0151 hrs, Wednesday, 5th March 1947, Çanakkale Naval Fortified Command Building, Çanakkale, Turkey.
Koramiral Cevdet Tezeren had ensured that much of the channel was monitored by either his own men, or not being monitored at all.
According to the Soviet request, the submarine force had already started its journey through the Dardanelles, and very shortly he would telephone his stations for reports before a casual meeting with his NKVD contact to receive his payment.
He could but hope that this phase was not as fraught as the mission that had earlier brought them safely through the Bosphorus, when army launches from 11th Infantry Division of Bosphorus Area Fortified Command had somehow found themselves in the midst of traffic.
Two had been rundown by the Greek freighter Makeconia, leading a column of civilian vessels moving through the narrow waters, concealing darker purposed vessels that moved beneath them.
One of the launches managed to get off some flares, bathing the whole channel in light for far longer than Tezeren cared for.
But the matter had been resolved, despite the loss of seven Turkish soldiers’ lives.
The army commander locally had exceeded his orders by running a night time exercise in the shipping lane, and the survivors had been recovered by Makeconia and her consorts.
The schedule allowed for a few days in the Sea of Marmara, which permitted the army to fete the captains of the rescuing vessels.
He picked up the telephone and made the first of his calls.
The procession of ships had taken nearly three hours, which had passed too slowly for Tezeren’s taste.
The final report had arrived just before four o’clock and he had taken it even as he stood to make his way home.
He drove himself for once, for no other reason than ease of meeting with an NKVD officer on a road out of Kepez.
Teoman Schiller had waited a long time, not knowing precisely when his man would appear, but the naval staff car ground into sight and pulled over by the stand of olive trees in which the NKVD agent had had taken up residence since about two in the morning.
“Good morning, Koramiral. I trust all went as planned?”
“Not quite… but the vessels are out and safely into the sea beyond. I should ask for double. It has been a very stressful few days, I can tell you.”
“My commander understands this and he hopes that the Bosphorus situation is now resolved?”
“Yes. I’ve managed to make it go away.”
“Excellent. My commander has included something extra for your efforts on our behalf.”
“Very kind.”
“He also asked me to give you a special gift and asked me to assure you that it’s quite safe. I assume you know what he means by that, Koramiral?”
Tezeren looked at the bottle of superior Fig Raki and laughed.
“I understand fully. Thank you.”
The Admiral swept up the modest canvas bag that contained enough Turkish Liras to ensure a comfortable and happy life ahead, plus the bottle of Raki.
Back in his luxury villa on the Mediterranean coast near Kumburan, Tezeren decided that he would examine the bottle over early morning coffee.
There were no tell-tale marks of tampering but, despite that, he broke the seal and poured its contents into the ground around an apricot tree, musing that it might become a popular move if the apricots take on board any of the flavour…
‘…and none of the poison if the dogs put any in!’
He poured another coffee and enjoyed the early morning view of an awakening world.
Screwing up his eyes he could even imagine the faint smoky marks of the ‘Soviet’ surface group disappearing over the horizon.
Twisting his neck from side to side, Tezeren tried to ease the stiffness from his joints, and used his hand to manipulate a jaw that suddenly felt heavy and leaden.
He had talked to every command post along the Dardanelles that very night, so he was not in the least bit surprised.
His odalik… he liked to use the old term… brought forward another jug of hot sweet coffee but he declined, feeling that the pool was more for him.
As was usual, Tezeren simply removed his clothes and handed them to his attendant, squeezing her breasts as he did.
She was more than a maid, a symbol and throwback to an older age, when concubines were more common and humans could be owned by another.
Her face remained passive as he cupped and squeezed her ample flesh, his ownership and subjugation of her demonstrated as total.
Tezeren simply fell into the pool and felt the coolness of it immediately alleviate his aches and pains.
But only for a moment.
His stomach started to cramp and swimming became difficult.
“Sidika!”
The odalik was stood by the side of the pool.
“Sidika… help me… I can’t swim…”
He dropped beneath the water and tried to fight his way back up to the surface.
His feet touched the bottom and he found the strength to thrust upwards and gasped in the warm air.
“Help me, woman.”
He spluttered and drank in some pool water.
The combination of the look on her face and his present predicament combined into one horrible thought.
“You fucking bitch!”
He went under again as his arms and legs started to seize up and spasm.
Once more he came to the surface, trying hard to draw air into his lungs but finding the action more difficult than he could ever remember.
“Help me, Sidika…. Help… me!”
“Just shut up and die, you fat fuck.”
“Bitc…”
His efforts to stay afloat floundered as pain wracked his muscles and his stomach convulsed.
One last time he came up, to witness Sidika holding the coffee pot and, when she saw him break the surface, pouring its contents into the earth around the Apricot tree.
Her smile was the last thing Tezeren saw.
Sidika summoned the police and within an hour the villa was crawling with constabulary and high-ranking naval officers.
Her story clearly tallied with the evidence and, given Tezeren’s well-known proclivities, was swiftly accepted as the truth in the matter.
The admiral had taken coffee and gone swimming, only to suffer some sort of arrest whilst in the pool. His loyal odalik was in the kitchen but heard his cries for help and, on dashing to the poolside, plunged in to pull out the distressed man, only to fail in her attempts.
Given the size of the two, no one doubted that she had tried hard but had been destined to fail.
The villa was cordoned off and guards were placed to keep away prying eyes, but Sidika was permitted to stay, although the circumstances of her residence prevented her from signalling her NKVD controller on the success of her mission.
But in any case, Schiller already knew.
1212 hrs, Wednesday, 5th March 1947, Headquarters of the Red Banner Forces of Soviet Europe, Brest Litovsk, USSR.
“Very careless of them… but very interesting.”
Nazarbayeva looked up from her lunch and silently quizzed Orlov.
“A snippet from our man at Baltic Naval Headquarters, Comrade General. They’ve lost a submarine.”
He handed the report over, careful not to smear any butter from his own meal on it.
Tatiana was less successful and ending up wiping a little residue away before she read the brief message.
Her foot was aching so she eased her boot as she read and felt immediate relief.
“Failure to report… Soviet submarine J-57… two days overdue… two days? I thought they went weeks without checking in.”