“There has not yet been any exchange,” said Travin, trapped.
“When did you ask for something?” pressed Natalia. “You’ll have logged your request, of course?”
“I was waiting for the return of Colonel Lestov,” tried Travin, desperately.
There was another long silence, which again Natalia ended. Soft-voiced in apparent disbelief, she said, “They’ve been back for two days!”
Travin looked fervently for help from Viskov. The deputy minister ignored him. Travin said, “I have been too busy following your other instructions.”
“But you haven’t!” rejected Natalia, louder now in outrage. “I initiated Lubyanka. Nothing arrived until today …” She feigned the sudden awareness of Suslov and the homicide detective before looking to Nikulin. “I don’t consider this is the time or place to continue this conversation. But I do think it should be continued …”
“I totally agree,” said Nikulin.
Charlie was sitting with Sasha on his lap, watching her permitted thirty minutes of English language cartoon, when Natalia got back to Lesnaya.
“Well?” he asked.
“I won,” declared Natalia. “But they know a second officer was there at the murder.”
“Oh, shit!” said Charlie, unthinking.
Sasha said, “What’s ‘shit’ mean?”
“Maybe I could have done better,” conceded Novikov. “I hadn’t expected everything to end like that, so quickly. I wasn’t properly prepared.”
“He seemed a good man,” allowed Marina. “Did he promise to help?”
“He told me to call,” said the doctor, fingering the pasteboard on the table between them.
“When will you?”
“Soon. When this business with the woman’s body is settled. Polyakov realizes he’s been outsmarted. Still might try something.”
“Do you think the Englishman believed you had more?”
“I’ll hint what it is when we talk.”
“He’s definitely working to an agenda of his own,” complained Peters. His hair was too long for sea trips, blowing disordered around his face. Hurriedly he pulled on a sailing cap.
“It hardly matters,” Boyce pointed out, at the helm. “Whatever he keeps back from your woman, you get from me. Just as you get whatever our other departments contribute. We can’t be caught out.”
“Only by the Russians.”
“They’re not likely to do anything, are they?”
“They’re an uncertainty, and I don’t like uncertainties.”
“Their reaction would be intriguing, if we used Muffin as a diversion.”
“That’s increasingly what I’m thinking.”
“It would have to be an obvious assassination, of course.”
“Of course.”
“Your man ready?”
“Whenever I blow the whistle.”
“Let’s give it a day or two; there’s no urgency. But then make a sensation out of it.”
“Fine.”
“How was Moscow?”
“Appalling!” said Peters. “Dirty, uncomfortable and the ambassador served the most disgusting food I’ve ever eaten. Which I didn’t, hardly.”
“It was good of you to go,” said Boyce, repeating the earlier gratitude.
“Necessary, particularly in view of events,” said Peters. “Have you ever seen Muffin personally?”
“Of course not!” said Boyce, surprised at the question.
“Peculiar man. Looks like a bum. Won’t be any loss at all to your service.”
19
Charlie let Natalia feed and bathe the still-demanding Sasha (“If it’s a silly word, why did you say it?”), needing the escape more than the time. He still used the time, though. It was necessary to rethink. Reevaluate. It had been stupid leaving the grave when he did—downright bloody stupid. Not a disaster—easily recoverable, in fact—but that wasn’t the point. The point was getting everything—getting it all—the first time, and he hadn’t, which was more arrogance, hurt pride, than professional objectivity. So what was professionally objective? London’s secrecy intention—perhaps Washington’s, too—was now at Moscow’s mercy. A major reassessment. But more a diplomatic consideration than his, at operational ground level. What was there at his level? Vadim Lestov hadn’t told all to Miriam. So much for pubic power. Which wasn’t an irrelevant reflection. Told him something about the Russian detective. Had to keep it in mind. What else? Get it all, this time. Which he could. And would. So that wasn’t the point, either. The primary consideration—the sole consideration—was whether Natalia had been as successful as she obviously believed herself to have been. Everything else, for the moment, was secondary.
She accepted the wine he had waiting when she emerged from the bedroom corridor and said, “I told Sasha you’d be along in a minute to say good night.”
That, like so much else, was becoming a ritual he enjoyed. “Of course.”
“I had to tell her what shit meant. She still thought it was silly.”
“I’m sorry,” apologized Charlie.
“Is what Denebin found a major problem?”
Charlie poured himself a second malt and said, “Not even one we’re going to think about yet. First priorities first. You.”
Natalia smiled, knowing the preference might have been difficult, the triumph rehearsed during the homeward drive. He listened leaning forward from his encompassing chair, looking into the glass cupped between both hands but not drinking. The silence unsettled Natalia, who’d expected—wanted—as much excitement, as much enthusiasm, as she felt.
Charlie didn’t immediately speak, even when Natalia had obviously finished. Natalia waited, becoming more unsettled. Finally Charlie said, “The adjournment was limited to just you, Viskov and Travin? And Nikulin?”
Natalia nodded. “Lestov was called back at the end, when Nikulin announced he was to take over operational control.”
“But he wasn’t officially appointed by title as your deputy?” pressed Charlie.
“Nikulin talked about there having to be changes, but there was nothing official, no. Letting them sweat, I suppose.”
“Which of them do you think Nikulin was talking about?” demanded Charlie.
Natalia allowed another pause. “Travin, primarily. Reducing his responsibility to the Lubyanka documentation was total humiliation. For him and Viskov, after the way they dismissed it and tried to use it.”
Charlie had hoped for more: a dismissal, even. “Are there any arrangements for you to see Nikulin again? By yourself?”
Natalia shook her head once more.
“Ask for a meeting,” urged Charlie. “It might have been too much to hope that by itself it would have been enough to get Viskov moved, as well as Travin. But you’ve definitely got to get rid of Travin. Totally. He and Viskov have been humiliated, as well as caught out. They’re a threat as long as they’re still together in the same building, able to plot. Maybe more so than before, after what happened today. They’re fighting for their very existence now.”
The final vestiges of Natalia’s excitement seeped away. Charlie’s killer instinct, she remembered. “So I haven’t won?”
“Not yet.” Seeing her need, Charlie said, “But you will. That’s what we decided, didn’t we?”
“How?” she asked, despondently unsure.
“Using what we’ve got,” he said, inadequately. “Now tell me about the button from the Western uniform.”
“It’s not like those on the uniforms the dead men were wearing—not the same metal. And it’s definitely not from a Russian uniform.”
“Were there any special markings on it?” asked Charlie, urgently. There was another possibility that actually fit the way the English lieutenants had been dressed. There were two uniforms, dress and battle dress.
“I haven’t seen it yet. I will, of course.”
“I need a photograph,” insisted Charlie. He fell silent. Then he said, “I made a bad mistake—a stupid mistake—
leaving the grave too early. Don’t like fucking up like that.”
“You’d decided there was someone else,” reminded Natalia, trying to help.
He had, acknowledged Charlie—from the .38 bullet as well as another person’s military knowledge of the waistband label. Charlie said, “It was a possibility that had to be considered. This is proof.” He straightened positively, dismissing the self-recrimination, at the same time topping up both their glasses. The immediate future was more important than the immediate past. Natalia’s survival was still the priority. “What was decided to do about a second English officer?”
Natalia made an uncertain gesture. “I used it as an accusation, as part of the argument: turned it against Travin that he hadn’t approached you or the American to get your findings. Your idea, remember?”
“What about disclosing it? I challenged Denebin in Yakutsk about everything else I saw him recover.”
“They know you went off before Denebin found the buttons—that you don’t know. That the American doesn’t know, either.”
“So?”
“It comes down to what you—and she—officially offer,” said Natalia. “Maybe not even then. It’s a hell of an advantage for us: the worst imaginable, as far as you’re concerned—” She hurriedly stopped. “The worst imaginable for Britain. I didn’t mean you personally.”
Was there a differentiation? wondered Charlie. There shouldn’t be, logically. But logic had very little to do with getting out from under when the toilet was flushed, and Charlie had a longtime aversion to getting covered in little brown bits. His was the name on everything: even on television, the identified person at the bottom of the toilet bowl. Charlie said, “But I know! And by knowing I can avoid a mistake.” He paused. “Any more mistakes,” he added, refusing himself an escape.
“I hope,” said Natalia, at once wishing that she hadn’t.
Charlie didn’t pick up on the remark. He said, “Lestov, with whom I always had to liaise anyway, is effectively your deputy?”
“He was the obvious choice,” Natalia pointed out. “Suddenly to have introduced anyone else as an operational controller—apart from his need to be totally rebriefed—would have shown our internal problem. Lestov getting the job can be explained, even if there’s a need to explain, as a promotion. Which he rightly deserved.”
“And which he must get, by title,” insisted Charlie. He hadn’t done enough to reassure her, he decided. He really wasn’t used to worrying about people and protecting people other than himself. It meant a further delay in talking to Natalia about Novikov, too: her involvement in that was the last thing that could be risked with Viskov and Travin still in place and working against her.
“Which you still haven’t told me how we’re going to achieve?” prompted Natalia.
“You are still going to get the camp archives before Travin?”
“I insisted upon it,” confirmed Natalia. “Said I wanted personally to be sure that a search neither Travin nor Viskov judged important was carried out properly.”
“Excellent,” exaggerated Charlie. It would have heaped further humiliation, increasing their determination to hit back.
“I’m waiting!” protested Natalia.
“I already think Colonel Vadim Leonidovich Lestov is a good policeman,” said Charlie. “We’re going to make him better … .” He paused again, remembering Miriam’s lunchtime phrase. “Superman, in fact. And when the great discovery comes from Gulag 98, Petr Pavlovich Travin is going to miss it.”
“What if there isn’t anything to discover about Camp 98?” argued Natalia, raising at last one of her nagging doubts. “We don’t even know that the records of every camp have survived.”
The reason to get Novikov and whatever the man had to Moscow as soon as possible, thought Charlie. “We do know there was a Gulag 98 for special prisoners?”
“Yes?” agreed Natalia, doubtfully.
“None of whom, after fifty-four years, will still be alive today?”
“I wouldn’t have thought so,” Natalia further agreed.
“All we need is a name. I can invent an importance supposedly from an English source,” said Charlie, simply.
“What if there isn’t a surviving file?” pressed Natalia, relentlessly.
“The three bodies were where a special camp once existed, weren’t they?” coaxed Charlie. “The information from England—from me—will still be that it was vital to trace a prisoner there. The failure to locate the file will be Travin’s, won’t it?”
Natalia shook her head. “Sometimes you lose me, Charlie.”
“That’s something I’m never going to do,” he said, using her remark.
She started, at the strident sound of the street-level bell. So did Charlie. Shit! he thought. “I forgot to tell you,” he apologized. “I invited Irena to supper.”
“Why, Charlie?” demanded Natalia, seriously.
“I’m not sure yet. I’ll tell you if I find out,” he answered, obscurely. “Maybe it’s nothing.”
“You’re not making sense.”
“Trust me.”
Natalia wished Charlie wouldn’t keep asking her to do that.
Irena’s last flight had been to Japan, where there is a theme park dedicated to the cartoon character, and Sasha’s present was a Thomas the Tank T-shirt, complete with a smiling-faced railway engine printed on the front. Sasha, who was still waiting for Charlie, insisted upon putting it on and announced she was going to sleep in it.
“No,” refused Charlie. “You can wear it tomorrow.”
“Shit!” Sasha challenged, in English.
Irena sniggered, turning away.
Charlie said, “I told you that was a silly word. I don’t want you saying it again.”
“Why did you, then?”
“To see whether you would be silly and repeat it,” said Charlie, desperately. “Or whether you were a big girl. So now we know: you’re silly, like the word. And you can’t sleep in the T-shirt.”
“I want Mummy!”
“Take it off and go to sleep.”
Sasha sat in bed with her arms tightly folded, not moving, glaring although not directly at him. Her lips were tightly together, too. Irena said, “I don’t think I want to talk to silly girls. I’ll come back later.”
Sasha’s bottom lip didn’t stay tight. Charlie was hot, sweating, a never-lost man completely lost. It was unthinkable—literally—to slap her. Charlie said, “I’m waiting.”
Sasha said, “I want Mummy.”
Charlie didn’t turn at Natalia’s arrival. Natalia said, “What has Daddy told you to do?”
“He’s not my daddy!” said the child.
“He is and you do what he tells you,” said Natalia. “Take the shirt off.”
Sasha started to pull it over her head and to cry at the same time, pointedly offering it to Natalia, who didn’t reach for it. Charlie held out his hand and after a moment’s hesitation Sasha gave it to him. Natalia kissed Sasha and left Charlie in the room with her.
Charlie said, “Do I get a kiss?”
“No,” said Sasha, her voice muffled in the pillow, her body rigid.
“This isn’t much fun, is it?”
There was no reply.
Charlie leaned forward, kissing Sasha’s turned away head. He said, “I am your daddy and I love you very much.” It was a whisper, but he still heard her say, “shit,” before he got to the door.
The two sisters were waiting for him in the smaller lounge, Irena already with the whiskey Natalia had poured for her.
Irena said, “What was that all about?”
“Growing up,” said Charlie. “Sasha and I together.” He still felt hot, disoriented by something he hadn’t known how to handle or control and wished hadn’t happened. How difficult was the rest of the evening going to be?
“It’s a learning curve, I guess,” suggested Irena.
“Maybe I’ve got more to learn than Sasha,” conceded Charlie.
“I certainly h
ave,” simpered Irena. “Learning the man my sister’s involved with is an international detective was a hell of a surprise!” She was wearing one of her second skin outfits, a black catsuit that didn’t show panty or bra ridges because she wasn’t wearing either. “I thought you looked terrific on television.”
“I didn’t,” said Natalia. She was serious, subdued.
“What sort of policeman are you?” persisted the younger woman.
“A clerk,” dismissed Charlie, his script ready in outline at least. He should have prepared Natalia; prepared himself better. Another stupid mistake. Too late now. “I just exchange information between London and here.”
Irena made a sweeping gesture around the apartment. “Clerks don’t live in palaces.”
“There are ways,” He smiled. Would this eventually qualify as another learning curve? He hoped so.
Irena regarded him curiously. “Like what?”
“Always useful, having access to foreign currency.”
Now Irena smiled, although uncertainly. Natalia was looking at him in bewilderment, mouth slightly open. Irena said, “You don’t, do you?”
“You should know how to turn dollars around: the best use of any foreign currency in the financial mess this country’s in.”
He refilled Irena’s empty glass. Natalia shook her head irritably against any more. He left his drink as it was.
With forced indignation, Irena said, “I don’t deal in foreign currency!”
“I don’t believe you,” challenged Charlie, expansively. “You’d be a fool not to, with the chances you’ve got. We’ve got it made, people like you and me.”
Irena looked at her sister. “Is he telling the truth?”
“I don’t know what he does or what he’s saying,” Natalia, said with a shrug, angrily soft-voiced.
Dead Men Living Page 19