Triple

by Ken Follett

  Nik, sensing that the younger man was thinking of disobedience, seized both his arms just below the shoulders and held him tightly.

  "Don't hurt him, I'll go," said the older man. He stepped out of the house.

  His friend said, "The hell you will!"

  Rostov thought: Damn.

  The younger man struggled in Nik's grip, then tried to stamp on Nik's foot. Nik stepped back a pace and hit the boy in the kidney with his right fist.

  "No, Pierre!" the older one said, too loud.

  Tyrin jumped him and put a big hand over the man's mouth. He struggled, got his head free, and shouted "Help!" before Tyrin gagged him again.

  Pierre had fallen to one knee and was groaning.

  Rostov leaned across the back seat of the car and called through the open window, "Let's go!"

  Tyrin lifted the older man off his feet and carried him bodily across the pavement toward the car. Pierre suddenly recovered from Nik's punch and sprinted away. Hassan stuck out a leg and tripped him. The boy went sprawling on to the cobbled road.

  Rostov saw a light go on in an upstairs window at a neighboring house. If the fracas continued much longer they would all get arrested.

  Tyrin bundled the delivery man into the back of the car. Rostov grabbed hold of him and said to Tyrin: "I've got him. Start the car. Quick."

  Nik had picked up the younger one and was carrying him to the car. Tyrin got into the driver's seat and Hassan opened the other door. Rostov said, "Hassan, shut the door of the house, idiot!"

  Nik pushed the young man into the car next to his friend, then got into the back seat so that the two captives were between Rostov and himself. Hassan closed the door of the house and jumped into the front passenger seat of the car. Tyrin gunned the car away from the curb.

  Rostov said in English, "Jesus Christ almighty, what a fuck-up."

  Pierre was still groaning. The older prisoner said, "We haven't done anything to hurt you."

  "Haven't you?" Rostov replied. "Three nights ago, at the club in the Rue Dicks, you delivered a briefcase to an Englishman."

  "Ed Rodgers?"

  "That's not his name," Rostov said.

  "Are you the police?"

  "Not exactly." Rostov would let the man believe what he wanted to. "I'm not interested in collecting evidence, building a case, and bringing you to a trial. I'm interested in what was in that briefcase."

  There was a silence. Tyrin spoke over his shoulder. "Want me to head out of town, look for a quiet spot?"

  "Wait," Rostov said.

  The older man said, "I'll tell you."

  "Just drive around town," Rostov told Tyrin. He looked at the Euratom man. "So tell me."

  "It was a Euratom computer printout."

  "And the information on it?"

  "Details of licensed shipments of fissionable materials."

  "Fissionable? You mean nuclear stuff?"

  "Yellowcake, uranium metal, nuclear waste, plutonium . . ."

  Rostov sat back in the seat and looked out of the window at the lights of the city going by. His blood raced with excitement: Dickstein's operation was becoming visible. Licensed shipments of fissionable materials . . . the Israelis wanted nuclear fuel. Dickstein would be looking for one of two things on that list--either a holder of uranium who might be prepared to sell some on the black market, or a consignment of uranium he might be able to steal.

  As for what they would do with the stuff once they got it . . .

  The Euratom man interrupted his thoughts. "Will you let us go home now?"

  Rostov said, "I'll have to have a copy of that printout."

  "I can't take another one, the disappearance of the first was suspicious enough!"

  "I'm afraid you'll have to," Rostov said. "But if you like, you can take it back to the office after we've photographed it."

  "Oh, God," the man groaned.

  "You've got no choice."

  "All right."

  "Head back to the house," Rostov told Tyrin. To the Euratom man he said, "Bring the printout home tomorrow night. Someone will come to your house during the evening to photograph it."

  The big car moved through the streets of the city. Rostov felt the snatch had not been such a disaster after all. Nik Bunin said to Pierre, "Stop looking at me."

  They reached the cobbled street. Tyrin stopped the car. "Okay," Rostov said. "Let the older man out. His friend stays with us."

  The Euratom man yelped as if hurt. "Why?"

  "In case you're tempted to break down and confess everything to your bosses tomorrow. Young Pierre will be our hostage. Get out."

  Nik opened the door and let the man out. He stood on the pavement for a moment. Nik got back in and Tyrin drove off.

  Hassan said, "Will he be all right? Will he do it?"

  "He'll work for us until he gets his friend back," Rostov said.

  "And then?"

  Rostov said nothing. He was thinking that it would probably be prudent to kill them both.

  This is Suza's nightmare.

  It is evening at the green-and-white house by the river. She is alone. She takes a bath, lying for a long time in the hot scented water. Afterward she goes into the master bedroom, sits in front of the three-sided mirror, and dusts herself with powder from an onyx box that belonged to her mother.

  She opens the wardrobe, expecting to find her mother's clothes moth-eaten, falling away from the hangers in dun-colored tatters, transparent with age; but it is not so: they are all clean and new and perfect, except for a faint odor of mothballs. She chooses a nightgown, white as a shroud, and puts it on. She gets into the bed.

  She lies still for a long time, waiting for Nat Dickstein to come to his Eila. The evening becomes night. The river whispers. The door opens. The man stands at the foot of the bed and takes off his clothes. He lies on top of her, and her panic begins like the first small spark of a conflagration as she realizes that it is not Nat Dickstein but her father; and that she is, of course, long dead: and as the nightgown crumbles to dust and her hair falls out and her flesh withers and the skin of her face dries and shrinks baring the teeth and the skull and she becomes, even as the man thrusts at her, a skeleton, so she screams and screams and screams and wakes up, and she lies perspiring and shivering and frightened, wondering why nobody comes rushing in to ask what is wrong, until she realizes with relief that even the screams were dreamed; and consoled, she wonders vaguely about the meaning of the dream while she drifts back into sleep.

  In the morning she is her usual cheerful self, except perhaps for a small imprecise darkness, like a smudge of cloud in the sky of her mood, not remembering the dream at all, only aware that there was once something that troubled her, not worrying anymore, though, because, after all, dreaming is instead of worrying.

  Chapter Seven

  "Nat Dickstein is going to steal some uranium," said Yasif Hassan.

  David Rostov nodded agreement. His mind was elsewhere. He was trying to figure out how to get rid of Yasif Hassan.

  They were walking through the valley at the foot of the crag which was the old city of Luxembourg. Here, on the banks of the Petrusse River, were lawns and ornamental trees and footpaths. Hassan was saying, "They've got a nuclear reactor at a place called Dimona in the Negev Desert. The French helped them build it, and presumably supplied them with fuel for it. Since the Six-Day War, de Gaulle has cut off their supplies of guns, so perhaps he's cut off the uranium as well."

  This much was obvious, Rostov thought, so it was best to allay Hassan's suspicions by agreeing vehemently. "It would be a completely characteristic Mossad move to just go out and steal the uranium they need," he said. "That's exactly how those people think. They have this backs-to-the-wall mentality which enables them to ignore the niceties of international diplomacy."

  Rostov was able to guess a little farther than Hassan--which was why he was at once so elated and so anxious to get the Arab out of the way for a while. Rostov knew about the Egyptian nuclear project at Qattara: Hass
an almost certainly did not--why should they tell such secrets to an agent in Luxembourg?

  However, because Cairo was so leaky it was likely the Israelis also knew about the Egyptian bomb. And what would they do about it? Build their own--for which they needed, in the Euratom man's phrase, "fissionable material." Rostov thought Dickstein was going to try to get some uranium for an Israeli atom bomb. But Hassan would not be able to reach that conclusion, not yet; and Rostov was not going to help him, for he did not want Tel Aviv to discover how close he was.

  When the printout arrived that night it would take him farther still. For it was the list from which Dickstein would probably choose his target. Rostov did not want Hassan to have that information, either.

  David Rostov's blood was up. He felt the way he did in a chess game at the moment when three or four of the opponent's moves began to form a pattern and he could see from where the attack would come and how he would have to turn it into a rout. He had not forgotten the reasons why he had entered into battle with Dickstein--that other conflict inside the KGB between himself and Feliks Vorontsov, with Yuri Andropov as umpire and a place at the Phys-Mat School as the prize--but that receded to the back of his mind. What moved him now, what kept him tense and alert and sharpened the edge of his ruthlessness, was the thrill of the chase and the scent of the quarry in his nostrils.

  Hassan stood in his way. Eager, amateur, touchy, bungling Hassan, reporting back to Cairo, was at this moment a more dangerous enemy than Dickstein himself. For all his faults, he was not stupid--indeed, Rostov thought, he had a sly intelligence that was typically Levantine, inherited no doubt from his capitalist father. He would know that Rostov wanted him out of the way. Therefore Rostov would have to give him a real job to do.

  They passed beneath the Pont Adolphe, and Rostov stopped to look back, admiring the view through the arch of the bridge. It reminded him of Oxford, and then, suddenly, he knew what to do about Hassan.

  Rostov said, "Dickstein knows someone has been following him, and presumably he's connected that fact with his meeting with you."

  "You think so?" Hassan said.

  "Well, look. He goes on an assignment, he bumps into an Arab who knows his real name and suddenly he's tailed."

  "He's sure to speculate, but he doesn't know."

  "You're right." Looking at Hassan's face, Rostov realized that the Arab just loved him to say You're right. Rostov thought: He doesn't like me, but he wants my approval--wants it badly. He's a proud man--I can use that. "Dickstein has to check," Rostov went on. "Now, are you on file in Tel Aviv?"

  Hassan shrugged, with a hint of his old aristocratic nonchalance. "Who knows?"

  "How often have you had face-to-face contacts with other agents--Americans, British, Israelis?"

  "Never," Hassan said. "I'm too careful."

  Rostov almost laughed out loud. The truth was that Hassan was too insignificant an agent to have come to the notice of the major intelligence services, and had never done anything important enough to have met other spies. "If you're not on file," Rostov said, "Dickstein has to talk to your friends. Have you any acquaintances in common?"

  "No. I haven't seen him since college. Anyway, he could learn nothing from my friends. They know nothing of my secret life. I don't go around telling people--"

  "No, no," Rostov said, suppressing his impatience. "But all Dickstein would have to do is ask casual questions about your general behavior to see whether it conforms to the pattern of clandestine work--for example, do you have mysterious phone calls, sudden absences, friends whom you don't introduce around . . . Now, is there anybody from Oxford whom you still see?"

  "None of the students." Hassan's tone had become defensive, and Rostov knew he was about to get what he wanted. "I've kept in touch with some of the faculty, on and off: Professor Ashford, in particular--once or twice he has put me in touch with people who are prepared to give money to our cause."

  "Dickstein knew Ashford, if I remember rightly."

  "Of course. Ashford had the chair of Semitic Languages, which was what both Dickstein and I read."

  "There. All Dickstein has to do is call on Ashford and mention your name in passing. Ashford will tell him what you're doing and how you behave. Then Dickstein will know you're an agent."

  "It's a bit hit-and-miss," Hassan said dubiously.

  "Not at all," Rostov said brightly, although Hassan was right. "It's a standard technique. I've done it myself. It works."

  "And if he has contacted Ashford . . ."

  "We have a chance of picking up his trail again. So I want you to go to Oxford."

  "Oh!" Hassan had not seen where the conversation was leading, and now was boxed in. "Dickstein might have just called on the phone . . ."

  "He might, but that kind of inquiry is easier to make in person. Then you can say you were in town and just dropped by to talk about old times . . . It's hard to be that casual on the international telephone. For the same reasons, you must go there rather than call."

  "I suppose you're right," Hassan said reluctantly. "I was planning to make a report to Cairo as soon as we've read the printout . . ."

  That was exactly what Rostov was trying to avoid. "Good idea," he said. "But the report will look so much better if you can also say that you have picked up Dickstein's trail again."

  Hassan stood staring at the view, peering into the distance as if he was trying to see Oxford. "Let's go back," he said abruptly. "I've walked far enough."

  It was time to be chummy. Rostov put an arm around Hassan's shoulders. "You Europeans are soft."

  "Don't try to tell me the KGB have a tough life in Moscow."

  "Want to hear a Russian joke?" Rostov said as they climbed the side of the valley toward the road. "Brezhnev was telling his old mother how well he had done. He showed her his apartment--huge, with western furniture, dishwasher, freezer, servants, everything. She didn't say a word. He took her to his dacha on the Black Sea--a big villa with a swimming pool, private beach, more servants. Still she wasn't impressed. He took her to his hunting lodge in his Zil limousine, showed off the beautiful grounds, the guns, the dogs. Finally he said, 'Mother, mother, why don't you say something? Aren't you proud?' So she said, 'It's wonderful, Leonid. But what will you do if the Communists come back?' "

  Rostov roared with laughter at his own story, but Hassan only smiled.

  "You don't think it's funny?" Rostov said.

  "Not very," Hassan told him. "It's guilt that makes you laugh at that joke. I don't feel guilty, so I don't find it funny."

  Rostov shrugged, thinking: Thank you Yasif Hassan, Islam's answer to Sigmund Freud. They reached the road and stood there for a while, watching the cars speed by as Hassan caught his breath. Rostov said, "Oh, listen, there's something I've always wanted to ask you. Did you really screw Ashford's wife?"

  "Only four or five times a week," Hassan said, and he laughed, loudly.

  Rostov said, "Who feels guilty now?"

  He arrived at the station early, and the train was late, so he had to wait for a whole hour. It was the only time in his life he read Newsweek from cover to cover. She came through the ticket barrier at a half-run, smiling broadly. Just like yesterday, she threw her arms around him and kissed him; but this time the kiss was longer. He had vaguely expected to see her in a long dress and a mink wrap, like a banker's wife on a night out at the 61 Club in Tel Aviv; but of course Suza belonged to another country and another generation, and she wore high boots which disappeared under the hem of her below-the-knee skirt, with a silk shirt under an embroidered waistcoat such as a matador might wear. Her face was not made up. Her hands were empty: no coat, no handbag, no overnight case. They stood still, smiling at each other, for a moment. Dickstein, not quite sure what to do, gave her his arm as he had the day before, and that seemed to please her. They walked to the taxi stand.

  As they got into the cab Dickstein said, "Where do you want to go?"

  "You haven't booked?"

  I should have reserve
d a table, he thought. He said, "I don't know London restaurants."

  "Kings Road," Suza said to the driver.

  As the cab pulled away she looked at Dickstein and said, "Hello, Nathaniel."

  Nobody ever called him Nathaniel. He liked it.

  The Chelsea restaurant she chose was small, dim and trendy. As they walked to a table Dickstein thought he saw one or two familiar faces, and his stomach tightened as he strove to place them; then he realized they were pop singers he had seen in magazines, and he relaxed again. He was glad his reflexes still worked like this in spite of the atypical way he was spending his time this evening. He was also pleased that the other diners in the place were of all ages, for he had been a little afraid he might be the oldest man in sight.

  They sat down, and Dickstein said, "Do you bring all your young men here?"

  Suza gave him a cold smile. "That's the first witless thing you've said."

  "I stand corrected." He wanted to kick himself.

  She said, "What do you like to eat?" and the moment passed.

  "At home I eat a lot of plain, wholesome, communal food. When I'm away I live in hotels, where I get junk tricked out as haute cuisine. What I like is the kind of food you don't get in either sort of place: roast leg of lamb, steak and kidney pudding, Lancashire hot-pot."

  "What I like about you," she grinned, "is that you have no idea whatsoever about what is trendy and what isn't; and furthermore you don't give a damn."

  He touched his lapels. "You don't like the suit?"

  "I love it," she said. "It must have been out-of-date when you bought it."

  He decided on roast beef from the trolley, and she had some kind of sauteed liver which she ate with enormous relish. He ordered a bottle of Burgundy: a more delicate wine would not have gone well with the liver. His knowledge of wine was the only polite accomplishment he possessed. Still, he let her drink most of it: his appetites were small.

  She told him about the time she took LSD. "It was quite unforgettable. I could feel my whole body, inside and out. I could hear my heart. My skin felt wonderful when I touched it. And the colors, of everything . . . Still, the question is, did the drug show me amazing things, or did it just make me amazed? Is it a new way of seeing the world, or does it merely synthesize the sensations you would have if you really saw the world in a new way?"