A Wild Justice

by Craig Thomas

‘Your Moscow Centre boyfriend came up with Al-Jani’s real name and rank. You were right — clever girl.’

  ‘Intelligence?’ She asked the question reluctantly, as if she were being made to relive something she wished profoundly to forget.

  ‘Yes.’ He withdrew the faxed sheets from an inside pocket and handed them to her. Goludin scraped his chair forward in order to look over her shoulder and she held the pages so that he could read them. Like two children with a romantic story, an adventure … which it wasn’t. Pomarov. Semipalatinsk. It was appalling. He wouldn’t tell either of these two, perhaps not even Dmitri, of his growing concern. Not at the moment. ‘Interesting?’ he asked with forced lightness.

  ‘You think he’s connected with the heroin, sir?’ Goludin asked eagerly.

  Marfa snorted derisively. ‘Obviously,’ she mocked.

  They could continue down that road — at least for the time being. As they resumed reading, Vorontsyev looked around the four-bed ward. Two of the beds were empty. The one opposite Marfa contained a resigned old lady — her skin was yellow and her body shrunken — yet she seemed somehow overwhelmed by the warmth, the clean sheets, the silence. Unsettled, he looked away from the old woman who emanated worlds and experiences he could not define.

  He turned back to the ridiculously young-looking Goludin, with his eager, dumb dog’s expression, and the ill, frightened Marfa who looked up and, as if catching the shadow of his interest in the old woman, nodded towards her.

  ‘She’s dying of cancer yet she likes it here. Never been so warm and well fed before. Poor old soul.’ She sniffed, and seemed more herself, recovered from her recent experiences, if only for a moment. Her compassion was instant and embracing. ‘It’s warmer than my flat, too,’ she added.

  Vorontsyev smiled, then said quietly: ‘Listen to me, both of lU you.’ It might be endangering them once more, but he was able to shrug that idea aside as his own speculations made all other elements and risks of the investigation minimal. ‘Dr Schneider.

  I want to know for certain whether or not the heroin comes through this place.’ He was whispering, as if the nurse or the old woman had been planted in order to spy on them. He felt his nerves ripple. ‘Schneider, as Goludin already knows, is friendly with Val Panshin. Who may once upon a time not have dealt in drugs, but now I’m not so sure. I’m going back to have a word with that old pimp Teplov at his knocking shop. He knows more than he’s letting on; meanwhile, I want you two

  … are you up to it?’ She wanted to confess that she was not, but couldn’t allow such weakness or lack of duty and enthusiasm in herself to be admitted. She nodded slowly, her eyes big.

  ‘Good.’ He was setting them up, like two inquisitive chimpanzees, with a stick with which to poke at a termites’ nest. ‘A shipment of medical supplies — remarkably — came off that flight from Tehran, the one carrying our dead friend Hussain. Tehran is, as you know, the epicentre of advanced medical research … so, what was in the consignment?’

  ‘How do you know all this?’

  ‘Dogged Dmitri turned it up, and checked it out. Medical supplies, the crates said — but not off a US or Moscow flight but one from Tehran. Keep your eyes and ears open, and see what you can learn, or what you can find. You sure you can do it, Marfa?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Good. The crates arrived here, in this building, two days ago.

  Usual manner of collection, by hospital truck. See if you can find out what was in them. And be careful.’

  He stood up.

  ‘Watch out for each other this time,’ he warned Goludin, who appeared gloomy in an instant. Vorontsyev was aware of the old, dying woman at the edge of eyesight. ‘Be extra careful.’

  He nodded to both of them and left quickly, as if a sudden bout of nausea or the temperature of the place threatened him.

  In the corridor and the lift, he felt stifled by his own suspicions.

  He blundered across the foyer and out into the wind.

  The moon was down, the stars more unsettled in the cloud rags and the wind.

  A scientist named Pomarov. A place called Semipalatinsk.

  The heroin was becoming as insubstantial and unimportant as black-market cigarettes or denims. Dear God, what in hell could he do about it?

  EIGHT

  Little Knowledge

  ‘I’d like these registration forms,’ Dmitri Gorov murmured, yawning. Unlike Vorontsyev, he did need sleep; at least he could occasionaliy find it, sometimes without the help of the bottle.

  He tapped his finger on the creased papers, hardly larger than rouble notes. ‘You admit they left suddenly, booking out together, at exactly the same time.’

  The assistant manager of the Gogol Hotel nodded. Night duty dragged at his eyelids and he had smeared, dark marks beneath his pale eyes. Blond eyelashes, a receding hairline, a stiff approximation of aloofness borrowed from hotel staff in the West.

  ‘They paid their bills — at least, their bills were paid. There seemed nothing suspicious about them.’

  ‘Who paid their bills? Suite 12, by any chance?’ The night manager appeared startled, his eyes open for a moment in admission before they became officially blank once more.

  ‘That’s hotel business.’

  Beside Dmitri, Lubin grinned at the manager across the reception counter. Obviously, his anger at being dragged from bed and wife and child had evaporated, Dmitri realised.

  ‘Thanks for the information,’ Lubin said.

  ‘I said nothing.’

  ‘Were these two collected, these friends of Mr Pomarov? What transport did they have?’

  The night manager clicked his fingers by way of reply and a man in a porter’s uniform ambled towards the hotel desk.

  ‘Ask Antipov here. He’s the member of staff who summons taxis.’

  There was a gust of icy air and the noise of the wind and warm laughter as a sleek individual and a high-class hooker entered the lobby. They headed for the lifts. Dmitri watched them with what might have been a child’s puzzlement.

  The night manager said: ‘These officers want to ask you some questions.’ He smirked, unsettling the porter. Dmitri remembered the name, Antipov. The man Marfa had interviewed over the telephone, at the beginning of this business.

  ‘We know all about you, Antipov,’ he snapped. ‘Quite the little whoremaster, aren’t you?’

  The night manager avoided any complicity or embarrassment by moving to the other end of the long counter and fiddling with a sheaf of receipts. Antipov’s face crumpled into abjection, solicitation, worldly cunning.

  ‘It’s not harming anyone. It’s a public service, more or less.’

  ‘Christ!’ Lubin laughed. The porter winced at the noise. ‘You’ll be telling us you’re saving us work next!’

  ‘I might be.’

  ‘We’re not interested — at the moment — in your part-time job. Nor are we interested in the dead American. It’s about the companions of the guy who had the heart attack. Remember him? i hope he wasn’t a client of yours, didn’t ask you for a girl too frisky for his heart condition?’ Antipov scowled, his eyes ferreting after something he might have mislaid amid the pattern of the thick carpeting of the lobby. Lubin sniggered. Antipov rubbed his long nose and chin with a dirty-nailed hand, shaking his head continually.

  ‘I didn’t have anything to do with him,’ he finally protested.

  ‘The other two. Friends of his, we presume.’ Antipov shrugged. ‘They were together, weren’t they?’

  ‘Dunno. I saw him with them, yes — but they didn’t seem friends. Not close or anything. They didn’t arrive together. They met up here.’

  Dmitri recalled Vorontsyev’s insistent warning to tread carefully, and said casually: ‘Did you ever see them with the American — you — know which American? Or with anyone local?’ Suite

  12, the Iranian, had paid their hotel bill. The porter shook his head, his eyes darkening and filling with slow, bland cunning.

  ‘No.’
/>   ‘He’s lying,’ Lubin offered.

  ‘I’m not I’

  ‘You are,’ Dmitri affirmed.

  ‘Look, I don’t know what it is you want to know, do I?’

  Antipov whined. ‘Tell me what you want to know.’

  ‘Did you ever see all or any of them with Mr Al-Jani? You know, one of your best clients,’ Dmitri added, guessing — correctly. Antipov blanched.

  ‘Maybe,’ he admitted slowly, ‘just a nod and a wink, sort of thing. I didn’t know what they had to do with one another honestly.’

  ‘Good. Now — when they left, did anyone collect them? When they left in a hurry?’

  ‘Hurry?’

  ‘This is like pulling hen’s teeth, sir!’ Lubin growled, understanding what was required of him. ‘Let me take the little shit outside and kick some sense out of him!’ The assistant manager seemed to have discerned a smell from the drains. ‘Come on, you — I’ Lubin roared, grabbing for Antipov’s collar.

  ‘I didn’t seel’ the porter roared back. ‘I saw them go out, get into a taxi. They were in a hurry, yes, but I don’t think there was anyone with them!’

  ‘Not Mr AlJani?’

  ‘Why do you keep on about him? I didn’t know him! Just the occasional girl, always blondes ‘

  ‘All right. Calm down. Slop whingeing. Go on, sod off — for the moment.’ Dmitri, still grinning, turned to Lubin. ‘Let’s take these registration forms back to the office. Our beloved, insomniac chief should be back by now. After he’s been to Teplov’s knocking shop.’

  ‘Where do you think these two disappeared to? Have they disappeared?’

  ‘God knows. They must have been on false papers, like Pomarov, mustn’t they? It’s too coincidental otherwise. But why the hell were they here, anyway, and associated with Major Vahaji of Iranian Intelligence? Mr Al-Jani, as was, with a fistful of false passports? I hope our revered leader’s come up with more than we have!’

  ‘I want you to tell me about ‘Nam,’ Lock announced, as Kauffman handed him a bourbon. ‘I want to know about Tran, how he fits in, what he was over there.’

  Kauffman sat opposite him in a second leather armchair. His features had retained surprise, as if photographed with that expression, for some moments after he had answered the door to Lock. Now, there was a specious bonhomie that had no effect in stilling the quick, sharp eyes. He raised his glass in salute, then swallowed at fiis martini.

  ‘You waited outside all afternoon just to ask me about a Vietnamese?

  I told you, John, the files aren’t available or they no longer exist. I’m sorry, but that’s the truth.’

  ‘Is it, Bob? Is it really?’ Kauffman’s eyes narrowed, then he was at once expansive, warm.

  ‘John, what can I tell you? I understand — you need to do something. What happened was awful. But I just don’t see what this guy Tran has to do with anything.’

  ‘You said this morning you couldn’t help me unless I told you why. Does that mean you can help me. Bob?’ His raincoat lay across his lap as he sat hunched in the chair, and he was angrily aware of the gun in the pocket. ‘I got run off the road by a truck on my way back from Langley, Bob. I mean, run off the Dolly Madison, it was no accident.’ Kauffman was shocked and disbelieving.

  It was the latter reaction in his eyes that convinced Lock he had nothing to do with the attempt on his life … but there was worry, too, deeper in his expression, like someone catching an old, dangerous scent. ‘Someone ordered that. Bob.

  I think it was Tran.’

  TraŤ? The guy’s in Calif-‘ Realising his error, he swallowed at his drink. ‘The guy went west, years ago.’

  ‘You remember. Why?’ Lock hunched intently forward. The draped raincoat let the gun’s weight nestle against his calf. ‘Why do you remember one special status immigrant, Bob?’

  ‘I remember the name, that’s all. You reminded me I knew the name. There isn’t anything else to it, John — on my life.’

  ‘Now I know it’s important. Bob,’ Lock murmured.

  They sat facing one another. Lock suppressing his excitement, while Kauffman studied him, weighing the danger he represented. He evidently regarded him as a threat. Which probably meant what he knew was old, he was no longer involved

  … but he knew something, that was all that mattered at the moment.

  ‘It’s nor important,’ Kauffman said eventually in a level, almost schoolmasterish tone. ‘It hasn’t been important for a very long time. Believe me. Whatever you think happened to your sister and Billy Grainger, it had nothing to do with Tran or Vietnam.

  That’s ancient history and it’s — it’s better left buried.’

  ‘Like My Lai, Bob?’

  ‘Don’t be smart. You weren’t over there — count yourself a lucky man.’

  ‘Who is Tran, Bob?’

  ‘Tran is nobody.’

  ‘He tried to kill me — in Phoenix. I can’t be sure about today, but there, I’m sure. I met him. He believed I was a threat.’ He said nothing of the heroin, of Vaughn’s fear of Tran, of the red horse. How much did Kauffman know? ‘You want to know why I would threaten him? Because of some connection between himself and Vaughn Grainger.’ He paused abruptly.

  Kauffman’s features were paler under the downlighters of the bright, modern apartment, he was certain of it. His eyes narrower.

  Beyond the blinds, the rain continued to slide down the windows and car headlights flashed on the darkening air outside.

  ‘What connection with Vaughn? I told you, Tran wouldn’t have had anything to do with Billy and your sister.’

  ‘How can you know that. Bob?’ Lock felt angry tension stiffen in his jaw.

  Kauffman raised his hands in a gesture of calm. ‘I just know it. There’s no connection.’

  ‘Then why did Tran ring Vaughn and threaten him? I heard him, Bob. I have to know all about Tran.’

  ‘There’s nothing I can tell you, John. Really, there isn’t.’

  ‘Tell me about Vietnam. Tran worked for the Company, that’s kind of obvious by his special immigrant status. He was bankrolled by the Company after he got here.’

  ‘OK — my memory’s hazy, it was a long time ago, but all I recollect is Tran was a messenger boy. We used these guys all the time, running errands, informing, setting traps… you know the kind of thing that went on then. He was no more important than that. Someone just looked after him when we got out.

  That’s it, all of it, as far as I can tell you, John.’ There was the faintest trace of special, insistent pleading in his last sentence.

  But there didn’t seem to be much more behind it than a man backing away from a past the Company now regarded as unsavoury.

  ‘He worked for Vaughn’s Special Forces unit, right?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know.’

  Lock remained silent. Kauffman was only in the slightest degree edgy.

  ‘Another drink, fella?’ Kauffman asked. Lock shook his head.

  Kauffman made himself another martini, his back to Lock.

  There was no mirror on the wall that would reveal his features.

  Then he returned to his seat, raised his glass, and settled himself.

  ‘I ought to see about dinner,’ Kauffman announced eventually.

  ‘You eaten yet?’ Lockshook his head once more. There was no invitation in the question; rather the opposite. He sensed himself as he appeared to Kauffman, someone thrashing about in the dark, begging for information like scraps of food. Someone stumbling about, banging into the furniture of the past and unable to recognize any single item for what it was. ‘I — have a dinner date,’ Kauffman added, which was evidently a lie.

  Lock looked up. ‘I’ve been trying to recollect Vaughn’s stories about ‘Nam. He didn’t talk often, and Billy only ever talked about his own time there …’

  ‘Yes?’ The nervousness of a cat unexpectedly stroked.

  ‘His group worked up against the Ho Chi Minh Trail, at first …’

  ‘Did they? Maybe
you’re right. Like I said, ancient history, John.’ An effortful shrug of Kauffman’s large frame which failed to convey ease.

  ‘Then, later, in Military Zones Two and Three, further south …’ It was only now, facing Kauffman, that he could recollect with any clarity. The modern apartment, with its tubular steel and smoked glass, had the anonymity that rendered memory easy. It was like a debriefing room. He debouched Vaughn Grainger’s past, as he knew it, as if he were the one undergoing interrogation. ‘Further south,’ he repeated. ‘But they were always near the Cambodian border. Tran was from just outside Saigon. What use was he to Vaughn — what local or specialist knowledge would he have?’

  ‘You’re worrying at a rabbit that’s already dead, John. Died of natural causes.’ Kauffman grinned, as if Lock’s recollections were childish dreams that could be safely indulged.

  ‘I remember something else’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Vaughn talked, once or twice, about some scheme for putting people back on the land … I remember — yes, I remember one afternoon, by the pool, a bright, hot day, and he was angry about that movie. Apocalypse Now. It wasn’t all like that, he said. Really angry. We did good things, we tried. What did he call it? I can’t remember the name he gave the project!’ His sudden outburst of rage seemed to unsettle Kauffman. He stirred in his chair. The gun dropped from the raincoat pocket onto the pale, thick carpet, lying there between them.

  ‘What in hell — ?’ Kauffman began. Lock snatched up the pistol, embarrassed. ‘What is this, fella?’ Kauffman barked angrily, frightened. Lock held the pistol in his hands, cradling it and staring at it as if he had outraged hospitality. ‘What in hell do you need a gun for?’ Kauffman hissed.

  Lock looked up. There was perspiration along Kauffman’s hairline and his forehead was coldly pale. He almost gestured with the pistol, to signal harmlessness — then he turned the gun on Kauffman. In his head, something echoed away like a stone down a deep well. Anger surged in him like nausea, filling his throat.

  He growled: ‘You know something, Kauffman. Stop being an asshole and tell me about Tran and Vaughn and Vietnam!’

  ‘I know nothing!’ Kauffman shouted back at him.