Stroika

Chapter 61

^MOSCOW

Viktoriya sat on her duffel bag outside Terentev’s flat on Degtyarny. Six thirty in the morning and it was still dark. She had already worked out that the doorbell to flat five did not work and decided to wait fifteen minutes and see if anyone opened the main door before she started ringing bells randomly waking residents and drawing attention to herself.

Her sleep had been fitful on the Red Star from Leningrad. Travelling second class in a women’s-only four-berth couchette, her only fellow passenger was a woman in her forties visiting family in Moscow. She did not proffer anything more than visiting a friend herself. What would she have said if she had told the truth – taking photographs of indefinite significance to a KGB colonel?

The door clanged open. Viktoriya jumped to her feet. A man, mid-thirties, sporting a military-style haircut and a canvas duffle bag hung off one shoulder, stepped onto the street.

‘Can I help you?’ he asked, looking her up and down and the bag parked on the street. She had slipped on a pair of jeans and a blue cashmere sweater in the car before boarding the Red Star but had still not bothered to remove her make-up from the night before.

‘I’ve come to see a friend. I’m from out of the city; his bell doesn’t seem to be working.’

‘If you don’t mind my asking, who is it you have come to see?’

‘Ilya Terentev.’

The man stared at her for a moment, sizing her up. She felt slightly unnerved.

‘I’ll show you up. I know where he lives.’

Viktoriya protested that that wouldn’t be necessary but he ignored her. Extracting his key, he unlocked the street door and waved her in. There was nothing else for it. She picked up her bag, slung it onto her shoulder and let her hand drop inside.

‘Please follow me,’ he said politely.

‘Second floor,’ she said.

‘Yes, number five. I know most of the people in this block.’

The lift was only fit for three people and felt claustrophobic with the two of them packed in so closely. She should have insisted they take the stairs, rather than be trapped in such a tiny space with a complete stranger. Still, it was only two floors. The door opened.

‘After you,’ he beckoned. It was still dark and the stairwell empty. ‘Take a right.’

Was he really going to walk her to the door? she thought. They stopped outside number five.

A hand reached over her shoulder and wrapped on the door. She wondered how well this man knew Terentev. Her hand closed tightly on the automatic. It didn’t feel right.

Footsteps sounded on the other side and the door opened. A woman with long hair, thirties, busy knotting the belt of a dressing gown, looked from her to the face behind.

‘Natasha, may I introduce Viktoriya Nikolaevna Kayakova, late of Leningrad, probably the richest woman in Russia.’

She turned round to face her escort.

‘Colonel?’

‘The same… I didn’t want to effect introductions in the street… this is my wife Natasha… and I think you can remove your hand from your bag now. I don’t think you need a gun.’

More embarrassed that her manoeuvre had been so transparent than that she had taken the precaution in the first place, she let go of its handle.

‘I don’t normally look like this,’ she said in her own defence.

‘Please come in, Viktoriya Nikolaevna,’ said Natasha.

The apartment was small but cosy. Several photographs of the couple were displayed on a dresser.

‘Please,’ gestured Natasha at the slightly worn brown tweed sofa. ‘Would you like something to eat? Maybe freshen up?’

Viktoriya was not about to decline any of it.

‘Red Star?’ asked Terentev, almost a rhetorical question.

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘no complaints… look, I’d love to have a shower, but before I do, can I give you this envelope.’ She reached into her duffel bag, prised the inside panel off the base and pulled out a brown envelope.

‘I received a message from Yuri yesterday… one of the men he’s been on the run with… he wouldn’t say from where or to,’ – it seemed such a long time ago, she thought – ‘he said I could trust you.’

‘You can,’ replied Terentev. He held out his hand for the envelope and she handed it to him.

‘Twelve years ago – in fact, April 1977 – I was a student, my friend Mikhail Revnik—’

‘—of RUI?’

‘—yes,’ Viktoriya continued. ‘He took some photographs of two men on the Moika embankment. Some KGB type put him up to it, offered Misha a reward. We were only sixteen at the time… it could have been almost anyone. The trouble is, he was spotted… but he managed to fence it off on me before they caught up with him. Misha persuaded them he had thrown the camera into the canal.’

‘Sounds very resourceful… and the man who had paid him to do it?

‘He never reappeared. I hid the film for years and gave it back to Misha just before he travelled to Milan for the first time.’

‘And he had it developed there?’

She nodded.

‘I’d never seen the photographs until yesterday. I know Misha couldn’t identify the people in them… well, until yesterday, when he came briefly out of his coma. Maybe he recognised a voice… I don’t know.’

‘I’m sorry about Mikhail Dimitrivich. I heard the news. Where is he now?’

‘In our own building in Leningrad… under medical supervision… don’t worry, it’s like a fortress… I can’t help but think this is related.’

Terentev opened the envelope and spread the large black-and-whites on the dining room table. The photos were remarkably clear. She watched him frown and without a word pull up a chair as if to stop himself falling over.

‘You recognise them?’ she said.

‘I recognise him.’ Terentev pointed at the man with the glasses. ‘Karzhov, chairman of the KGB, but not him, I’ve never seen him before. April 1977, you say?’

She nodded.

‘Can I keep these… for now… I want to run some checks… under the radar?’

‘Of course, that’s what I hoped you were going to say.’ Viktoriya stood up. ‘I’d like to freshen up now, thank you, and then I want you to tell me what you know about Yuri.’

Chapter 62

Viktoriya stepped out of the small shower cubicle and towelled herself dry, glad to have washed the night away. She wondered if Misha had shown any further signs of improvement and whether Kostya would honour his side of the bargain. For now, she reasoned, it was not in his interest to do otherwise – there were at least eighty-five million reasons why he might hold back for forty-eight hours or so. And he was right. If the so-called Emergency Committee did wind back the clock and the communists regained the upper hand, she would be the one on the run. Exile would be the only option, the only one that didn’t involve being incarcerated, or worse.

A knock on the bedroom door made her start. It was Natasha’s voice.

‘Coffee.’

The door opened a fraction and the welcome smell of coffee wafted into the room. She thought of mid-morning breaks in Misha’s office, standing at the window observing the goings on below, catching up. She took a deep breath and held it, let go and took another before savouring her first bitter taste of coffee that day. She winced and closed her eyes, concentrating on the familiar caffeine rush, and immediately felt more positive. There was progress of sorts: Misha had woken, even if momentarily, and said something coherent, Kostya had been neutralised, for now at least, and she had arrived safe in Moscow and met someone Yuri told her she could trust. And on top of all that he had identified one of the players in the photograph as the KGB chair himself.

With her towel, she wiped the mirror free of steam and looked at her normal self, absent heavy make-up and her hair parted where it customarily fell. Quickly, she pulled on her clothes, jeans, a fresh T-shirt and sweater and with the dregs of the coffee headed back into the living room.

Terentev was talking to a man who must have arrived when she was in the shower. He nodded in acknowledgement but did not introduce himself. Two of the photos were gone. She assumed they were now stowed in his shoulder bag.

‘If you will excuse me,’ the stranger said, and let himself out.

Natasha handed her a plate of scrambled eggs.

‘I have to be going too. Maybe I will see you again,’ she said and followed the other man out of the door.

The colonel scooped up the remaining photos and handed them to her.

‘No, please keep them; they’re safer with you now.’

He disappeared into the bedroom and reappeared a minute later minus the envelope.

‘So… where’s Yuri? Please tell me what you can, everything,’ she said, sitting back down again on the sofa.

Terentev sat down on the dining room chair opposite.

‘Not good, I’m afraid. Yuri’s locked up in the KGB prison in Lubyanka, the general secretary is under effective house arrest twenty kilometres south-west of Moscow, and General Ghukov has been replaced by a new chief of staff, General Volkov.’ Terentev paused for breath. ‘If that is not bad enough, the East German government is on the brink of collapse and there is a simmering mass uprising.’

‘How do you think the new Emergency Committee will react?’

‘Suppress it… start World War Three probably.’

‘Not good then.’

Terentev smiled. ‘Yes, I think that is a good assessment.’

‘Can you do anything?’

‘I may be a colonel in the KGB, but I have no political affiliations, money, or influence, to any degree… and I am up against some very powerful people, including the chairman of the KGB himself.’

‘What about Yuri? Doesn’t he have a following?’

‘Not in Lubyanka… the old communist diehards are not giving up without a fight.’

‘It would be interesting to know how much support this committee has from other ministers and how much they know about what is going on. Many of them are going to suffer – financially – if the communists gain the upper hand now. Do you know Federov?’

‘The oil minister? Not personally.’

‘He would be a good place to start. I spoke with him yesterday by phone, but he was necessarily circumspect… Do you have a phone?’

Terentev nodded.

‘I am going to call him to arrange a meeting this morning at that café next to the ministry, you know the one. I’m not going to give him my name, but I’m sure he’ll recognise my voice.’

‘And you think you can get him to a meeting, just like that?’ He snapped his fingers.

‘Absolutely… if I know Stephan Federov.’

Chapter 63

Viktoriya remembered the café from her last visit with Federov: the French-style coffee bar and high stools, the mirrored wall behind, and low-hanging smoked-glass pendant lights. Terentev sat at the bar, facing the mirror with a clear view of the booth she had occupied in a corner out of sight from the street window.

She took a sip of the cappuccino that had been placed in front of her and thought back to her earlier call to Federov’s office. At first she had struggled to be put through; his secretary had been understandably suspicious but Viktoriya had insisted. It was personal, she had said, Stephan would be very unhappy if she weren’t put through immediately. Federov had taken the call. ‘Federov,’ he had said, his voice filled with suspicion. ‘Stephan’, she had replied, in the warmest voice she could muster. To his credit he had understood the situation immediately, played along with the demanding girlfriend routine and agreed to meet her at the café at ten o’clock. She looked at her watch: now, in fact.

On cue, the door to the café opened and Federov walked in.

At least he is alone, she thought.

‘I thought you were still in Leningrad? How is Mikhail Dimitrivich?’ Federov said as he slid into the booth next to her.

‘Showing signs of improvement, thank you. Stephan, I appreciate the position you may be in, but some candour would be useful.’ There was no point in asking Federov if she could trust him. A simple yes wasn’t going to prove anything.

‘There is more at stake here than simply our business relationship, as important as that is. I need to understand your position and that of your colleagues. The information I have is that the Emergency Committee has the general secretary under house arrest.’

Federov looked surprised.

‘You are well informed… who is the man at the bar?’

‘He’s with me. He’s totally trustworthy.’

He nodded. ‘The Emergency Committee is not the Politburo. I have been told the same story as the rest of the public, although I know from my own contacts that what you say is true. The deputy secretary has assumed the levers of state, backed by the KGB chair and the defence minister. Those opposed have been detained or eliminated, like your friend General Marov, for instance. The Emergency Committee is relying on us to keep our heads down.’

‘While it decides?’

Federov looked away.

‘The opposition is too strong. It will be like Khrushchev. The general secretary will be replaced.’

‘But it won’t be so silent this time, not with Volkov about to risk a war in Europe.’

‘No, it won’t,’ his voice trailed off. ‘All I know is we haven’t got long. There is a meeting of the Emergency Committee this afternoon. They are not going to let this drift, especially with the East German situation. I get the impression the general secretary is not going to resign through reasons of bad health either,’ said Federov.

‘What do you think will happen to General Marov?’ asked Viktoriya.

‘He’ll have to fall in line or not, and if he doesn’t… a posting to the Far East would be a good outcome.’

Viktoriya knew he was right. It was all or nothing for the Emergency Committee. They would have to legitimise their coup, and anything that challenged that legitimacy would be dealt with. The KGB was not squeamish about such things, arrests and payoffs would be the order of the day.

‘And you, Viktoriya Nikolaevna, what will you do?’

‘I don’t want to think about that for the moment.’ But she knew she would have to very shortly. Kostya would close in for the kill if the committee became the new government. Nobody was going to worry about the wellbeing of a wealthy street trader cum banker. Kostya would have delivered and no doubt be rewarded with RUI. It wouldn’t take long to make back his lost eighty-five million.

The oil minister stood up.

‘I have to be going, I’m afraid. If I can do anything for you, I will. My advice to you is to follow your money out of the Soviet Union. Don’t wait too long. And if Mikhail is well enough to travel, him too… even if he isn’t, you will have to risk it.’

Viktoriya watched Federov exit the café as Terentev climbed off the bar stool and walked over to her booth.

‘What did Federov have to say?’

‘That we are all going to hell in a hand cart… there is no effective opposition…’

The door of the café opened and the man she had seen in Terentev’s apartment that morning walked in. Terentev waved him over.

‘Any joy?’

‘I’ve given the photos to our best man; he remembers one or two operatives from that time. He knows it’s urgent… and that if he gets caught it’s probably curtains. The Emergency Committee are meeting at five this evening at the Defence Ministry. There is a broadcast booked for seven.’

The table fell silent.

‘We need to get Yuri out of Lubyanka,’ said Viktoriya. ‘If the conflict widens in Eastern Europe he’ll just be a footnote. Plan A was to kill him… they sabotaged his aircraft. There is no Plan B, not if he fails to support them and, knowing him as I do, he is not going to do that.’

The colonel nodded.

‘I’ve been thinking, Colonel. I have twenty-five fully armed men at the Leningrad Freight yard on the outskirts of Moscow – Yuri’s request before he was arrested. He gave no further instructions… I’m sorry I didn’t mention this before…’ said Viktoriya.

‘Well, we can’t storm Lubyanka. It’s bristling with guards.’

‘I’ve got another idea.’

Chapter 64

Terentev cricked his neck up at the clock set into the uppermost band of the yellow brick neo-baroque palace façade that was Lubyanka: midday. He cast a glance at Gaidar and the two men behind him dressed in military uniform.

‘Ready?’

The three of them nodded. One of the soldiers rearranged his grey ushanka, making sure the red star faced forward.

With the two soldiers squarely behind him, Terentev walked into the high-ceilinged entrance hall he had entered a thousand times before. Failure, he knew, would also make it the last time.

Two KGB officers, standing beside a grey granite desk, barred his way.

‘Colonel.’ The nearest snapped to attention while the other stood stock-still, his hands gripping the barrel and stock of the Kalashnikov strapped across his chest.

‘I’ve come to transfer a prisoner to Lefortovo.’

The officer entered their names in the log book, giving only a cursory glance to the official-looking paper Terentev produced from his inside pocket.

‘Thank you, Colonel.’ He saluted Terentev and Gaidar and stepped back.

Terentev led them left down the parquet corridor towards the rear of the building and the courtyard where the prison began, nodding occasionally at a familiar face. A second detail blocked its entrance. This time there was no salute. The officer in charge, a lieutenant, young, perhaps twenty-six – he had not seen him before – looked at him and his escort suspiciously.

‘Can I help you, Colonel,’ he asked. Behind him, three soldiers stood studying Gaidar and his men.

‘I’ve come to transfer General Marov to Lefortovo Prison – orders of the chairman.’

The lieutenant took the transfer form from Terentev’s hand and studied it before handing it to one of the men behind him.

‘What unit are you with, Major?’ said the lieutenant, directing his question at Gaidar.

‘Kantemirovskaya Division, under Lieutenant General Tretyak.’

‘General staff have assigned Major Gaidar to the transfer,’ added Terentev.

It was normal for the military to accompany high-ranking staff officers.

‘I haven’t heard of any pending transfer of prisoner Marov, Colonel.’

‘As you can see, Lieutenant, the order was only dated an hour ago.’

The lieutenant held out his hand for the transfer note. The soldier placed it in his palm. He studied it again. For a moment Terentev thought he might hold it up to the light, not that that would reveal anything. The paperwork was real enough; it was only the signature that had been forged.

‘Why don’t you call upstairs, Lieutenant? Third floor. I’m sure the chairman’s office will confirm the transfer. Extension 363. We are in a hurry, Lieutenant.’

Sometimes events hinge on the simplest of turns, thought Terentev. If the lieutenant called his bluff, they were done for.

The officer studied his and Gaidar’s faces before lifting the receiver and dialling.

‘Detail to collect prisoner Marov.’ The lieutenant turned to Terentev. ‘Someone will be up to escort you to the prisoner shortly, sir.’ The lieutenant snapped to attention.

Terentev cast a sideways glance at Gaidar, hoping that his relief did not show.

They did not have long to wait; a soldier led them down a narrow stone staircase. In the basement a wide corridor with cell doors extending either side reached to the corner of the building. Two plain-clothes officers emerged from one and walked past them. Terentev caught the sound of moaning from inside. They took the corner and stopped at a section protected by a steel-studded door.

‘General… prisoner… ’ he corrected himself, ‘Marov is being kept in isolation,’ the private said by way of explanation.

He stopped at the end door and flicked through the keys on his belt until he found the corresponding number to the cell door – 107 – inserted it in the lock and pushed.

Yuri looked up at the door as it opened and watched his friend and Gaidar walk in. The two of them were the last people he had been expecting to see. Terentev’s and Gaidar’s unsmiling faces warned him not to jump to his feet and grab them in a bear hug. Yuri noted the two soldiers standing behind Ilya and the prison guard.

‘A bit cramped in here, Major,’ he said, addressing Gaidar, ignoring Terentev.

‘We have orders to transfer you, General, to Lefortovo.’

‘Lefortovo? Am I a political prisoner now?’

Yuri had no idea about what was happening; he just had to trust in his friend.

‘General, I am Colonel Ilya Terentev, is there anything you need to take with you?’

Were they really going to try and just walk out of here? Yuri thought. Was that the plan? Yuri stood up.

‘I’m ready.’

With the prison guard leading the way, Yuri marched with Terentev and Gaidar directly in front of him and the two soldiers immediately behind. From their uniforms he assumed they were both Major Gaidar’s men. Twenty metres down the main corridor they passed two prison officers leading a smartly dressed man in a charcoal-grey suit and tie. He glanced up from the floor as they walked by and looked directly at Yuri. He had blood on his white shirt and his lip had been split; above his left eye a large livid swelling had begun to emerge.

Yuri wondered what had befallen Derevenko and Stephan. Were they buried somewhere in this hellhole? He wanted to stop and insist they found them, but he would only be putting other lives at risk. Ilya had managed to bluff his way in and presumably was about to bluff his way out. Stopping for passengers was not going to work.

Only the sound of their heavy footsteps marked the military procession. Yuri followed Terentev and Gaidar up the narrow staircase to the main floor. As they rounded the final corner and emerged into daylight, Yuri took a deep breath and slowly let the air out of his lungs.

A young lieutenant approached them. Terentev signed the release paper and they were through into the main corridor. Men and women in plain clothes and uniform bustled back and forth, throwing the occasional glance in his direction. Yuri wondered if anyone recognised him.

‘We are leaving by the east entrance,’ said Terentev over his shoulder. They took the next right down a service corridor and soon came out on the main corridor again but on the other side of the building. This was much less trafficked. Twenty metres along, three guards manned the exit onto a side street. They were deep in conversation. One of them noticed their detail approach and tapped his colleague on the arm.

‘Colonel,’ said the senior NCO. He saluted Terentev, clearly recognising him.

Terentev produced a duplicate of the release note.

The NCO was in the process of handing the note back when the wall phone rang. A private behind the NCO lifted the receiver from its cradle when the deafening wail of an alarm suddenly broke above them. Yuri looked up at the flashing box and back down again at the face of the soldier struggling to hear what was being said to him. Yuri could guess. The private’s eyes darted from him to Terentev. Terentev stepped forward, ripped the phone out of his hand and kneed him in the groin. Gaidar and the two soldiers grabbed the other two, forcing them to the ground. They ejected their magazines and lobbed them and the AKs in opposite directions.

‘Let’s go!’ Terentev shouted.

Gaidar pointed his revolver at the prone soldiers as two cars pulled up in front of the entrance. Terentev was the first to make it to the car door and fling it open.

‘Get in!’ he shouted to Yuri.

Yuri did not need any encouragement. He threw himself into the back seat, followed by Terentev and one of Gaidar’s men. Out of the back window he saw the other two soldiers jump into the second car. His car lurched forward. Yuri turned towards the front and the balaclava-covered heads of the driver and front passenger. They took the first corner at speed and accelerated around the next.

‘Where are we going?’

The figure next to the driver turned to face him. All he could see through the mask’s visor were piercing icy-blue eyes and the twinkle of a smile around their edges.

‘So glad you could make it, General. We’re switching cars in two blocks,’ said the now familiar female voice.

Chapter 65

Yuri gazed out of the Leningrad Freight first-floor window over the yard towards the gate, where armed security guards monitored traffic in and out. Terentev, Gaidar and Viktoriya sat expectantly across the table.

‘So we have the general secretary under house arrest, the same for Ghukov, the Emergency Committee with the deputy general secretary in charge, and the defence minister, KGB chair and Volkov in support. No overt military support for the coup… but they are taking orders from Volkov,’ reiterated Yuri. He had already established that Derevenko and Stephan were relatively safe for now inside a military prison on the outskirts of Moscow; the intelligence service had shown no interest in either of them.

‘Yes, except, of course, the Emergency Committee is not painting this as a coup, but a necessary step given the condition of the general secretary,’ chipped in Terentev, ‘whose condition might turn fatal at any second.’

‘Yes, and from what Federov has told you, Vika, the other government ministers are keeping their heads down seeing which way the wind blows.’

‘Federov is certainly not going to stand up and be counted, not as things are,’ said Viktoriya. ‘The KGB and the army are going to be looking for you now. I can get you out of Moscow over the border in twenty-four hours if you want… that goes for all of you.’

‘And you?’ Yuri asked her.

‘I’m staying put – at least in Leningrad with Misha.’

‘What time is the Emergency Committee meeting?’

‘Five this evening at the Ministry of Defence,’ said Terentev. ‘They are going on TV at seven.’

Silence descended again.

‘Sergei,’ Yuri said, turning to Gaidar, ‘do you think you can get someone over to my apartment and smuggle out my uniform and a change of clothes. I need to get out of these,’ he said, pointing at his jeans and soiled parka jacket. ‘I don’t think this will impress anyone.’

‘I’ll see to it straight away, General.’

He caught the flash of a smile on Viktoriya’s lips.

‘So, you are going to stay?’

‘Do I really have a choice? These photos, Terentev, how important do you think they are?’

Terentev shrugged.

‘And you say they are of the KGB chair, twelve years ago. What was he then?’

‘A KGB colonel, foreign intelligence, spent time between East Germany and Moscow.’

Clearly, the photo is compromising one or both of the subjects. How many possibilities could there be? Yuri thought. Was the other man a KGB mole inside one of the Soviet ministries – an informer? But what was so unusual in that?

Gaidar re-entered the room and took his seat.

‘Thirty men?’ Yuri said, looking in the major’s direction.

Gaidar nodded.

‘Well that should be enough. Is there anywhere I can take a shower, preferably hot, while I wait for my uniform?’

Chapter 66

Volkov received the news from the KGB chair in stony silence. How could someone just walk in and escort Marov out? But he wasn’t just someone. Terentev was a KGB colonel. Karzhov had assured him that Terentev and Marov were friends and that they went back a long way; he did not suspect dissent went deeper. But how could he tell? Maybe it didn’t matter; they had figured on opposition, planned for it and if this was the sum total of the remainder, it was an irritant and nothing else. Hadn’t everyone important already fallen in line: the Politburo and the district generals… admittedly some with less enthusiasm than others. Besides, as soon as the deputy was confirmed as general secretary that would all change. The current general secretary would either resign, through reasons of ill health, or fall on his sword… or be pushed onto it.

After this evening, Marov and his merry men would be a mere side-story. Indeed, if Marov had any sense, any sense of self-preservation, he would be on his way out of the Soviet Union by now. General Marov – defector. It had a good ring about it.

There were more important things to worry about than General Marov… or the wellbeing of the general secretary. The Western Army had been brought to full strength. The Americans could posture how they liked, but when the arrests started in East Germany, their promise of intervention would ring hollow. The US was not about to risk war.

Three o’clock… the car would collect him from GSHQ at four thirty and, at seven, perestroika and all the chaos that it had brought would be history.

Chapter 67

Yuri fastened the last button of his military jacket and looked at himself in the small dust-covered mirror balanced on the mantelpiece. The shower had been anything but hot, but he wasn’t complaining. His hair and clothing had reeked of his Lubyanka cell, the odour of stale urine and mould. He hadn’t been able to banish the smell, not until he had stood under running water for five minutes.

A knock on the door made him turn round. Terentev stepped into the room and gave him a mock salute.

‘General Marov,’ he said, looking him up and down. ‘Quite a difference from when we picked you up, Yuri.’

Yuri could sense his friend was bursting to say something.

‘What?’ Yuri said.

Terentev placed one of the black-and-white photos on the desk.

‘I think my man has had a breakthrough; it’s only conjecture. He talked to one or two colleagues on the East German desk and they pointed him at a retired officer. He worked with Karzhov, didn’t like him much apparently. This man said that at that time – 1978 – there was talk of someone on the inside high up in Soviet intelligence feeding information to the Americans. We also know from our own double agent at the time that the Americans had no idea who their agent’s contact was on our side. An investigation drew a blank. One of the officers involved met an untimely end, found drowned in the Moskva. No one has sought to follow up since.’

‘And the photo?’

‘The retired officer recognised the other man in the photo – we only have his word; we can’t run it through Lubyanka for now, for obvious reasons. He was an American CIA officer, a Tom Banner, arrested by us in the early eighties on spying charges, sentenced to life imprisonment but died in jail before he could be put up for one of our regular prisoner exchanges with the Americans – heart attack… if you want to believe that.’

‘So you think it was Karzhov who was feeding the Americans?’

‘It’s certainly a possibility, working both sides for his own ends. Banner either never revealed his Soviet source or the CIA has chosen not to.’

‘You mean he could be a sleeper.’

‘Perhaps… or simply that they do not want to undermine other assets they might have in the Soviet Union… and they’ll have them… best let him off the hook. Who’s going to sell them information if there’s a treason charge at the end of it?’

‘And you think Karzhov engineered Banner’s death to protect himself.’

Terentev nodded.

‘Again a probability… he was frightened that Banner might give away his identity in return for freedom… maybe Banner was becoming impatient.’

‘Okay… How about Peredelkino?’ said Yuri. They only had hours before the Emergency Committee went on the air waves.

‘Half an hour by the M1.’

‘What about the back road – Michurinskiy Prospect – and you approach from the south? If you are stopped on the motorway there’s nowhere else to go; I’m guessing you don’t want a return trip to Lubyanka? Might take fifteen minutes longer… Does Viktoriya still insist on going?’

‘No stopping her,’ replied Terentev. ‘They’re her men too.’

‘Okay, but I have to talk with her first. She needs to make a call.’

Chapter 68

The truck was more comfortable than she had imagined. Closeted behind boxes stacked to the roof, Viktoriya sat with ten soldiers in the back of an LF freighter. She stood up and looked through the clear oval plastic pane into the driver’s cab where two other soldiers, in dark grey overalls, posed as LF crew. Outside, endless rows of anonymous red-brick tower blocks with white bay windows and covered balconies raced by in the fading light.

A car drove past them and tucked in between the two vehicles before pulling out again and overtaking. Military jeeps parked to the side of intersections on wide grass verges watched them go by. She counted three in as many blocks, ready to shut down one of the city’s main arteries at a second’s notice.

She sat back down again on the cold corrugated aluminium floor, took off her jacket and folded it under her. Nobody spoke. This wasn’t what her security force had signed up for at RUI, but from the occasional smiles on their broad faces she guessed that this meant more than the solid pay cheques and bonuses they had been receiving. Besides, weren’t all their interests in the new Russia perfectly aligned. If the Emergency Committee succeeded in turning back the clock, most of them would likely find themselves back where they started – in the real army on no pay and no future, stuck in some backwater or attempting to put down restive East Europeans.

Gaidar cast a glance in her direction and at Terentev sat next to her. Until now, Viktoriya had not had much to do with him. Ivan handled security. But she could see why Yuri had placed so much confidence in him. Around her age, she guessed, maybe a little older, he had not let his rapidly growing private army atrophy. From what Ivan told her, it was better trained and armed than most regular units.

She looked at her watch. Fifteen minutes past five, sunset just after five thirty. Was it only this morning she had arrived in Moscow and this afternoon Terentev had managed to march Yuri out of Lubyanka? With a little luck and Kostya’s reluctant support, the authorities might still think her barricaded in Malaya Morskaya.

Without any warning, the truck braked sharply, pulled left into a side street and abruptly stopped. Viktoriya stood up again and warily peaked out of the trailer window. A military jeep blocked their way. She immediately sat back down again and raised a finger to her lips, pointing to the outside. One of the soldiers flipped the safety catch on his Kalashnikov. Gaidar shook his head. Starting a firefight in the back of a truck would be as good as suicide, she thought. Viktoriya held her breath as the rear door creaked open and light flooded into the wagon. Someone shifted boxes, sliding them this way and that. No one moved. Terentev looked at her, unblinking, and squeezed her arm. It would all be over before it started, she thought, if they were discovered now.

The soldier shifting the boxes stopped and shouted the all-clear to another. The rear doors banged closed and the truck pulled out and turned once again onto the main road.

Viktoriya looked at her watch in the dim interior light. In fifteen to twenty minutes, roadblocks willing, they would be there.

Chapter 69

No one stopped him when Yuri entered by the main doors of GSHQ. Whether it was an inbuilt deference to uniform or tacit support he wasn’t clear, but one thing he did know was confidence was everything… well almost… carpe diem, you either did or you didn’t.

Suppressing the urge to break into a run, Yuri increased his stride, his metal-edged heels ringing out loudly along the flagstone passage as he hurried towards the communication room. His arrival was greeted with a frantic pushing back of chairs as soldiers and officers jumped to attention.

‘At ease, men,’ said Yuri, returning their salutes and turning to the duty officer.

‘Lieutenant, put me through to the duty officer at Central District command.’

The lieutenant stared at him, frozen.

‘General Marov, we thought you were under arrest.’

‘I was… Lieutenant… didn’t you serve under me at Smolensk – communications?’

‘Yes, General, you recommended me for promotion to Moscow.’

It was coming back to him now.

‘Yekaterinburg… you are from Yekaterinburg, my home city?’

The officer nodded. ‘Yes, sir, well remembered.’

‘Well, Lieutenant, I need your services now, and I haven’t got time to explain.’

Yuri could see the officer hesitate before making up his mind.

‘Yes, General.’

The lieutenant saluted him again before retaking his seat. The duty sergeant cast a wary glance in Yuri’s direction and rotated the radio dial to the appropriate frequency.

‘This is General Yuri Marov from the general staff,’ said Yuri when the duty officer, a Lieutenant Orlov, responded. ‘I wish to speak with General Alyabyev. Please put him on the line.’

‘General Alyabyev is in a meeting, General. I have orders he is not to be disturbed.’

‘Lieutenant, this is an emergency.’

Yuri could almost hear the soldier’s mind whirring, calculating how much trouble he would be in for disobeying him or Alyabyev.

‘Lieutenant Orlov,’ said Yuri, exasperated, ‘do you know who I am?’

‘Yes, sir, of course’

‘Well I intend to be around for a very long time, Lieutenant.’ There was a pause. Everything depended on Lieutenant Orlov, Yuri thought – maybe the whole weight of the Soviet Union.

‘I am putting you through now, General.’

‘Thank you, Lieutenant.’

A few moments later, Yuri heard Alyabyev’s disgruntled voice. Yuri imagined Alyabyev’s face, the sardonic, slightly bored look he had seen so many times over the negotiating table that he had long since ceased to recognise as lack of interest.

‘Yes, General, what can I do for you?’ Alyabyev sounded tired. ‘Aren’t you under arrest, Marov?’

‘Technically, yes, sir.’

‘You’re taking a big risk, Marov, walking into GSHQ and contacting me. Volkov will have you rearrested if he finds out.’

‘He won’t have to look very far, General. He left for a meeting at the Defence Ministry twenty minutes ago, and I plan to join him there after I finish this call with you. General, I need your help.’ Yuri knew he didn’t have much time. ‘You know there is nothing wrong with the general secretary and that he is under house arrest in Peredelkino?’

‘Marov, you probably know a lot more than me… we’ve all been kept busy with this mobilisation.’

‘Well, I’m telling you, General, and my guess is that if he doesn’t step down voluntarily, that will not prevent the Emergency Committee engineering it. You know what that will mean for him and for the Soviet Union.’

‘You are talking about half the Politburo. Let’s assume, General, you are correct for a minute. What do you propose to do about it?’

‘General, you had a commando battalion the last time I looked at your dispositions, five kilometres east of Peredelkino. I have a squad of men on their way to his dacha.’ Yuri looked at the wall clock. ‘ETA ten minutes.’

‘And you want to fight your way in?’

‘No, General. I want you to deploy the battalion around Peredelkino. I’m not expecting your men to fight, General. But I do want you to block anyone coming in or out.’

‘Volkov will consider this a mutiny.’

‘He’s going to be in meeting for the next two hours. Call it a military exercise, General. I just want them there until 8 p.m. You can retire them to barracks after that; three hours, that’s all I ask.’

‘Give me a minute, Marov.’ The line went dead.

The sergeant looked from the lieutenant to Yuri, waiting for further orders. Yuri glanced at his wristwatch. What was Alyabyev doing now? Putting a call through to Volkov? Calling the military police? Maybe he had read the district general wrong all along, and Alyabyev wasn’t a neutral and he had thrown his lot in with the conspirators. A minute passed and then another. Yuri expected the steel door to open at any second and for him to be led away.

There was a click on the line. Yuri looked over at the sergeant, who signalled Alyabyev was back on line.

‘Yes, General?’

‘General Marov, you have until 8 p.m. I hope I don’t live to regret this.’

Chapter 70

^PEREDELKINO

The freighter took a right off Borovskoye and north onto Chobotovskaya and the wooded outskirts of Peredelkino. Less than a kilometre now, Viktoriya thought. She wondered if Yuri had any success with Alyabyev. If he hadn’t, they were all walking into a trap.

The vehicle lurched to a halt. She heard someone run round to the rear and the creak of the rear doors as before.

‘Okay, everyone out!’ shouted Gaidar.

Viktoriya read the road sign opposite: Lukinskaya. To their right and left, dense woodland stretched in either direction. Around her, soldiers flexed limbs and checked kit as the truck completed a U-turn and headed back in the direction from which they had come. She stared at its retreating vermillion lights, momentarily mesmerised, as it faded into the rapidly descending darkness.

‘Let’s go,’ she heard Gaidar say.

They headed left over a low wire fence and across an open field where a flurry of early winter snow had thawed the earth to soft mud. They stopped at the forest edge – one last check. Gaidar gave the thumbs-up and they melted into the wood.

Fending off branches with her hands, Viktoriya tucked in close behind Terentev. Underfoot she felt the springy softness of pine needles and young saplings. Only the swishing and snapping of branches marked the phantom-like progress of their small column.

Two hundred metres in, they found the railway track they were looking for. They paused to get their bearings. Viktoriya pictured the map they had all memorised back at the yard. Michurinets and Peredelkino stations top and tailed the tiny dacha village. Terentev had made it plain they didn’t want to land up at either. Both would be crawling with KGB troops. Across the open railway track, Viktoriya made out the lane that marked the outer perimeter of old Peredelkino; along its length, fruit trees shed the last of their cinnamon-tinted leaves.

They froze as headlights raced from the right. An army jeep carrying heavily armed KGB soldiers sped by, closely followed by a second. She imagined them turning right into Serafimovicha and left into Pavlenko, and the general secretary’s dacha set back in the woods a hundred metres from Pasternak’s.

Gaidar walked back towards her and Terentev.

‘What’s up?’ she asked.

‘Serafimovicha is swarming with KGB; one of the men has been reconnoitring ahead,’ said Gaidar.

‘How about we stick to the west of the village, make our way up through the wood by the river and work our way above Pavlenko before dropping down onto it?’ she said.

‘I should have remembered that logistics is your speciality… yes, that’s exactly what I was going to suggest. We backtrack a hundred metres and cross here.’ Gaidar pointed at the intersection of the railway track stretching east and stream running north. ‘Five hundred metres up, we exit the wood onto this lane and walk up.’ His finger skirted the lane until it intersected with another that led east. Three hundred metres along, it crossed Pavlenko.

A third jeep appeared, headlights on full beam, and disappeared towards Serafimovicha.

Viktoriya wondered whether the general secretary’s captors were becoming twitchy. It was only an hour or so before the Emergency Committee was supposed to go on the air waves.

‘We haven’t got long,’ she said, almost unnecessarily.

Spread out in twos and threes, they moved east as fast as they could until they hit the small stream that ran under the rail track and followed it north into the woodland beyond. A branch plucked Viktoriya’s beanie off her head. A soldier behind her reached up and retrieved it.

‘Let’s stick close together now,’ Gaidar whispered. ‘Night visors, those of you who have them.’ The undergrowth had become dense and impenetrable in places.

A soldier in front waved them forward. She stuck close to Terentev, eager to avoid twisting her ankle in some foxhole or having her eye poked out by a low-hanging branch. Squinting into the darkness, doing her best to shield her eyes, she swam forward, arms flailing.

Relief marked getting to the edge of the wood as the forest canopy evaporated. Viktoriya took a lungful of cool fresh air as she walked down off a low bank onto the narrow lane she remembered from the map. Subdued street lighting illuminated a roughly made track. Opposite, ink-black windows of unoccupied dachas gazed bleakly towards them. Viktoriya shivered. A man grabbed her by the arm and pulled her back out of the light. A jeep crossed the lane two hundred metres below and disappeared. Nobody moved. They stood, silent, straining to hear the whine of an approaching engine or the murmur of distant voices. Viktoriya felt the warm breath of the man standing next to her and wondered if he could hear her pulse pounding in her neck.

A silhouette stepped back into the road. It was Gaidar. He signalled everyone to form a line behind him and murmured something to his sergeant. Viktoriya looked for Terentev and found him towards the end of the file standing next to the dehumanised form of a soldier wearing a monocular night-vision visor. She wondered if he could make anything out behind the blank windows: a resident’s finger on the light switch, arrested by a band of heavily armed men emerging ghostlike from the black wood, or a guard calling the alarm.

Chapter 71

^MOSCOW

Volkov looked at the assembled. Karzhov had walked into the room five minutes before and was deep in conversation with Dubnikov in the corner of the room; the others had dotted themselves around the long mahogany table with papers spread out in front of them. Opposite, the head of the Peasants’ Union worked his way through a long list of names. Volkov watched him studiously placing ticks and crosses against them, settling old scores, removing opposition. He passed the list to the interior minister, who edited it here and there before bagging it in his portfolio case and zipping it firmly shut.

‘Everything in order, General?’ he asked.

It was, apart from the whereabouts of that idiot Marov, but he did not have time to respond. The large double doors at the end of the room flew open and Gerasim Gerashchenko strode purposefully in. The deputy general secretary took his seat at the head of the table and called the meeting to order. Karzhov and Dubnikov hurried to their places, casting a glance in Volkov’s direction. Gerashchenko looked pale, exhausted. Dark circles pooled under his eyes. How long had it been since they had precipitated this venture?’ Volkov thought. Was it only three days?

When Gerashchenko spoke, he did so with the voice of a man who no doubt felt the weight and future of the Soviet Union upon him.

‘Comrade Chairman,’ he said, looking at Karzhov, inviting the KGB chair to speak first.

Karzhov picked up a typed sheet of paper and cast his eyes down the page.

‘Deputy General Secretary, comrades,’ started Karzhov, ‘I can report that, as of this morning, internal opposition to the new government has been neutralised.’ A good word, thought Volkov – neutralised – very KGB. ‘Russians are giving us the benefit of the doubt for the moment, as are the other Soviet republics. Rest assured we will take whatever action is necessary to maintain calm.’

‘And East Germany?’ asked the interior minister.

Gerashchenko interrupted, ‘I spoke with the East German premier an hour ago. He is confident that with our support he can reassert his authority.’

Our support? thought Volkov. Two hundred thousand Soviet troops would begin retaking the streets tomorrow.

‘I know we can rely on General Volkov,’ he added. ‘Once we have re-established order we can replace the premier with a fresh face, not immediately. We do not want to be encouraging more dissent.’

‘And the general secretary, do you have his resignation in writing yet? We need to conclude this matter.’

‘Within the hour, Secretary,’ Karzhov said confidently; he did not elaborate. Indeed, none of them wanted to know the detail; that was Karzhov’s responsibility. The general secretary would go quietly one way or the other, of that Volkov was sure.

The soft burring of the phone next to Gerashchenko interrupted proceedings. He picked it up. It must be important to have interrupted the meeting, thought Volkov. The secretary looked in his direction as he listened.

‘General, apparently General Marov is in reception, demanding to join the meeting. I thought he was under lock and key?’

‘That was the case until this morning. My men have been looking for him but it seems he has found us.’

‘My men can rearrest him,’ chipped in Dubnikov, looking at Volkov as though his men were incapable of that feat.

‘He has warned me against that.’ Gerashchenko shrugged. ‘Let’s see what he has to say; there can be no harm in that. Maybe we can win him over.’

Chapter 72

Gaidar was the first to spot the military checkpoint thrown across the wide lane above Pavlenko. Viktoriya counted five heavily armed soldiers standing behind a makeshift manually operate red-and-white painted boom. To the right, another soldier manned a heavy machine gun behind a neatly constructed wall of sandbags that curved protectively around him.

The soldier nearest the barrier shouted ‘Halt!’ as Viktoriya observed the man in his sandbag redoubt hunker down behind the gun and trail its barrel towards them. Gaidar’s military uniform clearly confused them. One of the soldiers standing beside the barrier said something to the gunner. Grit and mud zipped around her a split second before she heard the deafening sound of the machine gun weave its deadly path. Viktoriya covered her ears and fought the urge to throw herself on the ground.

‘Soldier!’ shouted Gaidar, when seconds later the rapid tuck-tuck of the machine gun stopped. Their presence would no longer be secret. ‘This is Major Gaidar of the Kantemirovskaya Division.’

When Viktoriya turned to find Terentev, he was no longer there, nor was the soldier with the night visor. She quickly counted the number of heads she could see in the narrow beam of light that flooded towards them from the barrier: twenty men – that left Terentev and four others unaccounted for. She looked up at the two-metre-high bank of scrub and pine needles that followed the lane along its right side towards the temporary barrier and then back down the lane where they had just come and the ink-black forest beyond. Where had they got to? she wondered. She couldn’t believe Terentev had deserted them.

‘What are you doing out here, Major? Peredelkino is strictly off limits. You should know that? How did you get here?’ Sound carried perfectly over the fifty metres that separated them. An owl cooed and then another a little further off. In the near distance, Viktoriya could hear the rising rumble of approaching vehicles.

‘Throw down your weapons, Major,’ the soldier ordered. Viktoriya watched the gunner tilt the barrel a fraction higher. They would all be dead in an instant if he squeezed the trigger.

‘Drop your weapons, Sergeant.’ It was Terentev’s voice from behind the barrier. She looked up at the bank and saw Terentev and three other soldiers lying flat, their Kalashnikovs extended in front of them; a fourth soldier had his gun pointing directly at the back of the gunner at a distance of no more than ten metres.

‘Soldier,’ it was Gaidar’s voice, ‘Let’s all remain calm. It’s your commanding officer I need to speak with.’

As he finished speaking, a truck ground to a halt behind them and ten soldiers jumped down off the back board. A lot of people were going to die, Viktoriya thought, if someone lost their nerve. An eerie silence descended on the impromptu gathering as they faced off, soldier on soldier. Only the sound of the diesel engine ticking over disturbed the still night air.

‘Major, it’s me you need to speak with.’ In the glow of the truck’s headlights, Viktoriya made out the silhouette of the man who had spoken. ‘I think it would be best if we avoided any unpleasantness.’

Gaidar lowered his gun and walked to the rear of his small column.

‘You’re not with Kantemirovskaya Division, are you, Major, if that’s what rank you truly are?’

‘Major Gaidar works for me,’ said Viktoriya, before Gaidar had a chance to explain himself. ‘And right now I represent General Marov.’

‘General Marov?’ He almost sneered. ‘You are backing the wrong horse, comrade.’

‘Viktoriya Nikolaevna—’

‘Kayakova of Leningrad… ah yes. Is it the “Gang of Two”?’ The colonel laughed. ‘And what is it you are trying to do here? Recue our ailing general secretary? I’ve fifty men between where you are standing and his dacha. You are not going to get very far.’ He took a step forward. Gaidar raised his Kalashnikov.

She could see now the three stars on his epaulette.

‘Colonel, we are here simply to protect the general secretary. There is no need to spill Russian blood.’

He was smiling now as if she were deranged.

‘Protect, doesn’t he already have protection?’

‘Colonel, I trust that is the case… just look at our presence as an insurance policy.’

Viktoriya looked at Gaidar, who had his barrel trained directly on the colonel. She had no doubt he would use it if he felt the situation were moving against them.

‘Nobody leaves Peredelkino while the general secretary is held here against his wishes,’ she said in a flat tone, ‘you, your soldiers, no one. If anything happens to him, you will be held to account. Do I make myself clear?’

The smile vanished and his jaw tightened. Viktoriya prayed that Yuri’s powers of persuasion had remained intact.

‘And how do you propose to do that?’

‘I’m surprised you aren’t better informed, Colonel. If I’m right, a spetsnaz battalion is deploying around us as I speak… we are all hostages now.’

The colonel glared at her, his fists clenched. ‘Corporal!’ he shouted, ‘put me through to Central District command.’ A moment later he stepped into the cab of the truck and slammed the door shut.

The whop-whop-whop of a rotor blade made her look up as an MTV passed over them and headed in the direction of the dacha. Friend or foe? she thought. It stopped over where she imagined the general secretary to be and hovered in a holding position.

The door of the cab opened and the colonel climbed out. Ignoring the gun pointed directly at him, he walked up to Viktoriya and stopped. He stood there and looked at her for a moment, his face expressionless, exuding a deadly calm.

‘My compliments, Viktoriya Nikolaevna, it seems for the moment you have the temporary advantage…’

Chapter 73

Yuri heard footsteps behind him on the marbled hall of the defence building and turned to see Dubnikov accompanied by two soldiers. Was he about to be rearrested? He had brazened it out so far. Soldiers, who he encountered every day at checkpoints around the Arbat, had been reluctant to challenge him so far. He might be at odds with the interim government, but that was it, for now it was only interim and here he was in plain view in uniform, acting as if nothing were amiss. He doubted the defence minister would be so reticent.

‘General Marov, I offered to come personally and collect you. We don’t want anything to happen to you like last time. Please come this way.’ He smiled and waved his hand towards the lift.

There was no going back now.

‘We are all in the plenary room,’ Yuri heard Dubnikov say. ‘I’m sure you know it well.’ He did indeed, thought Yuri; he could have found it with his eyes closed. He’d lost count of the number of meetings he had chaired there under different circumstances.

‘You’ve had a busy day by all accounts, General. I think General Volkov will be pleased to see you.’

‘I am sure he will, Comrade Dubnikov.’

When they entered the room, Volkov was in the corner on the phone. Yuri prayed that Alyabyev had followed through. By the red-faced look on Volkov’s face, he guessed he had. Volkov slammed down the receiver and retook his seat at the table.

‘Apologies, comrade… It seems we have a problem. General Alyabyev has slung a cordon around Peredelkino – a military exercise, he says. I have ordered him down.’

Yuri saw Volkov cast a worried glance in Karzhov’s direction.

‘I’m sure this will only be temporary, General,’ said Karzhov.

‘I assume this is your doing, Marov?’ said Volkov.

Yuri ignored him and looked at Gerashchenko.

‘General, please take a seat, you are among comrades,’ interjected Gerashchenko.

‘Thank you, deputy secretary, but I would rather stand.’ Yuri looked down the table, at the faces either side and Gerashchenko at its head. He had at least got this far without being rearrested. He wondered how the next bit would go down.

‘So, what is it you would like to discuss with us that is so vital?’

There was little point in hedging around what he had come to say. Directness was the best policy. He needed to stay focussed… it was only him and them in the room… not the four thousand Defence Ministry staff on the other side of the door.

‘I have come to demand that you release the general secretary while there is still time.’

He looked around the table at all the open mouths. Karzhov clenched and unclenched his fist.

‘Demand… Still time,’ scoffed General Volkov. ‘Do you think that your little charade with General Alyabyev is going to change the course of history, that we are just going to let you carry on with your plans to defenestrate the Soviet Union? Haven’t you done enough damage, General?’

‘General Volkov,’ interrupted Gerashchenko, ‘please let the general finish.’

‘It’s been less than seventy-two hours since you reported the general secretary ill,’ Yuri continued. ‘You have time to pull back. We have just withdrawn from Afghanistan. You know the state of the army and the strength of public opinion. I’m sure General Volkov has made a good case for intervention in Eastern Europe, but the general secretary is right on this. If I am a judge of anything, Soviet troops are not about to begin street fighting in Leipzig or Dresden… even less East Berlin. And the West? You will drag them into a conflict they hardly have to fight… isn’t our population already starving… Poland has gone, let East Germany run its course.’

‘Glasnost… perestroika… hasn’t it led us to collapse? This is just defeatist talk,’ said Karzhov, looking around the table.

‘The chairman is right,’ said Yuri. ‘Perestroika has led us to the brink of collapse, but so have our previous failures.’ He knew he was talking heresy now. ‘I don’t know how many of you have visited the West… their world is not perfect either, but it’s a long way from ours. Perestroika needs more time… we have to be more open if we are to solve our problems. That is not defeatism… locking up Russian dissidents is. It didn’t work in Poland and it won’t work in East Germany.’ Yuri paused and looked at the faces fixed impassively on him. Was he wasting his breath?

‘Why are you here, General? Couldn’t you be sunning yourself on the French Riviera,’ said Dubnikov. ‘Your business interests are no secret. Why don’t you just get on the next plane and fly out of here… while you still have time?’

‘I’m not going anywhere… nor is General Alyabyev,’ he lied. He had no idea whether Alyabyev would withdraw or not, but he had to assume for now that they did not know either. ‘If you wish to oppose the general secretary then do so openly – release him.’

Yuri extracted a large envelope he had folded into his pocket and slid it across the table towards Gerashchenko, who reached forward and grabbed it.

‘Open it,’ said Yuri, knowing this was his last gambit.

Gerashchenko pulled out three black-and-white photographs and dropped them onto the table. Yuri watched Karzhov change colour.

‘What are these?’ Gerashchenko asked, turning from Yuri to face the KGB chair.

Karzhov picked up one of the photos and looked at a younger image of himself, together with another man on the Moika embankment.

‘These are forgeries,’ he fumed indignantly.

‘Do you recognise the other man, Comrade Chairman, the man you are with? The year is 1977, if that will help jog your memory.’

Karzhov looked around the table for support, only to be met with stares of consternation.

‘Who is this?’ demanded the interior minister, pointing at the monochrome image.

‘Comrade Karzhov?’ invited Yuri.

‘You’ll pay for this,’ hissed Karzhov.

‘The other man in the photo was a CIA operative – a Tom Banner,’ Yuri continued. ‘He was imprisoned by us for espionage not long after this picture was taken. Soviet intelligence knew about an inside leak but couldn’t identify the traitor, not until this photo, that is. The man who took it paid the price two days ago. Konstantin Stolin – some of you know him – tried to assassinate him.’

‘His name?’ asked the defence minister.

‘Misha Revnik. He is alive, just. The agent who had him take this photo did not fare so well. Alexsei Baturin disappeared shortly thereafter; Tom Banner died in jail.’

All eyes were now fixed on Karzhov.

‘He’s lying… don’t you see… I’m no double agent. What could possibly be my motive?’

‘Key US intelligence information that helped you rise up the ladder… How many Russians did you betray for your own ends?’

Karzhov jumped to his feet. ‘I want this man arrested!’ he shouted, red-faced.

‘Sit down, Mr Chairman,’ said Yuri in a calm voice. ‘Comrade Gerashchenko, may I put your phone on speaker. I have a call you need to hear.’

Yuri walked around to the other end of the table, switched the speakerphone on, picked up the receiver and punched in the international code. The number connected. Pick up, pick up, he thought. All eyes fixed on the phone.

‘Pronto,’ it was a woman who answered.

‘Ilaria, please will you tell these gentlemen, in Russian, what you have on your desk and where you are.’

‘Milan, General… I have four black-and-white photos on my desk – two men by an embankment.’

‘Can you tell me, the man wearing the hat, what has he on his face?’

‘Glasses, General… dark-rimmed glasses.’

‘And the negatives of these photos, where are they now?’

‘With a friend, who will release them to the international press if your general secretary is not freed by tomorrow morning or any harm should come to you, General, or in fact me or my associates.’

Yuri picked up the receiver and dropped it back in its cradle, ending the call.

‘Comrades, do you wish to be associated with this traitor? If these photos are released, the Russian people will know soon enough that a key member of the interim government sold his country to further his career and even now may be supplying key information to the Americans. Maybe this whole coup – and that’s what it is – is an American invention to bring Russia to its knees, to banish it for ever?’

For the first time, Yuri could see fear mixed with doubt on their faces.

‘Don’t think you are overreaching, General?’ said Gerashchenko.

‘I tell you, Comrade Gerashchenko, if we launch this repression, it will be the end, economically and politically – you will all be branded traitors by the people.’

Yuri looked again at Karzhov, who had turned as white as a sheet.

‘Release the general secretary and we have a reset. I will do my best to intercede on your behalf; it cannot be in the general secretary’s interests to advertise such dissension at the heart of his government – not in the middle of a crisis. That does not go for Karzhov; he is to be arrested for treason.’

They were staring at him now like rabbits caught in a headlight.

‘And two other matters… you will release General Ghukov immediately and until such time as he is back at GSHQ I am to be made acting head of the army. General Volkov is to be relieved.’

Volkov looked across at Gerashchenko, his face filled with fury at the prospect of an end to his ambitions. ‘Gerasim, we can face this down, we can’t pull back now.’

‘You can… that’s the point… you simply have to give the order,’ interjected Yuri. ‘Deputy Secretary, I suggest you speak with the general secretary yourself, in person, before he goes on the air waves. Make your peace.’

Yuri walked back along the length of the room and opened the double doors. Two soldiers appeared.

‘Arrest Chairman Karzhov.’

The soldiers looked from Yuri to Gerashchenko, confused.

‘Do as he says,’ said Gerashchenko, capitulating. Gerashchenko switched on the intercom to the outer office.

‘Anna, organise me an escort to Peredelkino. Comrades, if you wish to join me, please do. General Marov, I am appointing you acting head of the army. I emphasise acting.’

Yuri thought Volkov would charge at him. Instead, he sat down in his chair and stared out of the window. Volkov turned and faced him.

‘General Marov, I admire your courage, but it will be you not me that will ring the death knell of the Soviet Union.’

‘No, General, you’re wrong… time… and people like Karzhov.’

Yuri turned to the soldier standing beside him.

‘Soldier, order me a car for GSHQ.’