by Max Grant
“Basically it’s the assassination branch of the Soviet MGB” she explained. “I’ve heard of them but that’s about it. From what I understand they mostly hunt down and kill renegade Soviets and the occasional noisy Western anti-communist. He made it plain someone in Moscow wants me out of the way.”
“I wonder if he’s even still there,” she added.
“Forgive my density, but you’re saying that a Soviet government hit man sent out to kill you is right now sitting in your apartment? And he’s waiting for you to come back and help him defect?”
“Something like that, if he was being truthful.”
“Well, that’s a lot to expect from a hired gun,” I mused.
“Forgive my bluntness,” I continued, “but why come to me?”
“I’d been thinking of you from the second I understood what was happening, wishing you were there, so naturally I came straight here.
“I know you’re not one of us. I don’t know who else to turn to. I’m in over my head. I need to get out too. I need help, Ray, from you. Everyone else I know is with them.”
“You made the right choice, Ruthie. I’ll deal with this guy, if he wants to talk.” You better stay clear, though, in case he changes his mind.”
“I told him it wouldn’t be me coming back there tonight.”
* * *
Ruthena lived in the Fairfax district. I had mixed feelings for this little fallen angel. Last year she’d given me the impression that her soul had been cored out at birth. She was a Red-diaper baby and had swallowed the commie line hook and sinker. Several times I’d wanted to slap her silly and shake the Devil from her bones, but in the end I wasn’t really interested enough to much care.
I felt differently as I entered the flat with her key and confronted her uninvited visitor. Now occupying her sofa, the little man looked up at me and nodded slowly as if recalling Ruthie’s departing words.
“What can you do for me?” he asked.
“First I need some assurances.” I told him.
“Such as?”
“Such as you’ll not communicate with anyone else about the ordered hit on Miss Ginzberg, or the outcome. Keep to other subjects, whatever you like, but this thing tonight never happened. You found me. You came to me.”
“All right,” he spoke, with some relief. “Now what can you do for me?”
“I know a local DA, a Los Angeles City District Attorney,” I responded. “He has a safe house. He’ll keep you out of circulation until he can get you in touch with the right people. They can make your current identity and your immediate problems disappear.”
“OK. I will see this man.”
I sat back and thought about this strange fellow for a moment. He waited patiently without speaking.
“Two shots up close in the brainpan is a bit obvious isn’t it?” I asked him. “Aren’t you guys a little more subtle? You know - accidents that aren’t accidents? That sort of thing.”
“You’ve seen her. You know she’s a looker. That’s what they told me, and they were right.
“ This was set up to be a sex crime,” he continued. “I was instructed to rape her, batter her corpse, and set a scene. Drop a few clues to make it look like a sex-crazed Negro had busted in and taken her for the long ride.
“You know how the Party thinks. Why just make a hit a simple hit if you can add a few months of racial strife in the mix. And you think that’s not subtle?”
“Hoo, boy,” I exclaimed. “That does sound like something right out of the Party playbook. You don’t talk like someone straight out of Europe?”
“Why should I? I was born in Belgium, but I’ve lived in Chicago since the age of three. My father was a big cheese in the Comintern, but was recalled to the USSR during the purges and we never saw him again. It was my mother that convinced me to follow in his footsteps, but I got involved in the Party underground after Stalin folded the Comintern.
“Lately I’ve come to realize what a stupid, sick and evil game this all is. Rooted in the paranoid delusions of yet another undereducated, ruthless and cunning strongman with visions of a global empire. When I looked upon Miss Ginzburg’s lovely face this night, even before she awoke. I knew that the precise time had come for me to give it up.”
About the Author
A child of the Cold War, Max Grant departed eastern Canada at an early age for an all-American upbringing in Vermont and points south. His first exposure to geopolitical realities occurred at age 9 when the town fathers, in response to the ongoing Cuban Missile Crisis, passed out red-filtered flashlights for use by children trick-or-treating on Halloween.
Max became an avid reader of World War II and Korean War accounts during his school years in upstate New York, where he learned to duck and cover to survive nuclear attack. At age 14, on a family vacation to England, he came face to face for the first time with real live Communists, a group of Chinese diplomats in identical Mao suits out for an afternoon stroll.
Ever curious about the land of his origin, Max returned to Canada’s Maritime Provinces to pursue his undergraduate studies, majoring in the environmental sciences. Intrigued by his new cultural experiences Max pursued graduate studies, in French, under the guidance of a cadre of Quebec separatists.
Based in Washington DC, his consulting career saw Max travel for work to 49 of the 50 US states. Max has spent the past six years in the long shadow of the DMZ enjoying the wonderful people, culture and economic miracle that are the Republic of Korea.