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Entry tags:
006 - Peter Guillam - Nemesism
There is a point, a moment at the end of a long day, long and particularly terrible, at which it seems that something, some form of nostalgia, perhaps, comes over all spies, or nearly all. There is something in the air, if not in the water, something they breathe in, something which saturates them to their very cores -- which all sounds very poetic, but of course it isn't, not really. The word 'nostalgia' implies delicacy, implies the bittersweet, some nuance, but all anyone becomes, and Peter no less than the rest (perhaps more), is maudlin.
He cannot lie about who they are. Not even this trained liar, this exclamation point at the end of vehement mistruths that he has made of himself (or has been made; if he were more charitable towards himself he might be able to deny his own involvement). There is the work. There's always the work, and that's the core of the argument, this argument he would make if he could, that they are lonely men, sad men, the last in any world which ought to be given any power whatsoever, the last that ought to be left to control from behind their curtain (iron or otherwise) the fate of nations. If they knew, the public milling about outside, if they had any idea...
He'd have been hanged long before Casablanca. They'd be strung up from the trees, a pathetic collection of spiteful, petty men.
They come to a point: it wasn't always like this. Even in the business: once there was the war, and hadn't the war been good? Peter wouldn't quite know; he'd missed it, been too young, but he remembers his mother, and her weariness, but the quiet pleasure she'd seemed to take in her work, of which she was never able to tell him. At home they were lotus eaters, she and he, and over their heads hung Damocles' sword, tied up all the way in France. Father. Sometimes he came home, and they pretended they were a family, that he was a businessman, a dealer in goods, not documents smuggled across the French border and then the channel.
He hadn't known at the time, of course. Nous ne parlerons pas de ça. But it had become clear.
Perhaps he had been groomed for it. Perhaps Peter Guillam could never have had a normal life, not ever; he suspects it, sometimes, nights like these, curled up around a tumbler of cheap scotch in his empty flat, lights off, reminiscing. No, it wouldn't ever have been normal -- not since the first time he'd really noticed a boy's shape, all of them a collection of skinny limbs, hair fair and dark; they'd blazed or they'd smouldered but they had all made their imprint on his consciousness, and he'd bitten down on the bitter gall of the guilt of it, the shame. He'd saved his kisses for girls. In public life he still does.
Sometimes he even brings them home, and he'd done that then too, but then it had been hopeful. Now it's a chore, and he's practiced at going through the motions but that hasn't ever managed to produce enjoyment. Some of them relish it, the lying. Maybe not men like him, but the ones who run several lovers, several wives, families with children; they get off on the lying because they were trained to, because it's the greatest thrill any of them have ever known, better than sex. It is. God, it is, but Peter has never stopped dreaming of picket fences and grandchildren, and that's the most despicable thing of all.
Sod the rest. Sod it entirely; Casablanca should have taught him better. Bloated faces, blackened tongues; he can't be trusted with agents, much less children, even if that wasn't his fault, even if they'd been blown; he ought to have known, ought to have guessed, ought to have worked it out faster. Every moment of distraction, every quiet instance of admiration for dark skin and darker eyes and long eyelashes, however brief, weighs on his mind like an anchor. On one of his shelves there rests, in the original, a collection of the poems of Abu Nawas, and some days he can hardly bear to look at it, no matter how much he loves the words.
Have they destroyed him? Has he destroyed himself? Was there anything salvageable in the first place? Ricki Tarr had wanted out; I don't want to end up like you lot, but there is no out for them anymore, is there? Certainly not for Peter. Not anymore. God, if only the knowing stopped the wanting. If only he weren't too frightened to try. If only it weren't for obligation, for George, poor old George, if only...
Pointless tripe, 'if only'. That's the great irony in it, Peter thinks as he raises the glass to his lips and takes a burning swallow. The funny bit. He's going to hate himself no matter what he chooses now.
He cannot lie about who they are. Not even this trained liar, this exclamation point at the end of vehement mistruths that he has made of himself (or has been made; if he were more charitable towards himself he might be able to deny his own involvement). There is the work. There's always the work, and that's the core of the argument, this argument he would make if he could, that they are lonely men, sad men, the last in any world which ought to be given any power whatsoever, the last that ought to be left to control from behind their curtain (iron or otherwise) the fate of nations. If they knew, the public milling about outside, if they had any idea...
He'd have been hanged long before Casablanca. They'd be strung up from the trees, a pathetic collection of spiteful, petty men.
They come to a point: it wasn't always like this. Even in the business: once there was the war, and hadn't the war been good? Peter wouldn't quite know; he'd missed it, been too young, but he remembers his mother, and her weariness, but the quiet pleasure she'd seemed to take in her work, of which she was never able to tell him. At home they were lotus eaters, she and he, and over their heads hung Damocles' sword, tied up all the way in France. Father. Sometimes he came home, and they pretended they were a family, that he was a businessman, a dealer in goods, not documents smuggled across the French border and then the channel.
He hadn't known at the time, of course. Nous ne parlerons pas de ça. But it had become clear.
Perhaps he had been groomed for it. Perhaps Peter Guillam could never have had a normal life, not ever; he suspects it, sometimes, nights like these, curled up around a tumbler of cheap scotch in his empty flat, lights off, reminiscing. No, it wouldn't ever have been normal -- not since the first time he'd really noticed a boy's shape, all of them a collection of skinny limbs, hair fair and dark; they'd blazed or they'd smouldered but they had all made their imprint on his consciousness, and he'd bitten down on the bitter gall of the guilt of it, the shame. He'd saved his kisses for girls. In public life he still does.
Sometimes he even brings them home, and he'd done that then too, but then it had been hopeful. Now it's a chore, and he's practiced at going through the motions but that hasn't ever managed to produce enjoyment. Some of them relish it, the lying. Maybe not men like him, but the ones who run several lovers, several wives, families with children; they get off on the lying because they were trained to, because it's the greatest thrill any of them have ever known, better than sex. It is. God, it is, but Peter has never stopped dreaming of picket fences and grandchildren, and that's the most despicable thing of all.
Sod the rest. Sod it entirely; Casablanca should have taught him better. Bloated faces, blackened tongues; he can't be trusted with agents, much less children, even if that wasn't his fault, even if they'd been blown; he ought to have known, ought to have guessed, ought to have worked it out faster. Every moment of distraction, every quiet instance of admiration for dark skin and darker eyes and long eyelashes, however brief, weighs on his mind like an anchor. On one of his shelves there rests, in the original, a collection of the poems of Abu Nawas, and some days he can hardly bear to look at it, no matter how much he loves the words.
Have they destroyed him? Has he destroyed himself? Was there anything salvageable in the first place? Ricki Tarr had wanted out; I don't want to end up like you lot, but there is no out for them anymore, is there? Certainly not for Peter. Not anymore. God, if only the knowing stopped the wanting. If only he weren't too frightened to try. If only it weren't for obligation, for George, poor old George, if only...
Pointless tripe, 'if only'. That's the great irony in it, Peter thinks as he raises the glass to his lips and takes a burning swallow. The funny bit. He's going to hate himself no matter what he chooses now.