The Honourable Schoolboy

The Honourable Schoolboy
First edition cover
Author(s)	John le Carré
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English
Series	The Karla Trilogy
Genre(s)	Spy novel
Publisher	Hodder & Stoughton (UK) & Random House (USA)
Publication date	1977
Media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)
ISBN	ISBN 1-135-43056-X (first edition, hardback)
Preceded by	Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
Followed by	Smiley's People

The Honourable Schoolboy (1977) is a spy novel by John le Carré. George Smiley tries to reconstruct an intelligence service and to run a successful offensive espionage operation to save the service from falling to the "war hawks" in government. The "Honourable Schoolboy” of the title is Gerald Westerby, a spy sent to Hong Kong.

The Honourable Schoolboy is the second novel of the informal “Karla Trilogy” and won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for literature for 1977. It was later anthologized in The Quest for Karla (1982), an omnibus edition of the Smiley books.

Synopsis

In 1974, George Smiley, the Chief of the Secret Intelligence Service (known as "the Circus"), is cleaning its London house—in the aftermath of discovering and capturing a Soviet mole among the Circus's leaders. In reconstructing and rehabilitating the compromised organization, he seeks clues to the trail of Karla, his KGB counterpart and personal nemesis, in the USSR.

To protect the politically weakened spy service from the Government war hawks, Smiley must launch a successful offensive espionage operation against the enemy. To that effect, Smiley, Sachs, and di Salis “take back-bearings” and identify investigations unreasonably suppressed by Bill Haydon. They discover Sam Collins’s investigation of a money-laundering “gold seam” in Vientiane, Laos; it points to Karla—also evident in the matter is Collins' personal agenda.

The Honourable Gerald “Jerry” Westerby is a former newspaper reporter and occasional SIS secret agent and a minor character in Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, the preceding novel. At the opening of the novel, Westerby has been living in retirement with his girlfriend in a small Italian village, whose inhabitants have nicknamed him "The Honourable Schoolboy". Collins' investigations prompt Smiley to recall Westerby and despatch him to Hong Kong where he blackmails the banker Frost for photographs of the account of Drake Ko—destination of the Soviet money transmitted via Vientiane. The photographs reveal to Westerby that it is a “lock-away account”, featuring only the name of the founder’s trust—“Drake Ko”; moreover, the trust-beneficiary is identified only via fingerprint; no money has been withdrawn, and the balance is about a half-million American dollars.

The field work of Westerby and Craw, another journalist-spy, in Hong Kong, and of the Circus “burrowers” in the UK, identified “Elizabeth Worthington” as Ko’s blonde girlfriend Liese Worth; previously, she was girlfriend to bush pilot Tiny Ricardo, a Mexican mercenary in Vientiane, as such, she thought herself a British intelligence agent run by Mr Mellon (Sam Collins). Sachs and di Salis interview a Mr Hibbert, learning that he is the missionary who named the foundling Ko brothers “Drake” and “Nelson” to honour Britain; and that “Liese” was the name of his dead wife.

US intelligence reports that Ricardo is alive and that he had approached them with information about an opium cargo he was to fly to Red China. Moreover, because the US wants to arrest Ko as a drug kingpin, they give Smiley ten to twelve weeks to pursue Circus interests before intervening. Faster than Peter Guillam, Smiley quickly grasps the implication—Tiu's, Ko’s second-in-command, quick trip to Shanghai six weeks before Ricardo’s planned opium cargo flight to Red China, was to meet with Nelson, Drake’s brother, to arrange their reunion rendez-vous via which Nelson would escape China in Ricardo’s Beechcraft.

Smiley thus decides to “shake Ko’s tree”, forcing him to react to being spied upon, thereby advancing Operation Dolphin. Westerby manœuvres Liese Worth—aka “Lizzie Worthington”—to dinner. She calls Tiu to the restaurant; before him, Westerby interviews her about Ricardo, the bush pilot, about the connection between Indocharter Air Transport and the Soviet embassy in Vientiane. Surprised and personally relieved, Westerby perceives her ignorance of the gold seam, of Nelson Ko and of the Soviet connection.

The burrowers’ biography of Nelson Ko, aka “Sheng-hsiu Ko”, and later, “Yao Kai-sheng”, reports that, from 1955-56, he attended shipbuilding school in Leningrad, where the faculty included Ivan Ivanovitch Bretlev (a “talent-spotter” for Karla). In 1957, Nelson returned to China (the Circus presumes he spent the intervening time training under Karla), where, as Yao Kai-sheng, Nelson held great responsibilities, until 1967, when his Soviet credentials politically disgraced him during the Cultural Revolution. In 1971, he took a naval engineering job, but was not formally rehabilitated until early 1973. He was then integrated into the Central Planning Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. In assistance, the “Cousins” give the Circus the biography of opium smuggler Charlie Marshall, a friend and Ricardo's co-pilot.

In the event, Drake's men torture and murder Frost for revealing Ko’s account to Westerby; his brutally mutilated, fly-covered corpse unsettles Westerby and the Circus.

On Circus orders, Westerby finds the bush pilot-opium smuggler Charlie Marshall in Battambang, Cambodia, and manages to board the DC-4 Carvair flight Marshall is flying en route to Phnom Penh. Ricardo also is aboard, but Westerby doesn’t grasp who he is until Phnom Penh; in evading him, Ricardo shoots at Westerby. That night, Westerby takes Marshall from an opium den and interrogates him, learning that Lizzie was a heroin courier for Mellon (Sam Collins); that she directly intervened with Drake on Ricardo’s behalf; that Tiu offered him (Marshall) five thousand dollars for an unconventional flight—which he (Marshall) turned down, per paternal advice; and where, between flights, Ricardo currently hides.

Westerby pursues Ricardo, by ferry, across the Mekong River, into Thailand; Ricardo tells Westerby that Tiu, on behalf of Ko, hired Ricardo to fly opium into Red China and pick up a package, paying Ricardo's debts as an advance for the job; but instead of completing the job, Ricardo stole the opium and the Beechcraft airplane and went into hiding. Westerby tells Ricardo that Nelson was the package. Ricardo again tries to kill Westerby, with a delayed-action hand grenade in the fuel tank of his hired car; Westerby figures out the ruse, and safely watches the car explode.

On the 30th of April 1975, Westerby arrives at an American air force base in northeast Thailand, and cables his report to the Circus; he also learns that the North Vietnamese Army captured Saigon, winning and ending the Vietnam War (1945–75). In turn, the Circus orders his direct return to London, explicitly ordering he not return to Hong Kong. Disobeying, Westerby goes to Hong Kong, where, at his flat, he finds the corpse of Luke, his photo-journalist room-mate, shot dead;(perhaps) mistaken for Westerby, by Tiu.

To ascertain the successful conclusion of Operation Dolphin, Smiley, Guillam, Fawn (Smiley’s factotum-bodyguard), and the CIA men Martello and Murphy, are in Hong Kong to capture Nelson. Smiley knows Nelson will escape China (as Drake did in 1951) on a fishing fleet junk to the southern-most island of Po Toi.

On the run, and spurred by schoolboy romanticism, Jerry Westerby remains in Hong Kong—to rescue Lizzie Worthington (he takes her from a cocktail party), and to protect Nelson from capture by the Circus, while the CIA spies on Drake. They go to her apartment; Smiley enters unannounced, and Westerby, expecting either Drake or Tiu, assaults him, before realizing it is his boss, and, in turn, Fawn manhandles Jerry. Smiley orders Fawn and Guillam to put Westerby aboard a flight to London; but Westerby escapes, gets Lizzie, and they take a boat to Po Toi. There, she shows him the places special to Drake, helping Westerby to determine where Nelson will land from China. After arranging a next-night rendez-vous with Westerby, Lizzie returns to Hong Kong.

That night, on Po Toi island, Westerby finds Drake and Tiu at the beach, awaiting Nelson. Upon disabling Tiu, Westerby tells Drake he wants Lizzie for himself, for saving Nelson from the British and the Americans; Drake is sceptical. When Nelson lands, he and Drake embrace; American helicopters appear, depositing men who separate the brothers, and load Nelson on a helicopter. Fawn shoots and kills Westerby; leaving Drake on the beach, sobbing over his brother, again lost to politics.

Peter Guillam’s suspicions of the CIA, of Enderby, and of Collins proved correct—the Americans, not the British, detain and interrogate Nelson; his interrogators do not include di Salis and Sachs; the success of Operation Dolphin yields top Circus jobs for Enderby and Collins; the (temporary) Chief of the Circus, Smiley, and Connie Sachs are retired with pension; and Peter Guillam, again, is exiled to head the scalp-hunters in Brixton, as at the start of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.

Authorial Epilogue: In the foreword to a later edition, le Carré wrote that the story’s narrative thrust might have been smoother had he omitted George Smiley, because Smiley’s appearances distracted readers from Westerby.

"Circus" jargon

The characters’ jargon-heavy dialogue establishes the fictional authenticity of the espionage portrayed in The Honourable Schoolboy; examples of John le Carré’s tradecraft language are:

Tradecraft term	Definition
Agent	An external, free-lance person recruited to provide information and services; Circus staff are referred to as intelligence officers.
Burrowers	The Circus’s researchers, usually intellectuals, recruited at universities.
Circus	The in-house name for MI6, the SIS (Secret Intelligence Service) which collects foreign intelligence. “Circus” refers to the SIS’s London locale at Cambridge Circus.
The Competition	MI5, the internal UK counter-espionage and counter-terrorism security service, whom the Circus often calls “The Security Mob”.
The Cousins	The CIA in particular, and US intelligences services in general.
Ferrets	Technicians responsible for finding and removing hidden microphones, cameras, et cetera.
Housekeepers	Internal auditors and disciplinarians of the Circus.
Janitors	Operations staff
Lamplighters	Controls surveillance and couriers.
Mothers	Secretaries and trusted typists serving the head of the Circus.
Nuts and Bolts	Engineers who develop and manufacture espionage devices.
Pavement Artists	Circus officers who inconspicuously follow people in public.
Scalphunters	Assassinations, counter-espionage, burglaries, kidnappings, et cetera, that was sidelined after Control’s dismissal.
Shoemakers	Circus forgers
Babysitters	Bodyguards
Wranglers	Radio signal analysts and cryptographers; the name derives from Wrangler maths students.

Characters

The Circus

• The Hon. Jerry Westerby — a reporter, and occasional SIS secret agent.
• George Smiley — (temporary) Chief of the Circus.
• Peter Guillam — Circus “cupbearer” to Smiley.
• Fawn - Smiley's factotum
• Connie Sachs — chief Moscow-gazer.
• Doc di Salis — head China-watcher.
• Molly Meakin — skilful, junior staff; a pretty Circus girl who catches Peter Guillam’s eye.
• Sam Collins — an "old Circus" field officer, formerly based in Vientiane, Laos.
• Stubbs — Westerby’s managing editor at the newspaper.

The Steering Committee (authorising further operations after the Ko bank account papers are obtained)

• Oliver Lacon — Circus watchdog from the Cabinet Office
• Roddy Martindale — of the Foreign Office, the scourge of the Circus.
• Saul Enderby — of the Foreign Office, was ambassador to Indonesia; the chief pundit on South East Asia; future chief of the Circus.
• Wilbraham — of the Colonial Office.
• Pretorius — of the Security Service.
• The Welsh Hammer — a Treasury banker.

Other Characters

• Ann — Smiley’s unfaithful wife.
• Peter Worthington — the husband Elizabeth Worthington abandoned.
• Mr. and Mrs. Pelling - Elizabeth Worthington's parents
• Mrs. Matthews - unofficial widow of Control
• Mr. Hibbert - as a missionary in Shanghai, knew Drake Ko and his brother Nelson
• Martello - head of CIA London office
• Murphy - Martello's assistant
• Tiny Ricardo - Mexican frontman for Indocharter Vientiane S.A.
• Elizabeth Worthington, alias Lizzie, alias Lizzie Ricardo, alias Liese Worth - first, common-law wife of Tiny Ricardo; then, mistress of Drake Ko
• Charlie Marshall - sometime business partner of Tiny Ricardo
• Luke - Californian journalist in Hong Kong
• Big Moo - local journalistic jargon for the governor of Hong Kong
• Rockhurst ("The Rocker") - Superintendent of Police in Hong Kong
• William Craw - an aging journalist, working for British Intelligence
• Jake Chiu - Luke's landlord, a real-estate entrepreneur
• Major Tufty Thesinger - Erstwhile SIS Head of Station, Hong Kong
• Frost - works at a Hong Kong bank, is used by Westerby
• Drake Ko - Hong Kong Fat Cat, receiving US$25K a month from the Soviets
• Nelson Ko - Drake's brother; also the name of Drake's deceased son
• Tiu - Ko's assistant
• Arpego - wealthy Filipino, friend of Ko
• Phoebe Wayfarer - half-English, half-Chinese agent for Brit Intel
• Sally Cale - art faker, illicit bullion dealer, occasional heroin trafficker, business partner or employee of Ko, introduced Liese to him
• Keller - veteran journalist whom Westerby meets in Phnom Penh
• Lorraine - American journalist in Phnom Penh

Adaptations

Jonathan Powell, producer of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1979), said the BBC considered producing The Honourable Schoolboy but a production in South East Asia was considered prohibitively expensive and therefore the BBC instead adapted the third novel of the Karla Trilogy Smiley's People (1979) which was transmitted in 1982. In Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, casting Joss Ackland in the minor role of Jerry Westerby was logical, if the original intent was retaining him as the protagonist of a television adaptation of The Honourable Schoolboy novel.^{[citation needed]}

In 1983 the BBC adapted The Honourable Schoolboy to radio. Martin Jarvis played Jerry Westerby and Peter Vaughan played "George Smiley". A subsequent BBC radio adaptation, first broadcast in 2010 in the Classic Serial slot, featured Simon Russell Beale as George Smiley and Hugh Bonneville as Jerry Westerby, as part of Radio 4's year-long project to adapt all eight Smiley novels.