Brian Freemantle - In the Name of a Killer

‘Yes,’ she agreed.

‘And did he?’ Cowley came in.

She hesitated. ‘He said he was better than the other drivers: knew exactly the times to go up and down.’

Cowley came forward on his chair. ‘So he must have been talking about people working in the embassy? There couldn’t have been special times for casual visitors.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘The customers were people who worked at the embassy?’ pressed the American.

Another shrug. ‘I suppose so.’

‘Don’t suppose, Natalia! Were they?’ urged Danilov, forward himself now. ‘It’s important; very important.’

‘Yes. He said they liked him. He spoke quite good English: didn’t try to charge too much, like a lot of the others.’

‘What about regular customers?’ demanded Cowley. ‘If people at the embassy liked him — preferred him to other drivers — he must have had regular customers.’

‘I suppose so,’ said Natalia, falling back on her favourite phrase. Immediately realizing the negative repetition, she hurried on: ‘I’m not trying to be evasive. Of course he did. But he never mentioned names. He never knew names. He’d just say things like “I had the quiet one today” or “the one who tries to talk Russian” or “the rude one, who thinks he knows Moscow better than I do”. That’s all he ever said.’

‘Men?’ asked Cowley. ‘Did he always talk as if they were men? Or did you ever get the impression there might have been women who were regular customers?’

Natalia Suzlev frowned across the table. ‘He never said anything about women.’ There was a pause, the first indication of any difficulty. ‘Vladimir wasn’t interested in women … other women, I mean.’

Danilov wasn’t sure precisely what she meant. ‘Customers could call central dispatch, to order a taxi?’

‘Yes.’

‘By name? Did Vladimir ever say if people from the American embassy asked for him by name?’

Again there was a delay, while Natalia apparently considered the question. Abruptly she said: ‘No, never.’ There was a hesitation, to gain courage. ‘What is this all about? Please tell me. What did Vladimir do wrong at the American embassy?’

‘Nothing,’ said Cowley, urgently. ‘There’s not going to be any trouble. You’ve been very helpful.’

Back in the car on Leninskii Prospekt, Danilov said: ‘It would be a mistake to attach absolute importance to what she said; it could still be a coincidence.’

‘Or it could be something else,’ countered the American.

Danilov realized for the first time that somehow Pavin had got the windscreen wipers replaced on the car. There was another far more important function he had for Pavin: one he didn’t intend discussing with Cowley. The American should have thought of it himself, but he hadn’t. Or perhaps it was something else he was keeping to himself.

Senator Walter Burden didn’t like irritation, so he always travelled with an organizing entourage. Beth Humphries was an extremely efficient secretary. She was also a strikingly attractive, blue-eyed blonde who very obviously needed a 36 D-cup: Burden took a middle-aged man’s pleasure in the close presence of beautiful women and the misconception of other men that he slept with them all, which he didn’t and couldn’t since the precautionary prostate operation for a malignancy that had proven benign. John Prescott, one year out of Harvard, was eager to put the political degree to practical use and believed the patronage inherent as Burden’s personal assistant to be invaluable; his true ambition was actively to run for office in his native New Hampshire, but realistically he recognized the uncertainty of elected office against the better and longer-term career prospects as a Capitol Hill lobbyist. At the moment, he didn’t know which way to jump.

Charles Easterhaus had been baptized Carlos and was included in the circus because Burden liked to convey to the influential Hispanic electorate in his constituency that he did not hold the racial prejudices that he actually did. Easterhaus’s function was difficult to define. The job description was also that of personal assistant, but his graduation had been from the streets of New York’s Little Italy, although no evidence of the background remained, either in his appearance, behaviour or accent. He was more basically a fixer than the Harvard graduate and usually better at it. Easterhaus got favoured tables at restaurants with month-long waiting lists, theatre tickets for blocked-out shows and presidential suites in hotels which had months before confirmed the reservations to other guests. He was a dark-haired, archetypal Latin who possessed an enviable address book to supplement necessary public events with girls who looked every bit as good as Beth Humphries and sometimes better. Some were professionals. Burden paid and Easterhaus slept with them: he was a man who enjoyed complete job satisfaction.

James McBride had been with Burden since his earliest days as a Congressman, which made him invaluable as a media organizer. McBride knew every favour received or bestowed, every deal struck or broken, every trick practised and played and every shortcut Burden had ever taken to become the power he now was in Washington, DC. It meant McBride was always ahead when some ambitious journalist tried to rake the muck, which they sometimes did. He had a book, like Easterhaus, but McBride’s tome recorded the indelicate embarrassment of those who tried to expose the embarrassments of the Senator. He called it his shield, which it was. He was the only man who, late at night when they were drinking, could openly call Burden an asshole to his face and get away with it because no matter how drunk Burden became, he knew McBride could never be replaced. Deep down Burden knew it was true, anyway.

Despite the individual expertise and the team’s cohesive efficiency, their Moscow arrival was disorientating. Each and all of them were accustomed to special receptions and it didn’t happen at Sheremet’yevo airport. They had to stand in the immigration line like everybody else and wait interminably in the Customs reclaim for their baggage. Ralph Baxter did succeed in getting to them there, but there were no porters, so they had to pay a foreign currency dollar each for a cart to wheel their own cases into the crowded, jostling concourse.

Easterhaus was left to guard the carts while the rest, led by the Senator, ascended to the VIP lounge on the first floor for the Burden-convened press conference.

It was exclusively for Western correspondents and television reporters and cameramen. Burden agreed to the print media conference first and television interviews afterwards. He had come personally to Moscow to find out what had happened to his niece; until now he felt he had been denied information by American officials and looked for more cooperation in Russia. He was determined the killer would be brought to justice. Meetings were scheduled with a number of Russian officials and ministries. Towards the end of every interview, he introduced his favourite speculation, wondered if it were coincidence that the victim had been his niece. The reference was sufficiently intriguing to guarantee headlines across America. Burden was extremely pleased with the coverage.

Danilov hadn’t expected the Security Service’s Colonel to agree to an immediate meeting, but Gugin had insisted he was free, so Danilov had obviously accepted. The monolithic, yellow-washed headquarters of the disgraced and much reduced State Security Service formed before him as Danilov drove up the hill from the direction of the Kremlin. Of all the changes to Moscow squares and streets and boulevards, supposedly to erase the discredited legacies of communism, Danilov found the renaming of Dzerzhinsky Square the most illogical. Although Lubyanka was the pre-revolutionary original, Danilov considered the word far more emotive and reminiscent of past horror: Lubyanka, the prison which the KGB had grown to absorb, was infamous as one of the centres of Stalin’s slaughter, the title indelible in every Russian’s mind.