Collection 2 - The Defector From Leningrad Affair

by LRH Balzer

  He called Waverly on his transceiver and passed on the doctor's report. As Waverly didn't fail to remind him, he couldn't leave Kuryakin unattended and he returned to the Emergency Room.

  Surrounded by equipment and the crisis staff, Kuryakin lay naked on the table, his lower body covered by a thin sheet, his chest bare. It looked like they were slicing into his chest with something, fresh blood staining his skin in rivulets.

  Solo's radio transceiver twittered and the medical team turned and stared at him. "Solo here," he answered quietly, turning away from what they were doing to his partner.

  "What's happening?" asked Norm Graham.

  "The police haven't arrived yet. Have you found Petrov?"

  "No. We found another body, though."

  "What? Who?"

  "I'll tell you later. How is Illya?"

  "They say he's out of danger. Has the hotel been checked? Was Petrov staying at the hotel with the Bolshoi group?"

  "No. At the Soviet Embassy. We think he may be back there."

  "With Zadkine?"

  "Perhaps. I have men checking the hotel but it is difficult to get past the Soviet officials."

  "Where are you now?"

  "En route to the hospital. I'll send for more backup."

  The transceiver cut out and Solo pocketed it, glancing back to his partner.

  The doctor had called for assistance; Kuryakin's pulse was unsteady. Once again, the emergency team swarmed around the table, blocking the blond Russian from sight, trying to keep his condition from deteriorating.

  Life and death. Death and life. A fine line. Solo felt his mind carefully guarding his reactions. Statistics showed few agents ever lived long enough to collect a pension. In this business there were no guarantees and to go a few months without an injury was rare. In the last ten weeks he had barely escaped death himself on numerous occasions: fire, steam, poison darts, gas, deadly spiders. He had been shot at, strangled, smothered, drowned, and whipped.

  And he had lived. For now. So had Kuryakin.

  Come on, my friend.

  A minute went by. One intern glanced over at Solo wide-eyed, then pulled his concentration back to the patient. Another two minutes of activity before the group pulled back. Solo's gut clenched as he saw his partner's grey and pasty skin streaked with fresh blood. The intern looked over at Solo again, his eyes apologizing.

  What? Solo thought, woodenly. No.

  The doctor approached him, wiping the blood from his hands with a towel. "No need for alarm. We've stabilized his vital signs again and will be taking him into surgery soon. How should--"

  The clatter of an automatic weapon echoed through the ward and Solo spun away from the cubicle they were in. From the outer reception area came screams and the crowd's hysterical clamor as the rasping, deadly rat-a-tat hiccup sounded again.

  "Get down!" Solo called urgently to the medical team who were looking around frantically for the source of the sound. His own U.N.C.L.E. Special was already out, safety off, the comfort of the metal beneath his fierce grip. He slid to the swinging door connecting the Emergency Reception from the ward and peered out.

  Where were the U.N.C.L.E. guards that were supposed to be at the entrance?

  Through the smudged window, the gunman came into sight, his weapon held against the nurse's temple as he pulled her in front of him. He was Latin, had dark curling hair, was in his late twenties or early thirties, five feet nine or ten. Unknown, except for the .32 caliber Smith and Wesson revolver in his hand which was well-known and respected for its performance.

  Solo pushed open one door with his foot, the U.N.C.L.E. Special pointed at the gunman. "Let her go," he ordered loudly over the noise.

  "Ya ishcho Zadkine!" the man responded. A Latin man speaking Russian.

  "I know who you're looking for." Solo kept the automatic pistol trained on the assassin. "Move away. Let the woman go." As long as she was blocking the gunman, Solo couldn't get a clear shot at the man.

  "Let me have Zadkine and the woman will live." The words were heavily accented but the calm, almost amused, delivery was precise and understandable. The man was a professional; it showed in his meticulous appearance, his confidence, and the ease with which he handled the deadly weapon in his hands.

  Around them, equipment chirped and beeped as life-saving machines continued to operate. The armed man drew the woman closer and edged towards the door where Solo stood at guard. "Move out of my way, pretty boy. Drop your weapon or the woman dies now and I can still use her body as a shield. Either way, it doesn't matter to me. Let me through--"

  Solo's head jerked as a the crack of a pistol rang through the ward. Before he could question its source, another shot was fired and the weapon went flying out of the assassin's hand. The man roared in rage and pain, the nurse twirling out of his reach. As he spun to see who had shot at him, he reached with his other hand for a second weapon.

  Norm Graham appeared from around the corner and shot him again and there was no whispered ping of an U.N.C.L.E. sleep-dart. The man was dead before he hit the floor. The older agent moved steadily toward the downed assassin, cautiously using his foot to flip him over onto his back. "It is Oculto. The Cuban. We have been looking for him."

  Solo knew the name. As a contract killer, Oculto would be the perfect choice for an undertaking such as this, for unless he was taken alive, it would be impossible to trace who had hired him. The Soviets? The CIA? Everyone had their hand in Cuba these days.

  "Stay with Illya," Graham called to Solo. "Don't let him out of your sight. Oculto rarely worked alone." He disappeared with two of his Washington office agents. The local police, just now arriving, swarmed around the assassin and covered the hospital entrances. The U.N.C.L.E. agents who had been guarding the door were dead, shot through the head, most likely with a silencer by Oculto's accomplice.

  The Emergency ward swung back into action, the medical team returning to Kuryakin, trying to continue from where they had left off. Solo stood in the doorway, his eyes traveling from the scene inside to the outer reception area where hospital staff were moving among the shaken incoming patients and visitors to the ward, offering calming advice and helping the police take information.

  Within a few minutes, the chest specialist had arrived, as had Jack Mercer, the Washington U.N.C.L.E. Medical chief, and Kuryakin was wheeled past Solo down to surgery. Mercer would monitor the actual operation while Solo watched the corridor outside.

  Solo sank to the welcome support of the Waiting Area couch, slipping his weapon once again into his holster.

  Half an hour later, Norm Graham dropped into the seat opposite him. "Still in surgery?"

  Solo nodded, replacing the unread magazine on the low table in front of him. "They took him in just after you left. Do you want some coffee?"

  "No, I'm fine. How are you doing?"

  "I'm not the one who was shot."

  "Okay, then, how is Illya doing?"

  "I don't know. They seem confident enough." Solo stared across at the head of U.N.C.L.E. Washington. "I've been keeping Waverly up-to-date. Any news on Oculto's accomplices?"

  "Nothing yet. We're looking but--" Graham shrugged, his frustration obvious in his tired eyes. "There are too many suspects right now. Do you remember seeing Oculto on the stage?"

  Solo shook his head. "No. I've been running his face through my memory and I am positive he wasn't there. Could the shot have come from above, from the catwalks?"

  "No, Tony says the angle is wrong. We both went over the area before we left the theater. It came from where the weapon was found, all right. Even so, whoever fired that was a marksman. The weapon must have been hidden within a coat or covered somehow or it would have been noticed from across the stage. That takes some mighty precise shooting."

  Solo grinned crookedly. "You're a terrific shot yourself."

  "Thanks. But I killed him. I knew I didn't have time to switch from bullets to the U.N.C.L.E. darts, and I needed a bullet to knock the gun from his hand. I ha
d gambled that he wouldn't have a second weapon and I lost." Graham pulled off his coat and carefully placed it beside him, loosening his black tie.

  "Okay, so Oculto had a man on the inside," Solo said, "or, more likely, Oculto was the backup for someone on the inside. Regardless, we need to know who hired him. I've been running possibilities and matching motives."

  Solo continued talking as he crossed to the coffee machine and fed some coins into it. "We have the Soviets. Primarily, Petrov, who is unaccounted for. You said he was trying to lure Illya back to Moscow. Now suppose Illya refused just prior to the ballet; Petrov has already set the performance for Kosygin and will look foolish when Illya doesn't return with them to the Soviet Union after he has announced this. So, he saves his own hide by shooting Illya at the end of the ballet, making it appear the American government has done so. He was on the stage at the beginning. If so, I suspect he will make an outraged public statement soon."

  "I agree, Napoleon, but he would make the same claim against the government whether he was responsible for the shooting or not. He has nothing to lose."

  Solo sat down again, cradling the hot drink between his hands. "Okay. What about Grigory Zadkine?"

  "There was no sign of him at the theater. We had men assigned to watch for him."

  "When was the last time he was spotted?"

  "Cars were entering and leaving the Soviet Embassy grounds all day yesterday. It is impossible to say. One of the watchers on the street reported a possible sighting of Zadkine in one of the vehicles exiting just prior to sunset yesterday."

  "So it is conceivable he's in town. I don't understand why he wasn't at the theater though. You'd think he'd want to be there for his ballet... But the warrant...? Motives... The one time Illya was able to contact me, he mentioned Zadkine was urging him to do something--probably return with him--which means Zadkine was not a defector as he claimed. Lagto's report also said Zadkine appeared to have free movement within the New York building and had left it, before the warrant was issued, on his own several times."

  "Where did he go?"

  "Once to the Soviet Mission Headquarters. Once to Sasha Travkov's apartment, but there was no one home. Twice to a local bookstore where he made small purchases. Probably a front--we're checking it out."

  Graham frowned. "So why would he arrange to have Illya shot? I can understand him wanting his brother with him, but to kill him for choosing not to go back?"

  "I don't know why he would have him shot. I do know that I don't trust him. He is devious, even more so than Petrov. He has his own agenda and I think discovering Illya here two weeks ago threw a major wrench into his plans."

  "So why did Zadkine defect? Where did he get the information from? And who is he working for?"

  "Sasha Travkov says he's working with the KGB. Or at least he was previously. Norm, I get the feeling that the words 'Project Cipher' may have been thrown in simply to bring U.N.C.L.E. into this. We normally wouldn't be involved in a defection of a ballet dancer, would we?"

  Graham thought about it for a moment. "That's true. We would be notified of the results for our records, but the FBI--or sometimes the CIA--would handle it. So the information he passed on was slanted. But we found the Thrush mole in New Hampshire because of it, didn't we?"

  "That's just it. What if the KGB just used us to get Thrush out of their hair? But why don't they want Thrush involved in the American satellite program? Surely if Thrush caused us problems, it would only strengthen the Soviet cause."

  "Unless they have their own agenda... Has the CIA mentioned anything to your office about a possible threat from the Soviets on the satellite program?" Graham asked.

  "I don't know. We get little from them anyway. They are closed-mouthed about their findings. I also don't understand why the CIA didn't pick Zadkine up for questioning even before the warrant was issued."

  "That's not the way things are done here in Washington. Ballet defectors don't get the same treatment as KGB defectors. Zadkine was questioned initially, but the only information he had was something he said he had heard at a party. It meant nothing to the CIA until he said the words 'Project Cipher'. They knew it was an U.N.C.L.E. deal, so they called us in."

  "Norm, a few days ago I finally had a chance to read through Illya's initial debriefing by the CIA that was done in Waverly's office. His papers listed him as a ballet dancer, not a KGB agent, and yet they dragged him down to Langley for months of interviews."

  "Alexander was applying for Illya to enter the country, not on a H1 visa such as Zadkine would have received for someone with special abilities, but on a top status that would also allow him to work with U.N.C.L.E.. That's when his past record was candidly laid out and the CIA pounced on it. Alexander had hoped U.N.C.L.E. would sponsor Illya--which would have virtually guaranteed his entry--but the other four of Section One refused. So Alexander signed the papers himself and sponsored him privately."

  "Putting his own career on the line."

  "Not to mention his reputation in this country."

  "Norm, would Section One have--"

  "Don't say it."

  "Would they have arranged for Illya to have been killed? To protect U.N.C.L.E.'s reputation? Or maybe to protect Waverly?" Solo persisted.

  Graham buried his face in his hands for a moment, then answered very carefully, "I cannot believe that for a moment. It goes against everything we believe in at the United Network Command. Illya Kuryakin is Number Two in the Enforcement Section and there is no way Alexander could have allowed him to reach that position if Section One had any suspicions as to his trustworthiness. Illya has access to virtually every piece of information that comes into U.N.C.L.E. North America and Alexander even has him regularly do the courier run between Washington and the New York Headquarters. Working alone, he carries top secret documents from my office, from the Pentagon, the CIA, the FBI, the White House, and whatever else is required. Had he been suspect or if there was any doubt of his loyalty, that would be impossible. Even after all the events this summer in Rotterdam, Section One still backed Alexander in his assessment of Illya."

  "What about the CIA then? Would they put a contract out on Illya?"

  "I want desperately to say no. We're the good guys, right? Americans don't assassinate people. Even the KGB only kill their own people. But I have no idea. Our own hands aren't very clean. The CIA is in the middle of a fierce molehunt and they want a scapegoat. It's been almost two years, and they have yet to come up with something tangible; they want to believe Illya is the black sheep they're after. Not only does he match their leads, but it would mean the mole wasn't in the CIA. I saw the security film of the meeting yesterday with Alexander and the Counterintelligence officers--if they think Illya Kuryakin is who they've been looking for, I don't know to what length they would go to prevent what they might feel is a security breech. Illya is on record as currently being on assignment by U.N.C.L.E.'s orders. For the CIA to ignore that, to go ahead and treat him as a double agent--? I would like to believe that they would simply have him arrested."

  "And the FBI?"

  "Again, at this point, what crime has Illya committed? It isn't a crime to dance with the Bolshoi Ballet in America as a guest artist. Illya has committed no crimes. Should he try to defect back to the Soviet Union, there would be motive for arresting him. But he had stated he was staying and had at that point made no motion of doing otherwise."

  "So we're at another dead end... which reminds me, Norm, you said you found another body?"

  Graham nodded grimly. "Knifed between the shoulder blades and pulled into an empty room and left. Probably happened a few hours before Illya was shot."

  "Has he been identified?"

  "His papers say he's a Soviet attaché. Late forties. Unpronounceable last name. I've never heard of him. We haven't asked too many questions yet since no one has been declared missing by the embassy. We're trying to see when anyone by that name came into the country." A surgeon approached them and Graham broke off his acco
unt and stood quickly.

  "You are waiting for news on Illya Kuryakin?" the doctor asked, stumbling over the name.

  "Yes." Solo stood and introduced himself, shaking hands with the man.

  "My name is Dr. Clements. Your Dr. Mercer is with the patient, who is being moved into Intensive Care at this time. The surgery was successful: the bullet, probably only a .22 caliber, passed straight between his ribs and out the other side, causing relatively little damage--which made our work a lot easier. We repaired what we could; it was a clean wound. Moderate damage to the right lung, but nothing that won't heal quickly under care. The entry wound left a very slight powder burn around it. The exit wound is much larger, of course, but again, he was lucky."

  "And the head wound?" Graham asked.

  The doctor frowned. "The second bullet grazed the side of his head; it took away only a small piece of skin and chipped the bone. At the moment, we can detect no internal bleeding, but we are keeping close track of the injury. He was very fortunate; I'll show you the X-Rays later. Our primary concern now is the extent of any concussion. We are monitoring him carefully and we'll know more when he's conscious and we can check his awareness over a twenty-four hour period."

  "How long before he's able to talk? It's urgent that I speak with him."

  "Oh, he should be able to talk in four or five days, if all goes well."

  "We don't have that long. Can we make it sooner? As you are aware, Kuryakin is an agent for the U.N.C.L.E. and has vital information that we need."

  Dr. Clements looked carefully from one man to the other. "Could you follow me please?" he said, turning back the way he had come. He led them through the corridors, passed a doorway guarded by both the police and an U.N.C.L.E. agent, into a semi-private room off the Intensive Care Ward. "We heard there was trouble in the Emergency Room," the doctor said, referring to the guards. "I'll be checking in on the patient periodically and there is a fully qualified nurse at the station. Dr. Mercer says he will be monitoring the patient's condition personally. Perhaps he can best explain to you what is happening. Now I have other patients that also require my attention. It's very busy in here tonight." He shook their hands and left them at the entrance to the ward.