No Time for Heroes (31 page)

The two government officials appeared to have withdrawn, leaving the questioning to the trained lawyer. Danilov was uneasy at the prosecutorial questioning. Why? he thought again. He had the sudden fear Pavin was being edged towards a concession, but couldn't think what there was to concede.

Smolin went briefly back to where he had first been sitting, picked up several sheets of paper, and carried them back to Danilov and Pavin. ‘These will be indexed, like everything else?'

Danilov had never seen any of them before.

The sheets were all dated on the fifteenth of the month, the day Ignatov's body was found in the river. The first was a memorandum from Vladimir Kabalin, acknowledging his appointment as senior investigator into the murder of Ivan Ignatsevich Ignatov and suggesting to the Director that because of the man's existing knowledge and involvement, Major Yuri Pavin be seconded as operational scene-of-crime officer at the river bank, in addition to Aleksai Raina, to organise all the necessary and essential routine. There was a reply, signed by Metkin, agreeing. A third sheet, from Kabalin to Pavin, contained detailed instructions that the entire area be sealed for scientific examination.

Danilov felt satisfaction, the first of a switchback of emotions he was to experience that day, sweep over him. He'd taken just the right precautions, without knowing why, to expose this whole charade as the evidence tampering it was. He remained utterly impassive, handing page after page to Pavin in the order in which he'd read them. Danilov knew Pavin was apprehensively respectful of authority, and would be awed in the presence of ranked officialdom, being questioned by the Federal Prosecutor; he ached for a way to let the man know there was no danger.

Pavin was red with confusion. He looked helplessly at Danilov, then back to the three officials. Stumbling again, Pavin said: ‘This can't be. This never happened. I don't understand …'

Much as he wanted to, Danilov decided he couldn't intervene yet, not until he'd fully gauged the manoeuvre against them.

Smolin was back at the table, standing by the dossiers like a conjuror behind boxes from which inexplicable magic would be produced. ‘These are your files, brought by yourselves today. Come …!' He beckoned Pavin, imperiously. ‘… Each memorandum is numbered. Locate it in the index. Then find its cross-reference …!'

Pavin stood but hesitated, and Danilov agonised at the appearance of the man physically holding back. When he did move, it was reluctantly. As he made the examination, the head-shaking bewilderment grew and he looked helplessly again at Danilov. ‘… It's properly done! As I do it! But I
didn't
do it! I was never ordered to seal the area: work with Colonel Kabalin and Raina. These orders, these messages, never came to me …!'

‘You received orders you did not carry out,' accused Oskin, re-entering the discussion.

‘The ill feeling between yourself and some members of the Organised Crime Bureau is obvious,' said Vorobie, speaking to Danilov again. ‘We have conducted a lengthy enquiry with Director Metkin. He believes – as we believe – that because you were passed over for the directorship, you gave telephone instructions from Washington to ignore essential routine to create precisely the sort of embarrassment that arose, to discredit your department and him …'

It was a much cleverer and much more devious effort than they had tried before. Would this be all Metkin had fabricated? Or would there be more? He'd been excluded from the arrest of Mikhail Antipov, then entrusted with the so-far failed interrogation, which didn't make complete sense. Danilov decided to limit his defence until he was sure there was nothing else. It would still be a staggering counter-accusation to make.

He cleared his throat, not wanting to appear uncertain. ‘Your accusation – the accusation of Director Metkin – is entirely without foundation or substance. The files in this case have been fraudulently tampered with, altered to include documentation invented to conceal either total incompetence or an attempt to discredit Major Pavin and myself! All of which I can categorically prove …'

He welcomed the utter astonishment of the three men facing them. Further awareness came to Danilov. This
had
to be the make-or-break confrontation between himself and Metkin: if he was going to survive, he had to make the rebuttal utterly devastating. He pointed to the stacked table.

‘Those
are
our files. And because we were given no warning of what to expect this morning, you will accept we had no opportunity – or reason – to change them to support any defence we might make. They don't, in fact, support us: they damn us …'

‘What's your point?' broke in Smolin. The lawyer's voice had lost its attack. It was neutral, less sure than a few moments earlier.

‘Retain them until I produce a true copy.'

‘You have a copy …?' broke in Smolin, again.

Before Danilov could reply, Vorobie demanded: ‘Why?'

The moment of positive commitment, Danilov recognised: there would be no retreat, no place of safety if he got anything wrong. He wouldn't disclose his duplication of Serov's documents, which still had to be tested. If he'd believed in God Danilov would have thanked Him for the decision, that first day back from Washington, to safeguard himself the way he'd devised there.

‘Anatoli Nikolaevich Metkin should
not
be the Director of the Organised Crime Bureau. He is incompetent, promoted beyond his capability … someone prepared to falsify and lie to remain in office and try to destroy others he regards as a threat …'

Astonishment stayed on every face, even Pavin's.

‘The start of the investigation into the Ignatov killing was chaotic, completely disorganised and completely justifying the American complaint,' resumed Danilov. ‘I believed a cover-up would be attempted, which is why, unknown even to Major Pavin, I have maintained duplicate records of every official communication in this case … I consider an enquiry should be held into the actions of General Anatoli Metkin' – Danilov allowed a final pause – ‘both during his directorship, and as a Militia colonel of investigation before that.'

Both Sergei Vorobie and the Federal Prosecutor were looking at Oskin, the man representing the ministry to which the Militia was answerable. ‘How long will it take for you to produce your evidence?'

‘An hour,' promised Danilov.

‘Time to summon Director Metkin,' said Oskin.

‘I suggest senior Colonel Vladimir Kabalin also be included,' said Danilov.

In the car, returning to Petrovka, Pavin said: ‘Where have you kept the copy memoranda?'

‘Among all my other files that irritate you so much, because of the mess.'

‘It won't be there,' predicted Pavin gloomily. ‘They'll have gone through everything!'

But it was. Danilov looked up triumphantly at Pavin, who had gone to his exhibits. The man was standing by the open safe.

‘The gun,' said Pavin, his voice choked with disbelief. ‘It's not here! It's gone!'

The surveillance by the New York Task Force was kept on the house near La Guardia, but no-one returned. The telephone tap heard nothing. The public records search through the boroughs of Queens and Brooklyn did not produce any of the other names Petr Serov had coded, in his Washington office. None of them had been accorded a Social Security number.

‘I'm damned glad we're not up there,' said Rafferty. ‘It's turning out to be one great big dead end. Harsh words are going to be spoken and ability questioned.'

Unaware of what was going to erupt in the next twenty-four hours, Johannsen said: ‘It ain't going any better in Moscow, either. The only lucky guys are us, in this nice little backwater.' He looked up, curiously, at Rafferty's failure to reply.

The other man was standing at the table, the photographs that had been taken from Rimyans' living room laid out before him. He looked up at last, frowning. ‘I think we're missing something,' he declared seriously.

‘What?' demanded Johannsen.

‘If I knew that we wouldn't be missing it, asshole!'

The summons from the Interior Ministry had been made by telephone, and the two men had left the Bureau headquarters before the return of Danilov and Pavin.

‘The reaction is too quick!' insisted Kabalin. He was driving because they wanted to talk out of the presence of a driver.

‘What was there to take any time?' said Metkin. ‘The documents are unchallengeable.'

‘Why both of us?'

‘You were the officer in charge.'

‘Acting on your instructions.'

Metkin frowned at the man. ‘Don't do or say anything foolish, will you, Vladimir Nikolaevich?'

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

It was Danilov's first intention to say nothing about the missing Makarov, to allow time for a proper internal enquiry and search. Just as quickly he realised, like he realised a lot of other things, that the gun would never be found. And watching their initial frantic hunt and then insisting she had seen no-one open the safe was Ludmilla Radsic, who, if questioned by others which she undoubtedly would be, would provide the precise time he had discovered the gun had gone to prove he had withheld the information. The momentary concentration upon the woman prompted another thought and he almost asked her a quite different question, but stopped himself until he was sure.

‘What are we going to do?' demanded Pavin. The normally unshakable man was white with bewilderment, moving around the room without direction, touching and shifting things as if he expected suddenly to find the missing evidence.

‘Go back to the ministry,' said Danilov calmly.

‘But this means …'

‘… that everything's collapsed.' It was as much a remark for the woman's benefit – and satisfaction – as to stop Pavin blurting out something Danilov didn't want her to hear. Danilov was thinking even further ahead now, itemising what could be salvaged. A lot, he decided. Not everything – and not by far the most important thing – but a lot.

Pavin was still too confused fully to agree when Danilov tried to talk through the implications of the missing Makarov on their way back to the ministry. He wasn't able to provide an answer to Danilov's query about Ludmilla Radsic, either.

‘It's all or nothing,' Pavin complained.

‘It's that anyway,' Danilov said. ‘It always has been.'

‘It's the system to accept, unquestionably, the word of the superior officer.'

Just survive
. Lapinsk's words, remembered Danilov. Now he was sure he could. He said: ‘That's just it! That's the way Metkin and Kabalin think: their mistake. That's
why
we can win!'

‘Only if the others will hear you out.'

‘They'll have to, whether they like it or not,' insisted Danilov. ‘It can't be kept internal; swept away. The Americans will have to be told the gun has vanished.'

‘It was in our custody,' said Pavin miserably. ‘My custody.'

‘I can do it!' Danilov said adamantly.

Despite its lavishness, Vorobie's office was inadequate for the enlarged meeting. Metkin and Kabalin were waiting in a larger conference room, with the Federal Prosecutor and the two government officials.

‘I hope there's good reason for keeping us waiting?' demanded the Interior Ministry man.

‘There is,' announced Danilov at once. ‘The Makarov found by the river, with Antipov's fingerprints, has disappeared.'

Smolin's mouth actually fell open and stayed like that for several moments: Vorobie turned to look at Oskin, as if he'd misheard and expected the other man to correct the misunderstanding. Kabalin frowned. Any facial movement from Metkin was lost in the already creased features.

‘What!' managed Smolin, finally.

‘Major Pavin checked the evidence safe, while I was collecting this,' said Danilov, gesturing with his true copy of the communications register. ‘The gun has gone.'

‘That can't be!' said Oskin weakly.

‘It is,' said Danilov. He had to anticipate every move and counter-accusation likely to come from the other two Militia officers. He wanted them confused, making mistakes in their eagerness to make their charges.

‘The evidence exhibits are your responsibility,' intruded Metkin at once.

Good, thought Danilov: from the fatuous exchanges on the day of their return from Washington, he knew the more Metkin tried to advance an unsound argument, the more he exposed his weakness: the man's reasoning and manoeuvring
was
too deeply embedded in the past. ‘I accept that: as I accept the dossiers are entirely my responsibility.'

The apparently full admission caused the baffled curiosity Danilov wanted. This time Metkin's frown was discernible.

‘You admit it?' demanded Vorobie.

‘I want it
understood
,' qualified Danilov. ‘Like I want it understood that is why the written records have been altered and the gun has disappeared. To discredit me and bring about my dismissal.'

‘I don't know anything about records being altered,' said Metkin. ‘Those records prove without question either incompetence or insubordinate refusal to follow others. I don't need to describe to anyone here what the loss of the murder weapon means.'

‘Without the gun, Antipov can't be charged: brought before a court,' said the Federal Prosecutor anyway, as if he couldn't believe what he was being forced to say. ‘The gun, with unarguable fingerprints,
was
the evidence.'

‘Which the Americans will have to be told,' agreed Danilov. ‘It's difficult to imagine their reaction to this. Proof, if any more were needed, of official complicity, to prevent a proper police enquiry …' Time now to switch, to bury the bastards under the weight of their own misjudgements. ‘… The enquiry into the Ignatov killing was deliberately mishandled, at its outset. Since then every effort has been made by the Director of the Organised Crime Bureau flagrantly to obstruct it. There should be a thorough and complete enquiry into that determined attempt to disgrace and discredit the department, together with myself and Major Pavin.' Had he left anything out? If he had, it was too late now. The abyss was yawning before him, bottomless. He wasn't frightened. He supposed he should be.