Free Secret Kingdom by Francis Bennett

aggressively. ‘Whether we like it or not, the Soviets regard Hungary as theirs. If the Hungarians are foolish enough to get it into their heads to try to chuck them out, they’ve got to accept what’s coming to them.’
    The silence that met Watson-Jones’s enquiring gaze as he surveyedthe room was not an endorsement of his views. To all but the very thick-skinned it was a clear signal of disapproval. If Watson-Jones noticed it at all, and that was unlikely, he ignored it. What surprised Pountney was the unexpected distance between Lander’s analysis and Brotherton’s summary. How could the two be so far apart?
    ‘If there were to be an uprising,’ Brotherton persisted, though without the firmness that Pountney would have expected – don’t use the conditional with Watson-Jones, he doesn’t understand it – ‘there may be calls for Western aid, perhaps even intervention. That raises a number of difficult questions. Shouldn’t this committee prepare a position on this so that we are ready to help when the time comes?’
    ‘Damn fool idea. Of course we shouldn’t,’ Watson-Jones said dismissively. ‘Not our business to go into Hungary and tell the Soviets what to do. Our position couldn’t be clearer.’
    ‘We don’t mind telling Nasser,’ said some brave soul at the back.
    ‘Not the same thing at all.’ Watson-Jones rounded on the speaker, his eyes sizing up the culprit for future humiliation. ‘Nasser’s a nobody who’s got to be taught a lesson. The Soviets are far too powerful to mess with, so we leave them alone. I don’t think there can be any disagreement on that.’
    ‘And let innocent people die in the cause of their own freedom?’
    ‘I’m not taking responsibility for the Hungarians,’ Watson-Jones said, raising his voice and banging the end of his pencil on the table, ‘and nor is Her Majesty’s Government. If the Hungarians want to pick a fight with the Soviets, that’s their business. It’s a damn fool idea that will end in tears and it’s got nothing to do with us.’ He looked round the table. ‘Are we agreed on that?’
    It was no different to what Pountney had feared. When it came down to it, nobody at this meeting was prepared to stand up to Watson-Jones. Not even Brotherton who, on the face of it, had a case to answer. (Why didn’t he pursue his position? Why did he give in to Watson-Jones’s bullying tactics so quickly?)
    ‘Item seven. Soviet activity in the Middle East. Here’s something we can get our teeth into.’
5
    Bloody in-tray. It filled up every time you blinked. Where the hell was Martineau? Why couldn’t he deal with all this paperwork?
    Hart picked out another telegram. Some damn fool Englishman had gone missing and London was asking the embassy to keep an eye out for him. Surely they knew better than that. If there was a missing Englishman in Budapest, the communist authorities would be shouting his name from the rooftops. What a useless bunch they were in King Charles Street.
    Joe Leman.
    He knew that name from somewhere. Deep in his mind he heard an echo from another life. Could it be his Leman? He hadn’t thought about him for years. Now his name appeared on a piece of paper and memories came flooding back of those early days of his Russian course at Cambridge. It couldn’t be the same man, could it?
    Leman was a research student and he was teaching the course, he told them quite openly, because he needed the money. Hart hadn’t liked him at first. He was still at an age when he expected those who taught him to be older than he was and he took against Leman because he was in his early twenties, while Hart was eighteen.
    He changed his mind because Leman was a good teacher, very patient. A few weeks into the course, Hart had made a determined effort to get to know him. If there were mysteries in Leman’s life, and Hart and his friends agreed there were, they wanted to crack them. With others on the course, Hart invited him out for a drink a