the people will be behind you and there’ll be no need for the election. But McGarvey will be there as well.”
“What do you suggest, Colonel?” Liesel demanded. “That we hide like rabbits because of some foreigner that you’re unable to catch?”
“Send a double. The effect will be the same. And if McGarvey should succeed, it won’t matter, because he won’t escape, and afterward you’ll miraculously rise from death like a new messiah.”
Liesel was livid, but a smile spread across Tarankov’s face. “That’s quite good, Leonid. But are you telling me that you cannot guarantee my safety from McGarvey?”
“He was the one who killed General Baranov, and Arkady.”
“Your half-brother. Yes, I know this,” Tarankov said, his gaze not wavering. “It’s why you were selected to stop him. It was thought that you would have the proper motivation. Instead, you seem to be admitting that he’s better than you. Your thinking has been colored by … what, Leonid? Fear? Has your judgment slipped so badly that you allowed a FSK captain to follow you?”
“I didn’t come here to play semantic games with you, Comrade,” Chernov answered coldly. “I am respectful of Mr. McGarvey. In fact I am very respectful of his determination and abilities, as you should be. I came here to confirm that you plan on being in Red Square on May Day, and to warn you that if McGarvey somehow manages to slip past me, you should send a double to make your speech. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain.” ” Liesel’s face had turned red. She jumped up, snatched a pistol from the table beside her and pointed it at Chernov with shaking hands.
Chernov didn’t bother looking at her. “With all due respect, Comrade Tarantula, keep your wife away from me, and out of sight until afterwards. Just now Russians have no love for foreigners. Any foreigners.”
Tarankov nodded but said nothing.
Chernov turned, and left the train, Liesel’s enraged screeching clearly audible all the way over to where he parked his car.
THIRTY-TWO
For ten days Chernov went about his work alone at Lefortovo, briefing General Yuryn at irregular intervals. But he was operating under a handicap now. Everyone believed that if McGarvey struck here in Moscow, it would be on election day when Tarankov was expected to make his triumphal entry into the city. If the assassination attempt came sooner, it would take place outside of Moscow. In some other city.
Kabatov and the fools he surrounded himself with hadn’t put it together yet, that Tarankov had no intention of waiting for the general elections. His was to be a socialist victory. And May First was the day for the international socialist movement.
But McGarvey had figured it out. Chernov didn’t know how he knew this, but he was just as certain that McGarvey would be in Red Square on May Day, as he was that Tarankov would not send a double.
With little more than a week to go, Chernov was beginning to admit to himself that McGarvey wasn’t going to make a mistake. On May First he was going to be within shooting range when Tarankov took to the reviewing platform atop Lenin’s tomb to speak to his people.
Even after all this time Gresko conceded that McGarvey’s photograph had been distributed to less than twenty percent of Russia’s border crossings, and there was even some doubt how widely the information had been spread in Moscow. At this rate it would take several more weeks to get the job done. But the FSK task force did not seem to be overly concerned, because the general elections were still more than seven weeks away.
The CIA and SDECE seemed to be having the same sort of luck as well. They’d lost McGarvey’s trail somewhere in Paris, which was actually a moot point, because in Chernov’s estimation they’d never had his trail in the first place. No one knew if he was still in Paris, or even in France. No one knew how he’d gotten to Moscow, or how he’d gotten back out of Russia, if in fact he’d even been here. The whole story could have been Yemlin’s invention to somehow misdirect their investigation.
Nor had stationing a man at the Magesterium to eavesdrop on Yemlin’s homosexual love nest produced any results other than the story Yemlin was telling his queer that he was calling McGarvey off. That story for certain was a fiction, because Yemlin’s every move was being watched, now even inside the SVR. He’d never contacted McGarvey or made any effort to do so.
Paporov’s body had been found about the same time Chernov had reported him missing. The autopsy took five days after which the Militia came to the conclusion that he’d been shot to death during a robbery. They refused to speculate why the Mercedes the captain had been driving had not been stolen as well.
Chernov refused another assistant, though secretly he wished Paporov were still around. It had been a stupid mistake on his part allowing the captain to follow him to the train. He’d underestimated the man, something he would have to be careful not to do with McGarvey.
Tarankov’s raid on Smolensk got very little official attention inside Russia, and only a brief mention in the western media. It seemed as if the entire world was holding its breath until the June elections.
As the clock in Chernov’s office slipped past midnight, he flipped his desk calendar over to the 23rd of April, eight days until May First, then got his jacket and went out. He’d been thinking about his mistress Raya Dubanova all afternoon, and he decided to spend a few hours with her tonight, because his nerves were on edge. The grinding stupidity and inefficiency of the FSK and Militia threatened to drive him crazy.
Outside, he hesitated for a moment in the darkness. The prison compound was utterly still. If the assassin were anyone other than McGarvey, he would leave now, get out of Russia, perhaps to Switzerland. There was still plenty of work for men such as him. The problem was that he would not be able to ask the Militia for much help covering Red Square until the last minute. Otherwise Kabatov would order a trap to be laid not only for McGarvey but for Tarankov too.
But he was going to have to stay, to play this little drama out to its end. For revenge, if nothing else.
By ten o’clock McGarvey left Riga behind, the morning overcast and cool, eastbound traffic fairly light. The Mercedes was running well, but he kept his speed within the posted limit of ninety kilometers per hour, which was less than sixty miles per hour. Their main highway that ran directly from Riga to Moscow followed the railroad. It was one hundred and fifty miles to the border at Zilupe, and another 395 miles to the Russian capital, most of the distance over indifferent roads. But traffic would be light most of the way.
The second Mercedes had arrived late yesterday afternoon, and it took Zalite the rest of the day and into the evening to prepare the Russian transit and import documents.
McGarvey had picked up the car before eight this morning, and handed the Latvian a bank draft for the remainder of the import taxes and handling fees.
The car had been washed, polished and gassed, the two spare gas cans filled, and sat his the middle of the warehouse floor surrounded by a half-dozen admiring men. Zalite was practically licking his chops.
He took McGarvey aside. “It’s nine hundred kilometers to Moscow, so naturally I had my mechanic check your car for defects. I’ll tell you something, that Mercedes is in perfect condition. Nothing wrong. Nothing!”
“Did your man take the engine apart?” McGarvey asked.
Zalite’s eyes narrowed. “Nyet.”
“It’s a good thing, because he would have gotten a very nasty surprise. He might not have lived through it.” Zalite glanced over at the car. “But you will drive it all that way without a problem?”
McGarvey nodded. “My little secret. And since there’ll already be a thousand kilometers on the car before I turn it over, no one will be able to blame me when something goes wrong.”
“It’s a beautiful machine,” Zalite said. “Such a shame.”
“Maybe when this is all over, I’ll get you a good one.”
“Maybe I’ve changed my mind about Mercedes,” Zalite said sadly. “When does the next one come?”
“Depends on how this trip goes. A couple weeks.”
Twenty transport trucks, empty, were lined up on the Latvian side of the border waiting to have their papers checked. Only a few trucks, all of them heavily loaded, were waiting to get into Latvia with their Russian-made products. By evening the numbers would be reversed with more loaded trucks arriving and fewer empty trucks
