Gordon Stevens - Moscow USA

Bastards – the anger boiled inside Kincaid. You set me up, laughed at me all the way to the bank. No problems, he told Maddox; they’d have to run a couple of things past Phil, but it was Phil who’d suggested he’d scored that night in the first place, so Arnie was covered. And no sweat anyway, because we all like a bit of spare occasionally, especially when we’re away from home.

‘Nite Flite …’ Kincaid picked up with Dwyer when he returned. ‘No problems, and everything’s confidential. The chick you picked up, though. Did you pick her up, or did she pick you up? Good idea taking her to your own hotel, of course, because you have to be careful.’

‘Lucky it wasn’t the Intourist.’ Sherenko’s voice was like winter.

‘Why?’ Dwyer looked at him.

‘Because there you have to buy in-house.’ Kincaid came at him like a wind out of Siberia. ‘Try to take your own in and they beat the shit out of you both.’

Dwyer was theirs, Dwyer would do anything for them. Dwyer would tell them nothing but the purest, most absolute truth.

‘Okay, Phil,’ Kincaid told him. ‘Take us through that evening.’

At four-thirty they left ConTex and the technical team moved in to sweep the premises. Freelance team, by which Sherenko meant FSB boys on a moonlight. Good at their job – installing or detecting – and American gear they’d bought personally from the shop at Frankfurt airport.

By the time Sherenko and Kincaid reached the Omega office Grere Jameson had arrived from Washington via an overnight in London. Kincaid did the introductions, then updated the case log and Sherenko phoned the morgue.

‘No Whyte.’ He put the phone down.

‘You don’t think we should check for ourselves?’

‘You want to?’

‘No point if we’ve left a photo.’

Riley came in, Gerasimov and Jameson behind him. They went through to the conference room, Jameson looking slightly tired and allowing Gerasimov to lead. Gerasimov checked his watch, brought the session to order and asked Sherenko for an update.

‘Looks leaky,’ Sherenko told him.

‘Explain.’

‘The organizational front at ConTex to begin with. The internal security is bad. Knowledge of a money shipment is not restricted. The chain of command and communication is such that too many people know when and how much is coming in, and we haven’t even started on the Russian staff or the office in Kazakhstan.’

Gerasimov turned to Kincaid.

‘There are also potential security problems on the personal front,’ Kincaid told them. ‘Five million of the missing money was requested by a ConTex vice president, Dwyer, who is doing some deal in Moscow. Probably getting ahead of the game in oil or gas leases. Unless it’s a scam, which is not our business at the moment, though I guess it might be sometime. On the night the money was ordered he and Maddox went to Nite Flite. Although they tried to brush it over, Dwyer picked someone up and spent the night with her.’

Gerasimov nodded. ‘Next?’

‘The motor the security pick-up used,’ Sherenko told him. ‘We should get the fingerprint people to take a look at it.’

‘Why?’

‘If it was involved in an accident, and the accident was one reason they didn’t make the airport for the pick-up, there’s an outside chance someone might have left a print.’

‘I’ll get someone in tomorrow.’

‘What about the courier who fell sick in London?’ Jameson spoke for the first time.

‘Tomorrow Nik does the security pick-up team and starts on the ConTex staff, and Jack flies to London to interview the courier. You carrying, Jack?’

‘No.’

‘Might be an idea. Fix him up, Nik.’ Gerasimov looked around the table. ‘What else?’

‘Might be good to know who runs the mafia at the airport.’ It was Sherenko again.

‘Why?’

‘Because if we don’t get anywhere within ConTex, whoever runs the airport mafia might not be too happy that someone else is doing something on his patch. Assuming he had nothing to do with it, of course.’

‘I’ll check it out,’ Gerasimov told him.

They left the conference room and returned to their offices. Gerasimov checked that his driver was waiting, then he and Jameson left.

‘Where are they going?’ Kincaid asked Riley.

‘Get changed, I guess.’

‘What for?’

‘Some sort of party.’

Kincaid waited for an explanation.

Riley sat forward slightly in his chair. ‘You remember what happened five years ago this week?’

‘Yeah. I remember what happened five years ago.’ Kincaid picked up his coat. ‘So why are Gerasimov and Jameson going to a party?’

‘Five years ago today it was Gerasimov’s men who were sent to assassinate Yeltsin in the White House. Five years ago tomorrow Gerasimov’s men protected Yeltsin instead of assassinating him, and probably changed the course of history.’ And that’s why he and Jameson are going to a party. ‘Drink?’ he asked.

‘Thanks anyway, but not tonight.’ Kincaid dusted his jacket. ‘See you tomorrow,’ he told Sherenko.

‘Yeah, see you in the morning.’

Kincaid left the office, walked down Gertsena Ulica and crossed to the Tverskaya. The evening was warm, there were strands of thin cloud across the sky, and the pavements were busy, cars parked along them and vehicles passing. So what’s this about, Jack my friend? What are you doing and why are you doing it? He stepped between the parked cars and held his hand in the air. The first Lada passed him and the second pulled in.

‘ Leningradski vokzal .’ The Russian was too much like the language school rather than the pavements of Moscow.

‘Twenty thousand roubles.’

‘Too much.’

‘It’s out of my way.’

Kincaid stood back, watched the Lada jerk away, and held his hand in the air again. Another Lada swerved in.

‘ Leningradski voksal .’ Better, he told himself.

‘Eighteen thousand roubles.’

‘Ten thousand.’

‘Fifteen.’

‘Okay.’

He opened the door and slipped into the rear seat. The windscreen was cracked, a fresh air filter was stuck to the dashboard and the back of the driver’s seat was ripped. ‘What time is it?’ he asked. The driver pulled out into the line of traffic without bothering to look and glanced at his watch. ‘Five to eight.’

‘Nice watch, what sort is it?’

‘Tag Heuer.’

‘Christ, you must earn a fortune.’

‘Counterfeit. Twenty dollars.’

They talked about prices in Moscow, where you could get what. You heard the joke about the new Russian, he told the driver. Goes to London and buys a watch for twenty thousand dollars. That evening he shows it to a friend. You’ve been done, the friend tells him: I know where I can get the same watch for thirty thousand.

The driver laughed and swerved, either to avoid a pothole or another cab, possibly both. New Russian wipes out his Merc, he told Kincaid. Why the hell you crying, a friend says; the car’s nothing; look, you’ve lost an arm. The man looks down. Christ, he says, my Cartier.

So what are you playing at, Jack, what are you up to?

The driver pulled in to the station. The building was brown and single-storey, steps going up to its three doors and people packed around it. Kincaid paid the driver and went inside. The hall was small and dark, connecting stairs and passages running off it, a kiosk selling drinks and a man who hadn’t shaved selling pirozhki , small pastries, from a wooden tray. People pushing past and the evening sun breaking through the dust on the windows at the far end. He felt in his pocket and pulled out a handful of notes. Counted them carefully and handed them over, moved to a corner and ate the pirozhki and drank the Coke, and sidled on. Passengers were already gathering for the mid-evening trains, a policewoman clearing a drunk from amongst them. Kincaid left the main station and crossed to the metro.