Old communists are supposed to die hard, but Kim Philby, the British intelligence officer turned KGB spy, ended his days hating the Soviet Union and longing for the taste of Cooper's Oxford marmalade.
These were just some of the revelations to emerge from a new book about Philby's life in Russia, launched Thursday by his widow and companion for the last 18 years of his life, Rufina Pukhova.
"There have been so many stories told about the life Kim led here in Moscow," said Pukhova as she unveiled the book, titled, "I Did It My Way." "Some claim he lived the life of a tsar, riding around in a chauffeur-driven car. Others say he spent his last years in the utmost poverty. I wanted to set the record straight."
The volume includes excerpts from Philby's unfinished autobiography, "My Silent War," first published in Britain in 1980. The second half of the book is made up of her own recollections. She said she had spent the nine years since Philby's death gathering material for the account, "The Island on the Sixth Floor" -- a reference to the couple's apartment at Patriarch's Ponds.
Former deputy head of the British desk of Soviet intelligence, Mikhail Lyubimov, who wrote the introduction to the new book, hailed it as one of its kind. "It is a human book, with a human touch," he said. "When it is translated into English, I am sure that it will become a best seller."
In one excerpt, Pukhova writes about the first time she saw Philby in 1970. They met by chance at Sportivnaya metro station -- both were heading to the same ice-skating performance at Luzhniki Stadium. The sun was shining, and Pukhova was wearing her sunglasses. "Please, take off your glasses," said the dapper English gentleman in line for tickets. "I want to see your eyes."
Very little is known about the last 25 years of Philby's life. In 1963, he disappeared from Beirut, where he had been working for British intelligence. By then, both Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean had defected to the Soviet Union. The three formed part of the infamous Cambridge Five, a circle of friends who had sworn to dedicate their lives to the communist cause during their university days in the '30s.
Philby followed the example of Burgess and Maclean, resurfacing in Moscow eight months later. He came clean about his involvement with Soviet intelligence during the Cold War, and was barred from ever returning to Britain.
"He never openly complained about the Soviet Union," said Lyubimov. "Of course we all knew that his apartment was bugged, but we never discussed it. His discontent with the country only came out after a bottle of whiskey."
Philby, famously dubbed the "third man" died in 1988, just as the state he had spied for was beginning to abandon communism. "Perestroika was only just beginning when Kim died," said Pukhova. "There are a lot of things he would dislike about Russia today -- the hoards of homeless, the lack of pensions for old people. But at the same time, I think he would have admired the freedom people enjoy in Russia today."
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