Snow Falcon kaaph-2

by Craig Thomas

  Buckholz grinned. 'Why do you British assume, by divine right, I guess, that you have all the diplomacy, and us colonials only get to be the stooges? Next time, I want to play the smartass — you be the dummy!'

  'Very well, Charles. Not that it would seem to matter much. Khamovkhin is relying on a miracle — and therefore, so are we.'

  'Dammit, yes! I know that. What the hell is the KGB playing at? When they got a real job on, they foul up!'

  'Never mind, Charles. I think, for the moment, we will interest ourselves in the smaller matter of one man's safety. And the identity of the mysterious Captain Ozeroff. That should be enough for two old night-soil men like ourselves.' He paused, then added bleakly, 'It should do to fill in time until the twenty-fourth,'

  The Englishman was near to breaking — perhaps within himself he had already broken. The fierce attention he seemed 10 be paying to Kutuzov indicated a distraction from self, rather than a real awareness, a calculated assessment of his situation. Novetlyn stood beside Kutuzov, deferential and silent. The narrow cell with its poor light from one high, barred slit of window, smelt foul. Folley's smell, as if something was rotting beneath the soiled clothes, rotting inside the man.

  'Well, Colonel?'

  'Sir?

  'Are we going to learn something of value, or not?'

  Folley blinded, leaned forward on the filthy cot as if straining to comprehend — or simply to keep himself awake. The body's posture flinched, even while he did it. Kutuzov was obscurely moved by the sight, but to no specific feeling.

  'Possibly, sir. What he knows, how much he knows — it's open to question.' Novetlyn sounded as if he had already done with the Englishman, discarded that particular card. The attitude irritated Kutuzov. 'Then I came to Leningrad for nothing?'

  'If you came to see him, sir — perhaps.'

  Novetlyn obviously knew about the border incident, and the escape of one of the agents in Helsinki. Perhaps that explained his indifference. And an indifferent interrogator would obtain nothing of value.

  'What do they know?'

  'Less when he was sent than they know now.'

  Kutuzov was suddenly tired of the smell, the confinement. Perhaps disturbed, too, though he ignored the feeling.

  'Very well, let's go. The Marshal should have arrived by now.'

  'And him, sir?'

  Folley's body looking as if it was pleading; but the eyes, as if overworked, were blank with an idiot's stare; the body might only be an actor's imitation of supplication, or a haphazard arrangement of weary, beaten muscles.

  'Keep him here for the moment. We might be able to use him later — in some sort of show-trial.' Kutuzov seemed pleased with the idea, as if it explained the vague reluctance he perceived with regard to Folley. 'Perhaps so. Agent of the Western imperialists — a courier to Khamovkhin's gang. Yes. Keep him alive!'

  Upstairs, Praporovich waited in civilian clothes in the main drawing-room of the old house. When Kutuzov entered, they embraced, kissed cheeks. Kutuzov held the Marshal at arms' length for a moment, smiling, assessing.

  'You look tired, Grigory Ilyich.'

  Praporovich dismissed the observation. 'Nothing the twenty-fourth won't put right!' They laughed together. 'I was not followed,' Praporovich added.

  'Nevertheless, this is the last time you must come out of headquarters, until things are under way.'

  'Perhaps. I will be careful, you know.'

  'I know it.'

  'Ossipov, then — ?'

  'He has been told to radio you the full instructions, timings, everything.'

  'We need twenty-four hours minimum to deploy and transport.'

  'Ossipov knows that.'

  'A pity it's so late in the day — being so important.'

  Kutuzov settled himself in his chair, studying Praporovich, suddenly wearied by the prospect of argument.

  'We could take no chances — chemical warfare training is an annual event. Last year, we failed to get it right, and we had to wait. Soldiers talk, Grigory Ilyich — and that is something not to talk about. Ossipov's men think they are only carrying out normal training — ' Praporovich raised his hand.

  'Very well, old friend. I agree. Let us not quarrel. As long as the cleaning-up is timed to the minute, I don't worry about it.'

  'It will be. Radio-traffic for everything, using the hourly changes of code, from now on. Tell Dolohov.'

  Praporovich nodded. 'Your part of it?'

  'Valenkov's gone underground. The KGB know it, but they can't do anything about it. Valenkov will be ready at 06:00, when I give the order, to move his tanks into the centre of Moscow. They will take up positions around and inside the Kremlin, and in Dzerzhinsky Street — a display of strength. Andropov will be — collected at home by a special squad. The Politburo members will be similarly rounded up. As for Feodor the traitor — he will be taken care of.'

  'He must come back for trial — '

  'What else? It is taken care of.'

  Praporovich nodded reluctantly. 'GFSG are still bellyaching about not being in on the action,' he observed.

  'They won't move?'

  'No. Marshal Bezenkov will do nothing. "1812" will come to a complete stop at 06:00, as you ordered.'

  'Good.'

  Kutuzov stood up, crossed to the drinks cabinet in one corner, and poured vodka for them both. He raised his glass, aware of, pleased at, the theatricality.

  'Your health, old friend.'

  'Yours, also.' They touched glasses, drank off the liquor. Kutuzov stayed the Marshal's hand for a moment.

  'I have to stay alive, because without me, Valenkov will never order his garrison regiments into the streets of Moscow. You have to stay alive, because without you the Army has no leader in the north. Remember that when you're tempted to walk the streets today or tomorrow — eh, old friend?'

  Praporovich nodded. Then, together, they threw their empty glasses into the fireplace. Praporovich roared with laughter, the laughter of a young man. After a moment, Kutuzov, too began to laugh.

  The senior Helsinki detective had been deferential, almost silent, certainly careful to avoid recognition of Davenhill and the wounded arm he nursed in a sling. He had his orders, evidently, and satisfied his frustrations by enjoying the discomfort that the cold of the city morgue brought to the pale-looking Englishman. Diplomacy, intelligence services, twist justice the way you want — the thoughts rumbled away in the back of his head.

  'I'll leave you, if you wish, Mr Davenhill?' he said, sliding out the drawer of the great metal cabinet that might have contained gigantic files. The expected white sheet with its contours like those of hidden furniture nevertheless shocked Davenhill, made him gag as if the thing under the sheet had rotted.

  'Don't you want my identification?' Davenhill snapped.

  'Naturally. I meant afterwards — '

  'I-'

  The detective pulled back the sheet like a conjurer. Water ford's face stared up at them. Davenhill could imagine the eyes beneath the closed lids, glowering, discontented with the ordinariness, the boredom of death. Davenhill nodded. Then he remembered his lines.

  'Yes — that is Mr Alan Waterford, of the British Diplomatic Service.' It was incredible, even insulting. The detective accepted the blatant untruth, the agreed version of identity.

  'Thank you, Mr Davenhill.'

  Davenhill was staring into the cabinet drawer. Waterford was neat, tidy. He did not hear the detective walk away, to wait outside for him.

  Civil servant — dear God! he thought. At last they had put Waterford in a category, and one he could not threaten or burst from. Waterford the killer, the operator, the desperate man — a clerk. Davenhill could feel nothing more than the irony of his words, his identification. He could not feel that Waterford had saved his life, more than once; he could not apprehend the person that Waterford had been. But he was assailed by a sense of loneliness that had nothing to do with the white room, the ranked drawers, the table with its sluice in the middle of the til
ed floor, the gowns hanging up on the door. It was a loneliness that belonged not to himself, but to Waterford. Waterford in life rather than dead.

  Stupid tears pricked at the back of his eyes. In an effort to dismiss them, he slammed the heavy drawer shut. It slid smoothly on its oiled rails, and clanged shut. The noise rang from the white walls, from the chequered tiles of the floor.

  Vorontsyev sat huddled hi a narrow gully, staring at the Makarov 9 mm automatic in his hands. Hands that were clumsily gloved so that he could only just press the trigger-finger into the guard. Eight rounds in the magazine, and three spare clips in his pockets. Thirty-two 244 milligram bullets between himself and the whole of Ossipov's Far East Military District forces. He could not bring himself to contemplate the number of divisions posted at this end of the Soviet Union.

  Ludicrous.

  His breathing had now become less harsh, and his heartbeat no longer thudded in his ears. He must have been running for miles, for hours.

  It had been for nearly an hour. It was twelve-fifteen on the 22nd. In Moscow, eight hours away by jet, it was — what was it? Midnight.

  He threw aside the thought with a shake of his head. It did not matter. What mattered more was that he wished he had the larger Stechkin 9 mm automatic, with a twenty-round magazine, better range, more stopping power, instead of the particularly futile Makarov.

  He laughed aloud when he considered the uselessness of either gun against a T-54 tank, or even the platoon of men that might leap out of an Armoured Personnel Carrier.

  He fumbled the map from his pocket, and folded and refolded it until it revealed his present position. He checked with the sun's position, then the compass, then the shape of the land — here, on the edge of the long knife of forest that had followed the valley as it narrowed. Pointing south.

  He was eighteen miles from the outskirts of Khabarovsk.

  He crouched instinctively as he heard.he beat of a helicopter, coming up the narrow valley from the south. He was just under the outlying trees, in an olive-green anorak and brown slacks, and jammed into a narrow dry watercourse. The beat of the rotors became louder, and he felt his arms against his head throbbing with nerves as he covered his fair hair. The noise was directly overhead, and he could feel the small down-draught. Dirt jumped and quivered near him, and the trees overhead were swaying in the created wind.

  Then the noise died away northwards, the way he had come, the pilot and observer in the chopper hoping that their down-draught might part the trees like some green and spiky Red Sea just long enough for them to spot a running man. He waited, not uncurling from his crouch, because he now knew the pattern they were using.

  Two minutes later, the second helicopter passed overhead. They could not seriously believe that he had come this far in the time — probably these were the original choppers that had escorted, then lost him.

  He stood up. He brushed his trousers free of the little hard dirt that had accumulated, and stepped out of the gully. There was no snow on this side of the narrow valley, facing the sun. The day was almost spring-like, mild. He had even heard insects in the intense silence, above his own breathing.

  A vague plan had formed itself in his mind — something akin to a half-dreamed ambition, and connected with childhood. Certainly not a definite plan of action. But it was all he had. It meant getting to Khabarovsk, at least to the eastern outskirts, soon after dark.

  He knew he could not enter Khabarovsk, or return to his hotel. He could not even rely on Blinn and the rest of the forensic team, or the replacement KGB officers flown in from Moscow. A tiny force, impotent. He could not attempt to board a plane hi Khabarovsk — the airport was outside the town, but it would be patrolled by now, or soon, anyway. He would be arrested, probably on some trumped-up charge and by a GRU detachment, and brought to Military District HQ.

  And then, he thought, the light would go out.

  Beyond the trees, the narrow neck of the valley opened out. He looked at the map. A small village — Nikoleyev — lay behind the valley, where the mountains and uplands surrendered temporarily to high pasture. A sloping bowl of meadowland. then narrow, radiating valleys again, before the land dropped down to the long hills which cradled Khabarovsk.

  In the village, he had to obtain a car. Covertly, or overtly, it did not matter. Probably, there were troops in the village already. It did not matter. He had to get to the village, and he had to have the car. Only by having transport could he hope to make the rendezvous that was already assuming a prominent place in his thinking.

  There was some kind of hut on a little rise, perhaps half a mile from where he stood. Not a house, perhaps a store for winter fodder.

  He stepped cautiously away from the trees, as if expecting to see the belly of a helicopter slide into view just above the tree tops. He scanned the sky, revolving on his heels until he began to feel dizzy. Nothing. He began to run.

  The ground was tussocky with the poor grass, flinty stones unsettling his footsteps. He ran as carefully as he could, his eyes scanning the ground immediately ahead of him, yet his mind screaming at the sense in the back of his neck, across his shoulders, that he was nakedly exposed as he moved with such idiotic slowness across that half-mile of grass and stones.

  His breathing became heavier, the steps more automatic, and more laboured. He began to consider the futility of running, of crossing half a mile when thousands of miles separated him from the people who could help him — no, not help, now; protect, hide. His breath began to tear and sob, like cloth being pulled apart roughly, something human in him being made into i rags for cleaning.

  He forced his legs on, his body seeming to bend lower, his face closer to the ground — stumbling more now, trying to shift weight immediately so that an ankle wouldn't give, twist. He could feel the body-heat, rising and breaking out in sweat. There was even sweat on his forehead now. He looked up. The hut appeared hardly any nearer than the last time he had looked up — perhaps one hundred strides ago. No, two hundred at least.

  One hand pushing away from the ground as he stumbled, and the tiredness stressed as he tried to drive the legs in a [reasserted upright position.

  He heard the noise of the helicopter, behind him, and it ' seemed as if the sound was gaseous, unnerving him, causing I the moving legs to quiver as if he had already stopped running.

  He turned round, staggering as his body shifted clumsily.

  he small scout helicopter, like the civilian one he had flown in, was fifty feet up, and moving across the grass towards him — a black, insect spot just horizoned above the dark lines of the trees.

  He whirled round, stumbling again, and it was now as if he moved through some restraining element. The beat of rotors behind him became louder: he stumbled on, careless of stones and tussocks, waiting for the shadow of the helicopter, the waving of grass as it bent before the downdraught.

  The hut wobbled on the rise, joggling in his vision as he looked up. The breath tearing, and the heartbeat frenzied. Above everything, the futility of it, the stupid blind panic to run, to keep running, thousands of miles from safety.

  The grass leapt with small stones, flying dirt, near his right foot, then ahead and to his side. Gunfire. The noise of the rotors drowned the rifle shots. The helicopter was no gunship, but it carried at least one marksman. Again, flying spots of dirt. He saw the distressed earth scatter on his boot like scuffed sand.

  Then his breath was knocked from him, and his shoulder jarred cruelly as he banged into the wall of the hut. He looked up, and the shadow of the chopper passed over him. White plucked splinters of dry wood stung his cheek as the rifleman, with the AK-47 on automatic, loosed a volley before he disappeared behind the overflown hut.

  Sobbing, straining to get his breath — one breath, clear and deep would be sufficient, as the blood roared in his ears — he banged against the locked door. Wood splintered — he heard the sound, even as the rotor noise increased again — and he fell into the darkness, redolent of stored fodder, and tumbl
ed against stacked hay bales.

  A line of jagged holes, striped across one wall, entry of sunlight in splashes like yellow blood, as the marksman in the helicopter sprayed the hut on automatic. He buried his head, wriggling his body between the spiky, hard edges of the bales. Bullets plucked into the packed earth door, thumped softly into bales beside him. He put his hands over his ears, terrified.

  The noise of the rotors came down to swallow him.

  He was unsure how long it was, but he was aware of the changing noises outside. The rotors dying away, then the crack-ing of a voice, voices, as the helicopter's cabin speaker amplified the calls from nearest units in the search. He was stiff with 'ear, weak and unable to move.

  The door of the hut was hanging open. He had to get out. He pushed himself upright, and staggered stiffly to the door, rugging the gun free of its shoulder holster. A ridiculous little thing, set against the AK-47 waiting for him outside.

  He pressed himself against the wall, craning round the door frame. The soldier, in olive-green combat dress, was stepping cautiously towards the door. The small MIL was behind him, its rotors turning sluggishly. The pilot was bent forward over his equipment, his head turned to watch the soldier.

  Vorontsyev went into the crouch, arms stiff, gun cradled by two hands. He fired three shots, all towards the centre of the target shape that the soldier had become. The man leapt aside, but a movement without volition, only the jerk of impact as two of the bullets hit him in the stomach, the other passing through his upper arm as he fell away. The AK-47 spun in the air, catching the sun along its stubby barrel and curved magazine. The pilot was moving to shut the door of the helicopter when Vorontsyev, still in the same crouch, two paces out of the door, shot him. Red hole in the temple, then the head dropping back out of sight behind the body which had been lifted out of the seat, held in some grotesque position of sexual proffering over the seat back.

  He turned the soldier with his boot, then bent to pick up the AK-47. Then, he rummaged in the dead man's combat suit for the extra magazines. They were bulky, unsuitable unless he wore combat dress himself. He threw one aside in irritation, and thrust the other into the deepest pocket of his anorak. Then he went to the MIL, moved the body slightly, and only then realised, as the mood of semi-robotic efficiency left him, that he had killed the pilot, and could not fly the helicopter himself.