Rostnikov vacation ir-6

by Stuart M. Kaminsky

  When he reached the door, Karpo stopped and reached back to halt Tkach. Then slowly, ever so slowly, he began to turn the handle, hoping that the growing crowd on the street and the sound of voices inside the room would cover whatever noise he might make. Before he could push the door open, two shots screamed like wounded jackals inside the room.

  The rain had begun almost as soon as Karpo and Tkach had entered the Moscow Soviet building. The rain had started to fall, and the umbrellas had begun to open on the street as the major officials began arriving with their own umbrellas. The platform was not covered. No one had anticipated the weather. It should not have rained today. But it was raining, and Yakov Krivonos was propped at his window, ready to fire.

  The problem was "Almost all of them on the platform are wearing raincoats, and some of them have umbrellas. I can't see most of their faces. How am I supposed to know who to shoot?"

  Jerold forced himself out of the chair and moved to the window.' 'The first three on the left, near the flag, see them?'' "Yes."

  "You will shoot them. And two over. The one with the boots. See him? The one who just climbed up?"

  "I see his boots," said Yakov.

  "Shoot him, too," said Jerold, wearily moving back to the chair.

  "Hell with this," Yakov decided as he moved the rifle to the window, lay on the ground, and propped the weapon up on the inverted metal V that served as a bipod to steady the already steady weapon. "The longer we wait, the harder the rain will be and the more the targets will protect themselves and be harder to find."

  Yakov Krivonos nestled the butt of the rifle against his shoulder, pressed his face against the cheek rest, and moved his left hand to the pistol grip and his right hand to the wooden piece in front of the trigger. The weapon was compact, the barrel clamped at the front and rear to ensure the torque initiated by a bullet passing through the bore would not lift the barrel away from the intended point of aim. The barrel was as long as that on almost any sniper weapon, but it ran the full length of the rifle, almost to the end of the short, comfortable butt. The Walther RA 2000 was gas operated, easy to handle, with the ejection port close to the person firing. Thus, there were both right-handed and left-handed versions so that the port would be on the side opposite the sniper.

  It was accurate within three inches at a thousand yards.

  "What are you thinking, Yakov?" Jerold asked, his voice dropping, near exhaustion.

  Yakov's solution was simple. He would shoot everyone on the platform. There were twelve men and two women. Jerold hadn't told him whom not to shoot. He had simply identified those who were to die. A few extras wouldn't matter, and Yakov didn't want the American to try to get out of his promises of wealth and women.

  He raised his rifle. He would simply shoot them all.

  "Yakov, you will shoot only those…"

  Yakov heard him but did not wish to, and so he told himself a lie. He told himself he had begun to fire before Jerold spoke. He fired the first shot, and the second came almost immediately after.

  Before the echo of the second shot had wept its last tear of pain through the stairwell, Karpo pushed the door open and stepped into the room, gun level, ready to fire. He knew where the window would be, must be. If both of the men they sought were in the room, he would go for the one near the window, the one who must be preparing to shoot down another Soviet official in the square.

  Karpo came very close to squeezing the trigger before he realized that the person leaning forward against the window with a rifle in his hands was half-turned and looking straight up at the ceiling, blood streaming out of his mouth. As Tkach scrambled up the stairs and joined him, Karpo swung around to the far corner and found Jerold, his hands raised high over his head.

  "My gun is on the floor, over there," said Jerold, nodding with his head toward the weapon, about five feet in front of him on the floor.

  "Sasha," Karpo said, and Tkach leveled his gun at Jerold while Karpo moved to the window to look down. There seemed to be confusion on the platform, and people were looking up at him through the rain, but he could see people scrambling in confusion. One person had fallen.

  "He was about to shoot President Gorbachev," said Jerold. "May I put my hands down? I'm feeling quite weak."

  "No," said Sasha, and Jerold could see that as much as his arms ached and his knees threatened to quit beneath him, it would be best to remain exactly as he was.

  Karpo quickly examined the dead Yakov Krivonos and turned to Jerold.

  "My pocket," Jerold said. "Rear. Take out my wallet. I'm a KGB officer."

  Karpo moved toward him quickly. The room would soon be filled with armed soldiers from the street, soldiers who would have to be stopped before they entered the room and began firing.

  "Sasha," Karpo said. "Go down the stairs. Tell them who you are, that everything is all right.''

  Tkach put his gun away, looking at the dead young man near the window, and felt a sudden chill through the open window as he moved through the door.

  "My name is Alexandrov," said Jerold, his American accent suddenly gone. "I was trying to locate and identify all of the members of an extended extortion and drug gang. Yakov was my link. He thought I was an American drug dealer."

  Karpo turned the pale man around and removed the wallet from his back pocket. He found the secret compartment and removed the KGB identity card with Jerold's photograph.

  "It is authentic," said Jerold.

  Below them they could both hear boots hurrying upward through the building.

  "I am sure it is," said Karpo.

  "You almost killed me this morning, Inspector Karpo," he said, putting his hands down and sinking into the chair.

  "And you almost killed me," said Karpo.

  "Had to make it look good for Yakov. I am sorry."

  Karpo nodded.

  "You understand?" Jerold went on as they heard Tkach's voice below, though his words were unclear.

  "Not completely," said Karpo.

  "But you believe me?" said Jerold, looking up, his shirt drenched with sweat.

  "No," said Karpo.

  ' 'It would be best for you to believe me, Inspector Karpo,'' Jerold said. "I'm about to make us heroes."

  With that, a major, his brown uniform dark and heavy with rain, his cap pulled down, came rushing into the room. His gun was drawn but at his side, indicating that Sasha had been reasonably convincing.

  "Major," Jerold said, "I am Lieutenant Vasili Alexandrov, KGB Security Division.

  The man at the window is Yakov Krivonos. He was about to kill President Gorbachev. Inspector Karpo arrived just as I prevented him from doing so."

  The major looked at the two men, trying to decide which one was more pale. The scene was unnatural, a moment frozen from some half-remembered play, and the major, who had witnessed many deaths in Afghanistan, felt a cold chill and knew this moment would haunt him till he died.

  THIRTEEN

  The next morning, the sun shone on Moscow.

  Shortly before nine, under that shining sun, tourists from both within the Soviet Union and beyond its formerly formidable borders boarded the excursion boats at the Kiev pier. There weren't many sightseers this early in the morning.

  Among those boarding, however, though not together, were a tall, quite pale man whom everyone avoided as best they could and a block of a man with a limp who was ignored by the people scrambling ahead of him to get the best seats.

  Porfiry Petrovich did not want the best seat, and Emil Karpo did not care.

  Before the ship had pulled away from the pier, Rostnikov was seated along the port rail in a chair with its view partly obstructed by a thick metal pole.

  Almost all the other passengers were in front of the ship with their guidebooks out. Rostnikov was very much alone when Karpo joined him as they pulled away from the pier and the ship began its journey.

  "Have you ever taken this ride before, Emil Karpo?"

  "I have not."

  "Over there," said Rostni
kov, pointing to the bank. "The fortress walls of the old Novo-Devichy Convent. See the belfry?"

  "I see it," said Karpo.

  "In the convent cathedral, Boris Godunov was proclaimed czar in 1597," said Rostnikov.

  "It was 1598," Karpo corrected.

  Rostnikov smiled.

  "You knew that," said Karpo, looking at him.

  "Perhaps," and Rostnikov, still looking at the bank. "The wife and sister of Peter the Great were imprisoned in the convent for plotting against Peter. Many famous people are buried inside those walls. I know you know this, Emil Karpo, but it gives me some small pleasure to say it aloud, so please indulge me while we wait. Sarah and I made this trip with Iosef when he was a boy.''

  Karpo looked at his colleague and saw a weariness he had never seen before.

  "You are ill," he said.

  "I am tired," Porfiry Petrovich corrected.

  "What is it that we are waiting for?" asked Karpo.

  "An answer," said Rostnikov.

  The ship passed the sports complex of Luzhniki, and over the cabin of the boat Karpo could see the Lenin Hills coming down to the edge of the water and, high on top, against the skyline, the massive main building of Moscow University, its tower lost for the moment in a low cloud.

  "Beautiful," said Rostnikov with a sigh.

  Karpo said nothing as they went under the double-level bridge.

  "Yes," said Karpo, though the mystery of beauty had either eluded him or, as he thought more likely, existed only as a bourgeois fantasy.

  Karpo was aware of the man approaching them well before he turned to face him.

  The man was in his mid-forties, thin, balding, and dark, dressed in a blue suit with a matching striped tie.

  "Colonel Zhenya," Rostnikov said, looking up and shielding his eyes against the sun with his hand in what might have been taken for a mock salute.

  The KGB colonel was known to both Karpo and Rostnikov. He stood erect and played with a ring on his right hand as he spoke.

  "I do not believe I have ever seen you out of uniform before," Rostnikov said.

  Zhenya looked at Karpo and then at Rostnikov without moving his head.

  "My presence doesn't surprise you, does it, Rostnikov?" he said.

  "I am completely surprised," said Rostnikov with what might well be taken for surprise.

  "You are tired from your flight, and you have not slept for almost two days," said Zhenya. "That, I assume, is why you are engaging in pallid irony."

  "You are certainly right, Colonel," Rostnikov said, shifting his leg as he remembered why it was that he had not taken this river ride or any other for many years. The dampness cramped his leg in wet, relentless fingers.

  "You were well aware that your conversations were monitored and that someone listening, someone who knew your background, would probably understand your little code,'' said Zhenya.

  "I was counting on it, Colonel," said Rostnikov. "There, see, you are right. I should never say anything like that to a KGB colonel, especially to you."

  "At least," said Zhenya, "you would not have done so before the dismantling of the Soviet Union, which is now underway."

  "I should not do so now,'' said Rostnikov.' 'But I am tired.''

  Emil Karpo stood silently, listening.

  Zhenya looked at him and said, "Congratulations, Inspector Karpo," he said. "I understand you are a hero. You participated in thwarting the assassination of our president. Only a minor official of no consequence was wounded."

  There was no irony to be detected in the colonel's words.

  "Thank you," said Karpo.

  "And you, Rostnikov, you are a hero, too, a silent hero, a hero behind the scenes," Zhenya said, suddenly abandoning the ring he had been playing with and moving to the rail. "You prevented a conspiracy to end the leaders of the reform. You should be very proud of yourself."

  "I simply forwarded information to my superior," said Rostnikov, deciding to suffer the cramping agony in his leg rather than stand and show Colonel Zhenya that he was nervous or, worse, rising to challenge him.

  Zhenya leaned on the rail. Beyond him, on the shore, Rostnikov could see the diving boards of the Moskva Swimming Pool. A man on the top board leaped off gracelessly. Zhenya turned and looked back at the two men.

  "I see a question in your eyes, Rostnikov," he said. "Do you wish to ask it?''

  Rostnikov said nothing, and Emil Karpo stood motionless.

  ' 'You want to know why I am here. You expected me, but you did not know why I would come. You were disturbed by what has happened, but you did not know quite what to conclude. I will enlighten you, Rostnikov. I will enlighten you because you have once again been used. I will enlighten you because I want you to know that you have been used." ' 'I appreciate that you would not be here if you did not intend to enlighten me," said Rostnikov.

  "I did not order Georgi Vasilievich murdered," Zhenya said. "If I had, I would tell you now, for there is nothing you could do about it. That murder was ordered by the man who organized the conspiracy, which you and Karpo thwarted with the help of one of my men.'' "Misha Ivanov is one of your men," said Rostnikov.

  "Yes," said Zhenya. "The notebook that you brought to Colonel Snitkonoy was a fake. Misha Ivanov planted it for you to find. Vasilievich's notebook, which was full of nonsense and would have led you in the wrong direction, was destroyed.

  You are wondering two things at this moment.

  First, given my own lack of sympathy for the current reforms, why did I not let the conspiracy take place and simply benefit from it? Second, if I did not want the conspiracy to take place, why did I not simply reveal it myself and take credit? I need not hide from you that I have ambitions, that I wish to serve the Revolution and not participate in its destruction. Have you figured out where we are going with this yet, Inspector?"

  Rostnikov could stand it no longer. He raised himself from the chair and leaned forward with both hands on the horizontal pipe before him to keep from falling.

  Rostnikov had figured it out, but it might well be essential to his survival to allow Colonel Zhenya to outwit him. Rostnikov resisted the urge to look at Karpo.

  "I am in your hands, Colonel," Porfiry Petrovich said.

  "The conspiracy the two of you helped to thwart was not aimed at Gorbachev and the reformers," said Zhenya. "It was aimed at the true patriots, the old guard and those of us who support the Revolution. It was not the Stalinists who planned to kill but the reformers who plotted to end opposition, to kill the Stalinists. Rostnikov, I was certainly one of the intended victims. The idea was to blame the entire operation on the CIA, Americans who wanted to keep Gorbachev in power. I needed honest policemen like you to step in. It is quite possible that you have now earned the enmity of the very people you thought you were saving from death. Now that is irony, Porfiry Petrovich Rostnikov. As a Russian, you should appreciate that. Now you may smile. Karpo, you have a question."

  "Alexandrov," Karpo said so quietly that the word was almost obscured by the purring engine of the ship.

  "Jerold," corrected Zhenya. "He was part of the conspiracy. He had several options. If Krivonos had succeeded, Alexandrov would have escaped and left him to his fate, assuming that Krivonos, if he survived, would identify an American as the man who had hired him to do the deed. If Krivonos failed, as he did, Alexandrov would kill him, as he did, and emerge a hero. See how honest I am being with the two of you?''

  Rostnikov allowed himself a glance at Karpo, whose attention was riveted on the colonel.

  "You have helped our cause, the true cause of the Revolution, to survive to do battle another day," said Zhenya. "Inspector Karpo, you, as a zealous and loyal member of the party, might, I would think, be content with this outcome that holds open hope of maintaining the old order.'' "Within the old society the elements of a new one have been created," said Karpo. "The dissolution of the old ideas keeps even pace with the dissolution of the old conditions of existence."

  Zhenya shook his head.r />
  ' 'You are becoming a reformer, one of them, Inspector Karpo," he said.

  "Those were not my words, Colonel," said Karpo. "They were written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. They are part of the Communist Manifesto."

  Colonel Zhenya looked first at the man known as the Washtub, who was trying to hide his pain, and then at the cadaverous creature who stood beside him and wondered how much naivete could survive. It had been foolish to seek them out, to savor his victory. It had been self-indulgent, a mistake he would never make again. Without another word, Colonel Zhenya walked to the front of the boat and lost himself in the crowd.

  "Well, Emil Karpo. What do you think?"

  "I do not think, Inspector Rostnikov. I enforce the law."

  "And I, Emil Karpo, think too much. We are cursed by a disease of opposites. It may account for our compatibility.'' "I was not aware that you considered us to be compatible," said Karpo as Rostnikov moved slightly to his right, urging feeling and circulation back into his leg. He checked his watch. There was still an hour to go on the ride.

  FOURTEEN

  On a spring evening, a very few months ago, three policemen, two in Moscow and one in Livadia, less than two miles from Yalta, were out walking at the same precise moment.

  Before the night was over, one of the men would be laughing, one would be crying, and the third would be showing no emotion whatsoever.

  This was not, Emil Karpo was sure, the ultimate solution to his increasingly frequent moments of uncertainty. He walked because he did not wish to be close to people on the Metro or a bus. He did not wish to be reminded of his own existence, did not wish to hear people talk of what had happened the day before.

  He walked knowing that when he reached his destination he would have respite from the memory of Colonel Zhenya.

  Karpo had become a policeman because it was at once the easiest and most difficult thing he could do. It was easy because he felt confident that the law was, basically, simple and direct, and the philosophy behind it was evident.