Old Flames by John Lawton Page B

Years ago, in Berlin, not long after the war, a Russian spy had told him that his father had been an agent of the Communist Party of the Soviet
Union ever since leaving Russia in the chaos of 1905. Frequently Troy had thought about this. It was something he did not want to believe, and in the end was something he had chosen not to believe.
It was certainly not a conversation he wished to have with the First Secretary of that party.
    ‘Where are you from?’ Khrushchev asked.
    ‘Moscow mostly. Before that Yasnaya Polyana. It’s near Tula.’
    ‘I know where it is. I’ve been there several times. The place is virtually a Tolstoy museum now.’
    ‘I envy you, Comrade Khrushchev. I’ve never seen it. I don’t suppose I ever will.’
    ‘Come to Russia.’
    Troy looked at Khrushchev. He was smiling. Perhaps he even meant it.
    ‘I don’t think that’s possible. My family history is a bit more complicated than I could tell you.’
    ‘Come to Russia,’ he said again. ‘I’ll show you a good time. Better than this dreary traipsing round the monuments of Britain.’
    ‘You’ve met Eden. You’ve met the Queen and the Duke. It hasn’t all been St Paul’s and the Tower.’
    ‘Eden’s a monument. The Royals are monuments.’
    Troy agreed wholeheartedly, but felt it was not for him to say so at this or any other juncture.
    ‘Where are the people? Where are the workers?’ The fat little hands, with their stubby little fingers spread outwards, emphatically open and empty. ‘Where are the
peasants?’
    Khrushchev had a point. The crowds had been thin on the ground from the start. B & K had been somewhat less than mobbed. In anticipation Troy had assumed that the visit would be little
different from visiting royalty or a personal appearance by Frank Sinatra or Johnnie Ray; in reality he had almost begun to wonder if the English had been told to stay home, or if, perhaps, Gone
With the Wind was showing nightly on ITV.
    ‘I doubt the English have any peasants. And you met a worker on Saturday. You just chose to shortchange him.’
    ‘You mean at Harwell?’ Khrushchev was almost shouting again. ‘The man was an Eden apparatchik! A stooge!’
    Quickly Troy weighed up the risk and concluded it was worth it. After all, his cover was blown, and with it probably the cover of the entire squad, and he would, no doubt, find himself resuming
his holiday with a flea in his ear from the Branch, on the morrow.
    ‘With all respect, Comrade Khrushchev, he wasn’t. He was speaking his mind. Quite possibly the only person you’ve talked to this entire trip who has. And I do not mean by that
that I question the integrity of George Brown or of my brother, but they, like you, are politicians.’
    Troy paused. In for a penny, in for a thousand roubles, he thought. If Khrushchev was about to explode again, so be it. He would be the one to light the blue touch paper, and with any luck he
would be the one to retire safely. It really was irresistible.
    ‘If you were to ask me, I would tell you that the trip, for you and for the Marshal, has been a diplomatic contrivance on both sides. Your own side doesn’t want you meeting the
people. It’s a waste of their time. They’d far rather you chewed the fat with a dimwit like Eden or exchanged brown bears and harmless pleasantries with Her Majesty. The British
don’t want you meeting the people. They’d far rather you were perceived as someone stripped of normal human feeling by the godlessness of Marxism. The last thing Eden wants is you
pressing the flesh among the proles.’
    Troy paused again. Cobb would surely fire him the minute he learnt that Khrushchev had seen through their pathetic charade. He had nothing to lose, not a damn thing.
    ‘However if that’s what you want, it’s not yet nine-thirty and I’m sure something could be arranged.’
    Khrushchev twinkled, mischief rippling out across those chubby cheeks, lighting up the impish eyes.
    ‘An English