Once again he stared down at the inside of the open icon, which was now laid flat on the table in front of him. The true irony was that the woman pressing his trousers was able to understand every word on the parchment while at the same time unable to explain its full significance to him. The complete surface of the inside of the icon was covered by a parchment, which was glued to the wood and fell only a centimeter short of the four edges. Adam swiveled it round so that he could study it more clearly. The scrawled signatures in black ink at the bottom and the seals gave it the look of a legal document. On each reading he learned something new. Adam had been surprised originally to discover it was written in French until he came to the date on the bottom—20 June 1867—and then he remembered from his military history lectures at Sandhurst that long after Napoleonic times most international agreements remained conducted in French. Adam began to reread the script again slowly.
His French was not good enough to translate more than a few odd words from the finely handwritten scroll. Under Etats-Unis William Seward’s bold hand was scrawled across a crest of a two-headed eagle. Next to it was the signature of Alexsander Gorchakov below a crown that mirrored the silver ornament embedded in the back of the icon. Adam double-checked. It had to be some form of agreement executed between the Russians and the Americans in 1867.
He then searched for other words that would help to explain the significance of the document. On one line he identified the words “sept million, deux cent mille dollars en or (7,2 million)” and on another “sept cent douze million, huit cent mille dollars en or (712,8 million), le 20 juin 1966.”
His eyes rested on a calendar hanging by a nail from the wall. It was Saturday, June 18, 1966. If the date in the agreement was to be believed, then in only three days the document would no longer have any legal validity. No wonder the two most powerful nations on earth seemed desperate to get their hands on it, thought Adam.
Adam read through the document line by line, searching for any further clues, pondering over each word slowly.
His eyes came to a halt on the one word that would remain the same in both languages and required no translation.
The one word he had not told Lawrence.
Adam wondered how the icon had ever fallen into the hands of Goering in the first place. He must have bequeathed it to his father unknowingly—for had he realized the true importance of what was hidden inside the icon, he would surely have been able to bargain for his own freedom with either side.
“Voilà, voilà,” said the farmer’s wife, waving her hands as she placed warm socks, pants, and trousers in front of Adam. How long had he spent engrossed in his fateful discovery? She looked across at the upside-down parchment and smiled. Adam quickly snapped the icon closed and then studied the masterpiece carefully. So skillfully had the wood been cut that he could no longer see the join. He thought of the words of the letter left to him in his father’s will: “But if you open it only to discover its purpose is to involve you in some dishonorable enterprise, be rid of it without a second thought.” He did not need to give a second thought to how his father would have reacted in the same circumstances. The farmer’s wife was now standing hands on hips, staring at him with a puzzled look.
Adam quickly replaced the icon in his jacket pocket and pulled his trousers back on.
He could think of no adequate way of thanking her for her hospitality, her lack of suspicion or inquisitiveness, so he simply walked over to her, took her gently by the shoulders, and kissed her on the cheek. She blushed and handed him a small plastic bag. He looked inside to find three apples, some bread, and a large piece of cheese. She removed a crumb from his lip with the edge of her apron and led him to the open door.
Adam smiled at her and then walked outside into his other world.
PART III
THE WHITE HOUSE
WASHINGTON, D.C.
June 18, 1966
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
THE WHITE HOUSE
JUNE 18, 1966
“I DON’T WANT to be the first Goddamn President in the history of the United States to hand back an American state rather than found one.”
“I appreciate your position, sir,” said the Secretary of State. “But …”
“Where do we stand on this legally, Dean?”
“We don’t, Mr. President. Abraham Brunweld, who was my tutor at St. John’s, has confirmed that the terms of the ninety-nine-year lease are binding on both sides. The lease was signed on behalf of the Russians by their foreign minister, Alexsander Gorchakov, and for the Americans by the then Secretary of State, William Seward.”
“Can such an agreement still be valid today?” asked the President, turning to his chief legal officer, Nicholas Katzenbach.
“It certainly can, sir,” said the Attorney General. “But only if they can produce their original. Both the UN and the International Court at The Hague would be left with no choice but to support the Russian claim. Otherwise no international agreement signed by us in the past or in the future would carry any credibility.”
“What you’re asking me to do is lie down and wag my tail like a prize Labrador while the Russians shit all over us,” said the President.
“I understand how you feel, Mr. President,” said the Attorney General, “but it remains my responsibility to make you aware of the legal position.”
“God dammit, is there any precedent for such stupidity by a head of state?”
“The British,” chipped in Dean Rusk, “will be facing a similar problem with the Chinese in 1999 over the New Territories of Hong Kong. They have already accepted the reality of the situation and indeed have made it clear to the Chinese government that they are willing to come to an agreement with them.”
“That’s just one example,” said the President, “and we all know about the British and their ‘fair play’ diplomacy.”
“Also, in 1898,” continued Rusk, “the Russians obtained a ninety-nine-year lease on Port Arthur, in northern China. The port was vital to them because, unlike Vladivostok, it is ice-free all year round.”
“I had no idea the Russians had a port in China.”
“They don’t any longer, Mr. President. They returned it to Mao in 1955 as an act of goodwill between fellow Communists.”
“You can be damn sure the Russians won’t want to return this piece of land to us as an act of goodwill between fellow capitalists,” said the President. “Am I left with any alternative?”
“Short of military action to prevent the Soviets claiming what they will rightfully see as theirs, no, sir,” replied the Secretary of State.
“So one Johnson buys the land from the Russians in 1867 while another is forced to sell it back in 1966. Why did Seward and the President ever agree to such a damn cockamamy idea in the first place?”
“At the time,” said the Attorney General, removing his spectacles, “the purchase price of the land in question was seven-point-two million dollars, and inflation was then virtually unheard of. Andrew Johnson could never have envisaged the Russians wanting to purchase it back at ninety-nine times its original value, or in real terms, seven hundred and twelve-point-eight million dollars in gold bullion. In reality, years of inflation have made the asking price cheap. And the Russians have already lodged the full amount in a New York bank to prove it.”
“So we can’t even hope that they won’t pay up in time,” said the President.
“It would seem not, sir.”
“But why did Czar Alexander ever want to lease the damn land in the first place? That’s what beats me.”
“He was having trouble with some of his senior ministers at the time over the selling off of land belonging to Russia in eastern Asia. The Czar thought this transaction would be more palatable to his inner circle if he presented it as nothing more than a long lease, with a buy-back clause rather than an outright sale.”
“Then why didn’t Congress object to his little plan?”
“After Congress had ratified the main treaty,
the amendment was not strictly subject to approval by the House, as no further expenditure by the United States government was involved,” explained Rusk. “Ironically, Seward was proud of the fact he had demanded such a high premium in the repayment clause, which at the time he had every reason to believe would be impossible to repay.”
“Now it’s worth that in annual oil revenue alone,” said the President, looking out of the Oval Office window toward the Washington Monument. “Not to mention the military chaos it’s going to create in this country if they’ve got their hands on the original copy of the treaty. Don’t ever forget that I was the President who asked Congress to spend billions putting a tracking station right across that border so the American people could sleep easy in the knowledge that we possessed an early warning system second to none.”
Neither adviser felt able to contradict their elected leader.
“So what are the British doing about all this?”
“Playing it close to the vest, as usual, Mr. President. It’s an English national who is thought to be in possession of the treaty at the moment, and they still seem quietly confident that they will get their hands on him and the icon before the Russians, so they may yet turn out to be our saviors.”
“Nice to have the British coming to our rescue for a change,” said the President. “But have we meanwhile been sitting on our backsides while the British try to solve our problems for us?”
“No, sir. The CIA has been on it for over a month.”
“Then it’s only surprising that the Russians haven’t got their hands on the icon already.”
Nobody laughed.
“So what am I expected to do next? Sit and wait for the Soviets to move seven hundred and twelve million dollars of gold from their New York bank to the U.S. Treasury before midnight on Monday?”
“They must also deliver their original copy of the agreement to me at the same time,” said Rusk. “And they have only sixty hours left to do that.”
“Where our copy at this moment?” asked the President.
“Somewhere deep in the vaults of the Pentagon. Only two people know the exact location. Since the Yalta conference, our copy of the treaty has never seen the light of day.”
“Why have I never been told about it before today?” asked the President. “At least I could have put a stop to so much expenditure.”
“For over fifty years, we’ve believed the Russians’ copy was destroyed at the time of the Revolution. As the years passed it became clear that the Soviets accepted this as a fait accompli, with the final acknowledgment of this fact coming from Stalin at Yalta. Brezhnev must have come across something within the last month that convinced him their copy had only been mislaid.”
“Christ, another month, and we would have been clear.”
“That is correct, sir,” said the Secretary of State.
“Do you realize, Dean, that if the Russians turn up at your office before midnight on the twentieth with their copy, it would make all of Kennedy’s efforts over Cuba look like so much piss in a thunderstorm?”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
WHEN THE COTTAGE door closed behind Adam, all he could make out was the outskirts of a small town. While it was still so early he felt safe to jog toward centre ville, but as soon as the early morning workers began to appear on the streets, he slowed to a walk. Adam opted not to go straight into the center of the town but to look for somewhere to hide while he considered his next move. He came to a halt outside a multistory parking lot and decided he was unlikely to find a better place to formulate a plan.
Adam walked through an exit door at ground level and came to a lift that indicated that the parking lot was on four floors. He ran down the steps to the lowest level, tentatively pulled back the door to the basement and found it was badly lit and almost empty. Adam had chosen the basement as he assumed that it would be the last floor to fill up with customers. He walked around the perimeter of the floor and studied the layout. Two cars were parked in the far corner, and a thick layer of dust suggested that they had been there for some time. He crouched down behind one of them and found that he was safely out of sight to all but the most inquisitive.
He began to fantasize that someone might park a car on that floor and leave the keys in the ignition. He checked the doors of the two cars already parked, but both were securely locked. He settled back to work out a more serious plan of how he could reach the coast by nightfall.
He was deep in thought when he heard a scraping noise that made him jump. He peered round the gloomy basement, and out of the darkness a man appeared, pulling behind him a plastic dustbin half full of rubbish. Adam could barely see the old man dressed in a dirty brown coat that stretched nearly to the ground and left little doubt about the height of the previous employee. He wasn’t sure what he would do if the man continued to walk toward him. But as he came nearer Adam could see that he was stooped and old; the stub of a cigarette protruded from his lips. The cleaner stopped in front of him, spotted a cigarette pack, picked it up, and checked to be sure it was empty before dropping it in the dustbin. After that, a candy wrapper, a Pepsi-Cola can, and an old copy of Le Figaro all found their way into the dustbin. His eyes searched slowly round the room for more rubbish, but still he didn’t notice Adam tucked away behind the farthest car. Satisfied that his task was completed, he dragged the dustbin across the floor and pushed it outside the door. Adam began to relax again, but after about two minutes, the old man returned, walked over to a wall and pulled open a door that Adam hadn’t previously noticed. He took off the long brown coat and replaced it with a gray one that didn’t look in a much better state but at least it made a more convincing fit. He then disappeared through the exit. Moments later Adam heard a door close with a bang.
The cleaner had ended his day.
Adam waited for some time before he stood up and stretched. He crept around the edge of the wall until he reached the little door. He pulled it open quietly and removed the long brown coat from its nail, then headed back to his place in the corner. He ducked down as the first of the morning cars arrived. The driver swung into the far corner in such a fluent circle that Adam felt sure it must have been a daily routine. A short dapper man with a pencil mustache, dressed in a smart pin-stripe suit, jumped out of the car carrying a briefcase. Once he had locked the car door he proceeded with fast mincing strides toward the exit. Adam waited until the heavy door swung back into place before he stood up and tried on the brown coat over his blazer. It was tight on the shoulders and a little short in the arm, but at least it made him look as if he might have worked there.
For the next hour he watched the cars as they continued to arrive at irregular intervals. Tiresomely, all the owners carefully locked their doors and checked them before disappearing through the exit with their keys.
When he heard ten o’clock strike in the distance Adam decided that there was nothing to be gained by hanging around any longer. He had crept out from behind the car that was shielding him and begun to make his way across the floor toward the exit when a Rover with English registration plates swung round the corner and nearly blinded him. He jumped to one side to let the car pass, but it screeched to a halt beside him and the driver wound down his window.
“All—right—park—here?” the driver asked, emphasizing each word in an English accent.
“Oui, monsieur,” said Adam.
“Other—floors—marked—privé.” the man continued, as if addressing a complete moron. “Anywhere?” His arm swept round the floor.
“Oui,” repeated Adam, “bert ay merst paak you,” he added, fearing he sounded too much like Peter Sellers.
Balls, was what Adam expected to hear him reply. “Fine,” was what the man actually said. He got out of the car, and handed Adam his keys and a ten-franc note.
“Merci,” said Adam, pocketing the note and touching his forehead with his hand. “Quelle—heure—vous—retournez?” he asked, playing the man at his own game.
“One hour at most,�
� said the man as he reached the door. Adam waited by the car for a few minutes, but the man did not come back. He opened the passenger door and dropped the food bag on the front seat. He then walked round to the other side and climbed in the driver’s seat, switched on the ignition, and checked the fuel gauge: a little over half full. He revved the engine and drove the car up the ramp until he reached street level, where he came to a halt, unable to escape. He needed a two-franc piece to make the arm swing up and let him out. The lady in the car behind him reluctantly changed his ten-franc note once she realized there was no other way of getting out.
Adam drove quickly out on to the road looking for the sign Toutes Directions. Once he had found one, it was only minutes before he was clear of the town and traveling up the N6 to Paris.
Adam estimated that he had two hours at best. By then the police would surely have been informed of the theft of the car. He felt confident he had enough petrol to reach Paris; but he certainly couldn’t hope to make Calais.
He remained in the center lane of the N6 for most of the journey, always keeping the speedometer five kilometers below the limit. By the end of the first hour Adam had covered nearly ninety kilometers. He opened the bag the farmer’s wife had given him and took out an apple and a piece of cheese. His mind began to drift to Heidi, as it had so often in the past two days.
If only he had never opened the letter.
Another hour passed before he spotted him limping up a hill only a few hundred yards from the main road. A broad smile came over Romanov’s face when he realized he could get to Scott long before Scott could hope to reach the road. When Romanov was within a few yards of him the flight lieutenant turned round and smiled at the stranger.
A Matter of Honor Page 25