Читать книгу Moscow USA - Gordon Stevens - Страница 9

The convoy cut across the river, passed the outer ring road, dropped toward the city centre and turned right down Gertsena Ulica. The street was lined with shops, three- or four-storey apartments and offices above them, and an occasional white-painted church or garden, railed off and set back from the road. The lead Saab stopped and the pick-ups stepped on to the pavement.

The door was wood and painted a dark heavy brown, no number on it. On one side was an electrical shop and on the other a small supermarket, both filled with shoppers. One of the pick-ups crossed the pavement and checked inside. The Volvo slid in behind the lead Saab, no doors opening, and the Volvo itself pointing out with enough space in front to scream away. The tail Saab slid in behind the Volvo and the other pick-ups got out, hands inside their jackets. The pick-up at the door checked inside and nodded.

Still a chance for someone to take them out – Kincaid glanced down and across the street. On the opposite side of the road the BMW pulled into position.

Clear, the komandir told Kincaid. Kincaid slid out, pulled the bag after him, Brady behind him and the pick-ups tight around them, crossed the pavement, up the single worn step to the door, and entered the building.

The floor inside was stone, there were stone stairs to the left, the walls were painted a faded off-cream, and an ancient elevator with a metal grille rattled up the front. The Omega team ignored the elevator and took the stairs, turned a corner, came to a landing, two doors off it, and continued up, came to another landing then another. The door on the left was wood but the one on the right was padded leather, the usual indication that the door itself was steel. The keyboard for the security lock was on the left. The team leader punched in the combination, pushed open the door and went in, Kincaid and Brady behind him and the pick-ups behind them.

The walls and ceiling of the outer office were lined with wood and the linoleum on the floor was worn. There were two desks, the men lounging against them standing to greet them as they came in. A door on the left ran back down a corridor, no indication what was there, and another corridor ran off the outer room, directly in front of them, two doors off it on the left and one on the right. A shaft of sun struggled through the bars on the single window in the room, the dust playing in its light.

‘Welcome to Omega,’ the team leader said in Russian.

Sure, Kincaid thought.

The man who entered from one of the rooms in the corridor in front of them was mid-thirties, just under six feet tall and wiry build. ‘Glad you made it safely.’ The accent was English. ‘Pat Riley.’ ISS’s manager in Moscow, Kincaid understood; service with the Parachute Regiment, ending his career as a major in the Third Battalion, plenty of time at the sharp end, including Northern Ireland, and fluent in Russian.

They shook hands then Riley led Kincaid and Brady along the corridor.

‘ConTex have been notified that you’ve arrived. They want five million delivered right away, the boys will see to that. They want the other million escorted to Kazakhstan tomorrow morning. Tom, you take that down with an escort. Mikhail’s on his way in.’ Mikhail Gerasimov, Grere Jameson’s partner in Moscow. ‘Conference as soon as he arrives. You needn’t attend, Tom.’

He led them into the office on the right of the corridor, overlooking the street. The room was functional but sparse: cream-painted walls, desks with computers, a good-looking woman at one, late twenties and well-dressed, and men at the others. Riley introduced them in Russian, translating for Brady:

‘Tatyana, our office manager …

‘Oleg and Josef, a couple of the boys …

‘Igor Lukyanov …’ Former KGB intelligence, their access point to the present FSB. Lukyanov was five-six and squat; his blond hair was short, and the suit jacket which hung on the back of his chair was expensive and well-cut.

‘Igor, this is Jack Kincaid and Tom Brady from DC. Jack’s working on the ConTex investigation. You probably had a file on him in the old days.’

Gerasimov’s room was on the opposite side of the corridor, and furthest from the outer office. It was wood-lined and small, functional desk and computer, grey carpet on the floor, one print on the wall, and a single window to the courtyard at the rear. The conference room next to it was also small: oval table with hard-backed chairs round it, window on to the courtyard, and the walls were papered, the design like the onion domes of St Basil’s in Red Square.

‘Not like ISS’s offices in London or DC,’ Riley suggested to Brady.

‘Not quite,’ the ex-FBI man conceded.

Riley perched himself on the edge of the table. ‘One thing you have to realize, Tom. Moscow is the third most expensive city in the world. Office space is at a premium; so you pay through the nose or you do a deal with someone you know for somewhere like this. Another thing you have to understand is how the system works here. The owner’s an old friend of Mikhail’s. He runs an import-export business from an office down the corridor, to the left as you come in. We get cheap rates for Omega, and he gets protection from the government and the mafia.’

He led them back to the main office and poured them each a coffee from the percolator in the corner. On one of the phones someone was speaking to Kazakhstan, on another to Kiev, the secure fax humming in the background.

‘While you’re in Moscow, for this trip at least, you’ll be staying in the company apartment which I use. Tom, you’ll be collected at five tomorrow morning, then fly to Kazakhstan with an escort and an interpreter. You return to London via Budapest. It’s an eye-opener. You may even enjoy it.’ He finished the coffee and poured himself another. ‘I’ve asked one of the boys to show you both around this evening.’

He turned to Brady. ‘Give us five, Tom.’ The order was polite and friendly. Brady nodded. Riley settled behind the desk in the left corner of the room and Kincaid pulled a chair in front of it and took the file Riley gave him.

‘Background on the ConTex investigation. You’ll be working with one of Mikhail’s people. We know this is a team job, but remember this is Moscow. New Moscow maybe, but some things never change. If you want anything, do it through them.’

Mikhail Gerasimov was on his way in, the office manager told them.

‘Any questions?’ Riley asked Kincaid.

‘Not yet.’

Kincaid went through to the conference room, sat at the table and read through the file. It was eleven hours since he had first been woken in Amsterdam and told to get to London, and the tiredness was seeping into him. Perhaps because he had been woken in the middle of the night, perhaps because he’d been carrying six million dollars and the previous day six million dollars had gone missing. Perhaps because he was in Moscow again.

The door opened and Gerasimov and Riley came in. Gerasimov was forty-eight, tall and powerfully built.

‘Mikhail Sergeyevich Gerasimov.’ Riley did the introductions. ‘Jack Kincaid.’

‘Good to meet you, Jack.’

‘You too, Mikhail.’

They sat at the conference table, Gerasimov at the head, his back to the window and facing the door, Riley at the other end, and Kincaid between them. The door to the boardroom opened again and the fourth man came in. I know you – it was a flash in Kincaid’s subconscious. I’ve seen you before.

‘Jack Kincaid, Nikolai Sherenko.’ Gerasimov did the introductions this time. ‘I think you’ve already met.’

‘Sort of.’ Kincaid spoke in Russian. The angel-khzanitel, at the airport. ‘Good to meet you.’

‘You too.’ Sherenko’s reply was in English. Traces of East Coast, almost Boston, Kincaid thought.

Sherenko hung his jacket on the back of the chair opposite Kincaid and sat down. The Sig Sauer still hung in the shoulder holster, but he had left the Kalashnikov in the secure cupboard in the other office.

‘Anyone interested in what was happening today?’ Gerasimov asked him.

Sherenko shook his head. ‘Not after yesterday.’

Gerasimov nodded and opened the briefing. ‘The pick-up went smoothly, which it should have done anyway, but ConTex is pleased. ConTex has now confirmed the contract to investigate the six million that went missing yesterday. Grere Jameson flies in from DC tomorrow to head up that investigation.’

‘Why?’ Sherenko asked.

‘Why what?’

‘Why is it necessary for someone to come in from DC to head an investigation in Moscow?’

Arrogant bastard – it was a flicker in Kincaid’s subconscious.

Gerasimov was unruffled. ‘Politics. ConTex is an American company, therefore wants to see an American running the show. We want the main ConTex security contract, they call the tune, we dance.’ He switched his attention to Kincaid. ‘You’ve read the reports?’

‘Yes.’

They ran through the various lines of enquiry. Whether the theft came from a conspiracy or a leak of information. ConTex itself, and the Americans and Russians who worked for the company. Whether the plan for the robbery began in Kazakhstan or Moscow, and who knew or might have known of the shipment. The security and courier companies contracted to ConTex and the couriers themselves, including the significance of Pearce’s sudden illness.

‘No sign of Whyte yet?’ Kincaid asked.

‘We haven’t had time to make enquiries. The primary objective today was the safe pick-up of the second shipment.’ Gerasimov spread his hands on the table. The hands were large and the fingers were thick and muscular. ‘We have his personal details and description, but we’re still waiting for a photograph.’

They finished the preliminaries and moved to the short and medium term stages of the investigation.

‘Background checks on the key players, both American and Russian. Whether any of them are in financial trouble or show indications in the past of sudden jumps in wealth.’ Gerasimov spoke in shorthand, Kincaid thought; the delivery clear-cut but staccato. Or perhaps it was the way he himself heard it, the combination of tiredness and the fact that he hadn’t listened to someone speaking Russian for five years. ‘Whether any of them are screwing, or being screwed by, anyone who might be a security leak. Jack, you run one set of checks through ISS’s offices in London and Washington. Nik, you run a second set through Igor Lukyanov, see if the computers at the FSB have anything to offer. You also check the morgues. Start this evening, show ConTex in Houston that we’re already moving.’

Five years ago this week he stood in the morgue at Belle Vue … it was a wisp in Kincaid’s subconscious.

‘Jack, you arrange interviews with ConTex personnel. Nik, you do the same with the security company personnel. Electronic sweep of ConTex offices and examination of their communication systems. Questions to airline and airport staff, plus interviews with VIP lounge staff and Border Guard personnel for a description of the bogus team which met Whyte.’

Gerasimov looked round the table. ‘Questions?’

Sherenko raised his hand. ‘How much time do we have and how long and how far do we go?’

‘I’ll tell you after Grere and I have talked.’

‘But what’s the bottom line?’

‘We want the main security contract for ConTex, therefore we’ll pursue this enquiry as far as we can, but the bottom line is that we don’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of getting the money back.’

‘And ConTex know that?’

‘Grere has already warned them that the chances of getting the money back are zero. ConTex aren’t virgins. If we come up with anything more than a detailed report, they’ll be happy.’

He closed the meeting and they returned to the main offices, Sherenko to his desk in one corner of the main office, and Kincaid to one opposite which had been cleared for him. Brady was waiting patiently. Couple of things to set up, then they’d be gone, Kincaid told him.

Igor Lukyanov crossed the room and slipped the photograph on to Sherenko’s desk. ‘Zak Whyte. Just come through from London.’

Sherenko studied it and passed it to Kincaid. Better get it out the way, his expression said. He lifted the telephone and punched the number. ‘This is Nikolai Sherenko at Omega. We’re looking for someone who went missing yesterday. Okay if we come now?’ He put the phone down. ‘You ready?’

My first time in Moscow since Joshua, Kincaid thought, and the first thing we do is go to a morgue. ‘Yeah, I’m ready.’ He turned to Brady. ‘Get Riley to arrange transport for you back to the apartment. We’ll pick you up when we’re through.’

They ran off copies of the photograph, took the stone stairs to the ground floor and collected Sherenko’s BMW from the courtyard at the rear. The evening was busy, the pavements crowded.

Kincaid settled in the passenger seat. ‘So where are we going?’

‘The central criminal morgue. Anybody goes missing, that’s where they turn up.’

‘If they turn up,’ Kincaid suggested.

Sherenko laughed.

They crossed the river, drove along Leninski Prospekt, and turned left down Profsojuznaja Ulica. It was early evening, warm and pleasant, Sherenko driving with the window open and children playing on the green areas between the apartment blocks. They approached the junction with Krasikova Ulica and the entrances to Profsojuznaja metro station. The buildings here were more grey and featureless, arcades of shops along the street and brightly painted kiosks selling liquor, food, vegetables and bread along the pavements on each of the roads leading into the junction, men and women milling around them. Sherenko turned left at the lights, stopped in a pull-in for buses and trams in front of a line of kiosks, and got out, Kincaid behind him.

Most of the kiosks on this stretch of road were selling alcohol or cigarettes; the doors were locked and the vendors were seated inside behind a small window. Sherenko checked along the line, stopped at the third, crouched slightly because the windows were low, examined the bottles on display, and pointed.

Stolichnaya.

Small bottle.

The woman inside took a bottle from a shelf, and placed it on the wooden ledge inside the window. Sherenko counted out nine 1000-rouble notes, passed them through, and the woman passed him the bottle. Sherenko checked that the seal on the top was intact, checked the writing on the label, checked the number stamp on the back of the label, turned the bottle over and checked that the glue on the back of the label ran in wide even lines, shook the bottle and watched for the vortex of bubbles. When he was satisfied the vodka wasn’t counterfeit he turned back to the car and put the bottle in the glove compartment. The evening was still warm, still sunny. They drove up the hill and turned into C’urupy Ulica.

Kincaid left the subway and crossed to Belle Vue hospital. Manhattan was noisy around him, a helicopter in the sky above and the wail of police sirens from the other side of the block.

Washing hung from the balconies of apartment blocks on the right and children played on the grass in front. A woman pushed a pram and a young couple walked together, holding hands. They passed a tennis court, also on the right, two thin girls playing with one ball and broken rackets. Silver birches lay on the ground where they had been cut down during the winter but not sawn up or hauled away, foliage still clinging to them and children playing in them. A dog crossed the road in front of them.

Kincaid stepped through the reception area. Time running out already, he knew. And he shouldn’t be here anyway.

The building to the left was new and low. Beyond it was another, set back from the road and grey, seven storeys high. Sherenko passed the modern building, passed the grey building, and turned left down the rough earth track along its far side. The link metal fencing on either side was torn, grass and weeds growing up through it, and the security gate at the bottom was hanging off its hinges. Beyond it was a second grey-brick building, two storeys high though the height and shape of the wide doors in front suggested there was only one level. Two policemen lounged in the doorway and a rubbish skip lay in the weeds to the right. A young man with blond hair, blood splashed over his surgical greens and white boots, fetched something from one of the three cars parked on a dust patch in front.

Sherenko parked, got out, nodded at the policemen and shook hands with the attendant. A bird was singing in a tree behind the grey-brick building. Kincaid left the car and glanced inside. The building was dark and cavernous, high ceiling, no upper levels, and a large concrete floor with a tarpaulin over something in the centre. No bodies, though. The attendant went into an office on the right and returned with two pairs of surgical gloves. ‘I’ll see you down there.’

The corridors smelt of antiseptic and the hospital bustled around him. Kincaid picked up the signs, turned left, then right. Checked his watch and hurried on.

Sherenko took one pair of gloves, gave Kincaid the other, and walked past the building. The area was rough and overgrown, grass and weeds growing on mounds and through a tangle of metal to the right. In front of them and to their left a ramp dropped underground towards the block on the road at an angle of around twenty degrees. The surface had been tarmacked at some stage but now it was torn and rough, and the sides were red brick, washed over with concrete. It was some fifty metres long, the last ten under the overhang of the ground above.

They walked down. No birds any more, Kincaid realized. The sides now were tarred black as protection against wet and damp, though the black and the concrete were peeling off and the brickwork underneath was decayed and crumbling. They stepped out of the sunlight. There were two doors in the semi-darkness at the bottom. The one to the right was metal and painted black, a padlock on it, and the one to the left was rusted red, no locks visible on it, therefore apparently no way of accessing it. They stood and waited, not speaking. There was a grating sound from inside the door to the left, as if someone was turning a handle, then the door was pushed open and they stepped through.

The corridors were silent around him now, though the smell of antiseptic was stronger. He turned right and stood in front of the door, punched the combination into the security lock, pushed the door open, and stepped inside.

The corridor was long; its floor, ceiling and walls were tiled white, but the tiles were discoloured and chipped, and eerie in the low-power overhead lighting. Left, Kincaid assumed, was back to the building at the rear. The attendant turned right. They followed him fifteen metres, turned half right then half left. The door was to the right. It was large and metalled, rusting at the edges and the bottom, a large metal handle in the centre also rusted slightly. The attendant looked at them. ‘You ready?’ He grasped the handle and turned it anti-clockwise, the sound the same as when he opened the main door to the outside, then pulled open the door. The light inside was already on. The attendant moved aside and Kincaid stepped through.

The morgue was empty, but that was the way it had been arranged. No attendants to ask questions and no pen-pushers to request signatures when the footsteps came down the corridor in two minutes’ time. The gleaming white examination slab was in the centre of the floor and the plastic body bag lay upon it. I was point man for you. I was baby-sitting you, Joshua; I was the one who was supposed to bring you through. I was the one Leo Panelli recommended to you, the one in whose hands you put your faith and your trust and your life. And I let you down. He walked round the slab, unzipped the bag, and looked at the face.

Oh Christ, Kincaid thought.

The bodies were naked and stacked on top of each other to the ceiling. Some blue, some white, some a garish tinted orange. Four or five deep, shoulders and heads hanging over one edge of the two tables which ran from the door to the far end, and legs and feet over the other. More on the floor underneath – again stacked on each other – as well as on the trolleys between. Eyes staring at him and mouths open to him. The lighting was in grilles overhead and the refrigeration bars which ran round the walls halfway up were rusting.

Oh Christ, he thought again.

The body nearest him had once been a man. The hair was long and matted, the eyes and mouth were open and twisted so the corpse seemed to be looking at him, the front of the torso was stitched following an autopsy, and the skin was orange. The body on which it lay was white, the one below that tinged a pale blue. The woman on the nearest trolley to him had a scarf tied round her head. A dirty sheet covered her nakedness – the only body covered – but her mouth was still open, her eyes were twisted up so that no matter where he stood they seemed to be staring at him, and the smell drifted out at him. Perhaps her smell, perhaps the smell of them all.

He looked for Joshua and saw the girl.

What had once been a beautiful face. Body still beautiful, breasts still full and nipples still dark on them. Blond hair splayed like corn over her shoulders and long slender legs slightly open as if the male body below was penetrating her.

Sherenko showed the attendant Whyte’s photograph and pulled on the surgical gloves. ‘He went missing yesterday, so where might he be?’

‘Should be at the front, but I’ve been away, and in this place you never know.’

Sherenko nodded. ‘Vpered.’ Let’s do it.

Sherenko picked his way between the two tables and Kincaid squeezed along the narrow space along the wall to the right.

Male, stiff and old, yellow skin and gunshot wound in lower abdomen. Woman, mid-forties, so don’t bother to look. Another male, too young – hell, no more than a kid. Another woman. Kincaid tried not to breathe, tried to look only at the faces, tried to stop the faces looking back at him.

‘Take the feet,’ Sherenko told him.

Business not personal, O’Bramsky had said five years ago. Business not personal, Sherenko’s attitude and eyes said now. Bastard, Kincaid thought. He grabbed the woman’s feet, Sherenko the shoulders, and moved her so they could see the face of the male underneath. Kincaid straightened and glanced at the girl even though he did not want to. Beautiful girl, beautiful body. So what the hell is someone like her doing here? Why the hell is Sherenko staring at her as if he’d paid his money at a peepshow?

The smell crept over them, consumed them; the eyes and the limbs and the hair. They came to the end, made their way back, and began to check the bodies on the table along the left wall. Male, white flesh almost translucent, the arm broken at a grotesque angle, either before death or after. Female, needle marks up the arms and face half missing. They finished checking the bodies on the tables, bent down, and checked underneath. An arm brushed against Kincaid’s face.

They came to the trolleys in the middle, came closer to the girl. Female, so no need to check, but the body beneath her was male, so they had to touch her, handle her. Move her so they could see the face of the man across whose body her legs were spread.

They came to the end.

In forty seconds the footsteps would come down the corridor. ‘Sorry, my friend …’ Kincaid zipped up the bag and left.

The attendant swung the door back in place and sealed the dead back in their own world, then they went back down the white-tiled passageway and out through the metalled rusting door to the gloom at the bottom of the incline down.

‘Thanks.’ Sherenko pulled off the gloves, shook the attendant’s hand, handed him a business card and slid him a folded hundred-dollar bill. ‘Keep the photo. If he shows, let me know.’

The man disappeared back inside and pulled the door shut. Kincaid and Sherenko walked back up the slope, into the sun at the top, and drove away.

The thin girls were still playing tennis and the children were still climbing amongst the felled trees, the washing was still hanging on the balconies and the couple were sitting on the grass holding hands. Kincaid rolled down his side window and allowed the little wind there was to brush against his face. At the top Sherenko turned left and dropped toward the Profsojuznaja metro station, past the kiosk where he had bought the Stolichnaya, then turned right at the lights toward Leninski Prospekt. Five minutes later Red Square was on their left, on the other side of the river, the domes of St Basil’s sparkling in the evening sun and the walls and towers of the Kremlin behind it. They crossed the river and turned right, up one street and down another. The buildings were suddenly changing, a set of kiosks on a corner – better built kiosks, better-dressed people round them – music coming from somewhere, and shops on either side.

Sherenko pulled in, switched off the engine, got out, and sat against the bonnet, breathing deeply. A well-dressed couple passed them, passed the armed guard on the door to the club behind them. A black Mercedes pulled in and two men – smart haircuts and padded suits – got out and went inside. Kincaid stepped out of the BMW and drew the air into his lungs, ran his fingers through his hair again as if that would dispel the odour. Sherenko fetched the Stolichnaya from the glove compartment and leaned again against the bonnet, cracked open the top and took a long stogram.

Chert vozmi, Kincaid thought. Screw you. You didn’t stand in the morgue at Belle Vue, you had no idea what it means to go into a place like the morgue on C’urupy Ulica. He leaned across, wrenched the bottle from Sherenko’s grasp, and took a long pull.

Sherenko took the bottle back, emptied it, threw it in a bin at the side of a kiosk with tables in front, jerked into the driver’s seat and started the engine in one movement, and pulled away, barely waiting for Kincaid to get in.

‘Riley said you and Brady were showing me Moscow tonight.’ Sherenko’s eyes were fixed on the road in front.

Screw you, Sherenko, Kincaid thought again. Screw you, Joshua. ‘Yeah. Show you Moscow.’

When the two of them plus Brady arrived at the Santa Fe it was almost nine-thirty. The restaurant, in one of Moscow’s residential suburbs, was protected by tall white walls, BMWs and Mercedes were pulled in to the dust strip between the road and the wall, and the South Western American style double gates were slightly ajar, one guard outside and a second inside. Sherenko nodded at the guards and led Kincaid and Brady through. The restaurant was to the left, white-washed and Spanish style, with steps up to it.

The first bar was spacious, high ceilings and tables and chairs around the edge. All of those present were well-dressed, a mix of expats and Russians. They looked round, chose a table near the door, and smiled at the waitress who asked for their drink orders. Didn’t expect to find tequila and Tex-Mex in Moscow, Brady joked, and ordered a margarita. Same, Kincaid told the waitress. Three – Sherenko held up three fingers. Two minutes later the waitress brought the margaritas and took their orders: salsa dip, ribs and French fries, and San Miguels in the bottle.

‘Vashe zdorovye.’ Kincaid held up the glass.

The woman came in the door behind them, looked at Kincaid and Brady, allowed her eyes to settle on Sherenko, and walked through to the restaurant at the far end. She was mid-twenties, tall, dark hair immaculately groomed, high-heeled shoes and expensive dress.

Brady turned as she went past.

‘Don’t even think about it,’ Sherenko told him.

‘Why not?’

‘You couldn’t afford it.’

Brady was still watching the woman. ‘Why couldn’t I?’

The waitress cleared the cocktails and brought the San Miguels.

Sherenko rubbed the lime round the rim of the bottle. ‘To understand, you have to understand the new Russian women, some of whom you see here tonight.’ He waved his hand towards the rest of the bar, the movement controlled and economic. ‘Okay, some of them are working girls. Some of them are young, probably late teens, dressing up and trying to look good. Others are high-class, good lookers, good dressers. Probably born into the party. By which I mean the Communist Party.’

He took a pull of San Miguel and smiled as the waitress served them the tortilla chips and salsa.

‘There is, however, a third type. Probably slightly older. Late twenties, early thirties. Similar background, university educated and multi-lingual, but now running their own businesses, or at least successful in their chosen careers. High-earners and high-players, but not on the game.’ He played with the bottle. ‘A woman like this might be single or might still be married but is running the show, might have got fed up with her husband. Perhaps he drinks too much Stoli so she’s kicked him out.’

He looked at Kincaid. Too close to home – Kincaid felt the unease, though for Stolichnaya read Jack Daniels. Screw you, Sherenko.

Sherenko looked back at Brady. ‘So she works hard during the daytime and plays hard at night. Comes to a place like this – hell, you can see them, see the way they do it. They could make the catwalks in Milan without problems, but the fashion world doesn’t appeal because it’s not as much fun as here.’ Sherenko looked round the bar again and Kincaid realized the woman who had come in earlier was glancing at him. ‘So she comes in, looks round, decides who she likes the look of. Makes eye contact and they’ll eat, possibly dance. She might pay, he might pay, it doesn’t matter. Might take in a club, might do some dope. And if she fancies him then she’ll go to bed with him; if she doesn’t, she’ll say ciao.’ He paused slightly. ‘Takova zhizn.’ He threw back his head and hands in a slightly exaggerated manner. ‘I’m me and nobody else. Take me or leave me.’

Arrogant son-of-a-bitch, Kincaid thought again.

‘So why couldn’t I afford one?’ Brady asked.

‘You could still afford some of them, but not the high class girls, not the ones you’re really talking about.’

And you’re saying you could, Kincaid thought. More than that. You’re saying you wouldn’t have to.

‘Why not?’ Brady asked.

‘A year ago the men they went for, the ones with the dollars, were the expats, the foreign businessmen. Now the ones with the real money in Moscow are the mafia.’

When Sherenko dropped them at the block containing the company apartment it was past eleven. The apartment was on the fourth floor, the furniture and decor functional rather than attractive. Two bedrooms, sitting-room, kitchen at the rear, and small bathroom. No bath, but an electric power shower bought in London.

Riley was at a computer in the sitting-room. ‘Coffee?’ He logged off the Internet.

‘Anything stronger?’ Kincaid asked.

‘Glenmorangie?’

‘Sounds fine.’

Brady claimed an early start the next morning and went to the second bedroom – two single beds, not much space between.

Riley fetched two glasses and a bottle. ‘Where’d Nik take you?’

‘The Santa Fe. Playing it safe, I guess.’

Riley laughed, poured them each a measure, and settled in the armchair. ‘How was it?’ he asked.

‘Take it or leave it,’ Kincaid told him. ‘Tell me about Sherenko,’ he asked.

‘Why?’

Kincaid shrugged.

Riley sipped the malt. ‘You have problems with Nik, Jack?’

‘He’s not the easiest man to work with.’

‘Which is why Tom’s pissed off and gone to bed?’

Kincaid shrugged again but said nothing.

Riley stared at him above the glass. ‘Can I ask you something, Jack?’

‘Sure.’

‘You got problems with Moscow?’

‘No. Why’d you ask?’

‘No reason.’

‘So tell me about Sherenko.’

‘Not much to say really. Ex-Alpha, like a lot of the boys. Apparently he served with Alpha for a while, then left. Surfaced two, three years back and Mikhail signed him up. Good operator, probably the best. Bit of a loner, keeps himself to himself. Divorced, couple of kids.’

Riley poured himself another Glenmorangie and passed the bottle across.

‘There’s one other thing I don’t understand.’ Kincaid splashed the clear brown liquid into the glass. ‘Sherenko was a member of Alpha.’

‘Yes.’

‘Alpha was Special Forces, including anti-terrorism, but primarily within the Soviet Union.’

‘For most of its history. Why?’

‘Nothing.’

Except if Alpha was internal, there was no reason for members of Alpha to speak English. The Omega guys are all Alpha, and they don’t. A few words perhaps, but nothing more. So why does Sherenko speak it fluently?

For the past hour he had lain on the bed and tried not to sleep; now he felt himself taking the first inevitable steps. The sunlight gave way to the shadow, the rusted door to the left opened, and the morgue attendant beckoned him in. He stepped into the cold; the white tiles of the corridor were almost blurred and the sounds of his footsteps were muffled yet echoing. You knew you would come this way, the sliver of rationality told him. He fought it anyway, tried to escape from it even though he knew it was to no avail. Moved slowly – all such moments were in slow motion – and followed the attendant. Stepped forward as the attendant moved aside, saw that it was his own hands which gripped the wheel at the centre of the door and ground it anti-clockwise. The sweat poured off his body. The lock gave way and the door swung open. He glanced to his left and saw the attendant grinning at him, the smile not on the face but on the gash of red which had once been his throat. Saw that the face was not the attendant’s, but his own. Saw his own hand, dismembered from his arm, beckoning him inside. The bodies were stacked to the ceiling. Red and blue and orange, the colours exaggerated and unreal, as if they had never been real, as if they were dummies from the set of a horror movie. He pulled the rubber gloves on. His fingers slid through the rips in the rubber, and he began the search. Saw the man: yellow skin and gunshot wound in the lower abdomen. Except there were two wounds, not one: the entry point of the 8.58x71mm round neat in the centre of his shoulders, and the front and chest of the body torn where the round had exited. He saw the girl. Naked body still beautiful, breasts still full and nipples dark on them, long legs slightly open as if the male body below her was penetrating her, blonde hair splayed like corn over her shoulders. Except the hair was black and the girl he now saw wore Levis.

Nikolai Sherenko pulled himself from the nightmare and stared at the ceiling. The apartment was quiet around him and the first light shone cold through the windows. He checked the time, rose, pulled on a dressing-gown, and made himself coffee. When he left it was six-thirty. Three minutes before seven he was at the office. Kincaid arrived at seven-fifteen. By seven-thirty they had updated the case log and Gerasimov and Riley had joined them.

The first backgrounds on Maddox and Dwyer at ConTex, and the couriers Whyte and Pearce, had come in overnight. They called for fresh coffee and flicked through them, then Kincaid and Sherenko were driven to the ConTex offices off the Tverskaya.

Maddox and Dwyer were waiting for them in Maddox’s office; both were in shirtsleeves and Maddox wore cowboy boots. They shook hands and sat down, Maddox leaning back in his chair with his feet on the desk, Dwyer in a high-backed leather chair to the right, and Kincaid and Sherenko facing them.

‘I’d like to make two things clear right away.’ Kincaid took the lead. US company, US money goes missing after all. ‘First, we’re all on the same side. Second, I brought in six million yesterday, and only one million of that went to Kazakhstan, so you’ve obviously got something else going which you might not want to talk about.’

‘Appreciated.’ Dwyer looked nervous.

Maddox changed position slightly. ‘Shoot.’

‘I’d like to do the interviews separately.’

‘No problems.’

Because we’re all on the same side, Kincaid understood; because us American boys have to stick together. He opened the briefcase he carried and took out a Sony cassette recorder. ‘I’d also like to tape the interviews. That way there’s no misunderstanding.’

‘Fine,’ Maddox told him. ‘Who’d you want to speak to first?’

‘Guess we’ll start with you.’

Dwyer began to leave. Got a meeting over lunch, but other than that he’d made the day free, he informed them. Kincaid thanked him, watched him go, accepted a coffee and clicked on the cassette recorder. ‘Arnie, I’ve read the reports. Can you take me through them, give us the general overall picture of what happened.’ His ballgame, his demeanour said; him calling the plays.

Maddox led them through his return from Kazakhstan, which was routine; the need for the dollars there, which was also routine, plus the need for additional dollars to finance something Phil Dwyer was working on.

‘Can you tell me what that is?’

Difficult, Maddox’s grimace said.

Commercial confidentiality – Kincaid nodded his understanding, no problems. Take me on, he told Maddox: how’d you communicate with Houston over this? When Kazakhstan wants money, how do your people there tell you? How did this shipment differ from any others? How many staff would have known about it and how much did the company providing the security pick-up know?

They broke for ten minutes while Maddox took a call from Kazakhstan.

Take me through your personal timetable, Kincaid asked Maddox when they reconvened; who you met and who you talked to. Take me through that day. What about the waiter who served him and Phil Dwyer at dinner, what about when he and Phil went for a walk after? What about Nite Flite; anyone pick them out more than the usual way, anyone target them? What about when they left, when Maddox’s driver picked them up?

They moved next door to the office Dwyer was using and ran the same routine, Kincaid asking the questions because the show was his.

Anybody Dwyer had met who’d asked him about what he was doing, anybody ask about the dollar shipments? The shipment was in two sections, they didn’t want the details of course, but what about the people he was dealing with? Were they from a company or a government department or were they individuals? How and when did the subject of payment come up? Did the guys he was dealing with specify a date and did they therefore know the money was coming in? Anyone asked him anything, but anything, which in retrospect struck him as unusual? What about his staff? Anyone at the hotel or Nite Flite?

Dwyer glanced at his watch.

‘Time to leave?’ Kincaid asked.

‘Afraid so.’ Dwyer stood up. ‘Like I said, I have to meet someone over lunch. Feel free to come back this afternoon.’

‘Not necessary, Phil. I think we have everything we want.’ Kincaid returned the cassette recorder to the briefcase and allowed Dwyer to show them out of his office and down the corridor. The atmosphere was relaxed and friendly. They shook hands. Dwyer half-turned from them to return to his office.

‘Hope you used some protection, Phil.’ It was Sherenko, casual, boys amongst boys, beer at the bar and your round next. ‘You know about the girls in Moscow.’

‘Course I used some protection.’ Dwyer was still on the half-turn, the laugh on his face and the conspiracy in his eyes. ‘Course we all know about the girls in …’ His face froze.

The fog descended on Kincaid: deep and cold and freezing. Screw you, Sherenko, he thought, because all morning you sat and listened and didn’t intervene. Okay, so I didn’t give you the chance, but screw you anyway. Screw you Dwyer and Maddox, because you played the American card with me and I fell for it. Thought you were telling me the truth therefore went easy on you. Okay, so I believed you because the ConTex enquiry is as good as wrapped up and the report’s as good as written. Okay, so I went into the goddam interview believing you before you’d even said a word, because I detest and loathe this city just as I detest and loathe people like Sherenko. So screw you, Dwyer and Maddox, for taking me to the cleaners. Screw you, Sherenko, for knowing what they were doing all along, even screw you for getting me out of it. Screw you, Joshua, because you’re still sitting on my shoulder as Bram said you would.

He stared at Dwyer. ‘Thought you said Arnie’s driver collected you and him from Nite Flite, Phil.’ There was just enough threat in his voice. ‘Thought you said you didn’t score that night?’

‘Yeah, well …’ Dwyer hesitated.

‘Think you’d better cancel lunch, Phil.’ Kincaid walked past Dwyer and back into the office, held the door while Dwyer then Sherenko came in, and closed it. ‘You want to sit down, Phil?’

Dwyer sat at his desk, the desk itself no longer a barrier between them, no protection for him. ‘Okay.’ He pulled the handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his face. ‘I scored at Nite Flite.’ He looked at his watch again. ‘Look guys, I really got to make this lunch.’

‘No problems, Phil,’ Sherenko told him. ‘Do lunch and speak to us after.’ He rose and opened the door for Dwyer. ‘Hell, Phil. Look on the positive side. At least you did wear some protection.’

The relief flooded over Dwyer. ‘Yeah, at least I did.’

They watched him leave, made sure he didn’t speak with Maddox, told Maddox’s secretary they needed ten minutes with the boss, and waited till they were shown in again.

‘Got a problem, Arnie.’ Kincaid looked straight at Maddox. No preamble. ‘You said that you and Phil left Night Flite together, that your driver picked you both up and drove you both home.’ We got it on tape, Arnie – it was in Kincaid’s stare; so time to come clean, time to drop the bullshit. ‘Phil tells us he scored that night. Phil says he picked up someone at Nite Flite.’

Okay, guys – Maddox was always bullish when he was on the defensive. Phil pulled someone. Good-looking chick, but they all were. He’d made sure Phil was covered, though, because although Phil was a man of the world, Moscow was something else. So he’d called his driver, made sure he was waiting outside Nite Flite with strict orders to take Phil and Phil’s piece of ass to Phil’s hotel and nowhere else. Then he had made his own way home. Except Phil was married – hell, they all were. So when Phil had asked him to cover it, he’d agreed.

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.

So what’s tonight all about, Jack old friend? What game are you playing and why?

Not Jack – he corrected himself. Jack Mikhailovich Kincaid, because in Russian everyone used the first name of their father as their own middle name.

Okay, Jack Mikhailovich, so what’s running?

He stepped on to the escalator, the descent reminding him of the metro stations at Dupont Circle or Bethesda, except in Washington the walls and ceilings were grey and concrete. He came to the bottom and stepped into a different world. Walked through the hallway connecting the various platforms and could have been walking through the Louvre or the Smithsonian or the Hermitage. The floor and walls and ceilings were marbled, marbled busts on plinths and marbled garlands in alcoves.

At the end of the platform a digital clock indicated how long ago the previous train had left and therefore, by deduction, how long the next would be. Even in mid-evening the platform was crowded. The train pulled in and the doors opened. Those waiting on the platform stood to each side, and those arriving poured off. The moment the last left the train those waiting streamed on. He found a seat and looked up and down the carriage at his fellow travellers.

So what’s this about, Jack Mikhailovich? Why take a cab, then the metro, and end up less than a thousand metres from where you started?

His observations over the next hour were footnotes to what had gone before. When he returned to the flat shortly before eleven the message from Riley was on a notepad.

Nik will pick you up at six. Session at range for six-thirty. You’re on the nine o’clock flight to London.

Gerasimov’s driver collected Jameson from his hotel at eight. Gerasimov was in the rear seat. He wore a dark blue suit and matching tie. In his left lapel he wore an Alpha pin. The driver cut across the inner ring road, skirted Red Square, and eased down the narrow tree-lined street three hundred yards from the Kremlin.

‘Brief me on who’ll be there tonight,’ Jameson requested.

Gerasimov briefed him.

‘Who’s important?’ Jameson asked.

‘They’re all important, but the man for the future is Malenkov. He was First Chief Directorate, now he’s a major-general in the SVR.’

The Omega driver eased to a halt on the right side of the street. They left the car and crossed to the building on the left. The house was three-storey, grey and anonymous, black door and no obvious security. As Gerasimov and Jameson crossed the road another car pulled in behind theirs.

The doorbell was on the left; before they had pressed it the black door opened and they stepped inside. The reception area was marbled, marbled stairs on the right leading to the floors above and a desk on the left, the monitors of the security cameras above it, one man at the console and another standing. They were escorted up the stairs, past the next floor, to the next. The double doors were wood and highly varnished, another set of stairs leading to the floor above. They went through the doors and into the flat.

The hallway was long, the walls a pleasant pastel, and the lounge was on the left. It was large, windows on to the street, and the furniture and decoration were art nouveau. The library was through a door in the far corner, the dining-room was on the other side of the hall – exquisite oval table, finest tableware, elegant chandelier above it and priceless Lalique glassware behind it. The first bedroom – as Jameson would be shown later – was on the same side as the dining-room: again art nouveau and twin beds. The bathroom, large and luxurious, was next to it, and the double bedroom – king-size art nouveau bed – was opposite the bathroom, on the same side as the lounge.

Half a dozen men were already in the room. Most were in their forties or early fifties, though two were older, all were wearing suits, and all were former or present generals in the KGB or its successors, the FSB, the internal security service, and the SVR, the Foreign Intelligence Service.

Jameson looked around. ‘Nice place.’

‘Marcus Wolfe used to use it when he was in town,’ Gerasimov told him.

Marcus Wolfe was the legendary East German spymaster.

‘What I would have given to have been here ten years ago,’ Jameson joked.

‘What we would have given to have had you here,’ Gerasimov joked back.

They accepted a Lagavulin and caviar and Gerasimov began the introductions, the conversations switching easily between English and Russian, and the handshakes and welcomes as if Jameson was a new friend rather than an old enemy.

There was a movement at the door from the corridor and Malenkov came in. He was six feet tall, late forties and slim; hair beginning to turn silver and hand-cut suit that made him look like a high-flyer in an American or European bank or blue-chip investment house. His eyes were sharp and blue, the antithesis of the West’s image of a KGB general.

‘General Sergei Malenkov, Grere Jameson …’ Gerasimov did the introductions.

‘Recognize you from your file,’ Jameson joked in perfect Russian.

‘And I recognize you from yours.’ Malenkov’s face was locked in a smile and his reply was in flawless English.