“Igor, keep your head down,” Brewer said. “And go with the crowd, away from those stairs.”
“We sure could use Sauer and Conyers,” Court said.
Brewer hurried Court and the Chernies into the midst of a mass of moving bodies to another flight of stairs. At the top of the stairs he turned and looked back. The two men had seen them. With arms raised, they pushed through the crowds down the steps and along the platform, like two men wading in a deep surf.
Brewer led his group back down to the platform by another staircase then to another flight of steps. At the top he turned and looked. The two men were nowhere in view. He led the way along a gallery then up a long ramp to the Lexington Avenue subway platform. Their timing was perfect. As they reached the platform, a train was pulling in.
The four of them stepped on board. Brewer and Court looked out on the crowded platform.
“So far so good,” Brewer murmured.
As the doors began to close, Court abruptly stepped off the train and turned. He raised his pistol and shot Chernie in the chest. He shot twice more, then turned and fled. All Brewer remembered ever after was the horrified, staring eyes of Anna Chernie crouching over her husband as the train doors opened again. A crowd gathered as the doorman came running down the platform. Anna Chernie raised her head to Brewer, staring at him with both hands over her mouth.
He was holding her, turned away from Igor Chernie’s body, feeling her slight arms around him, feeling the great sobs of her body against his, hearing her muted cries.
Sauer came in a rush. Behind him came Conyers. They stood looking at Chernie’s body.
Sauer had dried blood on his forehead. Conyers had a badly bruised eye and cheek. The red parka she wore was torn and stained with mud and wet.
“Court?” Sauer asked.
Brewer nodded. “Court.”
“They shot him,” Sauer said.
“Who?”
“The Russians,” Sauer said. “They shot Court. Right there at the foot of the stairs.”
Chapter 34
Limoges flew up from Washington in a helicopter. He reached the beach house at ten-fifteen that night, after the snowfall had stopped, and in a blinding rush of whirling snow landed on the pad next to the other helicopter. Brewer climbed on board.
Limoges, in a tuxedo, sat behind the map table, watching him. “They yanked me out of my favorite opera for this,” he said.
“Maybe they’ll give you your money back,” Brewer replied.
Limoges peered through the window at the other helicopter. “That pilot had to be nuts to fly that thing in the height of a storm to New York. And you have to be as nuts as he is to fly with him. It’s a wonder you weren’t all killed. Where is she?”
“Inside. Hysterical.”
Limoges studied the house. It was a large old seashore house, covered in weathered cedar shakes. Lights blazed at every window and all around the grounds. There was over a foot and a half of snow on the sand dunes.
“Who’s with her?”
“Sauer, Conyers, and a small army of others.”
“Well,” Limoges said, drumming his fingers, “it’s making the front page of every newspaper in the world. Pictures of dead spies on subway steps and subway cars. The U.S. and Soviets are already calling each other every name in the book right out in public. Because of Court our counterespionage system has been compromised. Damage Control tells me it’s going to be months and even years before they can assess the harm that’s been done. God knows how long its going to be before they clean out all the turncoats in our ranks. They have no idea how many more Courts there are. I thought he was too stupid to turn his coat. And I’ve already heard from that claque in Congress that wants to kick the United Nations out of the country. That was quite a night’s work, Brewer.”
“Court was one of your boys.”
“I told you not to trust the system,” Limoges said.
“So did Chernie,” Brewer said.
“The critical question is, where are we?”
“Nowhere yet,” Brewer said. “We lost a priceless property in Chernie. It took me two years to develop him. A year ago he was trying to give us Court and everyone else in our system who’s been turned. But no one would listen. For one goddamned year I tried to tell those idiots they were missing the espionage coup of the decade with Chernie. If they’d listened, Court would be in chains and Chernie would be singing his head off. Instead, Chernie’s dead and we didn’t get that name we were after.”
“Give me some good news.”
“Good news?” Brewer shrugged. “The Soviet system has been compromised too. They must be going crazy right now in Moscow trying to figure out how many more Chernies there are. Also, now we know that there really is a Mr. X. But he pushed our faces in the pie. Again. So round two goes to him.”
“What about Chernie’s wife? What are we going to do with her? We can’t give her back unless she requests it. We can’t keep her unless she asks for asylum.”
“This isn’t the best time to ask her,” Brewer said. “She’s in pretty bad shape.”
“I don’t know how much longer State can hold the Soviets off,” Limoges said. “They’re saying an American agent murdered Igor Chernie in front of dozens of witnesses and that we kidnapped his wife.”
“What are we saying?”
“We’re contending that they sent Court to kill Chernie to keep him from blabbing about the Soviet’s penetration of our intelligence system. And we’re saying they then killed Court before he could be arrested and spill the beans. Their story is a pack of lies and ours is the truth.”
“Their story sounds more believable.”
Limoges untied his black bow tie. “Okay, Brewer. We just laid a big egg, we still have our problem, and time is almost up. What’s your next move?”
“We don’t have many pieces left on the board.”
“Don’t tell me your troubles, Brewer. Earn your pay. I want a miracle and I want it now.”
“She’s pregnant.”
“That’s no miracle.”
“She didn’t want to defect,” Brewer said. “He did. Now he’s dead and she’s locked out of her own country. Where else will she go?”
“Why are you so worried about Chernie’s widow?”
“If she decides to return to Russia, she’ll be no help to us at all. But if I can convince her to stay, she’s holding the biggest bargaining chip in the world.”
“Don’t play games, Brewer. What are you talking about?”
“Anna Chernie knows who Mr. X is.”
When Brewer reentered the beach house, Charles from the State Department was still there, sitting in the living room, shaking his head. His attempts to talk to Anna Chernie had come to nothing. She refused to tell him where she wanted to go—Russia, the U.S., or anyplace in between. She flatly refused to speak. She refused food. She wept.
She stayed in a bedroom on the second floor of the old beach house, sitting in a chair, staring at the ocean.
“Maybe you haven’t given her enough time,” Brewer said.
“Lord love a duck,” Charles said. “There isn’t any time! The Russians are raising hell. We can’t just give her back unless she tells us. And we can’t just keep her here unless she requests it. The pressure is unbearable.”
“She hasn’t said anything?”
“Not a boo. Candidly, Brewer, she has to do something. With each hour, the Russians are getting more propaganda value out of this. If you can get her to talk, I’ll personally create a special medal with your name engraved on it.”
Brewer stood in the bedroom doorway and looked at her. She sat immobile, her back to the door, looking even smaller than he remembered. Love is a purr, here, between the breasts, Margie had said. Brewer watched Anna Chernie’s sad face. Love is an agony—a knife between the breasts. What we do to each other in the name of love.
He stepped into the room. “Anna.”
She turned to look at him.
He walked ov
er to stand beside her chair.
“You’ll have to make a decision soon, Anna.”
She didn’t answer him.
“You either have to go back or start a new life.”
She squeezed her mouth into a button of anger. “What new life? He was my life. He was all the life I ever wanted.” She angrily wiped away the tears. “This was all his idea. He talked about nothing else. Freedom. Freedom. Freedom. And what happened? He’s dead. Dead. And now I’m alone in a foreign country. What has he done to us?”
“He was giving you a new life, Anna.”
“Without him, there is no life. Every morning when I woke up, the first thing I would do was look at Igor and think how lucky I was to have him.” She wept.
“Anna. What about the baby?”
Her mouth opened to protest. “How did you know about that? Did he tell you? It was our secret!”
“He couldn’t help himself, Anna. He was so happy.”
“Is he happy dead? He’ll never see his baby.”
“He didn’t want to raise the baby in Russia, Anna. He hated the repression, the gulags, the surveillance … you know all that. He wanted a fresh start.”
“Igor was a dreamer,” she said. “I have no reason to leave my country. That’s not my country—the Kremlin that he hated. The gulags. The repression. My country is my parents and my family and relatives. It’s the place where I grew up. It’s where I went to school. And all my friends and their families and their children. That’s my country. I want to see my mother’s face when I put my baby in her arms. I want my father to kiss me and tell me what a wonderful thing a new baby is. I never wanted to defect. I just want to go home.”
Brewer put his arms around her, feeling again those racking sobs he’d felt when he’d held her in the subway.
“I want my Igor and I want to go home,” she said.
“Maybe you can’t have either of those things, Anna.”
“Either?”
“Maybe you should stay here and take what we promised Igor.”
“Why?”
“You know what we promised him. It will be a good life.”
“But I want to go home.”
“You can’t go home, Anna. You know too much. And they’ll find out.”
“What do you mean I know too much?”
“Igor said he had pages of material, but when he came out of that movie, he had nothing with him. I know he didn’t carry it in his head. He had a terrible memory for things. He couldn’t remember simple telephone numbers.”
“The information died with Igor.”
“No, no, Anna,” Brewer said. “The information didn’t die with him. If Soviet security had known the truth, they would have sent Court after you.”
“What do I know?”
“You know everything.”
“No.”
“He said he put the information where Soviet security would never find it.” He held her chin. “He had you memorize everything.”
She tried to shake her head.
Brewer said, “You have a photographic memory, don’t you?”
She turned her face away.
“Anna. He got that information to start a new life with—for the three of you. You can use it too. You can’t go back to Russia. You’ll never be trusted again. Igor has burned your bridges behind you. They’ll realize you have a photographic memory, just as I did. You can’t go back. You can go only forward.”
She wept. “I don’t know what to do. Who can I trust? You. Can I trust you?”
“Trust yourself,” he said. “We have a lot to talk about. Why don’t you try to sleep for a little while?”
But when he returned an hour later, she was still awake.
“You didn’t sleep?”
She studied Brewer’s face. Then she nodded. “Everything you said is true. I can’t go back. If they find out what I did, they’ll put me in prison. Or worse. I have to make a new life for myself here in America.” She stood up. “And you’re also right about me. I have a photographic memory. Igor called me a walking computer.”
“What did he give you to memorize?”
“For the last few weeks, each night he brought home papers and he had me memorize them. I memorized all the embassy codes. I memorized lists of Russian personnel all over the world. I memorized lists of names of Americans the Russians use for spies, dozens of them.” She tapped her temple. “Pages and pages of material.”
“Did he tell you the name I asked him for?”
“Yes. He told me.”
“What is it?”
“The name is Gogol.”
“Who is Gogol?”
“I don’t know.”
“That’s it? Gogol? No title? No other information. Wasn’t there a whole dossier?”
“One name,” she said. “Gogol. Emil Gogol. That’s all he had.”
Chapter 35
Brewer walked into the meeting room carrying a pile of reference books. In the gray winter daylight slanting through the window, Sauer and Conyers sat silently waiting. They watched as he crossed the room and put his burden on the tabletop.
“So,” Sauer said.
Brewer nodded. “So.”
“Who are we looking for?” Conyers asked.
“Gogol,” Brewer said. “His name is Emil Gogol. And that’s absolutely all we know.”
“That’s why Court shot Chernie?” Sauer asked. “For a name?”
“What I want you two to do,” Brewer said, “is a name search. In our official file system. Check the Diplomatic List. The Consular List. The U.N. List. Check visas. Since we don’t know anything about Gogol, we can’t even assume what his nationality is. So we’re going to have to check visas from all East European countries, including East Germany.
“Most visa applications stay in the American consular office of the originating country,” Conyers said. “I know. I’ve been through a few of them.”
“Check the key American consulates in the Bloc countries—especially the office in Moscow,” Brewer said. “Also check the Visa Violations File here in Washington. Check Passport Control. If this Gogol has ever been in the U.S. as part of the Soviet diplomatic corps, there should be a record. If he’s been working through one of the Bloc trading companies—Elorg, Mashproborintorg, Metronex, Unitra, Tungsgram, Isotimpex, or any of the rest—his name would be on their lists. If he’s been in this country during one of his smuggling operations, there may be a record. If he’s been getting export clearances with falsified documents, the Department of Commerce could have his name on a list on one of the Stipulator Forms—that’s Form 823B. We’re even going to check the Chief of Protocol records in the White House.”
Brewer held up his list. “So—by the numbers,” he said. “Start with the State Department. Examine all their files, including the Deputy Secretary for Political Affairs, Office of Munitions Control. Go through their application forms for munitions registration—that’s Form DSP-3. And do the SPLEX file, all of it. And the Foreign Correspondents list in the Bureau of Public Affairs, the U.N. Correspondents list in the Office of International Affairs—he may be passing for a Pravda correspondent. And don’t forget the Visa Lookout Book and the Master Index of the Immigration and Naturalization Service—”
“There’s forty million names on that list,” Conyers said.
“Do just the A file,” Brewer said. “Nonimmigrants who departed from the U.S.” He continued reading from the list. “After that, go over to the Registration Section of the Internal Security Division of the Department of Justice. I want you to check out the Foreign Agents Registration. If all else fails, there’s the CIA at Langley. And there’re still the newspapers—New York Times, Washington Post, Paris Herald Tribune. And the newspapers of the foreign capitals. And there’s the Johnson file.”
“What’s the Johnson file?” Conyers asked.
“It’s a list of known political illegals,” Sauer said. “East Europeans, mainly. People who went underground when their visas ran out. Fo
reign students who never went back home. Suspects. Wetbacks. Probable sightings. Aliases. Thousands of names.”
“How about the files of NATO countries?” Conyers asked.
“I’ll take care of them,” Brewer said. “I’m going to call in a few favors.”
“It’s like looking for a needle in a haystack,” Conyers said. “And Gogol may not be on any of these lists. Directorate S of the KGB puts Russian underground agents into the U.S. all the time. There must be thousands of them here, living like ordinary citizens. And none of them would be on any of these lists.”
“While you two are checking the files out,” Brewer said, “I’m going to try something else. A long shot. I’m going to hunt Gogol with a camera.”
“A camera?” Sauer frowned at him. “How?”
“If you were Gogol,” he said to Sauer, “and you didn’t want me to find you, what would you do?”
“You mean murder?” Sauer asked.
“Someone tried to kill me twice,” Brewer answered. “I must have at least one surveillance team following me. If it’s Gogol, I can find him. Just by myself.”
“How?”
“I’m going to take his picture.”
Brewer called Hesse at National Security.
“I need a favor.”
“I thought you’d never ask.”
“I want a name search. All European files.”
“A full search?”
“Particularly Paris—the Direction de la Surveillance du Territoire,” Brewer added. “They’ve had their innings with Russian piracy.”
“Shit,” Hesse said.
“Maybe next time,” Brewer said, “when people like Limoges ask you for names, you’ll be smart enough just once in your life to keep your mouth shut. Is that possible, Hesse?”
In the State Department, Sauer and Conyers went to the Records and Services Branch of the Office of Security in the Office of the Deputy Undersecretary for Administration.
“We’ll divide this up,” Sauer said, looking at the list. “You check the Visa Office. ’Kay? Check the nonimmigrant visa applications. ’Kay? Then check the Visa Lookout Book and then the SPLEX file. See what I’m saying?”
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