by Arno Baker
Feklisov became convinced that faceless gnomes inside the FSB or the SVR were carefully reading every line he had written and spending precious government funds drafting detailed summaries of his memoirs for their case officers. It comforted him to think that his work was now being analyzed and stored on the hard drives of the most secretive espionage organizations in the world and that probably even some of the higher-ups were reading his account of what had happened some sixty years before. The old spies at the dacha would be green with envy had they known this was was taking place. “An old spy in a hurry ... to be read!” That was the more accurate description.
He laughed to himself as he remembered the face of Alec Guinness as the cuckolded George Smiley with his terribly unfaithful but very aristocratic wife. It made Alex suddenly feel proud of his solid Russian peasant stock that wouldn’t tolerate such humiliation. Not like those decadent British upper class homosexual traitors: the Cambridge Five or Six as they were called in the West. He had never trusted any one of them or their twisted motives. Except perhaps for MacLean, who was probably sincere, Burgess was nothing but an irresponsible pariah and Philby you couldn’t help but suspect that he’d been “turned” several times over by MI5 in the hope of planting him in Russia. Many on the inside remained convinced he was a double or triple agent.
At least that’s what some of the old comrades whispered. Give me a solid socialist like Klaus Fuchs any day, someone who really delivered the goods. Or even a messy enthusiast like Julius Rosenberg! Those guys at least got the job done. They were efficient and always came through in the end not like the multilayered Blunt or the inveterate liar Cairncross: both should have been liquidated early on.
But then if she was not putting on an act, what could Natasha’s fantasies be? Why was her sexual passion increasing? He didn‘t know because she never would reveal her inner thoughts and would only say: “I love our physical relationship, it allows for distance even though I know that you‘d like me to be here much more. I prefer to keep things the way they are.” Ten another strange thought then entered Alex‘s mind.
As she read his life story she enjoyed the danger of making love to a man who could still be so threatening. A man who had himself tortured and killed people in cold blood, under orders, a monster who had met and worked for the greatest monster of them all, Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin himself. She fantasized Feklisov in Stalin’s office in the Kremlin waiting to carry out his terrible orders. Was that what made him so attractive in the end? Was it the thrill of being taken by a man capable of committing murder? He was far from handsome, and anything but young. But he had done things, very big and very bad things like no other man she had ever met. But then he reasoned, perhaps not, perhaps it was only the security that his regular pension check provided, food on the table for her and her two girls. It had to be as simple as that.
Alexander Feklisov made several attempts at publication of a fictionalized adaptation and even of a long excerpt in 1982 and 1990. His request was rejected both times after he had submitted hundreds of pages that he had typed himself to the KGB for screening. A short unsigned and anonymous note on blank white paper was dropped in his mailbox one day: “Permission is denied at this time.” He had also turned the story into a novel hoping that since he used invented names and fake locations it would ease things up a bit. At one point permission to publish the novel in truncated form did come through and the book was actually announced and printed but then there was a change of plans and it was not distributed. He never even saw a single copy.
There had probably been some confusion during the change of regime in 1992 about granting him approval and he speculated that permission may have been suddenly withdrawn. Or otherwise they just wanted to find out if anyone had inquired about the book once it had been announced. Yes, that had to be it! They decided to announce publication as imminenet and then withheld the few printed copies. They wanted to see if anyone would take the bait. The targets had to be specialists in the West that the “brothers” wanted to identify and manipulate. Whatever the reasons were he still refused to stop writing. And Natasha provided the motivation he needed to keep on going. But time was not on his side and he began to fear that if she ever decided to leave him for a younger man he would finally surrender and give up and the book, in final complete form, would never see the light of day.
So he continued to submit his proposals and ask for permission, with innumerable suggestions about the possibilities, the ramifications of where the story could lead and how it could help Russia and so on. He had to show them that something could happen and that he was also capable of provoking a crisis to which they would be compelled to react.
The idea came from a radio announcement one day around noon. Natacha was preparing lunch that day when they both heard it in the kitchen and she said:
“On Friday you should go to that international book exhibit at Sokolniki Park. Perhaps you can see what books are being published in England and America, maybe make a useful contact. Who knows? What do you think?”
He jumped at the suggestion.
“Ah! Yes, that sounds perfect, excellent timing! So then you‘ll come with me. We‘ll go this Friday morning. If the Americans will be there I can talk to someone.”
On Thursday he prepared a few makeshift business cards with his address and home number on simple strips of paper. The next day they took the metro and then a bus to the exhibit hall located deep inside the park. When they were together they looked very much like father and daughter and behaved accordingly.
On the bus Alex, forever on the lookout, noticed a young fellow under thirty who was listening to balalaikas on a portable radio drumming his fingers in rhythm. He was sitting a few seats ahead of them. It was a perfect cover and a clever way of tailing the “subject” up close but from the front, an old trick they taught you during the first week of spy school. Make yourself conspicuous enough yet banal, make just enough noise to throw off any experienced agent who would conclude that such a clown couldn‘t possibly be following anyone. It usually worked.
However Alex became convinced that the unshaven chap in blue jeans and sneakers had to be there just for him. Never once did he turn or look in their direction. “Never look at the person you are following. Their eyes will sense that you are there for them the moment they see you. Just like dogs, when they expect you to feed or scold them: this is nothing but animal behavior, pure and simple! Comrades, remember: your knowing eyes will betray you every time.” That’s what old Vasily Zarubin would repeat endlessly to his pupils, including Alexander Semyonovich.
McAndrews, the prestigious New York publisher mostly known for quality non-fiction occupied a large booth. Feklisov hovered a bit and looked around, leafed through some books and after a time approached a young man with a name tag that read ‘Jack Harrison, Editor.’ The chap appeared to be in charge of the display and was dressed for the part in a dark grey suit and conservative tie, a manager, no doubt. They spoke in English in a corner for a few minutes, the colonel did most of the talking until they quickly exchanged business cards and shook hands. Alex then decided to return home. Natasha was surprised and asked why the hurry:
“Because my dear we are now being followed by more than one FSB agent. I can see them coming out of the walls! I want them to think that perhaps this chance contact was in fact planned in advance and part of something far bigger. Poor Mr. Harrison will probably be detained at the airport and questioned at length before they let him fly home. Just like the old days. He’ll get a bit of a scare but they can’t hold anyone now without seriously having something specific to ask or there would be thousands of incidents per day and things would quickly run out of control. But it will certainly not be that dramatic, just a bit memorable. He was very keen on what I told him, by the way. He wants to read the manuscript. So we shall see.”
The meeting with the director of the SVR took place exactly three weeks later, after Jack Harrison had been duly held up at Sheremetyevo overnight an
d questioned at length about his ten day stay in Moscow and what business he had with Mr. Feklisov, the man he spoke with at the exhibit and who gave him his card. The organs quickly went to work on Jack Harrison and investigated his background in the greatest detail since they were convinced that he was in fact a clever American spione! But what they found turned out to be exotic but not at all threatening to Mother Russia. The most bizarre element in the 40 year old vice president for foreign rights’ profile was that he had been born in Paris in 1954; spent his childhood in the French capital and returned to New York with his bohemian intellectual parents in 1960 after his father came into a small inheritance.
What further impressed the post-Soviet SVR analysts was that Jack was also the direct descendant of the 23rd president of the United States, Benjamin Harrison. The oddity was that his father Henry, known as “Hank,” had been at first disinherited by his parents because of his drop-out radicalism and love of the exotic. This rebellious nature led him to a bohemian lifestyle in Tangier then to Paris where he married another beat generation American woman poet named Sonia -- a stunning half Native
American and half Puerto Rican beauty whose hopelessly mixed background proved unacceptable to Hank‘s family. To them the marriage and the child were just another provocation on the part of their out of control offspring. They willed their money to charities and to his mother’s sister, a kindly old spinster who mercifully decided to leave the remaining cash and property to her beloved ‘crazy Hank.’ The property included a gilded age brownstone in Greenwich Village where Hank and his bohemian mixed blood wife and kid moved to in the fall of 1960 roughly at the time JFK won the presidential election.
The SVR thought somewhat naively, that they were dealing with an upper class, well connected American who could possibly be manipulated to infiltrate elite circles in the United States. Little did they know that Jack with his rather swarthy complexion that gave him a “South American” look was considered a complete outcast, a pariah, who was out of touch with the deeply conservative protestant side of the family. He managed to struggle through college and into a publishing career where he was unable to use those connections the Russians thought he could count on. The climb up the company ladder took him 15 grueling years, making some friends and a few enemies along the way but without any help or political pull from anyone. It was all spelled out in great detail in a report to the supervisor of the directorate of the SVR and it led to a vigorous reaction at the top.
Three
The follow-up to the meeting with Primakov in late September 1995 arrived unannounced three weeks later with the first colder days of the early Russian fall. Feklisov still didn’t believe that the SVR would actually go ahead with the plan that Primakov had outlined in private. Intelligence operations were very delicate flowers that could grow and wilt very quickly and unexpectedly: a change of direction could suddenly cancel any operation during its gestation period. He didn‘t say a word to Natasha and just complained for several days about feeling tired refusing to admit that he could possibly be depressed.
An attractive and well-dressed forty year old woman with a smart leather attaché case appeared at the door. The colonel thought he had seen her before and as soon as she took off her hat, he recognized her: she had wheeled in the trolley in Primakov’s office two weeks before. Slavic features, high cheekbones and a vague hint of central Asian origins in her eyes and thick black hair that fell straight down as though weighted with lead. Her smile however was cold and businesslike.
“Colonel Feklisov” she said with a tight smile extending her hand regally, “I am Irina Orlova, and we met briefly when you visited the director’s office three weeks ago. I shall be working with you on the project.”
She walked in, while the colonel stepped aside, as if she knew the surroundings and carefully placed her attaché case flat at the far end of the dining room table. She carefully proceeded to open it to show Feklisov an extremely rare device in Russia at the time, a laptop computer with Cyrillic alphabet keys and several gigs of hard drive space. Only top operatives had access to such magic portable machines that were used primarily as word processors and were fitted with highly sensitive recording equipment.
After tea she followed him to the tall armoire in the dining room where thick reams of typed text representing some 3500 pages of his original manuscript entitled “Memoirs of a Soviet Intelligence Officer” were kept neatly under lock and key. Even the unflappable Irina marveled at the incredible amount of work that had gone into the effort. She quickly skimmed through a few pages and made no comment. From readings and working sessions at headquarters Irina already knew that it was an unpalatable mix of sentimental memories, thick Stalinist propaganda and perhaps the hint of an espionage thriller somewhere within.
For the next six months Feklisov and Irina, reworked the story in fine detail and she did her best to overcome his objections to any cuts and changes to the original manuscript. The key to the tragic end of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, and the ultimate secret of their tragic fate however had to remain a mystery that even the colonel was unaware of.
Only a handful of people knew every facet of the story: the director, the deputy in charge of disinformation, a veteran archivist of the old Lubyanka archives, known only by his code name “Rudolf,” and an unidentified person who was thought to be holding the private papers of a forgotten French journalist who used to sign his articles as ‘Barnave’ during the early 1950s. Feklisov knew only part of the story and could reconstruct the threads only up to a point, he couldn’t possibly include the many rumors circulating at the time. Even Rudolf deplored the fact that the Barnave archives had never been located. Only after layers of documents were alnalyzed and non-computerized files were manually cross referenced and summarized for the director’s eyes, did the thread actually begin to appear.
Evgeny Primakov asked his secretary to hold all communications while he examined some of the original documents that Rudolf had sent up from the archives. First the 50 page summary of the incredible details no one was supposed to have access to; then documents dating as far back as 1945. Late that evening the director summoned General Mostovoy the head of the section handling ‘disinformation’ and in the course of a twenty minute conversation, gave him a complicated assignment.
Several years with various changes at the top went by but each time that particular operation was kept ‘active’ until the Feklisov memoir, now a manageable five hundred pages, was finally approved for publication. On that day a large yellow box containing many files and an original folder with the operational name of “King” adorned with a large “L” underlined in red ink was delivered to the new director’s desk. Vyacheslav Trubnikov leafed through the file, carefully handling some of the brittle original sheets of paper of that extra thin quality used during World War II that were now protected in transparent plastic sleeves. He read quickly some of the additional details Rudolf had underlined with a yellow highlighter until he was satisfied that at least the “useful” part of the story was now ready for distribution and publication.
He also took the time to examine a few original pages written in the same neat hand that remained unchanged and steady throughout. Trubnikov nodded that one more source of potential embarrassment from the distant past had yet to be effectively shuttered. The operation had almost gone sour and the unintended consequences could have led to the revival of old hatreds and tensions that no one wanted to see resurface, especially not with a tough new regime of young men intent on cleaning up following the Yeltsin laissez-faire period.
He closed the folder, wrote a few words in long hand in black ink on a top sheet, signed and dated the official paper on the cover of the box that stated the file was still “open.” The documents would now be locked in an off-limits area within the archives that was used for thousands of sensitive cases inherited from the old KGB that were still potentially embarrassing or even dangerous. At the same time all of the file‘s contents had been scanned and stored
electronically in a separate secure database.
The Rosenberg spy case was then officially closed.
It began with a casual meeting in Central Park in 1942 between Julius Rosenberg and Konstantin Shabenov who immediately handed the new asset over to “Sam” Semyonov, an insignificant detail in retrospect. It was one among hundreds of successful recruitments made in the United States during the war years, a mixture of deeply felt ideological commitment and pure chance. Much as the director would have liked to seal the box in red wax and declare the case closed, circumstances were forcing him to keep the file open, at least temporarily. The case wasn‘t yet ready to be shut down once and for all...
He looked at the original file with its many entries and smiled at the irony.
Part One
I
May 28, 1941 New York, Pierre Hotel, Suite 292 12:42 hours
The Venetian blinds were drawn but the shutters were kept open so that the heavy Rolleiflex camera mounted on a tripod could stay focused exclusively on the street below and precisely on the entrance to the Consulate General of the USSR at 7 East 61st Street in Manhattan. The building was a five-floor stately gilded age mansion where all the windows were kept permanently shut.
It was a stifling and muggy day in late May that felt like July at a very humid 89-F degrees. The asphalt was broiling and you could see heat waves rising periodically at that hour.
A stocky young man in his shirtsleeves and blue suspenders was looking through the camera lens; a second man also in rolled up shirtsleeves and loosened tie sat on the edge of an armchair with a pair of high-powered binoculars also trained on the big brass doors at the entrance of the consulate.
A messed up copy of the Daily Mirror lay casually on the carpeted floor, among empty root beer and ginger ale bottles, crushed packets of Chesterfield cigarettes and several crumpled brown paper bags that had served to carry sandwiches and coffee. A large standing glass ashtray was overflowing with cigarette butts. Every object the two men needed, including the black telephone resting on a night table, was placed strategically within easy reach next of the armchair. The air was thick with smoke and the radio, playing very low in the background, was broadcasting a Yankee game as the excited voice of an announcer occasionally yelled out the name of Joe Di Maggio as he scored a base hit or a home run. Then came a silly singing commercial break for Rheingold beer and finally the soothing sound of Tommy Dorsey, cool and restful at last.