by Ted Bell
“And what exactly did you want to know?”
“Your intentions. Whether or not you came here with the malicious intent to do me harm.”
“Of course not. Like it or not, we are still partners in crime, Nikolai. You, Halter, and I conspired to take down an entire government, lest you forget. You received a not insubstantial sum from my government to part with a code to the Tsar’s Zeta machine. A secret, believe me, that will follow me to the grave. But what gave my true motives away?”
“Alex, when you have worked in Lubyanka Prison, witnessed countless thousands of interrogations over a half century, you can determine whatever it is you wish to know in a remarkably short time. Lengthy torture is merely a function of stupidity coupled with sadism.”
“Yes, I suppose that’s true,” Hawke said, and gazed into the fire. Now that he was here, inside the palace walls and safe, he found he was at an utter loss as to how to begin to address the real reason for his visit.
“You took an enormous risk returning to Russia,” the general said a few moments later. He was sipping from a tiny crystal glass of vodka, using his right hand. Where his left hand should have been was an empty sleeve, sewn to his uniform in the manner of the one-armed Lord Nelson. In order to avert suspicion from his role in helping Hawke bring down the Tsar, Kuragin had lopped off his own left hand with a butcher’s cleaver in Hawke’s presence. It was an act of bravery Hawke would never forget.
“Really? Risky?” Hawke said, feigning surprise. “Why?”
“Because there are a great many old soldiers in the Kremlin who were fiercely loyal to the late Tsar. They know you killed him. They are called the Tsarist Society. And they want nothing more than to see you dead.”
“Amazing I’m still alive, then.”
“You have friends in high places in Russia, Lord Hawke. Otherwise, you’d no longer be with us, I’m afraid. You remember the beautiful young Russian tourist who was killed when her motorbike accidentally drove off a bridge in Bermuda? About six months ago?”
“Read about it in the local newspaper, yes.”
“She was a paid assassin, sent to the island to seduce and then murder you. One of our officers tracked her there and made sure she was unsuccessful at both.”
“I have you to thank for my skin, then?”
“To some extent. But the truth of it is, you owe your life to the prime minister.”
“Putin? Really? But why?”
“Surely you know why. You killed the Tsar, the man who deposed him and threw him into a hellhole, that horrid prison, Energetika. Left him there to rot. Had you not blown the Tsar and his airship out of the sky, Putin would have soon found himself sitting naked atop one of those sharp sticks, impaled. Thanks to you, he now sits atop a newly resurgent Russia and a massive personal fortune. He divides his time between his office at the Kremlin and sailing the world aboard his new megayacht, Red Star, with his best friend, former Italian prime minister Berlusconi.”
“ Red Star belongs to Putin? I was under the impression she belonged to Khodorkovsky, the big oilman. That’s what all the glossy yachting magazines say.”
“It’s only what people think. An impression we wish to convey. She belongs to the prime minister, I assure you.”
“We spent some time together, you know, in that bloody prison, Energetika. Down in his cell. Drinking vodka and smoking cigarettes.”
“I do know about that. The prime minister has fond memories of you. He finds you good company. As a former intelligence officer himself, Putin has long admired your brilliant career at MI6 from afar, as I’m sure he told you. Since you’re here, I will tell you a little secret. He has mentioned to me on more than one occasion that he would very much like to have a very private conversation with you.”
“About what?”
“About your helping him build a new Russia.”
“Come over to your side? You must be joking! I’ve got enough problems taking care of my own side.”
“Alex, listen carefully to me. Times have changed dramatically. The Communist Party, at least in my country, thank God, is dead and buried. And our two nations face common enemies in this young century: a rising China, obviously, that insane asylum North Korea, and radical Islam all over the world. Russia has historically been geographically schizophrenic, torn between the East and the West. Putin, and those closest to him, possess a yearning to shift toward Europe and the West. They would never admit this publicly, of course, but it’s true. Their sensitivities gravitate toward Berlin and Paris, to the great capitals of the West, not to Communist dictatorships in Beijing or Pyongyang. And let’s not forget the Castro brothers in Havana or that thug Chavez in Venezuela.”
Hawke was silent. A door had opened. Wide. And he was not about to slam it in Kuragin’s, much less Putin’s, face. That was not how the intelligence game was played at this level. It was a very delicate tradecraft moment, one in which to keep one’s cards preternaturally close. Hawke looked at Kuragin, not saying a word.
“Well,” Kuragin said finally, eyeing Hawke. “Obviously, this is not something to be discussed now. Or, ever, if that is your wish. Our warm feelings for you will remain unchanged regardless. Let me give you this card. There’s no name on it, only a number. It is Putin’s private number. Not ten people in the world have access to it.”
“Thank you,” Hawke said, pocketing the card.
“On to other matters. Let’s begin with the true nature of your visit, shall we?”
It was the one moment Hawke had been dreading during the long journey across Siberia. The moment of truth.
“Well. Where does one begin?” He hesitated, then plunged ahead. “You see, Nikolai, I’ve come about Anastasia.”
“Anastasia. I see. Well, I-”
Hawke, in a turmoil of emotion, held up his hand. “Please, Nikolai. Don’t say anything. Just let me say what I have to say first. After that, you can either throw me a rope or throw me to the wolves. Is that all right?”
“As you wish, Alex.”
Hawke rose to his feet, pacing back and forth before the fire with his hands clasped behind his back.
“It was no secret in Moscow that I was deeply in love with her. And, I believed, she with me. What you may not know are the exact events surrounding her death in Sweden. I had followed Korsakov from Stockholm to his island summerhouse. His escape route, his airship, was tethered to the roof. He had Anastasia with him in the car, bound and drugged. He felt she’d betrayed him for me. I had no doubt the Tsar was going to kill her. I was gravely wounded trying to get inside that house. To save her from her father’s blind rage. I failed. Then, I watched helplessly as he had her loaded aboard the doomed airship on a stretcher. I’m positive it was her. And-then-I-dear God-I-”
He felt a hot clench in the muscles of his throat and was afraid he could not go on.
“Alex, please, you’re very upset. Let me try to-”
Hawke waved him away and took a moment to regain his composure. He returned to the chair opposite Kuragin and stared into his eyes for a long time before speaking.
“Nikolai, I heard a rumor. I’m sure it cannot possibly be true. But I have lived with the knowledge that I killed the woman I loved for a very long time now. It’s unbearable. I returned to Jasna Polana solely because I was told that Anastasia is still alive. I was told that she was held prisoner here. I’ve absolutely no reason to believe this is true. I still don’t believe it, as we sit here. But I simply could not go on living without knowing the truth. I’ve come to you to learn the truth. Please-please help me.”
“Anastasia is alive, Alex. She’s here. In this house. Now.”
Five
Hawke stared at Kuragin in disbelief for a brief moment, then, seeing the clear truth in his wise old eyes, put his face into his hands and leaned forward, giving full rein to his overwhelming emotions. The general stood up and placed his one good hand on Alex’s shoulder. “I’ll go and get the ‘prisoner’ now, Alex. I’m sure you two will want to be alo
ne. I will send her to you here where you’ll be comfortable. Sit back now. Calm yourself. That decanter on my desk contains the purest Russian vodka dirty money can buy. I suggest you avail yourself of it.”
A gentle tapping at the door. So soft an anxious Hawke nearly missed the sound above the crackle and hiss of the great fire in the hearth. He practically leaped from the chair, set his small glass of vodka on Kuragin’s massive desk, and raced across the large room to the door. His hand was shaking badly as he reached for the doorknob. His heart had taken on a life of its own, beating like some jungle drum warning of imminent danger.
Little did he know.
He pulled the heavy wooden door open, slowly, terrified of what he might or might not see beyond it.
Anastasia.
He saw her upturned face, morning light spilling down from a high window, afire in her golden hair.
Her luminous green eyes shining with tears.
Her lower lip trembling.
Her tentative hand, reaching out, coming to a trembling rest against his wild heart, as she spoke his name, barely above a whisper.
“Alex.”
“It is you,” he said softly, almost breathless.
Hawke unfastened his eyes from hers with strained difficulty, as though they had become entangled. He felt if he lost contact with them he’d sink without a trace. He opened his arms and she fell into them, pressing her cheek against his chest, clinging tightly to him. He enfolded her, cradling her head, the two of them seemingly on a pitching deck, holding on to each other for dear life.
“It is me, Alex,” she said, her voice breaking, a single tear coursing down her cheek. Hawke looked down and gently brushed it away as he spoke softly to her.
“I thought-I thought I’d lost you… all this time, all these years, I’ve been broken inside… I’ve been so lost, so-”
She put a finger to his lips and said,
“I have to-sit down, I’m afraid. Where shall we-?” She looked around the room as if seeing it for the first time.
He took her hand and led her over to the yellow satin divan beneath the tall leaded-glass windows. She sat and arranged her emerald silk skirt around her, looking up at him, smiling through her tears. “Oh, Alex, my darling boy, I can’t believe I’m sitting here looking up at you. I gave you up so long ago. When I saw you lying there in the snow below my window. So still. All that bright red blood soaking into the snow. My father said, ‘There’s your hero. Do you still think he can save you? Do you, you lying bitch?’ And I didn’t, my love; I didn’t think I would ever see your face again. I was so sure you were dead. And now…”
Hawke had dropped to his knees at her feet, resting his head upon her lap, weeping, trying to hold on to himself, keep everything inside from flying apart. She ran her slender fingers through his wild black hair, whispering words of comfort to him as if he were a small boy, a child who’d lost his way and had now found his way home at last.
He looked up at her and finally found the courage to speak without a tremolo in his voice. He said, “But now I am here, aren’t I? We’re both young and alive. We’re together. That’s all that matters, isn’t it?”
Her forced laughter was like the sound of glass breaking.
“Yes. For now, my darling.”
“I still don’t understand what happened. I saw you. I saw the stretcher, watched them putting you aboard the airship. I don’t see how you can be here. It’s impossible. Eyes don’t lie.”
“It wasn’t me, Alex. I never left the house. Until I was arrested by the KGB the following day.”
“I saw your arm drop, your ermine sleeve, it fell from beneath the blanket when they lifted you up to…”
“It wasn’t me, dear Alex. It was Katerina. Katerina Arnborg, my father’s Swedish housekeeper. She came into my room and found me on the stretcher, waiting for the airship to depart. I was drugged, couldn’t move or speak. He did that to me. My own father. When I woke up, I was in a linen closet, hidden under the dirty linen. The stretcher was gone. The airship was gone. Everyone was gone, everything. Except the red-stained snow below when I looked out my window.”
“This Katerina, she took your place on the stretcher? Under the blanket.”
Anastasia nodded. “It’s the only possible explanation.”
“But why? Why did she do it?”
“She’d heard things in that terrible house. Over the years. She knew things. Evil things. Terrible secrets.”
“Tell me.”
“No. It is not for you. Not anymore. The past is dead and buried. Katerina was a good woman. I think in the end she wanted to save me from him. And in the end she gave her life for me.”
“She saved you. For me.”
“And who saved you?”
“No one. I just wasn’t ready to die. It was only afterward, after I killed your father, that I wanted to die. In the worst way.”
“Because you thought you had killed me, too.”
“Yes. I was sure of it.”
“Alex. Please. End this. For both of us. It’s unbearable, really, these horrible memories. We should be happy. We are both alive, as you said. And we have a child together. The most beautiful little boy in all the world. He looks exactly like you, my darling. He even smiles like you, which will of course get him into no end of trouble when he learns how to use it.”
Hawke lifted his head and smiled, really smiled, for the first time in memory. “What did you call him?”
“Alexei.”
“Alexei. It’s perfect.”
“I thought so, too.” She looked down, gazing at him with her perfect smile, and for a moment he lived once more in the bright green worlds of her eyes.
“How old is he now?”
“Almost three. His birthday is tomorrow. We’ll have a little birthday party.”
“Where is he? May I see him?”
“Of course. He is up in the nursery playing with his toy soldiers. I’ve told him that his father was here to see him. He’s very excited. He asked me what a father was and I told him.”
“What did you say?”
“I said a father is a tall, handsome man. Very strong and very brave. A good man, true and full of life and beauty.”
Hawke got to his feet and held out his hand. “It’s all a miracle. Let’s go and see him now.”
“He’s coming here. Nurse is bringing him. I’ve only to call.”
Hawke smiled as she picked up the receiver next to the divan and spoke a few brief words in Russian.
A lexei and his English nurse appeared at the library door a few minutes later. When the door swung open, the little dark-haired boy peeked out from behind his nurse’s skirts and stared wide-eyed at Alex for a few long moments, then ran to his mother’s arms, hiding his face in the folds of her skirt. He was dressed like a little prince, which, in some respects, he was. The late Tsar’s grandson wore a suit of dark blue velvet, with a ruffled white collar at the neck. His shoes were black patent leather with small black satin bows.
“Good morning, sir,” the attractive young nurse said, with a slight curtsy and a very proper British accent.
Anastasia gestured at Hawke as she said to the child, “Alexei, that is your father standing over there beside the fire. He’s come a very long way just to see you. You must be on your very best behavior. Show him what good manners you have. Can you say hello?”
The child peeked out at Hawke for a second or two, then hid his face once more in the folds on his mother’s skirts. Hawke went to him and dropped to a knee on the floor beside his son.
“Alexei?” he said softly, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder. “Alexei?”
The boy responded to the voice and touch and turned to stare silently at Hawke, seemingly memorizing every curve and plane of his face. Alexei’s eyes were big and blue and lively. He seemed totally unafraid of the tall stranger now. Hawke was shocked to see a very small version of himself. It was the face he’d seen in scrapbooks his own mother had kept, little Alex building
castles by the sea, little Alex on his pony, little Alex reading a picture book.
“Does he speak English?” Hawke asked, his eyes never leaving his son.
“Almost as well as he speaks Russian. We’ve been teaching him both since he first learned to talk,” the young English nurse said, and then she slipped silently from the room.
“Hello,” Hawke said, reaching up and lightly stroking the boy’s plump cheek, lit to a lovely flame, the flush on the face of a child after a warm bath on a cold evening. Alexei turned to hide his eyes again, then, seeing his nurse gone, turned back to stare openly at this person called a “father.”
“Say hello, Alexei,” Anastasia said. “Say hello to your father. Wherever have you put your manners?”
“Hello,” the child chirped. “Hello, hello, hello.”
“How old are you?” his father asked.
He looked shyly at Hawke for a moment, then raised his chubby pink hand, holding up three fingers.
“Good for you! And how many is that, Alexei?”
“Free?”
“Three, that’s right. Do you want to know a secret?”
Alexei nodded his head vigorously, already a great lover of secrets. His father said, “When I was three, I was exactly your age. Isn’t that something?”
The boy nodded again, instinctively knowing he was expected to agree, and his mother watched father and son together, finding a lovely peace wash over her.
Alex said, “You’re a very big boy for three, Alexei. Will you give your father a wee hug? I would like that very much.”
Anastasia bent down and whispered in the child’s ear. Alexei looked at Hawke’s open arms for a moment, unsure of himself, but then stepped into his embrace. Hawke held him closely, looking up at Anastasia, his eyes gleaming with unchecked emotion. He saw her look away, overwhelmed perhaps, and he suddenly felt as if all the molecules in the room had risen up and then rearranged themselves before settling down into a strange new pattern.