. Give it to an old hand, someone like Smiley or Leamas—”
“Leamas is dead.”
“All right then—Smiley.”
“Smiley is blown.”
Haldane colored. “Then Guillam or one of the others. One of the pros. They’ve got a big enough stable these days. Go and see Control, let him have the case.”
“No,” Leclerc said firmly, putting his glass on the table. “No, Adrian. You’ve been in the Department as long as I have, you know our brief. Take all necessary steps—that’s what it says—all necessary steps for the procurement, analysis and verification of military intelligence in those areas where the requirement cannot be met from conventional military resources.” He beat out the words with his little fist as he spoke. “How else do you think I got authority for the overflight?”
“All right,” Haldane conceded. “We have our brief. But things have changed. It’s a different game now. In those days we were top of the tree—rubber boats on a moonless night; a captured enemy plane; wireless and all that. You and I know; we did it together. But it’s changed. It’s a different war; a different kind of fighting. They know that at the Ministry perfectly well.” He added, “And don’t place too much trust in the Circus; you’ll get no charity from those people.”
They looked at one another in surprise, a moment of recognition. Leclerc said, his voice scarcely above a whisper: “It began with the networks, didn’t it? Do you remember how the Circus swallowed them up one by one? The Ministry would say: ‘We’re in danger of duplication on the Polish desks, Leclerc. I’ve decided Control should look after Poland.’ When was that? July forty-eight. Year after year it’s gone on. Why do you think they patronize your Research Section? Not just for your beautiful files; they’ve got us where they want us, don’t you see? Satellites! Non-operational! It’s a way of putting us to sleep! You know what they call us in Whitehall these days? The Grace and Favor boys.”