Robert Craven - Get Lenin

‘You have to go. My friend will be returning soon.’ It was a lie and he knew it.

Brandt turned to her and smiled. ‘I understand.’

‘No, you’re not supposed to understand, you’re supposed to be insanely jealous!’ she spat out. She suddenly felt aggrieved. The first green shoot of doubt had appeared in her mind. These past few hours were the best she’d known since Jonas. Brandt leaned in close and kissed her, then burying his face into her hair, inhaled its perfume. He looked into her eyes and she traced the recent scars on his face with a nail. Tears were streaming down her cheeks. She blinked them back, looking away in embarrassment. He kissed her eyelids tenderly; the beard stubble brushing against them.

‘Eva, you have your job to do. It’s a fact of life at this moment. I am jealous of your blind companion and I’ve been in love with you since I first set eyes on you.' His eyes glittered and his voice had dipped to a husky whisper, the emotion choking the words. His kiss burned deeper than any sensation she had ever encountered before and she became aroused. She slid over and across, clamping her thighs around his hips and sitting on his legs. Her hair fell into his face. ‘It is what it is, Eva,’ he whispered.

They made love for the last time and, as Eva slept, Brandt pulled back the sheets and looked at her sleeping figure. The moonlight coming in through the bedroom window gave her skin a creamy lustre. His eyes slowly roved over her flesh. Her chest rose and fell quietly and her full mouth was slightly open, revealing her white teeth. She was exquisite to look at, almost ethereal, rolling slightly onto her back and turning her head towards him, sighing gently. She looked so young and pretty, her skin smoothed out in deep repose. His gaze was drawn to a long knife scar across the top of her right hip which had been expertly sewn and healed. She stirred and looked up towards his face. She was smiling up at him. ‘What are you looking at, Captain Brandt?’

Brandt bent toward her, smiling back. ‘Just framing this moment in my head … Miss Molenaar …. ’

Brushing her hair from her face he kissed her, drawing the sensation out for as long as he could. He pulled the covers over their heads, creating a sanctuary from the night and the creeping dawn.

She woke to find him gone and her cigarette case by the dresser.

Chainbridge and De Witte stood with Colonel Valery Yvetschenko from Tyumen on the quay as the Russian warship Sovietski Leningrad pulled up alongside U-Boat 806. The deep channel was narrow, allowing little leeway between the vessels as the warship inched its way in. Finnish dockers eyed the vessel uneasily as they moored the ship securely. Armed Russian marines lined the decks with stoney-faced expressions, weapons primed. A group of them descended by rope onto the deck of the submarine and formed a phalanx surrounding the hold. The U-Boat had been repaired and was being dispatched to Plymouth for re-commissioning. She began to power up and the repaired hold doors opened like the petals of a flower.

The Russian warship lowered a series of chains and winches from a gantry, and the men on the U-Boat and the warship secured the sarcophagus. Kincaid had left nothing to chance; the hold had been equipped for a long voyage. Zbarsky had worked around the clock preparing Lenin for repatriation, remaining on board the submarine and sleeping in the Captain’s quarters. Slowly, with the creak of chains, shouts and whistles, the sarcophagus was winched up from the hold and within minutes was aboard the warship, secured below decks.

For Kravchenko it had been a difficult stay, being an enemy soldier and a high-ranking NKVD officer on Finnish soil. Once his identity had been established, it was requested by the Russians he be kept away from Brandt and his team and held under house arrest.

Chainbridge and De Witte used this opportunity to interview him at length away from the island in a safe house in Helsinki. They were particularly keen to know all about Stalin, his thought processes and his overall mental stability. They probed him about Yezhov, head of the NKVD, and Shpigellaz, head of foreign intelligence, and their networks. He would shrug nonchalantly between cigarettes, giving only his name, rank and serial number, enjoying the apartment which was clean, comfortable and warm.

The blind one’s Russian was perfect and Kravchenko found himself warming to the two scholarly men. The conversations continued for hours to the slow tick of the large clock in the sitting room. Kravchenko’s wounds and bruises had healed, his face returning to its normal size, allowing him to shave again.

They asked him directly to work for them, assisting them in the hunt for potential Communist ‘sleepers’ in the main British universities. A group of four had been eluding the men and they were keen to hunt them down.

Kravchenko’s information would, of course, be in exchange for political asylum. Kravchenko declined to work for them, knowing well that by the time the Russian fleet arrived he would be deemed by Stalin as ‘politically unreliable’ anyway. Stalin was paranoid about Russians being in contact with other nationalities. Working with German soldiers would not be looked on favourably, whatever the outcome. Nevertheless, he decided to go with the devil he knew, repeating only his name, rank and serial number to the men.

Added to that, right now his wife and son would no doubt have been arrested by Beria and be on their way to his headquarters for interrogation. He had to be there with them no matter what.

When Yvetschenko appeared, flanked by armed marines, on the Suomenlinna quayside, his heart sank. He was issued with a new NKVD uniform, without rank he noted. Before ascending the gangplank he said farewell to Brandt’s men and Olga. He had given Brandt his ornate cigarette case, making sure Kant was well stocked with more Russian cigarettes.

Olga had merely nodded, not making eye contact, and he returned the gesture.

Zbarsky mounted the warship's gangplank followed by Kravchenko and surrounded by the marines who had disembarked from the U-Boat. The two men both turned briefly and waved goodbye. Brandt, Kramer, Kant, Bader and Hauptman gave a soldier’s salute in return, dressed now in civilian clothes.

The Sovietski Leningrad slipped back into the dawn light and departed Suomenlinna. Just south of the island, a flotilla of Russian warships waited for the ship with its precious cargo aboard. Once it joined the convoy, the armada set sail for the motherland of Russia. They were going to sail close to the Finnish and Swedish coastline and back around to Murmansk, running the German U-Boat gauntlet of the North Atlantic.

Kravchenko stared out from the deck as the surrounding islands slipped past, his thoughts never far from Sondra and Oleg. Maybe when this war was over, when the years of bloodshed had passed, he’d return here with them.

Chainbridge got word to the American Embassy in London that Donald T Kincaid’s private flying boat had gone missing during a storm over Finland. Rescue efforts were being hampered by severe weather conditions and hopes were fading for survivors.

Yvetschenko lit a cigarette and offered one to Chainbridge. ‘This unfortunate incident never occurred, Mr Chainbridge.’

‘Of course, Colonel,’ replied Chainbridge, exhaling slowly. Studying the Colonel, Chainbridge guessed he was more or less his opposite in the NKVD, a fellow spymaster.

‘Did any of the film footage get to Berlin?’ Yvetschenko inquired. He hadn’t decided Kravchenko’s fate yet. No doubt Stalin would want to talk to him personally. He had wanted Brandt’s unit handed over to him for execution, but Chainbridge and De Witte wouldn’t countenance it.

Chainbridge pulled his coats lapels closer across his chest in the cold. ‘Some footage may have got through, Comrade Yvetschenko, though who would believe it?’