Running Blind / The Freedom Trap

‘It happens to be none of your business.’

‘Perhaps,’ he said, and sat down. ‘So you hid yourself in Scotland and didn’t expect to be found. Protective coloration, eh? A Stewart hiding among a lot of Stewarts. You’ve caused us some little difficulty.’

‘Who said I was hiding? I am a Scot, you know.’

He smiled fatly. ‘Of a sort. Just by your paternal grandfather. It’s not long since you were a Swede – and before that you were Finnish. You were Stewartsen then, of course.’

‘Have you travelled five hundred miles just to talk of old times?’ I asked tiredly.

‘You’re looking very fit,’ he said.

‘I can’t say the same for you; you’re out of condition and running to fat,’ I said cruelly.

He chuckled. ‘The fleshpots, dear boy; the fleshpots – all those lunches at the expense of Her Majesty’s Government.’ He waved a pudgy hand. ‘But let’s get down to it, Alan.’

‘To you I’m Mr Stewart,’ I said deliberately.

‘Oh, you don’t like me,’ he said in a hurt voice. ‘But no matter – it makes no difference in the end. I … we … want you to do a job for us. Nothing too difficult, you understand.’

‘You must be out of your mind,’ I said.

‘I know how you must feel, but …’

‘You don’t know a damn thing,’ I said sharply. ‘If you expect me to work for you after what happened then you’re crazier than I thought.’

I was wrong, of course; Slade knew perfectly well how I felt – it was his business to know men and to use them like tools. I waited for him to put on the pressure and, sure enough, it came, but in his usual oblique manner.

‘So let’s talk of old times,’ he said. ‘You must remember Kennikin.’

I remembered – I’d have to have total amnesia to forget Kennikin. A vision of his face swam before me as I had last seen him; eyes like grey pebbles set above high Slavic cheekbones, and the scar ran from his right temple to the corner of his mouth standing out lividly against the suddenly pale skin. He had been angry enough to kill me at that moment.

‘What about Kennikin?’ I said slowly.

‘Just that I hear he’s been looking for you, too. You made a fool of him and he didn’t like it. He wants to have you … ’ Slade paused as though groping for a thought. ‘What’s that delicate phrase our American colleagues of the CIA use? Oh, yes – Kennikin wants to have you “terminated with extreme prejudice.” Although I daresay the KGB don’t employ that exact wording.’

A damned nice term for a bullet in the back of the head one dark night. ‘So?’ I said.

‘He’s still looking for you,’ Slade pointed out.

‘Why?’ I asked. ‘I’m no longer with the Department.’

‘Ah, but Kennikin doesn’t know that.’ Slade examined his fingernails. ‘We’ve kept the information from him – quite successfully, I believe. It seemed useful to do so.’

I saw what was coming but I wanted to make Slade come right out with it, to commit himself in plain language – something he abhorred. ‘But he doesn’t know where I am.’

‘Quite right, dear boy – but what if someone should tell him?’

I leaned forward and looked closely at Slade. ‘And who would tell him?’

‘I would,’ he said blandly. ‘If I thought it necessary. I’d have to do it tactfully and through a third party, of course; but it could be arranged.’

So there it was – the threat of betrayal. Nothing new for Slade; he made a life’s work out of corruption and betrayal. Not that I was one to throw stones; it had been my work too, once. But the difference between us was that Slade liked his work.

I let him waffle on, driving home the point unnecessarily. ‘Kennikin runs a very efficient Mordgruppe, as we know to our cost, don’t we? Several members of the Department have been … er … terminated by Kennikin’s men.’

‘Why don’t you just say murdered?’

He frowned and his piggy eyes sank deeper into the rolls of fat that larded his face. ‘You always were blunt, Stewart; perhaps too blunt for your own good. I haven’t forgotten the time you tried to get me in trouble with Taggart. I remember you mentioned that word then.’

‘I’ll mention it again,’ I said. ‘You murdered Jimmy Birkby.’

‘Did I?’ Slade asked softly. ‘Who put the gelignite in his car? Who carefully connected the wire from the detonator to the ignition system? You did!’ He cut me off with a chopping motion of his hand. ‘And it was only that which got you next to Kennikin, only that induced Kennikin to trust you enough so that we could break him. You did very well, Stewart – all things considered.’

‘Yes, you used me,’ I said.

‘And I’ll use you again,’ he said brutally. ‘Or would you rather be thrown to Kennikin?’ He laughed suddenly. ‘You know, I don’t think Kennikin gives a damn if you’re with the Department or not. He wants you for your own sweet self.’

I stared at him. ‘And what do you mean by that?’

‘Didn’t you know that Kennikin is impotent now?’ Slade said in surprise. ‘I know you intended to kill him with that last shot, but the light was bad and you thought you’d merely wounded him. Indeed you had, but not merely – you castrated the poor man.’ His hands, which were folded across his belly, shook with his sniggers. ‘To put it crudely – or bluntly, if you like, dear boy – you shot his balls off. Can you imagine what he’ll do to you if – and when – he catches up with you?’

I felt cold and there was a yawning emptiness in the pit of my stomach. ‘There’s only one way of opting out of the world and that’s by dying,’ said Slade with phoney philosophy. ‘You tried your way and it doesn’t work.’

He was right; I shouldn’t have expected otherwise. ‘What it comes to is this,’ I said. ‘You want me to do a job. If I don’t do it, you’ll tip off the opposition and the opposition will knock me off – and your hands will be theoretically clean.’

‘Very succinctly put,’ said Slade. ‘You always did write good, clear reports.’ He sounded like a schoolmaster complimenting a boy on a good essay.

‘What’s the job?’

‘Now you’re being sensible,’ he said approvingly. He produced a sheet of paper and consulted it. ‘We know you are in the habit of taking an annual holiday in Iceland.’ He looked up. ‘Still sticking to your northern heritage, I see. You couldn’t very well go back to Sweden – and Finland would be even more risky. Too close to the Russian border for comfort.’ He spread his hands. ‘But who goes to Iceland?’

‘So the job is in Iceland?’

‘Indeed it is.’ He tapped the paper with his fingernail. ‘You take long holidays – three and four months at a time. What it is to have a private income – the Department did very well by you.’

‘The Department gave me nothing that wasn’t mine,’ I said shortly.

He ignored that. ‘I note you’ve been doing very well for yourself in Iceland. All the home comforts down to a love-nest. A young lady, I believe, is …’

‘We’ll leave her out of it.’

‘Just the point I’m making, dear boy. It would be most unwise if she became involved. It could be most dangerous for her, don’t you think? I wouldn’t tell her anything about it.’ His voice was kindly.

Slade had certainly done his homework. If he knew about Elin then he must have tapped me a long time before. All the time I thought I was in cover I’d been under a microscope.

‘Come to the job.’

‘You will collect a package at Keflavik International Airport.’ He sketched dimensions with his hands. ‘About eight inches by four inches by two inches. You will deliver it to a man in Akureyri – you know where that is?’