Death's Foot Forward

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by George B Mair




  DEATH’S FOOT FORWARD

  George B. Mair

  © George B. Mair 1963

  George B. Mair has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 1963 by Jarrolds Publishers (London) Ltd.

  This edition published in 2018 by Endeavour Media Ltd.

  This book is dedicated with affection, respect and warm thanks

  to

  NORRIE SMYTHE of The Citizen

  who started the ball rolling Moscow-wards and then kept it moving in the right direction.

  An expert teacher.

  A loyal friend.

  Table of Contents

  Author’s Note

  Chapter One – For you that girl is dangerous. . . .

  Chapter Two – Death under flood-light

  Chapter Three – Here there is always death before love . . .

  Chapter Four – One rib for every hour. . . .

  Chapter Five – Corpses don’t give away secrets. . . .

  Chapter Six – Asiatic tyrants dictate their own terms

  Chapter Seven – A highly secret weapon

  Chapter Eight – Agreement to kill

  Chapter Nine – A willing human guinea pig

  Chapter Ten – The vivisection unit

  Chapter Eleven – ‘Space-sickness’ is a good name

  Chapter Twelve – Love beside the General

  Chapter Thirteen – This is where we separate . . .

  Chapter Fourteen – Our weapons are fantastic

  Chapter Fifteen – There are no second chances for either of you . . .

  Chapter Sixteen – Doctor Grant must disappear . . .

  Chapter Seventeen – Life after death

  Author’s Note

  The Kremlin background to this book is accurate and the story was planned when the author and his wife received permission from the Soviet Government to photograph the interior of these buildings. The method used to smuggle David Grant into the Kremlin is perfectly possible. His escape route is less easy but equally feasible, given a little luck. So it may interest the reader to know that there is nothing fictitious about the background detail to Grant’s adventures both within Moscow city and inside Moscow Kremlin. At the moment of writing, January, 1963, there is evidence of scientific preoccupation with the effects of cosmic radiation upon bacteria, and the suggestions made in regard to dangers from bacteria so exposed do not come within the realm of scientific fiction. On the contrary, it is even possible that before this book is published the very circumstances which lead Grant to Moscow may become reality.

  Faced with the complexities of modern espionage technique, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation could hardly conduct its day-to-day affairs, far less plan long term policy, without the help of information collected by an Intelligence department similar to that described in this book.

  ADSAD . . . the Administrative Department controlling Security measures relating to Attack and Defence . . . almost certainly does exist, even if under a different name, and its approach to delicate operations must be controlled by measures not so very different from those under which David Grant operates.

  Finally, the micro-rocket used by Grant in the last chapter is one of N.A.T.O.’s more recent and most deadly pocket weapons, and it was designed amongst other things for the type of use to which it was put by Grant aboard Formosa Lily.

  Chapter One – For you that girl is dangerous. . . .

  The couple sitting by a window were playing with fire. And both of them knew it. David Grant hated the smell of a police state, and although terror had either been turned off a little, or else concealed underground, Moscow still smouldered with discipline and repression. Top Soviet ballerinas were almost as important as nuclear physicists, and not even the latest ‘new-look’ of imitation freedom allowed them to have love affairs with western capitalists. Even to dine together in public without a chaperon was asking for trouble, and Grant’s wits were sharpened to needle point as he glanced round the room.

  They were overlooking Manège Square, level with the Kremlin’s long northern wall, which silhouetted dark against a warm evening sky, and it seemed that his sloe-eyed companion was the only wholesome human being in the city. He lit his first after-dinner pipe and sat, chin in hand, smiling at his partner. Had it not been for her he would have been home a week ago. But he asked himself again why she still continued to see him when every second they were together stretched her nerves almost to breaking point. The tension between them had been building up for weeks and he guessed that an explosion was just around the corner. ‘Happy?’ he asked, cautiously testing her mood.

  Tiny stress lines suddenly etched around the girl’s eyes. ‘You worry me, David,’ she whispered. ‘One day your tongue may get you into trouble. I’m frightened the way you criticise things.’

  And then he remembered. He had only asked why Russians were always so reserved and suspicious of foreigners, though even that had been enough to send her back into her shell. ‘But it is true,’ he persisted. ‘Tell me if there is a single person laughing in this room who isn’t a foreigner.’

  She eyed him steadily across the rim of her glass and then, slowly, almost muscle by muscle, relaxed as she said ‘the right thing’. ‘Life is serious for the Russian people, David. We have work to do, but you Westerners are all going to seed because you play too much.’

  She was in deadly earnest, and he knew that she had been trained too well to believe anything else.

  A nearby couple were supping borsch and sprawling lazily across the table with their noses almost in their plates, whilst a trio of Asiatics, members of a Chinese delegation, slobbered boiled rice on to the floor. A small stout man was engrossed in his paper ten feet away, and two soldiers were arguing about what might well have been Dynamo’s latest centre-forward, whilst in the distance a handful of tired waiters stood together beside the cash desk.

  ‘Your father was English, wasn’t he?’ It was a statement rather than a question and he watched her reaction like a hawk, as she sat, deadpan, staring at her paper serviette.

  ‘Let’s talk about something else,’ she said at last, her voice flat, as though squeezed dry of every emotion. And the fierce discipline which controlled her suddenly interested that part of Grant which was still a doctor, that probing, clinical urge to expose the truth behind every human mask which had proved so invaluable in his other, more secret work, for N.A.T.O.

  ‘Why?’ he asked.

  ‘Because,’ she whispered, her fingers crushing the serviette into a tiny ball of fraying paper, ‘don’t you ever remember that I’ve got to live down that angle of my life?’

  She was flushed with excitement and he studied her with blatant admiration, her dark dreamy eyes and fine features, the sensitive broad mouth and jet black hair. Not blue black he decided. Just plain black. Like ebony, or the pit of Gehenna. Or like the minds of those maniacs who ruled the roost across the way. His nerves were twitching, and he yearned to feel the blackness again, to let the deep warmth of her body refresh his mind. Time was running out. Soon he would have to go home, and there was still so much to arrange. ‘Are you doing that tour?’ he asked, changing the subject, and half-smiling as she tossed back her hair in a subconscious gesture of satisfaction.

  ‘Yes. Part of the company is going to Paris on a cultural mission and I shall dance the White Swan Princess.’

  Cultural mission be damned, he thought, irritated in spite of himself. Why couldn’t she be natural and stop talking like an Intourist guide? But lazily he pointed to the little evening bag on her lap, a souvenir of their first night together in France. ‘Do you remember last year, and where we bought that? Let’s ha
ve an encore, and next trip we’ll really go to town.’

  Her lips tightened again and slowly she shook her head. Why could he never understand that artistes were not allowed to go around as they pleased when abroad? Last summer she had taken the most frightful chances and been lucky to get away with it.

  Sensing her rising panic, he covered her hand with his own, trying without much hope to infect her with some of his own confidence. But she allowed it to remain for only a second before again fumbling with her gloves. ‘And that isn’t allowed here either. We don’t flirt in Moscow.’

  He still forced himself to speak in a slow, cultivated drawl. ‘Then what are you allowed to do except soak up statistics about production or listen to propaganda?’

  A spreading crimson flush flared from her high cheekbones down her neck to lose itself in the mounds of her small high breasts. ‘I’m sorry. Honestly, David, I’m terribly sorry, because I know that this must all be disappointing for you, but you still haven’t learned how things are done in Russia. And even I can’t understand why we have been so stupid as to meet in public.’

  Grant suddenly seized her hands and forced her to look at him straight in the eyes. ‘When you do that trip in November get out of here, and stay out. Others have skipped into the West. Why not you?’

  The girl’s face sparked with anger. ‘Because Russia is my country and I like it.’

  ‘But do you really like me?’

  Now it was the girl’s turn to stare. The man by her side was different from a Russian as night is from day—medium tall, but lithe, and with deeply hazel eyes twinkling from a well-moulded head. His jaw was clean cut below firm lips which could caress her senses into a cauldron of ecstasy, though a thin scar about an inch long slightly hitched up the outer end of his right eyebrow and made him appear perpetually cynical. His hair was thick and often unruly, rising from short crisp curls above the ears to a sleek ripple which ran from his high forehead to the nape of his neck. She knew that he preferred grooming every few days to a short ‘back and sides’ once a month, and his hair was styled so that he never seemed to have had a recent trim.

  He was a fascinating man, fastidious in his appearance and meticulous with his possessions. But it was his personality which chiefly marked him off from a Russian. In spite of the strength which lay on his face and bones he affected an indifferent off-hand manner which matched his easy walk and slow, deep voice. He was the most disturbing man she had ever met, and it annoyed her that she could not catalogue him into a neat pigeon-hole. But when in doubt she always allowed herself to be guided by a man’s hands. They could tell more than anything except his eyes, and Grant’s hands were those of a surgeon—strong, warm and sensitive, rising from powerful wrists covered with fine black hair which sometimes made her shiver with excitement, whilst his fingers could grip like a vice, as she had learned during their precious stolen hours together when she had made her last trip with the ballet to Paris and London.

  Of course she liked him. Hadn’t she proved it again and again?

  He nodded. ‘Sure, but in an animal way. Real love wants to share everything.’

  She hesitated and then broke into a tantalising grin. ‘Then why not stay here and share Moscow with me?’

  ‘Maya, my timid little Muscovite bear,’ said Grant violently, ‘that’s not even funny.’

  ‘Then what’s so funny about asking me to go to France or Britain for keeps?’ she flashed. ‘I hated it before, and anyhow, I don’t believe that you want to marry me.’

  ‘I could still give you a wonderful time.’

  ‘But would you marry me?’ she persisted.

  They both knew the answer. Neither was the marrying kind, and the girl’s talent would enable her to make her mark anywhere. Every impresario in two continents would be after her, and she might well become a world sensation. Their lives would lie apart. ‘But we could still give one another a lot of fun.’ It was the best that Grant could force himself to say. For him marriage was as much out of the question as for the girl, and they were doomed, for years at least, only to be lovers. Marriage would mean the end of two careers. His chief had no room for wives and the sort of secrets which Grant knew could never be shared with outsiders.

  Suddenly the chimes of Spasskaya Tower were heard in the distance, and the radio stopped blaring in the Square below, where a few score people had been shuffling about in a clumsy dance. ‘Midnight.’ He said abruptly. ‘Where do we go now; I’ve only three days left?’

  The girl hesitated. ‘Don’t be cross, David, but this time I can’t ask you home. Mother came up from the Crimea this morning and she’ll be there for two days.’

  ‘Then how about my own rooms?’

  ‘The chamber-woman would see us and I would be reported.’

  ‘Then couldn’t we take a taxi and just drive around?’ His eyes were pleading. Like a spaniel puppy asking for a biscuit, she thought, and a finger was beating restlessly against his chin. ‘Please, Maya. Let me make love to you just once again before I leave.’

  The girl’s hand brushed his wrist in a silent gesture of affection. ‘Try to understand. It is utterly impossible. I’ve already been a fool to take you home so often. Everyone knows everything in Moscow, and one day they may ask questions.’

  They! That cloud which hung over every communist country. Even the New Russia. They! Informers. Secret police. Spies. The word was hanging like a knife between them when suddenly the short stout man rose from his table four paces away. He bowed briefly and then looked at the girl. ‘I’m glad you know how you stand, Comrade Koren, because you do have a lot to explain and the questions will start tomorrow morning. So until then go home and stay there.’

  His arrival was completely unexpected, and Grant turned in surprise whilst the girl sat, motionless, staring at him. Her face was suddenly pale and her lips trembled as the man bared a set of bad teeth, with gaps filled by stainless steel dentures. But his voice was curt and officious. ‘You look surprised. But haven’t you known for days that you were being foolish? Prima ballerinas are not allowed to flirt with our enemies.’

  ‘Just a minute,’ said Grant urgently, his hand catching her jacket as she sprang to her feet.

  The stout man moved with astonishing speed, his wrist crashing down on Grant’s forearm. ‘Next time I’ll break it, Doctor. There’s a heavily studded brass band just below my cuff and it can smash a bone when I wish. The girl has her orders.’

  Grant’s forearm was aching as though it had been kicked by a mule, but he continued to stand and his voice was steady. ‘I don’t know what this is all about, Maya, but when we get things straight I’ll see you again, probably tomorrow. How about luncheon?’

  He was watching her carefully; the newcomer seemed as much of a surprise to her as he had been to himself, but she was terrified, and for a moment he thought that she was going to faint as her hand reached out to steady herself against the table. And then she spoke rapidly in Russian, tripping over her words as she tried to explain, until at last she turned back to Grant. ‘I’m sorry, David, I thought I didn’t know him, but now I remember and you must do what this officer says. He is very important and we can’t talk any more. I’ve always been afraid that your tongue would get you into difficulties and I’ve been a fool even to listen. They must think I’m crazy.’

  The two men were silent as she lifted her bag and gloves and walked off with her chin tilted high, whilst the hum of background conversation continued as though nothing had happened. She hesitated at the door and then turned round to lift her hand whilst her lips framed one word. ‘Good-bye.’

  The stout man relaxed as she disappeared towards the staircase. ‘She is quite right, you know. She has been crazy, but you won’t speak to her again, in Paris or anywhere else. That woman belongs to the Soviet people and although her position as a prima ballerina with Kirov and Bolshoi gives her a lot of freedom she has recently been going too far.’

  A waiter paused beside them. ‘Want anything, comrade
s?’

  The stout man nodded. ‘Stolitschnaja Vodka.’ And then, in English. ‘You’ll join me.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘But I wasn’t asking you a question, I was giving an order. I said “you’ll join me”.’

  The waiter shuffled off and returned in less than a minute with two large vodkas. Which was a sure sign that his companion was really big brass, thought Grant. ‘Normally they take their time,’ he said. ‘How come this arrives so quickly?’

  The stout man lifted his glass and drained it in a gulp. ‘Because I’m Dybenko Sokolnikov.’

  ‘An officer, Maya said.’

  ‘Yes, a Lieutenant-General in our security forces. General Serov used to call me one of his rising young men.’

  ‘But now Serov has disappeared.’

  ‘So you do know a little about the Soviet scene,’ Sokolnikov grinned. ‘Yes, indeed. General Serov was removed from being in charge of what some people called our secret police in 1959. Then Alexander Sheplin, his successor, was purged in 1961.’

  ‘And you took over?’

  ‘Things aren’t quite that way now, but it is true that a more up-to-date organisation was formed[1] and that I am in charge of a certain department.’

  ‘For pestering ballerinas?’

  ‘That and other things, and one of the other things makes me wonder what brought you to Moscow. We know quite a lot about you, Mr. Grant, or should I have said Doctor Grant? About your work for W.H.O. and your record in Korea and Africa, though I must admit that when you arrived here as a tourist it was a few days before one of my own rising young men brought your name to my attention.’

  ‘But I only came over for a holiday.’

  Sokolnikov slowly picked his teeth with a grubby sliver of wood. ‘We Russians say that truth is often stranger than fiction, and part of me believes you. But only because reports have noted nothing suspicious, and now I’m wondering if you’ve been even more clever than we thought.’

 

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