Rosemont nodded and let the censure pass. He gave Crosse the remaining photos, wanting the Englishman’s cooperation and needing it. “These’re shots of the house they went into. And the street sign. Our guy couldn’t read characters but it translates, ‘Street of the First Season, Number 14.’ It’s a rotten little alley in back of the bus depot in North Point.”
Crosse began to examine them with equal care. Rosemont glanced at his watch, then got up and went to the single window that faced part of the harbor. “Look!” he said proudly.
The other two went over to him. The great nuclear carrier was just rounding North Point heading for the navy yard, Hong Kong side. She was dressed overall, all her obligatory flags stiff in the breeze, crowds of white-clothed sailors on her vast deck, with neat lines of her vicious fighter jet airplanes. Almost 84,000 tons. No smokestack, just a vast, ominous bridge complex, with an eleven-hundred-foot angled runway that could retrieve and launch jets simultaneously. The first of a generation.
“That’s some ship,” Crosse said enviously. This was the first time the colossus had entered Hong Kong since her commissioning in 1960. “Pretty,” he said, hating the fact she was American and not British. “What’s her top speed?”
“I don’t know—that’s classified along with most everything else.” Rosemont turned to watch him. “Can’t you send that goddamn Soviet spy ship to hell out of port?”
“Yes, and we could blow it up, but that would be equally foolish. Stanley, relax, you have to be a little civilized about these things. Repairing their ships—and some of them really do need it—is a good source of revenue, and intelligence, and they pay their bills promptly. Our ways have been tried and tested over the years.”
Yes, Rosemont was thinking without rancor, but your ways don’t work anymore. The British Empire’s no more, the British raj no more and we’ve a different enemy now, smarter rougher dedicated totalitarian fanatic, with no Queensberry rules and a worldwide plan that’s lavishly funded by whatever it takes. You British’ve no dough now, no clout, no navy, no army, no air force, and your goddamn government’s filled with socialist and enemy pus, and we think they sold you out. You’ve been screwed from within, your security’s the pits from Klaus Fuchs and Philby on down. Jesus, we won both goddamn wars for you, paid for most of it and both times you’ve screwed up the peace. And if it wasn’t for our Strategic Air Command, our missiles, our nuclear strike force, our navy, our army, our air force our taxpayers our dough, you’d all be dead or in goddamn Siberia. Meanwhile, like it or not I got to deal with you. We need Hong Kong as a window and right now your cops to guard the carrier.
“Rog, thanks for the extra men,” he said. “We sure appreciate it.”
“We wouldn’t want any trouble while she’s here either. Pretty ship. I envy you having her.”
“Her captain’ll have the ship and crew under tight wraps—the shore parties’ll all be briefed, and warned, and we’ll cooperate a hundred percent.”
“I’ll see you get a copy of the list of bars I’ve suggested your sailors stay out of—some’re known Communist hangouts, and some are frequented by our lads off H.M.S. Dart.” Crosse smiled. “There’ll still be the odd brawl.”
“Sure. Rog, this Voranski killing’s too much of a coincidence. Can I send a Shanghai speaker to assist the interrogation?”
“I’ll let you know if we need help.”
“Can we have our copies of the tai-pan’s other AMG reports now? Then we can get out of your hair.”
Crosse stared back at him twisting uneasily, even though he was prepared for the question. “I’ll have to get approval from Whitehall.”
Rosemont was surprised. “Our top man in England’s been onto your Great White Father and it’s approved. You should have had it an hour ago.”
“Oh?”
“Sure. Hell, we’d no idea AMG was on the tai-pan’s payroll let alone passing classified stuff for chrissake! The wires’ve been red hot since Ed got the top copy of AMG’s last will and testament. We got an all-points from Washington on getting copies of the other reports and we’re trying to trace the call to Switzerland but—”
“Say again?”
“Kiernan’s call. The second call he made.”
“I don’t follow you.”
Rosemont explained.
Crosse frowned. “My people didn’t tell me about that. Nor did Dunross. Now why should Dunross lie—or avoid telling me that?” He related to them exactly what Dunross had told him. “There was no reason for him to hide that, was there?”
“No. All right, Rog: Is the tai-pan kosher?”
Crosse laughed. “If you mean is he a one hundred percent British Royalist freebooter whose allegiance is to his House, himself and the Queen—not necessarily in that order—the answer’s an emphatic yes.”
“Then if we can have our copies now, Rog, we’ll be on our way.”
“When I’ve got Whitehall’s approval.”
“If you’ll check your decoding room—it’s a Priority 1–4a. It says to let us have copies on receipt.”
1–4a’s were very rare. They called for immediate clearance and immediate action.
Crosse hesitated, wanting to avoid the trap he was in. He dared not tell them he did not yet have possession of the AMG reports. He picked up the phone and dialed. “This is Mr. Crosse. Is their anything for me from Source? A 1–4a?”
“No sir. Other than the one we sent up an hour ago—that you signed for,” the SI woman said.
“Thank you.” Crosse put the phone down. “Nothing yet,” he said.
“Shit,” Rosemont muttered, then added, “They swore they’d already beamed it out and you’d have it before we got here. It’s got to be here any second. If you don’t mind we’ll wait.”
“I’ve an appointment in Central shortly. Perhaps later this evening?”
Both men shook their heads. Langan said, “We’ll wait. We’ve been ordered to send ’em back instantly by hand with a twenty-four-hour guard. An army transport’s due now at Kai Tak to carry the courier—we can’t even copy them here.”
“Aren’t you overreacting?”
“You could answer that. What’s in them?”
Crosse toyed with his lighter. It had Cambridge University emblazoned on it. He had owned it since his undergraduate days. “Is it true what AMG said about the CIA and the Mafia?”
Rosemont stared back at him. “I don’t know. You guys used all sort of crooks during World War Two. We learned from you to take advantage of what we’ve got—that was your first rule. Besides,” Rosemont added with utter conviction, “this war’s our war and whatever it takes we’re going to win.”
“Yes, yes we must,” Langan echoed, equally sure. “Because if we lose this one, the whole world’s gone and we’ll never get another chance.”
On the closed-in bridge of the Sovetsky Ivanov three men had binoculars trained on the nuclear carrier. One of the men was a civilian and he wore a throat mike that fed into a tape recorder. He was giving an expert, technical running commentary of what he saw. From time to time the other two would add a comment. Both wore light naval uniform. One was Captain Gregor Suslev, the other his first officer.
The carrier was coming up the roads nicely, tugs in attendance, but no tug ropes. Ferries and freighters tooted a jaunty welcome. A marine band played on her aft deck. White-clad sailors waved at passing ships. The day was very humid and the afternoon sun cast long shadows.
“The captain’s expert,” the first officer said.
“Yes. But with all that radar even a child could handle her,” Captain Suslev replied. He was a heavy-shouldered, bearded man, his Slavic brown eyes deepset in a friendly face. “Those sweepers aloft look like the new GEs for very long-range radar. Are they, Vassili?”
The technical expert broke off his transmission momentarily. “Yes, Comrade Captain. But look aft! They’ve four F5 interceptors parked on the right flight deck.”
Suslev whistled tonelessly. “They’re not
supposed to be in service till next year.”
“No,” the civilian said.
“Report that separately as soon as she docks. That news alone pays for our voyage.”
“Yes.”
Suslev fine-tuned his focus now as the ship turned slightly. He could see the airplanes’ bomb racks. “How many more F5’s does she carry in her guts, and how many atomic warheads for them?”
They all watched the carrier for a moment.
“Perhaps we’ll get lucky this time, Comrade Captain,” the first officer said.
“Let’s hope so. Then Voranski’s death won’t be so expensive.”
“The Americans are fools to bring her here—don’t they know every agent in Asia’ll be tempted by her?”
“It’s lucky for us they are. It makes our job so much easier.” Once more Suslev concentrated on the F5’s that looked like soldier hornets among other hornets.
Around him the bridge was massed with advanced surveillance equipment. One radar was sweeping the harbor. A gray-haired impassive sailor watched the screen, the carrier a large clear blip among the myriad of blips.
Suslev’s binoculars moved to the carrier’s ominous bridge complex, then wandered the length of the ship. In spite of himself he shivered at her size and power. “They say she’s never refueled—not since she was launched in 1960.”
Behind him the door to the radio room that adjoined the bridge opened and a radio operator came up to him and saluted, offering the cable. “Urgent from Center, Comrade Captain.”
Suslev took the cable and signed for it. It was a meaningless jumble of words. A last look at the carrier and he let the binoculars rest on his chest and strode off the bridge. His sea cabin was just aft on the same deck. The door was guarded, like both entrances to the bridge.
He relocked his cabin door behind him and opened the small, concealed safe. His cipher book was secreted in a false wall. He sat at his desk. Quickly he decoded the message. He read it carefully, then stared into space for a moment.
He read it a second time, then replaced the cipher book, closed the safe and burned the original of the cable in an ashtray. He picked up his phone. “Bridge? Send Comrade Metkin to my cabin!” While he waited he stood by the porthole lost in thought. His cabin was untidy. Photographs of a heavyset woman, smiling self-consciously, were on his desk in a frame. Another of a good-looking youth in naval uniform, and a girl in her teens. Books, a tennis racket and a newspaper on the half-made bunk.
A knock. He unlocked the door. The sailor who had been staring at the radar screen stood there.
“Come in, Dimitri.” Suslev motioned at the decoded cable and re-locked the door after him.
The sailor was short and squat, with graying hair and a good face. He was, officially, political commissar and therefore senior officer on the ship. He picked up the decoded message. It read: “Priority One. Gregor Suslev. You will assume Voranski’s duties and responsibilities at once. London reports optimum CIA and MI-6 interest in information contained in blue-covered files leaked to Ian Dunross of Struan’s by the British Intelligence coordinator, AMG. Order Arthur to obtain copies immediately. If Dunross has destroyed the copies, cable feasibility plan to detain him for chemical debriefing in depth.” The sailor’s face closed. He looked across at Captain Suslev. “AMG? Alan Medford Grant?”
“Yes.”
“May that one burn in hell for a thousand years.”
“He will, if there’s any justice in this world or the next.” Suslev smiled grimly. He went to a sideboard and took out a half-full vodka bottle and two glasses. “Listen, Dimitri, if I fail or don’t return, you take command.” He held up the key. “Unlock the safe. There’re instructions about decoding and everything else.”
“Let me go tonight in your place. You’re more impor—”
“No. Thank you, old friend.” Suslev clapped him warmly on the shoulders. “In case of an accident you assume command and carry out our mission. That’s what we’ve been trained for.” He touched glasses with him. “Don’t worry. Everything will be fine,” he said, glad he could do as he wished and very content with his job and his position in life. He was, secretly, deputy controller in Asia for the KGB’s First Directorate, Department 6, that was responsible for all covert activities in China, North Korea and Vietnam; a senior lecturer in Vladivostok University’s Department of Foreign Affairs, 2A—Counterintelligence; a colonel in the KGB; and, most important of all, a senior Party member in the Far East. “Center’s given the order. You must guard our tails here. Eh?”
“Of course. You needn’t worry about that, Gregor. I can do everything. But I worry about you,” Metkin said. They had sailed together for several years and he respected Suslev very much though he did not know from where his overriding authority came. Sometimes he was tempted to try to find out. You’re getting on, he told himself. You retire next year and you may need powerful friends and the only way to have the help of powerful friends is to know their skeletons. But Suslev or no Suslev your well-earned retirement will be honorable, quiet and at home in the Crimea. Metkin’s heart beat faster at the thought of all that lovely countryside and grand climate on the Black Sea, dreaming the rest of his life away with his wife and sometimes seeing his son, an up-and-coming KGB officer presently in Washington, no longer at risk and in danger from within or without.
Oh God protect my son from betrayal or making a mistake, he prayed fervently, then at once felt a wave of nausea, as always, in case his superiors knew that he was a secret believer and that his parents, peasants, had brought him up in the Church. If they knew there would be no retirement in the Crimea, only some icy backwater and no real home ever again.
“Voranski,” he said, as always cautiously hiding his hatred of the man. “He was a top operator, eh? Where did he slip?”
“He was betrayed, that was his problem,” Suslev said darkly. “We will find his murderers and they will pay. If my name is on the next knife …” The big man shrugged, then poured more vodka with a sudden laugh. “So what, eh? It’s in the name of the cause, the Party and Mother Russia!”
They touched glasses and drained them.
“When’re you going ashore?”
Suslev bit on the raw liquor. Then, thankfully, he felt the great good warmth begin inside and his anxieties and terrors seemed less real. He motioned out of the porthole. “As soon as she’s moored and safe,” he said with his rolling laugh. “Ah, but she’s a pretty ship, eh?”
“We’ve got nothing to touch that bastard, Captain, have we? Or those fighters. Nothing.”
Suslev smiled as he poured again. “No, comrade. But if the enemy has no real will to resist they can have a hundred of those carriers and it doesn’t matter.”
“Yes, but Americans’re erratic, one general can go off at half-cock, and they can smash us off the face of the earth.”
“I agree, now they can, but they won’t. They’ve no balls.” Suslev drank again. “And soon? Just a little more time and we’ll stick their noses up their asses!” He sighed. “It will be good when we begin.”
“It’ll be terrible.”
“No, a short, almost bloodless war against America and then the rest’ll collapse like the pus-infected corpse it is.”
“Bloodless? What about their atom bombs? Hydrogen bombs?”
“They’ll never use atomics or missiles against us, they’re too scared, even now, of ours! Because they’re sure we’ll use them.”
“Will we?”
“I don’t know. Some commanders would. I don’t know. We’ll certainly use them back. But first? I don’t know. The threat will always be enough. I’m sure we’ll never need a fighting war.” He lit a corner of the decoded message and put it in the ashtray. “Another twenty years of détente—ah what Russian genius invented that—we’ll have a navy bigger and better than theirs, an air force bigger and better than theirs. We’ve got more tanks now and more soldiers, but without ships and airplanes we must wait. Twenty years is not long to wait for Moth
er Russia to rule the earth.”
“And China? What about China?”
Suslev gulped the vodka and refilled both glasses again. The bottle was empty now and he tossed it onto his bunk. His eyes saw the burning paper in the ashtray twist and crackle, dying. “Perhaps China’s the one place to use our atomics,” he said matter-of-factly. “There’s nothing there we need. Nothing. That’d solve our China problem once and for all. How many men of military age did they have at last estimate?”
“116 million between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five.”
“Think of that! 116 million yellow devils sharing 5,000 miles of our frontiers … and then foreigners call us paranoiac about China!” He sipped the vodka, this time making it last. “Atomics’d solve our China problem once and for all. Quick, simple and permanent.”
The other man nodded. “And this Dunross? The papers of AMG?”
“We’ll get them from him. After all, Dimitri, one of our people is family, another one of his partners, another’s in Special Intelligence, there’s Arthur and Sevrin everywhere he turns, and then we’ve a dozen decadents to call on in his parliament, some in his government.” They both began laughing.
“And if he’s destroyed the papers?”
Suslev shrugged. “They say he’s got a photographic memory.”
“You’d do the interrogation here?”
“It’d be dangerous to do an in-depth chemic quickly. I’ve never done one. Have you?”
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