The writing steadied again.

' "Yavas Lagloo," says I, which I understand is Russian for meet me in the woodshed or something similar, and he says "Oh hullo," which I think he would have said to the Archangel Gabriel if he'd happened to be passing.

' "What is your dilemma?" says I.

'"I haven't got one," says he, after about an hour's thought.

' "Then what are you doing here? If you haven't a dilemma how did you get in?"

'So he gives a big placid grin and we saunter over to the great Khlebnikov, shake his tiny paw for a while then toddle back to my rooms. Where we drink. And drink. And Fan, he drank everything in sight. Or perhaps I did, I forget. And come the dawn, do you know what we did? I will tell you, Fan. We walked solemnly down to the Parks, I sit on a bench with a stopwatch, big Jim gets into his running kit and lopes twenty circuits. Twenty. I was quite exhausted.

'We can come to you any time, he asks nothing better than to be in my company or that of my wicked, divine friends. In short, he has appointed me his Mephistopheles and I am vastly tickled by the compliment. By the by, he is virgin, about eight foot tall and built by the same firm that did Stonehenge. Do not be alarmed.'

The file died again. Sitting up, Smiley turned the yellowed pages impatiently, looking for stronger meat. The tutors of both men aver (twenty years later) that it is inconceivable that the relationship between the two was 'more than purely friendly'... Haydon's evidence was never called... Jim's tutor speaks of him as 'intellectually omnivorous after long starvation' - dismisses any suggestion that he was 'pink'. The confrontation which takes place at Sarratt begins with long apologies, particularly in view of Jim's superb war record.

Jim's answers breathe a pleasing straightforwardness after the extravagance of Haydon's letter. One representative of the competition present, but his voice is seldom heard. No, Jim never again met Khlebnikov or anyone representing himself as his emissary... No, he never spoke to him but on that one occasion. No, he had no other contact with Communists or Russians at that time, he could not remember the name of a single member of the Populars...

Q: (Alleline) Shouldn't think that keeps you awake, does it? A: As a matter of fact, no. (laughter)

Yes, he had been a member of the Populars just as he had been a member of his college drama club, the philatelic society, the modern language society, the Union and the historical society, the ethical society and the Rudolph Steiner study group... It was a way of getting to hear interesting lectures, and of meeting people; particularly the second. No, he had never distributed left-wing literature, though he did for a while take Soviet Weekly... No, he had never paid dues to any political party, at Oxford or later, as a matter of fact he had never even used his vote... One reason why he joined so many clubs at Oxford was that after a messy education abroad he had no natural English contemporaries from school...

By now the inquisitors are one and all on Jim's side; everyone is on the same side against the competition and its bureaucratic meddling.

Q: (Alleline) As a matter of interest, since you were overseas so much, do you mind telling us where you learned your off- drive? (laughter) A: Oh, I had an uncle actually, with a place outside Paris. He was cricket mad. Had a net and all the equipment. When I went there for holidays he bowled at me non-stop.

[Inquisitors' note: Comte Henri de Sainte- Yvonne, dec. 1941, PF. AF64-7.] End of interview. Competition representative would like to call Haydon as a witness but Haydon is abroad and not available. Fixture postponed sine die...

Smiley was nearly asleep as he read the last entry on the file, tossed in haphazard long after Jim's formal clearance had come through from the competition. It was a cutting from an Oxford newspaper of the day giving a review of Haydon's one-man exhibition in June 1938 headed Real or Surreal? An Oxford Eye. Having torn the exhibition to shreds the critic ended on this gleeful note: 'We understand that the distinguished Mr James Prideaux took time off from his cricket in order to help hang the canvases. He would have done better, in our opinion, to remain in the Banbury Road. However, since his role of Dobbin to the arts was the only heartfelt thing about the whole occasion, perhaps we had better not sneer too loud...'

He dozed, his mind a controlled clutter of doubts, suspicions and certainties. He thought of Ann, and in his tiredness cherished her profoundly, longing to protect her frailty with his own. Like a young man he whispered her name aloud and imagined her beautiful face bowing over him in the half light, while Mrs Pope Graham yelled prohibition through the keyhole. He thought of Tarr and Irina, and pondered uselessly on love and loyalty; he thought of Jim Prideaux and what tomorrow held. He was aware of a modest sense of approaching conquest. He had been driven a long way, he had sailed backwards and forwards; tomorrow, if he was lucky, he might spot land: a peaceful little desert island, for instance. Somewhere Karla had never heard of. Just for himself and Ann. He fell asleep.