Michael Bywater@teklds.UUCP (Michael Bywater) (09/24/84)
[From PUNCH Aug 15, 1984] Dr Niet by Michael Bywater "Russians are glued, it seems, to the televised adventures of a Russian 'James Bond style' KGB agent searching for a Western mole..." The Guardian Ivan Fyodorovitch Plotkin slouched into the shabby, overheated room, grunted at the fat man behind the desk, and carelessly threw his snap-brim trilby onto the hatpeg. The crown parted from the brim and fell to the floor. "You're drunk, Ivan Fyodorovitch", said the fat man, wearily. "Okay", said Ivan Fyodorovitch, "By me, I'm tired like a dog, it howls in the Balkans, I been up all night, tidying, making things nice, brillo-ing my shoes. By you, I'm drunk. I don't care. Is no skin off my teeth, never mind that, inside, my soul weeps. WEEPS! Like a dog, it..." "Never mind your soul", said the fat man, "and what for you been brillo-ing your shoes? Huh? You going queer?" "Suede", said Ivan Fyodorovitch, lighting a cigarette. "We don't do suede", said the fat man. "Not in the shops." "There you are, then", said Ivan Fyodorovich. "You got leather shoes, you do the brillo, you got suede. Stylish. Nice." The fat man thought for a moment. "This brillo," he said. "It works on p_e_o_p_l_e_, maybe?" "Bring them up nice", said Ivan Fyodorovitch. "For the greasy marks, you use petrol." In the silence, Ivan Fyodorvitch's cigarette crackled cheerfully. "You're a good boy, Ivan Fyodorvitch", said the fat man, "And I got a job for you." "Is following tourists, no way", said Ivan Fyodorovitch. "Last time I had that stinking job, some lousy American widow, she doesn't know the score, she walks me right out to Krasnokursantsky Street, puts her had down my trousers and disconnects my apparatus. Wires trailing everywhere, hot valves, everything. Next thing, some fat pig from the Lefortovo takes me in for questioning for anti-Soviet free-form dancing in a public place. No way again." "Is not tourists, Ivan Fyodorovitch", said the fat man. "Is more exciting. From High Up. They want a real James Bond. Like the television. Is image. Is style. Is suede." "R_e_a_l_ suede?" said Ivan Fyodorovitch. "Would I lie?" said the fat man. "Yes", said Ivan Fyodorovitch. "So why ask?" sighed the fat man, wearily. "Welcome to the firm, 007682/KSSG/1910/BER/22B." "Do me a favour," said Ivan Fyodorovitch. "Call me 007." The fat man looked at him. "For God's sake, 007682/KSSG/1910/BER/22B," he murmured, "You're in the USSR. We do things different here." He pushed a scrap of paper across the desk. "Go to this address. They'll fix you up." Ivan Fyodorovitch jammed his brim onto his head and opened the door. "Oh, by the way, 007682/KSSG/1910/BER/22B..." Ivan Fyodorovitch turned. "Good luck." The little man behind the counter looked suspiciously at the slip of paper, then at Ivan Fyodorovitch, then at the paper again. There was a long silence. "You want a license?" said the man behind the counter, screwing his little finger into his nostril. "Is correct", said Ivan Fyodorovitch. "We are shut", said the man behind the counter, "We do not do licences, this is the wrong department, I am off duty, there is four weeks notice, you come in here, you say 'I want a licence to kill', you expect it straight away. Huh. I need your birth certificate, citizenship papers, identity card, three photographs, and an application signed by a Party official." "Okay, so then I get my licence?" asked Ivan Fyodorovitch hopefully. "No", said the little man, a carious and mephitic leer spreading across his pinched face. "You get a chit to take to be stamped by Licence Applications. Then you bring it back here." "How long before I get my licence?" "Never mind your licence, tovarich", said the man behind the counter, "It'll be six months before you can get your applications forms. There's a shortage. Forms, giblets, sanitary wear, plastic hosepipe, it's all the same. Unless..." "Yes?" "Unless you have any blue jeans..." "...And this may interest you, 007682/KSSG/1910/BER/22B", said the balding man in the pince-nez, opening a drawer in his desk and taking out what looked like a fountain-pen. "Watch carefully." The balding man unscrewed the cap, reversed it carefully and placed it on the other end. Then he unsrewed the barrel, revealing an ordinary-looking rubber sac with a plunger. "Cunning", said Ivan Fyodorovitch. "I thought you'd like it", said the balding man. "It holds ink. You poke the nib in, squeeze the thingy, it sucks it up and keeps it there, Versatile, too. Black, blue-black, black, blue-black, you name it." Ivan Fyodorovitch stared incredulously. "You mean, I'm in a tight corner, I'm supposed to get this thing out and write threatening letters?" The balding man laughed. "No, no, no, no, no... My dear 007682/KSSG/1910/BER/22B, nothing could be further from the truth." "Thank God for that", said Ivan Fyodorovitch, "I..." "...No, no, We haven't seen ink for, oh, three years. O dear me no." He looked up and caught sight of Ivan Fyodorovitch's expression. "Of course", he said, soberly, "You could stab them in the back of the hand. Pretty painful, a nib wound. In the short term." "Could I have a gun?" asked Ivan Fyodorovitch diffidently. "Licence?" "Not without blue jeans", said Ivan Fyodorovitch. "Ah", said the balding man, "I could let you have a pair..." "Marvellous!" said Ivan Fyodorovitch. "...in exchange for a Boy George LP", said the balding man. I've done my best, thought Ivan Fyodorovitch as he sipped his fifth Turpentini in the Tsentrainyi bar. The hiss of the rain on Gorky Street outside showed no signs of abating. Ivan Fyodorovitch looked glumly down at his GUM Burberry, from which the waterproofing was slowly peeling like a moulting toad. He glanced nonchalantly at his Sekonda. 3:47, it said, which was bloody silly. He took out a Belmore western-style cigarette and tapped it twice on the bar, pulled his pipe from his pocket, swept the tobacco which had fallen out of the cigarette into his pipe, and let it off. They'll find me, he thought. We sophisticates...he bit off a chunk from his tkhum-dulma and chewed ruminatively. Suddenly the vast knapsack hanging round his neck crackled into deafening life. "I say, Ivan Fyodorovitch, hello, are you there?" it said. "Okay, chief", said 007682/KSSG/1910/BER/22B. "I say, hello? Hello? There's an Englishman just coming into the bar. Strike up a conversation. Get him to go to the Rossiya with you. Big Svetlana is waiting in her roll-on." "Very clever", said a suave voice in 007682/KSSG/1910/BER/22B's ear. "But you ought to try one of these." He flipped open a platinum cigarette case which instantly played A_u_l_d_ L_a_n_g_ S_y_n_e_, telexed London, calculated the internal rate of return on a new robotics installation in Ulyanovsk, and began to run a mucky video, "Standard MI5 issue, old chap". "What did he say? Ivan Fyodorovitch, you there? I can't hear", said the knapsack. But Ivan Fyodorovitch wasn't listening. He was drinking in the stranger's appearance, from his Trumper's haircut to his Lobb suede brogues, taking in the Charvet silk shirt, the Sulka tie, the Huntsman suit and the Aramis suntan. If I could get his tie, thought Ivan Fyodorovitch, I could give it to Misha, who would give me his Dunhill lighter, and Grigori would swap that for his Omega, then I could exchange that for Leonid's blue jeans a_n_d_ his Boy George LP, then I could get a licence to kill a_n_d_ a gun and maybe even a new hat, a fedora, and come back and kill this capitalist snake and steal his clothes and things and then I could really be a proper agent... "Nice tie", said Ivan Fyodorovitch, reddening. "It's yours, old fruit", said the Englishman. "But perhaps y_o_u_ can help m_e_. I don't suppose you know anything about the KGB...?" For a moment, Ivan Fyodorovitch wavered. But he was, after all, a spy, with a career to think of. Slowly, steadily, he began to talk.