Then I slammed the door in his face, flipped the dead bolt, and snapped shut all my curtains.
“Some help you are,” I said to Vlad when he padded toward the window and nosed at my leg.
This man’s visit was a warning. By being in New York—or anywhere in America, really—I was too close to the FBI while not far enough from the NKVD. I certainly wasn’t going to take a vacation to Mexico or Canada as Al had suggested—we’d all seen how well that worked for Leon Trotsky.
Something had to give, and soon. Or I might well end up one of those women found dead in her apartment, undiscovered for weeks until the smell got too bad.
* * *
NOVEMBER 23, 1963
6:37 P.M.
Cat noticed how slowly Elizabeth moved while they ate the lackluster tuna casserole—the ancient peas were freezer burned, and apparently Elizabeth didn’t believe in fresh produce, so Cat had substituted onion powder for real onion. Elizabeth’s same hands that had gestured so animatedly when talking about her sources now fell limply at her sides between bites. Under normal circumstances, Cat would have felt guilty for making Elizabeth relive all these terrible experiences, as if she was forcing an exhausted, aging woman on some terrible Bataan Death March down memory lane.
But these weren’t normal circumstances. And if anyone could survive a death march, it was Elizabeth Bentley. Hell, the woman hadn’t even asked for a bathroom break since she’d started talking this afternoon.
Cat set down her fork and asked the question that had been niggling at her since Elizabeth’s story went south. “Did you ever blame yourself for your fallout with Al and the NKVD?”
She expected Elizabeth to snarl like the semi-feral beast she was, but the former Soviet spy merely brought out that golden lighter, gave it three damnably annoying clicks. Cat had recognized it the moment it showed up in Elizabeth’s reminiscences, wondered how it came to be in Elizabeth’s possession given her falling-out with Al. “It’s difficult to feel responsible considering Earl Browder intercepted one particularly long and chilling memo in which Al went through all the viable options of eliminating yours truly.”
“No. Really?”
“Hmm.” Elizabeth raised both eyebrows. “That would have saved you a lot of trouble, now wouldn’t it, Catherine? The report was actually terribly unimaginative and by the book: Al deemed shooting would draw too much attention, faking my suicide was too problematic, and arranging an accident was judged too risky.” Her tone was carefully measured, but Cat caught the way she shivered despite the heat of the casserole-scented kitchen. “But the clever mouse—or the Clever Girl in this case—gets the cheese. Or at least avoids the cheese laced with nerve poison.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning I beat them to the punch so the NKVD couldn’t assassinate me without causing an international incident.”
“You outmaneuvered the NKVD? Really?” This time it was Cat’s turn to snort. “I think you’re full of shit, Elizabeth. That’s like outsmarting the FBI.”
Cat didn’t know what she said that was so funny, but Elizabeth doubled over in sudden laughter that quickly turned into a choking fit that had Cat thumping her on the back. It occurred to Cat that while Elizabeth wasn’t that old, she also wasn’t in the best of health. Smoking, spying, and drinking will kill you early, Cat mused. Although at the rate she was going, if Elizabeth’s liver hadn’t failed yet, Cat suspected it was pickled well enough to last at least two lifetimes.
Not that any of that mattered, given that Elizabeth might still wind up with a bullet between the eyes.
“I’m all right,” Elizabeth finally rasped out, waved off Cat’s assistance as she righted herself, cheeks flushed with color that made her suddenly seem younger and full of life. “Catherine, if your college major or being an assassin doesn’t pan out, you may have a career waiting as a stand-up comedienne.”
Cat frowned. “So, you’re telling me you outsmarted the FBI?”
Elizabeth crossed her heels beneath her in one of those jarring mannerisms so at odds with her tarnished appearance, a glimpse into one of the many more elegant personas she had once played. That was, until she removed a small flask from her dress pocket. “Catherine, there’s a saying that a jealous woman does better research than the FBI—it doesn’t take much to outthink them. But after my falling-out with Al and knowing that the NKVD was ready to slip a noose around my neck, I was sick of jumping at every motorcycle engine that backfired and hiding from each strange bump in the night. A person can only be besieged from so many sides before they lose it.”
All right, Cat thought. I’ll humor the old bat. For a while longer at least. “So, what did you do?”
“Well, according to Out of Bondage, I went into a white-steepled Congregational church on Long Island Sound and had a religious epiphany.” The smile that slid onto Elizabeth’s lips could only be described as sly. “There was a deep voice saying You must make amends before I walked out into blinding summer sunshine.”
“I call utter bullshit. Don’t tell me people actually bought that.”
Elizabeth chortled. “Honestly, Catherine, that priceless anecdote was some of my best work. People lapped it up. And I did convert to Catholicism later.” She gestured to the wooden crucifix nailed to her kitchen wall. “Although that was mostly strategic. As well as being a good way to hedge my bets for the inevitable day when I cash in all my chips.”
“All right. We’ve come this far—you may as well tell me the rest.” Cat picked up her empty plate and ran water for the dishes. Am I really washing up for this woman? She put the plate in the sink, refusing to go that far. “What’s the real story?”
“There’s that old Russian saying Yasha taught me: the best defense is an attack. The real story is that I did the last thing any of them expected—I attacked. And I did it because it was the last thing anyone expected.” Elizabeth removed the stopper from the flask, kicked back God only knew what proof. “Pick your poison, so they say. To which I always say, choose the poison you know best.”
ИЗМЕННИК
THE INFORMER
With a pang of nostalgia, I realized that the good old days were over. Now I was one of the hunted and no matter where I went, the footsteps of the hunters would be hot behind me.
—Elizabeth Bentley, Out of Bondage
14
NOVEMBER 1945
I recalled the old Lithuanian gentleman who had come into World Tourists and told of the Nazis killing his family during the war, my disbelief at his warning that the Soviets had been even more ruthless when they’d come under the guise of liberation. How Americans like me didn’t realize what a paradise we were living in.
How could I have been so blind?
I’d hoped to take down Hitler, but in doing so, I had thrown my lot in with the wolf in sheep’s clothing, just as America had done when getting into bed with Stalin. In trying to buy me off and then planning to have me killed when I wouldn’t cooperate, the Party had become anathema to me. I now understood how much Yasha had shielded me from the dark machine that mangled decent human beings, whored out women like Mary Tenney, and ordered their own agents liquidated.
With what I knew of the Center’s network here in America and what I’d done, I could never return to a regular life. Not because I maintained any delusions of grandeur about my own self-worth, mind you, but because neither the Russians nor the Americans would allow me to fade into the background. Not when I understood both their strengths and weaknesses.
If I gave in to the NKVD, I’d end up shivering in a gray and drafty Communist apartment in Siberia during a December snowstorm, sharing a package of crackers with my Party-mandated husband whose real name I would probably never learn. And that’s if I was lucky. The more likely scenario was that they’d put a convenient bullet in my head.
If I threw my lot in with the FBI, my fellow Americans would sh
un me as a traitor and a leper.
Pick your poison, indeed.
But the FBI wasn’t likely to murder me, so I’d just have to take the shunning on the chin. Hell, maybe I even deserved it for being so blind and idealistic. The school of hard knocks and all of that.
The New Haven FBI office I arrived at was an ordinary business building where the danger of detection was minimal, especially after I took the elevator to the third floor and backtracked down the fire stairs. Beyond the receptionist’s partition was an office in a drab shade of puce, its linoleum peeling off the floor and water stains marring the ceiling. Was this room with its government-issue metal desk and two uncomfortable office chairs where I would slide out of this ugly mess?
I almost bolted when the secretary asked me to wait in the interrogation room, fell back on the old Party maxim of my revolutionary days: when you’re in a tight spot and want to keep calm, think of a group of words—it doesn’t matter whether they make sense or not—and repeat them over and over to yourself until you have drowned out everything else.
Safety. Freedom. America. George Washington. Crossing the Delaware.
This was my Delaware. And there was no turning back.
“I’m Agent Buckley, and this is Agent Jardine, our specialist on the New York Communist scene.” Buckley, in his double-breasted wool tweed suit, was the New Haven office’s Soviet expert; I’d asked for him specifically. “I want Agent Jardine to sit in on our interview today.”
Interview . . . Interrogation . . .
My pulse was thrumming in my fingertips, and I was already perspiring beneath my dark wool suit. I kept on my kid leather gloves as we shook hands so the agents wouldn’t notice my sweating palms. “Thank you for seeing me today, gentlemen.” I kept my voice level, bored even. I was struck by both men’s faces: lined with fatigue but lacking the superficial arrogance and underlying fear that I’d seen on so many Communist faces over the years. “I hope I’ll have some information that’s helpful to you.”
Helpful while also loosening this double noose around my neck.
“Why don’t you start by telling us a little about yourself?” Buckley prompted. “Explain how a woman like you got mixed up in Party business.”
And that’s how it went, these two FBI agents in their striped ties tossing me softball questions while I cherry-picked which tidbits to tell them. I spoke of my desire to see America awash in economic equality during the Depression and how I wanted Hitler to fail during the war. I chose each word wisely, knowing that this first impression meant everything, thankful that I’d been able to resist a drink that morning. I must come across as well educated and eloquent, well-intentioned, and above all, stable.
And I could tell they were biting; hook, line, and sinker.
The agents scribbled on yellow legal pads, filling the pages until they had to call for more when I started speaking of Yasha, World Tourists, and even USS&S.
All the while, I was the perfect idealist. I’d just wanted to see a better world.
I didn’t tell Agents Buckley and Jardine everything, but I sprinkled in enough chicken feed to make them believe. That was the key—that they accept this version of my story as ironclad truth.
Which was also tricky, given that I had absolutely no documentation of anything, which also meant they weren’t likely to arrest me. All my evidence was gone, either passed along to the Soviets or turned to ash in my Barrow Street fireplace. Yasha and I had broken many cardinal rules of spycraft, but never had I ever kept a single page of incriminating material. And now I was kicking myself for a month of Sundays because of it.
All I had was my memory and my word. It would have to be enough.
Even if what I gave them wasn’t quite the whole truth.
I dropped names; I had to. Not all of them—certainly not Mary Tenney or Earl Browder (who couldn’t help me, given that after intercepting the memo about my possible execution he had been expelled from the Party for his public views concerning postwar harmony between the US and USSR), or even William Remington—I focused on those who had already been outed or lost to me, including the Silvermasters and Perlo group. I wasn’t endangering the Perlo group by naming them, given that the letter by Perlo’s ex-wife had already landed them on the FBI’s watch list. I hoped that perhaps the Silvermasters would come to see the truth as I had, that the Party they served wasn’t the savior we’d been led to believe.
I talked all afternoon and long after the sun set. Told Agents Buckley and Jardine of microfilm carried in my knitting bag (which included specs on American military strength), which Whelan’s Drug Store I’d met Mary Tenney at once three years before (without naming her, of course—the one on Vanderbilt Avenue, with the sign for a dance studio on the second floor that read Guaranteed $5 Course: If you can walk, we can teach you to dance), what shoe size Helen Silvermaster wore (size 11 wide—the woman might have passed for a Hollywood starlet, but her feet were boats—which I knew after tracking down a pair of stunning black slingbacks for her as a Christmas gift in 1942). Buckley sent out for sandwiches, but neither FBI agent touched theirs. Finally, when it was over and I’d given them my new contact information at the Hotel St. George, they both stood, their metal chairs scraping against the linoleum.
“We’ll be in touch, Miss Bentley.” Which meant they weren’t going to arrest me, at least not today. Of course, on the other end, they couldn’t offer more than that, not until they’d verified that this wasn’t a trap set by the Russian Secret Police.
I accepted their handshakes, gloves still on. “I certainly hope so.”
My ears perked to hear their excited murmurs that started before I’d even left the office.
I think we’ve got something here, Buckley.
You’re damn right. This goes straight to Hoover’s desk.
I was now a defector.
* * *
* * *
Two days after my initial interview, FBI’s Manhattan office on Foley Square called me in to corroborate my claims (if they thought I’d waver, they were wrong), and the day after that I met two new agents—Spencer and Kelly—at a hotel near USS&S.
“Do you recognize this one?” Spencer showed me FBI surveillance photographs of known Russian operatives, trying to link my information to existing files. Oftentimes, the shots were too grainy or taken from too far away to make a positive identification.
Not so today.
Because the jowly face of the man ducking out of a Woolworth’s in grainy black and white . . .
. . . was Al’s.
I wanted to shout his name from the rooftops, but instead . . . I faltered. Here was something concrete I could give the FBI, a direction I could point them that they could verify and confirm. It also meant I was blowing wide open the cover of my direct superior.
This was a dangerous game of Russian roulette I was playing. One I would be lucky to escape from unscathed. Then again, Al had considered how best to execute me.
I glanced up to see both FBI agents staring at me expectantly. Without realizing it, I’d starting working one of their pencils between my fingers.
“I know him.” I set the pencil down, heart thudding. “His code name is Al—I was never given his real name, of course. He told me he’s a Czech businessman working in Washington, DC. That’s just a cover story, of course.”
“You’re sure this is him?” Kelly fixed me with a gimlet eye, the barely leashed eagerness in his stare akin to one of Pavlov’s dogs just before the bell rang. “You’re one hundred percent sure?”
“I’d swear it on my father’s grave. Why?”
Spencer rubbed his forehead, his eyes wide. “That’s Anatoly Gorsky, Soviet rezident here in America, head of the NKVD in America and first secretary at the Soviet Embassy. We think he’s responsible for sending ten thousand documents from London to Moscow during the war.”
Shit. Holy shit. An
d a fuck or two for good measure.
As it turned out, it was a day made for cursing.
“We just intercepted a coded memo from Gorsky to Russia last week, outlining specific liquidation plans for one of his contacts. Ruthless, really, either faking her suicide or dribbling a little agent X on a handkerchief and, how did he put it . . . ?” Spencer’s eyes narrowed, and he flipped through his notes. “. . . hoping for the best.”
I’d already been told by Browder that Al had been brainstorming ways to eliminate me, but I thought the plans had all been rejected. Some invisible hand closed around my throat. “What was her name?”
“Myrna.”
I shall refer to you as Myrna in all my correspondence with the Center, although you shall remain known as Miss Wise to your contacts.
Shit, shit, shit. I was definitely not feeling very wise or clever right now.
Buckley glanced at me, must have caught the way the blood had drained from my face. “That’s not you, is it?”
“Myrna is one of my code names.” I was sure Spencer—and probably the secretary in the room next door—could hear the tremor in my voice. I’d known when I’d joined the underground that I was swimming with sharks—Yasha had helped coordinate Trotsky’s assassination, for crying out loud—but it was a different thing entirely to hear that you might soon be twitching on the floor while foaming at the mouth from nerve agent.
“I’m going to need some sort of protection from the FBI.” The room was suddenly hotter than the flames of hell as I decided to leapfrog a few steps of my plan. “Surely, you can see that.”
“We understand the predicament you’re in, Miss Bentley, but I’m afraid that in order for us to guarantee your safety, we’re going to need proof of your claims.”
A Most Clever Girl Page 25