Charlie had preferred the Arbat as the flea market it had been when he’d first known it, not the hybrid now of doubtful antique galleries, Western designer shops, Russian bric-a-brac and icon stalls, artist-attended-and eagerly selling-exhibitions and tourist-trap outlets. And most definitely not the soccer-crowd volume of people from which to stage the perfect assassination. As he stepped out into the throng his apprehension began to tighten like a spring, his skin reacting into something like an itch at the jostling, inevitable physical contact, the irritation so immediate and intense he had to feel out, to scratch his arms and shoulders.
He moved as instructed, the wandering pick-up-and-put-down loiterer, unsure after so much and so many public interferences-and not one single confirming telephone approach since the rendezvous was arranged-if his was not an entirely pointless performance to a nonexistent audience. He guessed the crowd at this particular midpoint was as dense as that at Lvov’s demonstration and even more difficult to be part of: the previous day, those demonstrators had all moved in one direction but now there was a constant ebb and flow of people struggling every which way. To get himself out of the crush Charlie frequently detached himself from the main, outside stream and went off the stall-cluttered road into some of the more established and permanent shops and boutiques, constantly checking the time either from his own watch or available clocks.
At 10:35, he finally allowed himself the thought of his other rendezvous. Natalia had said it would take her an hour to get from her flat to McDonald’s. Which only gave him thirty-five minutes to be at one of the two public telephones he’d already isolated to warn her of his inability to keep their meeting if there hadn’t been a personal approach from the hoarse-voiced woman. But Natalia had told him she’d be going to the fast-food restaurant anyway. And it would only take him thirty minutes, less even, to get there from the Arbat.
He was being stupid, unprofessional, Charlie accused himself. What if the woman in whom he’d put every hope of survival did make contact? He had no way of judging what she had to say or would want to do: whether she’d be a crank. Or a would-be killer. If she were neither and he for a moment believed she were genuine it could-inevitably would-take hours, days, to gain her confidence and trust.
Natalia and Sasha had to be a secondary consideration. No! Charlie refused at once. Not relegated to second place: put in their rightful place, that of being of absolute personal importance to him but separate from what was professionally essential. Separate, too, from the potential danger at that moment burning through him.
Their meeting had to be postponed. Maybe only put off for a day: freed from the noon deadline he could remain in the Arbat for the rest of the day and if there was no approach he’d know the episode had been a hoax or a crank or that the woman had been frightened away.
He reached the closer of his two chosen telephone phone booths at 10:45, to find it occupied by a woman with a notepad and a heap of replenishing coin on the ledge in front of her and an increasingly fidgeting man waiting ahead of him. The milling crowd in which he’d so recently immersed himself for its concealing protection now became an obstructive, delaying interference.
When it came it wasn’t the tight-together pressure of people jamming him between them for a quick, agonizing knife thrust or the hard jab of a silenced pistol. It was a tug, a dip into his jacket pocket. He started to snatch toward whatever had been planted and he only just managed to turn it into the jerk of someone colliding into him, the hoarse-voiced telephone warning-don’t look or act surprised-echoing in his head as if he were hearing it at that moment. He didn’t stare about him, either, but forced himself on, leaking perspiration but not touching his pocket until just before he reached the intended telephone. The interior of Charlie’s pockets invariably resembled a schoolboy’s treasure pouch, which like so much else about the man was intentionally misleading. He was aware of everything in every space and immediately detected the folded piece of paper, taking it out as if it were a reminder, which it could easily have been, a telephone number which Charlie instantly recognized to be another street kiosk, that day’s date and a time: 1700. The numerals were written in a Russian hand.
It was five minutes before eleven, Charlie saw. He could get with time to spare to where he knew Natalia and Sasha would be. He needed time to calm himself, as well as a drink, to help. Probably two, to help even more.
And because he had that much time, Charlie chose again to fill it line-hopping across the Metro’s central-city spider’s web, the tradecraft dance subconsciously prompted by what he’d recognized during the preceding hour and now wanted more reassurance, fully confronting what he was contemplating. He’d lied to Natalia-again-and was about to lie further after promising he never would again: that, instead, he would always put her safety and Sasha’s safety before anything or anyone else. It was ridiculous for him never to accept the possibility of failure or to delude himself into thinking the car crash might have been a coincidence. Ridiculous, too, to believe he’d always be able to lose a surveillance tail and the possibility of another assassination attempt, an assassination attempt in which Natalia and Sasha might all too easily be caught up, and even die, with him. So why was he going on as he was, thinking more of himself-only of himself-and what he wanted instead of how he should be thinking, of what he should do if he loved them both as much as he insisted that he did? He didn’t have an answer. Not one that came even half close to justifying anything.
There was one thing he did know, from the Arbat experience. The hoarse-voiced woman’s apparent nervousness during the arranging telephone conversation might have been genuine but her claim not to be sure of a rendezvous definitely hadn’t been. She’d planned the Arbat as she’d planned everything else-the concealing crowd on the busiest day of the week, the protective watch for which she would have been in place long before ten to ensure she wasn’t risking a snatch squad, and the brush contact drop within a yard or two of the escaping Arbat Metro.
She was, Charlie recognized, a professional intelligence operative with the knowledge and ability of operational field-level tradecraft. And could so easily have been a killer, he reminded himself, refusing to push aside the self-accusation of cheating Natalia and their child. Everything was planned, he further reminded himself. He knew he was clean, that he wouldn’t be endangering them today. Just this one more time then, maybe the last-his only chance-to be with Sasha. He’d see them today, judge how the encounter went and then find the answer eluding him.
He scuffed on aching feet up the slightly inclined Kreschatik Square upon which he saw the line stretched at least twenty-five yards from the entrance of the McDonald’s, out into the square, and which didn’t appear to be moving. And then he saw Natalia close to its front, Sasha’s hand obediently in hers. He knew Natalia’d seen him virtually at the same moment, although she gave no indication of doing so. Neither did he, happy that the delay would give her all the time she needed to satisfy herself he had not been followed. If he had been, he would have been hit by now.