Douglas Jacobson - The Katyn Order

The men standing in front of the two doors both took a step forward, and the man sitting at the bar slowly turned around facing the table. “We don’t help Russians up here,” the blond man said. “Now, what the fuck are you doing here?”

Andreyev appeared unfazed. “There are two things you should know,” he said calmly. “The first is that I may be a Russian, but I am here unofficially and I mean no harm to you or anyone else.”

The blond man spat on Andreyev’s shoe. “And what’s the second thing?”

“The second thing is that I’m holding a Tokarev T30 in my lap, pointed directly at your crotch. If one of those three goons so much as twitches, I’ll blow your balls off.”

Natalia noticed the man sitting at the bar move slightly, as if to slide off the stool. He stopped abruptly when Andreyev, who hadn’t taken his eyes off the blond man, barked, “Don’t even think about it! Keep your ass on that stool or your friend is dead before your feet hit the ground!”

The blond man glared at Andreyev for a long tense moment. Finally he turned to Natalia. “Are you Russian too?”

“Polish.”

“All right, then. Before we all kill each other maybe you should tell me what you want.”

“We’re looking for Tytus.”

The man didn’t respond.

“Do you know Tytus?” Natalia pressed.

“What if I do?”

“If you do then you’ll know that he met a man named Wolf last Friday.”

Again, he didn’t answer.

Natalia leaned forward. “This is important. The man called Wolf is an American who fought with the AK in Warsaw. He needed to make contact with the Górale. We think he may have run into trouble, and we need to find him.”

The blond man grunted. “You’re AK, and you’re running around with a fucking Russian. How stupid do you think I am?”

Andreyev broke in, his tone of voice sharp and authoritarian. “Have you seen any other Russians around here in the past few days?”

The man hesitated.

“If you did, they were probably NKVD. If they find Wolf before we do, they’ll not only kill him, but they’ll also kill every one of the Górale that Tytus took him to meet.” Andreyev paused and then added, “And after that, they’ll come for you.”

“They’re going to come for all of us sooner or later,” the man said. He was silent for another moment, his eyes flicking back and forth between Andreyev and Natalia. “Yes, I know Tytus met a man called Wolf,” he said finally. “He took him to a chapel farther up the mountain where they made contact with the Górale. Tytus left him there and came back the next day.”

“Have you seen any Russians around here?” Andreyev repeated impatiently.

“Hell, all the time. Red Army hooligans, usually drunk and looking for trouble. We’re with the local militia, and they like to push us around.”

“What about NKVD?”

The blond man tilted his head toward the bar. “Tell him, Jacek.”

The man named Jacek spoke up, but stayed firmly planted on the bar stool. “It was early yesterday morning, before dawn, a group of NKVD riflemen and a man in a black trench coat. They headed farther up the mountain.”

“How did they know where to go?” Andreyev asked.

A sudden emotion passed over the blond man’s face. He grimaced. “They took Tytus with them—after they murdered his wife.”

Natalia slapped her hand on the table. “Jesus Christ! It’s Tarnov! We’ve got to get up there. Now!”

Andreyev pushed his chair back slightly, and put both hands on the table. They were empty. “Is there anything else we should know?” he asked the blond man.

The man looked down at Andreyev’s hands and smiled. “The one in the black trench coat drove back into town yesterday evening,” he said, “along with two of the riflemen. They went to the bus station and forced the manager to open all the lockers. Then they headed back toward Krakow.”

Natalia’s stomach lurched. “Shit!”

On Thursday evening Tarnov had dinner alone at a restaurant just off the Rynek Glowny in Krakow’s Stare Miasto District. It was located on the ground floor of a small hotel whose name he couldn’t pronounce, a small, simply decorated establishment that he’d frequented with Hans Frank back in the days when the Russians and Germans were allies. Frank had always enjoyed Krakow, Tarnov recalled, thought it was a magnificent city, filled with glorious Medieval treasures and rich history. The man was a fool.

Tarnov tossed back his glass of vodka and poured another from the bottle the waiter had left on the table. How could he have trusted a lunatic like Frank with the only copy of Stalin’s Katyn Order? He thought back to the previous evening. Of course, the order wasn’t in a locker at the Nowy Targ bus station. He wasn’t surprised. He had suspected Nowak was lying, but he couldn’t waste any more time. He’d had to take care of the Kovalenko business. But Nowak and those Górale sheepherders would pay dearly for their sins, and Tarnov knew he’d get what he wanted, one way or the other.

His dinner arrived, the house specialty, a fried pork cutlet in thick sauce with a potato pancake. Tarnov sighed, forcing himself to relax. It was too late to drive all the way back tonight. Nowak was secure for the moment, locked in the mountain chapel under heavy guard. And now, with Kovalenko out of the way, he’d be able to operate without interference. But first, there was one last issue to deal with.

When Tarnov finished, he lit a cigar and sipped cognac, occasionally glancing at the hand-carved clock on the fireplace mantel. A bit later his aide, a young and eager NKVD lieutenant named Resnikov entered the restaurant. Resnikov had committed more than a few “indiscretions” over the years, particularly with young boys. Tarnov had protected him from the do-gooders within the NKVD, and Resnikov was grateful. He could be trusted.

Resnikov removed his hat and stood at the table until Tarnov acknowledged him and gestured for him to sit.

“Well?” Tarnov asked, setting his cognac snifter on the table.

Lieutenant Resnikov hesitated. “I haven’t found anyone, sir.”

“Damn it!” Tarnov snapped. “I know there’s someone out there, Lieutenant. Someone who has the other copy of Kovalenko’s letter.”

Resnikov was silent, his eyes dropping to the table. After a moment he cleared his throat. “Prastítye, but with the general’s death… does it matter?”

Tarnov glared at the young officer. “We can’t take any chances. Whoever it is could still cause a problem.”

Resnikov sat up straight. “Give me an order, sir.”

Tarnov tapped his fingers on the cognac snifter. “Let’s go over this again. When that librarian, Jastremski, revealed where Ludwik Banach went, he gave up Adam Nowak’s name… his ‘visitor’ at the library.”

The lieutenant nodded. “He couldn’t stand to see his wife tortured.”

“And when you interrogated him a second time, he gave you the name of the priest, his contact in the smuggling operation.”

“ Da.”

“But when you interrogated the priest earlier today, he didn’t provide any new names?”

“ Nyet.”

Tarnov continued to tap his fingers on the glass. The priest didn’t have the copy of the Katyn Order. They’d already torn apart his quarters at the monastery and found nothing. There has to be someone else, someone the priest was working with.

“The priest is still alive,” Resnikov offered, “though he’s in pretty tough shape.”

Tarnov finished off his cognac and pushed his chair back. “Then go at him again, right now, until he gives you a name.”

THEY SLIPPED QUIETLY through the forest, their moccasin-covered feet making barely any sound at all. It was approaching dusk on Thursday evening, and there were eight of them, the best of the Górale hunters in Prochowa. Three were armed with shotguns, the others carried their own hand-fashioned ciupagas. They moved quickly with an unspoken communication born of years in the wilds of the Tatra Mountains.