Kings of Many Castles cm-13

by Brian Freemantle

  Olga smiled at his automatically talking in the plural, of both of them. “I think we already have.”

  “You got it, Charlie!” agreed Anne, excitedly. “An absolute defense to murder! An expert witness, even.”

  “I’d still prefer him to be British,” said Charlie. He was distracted by the Isakov file. Like so many other unresolved impressions-frustrations-there was something in it demanding to be seen. But like all the others, he couldn’t see it!

  “I’ve filed the diplomatic protest. So’s Noskov, legally.” Anne was disappointed-curious even-at how subdued Charlie was.

  “We’re still short of too much else.” He was glad he’d printed off the Isakov material to bring back to the embassy, to go over it further.

  “There could be the breakthrough with Bendall if you continue teasing him along as well as you did today. And that could be as early as tomorrow.”

  Her ambition was making her over-confidence-or overexpectant-Charlie decided. “Then all our problems will be over. Or just beginning.”

  “Misery guts!”

  “Realist,” he corrected.

  Anne put into its designated order the material Charlie carried into her office thirty minutes earlier and gestured vaguely in the direction of the embassy’s residential apartment block. “The weary end to a long day. You fancy a Happy Hour drink?”

  Charlie couldn’t at that moment imagine anything he would have enjoyed more. “No.”

  “OK.” Anne showed no offense, no anger at a rebuff, which Charlie hadn’t intended it to be.

  That night Natalia came to him in bed and the lovemaking was as uninhibited and passionate as he could ever remember, even from their first, excited, discovery days. Afterwards Natalia said, “I’m sorry, Charlie: sorry for too long being such a shit.”

  “We’ve both been shits,” said Charlie and at last felt the overdue and searing guilt.

  19

  Viktor Ivanovich Karelin was the first intelligence chairman Natalia had ever personally met but the apparent diffidence was so alien to the lower hierarchy with whom she was familiar that she was vaguely disconcerted by it. Which, she acknowledged, she was perhaps supposed to be, although she didn’t get the impression there was any affectation about the self-effacing demeanour. Another interpretation could be that Karelin was so sure of himself and the power he represented that he didn’t feel the need to posture and intimidate.

  “Thank you for returning to us so quickly,” greeted Natalia. What would the man have managed to achieve in thirty-six hours compared to what their president-endorsed demand to the Defense Ministry had generated in less than twelve, five of those with the previous night intervening? It would be important for her-the tribunal-not to appear to try to trap the man.

  “You stressed the urgency,” reminded Karelin.

  “We’re indeed anxious to hear what you have to tell us,” said Filitov, stilted in his eagerness to get himself on the ever-kept record.

  “There has clearly been considerable, malicious interference-possibly destruction-of a substantial proportion of archival material concerning Peter Bendall and his family,” admitted Karelin, at once. “I have instituted an enquiry, the results of which I will make fully available to this commission when it is completed.”

  Honesty or yet further prevarication? She was the trained interrogator, Natalia reminded herself. “This malicious interference? Is it indiscriminate, consistent with the haphazard pilfering by disgruntled former personnel, about which we talked earlier? Or is there a pattern?”

  A smile wisped across Karelin’s face. “There is unquestionably a pattern.”

  Had the smile been admiration or something else? Having been specific Natalia intentionally generalized. “Help us with that.”

  “No material whatsoever remains for what would have been the last five years of Peter Bendall’s life.”

  “And the son?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Which there would-should-have been?”

  “Unquestionably.” The woman, with her KGB background, was the only one who might be difficult. The lawyer and the politician were spreading their bets.

  “So the interference has been calculated, carried out for a reason?”

  “Obviously,” agreed the FSB chairman.

  “What reason?” demanded Yuri Trishin.

  Karelin frowned. “That’s what I’ve set up an internal enquiry to find out.” The man looked fleetingly across the echoing Kremlin room towards the record-keeping secretariat. “There is clearly an attempt being made to discredit the organization I head by apparently implicating it in the assassination of the president. The FSB was, obviously, in no way involved. Its only culpability is a serious lapse of internal security, which has already been corrected as well as those responsible being punished.”

  The fulcrum upon which Natalia’s early employment in the KGB had been balanced was her being able to judge whether the person she was interviewing was lying or being truthful. Karelin had conceded what they already knew. And had established internal enquiries, which was precisely what her outside commission had been created to prevent. Despite which Natalia’s professional assessment was that the FSB chairman was telling the truth. Continuing to call upon her previous association and awareness of Russian intelligence working, Natalia said, “Peter Bendall’s records would not have been concentrated. Archives would have been cross-referenced with Registry. While he was alive, even though his practical use might have become minimal, there would have been a current file maintained upon him?”

  The shadowy smile came and went again. “It’s the very fact thatthe removal has been from several different centers that confirms a pattern.”

  “Nothing whatsoever beyond that which has already been made available has survived?” persisted Natalia.

  Karelin had his tidbit ready. “I have obtained from Registry the identities of four of Peter Bendall’s Control officers, one of whom might, calculated from the son’s age, have been the man who might have corrected George Bendall in his teens and obtained psychiatric help for him.”

  “The KGB would have had a copy of that treatment,” insisted Natalia.

  “I’ve checked. There is no copy,” said the man.

  There was a shift from the men either side of her but Natalia remained unmoving, curious at how Karelin was providing his information. He was unarguably cooperating but at his own careful pace, which she realized she was making easy for him. The occasional smiles were more likely to be self-satisfaction-just tinged with gratitude-at how he was manipulating her questioning than admiration of her technique. It would be as wrong too obviously to challenge the man as it would not to make him aware, as subtly as possible, that she recognized his skill. “I’d like to think that he particularly was available to help us. But I don’t imagine that any of them are.”

  “They’re all dead,” the FSB chairman confirmed. She was very good, to have anticipated that: a loss to the service, in fact.

  “How?”

  Karelin, in his complete self-confidence, decided to test the woman. “The first, who took Peter Bendall over upon his arrival in 1972, died of cancer in 1975. His successor had a stroke, in 1981. The Control most likely to have put George Bendall back in line-briefly at least-was electrocuted by faulty wiring in his apartment and the fourth committed suicide by hanging himself. He was one of the officers made redundant during the restructuring of the old service.”

  “A disgruntled officer!” seized Filitov, overanxiously.

  “Beyond which we’ve already extended the discussion,” dismissedNatalia. Karelin hadn’t finished but wanted prompting, she guessed. “You didn’t give dates, for the last two deaths?”

  She’d more than passed the test, decided Karelin. “The man most likely to have lectured George Bendall died three months ago. The one who committed suicide did so last month.”

  “Both deaths were accepted for what they appeared to be?” came in Filitov, unexpectedly.

  Kar
elin took folders from his briefcase, offering them across the table. “They are the personnel files on all four. The last two are marked. Both their deaths are now being investigated for possible suspicious circumstances. The result of those investigations, like the internal security breaches, will be made available.”

  Another intelligence-restricted enquiry, Natalia noted. “But there had to be other Controls after these-at least one-during the last five years of Peter Bendall’s life?” She spoke looking down at the newly presented dossiers, needing the names. None fitted.

  “Yes,” agreed Karelin.

  “And a case officer-or officers-for the son?”

  “That’s the system.” There was no way an outside tribunal like this could breach the protection built up over so long by the succeeding intelligence services but it would be wrong for him to be complacent about this woman.

  “We made another request, at our previous meeting,” reminded Natalia. “About FSB presence at Burdenko Hospital?”

  “There is no FSB-or long-established KGB-presence at Burdenko Hospital,” asserted Karelin, positively.

  It was time, Natalia decided. Despite the awkwardness with which Karelin had tried to ringmaster the encounter she still had to guard against appearing confrontational. “There is-or has been-some sharing between us, the Americans and the British, into the shooting of the presidential group; more particularly, perhaps, with the British who have consular access to Bendall. Their interview recordings are automatically duplicated …”

  Karelin sat politely attentive, making no effort to anticipate what Natalia might say but knowing there was something for which he had not been able to prepare.

  “At one such interview yesterday Bendall claimed the KGB maneuvredhis admission into the Russian army. And that a Control was infiltrated to monitor whatever function he was expected to perform in the military,” continued Natalia.

  “I know nothing of this,” said Karelin. His face was mask-like.

  It was predictable but Natalia had still hoped for more. “From the interview it would appear Bendall’s Control was withdrawn or discharged from his specialized unit after Bendall’s persistent refusal to operate as he was instructed.”

  “It should be fairly simple to check personnel movement from military records, especially from a specialized unit,” said Karelin, at once. He genuinely didn’t know anything about it but it was quite likely to be the case. And if it was, it took the enquiry outside his-of FSB-containment.

  Perfect, decided Natalia. “We realized that. This morning, unfortunately not in time to advise you in advance of your coming here, the Defense Ministry provided us with the names of fifteen men discharged, transferred or reassigned from Bendall’s group during the first six months of the man’s service …” She pushed the Defense file across the desk towards the intelligence chief. “The four Control names you’ve supplied are not among these. We’d like you to have Registry run a check, against the fifteen.”

  Karelin hesitated, then picked up the folder. “I cannot confirm the KGB had anything to do with arranging Bendall’s army service.”

  Karelin felt himself tricked, despite her effort to prevent his thinking that. “We accept that, Chairman Karelin. It’s not what we’re asking you to confirm. We are asking you to compare the fifteen names through Registry, in an attempt to discover if any KGB personnel accompanied George Bendall into his military service. That should be very easily possible, shouldn’t it? Within hours, even?”

  “I would expect so,” agreed the expressionless man.

  “If one of them does appear in Registry, let’s hope he’s still alive,” said Natalia.

  The meeting had been convened solely because of the FSB chairman’s approach to them and Filitov and Trishin appeared surprised that Natalia didn’t move at once to suspend it until the promisedwithin-hoursresult of their new request to the man. But Natalia decided that she had sufficient excuse-if not the true reason-to argue against George Bendall’s court arraignment.

  There were other more self-protective points she felt necessary to establish, too. Virtually as the door closed behind Viktor Karelin, she said, “What’s your feeling about what we’ve just been told?”

  Each man looked to the other to respond first.

  “Pavl Ivanovich?” pressed Natalia.

  “It’s positive confirmation of the conspiracy being within the FSB,” declared the lawyer.

  “Yuri Fedorovich?”

  “I was surprised at the chairman’s openness,” said the presidential chief of staff.

  “He has, though, taken all the enquiries away from us-kept everything internal-which we were specifically appointed to prevent,” Natalia pointed out.

  “He’s undertaken to make them available to us,” said Filitov.

  “Something will be made available,” qualified Natalia. “We have no independent way or method of knowing whether we are being told the truth. Or how much of any enquiry is being given to us. We’ve been very effectively and very cleverly neutered.”

  Trishin shifted, uncomfortably. “I wouldn’t go that far.”

  “Think about it,” demanded Natalia.

  The silence lasted several moments before Filitov said, “What do you suggest?”

  Natalia tapped Karelin’s naming dossiers. “An independent, professional militia investigation into the two most recent and violent deaths. A presidential insistence upon there being an outside militia presence or monitor on the internal FSB enquiries. And an independent militia trace upon the fifteen names we received this morning from the Defense Ministry.”

  “That’s directly challenging Chairman Karelin’s integrity,” protested Filitov.

  “Not to do so is directly challenging ours, and by inference that of the acting president,” insisted Natalia, acknowledging the repetition of the same argument as before but at that moment anxious to move on to what she considered the other, more important argument.“The Defense Ministry names opens the door into the conspiracy.”

  “Only if one of them is on the FSB Registry,” insisted Filitov.

  “No,” refused Natalia. “We’ve got last known addresses as well as names. And every legal justification for having the militia fully investigate every one, as soon and as quickly as possible. Beginning today, in fact.”

  There was a pause from both men.

  Filitov said, “Yes, I suppose that, specifically, would be the right course for us to take.”

  “I agree,” said Trishin.

  “Which surely creates something else to be considered?” suggested Natalia.

  “What?” demanded Filitov.

  “The court arraignment of George Bendall.”

  “What consideration is that of this commission?” demanded Filitov.

  “Quite separately from anything with which Chairman Karelin might return, from the Registry check, we are providing the militia with a source which could lead us to others involved in the conspiracy, could greatly affect the charges and prosecution against George Bendall,” said Natalia. Directly addressing Filitov, she said, “Surely the prosecution doesn’t know enough for an arraignment, this early? Aren’t you risking a flawed case, not giving the investigation more time.”

  “The arraignment isn’t the trial,” rejected Filitov. “That’s weeks away, time enough for all the conspirators to be identified and arrested and co-joined in a prosecution upon whatever additional charges need to be proffered.”

  “World attention will be upon us, for the funeral of President Yudkin,” said Trishin. “Politically it is necessary for there to be a publicly witnessed court appearance …” He hesitated. “ … And there has been some overnight communication from the Americans that make that even more essential.”

  She was wasting her time, Natalia acknowledged: she didn’t have either logic or law on her side, quite apart from political necessity which more often than not wasn’t affected or influenced by either.“The order is from the Kremlin, from Okulov’s office itself!” said Zenin. He
was red-faced, pacing his crumbling office, needing movement to exorcise his fury.

  “Why?” asked Olga. She pushed the indignation into her own voice but was secretly glad at the instruction to resume cooperation. What little progress had been made-far too little though it was-had been through association, particularly with the Englishman. There was more professionally-by which she meant career enhancing-to be gained than sacrificed by linking up again.

  “No reason was given.” Zenin slumped in his seat. “It’s a personal rebuke, to me.”

  Olga had momentarily forgotten the withdrawal had been Zenin’s decision. “No it’s not. If it had been considered a mistake it would have been overruled immediately; you were actually supported. Something’s happened, to change things.”

  Zenin’s smile was as brief as it was reluctant. “Yes, I suppose you’re right.”

  She was the person who had to crawl back, Olga abruptly realized, her own anger surfacing. “Am I expected just to walk into the incident room, as if it was all a big misunderstanding!”

  “I’m sorry,” said Zenin, unhelpfully.

  “So am I!” It wouldn’t be as difficult with the Englishman, despite the previous day’s argument at the hospital. Her personal difficulty would be openly descending into the American embassy basement with everyone’s eyes upon her.

  “Today’s hospital meeting …” Zenin started to remind but stopped at the tentative entry of his personal assistant, a uniformed major.

  The man extended the package he carried and said, “It’s been couriered from the Kremlin. For immediate and personal delivery.”

  Olga saw the smile, no longer reluctant, settle on Zenin’s face as he read. It remained when he looked up. “We’ve got names of people from Bendall’s unit who could have been his KGB case officer. The commission wants us to trace every one. It’s your entry back. I’ll assign the investigators, you provide the list as part of the combinedinvestigation. And we’d already decided you should be at the British interview this afternoon.”