Charm School v1_0

by Nelson DeMille

  “Not that I know of. From what I see here, that's not possible.”

  “No, it's not. And Dodson's escape was wholly an internal conspiracy here. No outside help. Correct?”

  “We had no part in that.”

  “And Fisher's meeting with Dodson was totally chance?”

  “Of course. You heard Fisher on the taped phone conversation. He's not ours.”

  “And your snooping around here—that was not an attempt to rescue a prisoner?”

  “No. There was only Lisa Rhodes and I. We did that on our own.”

  “You have no contact with any prisoners inside the camp?”

  “No.”

  “With any staff?”

  “No.”

  “Do you have Soviet citizens on the outside who are your agents?”

  “None that have any connection with this camp.”

  “But you do employ Soviet citizens as American agents.”

  Hollis thought it was time to get one point on the board.

  “Not employ. They don't take a kopek. They do it because they hate the Communist Party and the KGB.”

  Burov said nothing for a while, then asked, “You'll give me their names.”

  “I don't have any actual names. Just code names.”

  “We'll see.”

  “Why should I tell you anything if I'm going to be shot?”

  “Because being shot is not as bad as what I can do to you.”

  “And I could kill myself before you do anything to me.”

  “I don't think you have any lethal means at your disposal.”

  “I could have pushed that ballpoint pen through my jugular vein. You're not supposed to give trained intelligence officers things like that.”

  “Ah, yes. The pen. So, you think that as an intelligence officer your brains are too valuable to be blown out?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Well, then let me ask you something. What do you propose? Intelligence officer to intelligence officer.”

  “My appeal makes that clear. I realize I'm officially dead. I'd rather work here, among my peers, than go to Siberia or be shot. I want Lisa Rhodes with me.”

  “Yes, you are officially dead. I'll show you the American newspaper accounts. The Center wants you actually dead after your debriefing. But perhaps I can convince them that you and your girlfriend will be an asset here. Perhaps a life sentence here, helping us destroy America, will be worse than death. I'd enjoy that, Hollis.”

  “I know you would.”

  Burov smiled, then said, “I don't think you defense attaches are as tough as your CIA people. However, if I begin to think that your capitulation is a ruse of some sort, I'll torture your girlfriend to death. Right in front of you.”

  Hollis didn't reply.

  Burov walked over to Hollis and looked down at him. “You thought you were quite the man, didn't you? In the Mozhaisk morgue, then in Lefortovo restaurant, then on the telephone with me. What abuse I took from you.”

  “I had diplomatic immunity.”

  Burov laughed. “Yes, you did. Big shot. Now I can do whatever I please to you.” Burov grabbed Hollis' hair and yanked his head back. “Look at me, you smug American bastard. You shits in the embassy look down your noses at us, don't you? I've heard some of the tapes of embassy conversations. You laugh at our drinking, you think we don't bathe enough, you make fun of our women, you joke about Moscow, the food, the housing, and just about everything else about us.” Burov pulled harder on Hollis' hair. “Do you think you look or smell so good now, you son of a bitch?” Burov released Hollis' hair and slammed the heel of his hand against Hollis' forehead. “Do you think your delicate girlfriend looks or smells so good now? Do you think you look so civilized now? What are you without your tailored clothes and your deodorants? You're nothing, that's what you are. A Russian can stand more suffering because we don't start with so much. And because we have more inner strength. You people fall apart as soon as you miss a shower or a meal.” Burov paced around the room, then came to Hollis and barked, “Stand up.'”

  Hollis stood.

  “Hands on your head!”

  Hollis put his hands on his head.

  Burov glared at him. “Can you imagine the things I could do to you and Lisa Rhodes? Things that wouldn't leave a mark on your bodies, but would completely destroy you inside, your humanity, your souls, your minds. Answer me!”

  “Yes. I know.”

  Burov stood off to Hollis' side and said, “Your girlfriend is a lover of Russian culture. Perhaps she would like a Russian boyfriend. Maybe several dozen of them.”

  Hollis didn't reply.

  “Did you know that she and Alevy were lovers? Answer me.”

  “Yes.”

  “I told you that your wife has taken up with an English gentleman.”

  “I don't care.”

  “She's in Washington now for your funeral. I think it's tomorrow.”

  Hollis made no response.

  “Who is Simms?”

  “I don't know.”

  “I think I know.” Burov looked at his watch and said, “Well, Hollis, do you want to see your slut?”

  Hollis nodded.

  Burov opened the door to his office and said something to the guard, then turned to Hollis. “You may take your hands down. Get out.”

  Hollis walked to the door, and Burov said, “You may have sex if you wish.”

  “Thank you.”

  Burov smiled and closed the door.

  The guard marched Hollis down the stairs. The man opened the door of Lisa's cell and shoved Hollis in. The door closed behind him.

  Lisa sat in a sleeping bag, curled up in the corner. She looked at him but said nothing.

  Hollis knelt near her and examined her face. Her cheeks were drawn, and her eyes seemed sunken. He noticed her lips were dry and cracked, and there was a bruise on her neck. On her left cheek there was still a smudge of blush, and this somehow caused him more pain than the rest of her appearance. “How are you?”

  She didn't reply.

  “Do you need a doctor?”

  She shook her head.

  Hollis felt weak and sat down beside her, putting his arm around her shoulders. She didn't move toward him or move away. She sat still, staring straight ahead.

  They sat in silence for a long time, then Lisa put her face in her hands and wept.

  Hollis drifted off from time to time, but the numbing cold and his empty stomach woke him every fifteen minutes or so.

  The lights went on and off, and there were bootsteps in the corridor that stopped outside the cell door, then continued. Now and then someone slid the bolt back, but the door never opened. A few minutes later, the bolt would slide closed again.

  Lisa stared at the ceiling and spoke in a barely audible voice. “I was sentenced to death.”

  Hollis didn't reply.

  She reached her arm out along the wall, then held her hand out in front of Hollis.

  He didn't know at first what she was holding, then recognized a heap of ash and charred pieces of paper. Photographs. Her photographs of Moscow. He turned her hand so the ash spilled out, and wiped her palm on his knee.

  She said, “It doesn't matter.”

  Hollis knew the room was wired to pick up the slightest whisper, and even in the dark, the fiber-optic device could see them. He wanted to comfort her but thought it best to say nothing that Burov could use. In fact, he knew he should not have even told Burov he wanted to see her.

  She asked, “Why did you tell them about Yablonya?”

  “I'm sorry.”

  She stood unsteadily and went to the waste drain in the floor and used it. The guard picked that moment to come in, confirming Hollis' belief that they could see as well as hear. Lisa stood and pulled her sweat pants up as the guard leered at her. The Russian looked at Hollis, then threw a piece of black bread in the center of the floor. He said to Hollis, “I told you that you wouldn't feel much like fucking.” He laughed and closed the door.
>
  Lisa washed in cold water, then put her mouth under the spigot and drank. She picked the bread up off the floor and carried it back to her sleeping bag. She slid into the bag and took a bite of bread, chewing it slowly, Hollis noticed, more like a person who is starving than merely hungry.

  Hollis estimated they were getting about three hundred grams of bread a day, about four hundred calories. They'd been here about eight days, though it could have been longer. There were enough calories to stay alive, but as the guard suggested, he didn't feel much like doing anything but breathing. He suspected, too, that the food was drugged, probably with sodium pentothal or a similar truth serum, which, along with the sensory deprivation and numbing cold, would account for their extreme lethargy.

  Lisa stared at the black bread awhile, then offered him the piece. He broke off about a third and handed the rest back to her.

  After they'd finished the bread, Hollis said, “Feeling better?”

  She shrugged. After a few minutes she reached out and took his hand. “You must be cold. Didn't they give you a bag?”

  “I'm all right.”

  “Come in here. There's room.”

  He slipped into the sleeping bag beside her.

  She said, “I don't blame you for this. You warned me.”

  Hollis made no reply.

  They slept fitfully. Lisa cried out in her sleep several times, but he couldn't understand what she was saying.

  Hollis got up to get water. The water pressure was low, and he knew from experience that this meant it was dawn. He heard footsteps, and the door opened. The guard said, “Stand up. Follow me. No talking.”

  Hollis helped Lisa to her feet. She said, “I love you, Sam.”

  “I love you.”

  “No talking!”

  Hollis took Lisa's hand, but the guard pushed them apart. “Walk!”

  They walked down the long corridor, and another guard opened the door to the room where Hollis had written the appeal of his death sentence, the room with the bloodstained table and the straw bales against the wall. The execution room. Lisa hesitated, but the guard shoved her inside.

  * * *

  32

  On the bloodstained table was hot tea, boiled eggs, bread, and jam. The guard said, “Eat all you want, but if you throw it up, you'll clean it. No talking.”

  Hollis and Lisa sat. Hollis glanced at the bloodstains beneath the food. They were actually rust-colored, not bright red, and he suspected that Lisa didn't know what they were. He wondered, too, if it was animal blood, put there to frighten prisoners and amuse the guards.

  They ate slowly, but they both got stomach cramps just the same. The guard led them out of the room and into what looked like a locker room, probably, Hollis thought, used by the night guard. There were wall lockers, a sink, a toilet, and in the corner an open shower. The guard motioned toward the shower. “Go ahead. Use it.”

  They both undressed and showered with hot water and soap. A matron brought in towels, a shaving kit, underwear, and clean warm-up suits. Hollis dried himself, shaved, then dressed, noticing that the clothes had Jockey labels. Lisa dressed quickly, avoiding the guards eyes. The matron pointed to a box full of Adidas running shoes, and they each found a pair that fit.

  The guard said, “Come with me.” He led them to the east wing of the building and through a door marked Klinika. They were met by a female nurse, who took them into separate examining rooms. The guard stayed with Hollis. Presently, a plump middle-aged woman entered the room and introduced herself as the camp doctor.

  She gave Hollis a perfunctory examination, being interested mostly in his heart, Hollis thought, recalling the Russian obsession with heart disease. He said curtly in Russian, “I am malnourished and have been sitting in a cold cell for about two weeks. I've been punched in the jaw, kicked in the testicles and the solar plexus. Also, I hear fluid in my lungs.”

  She moved the stethoscope back to his lungs, told him to breathe deeply, listened, and tapped his chest. “Yes. A little congestion. You'll be all right.”

  “All right for two more weeks of starvation?”

  The guard said, “No talking.”

  Hollis looked at the man. “I'll talk to the doctor. Why don't you shut up?”

  The guard snapped back, “Only medical talk!”

  The doctor gave Hollis a pill and a glass tumbler that looked as if it could use a washing.

  Hollis asked, “What is this?”

  “Just a vitamin.”

  “Then you take it.” He handed it back to her.

  She looked at him a moment, then put the pill in her mouth and washed it down with the water. She said in a low voice, “I too am a prisoner here. A political prisoner.”

  “I see. I apologize for my rudeness.”

  She gave him another vitamin, and he took it. She said, “You'll be fine. Your heart is good.”

  Hollis got down from the examining table and dressed. He asked, “What dies first here, the heart or the soul?”

  “The soul dies. The heart breaks.”

  Hollis looked closely at the woman. He should have seen immediately that she was not free, but in Russia it was sometimes hard to tell and very relative. Hollis said to her, “Thank you.”

  The guard took Hollis to the waiting room, and within five minutes, Lisa joined him. The guard said, “Follow me.” He led them upstairs to Burov's office. As they entered, Burov said, “Sit down.” They sat in chairs facing Burov.

  Burov said, “Now you are Americans again. Right, Hollis?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you feel well?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. You'll feel much better when I tell you that both your death sentences have been conditionally commuted to life in prison.”

  “What,” Hollis asked, “is the condition?”

  “Two conditions. One is that you pass a polygraph test. The other is that you agree to work for us here.”

  Neither Hollis nor Lisa replied.

  Burov added, “If you say no, you'll be executed for murder.”

  Lisa said, “What you're asking is that we become traitors. The answer is no.”

  Burov didn't respond to that, but said, “You should know, Ms. Rhodes, that your friend has already indicated he would work for us here in exchange for his life.”

  She looked at Hollis.

  Hollis said to Burov, “I didn't say I would subject myself to a polygraph interrogation.”

  “No,” Burov replied, “but you will be thoroughly debriefed nonetheless. There are several methods of interrogation. I prefer polygraph and sodium pentothal over electroshock and a truncheon, especially as the results of the former are more reliable than the latter. I'm sure you and Ms. Rhodes would prefer that too.”

  Hollis said, “Working here for you is one thing. But I cannot give you intelligence secrets that would compromise or endanger the lives of other agents.”

  Burov tapped his fingers on his desk and looked from one to the other. “You're not in a position to make deals. You're already dead, and no one knows you are here. And the reason you are here is that you know entirely too much about this place, and we want to know what you know.”

  “We're here for killing two Border Guards,” Hollis reminded him. “That's what we are under a death sentence for.”

  “Well, that too, of course.” Burov regarded Hollis a moment. “You know, as soon as the blood sugar goes up, people revert to their former selves. In your case, Hollis, I don't like your former self. Please try to control your sarcasm.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Burov turned to Lisa. “In your case, a debriefing would most probably yield very little and would in no way endanger anyone. Correct?”

  Lisa nodded hesitantly.

  “So the question for you is this? Do you want to live and work here, or do you want to be shot? Answer.”

  “I… I want to be with Colonel Hollis.”

  Burov grinned. “Here? Or in heaven?”

  “Anywhere.�
��

  Burov looked at Hollis. “Such loyalty. So what is your decision?”

  Hollis thought a moment, then replied, “I would like for both of us to be let out of the cells, to live here awhile before we decide if we want to become willing instructors in this place.”

  Burov nodded. “All right. I think when you see how comfortable you can be here, you'll decide you don't want to die in front of a firing squad. But we haven't resolved the question of your interrogation.”

  Hollis replied, “Let's resolve that after Ms. Rhodes and I resolve the question of working here or not. We'll need ten days.”

  Burov smiled. “You're stalling.”

  “For what? I'm dead. We are both dead.”

  Burov stood and went to the window. He stared out into the trees for a while, then nodded. “One week.” He turned to Hollis and stared at him. “The very first moment I think you are up to something or lying to me”—Burov pointed to Lisa—“she dies. And as I told you, not by firing squad.”

  Neither Hollis nor Lisa spoke.

  Burov walked toward them. He looked at Hollis. “You are intelligent enough to know that I let you bargain with me because I'd rather have you alive. I want you alive so I can question you, not only now, but anytime something comes up in American intelligence matters that you can enlighten us on. I also want you alive because we went through a great deal of trouble making you dead. You are both valuable commodities here, potential assets for this school. And lastly, but not least, I want you both under my thumb. Forever. You amuse me.”

  “But you're not smiling,” Hollis pointed out.

  Burov stared at Hollis for a long time, his face impassive, then he turned and went to his desk. Burov took a heavy revolver from the top drawer and emptied five of the six chambers. He walked over to Hollis and Lisa. “No, not what you call Russian roulette. Stand up.” He handed the revolver to Hollis. “See that the loaded chamber will fire if you pull the trigger.”

  Hollis checked the cylinder.

  Burov stepped back a pace. “Go ahead.”

  Hollis stood with the revolver in his hand.

  “I'm giving you the opportunity to be a hero to your country, albeit an unknown one, and to indulge your own fantasy. Go ahead.”