The Matarese Circle (20 page)

The phone rang.

“This is Taleniekov,” said the Russian into the silence of the telephone. It had been picked up but there was no voice on the line. “I submit that your position is not lessened by acknowledging our contact.”

“Acknowledged,” was the one-word reply.

“You reject my cable, my white flag, and were I you, I would do the same. But you’re wrong and I would be wrong. I swore I’d kill you, Beowulf Agate, and perhaps one day I will, but not now and not
this
way.”

“You read my cipher,” was the answer, delivered in a monotone. “You killed my wife. Come and get me. I’m ready for you.”

“
Stop it!
We both killed. You took a
brother
 … and
before that, an innocent young girl who was no threat to the animals who raped her and killed her!”

“What?”

“There’s no time! There are men who want to kill you, but I’m not one of them! I’ve caught one, however; he’s with me now—”

“You sent another,” interrupted Scofield. “She’s dead. The knife went into her, not me. The cut didn’t have to be very deep.”

“You had to have provoked her; it
was not
planned! But we waste seconds and you don’t have them. Listen to the man I put on the phone. He’s from Amsterdam. His face is damaged and he can’t see very well, but he can speak.” Vasili pressed the telephone against the Hollander’s bloody lips and shoved the Graz-Burya into his neck. “Tell him, Dutchman!”

“Cables were sent.…” The injured man whispered, choking on fear and blood. “Amsterdam, Marseilles, Prague. Beowulf Agate was beyond salvage. We could all be killed if he lived. The cables made the usual statements: they were alerts, urging us to take precautions, but we knew what they meant. Don’t take precautions, take out the problem, eliminate Beowulf ourselves.… None of this is new to you, Herr Scofield. You have given such orders; you know they must be carried out.”

Taleniekov yanked the phone away while keeping the barrel of his weapon pressed against Amsterdam’s neck. “You heard it. The trap you set for me is being used to ambush
you.
By your own people.”

Silence. Beowulf Agate said nothing. Vasili’s patience was running out. “Don’t you
understand?
They’ve exchanged information, it’s the only way they could have found the depot—what you call a ‘drop.’ Moscow
provided
it, can’t you see that? Each of us is being used as the reason to execute the other, to kill us
both.
My people are more direct than yours. The order for my death has been sent to every Soviet station, civilian and military. Your State Department does it somewhat differently; the analysts take no responsibility for such unconstitutional decisions. They simply send warnings to those who care little for abstractions, but deeply for their lives.”

Silence. Taleniekov exploded.

“What more do you
want?
Amsterdam was to draw
you out; you would have had no choice. You would have tried to position yourself in one of two exits: the service area or the staircase. At this moment, Marseilles is by the service elevator, Prague on the staircase. The man from Prague is one you know well. Beowulf. You’ve employed his gun and his knife on many occasions. He’s waiting for you. In less than fifteen minutes, if you do not appear in either place, they will take you in your room. What more
do
you want?”

Scofield answered at last. “I want to know why you’re telling me this.”

“Reread my cipher to you! This isn’t the first time you and I have been used. An incredible thing is happening and it goes beyond you and me. A few men know about it. In Washington
and
Moscow. But they say nothing; no one can say anything. The admissions are catastrophic.”

“What admissions?”

“The hiring of assassins. On both sides. It goes back years,
decades.
”

“How does it concern me? I don’t care about you.”

“Dimitri Yurievich.”

“What about him?”

“They said you killed him.”

“You’re lying. Taleniekov. I thought you’d be better at it Yurievich was leaning, he was a probable. The civilian killed was my contact, under
my
source-control. It was a KGB operation. Better a dead physicist than a defected one. I repeat, come and get me.”

“You’re
wrong!
… Later! There’s no time to argue. You want proof? Then listen! I trust your ear is more skilled than your mind!” The Russian quickly shoved the Graz-Burya into his belt and held the mouthpiece up in the air. With his left hand he gripped the throat of the man from Amsterdam, his thumb centering on the rings of trachea cartilage. He pressed; his hand was a vise, his fingers talons crushing fiber and bone as the vise closed. The Hollander twisted violently, his arms and hands thrashing, trying to break Vasili’s grip, the effort useless. His cry of pain was an unbroken scream that diminished into a wail of agony. The man from Amsterdam fell to the floor unconscious. Taleniekov spoke again into the telephone. “Is there human bait alive who would permit what I’ve just done?”

“Was he given an alternative?”

“You’re a
fool,
Scofield! Get yourself killed!” Vasili shook his head in desperation; it was a reaction to his own loss of control. “
No
.… No, you mustn’t. You can’t understand, and I must try to grasp that, so you must try to understand me. I loathe everything you are, everything you stand for. But right now, we can do what few others can do. Make men listen, make them speak out. If for no other reason than they fear us, fear what we know. The fear is on
both
sides—”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” interrupted Scofield. “You’re mounting a nice KGB strategy; they’ll probably give you a large
dacha
in Grasnov, but no sale. I repeat, come and get me.”

“
Enough!
” shouted Taleniekov, looking at the clock on the desk. “You have eleven minutes! You know where your final proof is. You can find it in a service lift or on the staircase. Unless you care to learn it as you die in your room. If you create a disturbance, you’ll draw a crowd. That’s more to their liking, but I don’t have to tell you that; you may recognize Prague, you won’t Marseilles. You can’t call the police, or risk the chance that the management will; we both know that. Go find your proof, Scofield! See if this enemy is lying. You’ll get as far as your first turn in the corridor! If you live—which is unlikely—I’m on the fifth floor. Room five-zero-five. I’ve done what I can!” Vasili slammed down the phone, the gesture equal parts artifice and anger. Anything to jar the American, anything to make him think.

Taleniekov needed every second now. He had told Beowulf Agate that he had done all he could, but it was not true. He knelt down and tore off the black overcoat from Amsterdam’s unconscious body.

Bray replaced the phone, his mind was churning. If he’d only had sleep, or if he had not gone through the totally unexpected violence of the old woman’s attack, or if Taleniekov had not told him so much of the truth, things would be clearer. But it had all happened and, as he had done so often in the past, he had to shift into a state of blind acceptance and think in terms of immediate purpose.

It was not the first time he had been the target of factions
distinct from each other. One got used to it when dealing with opposing partisans from the same broad-based camps, although killing was rarely the objective. What was unusual was the timing, the converging of separate assaults. Yet it was so understandable, so
clear.

Undersecretary of State Daniel Congdon had really done it! The seemingly bloodless deskman had found the courage of his own convictions. More specifically, he had found Taleniekov and Taleniekov’s moves toward Beowulf Agate. What better reasoning existed for breaking the rules and eliminating a terminated specialist he considered dangerous? What better motive for reaching the Soviets, who could only favor the dispatch of both men.

So clear. So well orchestrated he or Taleniekov might have conceived of the strategy. Denials and astonishment would go hand in hand, statesmen in Washington and Moscow decrying the violence of
former
intelligence officers—from another era. An era when personal animosities often superseded national interests.
Christ,
he could hear the pronouncements, couched in sanctimonious platitudes made by men like Congdon who concealed filthy decisions under respectable titles.

The infuriating thing was that the reality supported the platitudes, the words validated by Taleniekov’s hunt for revenge.
I swore I’d kill you, Beowulf Agate, and perhaps one day I will.

That day was today, the
perhaps
without meaning for the Russian. Taleniekov wanted Beowulf Agate for himself; he would brook no interference from killers recruited and programed by deskmen in Washington and Moscow.
I will see you take your last breath
.… Those were Taleniekov’s words six years ago; he meant them then and he meant them now.

Certainly he would save his enemy from the guns of Marseilles and Prague. His enemy was worthy of a better gun,
his
gun. And no ploy was too unreasonable, no words too extreme, to bring his enemy into that gunsight.

He was tired of it all, thought Scofield, taking his hand away from the phone. Tired of the tension of move and countermove. In the final analysis, who cared? Who gave a godamn for two aging
specialists,
dedicated to the proposition that each’s counterpart should die?

Bray closed his eyes, pressing his lids together, aware
that there was moisture in his sockets. Tears of fatigue, mind and body spent; it was no time to acknowledge exhaustion. Because he
cared.
If he had to die—and it was always an around-the-corner possibility—he was not going to be taken by guns from Marseilles, Prague
or
Moscow. He was better than that; he had always
been
better.

According to Taleniekov he had eleven minutes; two had passed since the Russian had made the statement. The trap was his room and if the man from Prague was the one Taleniekov had described, the attack would be made quickly, with a minimum of risk. Gas-filled pellets would precede any use of weapons, the fumes immobilizing anyone in the room. It was a tactic favored by the killer from Prague; he took few gambles.

The immediate objective, therefore, was to get out of the trap. Walking in the corridor was not feasible, perhaps not even opening the door. Since it was Amsterdam’s function to draw him out, and he had not been drawn, Prague and Marseilles would close in. If there was no one in the hallway—as the absence of sound indicated—they had nothing to lose. Their schedule would not be postponed, but it could be accelerated.

No one in the hallway … 
someone
in the hallway People milling around, excited, creating a diversion Most of the time a crowd was to the killers’ advantage, not the target’s, especially if the target was identifiable and one or more of the killers were not. On the other hand, a target who knew precisely when and where the attack was to be made, could use a crowd to cover his run from ground-zero. An escape based on confusion, and a change of appearance. The change did not have to be much, just enough to cause indecision; indiscriminate gun-fire during an execution had to be avoided.

Eight minutes.
Or less. Everything was preparation. He would take his essential belongings, for when he began running, he’d have to keep running; how long and how far there was no way to tell, nor could he think about that now. He had to get out of the trap and elude four men who wanted him dead, one more dangerous than the other three for he was not sent by Washington or Moscow. He had come himself.

Bray crossed rapidly to the dead woman on the floor,
dragged her to the bathroom, rolled the corpse inside, and closed the door. He picked up the heavy-based lamp and smashed it down on the knob; the lock was jammed, the door could be opened only by breaking it down.

His clothes could be left behind. There were no laundry marks or overt evidence connecting them immediately to Brandon Scofield; fingerprints would do that, but lifting and processing them would take time. He would be far away by then—if he got out of the hotel alive. His attaché case was something else; it contained too many tools of his profession. He closed it, spun the combination lock, and threw it on the bed. He put on his jacket and went back to the telephone. He picked it up and dialed the operator.

“This is room two-thirteen,” he said in a whisper, effortlessly made to sound weak. “I don’t want to alarm you, but I know the symptoms. I’ve had a stroke. I need help.…”

He let the phone crash against the table and drop to the floor.

Taleniekov put on the black overcoat, and reached down for the gray scarf, still draped around Amsterdam’s throat. He yanked it off, wound it around his throat, and picked up the gray hat which had fallen beside the chair. It was too large; he creased the crown so it covered his head less awkwardly, and started for the door, passing the closet. He spoke firmly to the couple within.

“Remain where you are and make no sound! I shall be outside in the corridor. If I hear noise, I’ll come back and you’ll be the worse for it.”

In the hall, he ran toward the main elevators, and then beyond them, to the plain dark elevator at the end of the corridor. Against the wall was a tray table used by room service. He removed his Graz-Burya from his belt, shoved it in his overcoat pocket, and pushed the button with his left hand. The red light went on above the door; the elevator
was on the second floor. Marseilles was in position, waiting for Beowulf Agate.

The light went off and seconds later the number
3
shone brightly, then number
4.
Vasili turned around, his back to the sliding panel.

The door opened, but there were no words of recognition, no surprise expressed at the sight of the black overcoat or the gray hat. Taleniekov spun around, his finger on the trigger of his gun.

There was no one inside the elevator. He stepped in and pressed the button for the second floor.