Assassin

by David Hagberg

  McGarvey searched his memory. “No. What’d you find out about him?”

  “Not much more than Chernov. He’s supposed to be one of the best cops in Russia though. But they know you’re coming, Mac, so you’re going to have to call it off.”

  “What else do they know?”

  “Didn’t you hear me? They know your name, and they know that you’ve been hired to kill Tarankov. They’re waiting for you. The second they spot you, they’ll kill you. But that’s not all, Mac. The Russians asked for help from us and the French, and we’ve agreed. That stupid bastard Ryan agreed. He’s sent someone here to Paris to work with the French to find you. They’re going to share information with Bykov.”

  McGarvey weighed what he was being told. “Who’d Ryan send?”

  “I don’t know. But didn’t you hear me? By now every cop in Europe is looking for you. Which means that if you get busted for so much as spitting on a sidewalk they’ll nail your ass to the cross.”

  “Did they get my name from Yemlin?”

  “If they did, Ryan hasn’t put it on the wire. He probably sent whatever he had by courier to Tom Lynch. Which means they might suspect you’ve got some help.”

  “Maybe it’s time for you to get out.”

  “You magnificently stupid bastard, I’m not going anywhere until you do,” Rencke said, his voice pitched even higher than normal. “Do you think you can still pull it off?”

  “I’m going to try.”

  “I’ll be here.”

  “Watch yourself, Otto.”

  “You too, Mac.”

  McGarvey paid for the phone charge, then drove over to the Radisson International that had opened less than a year ago overlooking the river near the Vanšu bridge. He surrendered the car to an admiring valet, and checked in, booking a room for a week. Latvia was beginning to have a tourist season, but it didn’t start until June, so the hotel was half-empty, and the staff was appreciative and attentive.

  Upstairs, he ordered a pot of black coffee, an omelet and toast from room service. While he waited for it to come, he unpacked his bags, and took a quick shower. Afterward he sat by the window overlooking the city, and smoked.

  Almost everyone he’d known from the old days at the CIA was gone. It was a safe bet that Ryan would not have come over to Paris himself, nor would the Assistant DCI, Larry Danielle. Which left no one of any importance, or at least no trained field officer. Ryan had probably sent one of his section heads with a stack of files and orders to find McGarvey or else.

  McGarvey reasoned it out. The Russians knew his name, and knew that he was coming. But it was a big country, and they could not know his timetable. Nor could they know where he was planning to kill Tarankov. Since the government wanted Tarankov arrested and tried for treason and murder, it was a safe bet that no one in the Kremlin or on the special commission would send a warning to Tarankov. Although on reflection he decided that he could not be certain of that. It just seemed to make sense that there wouldn’t be any lines of communications between the opposing forces.

  It was possible that Ryan had sent the Russian commission the CIA’s files on McGarvey. Combined with the files of the SVR, it would make a formidable record of not only his accomplishments, but of his methods of operation, his tradecraft. In the right hands that would give them a decided advantage. But Bykov was just an unknown investigator. Probably very good, but just an investigator for all that.

  The only man in Russia who he had any cause to be concerned about, McGarvey decided, was Leonid Chernov. If somehow he became involved the danger would be a quantum leap greater.

  On balance, then, he decided, he would go ahead with his plans made more difficult because they knew his name and face, but still not impossible.

  His breakfast came, he signed for it, and the waiter left. He ate the food, drank one cup of coffee, and then went to bed for a few hours sleep. There was much to be done in the coming days, and he wanted to make a good start as soon as possible.

  Paris

  Elizabeth McGarvey sat on a bench in the Tuileries Gardens in sight of the obelisk in the Place de la Concorde studying the display on her laptop computer. She’d become tired of being cooped up at the apartment, so she had come down here to continue working because the day was beautiful. Jacqueline was in a cramped office at the main telephone exchange a few blocks away, sitting in front of a much larger computer that could instantly trace virtually any telephone number in Paris and its environs. She and Elizabeth were in contact via one of the two cellular telephones Elizabeth carried. The second cell phone connected her laptop to the Internet.

  At the moment she was logged in under the Globalnet name of LIZMAC in a Usenet newsgroup called talk.politics.misc, in which participants posted messages in a sort of dialogue on what was wrong with politics these days.

  At the top of each message was the name of the writer, the subject, the date and time the message was posted, and the location of the originating computer system. Following each message was a signature, which as often as not was the participant’s nickname. And the nicknames were just as colorful as the messages.

  If Otto Rencke had too much time on his hands he would almost certainly be taking part in a number of these newsgroups. His ego would make it impossible for him not to make comments, and Elizabeth hoped to be able to spot him by what he was saying, and by his nickname. It was a sure bet that he would not use his real name, nor would he use his real telephone number.

  Elizabeth also hoped that if she did stumble upon a newsgroup which he posted he might recognize her own signature, and out of curiosity, if nothing else, he would have to open a dialogue with her.

  His CIA file had been sent over, and combined with what she remembered her father saying about him, she thought she had a good idea what kinds of newsgroups he’d be browsing, and what kinds of messages he would be posting.

  Each time she came up with a likely candidate, she passed the computer location telephone number to Jacqueline to check out. So far every possibility had turned out to be legitimate. But worldwide there were more than 60,000 Usenet newsgroups, nearly 95 million computer sites, and hundreds of anonymous remailer sites, through which messages could be retransmitted without valid IDs.

  From: Thomas LeBrun 33.1.42-74-21-31

  Subject: Lindsay/Chirac trade debate

  8/4/99 11.25

  Who does the Monk think he’s kidding? NAFTA and GATT had exactly the opposite effect he claims. Reducing trade barriers simply means a redistribution of jobs and capital. But it’s never a one-way street as he suggests. Foie Gras in France, Toyotas in Japan and commercial airlines in the U.S. (bigdaddyitem7)

  Elizabeth speed-dialed the telephone exchange.

  “Paris exchange. Four-two, seven-four, two-one, three-one,” she told Jacqueline. “He calls himself ‘big daddy.’”

  “Une moment,” Jacqueline said.

  Elizabeth continued to watch the messages continually scrolling up the screen. This went on twenty-four hours per day, seven days per week across the world. Finding Rencke would be next to impossible, but they had nothing else to go on for the moment.

  “Thomas LeBrun. A street number in the twentieth arrondissement,” Jacqueline said. “He’s legitimate.”

  Elizabeth ran a hand tiredly across her eyes. “Okay, Jacqueline, I’m going to a different newsgroup. I’ll try talk.politics.theory, maybe we’ll have better luck.”

  “How about some lunch, cherie?”

  “Let’s work till noon. That gives us another half hour. I just can’t stop.”

  “I know,” Jacqueline said soothingly. “We’ll find him.”

  “We have to.”

  Riga

  McGarvey got up around two in the afternoon after only a few hours of sleep. He showered, shaved, and got dressed then went downstairs and had a late lunch at the hotel’s coffee shop. He was still logy from lack of sleep, but by the time he’d walked two blocks from the hotel he was beginning to feel better. He caught a taxi at
Krastmala Boulevard, and ordered the driver to take him out to the airport where he rented a Volkswagen Jetta for one month from Hertz. He explained that he wanted to explore the entire Baltic region, something he’d wanted to do for years. Now that they were independent from the Russians he was finally able to get his wish.

  Even though only a small percentage of the population spoke Latvian, all the street signs were in that language, which sometimes caused confusion. In actuality the lingua franca was Russian, a fact that everyone despised, but that everyone lived with.

  While at the airport he changed the remainder of his deutchmarks to Latvian latis, then headed back into the city. The weather continued to hold, but if anything traffic was worse than it had been this morning. Riga and its companion city Jrmala, where the international ferries docked, were major Baltic seaports. It was one of the reasons the Soviet Union had fought so hard to keep Latvia. But the nation continued to struggle with its independence from communist rule. Still, nearly half the population was Russian, which created strong ethnic tensions. The new businessmen millionaires were Latvian Mafia, while the Russians, who were constantly being discriminated against, ran their own rackets. Just about anything went here, which was one of the reasons McGarvey had picked this place.

  By four o’clock he was in the waterfront district of warehouses and dreary offices above chandeliers and other dingy shops. He found what he was looking for almost immediately, an import/export company under the obviously Latvian name of Krlis Zlite, situated above a small machine parts warehouse. Pallets marked in English, MADE IN GERMANY, were being unloaded from a big truck.

  McGarvey parked across the street, and went upstairs to a cramped, grimy office in which stacks of files and paperwork were piled on the floor, on chairs, on two small tables, and atop several large filing cabinets. A young pimply-faced man with thick, greasy hair worked at a tiny desk next to the one window, while the proprietor worked in the back from a much larger, cluttered desk. The place smelled like a combination of stale sweat, cigarette smoke and grease from the warehouse below.

  “I wish to hire your firm to import Mercedes automobiles from Leipzig. Can you handle this for me?” McGarvey asked.

  “Da, of course,” Zlite, a skinny ferret-faced little man said, rising from his chair. He stuck out his dirty hand. “Mr … ?”

  “Pierre Allain. I am Belgian,” McGarvey said, shaking hands.

  “Your Russian is very good.”

  “My father worked in Moscow and was conscripted into the army when I was a little boy. It wasn’t until I was ten before my mother and I could escape.”

  “What of your father?”

  “He was sent to Siberia to count the birches, and never came back.” McGarvey lowered his eyes for a moment, his jaw tightening. “But that was many years ago. Now I wish to do some business with you.”

  “Do you have buyers here in Riga for your cars? Because if we can come to reasonable terms, I would certainly take one of them off your hands.”

  “These will be for sale in Moscow. Very cheap.”

  “I see,” Zlite said, sitting back, and eyeing McGarvey with a sudden wariness. “Perhaps you have come to the wrong man.”

  “I wouldn’t sell one of my cars to you, at any price,” McGarvey continued. “Nor would I sell them to anyone in Latvia, or anywhere else other than Moscow. People could … get hurt in my cars. They will get hurt.”

  Zlite’s eyes narrowed. “It’s a dangerous game you are playing, Mr. Allain.”

  McGarvey sat forward so suddenly that Zlite reared back. He slammed his fist on the desk. “I’m going to stick it to the bastards for what they did to me, with or without your help!” McGarvey shook with rage. “Goddamn stinking sons of bitches!” He glanced at the young man, who watched with round eyes. “My father went there to help, and they killed him. They killed my mother too. I’m all that’s left.”

  “How many units are coming?” Zlite asked respectfully.

  “One to begin with, by truck. But there’ll be many more later.”

  “Do you have buyers for them in Moscow?”

  “Mafia,” McGarvey said through clenched teeth.

  “And how will you get these cars there?”

  “I’ll drive them, one at a time. I want to see the looks on their faces.”

  Zlite hesitated.

  “I’ll pay you one thousand deutchmarks above your usual fees,” McGarvey said. “Your name will never be mentioned by me to the Russians. I’ll instruct the car dealer in Leipzig where he may ship the cars, which you’ll store in a secure place until I call for them one at a time.” McGarvey took a Creditbank draft in the amount of DM 1.000 out of his attache case and laid it on the man’s desk. “This is for the first car, I’ll have another bank draft ready for your fees.”

  Zalite eyed the bank draft. “You’ll get yourself killed.”

  “That’s my problem. In the meantime you’ll make a profit. Do we have a deal?”

  “Where can I reach you if there’s a problem?”

  “If there’s a problem, you handle it. The first car will be here in less than ten days. Will you do it?”

  Zlite looked at the bank draft again, then picked it up and put it in his desk drawer. He stood up and extended his hand. “We have a deal, Mr. Allain, if for no other reason than I too would very much like to stick it to the bastards, as you say.”

  McGarvey shook his hand. “I’ll call when I’m ready for the first car. In the meantime I’ll count on your discretion.”

  “Oh, you have my word on that,” Zalite said earnestly.

  From there McGarvey drove back to the Telephone and Telegraph office where he placed a call to Bernard Legler at Mercedes Rossplatz in Leipzig. He gave the German Zlite’s address, and then rang off before Legler could ask any questions.

  It was late afternoon by the time he found a parking garage a few blocks from the hotel where he dropped off the Volkswagen and went the rest of the way on foot. He stopped at the bar for a martini, then went back up to his room where he intended changing clothes and coming back down for dinner around eight. He turned on the television to CNN, lay down on the bed and fell asleep in his clothes.

  THIRTY-ONE

  Lefortovo

  Chernov sat at his desk staring at the detailed maps of Moscow, feeling that he was missing something that was vitally important. Paporov was talking on the telephone to Captain Petrovsky at the Militia, and from the tone of his voice Chernov got the impression that there was no news. The FSK was coming up empty-handed as well. As Chernov suspected, the service did not have enough manpower to do its normal work, let alone mount a nationwide search for McGarvey. For instance McGarvey’s photograph hadn’t been distributed to all the border crossings yet, though Gresko promised the job would be completed within the next three or four days.

  Moscow was a city of nine million people spread over nearly six hundred square kilometers, the Moscow River meandering sometimes north and south, at other times east and west through it. Defined by four ring roads, the outermost of which was fifteen kilometers from the Kremlin, the city was a maze of broad boulevards, twisting side streets and narrow, dirty back alleys down which many Muscovites feared to travel. Underground, nine separate metro lines crisscrossed the city through more than two hundred kilometers of tunnels. In addition to an extensive storm sewer system, a half-dozen underground rivers all flowed eventually into the Moscow River. In winter, subterranean Moscow was a busy place, populated by a large percentage of the city’s poor and homeless.

  Instinctively Chernov felt that McGarvey was no longer in the city. He had come to Moscow and to Nizhny Novgorod to stalk his prey, and to work out his plan for the kill. The fact that he’d been spotted in Red Square led Chernov to the conclusion that McGarvey had chosen the city for the assassination attempt. Putting himself in the American’s shoes, Chernov decided that he would do the same thing. Because once the kill was made there was an unlimited number of places where a man could hide until the dust
settled.

  Paporov put down the telephone. “The Militia is getting nowhere with the Mafia. They’re shitting in their pants out there on the streets.”

  “Did you tell them to keep trying?”

  “Da, for what it’s worth,” Paporov said.

  “What about Viktor Yemlin, has he made any telephone calls?”

  “None of any significance from his apartment,” Paporov said. “But you were right about one thing. Apparently he has some sort of an electronic device that masks video and audio surveillance equipment, because they got nothing from the Magesterium, and nothing from his dinner with Sukhoruchkin.”

  “He’s gotten it from his own technical service, which means he knows that we’re on to him,” Chernov said.

  “You don’t think he’s dragged the SVR into it, do you?”

  “No,” Chernov said. He figured they would have heard something if that were the case.

  “Well, if he’s making any important calls, they must be from public phones. I can arrange to tap every pay phone within a four block radius of his apartment.”

  “Do it,” Chernov said.

  “Still leaves us with the rest of it. I think Valeri Doyla is our best bet, but the stupid bastard gets himself cornered every time.”

  “Put someone in the next room. Yemlin’s little electronic toy can’t blind a man, or stop his ears from working.”

  “I’ll get on it right away,” Paporov said. He lit a cigarette and came over to Chernov’s desk. “You think it’s going to happen here, and not out in the countryside somewhere?”

  “If I wanted to kill Tarankov I’d wait until he came to Moscow,” Chernov said. “There’d be a better chance of escape.”

  “It’s a safe bet that the Tarantula will be here on election day. Probably at the reviewing stand in Red Square.”