The priest said, ‘I know, but we expect the attack on His Holiness to take place shortly, probably on his forthcoming trip to Asia. Our analysis leads us to believe that Andropov’s successor will cancel the operation . . .’
The General mashed out the stub of his cheroot into an ashtray and said, ‘Your analysis is correct. Chernenko will probably take over but he’s senile. Gorbachev will follow him and anyway, after Andropov’s death, he and his pals will be pulling the strings . . . not a bad thing. It’s time for new blood. Gorbachev is not an adventurist. He will certainly cancel that operation . . . but. . .’ He paused and sighed and poured more vodka.
The priest asked, ‘But what?’
The General wagged a finger at him.
‘Yes, I can get your assassin to Moscow . . . at minimal risk to myself. But I cannot get him close to Andropov . . . neither can you. The Supreme Leader of the Soviet Union is the most protected human being on earth. Even more so now that he knows about your assassin. Even I could not get close to him without several stringent security checks and a complete body search. Bacon Priest, I know of your organisation and reputation but you will fail.’
The priest took a gulp of vodka and shrugged. ‘If that is God’s will, so be it. . . But will you get them to Moscow?’
A long silence, then the General said sombrely, ‘I will discharge my debt . . . but on conditions.’
‘Conditions?’
‘Yes. First, your word that this assassin and nun will know nothing of my involvement . . . Nothing!’
‘Certainly. Apart from me the only other person to know about it is a priest who works for me . . . I trust him implicitly. But what about your side?’
The General smiled. ‘Leave that to me. One or two people owe me debts also. They will take the risks.’
He refilled the glasses and said, ‘The second condition is that you write for me now a letter, in your distinctive handwriting, and with a distinctive signature, saying that I, Major General Maxim Saltikov, assisted you in this mission.’
The priest had his glass half raised to his lips. His hand jerked to a stop in astonishment, spilling a little of the vodka.
‘But why . . . ? Oh.’
The General was grinning.
‘Yes, you are one of the few who would understand. The letter will be kept in a very safe place. If, against all odds, your man succeeds, then at some future date that letter could be very useful to me.’
The Bacon Priest shook his head in awe and said, ‘The machinations of Russian politics.’
The Russian smiled. ‘Yes. Something similar to Vatican politics . . . Now are they in Warsaw already?’
‘No. They will arrive there tomorrow.’
‘How?’
‘By train from Cracow.’
‘Just like that!’
‘Yes.’
Now it was the Russian’s turn to shake his head in awe. He was about to ask how, when the priest leaned forward and explained about the special train. The General nodded in satisfaction, then asked where they were to be delivered in Moscow.
The priest reached into his pocket and passed over a slip of paper. The Russian read it and again nodded.
‘No problem.’
The priest grinned.
‘Just like that?’
‘Yes.’
‘How?’
The General poured more vodka. The bottle was more than half empty. He dropped it back into the ice bucket with a little splash and said, ‘The day after tomorrow I will send the bodies of my soldiers who died in the helicopter crash back to Moscow . . . Instead of fourteen coffins there will be sixteen. Your assassin and his nun will see only one disguised face at the beginning. From then on they will know nothing about it until they are in your safe house in Moscow. It’s better that way . . . certainly for me.’
He reached into an inside pocket and pulled out a wallet and a gold Parker pen. From the wallet he extracted a folded piece of paper. He unfolded it and, together with the pen, pushed it across the table.
‘Now write your letter.’
The Bacon Priest uncapped the pen and, with a scrawl, wrote several lines. Then he signed the bottom.
He passed the pen and paper back. The Russian read the words and his thick lips twitched into a grim smile. He waved the paper back and forth a few times then, carefully folding it into his wallet, said, ‘I’ll make you a wager, Bacon Priest. I bet that your assassin fails.’
‘What are the stakes?’
The General grinned. ‘A case of good Russian vodka against a side of bacon.’
The priest smiled and reached across the table and they shook hands on it.
The Dutchman was three minutes late getting back to the bus and received a stern look from the courier. He swayed slightly as he moved down the aisle to his seat. A few minutes later the courier forgave him. She could hear his wife ticking him off. She spoke in Dutch but the tone of her words made their content obvious. He was nodding his head in abject repentance. Then he saw the courier watching him. His left eyelid dropped in an elaborate wink.
Chapter 24
The train rattled through the junction outside Kielce. The kacyki played cards. The game was skat and Marian was winning - heavily. Jerzy was the big loser. Antoni and Irena were holding their own. Ania and Natalia were in the little kitchen preparing a meal. Mirek was in the sleeping compartment. He had piled the pillows behind him and was sitting up in bed watching the passing scenery. It had snowed heavily during the night and the countryside was covered with a mantle of white. His side still throbbed painfully. His mind was at peace.
It was the second day after Ania’s rescue. Word had come through that the contact in Warsaw would be waiting at the railway siding where the official carriages were parked. Ania had been concerned about moving Mirek so soon. She had wanted to wait several more days but the message had stressed that time was pressing. Also Mirek was impatient himself. After the events of the past three days he wanted only to get the job over and start a new life a great distance away. His mind also was free. Freedom from mental and physical tension. Freedom resulting from a pain that is finally shared; freedom from at last recognising his own identity.
It had happened the night of the rescue. They had returned to the General’s house only minutes before road blocks bracketed the road leading to it.
Irena and Natalia wept with relief but then Irena endured a terrible hour before Antoni strolled in grinning broadly. No one had realised that Mirek was wounded until he got out of the car. His left trouser leg was wet with blood. Ania had not spoken a word during the escape or the drive back to the house. She seemed to be in a state of shock. Her face was very pale and she was cold. But when she saw the blood her instincts pulled her out of the shock and she took charge.
Jerzy wanted to call a doctor friend whom he insisted could be trusted. Mirek adamantly refused. He pointed out that the SB would know he was wounded by the blood he had left in the building, on the steps and in the two abandoned cars. He had bled a lot and they would assume that it was more serious than a mere flesh wound. They would also assume that he would need urgent medical attention and their first action would be to monitor the movements of all doctors.
The General was a very organised man and there was an emergency medical kit in the kitchen.
Ania and Marian had taken him upstairs to the General’s bedroom, undressed him in the adjoining bathroom and examined the wound. The bullet had angled upwards, ploughing a six-inch furrow from just above his hip to the bottom of his ribcage. From the pain Mirek guessed that the bullet had nicked the bottom rib. He knew what had to be done. He sent Marian down for a bottle of vodka and, when she returned, poured some of it down his throat and a lot more over the wound. He had cried out from the agony, sagging with an arm around both women. Then they dried the wound and bandaged it tightly. To treat it just like a big cut and then hope that it healed was all that could be done. There were broad spectrum antibiotic pills in the medicine box and h
e took double the normal dose to counteract the vodka. Then He drank some more vodka and fell into bed.
An hour later they had all had a meal; in the bedroom. A celebration was a certainty and they were determined that Mirek should not be left out. Two folding card tables were brought up and a cassette player and bottles, glasses, plates and cutlery. The meal was simple. Thick vegetable soup followed by a beef stew with boiled rice.
The mood had been strange. Not subdued, but not ebullient. There was an air of contentment. After Mirek had briefly told them of the events inside the building the rescue was not mentioned. Marian had been the most relaxed, laughing a lot and teasing everyone. By this time both Mirek and Ania knew that behind her scatterbrained attitude was an intelligent and resilient woman. Mirek was the only one she did not tease. Like the others, she was now treating him with respect bordering on hero worship. For them he had done the virtually impossible and in so doing had saved their families and themselves from ruin, prison and possibly death.
The mood came from shared danger and shared relief. There was now, more than before, a bond between them all. They were a family.
Jerzy was addicted to modern jazz. His favourite was Thelonius Monk. He played his tapes on every possible occasion. One of them had just ended and he got up to change it for another. Marian had objected. She turned to Irena and asked her to sing for them. Irena, normally a little shy, had drunk plenty of vodka. She had raised her head and sung in a clear voice. She sang Polish folksongs: ‘Karolinka’ and ‘Lowiczanka’. Ania knew the words and joined in. An air of nostalgia settled over everybody. Mirek, propped up in bed with pillows, had the feeling that he had finally come home.
The others had left just before midnight. Ania went into the bathroom and ran herself a bath. She came out twenty minutes later wearing her usual ankle-length nightdress and with her hair turbaned up in a towel. The bed was very wide. He was lying in the middle of it. With a wince of pain he moved further over to one side. She pulled back the duvet on the other side and slid in. He turned off the bedside light. The bathroom door was slightly ajar. She had left the light on and it cast a glow through the bedroom. She started to get out of bed to turn it off but he stopped her. He preferred not to sleep in a pitch black room. He had taken strong painkillers but his side was still very painful, especially if he made even the slightest move. He knew that even though he was mentally and physically exhausted he would get little sleep.
He had thought she would fall asleep quickly, but after about half an hour he had heard her low, harsh voice.
‘Mirek, in the morning we must talk.’
‘What about?’
‘About us . . . what has happened . . . what we are doing.’
He had turned his head to look at her. He could just make out the dim profile of her face.
He said, ‘All right, Ania. We will talk in the morning.’
For hours he had drifted in and out of sleep. Once he had to inch painfully out of bed and go to the bathroom. While there he took more painkillers. When he climbed back into bed he found that, in her sleep, Ania had rolled over to the centre. He lay next to her on his good side. He could see her face more clearly now. Her sleep was troubled. Considering her ordeal it was to be expected. Occasionally her limbs twitched and she whimpered in her throat. Very slowly he reached out an arm and put it over her and pulled her gently towards him. Her head rolled on the pillow and came to rest in the crook of his shoulder. He softly stroked her hair and felt her breath on his skin. He lowered his hand and ran it slowly up and down her back as though gentling an agitated kitten. Her breathing steadied and he felt her arm come across his waist and her leg came over his and their bodies were close along their entire lengths. Her hand was also moving on his back, up and down. A constant feathery caress. He felt no passion, no sudden sexuality. Just a closeness of body and mind. He could feel the flesh of her legs. The nightdress had ridden up past her knees. She moved against him. He turned his head. Her eyes were closed. He softly kissed one of them; then her cheek close to her mouth; then her lips. They moved against his. The breath from her nostrils mingled with his. He felt her hand on the back of his head, stroking his neck and pulling him closer. He closed his eyes. There was nothing in his mind. All thought was suspended. He only had the sense of her against him. His right leg was clasped between her legs. Very slowly she started to move against it. Involuntarily he pushed his knee higher, hard against the softness of her. The pain in his side was forgotten. His hand slid down to her moving bottom and beyond to the rucked hem of her nightdress. He pulled it higher and his palm was against her bottom, caressing it as she moved against him.
It could have been minutes or hours. Time was in suspension. They lay in half light, one body undulating within itself. Her face was against his neck, her parted lips next to his ear. As the day dawned he felt her breath on his skin quicken. Against his knee the softness of her centre hardened. Her thighs gripped tighter. She moaned and her whole body stiffened and shuddered as it crushed against him.
She was rigid and fused to him and time passed. Then she sighed deeply and her body relaxed and became soft. She murmured something which he could not interpret and moments later her breathing was in the steady rhythm of sleep. He too passed into painless unconsciousness.
His pain had returned with a vengeance the moment he awoke. His whole side felt as though a branding iron was being held against it. He opened his eyes. The bed alongside him was empty. He heard faint words and lifted his head. She was beside the bed, lower down. He could only see the top half of her body. Her head was bowed, her right hand was clutching something at her throat. He realised that she was on her knees praying. He could not understand the words; they were in Latin. With a gasp of pain he sat up. She lifted her head and he saw that her cheeks were wet. She coughed, wiped a sleeve across her face and stood up. He thought how vulnerable she looked, but then she shook her head as though dispelling a mood and said firmly, ‘How is your side, Mirek?’
‘It hurts like hell. Are you all right, Ania?’
She nodded. ‘Yes . . . I will get you some breakfast and then change the dressing.’
She had gone into the bathroom, emerging five minutes later fully dressed and carrying a glass of water. She handed him two pills and the glass.
‘Antibiotics. I’ll go and get some breakfast and find out what’s happening. It’s quite late.’
He glanced at his watch and saw to his surprise that it was after ten o’clock. What had happened during the night was at once hazy and very real. She was at the door. He opened his mouth to say something but she held up a hand and said, ‘Later.’
Later was half an hour. She had come back carrying a tray laden with a pot of tea, wheatbread, smoked meats, orange juice and a bowl of fruit.
She had sat on the bed and eaten with him. She told him that early in the morning Jerzy and Antoni had taken walks in different directions to see what was happening. The security forces were in massive evidence. Everyone’s papers were being carefully checked and even units of the Russian army were in the city. They had also learned that the two safe apartments had been raided by the SB within hours of the rescue. They had been lucky to come back to the General’s house.
After this report they ate in silence until she said introspectively, ‘I have sinned very deeply.’
He had been waiting for this. He said quickly, ‘Look, Ania . . . about last night. . .’
She shook her head.
‘I am not talking about last night, Mirek. I have sinned because I took a vow . . . a vow to love only my Lord God. I have broken that vow.’
It took several seconds before the implications sank into Mirek’s mind. Then he said very quietly, ‘You’re saying that you love me?’
She nodded briskly. ‘Yes, Mirek. I have been running from it . . . but I can run no more. It is not gratitude for what you have done. Nor is it a reaction to my having been cloistered all my life . . . I don’t understand why it happened. I suppose that
is one element of love . . . the lack of logic.’
‘I love you too, Ania.’
She sighed and nodded. ‘I know. Mirek, what is happening to us? What are we doing?’
He reached out and took her hands.
‘Ania, when this is over we shall make a life together.’
She shook her head. ‘I will not even think of that. Maybe it will never be over. How much longer can we be lucky?’
Fervently he said, ‘It will end.’
She pulled her hands from his and then grasped his hands in hers, looking down at them. In her harsh low voice she said, ‘I have fallen in love with a killer. I have watched you kill. What is it for, Mirek? What are you going to do in Moscow?’
Automatically he said, ‘I cannot tell you that.’
Bluntly she said, ‘Then you go on alone. I am involved completely or not at all.’
He raised his head and looked at her face and saw the determination in her eyes. He considered for only a moment, then said, ‘My mission is to kill Yuri Andropov.’
Seconds passed and then her fingers tightened around his hands. She shook her head and said, ‘That is impossible . . . you . . . they are mad . . . and why . . . why to kill him?’
Succinctly he gave her the background. When he had finished she released his hands and stood up and began to pace up and down the large room.
Finally she stopped and said scathingly, ‘I do not believe it. No matter how much danger His Holiness is in, there is no possibility that he would condone such a sin.’
In a tired voice Mirek had said, ‘He knows nothing about it.’
At first she had been puzzled, thinking back over the weeks. She said, ‘He must know. He gave me his dispensation for what I have been doing.’
Mirek had great difficulty finding the words. In one way he wanted everything out in the open. In another way he was frightened of the effect it would have on her.
Tentatively he said, ‘Ania, I promise you that the Pope is totally unaware. It is . . . or was, a group of three. Cardinal Mennini, before he died, Archbishop Versano . . . and the Bacon Priest. They called themselves Nostra Trinita and they called me the “Papa’s envoy”.’
In The Name of The Father Page 31