‘You think I should have followed my father’s advice, don’t you? Because he only wanted the best for his little Amara. But you know what would have happened if I’d listened to him? I’d be stuck in that shithole up north, watching Egyptian soap operas all day, pregnant with my eighth child and eating tray after tray of pastries till even he wouldn’t look at me anymore. At least this lot left me in peace.’
Dima hoped there was some hot water left, and shampoo, preferably smelling of apples. The receptionist at the Aquarium had smelled faintly of apples.
‘I could have one of my men take you back to your father’s house. The quake’s not hit so bad up there.’
She turned towards him, glaring. ‘Why do all you men think we’re so helpless, huh?’
Kroll was right about Dima being no one’s idea of a knight in shining armour, especially not to this harpy. Anyone less like a damsel in distress would be hard to imagine.
Kroll came in now, clutching the scanner and smiling oddly.
‘Want to hear something funny?’
‘Why not? We could do with a laugh.’
‘Look.’ He held it out and tapped the screen. ‘There isn’t one nuclear device: there’s three.’
36
Dima peered at the map spread out on the desk in Gazul’s study.
‘So, your reading puts one nuke sitting on the edge of Tehran where the Americans are, and the other two halfway up a mountain.’
Kroll had nodded off over the scanner. He awoke suddenly, his elbow landing in the ashtray.
‘All I’m telling you is what the scanner’s saying. I never said anything about being sure. There’s so much interference, what with the dust from the quake, plus Uncle Sam jamming the radio and radar signals.’
‘Go and find somewhere to lie down. You’ll be a lot more use to us with a few hours’ sleep under your belt.’
Kroll didn’t move, probably too tired even to get up. Half an hour ago Dima had watched Vladimir go out into the hallway, glance in the direction of the stairs and then, as if the climb were too much for him, flop on to one of the pale beige leather couches. Both he and the leather gave a satisfied sigh: a minute later he was snoring like the distant rumble of another earthquake. Gregorin and Zirak were in the kitchen, helping themselves to Gazul’s beers out of an abnormally large American fridge. He could hear them discussing whether the integral ice-making machine should be able to dispense a choice of ice cube size. Amara had gone to her room with a bottle of whisky and the Gulf edition of Cosmopolitan magazine.
Dima had tried four times to reach Paliov on the satphone. He had failed every time. Paliov had said not to try and contact him, only to wait for a call from him. He continued to stare at the map, as if it might now deliver better news. Three devices: three separate suitcase nuclear bombs. And one possibly already in American hands. Right now they’d be crawling all over it. Situation rooms from the White House to the Pentagon to Langley would be soaking up whatever intelligence they could extract from it, before discussing threat levels and proportionate responses. What was the proportionate response to a nuclear bomb? Death to imperialists and former communists alike, thought Dima: what difference did it make if you all ended up as dust?
Was Paliov really unavailable, or had he been retired? Fallen on his sword, or been pushed? In Moscow, anything was possible.
Dima glanced at the scanner, battered and scorched but still functioning, just. It looked like a typical piece of shit Russian technology. Built to survive an arctic winter but disinclined to offer a precision reading unless it felt like it. Every thirty minutes it spat out a map reference and on a tiny green screen showed the direction of the bombs’ movements from the last point they were logged as stationary. If that was the bank, and Kroll said he couldn’t even be sure of that, then one of the nukes had been moved to the northwest outskirts of the city. In other words, the American base. The other two, seemingly travelling together, were being taken somewhere due north of the capital, but that was all mountains with hardly any roads.
Eighty to a hundred men had died at the compound and he now had even less of an idea of Kaffarov’s whereabouts than he had when they were back in Moscow looking at the satellite images. He tried Paliov for the sixth time. The satphone said his number was still unobtainable.
He called the main GRU field emergency number. He hadn’t used it in twenty years, but like his mother’s birthday it was a number he never forgot.
‘Speak slowly, state call-sign, mission status and ID code followed by hash.’
An automated response: the GRU was moving with the times! But this was a black op, deniable. No one had given him any of the above. He pressed the hash key and waited some more.
‘You have entered incorrectly.’
Being Russia, and being the GRU, there would, of course, be someone behind the voice, listening.
Dima cleared his throat and spoke in his best Chechen.
‘Regarding the incriminating pictures of Secretary Timofayev and the schoolgirl. . ’
The voice was clipped, weary, instantly recognisable.
‘Who is this?’
‘Smolenk! How heartwarming to hear your voice. So glad some things are constant in an ever-changing world.’
What the man had done to condemn himself to a life as the GRU’s out-of-hours phone operator didn’t bear thinking about.
‘Dima Mayakovsky for Senior Strategist Omorova.’
‘Do you have accreditation?’
‘No, no, this is a black op; just put me through to her.’
‘Do you know what time it is here?’
A massive explosion followed by a blast from three low-flying jets obliterated all sound. Kroll jerked awake again, spilling more ash. It was a miracle he never caught fire.
Smolenk suddenly sounded concerned.
‘Are you under fire?’
He glanced at Vladimir on the couch surrounded by beer cans and the semi-conscious Kroll.
‘Yes, we’re all being killed: get on with it.’
‘I will post a message in her inbox. You’re not authorised to speak to staff after hours.’
Dima sighed. You could be in the middle of an actual nuclear meltdown and this lot would be demanding your lunch ticket reference numbers.
‘Then I’m calling the CIA in Langley. At least they’ll want to talk to me.’
He sighed. ‘You people.’
The line went dead, then there were several clicks.
‘Comrade Mayakovsky, this is a surprise.’ Even at three a.m. Omorova’s voice had an invitingly velvet tone.
‘I’m sorry about the time.’
A couple of seconds passed before she spoke.
‘We thought you were all dead.’
‘I’ve got a — situation. I can’t raise Paliov.’