Brian Freemantle - Kings of Many Castles

“Think is the operative word,” said Agayan. “Bendall wasn’t thinking . He was reacting.”

“To what?” demanded Olga. The tape was permanently revolving and she wanted to be featured on it as much as possible.

Agayan shook his head. “To something he didn’t want to confront.”

“By tomorrow I want to know what, in your considered, analytical opinion, went wrong today,” insisted Zenin.

“That sort of opinion is not possible overnight.”

“Do you really need reminding of the importance of this! Of everything connected with it!”

“Of course not!” protested Agayan, in matching indignation.

“Good!” said Zenin. The smile was a lip-withdrawn grimace. “So you’ll know how essential it is to help us, in every way you can. And I look forward to getting that help by tomorrow ….” He looked to Badim. “What’s wrong with him medically? Is he unconscious?”

“Deeply sedated. He had to be quietened.”

Olga said, “Could he be rational again when he comes around?”

“I don’t consider he’s ever been totally rational,” intruded Agayan, bringing both militia officers around to him at once.

“He’s said things we’ve believed to be important, things we’re trying to work on, work out ,” said Olga. “Are you telling us it could all well be fantasy!”

“Quite easily,” said the psychiatrist. “He might well not even remember what he did.”

“Every taped conversation indicates that he knows perfectly well what he did,” rejected Zenin.

“In your judgment, perhaps.” said Agayan. “Your judgment isn’t necessarily mine.”

A smile at the psychiatrist’s refusal to be intimidated was flickering at the corners of Nicholai Badim’s mouth. It was out-matched by another of Zenin’s teeth-baring grimaces.

“I knew it wouldn’t take you long to help with a diagnosis,” said the militia commander.

“We can X-ray an arm, to find a break,” patronized Agayan. “We can brain-scan a hemorrhage or a tumor, because they’re physicalmanifestations; we can visually see the problem, on a screen. We can’t photograph-visually see -mental illness. We can conduct outward observations and attempt verbal analysis and try to fit our conclusions into general and wide guidelines and every time we do it we know those guidelines are far too general and far too wide and that we could be wrong by a margin of one hundred percent. Precisely because I know the level and importance of what I’m being asked to do I don’t want to be wrong by a margin of one hundred percent. That’s why you’re going to have to wait for my opinion of this man’s mental condition and health. If you think anything he’s said gives you something to follow up, follow it up. But don’t expect it to materialize. If it does, you’re lucky. If it doesn’t, you’ve encountered the problem I meet every day of my life. The day you start solving a one hundred percent of all crime, I’ll be hoping to reach a twenty-five percent success rate with my patients.”

The only sound in the room was the sonorous rumble of George Bendall’s drugged breathing.

Trying to come to the aid of her lover, Olga said, “When will you be able to give us a firm diagnosis?”

The man shrugged, shaking his head at the same time. “I don’t know. I haven’t been able to get past you people for a proper conversation yet.”

“He said he understood me, when I charged him,” remembered Olga.

“He might equally have said he knew how to land a space vehicle to the moon if you’d asked him,” said Agayan.

“You both told me he was medically and mentally able to be interviewed; charged even!” Olga accused the two doctors.

It was the psychiatrist who continued to answer. “At the time we agreed that, we both considered he was. Today he suffered a mental collapse. Which proves everything I’ve tried to make clear to you, about reaching mental opinions.”

“When will the sedation wear off?” asked Zenin.

“Sometime during the night,” said Badim.

“What happens then?”

“We see how he behaves, how rational he appears to be, and then try to decide what else to do.”

“Might he need to be further sedated?” pressed Olga.

“Quite possibly.”

“Could he never properly recover to what until now we’ve believed to be a rational level of comprehension?” asked Zenin.

“Yes, that’s possible too.”

“For all our sakes, I hope you’re wrong,” said Zenin.

“You don’t have to concern yourself about my career,” said Agayan. “Only your own.”

“We need a new-a better-psychiatrist,” insisted Olga. She hadn’t liked seeing Zenin so openly opposed.

The man shook his head, not looking at her across the car in which they were driving, again without discussion, back to his apartment. “This will go to trial, whether Bendall’s got a mental condition or not. The caliber of every Russian witness will be important in front of an international audience. Agayan will look good in a witness box.”

Olga’s embarrassment became admiration. “I still think he’s hiding behind psychiatric mumbo-jumbo. Bendall’s understood what’s been going on.”

“I want you to talk very closely to Kayley, see if Bendall was trying to fight them off.”

“From doing what?”

“Something being done to him physically.”

Olga twisted in her seat to stare directly at Zenin. “You surely don’t imagine …!”

“Kayley’s FBI, a counter-intelligence agency, probably the other man, too. Maybe even the supposed lawyer,” argued Zenin. “Scopolamine is a known part of their lie detection equipment, just like it is with our people. Pentothal too. In similar circumstances the FSB would use them: the KGB certainly did.”

“We should have asked Badim to check for puncture wounds,” said Olga, reflectively.

“What?” Now Zenin looked at her.

“Supposing the Americans did inject Bendall,” suggested Olga. “The violence-the mental collapse even-might be the result of their drugs against whatever other medication he’s on.”

Zenin made the call from his apartment. Badim said he hadn’t looked for injection marks on Bendall’s free arm, which would now be punctured by the sedatives he’d had to administer to calm the man. There was one failed injection, which would have left two marks. Reluctantly he agreed to take a blood sample to test for any drug other than those recorded on Bendall’s hospital log. Even more reluctantly he agreed there could possibly have been a violent reaction if Bendall had been given an unauthorized drug.

Zenin remained on the line for both security group leaders to be brought to the telephone. Each man insisted that the briefcases of the three Americans had been thoroughly examined but that their orders had been that no body searches could be carried out upon accredited diplomats. Those orders had been reemphasized after such a search was attempted upon the British embassy visitors.

“A prepared syringe would have been no more obtrusive than a pen,” said Zenin, as he replaced the receiver.

An hour later Nicholai Badim called back, as instructed. There was what could be a puncture mark on Bendall’s uninjured arm where no hospital doctor would have attempted an injection. Blood had been taken for tests that would take at least twenty-four hours.

“They’ll deny it,” said Olga.

“They won’t be able to if we can prove he’s been drugged,” said Zenin.

“So!” demanded Anne. She’d chosen the Italian restaurant in Wilton Street because it had memories. Charlie hadn’t asked. She hadn’t offered.

“The British-which seems to come down to me-are being blamed for the leak. The ambassador or Brooking-probably both-have made it political. My people here don’t see things the way I do: there’s one trying to dig my burial pit. The scientists and professional experts can’t break away from other things to do what I’ve asked. The psychiatrists or psychologists-Christ knows which or who-are demanding I stay, to answer their questions. Which means I can’t get back to Moscow, where I need to be …” He couldn’t tell her about George Bendall’s collapse. There was no way he could officially know.