Guess Who’s Coming to Kill You

Chapter 14

“Tell him what?” Brook said.

“I didn’t say tell. I said kill.”

“I see.” Brook didn’t see. Brook didn’t see anything. He thought he must be dreaming. At last he said, “Very funny.” Holloway cracking a joke?

“Brook, pay attention.” Brook could see him sitting there at his desk, a man so gray he drained the color out of his background, looking out at a world on which he had declared war through his North Atlantic eyes. “I want you to kill Levashev. Right now.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Do it in such a way as to make it look like Krylov’s work. Use the pistol he took from Levashev. The two bullets we’ll find in Levashev’s body will prove out from the same weapon.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, hang up and do it.”

“Mr. Holloway—”

“You have your orders.” The Director hung up.

Brook returned his phone to its cradle grudgingly. He felt disoriented. General Levashev’s frail body was stretched out on the couch in absolute helplessness. The old man’s eyes were shut and there was a look of weary peace on his face.

Just a peace-wanting old man.

You didn’t walk up to a dozing, peace-wanting old man and put a bullet through him. Who didn’t? People didn’t. Ordinary people. The people who spent their lives looking for peace — peace across frontiers, peace in their streets, peace from their wives, peace from their bosses, peace from the banks and the bill-senders, peace from their internal struggles... above all, that peace, the kind all the others added up to: peace of mind. It was for such people, the argument ran, that all this deceit, this plotting and counterplotting, this torture, this murder took place. It was in their interests that the skillful robots of FACE and the CIA and M.I.6 and the KGB and the rest had been created. Or so the big brains said. It was for them that the Peter Brooks of the world sold themselves to the intelligence establishment. It was for them that you crossed over and gave up your membership in the human race.

That’s what they told you. That’s what you came to believe. It might even be so. There was nothing else a Peter Brook could tell himself. It was the only justification in town. But always there was that little nag of doubt.

You were luckiest if you grew calluses through the daily exercises in indecency. The closer to the robot, the easier it became. If you achieved the ideal state you needed no justification. The act was its own excuse.

Kill Levashev.

Tug-of-war. To do it was a hard thing, because he was still in some vital part of him a man. Not to do it was an even harder thing, because unquestioning obedience was the hallmark of FACE and its brother organizations; a bit of man he might still be, but the robot part was in the ascendancy.

All this time Brook was crossing the room. General Levashev’s hands were folded laxly on his chest; he looked as if he were already lying in a coffin. Brook paused, took out his handkerchief, and picked up Krylov’s pistol and his own; his own he returned to its shoulder holster, Krylov’s he gripped through the handkerchief. The weapon he now held was Levashev’s, but he thought of it as Krylov’s.

He went up to the dozing old man and stopped at the precise distance which had separated Krylov from Levashev when Krylov had got off his shot.

He raised the pistol.

Levashev opened his eyes.

“You know,” the old man said. “You have known all along.”

Brook was startled. “What?” he said.

“I see,” the old man said. “I see you do not.” He was looking not at the muzzle but at Brook’s face. “You have just been ordered to kill me, Mr. Brook?”

Brook said, “Yes.”

“I think—” Levashev raised his head slightly “—I think you do not wish to. Yes. It is in your face, Mr. Brook. Krylov had no hesitation. But you are disturbed. Why, Mr. Brook? Is it because I am an old man?”

“There’s nothing to talk about,” Brook said roughly.

“But there is. It was your superior on the telephone who gave you the order, yes?” Struggling, General Levashev swung his feet to the floor. Brook stepped back to adjust the distance. “This leads me to believe that he has just discovered why I am here. At first glance it would seem to be that. But one learns to look beyond the obvious.”

“Sorry, General. No more time.” His finger contracted.

“Wait! Do not begrudge me a few moments. It is my final opportunity to analyze an event for what lies behind it. Do not deny me this.”

“Sorry.” But Brook did not pull the trigger.

The old eyes went to the weapon. “My pistol, not yours,” he said thoughtfully. “Why? Why indeed. Follow the logic of this, please. Krylov used my pistol to wound me. Therefore you have been ordered to finish me off with the same weapon. It falls into place. From the beginning your Director knew that Krylov was not a genuine defector, that he was being sent here to assassinate me. It follows, then, that your Director knew even more. From the beginning he knew why I had defected.”

“I don’t know,” Brook said. “I don’t care.”

“Ah, Mr. Brook, that is not so. You care very much.” And there was the old man incredibly propelling himself from the couch and plunging toward Brook, hands extended like claws. Brook stepped back and squeezed off three shots: one, two, three, the first in the head, the second in the chest, the third in the abdomen. The old man jerked with each impact. The top of his head came off in a bloody bean curd, roses bloomed rapidly on his chest and abdomen. Then he fell on his face.

The old man’s right leg twitched twice like a lizard’s on a dissecting table. It stopped.

Brook stooped to feel the neck.

Then he went to the telephone and dialed the gatehouse.

“Yes,” the Director said, looking at Brook, “I believe I will.”

Brook had asked out of politeness; everybody knew that Holloway didn’t drink. Maybe he was a secret lush. You would almost have to be in his job. Correction: I would have to be in his job. “With or without, sir?”

“On the rocks.”

Brooks poured and delivered the drink to the lemon-yellow plastic easychair and Holloway. The Director took it and held it. So he had said yes out of politeness. That was even more startling than the secret-lush theory.

“Thank you,” Holloway said. Mirabile dictu. It had been big, all right.

Gone — or concealed — was the coiled spring. Holloway sat back in the easychair with every evidence of relaxation. His icefloe eyes even held a certain... not warmth, but a lesser chill.

“Have a good air trip?” Brook asked. They were in the same motel Brook had used on his first trip to Albuquerque to talk to Levashev.

Holloway looked puzzled. “They’re all the same,” he said. He glanced down at the glass in his hand and leaned over to set it on the night table. Brook sat down on the edge of the bed and tasted his drink. “I suppose you’re wondering, Mr. Brook.”

“Frankly, yes, sir. You don’t usually visit the scene.”

“This was of unusual importance. I had to be sure you set it up this morning convincingly. So far everybody appears convinced Krylov did it.”

“No problem. The locals, the guards in the gatehouse, swallowed my story in one gulp.”

“So it seems. But before you dislocate your arm patting yourself on the back, Mr. Brook, I point out that Krylov got away from you.”

“From everybody, sir,” Brook said, piqued. “I didn’t set up the security on that rancho. Krylov is one of the best.”

“We’ve got to put the arm on him before he gets out of the country.”

Brook put his glass on the floor with a bang. “If you don’t mind, Mr. Holloway, I’d like to be let in on exactly why it will be better. What in hell’s been going on?”

The Director actually smiled. “Are you slowing down, Mr. Brook? Think now. Why did I order you to go ahead with Krylov when you reported from Toko that your cover was blown?”

“Because,” Brook said bitterly, “agents are ten kopeks a dozen.”

“Hardly,” Holloway said. “Agents cost the government forty-two thousand dollars a head before they’re trained and ready for assignment with FACE to my satisfaction. I don’t say I haven’t thrown my agents to the wolves on occasion, Mr. Brook, but the sacrifice is always carefully weighed against the benefits. In this case you and Mr. Lopez were expendable, valuable as you are. Also, knowing that Krylov’s real mission was to kill Levashev, I could count on his completing his fake defection whether you had blown your cover or not.”

“I guess I am slowing down. I don’t understand any of this. From the way things have turned out, you wanted Krylov to kill General Levashev. For God’s sake, why?”

“We dug up the real skivvy on Levashev not long after he defected to us. Bits and pieces put together in the Analysis Branch. We doublechecked until the conclusion was inescapable. Meanwhile sources of ours behind the Curtain learned of Krylov’s assignment. We could have taken Levashev out ourselves at any time, of course, but this was made to order for our purposes. It was simply too good an opportunity to pass up. It’s worked out beautifully. Krylov, on orders of the KGB, is now officially General Levashev’s murderer. Even you, I’m sure, Mr. Brook, must see that the worldwide news story will have immense propaganda value for us.”

Brook was shaking his head. “It doesn’t look that way to me, sir. The KGB will get a lot of mileage out of Krylov’s being announced internationally as the killer of Levashev. It’ll scare hell out of every would-be defector in the Communist world. Unless you’ve left something out. What do you mean, the real skivvy on the General?”

“The General,” said the Director of FACE with a certain enjoyment, “was working with and for the Red Chinese.”

“The Red Chinese — Levashev?”

“Since way back, Mr. Brook, even when he was in the KGB. That’s what we put together after he ‘defected’ to the West. He was a hard-core Marxist — genuinely so; he even used this motivation, very cleverly, to explain to us why he turned his back on the Soviet Union. He was always saying how the big boys in the Kremlin had betrayed the Revolution. What he didn’t tell us, and what we found out, was that he had taken the logical next step: since Soviet Communism had strayed from the Marxist path, he had gone over to Chinese Communism, which sticks to it.”

It all fell into place rapidly. Brook sat on the bed shiny-eyed, drink forgotten.

“As a top man in the KGB, Levashev was in a unique position to pass its most important secrets over to Peking. A little over a year ago somebody in the Politburo became suspicious of him. Before they could arrest him he defected and got clear. His original purpose seems to have been to go to China; that’s why he holed up in Vienna so long while the messages went back and forth. The Mao people saw no profit in his hanging around in Peking; they finally convinced the old sucker that he could do more for them as their agent in the United States. So he came over to us. And here he sat, giving us leads whenever he got the chance that favored Red China as against the Soviet Union, occasionally learning or figuring out some of our plans vis-à-vis Red China and passing them on to Peking through a man we thought was a U.S. government agent.”

“Who was that?”

“The houseman we thought we put in there. Dead ringer for the CIA man we had assigned, a man of Filipino descent, whose bones are probably whitening in some arroyo in the desert. We’ve checked the dead man’s prints against the real Filipino’s on file; there’s no question about it. Somebody’s going to pay for that.”

“Some setup,” Brook muttered. “The Red Chinese with a listening post in the middle of our operations. I owe you an apology, Mr. Holloway. I thought you’d gone off your rocker.”

“Soviet agent liquidates Red Chinese agent,” the Director said with a trace of animation. He actually reached over and picked up his Scotch and took a sip. “Yes. Very nice. Helps widen the rift between them. Important overall policy for the U.S. just now. It’s their own technique, by George. About time we tried it. What’s the matter, Mr. Brook? Feeling unloved again?”

“Not again,” Brook said, “yet. I just remembered how you used me.”

“To be used, Mr. Brook, is a condition of your function,” Holloway said severely. But then he said, “Take a few days’ leave when you get back to Washington. Go to bed with a pretty girl or two. It will restore your usefulness to me.”

“Thank you, Mr. Holloway,” Brook said. “Shall I lick your hand?”

The Director rose. “Sometimes I think it would be less taxing to run a corps of he-she ballet dancers than you prima donnas. See you in the morning, Mr. Brook.”

Brook was dreaming of a woman. Sometimes her face was Kimiko Ohara’s, sometimes Jasmine’s, but at last she developed a crop of freckles across the bridge of her nose.

Whoever she was, she was wearing a filmy nothing that for kicks kept coming apart. The walls were covered in leopard skin. He was seated on a piano stool, naked, and she was coming across the room to him in great slow leaps.

“Turn out the light!” she was crying. “Turn out the light!”

“I like it better on,” Brook heard himself say.

“Out, out!” Megan Jones picked up a girl’s field hockey stick that turned into a giant Luger as she raised it. She pointed it at the light and said, “Bang.”

But instead of going out the light waxed in a flash.

Brook sat up in bed.

The light in the motel room was on, and Aleksei Krylov was standing at the foot of the bed pointing a pistol at him. His smile showed the gap between his teeth.

Brook made a brushing gesture. “Go away.”

“Oh, I shall,” Krylov said. “Both of us, Peter. No, you are not dreaming.”

“I wish to hell I were,” Brook said.

“No doubt.” The Russian moved a little closer, but still out of range. He was disheveled and dusty; there was a long scratch on the hand that held the gun. Where had he found a gun? “I have the feeling, Peter, that you are not a man of your word after all. You did not wait the hour we agreed on. There were roadblocks set up in every direction too quickly. And here in your desert there are not many roads. Every escape is cut off.”

“That’s your problem.” The gun was his own; Brook could only not look at the empty holster hanging on the chair beside the bed. That’s what comes of arming agents except for kills, he thought. A dumb practice.

“Our problem, Peter.” Krylov’s head jerked in the direction of the window. “You still have your rented automobile outside. That is fortunate for me. And the blanket you threw aside when I awakened you. Yes, we shall need the blanket, too.”

“What for?” Brook moved his legs slowly on the bed, as if he felt cramped.

“I shall be in the rear of the automobile under the blanket. The pistol, of course, will be pointed at the back of your head at all times. You will be stopped at the roadblocks. You will present your impressive identification and they will wave you on without searching the car. Careful!” Krylov steadied the gun as Brook swung his legs to the floor.

Brook remained in the sitting position on the bed. “Not bad, Alex, except that it won’t work.”

“For me it must. And I believe there is a good chance. I must point out, Peter, that your life depends upon it.”

“That gun isn’t loaded.”

Krylov laughed.

“Take a look.”

“No, I shall not take a look. You are lying, Peter. If the gun were not loaded you would have attacked me before this.”

“I’m telling you, Alex, I empty it at night. The cartridges are in the desk drawer there.”

“Not good enough, Peter.”

“You can’t be sure it’s loaded, and you can’t risk a shot to find out. Everybody in earshot will come running — the motel’s full.”

“You are deliberately wasting time.”

“You’ll defeat your own purpose, Alex.”

Krylov frowned. He shifted the pistol ever so little and raised it swiftly for a glance at the cylinder.

Brook dived.

It was a reasonable gamble. Krylov would instinctively expect a grapple. Brook hit him under the knees. The bullet went over his head as Krylov topped and dropped the pistol. They scrambled for it like two boys playing a game. Each man secured a grip, partly on the weapon, partly on the other’s hand. They rolled about the floor. Brook punched with his free hand. Krylov’s answering chop hit a shoulder. Brook’s knee whistled up in a try between Krylov’s legs, but the Russian locked his thighs a split second before and the knee hit muscle.

They rolled again.

The gun went off again.

Krylov looked surprised. “Nyet, nyet” he muttered. “Chto sluchilos?”

“What’s happened, Alex, is that you’ve had it.” Brook looked down at the Russian. He held the gun ready more out of habit than necessity. Krylov twitched a little, staring up at him. The bloodstain on his chest was spreading through the powder burn.

“Piotr,” Krylov said.

“Yes, Alex.”

“Eta dalyeko?”

“Yes, Alex, it’s very far.”

The Russian’s eyes lost their gloss. They stayed open.

The door exploded. Holloway, ludicrously dressed in purple-striped pajamas and brandishing a .45, almost fell to his knees as he burst in. He recovered his cool very quickly. But he was still unsettled enough to say, “I’ll be damned.”

“Won’t we all?” Brook said, still looking down at the Russian’s body. “It’s only a matter of time.”

“Did he say anything?” the Director of FACE demanded.

“Nothing, sir,” Brook said respectfully, “you’d consider important.”

In her high-rise efficiency apartment with its picture window overlooking the Potomac, Megan Jones brought Brook his favorite libation from her kitchenette. It was a night that promised favors. She had put on a chartreuse dress, not too mini; a sensible dress, Brook thought. What gave it its sensible character was that the length made leotards unnecessary, and there was a line of buttons down the front.

Megan handed Brook his Scotch, sat down on his lap, and twined her arm around his neck.

“Thank you,” Brook said.

“You’re welcome,” she said, “but very unappreciative.”

“I’m saving my appreciation, Megan.”

She pouted. He hated women who pouted.

“Look at that.” She nodded toward the table where the two chartreuse candles were still burning. The cradled bottle of wine lay there with its cork loosened and its contents undisturbed. “I went to all the trouble — not to mention the expense — of getting you a Mouton-Rothschild ’55, a grand premier crus. And you haven’t even tasted it.”

“I’m a vulgarian,” Brook said. “Besides, I’ve been saving my taste buds for this—” he touched his lips to the Scotch “—and this—” he touched his lips to her lips.

“Your appetites are so basic, Peter.”

“Primitive,” Brook said, nodding.

“Let me refine them.”

“That sounds awfully civilized. Give me the primitive state any time.” He wondered suddenly how amenable she would be to a course in Jasmine’s technique, or even Kimiko Ohara’s. Hell, no. She’d probably accuse him of being a sexual offbeat.

“I feel exploratory tonight.” Megan took the glass from his hand, placed it a little shakily on the coffee table, and reached up to turn off the bridge lamp. “To tell you the truth,” she said, bracketing his cheeks with her palms and bearing down on him with all her weight, “I feel positively wicked.”

Brook began to be interested in the game.

He was just completing the opening moves when the alarm watch on his wrist buzzed.

“Oh, no,” Megan moaned. “Not again!”

Brook cursed. He shoved her off the sofa and rose.

“Peter Brook,” Megan wailed. “You’re not going out for another walk. The last time you did that you didn’t come back for almost a month!”

Damn Holloway.

“You know how it is with research analysts.”

He left to go back to the war.