Red Star Falling: A Thriller

by Brian Freemantle

  Charlie cleared his throat, twice, to avoid the uncertainty sounding. ‘I am permitted exercise.’ His voice cracked before he got to the end.

  There was laughter all around him. Both dogs lurched forward, their snarling triggered by the words, needing all their handlers to hold them in place. Charlie didn’t see from whom the order came but in unison the handlers to the left of the animals snapped off their muzzles. Both dogs emitted mournful howls before lurching again towards Charlie, slavering mouths open. There was jeering laughter at Charlie’s instinctive recoil and there were isolated shouts of ‘let them go’ and ‘one at a time’ and ‘make him run.’ Both sets of handlers staggered closer, fighting to restrain their animals.

  ‘This is wrong. I am allowed here,’ Charlie tried again, more loudly the second time, but the jeering overwhelmed his effort. ‘Make him run, make him run’ became a chant, picked up all around him: the dog to Charlie’s left reared onto its hind legs in its snarling frenzy to get to him, its thrown-back head far above those of either of its handlers.

  The shrill of a whistle startled everyone, bringing instant silence again. Charlie’s house guard came from his left, easing past the intervening soldiers and showing no fear of the dog pulled marginally to one side by its handlers. Strong-voiced, the guard said, ‘You’re out of control!’

  There were several shouts of ‘fuck off’ and one of ‘make them both run’ and an attempt to turn it into another chant but it straggled away, dying.

  Putting himself directly beside Charlie, the guard looked around the encircling spetsnaz and said, ‘The general is here, with your colonel. They know where I am: where both of us are. You are going to stay exactly as you are: re-muzzle those dogs and hold them. We are going to walk away. You are going to do nothing: not try to obstruct us.’

  Charlie felt the pressure against his arm and began to move, not initially aware of his usually protesting feet actually shuffling forward, glad the guard led their way past the re-muzzled but still slavering animals. The man didn’t speak until they got close to where the path widened at its approach to the dacha, where they could walk side by side. The man said, ‘Those dogs kill. They’re a strain of Siberian wolfhound.’

  The retreat from the spetsnaz ambush had allowed Charlie outwardly to recover. ‘How could you intervene like that?’

  ‘It was an exercise, approved by their colonel. We weren’t told until it was under way. They’ve done it before and it’s gone wrong: people have been killed. There’s little difference between them and their animals. That’s how I know they’re trained to kill.’

  ‘You still took a hell of a chance.’

  ‘Don’t expect me to do it again,’ said the man, nodding up to an obvious CCTV mounting. ‘You’re lucky I’d seen which way you’d gone.’

  ‘I won’t expect you to do it again,’ assured Charlie. Because he didn’t need any further confirmation, confident he’d completely evaded the camera the Russian indicated.

  There was no-one at the dacha. The house guard said, ‘The spetsnaz colonel’s on his way, but I decided it wasn’t a good idea to wait.’

  ‘I’m glad you didn’t,’ said Charlie, sincerely. ‘What about Guzov?’

  ‘Delayed in Moscow until tomorrow.’

  By what? wondered Charlie.

  14

  Aubrey Smith wasn’t the first to reach the emergency-committee co-chairmen. Rebecca Street was, going directly from the conservatory to Jacobson’s fortunately empty office to confirm Sir Archibald Bland had seen the transmission. The Cabinet Secretary ordered her personally to bring Maxim Radtsic’s letter to an immediately convened subcommittee session of MI5 and MI6, allowing her two hours for the journey from Hertfordshire. Jacobson arrived as Rebecca replaced the telephone, clearly surprised to find her there. Rebecca didn’t get up from the man’s chair.

  ‘I’ve been on the phone from the control room, telling the Director about your debriefing.’

  ‘He wasn’t watching!’

  ‘He’s studying the replay now. I told him about Radtsic’s letter.’ Jacobson extended his hand. ‘He wants me to take it to London tonight.’

  ‘I’ve been ordered by the Cabinet Secretary to deliver it to him at a special meeting of both directors in two hours’ time,’ said Rebecca, not fully realizing the unintended mocking echo until she was halfway through. ‘Didn’t Gerald tell you one had been convened as a result of the debriefing?’

  Jacobson gave up waiting for Rebecca to vacate his chair, taking the smaller one to which she’d earlier been relegated. ‘No, he didn’t. He wants the letter. I saw you take it with you from the conservatory.’

  ‘Who’d you say’s got more clout in the pecking order, the Director of MI6 or the Downing Street–appointed Cabinet Secretary co-chairing an investigation into the current intelligence fiasco?’

  ‘I’ll tell the Director that Bland wants it.’

  Another moment of commitment, Rebecca reminded herself. ‘No. I’ll ensure a copy is taken for Gerald tonight. The original has a diplomatic purpose, forlorn though we all expect that to be.’

  ‘We can take a copy before you go,’ desperately tried Jacobson.

  ‘Diplomacy has the priority, which includes the extent of the letter’s internal circulation,’ refused Rebecca.

  ‘The Director is not going to like this,’ finally threatened Jacobson.

  ‘I’ll make everything very clear to him when we meet tonight,’ promised Rebecca, more conscious of the permanent monitoring than Jacobson appeared to be. ‘But I expect you’ll have spoken to him again by then, won’t you?’

  * * *

  Jacobson had, of course.

  Gerald Monsford was moving between the annexe to the main committee chamber and its approach from the outside corridor and the ground floor below, determined to intercept Rebecca, which he did at the top of the expansive Victorian staircase, putting them in full view of Foreign Office night staff, as well as those still to respond to Bland’s summons.

  ‘What game do you think you’re playing?’ Monsford demanded.

  ‘We’re not involved in any game, Gerald. If I can persuade Maxim Radtsic to tell us all there is to be told, we’ve got the biggest intelligence coup of our lives, far bigger and more sensational than we ever imagined,’ said Rebecca, calmly.

  ‘I want his letter!’

  ‘So does Sir Archibald Bland, to whom I’m going to give it.’

  ‘Have you forgotten who I am!’

  From any other man in any other circumstance, the arrogance would have been risible: here it seemed entirely fitting. ‘Of course I haven’t. Nor have I forgotten who Sir Archibald Bland is, either.’ Rebecca heard footsteps mounting the stairs behind her, knowing from Monsford’s fleeting expression that the newcomers were for their meeting and that Monsford hadn’t wanted to be caught as he had been.

  ‘You’re through! You know that, don’t you? Through!’

  ‘We should go in,’ smiled Rebecca, looking sideways at last as Jane Ambersom drew level. Aubrey Smith and John Passmore were still only halfway up the stairs.

  ‘I’m hardly surprised it’s a special meeting,’ greeted Jane, although she was looking after the retreating Monsford. Sure the man was beyond hearing, she added, ‘I’ve been waiting for your call.’

  ‘This has intervened.’ She’d done it, Rebecca thought: declared herself and made the break! She’d expected some sensation, a feeling, but at that moment there was nothing. It would come, she supposed?

  ‘There’s no reason why it should have done.’

  ‘Radtsic’s talking to me! Only to me. I don’t want to lose that: none of us can lose that.’

  Aubrey Smith and Passmore reached the first floor but didn’t stop. As he passed Smith said, ‘Well done.’

  Jane said, ‘We could still talk, you and me.’

  ‘I’ve been recalled just for tonight. I’m staying—’ Rebecca stopped abruptly. ‘It’s not convenient for us to meet at the moment.’

  �
��Don’t run away from it, Rebecca. We’re going to have to talk.…’ Jane looked beyond, farther along the corridor. ‘We’re being called.’

  The secretariat and support staff outnumbered those officially assembled. In addition to the two intelligence groups, the unidentified Foreign Office contingent had been reduced to four, positioned behind Bland and Palmer halfway along a much smaller oval table than that in the main room.

  ‘We’ve all of us seen today’s recording of Maxim Radtsic’s encounter with MI6 deputy director Street. In the opinion of my co-chairman and myself, it’s extremely encouraging, with a potential none of us can yet predict.…’ He smiled directly at Rebecca. ‘And before we get into general discussion I want to place on record my congratulations for the manner in which Deputy Director Street has handled Maxim Radtsic, whom we all recognize to be an extremely difficult man. Those congratulations will be expressed as a listed commendation—’

  ‘I would like to endorse those congratulations on behalf of MI5,’ unexpectedly broke in Smith, to the visible surprise of everyone around the table.

  The most obviously amazed was Gerald Monsford, whose mouth briefly worked without words before he managed, ‘It was my intention to recommend such an official recognition. I obviously want to add my congratulations to those that have been expressed.’

  Rebecca dipped her head in modest acceptance but continued briskly, ‘This might be the moment for me to deposit with the committee the letter given to me by Radtsic, in the expectation of it being forwarded through diplomatic channels to his son, Andrei. It’s an undertaking I gave him and which I think we should honour, in view of his reaction.’ She acted upon the thought as it occurred to her, not handing the envelope to one of the waiting attendants but sideways to Monsford to deliver, conscious as she did so of the anger shaking through the man as he was forced to accept it.

  Monsford managed to keep the emotion from his voice, though. ‘You obviously have to be the official recipient, Sir Archibald, but I would welcome a copy as I’m sure my MI5 colleague also would.’

  ‘Don’t touch it!’ stopped Aubrey Smith, as Bland reached out for the envelope from the now ferrying attendant. To Rebecca, Smith said, ‘Have you handled the letter or just the envelope?’

  Professionally recognizing the interjection, Rebecca said, ‘The very outer edges of the letter, as little as possible: Radtsic handed it to me outside the envelope. I put it in. The only other prints will be Radtsic’s. Elena’s too, I guess: she wrote the postscript.’

  ‘Four in total,’ numbered the MI5 Director-General. ‘The envelope and the letter must be forensically cleansed of every fingerprint but those of Radtsic and his wife—apart from an attendant handling—to be untraceable to FSB forensic examination, to which it will be subjected. We don’t want to give the Russians the prints of the Director and deputy director of MI6, do we? Or those of the Cabinet Secretary?’

  Bland nodded for the envelope to be dropped onto the blotter in front of him, continuing the gesture across the table to Smith. ‘Thank you for the timely intervention.’ Turning to Monsford, he said, ‘Of course copies will be made, after the forensic cleaning. And the Director-General is right: we certainly don’t want your fingerprints on your Lubyanka file, along with whatever else they’ve probably already got.’

  From where she sat Rebecca saw Monsford’s hands were white from the fury with which he was gripping them beneath the table.

  * * *

  And they stayed tightly bunched during the general discussion that followed. Geoffrey Palmer warned that to stop Radtsic carrying out his revelation threat, Moscow might make quick concessions, even producing Andrei for another televised linkup, making it essential that the maximum be extracted as quickly as possible from the Russian intelligence chief ahead of a Moscow reaction. To delay that, the letter would not be delivered for at least a week. Rebecca was to be permanently seconded to the MI6 safe house, apart from any necessary consultation recalls, and to take back to Radtsic the assurance that his letter would be personally handed to the Russian Foreign Ministry by a senior British-embassy diplomat. Radtsic’s apparent change of heart both elevated and divided the remit of the emergency committee, endorsed Bland. It would continue in the manner in which it was currently functioning, with the interrogation of Radtsic proceeding in parallel, but with liaison constantly maintained beyond the simultaneous relay of the sessions between Rebecca and MI5 deputy Jane Ambersom.

  Although comfortably distanced from the man, Rebecca saw Monsford now had one white-knuckled hand clamped over the other as if to restrain some physical outburst. The man’s frustration was becoming facially obvious, too, a mottled redness moving up from his neck.

  Taking Palmer’s pause as an invitation, Aubrey Smith said, ‘I think all that perfectly fits the situation. Irena Novikov’s begun to talk. And we’ve been approached by the CIA, through their FBI conduit, for the fullest comparison exchange of what she told Charlie, in Moscow as well as here. I’ve agreed, on condition we get access to what she tells the Americans. It will make an even more invaluable comparison with what Radtsic might tell us.’

  ‘Absolutely!’ enthused Bland. ‘This is tonight’s second big step forward.’

  ‘Do the Americans know that I’ve got Radtsic?’ demanded Monsford, anxious to establish a footing.

  ‘We’ve let it be known we’ve got someone valuable. Obviously there’s been no names,’ avoided Smith, smoothly.

  ‘What about Natalia Fedova?’ questioned Palmer, seeking further disclosure.

  ‘Her only interest, matching ours, is doing everything she can to help Charlie Muffin,’ said Smith, continuing the sanitized avoidance. ‘She’s studying everything that might contribute towards that. Our concentration has to be upon Radtsic and to a slightly lesser extent upon Irena Novikov. It’s an unprecedented situation for us to find ourselves in.’

  ‘I should have been more personally involved in this,’ protested Monsford. ‘MI6 is the communication conduit with the CIA. It was my organization that brought Radtsic out!’

  ‘Which I totally recognize, even though it was my organization that brought Irena Novikov out,’ responded Smith, prepared. ‘The point was put to the FBI head of station here in London, who reminded us that in the immediate aftermath of the Lvov disaster it was your personal decision that MI6–CIA communications be maintained through MI5 and the FBI, to safeguard against any still-embedded Russian infiltration of the CIA compromising MI6.…’ Smith hesitated, wanting to extend the confrontation as long as possible. ‘Now, of course, with just such an infiltration investigation under way within MI6, it’s unthinkable that there should be any sensitive traffic between you here in London and Washington—’

  ‘And it’s Radtsic’s personal decision not to co-operate with you,’ completed Bland, for the first time sharing his co-chairman’s irritation.

  Monsford once more had the sensation of the floor and ceiling crushing together as the walls closed in upon him. ‘I have a right to be kept fully informed upon every development!’

  ‘Every member of this committee is being kept fully informed of every development,’ insisted Aubrey Smith, patiently.

  Eager for some public demonstration to increase the obvious discomfort of the man who’d tried so hard to destroy her professionally, Jane slid another of her already provided cards across the table to Rebecca. ‘You’re going to need these numbers for us to stay in touch: always try the mobile first. It’s never off.’

  * * *

  ‘You were very stupid.’

  ‘Their colonel lectured me: called them animals when he arrived to herd them up,’ said Charlie. He was anxious to resume the debriefing, wishing there hadn’t been a day’s interruption.

  ‘Which I told you they were before he did,’ reminded Mikhail Guzov. ‘You should have believed me.’

  ‘I do now.’ Charlie still wasn’t totally convinced the ambush hadn’t been orchestrated but he’d sufficiently satisfied another suspicion and hadn’t
any intention of further woodland experiments.

  ‘You’ve been very honest.’

  ‘It wasn’t an easily forgotten experience,’ Charlie looked instinctively towards the footpath leading to the scene of the spetsnaz episode, his skin itching at the memory.

  ‘We’re finished with the spetsnaz,’ impatiently dismissed Guzov. ‘I spent yesterday reviewing everything you’ve so far told me. And couldn’t find a single lie.’

  Because there hadn’t been one to find, reflected Charlie, finally coming to his recurring concern, to which he at once added the smaller question: what comparison did Guzov possess to assess his honesty? Not something to let intrude upon his far greater, all-important search for the self-made mistake that had led him for too long in the wrong direction. Which was, ironically, why he’d been so totally truthful with Mikhail Guzov: the tooth-comb examination of everything he’d said and done was not for the Russian’s benefit but for his own essential hunt to find that one wrongly taken step. Charlie said, ‘I’m not going to achieve much by lying, am I?’

  Guzov gave his gargoyle grimace. ‘Charlie Muffin, admitting defeat! That’s not the profile we’ve compiled on you.’

  The profile that Natalia had sanitized? Or a new one compiled after the first murder and all that had resulted from the uncovering of the attempted Lvov emplacement? ‘It can provide the epitaph.’

  ‘Not yet, Charlie. Not for a very long time. We stopped, the day before yesterday, with your getting to the militia investigator’s offer to work behind my back.’

  ‘Sergei Pavel was a good detective: an honest one, which should impress you, honesty being the new watchword.’

  ‘He was stupid,’ dismissed Guzov. ‘What reason did he give for wanting to work like that?’

  This might lead somewhere after all, thought Charlie. Cautiously he said, ‘He told me you were determined to screw up the investigation, leaving him and me the scapegoats. He didn’t want to be made a public scapegoat.’