When they were in Nairobi, that is the kind of person Jan Kleyn had said South Africa needed most of all right now.
White people with a disregard for death.
Konovalenko dialed the number he had memorized as soon as he was given it in Africa. During his many years as a KGB officer he had always tried to hone his powers of concentration and memory by memorizing telephone numbers.
He had to dial the string of numbers four times before they were picked up by the satellite over the equator and sent back to earth again.
Someone picked up the receiver in Pretoria.
Konovalenko recognized immediately the slow, hoarse voice.
He explained once again what had happened. As usual, he spoke in code. Victor Mabasha was the entrepreneur. He had prepared himself thoroughly while driving up to Stockholm, and Jan Kleyn did not interrupt him a single time with questions or requests for further explanations.
When Konovalenko was finished, there was silence.
He waited.
“We’ll send you a new entrepreneur,” said Jan Kleyn in the end. “The other one must be dismissed immediately, of course. We’ll be in touch as soon as we know more about who his successor will be.”
The conversation was over.
Konovalenko replaced the receiver and knew the call had turned out exactly as he hoped. Jan Kleyn interpreted events as a case of Konovalenko preventing a disastrous outcome of the planned assassination.
He could not resist sneaking up to the bedroom door and listening. It was silent, apart from the radio.
He sat down at the table and poured himself half a glass of vodka. Now he could afford to get drunk. Since he needed to be alone, he let the bedroom door stay closed.
He thought about escorting Tania to the room where he slept when in residence. All in good time.
Early the next morning, he rose carefully so as not to disturb Tania. Rykoff was already up, sitting in the kitchen over a cup of coffee. Konovalenko got a cup himself and sat down opposite him.
“Victor Mabasha has got to die,” he said. “Sooner or later he’ll come to Stockholm. I have a strong suspicion he’s already here. I cut off one of his fingers before he disappeared. That means he’ll have a bandage or a glove on his left hand. He’ll probably go to the clubs in town where Africans generally gather. He has no other alternative if he’s going to track me down. And so you can start spreading the word today that there’s a contract out on Victor Mabasha. A hundred thousand kronor to anybody who can eliminate him. Go and see all your contacts, all the Russian criminals you know. Don’t mention my name. Just say the person issuing the contract is OK.”
“That’s a lot of cash,” said Vladimir.
“You leave that to me,” said Konovalenko. “Just do as I say. There’s nothing to stop you earning the money, in fact. Nor me, come to that.”
Konovalenko would have nothing against putting a pistol to Victor Mabasha’s head himself. But he knew that was hardly likely. Such good fortune would be too much to hope for.
“Tonight we can tour the clubs,” he said. “By then the contract must have been issued so that everybody who ought to know about it has heard. I’d say you’ve plenty to do.”
Vladimir nodded and got to his feet. Despite his flabbiness, Konovalenko knew he was most effective when the chips were down.
Half an hour later Vladimir left the apartment. Konovalenko stood at the window watching him in the parking lot down below, getting into a Volvo that looked to Konovalenko like a more recent model than the one he’d had before.
He’s eating himself to death, thought Konovalenko. He gets his kicks from buying new cars. He’ll die without having experienced the great pleasure of exceeding his own limitations. There’s barely any difference between him and a cow chewing its cud.
Konovalenko also had an important job to do that day.
He had to raise a hundred thousand kronor. He knew it would have to be done by robbery. The only question was which bank to choose.
He went back to his bedroom and was momentarily tempted to creep back under the covers and wake Tania. But he resisted, and got dressed silently and quickly.
Shortly before ten he left the apartment in Hallunda.
There was a chill in the air, and it was raining.
He wondered for a moment where Victor Mabasha was.
At a quarter after two on Wednesday, April 29, Anatoli Konovalenko robbed the Commercial Bank in Akalla. The raid took two minutes. He raced out of the bank around the corner and jumped into his car for a quick getaway.
He figured he had gotten away with at least twice as much as he needed. If nothing else, he intended treating himself and Tania to a gourmet dinner once Victor Mabasha was out of the way.
The road he was on curved sharply to the right as he approached Ulvsundavagen. Suddenly he slammed his foot on the brakes. There were two police cars ahead of him, blocking the way. How had the police had time to set up a roadblock? It was only ten minutes at most since he left the bank and the alarm went off. And how could they have known he would choose this particular route?
Then he acted.
He slammed into reverse and heard the tires squealing. As he swung around he knocked over a trash can on the sidewalk and ripped the rear fender loose against a tree. Now there was no question of driving slowly anymore. All that mattered now was his escape.
He could hear the sirens behind him. He swore aloud to himself, and wondered one more time what could have happened. He also cursed the fact that he did not know his way around the district north of Sundbyberg. In fact, the escape routes he had to choose between would all have taken him onto a major highway leading to the city center. But he had no idea where he was, and could not figure out the best getaway.
He soon strayed into an industrial estate and found himself trapped on a one-way street. The police were still on his tail, even though he had stretched the distance between them by running two lights. He leaped out of the car, the plastic bag in one hand and his pistol in the other. When the first squad car screeched to a halt he took aim and shattered the windshield. He had no idea if he hit anybody, but now he had the advantage he needed. The cops would not chase him until they had called for reinforcements.
He scrambled rapidly over a fence and into an enclosure that could have been either a dump or a building site. But he was lucky. A car with a young couple had driven in from the other side. They were looking for some place off the beaten track where they could be alone. Konovalenko did not hesitate. He crept up on the car from behind and thrust the pistol through the window at the man’s head.
“Quiet and do exactly what I say,” he said in his broken Swedish. “Out of the car. Leave the keys.”
The couple seemed completely confused. Konovalenko had no time to waste. He ripped open the door, dragged out the driver, leapt in behind the wheel, and looked at the girl in the seat next to him.
“Now I drive,” he said. “You have exactly one second to decide if you come with me or no.”
She screamed and flung herself out of the car. Konovalenko drove off. Now he was no longer in a hurry. Sirens were approaching from all directions, but his pursuers had no way of knowing he had already gotten himself a new escape car.
Did I kill anybody? he thought. I’ll find out if I turn on the television tonight.
He left the car at the subway station in Duvbo and rode back to Hallunda. Neither Tania nor Vladimir were at home when he rang the doorbell. He let himself in with his own key, put the plastic bag on the dining table, and got out the vodka bottle. A few big gulps calmed him down. Everything had gone well. If he had wounded or even killed a policeman, that would naturally raise tensions throughout the city. But he could not see how that would put a stop to or even delay the liquidation of Victor Mabasha.
He checked the money; he had a total of 162,000 kronor.