Program for a Puppet

by Roland Perry

  Graham drove straight back to the center of Moscow, but not directly to the National. Instead, he parked in Gorky Street about four hundred yards from the hotel. Finding a telephone booth, he rang Irena.

  After about fifteen rings, she answered.

  “Yes?” she said drowsily.

  “Someone tried to kill me when I left your apartment.”

  “Kill you?”

  “Yes. Two bastards in a truck. They tried to run me off the road.”

  “You are not hurt?”

  “I’m still shaking, that’s about all, but it was a near thing.”

  “I do not understand,” Irena said incredulously.

  “Neither do I. All I want to do is get out of this damn country in one piece. Could you find out what’s going on? If there is a plan to get me?”

  “I’m sure there can’t be.”

  “Should I go back to the hotel? Or hide? Perhaps I should head for the airport now and wait for the tour?”

  “Let me make a call. Call me back in five minutes.”

  The telephone clicked dead at the other end while Graham was putting the receiver down. He lit a cigarette. The snow was drifting down lightly and had covered the whole street. About forty yards away, a fire flickered from a camp where workmen were repairing the road.

  After seven minutes, he phoned her again.

  “It’s safe to go back to the hotel.” Irena had checked by telephone with her contact at KGB HQ who had managed to get her assigned to Graham.

  “You’re sure?”

  “Yes. The official surveillance on you is tight. But that’s all, unless you’re wanted for something I don’t know about.”

  “Okay,” Graham said, sighing deeply. “Thank you, Irena. ‘Bye.”

  He left the telephone and hurried down the street, but instead of going directly to the front of the hotel, he waited on the corner and watched the entrance for about ten minutes. No one came near it. There wasn’t an occupied car within sight. He walked cautiously to the entrance and had to knock on the glass doors to arouse a guard, not at all pleased at being awakened at such an ungodly hour.

  Graham took the elevator to his floor and moved quickly to his room. He unlocked the door cautiously, switched on the light and then locked the door securely behind him. It was 5:10 A.M. The tour group going early to the airport would be having breakfast at 5:30. He turned off the light, sat in a chair and waited.

  After breakfast, Graham collected his luggage from Bob Halliday and joined the bus that was to take them to the airport.

  They arrived at the airport at 6:15 and went through currency and customs checks. Graham looked around for Victor and found him preoccupied with some of the tourists, who had discovered the airport officials would not change their surplus rubles back into their own currencies.

  When Victor saw the Australian he broke away and went over to him.

  “You’ve managed to come early, Doctor,” Victor said with a trace of cynicism. “I’m afraid you will have to be patient and wait to see if there is a seat on the seven A.M. flight.”

  Graham’s hopes sank. Uppermost in his mind now was the strong possibility that someone had learned of his cover or his impersonation of Radford. There seemed no other explanation for the attempt on his life. If he had to wait another six hours for a flight it might be too late.

  “Just see what you can do, Victor,” the Australian said, forcing a smile.

  At 6:40 the departure call for the 7:00 A.M. flight to London—810—caused the tour group to make their way to the plane.

  Graham was about to speak to Victor again, when he approached him. “You are in luck, Doctor,” the tour guide said with a sly smile. “Here is your boarding pass and seat number.”

  Graham refused to allow himself to relax as he sauntered out to the airplane at the rear of the tour group. He braced himself when he saw there were four armed militiamen at the foot of the gangway. Two were collecting visa cards. The others eyed the passengers.

  The Australian was last to reach the gangway. A guard collected his visa, looked at him for a second and then pointed to the door of the plane. Graham didn’t need a second invitation as he moved briskly up the steps and into the cabin.

  Even during takeoff he didn’t allow himself the luxury of a thankful cheer along with the other passengers. Until he was out of the aircraft and on English soil he would still be officially inside Soviet territory.

  Bromovitch arrived at KGB HQ before 9:00 A.M. on Saturday and waited patiently for the call that never came. He tried several times to contact Menkelov and Igor and learned that two men answering their description had been burned to death in a road accident. He moved quickly to have Graham hauled in.

  Twenty militia and KGB personnel were ordered to the National Hotel. Bromovitch found a tour guide who informed him that Dr. Boulter had gone to the airport with a tour leaving earlier in the hope of catching the 7:00 A.M. flight to England.

  The assassin was furious. He grabbed a telephone in the hotel lobby and got through to Victor, who was at the airport preparing for Graham’s original tour group’s departure at 2:00 P.M.

  The distressed tour guide confirmed that Dr. Boulter had been cleared by the Intourist central computer and allowed to go on an earlier flight.

  “Put me through to the traffic controller,” Bromovitch ordered angrily as he looked at his watch. It was 10:10 A.M. Seconds later a voice came on the line: “Sheremetyevo traffic control here.”

  “Comrade, this is the deputy chief of Department Four, state security. I want you to order Flight 810 to return to Moscow immediately. There is a foreign criminal on board.”

  Bromovitch heard the crackle of a radio transmission as the controller contacted the 810 Flight captain. Seconds later the assassin was told, “Comrade, 810’s passengers have just disembarked.…”

  Once down the steps of the gangway from the Aeroflot jet Graham hurried across the tarmac ahead of members of the tour group.

  Near the entrance to the hallway which would take him through to Immigration, he stole a glance over his shoulder at the airplane and noticed two, three, then four men in overcoats close behind him, none recognizable as members of the tour.

  “Keep moving!” one of them ordered as the Australian slipped through the doors and headed toward Immigration. Within yards of the desks one of the men moved next to him.

  “Follow me, Mr. Graham, please,” he said with a quick glance.

  The Australian looked back. The other three had fallen behind at different intervals along the hallway. Each was facing the jet, hands in pockets.

  Graham was led past Immigration and through to the luggage area. He waited patiently for his suitcase while the man who had spoken to him stood nearby. When the suitcase arrived Graham grabbed it from the conveyor belt and turning to the man said, “I take it you’re with Commander Gould.”

  The man nodded, smiled again and led Graham to an office where the commander was waiting. He was beaming and Graham reflected it was the first time he had seen the Intelligence man smile.

  “Have a great holiday?” he said, shaking the Australian’s hand.

  “Terrific.” Graham grimaced. “Can’t wait to get back.”

  “Anything to declare?”

  “Yes. One shattered human being.”

  The Australian felt in his coat pocket and handed Gould the icon containing the microfilm.

  “When you feel ready for the debriefing, call me.” He handed Graham a card. “That’s a hotel in Hampstead. All your belongings at Strand-on-the-Green have been transferred there. Hope you don’t mind.”

  Graham shook his head. “No,” he said wearily. “I suppose you’ll have someone watching the new place?”

  Gould nodded.

  “I’m going away tomorrow for about five days. I must have a break. A friend of mine has a flat at Brighton.…”

  “I would appreciate knowing where we could contact you…

  Graham nodded and picked up his case. “I’
ll let you know.” He left the office.

  Rounding the customs barrier, he was suddenly conscious of the hundreds of people waiting to greet arrivals. He thought of Françoise.

  “Ed, darling,” he heard an excited voice say, and then felt those familiar long arms around his neck as she embraced him.

  PART 3

  THE

  PUPPET

  CONNECTION

  “What the mind can perceive,

  the mind controlling the computer can achieve.”

  7

  President Rickard was furious about the leak of a top-secret decision to supply the Chinese with ten billion dollars’ worth of arms for its potentially dangerous confrontation with the Soviet Union. Less than a week after he and his National Security Council made the decision, the story was plastered over the front pages of America’s daily papers.

  After the earlier leak of the confrontation note to the Soviet administration, Rickard had called in the FBI to investigate the holes in information security in Washington. Then his orders had been, “I don’t care how the hell you do it, but find out the leak.”

  FBI Director James Dent had dutifully carried out his President’s rather frustrated orders, deducing that the leak must have come from either the President’s staff or the Secretary of State’s offices. In the early afternoon of October 2, Rickard received a telephone call from him.

  “We have a breakthrough, Mr. President.”

  “You’ve traced the source?”

  “Yes. We were right. It was the Secretary of State’s department.”

  “Who?”

  “Assistant Under Secretary Gregor Haussermann, sir.”

  “Haussermann,” the President breathed. “Are you absolutely positive?”

  “No doubt about it. We have conclusive taped information.”

  “Tape? How?”

  “We tapped his phone, and recorded conversations.”

  “Where?”

  “At his office and his home.”

  “You have other evidence? You know we couldn’t use bugging.”

  “Yes. We know how he gets classified data in and out, who he passes it to and where he does it. The tapes verify everything.”

  “Okay. Get all the evidence including the tapes to me. I want to be positive myself before I make another move. You know how delicate this one is.”

  By late Thursday afternoon Washington time, Rickard had played the tapes of Haussermann’s conversations in the presence of the Secretary of State and FBI Director Dent. Rickard decided to fire Haussermann as soon as possible. The second assistant Under Secretary of State was summoned to the Oval Office. At 6:30 P.M. he eased his slight frame into a chair facing Rickard, who was talking on the telephone. Haussermann shifted uncomfortably as the President made obvious reference to him.

  “He’s right here now sitting in front of me … we’ll find out from him … we’ll see what he says…”

  After three nerve-racking minutes, President Rickard put the receiver down and then scribbled on a notepad, not looking up at Haussermann for nearly another minute. Taking off his glasses, he rubbed his eyes and said, “Now, Mr. Haussermann, you know why you are here?”

  Haussermann looked perplexed and blinked nervously. “N-no I don’t, Mr. P-President.”

  Rickard’s gaze pierced into the other man’s skull. “Well I’ll get straight to the point. I know without a shadow of doubt you have been leaking important confidential administration minutes.”

  Haussermann reacted visibly. The irises dilated. His nostrils and lips quivered. His mouth opened and closed twice before he managed to blurt out, “You’re … you’re … you’re wro-wro-wrong!”

  The President snapped, “No, I’m not!” He then read off in detail the classified information Haussermann had relayed, the times when he had done it and the people to whom he had passed it.

  Haussermann was shocked. The confrontation had not helped his speech impediment. “You-you can’t pro-pro-prove any-any-any of it.”

  “I have!” Rickard thundered. “I want your resignation by tomorrow and I’m going to ask you to submit to questioning by the FBI and CIA, just in case you’ve passed on any more secrets we should know about.”

  “Oh, no … oh, no … you can’t do that!” Haussermann breathed, his words coming very fast. “You must have bugged me. You should be impeached for that!”

  “Look. I don’t want any arguments, Haussermann,” Rickard shouted angrily. “You’re finished!”

  “Ju-just like Ro-Ro-Ronald MacGregor.”

  “What did you say?” Rickard glared. “Just like MacGregor. What do you mean by that?”

  “We-well, he’s dead, isn’t he? And so am I, if you-you persecute me like this.”

  “Is there anything else you want to tell me? Anything else you want to say?”

  “All right … all right … I’ll resign right here! Right now!” Haussermann pulled a pen and a piece of paper from the front pocket of his suit coat, leaned forward on the President’s desk and began to scribble.

  “Get hold of yourself, man. I said by tomorrow. Now if you have nothing more to say …”

  Haussermann’s pen rested in a shaky right hand. “I see,” he said, nodding quickly. “You-you are going to interrogate me with your Gestapo tactics! Well, I will not go as easily as MacGregor! Why don’t you-you admit you-you had MacGregor assassinated?”

  “I had MacGregor assassinated? Are you insane?”

  Perhaps, the President thought, with a sudden flash of compassion, the rush of guilt may have unbalanced the poor devil.

  Haussermann carried on regardless. “He would have beaten you. So you had an assassin strike him down!”

  Rickard had had enough. “I’d like you to leave now, Mr. Haussermann,” he said firmly, as he placed his spectacles back on.

  “I ha-have evidence on MacGregor’s death.”

  “If you do have evidence, you had better give it to me, or the director of the FBI.”

  Haussermann laughed cynically. “Oh, yes … so you-you could be smar-smart and destroy incriminating evidence. You-you must be joking!”

  “I’m not joking, Mr. Haussermann. You are talking about a very serious situation. I have personally ordered the direction of the investigation into MacGregor’s death. It’s my responsibility to hand over any relevant information!”

  Haussermann got up, his pen and paper still in his hand. He seemed in two minds whether to start writing again or obey the President’s wishes. “I have evidence you killed MacGregor,” he hissed.

  “Fine,” Rickard said calmly but firmly, thinking it best to humor the man. “If you have evidence that I killed MacGregor, then hand it in.” He leaned across his desk and flicked an intercom switch. “Rachel. Send in a security guard.”

  “Is everything all right?” his secretary’s voice squeaked.

  “Absolutely. Just send one in.”

  Seconds later, a burly guard knocked and entered.

  “Show him out, will you?”

  Haussermann backed away from Rickard. As he reached the door he yelled, “You’re a murderer!”

  The guard took him under the arm and began to escort him forcibly.

  “Okay,” the President said, with a sigh and shake of the head, “I’m a murderer.”

  As the guard departed with Haussermann, Rickard’s secretary poked her head in at the door. “What on earth was that all about?”

  “Don’t worry, Rachel,” Rickard said, as he sat down at his desk again. “It was one of those moments when all of a man’s sins return to haunt him. He was guilty as hell, I guess. He went off his rocker for a minute there.”

  “You’ve had a difficult day, Mr. President. Would you like coffee or something?”

  “Yes. Good idea, Rachel … just another tribulation in the trial of this great office,” he said sardonically.

  Inside he had to agree with her. First there was the leak, then the wire taps and now the dismissal of a senior official. Yes, he thought, taki
ng a deep breath, it has been an extraordinarily tough day. But he was certain things were going to get tougher before the election.

  He proved himself right the next day, when he went to New York.

  The firing of Haussermann made the headlines in the morning papers, but that didn’t bother him. What put his blood pressure well over his doctor’s recommended level, was a feature in a weekly women’s magazine, which had been picked up by the daily press and television. A young blonde in California calling herself Valeri Hudson claimed in an interview with the magazine that she was pregnant by Rickard. The woman, who was a former National Security Council employee, said she had visited the White House more than forty times to make love to him, and that they had formed a “very close” relationship over an eighteen-month period. She promised to make her true identity known in about six weeks’ time, when “their” child was expected.

  Rickard was furious. His first thoughts were for his wife, Lillian, and he rang her at noon from his party’s New York campaign headquarters. But she was at a Washington charity fashion show and could not be contacted immediately. He ordered his press secretary to put out a statement saying that both the woman and the magazine would be sued for substantial damages. He categorically denied the suggestions in the feature story and added that it was “most definitely part of a major smear campaign” as election day drew nearer. Despite this, he could do nothing to stop the media turning the story into a full-scale “possible” scandal. And with “Valeri” in hiding somewhere in Europe, it soon became the gossip point for matrons’ hairdressing salons and men’s bars right across the nation. Photographs in the press accompanying the story showed that the woman was extremely attractive, and this made her story even more juicy and credible.

  Rickard finally got through to the First Lady.

  “Just answer me one question, darling,” Lillian Rickard, an intelligent and demure forty-five-year-old, said. “Have you ever made love to this woman?”