In The Name of The Father

by A. J. Quinnell

  She paused while Gudov caught up with his notes. He finished writing ‘large’ and looked up. She went on.

  ‘Prior to entering this camp he had not had sex for a long period. I know that from sexual experience with men who have been deprived, and also he mentioned it. His virility is above average. He can have two full orgasms within twenty minutes and a third an hour later. But he is not selfish about it. He knows how to give a woman pleasure and enjoys doing it. . .’ Again she let Gudov catch up and then said, ‘Apart from that, it was noticeable that in his training he drove himself to a degree that was exceptional. We see that normally only from the Islamic fanatics and the Japanese. Being neither, I suspect his obsessive drive came from hatred . . . of what I don’t know. That’s all I can tell you.’

  Gudov wrote ‘hatred’ and then quietly asked, ‘Is he a sadist . . . I mean sexually.’

  She smiled slightly. ‘You mean am I a masochist? Well to some extent I am . . . But “Werner” was not a sadist. He liked to dominate sexually - most men do - and there is a cruel part to him . . . but then, Major, many women are attracted to that.’

  Gudov nodded as if realising a new truth. Then the corners of his lips turned down in disappointment. What she had told him was only marginally useful. It helped flesh out the character but gave no indication as to his background or origins. He had hoped for more. Hoped to be able to return to Colonel Zamiatin with more than just a photograph and a physical description. At the moment, in his mind’s eye, ‘Werner’ was represented by a hairy chest and a large scrotum.

  She must have noticed his disappointment. Almost contritely she said, ‘I’m sorry, Major. As I told you, we didn’t talk. I doubt if he talked to anyone in the camp.’

  Gudov capped his pen and said, ‘Not even that Filipino girl?’

  He saw the flicker of anger in her eyes. It was quickly gone but it told him that he had learned everything she knew. She was not so unemotional. She knew the feelings of jealousy. ‘Werner’ had dominated her and used her when he wanted to. She hated him. He pushed back his chair and said, ‘Thank you, Leila. Would you ask Frank to come in here.’

  They shook hands and she walked towards the door. Halfway there she stopped and turned; her eyes were a little puzzled.

  ‘Major, he did say something that I didn’t understand. He said it twice, both times just after he’d climaxed . . . said it to himself - not to me -just three words.’

  ‘What were they?’

  ‘Kurwa ale dupa . . . something like that.’

  Gudov let out his breath in relief and thanked his stars for the four years of duty he had done in Warsaw and the Polish mistress he had enjoyed for the last two of them. He smiled.

  ‘Kurwa ale dupa,’ he laughed. ‘Leila, it’s Polish. It means he appreciated you, or something very much to that effect.’

  She nodded thoughtfully. ‘So he’s a Pole. Is that a help?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ he breathed. ‘A big help. Thank you, Leila . . .’

  Half an hour later Frank watched Major Gudov climb into the helicopter. He was buoyant in spite of his punishing schedule. Obviously his visit had been a success. Frank’s own interview with him had been brief. He had told him more or less what he had observed. There were two things that he hadn’t told him. One was the signal that Werner had received telling him to grow a moustache and not to cut his hair. The other was his own gift to Werner of the ‘Denbi’ marker pen. As he watched the swirl of dust thrown up by the departing helicopter he wondered why he hadn’t told Gudov. He really did not know. It was obvious that Werner, whoever he might be, was taking on the KGB. In spite of himself Frank was rooting for the underdog.

  Major Boris Gudov reached Moscow at six in the evening. He had not slept on the plane but had spent the entire time working on his report. It was a minor masterpiece, showing of course how the Major’s brilliant deductions had cut straight through to the truth. He knew that Colonel Zamiatin would have been informed of the plane’s time of arrival but he did not report to his office immediately. He went first to the basement annex and had an animated conversation with the small, middle-aged, bird-like woman who was in charge of the Ryad R400 computer. She studied the photographs and nodded reassuringly. Within minutes the computer had enlarged and printed the photographs. The definition was vastly improved. Then for ten minutes it scanned for comparison. In those ten minutes tens of thousands of likenesses were compared. She had told Gudov that it could take up to half an hour. He couldn’t wait that long and was immensely relieved when in ten minutes it came to the name and background of the assassin. Gudov tore off the perforated strip and clipped it on to the file containing his report. At seven o’clock he was in Zamiatin’s office being congratulated. At seven thirty Zamiatin was in Victor Chebrikov’s office being congratulated. It seemed that all the KGB were working late. But Chebrikov’s face turned very sombre when he read the name in the report. Zamiatin started to explain his background but was cut off. Chebrikov obviously knew all about him.

  At eight thirty Chebrikov was drinking vodka in Andropov’s Kremlin apartment. Andropov was clad in a flowery silk dressing gown. ‘A gift from my wife,’ he had explained as though in apology.

  He finished reading the report, closed the file firmly and looked up at Chebrikov.

  ‘Victor,’ he said. ‘We do things sometimes which are remarkably clever at the time and then . . He left the sentence unfinished.

  Diplomatically Chebrikov said, ‘Yuri, it was never to be expected.’

  Andropov tapped the file and said musingly, ‘Mirek Scibor. . . they chose well those priests; they matched a man to a motive . . . You must catch him, Victor, and when you do he is to be killed, immediately. Not questioned. Not by anyone. Just killed.’

  ‘We’ll catch him,’ Chebrikov said, injecting a note of enthusiasm into his voice. ‘Now that we know his identity, the “Papa’s envoy” is as good as dead.’

  ‘That’s not good enough, Victor.’ Andropov leaned forward. ‘I want to see his body - and soon!’

  In Cracow Professor Stefan Szafer worked quickly. Not hurriedly but faster than his normal steady pace. This surprised his assistant doctor, Wit Bereda, and theatre sister, Danuta Pesko. Not that his speed endangered the patient at all. His fingers were as deft as always. Then he truly surprised them. Having slowly unclamped the renal artery and checked the fine line of micro-sutures which closed the wound in the kidney, he turned to Bereda and said from behind his mask, ‘Doctor, close up for me. I have an important lunch appointment and I’m running late.’

  He stepped away from the table and walked briskly through to the dressing room. Bereda looked at Danuta Pesko’s eyes across the inert body. They were as surprised as his own. Many, even most, busy top surgeons leave the sewing up to their assistants, but not Professor Stefan Szafer - not ever. He took immense pride in that aspect of his work. Incisions for kidney operations are inevitably long and disfiguring. He sewed with the expertise of a Los Angeles plastic surgeon to limit the scarring.

  ‘Must be someone damned important,’ Bereda muttered as he moved around the table.

  The ‘someone’ was important, but not in the way Bereda imagined. She was a struggling young actress called Halena Maresa and Stefan Szafer was totally, obsessively in love with her.

  He arrived fifteen minutes early at the Wierzynek Restaurant. The head waiter recognised him as an important person and customer and ushered him to his usual alcove table. What was unusual was that he was lunching rather than dining. He usually took a quick lunch in the hospital canteen.

  He ordered a vodka with lots of soda. While waiting for it he looked around the elegant room. It was an expensive place and so mainly frequented by high officials in the Government or armed forces and top academicians or people like himself who were in the top echelon of salary earners. Unlike his contemporaries he was not particularly impressed with the luxury of the restaurant or its prices. His time in the West had made him blasé about such things. In fact, with his st
ern idealism, he faintly disapproved. He would have been quite content in a simple, less pretentious place, but he knew that Halena enjoyed it. He had suggested it the first time he asked her out, trying to impress her. During that dinner he wondered whether she had accepted only because he was able to afford the place. But she had quickly dispelled the idea. With her beauty she must have had many such invitations. Also during that dinner her gaiety and attention towards him convinced him of her genuine interest.

  After their second date she had kissed him. At first demurely but then towards the end with passionate intensity. He had concluded that she was immune to his ‘problem’.

  His drink arrived and he glanced at his watch. Ten minutes to go and she was always punctual; a habit he appreciated. He reached into his jacket pocket and took out a small Amplex tablet and popped it into his mouth quickly. That tablet represented his problem. It was chronic bad breath. It had been the bane of his life. He was a good-looking man and had the personality and the position to attract women, but the attraction never lasted long; his halitosis saw to that. He had tried every prophylactic known to medical science. He had tried varying his diet. He could contain the problem to some extent but never alleviate it. His grandfather had it. He supposed it was hereditary, leaping every other generation. He realised that his love for Halena derived not only from her beauty and personality but from her utter lack of concern about his ‘problem’. He had even tentatively mentioned it to her once and she had merely laughed and said, ‘I must have bad olfactory glands. I hardly ever notice it. Put it out of your head, Stefan.’

  He had always thought that actresses were, by definition, somewhat promiscuous. He discovered that although that may be true in general, Halena was an exception. He had taken her out eight times since he met her four weeks before. She let him kiss her and lately they had petted fairly heavily. He had even caressed her bare breast; she never wore a bra. But so far that was as far as she would go. The promise of more was always there though in her mischievous eyes. Once after they had been kissing in his car and he had tried to go further she had pushed his hand away and sensed his disappointment and frustration.

  ‘Don’t think I’m a tease, Stefan,’ she had said gently. ‘I want to as well but I make a rule. First I must know a man well. Know that I love him.’

  ‘Do you think you could love me?’

  She had smiled at him, her eyes soft with affection.

  ‘Would I have wasted my time and yours if I thought I couldn’t?

  Give me a little more time. I eat slowly, I take a bath slowly, I get dressed slowly . . . and I fall in love slowly.’

  He had been encouraged, his frustration tempered. He knew it would be satisfied in the moderately near future. He thought of the evening he had met her at a boring reception at the University. A distant acquaintance had introduced them. They had spoken only briefly at first. Being undoubtedly the most beautiful woman in the room, she had been quickly monopolised by all the would-be Romeos. But he kept his eyes on her and several times he had seen hers on him. Finally quite late she had broken away and crossed the room to where he was standing. With a smile she had said, ‘I’m told you’re a brilliant doctor. You don’t look it-that’s a compliment. Now I’m going to break a social rule and ask a doctor a medical question at a party. What’s the best cure for a hangover?’

  ‘Are you going to have one?’ he had asked, seriously.

  ‘No, but my flatmate drinks a lot of vodka. She gets them all the time. She insists that the only cure is a “hair of the dog”.’

  He had smiled. ‘It’s quite true, Miss Maresa. It’s been medically proven that a couple of tots of what caused the malady helps alleviate it. . . but only a couple! That and a few breaths of pure oxygen.’

  ‘I shan’t tell her that,’ she had laughed. ‘She’ll clutter up the place with oxygen cylinders.’ She had glanced at her watch and muttered, ‘Damn, I have to go or I’ll miss my last bus.’

  ‘I’ll be glad to run you home in my car.’

  ‘Are you sure? It’s quite a long way.’

  ‘I’m sure,’ he had replied firmly.

  She came in only two minutes late, glancing at her watch. She was wearing a calf-length sheepskin coat and a little black pillbox hat, her ash-blonde hair falling from under it in careful disarray. She waved at him and threaded through the tables. Heads swivelled to watch her progress and Stefan felt again that thrill whenever she came to him through a crowd. He stood up and she kissed him lightly. Her nose was cold. She unbuttoned her coat and handed it to a hovering waiter. Underneath she was wearing a dark blue knitted cashmere dress. A present from Stefan that he had obtained from London and given to her on their last date. She pirouetted for him.

  ‘How does it look?’

  ‘On you it looks perfect.’

  Another waiter was holding a chair for her. She sat down, her face alive with excitement.

  ‘So what’s your good news?’ he asked.

  She held up her hand. ‘Let’s order first.’

  After the head waiter had taken their order and left she announced, ‘I’m going to Moscow for two weeks.’

  ‘Oh? I thought you didn’t like Russia.’

  ‘Russians,’ she corrected him.

  ‘Is it a part?’

  ‘No, Stefan. In a way better. It’s a theatre workshop run by Oleg Tabakov. He’s the best, even if he is Russian. There will be actors and actresses from Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Rumania - all over. It will be a great experience . . . and useful to my career.’

  He was pleased for her but also felt a twinge of disappointment. It was only two weeks but he would miss her.

  ‘That’s splendid, Halena. How did you get it?’

  She gave one of her mischievous smiles. ‘I didn’t at first. The Academy selected Barbara Plansky but then Szczepanski gave her a part in his new play, lucky bitch, and she had to drop out. So I got the chance.’

  He smiled. ‘That’s lucky, but you deserve it. When do you go?’

  ‘The fifth of next month.’ She cocked her head to one side and surveyed him. She had a little smile on her lips. ‘Will you miss me, Stefan?’

  ‘You know I will,’ he answered.

  She reached over and put a hand on his.

  ‘Then come with me.’

  His head jerked up in surprise. Before he could answer she went on persuasively, ‘You’ve told me that you haven’t taken a holiday for ages. I’ll have plenty of time off from the workshop. We could even go to Leningrad for a couple of days. It’s supposed to be beautiful. Irmina went last month. She said it’s fantastic. She went on the train overnight . . . do try to come. We’ll be together . . . together, Stefan.’

  The word ‘together’ and the way she said it took on great meaning in his mind. He felt himself stirring.

  ‘I could never get away for two weeks, Halena. That would be impossible at the moment.’

  She was undeterred. ‘So come for a few days. Even a long weekend would be worthwhile. Please, Stefan. Please.’ She squeezed his hand as if in supplication.

  He smiled. ‘I shall try, Halena. Just for a few days though. This afternoon I’ll check through my operation and lecture schedules and then talk to Professor Skibinsky.’

  She laughed with pleasure. He loved to see her laugh. From the seat beside him he picked up a gift-wrapped box and put it on the table in front of her.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘A camera.’

  ‘For me?’

  ‘Of course. You told me how much you enjoyed photography but could not afford one of the new reflex cameras. That’s a Leica. One of the best.’

  She looked at him fondly, her eyes shining, arid said, ‘Thank you, darling.- I’m going to take lots of photographs . . . especially of you.’

  After lunch the struggling young actress returned to her small apartment. On the way she stopped at a telephone box and made one brief call.

  Two days later Professor Roman Skibinsky, head of surgery, had lunch in
the same restaurant with Feliks Kurowski, director general of the hospital. Roman Skibinsky’s father had been a Colonel in the pre-war Polish cavalry. He had been one of the thousands of Polish officers murdered in the forest of Katyn. He had never believed the Russian propaganda that the atrocity had been carried out by the Nazis.

  After lunch, which was mostly taken up by a conversation on administration problems, they ordered coffee and brandy, and Skibinsky said casually, ‘Feliks, when is the new medical department budget coming out?’

  ‘In August, as usual. If those idiots in Warsaw haven’t lost their abacus or whatever else they use to do their sums.’

  ‘Do you think you’ll get the allocation for the new forensic lab?’

  Kurowski sighed deeply. Skibinsky had touched a raw spot. For five years he had been trying to squeeze funds out of the Ministry for just that project; so far without success. It was always the same story - maybe next year.

  He said, ‘You know how it is, Roman. I’ve been pushing for years. Frankly, I doubt it. There are rumours that the total budget for the Ministry is going to be cut.’

  The coffee and brandy arrived. With the departure of the waiter Skibinsky asked, ‘Do you mind if I speak frankly?’

  Kurowski smiled. ‘Roman, I’ve never heard you talk otherwise.’

  Skibinsky smiled back. The two men had a good working understanding.

  He said, ‘Feliks, in spite of being a good Communist you are also an excellent administrator. You run the best teaching hospital in Poland. Perhaps in the entire bloc.’ Kurowski shrugged but he was obviously pleased with the compliment. ‘But,’ Skibinsky went on, ‘you’re a God-awful politician.’

  ‘So what? I don’t want to be a politician.’