by Roland Perry
And the eyes, on the occasion that they stayed long enough on his, gave more than a hint of suspicion and coldness rather than inquisitiveness and candor.
It was only later in bed that Graham felt he could cope better with the situation. There in the semidarkness he could feign his desire for Svetlana in the mechanical physicalness of mindless sex.
Just after six on Monday morning, Svetlana woke to find the Australian almost fully dressed. Looking at the luminous dial of the alarm clock on the dresser next to her bed she asked, “Why do you leave so early?”
Graham turned to her.
“I want to have breakfast with the tour.”
“I can make …”
“Look. Some of my friends were worried about me last time. I’m joining them at the hotel and that’s that.”
She turned on the bedside lamp, rubbed her eyes, and stared at him as he swung his jacket on.
“When shall I see you?”
“I don’t know, tonight maybe.”
He leaned over to kiss her but she turned her head away. Graham gave a cynical grunt and walked out of the apartment. He took an elevator to the ground floor and hurried out of the building into the almost deserted street. One taxi was at the rank a hundred yards from Svetlana’s place. Graham asked the driver to take him to the south bank of Vasilivsky Island. Once there, he waited for several minutes, looking out over the Neva Canal and the stone landscape silhouetted against the breaking dawn. Clearly in his head was a tortuous route of back streets he worked out from a map of Leningrad and a taxi tour he had taken after his telephone contact the previous morning. Looking around carefully for anyone who might be in pursuit, Graham began a brisk walk of two miles which took him behind Kazan Cathedral between Plehanova and Sadovaja streets, and a few minutes later to cobblestoned Mechinov Street. It was approaching 7:00 A.M. and workers were coming into the streets.
He turned down the third archway on the right into a small courtyard. He stopped and looked around. One kerosene lamp flickered. There was no one in sight. Graham found the entrance to back stairs and took the stone steps to the third floor. There was no light. He knocked gently on the thick oak door to number eleven. Two minutes later he knocked again and the door opened quickly. A figure ushered him in and the door was bolted behind him. The man stared at Graham for several seconds before moving over to a window facing Mechinov Street below.
Graham moved close to him. In the half-light of the dawn, he could see it was Dmitri Boronovsky. In his early forties, he looked fitter and taller than in press photos. His forehead was large, the size accentuated because of baldness. The nose was prominent and slightly twisted. The strong chin was marked with an ugly scar.
The scientist looked down to the street as he spoke in a deep, firm voice. “Sit down if you wish.” He pointed to a tatty fold-out double-bed couch, the only piece of furniture in the musty-smelling room. The Australian remained standing. The atmosphere had put him on edge.
“I know little about why you are here,” Boronovsky said, “but the contact is absolutely reliable. I will help you if I can. I risk everything to speak to you like this. We must be brief.” He glanced at Graham. “Were you followed?”
“I don’t think so. I caught a taxi to the south bank and walked the rest of the way.”
“The taxi may have been a trap.”
“I was careful the driver didn’t follow me.” Graham lit a cigarette. “I’m mainly interested in what you can tell me about the administration’s computer plans.”
He offered Boronovsky a cigarette. The scientist moved a few paces from the window to accept it. Then he stepped back.
“How much do you know?”
“Only that some kind of sophisticated computer bank is being built.”
“It’s a master network based in Moscow, Leningrad and Kiev.”
“For what?”
“The complete control of the Soviet military and society.”
Graham’s eyes narrowed on the scientist.
“Who controls it?”
“The KGB, although it did not initiate the network. The Twenty-fourth Communist Party Congress in 1971 set out a plan to improve the state’s economic and social management. Top Soviet scientists suggested it was a job for advanced computers. They advocated a master network for the whole state economy.”
Boronovsky suddenly leaned forward.
“Are you sure you were not followed?” he asked sharply without looking at the Australian.
“Why?”
“See that car. It has just turned around….”
Graham stubbed out his cigarette on the bare stone floor and moved to the window. The car had stopped almost opposite them.
“What do you want to do?” he asked nervously.
“If someone comes we must go quickly. There is a way out.”
Both men kept their eyes on the car.
“Let me continue,” Boronovsky said, dragging on his cigarette but being careful not to hold it up in front of the window.
“The master network the administration planned needed thousands of computers. We found we could not produce our own for many reasons….”
“I think I know most of them. How did the KGB get involved?”
“Andropolov told the government chiefs and scientists he could get them by smuggling them from the West. He completely changed the purpose of the network and built his own power base in the process. The master network is his stepping-stone to total power within the Soviet Union.”
Graham had not taken his eyes off the stationary car below. “What are the master network’s priorities?” he asked, almost in a whisper.
“There are three. Build-up of the military part of the network has the highest priority. The biggest computers coming in are immediately converted to military machines controlling weapons systems.”
“And the second?”
“The KGB wants watertight control over society. The network will allow mass repression. Andropolov and his technocrats are using it to crush anyone fighting for greater freedom or rights….”
The car had crawled to the top of Mechinov Street and turned around.
“The third?”
“The third priority is a combination of the first and second: increased control over satellite and puppet nations. Wherever there is Soviet influence it will be greatly strengthened by military intimidation and computerized political control.…”
Graham had the overall picture. Time could be up any second. He had to have specifics….
“Can you give examples of how the files are used for political control? Against dissidents, for instance?”
Boronovsky sighed. “They are innumerable. Perhaps the most vivid development is where a simple device is secretly added to a television set. It allows anyone, anywhere, to be spied on when their set is going. People can be observed and listened to.… I have forgotten the English technical term for this computer-controlled …”
“Interactive television. Is this operating?”
“Yes. We believe at least in all the homes of dissidents….”
“You have some proof?”
“Yes. Our informants give us details about the KGB planting the device … and of course there is other proof. When people are arrested there is no doubt evidence gathered could only have come from this special form of electronic spying.” Boronovsky’s voice trembled more from rage than fear, Graham guessed. “It is the most disgusting form of surveillance.…”
“I want more examples like that,” the Australian said urgently as they watched the car crawl down near their building once more.
“From personal experience we know the KGB has built computer identification checks. Soon anyone traveling any distance in the Soviet Union, or outside it, will have to carry a small computer card. The card of anyone seen as a threat to the state, such as myself, will activate computer scanner alarms for closer inspection….”
He broke off for a few seconds as the car headlights went out. “Another form of sur
veillance by the network can analyze behavior patterns … an important MI-6 agent was recently uncovered by it …”
Boronovsky broke off suddenly. Four figures had quickly gotten out of the car.
“They have come!” The scientist grabbed Graham by the arm and pushed him toward a window at the back of the room.
“One more question,” Graham whispered as Boronovsky struggled with a window latch leading to a balcony. “What computers are going into the network?”
“They’re all Cheetah …” the scientist said urgently as he forced the latch. “When they come through the courtyard, go down there!” He pointed to a ladder of circular iron railings that ran down the wall about ten yards to the courtyard ground. Seconds later three men ran through the archway and headed for the back stairs. Graham edged into the balcony and descended the railings, Boronovsky following. Suddenly Graham stopped. He pointed down to one of the men who stood in the archway below. Boronovsky didn’t see Graham’s movement and accidentally kicked the fingers of his right hand which gripped the railing. Graham grabbed at the railing but lost his hold and fell. He landed awkwardly on top of the man, and they both sprawled on the ground.
The man seemed winded, but still managed to stun Graham with a kick in the back of the head and the stomach. They exchanged blows as they grappled. Boronovsky reached the ground and went to Graham’s aid. They brought the man down with several blows, and then moved off fast, Boronovsky leading the way down several side streets. They brushed their way past workers for about four hundred yards until they reached an underground station.
Pale and out of breath, Boronovsky fumbled in his pocket. “I must leave you know,” he gasped. “Quick, take these!” He shoved two train tokens into Graham’s trembling hands. “I’ll show you where to catch the train.” The scientist hurriedly moved down more steps with Graham close behind. They stood at the top of the escalator. Boronovsky pointed to another about twenty yards away.
“You take a train down there for as long as you wish,” he said, “then a taxi back to your hotel. You should be safe that way.”
Both men looked urgently up to the entrance. Boronovsky mounted the escalator and Graham ran along the passage toward the other. He took one last look at the scientist as he shrank into the bowels of the very deep Leningrad subway. Echoing in Graham’s mind, as if it were reverberating off the walls of the tunnels, was the vital answer to his last question—”Cheetah.”
KGB agent 3342 Svetlana Moronova had put in an extra long report on Australian tourist Dr. Ross Boulter, which she hoped would gain the attention of her superiors.
She had been genuinely curious about her assignment. Yet, being truly honest with herself, her motivations were more for survival purposes than because of real suspicion.
Svetlana had been a state-agent prostitute for twelve years and she was becoming increasingly worried that her age could soon put her on the KGB scrapheap. Younger women were being persuaded to join the secret police all the time to do their sexual bit for the glory of the Great Leninist-Marxist State, and she had heard rumors that experienced women like herself had been imprisoned or even liquidated for knowing too much.
Svetlana had learned more than most. She had made her reputation on three major assignments, involving the compromising of a French ambassador, an American businessman in the rocket industry, and an Arab diplomat with foreign policy secrets.
But they had all been more than five years ago. Now she was being put on lesser assignments such as this touring anthropologist, a routine surveillance similar to thousands run each year on foreigners. Svetlana feared it was the slippery slope to nowhere. She was becoming desperate. She had tried hard to fill out reports on her last few assignments, but they had been boring nonevents. Dr. Ross Boulter offered more scope.
On Monday morning she received a telephone call at her apartment which appeared to offer new hope. It was her immediate superior who asked her to report to the KGB’s Leningrad HQ an hour later.
Graham went straight back to his hotel after his underground escape. The back of his head throbbed and the pit of his stomach ached from the kicks. He was slightly concussed and fell into a deep sleep in his hotel room.
He awoke six hours later to the brain-vacillating ring of the telephone. Graham fumbled for the receiver.
“Hallo.”
No one answered. Seconds later the telephone went dead.
Graham sat up on the bed and lit a cigarette. The mistiness in his head cleared enough for events to arrange themselves in time and space.
Meeting Boronovsky. The fight. The escape. He rolled over and the legacy from several blows shot to his brain.
The telephone rang again.
“Yes?”
“Hallo?”
“Svetlana. Did you call me a minute ago?”
“No,” she said, a note of confusion in her tone. “Why aren’t you with your tour group?”
“I’ll explain later …” Graham struggled hard to sound alert. Tiredness strained his voice.
“Are you going to see me today?” Svetlana asked.
“No … let’s have dinner tomorrow night.” The Australian had to stall her to allow himself to recover completely. But he didn’t want to leave the hotel. “Why don’t you meet me in the lobby here at, say, eight-thirty?”
“If you wish,” Svetlana said angrily and hung up. Again there was a ghostly click about fifteen seconds later.
Graham lay back on the bed and continued smoking. He wondered how much Svetlana knew. Had someone found out about the morning’s incident? Suddenly he felt ill. He rolled off the bed and sat on the only chair in the room. His breath came quickly as people and events spun around in his head, thumping, colliding, deflecting.
Realizing he must be in a state of shock, the Australian went to the bathroom. Seconds later he was dry-retching over the toilet bowl, but without success. He shakily poured himself a glass of mineral water and walked unsteadily back into the other room. Sitting in the chair again, he drank the water. This seemed to cool him momentarily, but still not enough…. Would his cover be blown? Had he got Boronovsky into trouble? Could he end up in a mental hospital like MI-6’s dead agent Steven?
Graham looked around the room at the light brackets, a stark, lonely flower painting, the telephone, the television set. He felt as if he were in a cell.
He thought of Boronovsky’s information on surveillance by television, and the obvious telephone bugging. He wondered where the other bugs for sound were in the room. In the light brackets? Behind the picture?
Leaning his head back, Graham inwardly cursed himself for getting caught up in such a crazy nightmare. He felt there and then that he had cracked and could not go on with the investigation. Trying desperately to calm himself, he began to breathe deeply and slowly, concentrating on a void.
Minutes later the shock and panic subsided to a more rational, controllable fear. He wanted simply to get out of the Soviet Union as soon as possible. He picked up the telephone on the bedside table and asked reception to put him through to his tour guide, Victor.
“Yes, Dr. Boulter?”
“Victor, I want to catch the next possible flight out of the Soviet Union.”
“That is not possible, Doctor,” the tour guide said, sounding surprised. “Is there anything wrong? Are you ill?”
The last thing Graham wanted was to be examined by a doctor. “No, I’m okay; I’m just sick of the place, that’s all.”
There was an embarrassed silence before Victor said, “I can only offer you an earlier flight out on the day you are scheduled to leave. But it is highly irregular and I cannot assure you of it. You will have to arrive at the airport about six A.M. and hope to leave on the seven A.M. flight to Gatwick, England.”
“Thanks a billion,” Graham said sarcastically, hiding his desperation. “Let me know if you can do better, please.”
“We shall only know next Saturday morning. Officially your flight is still for two P.M.”
Gra
ham put the receiver down hard. The almost meaningless concession meant he still had nearly five days left in Russia. At that moment the Australian felt certain his nerves would not last the distance.
Anatoli Bromovitch had had a mixed day. He had spent most of it deeply engrossed in his favorite hobby, tending cymbidium orchids in the hothouse in the back of his dacha outside Moscow. This he enjoyed immensely because it allowed him to breed competition flowers, for which he was fast becoming famous throughout the Soviet Union. It was a patient yet rewarding pastime, made less frustrating by a computer terminal in his dacha which allowed the assassin to do his calculations by hooking up with a big computer in Moscow normally used for KGB activities. Everyone at Dzerhinsky Square HQ had for years turned a blind eye to this little office perk which had never meant anything until the KGB recently began its installation of Cheetah machines. Now he was breeding prizewinners.
What had upset the tranquillity of his otherwise perfect day was the news that Edwin Graham had completely disappeared. Operatives in London instructed to locate the Australian and await orders for eliminating him, had found no trace of him for more than a week. Callers to Ryder Publications were being told that he was “indisposed” until further notice. Bromovitch’s first thought was that the Australian had secretly left London. But for where? Another part of the United Kingdom? Another country? The United States maybe? Or even Australia?
Almost idly, the assassin began to key in on his computer terminal other reports for the day that he had to check through for more than three hours.
About an hour into the reports an item appeared which held his attention for marginally longer than the others.
FROM: OPERATION 10 COMMITTEE SECRETARY
TO: ALL OPERATIVES ASSIGNED TO OP. 10
PERSONNEL ASSIGNED TO PROFESSOR BORONOVSKY INVOLVED IN VIOLENT INCIDENT, AT 0700 HRS, SEPTEMBER 29. 3147 RECEIVED FRACTURED CHEEKBONE IN INCIDENT FROM UNKNOWN ASSAILANT. ADDRESS AT INCIDENT, MECHINOV STREET, LENINGRAD. BORONOVSKY TO BE INTERROGATED.