‘Is he still there?’
‘No, he left about an hour later, but he was so well disguised that I nearly missed him myself. If it hadn’t been for the walk, he might have given me the slip.’
‘Where did he go?’ asked Lloyd.
‘He took another circuitous route, and ended up at the campaign headquarters of Victor Zerimski.’
‘Why Zerimski?’
‘I don’t know yet, but he came out of the building carrying all Zerimski’s campaign literature. Then he bought a map from a news-stand and had lunch in a nearby restaurant. In the afternoon, he hired a small car and returned to his hotel. He hasn’t left the building since.’
‘Oh my God,’ said Lloyd suddenly. ‘It’s going to be Zerimski this time.’
There was a long pause at the other end of the line before Jackson said, ‘No, Mr Lloyd, that’s not possible.’
‘Why not?’
‘He’d never agree to carry out such a sensitive assignment unless the order had come directly from the White House. I’ve known him long enough to be certain of that.’
‘Try not to forget that your friend carried out exactly the same assignment in Colombia. No doubt Dexter was able to convince him that that operation had also been sanctioned by the President.’
‘There could be an alternative scenario,’ said Jackson quietly.
‘Namely?’
‘That it’s not Zerimski they’re planning to kill, but Connor.’
Lloyd wrote the name down on his yellow pad.
Book Two
The Loner
Chapter Twelve
‘American?’
‘Yes,’ said Jackson, not looking down at the source of the piping voice.
‘You need anything?’
‘No thanks,’ he said, still not taking his eyes off the front door of the hotel.
‘You must need something. Americans always need something.’
‘I don’t need anything. Now go away,’ said Jackson firmly.
‘Caviar? Russian dolls? General’s uniform? Fur hat? Woman?’
Jackson looked down at the boy for the first time. He was draped from head to toe in a sheepskin jacket three sizes too large for him. On his head he wore a cap made out of rabbitskin that Jackson felt he needed more every minute. The boy’s smile revealed two missing teeth.
‘A woman? At five o’clock in the morning?’
‘Good time for woman. But perhaps you prefer man?’
‘How much do you charge for your services?’
‘What type of services?’ asked the boy, looking suspicious.
‘As a runner.’
‘Runner?’
‘Helper, then.’
‘Helper?’
‘Assistant.’
‘Ah, you mean partner, like in American movies.’
‘OK, so now we’ve agreed on your job description, wiseguy, how much do you charge?’
‘Per day? Per week? Per month?’
‘Per hour.’
‘How much you offer?’
‘Quite the little entrepreneur, aren’t we?’
‘We learn from Americans,’ said the boy, with a grin that stretched from ear to ear.
‘One dollar,’ said Jackson.
The boy began laughing. ‘I may be wiseguy, but you are comedian. Ten dollars.’
‘That’s nothing less than extortion.’
The boy looked puzzled for the first time.
‘I’ll give you two.’
‘Six.’
‘Four.’
‘Five.’
‘Agreed,’ said Jackson.
The boy raised the palm of his right hand high in the air, something else he’d seen in American movies. Jackson slapped it. The deal was struck. The boy immediately checked the time on his Rolex watch.
‘So, what’s your name?’ Jackson asked.
‘Sergei,’ replied the boy. ‘And yours?’
‘Jackson. How old are you, Sergei?’
‘How old you want me to be?’
‘Cut the crap and tell me your age.’
‘Fourteen.’
‘You’re not a day over nine.’
‘Thirteen.’
‘Ten.’
‘Eleven.’
‘OK,’ said Jackson. ‘I’ll settle for eleven.’
‘And how old are you?’ demanded the boy.
‘Fifty-four.’
‘I’ll settle for fifty-four,’ said Sergei.
Jackson laughed for the first time in days. ‘How come your English is so good?’ he asked, still keeping an eye on the hotel door.
‘My mother live with American for long time. He return to States last year, but not take us.’
This time Jackson believed he was telling the truth.
‘So what’s the job, partner?’ asked Sergei.
‘We’re keeping an eye on someone who’s staying at that hotel’
‘Is a friend or enemy?’
‘Friend.’
‘Mafya?’
‘No, he works for the good guys.’
‘Don’t treat me like child,’ said Sergei, with an edge to his voice. ‘We’re partners, remember.’
‘OK, Sergei. He’s a friend,’ said Jackson, just as Connor appeared in the doorway. ‘Don’t move.’ He placed a hand firmly on the boy’s shoulder.
‘Is that him?’ asked Sergei.
‘Yes, that’s him.’
‘He has kind face. Maybe better I work for him.’
Victor Zerimski’s day hadn’t begun well, and it was still only a few minutes past eight a.m. He was chairing a meeting of the Central Council of the Communist Party which was being briefed by Dmitri Titov, his Chief of Staff.
‘An international body of observers has arrived in Moscow to monitor the electoral process,’ Titov was telling them. ‘They are looking principally for any suggestion of ballot-rigging, but their chairman has already admitted that with an electorate so vast and so widespread, there is no way they can spot every irregularity.’ Titov ended his report by saying that now that Comrade Zerimski had climbed to second place in the polls, the Mafya were pouring even more money into Chernopov’s campaign.
Zerimski stroked his thick moustache as he looked in turn at each of the men seated round the table. ‘When I am President,’ he said, rising from his place at the head of the table, ‘I’ll throw those Mafya bastards in jail one by one. Then the only thing they’ll count for the rest of their lives will be rocks.’ The members of the Central Council had heard their leader lambast the Mafya many times before, though he never mentioned them by name in public.
The short, muscle-bound man thumped the table. ‘Russia needs to return to the old-fashioned values the rest of the world used to respect us for.’ The twenty-one men facing him nodded, despite having heard these words repeatedly over the past few months.
‘For ten years we have done nothing but import the worst America has to offer.’
They continued to nod, and kept their eyes firmly fixed on him.
Zerimski ran a hand through his thick black hair, sighed, and slumped back into his chair. He looked across at his Chief of Staff. ‘What am I doing this morning?’
‘You’re paying a visit to the Pushkin Museum,’ said Titov. ‘They’re expecting you at ten o’clock.’
‘Cancel it. A complete waste of time when there are only eight days until the election.’ He banged the table again. ‘I should be out on the streets where the people can see me.’
‘But the director of the museum has applied for a grant from the government to restore the works of leading Russian artists,’ said Titov.
‘A waste of the people’s money,’ said Zerimski.
‘And Chernopov has been criticised for cutting the arts subsidy,’ continued the Chief of Staff.
‘All right. I’ll give them fifteen minutes.’
‘Twenty thousand Russians visit the Pushkin every week,’ Titov added, looking down at the typewritten notes in front of him.