Nimitz Class

they have advanced the search further. Every time I talk to the CIA we have nothing more than the Mossad is telling us. And there’s twenty-five thousand people on the staff in Langley. Christ knows what they’re all doing.”

“I guess it’s because the Mossad is so damned small and tightly controlled,” said Bill. “What have they got, twelve hundred people — only thirty-five case officers? What are they called? Katsas?”

“Yeah. But there’s something more to it, Bill. Israel has a ton of people, all over the place, who are deeply sympathetic to its plight, and its fears. They are a kind of unseen army, numbered in their thousands in almost every country. They are always there to help any Mossad agent. The Israelis call them ‘the sayanim’—and they have vast computerized lists of ’em. That’s how they tap into real information.

“I guess that’s how they got into Barzan al-Tikriti’s phone line. A Swiss Jew involved in the telephone system in Geneva. A favor from a proud member of the sayanim, for his spiritual home in the Middle East. That’s how it works.”

“So right now they’re looking for a helpful Turkish Jew in the hotel business in Istanbul,” replied Baldridge. “A guy to see them on the right track, to call a couple of friends, check out those guest registers?”

“You got it, Billy. That’s how it’s done. Stay close to Rankov. He wants to find that Kilo too. And stay in touch. Call me if you get anything.”

The phone went dead. Bill was still holding the receiver, as always. “Oh, thank you very much,” he said sarcastically. “It was so nice to talk to you, Admiral Morgan. Have a nice day, rude asshole.”

Bill showered and changed, gazed out of the window at the soulless spread of Sevastopol. In the near distance he could see the giant cranes of the shipyards. He decided to wander downstairs, have some coffee, and then go to the bar to meet Admiral Rankov. The coffee was pretty nondescript, and he skimmed through a copy of an English-written Arab newspaper he found on the next seat.

There was a picture of the wrecked floating dock, jutting out of the water in the harbor of Bandar Abbas, but the caption carried no suggestion of anything more than an accident in the dockyard area.

Bill signed the check, and decided to play a mild hunch. He knew now that the Kilo had sailed on April 12, which he had not known before he talked to Rankov. And he felt instinctively that if Adnam had been in Sevastopol in the days leading up to that sailing, he had stayed in this hotel. Everyone in the shipping and arms business did. But, unlike the Mossad, he could not spend days trying to get into a Russian hotel guest list for the first part of April. They would never reveal anything. Not here.

But there was one thing he could do immediately, and he strolled outside to talk to the waiting limousine drivers who inhabit the fore-courts of hotels such as this.

The first man he spoke to wore a gray uniform. No, he had never had a long distance run to the southern border of Georgia and Turkey. But he thought Tomas did, back in the spring, and Tomas had just arrived back in the forecourt. Bill then sought out Tomas, a thick-set, blond young Russian. Aged around twenty-five. Yes, he did once have such a customer. Back in April. They drove all through the night, stopping only for gasoline. He remembered it well, because it nearly caused him to be divorced. “My wife was not at home so I could not tell her, and the man wanted to leave immediately. So I just went. Made it in fourteen hours — six hundred miles, right down the coast road, through Sochi. He was an Arab gentleman, paid me two and a half thousand American dollars, cash. Best job I ever had.”

“How come you nearly got divorced?”

“I forgot it was her birthday. We were going out to celebrate with friends. It was awful, I phone her from Batumi. She says she never speak to me again. Slammed down the phone. I drive all the way back not knowing if I’m still married. If I had not agreed to share the money with her, I would not be still married.”

“Do you recall the name of the man?”

“No, he never told me that. He hardly spoke.”

“Do you recall what he looked like?”

“Not really. He was an Arab. Dark-skinned, tight black hair. Not very tall, about my height. But well built, muscular.”

Bill reached into his pocket for his wallet, took out the grainy, fax machine photograph of Benjamin Adnam in Arab dress — the one they had taken in the Israeli search room at the Allenby Bridge. It was absolutely useless except to the eyes of someone who knew Adnam well. But Bill held out hope for the Russian driver.

“Could this have been him?” he said, handing the photograph to Tomas.

“Well, it could have been,” he replied. “But the man I took to the border was not wearing a headdress. I cannot really tell from this. It was night, and I hardly saw his face. He rode in the backseat. This photograph could be any one of fifty Arabs I have driven for. I could not say this was the man I drove to Georgia. But then, I probably wouldn’t recognize him if he was standing here right now.”

“Where did you leave him when you arrived in Georgia?” asked Bill.

“In the town. There was another car there to pick him up, and take him on. I think he was going to Turkey but I could not tell whether by road, or on the hydrofoil to Trabzon. I have never seen him since.”

“Thanks, Tomas,” said Bill, pressing a ten-dollar note into the driver’s hand. “By the way, when’s your wife’s birthday?”

“I never forget that again. April 11.”

The time was now 1858 and Bill Baldridge wished the driver good evening and walked back into the hotel to find the bar. He was mildly surprised to find the admiral already there. His Russian uniform cap was on the seat beside him, and the admiral was sipping a glass of gorilka z pertsem, vodka with a small red pepper floating in it. The vodka was a special Ukrainian variant, and Bill, wary of his last run-in with foreign liquor, settled for a scotch and club soda, which was not so elegant in flavor as that at Inveraray Court.

Admiral Rankov was enjoying his drink, taking steady gulps as they talked. Bill half-expected him to hurl the glass over his shoulder in some kind of crazed Cossack ceremony. But before he could, a bell captain came over to announce a phone call for the admiral.

When he returned, Vitaly Rankov’s big, handsome face was grave. “This is trouble,” he said. “I can sense it. That was young Sapronov. The KGB observers’ daily report says Mrs. Kokoshin’s children did not attend school today. And they were not there yesterday either. They want to know what to do. The school knows nothing, except they are absent.”

“I know what I’d do,” said Bill. “I’d get round to her apartment real quick. And I would not alert the entire secret police force of the Ukraine either.”

“You mean now?”

“Hell, yes. You got the address?”

“Sure I have.”

“Then let’s go. I might be able to help.”

“This is a bit irregular, conducting a search of a Russian officer’s premises in the company of an American Naval officer.”

“Do you want to be in partnership with the USA in the search for the boat?”

“I not only want to be, I am instructed by the Kremlin to work with you all the way.”

“Then let’s get the hell out of here and see what shakes with Mrs. Kokoshin.”

The admiral signed the check, and they headed out to the car. Rankov gave the new driver the address, and told him also to step on it.

The Kokoshin family lived only ten minutes away. Their apartment building stood about ten stories high. There were glass swing-doors, but no doorman on duty. The captain’s family lived on the eighth floor, number 824, and Bill stood aside while the admiral rang the bell twice. They could see there were lights on in the apartment, and they could hear a radio or a television in the background.

No one answered. Rankov hit the bell again, this time three rings. They waited but no one came. “Maybe she just went to see a neighbor,” said the admiral.

“Why don’t we check?” said Bill. They walked along to number 826 on the same side of the central corridor. The admiral rang the bell, and again there was no reply.

“Let’s have a shot at 822,” said Bill. And there they were more fortunate. The woman who answered the door