James Rouch: Plague Bomb

That day he had killed twenty or more of the prisoners himself, perhaps twice that number, he’d not kept a count. He could recall standing off from a group cowering in a corner of a dimly lit cell and emptying his pistol into them, then closing with a bayonet fitted AK74 to whittle the huddling would-be escapers down to more manageable numbers, using his skills at inflicting painful death to peel away the outer layers of the hysterical press until with his bare hands he had throttled its last surviving member.

He fingered the slight ridge of a circular scar on the back of his hand where a shattered stub of a light bulb had momentarily been used as an effective weapon against him.

Insulated as he was by half the width of the huge building from the Lubyanka’s cell block, Rozenkov couldn’t hear the clamour that would be starting, but he knew it would have. It didn’t matter, the thought like the sound was blocked from his mind. He had eyes and ears only for the telephone.

The horror that was the Soviet Union’s most notorious prison no longer concerned him. It had never been more than a stepping stone on the way to greater things, to higher rank and position. In his time there he had signed away lives beyond number, hardly knowing, not caring whose they were… but it was in a way fitting that his departure should be marked by this last slaughter… And he had thought that the execution squads were in for an easy day…

It took an effort of will, but he let the telephone ring twice before snatching it from its cradle.

The Range Rover’s two-tone blue over grey paintwork had been heavily smeared with mud, and sprays and bundles of wilting foliage festooned it haphazardly, inexpertly secured to any projection and wedged into every joint between the panels.

Four civilian passengers sat inside, a fifth stood beside the vehicle using powerful binoculars to scan the road ahead. Several times the observer panned the winding route, until a distant scene of activity caught his attention and was brought into focus. He stood for a moment, concentrating his attention, then lowered his glasses and flicked through an artwork illustrated book laid open on the driver’s seat.

‘Well have to make another detour.’ Stopping at a page that showed front and side views of an armoured recovery vehicle, he took another look through the glasses to confirm the identification. There are troops up ahead. Another mile or so and we’d have run straight into them.’

‘Are they ours?’

A rear window was wound down and Professor Edwards’ wrinkled face blinked sharp-eyed inquiry.

‘Depends what you mean by ours. Seems to be a NATO group.’ The thin-lipped mouth among the wrinkles gave a disparaging grunt and Edwards restored the glass barrier between himself and the world. Stowing the binoculars in an imitation leather case every bit as scratched and battered as the instrument itself, the observer climbed back into the driving seat, pushing the book in among the crumpled maps filling the parcel shelf. ‘If you’re all ready?’

‘I haven’t finished my coffee.’

Father Venable’s reedy voice piped from the far side of the rear seat.

‘Well bloody hurry then, we’re here to stop a fucking war, not have a sodding picnic.’ The burly figure whose broad frame dominated the centre of the rear seat, without regard for the discomfort he inflicted on the elderly men squeezed on either side of him, glowered at the bespectacled priest. ‘Be better if you didn’t have a drink. Who was it who ever persuaded me to come on this trip with a bus load of incontinent geriatrics?’

‘Really… there is no need for… language…’ The driver interjected to cut through the plaintive chorus of protest from the pair being crushed by the big man’s contortions as he strove to make himself comfortable. ‘It’d be a help, Gross, if you cut out the personal abuse, saved it for your shop stewards’ meetings, and if the rest of you rose less swiftly to his bait.’

‘Sir Julian is quite right.’ Nodding agreement with their driver, Professor Edwards gave up the unequal struggle to try to obtain a more equitable share of the available space and sought distraction in a contribution to the discussion. ‘We should recall our mission, its purpose. For the sake of that, for appearance’s sake, we should strive to achieve a degree of harmony. I must myself admit, that while I cannot subscribe to so optimistic a projection of the outcome of our endeavours we must not let petty differences blind us to the importance…’

‘Aw, shut it, you prissy asshole.’ The CND badge pinned to the left breast of the stained fawn anorak worn by the woman in the front passenger seat rose and fell significantly as she let out a long sigh. She leaned across and spoke to their driver as he steered them on to a fresh heading that would take them past the NATO troops. ‘Jesus Webb, did you say that Edwards had won a Nobel prize? What for, hot air and bullshit?’

Webb glanced at the woman, able to spare only that moment as the potholed surface and the many broken boughs that littered it tested even the Rover’s rugged suspension and power steering. ‘He was espousing the cause of disarmament before you were born, let alone before you decided you weren’t much good as an actress and there might be more in it for you to make yourself into a pale imitation of Jane Fonda.’

‘He got you there.’ Gross leaned forward and turned a wet-lipped rubbery leer to the women. ‘Be warned little starlet, little aging starlet, Sir Julian here has crossed verbal swords with better men and women than you. For years he’s been virtually a compulsory member of every expert panel on television and radio in England. He’s made more in appearance fees than you have hooking on Broadway between walk-on parts, or should I say lie-down parts.’

‘That’ll do Gross, let it go at that.’ Wrenching the wheel hard over, Webb didn’t quite succeed in avoiding a deep hole where a drain cover had collapsed. From Father Venables came a yelp as the vehicle lurched. A garishly coloured flask jumped from his hand, bounced against the fabric lining of the roof and spattered all the passengers with lukewarm coffee.

Again Webb caught a glimpse of the woman, this time as she tried to cover her head against the sticky deluge. She wasn’t completely successful and the sweet fluid trickled through her plastered hair and down her cheek. Immediately she set to work to repair the damage, using tissues and cosmetics from a small bag pulled from the depths of a pocket. He wondered how much effort went into cultivating her outdoor look.

The grubby jacket hugging close to her curves, the tight faded jeans; it was all carefully contrived, like her carelessly attractive hair style. But as she worked fast with comb and make-up for an instant he saw the real Sherry Kane, frightened of being a shade over thirty, trying hard to stay in the mould, maintain the image she liked to see of herself. As repairs to hair and face were completed, her style returned and she launched back into character.

‘Can we get around that position, or are we likely to be up to our fannies in NATO boy scouts any minute?’

That conjured an absurd and amusing picture, and Webb was surprised that Gross didn’t jump in with something suitably suggestive and crude. Possibly the picture wasn’t so outlandish; perhaps not boy scouts, but Webb could imagine her going with younger men, much younger…

‘It’s not a position. We’re far out in front of any fixed defensive lines, have been for the last six hours. Actually there are other parts of the Zone we could have driven across in that time, if there hadn’t been the certainty of our being spotted within a few miles. Here it’s going to take us a day or so, but the ground forces are far more thinly spread and there’s a good chance we’ll be able to slip between them. Besides, the more arduous the journey the greater the gesture, and its publicity value.’