Red Sparrow

by Jason Matthews

  “How can he travel incognito?” asked Nate. “He was all over the news.”

  “He’ll be in Copenhagen for the NATO thing,” added Forsyth. “How he’ll slip away from the Danes beats the hell out of me. Allen Dulles used to do this, Angleton too, get on a plane, not tell anyone, show up unannounced.”

  “Yeah, in fucking 1951,” said Gable. “And those guys traveled solo, and you walked down the steps of the Constellation across the tarmac into a taxi, and checked into a hotel by signing the register. Those pillbox hats on the stewardesses, though…”

  Forsyth ignored him. “I sent a polite no-thank-you response last night, and Chief Europe called me on the green line half an hour later and chewed my ass. Not a request. Director wants to get involved.”

  “There’s another inflated balloon, fucking Chief Europe,” said Gable. “Thinks he’s a ship’s captain at Trafalgar. Ever read his Christmas benediction to the troops?”

  Forsyth continued to ignore him. “We can control things only from the minute he gets off the plane. VIP gate, drive him around, dry-clean him, stash his security guys in a van downstairs, get him up there, shake her hand, then get him out. Just pray FAPSI—Russian SIGINT Service—doesn’t pick up his flight plan.” Forsyth looked at the cable again. “They must have briefed DIVA to him recently. Well, at least it’s good PR for the case.”

  “PR? He’s going to get her killed,” said Nate. “It’d be safer for us to put her in a car trunk and run her over to Sweden for a long weekend. Why don’t we tell him she’s not available?”

  “No,” said Forsyth.

  “Tell him she refuses.”

  “No. Get her primed, tell her to smile. Those blue eyes will do the rest. Let’s get some food up there, some drinks.”

  “A bug-out car, parked close,” said Gable.

  “What about Dominika?” asked Nate. “Who eats the shit sandwich if something goes wrong?”

  “You do,” said Gable and Forsyth.

  =====

  Footsteps on the landing, and the door opened and Dominika stood up as the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency shrugged off his coat and came across the room and pumped her hand up and down, saying how glad he was to meet her, then pumped Nate’s hand too, told him he was doing a great job with this young lady, a beaming smile in her direction, and they both could be proud of what they were doing for the United States. Dominika tilted her head a little at that, and they sat down, Dominika and the Director on the couch, and he opened the charm spigot from his legislative days and he tapped her knee to make a point, and sometimes his hand stayed on her knee, a habit from the Senate cloakroom and the pages.

  He was tall, and thin, and squirrel-eyed, with sunken cheeks and shiny hair dyed black. Dominika decided he looked like Koschei, the mythological evildoer her father used to read to her about when she was a little girl. Dominika looked hard at him, but his aura was faint, a pale green glow around his face and ears. Green, zelenyj, emotional, not what he appears to be, an actor, thought Dominika. So different from Uncle Vanya, but the same, different services, the same yashyeritsa, the same lizard.

  He was asking Forsyth about the “operational ambient” in Scandinavia, and they all knew that was nothing to be discussing in front of an agent, so she got up and brought out a plate of pelmeni, steaming dumplings just fished out of the pot, stuffed with savory ground meat and spices, slathered with sour cream. Dominika had insisted on making something, a Russian way to honor the guest. Nate thought they should have served dry näkkileipä crackers and warm cream soda.

  “Quite excellent,” said the Director, clotted sour cream at the corner of his mouth.

  The Director wiped his lips and patted the cushion so Dominika would sit back down beside him. Nate and Gable and Forsyth sat in chairs close by, angled to watch Dominika, to give her support, while the Director asked where she was from, as if to check if she were a constituent. Gable thought of long ago and desperate late nights in stinking hotel rooms with sweating agents, little men running unspeakable risks, spinning up their nerve to go out again, intently listening to Gable speaking slowly and without pause, watching his face, pouring the vodka, or the maotai, or the arrack. That was long ago. Here, in the sun-splashed apartment, they were having a jolly old agent meeting.

  For a Russian, talking about future success is inviting bad luck. Better to shut up about it. The Director moved closer to Dominika but she didn’t lean away. Good show, thought Nate, she would know how to handle that, wouldn’t she? The Director was saying that they all applauded her efforts, that he was taking a personal interest in her activities, and that she should not hesitate to contact him directly at any time of the day or night. Nate was tempted to ask for his home telephone number in Bethesda. Forsyth read his thoughts and scraped his chair to tell him to shut the fuck up.

  Bottle-green and prattling, Director Koschei was saying something about a covert bank account. A sum of money had been put in the account for Dominika as a recruitment bonus, more money would be deposited each month. The account was completely under her control, but of course withdrawals and profligate spending were inadvisable. He continued that additional funds would be deposited when she began work in Moscow. Dominika looked up at Nate, and turned to look at Forsyth. Both their faces were expressionless. Koschei continued remorselessly.

  At the end of two years’ internal service in Moscow, he droned, an additional bonus of a quarter million dollars would be deposited in her account. Finally, on the mutually agreed-upon date of her retirement from service, the CIA would resettle her in the West in a location selected with her security in mind and would provide her with a retirement home of not less than three thousand square feet.

  The room was quiet. Dominika’s face had changed and she looked at each of them, then turned back to the visitor. She smiled her incandescent smile. Nate thought, Oh, fuck.

  “Sir, thank you for coming such a long way to meet me,” said Dominika. “I have told Mr. Forsyth, and Mr. Gable, and Mr. Nash”—she gestured to each of them as she mentioned them—“that I am committed to helping your service any way I can. I am committed to trying to help my country, to help Russia. I appreciate all you have offered me. But please excuse me. I am not doing this for money.” She looked evenly at this nekulturny scarecrow.

  “Oh, of course you’re not,” said Koschei, patting her knee. “Although we all realize how useful money can be.”

  “Yes, sir, you are right,” said Dominika. Nate saw she was upset, there was a flush at her collarbones. Forsyth saw it too. Gable started gathering coats, moving around the room.

  “Mr. Director, we unfortunately have to spend another half hour driving out of here before getting you back to the plane,” said Forsyth, getting to his feet.

  “Fine, fine,” he said. “It’s been a pleasure meeting you, Dominique. You’re a courageous woman running terrible risks.” Jesus, tell her how long she has to live, thought Nate.

  “Remember,” the Director said, giving her a hug, his arm across her chest, “call me anytime in case of need.”

  Yeah, so he can take you by the hand and lead you across the plowed strip at the border wire, between the bounding antipersonnel mines and two minutes ahead of the dogs, thought Gable.

  Forsyth bundled Koschei into his coat and hat while Gable went downstairs to alert the security detail. The Director followed. Forsyth stopped at the door and winked. “Talk to you soon,” he said, and disappeared. Dominika and Nate stood in the doorway of the apartment like newlyweds saying good-bye to a grumpy uncle who had come to Sunday dinner.

  Nate softly closed the door. The safe house was dead still, they could hear car doors chunking, then the sound of them driving away. “Well,” said Nate, “did you like the Director?”

  =====

  It was twilight and running lights ghosted along the inlet, and happy voices came over the water through the open window. Two glasses of wine stood untouched on the table as they sat in the dark, Dominika on the couch, Nat
e in a chair. The ambient light caught her hair and the eyelashes on her right eye. She had worn a summery dress for the day, tight in the bodice, with heels, like for a job interview. She didn’t feel like talking, and Nate didn’t know what to say, worried that their arguments and now this visit had broken her back, that she was going to tell him she was backing out. Nate was her handling officer. It was his responsibility to keep the case going.

  Fuck, he thought, lots of pitches get turned down, agents are lost in the CI grinder, there’s bad luck, or bad timing, you miss a train by thirty minutes and it changes everything. But who loses an agent because she thinks we’re all shitheels? He could imagine the heads bent forward in the Headquarters cafeteria. Yeah, it was Nash, in Helsinki. Hall file was right after all, usually is. Langley would cable, Time for a CONUS tour, sit a spell, let’s talk about your future. His father would write, Welcome home, son, all is forgiven. A pitch-black mine shaft, steep and airless. He registered that she had stood up and was walking toward him.

  The dark room affected her, a cocoon, invisible, she didn’t know, but she stood in front of him, looking down at him. The usual deep purple of his background was there, and strangely she could feel a heat emanating from it, still and steady. She knew he was suffering, the too-serious professional worried about the equilibrium of his career, but there was vulnerability under the professional seriousness. Whatever he thought about her personally—she wasn’t sure—his fretting and worry were endearing. She realized that she herself was feeling the strain, living constantly with the ice-cold secret. Goaded by anger at first, she had fallen into her new role, a different role. She had pushed herself for the Americans because she trusted them, they cared for her, they were professionals.

  But especially for Nate. Part of what Dominika was doing was for him, she realized. If he had asked her, she would have told him she had no thought of quitting. She was determined and focused.

  But right now she needed something more than the rush of deception, of the knowledge that her will was stronger than all others’, that she was besting the Gray Cardinals. She needed to be needed. By him. She could feel her secret self open the hurricane-room door and step outside. Dominika put her hands on the arms of Nate’s chair, bent over, and kissed him on the lips.

  She hadn’t foreseen this. (She knew he certainly had not.) In her service as well as his, Dominika knew it was zapreshchennyi, strictly forbidden, to become physically involved with an agent. Emotional complications are death to a clandestine operation. It’s not for no reason they whisk the Sparrow from the room after the honey trap and “Uncle Sasha” takes over, all business, because passions get in the way, you can’t get anywhere with an agent who is thinking about his khuy, the old instructors used to say, cackling and trying to get her to blush.

  She was in his arms, kissing him, not frantically, but slowly, softly; his lips were warm and she wanted to drink them in. She felt a pressure building in her body, inside her skull, in her breasts, between her legs. His hands pressed on her back and she felt sweet and edgy, as if they were childhood friends who years later had discovered each other as adults. He breathed deep purple heat into her ear, and she felt it down her spine.

  “Dominika,” he said, wanting to slow down. They had argued days before, it was folly to become involved like this, the stability of the case required—

  “Za molchi,” she whispered, shut up, you fool, and she brushed her lips along his cheek and held him tighter.

  His head was spinning, from indecision, from alarm, from an unbidden lust growing in his guts. Nate knew he wanted her; it was insane, reckless, forbidden. He couldn’t remember what happened next.

  They were naked and feverish in the little bedroom, and Dominika raked her nails lightly between his legs to make him follow her—she thought she must have just invented a new come-along technique—and they were climbing ridiculously over the footboard onto the bed wedged between the bedroom walls. She kept her hand on him, fixing her fingernails a little tighter, and she laughed, her mouth dry with desire. Feeling his skin for the first time, trailing her lips across his stomach, was unreal and dizzying. He looked at her in surprise as she pushed him back, her hand on his chest. Prurient and tender and shy and slutty, she tasted him, and savored the mouthfeel of him, and it was as if they had been lovers since forever. There was never a thought of Sparrow School, or numbered techniques. Dominika simply wanted him.

  It was becoming more urgent, her secret self was expanding and filling her head and constricting her throat, and just in time Nate blessedly flipped her on her back and she pointed her quivering toes at the ceiling and the light of a bloated moon rising over the harbor islands came through the window and got in her eyes. She was night blind and moon blind, and Nate was only a silhouette above her, then a crushing weight. Dominika felt a sudden, excruciatingly sweet expansion, and the moonlight was rocketing around behind her eyelids, and she hoped he could keep her heaving body from blowing away like a piece of paper. She felt the hollow rush expand inside her, and then a rogue wave rose up from the deep, bigger than the others, hanging, curling, and she said, “Bozhe moj,” from way back in her throat, and a white-eyed state of grace rolled through her like the wind bends a wheat field.

  They lay side by side in the crushing moonlight. Dominika waited for her thighs to stop quivering before turning to look at his moon-wet body. “Dushka, you are very good at agent handling,” she whispered.

  The night air had not yet dried their bodies when they heard a key turn in the lock of the safe-house door, and they rocketed out of the bed, and Nate pulled on shirt and pants and shoes, Dominika grabbed a handful of clothes and ran into the bathroom. Nate walked into the living room to see Gable in the kitchen, leaning into the open refrigerator.

  “Thought I’d come back to do damage control after the Director’s tour-de-force performance,” said Gable. He turned back to look into the refrigerator. “Any more of those dumplings left?”

  “On the bottom shelf,” said Nate. “Yeah, I talked to Dominika about all that shit. I think she understands the diff between us and the suits.”

  “I was laughing my ass off when she got pissed at the old peacock. She’s got spirit,” Gable said. He put a container of dumplings on the counter. “So you calmed her down okay?” he asked.

  “Yes, Bratok,” said Dominika, coming out of the bathroom, “I am calm now.” She was completely dressed, hair combed and features composed. Nate watched Gable’s face. “Let me reheat the pelmeni for you,” said Dominika. She lit the burner, rattled a pan. “They are best the second time,” she said, “especially like this.” She poured the boiled dumplings into the skillet with butter and fried them until lightly brown on all sides. “But now this way they are best with vinegar,” she said.

  The deadly domestic prattle continued as they stood around the kitchen counter eating out of bowls. No one spoke, and Gable occasionally looked from Dominika to Nate and back again. Nate studiously looked at his food, but Dominika returned Gable’s look unperturbed, reading the bloom around his head. Finished eating, Gable ran water in the sink as Dominika put on her coat and said good night. She didn’t look back at Nate as she went down the stairway. Nate closed the door, turning with dread to face Gable, who was walking to the living-room couch with two glasses held between his fingers, a bottle of scotch in the other hand.

  “Well, Priapus,” said Gable, setting the glasses down on the table, “run your fingers around the rims while I get the ice.”

  PELMENI DUMPLINGS

  Roll two-inch discs of wafer-thin dough made from flour, egg, milk, and salt. Mix ground beef, ground pork, minced chicken, grated onion, puréed garlic, and water. Place a dot of filling in center of each disc, moisten edges, fold closed, and crimp. Bring bottom corners together, pinching to attach. Boil in salted boiling water until dumplings float to the surface. Serve with sour cream.

  19

  “It got away from you?” said Forsyth, leaning over his desk. “You are handl
ing, by Headquarters’ reckoning, one of the most promising Russian cases in the Operations Directorate in the last decade, and you lack the discipline to stay out of her bed?”

  “Chief, I know it was a mistake, I didn’t plan it, it just happened. She was freaked out about the Director. He called her Dominique. It’s been building up with her, she needed a connection, she’s been under a lot of pressure.”

  “She needed a connection?” said Gable from his usual seat on the couch behind Nate. “Is that what your generation calls scrogging now?”

  Forsyth’s normally kindly, patrician face was dark; his eyes held Nate’s until the younger man looked down. “Then you address her needs, you talk her down, you give her support. But you don’t—”

  “Go at it like minks,” said Gable.

  “Yeah, minks,” said Forsyth. “What happens if your relationship hits a bump? What if you have a fight in four months and she decides she can’t stand you?”

  “Easy to see it happening,” said Gable.

  “Is she going to keep working for the CIA? Or is she doing all this because she’s besotted with your—”

  “Macho gazpacho,” said Gable.

  “What the fuck are you talking about?” said Forsyth, looking at Gable slouched on the couch. He turned back to Nate, who had laughed at Gable’s comment.

  “C’mon, Nate,” he said. “Despite the intelligence she’s provided to this point, and despite her poly, DIVA is a new asset. We need to see her operate productively before we know your recruitment took. Does that mean we don’t trust her? Yes and no; you never totally trust any agent.

  “Russians get morose, they get dramatic, they get homesick. They get nutty. Remember Yurchenko waving good-bye on the steps of the Aeroflot flight? DIVA’s strong, but we all know she’s temperamental, impulsive.” He held up his hand to stop Gable from making a puerile comment.