How to Catch a Russian Spy

by Naveed Jamali

  “We can’t provide you with a script,” Ted said. “You have to be natural. You have to be in the moment, believe what you’re saying. If you don’t believe, why should he?” If Oleg was going to trust me, our interaction had to be real and fluid, like a genuine relationship. There are no teleprompters in espionage. “So the important question is ‘How do you think you would have gotten these materials?’ And don’t forget, it’s okay sometimes to leave it vague.”

  “Vague might work,” I agreed. “In the past, the Russians have never asked how I got the books. They just took the stuff we gave them and went away.”

  Increasingly, the agents had been making me feel like I was part of the conversation, that we were three smart people trying to dream up a sensible strategy and get our heads around a challenge. It definitely brought out the mentor in Ted. I kept asking him questions. I wouldn’t call him fatherly. We had too much of a smart-ass banter for that. But he seemed to like giving me advice.

  Were they working me? Were they flattering me? Or did they actually appreciate what I had to say? Let me put it this way: They made me believe we were on to something.

  * * *

  A few days later, Terry was on the phone again. This time he was calling me.

  “We got you what you wanted,” he said. “We put it all on one CD for you. You gotta see the PowerPoint transitions our guys used!”

  “Ugh, PowerPoint!” I said.

  I hated PowerPoint. I knew Terry was trying to appeal to my geeky side, but he’d chosen the wrong software to praise. In the hands of a boring speaker, PowerPoint squeezed the life from the very ideas it was supposed to enhance. Whatever the topic—replacing a toilet seat or invading Iraq—PowerPoint imposed its mind-numbing uniformity, turning even an interesting subject into an undifferentiated blob. The famous speech by Martin Luther King Jr. wasn’t “I Have a [pause/dissolve/new slide] Dream.” If I had to sit through another list of PowerPoint bullets, I might have to put one of them in my head.

  “Come on, Naveed,” Terry said. “You should look at it. There is some nice work in there.”

  “I guess that’s why they pay you the big bucks, dude,” I told him. The fancy graphics didn’t excite me. The fact that I had a CD did.

  It was pretty impressive what the agents had pulled together about that conference. A detailed agenda. An attendees list. Summaries of the panel discussions on “Actionable Intelligence on the Network and Airborne Networking Flight Test Results.” All the PowerPoints. Copies of slide decks. Even the notes from the speakers. So much was packed on that single CD, it was the next best thing to being there. Give the feds this much credit: When they got in gear, things moved.

  Ted never told me who the agents had spoken with or what explanation they gave. I’d tried every way I knew to get this information—or even a small part of it—with no results. I consoled myself with the thought that they had operated with a distinct advantage. Quasi-government research is significantly easier when the first words out of your mouth are “Hello, we’re calling from the FBI.”

  They got what I couldn’t, and I was very glad they did.

  * * *

  Oleg kept up his rapid-return rhythm. He was back in November. When I saw him trudging down the driveway to our building, I ran downstairs and cut him off before he ever reached the door.

  “Let’s take a ride,” I told him. “I have something for you.”

  We climbed into my gold 2005 Acura RL, the latest in a rapid succession of vehicles. We drove toward Cedar Avenue, the main drag in downtown Dobbs Ferry.

  “Here,” I said, handing him the FBI’s CD. “It’s got everything from the conference. “I mean everything, right down to slide decks and the speakers’ margin notes. Am I fuckin’ amazing or what?”

  Oleg didn’t answer that. Actually, I’m glad he didn’t. But he said thank you, and he seemed to mean it. And he handed me a white legal-sized envelope stuffed with American cash. “Will a thousand dollars be okay?” he asked me.

  “Ten would be better,” I told him, “but a thousand will get us started.” I immediately thought I’d accepted too little. “This is not indicative of the cost going forward,” I emphasized, “but it’s a fine place to begin.”

  Oleg didn’t press me on how I got the conference proceedings. I never got a chance to trot out my helpful-friend cover story, which was extremely lucky. It couldn’t have withstood thirty seconds of follow-up. Who was this friend? What was his motivation? How much did you pay him? Will he help us again? Can I meet him? “It was a little bit of work” was all I said to Oleg. Mainly, he seemed pleased that I’d been able to get what he’d asked for. He turned his attention to my parking skills.

  “That is a very small spot,” he said as I pulled the Acura in front of a bagel shop on Cedar Avenue. “I don’t believe you could park there.”

  “Oh, yeah? Just watch,” I said.

  Why did I feel so competitive with Oleg? And why would that competitiveness assert itself over a suburban parking spot? All I know is that as I put the car in reverse and eased my foot against the accelerator, a little voice in my head was whispering about American honor. And as I cut the wheel hard to the right, I could have been Sylvester Stallone pounding Dolph Lundgren in the fifteenth round of Rocky IV.

  The Acura had very delicate handling and back-up sensors, which I’m not sure Oleg had ever heard before. I don’t want to say I needed the beeps to get into that parking place on Cedar Avenue. I was always a pretty good parallel parker on my own. But I did cut the wheel at the extra perfect moment, and the sensors didn’t hurt. I glided the Acura snugly into the tiny spot. Cue James Brown’s “Living in America.”

  “Very good,” Oleg said.

  We didn’t stay long at the bagel shop, just long enough to grab coffee and have a short chat. We hadn’t begun to bond. But I wanted to get him used to the idea of leaving the office with me. And I wanted to float the idea that things could be changing between us soon.

  “My parents are ready to retire,” I said. “I’m trying to find new revenue streams. Selling paper has a limited shelf life, I think.” Oleg looked intrigued. I couldn’t tell if he understood what I was saying or was afraid to admit that he couldn’t. He didn’t seem to like showing weakness of any sort. “Perhaps this creates an opportunity for you and me?” I asked.

  He perked up at that. “Yes,” he said. “I am interested in opportunities.”

  What the fuck? I thought. Who isn’t interested in opportunities? It was time to test the waters. “Perhaps there are some things I could do for you?” I suggested.

  He smiled. “Naveed,” he said, “I am so glad we were able to leave and get coffee. It is a good way to discuss business, drinking coffee.” He raised his paper cup as if toasting with a crystal glass of chilled Russian vodka. “Now, tell me, how would you like to do business?”

  Uh-oh. It hit me that I hadn’t thought this through. I’d violated the rule that every baby lawyer learns, hopefully before walking into a courtroom for the first time: Never ask a question you don’t already know the answer to. Now that I’d opened the door, I had no choice but to walk through it.

  “My goal,” I told him, expanding on what I’d said earlier, “is to switch from ink on paper to more technology projects. I’d really like to change the direction of the business a little bit. We are working on some different projects for the navy and other parts of the government, mostly with military data. There is a lot of opportunity there for you and me. I am convinced of that.”

  “Very interesting,” Oleg said. “That could be very interesting.”

  “We also have some library-related projects,” I said. “Do you think you can help me find a librarian in Russia I can speak to?”

  He didn’t come up with a name for me, but he didn’t seem perturbed by the question, and he didn’t shut me off. “I will think about that,” he said. “So do you like
working in this business? Is this your—how do you say it?—your profession?”

  “Well,” I said, taking a breath before I tried to explain how I’d gotten drawn into technology. Out of the corner of my eye, I thought I saw somebody watching me. I vaguely recognized the older gentleman as someone I knew through my father. I tried not to make eye contact with him, knowing he would invite himself over. But it was too late. With a smile and a wave, he was making his way toward us.

  “Naveed, right?” he said. “Naseem’s son? How is your father? How’s business? I thought you were in Boston!”

  “Things are really great,” I said. “You should give him a call.”

  I didn’t introduce the man to Oleg, and Oleg didn’t say anything at all, but I could tell he was paying attention. He was leaning forward without actually leaning forward. He seemed to enjoy my flustered expression.

  “I’m sorry,” I told the man. “I’m just in the middle of some business right now. Let’s catch up later.” I gave him my card and all but told him to leave. He looked at the card, realized he had interrupted something, and backed away.

  “I’m so sorry,” I said to Oleg after the man had left. “This is the difficulty with small towns—they’re small.”

  Oleg waved away my concern like he would a tiny mosquito. But he seemed to have lost interest in continuing our conversation. He was out of his seat before I could finish my sentence, pulling his jacket on.

  I already knew that this was a crucial day in my growing relationship with Oleg. The lead-up hadn’t been easy, but the rewards were going to be great. I’m not sure what would have happened if the FBI hadn’t gotten the conference proceedings. I’m just glad they did. Message delivered. Thank you very much.

  I knew from the beginning that if Oleg and I were ever going to commit espionage together, our interaction would have to change. He’d need to become more than a customer to me, and I’d have to become more than a vendor to him. We’d have to get out of the office. The subtleties would have to end. I’d have to betray my own country, and he would have to ask me to.

  The agents and I had dangled the bait that Oleg found enticing, and he had bitten.

  * * *

  A few days later, I met with Ted and Terry. They told me to bring the white envelope Oleg had given me. I was glad to hand it over, along with the thousand dollars. For as long as the Russians had been ordering books and paying us—always a little more than the invoice—any extra money we got from them just went back into the company.

  But the dollars were growing, and I knew I couldn’t just pocket the money. This was more than simply ordering books. I didn’t know the right way to handle it. So I asked Ted and Terry.

  “You can’t take money from the Russians,” Ted told me. “Give it to us. We’ll voucher it. You’ll sign a receipt. We’ll give you the same amount of money back.”

  So that was what we did. It was all very official. Terry handed me the receipt to sign. “What if I don’t want to sign this?” I asked him.

  “Then we can’t give you the money.”

  That seemed fair enough to me. I hadn’t gotten into this for the money. Given all the time it was taking, I’d have been better off putting an ad on Craigslist for babysitting work. But I was incurring expenses. Our growing operation was taking time away from my regular work. I couldn’t have Books & Research financing the counter­intelligence efforts of the United States. And Ted and Terry seemed to like the idea that, in a roundabout way, the Russians were paying me to double-cross them. I liked that, too.

  “I’ll sign,” I told Terry.

  CHAPTER 10

  * * *

  OUT AND ABOUT

  “Oleg!” I snapped when he showed up again the week after Thanksgiving. “You can’t keep coming here randomly every time you feel like it. This doesn’t work for me.”

  I hustled him out to the parking lot even before he’d had a chance to snag a single free book. We stood next to the Acura and spoke for a few minutes. “From now on,” I said to him as firmly as I could, “we have to start meeting someplace different. Do you hear me?”

  With the CD, I knew we had crossed some kind of threshold, Oleg and I, even if I wasn’t certain what was on the other side. He had asked for something difficult, and I had delivered it to him with the help of the FBI. He had paid with a crisp stack of U.S. dollars. This double-agent business wasn’t easy, I could see that already. But I was starting to think I might have some talent for it.

  Though that delivery was going to seal my credibility with the Russians, some loose ends needed to be tied down. The most pressing item on my agenda was getting Oleg out of the office for good. There was no way he and I could talk there. Every time he showed up was another potential disaster. He never came and went discreetly. Even if he stayed for only fifteen minutes, it felt like he was lurking around. His visits were an obvious focus of curiosity and suspicion for the other employees. They couldn’t help wondering about the weird Russian guy and his coat-pocket garbage bags. And each time Oleg left, I had to go through a routine to avoid their questions: I would busy myself with phone calls that couldn’t be interrupted or meetings that couldn’t be disturbed, hoping that by the time I came up for air, attention would have shifted elsewhere.

  There was no need for Oleg to keep popping in like this, especially with his appearances being so frequent. I wasn’t just his vendor anymore. The relationship had already moved beyond what it had been in my parents’ day, a box the New York Russians could check off regularly and report to their minders back in Moscow. I needed to find a way to separate the book business from the spy business.

  The Books & Research part of my relationship with the Russian Mission was still part of the equation. Acquiring information, even open-source information in an open society, had genuine value to them. The kinds of reports, articles, and books the Russians wanted might be available, but that didn’t mean America’s longtime enemy had easy access. Almost everywhere the Russian diplomats went, their trench coats, accents, and documents were sure to raise eyebrows and suspicions. Why do you want this? people would ask. Is it legal? Will I get in trouble if I give it to you? Isn’t your country the enemy of my country? Why should I help you? Even when there were no legal prohibitions, our nations had a history that made getting these items maddeningly difficult. Where else were the Russians going to go? This stuff wasn’t stocked at Barnes & Noble. Mail orders left paper trails that could lead to questions of intent. These topics were too technical, too narrow, too arcane for general distribution. And even if no one ever asked directly about their true objectives, my assumption was that the Russians had a near-obsessive desire to operate as discreetly as they could. It was clear they didn’t want the FBI or any other U.S. government entities knowing what they sought. With our experience and contacts, my family’s company was able to get this stuff easily without raising concerns. There were no forms to fill out. No purchase orders in triplicate. And we were based in New York. That allowed Oleg and his predecessors to make in-person visits to a private office. They never stayed very long. They didn’t even like to sit down. Our company offered the diplomats of the Russian Mission an agreeable alternative to the things they most wanted to avoid.

  Now things were shifting and growing more complicated. While dealing with my parents had been safe and convenient, I wasn’t just a sporadic asset. I had become someone they were working regularly with—and valued, I hoped.

  The decades of business-as-usual civility shifted noticeably when I got grumpy with Oleg that morning in early December. But he was surprisingly agreeable to my change-of-venue demand. Maybe he didn’t like visiting the office any more than I liked hosting him.

  Almost immediately, the benefits of being out of the office were made clear. We were able to talk without fear of being overheard. He asked for my cell phone number. I gave it to him. He offered me an email address, a generic Yahoo! account. I wr
ote it down but told him I probably wouldn’t be using it. “When things go over email, there is always a record,” I said.

  “At least you will have it,” he said. I think he liked my caution, though.

  It was chilly in the parking lot that morning. A sharp breeze was blowing in from the river. But our conversation felt comfortable and natural. And then Oleg came back to the reason we were freezing outside.

  “I have thought about what you were saying,” he told me. “After today, we will meet in different places. If I order books, you will bring them when we meet. I will not come here anymore. Our relationship is changing.”

  Damn, that was easy!

  “I must be away for the holiday,” Oleg continued. “But we will have many things to discuss when I return. The next time we meet, will it be okay if we meet in a restaurant?” He went into his pocket and pulled out a business card. “Do you know where this is?”

  “Uno Pizzeria & Grill,” the card said. “Original Chicago Deep Dish Pizza.” The address was on Central Avenue in Yonkers, on the main suburban-sprawl drag through this part of Westchester County.

  We were going to Pizzeria Uno? Was this really where treason was committed these days?

  “That will be just fine,” I told him.

  “I will call you on your phone when I return,” he said.

  “And if something happens and I’m busy and can’t meet you, how will I contact you?”

  I worried for a minute that I was asking too many questions, but Oleg didn’t seem to mind. “It will be fine,” he said. “I will wait and if you do not come, I will leave. I will call you. We will meet another time.”

  I have to say I was a little disappointed by Oleg’s choice of restaurant. I imagined us whispering at a back table in Manhattan’s glamorously ostentatious Russian Tea Room or conspiring over late-night Iordanov shots at a sleek vodka bar on the far West Side. Pizzeria Uno? Not even close. Instead of a perfect-30 Zagat rating, I was getting a pizza chain with an “ample parking, ample portions” Yelp review. Instead of blinis with sour cream and caviar, I was headed for prima pepperoni and cheese stix. I wasn’t really sure why he chose the pizza chain. Maybe that was all his Russian Mission stingy expense account could cover. And if Pizzeria Uno was Oleg’s idea of fine American dining, that was where we’d go. I was just happy he wouldn’t be coming to the office anymore.