The Factory by Brian Freemantle Page B

small bathroom and a minute kitchen, curtained off from the living area. All the furnishings appeared old.
    â€˜Is this where I am to live?’ asked Davies.
    â€˜Maybe,’ shrugged Oleg.
    â€˜How will I know about the language classes?’
    â€˜You’ll be collected. Ten tomorrow morning.’
    Davies’ Russian was already of a high standard because there had been instruction before he left London, so he found no difficulty with the classes. Very quickly he started anticipating them eagerly, however, because they became his only effective contact with another human being although his teacher, a stiffly correct, elderly woman named Borishev, offered no friendship.
    Otherwise he was achingly lonely. Which was something else he hadn’t anticipated. He had expected constantly to be with people, interrogators and debriefers and then, hopefully, with other intelligence professionals, although Russian not British. But not to be abandoned like this. The first few days he had been unsure if he were expected to remain inside the apartment and so he had, cooking for himself, but then, as an experiment, he ventured out one evening and there was no challenge. He still kept close to the Ploshchad building on that first occasion but gradually began extending the outings, seeking out restaurants and cafés although always remaining careful to avoid not just the places but the entire districts he knew to be favourites of people from the British embassy, who would have recognized him.
    And then, at the end of the third week, Davies picked up the surveillance and realized, with sinking relief, how wise he’d been in that avoidance. He hadn’t been abandoned and he hadn’t been accepted. The move into Moscow and leaving him entirely alone was yet another test to see if he were a sincere defector or whether he would attempt some surreptitious prearranged contact with someone from his own embassy.
    At once Davies’ loneliness went because it meant he was working again, professionally. He continued his evening and weekend outings – but never going near the favoured Western places – and diligently studied his Russian, curious as to how long the Russians would sustain the now wasted exercise.
    It was a month.
    On a Tuesday, quite unexpectedly, Oleg appeared instead of the driver taking him to the language course and announced: ‘No more school.’
    Davies thought the man seemed more irascible than during their encounters at the dacha. He said: ‘What then?’
    Oleg’s hesitation this time seemed more reluctance than an interrogation ploy. ‘You are to see people in our intelligence,’ the man said at last.
    Davies was attached to Viktor Lezin’s secretariat, which was where he wanted to be because it was through this department that the raw, incoming intelligence was channelled, particularly from England. He settled in carefully, polite to everybody, deferring to every instruction, in no hurry to start his true, infiltrating function until he was completely accepted by everyone.
    He started to forget the debriefing sessions at the dacha and so when the order came, personally from Lezin, Davies was surprised.
    â€˜A press conference?’ he queried.
    â€˜I have decided it would be worthwhile,’ said the plump man. ‘It will be unsettling for them to remind the British of how much they have lost. Of the damage they have suffered.’
    And shatter his parents anew, thought Davies. There was, however, an advantage, although he did not feel that it in any way balanced the hurt to his mother and father.
    The KGB maximized the effect of his appearing before the world media, announcing it in advance and staging the encounter in a vast hall close to the Kremlin. He tried to look as smart as he could although the one suit he possessed had begun to bag from constant wear: at least the university tie remained crisp. The Russians imposed no time limit and the