“No, pig. You don’t get away so easily!” The ironworker’s face was a hate-filled mask.
The manager screamed in terror. He was still screaming when the big man hurled him into the midst of the howling mob.
The big black ZIL limousine swept past the guards manning the Borovitskaya Tower gate without stopping. Command flags flying from its hood identified the car, and no soldier with any sense delayed Marshal Yuri Kaminov on his way to a meeting with the Russian Republic’s President. Plenty of the dirt-poor and isolated border outposts near Kazakhstan were full of officers and men who’d done something to annoy the notoriously bad-tempered chief of the general staff.
Gearshift grinding, the ZIL followed the steeply rising road, roaring uphill past the elegant nineteenth-century façade of the State Armory building and into the main Kremlin compound. Still moving at high speed, the black limousine flashed past the domed palaces, cathedrals, the old headquarters of the Supreme Soviet, and the Russian Senate building. Flocks of startled birds and well-dressed bureaucrats scattered out of its path.
Kaminov’s staff car stopped in front of the massive yellow brick Arsenal — once an army museum and now used as an office building by the President and his advisors. The driver, a young sergeant in full dress uniform, climbed out quickly and opened the rear driver’s-side door. Then he stiffened to rigid attention, still holding the door open.
The marshal, stocky and squarely built with a rough-hewn peasant’s face, nodded to the young man as he emerged from the ZIL. “Wait here, Ivanovskiy. I won’t be inside long.”
“Yes, sir.”
Another officer followed the marshal out of the limousine. The three stars on Valentin Soloviev’s shoulder boards identified him as a full colonel in the Russian Army. Everything else about him, from his straw-colored hair, ice-cold gray eyes, and high, aristocratic cheekbones down to his immaculately tailored uniform and brightly polished boots, seemed to separate him from the older, plainer Kaminov.
A waiting functionary hurried forward from inside the Arsenal. “The President is ready to see you, Marshal. In his private office, as you requested.”
“Good.” Kaminov pointed at Soloviev. “The colonel is my military aide. He’ll accompany me.”
“Of course, sir.” The bureaucrat’s eyes flicked nervously in Soloviev’s direction. Last-minute additions to presidential meetings were rare. That made this officer someone to be watched. And possibly someone to be feared. He nodded toward the Arsenal’s main door. “If you’ll follow me, gentlemen?”
The inner office of Russia’s President was a relatively small room more cluttered than decorated. A large marble-topped writing desk, several plush chairs, and a more modem and utilitarian computer desk all competed for the limited floor space on a hand-woven Armenian rug. Thick drapes cloaked a large, arched window overlooking the Arsenal’s inner courtyard. Pictures of the republic’s leader, smiling, white-haired, and boisterous in summit meetings with other heads of state, filled the other three walls.
Only close examination showed that the room’s current occupant was the same man shown in the photographs. The President was starting to show the tremendous strain involved in governing an almost ungovernable nation. His thick white hair was thinning and his eyes were shadowed and bloodshot. New lines across his broad forehead and around his mouth gave him a haggard, worn appearance.
“Yuri, it’s good to see you.” The President’s words were more enthusiastic than his tone. He’d had to pay a continuing price to keep Kaminov’s support for his political and economic reforms, and he was a man who disliked owing anybody for anything.
“Mr. President.” Kaminov gestured toward Soloviev. “I don’t believe you’ve met Colonel Valentin Soloviev.”
“No, I haven’t had the pleasure.” The President paused, visibly searching his memory. His eyes narrowed. “But I have heard many… interesting… things about this young officer. You were ranked first among your class at the Frunze Military Academy, yes?”
Soloviev shook his head. “Second, Mr. President.” He smiled tightly. “But the man who was first died in Afghanistan. I survived.” He pushed away mental pictures of the dead, the maimed, and burning, broken villages. Years of constant combat, ambush, and atrocity. And all for nothing.
The President watched him closely, as though waiting for him to say more. Then he nodded in understanding. Few veterans of the Afghan War ever said much about their experiences. All memories of that debacle were bad. He pointed to two chairs in front of his desk. “Sit down, gentlemen. To business, eh?”
They sat.
“Now, Marshal, exactly what is so urgent that it could not wait until our next Defense Council meeting?”
“The fate of our nation, Mr. President,” Kaminov said bluntly. “That is the urgent matter we must discuss. And decide.”
“Oh?” The President raised a single eyebrow. His hand drifted closer to the phone on his desk. The chief of the general staff was hardly likely to try launching a coup with just one officer by his side. But then stranger things had happened in Russia over the past several years. “Perhaps you’ll explain what you mean by that.”
“Of course.” Kaminov frowned. “Anyone with his eyes open can see the dangers we face this winter.” He ticked them off one by one on his thick fingers anyway. “Starvation and anarchy in our cities. Chaos and banditry in the countryside. Our farmers hoarding needed food. Our factories idled and rusting away.”
“All problems we’ve faced before and survived, Yuri. What precisely is your point?”
“Teeter on the brink long enough, Mr. President, and eventually you’re bound to fall in.” Kaminov leaned forward in his chair. “Things are different this year. For a start, we won’t be getting much more emergency aid from the French or the Germans, and certainly not from the Americans. They’ve got too many problems of their own to do much for us. True?”
“True.” The President looked troubled. “I’ve spoken to them all. They’re polite enough, God knows, but also empty-handed.”
“Just so.” Kaminov seemed satisfied by the other man’s admission. “So we can’t beg our way out of these troubles any longer. We must maintain order with our own resources. With all the forces at the state’s disposal.”
He rapped the desk to hammer home his point. “And yet those forces are falling apart before our very eyes.” He glanced at Soloviev. “You have those reports, Colonel?”
Soloviev silently opened his briefcase and handed a thick sheaf of papers to his superior.
Kaminov fanned them out across the desk. “Look at these! Police strikes in St. Petersburg, Volgograd, and Yekaterinburg. Mutinies for higher pay in two motor rifle divisions! Officers murdered by their own men in half a dozen more units!”
The President brushed the papers back toward the marshal. “I’ve seen the reports, Yuri.”
Kaminov glowered back at him. “Then you must also realize the need to regain full control over the security forces. And over the railroads and other transportation networks. For our country to survive the coming winter we must take strong action. Action unencumbered by absurd legal niceties.” He paused briefly to let that sink in and then went on. “That is why we insist that you declare an immediate state of emergency.”
“We, Marshal Kaminov? You and the colonel here? Or are there others supporting this…” The President fumbled for a neutral term. “This proposal of yours?”
The marshal nodded grimly. “There are others. Many others.” He slid a single-page document across the desk. “You’ll find this document interesting reading, Mr. President. It contains an outline of the measures you must take to maintain order over the next several months. All you have to do is sign it.”