Andropov brought it quickly to a close. ‘Gentlemen, you’ve had a long day. Tomorrow — our first meeting. Comrade Sakharovsky will be in the chair. I will be with you for the afternoon session. On Sunday, as last year, our hunting party.’ He turned to the Coloneclass="underline" ‘I trust your aim remains true, Colonel? The quarry, I gather, are as lively as ever. I believe we shall have some “good hunting”.’ But Colonel Hartep was not a linguist and Andropov’s sally died at once in the rigid atmosphere.
But for Andropov and Sakharovsky the meeting had served its purpose: it had delayed their departure from the Hotel, they had not had to leave with the others of the committee and could thus travel back home together, undetected in the same car.
‘Well?’ Andropov spoke as soon as the big Zil limousine began to gather speed through the freezing empty streets of the city, moving out of Red Square towards the northern suburbs. ‘What do you think?’
Sakharovsky rubbed his hands busily again, though the car was warm enough against the bitter night.
‘I don’t know. I’m not sure now. He handled it perfectly. A great actor — or else he’s nothing to do with it.’
‘Yes. I had the same feeling for a while. But I’m sure it’s him.’
‘I don’t know. It looks very possible, I agree,’ Sakharovsky went on. ‘But that’s my worry: it’s too obvious. What Flitlianov did in his imaginary profile of the Sixth Directorate was to outline almost exactly the real subsidiary group — which he controls, which your predecessor appointed him to, which you and I know about. The Sixth Directorate he suggested — almost everything about it, its formation, composition and so on — corresponds with our own internal security division which he heads: an equally “clandestine” directorate. Are we to suppose that this is the basis of the whole conspiracy — that the men Flitlianov has recruited over the years are there to ensure not the security of the KGB but its destruction?’
‘That seems to me very probable. You say it’s too obvious. But look at it another way: it was also a unique opportunity for anyone with this sort of long-term conspiracy in mind: Flitlianov has had the entire responsibility for forming this security division, with very little reference to the top. He had his own budget, which always included a large floating allocation, including hard currency overseas. He kept everything to himself. That was the whole point of the operation originally, which I don’t think I would ever have sanctioned: he was to recruit and train a special corps of men, here and abroad, quite outside the regular KGB channels, and to place these men among KGB operatives whose loyalty or performance we had doubts about. His division is an early-warning system throughout the KGB. And all right, I’ll admit it has worked extraordinarily well. We’ve suffered very few lapses. But you can see the unique lever it’s given him: none of the other Directorates know of the existence of this group. And how much do you and I really know of it? That again was part of the original plan: that the names of Flitlianov’s little army of agents provocateurs should be kept on a single file, with him. There was, of course, to be no general access to them — no possibility of crossed lines, of anyone in the official KGB ever knowing the names, or anything about the members of this unofficial group.’
‘You have access to those files, if you want it. You could open the whole thing up.’
‘Yes, I have. But the birds would fly before I got anywhere with an investigation. Besides, it is likely that most of the names he has on file in Moscow are bona fide members of his security group. And the rest — the real members of his conspiracy — won’t be on any list at all. No, when we move, we must hit everyone in this, not just the leader. That’s essential. Otherwise it is just killing part of a worm — the rest lives on, and reproduces itself. And remember this is not just one or two defectors, or double agents — or someone working for the CIA or the British SIS or the Germans, just out to get a few secrets from us. This is a group of men, a disciplined intelligence corps — there could be hundreds of them — dedicated to overthrowing the KGB and after that the Soviet State. Unless we get all the leaders of this group we might as well not bother at all.’
‘You’d have to track these people down almost simultaneously then — if you want them all. Flitlianov pointed that out. An almost impossible task.’
‘We’ll see. But whatever we have to do this is the time to keep Flitlianov in the dark, keep him guessing, undermine his confidence. That’s why I gave him the opportunity of describing his own security division at the meeting — I put the words into his mouth. He must have been surprised: he can have no idea what I’m up to — whether I know and if so what and how much I know. Prepare him psychologically. It’s the only way we can ever hope to get anything out of him when the time comes. Meanwhile, we keep the pressure on him. Sunday will give us another occasion for that. It’s an invitation, in the present circumstances, he can’t refuse.’
‘But what if he does refuse it?’ Sakharovsky asked. ‘What if Alexei is the leader of this group, realises he’s a marked man, and decides to break now — before Sunday? In his position, even under the closest possible surveillance, he mightn’t find it impossible to get out of the country.’
Andropov was suddenly happy in the warmth, looking out on the bitter, empty streets — happy as the man is who has the final ace up his sleeve.
‘Well that — as I see it — is the whole point of this psychological pressure: to make him run. That would be the beginning of the end of our troubles, I think — one sure way of getting a lead on the other ringleaders. Those are the people he’d make for. Or person. That’s the one thing he’d have to do at some point outside — make contact with his deputies — or deputy — and start re-activating his group from outside the Union.
‘You see, as you pointed out just now, the strange thing is that almost everything Alexei said about the formation of this imaginary Sixth Directorate is true of his own clandestine group. He went out of his way to make the point — an extraordinary risk which nearly came off — an immense double bluff: telling the truth about his own group in order to put us off his trail entirely. You remember what he said — what he insisted — that he would use the chain and not the block cut-out with his men? He would know the name of his first deputy, who in turn would have recruited the second and so on; each deputy recruiting his own men? Well, if that’s true, and I think it is, then his immediate contact overseas would be this first deputy. And that’s someone we want as much as Alexei himself. Through him we start to eat our way along the chain to all the others. So I’m hoping he will run.’
‘Good. Good.’ Sakharovsky nodded, following the line of thought ‘On the other hand if he does run in order to make this vital contact he’s going to be looking over his shoulder.’
‘Certainly. That’s why I have in mind two things: I want to make him think it’s time to run, yet without allowing him to think that we know for certain he’s our man. He’s given us an opening on this with Vassily Chechulian: he’s suggested him as an alternative suspect. Well, we’ll go along with that. We’ll take Vassily. And afterwards keep Alexei moving in his real job, take the heat off him, put him back on an even keel with some genuine priority business in his own Second Directorate. And that’s the moment I think he’ll choose to run. It was always catching people that mattered in our job,’ Andropov ruminated. ‘Now it’s just the opposite; making sure they get away.’