So the assassination was actually planned for today!
The realization brought a fresh trickle of apprehension and Charlie scrubbed the sleeve of his coat across his forehead, looking again towards the faraway telephones. It had been a mistake, trying to go it alone. He needed more people, a squad at least. There should have been proper, technical communications and necessary warnings, not just to those who had been involved so far but to the other unwitting delegations. And his having finally located the Russian should not have been allowed to run, like he was being allowed to run now. The difficulty of any proper charge could have been ignored. He should have been swept up and held, until the conference was over and the danger with it. Ten-thirty, Charlie saw, from the station clock. Time was getting tight: too tight. Should he abandon the Russian, worry only about a warning? There was still Cummings to provide that, whatever happened. Blom would not be able to keep everything under wraps, once the woman were seized. So everyone would be alerted, the protection made absolute. And Charlie wanted the Russian. After all the ridicule and condescension he wanted to bring the bastard in and destroy the entire Soviet operation, not just half. He’d stay with the Russian, Charlie decided: cling to him like shit to a blanket until the man stopped moving and he could lead Blom right to him.
Charlie actually started, as if he were surprised, when the Russian emerged from the lavatory, making at once for the steps leading down to ground level. Charlie set out in renewed pursuit, conscious at once that the man was moving faster and with more positive direction than before, striding around Cropettes park into the Leonard Baulacre avenue. Twice Charlie was aware of him checking his watch, appearing no longer concerned about being followed. Further realizations crowded in upon Charlie. One was that they were heading due northwards now, without any attempted evasion, directly towards the Palais des Nations. Another was that, convinced he was safe from any surveillance, the Russian had abandoned any further precautions, which represented a victory: there began a bubble of satisfaction, which popped abruptly, unformed. He’d fucked it up! The awareness crowded in upon him, sickeningly. He’d been wrong – horrifyingly, stupidly wrong – relying upon an imagined fail-safe of eleven-thirty, with the conference not convening until noon. He’d forgotten the photographic session: all that stupid posturing for posterity! Charlie looked at his own watch. An exposed, targetable photographic session that began in precisely seventeen minutes!
They turned off the Rue du Vidollet on to the Avenue Guiseppe Motta, Charlie searching desperately for a telephone box or a policeman. Why were there never any of either about when you wanted one, like the joke said! Almost at once, ahead, the Russian went off the major highway and Charlie hesitated, unsure. Why hadn’t the man continued straight on, to the Palais des Nations? Because he had almost arrived at wherever he was heading, idiot, Charlie told himself.
Charlie risked getting closer, only twenty yards behind when the Russian turned into the small road off Colombettes. Charlie stood at the corner, watching, feeling another small spurt of satisfaction when he saw the man enter the building. Gotcha! he thought again.
Charlie practically ran forward himself, hesitating only at the entrance, but the Russian had already entered the elevator. Charlie didn’t need to see the indicator needle heading to the top floor, because he’d already worked out the building’s location and its overlooking vantage points into the conference complex.
Inside the foyer Charlie looked desperately around, seeing the travel agency in the corner. He threw open the door and said to the startled clerk who looked up: ‘A telephone! For Christ’s sake where’s a telephone!’
There was a wall clock, facing him. Fourteen minutes, he saw.
The assembly was strictly regimented, rehearsed over several days by the support groups, so there was no confusion. The Israeli group formed one edge, with the American delegation creating the buffer as they did within the conference building. Then came the Palestinians, followed by the Jordanians and finally the Syrians. The delineation was very positive in the front, with the leaders, but less formal among the aides and secretariat. Sulafeh Nabulsi stood less than ten feet from her victim, the briefcase containing the Browning no longer hanging from her shoulder but held in front of her, her hand already partially inside.
Chapter Thirty-six
Vasili Zenin hesitated immediately inside the apartment, looking at the neatly positioned rubber wedges and recalling his uncertainty during the escape preparations. Unnecessary and time-delaying, he decided, positively. A hindrance, in fact. He continued on, taking off his jacket as he went, throwing it over the chair that remained in position from his weapon assembly and crouched before getting into the harness to bring the photographic gathering in the faraway garden into view through the image magnifier. Practically grouped, he saw. All very neat and orderly. Lining up like targets, in fact. The Russian smiled at his own joke, slipping into the leather vest and zipping it tightly beneath his chin. He secured the cross straps but did not attach himself at once to the M21. Instead, attachments trailing from him, Zenin pulled the curtaining tightly to one side and then lifted the bottom half to loop it through the sash of the adjoining window, so that it was completely out of the way. He raised the chosen window as far as it would go, giving him a gap about a metre and a half square and swivelled the rifle on its tripod mounting to point directly through it. Still in front of the M21, Zenin screwed on the sound suppressor which made the barrel protrude through the open window and snapped the magazine of hollow-nosed bullets into place. The guns of Israeli security would be loaded with the same, he knew. And so was the Browning carried by Sulafeh Nabulsi.
Four minutes to go, he saw, clipping the muzzle strap on to its ring. Timing was vital now, because Sulafeh had to move first. Zenin fastened the last strap to the tripod, hugging the stock into his shoulder, feeling at once the familiar sensation of the weapon being an extension of him, not something apart. The grouped-together statesmen were very clear, through the sight. Zenin could see the American Secretary of State, Bell, with Arafat quite close. Mordechai Cohen, the Israeli Foreign Minister, was talking earnestly to someone just behind him and Hassani, the Jordanian minister, was trying but failing to catch the attention of someone in the Syrian group alongside.
Zenin brought the rifle into line, sighting perfectly upon his first kill, breathing easily, quite relaxed. Zenin saw the gathering start to come formally together, everyone turning towards the camera, and realized the photographic assistant just intruding into the bottom of his magnified circle was warning them the session was soon to begin. Not much longer now, thought the Russian.
Charlie Muffin stared impatiently at the floors lighting up and then going blank on the indicator board as the elevator climbed upwards with agonizing slowness, driving his right fist into the palm of his left hand in his impatience. Blom and Giles and Levy would all be out there, somewhere around the picture session and impossible immediately to contact. But there’d surely be a radio contact, to Blom at least! Some way of reaching the man. No klaxon alarm, Charlie remembered. And he remembered Blom’s words: a klaxon has no other practical benefit beyond making a noise and alarming people. Exactly what they fucking well needed, some way of alarming them. What about the fire alarm here? Too far away, dismissed Charlie, at once. And there was no certainty it would deflect the assassin sufficiently.