“Understand me,” he said. “Do that once more and I'll call for the men I have waiting outside. They will take you, bed and all, to the embassy compound where there is a detention cell waiting for you. It's for your own good. Right or wrong, Mr. Lesko, you beat one man to death and are a suspect in the beating death of another. You also had a gun. You fired that gun. For that alone, you will otherwise rot in a KGB prison until they decide you have nothing else to tell them. If we can get you to the embassy, however, you'll be out of their reach.”
Lesko let his head fall back. He had no strength anyway. It seemed useless to argue that a gun-possession charge was bullshit. Let alone a homicide charge. That gun was Valentin's. He picked it up off the ...
Oh, damn. Oh, God damn.
“The kid ... Valentin ... he's dead?”
“I'm afraid so.”
“Belkin?”
“He's in surgery now. That bullet chewed his insides pretty good, but he's got a chance.”
Lesko took a long breath. ”I want to see Elena.”
The army doctor stepped back from the bed. “We're told that you're an honorable man, Mr. Lésko. If you will give me your promise of full and absolute cooperation, give truthful answers to a few questions I must ask, I will give you five minutes with your wife before we go.”
Lesko showed his teeth. “You're straight with me, I'm straight with you. There's your promise.”
“Okay, let's test it. Who were those men, Mr. Lesko? The two in that van.”
”I don't know. That's the truth.”
Colonel Meltzer seemed unconvinced.
“Doctor ... I was fucking shooting at them. I emptied half a clip at them. You think they were pals of mine?”
An ambiguous shrug. “Could they have been Paul Bannerman's people? And you just didn't realize it?”
Lesko shook his head. He meant it. “Bannerman wouldn't have sent them. Not without telling me first.” Prick better not have.
“Let's try a name. Is one of them David Katz?” he asked.
“Oh, for . . ” But Lesko understood. He was probably yelling for Katz all night. Telling him to go stay with Elena.
Bring Valentin with him. Bring . . . Wait a second. Bring John Waldo.
He was not about to mention Waldo. That was only a dream. But he explained who Katz was. The doctor seemed dubious. Fine. Let him check it out.
The doctor was talking about Bannerman now. Saying he was on the way. Didn't seem happy about it. All kinds of people coming, including Susan. Including Irwin Kaplan for some reason. Lesko was glad about Irwin. Irwin, you could talk to.
But Lesko didn't want to know about this now. He wanted to see Elena. All this doctor seemed interested in was containing this situation . . . saying there's a lot at stake ... Bannerman could screw it up ... saying they need his help to keep Bannerman under control... saying that if anyone has the moral authority to ask Bannerman and the Bruggs to stand down, it's the husband of Elena Brugg.
“Wait. . . wait. . . wait.” Lesko squeezed his eyes shut, trying to focus on all this. “Run that by me again.”
The doctor from the embassy did so. In somewhat more detail. Larger issues, he was saying. No room for personal vendettas. Not for what happened to Elena. Not for what happened to Bannerman's agent in Zurich.
“What agent?”
”A woman . . . Carla Benedict. . . dead . . . murdered.”
Lesko could not believe it. People like Carla are never victims. They make victims.
All this talk of vendettas. The idea of revenge had somehow never crossed his mind. Time for that later. When Elena's out of danger. But if he had to decide now who he'd want to go after, Belkin's stepfather would have to lead off the list. It was clear to him now. Kulik. Name was Kulik. Red-faced. Humiliated. He probably got out to the sidewalk, looked for a pay phone, and an hour later the shooters are waiting.
“What do you want from me?” he asked the doctor quietly.
”I told you. Your word.”
“That what? I won't go after anyone on my own?”
“And that you'll do all in your power to dissuade Paul Bannerman from doing the same.”
“On his own.”
“Your word on it?”
“You got it. Now where's Elena?”
They had closed her eyes.
The left side of her head was packed in gauze, a lump of it, the size of his fist. She had a tube in her nose. She was breathing. Very softly. That was good, he hoped.
Another tube led to her arm, the arm that was scarred from the other time she got shot. At the end of that arm, a finger was moving. He wanted to believe that she knew he was there, that the finger was for him. Come, Lesko. Hold my hand.
He couldn't because they had handcuffed him. The muscle from the embassy. They said it was a precaution. He had already wrecked one ambulance and half of the emergency room even when strapped to a gurney. Lesko remembered, dimly.
But he was able to lean over her bed. Kiss her. Talk to her. While he did, he kept looking at that finger. It kept moving, same way. He saw no change in response to his presence. It was just a twitch. Still, it said she was alive.
“You're going to be okay,” he told her. “No question.”
He said this and other things aloud because he'd heard that a coma patient knows when you're there. Sometimes just hearing your voice can bring them out of it. He had a neighbor, back in Queens, went into a diabetic coma. Was like that for weeks. Came out of it when they brought her dog to see her. And you're supposed to ask questions. One day, out of the blue, they answer you. Sometimes.
He spoke to her, quietly, tenderly, as long as he could. Until his voice began to crack and the tears spilled down his face. After that, he began talking to God. Trying to make adeal. Let her live, he said, and you can keep the baby. Let her live and you can take me. But if you let her die, you son of a bitch ...
The embassy doctor was at his shoulder. “We have to go,” he said.
You let her die and I'll fill up hell for you.
“Mr. Lesko.” The doctor touched his arm. “You gave your word.”
Lesko nodded slowly. He gave it and he'd keep it. Five minutes with Elena, Then go peaceably. After that, no action on his own, no action by Bannerman. Not on his own.
It won't be on his own.
65
The apartment house in Lenin Hills was still standing.
And it was guarded. But it wasn't quiet.
Out front, an old woman was yelling about something. She was running back and forth, between two guards, pulling at their uniforms. She was in a frenzy. One guard would shake her off, turn his back to her, and she would run to the other. He, too, would turn away.
Up above, a few tenants in bathrobes were watching this from darkened terraces. They were keeping to the shadows. They wanted to see. But otherwise, they wanted no part of that woman.
“Keep going,” Waldo said to the Austrian. “We don't need this either.”
But the old woman had spotted the blue Volga. Salvation. She threw up her hands and ran toward the street on a course that would intercept them. Lechmann had to brake quickly. He would have hit her.
The old woman put both hands on the hood, then on the left fender, then on the side mirror as if by touching it she could keep it from driving away. She reached Lechmann's window. She was yelling, wailing, spraying spittle through bad teeth.
“They took him,” she was shouting. “My son. They took him and dragged him out.”
Lechmann wiped his face. He looked past her at one of the guards who was gesturing to him. The guard was shaking his head at the two militia plainclothesman. He was tossing a thumb down the street. Get moving, was his message. This is none of your business.
But Lechmann felt Waldo's hand on his thigh. The touch, pressing firmly, said, “Wait.”
“Who took your son, old mother?” asked the Austrian.
“Men,” she cried. “Two men in a big car with guns. My son is KGB. My son is a general
in KGB and these bums did nothing.”
The guards were moving toward the Volga. They were probably on someone's payroll. Lechmann didn't want a confrontation. Too many pairs of eyes. Waldo, if he opened his mouth, could never pass for a Moscow cop. He might have to kill the guards.
But Waldo spoke anyway. “Your son. His name?” he asked.
Her expression wavered at the accent but only briefly. “Is Borovik. Vadim Borovik. Is important general.”
“You!” One of the guards. “Nothing happened here. This one is crazy.”
The thumb again. The second guard had the old woman by the collar. He was walking her, half carrying her, back toward the building's entrance.
“Her son was not taken?” asked Lechmann. “He is not a general?”
The guard made a show of noting the number of their car. “Take my advice,” he said, “and don't ask for trouble.”
“Good advice,” said Waldo in his ear. “Go.”
“What’l1 we bet,” asked Waldo when they turned the corner, “that the black car was a Zil?”
“No takers.”
“And that it's on its way, right now, to Zhukovka.”
Lechmanñ shrugged. “Just as likely to a lime pit someplace.”
“Maybe the lime pit's in Zhukovka. You got an address, right?”
The Austrian nodded glumly.
“What's the matter?”
“Zhukovka is big-shot dachas. Very well protected. To everyone but you, this means stay away. I think I am going to die tonight.”
“Yeah, well, you don't think this is interesting? This says Zivic is right. Borovik sent the shooters. But he fucked up. By accident, maybe even on purpose, he made it look like it was the guy in the Zil who sent them.”
A skeptical grunt.
“Where does it not make sense? You know from the doorman that Borovik has had dinner with whatzizname . . . Kulik . . . more than once. Borovik's in this guy's pocket, right? Like those two guards who are probably sticking a pillow over that old lady's face right now. But maybe Borovik gets ambitious. Maybe he decides to set Kulik up and he ... Make a right turn here.”
Lechmann cut the wheel, still grumbling. “You know how many times you said maybe in the past few hours? By actual count, it's six million.”
“Turn right again, next corner. Flip your lights off.”
“We're going back to that apartment house? What for?”
“Zivic said make noise. I want to pop those two guards in the ass.”
66
The Brugg Industries jet had departed late.
Not by long; they could still make Moscow on schedule. The delay had been caused by Barton Fuller.
He had used his influence to have takeoff clearance denied until he could speak to Bannerman personally. He wanted a promise. Do nothing, he said, until you've met up with Irwin and Roger. Do nothing until you hear them out.
Bannerman had no trouble agreeing. He could use the time to get his people in place. As for hearing them out, he had a sense that he knew more than they did already. About who the players were, at least.
He had spoken to Zivic at length by way of Willem Brugg's communications center. He learned of the Frenchman's visit to Grassi's boat and of the exchange with Ernst Lechmann in Moscow. He had listened to Yuri, also at length. He now knew about the Borovik network. Yuri described its scope but declined to list the names and places.
“Yuri ...” Bannerman asked, not unkindly, “who are you saving them for?”
It seemed to sadden him that Bannerman could ask. “General Belkin,” he said haltingly, “is not the only honest man in KGB.”
“These others, then. Have you met them?”
“Some. Yes.”
“Will I?”
“If they agree. If they think that Mama's Boy can understand them.”
“Yuri.. . what does that mean, exactly?”
“These are men who love their country. Good times or bad. For their country they will make any sacrifice.”
“And ….a man like me,” Bannerman said quietly, ”I could never understand that?”
”I do not mean to insult you. Please believe, you have my highest respect. No man is more loyal to those who trust him. But you, I think, have never known the pain that even I have felt. And mine is nothing compared to that of General Belkin and these others.”
Bannerman grumbled inwardly.
From Susan,he doesn't understand women.
From Anton Zivic, he doesn't understand just letting life happen every now and then.
And now from Yuri, he doesn't understand suffering. Or love of country.
As for suffering, he would agree that he doesn't understand making a national pastime of it. In Russia, that's what it is. Listen to their music. It's either heroic or melancholy with not much in. between. Try to read their poetry without wanting to drink straight from the bottle.
Bannerman dismissed that train of thought. He was beginning to sound like John Waldo.
“No offense taken,” he said to Yuri, rising. “But if that's all that's bothering you, try to put it aside until this is over.”
He was not annoyed so much. It was more a measure of discomfort when people who should know better allow themselves to be distracted.
There were fourteen passengers in the main cabin. Willem Brugg was in the cockpit, flying right seat and staying close to the radio. Of the fourteen, eight were medical staff. They sat in the rows farthest back and in the main salon—a bedroom cum office—where two of the doctors were reviewing an EEG of Elena's brain that had been faxed from the Moscow hospital. They were not distracted. They knew what they had to do.
Miriam who was now a nurse sat with them, learning to act and sound like one. Avram who was now an interpreter was memorizing those medical terms which seemed likely to arise.
Next was Yuri, who was keeping to himself in spite of Carla's efforts to comfort him about Leo and especially Lydia. Carla seemed more like herself again. A stimulant from one of the doctors had helped. She was pacing the aisles now, unable to sit. Several times, she made silent eye contact with Susan. Bannerman had no idea what that meant, if anything, but he thought he could read at least a part of Carla's mind. Just three hours further east there would be someone she could punish for sending Aldo Corsini into her life.
Susan sat two rows beyond Yuri. She, too, seemed very much within herself. He had not been very attentive to her since they learned about the Moscow shooting. He'd been busy debriefing people. He sat, reached for her hand, and squeezed it. She did not acknowledge his presence.
“How are you holding up?” he asked. “Can I get you anything?” .
“He's right, you know,” she said, staring ahead.
“Urn .. . About what, Susan?”
“That you don't feel pain. You don't even hate.”
Oh boy. “No, Susan. What I don't do is indulge it. What I don't do is feel what you're feeling exactly when you want me to feel it.”
”I want you to hate. This time, I want you to hate.”
He had never seen her quite like this.
The look in her eyes.
It was hatred, and that wasn't good. Carla could hate, and so could he, for that matter. But they'd learned, over time, how to put it aside. Even to use it. The way they'd learned to use fear.
“Paul. . . that baby
Twice now she'd started to speak, using those three words, and twice she'd stopped herself from saying more. The second time she said it, Carla was pacing up the aisle. Carla overheard it. Their eyes met and held again. There were no words in this exchange, but Carla, clearly, seemed to be telling her to shut up. Abruptly, the psychic message was completed.
“We need to talk,” Carla said.
She reached in and took Susan's hand, pulling her out of her seat. They went back to the main salon where the doctors were closeted. Carla threw them out.
They were in there for thirty minutes. When they came out they were holding hands. Very unlike Carla. They separated.
Susan stopped by Yuri's seat. She knelt, her arms folded across his knees, and made her own attempt to comfort him. Carla continued forward.
“Um ... ahem,” he said after she'd passed hìs seat.
“It's none of your business, Paul.” She kept walking.
That does it, thought Bannerman. That was the second time he'd heard that tonight, and in what seemed to be the same context. Elena's baby. He had also, apparently, moved down the evolutionary scale from cold fish to potted plant. Enough was enough. He got up and followed her.
“Do we have weapons?” she asked when he reached her seat.
“No, because we'll be searched at Vnukovo. Carla ...”
“They won't search me. I'm Lieutenant Voinovitch. Who do we have in Moscow?”
“Waldo and Lechmann, but keep that to yourself. Is Susan pregnant?”
“You're asking me?”
“Carla…”
“We didn't talk about that.”
“Then what's going on?” .
“Paul... it's really private. And it has nothing to do with you.”
“Elena's baby. Is there something wrong with it?”
A flicker of hesitation. “Not that I know of. Aside from Elena's condition. And aside from the kid being a Lesko.”
Bannerman stared. “You're joking about it. That means it's not serious.”
”I didn't say serious. I said private.”
“But she told you. She'll talk to you but not me.”
“Women talk to women, Paul. And I'm a woman. You can tell by the tits, such as they are.”
Bannerman's color rose slightly. Carla reached for his necktie. She pulled him closer.
“Look . . . Paul. You're a little dense about some things. Like knowing when to shut up and leave something alone. But mostly, you're very smart. Very perceptive.”
Bannerman waited.
“So you might even figure this out.”
“Fine. Then why not—”
She tugged the tie, stopping him. “If you do figure it out. . . and you say one word to any human being ... including Susan ... I am personally going to cut your balls off.”
67
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