Frederick Forsyth - The Devil's Alternative

Sir Nigel Irvine read the last lines of the Nightingale tran­script, closed the file, and leaned back.

“Well, Barry, what do you make of it?”

Barry Ferndale had spent most of his working life studying the Soviet Union, its masters and power structure. He breathed once more on his glasses and gave them a final rub.

“It’s one more blow that Maxim Rudin’s going to have to survive,” he said. “Ivanenko was one of his staunchest sup­porters. And an exceptionally clever one. With him in hospi­tal, Rudin has lost one of his ablest counselors.”

“Will Ivanenko still retain his vote in the Politburo?” asked Sir Nigel.

“It’s possible he can vote by proxy should another vote come,” said Ferndale, “but that’s not really the point. Even at a six-to-six tie on a major issue of policy at Politburo level, the Chairman’s vote swings the issue. The danger is that one or two of the waverers might change sides. Ivanenko upright inspired a lot of fear, even that high up. Ivanenko in an ox­ygen tent, perhaps less so.”

Sir Nigel handed the folder across the desk to Ferndale.

“Barry, I want you to go over to Washington with this one. Just a courtesy call, of course. But try to have a private din­ner with Ben Kahn and compare notes with him. This exer­cise is becoming too damn much of a close-run thing.”

“The way we see it, Ben,” said Ferndale, two days later, after dinner in Kahn’s Georgetown house, “is that Maxim Rudin is holding on by a thread in the face of a fifty-percent hostile Politburo, and that thread is getting extremely thin.”

The Deputy Director (Intelligence) of the CIA stretched his feet toward the log fire in his redbrick grate and gazed at the brandy he twirled in his glass.

“I can’t fault you on that, Barry,” he said carefully.

“We also are of the view that if Rudin cannot persuade the Politburo to continue conceding the things he is yielding to you at Castletown, he could fall. That would leave a fight for the succession, to be decided by the full Central Committee. In which, alas, Yefrem Vishnayev has a powerful amount of influence and friends.”

“True,” said Kahn. “But then so does Vassili Petrov. Prob­ably more than Vishnayev.”

“No doubt,” rejoined Ferndale, “and Petrov would proba­bly swing the succession toward himself—if he had the back­ing of Rudin, who was retiring in his own time and on his own terms, and if he had the support of Ivanenko, whose KGB clout could help offset Marshal Kerensky’s influence through the Red Army.”

Kahn smiled across at his visitor.

“You’re moving a lot of pawns forward, Barry. What’s your gambit?”

“Just comparing notes,” said Ferndale.

“All right, just comparing notes. Actually our own views at Langley go along pretty much with yours. David Lawrence at the State Department agrees. Stan Poklewski wants to ride the Soviets hard at Castletown. The President’s in the middle—as usual.”

“Castletown’s pretty important to him, though?” suggested Ferndale.

“Very important. He has only two more years in office. In November 1984, there’ll be a new President-elect. Bill Mat­thews would like to go out in style, leaving a comprehensive arms-limitation treaty behind him.”

“We were just thinking ...”

“Ah,” said Kahn, “I think you are contemplating bringing your knight forward.”

Ferndale smiled at the oblique reference to his “knight,” the Director General of his service.

“... that Castletown would certainly abort if Rudin fell from control at this juncture. And that he could use something from Castletown, from your side, to convince any waverers among his faction that he was achieving things there and that he was the man to back.”

“Concessions?” asked Kahn. “We got the final analysis of the Soviet grain harvest last week. They’re over a barrel. At least that’s the way Poklewski put it.”

“He’s right,” said Ferndale. “But the barrel’s on the point of collapsing. And waiting inside it is dear Comrade Vishnayev, with his war plan. And we all know what that would entail.”

“Point taken,” said Kahn. “Actually, my own reading of the combined Nightingale file runs along very similar lines. I’ve got a paper in preparation for the President’s eyes at the moment. He’ll have it next week when he and Benson meet with Lawrence and Poklewski.”

“These figures,” asked President Matthews, “they represent the final aggregate grain crop the Soviet Union brought in a month ago?”

He glanced across at the four men seated in front of his desk. At the far end of the room a log fire crackled in the marble fireplace, adding a touch of visual warmth to the al­ready high temperature assured by the central heating system. Beyond the bulletproof south windows, the sweeping lawns held their first dusting of November morning frost. Being from the South, William Matthews appreciated warmth.

Robert Benson and Dr. Myron Fletcher nodded in unison. David Lawrence and Stanislaw Poklewski studied the figures.

“All our sources have been called on for these figures, Mr. President, and all our information has been correlated ex­tremely carefully,” said Benson. “We could be out by five percent either way, no more.”

“And according to the Nightingale, even the Politburo agrees with us,” interposed the Secretary of State.

“One hundred million tons, total,” mused the President. “It will last them till the end of March, with a lot of belt tighten­ing.”

“They’ll be slaughtering the cattle by January,” said Pok­lewski. “They have to start making sweeping concessions at Castletown next month if they want to survive.”

The President laid down the Soviet grain report and picked up the presidential briefing prepared by Ben Kahn and presented by his Director of Central Intelligence. It had been read by all four in the room, as well as himself. Benson and Lawrence had agreed with it; Dr. Fletcher was not called upon for an opinion; the hawkish Poklewski dissented.

“We know—and they know—they are in desperate straits,” said Matthews. “The question is, how far do we push them?”

“As you said weeks ago, Mr. President,” said Lawrence, “if we don’t push hard enough, we don’t get the best deal we can for America and the free world. Push too hard and we force Rudin to abort the talks to save himself from his own hawks. It’s a question of balance. At this point, I feel we should make them a gesture.”

“Wheat?”

“Animal feed to help them keep some of their herds alive?” suggested Benson.

“Dr. Fletcher?” asked the President.

The man from the Agriculture Department shrugged.

“We have the feed available, Mr. President,” he said. “The Soviets have a large proportion of their own merchant fleet, Sovfracht, standing by. We know that because with their sub­sidized freight rates they could all be busy, but they’re not They’re positioned all over the warm-water ports of the Black Sea and down the Soviet Pacific coast. They’ll sail for the United States if they’re given the word from Moscow.”

“What’s the latest we need to give a decision on this one?” asked President Matthews.

“New Year’s Day,” said Benson. “If they know a respite is coming, they can hold off slaughtering the herds.”

“I urge you not to ease up on them,” pleaded Poklewski. “By March they’ll be desperate.”

“Desperate enough to concede enough disarmament to as­sure peace for a decade, or desperate enough to go to war?” asked Matthews rhetorically. “Gentlemen, you’ll have my de­cision by Christmas Day. Unlike you, I have to take five chairmen of Senate subcommittees with me on this one: De­fense, Agriculture, Foreign Relations, Trade, and Appropria­tions. And I can’t tell them about the Nightingale, can I, Bob?”