isolated General Dimitri Spassky as the man responsible for the security debacle, which Spassky had already and very obviously recognized. The ashtray in front of the man was overflowing and the hand with which he lighted the continual replacements was more visibly shaking than usual.
“There is some encouraging news,” announced Yuri Trishin. “The president has recovered consciousness. The latest from the Pirogov doctors is that his condition is stable and that he is out of immediate danger, although still critical.”
“Encouraging indeed, great news!” hurriedly coughed Spassky, anxious to have his name first on record.
The impatience of the presidential chief of staff for Natalia and the fourth member of the group, Militia Commandant Leonid Zenin, dutifully to respond was almost palpable and as soon as they had Trishin said, “So what’s encouraging for me to hear in return?”
Nothing, conceded Natalia, accepting it was a question posed to her. According to the Lefortovo prison authorities, she said, there was nothing to suggest Vera Bendall had been likely to take her own life, although that did not excuse the oversight of not removing articles of clothing with which she could do herself harm. It was hoped to interview George Bendall later that day. The investigation had been centralized at the American embassy. Ruth Anandale continued to improve although the indications were that she had permanently lost the use of her right arm. A decision was being made in the next twenty-four hours whether to amputate the leg of Feliks Vasilevich Ivanov, the Russian security guard injured in the shooting. The likelihood was that it would be necessary.
Natalia hesitated as she came to the end. Everything on yourterms, to your orchestration, Charlie had lectured: don’t let anyone else get their explanations or excuses in ahead of you. Spassky had to be first. “Unless there has been a discovery in the last two or three hours that Dimitri Ivanovich has not shared with me there is the risk of considerable embarrassment. Substantial sections of former intelligence files containing information that could be important to this investigation remain missing ….” She turned to the militia commandant. “I also understand, from taped meetings involving Senior Investigating Colonel Olga Melnik, that the American and British investigators are aware of what’s happened?”
It was Zenin who got in first. “I am not aware of the Americans or British being told. If they have been, I can only assume it emerged in answer to her being asked why the material was incomplete.”
Spassky was quick to follow, surprisingly strong voiced in the chosen denial. “I am not, nor ever was, directly or personally responsible for archives.”
“You are head of counter-intelligence-internal security-within Lubyanka,” challenged Natalia.
“Exactly! We are talking of departmental mismanagement.”
“Are we?” demanded Natalia. “I don’t think we are.”
“Are archives definitely missing?” asked Trishin.
“Yes,” finally admitted the old man.
Natalia didn’t want the impetus taken away from her. “Deliberately taken?”
“I have no evidence of deliberate interference,” insisted Spassky.
“Has a thorough search been made?” pressed Natalia.
“Yes,” said Spassky, again.
“Isn’t it an unfortunate coincidence that Vera Bendall died in custody in a prison administered by the FSB?” leapt in Zenin. “I suggest that the most thorough, independent enquiry be held.”
So Charlie had planted his suspicion in time for some contact between Olga Melnik and Leonid Zenin. Natalia’s realization was fleeting, quickly replaced by near incredulity at what Zenin had just proposed. The militia commandant was actually pressing for the Russian intelligence service to be investigated by an outside organization, which was unthinkable. Even the supposed enquiry into the failed, KGB-supported coup against Mikhail Gorbachov in 1991had been a strictly controlled, internal tribunal. Natalia’s awareness continued, worryingly. Was this what Charlie had anticipated and really been preparing her for, a collision of nuclear proportions between Russian intelligence and presumably Russian civilian police, with herself inevitably-more inextricably than she’d ever fearedcaught up in the middle? And she would
The same analysis-although not necessarily in the same personal order-had obviously been made by the men in the Kremlin office with her.
Spassky’s reaction was such open-mouthed disbelief that all he could initially utter was, “What?” so weak- voiced that he said it again, in louder outrage. “
Trishin was no less surprised but more controlled. “You’re virtually making an open accusation.”
Surely, thought Natalia, the civilian commandant did not for a moment imagine the militia strong enough-able enough-to confront an intelligence apparatus developed over more than seventy years!
“I believe the gravity of what’s happened demands a thorough enquiry,” insisted Zenin. “I understand, too, that also to be the feeling of the Americans and the British.”
Natalia was immediately, intently, alert. Charlie hadn’t given her any indication of that. But then he hadn’t properly-fully-explained all the guidance he’d given. And Zenin had clearly spoken to Olga Melnik at the American embassy, bringing him more up to date than she was. “What reason do you have for saying that?”
“The impression of my officers in direct contact with their investigators.”
Impressions, isolated Natalia: there was only one officer, Olga Ivanova Melnik. The militia chief was railroading.
“The woman was in militia, not FSB, custody at Lefortova!” said Spassky, inadequately.
“Precisely why I think an enquiry justified,” argued Zenin. “I do not want any innuendo-any innuendo whatsoever-directed at my service.”
Was it as simple as that, not an attack at all but simply a defense, in advance of any accusation? Natalia said, “By whom, or what, do you consider such an investigation should be conducted?”
“What else but a presidential commission?” said Zenin.
A neat sidestep from direct confrontation, Natalia recognized. The unbelievable challenge had been laid but Zenin had separated himself from directly pursuing it.
“I think,” said Trishin, “That this suggestion needs to be considered. Discussed with others.”
Dimitri Ivanovich Spassky’s hand was shaking very badly when he lit his new cigarette.
Like practically everything in Charlie Muffin’s upwardly and on-wardly mobile philosophy, the vindication was relegated to his mental trophy shelf for later burnishing-which none ever were-while he hurried on. Which, practicably, was not immediately possible because the bullets and George Bendall’s rifle had physically-and finally-to be transported from the militia forensic laboratories, in the faraway Moscow outskirts of Chagino. There was coffee and separate reflection in their respective offices while they waited. From his Charlie saw both Olga and Kayley in gesticulating telephone exchanges but decided against calling his own embassy. There was no time difference urgency. Having satisfactorily proved his suspicions from a partial test, he now wanted the complete ballistics analysis before, fittingly, lobbing the bombshell into London’s lap. Which wasn’t, at that precise moment, his most pressing concern. They now had, unquestionably, two gunmen from which a neon-lit, flag-waving conspiracy emerged, which jigsawed with missing KGB archives and the death in custody of a potential witness who’d remembered the official removal of more papers and belongings-including those of the one seized gunman-that had not been mentioned in anything that Colonel Olga Melnik had provided. But far more importantly were not known about by Natalia, whom he’d specifically asked the previous night. Which, as muddied waters went, was thicker than pea soup, a mixed metaphor that Charlie was content with because it was so appropriate. There was something approaching a familiar comfort at being confronted by a situationtotally different from that with which he’d begun: in Charlie’s life, the obvious had never, if ever, turned out to be obvious.
Olga’s sudden activity in the adjoining office alerted him to the arrival of the material evidence, which Kayley escorted her to the embassy reception area officially to receive. It was obvious that virtually everyone in the complex knew of a development, if not precisely what it was, but Kayley limited the audience in the forensic section to its specific staff, himself, Olga and Charlie. The much-filmed rifle as well as the medically-recovered bullets made up the Russian package but Willie Ying’s concentration was again upon the distorted metal. The tests were as straightforward as those earlier, quadruple checked within thirty minutes.
The Chinese straightened, finally, and said, “There isn’t any possible doubt.”
Kayley said, “I need to have this spelled out, nice and easy. I’ve got a lot of curious people to tell.”
Ying looked invitingly at Charlie, who said, “You’re the expert.”
