Peter Guillam is
living a calm retirement at the family homestead in Brittany when he is summoned back
to London, and reminded of his ‘lifelong duty to attend’ his
former masters at MI6. At the Stalinist monolith that now houses the
Intelligence Service, he is asked about an
Operation Windfall, and learns that the children of the agent Alec
Leamas and the English woman, Elizabeth Gold, are in the process of
suing the Service, and him, for causing their deaths at the Berlin
Wall.
What follows is
Guillam’s account both of his interrogation and his remembrance of
the events of another operation, concerning an agent, code named
Tulip, who was part of a network in East Germany run by his friend
Alec Leamas, the best agent he ever knew. Both take place amidst the
growing realisation that MI6 has been penetrated at a high level by a Russian mole.
Just as much as
Guillam is giving us a legacy of any number of spies, so John Le
Carre is presenting his own legacy of spies, a reflection on the
secrecy and building of false characters and pretend emotions that
are so much a part of his own trade as a writer, as well as those of
spies. The two stories, the hunt for information about the past by
the service and Guillam’s own recollections which he keeps as much
as possible secret, particularly his own emotions, just as he had to do when he was an active agent, and with just as much distrust of where emotions might take him. The two stories intersect, but they also move away from each
other, not least because of the way the business has changed. This is
symbolised by the buildings: the stark facelessness and crushing
architectural weight of Artillery House against the ramshackle
Circus, or the safe house still run Millie McCraig; or by the face
these modern bureaucrats are unable to do a simple effective
search or cope with what used to be called, in the days before
electronics, tradecraft.
The story is LeCarre
as sharp as ever, in fact, it’s as if the old LeCarre has been,
like Guillam, ‘recalled to life’ as Dickens would have had it.
But what makes it work is the contrast, the way the service has
itself changed positions, and the way the operations are revealed so
skillfully through a combination of truth and lies, as in all of
LeCarre’s best work. Those familiar with The Spy Who Came In From
The Cold will have some idea of where it is all going, and a much
better picture of some of the later details of the story, whereas
those aware of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy will know the deeper
background of what is going on. Neither is necessary, of course, but
the awareness adds depth. In this sense, we might consider A Legacy
Of Spies a valedictory work, as anyone who saw LeCarre’s interviews
around publication might surmise.
There is the paradox
of age. Guillam appears to have been born in 1931, like LeCarre
himself, and LeCarre's house in Cornwall is a sort of mirror image of Guillam's in Brittany. Guillam is writing his story sometime around 2010,
which would make him 79, still fit and active and full of sharp-edged
memory. But how old Jim Prideaux, Millie McCraig and yes, George
Smiley are is a matter of some debate, and they all seem as sprightly
as ever. But remembering LeCarre’s own age as he writes this novel,
those who make age a sticking point may well be missing the point.
Because it
is Smiley’s appearance, at the end, which strikes the note of
legacy the strongest, and the nature of what the current agents might
call a ‘mission statement’ might surprise some readers, because
of its overtly telling stance aimed at modern Britain’s politics.
But behind it is the memory of the tragedies, the lost lives, the
miscalculations involved in all those years of playing the game.
Smiley’s legacy may have been a failure to actually leave a lasting
legacy, and LeCarre is sensitively aware that neither Smiley nor he
were granted the perspective to see the long term effects of what
their business accomplished, or didn’t. LeCarre’s work has been a
marker in the world of spy fiction for almost six decades, his peak
still barely matched. This novel reminds us of his legacy, and
becomes a major part of it.
A Legacy Of Spies by
John LeCarre
Penguin £8.99 ISBN
9780241981610
Note: This review will also appear at Crime Time (www.crimetime.co.uk)
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