He looked out of the window at the Kensington Palace Gardens behind the embassy and then over at the palace itself on his right. He understood that the building had been cleared of the minor royalty and retainers who normally lived there. No doubt they had all decamped to safe luxury in the country.
In many ways this was not a bad posting. After the difficult years in Spain he had gone back to Moscow for a while. The Chief had been going through a particularly paranoid period – but then when was he not going through a paranoid period? Grishin had been lucky to survive that. Scores of his colleagues in the military and many other friends and associates had fallen victim to one or other of Stalin’s purges, but he had come out yet again with his career, family and life intact. Yes, he was a lucky sod, just like that bastard Voronov, who he kept on seeing out and about in London. Given Voronov’s past history with the Chief he was very surprised that he had not received instructions to liquidate him. Amazingly, it seemed as if Stalin had a soft spot for him! To think of Stalin having a soft spot for anyone was, of course, absurd. He was spluttering with laughter at this mad thought as his secretary, Ania, entered the room with the cup of Turkish coffee he had asked for minutes before.
“Thank you, my dear. Is the ambassador back yet?”
“No, Valery Stepanovich, not yet.”
The ambassador, Ivan Maisky, had an impossible job. Just before the outbreak of war, Stalin had agreed to the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. Dressed up as a mutual “non-aggression” treaty, it allowed for the division of the spoils of Eastern Europe between the two countries, which rapidly succeeded Hitler’s invasion of Poland in September 1939. Britain went to war to save Poland. Russia took advantage of the German invasion of Poland to share in carving it up. Didn’t that mean that Britain and Russia were at war? Not according to the niceties of diplomacy and Maisky was doing his very best to maintain the niceties. Grishin sat down at his desk and knocked the coffee back.
“Thank you, my dear, that will be all.” Grishin watched Ania’s pert bottom, tightly encased in a green dress, as it moved with a life of its own to the door and out of the room. He might have to pay his respects to that bottom again soon. It had been too long.
Grishin’s office title was Deputy Military Attaché, but he was in effect the embassy’s Chief Spy. The Deputy Commercial Secretary had until three months ago performed that role, but some unpleasantness back home had led to his recall and, so far as Grishin could tell, although it had not been officially confirmed, his liquidation. He had had to pick up the pieces and there were a lot of pieces to pick up. The Soviet spy network in Britain was extensive and ranged high and low. Aristocrats, politicians, professors, scientists, MI5 and MI6 officers, journalists, trade unionists, secretaries, coal miners – he had the lot. Keeping them under control and keeping his masters in Moscow happy was a big, big job. That’s why he had no time for distractions. Voronov was a distraction. He picked up a report on Kyril Ivanovitch Voronov, prepared by one of his men a while ago. It was attached to a thick file on the man who had a network of expatriates in London, which often intersected with his own. He was a liability and he knew the best way to remove a liability. However, what about the “soft spot”? If he took matters into his own hands, what repercussions might there be with the Chief?
He stood up and went to look out at the park again and thought of Spain. That stupid idiot Sasha. Did he really think that such a thing would not be noticed? Grishin thought he had managed to cover his tracks on this one, but what if someone shone a light on the affair again?
He shouted for Ania, who hurried in, fluttering her pale eyelashes alluringly. “I am going for a walk in the park, Ania. What are you doing tonight?”
*