Simon Montefiore - Red Sky at Noon

‘Did you speak to Kapto before you shot him?’

‘No.’

‘You just killed him?’

‘Yes.’

‘Where did you pick up such ruthlessness? From the brigands in the Camps? From Jaba? You didn’t know how to kill a fly when we last met. You could join us in the Cheka!’ A joke. Kobylov switched off the smile. ‘The materials were to be collected by officers of the Intelligence Section of the German Sixth Army. Did you know that?’

‘Yes.’

‘How?’

‘Kapto was accompanied by two officers.’

‘Ah yes, you were efficient enough to bring their papers. Captain von Manteuffel and Lieutenant Kreutzer. You killed them too, right?’

‘Yes, the Cossack Garanzha killed them.’

‘Very good, Golden. Did either of them speak before they were killed?’

‘I wasn’t there. I was with Kapto…’

‘Do you have any idea who’s coming to collect them? From the Sixth Army?’

Now Benya was worried. Where were all these questions going? He thought quickly. ‘Could it be Schwarzer? No, Schwerin? That’s it.’

‘Colonel Gerhard von Schwerin. Very good. When was Schwerin due to collect the maps and Kapto? Think hard, Golden. Did any of them say anything?’

‘No, I don’t think so. Hang on, yes, whilst Prishchepa was stealing the horse, the German captain called out that Schwerin would come… sometime later – perhaps in the night.’

Kobylov gave him his hairdresser’s smile and he sat back, lit a Belomorkanal cigarette and gave it to Benya before lighting his own. Benya watched the Bull inhale his slowly, closing his eyes under black eyebrows, thick as grubs, and blowing the blue smoke into Benya’s face. A long silence. Then suddenly he banged his fist on the table. Benya jumped.

‘You have fucked up an intelligence operation sanctioned at the highest fucking level by the Instantsiya. Yes, the Instantsiya! The highest! You’re not in line for redemption, Prisoner Golden. Your recruitment into the Shtrafbat was against regulations. We’re investigating this and if you survive this conversation, you’ll be returned to the gold mines of Madyak-7.’

Benya felt cold suddenly. Cold and sick. ‘Oh God,’ he groaned.

‘But you won’t even get that far. Your death penalty is hereby reinstated owing to your treasonable actions on the Don steppe. Prepare yourself, Prisoner Golden, for the Eight Grammes, you and your three donkey-fucking villagers!’

Benya bent double, sure he was going to vomit. How could this have happened? He was going to die!

But Kobylov was still speaking. ‘Wait! Pinch yourself! You’re still alive and I’m still talking to you. What does that signify?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t understand.’ Benya was shivering, red specks whirling behind his eyes.

Kobylov spoke very quietly now: ‘Every word I tell you is secret, you understand. You were not meant to kill Kapto. He was one of our agents, trained for months for this task. You were not meant to reclaim the maps. They are the creation of our counter-intelligence services.’

‘But Kapto was a traitor,’ Benya protested. ‘He was in the Camps with me. He looked after me but I learned later he was an invert. There was a little girl…’

‘A child? No surprise there. He was in the Gulags for child rape and murder.’

‘But he was a paediatrician…’

‘A doctor?’ Kobylov grinned. ‘No, no, he was never a doctor. He studied to be a vet, but he didn’t even qualify to treat dogs. The doctoring was all lies. But he had connections to Mandryka and nationalist White elements which made him perfect.’

‘Perfect? You used scum like that to work for you?’

‘Scum like Kapto? Yes, and scum like you too, Golden. He was ours. Ours! And you wiped him out! I’ve been down here for ten days waiting for news of this and then you turn up thinking you’ve done us a favour and we’re going to pat you on the head. Do you understand, prisoner?’

‘I am beginning to…’ Now Benya thought about it, what were the chances of Kapto turning up with his maps in the same sector as Mandryka? It was not a coincidence. Perhaps the entire Shtrafbat charge had been devised just to get him there; eight hundred Shtrafniki sacrificed for this mission. And he had ruined it. ‘Oh God!’ he groaned again.

‘Do you know what Lavrenti Pavlovich said? He said: “If you find the man who fucked up this operation, beat him to a pulp until his eyes pop from his head. Punch him so hard he swallows his own teeth.”’

Benya was shaking.

Kobylov paused. ‘But here’s the thing. It’s now five oh five p.m. You left Kapto and Manteuffel dead at around ten thirty. Schwerin is not expected until, shall we say, around midnight. Do you see what I am getting at?’

‘I am not sure I do.’

‘You and your horse-riding clods. Don’t you remember, Golden, who you are?’

‘I’m a writer, that’s all. And we fought the Fascists, we did our best, but I’m no soldier. Just a writer…’

‘A writer? No, no, prisoner. You are a convicted terrorist and British–Japanese spy, found guilty of the gravest and most shameful crimes, including planning to murder Comrade Stalin and our leaders, in conspiracy with your mistress, the spy Sashenka. Yes, I remember her all right! Quite a beauty.’

Is she alive? wondered Benya.

‘You are a terrorist sentenced to death, and you already have Eight Grammes lodged in your head. It’s just unfired. You have helped our enemies. If you resist me in any way, you and your Cossacks will be nothing more than smears on a wall within a few minutes. I’ll do it myself’ – and Kobylov slapped his pistol on to the plywood table like a gambler throwing down his money.

Benya flinched.

‘Ah yes,’ said Kobylov. ‘But there’s another way. Do you want to hear it?’

Benya tried to speak.

‘Do you know what we believe in? Watch me say it. Re-demp-tion, Golden, re-demp-tion! Do you know what that means for you?’

Benya shook his head.

‘If you correct your mistake, you may be redeemed. Not just sent back to the Camps but truly redeemed! I can’t promise anything for your donkey-humping bumpkins. They need to be checked out. But for you, that’s a promise! Golden?’

‘You want me to…’ Benya was overcome by a new panic. ‘I can’t go back. I can’t! I will die out there.’ He was shivering, beyond tears. ‘You don’t know what we saw out there!’

Kobylov glanced at his watch again, bejewelled fingers drumming. Then he lost patience and slapped Benya across the face. Benya saw a rain of red stars behind his eyes, and his face was burning. He touched his lip. It had a pulse of its own, it was ballooning, and there was blood on his fingertips.

‘Pull yourself together, Golden, and stop pitying yourself,’ Kobylov roared. ‘We’re in a desperate war. The Motherland is in peril and our great Soviet State is in jeopardy. Don’t you know the Germans are killing the Jews? Golden, listen to me. It’s just a few hours more and when you return, you will be redeemed.’

‘I’ll never return… I’m not sure I can do this. I mean I want to…’

‘You have every chance of succeeding and you’ll be helped by your Cossack pals. You’ll have new guns and ammo; fresh horses. Do this and you will return to normal life, to your cafés, your bookshops, your girls, all those girls who love writers – do you remember the old life, Golden? Good. Now, what do I want you to do?’

‘You want me to go back and replace the maps?’

Kobylov flashed his dazzling teeth. ‘You’ve got it! Get those three sheepfuckers. Mogilchuk rides with you. You leave in fifteen minutes.’

‘One thing.’

‘Speak.’

‘I want my horse, Silver Socks.’