Dead Men Living

When Natalia told him who the additional officials would be, Lestov said doubtfully, “There must be other, more important reasons.”

“The worldwide publicity has escalated everything,” Natalia pointed out, easily. “And there’s been some misunderstandings. Nothing, though, to do with you.”

“Because of what happened, there wasn’t any chance for me to discuss anything with the American or the Englishman, apart from his saying he’d made up what he said at the press conference-”

“Did you believe him?” broke in Natalia, recognizing again how perfectly what she’d just learned fit everything else. There was, she thought, such a thing as coincidence. Or was it luck?

“I do believe he had no warning of the media: the American was adamant neither of them knew. It was very quick-witted of him.”

Which Charlie was, among so many other things, Natalia thought. And which she had to be in the coming hours. She said, “I’ve got my own ideas about that, particularly after what you’ve just told me.”

“I wish I understood more,” admitted Lestov.

“I’m beginning to,” said Natalia.

It continued far better than Natalia could have hoped. Everyone except her deputy was already waiting when she led the homicide detective into the Interior Ministry conference room and she was halfway through the introductions before Petr Travin flustered in. He got halfway through, “Security told me …” before seeing Lestov.

“The colonel arrived early,” picked up Natalia. “It gave me the opportunity personally to congratulate him, as I am sure the rest of you would like to do.”

She was pleased by the confusion. Petr Travin looked to the deputy interior minister for guidance and Mikhail Suslov, from the Foreign Ministry, deferred to Dmitri Nikulin. The president’s representative told Lestov, “You came out well from what could have been a very embarrassing situation for us. So yes, congratulations are in order.”

“Which is why I am proposing an official commendation,” said Natalia, looking at Viskov. “You’d support that, wouldn’t you, Deputy Minister?”

Viskov was totally wrong-footed. “I thought … yes, I suppose. Of course.”

First blood, Natalia decided, conscious of Nikulin’s frown. “Is there something else, Deputy Minister?”

“A lot, I would have thought,” Viskov came back, eagerly.

“Indeed,” agreed Natalia, anxious to orchestrate as much as possible. “But surely we need logically to keep to the original agenda and hear first what Colonel Lestov has to tell us?” She felt confidently relaxed, although properly so: sure of her strengths-of being stronger, in fact, than she’d imagined-but not complacent. Viskov and his puppet might not have played their full hand yet, although she believed they had.

“That was the original intention of the meeting,” reminded Nikulin.

This afternoon’s success or failure depended, ultimately, on the presidential aide: his were the attitudes and nuances she had most accurately to gauge, above all others. She already knew those of her immediate superior and her intended replacement. Everyone else were unsuspecting spectators.

“Of course,” agreed Viskov, at once.

Uncertain, assessed Natalia at once: good. She said, “Perhaps, Colonel, you’d go through again what we’ve already discussed?” aware of Travin’s face tightening at having missed out on the preliminary account.

Calmed by that rehearsal and buoyed by an official commendation, Lestov spoke virtually without stammering, the hesitations appearing to be more pauses to move from one episode to another than an impediment. It was only when the man had been speaking for several minutes that Natalia remembered everyone but herself was hearing the Yakutsk story in full for the first time and that what she was listening to amounted to the final preparation for her own performance. Her concentration was absolute upon her two attackers, alert for anything and everything. Their absorption, in turn, was entirely upon the homicide officer, ignoring her. If they were that attentive, anxious for something more, maybe they had shown their full hand.

Everything depended upon how she played hers. The slightest miscalculation, intruding too soon, before the detective finished, risked confusion, which could deflect her counterattack. But if she waited until Lestov completely finished, the danger was Viskov or Travin realizing the significance of the homicide detective’s revelation and possibly outmaneuvering her before she outmaneuvered them. Or was there that danger? She had heard it-or almost all of it-before. Been able to analyze it-even listened to Charlie analyze it, talked it through with him step by step as she’d demanded he do. No one would be able to respond as quickly as she was tensed to. Certainly not Viskov or Travin, whose determination to topple her she was increasingly coming to think-although still not complacently-exceeded their conspiring ability. The right moment-the most effective, destructive moment-would be at the very end. Which again she could anticipate.

Natalia pounced the moment it came. “Everything we’ve heard totally justifies the commendation we’ve already agreed,” she declared.“And from what we’ve heard, it also justifies the Lubyanka inquiry ….”She looked directly at the deputy interior minister. “I’m personally sorry you don’t seem to have agreed to its need …?” She stopped, invitingly. Come on, she thought. Jump into the gaping hole.

Once more there was confusion throughout the room. Nikulin said, “I think we all might benefit from a detailed explanation.”

The president’s official was cautious, Natalia gauged: ready to change sides. “I am afraid there was a regrettable misunderstanding-one that’s easily resolved-between myself and the archival staff at the Lubyanka,” said Natalia. “And I take full responsibility for that. But I did not ask for the entire records of Yakutskaya. That would-”

“Your memorandum-” Travin tried to stop.

“Does not ask for that,” stopped Natalia, in turn. “Read it, more thoroughly than you appear to have done so far …”

There was concerted movement as everyone except Lestov went to their dossiers. The homicide colonel looked curiously at her. Natalia smiled back. Her stomach was churning.

“There can be no other conclusion-especially with your suggestions on how a necessary staff can be assembled and the work routines established-than that you intended every record to be withdrawn,” insisted Viskov, triumphantly.

“My first instruction to my deputy, yesterday, asks for-and I quote-‘a daily summary, as well as a detailed assessment, of the total number of camps that existed around Yakutsk.’ And even more specifically for any that might have held particular prisoners ….”

“That’s true,” said Nikulin. “That’s what it quite clearly says!”

The man was taking his escape with her, decided Natalia, relieved. If this was indeed a battle, then Nikulin was her reinforcement. More than that. Nikulin was the man who had to award the victory laurel. Natalia hesitated. She might be acquiring Charlie’s deviousness, but she wasn’t sure she could manage his final them-or-me killer instinct. Yes, she could, Natalia decided at once. There was Sasha-always Sasha.

Color began to suffuse Viskov’s face. “The memorandum is contradictory.”

“I don’t consider it is,” refused Natalia, directly addressing the presidential chief of staff. “At worst the request to the archives istoo general. It could have been resolved by a simple telephone call to me, from either the deputy minister or my deputy. My deputy could, in fact, have simply walked along our linking corridor. Neither chose to talk to me. Instead, from the correspondence that has been exchanged today, it would appear there has been a positive attempt to undermine my authority. And by suspending what I had already initiated, an investigation that has the president’s personal interest has been seriously delayed, possibly even jeopardized.”

Natalia stopped, pleased with her concluding reference to the president, which had only come to her as she talked and identified her unquestionably with Dmitri Nikulin. Committed, she accepted. In the middle of the battlefield, openly wielding her two-edged sword, with no retreat. There was a strange comparison between the two men she was confronting, Viskov’s face bulged and purple, outraged veins pumping in his forehead, Travin ashen in his awareness that he was indeed caught up in a war zone.

“I’m not at all sure what this dispute is all about or how it involves me or my department,” complained Mikhail Suslov, easing himself as far away as he could from the firing.

Wonderful! thought Natalia. “You are one of the most involved,” she told the deputy foreign minister. “There was always the need to look for foreign prisoners in the Yakutsk camps, which is why I suggested it. And why, by proposing the staffing I did, it could be completed as quickly as possible, certainly