The Kremlin Letter (23 page)

“Last night I made contact with the Kitai,” Janis began in total darkness. “A friend of Madame Sophie's set up the meeting. I went to the University Medical Center and walked down four steps to a basement door labeled Staff Clinic. There was a waiting room. There were two peasant women sitting there. The time was approximately ten-thirty last night. The man behind the desk looked Oriental. Most likely Chinese. I should have expected that. I gave him the code as I was instructed. I told him my doctor had told me to be there at ten and that I was twenty-two minutes late. He asked me who my doctor was. I told him it was Dr. Kitai. He said he had no one by that name. Then I handed him the piece of paper and said maybe I was mispronouncing it. The orderly got up and left. He was gone maybe five minutes. When he returned he told me to go down the hall to the third door on the left.

“The Kitai looked more Mongolian than Chinese. His skin was more brown than yellow. He had a flat face and a broad, pushed-in nose. His eyes looked rather webbed at the corner. I couldn't tell how old he was. He was wearing a bluish-gray hospital jacket. He didn't talk much, but when he did you could see that two of his bottom front teeth were made of some metal. Not gold, but sort of a dull silver. Bottom right front teeth. He never stood up but he looked tall, maybe six feet. He spoke perfect Russian.

“He said he had heard I was interested in buying some new medicine. I said that was wrong, that I was interested in selling. If he was surprised he didn't seem to show it. I confessed I had made contact to him by saying I was a buyer, but that I really wanted to sell. He asked me where the medicine came from. ‘By way of Turkey,' I told him. He asked when he could see some. I had the heroin in a small cigarette case. I gave it to him. He looked at it, rolled it in his fingers. He smelled his fingers. Then he tasted the stuff and asked me what I was interested in. “A distribution arrangement,” I told him. He asked me how much medicine I had. I told him as much as he needed. He closed the case and gave it back to me and said that he was not equipped to handle a large operation. I told him I had plenty of men. He said that wasn't the point, that Moscow just wasn't conducive to widespread activities. I asked if that was because of no customers. He said that it was because of the police. I asked if it had ever been tried on a large scale. He said it had, six or seven years ago. I asked why it had failed.

“I noticed him freeze a little when I said that. He tried to size me up again and asked me why I was concerned about that. I told him if I didn't work out a deal with him I'd go elsewhere or do it on my own. I wanted to know everything I could about it. He said he still might be interested and I said I still wanted to know what broke up the first ring. He said it was a Russian officer from the Third Department, a Colonel Kosnov. He arrested a Chinese by the name of Chang who ran the operation. There was a Russian involved too, but he got away. He said nothing had worked since that time. I told him I was willing to take the risk. I asked him if he was going to come in with me or would I have to start on my own.

“‘I am interested,' he said, ‘but if you're in a hurry begin by yourself. I will give you a few contacts. When I find out more about you then perhaps we will talk again.'”

They reached the site of the accident in the midafternoon. The truck lay on its side in a gully some sixty yards below the road. It had missed a turn in the storm, crashed into the abyss, caught fire, and burned itself out before the snow covered it. Kosnov's agents lowered him into the gully. Two bodies were frozen solid inside the cab. Both were burned beyond recognition. The corpse in the driver's seat still clung to the steering wheel. The other one lay on its side against the door. Kosnov noticed that the left thumbnail of each cadaver was completely missing, while the other nine nails were only charred. They were closer to Vorkuta than Kara, so Kosnov ordered the bodies taken there for autopsies. They drove behind the ambulance until they reached the city.

Vorkuta had been the site of Stalin's most infamous prison camp. During his reign tens of thousands of prisoners had perished from cold and hunger alone in this northern wasteland. During the Khrushchev era the camp was disbanded and the area redeveloped for settlement. Although the hospital was primitive it was still modern by Vorkuta's standards. The doctors were able to establish the age of the, man behind the wheel as about sixty. The dental work on his teeth was either British or American. His hands were too badly burned to take clear fingerprints. Preliminary specimens indicated that he may have been suffering from intestinal cancer. The interior walls of his heart showed definite signs of scar tissue. From a preliminary examination he appeared to fit the description of the Highwayman.

Fingerprints were obtained from the second body. They corresponded to those in Kosnov's file on Charles Rone. So did the dental chart. The dental work was either British or American.

Kosnov decided that they should spend the rest of the night in Vorkuta and leave for Moscow early the next morning. He slept fitfully. Most of the time he lay in bed smoking and thinking about Erika. A final resolution was needed. He had two choices. Marry her or do away with her. In either case their relationship would be finalized. Marriage would be complicated. The legal problems alone were almost insurmountable, not to mention the political and social reactions. He would have to make up his mind. He could not continue as he had.

Kosnov was able to relax on the plane to Moscow. As they passed over Kotlos he managed to fall asleep. After several hours he awoke.

“Do you think those are our men?” he asked Grodin.

“It seems so.”

“You feel they might not be, eh?”

“No, I think they are the men we were looking for. It's just why they would come in through Kara that puzzles me.”

“Forget that. What I want to know is, do you think we can prove they are the agents? Could we prove that those two burned bodies are the men we were looking for?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Then we have no worries. Our department is secure from—shall we say—official Kremlin observers who are interested in the Polakov case. We should congratulate each other. We are no longer in the middle. We have done our job efficiently. When we get back you can call off the search for foreign agents. Send official commendations to the area chiefs and single out Potkin for some special award or other.”

“Will we now concentrate on Polakov's contact?” asked Grodin casually.

Kosnov laughed. “Tell your father-in-law not to worry. We won't go into that for a while. When we do, I won't start with him. No, Grodin, our immediate worries are over. I haven't felt this good since I was twenty.”

25

The Fourth Grave

“So you think this brings Kosnov further into the picture, do you?” asked Ward as they reviewed Janis' report on their walk.

“It's possible. We know that Polakov and Kosnov met in Paris just after the letter was delivered. Now there is the chance that they had known each other since 1956. When the narcotics business Polakov and Chang were running in Russia was broken by Kosnov, only the Chinese was caught. Uncle Morris said that Polakov got away because the French helped him out. Maybe they did, and maybe they didn't. Maybe Kosnov let him off. Maybe they were cooking something up even then.”

“Mighty interesting thought, Nephew,” Ward said pensively. “It would explain how Kosnov found those two agents sent from England so easily—they were supposed to see him in the first place.”

“And it could also explain why Polakov was afraid to make the last trip into Moscow. It's not too easy to avoid your contact when he has the entire counterespionage department at his disposal.”

“Well, we just better put him on the probable list until we find out a little more.”

Ward led Rone along a line of vending stands beside the exhibition hall. He checked his watch and purchased two sodas.

“Sip slowly,” he said, handing a bottle to Rone.

“Why?”

“Because we got a visitor. I decided to take some of your advice.”

The doors of the building opened and a mass of men and women, each wearing a white identification card, swarmed out onto the street.

Rone spotted Professor Buley pushing his way toward them with an ice-cream bar in his hand. His lapel card read:

INTERNATIONAL NON-VIOLENCE CONVENTION

J. W. Booth

Observer—Canada

The Puppet Maker stopped a foot or two beyond Rone and Ward, turned his back to them and began eating his ice cream.

“The Whore's in business again,” Ward said softly. “He needs clients from the embassies. He needs them fast. Get Uncle Morris off her fat tweed ass in Prague. Nephew's got a brain-buster too.”

Rone felt Buley back into him as he began talking. “Get a movement check on the top four or five hundred Moscow politicos. Match it against Polakov's travel record. See if anything corresponds.”

Buley, still licking his ice cream, moved back toward the convention hall.

“Button our top button,” he whispered to Rone as he passed. “Russians seldom leave their top shirt button undone.”

Ward and Rone finished their drinks and headed up the street.

“Well, Nephew, feel better now?”

“I think it was a good idea,” Rone answered.

“You got lots of good ideas. I'm even going to use another one of 'em. Janis is moving in with Madame Sophie and the Warlock's bunking down with that instructor friend who picked him up. You and me will stay on at Potkin's for the time being.”

“What about B.A.?”

“She goes in with the pickpocket.”

Rone tried to hide his grimace.

“Leave that morality of yours back in New England, Nephew, it gets in the way out here. The girl goes where we need her the most. Now run on home. I got to get a Good Humor route started.”

“Good Humor?”

“I'm pushing dope for Janis.”

B.A. would not talk or look at him. Rone could think of nothing to say. They walked more than two miles through the cold, cloudy night before reaching the cemetery and slipping through a break in the wooden fence. The gray cement-block office building was unattended. Rone jimmied the window and boosted B.A. through. Time passed slowly.

“Four plots are listed under the name of Polakov,” she told him when she came out. “There were no first names or dates, but the ink looked fresh. The cards were probably written in the last few months.”

They made their way cautiously along the funereal arbored paths until finding the sites. There were only three graves. The mounds were fresh. A simple wooden marker on each read: Polakov. Rone examined the fourth plot alongside the last grave. It looked as if digging had been started and then the dirt replaced and tramped firm.

He was still kneeling and absently rubbing the soil between his fingers when B.A. gently put her hands on his back.

“I don't care what they make me do or who I have to live with, I only love you.”

Rone turned to her in time to see the solitary tear slide down her cheek. He pulled her to him.

The Warlock had moved into the instructor's apartment as an out-of-town colleague. All he could report was that the instructor's wife was a good cook and his children were rather precocious. Everything else was slow. The homosexual society of Moscow was cautious.

Ward's area was the most difficult. The addict does not like the pusher; he or she simply needs him. Confidences are not exchanged. Yet the addict has one overriding weakness—when his need grows great enough he will do almost anything to satisfy the appetite. Ward would have to wait and watch.

The Warlock accompanied the instructor to a dinner party at the apartment of a secretary to one of the cultural ministries. The Warlock was not allowed to know just what ministry, since discretion, at least job discretion, was uppermost in the minds of this particular group of Russian men. It was here that Polakov was mentioned.

“They say that Kosnov has married,” Dmitri said confidentially. He turned to his host. “They say that his wife was once married to the traitor Polakov.”

“Ilyushka Polakov?” asked the host. He was a thin young man in his mid-thirties. A pair of rimless glasses perched on his fragile nose.

“Yes, did you know him?”

“Why—why yes. I'd met him. I mean I really didn't know him, but I'd seen him.”

“Don't hide anything naughty from us, Rudolf. As I recall, you were questioned when he was caught.”

“That is very unfair of you, Dmitri. Very, very unfair,” said Rudolf nervously. “You know quite well everyone in my department was questioned—not just me. This Polakov creature had come to certain lectures at the University—that's where I met him. Everyone was questioned about him. It was a—a most hideous experience.” The host rubbed his forehead tensely.

“You shouldn't tease Rudolf so,” said the instructor. “We all know what he went through at the time. We can't be held accountable for everyone we might casually come in contact with.”

The others agreed. They felt ashamed. They apologized to Rudolf.

“Anyway,” Rudolf pointed out, “I doubt if it could be the same man. I mean the traitor, Ilya Polakov. The man they questioned me about wasn't supposed to be married.”

There was something about the way Rudolf pronounced the name “Ilya” that caught the Warlock's attention. The party continued with a literary discussion on current Soviet writers.

“I tell you that Osip Mandelstam is our greatest contemporary poet,” one of the guests asserted dogmatically.

“Then why don't we see any of his new work? I admit he was brilliant in the thirties. What has he done since?”

“Only written some of the greatest poetry ever to come from a Russian.”

“You've read them?” asked the instructor in awe.