John Gardner - Man From Barbarossa

‘Should be back at Stratford,’ Natkowitz yawned. ‘Off with his head. So much for Clive.’

‘You coming out?’ Bond was already strolling towards the elevators.

‘Too damned cold, and Guy, don’t say anything stupid, like “I may be a long time”, right?’

‘Back within forty-five minutes.’

He went up to his room, grabbed at the parka and put it on as he rode the elevator down. His head felt thick and his eyes ached, the result of being up half the night. The bitter weather outside would soon put him right.

Ten minutes later the roof fell in when the October Battalion of Spetsnaz arrived, coming in from the air with clouds of thunder.

17

THE DEATH OF 007

Everyone seemed to be standing around in the wide lobby leading to the sound stage. The metal doors were rolled back and a couple of Clive’s assistants were putting finishing touches to the set. All the people who had played the part of witnesses had been coaxed into their make-up. They talked and laughed, drank coffee and smoked. Bond caught sight of Natasha standing with Michael and Emerald who appeared in their first guise as the very old Jewish couple. Natkowitz was fiddling with the sound equipment and Nina seemed to have disappeared.

Bond had gone into the men’s room on his way to the exit in the main lobby before taking his brisk walk to clear his head. He was just emerging when it began.

They would have heard nothing had they already been taping, for once the doors were closed the stage was admirably soundproof. As it was, the roar of massive engines pulsed down, throbbing and making the whole building shake.

For a second it was as though everybody was engaged in the childhood game of ‘statues’. A shocked stillness seemed to spread over the throng, laughing and talking one minute, stock still, turned to stone the next, cigarettes, coffee and soft drinks poised. The liquids seemed solidified in a click of time.

Bond stepped back inside the empty men’s room, unzipped his fly and dragged out the P6, thumbing the safety and zipping everything up again. He leant against the door to hear what was going on.

The stillness had passed and was replaced by confusion. Shouting, some screams, the noise of a herd of uncontrolled people moving in panic. Bond pulled on his thermal gloves and gripped the pistol more tightly.

From outside the building came the sudden distinct whoomp of exploding grenades followed by shots, the burp of automatic fire and the thump-thump of single rounds. Then the sound of people running. Heavy footsteps racing towards the lobby.

Bond pushed the door open a few inches and saw Boris Stepakov in a camouflage jumpsuit followed by a tall, hard-faced officer and a group of soldiers, six or seven, he guessed. They were all in combat gear, carrying an assortment of weapons. Stepakov held one of the latest PRI automatics close to his hip. The others bristled with AKS-74 rifles, grenades, long-bladed knives sheathed high on their right shoulders. He even caught sight of an R-350 radio, the kind with encryption and burst-transmission ability. Only Stepakov and the tall officer had the hoods of their jump suits down, the men who followed were muffled so that only their eyes could be seen.

As they approached, the crowd of witnesses and technicians began to back away, clearing a path. To his right, Bond saw Michael Brooks edging towards the door leading to the closet and tunnel. He placed his back against it and worked the key with his hands behind him. Glancing to his left, Brooks’ eyes met Bond’s and he shifted his head, a signal for Bond to follow him as the door silently swung back.

Bond just looked at him, making no move to follow as the renegade spy slipped out of sight into the closet. Then he heard Stepakov’s voice, loud, raised above the babble.

‘Silence! Stay exactly where you are!’

He imagined the clownlike face turning, sweeping the crowd as they backed onto the sound stage. The talking had stopped leaving a stunned silence in its wake as though the crowd was making way for Stepakov and his little group.

Bond wanted to push the door fully open, join Stepakov and watch the rout of the Chushi Pravosudia . But something, experience and intuition he supposed, held him back.

Again he caught movement to his right and through the crack of the open door, saw Emerald and Nina slip quietly into the closet. Nina had retrieved her pistol and held it, two-handed, low, the butt hard into her crotch as she backed through the doorway.

‘General Yevgeny Yuskovich!’ Stepakov’s voice almost broke as he shouted the name, the pitch rising, caught on a dry spot in his larynx.

‘ Marshal Yuskovich.’ Bond had listened to the voice declaiming for most of the day. Now it had taken on a new arrogance.

‘Marshal by whose jurisdiction?’ Stepakov sounded as though he had complete control of both himself and the situation.

‘My own,’ Yuskovich snapped. ‘Marshal of the Red Army and soon secretary of the CCPSU, President of the Soviet Union.’

Stepakov laughed. ‘Yevgeny, I fear you’re no longer even a general. My friend, General Berzin here, has supported me in this operation on the direct instructions of the President of the Soviet Union. The building has been secured by the October Battalion of Spetsnaz. You should consider yourself under arrest together with any other troops you have suborned. We are to take you back to Moscow. Further resistance is . . .’

‘Really? How interesting.’ Yuskovich began to laugh, and another voice, Bond presumed it was the officer called Berzin, punctuated the laugh with a strange, chilling bark which sounded like a hyena.

‘Oh, Bory, what a mistake you’ve made.’ Then the crack of a command. ‘Berzin, take that damned pistol from him, he could do a mischief with it.’

Bond drew in his breath as the sounds of a scuffle reached him.

‘What?’ He heard Boris explode. ‘What the . . .’

‘What indeed, Bory? I’m among friends. You, I fear, are alone. What about those two thugs he carts around with him?’

Berzin, Bond assumed it was he, made a sound like the ripping of cloth. ‘Both of them,’ he said. ‘My men snatched them as they came off the helicopter. Bory, don’t look so amazed. You know how these things work. You merely got yourself mixed up on the wrong side of a coup. You should have seen it coming. It’s business, comrade. The business of Russia. The business of the Party and the future.’

‘Yes,’ Yuskovich again. ‘You were an incredible subject, Boris. I’ve always said the way to deal with loyalty is through autosuggestion. You took the bait like a greedy fox instead of a shrewd one. I’d expected some doubts, but you gobbled up everything, even the stuff we fed to you through Lyko.’

‘What the hell are you talking about?’

‘The overthrow of the present regime. A return to normal.’ There was a short pause before Yuskovich continued. ‘We have a full regiment of Spetsnaz at our command. Who did you think carried out the Chushi Pravosudia executions, Bory? If you had thought it through, there was only one answer. Trained men who had the means to get anywhere, go anywhere, hit any target. Did you never consider Lyko was planted on you?’

Some of the answers began to unravel in Bond’s head. Some, but not all. He would have to move in a moment. Slowly he put pressure on the door, opening it wider as Yuskovich continued to speak.

‘This trial, you knew we were taping this trial? Of course you did, you even took the lure suggested by Lyko and brought in people from the French and British intelligence services to help out. Where are the French and the British, by the way?’

Bond sucked in his breath and slid sideways through the door. The actors employed as witnesses, together with the technicians, were in a packed semicircle facing the sound stage. Bory Stepakov had his back to the crowd, as did the tall General Berzin. Yuskovich faced them, his lean ascetic face calm, the eyes fixed on Stepakov.