Baranovich knew that the mechanic was KGB. For months now, as he had installed and perfected the system on which he had been forced to work originally while still in the scientific prison of Mavrino, he had had assigned to his technical team this man, Grosch, an electronics technician of high capability. Grosch was the child of a German scientist captured by the Red Army early in 1945; there was no more loyal member of the Party.
Baranovich felt no anger at the man — not because his father was a Nazi, or because he himself was a secret policeman. If Gant had been able to see the look on his face as he gazed down at the top of Grosch's cropped head, he would have recognised that look of painful wisdom, of detached pity, which he had seen at Kreshin's quarters. Baranovich looked unobtrusively at his watch. Four minutes after four. He looked round him at the security within the hangar as Grosch absorbed himself in checking a printed circuit. He had decided already on the method of diversion he would use.
He looked back over the tail-unit of the Firefox, to where the second production prototype stood, rather shunted into a corner. The aircraft, seemingly in shadow, unglamorous, lacking the pristine deadliness of the model atop which he stood, was fully fuelled, in a state of readiness for take-off against some kind, any kind, of airborne attack upon the factory. All Soviet aircraft, whether prototype, production model, or service aircraft, as long as they were military, remained in a maximum twenty-four-hour condition of readiness while on the ground.
Therefore, Baranovich concluded, there was only one thing that could be done when Gant escaped at the controls of the first aircraft. They would send the second one after him. There would be a delay, of course, while it was fully-weaponed — perhaps an hour, including a quickest possible check of systems and controls. And the second aircraft would be refuelled in mid-air, unlike Gant, who would have to refuel on the ground, wherever that ground was. Unless he, Kreshin and Semelovsky could put that second aircraft out of action, Gant could be caught, and destroyed, by the only plane capable of doing both to him — PP Two.
Fire: he knew the answer. A hangar fire would create a panic, and allow Gant to climb aboard as the pilot, and taxi the aircraft onto the taxi-way outside without suspicion. Two birds with one stone, he remarked to himself. Gant away, and the pursuit of him prevented at the same time. There was so much fuel, oil, timber and other inflammables in the hangar that causing the fire would be no problem. Fire was one of the plans he had outlined to the others — now he would tell them of his final decision in its favour.
Baranovich spent no time wondering whether Gant would survive the flight. He would show up on no radar which meant the Russians would need a visual sighting before they could loose off infra-red or proximity missiles, or send aircraft after him. He glanced towards the tail where Semelovsky was supervising the fitting of the special tail-unit, his own project from first to last, on which Kreshin had worked as his assistant — the tail-assembly that provided Gant's most effective anti-missile system and ECM gear. Semelovsky said it would work, but it had only been tried on an RPV — that day, it would be a part of the weapons-trials and a man would have to use it. Gant would need it, he knew.
It was all a question of timing, he decided. The First Secretary's aircraft was scheduled to arrive at nine. Before that, he knew, he and the others would be placed under arrest. Their work would be completed by six-thirty at the latest. This meant that six-thirty was the latest time for the diversion, and the take-off. He would have to arrange the time-table with the others at their next coffee-break, which was at five.
The security was so tight that when he had visited the toilets at the other end of the hangar an hour earlier, a guard had detached himself from the wall, and followed him inside, making no effort to relieve himself, but merely contenting himself with observing Baranovich. Grosch should find that damaged power transistor within the next few minutes, he thought, which would helpfully lengthen the final checks.
He was suddenly, oddly, assailed by memory, a memory that was akin to his present situation, but removed from self-concern. He was in the same overalls as now, but those in his memory were oil-stained, uncleaned. The temperature was well below zero, and his hands were numb. He was bending forward into the cockpit of a Mig, an old wartime Mig. He was in a hangar at the Red Army air base outside Stalingrad. Because he was a Jew, he was an army mechanic, nothing more glorified than that.
He shrugged off the memory. The past was an intrusion, an interference in what he had to do, had to plan. He thought of the gun beneath his armpit. He had not been searched on entering the gates. The gun, he realised, with the kind of shock of cold water on the drowsy skin, meant that he had accepted that this was the end. He did not expect to live through the day.
Baranovich smiled as Grosch found the malfunctioning circuit-board, and looked up into his face. Grosch held up the extracted plastic square, with its thirty-seven gold-plated tags, into his face.
'Looks like the power transistor, Comrade Director Baranovich,' he said. Baranovich smiled. Grosch was being obsequiously civil. He, too, then understood that it was the end.
'Mm.' Baranovich turned the square of plastic over in his hand, nodding. Then he handed it back to Grosch. 'Scrap it, then. I'll get another.'
'From the experimental technical stores, Director?' Grosch queried with a smile.
'Yes, Grosch. But you won't have to get out of that comfortable seat to accompany me. The guard will take me.'
Before Grosch could reply, he began to descend the ladder, with a light, youthful, untroubled step.
'You incompetent bloody fool, Stechko — he's dead! You've killed him!' Tortyev exploded. He rounded on Stechko, and the big man stepped back, a look of confused, abashed defeat on his face. Tortyev rose from his haunches where he had squatted before the sagging, lifeless form of Filipov, and glared at his subordinate. The beatings had been too regular, too vicious, too hurried — he knew that now. In his desperate effort to make the man talk, he had allowed Stechko and Holokov to kill him. He ground his teeth and clenched and unclenched his fists in the fury of impotence.
When he turned to Priabin, the KGB lieutenant was already on the telephone. His indifference seemed to anger Tortyev further. He crossed the room to confront Holokov who was sitting on a hard chair, astride it, watching the body intently as if for some sign of life. Tortyev stood before him, and Holokov's intensity of expression became transformed to doubt.
'You stupid fat shit,' Tortyev breathed, his eyes blazing. 'You incompetent lump of dogshit!'
'You pressed us…' Holokov began, and then recoiled as Tortyev slapped him across the cheek with the back of his hand. He reached for his cut lip, in surprise, inspected his fingers, and the smear of blood on them in some state of shock.
'He knew nothing.' Tortyev heard Priabin speak quietly, and turned on him. Priabin was holding one hand over the receiver, and smiling. His smile irritated Tortyev.
'What the hell do you mean by that?' he said.
'He knew nothing — hell, he'd have told you long ago if he had anything to tell.'
'You clever bastard — what's the answer, then? Your precious bloody aircraft is still in danger, or had you forgotten that?' Tortyev wiped the saliva from his lip.
Priabin continued to smile irritatingly, and waggled the receiver in Tortyev's direction.
'Why do you think I want to talk to the computer?' he said mildly.
Tortyev looked at the clock, and said: 'You'd better get a bloody move-on! It's four-thirty, or hadn't you noticed?' There was a sneer in his voice, a returning self-confidence. He had done his part. Now it was up to Priabin.