The Red Horseman (20 page)

He was climbing a hill. He could tell by the
amount of throttle necessary. And the sky was getting
lighter to the northeast. He realized then that he could
see the road and the ruts better, so he eased on more
throttle.

How much time?

Couldn’t be much. If he could just get over the
hill. There on the other side, with the hill between him
and the reactor, there he would be safe.

very bounce, every jolt was another second past.

How many more did he have? He took his left hand
from the handlebar and tried to see the watch. The
bike swerved dangerously and he grabbed the handlebar
again.

How far had he come? Was he far enough … his

The shock wave almost knocked him off the
motorcycle.

Then intense heat. He felt intense heat on his
neck, on the back of his head, even through his
jacket. And he wasn’t under cover, wasn’t …

Behind him a cloud of dirt and debris blown
aloft by the explosion formed in the darkness above the
reactor. In seconds it began to glow.

The radiation intensified. The sensation of furnace
heat was the last thing the colonel felt as a
virulently radioactive ball of fire rose from
the melted remnants of the steel, lead and concrete
shielding.

In seconds he was dying even as the motorcycle
continued away from the blast, dying like the sleeping
soldiers at the army base on the other side of the
reactor, dying like every other mammal within four miles
of the now-glowing nuclear plant. Four miles, that was
how far the colonel had traveled. The
motorcycle continued upright with his dying weight for a
few seconds, then the front wheel kicked against a
rut, and the machine and the corpse upon it
skidded to a stop in the road.

The engine of the motorcycle choked to a stop as a
mushroom cloud formed over the reactor and the wind on
the ground strengthened markedly as air rushed toward the
intense heat source.

People and animals a few miles farther away from the
reactor had several minutes of life left,
amounts varying depending on the amount of material
shielding them from the runaway nuclear inferno. By the
time the sun came up in the northeast only a few
insects were still alive within seven miles of the plant.
Other people were also dying as a cloud of ferociously
intense radioactivity drifted southeast on the
prevailing wind.

AS JACK YOCKE DRESSED THE
FOLLOWING MORNING HIS mood was gloomy. The
euphoria he felt last night had completely
evaporated. He had managed only two hours
sleep and spent the rest of the night tossing and
turning.

At about four in the morning the implications of being
sought out by Shirley Ross finally sank in. Why
Jack Yocke? He wasn’t a famous
personage, not a known face.

And how had she known to find him at the
Metropolitan?

Now the significance of her evasion of that question
grew.

Maybe this was a setup.

He was in way over his head, chasing an
impossible story. He didn’t speak the
language, he didn’t have an ongoing
professional relationship with a single, solitary soul
in this goddamn hopeless Slavic morass. He was
a foreigner in a country deeply suspicious of
all foreigners. He didn’t know the politics in
a capital where politics was the staff of life,
played for blood and money. Nobody would talk
to him. Nobody would trust him to tell the truth.
Nobody.

Except Jake Grafton, and he didn’t
count. He wouldn’t know beans about the Soviet
Square killings. Even if he did and were willing
to share it, Yocke couldn’t print it.

He needed something he could publish.

Gregor was standing beside his battered tan Lada when
Yocke came out of the hotel. The sixty-degree
morning air was heavy with pollution and the sky looked
like rain. The best the reporter could manage in
reply to Gregor’s cheerful hello was a
nod. He sagged onto the passenger’s seat and stared
morosely though the windshield at a beggar woman
arranging herself for a day on the sidewalk while
Gregor got himself situated behind the wheel and
coaxed the car to life.

“Sleep well?” Gregor asked, “Not
really.”

“Where would you like to go this morning?”

Yocke sighed and ran his fingers through his hair.
“Police headquarters.” No, on second thought,
the district attorney was the place to start. What
did they call the prosecutor over here? “Make
it the public prosecutor’s office.”

“No interview with Yeltsin? Well, maybe
tomorrow.”

“Boris will have to wait. Tomorrow we do Gorby’s
proctologist.”

“Procto … ?”

“Can the corn and drive.”

The foyer was crowded with reporters. Yocke’s
heart sank. He looked around for Tommy
Townsend, the Post’s senior correspondent, and
didn’t see him. At least a dozen people from the
international press crowded around the desk man, who
was grunting surly Russian and scowling.

A television team had lights on and a camera
going. What a way to start a day!

Gregor elbowed his way to the desk, and in two
minutes came back with the word. A press conference in
fifteen minutes. Jack Yocke stared at the
TV reporter putting the final touches on his
hair and nodded. If Townsend showed up, Jack was
going to have to make a critical decision since the
Soviet Square Massacre was now Tommy’s
story.

Should he share the Shirley Ross tip with
Tommy?

Thank heavens he didn’t have to. Tommy never
showed, even though the press conference started late, as
do most things in Russia. It went about as Yocke
expected. In the glare of the television lights the
prosecutor’s spokesman made a statement about
the ongoing investigation-no leads yet on the
identities or whereabouts of the killers that could be
announced publicly, no arrests imminent, the
Russians had asked for Interpol assistance. The
questions from the floor were asked in a respectful tone,
merely for clarification of the spokesman’s points.
No one asked about anything he had not mentioned.

Yocke edged toward the door behind the
podium and pulled Gregor along.

When the farce was over he buttonholed the
spokesman on his way out, a husky man who
tried to breeze by.

“I need to speak with the prosecutor for one
minute.”

Through Gregor came the answer: “He is
busy. He cannot see you.”

“The Washington Post has a story about why the
police left the square that the prosecutor needs
to confirm or deny.”

The spokesman eyed him suspiciously.
“Wait,” was his answer.

Yocke waited. The other reporters drifted
out, the television crew packed up lights and
extension cords and cameras and departed, Gregor
lit a cigarette and lounged against the podium.
Yocke looked at his watch.

Fifteen minutes had passed when he looked
again. Gregor was on his third cigarette.

The prosecutor bustled into the room.
“Washington Post?”

“Yes.

“What is your story?”

Yocke took a deep breath and stared the
man straight in the eye. He had but two lousy
bullets to fight the war withand here goes shot number
one: “The police were pulled out of Soviet
Square by a transmission over the police radio
system.” He paused for Gregor to translate.

The prosecutor’s eyebrows knitted, but that was
his sole reaction.

Yocke continued: “The police left because three
KGB agents appeared in police headquarters and
demanded that the police be removed from the square.”

Now the prosecutor’s eyes widened in
surprise. He spewed Russian.

“Where do you get this story? We announce nothing.
Who talk to you?”

Yocke had counted on the man being a novice at
dealing with Western reporters. He was new at the
game, all right.

Yocke decided to try a shot in the dark.

“Why have you relieved the police chief from his
duties?”

The attorney’s face darkened a shade. He
chewed on the back of his lower lip while his eyes
scanned Yocke’s face.

The reporter tried to remain deadpan, but it was
difficult.

“We are investigating,” the prosecutor finally
said.

Jack Yocke bit his own lip to keep from
smiling. “Will he be prosecuted?”

The man shrugged. “Maybe.”

“For obeying the KGB?”

“Who has talked to you? No one should talk during
an investigation.”

“Was the police chief in conspiracy with the
killers?”

“Certainly not.”

“But he should not have obeyed the KGB? The
prosecutor took a deep breath and adjusted the
jacket on his shoulders. He frowned. “This is a
complex matter with many facets. We want no
stories written just now.

Surely you can understand that an accusation not later
supported by facts would do great damage. To people’s
fights. To human fights. To fight to a fair
trial. Surely you see that, Washington Post.”

Jack Yocke couldn’t believe his luck. He
had expected stony denials and the prosecutor had
denied nothing. And he had implicitly confirmed that
the police chief had obeyed the orders of KGB
officers, technically now Ministry of
Security officers. The reporter decided to fire
his last bullet and pray for a hit.

“Was Nikolai Demodov one of the KGB
officers?”

The reaction was an explosive “Nyet. was
Gregor translated the rest of it. “That’s a
lie. Who told you this lie?”

“It was just a rumor. But you deny it?”

“Absolutely. It’s a lie.”

“Who is Nikolai Demodov9″

But the prosecutor was leaving. He turned his
back and stomped away.

Jack Yocke whipped out his steno pad and
furiously began taking notes.

In the car he asked Gregor, “Who is
Nikolai Demodov?”

“Big man in KGB. Deputy to General
Shmarov.

“And who is Shmarov?”

“Number two man, I think. Little is printed
about top Ministry of Security officers. They are
Old Guard, old Communists loyal to the past.
No-goodniks, most of them.”

“Shmarov is a no-goodnik? That means he’s
anti-Yeltsin, antidemocratic,
doesn’t it?”

The Lada squealed loudly as Gregor braked
to a stop at a red traffic light. He sat
hunched over the wheel staring at the red light on the
pole. “I want more money,” he said with finality.
“You told me you wished to write stories about life
in Russia. Human being interest. You must pay me
more.

Jack Yocke rolled down the passenger window
and dragged a half-bushel of pollution down into his
lungs.

“You have no idea what it means to be
Russian,” Gregor remarked.

The light changed and he popped the clutch and
revved the tiny engine of the little sedan. Beside the car an
army truck kept pace and poured noxious fumes
through Yocke’s open window. The American gagged and
hastily spun the crank.

“Where are we going?” he asked Gregor.

“I don’t know. You haven’t told me.”

Soviet Square, Yocke decided, and informed
his colleague. Gregorjust nodded.

It was a broken-down car with the hood up that gave
Yocke the idea. Cars with open hoods and the
drivers bent over engines that refused
to run were commonplace in Moscow. In a society
without spare parts, without mechanics, without garages,
without service stations, you either fixed it yourself on the
side of the road with parts from junked vehicles or you
left it there to be mined for parts by other motorists.

He explained what he wanted to Gregor, who
again den 176 a manded more money. Yocke
explained about his editor’s parsimony and getting the
expense approved in Washington, Moscow on the
Potomac. Reluctantly Gregor agreed
to help.

As they neared Soviet Square on Gorki
Street Gregor turned the ignition off and let the
car coast to the curb.

Both men got out and raised the hood. Gregor
disconnected the spark plug leads and took the top
off the air filter. T y put their elbows on the
fender and their butts in the air and waite .

A policeman in gray uniform and white hat,
carrying a white traffic baton and wearing a brown
leather holster from which the butt of a small automatic
protruded, arrived in three minutes. Yocke
got busy under the hood and Gregor did the
talking. Two minutes later, when the policeman
wandered away, Gregor summed it up in a
short sentence.

“He was on duty in Red Square the day of the
assassination.

They tried it again around the corner. The cop this time
smoked one of Gregor’s cigarettes and offered
mechanical advice. They finally got the engine
running and drove away waving.

“He heard the transmission over the police
radio. He was one of the ones that left. The name of the
policeman in charge of the radio is Burbulis.”

“We’ll make a reporter of you yet.
Police station.”

It took a lot of talking and cigarettes all
round from the Marlboro carton, but Gregor and
Yocke got in to see Burbulis. He was a chain
smoker with steel teeth. He eyed Yocke
suspiciously.

“I write for the Washington Post, a great
American newspaper,” Gregor translated.
“I am following up a report that your chief is in
trouble with the prosecutor because of the Soviet Square
kfllings.” While Gregor translated this,
Yocke tried to decide how much B urbulis
liked the chief of police. He was praying for a little
professional loyalty even if
Burbulis loathed the man personally.

was Not his fault. I know the men. Good KGB
men. We have worked together many times.”

“Names and addresses,” Yocke told
Gregor, trying to keep the excitement out of his
voice, “Get names and addresses.”

They got three names and one address. And a
lecture about the duty of the police to cooperate with the
proper authorities. “This questioning of police doing
their duty by the prosecutor would never have happened in
the old days,” Burbulis summed up, and sneered.
“Yeltsin has no courage. No respect. He
understands nothing.” Burbulis smashed his fist on the
table and glowered.