When Fiona took one, Malkovic sat down casually in the other. “Some tea first, perhaps?” he asked. “It’s still quite cold outside, or so I understand. I came in very early this morning myself?several hours ago, actually. The world financial markets, alas, follow an unholy schedule in our day and age.”
“Thank you, yes. Tea would be lovely,” she said, hiding her amusement at hearing his scarcely veiled boast about the long hours that he worked.
Almost immediately, another of Malkovic’s secretaries brought in a tray with a sterling silver samovar, two tall clear glasses, and two small crystal bowls, one containing slices of fresh lemon, the other a dollop of jam to sweeten the strong tea. The woman poured for them and then left quietly and quickly.
“And now to business, Ms. Devin,” he said amiably, after they had both taken a few cautious sips of steaming tea. “My staff tells me that you are especially interested in the role I see for myself and my companies here in the new Russia.”
Fiona nodded again. “That’s quite right, Mr. Malkovic,” she replied, settling down into a familiar role, that of a journalist in search of a good story.
It was not difficult. Over the past several years, she had built a well-deserved reputation as a talented, hard-hitting reporter. She specialized m following and explaining the often-complicated interaction of Russian politics and economics. Her work appeared regularly in leading newspapers and business journals around the globe. Conducting this interview ? with the largest and most influential private investor in Russian industry?would have been a natural for her, even without her ultimate interest in using the billionaire as one more means of prying open the secrets of the state medical bnreaucrac v tor Covert-One.
And, on the surface at least, Malkovic himself was an easv man to interview. Ever-charming and apparently perfectly relaxed, he answered her questions about his plans and business dealings readily and without evident evasion, choosing only to dodge a few probes that even she realized were too personally intrusive or that might reveal closel) held propnetan information useful to his competitors.
Nevertheless, Fiona sensed that the billionaire was always m hill control of himself. He chose his words with precision, plainly determined to influence the way she saw him and the wav he would appear to her readers whenever this interview was published. She shrugged inwardly. This was the great game, the eternal dance for any journalist?especially a freelancer working without the clout provided by a major newspaper, magazine, or television network.
Ask too many tough questions and your subjects refused to speak to you again.
Ask too few and you wound up writing puff pieces that could have been churned out by any second-rate public relations firm.
Slowly and carefully she brought the conversation around toward politics, focusing delicately on the growing authoritarianism of the Dudarev government. “Surely you see the risks of arbitrary rule to any investor, especially a foreign investor?” Fiona said at last. “I mean, you’ve seen what happened to the owners of the Yukos oil cartel ?prison for some, disgrace for the rest, and the forced sale of all their holdings. Every dollar or euro you invest here could be snatched away by Kremlin decree in the blink of an eve. It laws or regulations can be made and unmade at the whim of a few, how can you plan ra-tionally for the future?”
Malkovic shrugged expansively. “There are always risks in anv venture, Ms. Devin,” he said genially “Believe me, I know that very well. But I am a man who looks to the long-term, beyond the shallow day-to-day twists and turns of fortune. For all its many faults, Russia remains a land of great opportunity. When Communism collapsed, this country gave itself over to capitalist excess?to its own Gilded Age of greedy tycoons and business oligarchs. So now, quite naturally, the pendulum has swung back a bit in reaction, toward tighter state control over life and politics. But that same pendulum will eventually swing back toward the moderate middle. And those of us who were wise enough to stand by Russia through the difficult times will reap enormous rewards when that day comes.”
“You seem very confident of that,” she said quietly.
“I am confident,” the billionaire agreed. “Remember, I know President Dudarev personally. He is no saint, but I believe that he is a man determined to give this countrv the law and order it craves. To restore a sense of discipline and decency. To break the power of the Mafiya and make the streets of Moscow and other cities safe again.”
He raised a quizzical eyebrow. “I would have thought that you, of all people, would appreciate the vital importance of that, Ms. Devin. Your husband’s untimely death was a great tragedy. It would not have occurred in a society better able to safeguard the lives and property of its citizens ?the kind of society I believe Russia’s new leaders honestly hope to build here.”
For a moment, Fiona stared back at Malkovic without speaking, aware of a wave of cold anger rising behind her tightly controlled features. Even after two years, the memories of Sergei’s murder were still very much a raw wound in her psyche. To hear the subject raised so casually, especially as a rhetorical prop for Dudarev’s growing tyranny, seemed a kind of grotesque sacrilege.
“I helped bring my husband’s killers to justice myself,” she said at last, speaking with a calm, even voice that masked her true feelings. For months, she had hunted those who ordered her husband’s death, piecing together evidence of their crimes at considerable risk to her own life. In the end, the public outcry she raised by her articles had forced the authorities to take action.
The men most responsible were now serving long prison sentences.
“So you did,” Malkovic agreed. “And I followed your courageous crusade against the Mafiya with great admiration. But even you must admit that your task would have been easier if the police here were less corrupt, more efficient, and better disciplined.”
Fiona hid a frown. Why was the billionaire suddenly throwing her husband’s murder back in her face? This man never said anything without a purpose, so what was his goal in trying to force her off-balance now? Was this his way of warning her off the uncomfortable subject of Russia’s gradual slide back to a police state? Was he trying to distract her from asking any more inconvenient or embarrassing questions about his business connections to the Dudarev regime?
If so, she would have to move quickly, before he decided to cut this interview short on one pretense or another. “There may be worse things than police corruption and incompetence,” she told him. “This growing cult of official secrecy, for example?secrecy I consider to be obsessive, unnecessary, and even dangerous. Especially when it concerns a serious matter of public health and safety.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I’m not quite following you, Ms. Devin. To what ‘cult of secrecy’ are you referring?”
Fiona shrugged. “What else would you call trying to hide the news of a deadly new disease, not only from the Russian people themselves, but also from the world’s public health agencies?”
“A new disease?” Malklovie leaned forward, suddenly wholly intent. His eyes were troubled. “Go on,” he said quietly.
He listened carefully while she ran through the gist of what she and Smith had learned separately from Kiryanov and Petrenko, though she concealed her knowledge that the two doctors had been murdered. Or that this mysterious ailment was now spreading outside Russia itself. When she finished, he pursed his lips in dismay. “Do you have any evidence to confirm these rumors of a strange new illness?”
“Evidence? Not yet. None of the other doctors involved will talk to me and all of the important records are under lock and key,” Fiona said, shaking her head. She frowned again. “But you see the danger, I hope. One way or another the word is bound to leak out. If the Kremlin ?or even just an official in the Ministry of Health ?is covering up the beginning of a new epidemic in a foolish attempt to avoid public panic or international embarrassment, the con-sequences could be catastrophic.”
Malkovic grimaced. “Indeed. The economic and political costs could be horrendous. The world community and the financial markets would not easily forgive a nation caught hiding something that might turn out to be another epidemic as bad as AIDS?or worse.”
“I was thinking more of the possible cost in human lives,” Fiona said softly.
A wintry smile touched his lips, “‘louche, Ms. Devin,” he said. “I stand, or rather, sit rebuked.” He looked at her with a new measure of respect. “So what is it that you really want of me? I assume all of your questions earlier were simply window dressing, a means of maneuvering our conversation onto the question of this apparent medical cover-up.”
“Not entirely,” she said, blushing very slightly. “But yes, I am hoping that you’ll exert your influence with the appropriate ministries to shed some light on this mystery disease.”
