The Translator

Harriet Crawley has been a journalist, writer, and art dealer, worked in television and radio, and she stood for the Westminster and European Parliaments. A fluent Russian speaker, Harriet was married to a Russian and sent her son to state school in Moscow, where she worked for almost twenty years in the energy sector. She speaks five languages and this is her fifth book. THE TRANSLATORHarriet Crawley To my beloved son, Spencer,who believed from the start and saw me over the line.In memory of Julian, who lit up my life. Ищи ветра в поле, а правду на дне морском.Seek the wind in the field and the truth at the bottom of the sea.A TRADITIONAL RUSSIAN PROVERB 1Clive was panting heavily as he reached the top of a peak in the Scottish Highlands. Sweat streamed from his forehead to his upper lip where he tasted its saltiness. The heart monitor was tight and damp around his chest. He slipped the backpack from his shoulder and pulled out his phone to check his performance. In case he had forgotten, the phone reminded him it was Saturday, 9 September 2017, and on that morning his running time had been 2 hours 42 minutes. Average heart rate: 152 bpm. Calories burnt: 2,100. Not bad for a man of forty-one, and every bit as good as last year.For Clive Franklin, hiking up a Scottish Munro in September had become an addiction, something he did every year when the craving for stillness and solitude became overwhelming. And here he was on the summit of Na Gruagaichean, surrounded on all sides by jagged Highland peaks, triumphant, king of the castle, holding his ground, wind blasting in his face. There were fierce white clouds scudding above his head, so close he could almost touch them, and an eagle wheeling high above the purple heather, which seemed on fire in the morning sunlight. His legs were scratched to ribbons. Far below, he could see Loch Leven and the village of Kinlochleven, where, with a bit of luck, he would spend his Saturday evening in The Green Man, watching Mollie Finch play her cello.Clive had plucked a broad leaf and was mopping the trickle of blood from his calf when he heard a high-pitched tinkle coming from the pocket of his backpack. The sound filled him with dread and had no place on Na Gruagaichean. He ignored the ringtone for as long as he could until there was no mistaking the frantic whirring of Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Flight of the Bumblebee” in all its dizzy gaiety. On his phone he saw the words: No caller ID. I don’t have to take this call, he told himself. I can choose not to pick up. Then, with a deep sigh, he pressed “accept”, and, as he did so, the wind dropped; the reception was good.“Where in God’s name have you been, Franklin? I’ve been calling you for the past two hours and forty minutes!”“Who is this?” Clive said, knowing right away that it had to be some nerd at the FCO who had tracked him down and was about to spoil his day.“Martin Hyde. Prime Minister’s Office.”“I’m afraid there must be some mistake,” said Clive. “I work for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.”Clive knew he was being pompous by calling the department by its full name, but he was irritated.“No mistake, I assure you.”“Then why the ‘No caller ID’?”“Fair point. Stay where you are. I’ll ring you right back.”Clive stood facing the wind, noticing a bank of dark clouds on the horizon. His phone rang again.“There!” said the peremptory voice. “Now you have my number. Right, let’s get on with it. You’ve been seconded to the Prime Minister’s Office. It says here you’re one of the best interpreters in the country.”Clive winced at the word “interpreter”. He thought of himself as a translator, for arcane reasons of his own, but it hardly seemed the right moment, standing on the side of a mountain in the Highlands, the wind ripping across his face, to go into detail.“Russian into English,” shouted Hyde.“And vice versa,” Clive shouted back, thinking of Mollie and her flaming red hair.“Yes, vice versa. That’s what it says here.”“With all due respect, Mr Hyde. I’m on a sabbatical. With three months to go.”“You were on a sabbatical,” said Hyde, spitting out words in bursts. “We need you. Important meeting. Tomorrow. In Moscow. With President Serov. We’re flying out tonight. Not using embassy interpreters. Taking our own team.”So that’s it, thought Clive. My day is ruined. And my evening with Mollie Finch, watching her play Brahms as if her life depended on it. Or is it?“Mr Hyde,” said Clive. “With all due respect you really don’t need me. You’ve got Martin Sterndale. He’s first-class.”“He may be first-class,” Hyde snapped, “but he’s lying in a coma in St Mary’s, Paddington. He was knocked off his bicycle at seven o’clock this morning in Hyde Park. Franklin, your country needs you! Leg it down that Scottish Munro of yours and be on the Kinlochleven quayside at two o’clock this afternoon. A helicopter will pick you up.”Clive scowled as he heard these instructions.“I’m sorry but… how… how… how do you know where I am?”The wind dropped suddenly, and so did Hyde’s voice.“Don’t be a bloody fool, Franklin. We always know where you are.”Whatever they say, going down is much easier. Clive fairly skipped through the heather. Now and then he would reach out to touch the purple flowers. They were part of his childhood, part of him. He thought of his father who had first brought him to the Highlands when he was six years old. And then he thought of Hyde and what lay ahead: an end to his peaceful, productive existence in the company of his favourite Russian writer, Anton Chekhov; an end to the solitude he loved. He would step out of the shadows and into the limelight, and the chaos, and the bad temper of international affairs. He knew exactly what he was going