Phantom ah-7

by Ted Bell

  I’m walking straight into a bloody trap, the voice in his head warned for the hundredth time, seduced by false hopes. I’m willfully entering a wholly hostile environment alone, dressed in a bloody bear suit and carrying a bloody popgun.

  Insanity!

  The train screeched to a stop, the passenger door slid aside, and a blast of icy particles stung his face like so many chips of diamonds. Enormous white billowing clouds were spilling from beneath the cars as he stepped down onto the deserted, snow-crusted platform. The new mantle of eggshell snow was already turning mushy in the strong winter sunlight. He quickly cast his eyes right then left. The platform, mercifully, appeared empty.

  No one was waiting for him, not this time. No beautiful Russian tsarina. Not even some grey-faced KGB goon squad waiting to simply gun him down right here at the steps. Alex Hawke, apparently not dead on arrival. He shrugged, finally admitting what had been the most likely scenario hiding in the back of his mind: that he would step off this train and into a hail of bullets.

  The trip was off to a good start. He had not really expected to leave this train depot alive. He smiled at his good fortune and started for the stationmaster’s office. He had not even noticed two large men in heavy black overcoats who’d stepped down from a first-class car near the locomotive of the train once his back was turned.

  After the stuffy, foul-smelling compartment, the icy air was bracing and, feeling cautiously optimistic, he made his way toward the station house, glancing at the elderly stationmaster through the ice-glazed window, the same man Anastasia had once introduced him to as her trusted friend. He paused at the door, the snow piled up against it like dirty sherbet.

  “Good morning,” Hawke said in Russian, stamping his boots to rid them of snow. Then, since his Russian was so embarrassingly poor, he asked the white-bearded stationmaster if they might speak in English.

  “Da, da, da,” the wizened old man said, staring up at him, this towering alien from another planet. He squinted through his gold pince-nez glasses and smiled, recognizing Hawke as the man the famous Anastasia Korsakova had journeyed by troika to meet here many years ago. “I’ve been expecting you, sir. I am Nikolai. Remember?”

  “Yes, yes, of course,” Hawke said. “The good Dr. Halter told me he paid you a visit sometime last month. He said you would have a name for me. Someone who might be of assistance in my travels.” Hawke extracted an envelope containing five thousand rubles and passed it to the old fellow. “I believe this is for you.”

  “I do, I do,” the old white-bearded man said, smiling as he quickly slipped the payment under a stained ink blotter. “His name is Grigory Ivanovich. A farmer. He lives in this village. His house is nearby, the only one with a red roof. You cannot miss it. Are you hungry? His wife, Rica, is a very good cook. Goulash. She’s Hungarian, you see.”

  “I am hungry. Well. Thank you for all your help. Spasibo.”

  “Spasibo,” the man grunted, not looking up, too busy counting his fistful of rubles.

  Hawke found the farmhouse but not without some difficulty. The tiny houses that composed the village, slumped against each other shoulder to shoulder, were all smothered in two or three feet of fresh snow and he had to clear away portions of a number of rooftops jutting out into the muddy road. Nearing the end of the short road, he found a red one. He rapped on the weathered wooden door. There came a happy exclamation in Russian from within. And also a wonderful aroma of stewed beef that stirred his latent hunger.

  A n hour later, a renewed Alex Hawke found himself with a full stomach, some black bread, a full liter of good country vodka with a cork stopper to keep the cold at bay, and a good horse beneath him, a great bay mare. He spurred her onward through the snow, anxious to arrive at the KGB facility before nightfall. His plan was to surveil it carefully before deciding on his approach.

  Indian country, he thought to himself, looking around at the vast forests and plains. It had begun to snow again, heavily. Great feathery flakes brushed his cheeks with the weight of dust. Old Petra plowed ahead through the heavy snow, jets of steam puffing from her nostrils.

  For better or worse, he was fully committed now.

  Three

  When he finally emerged from the forest, he saw that the snow and wind had heightened in intensity, and ice crystals stung his face and hands. He looked up, squinting through the foggy snow at a barrage of bright klieg lights lighting up the sky, now faintly visible in the distance. He could see the lake and the massive palace rising along its shores. The compound was maybe a mile distant and since he’d gotten this far without being shot at, he was slowly gaining confidence that getting off Petra and approaching alone and on foot had been a good strategy.

  His leg muscles afire, he marched on, planting one boot in front of the other for what seemed a hellish eternity. Another mile took him an hour to complete and brought him to the river. The river made no sound; it was running too fast and smooth. He sat down on a log to smoke a cigarette. Maybe it would stave off his hunger.

  Rested, he flicked the cigarette away and got to his feet to ford the river. The swiftly flowing water was knee-deep and frigid, but not too wide. Climbing the bank on the far side, he saw that the principal road leading into the KGB compound had been recently plowed. There were tank-tread tracks in both directions, the new Russian T-95 judging by the depth and width of the tread dimensions. He gratefully walked the last few hundred yards or so with ease, steadily marching toward the waiting and watchful sentries near the main gate, wondering if he’d hear a shot ring out.

  Russian Army soldiers standing in small groups were smoking and eyeing the intruder. Behind them, he could now make out a massive wall of steel and concertina wire some thirty feet high. Every fifty yards along the perimeter, a watchtower stood atop the wall, a slowly revolving searchlight mounted on each rooftop.

  Two guards were visible behind the windows at each tower, both armed with automatic weapons. This new enclosure surely encircled much of the vast acreage of the old palace grounds. What had once been a dreamlike vision fit for a tsar, this majestic architectural masterpiece, given to the Korsakov family by Peter the Great, now had a new sinister aspect that was quite unsettling.

  Six gate sentries appeared out of the mist, marching in loose formation, all with automatic weapons leveled at him. He pulled off his snow-encrusted sable hat and raised his arms into the air. He was smiling as a heavyset Russian Army officer, a captain, approached him, pulling his massive sidearm from the leather holster inside his full-length fur coat. Holding the gun loosely at his side, the man began shouting in Russian as he neared. Over the years Hawke had picked up enough native lingo to know the man was threatening to shoot him on the spot.

  “I mean no harm,” Hawke said in halting Russian, “but I am armed.” It was the sentence he’d decided upon some time ago, riding his steed through the wood. Now he’d find out how smart he really was.

  He planted his boots in the snow, kept both hands reaching for the sky, and waited. The captain quickly summoned five more guards who completely surrounded the intruder. Only then did the officer have Hawke open his heavy coat and allow the captain to reach inside and remove his weapon. The smell of vodka on the grizzled old soldier’s breath was powerful. He had a square face, a prominent chin, stubble on his head, and slits for eyes.

  He growled, “Speak English; your Russian is shit.”

  “Delighted. May I present my papers?”

  The man nodded. Slowly, Hawke withdrew his most current version of proper identification, impeccable documents courtesy of the lads in Cryptology at Six. Once the soldier had the intruder’s weapon and had hastily inspected his papers, he whipped out a small handheld radio and keyed the transmit button.

  “Intruder at the gate, sir,” he said to some higher-up, while another soldier patted Hawke down thoroughly, finding nothing.

  Hawke heard a loud and angry shout through the tinny speaker of the captain’s radio. The officer’s displeasure was understandable. Intr
uders were probably quite infrequent out here. The captain held the radio away from his ear, frowning at the tirade issuing forth. He scowled at Hawke, the man who had appeared without warning to completely ruin his evening.

  And then the captain said, “I’ve no idea how he got here-hold on.” Then, covering the mouthpiece and scowling at the Englishman, the burly officer said to Hawke, “How the fuck did you get here? You look like a goddamn frozen bear.” Hawke, shivering uncontrollably with cold and swiping at the icicles on his face, mumbled an answer in his pidgin Russian, before he remembered the captain’s request to speak English.

  “I w-walked.”

  “He walked. You walked?” He looked up and down at Hawke, who nodded his head in the affirmative. Speaking again into the radio, the captain said, “You heard right, Colonel Spasky. He says he walked. I have no goddamn idea, sir. Da, da, I know it’s impossible. What can I say? He’s got a United Kingdom passport. His name? Alexander Hawke, Hawke Industries, London.”

  “Chairman and CEO,” Hawke said helpfully, adding a smile. “Tell your superior officer I’m here to see General Kuragin, will you? I’m not expected, you understand, I was just passing through. In the neighborhood, as it were. Decided to pop in.”

  The captain looked at him with an incredulous snort and spat bloody phlegm in the snow before once more raising the radio to speak. “So? Now what, Colonel? Shoot him?”

  “Better not shoot me, Captain,” Hawke said. “The general might shoot you. The great Kuragin and I are old friends, you see. Tight. White on rice. Thicker than thieves, closer than two coats of-”

  Hawke, seeing the drunken captain’s eyes shift and flick, sensed sudden, aggressive movement behind him. Before he could whirl to confront his attacker, he was struck full force in the back of the head with a rifle butt. He sank to his knees in the snow and pitched forward facedown, unmoving. The captain spat again and kicked Hawke in the ribs with his heavy boot, smiling at the satisfying crack.

  “Take this crazy bastard down to the cells,” the captain said, stomping off toward the cozy warmth of the well-lit guardhouse at the gate, still shaking his head in wonder at the ridiculous Englishman who claimed to have walked across Siberia and strolled right up to the most heavily guarded KGB installation in all of Russia. With a smile on his face!

  Four

  “Good morning to you, too,” Hawke said through gritted teeth. The Russian guard had poked him in the right rib cage with the muzzle of his rifle. Hawke was already grimacing at the sharp stab in his left side. Couple of ribs broken for sure. Damned nuisance, this Russian penchant for cruelty. There was absolutely no heat in his cell and he could see his breath, great plumes of it that hung in the air.

  “Move!” the Russian shouted.

  Hawke rolled his long legs over the metal frame of the cot and got painfully to his feet. He appeared to have dropped off to sleep in his fur coat, which had no doubt saved him from freezing to death down here in the dungeon. “Time for breakfast, is it, then? Splendid. I’m famished.” The guard stepped to one side so Hawke could exit the dimly lit cell. Noticing his dungeon quarters for the first time, Hawke thought they must have been constructed in the late seventeenth century.

  There was a low, narrow corridor with a steep set of stone steps leading upward. A prod in the middle of the back told Hawke that was where he was headed. He started climbing, clearly not quickly enough to suit the giant because he kept getting sharp prods from the man’s rifle.

  At the top of the stairs he came to another long corridor, this one brightly lit and finished in tiles of pea green. Hideous, but at least it was heated. “Move!” his jailer said, as if he actually needed more encouragement.

  They passed any number of closed doors with tiny windows at eye level. Interrogation Centrale. The last one on the left was open. Inside was a plain wooden table with a battered pair of matching wooden chairs on either side. One wall contained a mirror that probably came in handy for prisoners wishing to tidy up after a long interrogation. Either that, or there was someone on the other side paying very close attention.

  Hawke was shoved into the chair facing the phony mirror and the burly chap in a cheap dark suit across the table. His giant escort now stepped behind him and rested a black leather truncheon on his right shoulder. Most reassuring. A conversational icebreaker.

  “Well, this is cozy,” Hawke said to the cheap suit for openers. “I must get the name of your decorator.”

  “Hands flat on the table, stretched out in front of you and keep them there,” the interrogator grunted. Hawke, an old hand at this sort of thing, did as he was told.

  “Your name?” the man said, his pencil poised above a pad. He leaned forward and put his nose ten inches from Hawke’s face, a hoary technique, but an effective one.

  “Hawke. Alex Hawke,” he replied with a grin, giving it his best Sean Connery spin.

  “You are an English spy.”

  “Hardly. I’m rather well known as the Playboy of the Western World.”

  “How did you get to this location?”

  “Train, actually. Then, a mare. Then, shank’s mare.” The sadistic giant slammed the lead-weighted truncheon viciously into Hawke’s exposed and broken ribs.

  He did not cry out as expected. Nor did he remove his hands from the table. He’d been held captive in an Iraqi prison, subjected to unspeakably brutal torture every day and night for an eternity. Starvation, hallucinogens, electroshock, the works. It would take a lot more than a couple of broken ribs and the giant’s nasty little truncheon to get any reaction out of him. A whole lot more.

  “This is a maximum-security Russian military facility. Why have you come here?”

  “I came here to speak privately with General Kuragin.”

  “I want the truth,” the man screamed, and Hawke again felt the sharp explosion of pain in his side. He smiled patiently at his torturer. The smile was a very effective little trick he’d learned in the desert outside Baghdad. It increased severity but decreased duration. Eventually, they got bored with you and moved on to more entertaining victims. That trick was the only reason he’d survived long enough to escape.

  Hawke said, “That is the truth, you stupid dolt. I’m here to see General Nikolai Kuragin.”

  “What makes you think such a person exists?”

  “I’ve met him. In person.”

  “You’ve met him. And where did you meet him?”

  “We took tea together once. At the Savoy Grill in London as I recall.” This earned him a blow to the side of his head. He saw stars for a moment but managed to shake it off and give the man an even warmer smile. Anger and frustration blazed in his interrogator’s eyes. A pushover, Hawke thought, gratefully. He could be out of here inside of an hour.

  “What makes you think that this person, if he exists, can be found here?” the KGB man snarled. He had produced a small hammer and brought it down on each of the five fingers of Hawke’s left hand. Hawk flinched involuntarily but gave away nothing with his eyes.

  “I was told that he lived here.”

  “Told? Told by whom?”

  “By a little bird, actually.”

  “A little what?”

  “Bird. You know. Wings? Flapping like mad?”

  There was a sudden crackle of static from a hidden speaker, and then Hawke heard a familiar voice fill the room.

  “It wasn’t a nightingale that sang by any chance?” the disembodied voice said with a chuckle. “In Berkeley Square?”

  Hawke immediately recognized the laugh. The interrogator turned and stared at the “mirror,” completely baffled at this interruption coming from someone behind it. And that someone was General Nikolai Kuragin.

  “Yes,” Hawke replied cheerfully. “And the moon that lingered over Londontown? Poor puzzled moon he wore a frown?”

  Laughter and then, “Good morning, Lord Alex Hawke.”

  “A very good morning to you, General Kuragin.”

  “Sorry about all this dreadful unpleasan
tness. And the rather uncouth reception you received from my gallant centurions at the gates. A little advance warning, perhaps?”

  “Ah. Should have done. Frightfully rude. It was a last-minute thing, actually.”

  The door swung open and Kuragin was standing there with a smile on his face. He’d not changed much. He was a skeletal figure of a man in his eighties, dressed in his customary sharply tailored black uniform. Made him look like a Nazi SS man, Hawke thought. He had sallow skin, almost yellow, and heavy-lidded deep-set eyes. “I’ve summoned a doctor down to take a look at those ribs. When he’s through with you, someone will escort you up to the library. It’s my office now. We’ll get you some breakfast served there. What would you like?”

  “I could eat a horse, but I’ll settle for caviar. And toast.”

  H alf an hour later, Hawke, his ribs taped up and Percocet or some other splendid painkiller flowing mercifully through his veins, found himself seated in the same beautifully appointed room where, three years earlier, he’d first met Anastasia’s father, the late Tsar of Russia.

  The high-ceilinged walnut-paneled library was filled with books, art, and military mementos from the last three centuries. A magnificent equestrian portrait of Peter the Great in battle hung above the mantel. A roaring fire lent the high-ceilinged room a cozy intimacy, and the two men sitting on either side of the cavernous stone hearth were speaking quietly.

  “Just out of curiosity, how long would you have let that interrogation go on?” Hawke asked Kuragin, a mildly curious expression on his face.

  “Until I found out what I wanted to know, of course. What else would you expect? Having you appear out of thin air like you did. I don’t get a lot of visitors out here as you can well imagine. And the ones who do come from Moscow arrive by helicopter, not on foot.”