Crossfire (Kirk McGarvey 3)

by Hagberg, David

  All of that had changed. Now the CIA was not his ally, nor were the police here in Argentina, or in France or in Germany. They all were looking for him.

  He had the girl, but as far as Kurshin knew she was no professional. Which left only the captain and crew of the small boat he'd hired. They'd have only as much loyalty as a few dollars would buy. They would not have the stomach for an all-out fight when the time came.

  Which left only McGarvey. This time it would be just the two of them. Head to head.

  The boats and the floating dock were heaving on the waves, sometimes violently. Kurshin had to time his move as he scrambled aboard, and as it was he lost his footing and fell heavily to the deck, banging his right elbow.

  He shifted the pistol to his left hand as the companionway hatch slid open and a heavyset man with pale hair looked out.

  "What the fuck ...!"

  Kurshin was on Jones in an instant, jamming the barrel of the big pistol into his face. "Where is he?"

  "What are you talking about?" Jones rasped, but Kurshin could see in the man's blue eyes that he was hiding something.

  Kurshin cocked the hammer. "I want McGarvey. Where is he?"

  "Gone. I swear it. Mother of God, the son of a bitch is gone."

  A sharp stab of disappointment hit Kurshin's chest. "Gone? Where? Where is he?"

  "I don't know. He and his woman just left. I swear to God. What are you, the police? They killed my mate. Stabbed him in the back."

  This was impossible. He had come halfway around the world, betraying Didenko and even killing the general's soldiers in the process. He had come so rucking close. He tried to think it out. He'd passed no one heading north. The highway had been totally deserted.

  Unless they had seen his headlights first, and had shut theirs off before he spotted them. They could have pulled over to the side of the road and he might have missed them.

  But that was paranoia. They were still here. They had to be!

  "How long ago did they leave?"

  "A half hour. Maybe less. I swear to God, there's no one here except me. Jorge is dead."

  It had been more than two days since Kurshin had last slept, and he was having trouble keeping his thoughts straight.

  He could almost hear McGarvey's laughter. The thought of it, the sound of it in his head nearly drove him crazy.

  "Jesus Christ, man, what's the matter with you?" Jones said.

  Kurshin shot him in the head, driving him backward down the ladder into the saloon with a tremendous crash.

  For a full minute Kurshin remained at the companionway hatch, listening for a sound from below. Any sound. But there was nothing other than the wind howling in the rigging, and the boat's hull banging against the rubber tires and the dock.

  Cautiously Kurshin went below, swinging his pistol left to right, sparks jumping in front of his eyes as he came from darkness into light.

  Jones lay on his back in a puddle of blood, his left eye destroyed. He was dead; there was absolutely no doubt about it. But there was a lot of blood. Too much blood, some of which led forward through an open door.

  Kurshin hesitated a moment. The man had told him that his mate was dead. Stabbed in the back. His body could have been dragged forward.

  Stepping carefully over Jones's body, and around the blood, Kurshin looked in the forepeak. A short, swarthy man, dressed in dungarees and a yellow slicker, lay facedown in the lower bunk. The back of his jacket was covered with blood. He had been dead for some time.

  But why? Kurshin stepped back into the main saloon. What had happened here to cause McGarvey to kill one man, leave

  the other alive, and simply walk off with the woman? It didn't make sense.

  Suddenly his eyes fell on something swaddled in a towel on the galley floor. He went over to it, bracing himself against the counter, and flipped aside a corner of the towel. It was a gold bar, a swastika and serial number stamped into the surface.

  They'd found the submarine and the gold. They'd apparently dived down to it and retrieved ... what? He looked up. This gold bar at least. Others, perhaps? A lot more gold?

  Working quickly, it took Kurshin less than ten minutes to search the entire boat from the forepeak to the aft cabins, and from the bridge to the bilges. But there was no more gold, although he found the scuba gear, a couple of .223-caliber automatic rifles, the magnetometer equipment, and below, at the chart table, Jones's calculations and sketches on the magnetometer readout strips. The navigational chart of the gulf showed not only their search pattern over the past three days, but the spot where they'd discovered the U-boat.

  He still wanted McGarvey, but this now offered another possibility.

  After memorizing the exact latitude and longitude of their find, he found a large plastic bag into which he stuffed the gold bar, still wrapped in the towel, the magnetometer strip graphs, and the gulf chart. Sealing the package with tape, he brought it topside, and making certain that no one was watching, he tossed it overboard.

  Kurshin was not particularly interested in wealth; he'd never been interested in having more than he needed for survival and a modicum of comfort. But there were others who thought differently. Once McGarvey and the woman were dead, presumably no one else would know about the treasure. It could be a powerful bargaining chip. Very soon he was going to have to face General Didenko.

  McGarvey would be dead, but the gold would be an offering. The KGB, especially in these times, was desperate for hard Western currencies to fund its foreign operations.

  Didenko would be interested. And the general had what Kurshin needed for survival: assignments, targets, kills.

  the storm intensified through the night, blowing sheets of rain against the windows of the Victory Hotel in Puerto Lobos. Even the bars along the waterfront had closed, and there was no traffic below on the street.

  McGarvey and Maria had gotten separate rooms for the night. In the morning they would rent a car and drive back to Viedma, where they would retrieve the airplane for the flight back to Buenos Aires. They would have to keep out of Esformes's way until they could get a flight out of the country, but McGarvey foresaw no trouble from the federates. Nor did he expect Jones to try anything. The man had been sufficiently intimidated to keep his mouth shut. And he had the prospect of making a fair sum of money from the fake gold bars from the submarine.

  McGarvey had not been able to sleep. He stood in the darkness

  by the window, looking down on the deserted street as he smoked a cigarette.

  He had not bothered to ask Maria what her plans were. He figured she had only two options: remain in Buenos Aires to straighten out the mess with the federal police over Rothmann's death, or pursue her search for the gold. He expected she would do the latter, and would fly to Lisbon at the first opportunity.

  A dark blue Chevrolet came down the street from the general direction of the waterfront, made a U-turn in front of the hotel, and parked at the end of the next block.

  It was nearly impossible to pick out details in the blowing rain, but after a moment the car's lights went off and a lone figure got out.

  There was something faintly familiar about the person, and McGarvey's stomach began to knot.

  He stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray and watched as the figure walked back toward the hotel.

  There was something But it was impossible, he told himself. It could not be.

  He reached for the telephone and dialed Maria's room number, keeping his eyes on the approaching figure.

  And in the end the legions from your past shall arise to strike you down. The agent come out of the field will spend his final days looking over his shoulder. It is axiomatic.

  The figure stopped below and looked up. McGarvey pulled away from the window, his heart hammering. Christ!

  It was Arkady Kurshin! Alive! Here!

  The telephone began to ring in Maria's room down the hall.

  It was impossible. And yet there was no doubt in McGarvey's mind that the man below w
as Kurshin. He'd known it from the moment the man got out of the car, from the way he walked, the way he held himself. He'd known it since Paris, when Carley had described the man who'd come to the embassy with the fake passport.

  It had been Kurshin behind him all this time. In Paris, in Freiburg, and again in Buenos Aires.

  The phone in Maria's room rang again. "Come on," McGarvey whispered urgently. He looked down again, but there was no one there now. Kurshin was inside the hotel.

  The man had come here for revenge. That part was clear. But what about Paris? Why had he gone through all of that? And

  what about Maria? Was there a connection between them after all?

  Her phone rang a third time.

  To each fteldman comes the moment when he must face himself through his past. The more extreme his dossier, the more violent his acts, the more terrible this showdown will likely be. For some it is a matter of honor, or dishonor. For others it is a life's summation that adds up to less than zero. For still others it is a nemesis come back to be reckoned with.

  The son of a bitch had traced them to this hotel. How?

  Maria's phone rang again, and she answered it. "What is it ... ?" she mumbled sleepily.

  "Get the hell out of your room right now!"

  "What?" she demanded, coming fully awake. "Kirk?"

  "We've got trouble. Get out of your room. Go up to the third floor and wait in the maid's closet. But do it now!"

  "What kind of trouble?"

  "Russian," McGarvey said. He slammed the phone down, then grabbed his jacket and pistol, opened the door a crack, and looked out into the corridor. There were five other rooms on this floor. Nothing moved for the moment. But Kurshin was certainly on his way up.

  The man had somehow tracked them to Viedma, and he could have learned from someone at the marina where they'd gone. Figuring that they would not remain at sea in this storm, he'd come to the only other logical spot where they might put in, and he was checking all the hotels in town.

  Which meant he'd already been to the docks. To the Yankee Girl. Jones, by now, was almost certainly dead.

  McGarvey slipped out into the corridor and hurried to the stairs. It would take Kurshin only a minute or so to find out what rooms they were in.

  Maria came out of her room as someone started up from the lobby.

  "Kirk," she called, and he turned and frantically motioned for her to be silent, but it was too late. Whoever was on the stairs below had stopped.

  Kurshin stood pressed against the wall between the first and second floors, fingering the safety catch of his gun. It had been a woman's voice calling the name. Unmistakable. They knew he

  was coming and they were waiting for him. He had lost the element of surprise, but it was of no matter.

  Someone would die here tonight. It would be either Mc-Garvey or him. Somehow, now that he was this near, he didn't think he really cared which. The final confrontation was all that mattered.

  "McGarvey," he called softly.

  Below in the lobby the night clerk lay dead behind the counter. There was no one to interfere this time.

  "I thought you were dead, Arkasha," McGarvey's voice drifted down to him. That the American had used the diminutive form of his first name did not bother him as he thought it should.

  "I very nearly was," Kurshin answered. "But I'm back."

  "What do you want?"

  "You."

  "What about the woman?"

  "Send her away. This is between you and me."

  There was silence from above. Kurshin moved away from the wall and leaned forward so that he could see farther up the stairs. McGarvey, he figured, was on the landing just above.

  McGarvey fired, the noise of the unsilenced pistol shockingly loud and intimate in the confines of the stairwell, the bullet smacking into the plaster wall well above Kurshin's head.

  "You missed," he said, ducking back.

  "It was you in Paris, wasn't it," McGarvey said.

  "Yes."

  "Why?"

  Kurshin chuckled. The question was satisfying. McGarvey hadn't figured out what was happening. "If you survive this night you will see."

  "A lot of innocent people died in your attack. It was a senseless gesture."

  "There are no innocents, you know that."

  Someone else on the second floor said something, and a woman stifled a scream. "Get back," McGarvey called urgently.

  "Oh, no," Kurshin said. "I'm coming for you, McGarvey." Keeping his back against the wall he eased himself up a step, and then another.

  McGarvey fired a shot, the bullet splattering plaster dust. His fleeting shadow flashed against the wall, and Kurshin fired three shots in rapid succession.

  "It was an act of insanity, Arkasha," McGarvey said after a few moments. His voice was distant and yet sensually close. "Bar-anov is dead, Arkasha. I killed him. Shot him in the back of the head. Tell me, who is your circus master these days?"

  Kurshin laughed again, but this time he felt the beginnings of a constriction in his throat, in his chest. "I've been to the boat. I know about the gold."

  There was only silence from above. He could hear the wind-driven rain against the building. McGarvey was testing him. Waiting for him to make a mistake. His grip tightened on his pistol as he moved up another step.

  The situation was getting totally out of hand. There were too many people up and awake now. Three doors on this floor were open. Kurshin would not hesitate to kill anyone in his path, anyone who tried to interfere with him. A lot of people were going to get hurt, unless the fight could be led away from the hotel.

  McGarvey wanted to end it here and now. He had waited a very long time to be sure about the Russian. This time he wanted no uncertainties. He wanted to see Kurshin falling; he wanted to see the man's blood. He wanted to feel for a dying pulse in his body, feel the flesh growing cold.

  Maria was watching him, wide-eyed. "Who is it?" she mouthed the words silently.

  McGarvey motioned for her to go upstairs, but she shook her head.

  "We'll both go up to the roof," McGarvey said just loudly enough so that he was certain Kurshin could hear him.

  "The notebook is in my room. I didn't get a chance to bring it with me," Maria protested.

  "Fuck the notebook," McGarvey said. "Upstairs! Now!"

  He stuck his gun arm around the corner and fired two shots down into the stairwell, then lunged across the corridor, grabbed Maria by the arm, and roughly propelled her up the stairs.

  Kurshin came after them in a rush, firing as he came, one of the shots plucking at the back of McGarvey's pants leg. McGarvey cried out in pain, and fired two more shots back.

  They rounded the corner halfway up to the third floor, and

  continued up, stopping at the top to listen for footsteps from below. Nothing.

  "Are you hurt?" Maria asked.

  McGarvey shook his head. A thin man in a bathrobe had come out of his room halfway down the corridor. McGarvey frantically waved him back, and the man ducked into his room and shut the door.

  "I want you to go up to the roof," McGarvey whispered urgently. "Find a way down, or at least find a hiding place and stay there until I come for you."

  "I'm not going to leave Roebling's notebook downstairs," she argued. "You heard him—he says he knows about the gold."

  "He doesn't care about that, goddamnit," McGarvey whispered. He ejected the spent clip from his gun, pulled his only spare out of his pocket, and snapped it in place. He had no other ammunition.

  It was quiet in the stairwell. Too quiet. McGarvey reached around the corner and fired a shot down, Kurshin's answering fire coming so fast and accurately that McGarvey felt the bullet passing his head.

  "Time to die," Kurshin called. "What do you say?"

  "What does he want?" Maria asked.

  "Me," McGarvey said. "He wants me dead. But he'll kill anyone with me. I want you up on the roof. Now, before it's too late."

  "And you're going to stay he
re, waiting for him?" she asked incredulously.

  McGarvey nodded, his jaw tight. This time there would be no mistakes, no questions after the fact. This time he would know for sure.

  "You're insane," Maria said. "Who is this man?"

  "Russian."

  "KGB?"

  McGarvey nodded. His head was light. Twice Kurshin had nearly succeeded in killing him. He'd lost a kidney to one of the man's nine-millimeter bullets.

  "The war is over," Maria said desperately. "At least what I'm doing means something—" She stopped herself in midsentence, realizing that she had gone too far.

  "I don't care about your gold either," McGarvey said. "This

  man has killed a lot of people. It was Kurshin who attacked our embassy in Paris."

  "And you have killed, too," Maria said.

  "Go up to the roof, dear," Kurshin said, his voice just around the corner, not more than five feet away. He had snuck up on them. McGarvey hadn't heard a thing; he hadn't been listening carefully enough. It had been a terribly foolish mistake.

  He pulled Maria around behind him, and shoved her down the corridor.

  "All right, Arkasha," he said in a reasonable tone as he backed off a couple of paces and raised his pistol. "I wonder if one of us is out of ammunition. Let's see, shall we?"

  Kurshin started to laugh, but he cut himself off abruptly. For just a moment McGarvey thought it was another of the Russian's tricks, but then he heard the sirens in the distance. A lot of sirens, sometimes loud on the wind, then fading, but definitely getting closer.

  Someone from the hotel must have called the police to report the shooting. But a town this size would not have so many police. There were a dozen sirens out there, maybe more.

  But if Kurshin had traced them this far, perhaps Captain Es-formes had done the same.

  "Goddamnit, what are you waiting for?" McGarvey suddenly shouted. He was not going to be cheated! Not this time!