Brian Freemantle - The Watchmen

“I guess you’re right.”

“Of course I’m right.”

“You think Gavri would do another separate deal?”

“Of course he would, if he had something to sell.”

“I didn’t like what he did, cutting us out: saying we had nothing to do with it and didn’t deserve a cut.”

“Maybe we don’t need him anymore,” suggested the woman. “Maybe nobody needs him anymore.”

“If he’s killed it would bring attention to the legit business. And through that to me.”

“I’ll think about it. I didn’t like what he did, either. What’s the arrangement for the next contact?”

“Him to me, as always. But not the topless bar anymore; says we’ve used it enough. I have to go through the routine of getting a new number, to be ready when he calls.”

“Mad, like I said. Playing at being soldiers.”

“With germ warheads and real bombs.”

“I’ll be waiting to hear.”

The phones were put down without any farewells.

The call timed out at eleven minutes forty-five seconds, and it took Cowley and Danilov exactly twenty-three minutes to get from the Savoy to Pereulok Vorotnikovskij. Immediately after alerting them the bureau duty officer, at Cowley’s instructions, had told the telephone-linked surveillance teams-particularly those at the rear-that every woman had, without fail, to be photographed leaving the Golden Hussar.

Danilov, who was driving, parked some way from the restaurant, but that was an unnecessary precaution, too. Vehicles-predominantly Mercedes and BMWs, as Yuri Pavin had reported-overflowed from the parking lot into adjoining streets. As they moved unobtrusively through the crush both men looked for American models. There were some-at least three Cadillacs-but none with upthrust rear fins and none were dark in color. They had, in fact, taken with them to Lasin’s apartment photographs of the three cars-two Oldsmobiles and a Lincoln-the embassy guard thought might have been the vehicle he’d seen, but Lasin claimed not to know of such vehicles in Moscow. Would there be any recognition from the supposedly gang-retired Igor Ivanovich Baratov, who ran a garage? Danilov wondered.

Besides a lot of cars there were a lot of people-not just from the vehicles but on foot. Danilov said, “We’re not going to get photographs of every woman here.”

“I know,” agreed Cowley, and repeated the same acceptance to each of the three surveillance teams as they were located. He also accepted that, by comparison to the brightly lit front of the Golden Hussar-complete with a neon depiction of a plumed and cloaked soldier-the rear of the building was almost too dark even for the fastest of infrared films on the longest of exposures.

Cowley used the mobile telephone of a rear car driver to summon replacement teams. The current ones would return to the embassy to begin developing their prints, then come back afterward with Danilov to the easier concealment of the jammed parking lot.

“There’d be no purpose, even if there wasn’t the risk of our being identified, in our going in there,” said Cowley. “But there’s a woman probably still inside who could tell us all-a hell of a lot, at least-of what we want to know. And there’s no way of knowing or finding out who she is. That’s crazy. Downright fucking crazy.”

“No way yet, ” qualified the equally frustrated Danilov.

“Manhattan relayed the conversation to a copy tape back at the embassy.”

“No real reason for our hanging around,” said Danilov.

“No real reason for us coming here in the first place,” Cowley said bitterly. “Downright fucking crazy.”

There was a printed transcript and English translation by the time they got back to Ulitza Chaykovskovo, but they still listened, twice, to the recording.

Cowley said, “They’re going for their germ warfare massacre.”

“We knew they would, if they had another warhead. Which they haven’t, not yet,” said Danilov, more objectively. “We’ve got time and we’ve got Bay View Avenue.”

“Which we mustn’t lose.” Cowley checked his watch. “I’ll speak to the director-Manhattan, too-when everyone wakes up in America.” They’d both already given up any idea of sleep for what remained of that night.

Danilov tapped the transcript. “There’s a lot here, if we can see it.”

“Gavri?”

“Doesn’t sound Russian. Greek maybe.”

“Where’s that leave the theory of the intelligence agent identification being KGB?” queried Cowley. “KGB didn’t employ foreign nationals in Moscow Center, did they?”

“Not as far as I know, although Feliks Dzerzhinsky, who founded the service, was a Pole,” admitted Danilov. “I’ll check. If it turns out to be a working code name, we’ve got our KGB search down to one.”

There were only the two of them in the FBI section. Martlew, at Cowley’s suggestion, had provided a bottle before leaving to check the picture development. Cowley and Danilov were on their second drink.

“Gavri has to be in America if killing him risked bringing attention to Orlenko,” said Cowley. “But what legitimate business was Orlenko talking about? You remember any reference to a business in anything we’ve heard from Bay View Avenue?”

“Not from the bugging,” said Danilov. “But when we were wiring the house she told Harrison they’d been in Chicago seeing import-export business friends of Arnie’s. And that Arnie was always talking deals.”

“There’d need to be an import-export front to bring in weapons,” said Cowley. “And Chicago’s a port.”

“If Orlenko’s name was on the register of an import-export business based there we’d have the route,” said Danilov. “And Chicago’s on the telephone list.”

“About time,” insisted Danilov.

“The Watchmen are definitely a fanatical military group,” said Cowley, looking down at his own transcript copy.

“Operating like an insurgency group in enclosed cells: like the booby trap at New Rochelle was insurgency,” said Danilov.

“What’s new , leading us somewhere?” complained Cowley.

“Torture,” said Danilov, to himself.

“What?”

“It fits,” insisted the Russian, still reflective. “Remember I told you how Nikov and Karpov had been tortured before being tied together and finally thrown in the Moskva? As an example to anyone else? Now look at the conversation between Orlenko and the woman. There was a falling out: someone trying to cheat. I’d say that someone was Vitali Nikolaevich Nikov, who got mutilated and murdered for doing it.”

“With Valeri Karpov, who worked at Plant 43 and had access to double war-headed missiles,” said the American, going along with the reasoning.

“According to Lasin, the story is that the killings were carried out by Americans,” recalled Danilov. “You think some of the Watchmen came in personally to set the example of what happens when something goes wrong?”

“‘Hasn’t got time to come all the way here again’” quoted Cowley. “Could be interpreted that way.”

“And Nikov stayed at the Metropole Hotel, the favorite of American visitors,” filled in Danilov.

“So,” said Cowley, underlining passages in the transcript as he talked. “The Watchmen set up a deal to buy a germ war-headed missile. Get a better offer-they think-from Nikov, who supplies them with one that doesn’t go off. They also think it’s his fault, that he sold them a dud, so he gets tortured and killed. So does Valeri Karpov, his supplier, by a Watchmen group. Who then have to go back to their original source.”

“Problems,” cautioned Danilov, lifting the paper toward the American. “This is Arseni Orlenko, a boyhood friend of Vitali Nikov-to whose garages in Gorki we know calls were made, and received, from Bay View Avenue-talking to the Watchmen’s original supplier. So who’s Orlenko running with?”