THE SPY WHO CAME IN FROM ThE COLD by Le Carre, John

* * 15 * Come to the Ball

Liz looked at the letter from Party Centre and wondered what it was about. She found it a little puzzling. She had to admit she was pleased, but why hadn’t they consulted her first? Had the District Committee put up her name, or was it Centre’s own choice? But no one in Centre knew her, so far as she was aware. She’d met odd speakers of course, and at District Congress she’d shaken hands with the Party Organizer. Perhaps that man from Cultural Relations had remembered her–that fair, rather effeminate man who was so ingratiating. Ashe, that was his name. He’d taken a bit of interest in her and she supposed he might have handed her name on, or remembered her when the Scholarship came up. An odd man, he was; took her to the Black and White for coffee after the meeting and asked her about her boy friends. He hadn’t been amorous or anything–she’d thought he was a bit queer, to be honest–but he asked her masses of questions about herself. How long had she been in the Party, did she get homesick living away from her parents? Had she lots of boy friends or was there a special one she carried a torch for? She hadn’t cared for him much but his talk had gone down quite well–the worker-state in the German Democratic Republic, the concept of the worker-poet and all that stuff. He certainly knew all about eastern Europe, he must have traveled a lot. She’d guessed he was a schoolmaster, he had that rather didactic, fluent way with him. They’d had a collection for the Fighting Fund afterwards, and Ashe had put a pound in; she’d been absolutely amazed. That was it, she was sure now: it was Ashe who’d remembered her. He’d told someone at London District, and District had told Centre or something like that. It still seemed a funny way to go about things, but then the Party always was secretive–it was part of being a revolutionary party, she supposed. It didn’t appeal to Liz much, the secrecy, it seemed dishonest. But she supposed it was necessary, and heaven knows, there were plenty who got a kick out of it.

She read the letter again. It was on Centre’s writing paper, with the thick red print at the top and it began “Dear Comrade.” It sounded so military to Liz, and she hated that; she’d never quite got used to “Comrade.”

Dear Comrade,

We have recently had discussions with our Comrades in the Socialist Unity Party of the German Democratic Republic on the possibility of effecting exchanges between party members over here and our comrades in democratic Germany. The idea is to create a basis of exchange at the rank and file level between our two parties. The S.U.P. is aware that the existing discriminatory measures by the British Home Office make it unlikely that their own delegates will be able to come to the United Kingdom in the immediate future, but they feel that an exchange of experiences is all the more important for this reason. They have generously invited us to select five Branch Secre- taries with good experience and a good record of stimulating mass action at street level. Each selected comrade will spend three weeks attending Branch discussions, studying progress in industry and social welfare and seeing at first hand the evidence of fascist provocation by the West. This is a grand opportunity for our comrades to profit from the experiences of a young socialist system.

We therefore asked District to put forward the names of young Cadre workers from your areas who might get the biggest advantages from the trip, and your name has been put forward. We want you to go if you possibly can, and carry out the second part of the scheme–which is to establish contact with a Party Branch in the GDR whose members are from similar ‘industrial backgrounds and have the same kind of problems as your own. The Bayswater South Branch has been paired with Neuenhagen, a suburb of Leipzig. Freda Lüman, Secretary of the Neuenhagen branch, is preparing a big welcome. We are sure you are just the Comrade for the job, and that it will be a terrific success. All expenses will be paid by the GDR Cultural Office.

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