by Tom Clancy
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
Tuesday, 2:06 P.M., St. Petersburg
Several hours before reaching the coast of Russia, Peggy James and David George got twenty seven minutes to taste the clean morning air of the Gulf of Finland. Then they reentered the mini-sub and undertook the second half of their journey. It was less than Peggy had wanted, but enough to keep her going.
An hour before reaching the coast of Russia, Captain Rydman lowered himself from his perch in the con and squatted in the narrow space between the hull and his passengers. Both Peggy and George had already checked their gear in the waterproof rucksacks and were struggling into their Russian uniforms. George looked away as Peggy wriggled into her blue skirt. Rydman did not.
After she finished, Rydman flipped open a twelve-by-fourteen-by-six-inch black metal box on the hull to the left of his head, then whispered, "When we surface, I'll give you sixty seconds to release the raft. You do that by tugging this pin." He hooked his finger through a ring attached to a nylon string, then pointed to the paddles on the top and bottom of the compressed raft. "These unfold in the middle. The raft has Russian markings that coincide with your documents," he said, "indicating that you're with the Argus-class submarine group operating out of Koporskiy Zaliv. I believe you've been briefed about this."
"Briefly," said George.
"How do you say that in Russian?" Peggy asked.
George squinted as he thought. "Myedlyenna, " he said, triumphantly.
"That means slowly," she said, "but it's close enough. Captain," she looked at Rydman, "why just sixty seconds? Don't you have to replenish your air and batteries?"
"We can run another hour on them enough time to get us out of Russian waters. Now then, I suggest you give your maps another look. Memorize the area nearest your drop-off point."
Peggy said, "Petergofskoye Shosse runs past the park. We follow it east to Prospekt Stachek, head north to the river, and the Hermitage is to the east."
"Very good," said Rydman. "And you know about the workers, of course."
She looked at him. "No. What workers?"
"It was in the newspapers, for God's sake. Several thousand workers are scheduled to assemble in Palace Square tonight to mark the beginning of a twenty-four-hour nationwide strike. It was announced yesterday, called by the Russian Federation of Free Trade Unions to obtain back wages and salary and pension increases for its workers. They're holding it at night so as not to frighten away tourists."
"No," she said. "We didn't know about it. Our myopic organizations can tell you what President Zhanin read in the loo, but they don't follow the news."
"Unless that's what he was reading," George pointed out.
"Thank you, Captain," Peggy said. "I appreciate all you've done for us."
Rydman nodded once, then shimmied back into the con to guide the midget submarine through the last leg of its journey.
Peggy and George were silent again as the submarine hummed through the deep. The English agent tried to decide whether having thousands of civilians and police gathered at the target site would help or hinder the process of getting inside. Help, she decided. The police would be too busy keeping irate Russian workers in line to bother with a pair of Russian sailors.
The departure from the submarine was accomplished quickly. After using the periscope to ascertain that there were no boats nearby, the submarine broke the surface. Rydman quietly unscrewed the hatch, and Peggy climbed through. They were about a half mile from shore, and the air was thick with a dirty layer of smog. She doubted that anyone could see them, even if they'd been watching, as George handed her the surprisingly heavy rubber package. Still standing in the con, she hooked her finger through the ring and tossed the raft overboard. It was fully inflated when it hit the water. Her arms braced stiffly on the sides of the con, Peggy tucked her knees to her chest, brought her legs out, stood poised for a moment on the sloping side of the minisub, then stepped into the raft. George followed a moment later with the paddles. He passed them down to Peggy, then handed her their rucksacks and joined her in the raft.
"Good luck," Rydman said, poking his head from the con for a moment before shutting the hatch.
The midget submarine was gone less than two minutes after breaking the surface, leaving Peggy and George alone on the gentle waters.
They didn't speak as they paddled ashore, Peggy watching for the distinctive stiletto-like peninsula that marked the northern boundary of the large cove that bordered the park.
The current was with them and they paddled rapidly in order to stay warm. The icy winds slashed right through the jackets of their uniforms, with their plunging V-necks and thin, blue-and white-striped T-shirts beneath them. Even the tight blue headbands of their white caps were barely strong enough to hold them on their heads.
The duo made it to shore in slightly over forty-five minutes. They arrived in a park that was relatively deserted where it met the chilly shore. Private George used the towline to secure the raft to one of several piles. While hitching on her backpack, Peggy complained loudly, in Russian, about having to check naval buoys when it was so chilly. As she did, she looked around. The nearest person was some two hundred yards away, an artist sitting in a collapsible lawn chair, beneath a tree, drawing a charcoal portrait of a blond-haired tourist while her boyfriend looked on approvingly. The woman was looking in their direction. But if she saw them she didn't react. A militiaman walked along a shaded footpath a few yards beyond them, while a bearded man napped on a bench, a Walkman on his chest and a St. Bernard resting on the grass beside him. A jogger ran past the artist. Peggy had never thought of runners or anyone else having leisure time in Russia. It seemed an odd sight.
Less than two miles to the south of the park, planes were landing regularly in the St. Petersburg airport. The roar of the engines disturbed the tranquility of the setting. But that was the paradox of Russia, the brutish rudeness of the modem day allowed to smother the beauty of the old. She looked north, toward the city itself. Through the filmy sky she saw the array of blue domes, gold domes, white cupolas, gothic spires, bronze statues, winding waterways and canals, and countless flat, brown roofs. It was more like Venice or Florence than like London or Paris. Keith must have loved coming here.
Private George completed his task and walked over after pulling on his backpack. "Ready," he said softly.
Peggy looked toward the broad Petergofskoye Shosse, less than half a mile away. According to the map, if they followed the road east, they would reach the Metro station. A change at the Technological Institute Station would bring them right to the Hermitage.
As they set out, Peggy chattered in Russian about the condition of the buoys and how the maps showing the currents required updating.
* * *
The man on the bench watched them go. Without moving his hands, which were folded on his belly, he spoke into the thin wire hidden in his shaggy beard.
"This is Ronash," he said. "Two sailors have just come ashore at the park and left their raft. Both are wearing backpacks and walking east."
Breathing deeply, Rossky's undercover operative turned his eyes back toward the beautiful Finnish girl and decided that on his next stakeout he would most definitely be an artist.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
Tuesday, 6:09 A.M., Washington, D.C.
It had been an uneventful night for Paul Hood.
He'd managed to locate Sharon and the kids at Bloopers the night before, and after hearing about the jelly bean burger and turkey ice cream soda, he'd stretched out on the couch in his office while Curt Hardaway ran the evening shift. A former CEO of SeanCorp, which provided navigation software to the military, Hardaway was an effective manager, a dynamic leader, and was familiar with the ins and outs of government. He had retired at sixty-five a millionaire, joking that he would have been a billionaire if he'd sold to private industry rather than the government. He once told Hood, "I never skimp on quality, however little the government is paying. I don't want some kid sitting
in the cockpit of a Tomcat thinking, 'All of this stuff was provided by the lowest bidder!' "
Unofficially, both Paul Hood and Mike Rodgers were off duty after 6:00 P.M. Officially, however, neither man was relieved until he left the premises. And while they were here, neither night Director Bill Abram nor Curt Hardaway ever attempted to "take the bones away from those two dogs," as Hardaway put it.
As he lay there through the night, his shoes off, feet on the padded armrest, he thought about his family— the people he didn't want to let down most, yet seemed to disappoint every which way he turned. Maybe that was inevitable. You let down the people closest to you because you know they'll be there when you get back. But boy, did it rip the conscience to ribbons. Ironically, the people he really seemed to have pleased yesterday were the people with whom he had the least in common, Liz Gordon and Charlie Squires. One because he'd acknowledged something she'd done by using it in a planning session, the other because he was letting him go ahead with a once-in-a-lifetime mission.
Between short snatches of sleep, Hood also stared at the countdown clock as it crept toward the extraction time they'd set for the tundra Striker mission.
Twenty-five hours, fifty minutes, and counting, he thought, looking at it now. It had been thirty-seven-odd hours when Hardaway had first set it. How would we all feel when it cashed out at all zeroes? Hood wondered. Where would the world be then?
It was at once depressing and strangely exhilarating. In any case, looking at the clock was better than watching CNN. The airwaves were full of the New York bombing and a possible relationship to the attack on the newspaper in Poland. Then there was Eival Ekdol ranting about his ties to the Ukrainian Opposition Force, soldiers who objected to the Russian incursion. That was smart, Hood had to admit. The miserable thug was swinging American opinion toward the Russian-Ukrainian union by speaking stridently against it.
Hood was awakened with word from the midget submarine, relayed via Helsinki, that Private George and Peggy James had been put ashore in St. Petersburg. Five minutes later, he was informed by Mike Rodgers— who hadn't slept much— that the 76T had crossed into Russian airspace and was speeding toward the drop point. It was expected to arrive in twenty minutes. Rodgers told him that the chaff the 76T dropped when it neared the coast disoriented the watching post at Nakhodka long enough for the plane to slip into the air lanes with the other transports. So far, no one had paid the plane any attention.
"Air Defense didn't react to the jamming?" Hood asked incredulously.
"We only did it to conceal where they were coming from," Rodgers said. "Once the 76T was in Russia, nothing appeared out of the ordinary. Our crew is maintaining radio silence, and on the way out they'll inform Nakhodka that they're going to Hokkaido to pick up replacement parts for decoy transmitters."
"I still can't believe we slipped through so easily," Hood said.
"For the last couple of years," Rodgers said, "the Russians have been more huff than puff. The soldiers manning the radar have been working longer shifts than we have. If nothing stands out as strange, it's unlikely they're going to catch it."
"Are you so sure it's that," he asked, "or could this be one of those traps that let a mouse in and don't let it out again?"
"We considered that possibility when we were planning the operation," Rodgers said. "There would have been no reason for the Russians to risk letting a strike force get on the ground. The truth is, Paul, the Russia you were worried about is no longer the Russia of reality."
Hood said, "They're still Russia enough to have us snacking on fingernails."
"Touché," said Rodgers.
Hood rose, phoned Bugs Benet, told him to send the department heads to the Tank, then went into his private washroom to scrub the sleep from his eyes. As he dried off, he couldn't stop thinking about Russia. Was Mike right about Russia or were they all just delusional, caught up in a false euphoria about the fall of Russian Communism and the Soviet Union?
Had it really fallen at all? Was this just a dream, smoke and mirrors, an interstitial period like the lulls between the great Ice Ages? Had the dark forces merely withdrawn from the spotlight to regroup and return, stronger than before?
Russians were not used to initiative and freedom. They had been ruled by dictators since the days of Ivan the Terrible.
Since Ivan Grozny, he thought with alarm.
As he headed for the Tank, Hood did not believe that however the next day's events turned out, the Evil Empire was dead at all.
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
Tuesday, 2:29 P.M., St. Petersburg
During his first space mission, General Orlov had not been able to speak with Masha, and when he returned he found her emotionally taut. She pointed out to him that that was the first time since they'd known each other that a day, let alone three, had gone by without them talking to one another.
He'd thought, at the time, that it was a silly woman's emotion he couldn't understand. But then when Nikita was born and she bled profusely and was unable to speak, he realized what a solace just hearing the voice of your loved one could be. If she could only have told him, "I love you," those long days of sitting by her bedside would have been easier.
He never again let a day pass without speaking to her, and was surprised to find how even the briefest talk anchored him as much it did her. Although Masha was not supposed to know what he did at the Hermitage, he had told her— though he did not tell her specifics or go into detail about personnel, other than Rossky: he had to have someone to complain to about him.
After calling Masha at 10:30 in the morning, and telling the disappointed woman that "business is so good" he wasn't sure when he'd be back, Orlov had gone to the command center. He'd wanted to be with his team to mark the passage of the first day's operational halfway point.
Rossky had come in at a few minutes past eleven, and both he and Orlov assumed what had quickly become their unofficial posts in the command center. Orlov walked slowly behind the bank of computer operators, each of whom was monitoring a section of the intelligence firmament. Rossky stood behind Corporal Ivashin monitoring the pipeline to Dogin and the other Ministers in the Kremlin. Rossky was even more intense and focused than usual he followed military and political developments. Orlov didn't think the impending arrival of the two operatives from Finland would put him on such high personal alert like this, though he decided not to ask him about it. Questions to Colonel Rossky did not seem to elicit useful answers.
At 1:30 the Operations Center intercepted a report from the Air Defense station at Nakhodka to the intelligence office of the Marshal of the Air Force that their radar had gone haywire for nearly four minutes but that everything seemed to be all right now. While Air Defense checked the electronic beacons of all the aircraft in the region against their radar blips to make sure there were no intruders, Orlov knew that it was the 76T from Berlin that had caused the disruption. It was now in Russian airspace and headed west— less than an hour from intercepting the train, if that was its intention.
He had immediately phoned Titev's afternoon counterpart in the radio room, Gregori Stenin, to contact the Marshal's office so he could speak with him. He was told the Marshal was in a conference.
"This is urgent," Orlov said.
Rossky asked Ivashin for his headphones. "Let me talk to them," he said.
While Orlov continued to listen on the telephone, Rossky was put through to Marshal Petrov. Orlov saw the glint of satisfaction in the Colonel's eyes.
"Sir," Rossky said, "I have a call for you from General Sergei Orlov at the Operations Center in St. Petersburg."
"Thank you, Colonel," Petrov said.
It was a moment before Orlov could speak. For the head of an intelligence operation, he was suddenly feeling very ignorant and very vulnerable.
Orlov told the Marshal about the 76T, and Petrov said that he had already scrambled a pair of MiGs to escort it to a landing or shoot it down. Orlov hung up and, his eyes still locked on Rossky's, he strode ove
r.
"Thank you," the General said.
Rossky drew his shoulders back. "You're welcome, sir."
"I know the Marshal socially, Colonel."
"You are fortunate, sir."
"Do you know him?" Orlov asked.
"No, sir," Rossky said.
"Then explain." Though Orlov's voice was soft, he was commanding, not asking.
"I don't understand, sir."
Orlov knew now, for certain, that the conversation with Petrov and now with him was a game. But he wasn't about to get into a public power struggle in the command center, one he might well lose.
"I see," Orlov said. "Go about your duties, Colonel."
"Yes, sir," Rossky said.
Orlov returned to his post, beginning to suspect that even his appointment here had been part of a larger game. As he saw Delev, Spansky, and others snatch quick glances at him, the only question he had was who was loyal to him here, who might have been in on it from the beginning, and who like Petrov— may have been brought in over the last few hours. The scope of the deception surprised him, but it didn't hurt as much as the thought that friends would desert him to preserve or advance their careers.
Orlov returned to his position behind the computer bank, though it was not the same position as when he had left it. The power base had shifted palpably to Rossky. Orlov knew he had to regain it. He'd never walked away from anything in his life. and he didn't intend to leave here defeated. But he knew he would have to undermine the Colonel quickly, and without being underhanded. He couldn't compete with Rossky on that level.
Orlov realized there was only one tack he could take just as Ivashin informed the Colonel that the local militia intelligence officer, Ronash, had called the St. Petersburg station house.