Brian Freemantle - No Time for Heroes

‘He make the threat openly?’ queried Leonard Ross. He’d already alerted the Secretary of State to the possibility of the approach, after Cowley’s warning. Hartz had said he wouldn’t believe it until it was formally made. Now he did believe it.

‘He didn’t need to, did he!’ said the outraged Secretary of State. ‘Said his government felt they should bring it to our notice and that they would welcome our views.’

‘There’s going to be another request, shortly,’ said Ross, who had two hours earlier received Cowley’s account of the Swiss conference.

‘Does that give us anything to bargain with?’ wondered Hartz, when Ross explained.

‘We could be difficult about it, I suppose: give them a bad time,’ said Ross. ‘But it ends with the same decision for us: can we have it made public that an insane Bureau agent was a serial killer, with a senator’s niece as one of his victims? And that we did a deal to cover it up from everyone, including the senator?’

‘Of course we can’t!’ accepted Hartz, exasperated. ‘And they damn well know it. How about the killings here, in the current investigation?’

‘Forensic are doing what they can.’

‘I’m not going to do anything about getting their thirty million back until we get an acceptable prosecution!’ insisted Hartz.

‘At the moment there’s no way of knowing we’re going to get that,’ warned Ross realistically.

‘So we’ll have to deal, in the end?’

‘Yes,’ said Ross bluntly. A fair-minded man, he added: ‘But they did it the last time. And we’d do exactly the same as the Russians, if we were in their position.’

‘I like making the demands,’ said Hartz, in matching honesty. ‘Not having demands imposed upon me.’

The photographic surveillance of Wernadski Prospekt revealed a large house partially hidden behind a protective wall. There always appeared to be a large number of Mercedes parked around it. A total of twelve men were repeatedly pictured, who were assumed to be staff or bodyguards. Women came and went; none were thought to live there permanently. The written reports, linked to the photographs, talked of a very definite attitude of respect towards one particular man, a thickset, hunched figure who always appeared to move head down, sure a path would be cleared ahead of him.

‘Yuri Yermolovich Ryzhikev?’ queried Danilov.

‘There’s no comparison picture in our records,’ said Pavin.

‘There’s bugger all in our records!’ reminded Danilov.

The protective custody had necessarily meant their separation in male and female facilities, and Raisa Serova’s first interest on entering Danilov’s self-appointed director’s suite was in Yasev, as his was in her. She came through the door a few moments after the man, who at once felt for her hand, smiling. Neither showed any awkwardness about the open affection, but then they hadn’t at the moment of discovery, at Leninskaya. Raisa, as always, was immaculate, perfectly made-up, perfectly coiffured, despite having spent the past three days in near-jail conditions. They both appeared relaxed and confident. It wouldn’t last, after he announced their formal detention, but Danilov guessed they would eventually be released, because of the government decision already made, and their sanitised version would be the one officially accepted. There should be some satisfaction, he supposed, in telling them they’d failed.

As Yasev helped Raisa into her chair the man noticed Pavin, waiting in his notetaking corner of the room and frowned, although only slightly. The same look encompassed Cowley, close to the window. Danilov looked, too, nervous of what was likely to emerge during the questioning: should he lie to the American, to preserve their relationship? Or retain his integrity and tell the truth?

‘You’ve arrested them?’ demanded Raisa at once. ‘Is it all over?’

‘It’s all over,’ said Danilov, which was not an answer to her question.

Yasev smiled at her again, more widely this time. ‘So it’s safe for us to leave?’

‘You’re no longer in danger, you mean?’ came in Cowley, from the window.

Yasev looked uncertain. ‘That was the point of our agreeing to come into custody, wasn’t it? For protection?’

‘We’ve been reconsidering some aspects of the case since our last meeting,’ said Cowley. He was having to make a determined effort to concentrate: Washington’s overnight message was that no decision had been reached on whether to agree to the Russian pressure. Which meant Pauline was still at risk.

The woman shook her head, bewildered. ‘What aspects? What’s going on?’

‘The search for the absolute truth,’ said Danilov, answering literally. ‘You see, we don’t think you’ve been totally honest with us. Everything’s there, perhaps. It’s just the order in which you’ve told it that’s wrong.’

She made another head movement. ‘You have the truth! We came voluntarily into your protection. We no longer need it. We will go now.’ She started to rise, followed by Yasev.

‘I agreed that it was all over,’ said Danilov, stopping both of them. ‘Not that the Chechen leadership is in custody. So far, the only one arrested is the man in Italy.’

‘Tell us,’ urged Cowley, ‘did you still think there was a way to get the money?’

The woman and her lover slowly regained their seats. Raisa said: ‘I was trying to find a way to return the money and get rid of the pressure. And protect my father’s name. That’s the truth.’

‘No,’ refuted Danilov. ‘We’ve had the Swiss company incorporation rules explained to us. Where did you learn about the transfer of an anstalt Founder’s Certificate? From your father? Or from Paulac? Maybe both: we know you would have had to go through the process when your father signed over the beneficiary agreement.’

‘I don’t know of the transfer regulations,’ insisted Raisa.

With both possible sources dead, that denial was beyond challenge. Danilov said: ‘Just one thing didn’t fit, from the beginning. Just imagine, if it had worked! A perfect double murder and a thirty-million-dollar fortune…!’

‘… On which to live happily ever after,’ Cowley finished. He no longer had any doubt about this supposition of Danilov’s, although there could never be sufficient evidence to bring a prosecution. He wondered why Danilov wanted to go through the charade.

Yasev reached out for Raisa’s hand again: Danilov got the impression it was a warning more than a gesture of affection. At the same time, the ministry official looked directly at Pavin, industriously recording every word.

‘That was the idea, wasn’t it?’ persisted Danilov. ‘Getting the money and disposing of Petr Aleksandrovich?’

‘This is ridiculous!’ persisted Yasev.

‘The one thing that always worried me – that I couldn’t reconcile, however much I tried – was how the Chechen hitman who killed your husband and Michel Paulac knew the precise date and place where they would be meeting in Washington,’ said Danilov. ‘It couldn’t have come from Paulac, could it? His loyalty was to a rival gang. And Petr Aleksandrovich was a clerk, standing in for you…’ He looked between the man and the woman, hoping one of them might speak. Neither did. ‘… There was only one other person from whom the information could possibly have come. You, Raisa Ilyavich! You who always made the ongoing plans with the financier, at the conclusion of every conference. Finding you two together at Leninskaya helped us towards understanding: realising you were having an affair and weren’t after all the grieving widow. And that affair has been going on for a long time, hasn’t it? Ever since Paris. We’ve become very good at tracing immigration records: entries and exits from countries. We know just how many times you two shuttled back and forth, between Moscow and Washington… and we know, Oleg Yaklovich, that you hold an exit visa valid over the next month…’