No Survivors

by Tom Cain

  “You will do exactly what I order you to do, and I will tell you why.”

  She started flicking through the pages in the file.

  “You currently owe the Montagny-Dumas Clinic a sum of, let me see . . .”

  She found the page she was looking for. “Forty-seven thousand, seven hundred and thirty-two francs. That was the total at six o’clock this evening. It will be more by tomorrow morning, once they’ve added another night to the total.”

  Alix hissed, “You bitch.”

  “Come, now. Is that any way to speak to someone who is about to solve all your problems? If you agree to target Vermulen, we will arrange for payments to cover Mr. Carver’s medical bills for as long as he requires. Believe me, you will hardly notice the expense. Yuri was very appreciative of your services.”

  “What if I say no?”

  “Then you and your boyfriend will have to accept the consequences of killing my husband. The penalty for murder is death. Maybe you are ready to sacrifice yourself for your principles. But would you sacrifice your man as well?”

  “I need to talk to Samuel, to let him know what is happening.”

  “No,” snapped Zhukovskaya. “That will not be possible. You will spend the night here. Your flight to Washington, D.C., leaves at nine in the morning.”

  “But . . .” Alix began to speak, but was instantly silenced.

  “Do not argue. These are your orders. You remember orders, don’t you . . . Agent Petrova?”

  Alix lowered her eyes submissively.

  “Yes, Madam Deputy Director. May I ask how I am supposed to approach General Vermulen?”

  “You will be hired as his personal assistant. Your cover, full legend, and job application have already been prepared. By Wednesday, you must be ready for your job interview. You will have excellent references. There are still many powerful men who know that it is in their interest to help us.”

  “As ever, you have thought of every detail,” said Alix. “But there is one thing I do not understand. How do you know that Vermulen needs a new assistant?”

  “That is being dealt with. . . .”

  Zhukovskaya consulted her watch.

  “Correction. It has just been dealt with.”

  MARCH

  28

  Ten minutes on the treadmill and already Carver was exhausted. Dr. Geisel was sympathetic, too, which made it even worse.

  “Don’t worry—this is normal,” he said, standing beside the apparatus, as calm and immaculate as ever. “You have been sick for many months. You cannot expect to be fit right away. The main thing is, you are making great progress.”

  Carver just about managed to speak between gasps for breath.

  “How much longer before I’m ready to be discharged? I’ve got to find out what happened to her.”

  “I understand, Mr. Carver, but you must appreciate that you are a long way from being cured. When you were admitted, you had suffered a very serious psychological trauma, a rift cutting you off from your own identity. Normally, in a case such as this, I would expect an additional trauma, such as Miss Petrova’s departure, to have set you back, maybe worse than ever. And yet now, Mr. Carver, it is as if the shock has dislodged some kind of obstacle. The boulder has rolled away, the cave is open, your consciousness is free. Really, it is a kind of psychic resurrection.”

  “Well, if I’m so much better,” Carver wheezed, “why won’t you let me out?”

  “Because nothing in psychology is ever that simple. Yes, you are recovering your long-term memory, but chaotically, randomly, and traumatically. Your prognosis is still unclear. You might, indeed, continue this remarkable progress. But, equally likely, the shock of these recovered memories could push you back over the edge, even deeper than ever before.”

  “So when is it safe for me to leave?”

  “When the odds are not so equal. Now enjoy the rest of your work-out. I strongly recommend physical fitness as an aid to your mental recovery.”

  When Geisel had gone, Carver stepped off the treadmill. His thighs were quivering, his legs barely able to support him as he walked across to the weight machines. He managed forty pounds on the lat pull-down and sixty on the bench press, low reps and feeble weights on the leg extensions and curls, sit-ups in sets of six.

  Carver could now remember when he possessed the extreme levels of fitness required of an officer in the Special Boat Service. For him to be struggling with a routine like this was like a professional soccer player getting beaten in a kids’ scrimmage. But just to sweat, to feel the burn, and to keep driving himself onward, made him feel alive again.

  He accepted that his mind was still balanced on a knife edge between recovery and relapse, just as Geisel had warned. He had a feeling some of his mental doors would stay firmly locked for a while yet. But after the terrible nonexistence of the past few months, he refused to countenance the prospect of failure.

  “Come on,” he panted, stepping back onto the treadmill. “Go faster.”

  And so he ran, and the memory came to him of another time he had run, a dash down a street in Geneva, late one night. In his mind’s eye he saw a white van, painted with the logo of the Swisscom telephone company. He could not see the man at the wheel, but he knew who he was: Kursk, one of the Russians. Carver felt his stomach tighten with tension at the memory of that name. He knew, too, who had been in the back of that van. Alix had been Kursk’s prisoner. The Russian had driven her away. But Carver had gone after her, though he still could not recall precisely what had happened.

  He knew one thing, though. He’d got her back. How else could she have been sitting by his bedside for all those months?

  With his awakening had come a profound conviction of his love for her, and hers for him. Carver was certain that Alix would never willingly have left him without even saying good-bye. Wherever she had gone, it had not been her choice. He would not rest until he had found her and made her his again.

  One of the gymnasium staff was walking toward the treadmill, a look of concern on his face as he ran his eyes over Carver’s scarlet face, his heaving chest, and his pale-gray T-shirt, darkened with puddles of sweat under his armpits and down the small of his back.

  “Maybe you should stop now,” he said.

  “No,” said Carver. “I want to keep running.”

  Across town a man was steeling himself to make a difficult call. He was way over six feet tall and beanpole-thin. His milk-skinned, freckled face, illuminated by gentle blue eyes, was topped by a starburst of red-blond dreadlocks.

  Thor Larsson took a deep breath and started pressing the buttons. He waited a few moments until the clinic’s switchboard had answered and then said, “Monsieur Marchand’s office, please.”

  He paced up and down, waiting to be put through to the finance director.

  “It’s about Monsieur Carver’s account . . .” Larsson began. “Please, can you just give me another few days? I think I may be able to get some money. Maybe not all the bill, but a lot of it, I assure you.”

  To his amazement, the voice on the other end of the line was reassuring, almost obsequious.

  “Monsieur, please, do not derange yourself,” said Marchand. “There is no need to be concerned. Monsieur Carver’s account has been settled in full and instructions have been left for any future expenses. He is welcome to stay as long as he likes.”

  “What? When did that happen?” asked Larsson.

  “Pah! Let me see . . . it must have been two days ago, I suppose.”

  “Who is paying the bill, then?”

  “I am sorry, monsieur, that I cannot say. We have simply received instructions to pass any outstanding invoices to a lawyer acting on behalf of a client. Who that client might be, well . . . this is Switzerland, monsieur. We respect people’s privacy here.”

  29

  The moment she walked into his office, Kurt Vermulen knew that Natalia Morley would be his new assistant. He’d already been impressed enough by her résumé. She was thirty years old
, born in Russia, but carried a Canadian passport, thanks to her marriage (now dissolved) to an investment banker, Steve Morley. They’d met in Moscow, where they both worked for a Swiss investment bank—she was his boss’s assistant and she’d taken another high-level P.A. job when Morley had been posted to the bank’s head office in Geneva. They’d moved again to the States, where the marriage had broken up. Now she was looking to start a new life on her own. It didn’t look as if she would have too much trouble doing that. Her letters of recommendation were outstanding, and when he called the men listed as her references, they all sang her praises. Then he saw her, and he understood why.

  Natalia Morley was a head-turning, jaw-dropping beauty. Over the past few weeks, Vermulen had been on a couple of pleasant, but unexceptional dates with Megan, the lawyer he’d met that night at the Italian restaurant in Georgetown. Megan was a fine-looking woman. Natalia was in a totally different league.

  Even so, looks will get you only so far. Kurt Vermulen had the same basic instincts as any other heterosexual male, but he was also an intelligent, thoughtful man. What really hooked him was a deeper quality, something that suggested vulnerability, and even sadness, as though life had wounded her in some way. It could have been the divorce, he guessed, although, in Vermulen’s experience, that was more likely to induce anger or even bitterness in a woman. All he knew was that he sensed a personal loss in Natalia Morley that echoed his own bereavement.

  At one point in their first meeting he even found himself talking about Amy and her death. It was, he realized, an inappropriate subject for a job interview. But it happened so naturally, and Natalia was so gracious in her response, that he found himself wanting her to be in his life. The job offer was really just a means, even an excuse, to have her near him. She’d started the following Monday.

  Since then, her work had been impeccable. His appointments, correspondence, and travel arrangements were organized with flawless efficiency. The brutal murder of a general’s secretary, right in the heart of the capital, had attracted a fair amount of media attention, but Natalia had been adept at keeping even the most persistent reporters at bay. Knowing that there was no one at home to look after him, she saw to his dry cleaning, found contractors for his household chores and garden maintenance, and arranged for deliveries of fresh produce and deli items from the D.C. branch of Dean & DeLuca to his townhouse near Dumbarton Oaks. The rest of the staff at Vermulen Strategic Consulting seemed to like her, too, including the other women. That struck Vermulen as quite an achievement. He’d have expected them to resent her looks and her closeness to their boss.

  Then again, she’d never got that close. Natalia Morley was perfectly friendly. She laughed at his jokes, listened to his problems, and charmed any client who set foot in the office. If she ever had a bad mood, Vermulen never saw it. But neither did he see any evidence that she was as interested in him as he was in her. Her manner was always entirely proper. She didn’t flirt with him at all, and while her elegant clothes could not help but show off her figure, her skirts were knee-length and her blouses demure. If anything was going to happen, he would have to make the first move.

  Meanwhile, he still had a business to run and, most important of all, a false-flag operation to organize. Vermulen had persuaded himself that if he was right about the threat from Islamist terrorism, then it would be inexcusable to sit back and do nothing. Even if his actions were questionable, they were better than the alternative.

  His plans were beginning to form now. He was going to take a couple of months off from the business. If anyone asked, he’d tell them he was taking a break by traveling around Europe, combining a spell of R & R with the opportunity to make new contacts. He would not mention, however, that the contacts were those required to procure a nuclear bomb. His itinerary would take him to Amsterdam, Vienna, Venice, and Rome, to start with. After that, he’d see how things panned out. Natalia could book him transportation and hotels as he needed them.

  And then a thought struck him. If he was in Europe and she was back in D.C. it would always be tricky keeping in touch and ensuring that everything ran smoothly. It would really be much more efficient if she was with him, right there on the spot, looking after him day to day. Obviously he couldn’t tell her who the people he was meeting really were, and he’d have to send her home well before the final phase of the operation. In the meantime, though, they’d be thrown together in some of the world’s most romantic cities. If nothing happened then, it never would.

  Vermulen could simply have ordered Natalia to accompany him, but that wasn’t the best way to go if he wanted her to feel good about him. He’d be asking her to spend several weeks away from home, on call 24/7, with only him for company. If she didn’t want to do that voluntarily, he wasn’t going to gain anything by forcing her.

  When he asked her to come into his office, his heart was pounding. He felt like a nervous kid summoning up the courage to ask for a prom-night date.

  As always, Natalia looked poised and imperturbable as she awaited his instructions.

  Vermulen reminded himself that he was a decorated combat veteran who had faced enemy fire on three separate continents and had commanded thousands of fighting men. How tough could it be to face one beautiful woman?

  “As you know,” he said, adopting what he hoped was a relaxed but businesslike air, “I will be spending some time in Europe this spring. I need a break, need to get away—it’s been a tough few years.”

  “Of course,” she said. “I quite understand.”

  “Good . . . good . . . Anyway, as you know, I will be doing some business while I’m away, taking meetings and so forth, so there’ll be a fair amount of administration required, which would best be handled on the spot. I was wondering, therefore, whether you would be willing to accompany me on the trip. It would be in a purely professional capacity, of course, and I would compensate you financially for the loss of weekends and free time while you were away. Does that sound, ah . . . agreeable to you?”

  She looked at him for a moment, frowning slightly.

  “Do you want me to arrange separate tickets for myself, coach class?”

  “Oh, no, that wouldn’t be right. You can travel first class, like me.”

  She seemed surprised.

  “That’s very kind, sir, thank you. And accommodation?”

  “We’d stay at the same hotels. So, are you interested?”

  She thought for a second.

  “I will have to change some personal arrangements. And I would need to arrange for someone to cover for me here while I am away. But that should be possible, so, yes, I would be happy to travel with you, sir.”

  “Outstanding,” said Kurt Vermulen.

  That evening, Alix Petrova met the FSB agent who was her Washington handler on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

  “The assignment is proceeding as planned,” she said. “Vermulen is clearly infatuated. He has asked me to go with him on a trip to Europe. He is telling everyone, including me, that he is taking an extended vacation, but I am certain that there is more to it than that.”

  She handed over a plain white envelope.

  “The itinerary for the first three weeks is in there, including flight numbers and hotels. It should not be difficult to arrange meetings and drops at any of the places we will be visiting.”

  “Excellent,” said her handler. “So, what is he like, this General Vermulen?”

  “If you want to know,” she replied, “he is a very fine man. I like him, which only makes me despise myself even more for what I am doing to him.”

  The handler raised an eyebrow.

  “I think I will leave that last observation out of my report to the deputy director.”

  “No,” said Alix, “please don’t. It will make her happy to think that I am suffering.”

  30

  A week later, Kurt Vermulen was in Amsterdam. He’d given the woman he knew as Natalia Morley the day off. Now he was standing on a piece of scrubland down by the
docks, where weeds grew between the boats pulled up onto the shore, and an old barge rusted in the water at the end of the plot. He was about to put a face to a name he’d known for a decade or more, an old Defense Intelligence Agency case file transformed into a live human being.

  A car turned off the road, drove past him, and pulled up about fifteen yards beyond. A thin man in a black suit, lank hair falling over the collar, emerged, smoking a cigarette. He threw the stub onto the damp, gravelly earth and crushed it with his heel, immediately lit another, then walked toward Vermulen. They didn’t bother to shake hands.

  “Jonny Koolhaas?” asked Vermulen.

  The man shrugged. He angled his head and blew a plume of smoke into the air, away from Vermulen, still looking at him from the corner of his eye.

  “So what do you want?”

  “A supplier of untraceable weapons and equipment, accessible at short notice. I’ll need pistols, submachine guns, grenades, plastique. Nothing fancy. Also vehicles. Untraceable, of course.”

  “And why would a respectable American officer want all that?”

  There was a glint of amusement in Koolhaas’s eye. It always pleased him to watch upright, law-abiding citizens having to trade in his criminal world.

  “Well, perhaps you will tell me when it is over,” he said, when Vermulen had not answered. “But yes, I can arrange for those goods to be available at any time.”

  “That’s good. Does your network cover Eastern Europe?”

  “I have associates in the East, yes.”

  “How about the former Yugoslavia?”

  Koolhaas stubbed out the cigarette.

  “Possibly, yes.”

  The following day, Vermulen transferred the first installment of Koolhaas’s payment to an account in the Dutch Antilles. Natalia Morley had accompanied him to the bank, where he made the transfer.

  He took her arm as they walked away.