Revelation

25 Armenia

Romella said, 'You were right about the old Geghard trading route. The merchandise went out that way after the war.'

A thrill ran through Findhorn. But now she was saying, 'There's a downside. The competition got to Kitty first.'

A teenage maneater, all eyeshadow and false lashes, entered the executive lounge, carrying a small suitcase. She stared openly at Findhorn, and Findhorn shot her a suspicious look.

Romella continued, 'It's weird. They got to Kitty less than an hour before I did. The poor woman got quite confused. So did I.'

'So where exactly were the messages going?'

Romella beamed. 'Not Turkey. Armenia!'

'You think he was sending them to his brother?'

'Almost certainly. And it wasn't atomic secrets or he'd have given them to a courier like Harry Gold or Rosenblum.'

Findhorn said, 'Hey, maybe it was just letters.'

'Maybe, but Kitty remembered the last thing Petrosian sent out just before he disappeared. It was a thick envelope and she thought there was something about it. She remembers, after all those years.'

'Okay, it's our best shot, not to mention our only one. Now all we have to do is find Lev's brother, if he's still alive.'

Romella said, 'We'll need visas.'

Doug said, 'It sounds as if we're neck and neck with the competition. If they travel out via Heathrow you might even be on the same plane. They could be in the terminal now.'

Stefi giggled nervously. 'But surely not in this lounge.'

Findhorn shook his head. 'No chance. It's too unlikely.'

'Much too unlikely,' Doug agreed.

They looked around, suddenly aware. A gaggle of white-haired ladies were sharing some scandal three tables away; a couple of Japanese businessmen were sharing a joke over hot chocolates; otherwise the lounge was quiet.

Findhorn was looking at a departures screen. He said, 'Blimey! Where's the Armenian embassy?'

Doug and Stefi were standing, cold and impatient, at the entrance to Terminal Four. Findhorn was barely out of the taxi when Doug thrust tickets into his hand. 'It's boarding now, Gate Fourteen. Miss it and the next flight is in two days. Run.'

'Good luck!' Stefi called after the retreating figures.

In Terminal Four, a harrassed official jabbered into a handset as he hustled Findhorn and Romella through the security and passport controls. They were joined by a large American in a green check suit who trailed them, puffing, through long corridors, and then they were straight onto the aircraft, with a burly stewardess hovering at the door.

Findhorn settled in at a window seat, and Romella's boarding card took her to a seat near the rear of the aircraft. The Tupolev had the air of discarded Soviet rolling stock. It reeked of kerosene and had worn carpets and rickety chairs. And open luggage racks: it was an aircraft designed for the flat Russian steppes, without steep banking turns in mind.

The American, with thick spectacles and a green jacket, slumped down next to him. Fat arms overflowed into Findhorn's space and a New York Times spread itself around.

'Bin to Armeenya before?'

Findhorn shook his head, trying to get the right degree of surliness.

'Still full of commies. Y'on business?'

Findhorn turned up the surliness a fraction. He mumbled without looking up from the in-flight magazine. 'Touring.'

'Armeenyan women are the pits. They got no class and no deodorant.' The American picked his nose and spread his elbows some more.

The air conditioning wasn't working, and the aircraft sat on the tarmac for half an hour while the air grew stifling and Findhorn's shirt and pants became sticky with sweat. A baby exercised her lungs mightily, and the hostess prowled up and down the aisle like a prison warder. Finally the three jet engines howled, died, howled, died and on the third howl thrust them along the tarmac and into the blue sky with a take-off angle like a Lancaster heading for Dresden.

Somewhere over the English Channel, the American tried again. 'By the way, don't let the lousy upholstery fool you. This is one extremely strong aircraft. It's made from girders.'

Findhorn grunted happily.

'Not so sure about the maintenance, though. I hear some of the ground crew haven't been paid for months.' The American started on the in-flight magazine, leaving Findhorn to examine the rivets on the wing.

There was a long, sweaty wait on the tarmac at Amsterdam and it was dark by the time the Tupolev touched ground in Armenia. In Findhorn's highly strung state, it seemed to come in at a hell of a speed. Yerevan Airport was a massive, concrete, solid structure, unadorned with the shops and restaurants of Western airports. Findhorn and Romella joined the queue trickling one at a time through a short passageway. An overhead mirror gave the uniformed girl a view of the passageway as she flicked through his visa and forged passport. She fixed a puzzled stare on him, and went through the documents again, slowly. He tried to look casual while his insides turned to jelly. Then she had stamped his passport and he was through and wondering why, if Armenia was an independent country, the immigration officials were Russian.

A bus with a cracked windscreen took a handful of passengers into Yerevan, along pitch-black streets lined with brightly lit market stalls. Beds were made up at the side of the stalls: it seemed that the owners slept al fresco beside their merchandise.

The Hotel Dvin was another massive tribute to the Soviet concrete industry, and there was another queue as names were checked at the reception desk and passports were taken. The noisy American was making a big thing of being a regular visitor, calling everyone by their first names in a deep, loud bass. Findhorn tried to get away at the elevator, but the man caught the door as it was closing. A woman at a desk seven flights up gave each of them a key. Romella had the room opposite; at least the American was further down the corridor. Findhorn tossed briefcase and holdall onto the bed and opened the balcony doors. He looked out over a dark city, letting the delicious, cool wind blow over him for five minutes. Then he slipped quietly out of his room. He returned two hours later, rattled and frustrated, had a quick shower and flopped into bed. He slept badly.

In the early morning Findhorn found himself looking out over the same scene he had seen in former Soviet bloc countries from Poland to Slovakia. A jumble of shacks, corrugated iron roofs, piles of rubble. A couple of mangy dogs prowled around, and a cock was crowing from somewhere inside a tree-packed garden. To his right the snowy peak of Mount Ararat, seventeen thousand feet high, floated in the sky, its base hidden in a blue haze. Around half past seven women with plastic bags began to emerge along unpaved tracks, and a few identikit cars trailed exhaust smoke along the potholed road.

Findhorn had a breakfast of grated beetroot, hard-boiled eggs, carrots and coffee. There was no sign of either Romella or the American. The girl at the reception spoke good English. She was courteous, had plenty of class and no need of deodorant. 'I'd like to hire a car, please,' said Findhorn.

'I've fixed it.' Findhorn turned. Romella, breathing heavily, as if she had been running.

'How are we for time?'

'Assume we're out of it.'

'I don't trust that American.'

They waited without conversation in the big, drab foyer. The American appeared, still in green jacket and trousers, with a small black bag over a shoulder. 'Hey ho!' he waved in passing. 'What did I tell you about the women?'

After ten minutes a small man with Turkish features and a Clark Gable moustache appeared. Romella gave her instructions with the help of a hand-drawn map. Then Findhorn and Romella were ushered into the back of a black Mercedes.

'I thought we'd start at the Geghard Monastery.'

'That letter from Anastas?'

'Yes, transcribed by some priest. The Petrosian family must have been known to people there.'

'Except that the priests are almost certainly long gone, along with Anastas.'

The driver was fiddling with the ignition. The engine coughed into life. He paused to light up a Turkish cigarette, and then took off without bothering about such refinements as rear mirrors, signals, or looking over his shoulder. He took them through earthquake-ravaged streets and past drab high-rise slums bedecked with washing. Twelve flights up, someone had knocked a hole in the side of the building, presumably to get fresh air into his flat. Children and dogs played in the dust. The sun was up and the air was getting warm.

Then they had cleared the city and were onto a steeply climbing road, with a good surface, and the traffic was light. Soon they were passing through mountainous country with high open vistas and steep gorges lined with fluted basalt. To Findhorn, the country had a vaguely biblical look about it. Away from the pollution below, he noted that Mount Ararat was in fact connected to the ground rather than floating in the sky. The road was deserted. After an hour of driving, Romella checking landmarks against the map, they passed a couple of girls carrying water in big Coke bottles, pushing a donkey ahead of them. Then there were calves at the roadside, drinking at a pipe flooding the road with water.

Mountains rose steeply on either side of them and the road became winding. Romella said, 'We should be there soon,' and in another fifteen minutes the road ended at a dusty little square with a couple of coaches and half a dozen parked cars. A trio of men in traditional dress welcomed them with a short, frenetic number played on drum, bagpipes and flute, and they walked up a steep, cobbled path past a handful of women selling sticky sweets and little brochures. The monastery was partly built into striated, precipitous mountainside.

At the arched entrance, Romella said, 'This may call for some delicate treatment. Remember Armenia was communist not so long ago and people don't necessarily open up.'

'I can take a hint.' He left Romella to disappear along a cloister, and strolled around the sparse, earthquake-cracked structure for about twenty minutes before taking a side door in a wall, and climbing a narrow track which wound steeply upwards. He sat on a rock and looked down on the monastery. Their driver was leaning against the side of his car, chain-smoking. A handful of tourists were wandering around the courtyard. The women with the sweets just sat. Presently Romella emerged, looking around her, and Findhorn climbed smartly back down the hill.

In the car, Romella said, 'Gna aya chanaparhov tas kilometr u tegvi depi zakh.' It was the first time Findhorn had heard her speak Armenian.

She sat back in the car and said, 'It's our lucky day. Lev's brother is not only alive, he hasn't moved house in his entire life. Lev and Anastas were brought up in a shepherd's cottage not far from here.'

They drove back about ten kilometres before Romella tapped Clark Gable on the shoulder and issued another volley of instructions. The man grunted. In another kilometre, around a corner, was a track leading to what looked like a shepherd's cottage. They turned along it, bumping over rough ground, past a tethered goat, and drew to a halt beside a dirty grey Skoda.

Out of the car, they stretched their legs. Flies were everywhere.

The man who opened the door was over eighty. He was white-haired and stooped, with a white moustache and deeply wrinkled skin. But his dark eyes were alert, and full of curiosity. Findhorn spoke in English, Romella translated into Armenian. They first established that the old man was in fact Anastas Petrosian, and they had hardly started when the shepherd waved them in. Inexplicably, Clark Gable seemed to think the invitation extended to him. He wandered into the room, his eyes taking in everything.

They sat in a small, cluttered room around a rough-hewn table. The room smelled of pipe tobacco. A small, ancient bureau was covered with photographs: a young woman and children, separately and together, a young man, a near-Victorian photograph of an elderly couple. The shepherd disappeared into a kitchen and reappeared with bread, cheese, four tumblers and a bottle containing some golden liquid.

'First,' said Findhorn, 'forgive me, but I don't speak Armenian.' There was an exchange between Romella and the old man. The shepherd smiled, as if the idea of a foreigner speaking Armenian was crazy. 'I'm a historian,' Findhorn lied. 'I'm interested in the life and works of your brother, Lev Petrosian.'

The old man's eyes opened wide with astonishment. There was an outburst of gabbling between him and Romella. Findhorn let it run its course. 'During the war, and just after it, your brother wrote some scientific papers, I mean articles. I know that when he was in America, he sent some of these to you for safe keeping. I am writing a history of that period, and I would very much like to know what became of these documents. Did they reach you?'

The old man said nothing, but his wrinkled face had acquired a tense expression.

Findhorn tried again. 'I don't want to take these papers away. I only need to read them for my historical research. If you have these papers, I would be grateful to read them. In your presence, without removing any. Or if you gave them to the authorities, please let me know where they went.'

Silence. The shepherd might have been mute. He certainly had no talent for disguising his thoughts: suspicion was plainly written over his face.

Findhorn sipped at the liquid. It was a first-class cognac. 'I know it was a very long time ago, but the Bomb was a watershed in the history of the world. Others have changed history with swords and armies, but your brother and his colleagues did it with mathematics and physics. Everything about that time has to be known. Especially I want Lev's contribution to be recorded for posterity, everything he did to be understood. He musn't be allowed to sink into obscurity, eclipsed by Oppenheimer, Teller, Fermi and the rest. His papers have been missing for fifty years and you are the link. For my research, and for the memory of your brother's achievements, I would be grateful to see them. You're the only person alive who can help me.'

The shepherd moved to a dresser and opened a drawer. They waited expectantly. Out came a jar, and a pipe was filled with dark tobacco. He puffed slowly at it, and a blue billowing haze began to drift round the little room. Then he returned to the table and spoke to the driver, who started to shake his head aggressively. A lively conversation followed.

Finally Romella turned to Findhorn: 'The old man says he doesn't possess such documents. He's lying. That fool of a driver is antagonizing him. It's some political thing.'

Findhorn assimilated this, and Romella continued: 'He's also telling us that even if he had them, possession would have been dangerous in the days of the Soviet Union. He'd have been expected to hand them over to the authorities and even then he might have ended up in a gulag. I think he's afraid, his mind is still set in the old ways.'

'He thinks he'll get into trouble if he admits to having them?'

Romella nodded. 'That's my interpretation.' But an angry exchange was going on between Clark Gable and the shepherd. Then the old man was on his feet again. He crossed to the dresser, opened another drawer, and turned with a medal which he laid on the table with a flourish. The driver made a remark, clearly insulting, and the shepherd replied in a withering tone of rage and contempt.

Findhorn sat bewildered, trying to make sense of it. But the bottom line was clear. If the old man had the Petrosian documents, he wasn't about to admit the fact. 'Okay, we're getting nowhere. Forget it.'

'What?'

'We're upsetting him.'

'Excuse me? Fred, would you keep your eye on the ball? Somewhere in this house, within yards of us, is a document which would make the Count of Monte Cristo look like a case for social security. It'll revolutionize the future. And you want to give up on it?'

The shepherd and the driver were now snarling angrily at each other. Findhorn raised his voice over the noise. 'He's scared of the authorities.'

'So let's threaten him with them.'

'He probably thinks we are the authorities and this is a sting. Look, Romella, this is out of control. He just needs reassuring that we're okay people. Let's clear off and try again later without that idiot driver.'

Romella looked at the angry exchange and reluctantly nodded her agreement. She tapped the driver on the shoulder, and said something to the old man in a conciliatory tone.

The driver made some remark to the shepherd which had the effect of further infuriating the old man. Romella said, 'Get out!' sharply in English, and turned to the door.

Clark Gable's driving was jerky and erratic, and he muttered and growled to himself all the way back to the Hotel Dvin. Findhorn felt queasy and decided to skip lunch. Romella agreed with surprising readiness, given the urgency, and Findhorn stretched out on his hotel bed, letting the breeze blow in through the open balcony door.

He had lain on the bed, dozing, for a good hour before a simple but shocking possibility occurred to him. It came in a half-dream, based on an old made-for-TV movie about the Count of Monte Cristo. The half-dream had all the costume pieces and the wigs and the absurd haughty faces of both sexes, but the man playing the Count was a woman, Romella, and Findhorn suddenly opened his eyes and stared at the flies on the ceiling and realized that his travelling companion might not be averse to a little private enterprise followed by a lifestyle which put the Count of Monte Cristo in the shade.

He knocked on Romella's door and had the familiar sinking feeling in his stomach, and he put the hour's delay down to his Calvinistic upbringing, the constant tendency to assume the best of humanity in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

A taxi, hastily summoned at the front desk, took him back out of the city, Findhorn directing from memory. An hour later, turning into the stony track, his heart sank when he saw a small blue car parked beside the shepherd's Skoda. He motioned the driver to stop about fifty yards back from the cottage. The lack of a mutual language gave the driver no means to express his surprise other than by exaggerated eye movements.

It was late afternoon and the little living room now looked dull. A smell of burnt cooking now overlaid the aroma of tobacco. Otherwise the room was much as Findhorn had left it except for a few grey bricks which had been removed from above the stove and were lying on the floor in amongst chips of plaster and dust. The cavity so revealed had about the same dimensions as Findhorn's safety deposit box in Edinburgh. It contained a legal-looking document which to Findhorn looked like a will or property deeds. It also contained a small bundle of banknotes, neatly tied by string. Whoever had raided the cavity had not been interested in the money.

Findhorn picked his way over the man's corpse — the face and tongue were purple and the eyes, bulging from the ligature round his neck, were staring at the ceiling — and found a bread knife in the kitchen. A pot of beans had almost boiled dry and Findhorn switched it off. Back in the living room, he used the knife to cut a small handful of white hair from the shepherd's head. He put this hair in his shirt pocket, used a handkerchief to wipe clean every surface that he had touched. He raised Romella gently from her chair by the elbow.

His first thought had been that she had strangled the man, but he quickly put the absurdity out of his mind. She clutched him for some moments, desperate for secure human contact. He said, 'Better dry your eyes.' Then they were out, Findhorn closing the front door with the handkerchief, and taking her by the hand. The driver was leaning against the side of his car, about halfway through a cigarette.

The American was drinking beer in a quiet corner of the big entrance foyer of the Dvin. Findhorn returned the man's wave, keeping on the move. He took the elevator to the seventh floor with Romella, quickly gathered up his worldly goods. They headed down the stairs just as the elevator door was opening and checked out, retrieving their passports.

They flew back in a shiny new Airbus, the flagship of Armenian Airlines. It had, he knew, a service contract, state-of-the-art navigation, microchips with everything. Canned music soothed him, and the hostesses were smiling and elegant and smelled delicious. His safety belt worked and the toilet door locked.

He looked down at Ararat, the biblical mountain, and the white-capped Little Caucasus Range; beyond them, in a light haze, was Georgia and the endless expanse of the Russian Federation. London was only four hours away. He regretted that, in his haste to flee the assassins, he had taken the first and only flight to Heathrow instead of going via Paris or Amsterdam or Coonabarabran or Outer Mongolia.

Findhorn downed two bloody marys, but the images of violent death wouldn't go away. He stopped himself asking for a third.

It wasn't just that the bad guys had won the race for the secret.

It was also that he was a loose end; he could talk. And even with the deficiencies of the Armenian telephone network, his flight number would by now be known, arrangements would by now have been made.

'Why did you go back?' he asked.

Her eyes were still red. 'Isn't it obvious? Three of us were a threat, especially that idiot driver. I thought if I went back alone I could talk to him gently. Fred, he was still warm to the touch. It was horrible.'

It was practically their first exchange of words in three hours. He squeezed her hand.

It would, perhaps, look like an accidental encounter, something as innocent as a shared taxi with a stranger. Or they might use someone he knew and trusted.

Beside him, Romella stared morosely out of the window, and Findhorn wondered.