Bearpit (19 page)

Yuri's first proper operation also taught him that remaining undetected was considered more important than the speed of delivery. After being alerted by Anatoli Granov at the United Nations, Yuri had to wait until a necessary excuse for his absence could be manipulated, an address on the international importance and value of the United Nations to a group of lobbyists in Washington DC. It took three days to arrange, three days for Yuri to grow increasingly unsettled by what he might be returning to in Moscow. He wished there had been some way of contacting his father, to be warned if a warning were necessary.

Anxious to extend his knowledge of America as much and as quickly as possible, Yuri travelled to the American capital by Metroliner, gazing from the window, reminded again of the parting-at-the-seams decay of Harlem when the express went through Baltimore. Why was it that trains always seemed to pass the worst back gardens in any city? Only when they began approaching Washington did he concentrate upon the already prepared speech, making the small changes that Smallbone had assured him were permissible for the address to appear his own and not an opinion written by someone else, annotating the main text with reference numbers from his back-up books.

Washington impressed him. He guessed there were exceptions but it seemed a freshly washed and newly swept city. He knew from the Kuchino lectures that Greek architecture had been a predominant theme in its planning and decided it had succeeded, with the broad avenues and massive, squat buildings which also reminded him of Moscow. He'd become accustomed to New York skyscrapers and their absence here was another surprise until he recalled that city ordinance prevented any building higher than the Capitol, which really did look like the decoration at a Western wedding feast which was how it had been described to him by the homosexual defector who'd tried to teach him the idioms of the American language.

It was a breakfast address, important for the necessary timed-to-the-minute operation, and it went perfectly and Yuri was pleased both by his performance and by his reception. As his taxi drew away from the Mayflower Hotel he tried to imagine what the reaction of these people whose vocation was influencing American government thinking would have been if they'd known their lecturer to be a Soviet agent on his way to Moscow to deliver a consignment of American secrets. Mass panic and then mass diarrhoea, he decided. Or maybe diarrhoea first, then the panic. Possibly followed by Congress convening a panel for televised hearings, to impress the folks back home.

Yuri cleared his trail by taking the cab to Union Station, utilizing the covered-in construction work he'd noted on his arrival, sure the boxed and enclosed walkways would hide the initial avoidance manoeuvre. He re-emerged through the side door to catch the shuttle bus back down the hill. He went as far as 13th Street, fascinated by the continuing reflection as he passed the FBI headquarters on Pennsylvannia Avenue; if only they knew, too, he thought. He used the side entrance of the flagship Marriott Hotel, gained the reception area by the escalator and then dodged into the bookshop directly at its top. There he pretended to leaf through the latest publications displayed at the entrance, in reality intent upon any hurried ascent up the escalator by a pursuer momentarily nervous at losing sight of his quarry. No one followed showing that sort of anxiety. Yuri still memorized the faces of the initial five – three men and two women – and was alert for their attention when he crossed the massive foyer to emerge at the main entrance, nodding agreement to the doorman's invitation to another taxi. None of the isolated five followed him.

The driver continued on Pennsylvannia, going by Lafayette Square and the White House, and Yuri had his first disappointment. Set against the grandeur of the Washington public buildings – without even bringing the massive and grandiose Kremlin into the comparison – the official residence of the President of the United States seemed insignificant in size and presence. Just not
important
enough. In front of railings which could have been scaled by a determined ten-year-old (surely there had to be better protection than that!) a bearded, many-coated man was camped beneath a wedge of tarpaulin, surrounded by banners and placards protesting the plight of America's homeless. Yuri reckoned that despite the supposed new freedoms within the Soviet Union it would have taken the KGB internal militia about three seconds on a slow day to find the man very permanent accommodation indeed if he'd attempted the gesture outside the Kremlin's Trinity Gate.

Yuri was ready when the vehicle started to climb the tree-bordered George Washington Memorial Parkway to leave the city, intent for what he had been assured in at least half a dozen lectures existed but which he'd always found difficult completely to accept. And then he saw it, the signpost actually indicating the location of the CIA's headquarters at Langley.

That's where the spooks hang out,' identified the driver unnecessarily. ‘Must be a strange job, being a spook.'

‘I just can't imagine it,' said Yuri.

At Dulles Airport he used the William Bell passport, took the camera bag unhindered and unquestioned through the x-ray examination of the Concorde check-in and accepted the offer of Dom Perignon champagne at the pre-flight invitation. Before his execution the condemned man ate a hearty meal, he thought. How would his father react to a positive demand to explain what the hatred was between himself and Kazin? The temptation was growing in Yuri to make it.

The choice of Concorde was not an indulgence. The three-hour flight got him to Paris' Charles de Gaulle airport with ninety minutes to make the Amsterdam connection, for which he again used the British passport. It was only at Schipol, for the Moscow transfer, that he reverted back to Soviet documentation and he used his KGB accreditation at Sheremet'yevo to avoid any Customs delay. Despite going through two (or was it three?) time changes Yuri did not feel tired, and knew why. The entire identity-switching, pursuit-avoiding journey had been uneventful, not even a flight delay, but all the time he'd known an adrenaline-pumping tenseness, the necessary professional awareness of everything and everybody around him. Would his first mission end with champagne or hemlock, he wondered.

His taxi driver had a full and drooped moustache, a topcoat with the collar black with grease, and emitted a permanent smell of tobacco: closer, inside the car, Yuri saw the moustache was browned with nicotine, so that it looked artificial, as if the man were wearing some clumsy and obvious disguise.

‘Come far?'

‘Far enough,' said Yuri. In the reflection of the rear-view mirror he saw the man frown at the refusal.

‘Know Moscow well?'

‘Well enough,' said Yuri. Would his father be at the dacha or the apartment? He should have telephoned from the airport.

‘You want anything, you let me know.' The man, who was driving dangerously fast, swivelled in his seat and grinned; his mouth was a graveyard of cracked and stained teeth.

‘Want anything?' queried Yuri, concentrating on the man for the first time.

‘Man on your own: special company maybe. Nice girls.'

Yuri had forgotten that propelling a vehicle was not considered the primary employment of Moscow cab drivers: would the man have anything to prevent knives going into backs? He said: ‘No thanks.'

The car swerved as the man reached across the front passenger seat and stretched back, holding a bottle. ‘Take it,' offered the driver. ‘Have a drink. See I'm not offering horse piss. It's good vodka.'

Yuri accepted the bottle to get the man's hands back on the wheel but didn't open it. ‘I don't think so,' he said.

‘Haven't you heard about the alcohol restrictions that Gorbachov's introduced?' demanded the driver, appearing offended at the rejection. ‘Lot of vodka stalls have been closed completely and the liquor shops have restricted licences now.'

‘I heard,' said Yuri.

‘It's a good offer,' persisted the driver. ‘Twelve roubles. Cost you more than that on the black market anywhere.'

Yuri saw there was no label on the bottle and that the seal was broken. The liquid inside was reddish, as if something metallic had rusted in it. It probably was horse piss. He said: ‘I'm not interested.'

The driver gave the grunt of a frustrated salesman, feeling back for the bottle, which Yuri returned. So much for reforms, he thought.

‘How about dollars?' demanded the driver suddenly. ‘You come from America, I'll give you the best exchange rate for your dollars? Twice the official price. No argument.'

‘I don't want to sell any dollars,' said Yuri.

‘That's an American suit,' accused the man, with easy expertise. ‘You've come from America.'

‘So?'

‘Maybe you want to buy some?'

‘No,' sighed Yuri.

‘You won't get a better rate anywhere.'

‘I don't need them.'

‘Everyone needs dollars.'

‘I don't.' Yuri wished he knew what he did need.

‘That luggage American?'

‘Yes.'

‘You want to sell it?'

‘No, I don't want to sell it,' said Yuri. He was grateful for the approaching grey outline marking the beginning of the city.

‘American jeans?'

‘No.'

‘American records?'

‘No.'

‘You travel between America and Russia a lot?'

Yuri hesitated. ‘No,' he said.

‘That's got to be a lie, dressed like you are and carrying American luggage,' rejected the driver. ‘You like, you and I, we could come to a very profitable arrangement.'

‘I said I'm not interested.' In America this man would have been a millionaire, several times over. Perhaps he was here.

‘You could make a lot of money.'

‘What would you do if I reported you?'

The man snickered a laugh. ‘Deny the conversation. Or buy the policeman off. Whatever was easier.'

‘I thought that sort of thing was all over?'

‘Forget it!' dismissed the man. ‘My regular stand is at the airport. You want to come to a deal, you look me up.'

‘This is a KGB building,' said Yuri as they halted.

‘I know,' said the man. ‘Don't forget: the airport stand.'

The Soviet Union lags at least fifteen years behind the West in technology development, so the value of the IBM information fully justified Yuri's courier return, but Belov sought a different, personal benefit in bringing Yuri back. The expected approach from the man's father, at which Belov could have more obviously declared himself, hadn't happened, not even when he'd advised the man of his son's homecoming. Belov knew it could only mean he wasn't trusted, because of his earlier association with Kazin. So it was essential he correct the impression.

Yuri was intrigued, as he was intended to be, to find Belov awaiting him at the directorate headquarters. The division head accepted the already exposed films and the camera and returned unexposed cassettes and a complete replacement camera. The exchange took less than a minute.

Belov said: ‘A long journey apparently for so little. It was actually extremely important.' He hoped the hint was passed on, to prompt an inquiry from which he could make his changed allegiance obvious.

‘Of course, Comrade Director,' said Yuri. He was as curious at the remark as he was at being received by the man; Belov owed him no explanation. Or perhaps he was trying to make one of a different sort.

‘You are experiencing no problems in New York?' Surely an approach as direct as this could not be misconstrued!

‘None whatsoever,' assured Yuri. What was the direction of this conversation?

‘What effect has the defection had upon the UN mission?'

This was a question for Granov, not him. Yuri said: ‘There was the obvious publicity, for several days. It has diminished now.'

‘Has there been any indication of greater surveillance from American counter-intelligence?'

If there had been any indication it would have been bad surveillance, thought Yuri. He said: ‘None. Of course precautions are being taken.'

‘I have advised your father of your return.'

Was it something as simple as being a conduit to his father, Yuri wondered suddenly. But why would the man need a channel to someone heading the division in which he worked? Access was no problem. Yuri said: ‘I would welcome the opportunity to see him.'

‘Your flight does not leave until ten o'clock tonight.'

‘That is extremely considerate,' said Yuri. Which was true. But why?

‘Convey my regards to your father.' What the hell more could he do?

Yuri was unsure of his father's attitude when he arrived at Kutuzovsky Prospekt. His first inference was impatience but almost at once he wondered if there were some nervousness involved as well.

‘What did you carry back?' demanded the older man at once.

‘I don't know. Something in a camera.'

‘No difficulties during the flights?'

‘None.' What had his father expected to happen?

‘Whom did you see?'

‘Belov himself.'

‘That was unusual: unnecessary.'

‘He was almost embarrassingly friendly. Which was unnecessary too. Asked me to convey his regards.'

‘He personally told me you were coming back today: a memorandum would have done.'

‘Switching from Kazin?'

‘Or working with him.'

Yuri felt a flicker of unease. ‘You think I was being set up?'

‘I'm not sure what to think at the moment,' said the older man.

Seeking reassurance somewhere, Yuri said: ‘What about reopening the inquiry?'

‘There may be something.'

‘What?' demanded Yuri.

‘Panchenko's squad were dispersed to other security units,' disclosed the older man. ‘The major to Kiev, the others to Leningrad and Odessa. All within three days of the inquiry ending.'