Breakthrough (The Red Gambit Series) (42 page)

The Spaniard laughed the sort of laugh that does not have humour at its heart.

“
Don’t be too modest
,
Colonel. Your role
in my country
is well known.”

For a man wearing many
dangerous
hats
,
such statements can be very worrying
,
and Vaspatin felt a momentary icy stab in his heart.

“You are
Soviet
Military Intelligence, this we know well
,
Colonel.
”

Franco looked at his guest with genuine puzzlement.

“
You didn’t think we didn’t know did you?”

Vaspatin smiled and shrugged, relieved that only part of his clandestine world was known.

“Now, we will see if any of the German swine have survived
,
and what they might tell of us of their reasons.”

The
GRU/
NKVD
officer
went to speak but was cut short by an imperious hand.

“We know what you have told us, at the behest and direction of your superiors of course.”

The last of Franco’s juice disappeared
,
and a waiter attempting a third refill was waved away.

“We want to hear what these assassins have to say for themselves.”

An aide walked briskly in and whispered in the Dictator’s ear.

“Good.”

Rising from the table and slipping into the jacket held by one of his personal valets
,
Franco concluded the discussion.

“
One of the assassins is still alive. We will question him.
If things are as you state, then
Spain
will not get involved in your war
,
Colonel Vaspatin.
Thank you again and good day.
”

Franco left the room
at speed
, leaving behind a worried man
.
A man who
had not expected any survivors to interfere with the plan to take
Spain
out of the war.

As the Caudillo’s car swept out of the Presidential Palace, this time containing the genuine article, another car parked inconspicuously
some miles away, pulling into a concealed shady spot
on the Calle del Sur in Majadahonda
.
T
wo men in civilian clothing walked briskly to the railway station
intent on
board
ing the next
north
west
-
bound train.

The
ir
Peugeot had been dumped, pushed into the Arroyo de Trofa
R
iver
before the men had used their ‘clean’ vehicle to drive to
the ten kilometres to the station. The second
‘clean’
vehicle had not followed the Peugeot into the water
,
despite the contingency plan, both men wishing to give any surviving comrades the best possible chance.

Nazarbayev and Horn both knew something had gone wrong
, in the same way as they both now accepted that no-one else from the team was coming back.

Despite the large number of people travelling that day t
heir compartment
was empty, save for themselves. T
hey were able to talk
about events
softly in Russian, and more loudly
about the weather
in
German
,
on the occasion
s
that someone strolled past the glass
between them and
the corridor.

Both
took
it
in turns to have a nap as t
he stations rolled
gently by. T
he pair
were both wide awake by the time that
Valladolid
materialised out of the sunny haze.

Dismounting from the train together
,
they quickly oriented themselves
, drawing on the
briefing they had received
,
and, identifying the main entrance, proceeded out through the arches into the Calle del Recondo, their eyes adjusting to the
strong
sunlight.

Moving
a few metres
left to the end of the main
entrance
they
waited in
a return, where the front recessed back, indulging in cigarettes as they waited for their contact.

Both were still alert and took in their surroundings with practicised eyes, noting objects and people, ticking off possible threats as each was processed through their brain.

Neither man saw anything except that which it was intended that they should see, although perhaps they should have noted that the shoeshine spent all his time on the left foot of his customer, and that the same customer had his newspaper on his lap rather than reading it or indulging in conversation.

The man and woman with the pram
stood side by side, facing the station and gazing down at their silent child, Nazarbayev was just starting to ask himself questions when
he spotted
a
huge
man holding a white suitcase
starting to cross the road
.

Their contact halted to let the Spanish Ar
m
y truck move past and then mounted the pavement, making directly for the two agents.

“Excuse me
,
Señors, can you tell me the time of the next train to
Madrid
?”

He delivered a perfectly executed pass
phrase
.

“So sorry, Señor, We don’t know.
W
e are from
German Nationals from Corunna,
here on business.”

Satisfied with the reply,
the man placed his suitcase on the ground and stepped back. It had only taken
ten seconds but a lot had happened whilst the two were distracted.

Where there had been a shoeshine
and customer there were no
w two men
holding pistols
. The husband and wife had similarly transformed into armed threats, both covering the Russians with their
handguns
.

The Army truck disgorged a dozen men in
half
as many seconds.

Both
Soviet
agents
no longer had
weapons and
were faced with an unpalatable decision. Nazarbayev reached into his
jacket
pocket for his papers, expressing his indignation in the chosen language of the mission.

S
uddenly
both
men
were on the ground
,
as their legs were wrecked by bullets from the
four
Spanish Intelligence Service officers. The soldiers quickly descended upon the stricken pair,
checking them for weapons,
before roughly picking them up and slinging them aboard the truck.

Shocked onlookers were being encouraged to move on
,
even as the two medics in the truck started to work on their charges, tasked only with keeping them alive for what was to come.

Nazarbayev and Horn lay side by side, the pain increasing
as the vehicle
bounced on the rough roads, picking
up speed on its way to the military hospital.

Horn attempted to rise but felt
a
stab in his side as an eager young soldier used his bayonet to dissuade him.

He rolled his head towards
the moaning
Nazarbayev
,
who nodded his goodbyes to his comrade.

Within seconds
,
both men had
used their tongues to free the capsules
Vaspatin had given them.

Horn bit on his capsule and
ingested
a
small
dose of Potassium C
yanide
. This entered his digestive tract and
reacted with his stomach acid, producing
fatal
Hydrogen Cyanide. He jerked a few times as the poison penetrated his system and then settled, dying within
ninety
seconds.

Oleg Nazarbayev, twin brother of Vladimir
,
and youngest surviving son of Yuri and Tatiana,
dropped into unconsciousness and failed in his act of self-destruction, the shoeshine boy sliding rough fingers into his mouth and hooking out the suicide pill
.

Horn
would take his secrets to the rough grave in which the Spanish later threw his body,
whereas two of his comrades
remained alive to be tortured and interrogated
at
painful length about the German raison
d’être
for the attack on Franco
,
as well
as
to answer questions on incriminating evidence found in their hotel room
, from
planning notes of El Pardo in G
erman through to
Maria Paloma’s personal diary
graphically detailing
her earthy expectations for
few hours of romantic liaison with a handsome
young
German
.

After local medical treatment,
Oleg Nazarbayev
was
flown
from
Valladolid
to
join Prisoner Meyer in
an innocuous building next a military airbase in the Cuatro Vientos ward of
Madrid
. Dwelling within an overt military security wall
,
the small building regularly entertained enemies of the state
.

Three days later
,
a Spanish
soldier
distributed
lunch according to the normal routine
but,
acting under instructions from
his
NKVD
paymaster
,
also
gave each man
new
means to end their lives.

Nazarbayev,
suffering badly from his wounds
,
was tended by physicians, anxious to nurse him back to health.

Meyer, in a bad way, his recently fractured skull bringing as much pain
as the torture, had already told all he knew. That the
team spoke
only spoke in German or Spanish, that
four
of the agents had arrived separately to
his group
, and a female agent had delivered their uniforms. He had screamed out the details of the ambush plan as his genitals were subjected to a cr
ushing attack by weighty pliers
.

The agent
managed to wait the requested
time, a
delay
to permit the guard to be out of immediate suspicion,
consuming
his deadly dose of Potassium Cyanide
during the mid-
afternoon siesta
,
before the Spanish
C
aptain could start work on his
remaining
testicle.

Alarm bells rang and other men immediately ran to
Nazarbayev’s
sick bed
, intending to stop a repeat performance.
At the first sound of running
feet,
Oleg, weakened by a systemic inf
ection
,
had instinctively known that his comrade had taken his own life and followed suit,
convulsing on
his bunk as keys rattled in the door.

Sat in his office
,
Beria
read the R
ezident’s report, sent
‘E
yes only
’
the previous evening.

It seemed that the decision made by Stalin and himself had done all that was desired, as
Spain
was about to openly declare her neutrality
,
on the basis of the recent German-sponsored assassination attempt on the life of the Caudillo.

Rather than simply cut off the head, the reasoning
had been
that it could even be possible to turn Spanish views around
,
and make the country more sympathetic to the Communist cause, particularly in
the light of the excellent assistance provided by the Russian Intelligence Services in foiling the recent plot.