Daniel Silva - The defector

In the lobby, Gabriel noticed several American reporters clustered around the Teatralnyy Prospekt entrance and quickly slipped out the back door into Revolution Square. In summer, the espla nade was crowded with market stalls where it was possible to buy anything from fur hats and nesting dolls to busts of the murderers Lenin and Stalin. Now, in the depths of winter, only the bravest dared to venture there. Remarkably, it was clear of snow and ice. When the wind briefly subsided, Gabriel caught a whiff of the deicer the Russians used to achieve this result. He remembered stories Mikhail had told him about the powerful chemicals Russians poured onto their streets and sidewalks. The stuff could destroy a pair of shoes in a matter of days. Even the dogs refused to walk on it. In springtime, the streetcars used to burst into flames because their wiring had been eaten away by months of exposure. That was how Mikhail had celebrated the arrival of spring as a child in Russia-with the burning of the trams.

Gabriel spotted him a moment later, standing next to Eli Lavon just outside Resurrection Gate. Lavon was holding a briefcase in his right hand, meaning Gabriel had not been followed leaving the Metropol. Moscow Rules… Gabriel headed left through the shadowed archway of the gate and entered the vast expanse of Red Square. Standing at the foot of Savior Tower, wearing a heavy overcoat and fur hat, was Uzi Navot. The tower’s gold-and-black clock face read 11:23. Navot pretended to set his watch by it.

“How was the entry at Sheremetyevo?”

“No problem.”

“And the hotel?”

“No problem.”

“Good.” Navot shoved his hands into his pocket. “Let’s take a walk, Mr. Davis. It’s better if we walk.”

THEY HEADED toward St. Basil’s, heads down, shoulders hunched against the biting wind: the Moscow shuffle. Navot wished to spend as little time as possible in Gabriel’s presence. He wasted no time getting down to business.

“We went onto the property last night to have a look around.”

“Who’s we?”

“Mikhail and Shmuel Peled from Moscow Station.” He paused, then added, “And me.”

Gabriel gave him a sideways glance. “You’re here to supervise, Uzi. Shamron made it clear he didn’t want you involved in any direct operational way. You’re too senior to get arrested.”

“Let me see if I understand this correctly. It’s all right for me to tangle with a Russian assassin in a Swiss bank, but it’s verboten for me to take a walk in the woods?”

“Is that what it was, Uzi? A walk in the woods?”

“Not quite. The dacha is set a kilometer back from the road. The track leading to it is bordered by birch forest on both sides. It’s tight. Only one vehicle can get through at a time.”

“Is there a gate?”

“No gate, but the track is always blocked by security guards in a Range Rover.”

“How close were you able to get to the dacha?”

“Close enough to see that Ivan makes two poor bastards stand outside all the time. And close enough to plant a wireless camera.”

“How’s the signal?”

“Not bad. We’ll be fine as long as we don’t get six feet of snow tonight. We can see the front door, which means we can see if anyone’s coming or going.”

“Who’s monitoring the shot?”

“Shmuel and a girl from Moscow Station.”

“Where are they?”

“Holed up in a crummy little hotel in the nearest town. They’re pretending to be lovers. Apparently, the girl’s husband likes to knock her around. Shmuel wants to take her away and start a new life. You know the story, Gabriel.”

“The satellite photos show guards behind the house.”

“We saw them, too. They keep at least three men back there at all times. They’re static, spaced about a hundred yards apart. With night-vision goggles, we had no trouble seeing them. In daylight”-Navot shrugged his heavy shoulders-“they’ll go down like targets in a shooting gallery. We’ll just have to go in while it’s still dark, and try not to freeze to death before nine o’clock.”

They had passed St. Basil’s and were nearing the southeast corner of the Kremlin. Directly before them was the Moscow River, frozen and covered by gray-white snow. Navot nudged Gabriel to the right and led him along the embankment. The wind was now at their backs. After they passed a pair of bored-looking Moscow militiamen, Gabriel asked whether Navot had seen anything at the dacha to warrant a change in plan. Navot shook his head.

“What about the guns?”

“The weapons room at the embassy has everything. Just tell me what you want.”

“A Beretta 92 and a Mini-Uzi, both with suppressors.”

“You sure the Mini will do?”

“It’s going to be tight inside the dacha.”

They passed another pair of militiamen. To their right, floating above the red walls of the ancient citadel, was the ornate yellow-and-white façade of the Great Kremlin Palace, where the G-8 summit was now under way.

“What’s the status of the Range Rover?”

“We took delivery of it last night.”

“Black?”

“Of course. Ivan’s boys only drive black Range Rovers.”

“Where did you get it?”

“A dealership in north Moscow. Shamron’s going to blow a gasket when he sees the price tag.”

“License plates?”

“Taken care of.”

“How long is the drive from the Metropol?”

“In a normal country, it would be two and a half hours tops. Here… Mikhail wants to pick you up at 2 a.m., just to make sure there are no problems.”

They had reached the southwestern corner of the Kremlin. On the other side of the river stood a colossal gray apartment building crowned by a revolving Mercedes-Benz star. Known as the House on the Embankment, it had been built by Stalin in 1931 as a palace of Soviet privilege for the most elite members of the nomenklatura . During the Great Terror, he had turned it into a house of horrors. Nearly eight hundred people, one-third of the building’s residents, had been hauled out of their beds and murdered at one of the killing sites that ringed Moscow. Their punishment was virtually always the same: a night of beatings, a bullet in the back of the head, a hasty burial in a mass grave. Despite its blood-soaked history, the House on the Embankment was now considered one of Moscow’s most exclusive addresses. Ivan Kharkov owned a luxury apartment on the ninth floor. It was among his most prized possessions.

Gabriel looked at Navot and noticed he was staring at the sad little park across the street from the apartment building: Bolot naya Square, scene of perhaps the most famous argument in Office history.

“I should have broken your arm that night. None of this would have happened if I’d dragged you into the car and pulled you out of Moscow with the rest of the team.”

“That’s true, Uzi. None of it would have happened. We would have never found Ivan’s missiles. And Elena Kharkov would be dead.”

Navot ignored the remark. “I can’t believe we’re back here. I swore to myself I would never set foot in this town again.” He glanced at Gabriel. “Why in God’s name would Ivan want to keep an apartment in a place like that? It’s haunted, that building. You can almost hear the screaming.”

“Elena once told me that her husband was a devout Stalinist. Ivan’s house in Zhukovka was built on a plot of land once owned by Stalin’s daughter. And when he was looking for a pied-à-terre near the Kremlin, he bought the flat in the House on the Embankment. The original owner of Ivan’s apartment was a senior man in the Foreign Ministry. Stalin’s henchmen suspected him of being a spy for the Germans. They took him to Butovo and put a bullet in the back of his head. Apparently, Ivan loves to tell the story.”