Quiller Balalaika

3: SCORPION

I didn't want to work too close to the Hotel Moskva International so I walked across the street and went into the RAOC building and told the desk clerk that Inspector Loshak wanted to see me and they said there wasn't any Inspector Loshak there, maybe I was mistaking this branch for the one down on Suharevskij Prospekt. I said they could be right – how would I get there?

Then I got the Mercedes S420 from the garage and drove sixteen blocks and found the other place and left the car halfway on the pavement – A car like that, Legge's briefing noted in the Field Information file, can be left almost anywhere you can find a space. The police won't touch it: the image is distinctly mafiya.

The snow had stopped in the early hours of this morning; I'd slept for a time and then got up and gone through the whole of the briefing again, committing the essentials to memory and testing them, looking down from one of the windows at intervals to check on the movements of the two surveillance people, bundled in their black leather coats to look like plain clothes policemen, hands pushed into their pockets and snow on their fur hats and their breath clouding as they shifted their feet, giving an oblique glance upward at my windows every time they reached the end of their beat and turned, could have been looking at the sky, wondering when it would clear.

The fax had come just before five this morning.

Yelena and the children arriving Sheremetyevo Airport 18:12 hours today on China Airlines Flight 2129, no need to meet them, will be staying at Hotel Romanov. Have a successful trip. No one called, no messages.

Ferris.

And already I was beginning to feel uneasy about Tully, the shadow executive for Rickshaw, out there in Beijing and just going into the end-phase with a replacement director in the field less capable than Ferris – any DIF would be less capable than Ferris.

Does it look sticky?

St Pyotr staring down with his plaster eyes, Croder's steel claw flashing in the candlelight.

Not at present, though in the end phase anything can happen, of course.

Yea, verily: the end-phase is when the executive goes in close and starts feeling the heat, confronting the risk, taking final chances he'd never have taken earlier, committed at last to bringing the mission home or leaving it wrecked in the field – You can't win them all, love – Daisy in the Caff, small comfort, it takes a lot of tea to wash away the penitence, the self-reproach as those snivelling bastards spell it out in blood on the files: Mission unaccomplished.

Conscience pricked as I stood under the noon sky watching the RAOC building, this one smaller, shabbier than the one opposite my hotel, red brick and grimy windows, the brass handles of the entrance doors tarnished with age, birds there, pecking at crumbs someone had thrown down.

But you wanted Ferris, didn't you?

Right.

And you've got him. So forget this conscience shit.

Whatever you say.

People starting to leave the building now.

Whatever you say, my good friend, forget it, yes, we've got work to do.

The entrance doors banging back and the birds darting upward to perch on the window sills, complaining. Most of the office workers came down the steps in groups, with only a couple of men walking alone so far, one of them slipping on the crusted snow and laughing as he found his balance, the sound clear in the cold air, the others turning to look and a girl in a white fur hat giggling, some of them crossing the street now, lurching their way across the deep frozen ruts in the snow, their boots crunching.

In a small building like this there wouldn't be too many on the staff and I watched them, concentrating, needing only one, just one of them, the right one if I could find her, it had to be a woman, a woman walking alone, independent of groups, easily bored in company, needing to do her own thing in her own way, to hell with the rules and regulations. A tall order, this I admit, small chance of finding someone like that in a government office, a freethinking bureaucrat, but hope springs eternal and I waited patiently, watching the entrance doors, the steps, because this was important, this was the first day of the opening phase for Balalaika and I wanted information, a lot of information, to give me the one quintessential requirement the mission demanded before anything else could happen, before I could get inside the mafiya infrastructure in Moscow, before I could move in to the target: Vasyl Sakkas.

Access.

It's a heady thing, when you find it. It's the first signal the shadow's going to send, right at the outset of the mission, the one they're waiting for under the floodlit board in Signals, the one they'll scrawl in chalk across the slate.

Executive has access.

The air cold against the face, a blood-red leaf circling downward from the black skeletons of the elms, smoke drawing out in a skein as someone lit a cigarette, the flame of the match bright on his cheeks and flashing on his glasses, three more people coming down the steps in a group, one of them swinging a blue woollen scarf round her neck as they went along the pavement under the trees, and suddenly there she was, a young woman walking alone, pulling on her black sable gloves as she looked around her, not seeing anyone she felt like joining, shaking her head to someone who called her name – Mitzi – and asked her if she was going to the library this evening, shaking her head to tell them no as I began moving, crossing the street behind her, taking care on the ice as a beaten-up Trabant went past with its front wheels shimmying through the ruts, exhaust gas clouding on the cold noon air.

She went into the fast food place almost opposite the RAOC building and I hung back until the door had swung shut and then pushed it open again, going inside. Steam and tobacco smoke and the comfortable smell of cabbage, three servers working hard behind the counter, four people waiting, Mitzi the last in line.

When her battered tin tray was loaded I shuffled forward a bit too fast and my foot got in the way and she tripped and the soup and the dish of shashlik slid off and crashed onto the floor, much laughter from a couple of workmen who'd just come in, Mitzi's face open with shock and her eyes flashing as she looked at me.

'Shit!' she said, to more laughter.

'I'm sorry – I'll order some more, it won't take a minute.'

One of the servers came round from behind the counter with a bucket and a mop, looking daggers at me while I apologized again and gave the order, getting the same for myself, the potato soup and kebabs, while Mitzi told the two workmen to shut up, it wasn't funny, I liked her anger, it had a cat's energy, where did she want to sit, I asked her when I had the two trays in my hands.

I followed her to one of the bare scrubbed tables. 'Mind if I join you?'

'Please yourself.' She was silent for a while, wanting me to know she didn't forgive easily, then looked up from her soup. 'Clumsy oaf,' she said, but with a quick bright smile.

'Dead right.'

She opened her money pouch and flattened a bank-note on the table. 'You didn't have to do that.'

'One should pay for one's mistakes. Dmitri,' I added, 'Dmitri Berinov.'

'Mitzi Piatilova.' She picked up the note and put it away.

I took my time, talked about the snow, the plane crash, the fist-fight they'd had in the Duma last night, it had been in the papers, talked about Zhirinovsky.

'He's a genius,' Mitzi said.

'He is?'

'Look,' she leaned across the table, her long eyes serious, intense, 'that man has it in him to bring Russia back as an imperial power in the world. I like that.'

'He'll need to shoot an awful lot of people.'

'So? You remember what he said? "I may have to shoot a hundred thousand people, but the other three hundred million will live in peace." '

'You're ready for dictatorship?'

'With a man like Zhirinovsky as our leader, yes. He could make real changes, sweeping and dramatic changes, clear out the trash we've been living with for all this time.'

'Yeltsin can't do that?'

'Yeltsin is in the pay of America. Russia can get back her place in the world without any help from the almighty dollar. Look at what Zhirinovsky did when he went over there – he spat in their eye. That's the message we need to get across: we're an independent, sovereign people, and give us ten years – maybe even five – with a man like that in charge, and we'll be powerful again in our own right, a force to be reckoned with.' Her hand slapping the table: 'Russia had a soul once, and that man can give it life again.'

'You're in politics?'

'Politics? No, I'm with the RAOC. But an ordinary citizen can -'

'You work over there, across the street?'

'Yes.'

'You don't look like a bureaucrat.'

'I'm not a bloody bureaucrat,' and her eyes flashed again. 'We're fighting crime.'

'Making much headway?'

'Are you serious?' With a short laugh.

When her glass was empty I went to the counter for some more vasti and came back with some pastries as well.

'So why can't you make any headway?'

Mitzi threw her head back. 'Against the mafiya? It's a farce! We catch them and put them into the courts and they buy themselves out or get a slap on the wrist for first-degree murder because either the judge is in league with their boss or he's terrified of making a conviction. It's not difficult in this town to get shot; it doesn't make any difference who you are.'

'Rather frustrating for you.'

'A job is a job.' With a shrug: 'Corruption's everywhere, you know that. We can fight crime but we can't fight corruption.'

'It must be dangerous.'

'Dangerous?'

'Fighting crime.'

She looked across at a man sitting three tables away, then back to me. 'For some of us, yes.'

'He's one of them?'

'Who?'

'The man you were looking at.'

'You don't miss much.' She checked me over with a quick glance. I was wearing the things I'd arrived in last night, black jeans and a padded bomber jacket, not the tra-la tailoring I'd be using later. 'He's one of our special investigators,' Mitzi said. 'They're crazy, you know that? Young bloods after promotion. They think they can take on professional hit men in the street and get away with it. They should leave the mafiya alone.'

'You tell your boss that?'

'Of course not. I got this job because there wasn't anything else. None of us working over there has any illusions. I was talking to a Japanese businessman only a couple of days ago, and he put the whole thing in perspective. He says the organizatsiya provides a service. You know what he did? He found a contact in one of the most powerful syndicates and made a deal with him. The night he opened his fancy sushi bar, people from three or four other gangs paid their usual visit and told him what percentage they were going to take. He'd known this would happen, and all he had to do was give them the name of his protector – the one he'd made the deal with – and they cleared out and never came back. There's an unwritten rule – you take over a protectee from a rival syndicate and you're dead, I mean within twenty-four hours.' She spread her hands. 'The Japanese told me that every entrepreneur needs protection, and since the police can't help him he pays his dues to a syndicate – and gets service.'

'The way the KGB used to run things. Freedom from trouble for sale.'

'Pretty much. The normal abuse of power – nothing's really changed.' With a bright laugh: 'Except that the mafiya's better organized and makes a lot more money.'

The man sitting three tables away was getting up, pushing his chair back and going across to the door. I watched him go out, a young fellow, walking like a cat as he hitched up his belt, a gun there somewhere, adding weight.

I turned back to Mitzi. 'So how long has he got?'

She looked round, and her eyes were deep suddenly. 'Until morning.'

'How do you know?'

In a moment she said, 'I think you're being too inquisitive.' I'd been expecting her to say it earlier, had the pitch ready.

'You want me to be frank?'

'Just as you please.' But she looked suddenly attentive.

'I've got to go over there today.'

'Over where?'

'To the RAOC office. I need some help.'

'What kind of help?'

I leaned across the table, moving the pastries. 'The thing is, I'm not sure which side you're on, Mitzi. I mean, you work for the RAOC but you say the mafiya provides a useful service.'

She watched me steadily. 'What do you think?'

'I agree.'

'You agree?' In a moment, 'I don't know who you are. I think it's time I did.'

I gave it a beat. 'I'll come to that. Do you know any of these people? In the mob? I mean, have you met them in the course of your work?'

She looked down, up again, turning the ring on her middle finger, the sapphire I'd noticed when we'd sat down at the table. It was small but flawless, not the kind of bauble a government worker could buy on the standard pay. But then she was attractive, would have a boyfriend, at least one. I thought it wasinteresting, the way her subconscious attention had gone to the ring when I'd asked her if she knew anyone in the mob. 'One or two,' she said.

'How well?'

'I'm waiting to know who you are.'

I finished my vasti, taking my time about it. 'I'll put it this way. The help I need is for a friend of mine. He's with the Scorpion.' They had fancy names, the chiefs of the syndicates, according to Legge's briefing, some of them taken from the world of the predators – the Jackal, the Tiger – some from the American motor industry: Stingray, Cutlass, Baretta.

In a moment Mitzi said, 'A friend? Or is it yourself?'

'No. I'm an independent entrepreneur.'

'A brave man.'

'I know what I'm risking.'

'I hope so. Anyway, if your friend is with the Scorpion, he shouldn't need any help from outside. They look after their own, like the Sicilians.'

'Normally, yes. But this is a rape case, and the Scorpion doesn't like that. He says it gives the syndicate a bad name.'

'We've got rape cases on our files, of course. Has your friend – you want to tell me his name?'

'Let's call him Boris.'

'Has he been charged?'

'Yes.'

'When?'

'A week ago.

With a shrug: 'It's still nothing anyone in the mafiya would need help with. Even if the Scorpion refuses, Boris must have more than enough cash in hand to fix the judge.'

'For one thing, he gambles – and loses. For another thing, the girl is still in the intensive care unit, and they don't think much of her chances.'

'So it could turn into a rape-murder.'

'Yes.'

Someone dropped an iron saucepan behind the counter, and Mitzi flinched, took a couple of seconds to recover. 'How do you think anyone in the RAOC could help Boris?'

'By taking the heat off him. Admitting to false arrest.'

She looked down again, turning the ring. 'It would be rather dangerous for you to approach our people over there. I only started work with them a month ago, so I don't know which ones would be open to persuasion. Most of them are loyal to the Administration, I do know that. You go to the wrong one and you'd be in trouble yourself. Deep trouble.'

'So what do I do?'

'Look,' she said in a moment, 'you could be anyone. You could be in the RAOC yourself – we've got internal investigators.'

I got out my wallet and put my identification card on the table. London had embossed it to read Dmitri Vladimir Berinov, Import-Export, Overseas Affiliates.

'What do you deal in?' Mitzi asked me.

'Anything I can find a source for. Antiques – mainly icons – furs, gems, strategic metals, drugs.'

'Have you got anything on you?'

I looked around, then pushed a small plastic bag across to her. 'Keep it out of sight.'

Mitzi opened the ziplock and sniffed the contents, her eyes on me. 'Is this coke?'

'You don't recognize it?'

'I'll take your word for it.' She zipped the bag shut and passed it back, her hand covering it. 'What kind of gems?'

'Diamonds, when I can find them. Rubies, opals, tourmaline, sapphires. That's a nice ring you're wearing. I've been admiring it.'

'Thank you.' She tugged her black sweater down, perhaps to show off her breasts: she'd done it several times, just as she tossed her head to show off her chestnut-brown hair. 'So maybe I'll trust you,' she said. 'Maybe I won't. It depends. This Boris – you mean he hasn't got any funds? Because of his gambling?'

'What would you call 'funds"?'

'I don't know – maybe a hundred thousand US dollars.'

'He might be able to find fifty thousand.'

'That could be enough.'

'But you said you don't know the people over there. The ones you might be able to buy.'

'I wouldn't do it through them.'

'How would you do it?'

Ignoring this, 'Ask him if he'll go to fifty thousand. And a thousand for me.'

'If he can't find that much, I will.'

She took another pastry and bit into it, dropping crumbs, watching me all the time. In a moment, 'What guarantee can you give me?'

'My word.'

'That doesn't mean a lot in Moscow these days.'

'It means a lot to me.'

'I like that.'

'And you like money.'

Laughing, tossing her head back, 'It's all I think about. Why shouldn't I?'

'Absolutely no reason. I'm not in import-export for fun, either. Excuse me a minute.'

There was only one man in the lavatory and I got out my wallet and did some counting. Back at the table I stood close to Mitzi and pushed the wad of notes against her arm. 'Put it away without looking at it.'

When she'd taken it I sat down. 'That's your thousand dollars. I'll hand over the fifty when Boris is off the hook.'

She looked at me with her eyes bright. 'How long will you give me?'

'He's due in court tomorrow.'

'That's rather short notice.'

'So you'll have to be quick.' The sooner the executive can find access at the outset of the mission the better it is for his nerves: he's no longer on the prowl in the field, trying to find his direction.

'I can't guarantee anything,' Mitzi said.

'That's understood.'

'You're a generous man.'

'It oils the wheels.'

Someone came in and let the door slam and she flinched again, and again tried to cover it with a wry laugh. 'Christ, somepeople are so noisy!'

'Gets on your nerves.'

She looked at her watch, a thin Jacques Picquot. 'I've only got ten minutes more of my lunch hour.' Getting a ballpoint and a piece of paper from her pouch, she began writing. 'TonightI'll be at the Baccarat Club. It's on Kirova Vlitsa. I'll be sitting at a table near the door. Be there by nine o'clock and give this to the doorman – he'll let you in.' She pushed the slip of paper towards me.

'And then?'

'There's a man you should talk to. I want to be there when he shows up. If he doesn't, I'll try and find someone else. But he should be there – he plays poker in a private room, most nights of the week.'

'He's mafiya?'

'Yes.'

'How big is he?'

'How big?'

'What's his status in the mob?'

She thought about it. 'Maybe halfway up the scale. But powerful. And dangerous – treat him with care.'

'What's his reket? '

'Protection, mainly, but he also deals in sable.'

'Nothing else?'

'Not as far as I know. But he keeps a few judges in his pocket. That's why you should talk to him.'

'You want to tell me his name?'

'Vishinsky. He calls himself the Cougar.'

'How long have you known him?'

'Maybe a month, six weeks. I've only talked to him a couple of times, but I know his reputation. And I see him around.'

'At the club?'

'Yes. I'm a spare-time hostess there when I've got nothing else to do.'

She looked at her watch again and I said, 'I'll be there before nine tonight.'

'All right. It's formal dress.'

'Black tie?'

'No, just a good suit.' She pushed her chair back, tossing her head. 'So I'll see you at the club.'

I got up and went with her to the door, and as I watched her crossing the street I considered the impression she'd been giving me all the time we'd been sitting together. Mitzi Piatilova was running scared.