Grunwald laughed. “Speak in whatever language you like, and I’ll do the same.” To Rick: “When we are through, I’ll pick you up in the waiting room.”
The two diplomats sat down.
Professor Valeria Mikhailov, tall, resolute in appearance, her straight blond hair framing her face, spoke, in her spare apartment, with her guest, Linbek Titov. “I suggest we both go to the airport in my car, if you don’t mind riding in a ten-year-old Fiat. That will save us the cab fare to the airport, which is considerable. When your wife and boy arrive, we can then hire a cab, which I assume will be required even if they don’t have much luggage. I will drive with your son, and you and your wife can take the cab. I have to confess to you, Linbek, I have very little money. I send a check every month to support my mother in Volgograd. I need to make every schilling count.”
“I have sensed your problem. The allowance extended me for incidental expenses during the conference gave me no slack. My wife will arrive with almost six hundred dollars in U.S. currency, carefully accumulated over the years. That will certainly tide us over until I have made a fresh connection.”
“Yes, of course. These are the least of our worries. And a friend on the fourth floor is leaving tomorrow for a week in France. She will let me use her apartment, but that begins only tomorrow. Tonight we will be squeezed into mine.”
“Valeria, this is such a very happy day for me. And adventurous. I think not of our privations, but of those that are had by our countrymen left behind.”
They were at the airport a half hour ahead of the flight from Helsinki. “I will wait for you in the baggage area. You can greet them at security and have your private family reunion. Then come to me, at baggage level.”
Dr. Titov was standing, excitement mounting as he saw the two-engine Russian-made jet draw up, and the airport passenger staircase wheeled out to the cabin door. In a few minutes, the passengers began to file out. His heart was pounding. Finally, young Aleksei would have realized his ambition to fly. His dream fulfilled—an airplane flight! Helsinki to Vienna. And, incidentally, to life in the free world.
The file of passengers thinned down. A very large man emerged. No doubt he had held up the passengers behind him.
Two minutes after the fat man had got past the gate, it hit Lindbergh Titov like a shaft of ice-cold air to the heart.
Nina and Aleksei were not on board.
“I’ve got a bagful of news, Bill.” Ambassador Grunwald was speaking to the director of the CIA. “I put the top of the news into a cable to State a half hour ago. I’ll give you more details, which you’ll want. First thing: Mrs. Titov and the son were supposed to arrive on Saturday. They were not on the scheduled plane. If they had had trouble at the Finnish end, they’d have gotten word to Valeria Mikhailov. They had her number. It means only one thing: The Soviets got them.”
“Where? Where, I wonder.”
“I don’t think the KGB would have taken any chances trying to kidnap them in Helsinki, so I figure they were stopped before boarding the ferry. And you know something? There is not one thing we can do about it. They’ve become just … a Soviet bargaining chip. Their absence makes our job much harder.”
“Right. Well, we’ll alert Moscow to listen hard for any clues. What about Jutzeler? Herr Jutzeler?”
“I had an hour with him. Very formal gentleman. But here is what the Austrian government says:
“In order to observe neutrality, they want conferences with Titov conducted under Austrian auspices, in a chamber under Austrian security. Soviet and U.S. representatives may confer privately with Titov, but only in quarters the Austrians designate. There is to be no effort made by Soviet or U.S. representatives to approach Titov elsewhere.”
Walter Jacobs approached the speakerphone and asked, “Does Jutzeler know where Titov is? I assume he does.”
“I thought he probably did. But you know, I’m not sure. It could be that Titov is calling in over the telephone. I didn’t press him, obviously. And of course I never let on that we think we know where he—probably—is hiding out.
“Now. Herr Jutzeler informs me that the Austrian Foreign Ministry stipulates that there shall be not more than two emissaries designated to represent the conflicting interests. No separate security. The emissaries’ names are to be given to Jutzeler. Just two Russians, two Americans.”
“Well, we’ll give one of our two spots to Gus Windels. His native Russian is a terrific advantage. We already spoke about him.”
“And the other?”
“I’m thinking.”
“You’ll need to act quickly. The Russians have already given the names of their representatives. I don’t know what Titov plans to do now that the family has been stopped. Captured. Conceivably he’ll just give up and go home.”
“That would be … terrible,” Webster said. “Also, sad.”
“Do we know anything about the Soviet representatives? Who they’ll be?”
“Yes, and here is their biggie: Professor Vladimir Kirov. An important figure as a teacher and medical practitioner. But what really counts is: He and Titov are old friends, going back forty years. Classmates.”
“And the other?”
“I don’t know anything about him. His name is Andrei Fyodorovich Martins. Odd surname.”
“Okay,” the director said. “We’ll get back to you, Mr. Ambassador.”
Webster called in Anthony Trust. “Walter Jacobs will fill you in, Anthony. I’ll be back in a few minutes. I have to put in a couple of calls, and I’d better speak to George Shultz. As Secretary of State, he’d certainly be interested.”
Webster left the room, and was back in a half hour.
Seated, he spoke to his two senior consultants. “Anthony, Walter: A bulletin just came in. Gus Windels had one of our people in Moscow ring Titov’s apartment on the telephone. No answer. She went around to the address. There were two goons very prominent in the lobby, checking people going in and out. Obviously the mother and son—her name is Nina, his, Aleksei; he’s seventeen years old—are on their way to Austria, or trying to get there. Or in detention somewhere. Our gal in Moscow doesn’t know, obviously, about the Helsinki flight they were supposed to be on.”
“Yes,” Jacobs said. “There is that possibility, that they tried an overland route. That would explain why they couldn’t call—you know the phone service in that part of the world.”
“Well, we’ll have to focus on the Vienna scene. We need one more man there. Ideally, we should send Blackford Oakes. Nobody beats him in skill and experience. He knows Vienna from ten years ago, and he has worked with Windels. Oh, and just this winter he spent—no comments, gentlemen—six weeks in Moscow. There’s just one thing I worry about—”
“His health?” Walter Jacobs asked.
“Yes. I’m concerned about it.
“Anthony, you’re his oldest friend. —Say. Is it true that you had the job of holding him down when his headmaster in England flogged him?”
“Well, yes. We don’t talk about it, a bad memory for both of us. Ten years later I made it up to Blackford by covering him in a shootout and saving his life. Though come to think of it, the bullet did graze him. On his ass!” They laughed.
Trust went on, “I agree with the director, Black’s health isn’t so good. He pulls out late afternoons, most days, just to rest up. But there’s nobody better than him, sizing up situations, acting quickly. I’d say: Give it to him, if he wants it.”
“If he doesn’t take it, I think Roger d’Aubisson is good,” Jacobs said.
“I’ll talk with Blackford,” the director said.
A half hour later, Blackford Oakes was in the room. He had got a quick briefing from Walter Jacobs.
“We have Gus Windels arriving in Vienna tonight,” Webster said. “We need somebody from here.”
“I’ll go, Bill.”
Blackford sensed the director’s reservations.
“You’re not looking too good yet. We ought to think a little about you
r health.”
“Fuck my health.”
Webster looked at him, hesitated, then said, “Okay, Black. Go. Have Walter fill you in on the latest Vienna developments. And when you get there, Grunwald will be up on anything that’s happened while you’re flying. You’ve been given the two Russian names. Do those names mean anything to you?”
“I’ve never met Kirov, but he was like a godfather to my … lady. And”—Blackford gripped the arms of his chair—“Andrei Fyodorovich Martins is Kim Philby.”
“Kim Philby! I didn’t know he was still doing missions.”
“He gets into a lot of missions, Judge. Including hospital operating rooms.”
“Well, okay, Black. Good luck. If you get a chance, kick Philby in the ass for me.”
“I promise I’ll do that, Judge.”
CHAPTER 59
They met at the café in the venerable Bristol Hotel. Oakes had been there a decade ago and it hadn’t changed, though in 1988 there were more young Austrians and tourists than back then. He recognized the distinctively recognizable headwaiter with the walrus moustache and the bronze chain hanging low from his neck. The headwaiter affected to recognize Blackford, but didn’t, really. Blackford looked much more than ten years older than when he had last frequented the Bristol. Gus could understand the headwaiter’s confusion: Gus wasn’t sure he himself would have recognized Blackford, from just a few months ago, let alone what he must have looked like ten years back.
They met with an embrace, never mind the formalities—you’re not supposed to embrace men who are traveling about under cover. But their joint experiences on two missions, and the natural attraction of the Ukrainian-born twenty-nine-year-old for the sixty-two-year-old legend was keen, and reciprocal. Blackford had arrived at noon and gone instantly to the Bristol Hotel for his much-needed nap. Gus had come in from Moscow the night before, and in the morning headed directly to the U.S. Embassy to confer with Ambassador Grunwald.
When the two men got together that evening, neither of them mentioned the death of Ursina, let alone the cause of her death. But Gus did speak about the buzz on the matter of her failure to speak at the welcoming ceremony. “I think you could get a thousand rubles for a copy of the speech she intended to give. You never actually saw it, did you, Black?”
“No. I know the culture minister, Belov, got a copy, and so did Rufina. That means, of course,” Blackford’s voice tightened, “that Philby saw it. I have to assume that Ursina had her own copy, but she never showed it to me. I was surprised, but after the shock of that afternoon’s meeting at the Culture Ministry, I didn’t want to press her for it.”
“God knows what she said in it.” Gus moved his hand out of the way so that the beer pitcher could be set down.
“We’re not ready to order,” Blackford said in impressive German.
“Some people are saying—I actually heard this from a university student; I mean, the student told it to my driver, who told it to me—that Ursina, in her speech, urged all those attending the peace forum to rise up and storm the stage and kill Gorbachev when he came on later in the program.”
Blackford managed a smile. “I guess I wish I did have a copy, so that stuff like that could be disproved.”
“They’d probably think the copy you exhibited was a forgery. Only the minister of culture could suppress those rumors and—you want my guess, Black? I think he wouldn’t want to. The more extreme Ursina’s speech is taken to have been, the more reason for suppressing it.”
“Yeah. I guess they wouldn’t want to be accused of suppressing a speech on the labor theory of value.”
“Well, let me tell you, because I’ve got a lot to tell you—” He quaffed his beer. “God, that’s good stuff. I spent the morning with Henry Grunwald, and the procedures are crystallizing.”
Gus pulled up his notebook:
“(1) We are to have as many meetings as Titov wants, before he makes up his mind which way to go.
“(2) They are to be held at a little bierhaus on Friedrichstrasse, Friedrichstrasse 49. Jutzeler goes there a lot at relaxation time and knows the owner. It is locked tight until 6 P.M. every day. Jutzeler’s got the keys and knows where the light switches are. In fact, he knows how to make the beer flow, not that that’s likely to happen. Though I don’t know, after a speech by Philby, I may need a beer, either to drink or to ram up his ass.”
“Gus, I’m not getting it all. What exactly is to go on at the bierhaus?”
“All of this, Grunwald reminded me, is subject to the final okay of Titov, but the arrangements reflect what he has demanded of Jutzeler, and the preliminary plans are approved by Kirov.”
“Is Kirov the chief guy? Or Philby?”
“Kirov. He is your counterpart. Philby is mine. To get on:
“(3) If Titov confirms, our first meeting is tomorrow at 1300. There will be Austrian security guards at the front and at the rear door of Otto’s—that’s what the bierhaus is called, Otto’s. Twenty minutes before rendezvous time, the Russians will be admitted through the front door by Jutzeler and will take their places at a table at the south end of the main room. They are Kirov, Philby, an interpreter, and—the Russians insisted on this—a bodyguard borrowed from the Soviet Embassy. They weren’t allowed to bring any from Moscow.
“(4) Ten minutes before rendezvous, Jutzeler will go to the back entrance of Otto’s and lead in the U.S. delegation. That’s you, me, an interpreter, and we too have to have one bodyguard—Jutzeler is making a big production of absolute equality, both sides. Grunwald’s looking around for a likely guy. There are no U.S. Marines in Vienna, not since the treaty, and that was thirty-two years ago! We’ll be seated at a table at the north end. Got that?”
“How big is Otto’s?”
“Small. The distance between us and the Russians will be about twenty feet.
“(5) At 1300, Jutzeler will escort in three people, to be seated in the center, opposite the bar. They are Titov, who insists on bringing along his ‘escort, companion, consultant, friend,’ Valeria Mikhailov. He’s been staying with her. She’s a former student of his who defected fifteen years ago and teaches biology. Nobody could object to her being there.
“Then … then the third person. He is a retired judge who, way back then, represented Austria in the long U.S.–USSR deliberations that led to the peace treaty. He established a reputation for rigorous neutrality. He has agreed to sit in and listen to, and rule upon, complaints.”
“Jesus Christ. It sounds like a fucking courtroom. Is there an appellate body standing by?”
“Ease up, Black. The rules are that the Russian representative gets to speak for fifteen minutes to a half hour. Then you speak for the same period of time. Then Kirov—obviously there is instant translation all the way through—can ask you questions, if he wants to. You can ask him questions, he can ask you questions. Both sides can object to questions as irrelevant. Judge Waldstein rules. Titov has the authority to overrule the judge. If he wants to hear your answer to a question by Kirov, you can give that answer, whether Waldstein says it’s relevant or not.”
“My, you people were busy in the last twenty-four hours. While you did all that, all I did was pack up, go to the airport, fly to Frankfurt, connect to Vienna, check in at my hotel, and sleep for an hour.”
Gus grinned. “Actually, it came together quickly. Titov wanted to hear both sides and wanted both sides to be free to comment on what had been said. He didn’t want this to stretch over an age.
“At the end of the day, unless Titov says, ‘Halt! No more!,’ we agree to come back the next day, same drill. At some point, Titov turns to you and says: ‘Kindly help me to get re-established in’—read Vienna, the United States, wherever, in the West. Or he turns to Kirov and says, ‘Vladimir Spiridonovich, I am ready to return to Moscow.’
“Both sides are pledged not to interfere with Titov’s movements at any time, in whatever direction he travels.”
“That’s worth thinking about with another beer.”
“I second that.” Gus hailed the waiter.
Blackford fondled his glass. “We’ve got one great thing going for us: the prospect of a free life. Kirov has two things going for him: reintegration into an institute Titov founded and into a community he grew up with, and—the blockbuster—reunion with his wife and son.”
CHAPTER 60
The outside of the bierhaus was Alpine-style, its wooden roof slanting down at both ends, the door and shutters a deep green, white wooden frames around the windows. Etched into the wood, and gilded, the words on the sign read, “Otto—1938.”
Well, Blackford thought, sitting in the minivan across the street, maybe the house was built just in time to welcome Adolf Hitler to Vienna. Herr Jutzeler, standing outside the bar, was keeping careful track of the time, and at 1249 he signaled to the van across the street. Blackford opened the front passenger door, Gus and the interpreter, the rear doors. They filed out and followed Jutzeler on the stone walkway around the building to the rear.
Blackford took a deep breath as he felt his way through the narrow passage toward the tables in the main room. The next time he raised his head, he would be looking into the face of Harold Adrian Russell Philby, traitor and woman-killer. He had rehearsed his face to register no reaction to that ugly man.
The room was adequately lit, as it would be in the evening, Blackford surmised, when the company of serious beer drinkers would weave in and out. There were no lit candles, but the yellow lamps at either end of the bar were aglow. And also the lamps at the ends of the room, where the opposing sides’ representatives would sit behind the tables, over which green felt had been placed.
The interpreter took the leftmost chair, Blackford the next, Gus on the right. They spread before them notepads and a bound folio. The lamps from behind gave ample light.
It was then that Blackford looked up. Opposite, on the left, was the interpreter. Next to him, Professor Kirov. His hair was gray and tidy, his brow furrowed. He wore glasses and kept his head tilted down toward his notes.
Last Call for Blackford Oakes Page 23