‘Have you heard of a man called Ferenc Heltai?’ Kirov asked.
Lucas looked up. He was tired and uninterested. ‘No,’ he answered. ‘Is he important?’
The apartment slept. A clock chimed. Kirov smoked a cigarette and looked out of the window into the inimical street, wondering if Heltai was keeping watch. Spying involved a playful malice when the victim was ready to be taken. Why not hang on a little longer for the kill? You never know who else may turn up. One more for the pot! But he knew that Heltai was not there — not yet. Heltai was at the Aquarium, still speculating whether he had left Kirov dead at the Darvitsky Reserve and husbanding the limited resources GRU disposed of for internal surveillance. For the moment circumstances dictated an economy of force on both sides, but that could easily change. In the meantime, sleep and thoughts of treachery.
Neville Lucas was bemused by treachery, by how easily it had come to him and by the way it left him with a longing for friends and loyalty with the pain of an amputated limb. ‘It’s a matter of security,’ he explained as the train went round and round hypnotically. ‘Here — so far away,’ but he didn’t say from where or what. From Torquay with its mackerel boats and penny arcades and its station on the Great Western Railway for ever beyond the reach of his toy trains? In a lucid moment he explained that treachery changed everything. The ground beneath your feet crumbled and never became as firm again: not friends nor a new home ever gave you the same old certainties. So, if the quality of friendship did nothing for you, try quantity. Peddle your stories around the Moscow bars and buy new friends with an old tale, a photograph of a more-or-less famous spy and a bogus promise to use your influence with the legion of little men who will always do a favour for a pal. Not all that different from Viktor really. Later, when Lucas slept, Kirov checked the bedroom to make sure that he had not slipped treasonably away to buy the love of some more friends — Ferenc, have I got a tale for you! Lucas and the woman were folded about each other in a ruck of bedclothes, each stealing comforting body heat from the other so that you could watch them and envy them.
He dreamt of holidays, of the rain-swept promenade in front of the hotel in Riga where he had sat drinking mineral water with Uncle Kolya and Ferenc Heltai. He wondered if Torquay were like that. He worried about what to do with Neville Lucas and Nadezhda Dmitrievna.
In his dreams Kirov went into the bedroom and massacred the couple as they slept.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Bogdanov met him in the departure hall at Vnukovo in the lively crowd of Armenians, Azerbaijanis, Georgians, Ossetians and other free-spending southerners who had just unloaded their goods in the Moscow private market and were now happy and looking forward to warmer places. He brought tickets, money, identity papers and clothing. He explained sourly, ‘I paid for these from my own pocket. I could hardly bill Radek for them.’
Kirov asked him, ‘How good are the papers?’
‘They look OK but for all I know they could have been lifted from a stiff. Don’t flash them around too much in case they ring a bell.’
‘Where did you get them?’
‘From Yuri the Bazaar — we’re friends again. He tells me they’re kosher but there are some people who say he’s not an honest man.’
‘What about Craig’s dossier?’
‘I’ve got Krapotkin working on it. Crashing into a closed file on the First Chief Directorate’s system isn’t easy. I can’t make promises.’
‘I know that,’ Kirov said comfortingly. He thought that Bogdanov looked exhausted even if he wore a glued-on grin that said he wasn’t. Why does he stick by me? When Kirov was gone, Bogdanov would be left to field Radek, nod and agree with him that it was a mystery where Kirov had vanished to. And then there was Heltai; but Heltai was unknowable. ‘Good luck,’ Kirov said, and grasped Uncle Bog’s forearm.
The passengers boarded the plane, bundled their warm clothes and their parcels into the racks and settled into the cramped seats. There was an atmosphere of good humour in the cabin except for the tail section where most of the Russians were sitting. Kirov found himself next to a cheerful Georgian who had done good business in the city and pressed him to share a bottle of Ararat brandy. His companion was still talking business and hospitality in equal proportions after take-off when a stewardess emerged from the crew cabin to check the passengers.
At first Kirov paid her no attention. She walked the length of the plane, disposed of the passengers and turned to walk back. She found a hand in her way. ‘Please, comrade,’ she said and her uninterested face looked down.
‘Hello, Nadia,’ said Kirov.
She stood for a moment without expression, barely appearing to register his presence. Then two pale flush spots showed beneath her make-up. Her eyes looked uncertainly aside before focusing on his, and her mouth, which had been limp with boredom, hesitated then formed a faint smile.
‘You gave me a surprise, comrade investigator.’
Kirov had forgotten the lies he had told her about his role and it seemed for a second that she was talking to someone else. He glanced away reflexively but saw only his fellow passenger who had blanched at the mention of his rank. ‘You surprised me too,’ he said at last.
‘Did I? After all, this is my job: I’m supposed to be here. And you…’
‘Pyotr Andreevitch.’
‘Pyotr Andreevitch…. You have business in Tbilisi?’
‘Something like that. Do you fly this route often?’
‘Fairly often,’ she answered calmly, as if to annoy him.
He returned her even tone. ‘Is that how you met Viktor?’
‘I met Viktor in Moscow. I’ve told you that already.’
‘You said you were introduced to him by someone you met on a plane. That someone — he was a passenger on this route?’
‘I forget. Why do you ask?’
‘I may know him.’
‘There are a lot of people. It’s not likely.’
‘No,’ Kirov agreed. ‘Unless, of course, he was one of my friends. Georgi Gvishiani — do you know him? He often flies between Tbilisi and Moscow.’
Nadia Mazurova hesitated. Kirov saw the lie in her eyes and her lips taste it. She prepared herself for a glib answer, then something held her back and in avoiding him she looked down at his hand which rested flat against a panel of her skirt.
‘I have things to do,’ she said, picking the hand up and delivering it back to him. She disappeared into the crew cabin and reappeared only at the end of the flight when, passing down the aisle, she left him with a note on which was written one word: Tamara.
He took a bus from the airport to the central bus station and a cab from the Verei Bridge to Rustaveli Prospekt where he was deposited under the sycamores and the damp Georgian sky outside the small Intourist hotel. He checked in at the desk and asked the clerk if there was a hotel in the city called the Tamara. The clerk was impatient and superior and said in accented Russian that there was such a hotel in the Avchala district, an industrial area where you wouldn’t want to stay unless you had to. Kirov carried his bags to his room and drew a lukewarm bath. He unpacked, shaved and bathed, then took a short walk to ease the tension of travelling and had a snack in the Nargizi café. The atmosphere in the café was light; the cinema next to the Intourist was showing Iron Harvest and the diners were talking excitedly about the seasonal sensation and the moving performance by the film’s star, Yelena Akhmerova.
He left the café and found a call box. He telephoned the hotel and asked for his room. The connection timed at fifteen seconds. He left the call box, walked along the boulevard past the park and picked up a cab at the Hotel Tbilisi. He asked the driver to take him to the railway station where he found another public telephone and called the hotel again. This time the response time measured twelve and a half seconds. He took a further cab, this time across the river to Plekhanov Road and had the driver drop him by the film studio on the corner of Chelyuskintsev Street. By now it had begun to rain, a fine drizzle, not too cold. The shift workers on the tramway system were returning to their apartments opposite the studios. Outside Ordzhonikidze Park children were standing on the pavement and pointing at the parachute tower, which was faintly visible through the rain. Past the Dynamo Stadium Kirov turned into the Didube district of the city.