Tsar: A Thriller (Alex Hawke)

by Ted Bell

  “Madame Secretary, welcome,” Betsey said, shaking hands with her friend and smiling at the security team. “Good morning, everyone.”

  “Is anyone else already in the Oval?” de los Reyes asked.

  “Yes, but they were early. You’re right on time.”

  “Who’s here? The vice president?”

  “No, the McCloskeys are down in Miami. They’re taking that airship cruise to the Nobel ceremony in Stockholm. The president was invited, but his schedule didn’t allow it.”

  “So, who do we have in there?”

  “His crisis team. General Moore from the Joint Chiefs, CIA Director Kelly, FBI Director Mike Reiter, the new Director of National Intelligence, Simon Pinniger, and a couple of guests. Brits from MI-6.”

  Consuelo’s eyes widened. “Alex Hawke is in there?”

  “Sorry, no,” Betsey said, patting her friend’s shoulder. She knew how Consuelo felt about the dashing British spy. Their on-again, off-again affair had been rocky from the beginning. From the look on her friend’s face, Betsey knew nothing had changed. Off again.

  “Who, then?” she asked.

  “It’s Sir David Trulove and his new assistant station chief from Bermuda.”

  “Bermuda? What’s his name?”

  “It’s a she. Pippa Guinness.”

  The secretary of state rolled her eyes and whispered in Betsey’s ear. “Bermuda. That’s where Alex Hawke is living now, damn Miss Guinness to hell.”

  “I know, dear. Sorry.”

  “How does the little bitch look these days?”

  “Restless as an eel.”

  The secretary laughed out loud. Then she straightened herself. “Oh, well. Nothing new, I suppose. He is who he is. What’s the weather like in there this morning?”

  “We had a nasty nor’easter blow through here earlier this morning—Senator Kennedy—but now it’s all sunshine and roses in there. He’s in a great mood. Feisty.”

  “He must not have seen the new polls this morning.”

  “Of course he did. You know what he said?”

  “Can’t even guess.”

  “He said, ‘Well, I guess I’m never going to be popular, so by God, Betsey, I’ll just keep on being right.’”

  The secretary laughed and headed toward the private entrance to the Oval Office. She was looking forward to her weekly meeting with the president. It was always informal, kept deliberately small, and anyone could bring up any topic they wished. And she was naturally curious about the crisis du jour.

  President McAtee stood as the beautiful Cuban-American secretary swept through the door. The members of the president’s team all stood and extended their hands in greeting. Pippa also stood and smiled, but Consuelo pointedly ignored her.

  “Conch, good to see you!” the president said. “Congratulations on your Mideast trip. I think we made a lot of progress.”

  “I think we made as much progress as we can make with the Saudis and the Iranians, Mr. President. At least for the time being.”

  When everyone was seated and the steward had served more tea and coffee, President Jack McAtee said, “Conch, I want to save your recent trip for last. We’re all looking forward to hearing your insights and points of view. But Brick is just back from a meeting in Estonia with our new ambassador there, Dave Philips, and picked up some insights into our Russian friends that I think we should discuss immediately. Brick?”

  “Thanks, Mr. President,” the lanky, red-haired Virginian said in his slow drawl. He leaned back in his armchair and stretched out his long legs. The director was wearing, as always, beautifully polished cowboy boots with his navy suit.

  “Based on my two days with Ambassador Philips, I’d say we’ve got trouble on the Russian front. Just a quick anecdote. Dave went to a reception at the French embassy in Tallinn with the Russian ambassador a week ago today. He’s become friendly with the guy, they’ve gone out drinking a few times. Anyway, the ancient Russian ambassador shows up in uniform. He was a general under Stalin. And he’s wearing his old uniform.”

  “Odd,” the president said. “What’s that all about?”

  “Dave asked him. He said all Russian ambassadors had received a directive from Rostov himself. From now on, they are to wear their military uniforms to all official state functions.”

  “Speaks volumes,” General Moore said. “They are going to a war footing.”

  “You believe that, Brick? War? With us?”

  “It could all be posturing, you know, on the part of a resurgent Kremlin. Part of their new public relations campaign to climb back onto the world stage. They might be just sticking their toe in the waters of the Baltic. See what we’ll let them get away with.”

  “What’s the military assessment, Charlie?”

  General Moore handed each of them a thin blue folder marked “Most Secret.” Moore started speaking as the group began flipping through the folders.

  “Here are the most recent satellite passes over Eastern Europe and the Baltic. And what you’ll see isn’t posturing, it’s Russian troops. Three divisions have massed along the Ukrainian border, here, here, and here. Another two divisions are poised here along the Estonian border. And most troubling of all, here you see five divisions moving into place at the Latvian and Belarus border. From our recent war gamers’ perspective, and from where those troops and tank corps are positioned, it’s a straight shot through Lithuania and back into Poland and the Czech Republic, where we’re deploying our antiballistic-missile batteries.”

  Brick Kelly said, “Sir, you’ll remember that only recently, Rostov threatened to deploy cruise missiles in the tiny Russian enclave of Kaliningrad, if we go ahead with missile defense in his backyard.”

  The president said, “Tell me again where Kaliningrad is, Brick? I swear I’m bad at geography. Always have been.”

  Kelly got up and spun the globe. He stopped it at Eastern Europe. “It sits right there between Poland and Lithuania. One Kremlin ploy might be to say they were sending troops in to reinforce their threatened enclave. It’s all tap-dancing and saber rattling right now, but I don’t think we can afford not to take it very, very seriously, Mr. President.”

  “Jesus,” the president said, loosening his tie. “Didn’t anyone see this coming?”

  “It was a sudden movement, but clearly the planning for this operation has been under way for some time,” the CIA director said. “We should have caught something, but we didn’t. We’re playing catch-up ball in Moscow, Mr. President. It’s going to take a while before we can get our field-agent network back up to where we were during the Cold War.”

  “Britain’s doing the same thing, Mr. President,” Sir David Trulove said. “As you well know, we’ve recently joined forces with Langley to create something called Red Banner. A secret division to deal with the resurgent Soviet—excuse me, Dr. Freud, I meant Russian threat. Based in Bermuda and headed up by Alex Hawke, whom I’m sure you remember.”

  “How is Alex bearing up, Sir David? He was quite ill for a while, I know.”

  “Well and good, sir. Living the good life in Bermuda these days until I darkened his door.”

  “Yanked him out of early retirement, did you?”

  “I keep him busy.”

  “Give him my regards, will you?”

  “I’ll do that, sir. Thank you.”

  At that moment, Betsey Hall entered the Oval through her private door. Her expression was grim, and she went immediately to the president, bent from the waist, and whispered something into his ear. McAtee listened intently, nodded his head, and got to his feet.

  “I need to take this call,” he said. “Urgent. No need to leave, sit tight. Please excuse me for a minute.”

  McAtee walked behind the historic Resolute desk. In 1850, the British HMS Resolute had gotten lodged in Arctic ice and was long abandoned before being discovered adrift by an American fishing vessel that towed her to port. Congress purchased the vessel, refitted her, and presented her to Queen Victoria as a token of
peace. Resolute served in the Royal Navy for twenty-three years. After decommissioning, Queen Victoria ordered two identical desks built from her timbers, presenting one to President Rutherford B. Hayes in 1880 and placing the twin in Buckingham Palace, where it stands today.

  McAtee sat at the historic desk, flanked by the two flags, and picked up the receiver on the phone that was blinking.

  “This is the president,” he said.

  He listened impassively, his expression giving little away to anyone in the room who glanced his way. A few minutes later, he said, “Thank you very much. You’ll be hearing from me shortly.”

  He stood and crossed the room, returning to his favorite chair by the fire. He sighed deeply and leaned his head back against the cushion of the chair. No one knew quite what to say, and a lengthy silence ensued.

  “That was the governor of Kansas,” McAtee said. “Along with Bill Thomas at NSA. Last night, the mayor of Salina, someone I knew personally, was murdered in bed, along with her husband and two children. There are no suspects, and Monie Bailey didn’t have an enemy in this world. It was the work of terrorists. The husband was shot dead, the other three were gassed.”

  “Gassed?” Mike Reiter said as he leaned forward. “Terrorists? In Kansas? Good Lord. Will you excuse me, Mr. President? I need to make a few phone calls.” McAtee nodded, and Reiter quickly left.

  “A cell phone was left on Monie’s body. There was a message on it. It came from a member of a group calling itself the Arm of God.

  NSA has already traced the call. It came from another cell. The caller was in an apartment complex in a suburb west of Tehran when the call was made. We have assets on the way to that building now.”

  “Unbelievable,” General Moore said.

  “It gets worse,” Jack McAtee said.

  “Sorry. Go ahead, Mr. President.”

  “The caller, whose voice was electronically altered, said that at precisely six o’clock Tuesday morning, Central Standard Time, that’s tomorrow morning, the town of Salina, Kansas, will no longer exist. He said evacuation of the entire population should begin immediately. Then he ‘allahued Akhbar’ three times and hung up.”

  The room sat in stunned silence.

  “Salina, Kansas,” Moore said. “Why? It doesn’t make any sense. There’s nothing there.”

  “Except churches and schools and families with little girls and boys,” McAtee said, his expression blank.

  Brick Kelly stared at the still-spinning globe. He stuck out a finger and stopped it, found Salina on the map of the U.S., and said, “This is interesting. Salina is in the absolute dead center of the country. Look. Right square in the middle of the north-south axis and the east-west axis.”

  “A shot to the heart?” General Moore said. “Some kind of warning shot to the heart of America?”

  “Maybe,” the president mused. He’d been thinking along the same lines.

  “What does NSA think, Mr. President?” Sir David asked. “Is this threat at all credible?”

  McAtee nodded gravely. “Very credible. They say I should authorize immediate evacuation. This radical group, this so-called Arm of God, has a blood-soaked history. They’re a Soviet-sponsored terror network headquartered in Iran. Lately, they’ve been training foreign fighters to infiltrate Iraq and Afghanistan with ever more sophisticated IEDs. And they’re the ones currently negotiating with the Russians on the purchase of new shoulder-fired missiles to bring our Ah-64 Apache choppers down.”

  “The Russians. Why do they keep coming up?” Consuelo de los Reyes said, to no one in particular.

  “I’m sorry. I’ve got to call the governor,” Mc Atee said. “I’ll have to cancel the remainder of this meeting, I’m afraid. There are forty-two thousand souls in that town whose lives are at stake. I want to thank you all for coming and we’ll regroup soon, I promise. I’ll keep you abreast of this situation as it develops. Betsey will call your offices with a time to reconvene.”

  The president stood, and so did everyone else. As they were filing out, he stopped Sir David and said quietly, “Could you stick around another minute or so?”

  “Certainly, sir.”

  When the room had cleared, McAtee said, “I want you to promise me something, David, all right?”

  “Anything.”

  “This man of yours. Hawke. He’s heading up that new division for you. What’s it called again?”

  “Red Banner.”

  “Right. I trust Alex Hawke. Completely. A couple of years ago, he single-handedly saved my life up on the inaugural platform. Not only mine but my wife’s and everybody in the damn government, most likely. We’ve got nobody like him, David, nobody who operates at his level. I want Hawke inside Russia. Tonight, if possible. If anyone can figure out what the hell these mad Russians are up to, it’s him. Quote me. Tell him I said that. And tell him there’s not a second to lose.”

  “You seriously think the Russians may have something to do with this Kansas situation, Mr. President?”

  “It’s possible. But I’m beginning to think the Russians have something to do with everything on the damn planet lately. Nothing those people do would surprise me at this point. They’ve pulled out of the arms treaty, they’re flying long-distance bomber sorties over Guam again, they’ve got troops massing on the NATO borders, they’re retargeting European cities with their missiles, and they’re selling advanced weapon systems to our most feared enemy, Iran. Friend or foe, David, you call it.”

  The president took a deep breath and sat back in his chair, looking at the chief of British intelligence. “Sir David, I’m sorry. I’ve got to get back on the phone with the Kansas governor. Get those poor people out there in Salina to safety. I’ll speak to you soon. Safe journey back to London.”

  “Good-bye, Mr. President. Thanks for your time. And good luck to you. It looks as if we may stand together yet again.”

  “It does, sir, it certainly does.”

  The president was distracted, already on to his next call, his next crisis, but he looked Trulove in the eye and spoke from his gut.

  “We’re it, you know, Sir David. Our two countries. The last barricade. We’re all that’s left. God help us.”

  PART TWO

  WHITE NIGHTS

  39

  RUSSIA

  Hawke pressed his forehead against the icy window of his small train compartment. He cradled a mug of lukewarm tea in both hands, grateful for the small amount of heat it offered. The train was slowing, wheels screeching, the air beyond the frosted glass smoking with snow, clouds of frothy white whirling about outside, obscuring everything. From somewhere ahead, the plaintive cry of the train’s whistle, a hollow call that could have sprung from the bottom of his heart.

  Were they finally arriving?

  He was on the last leg of his journey to Anastasia. He’d been at his window for hours, staring out at the frozen tundra, mesmerized by the view and thoughts of the new woman in his life. Hours had passed since he’d awoken from a sleep as deep and dark as the grave itself. He’d climbed down from his warm bunk and sprung to the window, his heart hammering. Was it love he was feeling, or was it merely the thrill of the game? Perhaps both? He knew this grip of conflicting emotions was powerful enough to paralyze him if he weren’t careful.

  So he sat by his window and forced himself to look at things he could actually see.

  He saw Russia. He saw its fields, steppes, villages, and towns, all bleached white by the moon and bright stars. He sat for hours on end and watched as Russia flew past, wrapped in glittering clouds of snow and ice.

  It had been nearly twenty-four hours since he’d received his orders and begun his onward journey. He’d said good-bye to Diana and Ambrose at the Bermuda airport and climbed aboard an RAF transport. He’d slept in the rear, freezing, on top of the mailbags, all the way to RAF Sedgwick, then caught a commercial flight into Russia, landing at St. Petersburg. He presented himself at immigration as Mr. A. Hawke, senior partner, Blue Water Logistics, Bermuda
. He had a Bermuda passport that, even to his jaded eye, was a work of art. A four-color brochure inside his briefcase described the worldwide shipping capabilities of his new company. Just in case anyone was interested.

  Since boarding the train at St. Petersburg’s Moskovsky Vokzal station, he’d had nothing to eat but Ukrainian sausage, which resembled a kilo of raw bacon coated in herbs, and some smoked cheese, which he found he simply couldn’t stomach. The kind of meal that you only want to see once but worry might resurface at any moment.

  The Russian beer, however, was delicious. At the last big station, all of the passengers had jumped from the train and run for the buffet. He’d followed and had purchased a loaf of black bread and a bottle of Imperia vodka, primarily for warmth, he told himself. It was long gone.

  Alone inside his compartment, despite its faint stench from the lavatories, not quite neutralized by the eau de cologne of some recently disembarked passenger and the smell of some fried chicken, pieces of which he’d finally found stuffed under the seat cushions, wrapped in dirty grease-stained paper, he was quite content.

  He’d bought a ticket for a kupe class compartment. This entitled him to a set of bunks, a small table, storage space, and, most important, a lockable door. By Russian standards, this was relatively cushy train travel. The next class down was a bed in an open train carriage with about forty other passengers, mostly Russian or Mongolian traders with stacks of bags of their stock in trade. Not much sleeping went on back there, rather a lot of beer drinking and fighting over the use of the toilet. The lavatory attendant, a grumpy elderly babushka, kept the one clean toilet on the carriage locked for her personal use.

  Hawke knew he was back in Russia.

  He glanced at the green glow of his wristwatch. It was after two o’clock in the morning, but the night was lit up like day. The citizens of St. Petersburg called their midsummer evenings the White Nights.