Original subtitles

[door opens]

- [coughing]

[phone ringing]

- Right.

We shall start.

[intense instrumental music]

J"J"

[car horn honking]

- Has he called yet?

- No. Six minutes to go yet, Control.

[phone ringing]

[beeping]

[coin clanks]

- Will you speak up, please?

- City removers here.

I believe you wanted an estimate.

- You're always welcome.

- You did exactly what I told you?

You talked to nobody?

Remember, Jim, trust no one.

No one.

You work to me alone.

I'm sorry there's no vodka.

- I didn't expect any.

[glass clinking, liquid trickling]

- I've got a job for you.

Familiar territory, Czechoslovakia.

- Perhaps a bit too familiar.

- Which identity do you want to use?

I'd suggest Vladimir Hajek.

- Still the Czech journalist? - Yes.

- Still based in Paris? - Yes.

- Has anyone else used him? - No.

You agree?

[siren approaching]

- Well, I think it serves, yes?

[siren blaring]

- I've had an offer of service, Jim...

on the military site.

His cover name is Testify.

You're a military-minded chap.

Two of you should hit it off pretty well.

He's fond of horses too,

something else you've got in common.

- We can chat polo, I suppose, yeah?

- His real name is Stevcek.

At the moment, he's an artillery general,

but in the past

he's worked in close liaison with Russian intelligence-

very close.

And now he wants to talk to us.

I have personally interviewed an intermediary in Austria.

Stevcek now wants to testify

to a ranking officer of mine who can speak Czech.

. Why'?

- There was a girlfriend, a student,

20 years difference between them.

Such things happen.

She was shot during the uprising of '68.

Stevcek never forgave the Russians for it.

He's been after their blood ever since.

Lain low, stayed friendly.

All the time, he's been waiting his chance.

Now he's ready.

- How sure are you?

- Stevcek.

Rocketry.

Ballistics.

Fourth man in Czech army intelligence,

secretary of the national internal security committee,

Anglo-American desk in Prague.

He's big, Jim.

And he's got treasure for us.

He's worked for Moscow Centers England section,

and he's going to give us the name

of the agent Moscow have planted inside our setup.

We have a mole, Jim.

- In London?

- Very near the top.

- In the Circus?

- One of the top five.

Their code name for him is Gerald.

We have a rotten apple, Jim,

and the maggots are eating up the Circus.

- These people? One of these?

- Why not'?

Are the British incapable of deception?

We've turned enough members of other outfits-

Russians, Poles, Czechs, even the odd American.

Why shouldn't there be a mole in the Circus?

Now, look at them.

- Oh, Control, I know who they are.

- Listen, Jim, we've got to have code names for them.

Do you remember the nursery rhyme

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor'?

Finish it.

- "Rich man, poor man, beggar man, thief."

- Percy Alleline,

director of operations- Tinker.

Tinker.

Bill Haydon, head of personnel-Tailor.

Roy Bland, head of Iron Curtain networks-

Soldier.

We leave out Sailor.

Too much like Tailor, could be misheard.

- Rich man?

- Don't like it.

Sounds like police work,

fraud, Swiss bank stuff.

Toby Esterhase,

top lamplighter,

our exquisite head sleuth.

Poor man? Yes.

Poor man.

And George Smiley, my devoted deputy-

Beggar man.

Have you got it?

- I'll remember.

- All I want from you, Jim, is one-

one word, just the one code name,

if you have to scrawl it on the front door

of the embassy in Prague or...

phone our resident hood

and shout it in his ear before you go underground.

If there's some kind of a fumble

and that should be necessary,

just give me that one word.

But remember, Jim, if you're caught, deny me.

I don't know you're there.

- Where do I meet Stevcek'?

How?

When?

- On Friday, March 20th,

Stevcek will be inspecting the weapon research station

at Tisnov, near Brno,

about 100 miles north of the Austrian border.

From there, he'll be visiting a hunting lodge

for the weekend, alone.

It's a place high up in the forest,

not far from Racice.

He'll provide you with an escort from Brno,

and he expects you on the evening

of Saturday, March 21st.

- Hmm, what does-

What does he get from us?

- Usual assurances.

If and when he wants to come, we'll look after him.

One word will do it, Jim.

I'm almost there.

[intense, dramatic music]

II

[phone ringing]

[footsteps approaching]

[engine revs]

[engines turning over]

- [Speaking Czech]

[engine starts]

[car horns blaring]

[car horn blaring]

[joyful music in background]

II

[voices overlapping]

[cash register dings]

- [Speaking Czech]

[men shouting in Czech]

[shouting fades]

[gun clicking]

- [coughing]

[Women conversing in Czech]

[car horn blaring]

[thunder rumbling]

[engine shuts off]

[muffled grunting]

[man speaking Czech over loudspeaker]

[engine revving]

[machine gun firing]

[machine guns firing]

[machine guns firing]

[bullets zinging]

[man shouting in Czech]

[dramatic music]

II

[dogs growling]

[dogs growling]

[gunfire]

[machine guns firing]

[bullets zinging]

[gunfire continues]

[men speaking Czech]

[man speaking Czech]

[voices echoing]

- [screaming]

[camera shutter clicks]

- Barabas was a bookseller.

- Mr. Smiley, please, you're making an investment.

- I hope you'll remember that the day I sell it back to you.

- Always a pleasure to do business with you, sir.

You always have a joke for me.

- I think, after all,

we could trust this to the post office.

- Yes, sir. I'll send it on, Mr. Smiley.

- I'll slip out that way, if you don't mind.

- Not at all, sir.

- George!

Hello there!

My dear boy.

If it isn't the maestro himself.

Don't say you've forgotten me.

- Hello, Roddy. Nice to see you.

- How marvellous to run into you.

They told me you were locked up with the monks

in St. Gallen or somewhere,

poring over manuscripts.

Self-exile, they said.

Of course, I knew that wasn't true,

because I know you, George.

You'd never leave England.

You're just not capable of such an act of abandonment,

no matter how shabbily the Circus treated you.

So...

what have you been doing all these months?

I want to know everything, every little bit.

How's the delectable wife?

How is the lovely Lady Ann?

Not in town at the moment, l hear

Pound to a penny you're shopping for her.

Little prezzies all the time, they tell me-

going-away gifts, coming-home gifts.

Are you back on the beat, George?

Or did you never really chuck it in?

Is that it, George?

Has it all been cover?

Cover, George?

- Roddy, I've retired.

- All right, George, if you say so.

- You look well, Roddy, but I mustn't delay you.

- Oh, no, George, really, my dear old friend,

you can't get away like that.

Roddy Martindale simply wouldn't let you.

Months and months since we last had a chin-wag.

Now, let me buy you a little aperitif

and then let me take you to dinner.

Allow me that privilege.

Honour me, George.

I can tell by the look of you

that no one else has claimed you tonight.

- Oh, it's kind of you, but-

- It's my role in life, George.

We all need to be good at something.

We mustn't forget Jebedee.

Wasn't he your old tutor?

- Yes, once upon a time.

- How do you rate Sparke,

the one who came from the School of Oriental Languages?

Place him in the batting order, George.

Not quite there.

Had trouble with his nerve, so they say.

- What a pity.

- All dead and gone now, of course,

properly appreciated by only a select few,

like you and me.

- You flatter me.

- Now, George...

let's talk about your old boss,

Control,

the only head of the Circus

who ever kept his name a secret.

Shall we talk about Control?

- If you insist.

- Of course, it wasn't a secret to you, was it, George?

He never had any secrets from you,

his tried and trusted right hand, did he?

- I don't know.

That's the point about secrets.

- Close as thieves, Control and Smiley were,

right to the end, so they say.

- They are very complimentary.

- Now, don't flirt, George.

I'm an old trooper.

You and Control were just like that.

That's why you were thrown out.

It's why Bill Haydon's got your job.

It's why Percy Alleline got into Control's chair

when it ought to be you.

Why Bill Haydon's his cup bearer

and you're out altogether.

- If you say so, Roddy.

- I do.

I say more than that.

Far more.

I say this.

Control never died at all.

He's been seen...

in South Africa.

Oh, we can't blame a man

for wanting a bit of peace in the evening of his life.

' [sighs]

- Willy Andrewartha walked straight into him

in Jo'burg airport in the waiting room.

Not a ghost.

Flesh.

- That's the most idiotic story I've ever heard.

Control died of a heart attack

after a long illness,

through most of which he continued to work.

Besides, he hated South Africa.

He hated everywhere except Surrey, the Circus,

and Lords Cricket Ground.

- Yes, of course.

Willy Andrewartha was always the most god-awful liar.

I said the same myself:

'Willy, you should be ashamed of yourself."

I, um, suppose

what put the last nail into Control's coffin

was the Czecho scandal,

the poor devil that got shot in the back,

the one who was so thick with Bill Haydon,

with his picture in the newspapers

under some fictitious name.

But we know his real name, don't we?

Jim Prideaux.

Somehow, I don't think I can ever quite believe

in Percy Alleline as chief.

Can you?

Might be just my...

natural cynicism,

but power sits poorly on those we've grown up with, doesn't it?

And there are so few

who can carry it off for me nowadays,

and poor Percy's such an obvious fellow,

especially after Control,

who was a positive serpent.

How can anyone take Alleline seriously?

What heavy good fellowship.

One has only got to think of him in the old days,

lolling in the bar of the Travellers',

sucking away on that log of a pipe, and...

buying drinks for all the moguls.

Well, really.

One does like one's perfidy to be suckled,

don't you agree?

Oh, that's his knack, George,

living off the wits of his subordinates, am I right?

- Really, Roddy, I can't help you.

I never knew Percy as a force, you see, only as a-

- Striver?

Right.

With his eyes on Control's purple,

day and night, yes?

Well, now he's actually wearing it,

and the mob loves him.

So who's doing the business for him, eh, George?

Who is it?

- I cannot help you.

- Who's the clever boots?

No, not Percy. That's for sure.

And don't tell me the Americans have started trusting us again,

because they'd never fall for Percy.

- Roddy, please stop this.

- Wonderfully well, he's doing.

We hear it from all sides.

Little committees popping up with funny names,

red carpet for Percy wherever he goes,

tripping the light fantastic along the Whitehall corridors.

- You are out of my depth, truly.

- So who's earning him his reputation?

[waiter speaks indistinctly]

- No, thank you. l

I think we've finished now.

- It's my party, George.

I'll get the bill when I'm ready.

So who's pulling the strings for Percy Puppet?

How about dashing Bill Haydon,

your old rival?

In every sense, I'm told.

Of course, he never was orthodox, was he?

Genius never is.

All right, then.

It's Roy Bland,

the shop-soiled white hope,

the first redbrick don to make the Circus,

and if it's neither of them,

and Control is really dead,

then there's only one possibility left.

It's someone who's pretending to be in retirement-

you, George.

Admit it.

- You featherhead, Martindale!

You pompous, bogus, gossiping old featherhead!

Roy Bland is not redbrick.

He was at Saint Antony's College, Oxford.

- Oh, don't be silly, dear.

Of course Saint Antony is redbrick.

It doesn't make the slightest difference

there's a bit of sandstone in the same street,

just because he was your protégé.

I suppose he's Bill Haydon's boy now.

Bill was father to them all, wasn't he?

Or something like that.

- It's not mine, thank you.

- I hope you're not going to tip him.

It's a guinea at Christmas.

Anyway- --

it's my party-

Draws them like bees to a honeypot,

doesn't he, our Bill?

- Good night, Roddy.

- Do you fancy a nightcap?

Start afresh with a bubbly?

Why not, George? I think I will.

Of course, Bill's got the glamour, hasn't he?

Not like some of us.

Star quality, I call it.

One of the very few.

I'm told that women literally bow down before him,

if that's what women do.

- Good night.

- Love to Ann.

Everybody's love to Ann.

- "Bits of sandstone."

"Shop-soiled white hope."

"Everybody's love to Ann."

Oh, damn.

Oh, damn!

[dramatic staccato strings]

J"J"

[vehicle approaching slowly]

[slight creaking]

Peter?

[siren blaring]

- I'd leave that coat on if I were you, George.

We've got a long way to go.

- Well, you're not me, Peter.

And before I go anywhere at all,

I shall change out of my sopping shoes...

and also, I think, make a pot of coffee.

- You sound a little testy, George, old boy.

Lacon is waiting for you.

- Me, Peter?

- George, I've been sent to deliver you.

- I've been reviewing my situation

in the last half hour of hell,

and I've come to a very grave decision.

After a lifetime of living by my wits

and on my memory,

I shall give myself up full-time to the profession of forgetting.

I'm going to put an end to some emotional attachments

which have long outlived their purpose,

namely the Circus, this house,

my whole past.

I shall sell up and buy a cottage,

in the Cotswold, I think.

Steeple Aston sounds about right.

Do I need overnight things?

- I'm not taking any.

- And there I shall establish myself

as a mild eccentric-

discursive, withdrawn,

but possessing one or two lovable habits,

such as muttering to myself

as I bumble along innocent pavements.

I shall become an oak of my own generation.

You make the coffee.

You know where everything is.

You can even pick my front door locks.

Clever, Peter Guillam.

[distant sirens]

[ominous music]

II

I saw you parking this toy

in Curzon Street this afternoon.

I ran away immediately.

Good guess on your part.

- What made you think I was looking for you?

- I hoped you weren't.

However, you found me eventually.

- You had to come home sometime.

[engine revving]

- It's far too young for you, Peter.

- It's quick.

- I'm surprised you didn't get thrown out

with the rest of us.

You had all the qualifications for dismissal,

good at your work, loyal, discreet.

- What happened tonight, George?

How's Ann?

- Roddy Martindale happened tonight.

Why do I permit it?

I tell myself it's for politeness' sake.

It's not.

It's weakness

and the fact that I have nothing better to do.

My wife's fine, thank you.

[car horn blaring past]

- They've put me in charge of scalp-hunters.

- You are Jim Prideaux's successor?

You?

Looking after the heavy mob?

- Why not'?

Tucked away at downtown Brixton

behind the broken glass and the barbed wire,

dispatching the thugs occasionally,

kept a good arm's length from the Circus ringmasters.

- How is Jim, do you know?

- In quarantine.

- I don't mean to pry.

I merely ask.

Can he get around?

Can he walk and so on?

Bad backs can be terribly tricky, I believe.

- The word is, he manages pretty well.

He's back in England, address unknown.

Travel-is that still

the scalp-hunters' official name?

Hit-and-run, cash-and-carry?

Sorry

Our Control always preached

that good intelligence work is gradual

and rests on a kind of gentleness.

- It's not my department.

- No.

Well, the scalp-hunters were always the exception

Control allowed to his own rule

on Bill Haydon's persuasion.

A reflection of Bill's temperament, of course.

The solo initiative,

very dashing, very audacious.

[engine shuts off]

I'm sorry, Peter. What?

- Lateralism.

I said, are you familiar with the word?

- I most certainly am not.

- It's the "in" doctrine now.

We used to go up and down. Now we go along.

- What's that supposed to mean?

- In your day, the Circus ran itself by regions,

Africa satellites, Russia, China,

Southeast Asia, West Indies, you name it.

Each region was commanded by its own juju man.

Control sat in heaven and held the strings, remember?

- It strikes a distant chord.

- Well, today everything operational

is under one hat.

It's called London Station.

Regions are out. Lateralism is in.

- Who's station commander?

- Bill Haydon.

His number two is Roy Bland.

Toby Esterhase runs between them like a poodle.

They're a service within the service.

Share their own secrets and don't mix with the proles.

- There are three of them and Alleline?

- That's right.

The object of it all is to make us more secure.

- A very good idea.

Why did Lacon send you for me, Peter?

- Do you mean, why did he send me for you,

or why did he send me for you?

- Quite right, Peter.

I should have known better than to ask.

- You remember your last day at the Circus,

just one day before Control departed

and the new regime took over?

You stuck your head round my office door and said,

"Peter, I've been sacked."

We went straight out, and you got drunk.

Why pick me, George?

I was pretty low-grade,

running some very sketchy networks of merchant seamen

out of London Dockland,

whatever Poles, Russians, Chinks I could cobble together.

Why me, George?

- You want a reason?

- You fastened on the same word that night

when I asked why you'd been kicked out.

I'll tell you exactly what you said.

- I hope this isn't going to be embarrassing.

- You said, "Reason as logic or reason as motive...

or reason as a way of life?"

You said, "They don't have to give me reasons.

"I can write my own damn reasons,

"and that is not the same as the half-baked tolerance

that comes from no longer caring."

I thought that was pretty impressive stuff

from a man as drunk as you were.

- At least I had the good sense not to let you drive me home.

[engine turns over]

- Lacon sent me for you, George.

Looks like Count Dracula's blood bank.

- Lacon once described it to me as his Hampshire Camelot,

built by a teetotal millionaire,

which he seems to think explains everything.

I'm so out of touch, Peter.

Does Lacon have any particular title nowadays?

- Nothing new,

just Sir Oliver of the cabinet office,

permanent watchdog of all intelligence affairs.

You know how he loves being one of nature's prefects.

[doorbell ringing]

- George, hello.

Thanks for coming.

Come on in, will you?

Guillam.

Hope we didn't get too...

[voice fading]

You've been enjoying retirement, George?

You haven't missed the warmth of human contact?

I rather would, I think.

One's work, one's old buddies.

- Oh, I think I manage very well, thank you.

Yes.

Yes, I'm sure I do.

And you? All goes well with you?

- Oh, no great changes. No, no.

All very smooth.

Charlotte got her scholarship to Roedean, which was nice.

- Oh, very good.

- Hmm.

And how about your wife?

In the pink, and so on?

- Very bonny, thank you.

- Ah.

All spruce and shipshape again, Guillam.

You were grubby.

He did look a ruffian, didn't he, George?

Well, um... shall we?

Please, George, I wanted to talk particularly to you.

All right, Fawn, lock us in, please.

I think you know Mr. Smiley, don't you?

- Yes, of course I do.

You once gave me a job, Mr. Smiley.

Don't you remember?

Tarr, sir.

Ricki Tarr, the lawyers boy

from Marseille.

Changed my first nappies, as we used to say.

They were very tough interviews

you used to give us tender young recruits.

Of course, 12 years ago, and it's that long, Mr. Smiley.

Well, you don't look any different to me, sir.

No, 12 years ago,

nobody but nobody got taken on

unless we got past you,

not even scalp-hunters.

Weren't quite your type.

We all had to get the nod from Mr. Smiley.

- Tarr...

- Of course I remember you, Ricki.

Your father was an Australian, I recall,

a solicitor

and a nonconformist lay preacher,

altogether a most unusual chap to pop up in Marseille.

But just such odd circumstances do seem to provide us

with suitable personnel.

- Hmm.

Bad boys like Ricki.

Daddy thought he could beat the sin out of me,

but you knew better, didn't you, Mr. Smiley?

He only beat it further in,

and that's what scalp-hunters are made of.

Isn't that right, Mr. Guillam?

- We're waiting for you, Tarr.

- Yes, I do think we ought to get on.

- Well, I guess I better make my pitch, then.

- Let's keep it precise, shall we, all the way along.

- Before you begin, Ricki,

do I understand correctly

that no one at the Circus

knows you're in England?

- Only Mr. Guillam.

- You're officially absent without leave?

On the wanted list?

- I think I'm safe now.

I've got a story to tell you.

It's all about spies.

And if it's true,

which I think it is,

you boys are gonna need a whole new organization,

right?

Shall I start with the day you sent me to Lisbon?

Changed my life.

You might find it's going to change all your lives.

[sighs]

[Song of Simeon]

- ♪ Lord ♪

♪ Now lettest Thou ♪

♪ Thy servant ♪

♪ Depart in peace ♪

II

♪ According to Thy word ♪

J"J"

♪ For mine eyes ♪

♪ Have seen Thy salvation ♪

II

♪ Which Thou hast prepared ♪

♪ Before the face ♪

♪ Of all people ♪

J"J"

♪ To be a light ♪

♪ To lighten ♪

♪ The Gentiles ♪

♪ And to be the glory ♪

♪ Of Thy people Israel ♪

II

♪ Glory be to the Father ♪

♪ And to the Son ♪

♪ And to the Holy Ghost ♪

♪ As it was in the beginning ♪

♪ ls now and ever shall be ♪

♪ World without end ♪

♪ Amen ♪