by Tom Clancy
“Eggs Benedict?” the retired woman cop asked.
“Ma’am, for that I will forgive the absence of Starbucks,” Jack replied, with a smile. Then he saw the morning papers, and he thought that reality and normality had finally returned to his life. Well, almost.
“Mr. and Mrs. Thompson run this house for us,” Kingshot explained. “Nick was a homicide detective with the Yard, and Emma was in administration.”
“That’s what my dad used to do,” Ryan observed. “How did you guys get working for SIS?”
“Nick worked on the Markov case,” Mrs. Thompson answered.
“And did a damned good job of it, too,” Kingshot told Ryan. “He would have been a fine field officer for us.”
“ ‘Bond, James Bond’?” Nick Thompson said, walking into the kitchen. “I think not. Our guests are moving about. It sounds as though the little girl got them up.”
“Yeah,” Jack observed. “Kids will do that. So, we do the debrief here or somewhere else?”
“We were planning to do it in Somerset, but I decided last night not to drive them around too much. Why stress them out?” Kingshot asked rhetorically. “We just took title to this house last year, and it’s as comfortable a place as any. The one in Somerset—near Taunton—is a touch more isolated, but these people ought not to bolt, you think?”
“If he goes home, he’s one dead Rabbit,” Ryan thought out loud. “He has to know that. On the plane, he was worried that we were KGB and this was all an elaborate maskirovka setup, I think. His wife did a lot of shopping in Budapest. Maybe we have somebody take her shopping around here?” the American wondered. “Then we can talk to him in comfort. His English seems okay. Do we have anybody here with good Russian?”
“My job,” Kingshot told Ryan.
“First thing we want to know, why the hell did he decide to skip town?”
“Obviously, but then, what’s all this lot about compromised communications?”
“Yeah.” Ryan took a deep breath. “I imagine people are jumping out windows about that one.”
“Too bloody right,” Kingshot confirmed.
“So, Al, you’ve worked Moscow?”
The Brit nodded. “Twice. Good sport it was, but rather tense the whole time I was there.”
“Where else?”
“Warsaw and Bucharest. I speak all the languages. Tell me, how was Andy Hudson?”
“He’s a star, Al. Very smooth and confident all the way—knows his turf, good contacts. He took pretty good care of me.”
“Here’s your coffee, Sir John,” Mrs. Thompson said, bringing his cup of Taster’s Choice. The Brits were good people, and their food, Ryan thought, was wrongly maligned, but they didn’t know beans about coffee, and that was that. But it was still better than tea.
The Eggs Benedict arrived shortly thereafter, and at that dish, Mrs. Thompson could have given lessons. Ryan opened his paper—it was the Times—and relaxed to get reacquainted with the world. He’d call Cathy in about an hour when he was at work. With luck, he might even see her in a couple days. In a perfect world, he’d have a copy of an American paper, or maybe the International Tribune, but the world was not yet perfect. There was no sense asking how the World Series was going. It was going to start tomorrow, wasn’t it? How good were the Phillies this year? Well, as usual, you played the games to find out.
“So, how was the trip, Jack?” Kingshot asked.
“Alan, those field officers earn every nickel they make. How you deal with the constant tension, I do not understand.”
“Like everything else, Jack, you get used to it. Your wife is a surgeon. The idea of cutting people open with a knife is not at all appealing to me.”
Jack barked a short laugh. “Yeah, me too, pal. And she does eyeballs. Nothing important, right?”
Kingshot shuddered visibly at the thought, and Ryan reminded himself that working in Moscow, running agents—and probably arranging rescue missions like they’d done for the Rabbit—could not have been much more fun than a heart transplant.
“Ah, Mr. Somerset,” Ryan heard Mrs. Thompson say. “Good morning, and welcome.”
“Spasiba,” Oleg Ivan’ch replied in a sleepy voice. Kids could get you up at the goddamnedest hours, with their smiling faces and lovely dispositions. “That is my new name?”
“We’ll figure something more permanent later,” Ryan told him. “Again, welcome.”
“This is England?” the Rabbit asked.
“We’re eight miles from Manchester,” the British intelligence officer replied. “Good morning. In case you don’t remember, my name is Alan Kingshot. This is Mrs. Emma Thompson, and Nick will be back in a few minutes.” Handshakes were exchanged.
“My wife be here soon. She see to zaichik,” he explained.
“How are you feeling, Vanya?” Kingshot asked.
“Much travel, much fear, but I am safe now, yes?”
“Yes, you are entirely safe,” Kingshot assured him.
“And what would you like for breakfast?” Mrs. Thompson asked.
“Try this,” Jack suggested, pointing at his plate. “It’s great.”
“Yes, I will—what is called?”
“Eggs Benedict,” Jack told him. “Mrs. Thompson, this hollandaise sauce is just perfect. My wife needs your recipe, if I may impose.” And maybe Cathy could teach her about proper coffee. That would be an equitable trade, Ryan thought.
“Why, certainly, Sir John,” she replied with a beaming smile. No woman in all the world objects to praise for her cooking.
“For me also, then,” Zaitzev decided.
“Tea or coffee?” she asked her guest.
“You have English Breakfast tea?” the Rabbit asked.
“Of course,” she answered.
“Please for me, then.”
“Certainly.” And she disappeared back into the kitchen.
It was still a lot for Zaitzev to take. Here he was, in the breakfast room of a manor house fit for a member of the old nobility, surrounded by a green lawn such as one might see at Augusta National, with monstrous oak trees planted two hundred years before, a carriage house, and stables in the distance. It was something he might have imagined as worthy of Peter the Great, the things of books and museums, and he was in it as an honored guest?
“Nice house, isn’t it?” Ryan asked, finishing off the Eggs Benny.
“Is amazing,” Zaitzev responded, wide eyes sweeping around.
“Belonged to a ducal family, bought by a textiles manufacturer a hundred years ago, but his business fell on hard times, and the government bought it last year. We use it for conferences and as a safe house. The heating system is a little primitive,” Kingshot reported. “But that is not a problem at the moment. We’ve had a very pleasant summer, and the fall looks promising as well.”
“At home, there’d be a golf course around this place,” Jack said, looking out the windows. “A big one.”
“Yes,” Alan agreed. “It would be splendid for that.”
“When I go America?” the Rabbit asked.
“Oh, three or four days,” Kingshot answered. “We would like to talk with you a little, if you don’t mind.”
“When do we start?”
“After breakfast. Take your time, Mr. Zaitzev. You are no longer in the Soviet Union. We shall not pressure you at all,” Alan promised.
My ass, Ryan thought. Buddy, they’re going to suck your brain out of your head and strain it for your thoughts one molecule at a time. But the Rabbit had just gotten a free ride out of Mother Russia, with the prospect of a comfortable life for him and his family in the West, and everything in life had its price.
He loved his tea. Then the rest of the family came out and, over the next twenty minutes, Mrs. Thompson nearly ran out of Hollandaise sauce, while the arriving Russians ensured steady employment for the local egg farmers.
Irina left the breakfast room to tour the house and was greatly excited to see a concert grand Bösendorfer piano, turning like a kid a
t Christmas to ask if she might tickle the keys. She was years out of practice, but the look on her face was like a return of childhood as she struggled through “On the Bridge at Avignon,” which had been her favorite exercise tune many years before—and which she still remembered.
“A friend of mine plays professionally,” Jack said, with a smile. It was hard not to appreciate her joy of the moment.
“Who? Where?” Oleg asked.
“Sissy—actually, Cecilia Jackson. Her husband and I are friends. He’s a fighter pilot for the U.S. Navy. She is number-two piano soloist at the Washington Symphony. My wife plays, too, but Sissy is really good.”
“You are good to us,” Oleg Ivan’ch said.
“We try to take decent care of our guests,” Kingshot told him. “Shall we talk in the library?” He pointed the way.
The chairs were comfortable. The library was another stellar example of nineteenth-century woodwork, with thousands of books and three rolling ladders—it isn’t a proper English library without a ladder. The chairs were plush. Mrs. Thompson brought in a tray of ice water and glasses, and business began.
“So, Mr. Zaitzev, can you begin to tell us about yourself?” Kingshot asked. He was rewarded by name, ancestry, place of birth, and education.
“No military service?” Ryan asked.
Zaitzev shook his head. “No, KGB spot me and they protect me from army time.”
“And that was in university?” Kingshot asked for clarity. A total of three tape recorders were turning.
“Yes, that is correct. My first year they speak to me for first time.”
“And when did you join KGB?”
“Immediately I leave Moscow State University. They take me into communications department.”
“And how long there?”
“Since, well, for nine and half years in total, set aside my time in academy and other training.”
“And where do you work now?” Kingshot led him on.
“I work in Central Communications in basement of Moscow Centre.”
“And what exactly did you do there?” Alan finally asked.
“During my watch, all dispatches come in from field to my desk. My job is to maintain security, to be sure proper procedures followed, and then I forward to action officers upstairs. Or to United States-Canada Institute sometimes,” Oleg said, gesturing to Ryan.
Jack did his best not to let his mouth fall open. This guy really was an escapee from the Soviet counterpart to CIA’s MERCURY. This guy saw it all. Everything, or damned near. He’d just helped a gold mine escape from behind the wire. Son of a bitch!
Kingshot did a somewhat better job of concealing his feelings, but he let his eyes slip over to Ryan’s, and that expression said it all.
Bloody hell.
“So, do you know the names of your field officers and their agents?” Kingshot asked.
“KGB officer names—I know many names. Agents, the names I know very few, but I know code names. In Britain, our best agent is code-named MINISTER. He give us high-value diplomatic and political intelligence for many years—twenty years, I think, perhaps more.”
“You said KGB has compromised our communications,” Ryan observed.
“Yes, somewhat. That is agent NEPTUNE. How much he give, I am not sure, but I know KGB read much of American naval communications.”
“What about other communications?” Jack asked immediately.
“Naval communications, that I am sure. Others, I am not sure, but you use same cipher machines for all, yes?”
“Actually not,” Alan told him. “So, you say British communications are secure?”
“If broken, I do not know it,” Zaitzev replied. “Most American diplomatic and intelligence information we get come from Agent CASSIUS. He is aide to senior politician in Washington. He give us good information on what CIA do and what CIA learn from us.”
“But you said he’s not part of CIA?” Ryan asked.
“No, I think he is politician aide, helper, member of staff—like that,” Zaitzev said rather positively.
“Good.” Ryan lit up a smoke and offered one to Zaitzev, who took it at once.
“I run out of my Krasnopresnenskiye,” he explained.
“I should give you all of mine. My wife wants me to quit. She’s a doctor,” Jack explained.
“Bah,” the Rabbit responded.
“So, why did you decide to leave?” Kingshot asked, taking a sip of tea. The reply nearly made him drop the cup.
“KGB want to kill Pope.”
“You’re serious?” It was the more experienced man who asked that question, not Ryan.
“Serious? I risk my life, my wife life, my daughter life. Da, I am serious,” Oleg Ivanovich assured his interlocutors with an edge on his voice.
“Fuck,” Ryan breathed. “Oleg, we need to know about this.”
“It start in August. Fifteen August it start,” Zaitzev told them, spinning out his tale without interruption for five or six minutes.
“No name for the operation?” Jack asked when he stopped.
“No name, just dispatch number fifteen-eight-eighty-two-six-six-six. That is date of first message from Andropov to rezidentura Rome, and number of message, yes? Yuriy Vladimirovich ask how get close to Pope. Rome say bad idea. Then Colonel Rozhdestvenskiy—he is main assistant to chairman, yes?—he send signal to rezidentura Sofia. Operation go from Sofia. So, operation -six-six-six probably run for KGB by Dirzhavna Sugurnost. I think officer name is Strokov, Boris Andreyevich.”
Kingshot had a thought and rose, leaving the room. He came back with Nick Thompson, a former detective superintendent of the Metropolitan Police.
“Nick, does the name Boris Andreyevich Strokov mean anything to you?”
The former cop blinked hard. “Indeed it does, Alan. He’s the chappie we think killed Georgiy Markov on Westminster Bridge. We had him under surveillance, but he flew out of the country before we had enough cause to pick him up for questioning.”
“Wasn’t he under diplomatic cover?” Ryan asked, and was surprised by Thompson’s answer.
“Actually not. He came in undocumented and left the same way. I saw him myself at Heathrow. But we didn’t put the pieces together quickly enough. Dreadful case it was. The poison they gave Markov was horrific stuff.”
“You eyeballed this Strokov guy?”
Thompson nodded. “Oh, yes. He might have noticed me. I wasn’t being all that careful under the circumstances. He’s the one who killed Markov. I’d stake my life on it.”
“How can you be sure?”
“I chased murderers for near on twenty years, Sir John. You get to know them in all that time. And that’s what he was, a murderer,” Thompson said with total confidence. Ryan could remember his father being like this, even on frustrating cases when he knew what he needed but couldn’t quite prove it to a jury.
“The Bulgarians have a sort of contract with the Soviets,” Kingshot explained. “Back in 1964 or so, they agreed to handle all the ‘necessary’ eliminations for the KGB. In return, they get various perks, mostly political. Strokov, yes, I’ve heard that name before. Did you get a photo of the chap, Nick?”
“Fifty or more, Alan,” Thompson assured him. “I’ll never forget that face. He has the eyes of a corpse—no life in them at all, like a doll’s eyes.”
“How good is he?” Ryan asked.
“As an assassin? Quite good, Sir John. Very good indeed. His elimination of Markov on the bridge was expertly done—it was the third attempt. The first two would-be assassins bungled the job, and they called Strokov in to get it right. And that he did. Had things gone just a little differently, we would not have realized it was a murder at all.”
“We think he’s worked elsewhere in the West,” Kingshot said. “But very little good information. Just gossip really. Jack, this is a dangerous development. I need to get this information to Basil soonest.” And with that, Alan left the room to get to a secure phone. Ryan turned back to Zaitzev.
“And that’s why you decided to leave?”
“KGB want kill innocent man, Ryan. I see plot grow. Andropov himself say do this. I handle the messages. How can man stop KGB?” he asked. “I cannot stop KGB, but I will not help KGB kill priest—he is innocent man, yes?”
Ryan’s eyes looked down at the floor. “Yes, Oleg Ivan’ch, he is.” Dear God in heaven. He checked his watch. He had to get this information out PDQ, but nobody was awake at Langley yet.
“BLOODY HELL,” Sir Basil Charleston said into his secure phone. “Is this reliable information, Alan?”
“Yes, sir, I believe it to be entirely truthful. Our Rabbit seems a decent chap, and a rather clever one. He seems to be motivated exclusively by his conscience.” Next, Kingshot told him about the first revelation of the morning, MINISTER.
“We need to get ‘five’ looking into that.” The British Security Service—once known as MI-5—was the counterespionage arm of their government. They’d need a little more specific information to run that putative traitor down, but they already had a starting point. Twenty years, was it? What a productive traitor that fellow had to be, Sir Basil thought. Time for him to see Parkhurst Prison on the Isle of Wight. Charleston had spent years cleaning up his own shop, once a playground for the KGB. But no more, and never bloody again, the Knight Commander of the Bath swore to himself.
WHOM DO I TELL? Ryan wondered. Basil would doubtless call Langley—Jack would make sure of that, but Sir Basil was a supremely reliable guy. Next came a more difficult question: What the hell can I/we do about this?
Ryan lit another smoke to consider that one. It was more police work than intelligence work. . . .
And the central issue would be classification.
Yeah, that’s going to be the problem. If we tell anybody, the word will get out somehow, and then somebody will know we have the Rabbit—and guess what, Jack? The Rabbit is now more important to the CIA than the life of the Pope.
Oh, shit, Ryan thought. It was like a trick of jujitsu, like a sudden reversal of polarity on the dial of a compass. North was now south. Inside was now outside. And the needs of American intelligence might now supersede the life of the Bishop of Rome. His face must have betrayed what he was thinking.