Bomb Grade

chapter 20

I t was the American’s game so it was right Kestler should run with the ball. Which suited Charlie fine. His most recent embassy confrontation needed thinking about. Charlie had no doubt the ambassador himself would have accepted the explanation that he was waiting until after this meeting before making a full presentation, which was the easy excuse Charlie offered, but the defence had been weakened by his not having arranged an appointment – and giving a reason for it – with Wilkes. The censure had been a double act masterpiece, the Head of Chancellery mouthing the words with Bowyer providing a lot of the feed lines. It had culminated with the threat of an official protest to Peter Johnson, whom Saxon said had already asked for any indication of insubordination. Had he not immediately before the bollocking spoken to the Director-General, Charlie would have been more concerned than he was. He nevertheless determined to do better in the future, which did not mean conforming, just getting his story better next time.

Far more worrying was Kestler’s embassy arrival remark that Popov had been about to shut them out until hearing what they had to trade. That was warning enough that post-mortem blame was already being apportioned and that a lot was being dumped on them. What he didn’t know and couldn’t guess was how much Natalia was getting. Charlie doubted the recrimination fallout could have moved so fast in so few hours, but Natalia was the most obvious internal target and there’d be a lot of flak flying. If she were absent it could mean she was the first casualty. What about Popov? The man was hardly endangered at all. The Kirov and Kirs interception appeared to have gone perfectly and the man’s approach to the American put him still very much at the centre of things. That call itself was interesting. Why to Kestler and not to him? Careful, Charlie warned himself. There were a hundred possible answers to each uncertainty with as many chances of his not getting any of them right: the danger of spinning the conspiracy carousel too fast was ending up too giddy to think straight.

It was a good feeling not to be any longer apprehensive about Kestler. The brash gaucherie wasn’t there any more. Kestler hadn’t been overawed in the presence of the deputy Interior Minister during the night, seeming to think of what he was saying before he said it. And Charlie was reasonably confident the younger man was not trying any sort of shell game. He believed Kestler’s isn’t-space-technology-wonderful call had come within minutes of the man being told what the satellite had picked up. Just as he believed Kestler had shared everything that he had been told. And hadn’t held back during their initial preparation discussion during that telephone conversation and again during the car journey.

As they were escorted up to the executive floor of the by-now familiar ministry, Kestler grimaced to Charlie, Trickle it out, a little at a time.’

‘It’s down to you,’ agreed Charlie, standing back for the American to enter first.

The tension in the room was palpable. So was the ill-concealed hostility: like preparing to do root canal dentistry on rattlesnakes with toothache. The relief Charlie felt seeing Natalia was brief. The freshly neat appearance in a suit she hadn’t been wearing earlier was belied by her expression and her physical attitude. She sat slump-shouldered, her usually unlined features creased by what Charlie guessed to be a combination of fear and despair. Natalia stared directly at him and Charlie would have liked to think it was an imploring look for help, but didn’t allow himself the fantasy. By comparison Aleksai Popov appeared positively vibrant, clear-eyed and thrust forward half out of his seat towards them. Charlie thought a Superman cape might have complemented Popov’s action-man outfit and at once stifled the sneer: personal jealousy didn’t have any place in this room, this afternoon.

From the top table arrangement Viskov clearly wasn’t in charge any more. Having carried out his intended embassy photographic comparison after Kestler’s wake-up call, Charlie recognized Rado-mir Badim in the chairman’s role, which was hardly surprising in the circumstances. He quickly surveyed the rest of the room, seeking more identities from the previous night’s scrutiny. There was no one else he could positively label but a tall, austerely dressed and austerely demeanoured man directly in front of the Interior Minister looked similar to Dmitri Fomin, a member of the President’s secretariat.

Badim waved them towards a table yet again set apart from the rest of the room and demanded, ‘You have information!’

‘I hope we both have information to exchange with each other,’ said Kestler and Charlie decided he couldn’t have done better himself.

The minister’s face tightened. ‘You have already been accorded access to a considerable amount.’

It was to Popov that Kestler briefly turned before coming back to the minister. ‘As you will have already been told, we have a considerable amount of data collected at the actual moment of the robbery at Pizhma. A complete documentary record of everything that occurred will, of course, be made available to you.’

Made available after detailed photo-analysis and image enhancement, Charlie knew. It would be up to Rupert Dean to make certain they got all that from Washington separately, to match what the local Bureau office made available to him.

Popov’s impatience at Kestler’s offer was so obvious that Badim looked enquiringly towards the man, who inferred it to be an invitation. ‘How?’ Popov questioned, loud-voiced. ‘Quite obviously you had advance intelligence that there was to be a second robbery; advance intelligence intentionally withheld from us, enabling the theft to take place!’

Battle-lines were being drawn, recognized Charlie, contentedly. But drawn badly. The intention not to intrude on Kestler’s presentation didn’t preclude him from any general discussion, certainly not when it was a full frontal attack which had to be just as quickly resisted, before it gained any dangerous support: Popov had made the accusation half looking at the presidential official, either for approval or affect. ‘That would have been very difficult, wouldn’t it?’ Charlie suggested, mildly.

‘Why?’

‘We didn’t know anything about material being transferred by train from Plant 69 until after it had been stopped and robbed at Pizhma, did we?’ pointed out Charlie, intentionally keeping Popov on the back foot with another luring question. ‘All our meetings here have been recorded, verbatim. By the people making the recordings this afternoon. It would be quite easy for you to confirm that. They might even have transcripts with them…’ Charlie looked towards the note-takers and let the suggestion trail away, before he patronized too far. It was tough shit if Popov ended up looking a prick in front of his superiors and Natalia: Popov had picked the fight, not him. Charlie couldn’t decide if Natalia has straightened slightly in her seat.

‘How was your data obtained?’ demanded Badim.

‘An American reconnaissance satellite was positioned in geostationary orbit over the area,’ admitted Kestler, simply. ‘As I made clear at every meeting, my Bureau – my government – is prepared to offer every facility.’

‘A spy satellite!’ The accusation came from the austere man and Charlie became even more convinced it was the presidential aide whose photograph he’d studied earlier that day. They were making a lot of premature mistakes in their anxiety to make accusations that hardly mattered.

‘A surveillance facility the information from which we always had every intention of freely sharing with you, fulfilling our understanding of the official agreement between us,’ corrected Kestler, perfectly pitching the formality. His conclusion was just as perfect. ‘Which is what I am here today to do.’

Now it was Dmitri Fomin who flushed. Charlie’s satisfaction at their so far rebutting any criticism was marred by a concern that their very success in doing so would add another layer to the discernible hostility. There was nothing they could do about it now. Bridge-building had to come later. He hoped they had the opportunity.

‘Photographs?’ came in Badim again.

‘A total of 150, all time-sequenced,’ confirmed the American. ‘Each frame is individually timed, providing a chronological record of every stage of the robbery. On the assumption that the drivers remained at the wheels of their vehicles, a total of eighteen men were involved…’

Steady, thought Charlie, glad the man beside him had paused; don’t forget the trickle affect.

‘How sharp is the detail?’ asked Badim.

‘Extremely good,’ assured Kestler, which Charlie knew to be an exaggeration: on their rehearsal-packed way to the ministry Kestler had admitted they wouldn’t know the clarity until after the technical evaluation.

‘It was the middle of the night!’ protested Popov, anxious to recover.

‘Our infra-red and image-intensifying technology is highly developed. So is our analysis: we can identify a person’s height, stature, weight… a full profile,’ said Kestler. ‘I am told, for example, it is possible to identify which of the attackers carried out the killings of the train guards.’

Charlie showed no surprise at hearing something he had not been already told. Despite the conversation with the Director-General he didn’t automatically believe it was something deliberately withheld, either. Instead, his mind followed the tangent he’d opened up with his GCHQ request to London. Kestler had found the denial easy because of the Russian’s clumsiness, but the American satellite was a spy in the sky, an overhang – literally – from the Cold War. And the technology was sophisticated: as long ago as Brezhnev, the Americans had a device miles high over Moscow capable of listening in to the Russian leader’s car telephone conversations. It was virtually certain the Kirov satellite – years in advance of what was available during Brezhnev – would have had a listening as well as a photographic capability. Kestler hadn’t mentioned the possibility. Maybe it hadn’t occurred to him. Or maybe he hadn’t been told. Or then again been told but instructed to say nothing.

‘So the detail is extremely good?’ insisted Badim.

Charlie, to whom verbal subtlety was like the scent of prey to a famished lion, wondered if there was any significance in the Interior Minister virtually repeating himself.

‘Extremely so,’ assured Kestler.

‘What else do the photographs show?’

‘The vehicles, to which the canisters were visibly transferred. There were three lorries, one canvas topped, the other two solid bodied. And two cars. One is certainly a BMW. The other is foreign to Russia, too: most probably a German Ford.’

‘You talked about knowing the escape road?’ demanded Popov.

‘The most obvious route,’ said Kestler. ‘Southwest, towards Gorkiy. Presumably continuing towards Moscow.’

‘Presumably?’ queried Fomin. ‘Can’t your satellite continue to track it?’

Kestler shook his head. ‘It was geo-stationary: held in one position by the counter-revolution of the earth. And that one position was over Kirov. Pizhma was at the very edge of its “eye”.’

Abruptly Fomin crossed the narrow gap to the table at which Badim sat and for several moments there was an unheard, head-bent exchange between the two men, with Viskov leaning sideways to listen although not contribute. Fomin had not resumed his seat before the Interior Minister said, ‘If the photographs are a consecutive time sequence, it will be an easy calculation to establish precisely how many canisters were taken?’

Charlie assumed Kestler’s brief hesitation reflected the same surprise he felt at the question. It was an even easier and more immediate calculation to establish how many canisters had gone to have subtracted the number remaining on the train from the figure of those loaded at Kirov.

‘Of course,’ said the American. If he was surprised it didn’t sound in his voice.

‘Do you have that figure available?’

The first twitch came to Charlie’s left foot.

‘Not of those transferred. But it would be easily obtainable in advance of the hard data arriving,’ offered Kestler. In what he later admitted to Charlie to have come automatically, the American added, ‘But I can tell you there were five canisters left lying beside the train.’

‘I can assure you the entire area has been sealed,’ said Badim, hurriedly.

The disclosure was like the tolling of a huge bell, so deafening it made the senses reel. In an instant Charlie understood the repeated queries about detail: perhaps the overwhelming reason for their being admitted at all. The Russians believed the photographic detail already sufficient – which it most probably would be, after enhancement – to show that the abandoned canisters were opened and leaking their radioactivity. Which was why they had so far been unable to establish precisely what had been stolen: the area was too hot to go anywhere near. Just as quickly, not wanting Badim or anyone else to realize the premature revelation, Charlie said, ‘That’s obviously a very necessary precaution. What is the extent and degree of the contamination?’ Another response came to him, but he decided to wait for his answer.

‘About two to three kilometres in area. Experts are there now assessing the degree.’

Turning directly to Popov, Charlie said, ‘London and Washington have had this information for more than twelve hours: information of a serious radioactive leak. The fact that there has been no public disclosure or announcement must prove our total discretion to anyone who continues to doubt.’

Dear God, thought Natalia, there wasn’t any place for him as a lover any more but she needed Charlie as a defender, unwitting though that defence had been. It was her only rational impression: she was confused – disoriented even – by everything Aleksai had said and done.

The attitude change towards them throughout the room was almost imperceptible but Charlie was sure it had changed and in their favour, although not from everyone. He didn’t expect any lessening of the military antipathy and Popov would surely remain on the other side of the fence. The importance was the shift of those in higher authority, the minister and the man with the ear of the President whose orders others – even the most hostile – had to obey. Where in the equation would Natalia be? Although her judgment should be businesslike he guessed she’d side with Popov.

Radomir Badim, the professional politician, certainly appeared to pick up the vibrations – or maybe decided to generate them – and almost immediately began making conciliatory noises. ‘I think we can appreciate that undertaking. And we’re grateful for it.’

Never leave an advantage until all the pips were squeezed out, thought Charlie. ‘I would hope that in the future there will not be any further misunderstandings.’

‘I’m sure there won’t be.’ It was Badim who looked pointedly at Aleksai Popov, not Charlie, but Popov who hurried back into the discussion.

‘You must concede the circumstances are utterly extraordinary?’ invited the bearded man.

Charlie, who’d made it a lifetime’s practice never to concede anything, allowed that Popov had balls even if he’d so far worn them around his neck. But he was buggered if he was going to make easy the man’s attempted rehabilitation in front of his peers. ‘Or utterly – even admirably – understandable.’

‘ Admirably!’ The astonishment came from Dmitri Fomin.

‘The robbery at Pizhma was brilliantly conceived and carried out,’ insisted Charlie. ‘It would be a great mistake to underestimate or despise an adversary clever enough to have done it.’

‘Think like your opponents think?’ She shouldn’t stay silent any longer, Natalia determined. In little over an hour she’d been brought back from the abyss – now the person to be praised, not condemned, for keeping Charlie and the American so closely involved – so it was time she made a positive contribution instead of sitting there, letting everyone guess her relief. And it was intended as a positive contribution. Charlie was more expert than anyone else in the room in putting himself in the mind of his opponents and she wanted to hear something practical, not more inquest avoidance.

Popov showed the most visible surprise at Natalia’s intervention, turning sharply towards her. Badim frowned, although Charlie couldn’t understand why. Or why, for that matter, Popov had reacted as he had.

‘It’s a tried and trusted methodology,’ suggested Kestler. ‘Taught even, at Bureau academies.’

Charlie was glad of the space the American’s response gave him. He might not know what Natalia’s personal attitude was but her outward appearance was most definitely changed. She wasn’t slumped any longer and her face wasn’t as care-worn as it had been, just perhaps showing the tiredness they all showed and in Natalia’s case even that not too noticeably.

‘We need to know, and know quickly, who they are, not how they think!’ rejected Popov.

Party time, decided Charlie: for him perhaps with more fun than he and Kestler had anticipated. ‘One could give you the other,’ he crushed, relentlessly. ‘And you’ve already got the way to find out. More than one way, even.’ A pause. ‘Haven’t we?’ Ask, you bastard, thought Charlie; I’m not going to help you. Radomir Badim didn’t help this time, either.

‘How?’ Popov was finally forced to enquire.

‘The most obvious, first,’ set out Charlie. ‘Two possibilities. You’ve rounded up the Yatisyna Family: the leader himseif. Run a criminal records check first, to find out who of the Yatisyna Family you haven’t got. They are your lever. The best guess is that they have gone across to a rival group who used the attempt at Kirs as the decoy it was…’

‘You might even be able to narrow it down tighter.’ picked up Kestler, choosing his moment according to their rehearsal on their way to the ministry. ‘To have known about the Kirs attempt sufficiently far in advance, someone would have had to be pretty high up in the Yatisyna organization. It doesn’t matter, though, if that doesn’t show up. You won’t have got everyone. Mock those you have with the names of those you haven’t, sneering how they were sold out. Someone will break, trying to even the score by naming the Moscow Family to which the Yatisyna are most closely affiliated…’

‘Which there’s another way of finding out, anyway,’ resumed Charlie. ‘Who, among those you’ve picked up, isn’t Yatisyna but from Moscow, representing the people with whom the Yatisyna were working? That’s easy enough to discover, once you’ve got your Moscow identities: a simple check on Moscow criminal records. One records comparison will give you the most important lead you need, the name of the Moscow Family rivalling that to which the men you’ve got in custody belong. Which will most likely and most logically be the Family that attacked at Pizhma. Your interception at Kirs would have been the best and most humiliating bonus they could have imagined.’

The Russians were being inundated with theory – all of it practical and feasible, the sort of basic investigatory process that should be followed – but an avalanche nevertheless, calculated to appear a far greater contribution than it was to set in concrete the right of Charlie and Kestler to remain part of everything. From the majority of the expressions confronting them, Charlie guessed they were winning.

‘Which shouldn’t be the only approach to the investigation,’ Kestler pressed on. ‘There might not even be a connection between Kirs and Pizhma, unlikely though that is: just conceivably the two could be a complete coincidence. In which case the information that made Pizhma possible wouldn’t have come from the north at all. But from the south, from wherever the components were being transferred to. The receiving installation would have had every detail of the train, wouldn’t they? Routes, schedules, quantities, timings. The receiving plant should be blanketed, to discover if the leak came from there…’

The American’s pause, whether intentional or otherwise, gave Charlie his entry. Smiling to Popov, as he’d smiled frequently towards the man in seeming friendliness, Charlie said, ‘That would have been our immediate operational reaction. But then I’m sure you’ve set everything like that in motion already.’ A final pause. ‘Haven’t you?’

Charlie didn’t expect it would be easy next time. But at least he was reasonably sure there would be a next time.

The photographic enhancement, which Fenby got within an hour of Kestler’s breathless telephone link from Moscow, went far beyond confirming the radioactivity leak. Refusing to believe what he was told at first, the FBI Director summoned the photo analysts to the seventh floor and had them take him through the montage to prove that not only were the canisters visibly breached but that, viewed in sequence, the only possible conclusion was that they had been intentionally forced. There were at least fifteen shots showing men with either crowbars or cold hammers, prising and smashing at the seals.

‘That’s incredible.. it’s…’ stumbled Fenby.

‘… Suicidal madness?’ suggested the photographic chief.

Hillary Jamieson didn’t agree when she arrived at Fenby’s office, fifteen minutes later; the skirt was as short but at least the shirt was looser. Impressively, she instantly and mentally calculated from the time-stamp on the relevant frames that the men would have only been exposed for a maximum of six minutes and said, ‘Enough to make them sick, maybe. Better if they changed their clothes and showered, but whatever it is in the containers I doubt it would be terminal.’

‘But look at the timing!’ insisted Fenby. ‘That stuff’s been there leaking for getting on for twenty-four hours now! We’re looking at another Chernobyl!’

‘No, we’re not,’ corrected Hillary, not bothering to soften the rejection. ‘Chernobyl was a melt-down, a China Syndrome. And it was an entire reactor: the amount was hugely much greater. But it’s still dangerous. Those poor bastards posted around it are in real trouble if they haven’t got the proper protective clothing and unless it’s sealed pretty damned quick Pizhma – I presume it’s a town or a village – is going to be affected. Other places, too, if there are any, the longer it remains unsealed. I can’t be any more precise until I know positively what was in the canisters and the extent and degree it had been irradiated.’

Fenby’s concern was such that he did not even notice Hillary’s careless cursing.

He had a big one here – the biggest of his career so far – of international consequence with the added burden of the House Speaker’s very personal attention. Everything had to be right, exactly right, with no wrong moves and certainly no oversights. Overkill didn’t matter; overkill was fine, in fact, because too much not too little got done in overkill.

He smiled across the expansive desk at the girl who sat, as she’d sat before, with her legs crossed to display practically the whole length of her thigh. ‘I want to be on top of this, one hundred per cent,’ he said, unthinking of the double entendre that broadened Hillary’s smile. ‘I want you in Moscow.’

‘Me! Moscow!’

‘As soon as you can,’ said Fenby. ‘I’ll get State to arrange the visa as quickly as possible.’

The conference, which continued after the departure of Kestler and Charlie, broke up in near disarray and with Natalia as exposed as ever although with more chance to influence decisions for which she was ultimately accountable. The Interior Minister insisted Natalia chair the immediately convened and following meeting to prevent the Pizhma haul getting out of the country, which was technically her responsibility as the department head, although Natalia thought there was an element of inferred criticism of Aleksai and suspected he thought so too. The impression increased, spreading, she believed, to the military commanders, when the meeting ended with the belated investigation following virtually every suggestion put forward by Charlie and the American. That second session was expanded, again on Radomir Badim’s orders by internal division commanders from the Federal Security Service, the new intelligence service formed from the old KGB, and the Federal Militia to provide as much additional manpower as possible to secure borders into Europe and the West. A further ministerial edict was that every planning decision be channelled to the minister through Natalia, which kept her the inevitable focus for mistakes as much as for successes. And realistically she recognized the risks of mistakes were far greater than the benefit of successes.

Ever conscious of that, Natalia questioned and examined every proposal, relegating to secondary importance the chauvinism of the military and the other male division chiefs and Popov’s barely concealed impatience at her operational experience. Natalia rigidly limited her questioning to the practicalities of stopping the stolen nuclear material reaching the West, but was not reluctant to challenge Popov.

She was as annoyed with him as he appeared to be with her. She’d been very vulnerable at the beginning of the minister’s inquest and Aleksai had done nothing to help: indeed, he had led the denunciation of Western involvement with which she would have been culpably linked if it had been judged ill-concieved, and she’d felt satisfaction as well as embarrassment for her lover when the attack had blown up in his face.

It was a resentment Natalia intended privately to let him know beyond what he’d doubtless already assumed, but she acknowledged the opportunity wasn’t going to be easy that night. As pointedly as Natalia felt able when she left to report to the minister, she demanded Popov contact her with the street-level, city-by-city details of the regional and outer border closures upon which they had decided.

She returned uneasily to Leninskaya, hoping Popov would assume the contact insistence a relayed demand from Radomir Badim that had to be complied with. Which it virtually turned out to be anyway from the point-by-point interrogation to which she was subjected by the minister, as well as by Viskov and Fomin, before they agreed every proposal. Because of the uncertainty, Natalia left Sasha in the care of the creche staff.

It clearly was Popov’s assumption from the formality with which he telephoned, an hour after she arrived back at the apartment.

He recited the demanded details in a flat, expressionless tone, scarcely making any allowances for her to take notes. She didn’t ask him to slow or repeat anything. ‘Is there anything additional you want?’ he concluded.

‘I don’t think so.’

‘I shall stay at the ministry tonight.’

Objectively Natalia accepted it was right he should remain in the ministry building: the need was greater now than when he was preparing for the Kirov interception. ‘Call me immediately there is any development’

‘Of course. Anything else?’

‘I would have liked more support this afternoon.’ If she couldn’t tell him to his face she’d tell him this way.

‘So would I!’

‘You were too anxious to criticize!’

‘And you to approve!’

‘I wasn’t approving! Just showing practical common sense to practical common sense suggestions!’

‘Which no one was left in any doubt about that I should have had and already initiated!’

‘You’re assuming a criticism nobody made!’

‘Your Englishman made it.’

‘He’s not my Englishman! And you asked him what he would do in the circumstances, didn’t you!’

‘I was made to look a fool!’

By yourself, nobody else, thought Natalia. Aloud she said, ‘Blaming Western involvement, which you set out to do, could have cost me the directorship!’

‘That’s an exaggeration.’

‘I don’t think so. I don’t have to tell you what that would mean… not just to me. To Sasha, too.’

‘And I don’t have to tell you how much I want properly to look after you. And Sasha.’

Natalia hadn’t expected him to turn the conversation like that and for several moments could not think of a response. She recognized it as the olive branch to end their argument but she didn’t want so quickly to take it. He hadn’t done enough to help her. So it was right he should know how deeply she was annoyed: too deeply to be mollified in a five-minute telephone conversation. Reverting to the formality with which he’d begun, Natalia said, ‘Call me, if there is anything.’

Rebuffed, Popov said, ‘I will,’ and replaced the telephone without any farewell.

Natalia remained by the receiver, gazing at it. She hadn’t said what she’d wanted to say and knew what she had said hadn’t been right. She felt confused and angry, at herself and at Aleksai and peremptory ministers and presidential aides and at whatever they were involved in, about which she felt most confused of all. She grabbed the receiver when it sounded, anxious to hear Aleksai apologize.

‘We should talk,’ suggested Charlie.

‘Yes,’ agreed Natalia. ‘We should.’

‘What’s the seriousness of the leak?’ demanded Patrick Pacey.

‘We need far more information before any proper assessment can be made,’ said Dean. ‘There’s a scientific team being assembled at Aldermaston. We’re feeding them the raw information as it comes in. Washington is cooperating fully: the President telephoned Downing Street an hour ago. I’ve had three separate telephone conversations with Fenby.’

‘Is it a Chernobyl situation?’ persisted Pacey.

‘We don’t know enough to answer that.’

‘The fallout, from Chernobyl, reached England!’ Simpson pointed out.

‘This can’t possibly be as big,’ guessed Dean.

‘Chernobyl was a reactor,’ reminded Pacey, unnecessarily. ‘This is weapons-graded. Surely that will be more powerful?’

‘I don’t know!’ repeated the exasperated Dean.

‘Why break open the canisters deliberately?’ said Johnson.

‘It’s beyond belief!’ said Pacey.

‘It all is,’ agreed Dean.

‘What are the Russians doing about public warnings?’ asked Johnson.

‘There’s still the insistence on a news blackout.’

‘They’ve never given a damn about endangering their civilian population with their nuclear programme,’ reminded Pacey.

‘We could have a catastrophe,’ said the deputy Director, point-lessly.

‘I’m not sure what we have got,’ said Dean. There was one thing he was sure about, though.