A Small Town in Germany

Written by John LeCarre & Reviewed by Noreen in the Cell

Arthur Meadowes and Cork idle in a gridlocked traffic jam, the local protests in Bonn, Germany wreaking havoc on their commute to the British Embassy. They finally arrive, only to discover missing office equipment, then they are surprised someone named Leo is not there. They meet with Peter de Lisle, then are summoned to some meeting tomorrow. Meadowes is particularly ornery about the whole thing.  However, this will be an ongoing theme that supports the larger forces at play, namely the British bureaucracy being just as much of an antagonist as any specific character.

The team arrives at Bradfield’s office.  One of the big dogs. LeCarre describes him beautifully, just by describing the way he uses his pen like a cobra while reading. De Lisle is there but not respected. The others listen to a woman’s briefing on civil unrest in Bonn. They go over data and no one seems to care that Leo is not present. There’s some social event work party later that day. Rawley Bradfield must visit Ministry of the Interior Siebkron. He’s issuing a curfew for all diplomats in Bonn and Bradfield is not happy because it looks weak and will provoke escalated unrest.

They are all at church later when Leo Harting, the organist, is missing, as are the Green Files.  Think the Red Files from the TV show Dallas.  Except green.  And they’ve been missing since Friday, same as Leo.

Alan Turner, resident protagonist, visits Shawn and vents about the British being overly precautious. Bonn library was sacked and with certain files now missing, Alan thinks the confidential files were deliberately stolen, as this protest had been planned for a month. Alan then visits Lumley, who assigns him the missing Leo case.

Turner leaves London for Bonn and meets with Bradfield, who only seems concerned with preserving diplomatic relations with Germany, ostensibly because of this Brussels situation that serves as an undercurrent to most of Britain’s diplomatic choices. Turner is not to alert anyone to Leo’s vanishing or the missing files.

Turner goes to the Embassy and rifles thru Leo’s office. He interrogates some custodian type John Gaunt and it becomes quickly apparent that Leo was able to skirt protocol and come and go as he pleased, mostly because of his innocuous charm. Turner bullies Gaunt into all the damning details about the loose procedures there, who then gives up Meadowes’ name as Leo’s boy.

After Turner argues with Meadowes to no avail (they had a previous working relationship) Turner and de Lisle fence at the American Embassy for lunch. Like the others, de Lisle is protective of the office and defensive regarding Leo, frustrating Turner further. The question still remains what Leo did on Thursday afternoons, because no one can account for that. When Turner gets back to the British offices, there’s a note from someone named Jenny asking to meet.

Turner meets with Jenny P. She’s racked with guilt. Leo came onto her once. She refused, so he gave her the cold shoulder which apparently wooed her. Then he guilted her into letting him borrow some important keys and now he’s gone with important files. Turner accuses her of sleeping with him, but she denies it. She reverts into a flimsy damsel in distress crying dishrag type female, the first and only misstep in the book.

Turner tries walking through a typical Leo day at the embassy in hopes of finding clues. He chats with Cork and asks him many Qs about the case, shepherding the reader in the process. He surmises that maybe blackmail would explain why everyone seemed to let Leo carte blanche. Bit of an Act II lull here, though that sort of mirrors Turner spinning his wheels in a way as well.

De Lisle takes Turner to Leo’s house but is a real douche to him. Not much is found but seems like Leo was planning to defect when he did based on evidence at the house. A boiler man shows that knew Leo and he vouches for him. Cops randomly show as well, citing intruder concerns because of the unrest from the rioting. Then word comes down that Germany has deserted the Brussels negotiations which upset the British.

Turner and Bradfield finally have it out. He wants Turner gone for visiting Leo’s house without his approval. He also states he will continue to be uncooperative because that means there will never be evidence and investigators can then only surmise, a more amenable outcome. Crabbe arrives and says he just saw Leo at the train station with some Greek kid. All three go but Leo is apparently gone by then. Turner is to leave Bonn on the next train.

Turner grabs his things and goes for one last night out with this Crabbe fellow. They drink and he interrogates but doesn’t really get much. When he gets back to his room he is assaulted. De lisle arrives to mend him despite not liking him. He tells Turner he can heal in secret at his place since something must be amiss given the assault. Turner still has Leo’s key that he doesn’t know what it unlocks.

De lisle drops Turner off near Hazel Bradfield’s place. (Isn’t that Rawley Bradfield’s place as well?) Turner slaps her around and makes her admit she was his mistress. She divulges what she knows and tells Turner the mysterious key is because of her. Leo had her sneak it to him without Rawley Bradfield knowing.

Turner goes to the embassy and gets Gaunt to admit a key is missing before Turner magically discovers a sort of obvious secret door that leads to Leo’s secret spy workstation with missing files etc. Turner trolleys all the files for all to see then storms into Bradfield’s office. (again)

Turner lays it out for Bradfield. Praschko seems to be the marionette and Karfeld, local German bad guy, was his pawn who spearheaded the research of chemical warfare on human subjects in a nearby village during the Reich. Leo had been mounting a full investigation on his own and stealing embassy tools and letterhead to bypass people and procedures that might thwart him. The statutes are all up but Leo is still missing and so is the green file…

Turner and Bradfield confront Praschko. He’s evasive but admits his alliance with Leo. The Karfeld fellow has been the target of British violence. But all statutes are up so best to ignore it all. That’s when Turner deduces that Bradfield is in collusion with Praschko and Karfeld. They were aiming to blackmail Karfeld to ensure compliance, but also sabotaged the Brussels alliance because they were making back door deals with Russia to be business partners if Brussels contracts went to the east instead of west. Kind of underwhelming really. A lot of build up to mostly just say let sleeping dogs lie. Is it better to take the British or Swiss approach, so to speak?

In the Epilogue, de Lisle and Bradfield and Turner are at the town square for Karfeld’s speech. He gives it, tells Germans they should fund the British army so Germany can get into NATO. Unrest begins and Turner spots Leo. He is mobbed and murdered. Some Saxon says check his pockets. 

Turner specifically says he doesn’t know what Leo looks like, then clocks him in a crowd at a distance? The plot itself was underwhelming. Leave the inter office politics to Deighton but the characters were incredible. Each one was so fleshed out. The tension between characters jumps off the page as does the camaraderie. And it’s done with minimal handholding and timely subtext.

In short, a relatively boring missing persons case that is elevated significantly by the author’s ability.