Early in Richter’s term of employment with the Foreign Operations Executive he had spent a painful five weeks with the SAS in Hereford, learning what the instructors had called the dirty tricks of the trade. One thing he remembered very clearly was that in a close combat situation, anyone who sticks a gun in your back is as good as dead. It’s all to do with speed of reaction and speed of movement. The technique is simple. With a pistol pressed into your back, even if the holder has his finger on the trigger, there is no way he can pull it faster than you can move providing that he doesn’t know you’re going to move. By the time his brain has registered the fact that you are moving, and has instructed his finger to squeeze the trigger, your move should have been completed, and by then he’s either dead or unconscious.
If you’re right handed, twist your body to the left, bringing the blade of your left arm back and down across his gun arm. That will knock the weapon off aim and even if it does fire the bullet won’t hit you. Continue the twisting movement of the body, and bring your right hand down hard – the harder the better – on the side of his neck. Dead simple. Dead being the operative word, if you do it right.
Two things had surprised Richter when the lights went on. The first was the fact that whoever it was behind him had used the name ‘Willis’, until he remembered that that had been his cover name in Moscow, and would be the name under his photograph in the Moscow Centre files. The second thing that surprised Richter was that the man behind him should have pressed his pistol into his back. But Richter hadn’t even started to move when the voice spoke again and the pressure vanished. ‘Don’t, Mr Willis. Just drop the gun and then put your hands on your head, fingers interlocked.’
His training had been as thorough as Richter’s, by the sound of it. Richter had absolutely no option anyway, because by then he’d seen the other two occupants of the room. Orlov was sitting in an easy chair in pyjamas and dressing gown, with a smile on his face, and a second man was standing behind him, wearing a somewhat crumpled shirt and slacks, and pointing an automatic pistol at Richter’s stomach. He looked as if he knew how to use it.
No man should ever surrender his weapon to an armed adversary unless there is absolutely no alternative. Richter calculated that he could, possibly, shoot the man standing in front of him, but if he did that he would certainly be immediately killed by the bodyguard standing behind him. Even a short extension of life is always preferable to instant certain death, so he tossed the Smith on to the thick pile carpet, and put his hands on his head.
The room was obviously a man’s bedroom. The walls were light blue, with hunting prints in silver frames, and the carpet a darker blue. There were two large built-in double wardrobes, no dressing table, a desk and chair in one corner, and a double bed with twin bedside cabinets against one wall. There were four other chairs – one easy chair in which Vladimir Orlov was comfortably seated, and three more or less upright chairs, one facing Orlov, the other two either side of it. It looked like a prisoner’s chair in front of a jury and Richter knew that was almost precisely what they had in mind. Orlov nodded and Richter received a hefty push in the back which propelled him to the chair.
‘Sit down, Mr Willis,’ said Orlov, speaking for the first time. His voice was low-pitched and bore only traces of his native Georgian accent.
Richter sat. With the bodyguard behind Orlov still pointing his gun directly at Richter, the second one pulled off the surgical gloves, then went through the pockets of his jeans. He found and removed six spare rounds for the Smith, but allowed Richter to keep his comb and handkerchief, as the Russian presumably thought that neither could be turned into any kind of weapon. Unfortunately, Richter agreed with him.
Orlov nodded again, and the bodyguards sat, one on each side of Richter, who saw them both for the first time. They were very similar. Tall, dark, and well built, and both looked very professional. Richter couldn’t see how he was going to get out of the house alive. There was a moment of silence while the three Russians looked at him, then Richter spoke. ‘Good evening, Vladimir. I’m from British Gas, and I’ve come to read your meter.’
‘If you’re right, Mr President,’ Walter Hicks said, ‘then that’s the worst possible news.’
‘Explain,’ the grey-haired man said, looking up sharply.
‘If Ambassador Karasin genuinely knows nothing about this assault – whatever the hell it is – then we can only assume we’re dealing with some kind of freelance operation.’
The President frowned. ‘You mean it’s some sort of terrorist attack?’
Hicks shook his head. ‘No, sir. All the information we have received from our informant, and the data we have obtained from technical surveillance, point to official involvement of some sort. A private organization simply would not have the resources or the ability to detonate a nuclear weapon in the tundra.’
‘So what do you mean?’
‘What I mean is that this assault might be the brainchild of the SVR or the GRU or even of some Russian minister. What I don’t think, assuming that Ambassador Karasin is being truthful, is that it is official Russian government policy. There’s also,’ Hicks added, ‘some circumstantial evidence which might support his denial. Ambassador Karasin is one of the most senior and important Russian diplomats, and I simply do not believe that Moscow would knowingly leave him here in Washington if any sort of conflict were imminent. They would have recalled him on some pretext weeks ago.’
The President nodded. ‘Yes, that makes sense. Right, in the absence of the Director, what are your recommendations, Walter?’ The Director of Central Intelligence, an old friend of the President, was out of town. In fact, he was in Florida recuperating from a mild heart attack, and had not been consulted about the situation, on the President’s explicit orders.
Hicks shrugged his ample shoulders. ‘We’re not getting very far, sir. Our own operatives haven’t been able to obtain any further data from our source in Russia, and the British haven’t so far been of any help.’ He paused, deducing that the President was seeking some approval, however tacit, for the actions he had already taken. ‘I would not presume to advise you about the political stance you have adopted, Mr President – that is not a function of my office – but I do think we should maintain a higher military alert state. In the absence of any definite information, escalating our operational readiness to DEFCON FOUR was, I believe, the wisest – and possibly the only viable – course of action. I think we should maintain at least that status until the implementation date quoted by our Moscow source.’
‘Or until the threat is actually implemented?’ the President asked, with a wintry smile.
‘Or, as you say, sir, until the threat is actually implemented,’ Hicks agreed.
‘Please don’t try to be funny, Mr Willis,’ Orlov said.
‘Who told you I was coming here?’ Richter asked.
Orlov smiled, his thin lips parting to reveal excellent teeth. He pulled his dressing gown more tightly round his spare body and raised his hands in a gesture of mock surprise. ‘Told me, Mr Willis? What is your real name, by the way?’ Richter told him – as far as he could see it wouldn’t make any difference whether the Russian knew or not. ‘No one told us you’d be coming, Mr Richter,’ Orlov said, then paused. ‘We’ve never met before,’ he added, ‘but I know quite a lot about you.’
‘I’ll bet you do,’ Richter said.
Orlov chuckled. ‘Oh, yes. It was a matter of simple deduction. When our bomb caught the wrong man this evening, we anticipated that you might be tempted to stop being on the defensive and do something rather more positive. It was, if our information about you is correct, entirely in character. You are a very dangerous man, Richter. The men we sent after you last week were two of the best we had. We brought them in especially to terminate you, and for what you did to them you’re going to die very slowly. Very slowly and very painfully.’
‘I didn’t think you went in for that kind of thing, Vladimir,’ Richter said. ‘Not if our information about you is correct, that is.’
Orlov smiled again. ‘I don’t personally,’ he said, and gestured to the man on his left. ‘One of the men you killed was Yuri’s brother. When I’ve finished talking to you, I’m going to give you to Yuri. Yuri will enjoy it, but I doubt if you will.’
Richter looked at Yuri. The Russian smiled, but it wasn’t the smile of a man who is enjoying life. It was the smile of a man anticipating future pleasures, and Richter didn’t like the look of it one bit. ‘So how did you know I
