Firefox Down

waited.

The car drifted slowly along the street. For a moment, a spotlight played on the entrance, washing over the walls of the foyer. Then it was gone. Quivering, he returned to the street. The police car had turned off. He hurried on, head down, breath smoking around him, feet hurting, leg stiffening.

He reached the corner of Tchaikovsky Street. It was wide and at first glance almost empty. It formed part of the Sadovaya Ring of boulevards around the inner city. It was lined on each broad pavement by trees. A red-and- white striped tent, unexpectedly, occupied one kerb. Flashing yellow lights, a taped-off section, the noise of a compressor. Road works of some kind. He crossed the Kalinin Prospekt, seeing the same foot patrols and parked cars, and began to move cautiously down the boulevard, keeping to the shadows of the trees. The street lighting was good here; betraying. His eyes sought each shadow, trying to dissolve it.

A parked car; he paused. The embassy was number nineteen, less than a hundred yards away, a post-war, ugly building. He could clearly see its facade, safe behind railings and the emblem of the eagle, illuminated by the yellowish street lighting. Just the single car…

He repressed the leap of optimism. He must not believe in the single car and its two occupants he could see as shadows through the rear window. He had to look -

Road works. Six men, two leaning on shovels, one leaning on a pneumatic drill, three others using pick-axes in slow, rhythmical movements. He waited, turning his attention to the windows of the buildings, especially the second and third floors. There were smaller, brightly painted houses jammed incongruously between the Stalinist- style apartment blocks, frowned upon by the concrete towers. Gant studied the windows. A car passed, but did not stop, did not even slow down. He looked at his watch, a nervous, hardly-aware reaction. Most of the curtains were drawn, most of the lights were off. One or two of the windows were open, even in the cold weather. He watched until his eyes were confused with dots and with dancing, unfocused images of windows, but he saw nothing to make him suspicious.

Excitement began to mount through his chilled body. There would be a marine behind the gates. Once he opened his mouth… he needed only one word, his name… the startled marine would open the gates and he would be safe…

Against belief, it seemed the guard was minimal. Perhaps they expected him to try the British Embassy — ?

He forced himself to study the windows again. Nothing. After ten minutes, nothing. Parked cars too far down the boulevard, only the one near the gates. And the road works -

He looked at the six workmen. The drill was working now, so were the two men with shovels. The other three, the men wielding the pick-axes, had stopped to rest under the spindly legs of the spotlights they had erected. The noise of the drill violated the silence of the street. Each of the three resting men faced in a different direction as he leaned on his pick-handle. Each head moved rhythmically slowly, traversing an area of the Tchaikovsky Street.

The red-and-white striped tent was twenty yards from the embassy gates. The six men were not workmen. The roadworks were a fake.

Gant swallowed bile and backed away from the shelter of the tree. He had passed a telephone box. In shadow, he hurried back towards it, entering and slamming its door behind him. Immediately, his tension and fear clouded the glass. He fumbled for coins — there were coins in the pockets of the jeans — and dialled the number of the embassy. It sprang out of his memory without effort, a signal of his necessity. He withdrew his finger from the dial and waited. The telephone clicked, then the noise became a loud, continuous tone. He joggled the rest and dialled once more. The same loud, unceasing noise sounded in his ears.

The lines to the embassy had been cut off at the switchboard. There was no way to reach them.

He clenched his fist and banged it gently but intensely against the small mirror above the coinbox. He swallowed, and shook his head. Illusions of safety dissipated. Then, furiously, he dialled another number, and waited, holding his breath.

The ringing tone -

They'd left the lines to the British Embassy — he would be able to talk to them, he would -

'Come on, come on…'

The operator on the embassy switchboard — a night-duty man — answered. Asked his name, his business… there seemed a note of expectant caution. Gant felt relief fill him, the words hurried into incoherence even before he began speaking -

Then he heard the clicks, three of them.

He stood there, mouth open, not daring to speak. The man on the switchboard insisted, his voice more demanding and, at the same time, more suspicious. Gant heard the man breathing as he waited for a reply. He understood the clicks, and wondered whether the switchboard operator had heard them — must have heard them…

The line was tapped. They'd left it open, hoping he would call. A tracer was probably at work now, seeking him.

'Caller?' Gant did not reply. He stared at the mouthpiece. Distantly, he heard the operator say: 'I'm sorry, caller…'

Then the connection was broken. The operator had circumvented the tracer both of them knew had been put on the call. Gant continued to stare at the receiver, then slammed it onto the rest, heaving open the door of the box almost blindly.

He looked down the wide boulevard. Red-and-white striped tent, six men, one parked car. He would never make it. He knew he did not dare to make the attempt.

He felt the wetness in his eyes and rubbed angrily at them. He jammed his hands in his pockets, hunching his body until its shivering stilled. Then he turned his back on the American Embassy.

Gant did not see the shadowy figure slip from beneath one of the trees on the opposite side of the Tchaikovsky Street and hurry after him.

EIGHT: The Strangers

The noise of her anguish had woken Maxim. The eleven-year-old had come into the kitchen, startled and half-awake, rubbing his eyes, his mouth already working with anticipated fears for his mother. Instantly, as quickly as sniffing back her tears and dragging the sleeve of her dressing-gown across her eyes, she had transformed herself once more into the figure he expected and needed. Even his immediate enquiries had been halfhearted. Being allowed to sit with her, drinking fruit juice, had been in itself a comfort, a reassertion of normality. He had gone back to bed satisfied.

Once she was alone in the kitchen, Anna buried her terror in activity. She called her Case Officer at the embassy, and he confirmed her sentence. The image of punishment had occurred to her with bitter humour. When the line suddenly went dead, the humour vanished and she felt chilled and isolated. She had put down the telephone, forcing herself not to consider the implications, not to consider her own danger. Instead, she began to build her fabric of deception. It would have to be an old aunt in Kazan — she didn't even have a telephone, though she lived in comfort, so Dmitri couldn't check on her story, nor could the ministry or her superiors…

She ticked off the benefits on her fingers.

Then, Maxim -

Her father, naturally; the boy's grandfather. The father who had assiduously promoted her career and had protected her from censure and suspicion after her husband's suicide. Her father, who had once risen to the position of first secretary of the party organisation of the Moscow Oblast region, and had thus been a member of the Party Central Committee. His retirement to a dacha outside Moscow had been honourable, luxurious. He still had the weight, the contacts and friendships to protect Maxim if something went wrong.

She swallowed. Maxim would enjoy a few days in the woods outside the city. The old man had taken up wildlife photography as a hobby. He had even bought Maxim a small Japanese camera for his birthday.