Tom Fox is an agent with British Military Intelligence.
Army Intelligence, to be exact, as he holds the rank of Major in the British Army.
When we meet him in the first recorded adventure he has just recently arrived in Moscow and two things become immediately known to us. One, his transfer to that capital city was unexpected by just about everyone there and one that was not appreciated; "only Sir Edward (the ambassador) had been unsurprised and he'd been disapproving without bothering to say why". Two, he was not thrilled with it himself; "he'd been in the Soviet Union for less than a week. It was already too long". As he explains to a Soviet official at a party, said with a touch of humor along with the honesty, he was sent to Russia because "someone thought it would be useful if I was out of the way". He would later admit yet again to himself that he was in Moscow "to keep him out of trouble. How much trouble he was in was being decided back in London".
All this is taking place during a New Years Eve party at the British Embassy in 1985 and Fox is there as required but definitely not pleased to be forced to attend, as it would seem was the case with several other guests. Most interesting (for me) was a very brief exchange between Fox and the Ambassador's disgruntled 16-year-old daughter who, he noticed, had a dull knife wound on her wrist. What was telling about it was Fox's final words as she walked sulking away, "Wrist to elbow. If you're serious."
Fox is separated from his wife, Caro, with the relationship heading quickly to divorce. By apparent joint decision, she did not move to Russia with him and was back in England as was their teen son, Charlie. Now for the most part he slept alone, accompanied only by the terrible nightmares that came to him far too often; dreams of his deployment to Northern Ireland and the terrible things he had seen and at least one that he had done.
Good Lines:
- Said by a Soviet official, "Life is invariably more complicated than one wants".
- Philosophy of an old Russian woman who occasionally passed on info to the police to be left alone, "The secret was to tell them as little as possible and very definitely nothing they needed to know".