James P. Hogan (6 page)

Paradoxically, it was just this that made the present situation so precarious in a different kind of way. At one time, before Khrushchev, communist dogma had held that the capitalists would launch a last, suicidal war rather than submit to the final triumph of Marx’s immutable laws. Now it seemed more likely to happen the other way around: that in desperation, an irrational element in the Soviet leadership might decide to take everyone else down with them if they perceived all to be lost anyway. It was Asia’s armies that stabilized the situation; in turn, their protection was the West’s “Starshield” orbital defensive system. If that shield were destroyed, the entire system of deterrence and containment around the Soviet bloc would disintegrate and set the stage for exactly the kind of last-ditch gamble that the West’s strategic analysts feared most. That was what made knowing the true nature of
Valentina Tereshkova
was so important.

That something big was in the wind, the various intelligence agencies of the US, Western Europe, and Eastern Asia were agreed. Also, it would happen some time within the current year. But what or exactly when, nobody knew. In the eyes of many, the game was nearing its end. But endgames have a perplexing tendency to suddenly go either way. At this stage of this particular endgame, there was no latitude for error.

“I’ll take a copy to read when I get a chance,” Bernard said. Myra activated the audio again and directed the text to be hardcopied in the den. Bernard washed down the last of his toast with some coffee, and rose from his chair. “How are we for time?” he asked.

Myra went to the window and looked down over the tree-lined avenue outside, normally peaceful but busier at this time of the morning with people leaving for work. There was a black Chevrolet parked halfway along the next block. “They’re here,” she said matter-of-factly.

“Damn,” Bernard muttered as Myra helped him on with his jacket. That meant he was running late. The two KGB agents from the Soviet embassy who tailed him every morning always arrived punctually and circled the block three times before parking. He bustled through to the den, picked up the sheets of hardcopied text, and slipped them into his briefcase. When he came back out, Myra was waiting in the hallway with his raincoat.

“You’d better take this,” she said. “It might start raining again later.”

“Thanks, I will.” Bernard took his hat from the stand.

“Oh, and if nothing pressing comes up, remember that Ella and Johnny are coming this evening. I know you wouldn’t want to miss your grandson’s birthday if you can help it.”

“I’ll try not to. What have we bought him?”

“A junior spy kit, of course. It has invisible ink, false beards and mustaches, a codebook and some software to go with it, and a miniature camera. You see, just like the real thing.”

“You mean they haven’t got something for kids to tap into phone lines?”

“Give them time, dear.”

“Okay, I’ll see you later tonight.”

“You too. Have fun today.” Myra kissed him lightly on the cheek and watched from the door at the top of the stairs leading down into the garage as he descended and climbed into his maroon Cadillac. The outside door opened, and he backed out.

Minutes later in the thick of morning traffic streaming toward the Beltway, he caught sight of the KGB car, sitting solidly four places behind him as he swung right off an overpass to take the ramp down to the freeway. Several cars farther back still, just coming across the overpass, was the blue FBI Ford that tailed the KGB every morning. Foleda shook his head as he turned on a piano concerto to relax himself before the working day started. It was all sure as hell a crazy way to run a planet.

Gerald Kehrn was a born worrier. When he was younger he had worried about the things he read that said resources were about to run out. And then when they didn’t run out and scientists began convincing the world that the whole problem had been exaggerated, he had worried that too many resources would produce too many people. When right-wing administrations were in power he worried about conservative fascists and fundamentalists, and with left-wing administrations he worried about liberal fascists and regulators. And of course, he had always worried about a war breaking out; the more time that went by without there being one, the more he worried that because weapons were constantly getting bigger and deadlier, it would be so much the worse when it did. He worried especially about things he didn’t know about, and so tried to keep himself informed about everything. That made him good with details and a useful person to have around, which helped explain how he had made it to a senior position on the staff of the defense secretary. And the position suited him, for if worse did come to worst, he would prefer to be right there in the center of the action – not able to influence the course of events very much, perhaps, but at least knowing what was going on.

As he drove toward the Potomac on his way to the Pentagon on the morning of May 4, an inner foreboding told him that this was the beginning. He wasn’t sure why, for there had been enough diplomatic goofs and intelligence screwups before, and this was hardly the first time the Soviets had nailed a couple of agents. Maybe it was the involvement of Mermaid, which had been taking on such big proportions in everyone’s thinking lately. But something about the situation filled him with the dull, cold certainty that this was the first tripping over the edge into the scrambling, steepening tumble that would take them all the way to the Big One.

Because he worried about being late whenever he had an appointment, he always left early. Hence, none of the others had arrived yet when he got to Foleda’s office. He found Foleda’s operations assistant, Barbara Haynes, a tall, graying but elegant woman in her late forties whom he knew well, and Rose, Foleda’s personal secretary, discussing something being displayed on a screen in the outer room. The strains of some piece of classical music coming through the open door at the rear – Kehrn had no idea what it was; he preferred jazz himself – indicated that Foleda was already ensconced within.

“We heard there was a snarl-up on the George Mason Bridge,” Rose said. “Didn’t think you’d make it so soon.”

“A vegetable truck decided to unload itself there,” Kehrn said. “But I left in good time. It wasn’t so bad.”

“Well, at least the rain’s stopped.”

“I’m glad I came in the other way this morning,” Barbara said.

“Who’s out there?” Foleda’s voice called from inside.

“Gerry Kehrn,” Barbara called back.

“Tell him to come on in. And you might as well come too, Barb. Let’s get our thoughts together before the others start showing up. And now Volst” – who was the secretary of state —” has just been on the line saying he wants a report on the whole thing personally over lunch before the big meeting starts this afternoon. I’ve got the feeling this is gonna be a long day.”

Kehrn went on through, and Barbara followed after exchanging a few final words with Rose. Foleda touched a button below his desk to cut the music and pushed aside some papers he had been reading. “Hi, Gerry.”

“Good morning, Bern. Or is that the wrong thing to say today?”

“Why should it be? – It’s stopped raining. Sit down. Relax. You look worried.”

Kehrn pulled out one of the chairs at the meeting table set at a tee against Foleda’s desk and sat down, placing his briefcase in front of him. Barbara shut the door. “Who wouldn’t be worried?” Kehrn said. “What a goddamn mess.”

“A million years from now it won’t matter,” Foleda assured him.

“Who else have we got coming this morning?” Kehrn asked.

“Pearce and somebody else from State. Zolansky from Operations. Do you know him?”

“We’ve met.”

“Uh-huh. And Uncle Phil will be coming in at around eleven to see where we’re at.” Philip Borden was the UDIA director. Foleda sent an inquiring glance at Barbara.

“Zolansky’s deputy will probably be coming too,” she said, sitting down at the far end of the table.

“But keep your party-joke book in your pocket, Gerry,” Foleda advised. “They won’t be in the mood.”

Kehrn fiddled with the lock of his briefcase and began taking out notebook, compad, and several files. “So what do we have?” he asked. “Anything new?”

Foleda shook his head. “Nothing.”

“What’s the story with Pacific News Services?”

“Forget them. They’re out of it. PNS agreed to being used as cover for a government operation. If our operatives haven’t come back, it’s our problem. The Soviets haven’t lodged any protest with PNS, and PNS isn’t going to go out of its way to pick a quarrel with the Soviets.”

“The Soviets know they were our people, and they’re letting us sweat for a while,” Barbara said. In other words, the Soviet reaction would come via the official channels.

“And there’s been nothing so far through State?” Kehrn checked.

“As Barb says, they’re letting us sweat,” Foleda said. “In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if they let us stew for a lot longer and don’t do anything.”

“You mean, like waiting until we bring the matter up with them.”

“Sure. Let us come crawling. We have to do something. Two of our citizens have disappeared, who were last heard of heading for a Soviet transfer station. Presumably they were caught red-handed committing espionage. Why should the Soviets be in any hurry to come to us?”

“How much trouble are we in with the Air Force?” Kehrn asked Foleda.

“None yet. Bryce was assigned to us for the duration. So far they don’t know bout it.”

Kehrn shuffled some papers aimlessly for a few seconds and fidgeted in his chair. “What, er… what about the two people up there?” he asked at last. “Do we know what to expect?”

“I imagine they’re still up there, and possibly will be for a while. Is that what you meant?”

“I was wondering more, how much are they likely to give away?”

“You’re worried?”

“I’m worried.”

“Well, Lew McCain’s an old hand. You needn’t worry about him,” Foleda said. “He’s worked for me for years. He won’t tell them anything. Even if it’s something that’s obvious and undeniable, he won’t confirm it. That’s the way he is. That’s the way they’re trained.” Foleda’s brow creased and his expression became more serious. “I wish I could say the same about the girl, though. This kind of thing isn’t her specialty. She’s from a different world. I don’t know what to expect there.”

“It’s one of the things we’ll try and get an opinion on from Colonel Raymond up at Hanscom when we’ve figured out how to break the news,” Barbara said.

Kehrn nodded and looked uncomfortable while he wrestled with some new thought. Finally he said, “What are the chances of the Soviets using… well, let’s say, ‘extreme methods’ of interrogation?”

“I can’t see it,” Foleda said. “This whole business has big propaganda potential if the Soviets decide to go public, and they know it. This one they’ll want to play clean for the world to see. They wouldn’t jeopardize their advantage by risking bad counterpublicity.”

“But threats, maybe,” Barbara said.

“That’s something else,” Foleda agreed, nodding. “Threats, implications of nasty things… McCain would read the situation and not be intimidated. But again, with the girl… who knows?”

“We shouldn’t have used her,” Kehrn said. “There had to have been someone else, with the right background as well as the technical know-how. It was a bad decision from the start.”

“Maybe,” Foleda conceded with a sigh. “Somehow I think we’re gonna hear that said a lot of times today.”

A tone sounded from the screen by the desk and Rose’s face appeared. “They’re arriving,” she announced. “Zolansky and his partner are on their way up, and Pearce has checked into the building.”

Foleda glanced at the other two and raised his eyebrows. “Okay, Rose,” he said resignedly to the screen. “You’d better start breaking out the paper hats and squeakers.”

There was a subdued humming sound, and buried within it a periodic resonance that came and went. Lewis McCain lay listening to it with his eyes closed, allowing the preoccupation to keep other thoughts from entering his mind for a few moments longer. He was aware that he had just woken up. The hum, with its rising and falling undertone, was not something familiar. He was not in a place that he was accustomed to waking up in.

He opened his eyes and saw a white ceiling with an air-conditioner vent off to one side of his field of vision. He moved his head to look at it. His head felt muzzy; the image was blurred, and swam. An ache shot between his temples and down the back of his neck as he strained to rise. He abandoned the effort, letting his head fall back on the pillow, and lay for a while until he could breathe more easily. Then he rolled over onto his side and opened his eyes again.

The cot was in a small, windowless, sparsely furnished room containing a plain table and a single upright chair with his clothes draped over them. Above the table was a shelf with some books and a few other oddments. The walls were dark blue up to a black strip running at half height, and cream from there to the ceiling. Slowly his head cleared, and the surroundings registered as the cell he’d been occupying for – how long had it been? three days? four days? – inside the KGB Internal Security Headquarters at Turgenev. The door was solid, with a small grille and sliding panel on the outside, and led out to the corridor. In the opposite corner was a partition screening a tiny washbasin and toilet.

Moving slowly and cautiously, he raised himself onto an elbow. Pain stabbed through his head once more. He held the position this time, and after a few seconds the pain eased. He sat up, pushed the single blanket aside, and lowered his legs over the side of the cot. A wave of dizziness swept over him, then nausea. He braced himself for the effort of having to make a sudden dash to the toilet, but the feeling passed. He pulled on the baggy, beltless pants and canvas shoes he’d been given in place of his own clothes, stood up gingerly, and moved to the table. One of the books on the shelf above was a travelogue about nineteenth-century life among the Yakut hunters. McCain took it down and opened the back cover to reveal three small notches cut into the edge, about an eighth of an inch apart near the top. He pressed a fourth notch with his thumbnail, replaced the book, and went behind the partition to the washbasin to rinse his face. He felt unusually lead-limbed and sluggish when he walked.