The Factory by Brian Freemantle Page A

narrow alleys and roads, but then Whitehead realized they were frequently backtracking on themselves while Tanya checked for any pursuit. He had instinctively been checking as well and was sure they weren’t followed. Despite the detours he realized they were gradually coming closer and closer to the waterfront. The house they finally entered was very near the harbour: Whitehead could hear gulls and the groan of ships’ sirens.
    The door from the street led directly into a kitchen and Whitehead started back in instant alarm at the sound of movement when he entered. At once he was embarrassed at his reaction to the child who stood before him. She was a girl, blonde and very pretty, with large, serious eyes. Whitehead guessed her to be about twelve years old.
    â€˜It’s all right,’ said Tanya to the girl. ‘He’s a friend. It’s all right.’
    To Whitehead she said: ‘This is my daughter, Natasha.’
    The way to relieve the headache would have been to take a drink – maybe two – from the bottle in his bottom left-hand drawer but the Director General held back from doing so, challenging his own resistance and determined to endure the discomfort. He still looked up irritably when his deputy, Jeremy Thurlow, entered the room from his adjoining office. ‘What is it?’ demanded Bell.
    Thurlow, a stick-thin, unemotional man, put a sheet of paper on the desk in front of the Director General. ‘It’s the communication code agreed between the NATO countries for the forthcoming defence ministers’ meeting in Brussels. Our interception people picked it up being relayed to Moscow.’
    â€˜It’s low priority,’ pointed out Bell. ‘Every attending country has a copy. It could have come from a dozen sources.’
    â€˜It was being relayed from the Soviet embassy here,’ rejoined Thurlow, ‘so it came from London. There were three copies in England. We had one of them.’
    â€˜Which leaves two other sources from which a leak could have come,’ retorted Bell. When the hell was he going to get a lead to who was doing it?
    The fish was surprisingly good but the only vegetable was potato, old and black. Conversation was difficult, although Whitehead’s Russian was fluent. Occasionally, defiantly, Natasha addressed her mother in Latvian, although halfway through the evening the child looked curiously at him and said: ‘You’re not a born Russian, are you? You learned the language somewhere, like I have to learn it at school.’
    â€˜I’m from a long way away,’ avoided Whitehead.
    The coffee, after Natasha had gone to bed, was very weak and came from a tin, not fresh. Tanya said: ‘You mustn’t worry about her telling anyone you’ve been here. Your not being Russian is a protection.’
    â€˜Why didn’t you tell London about her?’
    Tanya shrugged. ‘It didn’t seem important, not until now.’
    â€˜What else have you held back?’
    â€˜A lot, I suppose.’
    â€˜So tell me now.’
    Tanya sighed, both hands around her coffee cup. At last she said: ‘Vadim … he was Natasha’s father … was the real nationalist. He would have been a recognized leader now, if he’d lived. But he didn’t. The KGB arrested him about six years ago, before the Gorbachev changes. He was tried on charges of endangering the state – their state, not ours – and he was exiled to Siberia. He’d never been strong. He only lasted two years. I never saw him, from the day he was sentenced. That is why I took over, even offered myself to London. To get revenge, however I could. I never thought anything could happen to me, like it did to Vadim. That was stupid, I know. It just didn’t …’ Her voice trailed away.
    â€˜â€¦ so now you’re trapped,’ picked up Whitehead, agreeing to Tanya’s own assessment. There was no question of his shooting