Red Square

by Martin Cruz Smith

  On the far side of the clubhouse were two recycling bins, orange for plastic, green for glass. Arkady tossed the phone into the orange one, then walked back past the tennis courts, through the station gates, under the cameras, by the guard booth in the parking lot and up the steps to the reception area.

  Summoned, Stas came to the desk, a little astonished to see him, while the guards tried calling Michael. 'It's ringing.'

  Stas said, 'We haven't got all day.'

  The guard hung up, welcomed Arkady with a glare and a pass. After a buzz at the door he was back in the cream-carpeted hallway of Radio Liberty. The bulletin boards were changed, a sign of a well-run organization. Glossy photographs showed President Gilmartin leading a tour of Hungarian broadcasters and applauding folk dancers from Minsk. Technicians with audio tape trafficked up and down the corridor. Ludmilla's grey hair bobbed in and out of a doorway.

  'Did you come to bomb the director's office or Michael's? How much trouble am I in?' Stas asked.

  'Which way is the Red Archive?'

  'The stairs are between the drinks and the snack machine. Bomb away.'

  When Tommy boasted about the Red Archive being the greatest library of Soviet life outside Moscow, Arkady had pictured the lamps and musty stacks of the Lenin Library. As usual, he was unprepared for reality. There were no lamps in the Red Archive, only the aquarium glow of room-length fixtures. No books either, only microfiche files, motorized steel cabinets that glided on tracks. Instead of a reading room there was a machine that enlarged microfiche to legible size. Arkady ran a hand over a file in awe. It was as if Ancient Rus, Peter and Catherine the Great and the storming of the WinterPalace had been reduced to the head of a pin. He was relieved to see something as primitive as a wooden box with filing cards in Cyrillic.

  All the researchers scribbling away at desks were Americans. A woman with a blouse full of bows was delighted to see a Russian.

  'Where was Tommy's desk?' Arkady asked.

  'The Pravda section.' She sighed and pointed to another door. 'We miss him.'

  'Of course.'

  'There's just so much information coming these days,' she said. 'There used to be none and now there's too much. I wish it would just slow down.'

  'I know what you mean.'

  The Pravda section was a narrow room made smaller by shelves of bound copies of Pravda on one side and Izvestya on the other. At the end of the room a VCR was taping from a colour television set. The station had to have a satellite dish because, though the sound was low, Arkady realized that he was watching Soviet news. On the screen, a crowd in shabby clothes was pushing over a lorry. When it landed on its side, they swarmed into the back of it. A close-up of the driver showed his bloody nose. A different angle on the lorry displayed the name of a cooperative for rendering tallow. People climbed out of it waving bones and black meat. Arkady realized how much he had been conditioned by a few days of ample German beer and food. Was it this bad, he asked himself. Was it really this bad?

  Behind the set was Tommy's desk, covered by newspapers, coffee rings and machine-gun bullets used as paperweights. In the middle drawer were soft pencils, staplers, memo pads and paper clips. In the side drawers, Russian-English and German-English dictionaries, cowboy paperbacks, heavier books on military history, manuscripts and rejection letters. There was not even a phone jack for a fax.

  Arkady returned to the file room and asked the woman at the filing cards, 'Did Tommy have a fax when he worked at "Programme Review"?'

  'Possibly. The "Review" section is in a different part of town. He could have used one there.'

  'How long was he here?'

  'A year. I wish we had a fax here. That's one of the executive perks. Privileges,' she said brightly, as if describing awards. 'We do have information here. Anything about the Soviet Union. Any subject.'

  'Max Albov.'

  She took a deep breath and played with the bows on her collar. 'Well, that's close to home. Okay.' She started to move away, stopped. 'Your name is?'

  'Renko.'

  'You're visiting?'

  'Michael.'

  'Then...' She lifted her hands. The sky was the limit.

  Max was a vein of gold that seemed to work its way through cabinet after cabinet of microfiches. Arkady sat at the enlarger and scrolled through years of Pravda, Red Star and Soviet Film describing Max's career in cinema, his treacherous defection to the West, his service with Radio Liberty, the CIA's mouthpiece of disinformation, his pangs of conscience, his return to the motherland and recent incarnation on American television as a respected journalist and commentator.

  An early item in Soviet Film caught Arkady's attention. 'For director Maxim Albov, the most important part of the story is the woman. "Get a beautiful actress, light her properly and your film is already halfway a success." '

  His films, however, had all been of the action variety, extolling the daring and sacrifices of the Red Army and border guards against Maoists, Zionists and mujahedin.

  Another item read, 'One effect of an Israeli tank on fire was particularly difficult because the film crew didn't have the blasting caps or plastic explosives they had requested. The successful shot was improvised by the director himself.

  'Albov: "We were filming outside Baku, near a chemical complex. Film-goers don't know that my initial schooling was in chemistry. I was aware that by combining red sodium and copper sulphate we could create a spontaneous explosion without a fuse or a cap. Since the question was timing we tested forty or fifty samples before filming, which we did with a remote camera behind a Plexiglas screen. It was a night shot and the effect when the Israeli tank erupts into flame is spectacular. Hollywood couldn't do better." '

  Arkady's head snapped up as the archive door slammed open and Michael and Federov entered. Still in tennis shorts, Federov's legs were a fluorescent white. He carried a racquet. Michael held a phone. They were accompanied by the guards from the reception desk and by Ludmilla, who glowered like a vicious pug.

  • • •

  Ludmilla said, 'Use my office. It's next to yours. That way your secretary won't log him in. He just disappears.'

  Michael liked the suggestion. They crowded into a room with black furniture and ashtrays set out like urns of the recently departed. On the walls were photographs of the famous poet Tsvetayeva, who had emigrated to Paris with her husband, an assassin. Even by Russian standards it had been a troubled marriage.

  The guards pushed Arkady down on to an ottoman. Federov sank into the sofa and Michael perched on the edge of the desk.

  'Where's my goddamn phone?'

  'In your hand?' Arkady asked.

  Michael let the receiver drop on his desk. 'This is not mine. You know where mine is. You changed the fucking phones.'

  'How could I change your phone?' Arkady asked.

  'That's how you got past the front desk.'

  Arkady said, 'No, they gave me a visitor's pass.'

  'Because they couldn't reach me on the phone,' Michael said. 'Because they're idiots.'

  'What does your phone look like?'

  Michael practised even breathing. 'Renko, Federov and I got together today to talk about you. You seem to cause problems across the board.'

  'He refused an order from the consul to go home.' Federov was happy to be included. 'He has a friend here at the station named Stanislav Kolotov.'

  'Stas! I'll interrogate him later. He sent you to the archive?' Michael asked Arkady.

  'No, I just wanted to see where Tommy worked.'

  'Why?'

  'He made his work sound interesting.'

  'And the files on Max Albov?'

  'He sounded fascinating.'

  'But you told the head researcher that you'd come to see me.'

  'I did come to see you. Yesterday, when you took me to President Gilmartin, you promised me money.'

  Michael said, 'You fed Gilmartin horseshit.'

  'Renko does need money,' Federov said.

  'Of course he needs money.
Every Russian needs money,' Ludmilla said.

  'Are you sure that's not your phone?' Arkady asked.

  'This is a stolen phone,' Michael said.

  'The police should check it for prints,' Arkady said.

  'Well, it's got my fingerprints on it now, naturally. The police will be here soon enough. The point is, Renko, that you like to stir things up. It's my job to keep things smooth. I've come to the decision that things here will run a lot smoother if you're back in Moscow.'

  Federov said, 'That's the feeling at the consulate, too,'

  When Arkady shifted, he felt a guard's hand leaning on each shoulder.

  Michael said, 'We've decided to put you on the plane. Consider that done. The communiqué my friend Sergei here sends to Moscow will depend in large part on your attitude, which so far is piss-poor. He could describe your work here as so successful that you went home early. On the other hand, I would guess that an investigator who's sent back for harming relations between the United States and the Soviet Union, for abusing the hospitality of the GermanRepublic and for stealing the property of this station will get a cold reception. Do you want to clean a latrine in Siberia for the rest of your miserable life? That's your choice.'

  'I'd like to help,' Arkady said.

  'That's better. What are you looking for in Munich? Why have you been poking around Radio Liberty? How is Stas helping you? Where's my phone?'

  'I have an idea,' Arkady suggested.

  'Tell me,' Michael said.

  'Call.'

  'Call who?'

  'Yourself. Maybe you'll hear a ring.'

  There was silence for a moment. 'That's it? Renko, you're worse than an asshole, you're a suicide.'

  Arkady said, 'You can't send me back. This is Germany.'

  Michael hopped off the edge of the desk. He had the springy step of an athlete, a faint sunglass mask around his eyes and a tarry smell of sweat mixed with aftershave. 'That's why you're going. Renko, you're a refugee. What do you think the Germans do with people like you? I think you know Lieutenant Schiller.'

  The guards pulled Arkady to his feet. Quick as a dog, Federov jumped up.

  An ashtray, phone and facsimile machine furnished Ludmilla's desk, and as Michael strode across the room and opened the door for Peter Schiller, Arkady saw that, next to its transmit button, the fax had the number that had called Rudy Rosen and asked, 'Where is Red Square?'

  Peter said, 'I hear you're going home.'

  'Look at the fax,' Arkady said.

  This seemed to be an occasion that the lieutenant had waited for. He bent Arkady's arm behind his back and screwed his wrist so that he rose on to the balls of his feet. 'Everywhere I go, you are making a mess.'

  'Take a look.'

  'Theft, trespass, resisting police. Another Russian tourist.' Peter swung Arkady towards the door. 'Bring the phone you found, please,' he told Michael.

  'We're dropping charges to speed the repatriation process,' Michael said.

  Federov followed. 'The consulate rearranged his visa. We have a seat for him on the flight today. This can all be done quietly.'

  'Oh, no,' Peter said. He held Arkady like a prize. 'If he has broken German law, he's in my hands.'

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  * * *

  The cell was like a Finnish bathroom; fifteen square metres of white tiled floor, blue tiled walls, a bed facing a bench, a toilet in the corner. For cleanliness' sake, on the other side of the stainless-steel bars lay a coiled hose. Arkady's belt and shoelaces were in a box by the hose. A uniformed policeman little older than a Young Pioneer came by every ten minutes to make sure Arkady wasn't hanging himself by his jacket.

  A pack of cigarettes arrived in mid-afternoon. Oddly enough, Arkady wasn't smoking as much as usual, as if food had cut down the appetite of his lungs.

  Dinner came on a compartmentalized plastic tray: beef in brown sauce, dumplings, carrots with dill, vanilla pudding, plastic utensils.

  Ludmilla had been the voice on the other end when he called the fax number from the train station. Even if she had known Rudy, though, she didn't know he was dead when she asked, 'Where is Red Square?'

  The Soviet quota of living space was five square metres, so this holding cell was a veritable suite. Also, a Soviet cell was manuscript. Plaster walls were scribbled with personal messages and public announcements. 'The Party Drinks the People's Blood!' 'Dima Will Kill the Rats Who Turned Him In!' 'Dima Loves Zeta Forever!' And drawings: tigers, daggers, angels, full-bodied women, free-standing cocks, head of Christ. But the tiles here were glazed, highly fired and unscratchable.

  Aeroflot had taken off by now, he was sure. Did Lufthansa have an evening flight?

  As he made a pillow of his jacket, Arkady found a wadded envelope in an inner pocket and recognized the shaky, needle-fine writing of his own name. It was the letter from his father that Belov had given him and that he had carried around for more than a week, from a Russian grave to a German cell, like a forgotten poison capsule. He crumpled the paper into a ball and threw it towards the bars. Instead of passing through, it hit one and rolled to the drain in the middle of the floor. He tossed it again, and again it bounced back and rolled to his feet.

  The paper rustled. What would the parting words of General Kyril Renko be? After a lifetime of curses, what final curse? In the war between father and son, what last blow?

  Arkady remembered his father's favourite phrases. 'Titcalf' when Arkady was a small boy. 'Poet, queer, shitpants and eunuch' were heaped upon the student. 'Coward', naturally, when Arkady refused officers' school. 'Failure', of course, from then on. What extra accolade had been saved? The dead had a certain advantage.

  He hadn't talked to his father for years. At this low point in his career, in this tiled hole, was this the right time to allow his father a posthumous stab? There was something funny about the situation. Even dead, the general still had the instincts of an executioner.

  Arkady flattened the envelope on the floor. He tugged open the corner of the flap, inserted a finger and cautiously tore open the end, because he wouldn't have been surprised if his father had left a razor. No, the letter itself would be the razor. What were the most hateful, damaging words he could hear? What was worth hissing from the grave?

  Arkady blew into the envelope and his breath lifted a half-sheet of onionskin. He smoothed the paper and held it to the light.

  The handwriting was so faint and palsied that it was more a wave from the deathbed than a letter, written with a hand that could barely hold a pen. The general had managed only one word: 'Irina'.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  * * *

  Night traffic on Leopoldstrasse was a sinuous flow of headlights, glass, pavement cafes, chrome.

  Peter lit a cigarette while he drove. 'Sorry about the cell. I had to put you somewhere where Michael and Federov couldn't get at you. Anyway, you really screwed them. You should be proud. They can't figure out how you switched phones. They kept showing me: car, tennis court, car.'

  He shifted down a gear and snaked in front of other cars. Sometimes Arkady got the impression that Peter barely controlled the urge to drive on the pavement to get ahead.

  'Apparently Michael's phone is special. It has a scrambler for security. He was upset because he would have to get a new one from Washington.'

  'He found his phone?' Arkady asked.

  'This is wonderful. This is the Schlag, the whipped cream on the cake. He took your advice. After Federov left, Michael put on trousers and called his own number and walked up and down the street until he found his phone ringing just so softly inside a rubbish bin. Like finding a kitten.'

  'So there are no charges?'

  'You were seen leaving the garage where the first phone was stolen, but by the time I'd finished with him, the attendant didn't know if you were short or tall, white or black. With better prompting, he might give a more accurate description. The main thing is, you're still here and you have me to thank.'

  'Thank you.'


  Peter showed a crescent smile. 'See, that wasn't hard. Russians are so touchy.'

  'You feel unappreciated?'

  'Ignored. It's nice that Russians and Americans get along so well, but that doesn't mean they can ship you back to Moscow when they want.'

  'Why didn't you look at Michael's fax when I told you to?'

  'I already knew. After your friend Tommy died, I called the number. The woman answered herself. I'm that way, when someone is killed I become more curious, not less.' He handed Arkady the pack of cigarettes. 'You know, I enjoyed your game with the phones. We must be alike. If you weren't such a liar, we could be a good team.'

  On the motorway, Peter shifted into overdrive, where he was happiest. 'You admit you made up the story about Bayern-Franconia and Benz. Why did you choose my grandfather's bank? Why call him?'

  'I saw a letter he wrote to Benz.'

  'Do you have the letter?'

  'No.'

  'Did you read the letter?'

  'No.'

  Kilometre signs flashed by. Flyovers roared above them.

  'Don't you have a partner back in Moscow? Couldn't you give him a call?' Peter asked.

  'He's dead.'

  'Renko, do you ever feel like the plague?'

  Peter must have been keeping track of where they were because suddenly he shifted gear and braked to the footing of a black ramp shaded into ash white. Tommy's Trabant was gone.

  Peter let the BMW roll back slowly. 'You can see the concrete is not just burned, it's chipped. I asked myself, how could a feeble little Trabi hit with that kind offeree? Doors folded, locked shut. Steering wheel bent. There are only the Trabi's tyre marks and no sign of any broken glass or rear lights. But as we come back on to the road, see the skidmarks.'

  Two dark apostrophes tailed away from the road towards the ramp.

  'Did you test them?'