The Accident Man

70

The first things Carver noticed were the photographs. On the bookshelves, on the mantelpiece, a couple on the desk itself – everywhere pictures of the man whose room this was. He was sharing a joke with Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev, standing in a dinner jacket next to an evening-gowned Margaret Thatcher; he was drinking cocktails with JFK and Jackie by the pool at Hyannis Port, admiring the steaks on the Bush barbecue at Kennebunkport. There were dedications to “My good friend Percy” from Richard Nixon and, “Mon cher Percéval” from General Charles de Gaulle. There was even a greeting in Cyrillic script on a picture of the old Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev.

This man didn’t name-drop. He name-bombed.

Then Carver spotted a picture on a cabinet behind the desk. It must have been taken at a royal gala. The old man was standing in a reception line. He was talking to the guest of honor. She was wearing a long blue dress, and a diamond tiara was pinned in her feathered blond hair. The inscription at the bottom, written in a rounded, girlish hand, read: “Thank you so much for those wise words of advice!” The “so” had been underlined. Twice.

Unbelievable. The old boy had just had the princess killed, but he still wanted the world to know that they’d been pals.

Perhaps he thought they still were. Sir Perceval Wake struck Carver as the kind of man who believes that reality is whatever he says it is, whose lies are convincing because he genuinely believes them to be true. He still believed, for example, that he could call the shots. His tame commander was bobbing about in the Channel with his head blown away. His troops were filling up the morgues of Paris. The Russians clearly reckoned they had him under control. But in Wake’s mind, he was the chairman, and he was still the boss.

It still worked, for some people. When they’d arrived, a secretary had told Malgrave that the chairman wanted to see Carver alone. He’d been asked to wait outside the office. Malgrave had obeyed at once. If anything, he’d looked relieved.

Carver was asked to leave his case and gun with the secretary. He complied, then went into the office.

“You’ve got nerve coming here, Carver,” Wake said, as if his arrogance alone were enough to keep a killer at bay.

“Who’s the Russian?” asked Carver.

“Which particular Russian did you have in mind? As you can see” – Wake waved an arm airily at the walls – “I’ve known quite a few.”

“Really?” said Carver, walking up to a bookshelf and peering at the pictures in the silver, wood, and leather frames. “Which ones are the Russians, then?”

“Well,” said Wake, “let’s see now.” He rose from behind the desk and came over to where Carver was standing. He searched among the rows of happy snapshots. “Ah yes, that’s Nikita Khrush-”

Carver swung around to face Wake and jabbed the first and middle fingers of his right hand into the old man’s eyes, as hard and fast as the fangs of a snake. The old man yelped and bent double, his head in his hands. Carver grabbed Wake’s jaw and pulled it upward till their eyes met. He kept his grip tight and repeated, “Who’s the Russian?”

Wake looked up at him, blinking back tears. “Can’t tell you,” he said. “Just can’t…”

Carver didn’t have time to waste. He wrapped his right arm around Wake’s neck, standing behind him, his mouth by Wake’s right ear, the two men clasped in a warped intimacy. Then he started tightening.

“Who’s… the… Russian?” he hissed.

Wake’s hands flapped helplessly. His head rocked back and forth and his chest heaved as he fought for air. It occurred to Carver that he might be going too far. The old man’s heart might give out before he could talk. When he heard a croaking sound in Wake’s throat, he eased his arm a fraction. Wake took a ragged breath.

“Zhukovski,” he gasped. “Yuri Zhukovksi.”

“Who’s he?”

“One of the oligarchs, the men who own Russia. He’s got paper mills, aluminum smelters, armaments factories, assets everywhere.”

Carver frowned, “I thought the state still controlled all weapons manufacturing.”

“It does. But Zhukovski is a middleman. He finds buyers, collects payments in dollars, and passes it on to the Kremlin in rubles, taking a cut along the way.”

“Nice business.”

“That’s not all,” said Wake, relishing the small sense of control that his knowledge provided. “Back in Soviet times, many factories had parallel, black-market production lines, controlled by local party chiefs and gangsters. Those lines still exist. The armaments industry is no exception.”

“And oligarchs like Zhukovski have taken over from the gangsters?”

Wake attempted a superior, if somewhat battered smile. “Do you seriously think there’s a difference?”

“But what’s his interest in the princess?”

“You’re a bright young man, you work that out. He was prepared to pay millions to get rid of her. It was his idea.”

“And you agreed. Why?”

“Long story, goes right back to the old days… I had no choice…”

Carver pulled his arm away from Wake’s throat, then shoved him back against the bookcase, pinning him there. “What exactly did Zhukovski do in the old days, then?” he asked.

“He worked for the State.”

“Everyone worked for the State. That’s what communism meant. What part of the State?’

Wake grimaced. “Dzerzhinsky Square.”

Carver understood. Dzerzhinsky Square was the headquarters of the KGB. So Zhukovski’s power over Wake went all the way back to the cold war days. The old bastard had probably been playing for the other side, just another one of Britain’s band of upper-class traitors. Zhukovski would have known and used the information as leverage. But that was ancient history. Carver had more important issues to deal with in the here and now.

“Has he got the girl?”

“I believe so.”

“Well, get on the phone and call him for me, then.”

Carver stepped back. Wake pushed himself away from the bookcase. It took him a second or two to find his balance, then he staggered back to his desk. He collapsed into his chair.

“You don’t believe in social niceties, do you?”

“Not when I’m working. Not when there are lives at stake.”

“You think you can actually save that girl? Ha!” The laugh came out as a bitter croak. “You don’t know who you’re dealing with.”

“Nor does he. Start dialing.”

Wake picked up his telephone and spoke to his secretary, trying to keep his breathing even and the pain out of his voice. “Please get me Mr. Zhukovski. I suggest you try his mobile number first.”

A few seconds later, the telephone rang. Wake answered it. He put on a fine performance. “Well,” thought Carver, “the chairman was hardly going to let this paymaster know that his whole operation was falling apart.”

“Yuri, my dear chap… Yes, it’s good to speak to you too. I have someone here who wants to talk to you. His name is Samuel Carver.”

Wake held out the phone. Carver grabbed it.

“Have you got her?”

There was silence for a moment on the other end of the line.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Carver. My name is Yuri Zhukovski.”

‘So, we’ve been introduced,” said Carver. “Now prove that she’s still alive.”

“Of course,” said Zhukovski.

Carver heard the sound of scuffled footsteps, then Zhukovski said, “As you requested…” and he heard an unmistakable voice cry, “Carver! Don’t-” Then there was a slap, a muffled female cry of pain, and more scuffling as she was dragged away.

Zhukovski returned to the phone as if nothing had happened, his tone as even as before. “So, Miss Petrova is in my hands. To be frank, I had expected you to contact me sooner. I know all about your adventures with Monsieur Leclerc in Geneva.” He let out a contemplative sigh. “I hope you enjoyed watching Petrova at work. I always used to. In any case, I take it you want her.”

“Of course.”

“Very well, what will you offer me in exchange? Please bear in mind that I require a high price. My men wish to let her know what they think of her treachery. I need hardly describe what that will entail. If you want the woman, you must give me a very good reason for denying them their amusement.”

“The computer,” said Carver. “I have the laptop on which Saturday night’s operation was planned and controlled. The firewalls are down. The files have been decrypted. And the man who had it was very efficient. He kept records of every order, every transaction, every detail of the project.”

He was trying to work out how far to take the bluff. He had nothing in his hand, but he didn’t have an option. He had to go all-in.

“This man did some digging of his own,” Carver continued. “He must have had a suspicious nature. Two people he’d never heard of were dumped on him. He wanted to know who they were, where they were getting their orders. He followed the trail all the way back to Moscow. Trust me, Zhukovski, you need that computer. You certainly don’t want me to keep it.”

“What’s to stop you from copying the hard drive?” the Russian asked.

“What’s to stop you from killing the girl and taking the computer anyway?” Carver retorted. “But you want to get on with your business, I want to get on with my life. Neither of us has any interest in seeing any of this go public. Let’s just do the trade and be done.”

“Very well, be at the main entrance of the Palace Hotel, Gstaad, Switzerland, at seven p.m. this evening, with your precious computer.”

“That’s less than five hours from now,” snapped Carver.

“Yes,” the Russian agreed, “it is a tight schedule. But if you start now and do not waste time – for example, by trying to double-cross me in any way – it should be possible for you to make it. And of course, you will come alone and unarmed. I do not need to explain what will happen if you break either of those conditions. Beyond that, I make no promises. If you can convince me that you have something to offer, perhaps I will let you take the girl. If not, well, my people feel as strongly about you as they do about her.”

The line went dead. Carver handed the phone back to Wake.

“Call your secretary,” he said. “I need to get on an afternoon flight to Zurich or Geneva. Now.”

There was only one flight that could possibly get him to Switzerland in time to make the deadline, and even that would be tight. The plane left Gatwick Airport, roughly thirty miles away to the south of London, at 2:50. He should be checking in now. It got in at 5:20 local time, which would leave him an hour and forty minutes to get through passport-and-customs control, meet up with Thor Larsson, pick up the computer, and drive 150 kilometers to Gstaad.

By any rational analysis, Carver didn’t stand a chance. But if he ran flat-out to Victoria station and caught the next airport express; if there were no delays in London’s notoriously inefficient train system; if he could pick up his ticket and dash to the gate; if the plane was on schedule and the customs quick; if Larsson’s Volvo had full tanks and the roads were clear… well, maybe he could make it. Just.

He put the handset back on the receiver. Wake was still sitting, unmoving, behind his desk, drained of animation.

“I suppose you’re going to kill me now,” he said.

“I’d love to, old boy,” said Samuel Carver. “But I really haven’t got the time.”