"O'Donnell, Peter - Modesty Blaise Pieces Of Modesty" - читать интересную книгу автора (O'Donnell Peter)

'The Russians aren't making a tooth-comb search,' Tarrant said. 'They know we have Okubo in a safe-house, and they're simply waiting for him to move. Then they'll net him. Starov's no fool.'
'Starov?'
'Major-General Starov. Head of Russian Security in East Berlin. He's very devious. A man I fear.'
Waverly returned to the desk. 'You said it would require a major operation to bring Okubo out. I see what you mean. But you'll just have to mount one.'
Tarrant kept a tight hold on the fear and anger he felt. 'We've spent fifteen years building up the network we have in East Berlin,' he said quietly. 'It takes time to recruit safely and to get people planted, but we have a very nice tight little network now. Agents have been spotted in carefully. They don't do anything. They're sleepers, and they've been placed
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there for one purpose only - so that we can activate them if and when the Berlin situation ever really catches fire. That's the real crunch, and they shouldn't be activated for anything else, however tempting. I suggest Okubo isn't worth it, Minister. It's like using kamikaze pilots to sink a row-boat.'
Waverly stared into space for a while, then said, 'Can you hire agents for the job? Money's no object for this.'
Tarrant sat up a little. 'No object to whom, Minister? The budget for all Secret Service departments was cut last year and again this year. We now have just over ten million pounds annually. I doubt if that would pay the CIA's telephone bill.'
Waverly shook his head. 'You're too old a hand to be disenchanted by Government parsimony. The Americans can afford it, and we can't. But you needn't touch your budget for this. I can secure money from the Special Fund. Surely you can hire the necessary personnel? I understand there are more freelance agents in West Berlin than we have civil servants in Whitehall.'
'There are almost as many Intelligence groups as that,' Tarrant said dryly. 'Some agents have become so entangled in the situation that they find it hard to remember who they're working for. And since there's precious little liaison, they spend some of their time industriously liquidating each other's agents by mistake. The fact that many of the groups have been penetrated by Russian Intelligence complicates matters. Add in the freelances, the doubles and the triples, and you have a situation which must make the Russians laugh themselves to sleep at nights.'
Waverly smiled. It was a small and not very humorous smile. 'Then if you can trust nobody else, you'll have to use your own people.'
'I thought I'd covered that point, Minister.'
'No.' Waverly looked into Tarrant's eyes. 'No, not really. You said Okubo wasn't worth risking your network for. But what Okubo is worth is a Ministerial decision. My decision.'
There was a very long silence in the room. 'Of course,' Tarrant said at last, and got to his feet. 'I'll keep you fully informed, Minister.'
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When Modesty Blaise came into the reception hall of the penthouse block she appeared to be accompanied by a small but very handsome walnut tallboy chest of Queen Anne's day, moving on human feet that protruded from beneath it.
Willie Garvin set the tallboy down and wiped his brow. He had sat with it resting across him in the back of Modesty's open Rolls while she drove the eighty-odd miles from the country house where the auction sale had been held.
She was looking apologetic now, as well as stunningly attractive in the powder-blue matching dress and jacket she wore. Tm sorry, Willie,' she said as he stretched his cramped muscles. 'I ought to have let them send it.'
'That's right,' Willie agreed amiably.
'But I kept remembering how that lovely little table was ruined last year.'
Willie nodded judicially. 'That's right, too.'
'So it was better to bring it with us, really.'
'That's right, Princess.'
She grinned suddenly, patted his arm and said, 'You ought to get mad at me sometimes for my own good.'
'Next time.' He looked past her and registered mild surprise. 'Look who's 'ere.'
A man had risen from an armchair in the reception hall and was moving towards them. He carried a bowler hat and a rolled umbrella. His name was Fraser, and he was Sir Gerald Tarrant's personal assistant.
Fraser was a small bespectacled man with a thin face and a timorous manner. The picture he chose to present most of the time was one of nervous humility. This was a role he had acted for so long that it was a part of him. Sometimes, within a tiny circle of close intimates, the role was dropped and the real Fraser appeared. This was another man, and a very hard personality indeed. Fraser had served as an agent in the field for fifteen years before returning to a desk job, and he had been one of the great agents.
Now he said with an anxious smile, 'I hope my visit isn't... I mean, I tried to telephone you, Miss Blaise, but - er ... so I thought I'd come along and wait for you.'
'That's all right. I wanted to go over the policy with you
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before I signed,' Modesty said, and turned to the porter behind the reception desk. 'George, will you give Mr Garvin a hand to get this thing in the lift?'
A private lift served Modesty's penthouse. There was just room for the three of them and the tallboy. Going up in the lift, Fraser retained his servile manner, commenting fulsomely but knowledgeably on the tallboy.
Willie lifted it out and set it down in the tiled foyer. Modesty led the way into the big sitting-room, taking off her jacket, and said, 'Is something wrong, Jack?'
Fraser grimaced, threw the hat and umbrella on to a big couch and stared at them sourly. 'Tarrant's resigning,' he said, discarding his image. 'Bloody hell. The longer I live, the more I sympathize with Guy Fawkes, except that blowing up politicians is too good for them. Do you think I could have a drink?'
Modesty nodded to Willie, who moved to the bar and poured a double brandy. He knew Fraser's tastes.
'Why is he resigning?' Modesty asked.
'If I tell you that,' Fraser said, 'I shall be breaking the Official Secrets Act.' He sipped the brandy, sighed, and said, 'God, this is good. If anyone ever wants to ruin it with dry ginger, I hope you break their teeth.'
Modesty and Willie glanced at each other. Fraser was a badly worried man, and that was so unlikely as to be alarming.
'So let's drive a truck through the Official Secrets Act,' Fraser said with gloomy relish. 'There's some bloody Jap bacteriologist who's been working for the Russians for years. Professor Okubo. He's defected and he's in East Berlin now, being kept under wraps by our liaison man. Our masters want him. Waverly's told Tarrant to get him out - even though Starov knows he's in hiding there. We can't do it without activating the sleeper network. Tarrant's been told to go ahead and do just that.' Fraser shook his head. 'My sister's husband would have more sense, and I wouldn't match him against a smart dog, the thick bastard.'
Willie Garvin whistled softly. This was bad. He saw that Modesty was angry. Like him, she was thinking of the agents, the men and women who for years had lived the bleak,
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comfortless and restricted life of East Berliners, and who with luck might go on doing so for years more, simply so that they could be activated if ever a crisis got out of hand and the chips went down.
At very best the job was a sentence to long barren years of deprivation. At worst, a bad break would mean torture and death. God alone knew why they did it. But they did. And the very least acknowledgement they could be given was not to sell them down the river by needless exposure.
'If Tarrant resigns,' Fraser said brusquely, 'we lose the best man ever to hold the job. That's one thing. It's bad, but we seem to specialize in self-inflicted wounds, so it's nothing new. The second thing is this. If he resigns, they'll put in somebody who will agree to do what Tarrant won't. The new boy will activate the network to get this bloody Japanese measles expert out, and it's an odds-on chance that Starov will have the lot.' He looked down into his glass and said broodingly, 'I've been where they're sitting now. It's not funny.'
Modesty said, 'You're asking us to do something?'
Fraser gave her a lopsided, humourless smile. He looked suddenly tired. 'Not asking,' he said. 'I don't see what the hell you or anybody can do. I'm just telling you and hoping. Hoping you might think of some way to save those poor trusting buggers in East Berlin.'
Nobody spoke for a while. Fraser looked up and saw that Willie Garvin was leaning against the wall by the fireplace, looking at Modesty with an almost comically inquiring air, as if they were sharing some faintly amusing joke.
She got up and moved to the telephone, saying, 'Do you know where Sir Gerald is now?'
'At the office,' Fraser said, hardly daring to acknowledge the flare of hope that leapt within him. 'Composing his resignation, I imagine.'