The Bearpit

24

Yevgennie Levin had never before travelled in a helicopter and the moment it lifted off he decided he didn’t like it; his stomach dropped with the sudden upward movement, so that he had to swallow against the risk of being sick and when that passed he grew uncomfortable at the fragility of everything. There seemed to be more glass than protective metal. The control panel did not appear big enough and the constant vibration jarred through him, shaking a machine too flimsy to withstand that sort of disturbance. He forced himself to concentrate upon landmarks, trying to lose himself in tradecraft. From above he saw again the withered, stripped-bare trees he had described to Natalia and then the black snake of the Naugatuck and realized there was river along the valley floor. From its direction he was able to isolate Litchfield and because the pilot initially took a south-easterly route, to pick up the coast, Levin knew how accurate he had been in describing the captain’s walks as look-outs to watch the sea where there was no sea.

Bowden, who was sitting to his right, gestured and mouthed the name when they approached New York but it was an unnecessary identification: Levin had already isolated the sprawl of Queens and Brooklyn and New Jersey and the jammed-together centrepiece of Manhattan. From the air there hardly looked to be any roads or avenues at all between the stuck-together skyscrapers, as if all the buildings had been neatly packaged up to be shipped elsewhere. It was easy for him to pick out the United Nations, its greenness obvious even from this height. What would have happened to Vadim Dolya? And Lubiakov, the other sacrifice? Would the FBI surveillance still be on Onukhov, for when he made his mistake? Always questions.

The pilot continued to fly south with the shoreline in view and Levin stared down, thinking how vast a country America was. Of course the Soviet Union was as large – larger – but Levin had never flown over it like this, from literally a bird’s-eye vantage point. My home now, he thought. Forever. Providing he did not make any sort of mistake: never relaxed. At least the worry – and distraction – with Petr was over. He had actually begun to fear that the rift between them was permanent and would worsen, and knew Galina thought the same. Her mood had visibly improved with Petr’s acceptance of the situation. Only one major distraction remained. Would Natalia have got his last letter? Was there one on its way from her? More questions. It was important to go on stressing the concern over Natalia when he got to Langley.

Which would not take much longer, Levin guessed. The pilot made a circular approach, looping over the Capitol and then coming back upon himself, giving Levin a tourist’s overflight of The Mall and the Washington Monument, and the Reflecting Pool in front of the Lincoln Memorial, before picking up the Potomac and flying parallel with it to the headquarters of the CIA. There were three cross-marked landing areas; they came down upon the first, the nearest to the hotch-potched building, wings and extensions obviously added to the original, inadequate structure. With objective comparison, Levin supposed the additions here had been made with slightly more success than those built on to Dzerzhinsky Square by Stalin’s prisoner-of-war slaves.

They were expected, Levin guessed from some radio warning from the pilot. Two unidentified men approached and nodded to Bowden and Proctor, but made no gesture towards Levin. The Russian walked in the middle of the group not towards the main complex but to a small, separate building to one side. He was not surprised to be kept from the most secret centre of America’s external intelligence organization; his surprise, in fact, was at being brought here at all. It would not have been the way a defector’s debriefing would have been conducted in the Soviet Union, even a defector apparently with information as important as his. The encounter would have taken place somewhere far removed from the organization headquarters.

The route took them in front of the main building and directly by the statue of Nathan Hale, the American patriot hanged as a spy by the British during the American War of Independence. The history had naturally been part of Levin’s instruction, which was why he had immediately recognized the name of the American chief of intelligence during that war when they had toured Litchfield with the attendant Bowden as a guide, aware that Benjamin Tallmadge had been a friend of Hale’s.

Levin glanced towards the memorial, showing no particular interest, recalling as he did so a forgotten part of that long-ago basic training. As he ascended the English gallows, Hale was supposed to have said: ‘I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country.’

Which was all he had, acknowledged Levin. Remembering his helicopter reflection on the journey from Connecticut, the Russian thought again how careful he was going to have to be, now he appeared to be within finger-touching distance of making work the operation he’d been sent to perform. If they found out what he was really doing then he really could lose his life, he realized.

At the entrance to the outbuilding Proctor and Bowden went through the required identification and screening and Levin guessed he was being photographed by various unseen cameras positioned in the foyer. When the security officials completed their checks of the two Americans they took prints of Levin’s every finger and thumb, photographed him with an instantly produced Polaroid – which Levin thought created a very bad picture – and had him sign against it and the prints on a large, official-looking form. Levin wondered with whom or with what the details were going to be compared in a further effort to confirm his bona fides.

The unspeaking escorts took them to a ground-floor room at the back, overlooking a packed car park which Levin thought larger than the square separating the KGB headquarters from the GUM department store, back in Moscow. A Cona coffee machine steamed on a side table and Levin nodded acceptance to Bowden’s invitation.

‘Feel OK?’ asked Proctor.

‘Fine,’ lied Levin. Persist with his genuine concern over Natalia and volunteer no more than the very minimum to any question, he thought. String it out, in fact: ideally there had to be as many sessions as possible.

Harry Myers led the committee into the room, with Norris immediately behind and Crookshank coming last. The formation told Levin that Myers was in charge, although no introductions were made, which he did not expect. Myers jerked his head to Proctor and Bowden with the familiarity of the earlier escorts and then smiled, with surface politeness, at the Russian.

‘Appreciate your coming here today, sir,’ said Myers. ‘Believe you might have things to tell us that we’d find extremely interesting.’

Although he hoped for more meetings between them, Levin studied the three CIA officials with instinctively intense professionalism, trying to memorize in one interview every personal detail for later recall and possible – although now unknown – use. The chairman was a huge bear of a man, obese with neglect and indulgence, flowing beard unkempt, strained suit sagged and bagged around him. Maybe an intentionally careless appearance – as he judged Bowden’s appearance to be intentionally careless – to inculcate ill-judged contempt. Just like it would be ill-judgement to infer respect by the man’s use of the word ‘sir’, which Levin had come to recognize from his time in America to be a verbal mannerism, the equivalent of a comma or a full stop in a sentence and nothing to do with respect. The man to his right was contrastingly neat, crisply suited, crisply barbered, open-faced. The third member of the panel wore a suit and a club-striped tie but Levin was intrigued by the hair, long enough practically to reach his collar. Of the three only the last set out pens alongside the yellow lawyer’s pad, to take notes.

Nodding towards Proctor, Levin said: ‘I have promised to help, in any way I can.’

‘You’ve said you believe there to be a spy within this agency?’ demanded Norris, direct.

‘I have also been promised help,’ avoided Levin, smoothly.

‘Sir?’ said Myers.

‘What progress has there been getting my daughter Natalia from the Soviet Union to join me?’

‘We’ve gone through all this, Yevgennie,’ came in Proctor. As he spoke he shrugged apologetically in Myers’ direction. Back to the Russian he said: ‘You know we’re doing all we can.’

Ignoring the FBI supervisor, Levin said to Myers: ‘Have you heard anything from your sources?’

Myers sighed. He said: ‘We know your concern – can understand your concern – but until today we haven’t been involved…’

‘… Can you do anything now that you are involved?’ interrupted Levin, finding no difficulty with the urgency.

‘Like what?’ demanded Norris, recognizing that the matter of the man’s daughter would have to be disposed of before they could go any further.

‘You’ve got a CIA residency at the American embassy in Moscow. Assets, presumably,’ said Levin. ‘Can’t you find out what’s happening to her?’

‘You’re getting letters telling you what’s happening to her,’ responded Norris carelessly. ‘She’s not under pressure.’

The reply told Levin several things. From it he knew there was some liaison concerning him between the FBI and the CIA. Which therefore meant here at least there was not the animosity that existed in his own country between the KGB and the GRU. And that if they knew she was not under pressure they were opening and reading the letters before passing them on. Monitoring the correspondence was to be expected, he supposed: the KGB would be doing the same in Moscow. There would be a lot of curiosity about him in the American section of the First Chief Directorate. He would have liked to convey some message but knew any attempt at a code was impossible; particularly now he had confirmed the tampering. To extend the conversation, he said: ‘Couldn’t you make some inquiries?’

‘But would that be wise?’ demanded Myers at once. ‘You are trying to get her out, right? Can’t you see the danger, of Moscow discovering the CIA inquiring about her? They could stage a trial over something like that.’

To explain the apparent thoughtlessness of the demand, Levin said: ‘I’m very worried about her. Desperate.’

‘We know, sir, we know,’ soothed Myers.

‘Will you tell your State Department how I’m helping: add to the FBI pressure?’ persisted Levin.

‘Sure,’ said Myers, the promise as glib as Proctor’s had been, that first day.

‘What is it that makes you think there’s a spy here?’ demanded Norris, maintaining his earlier insistence.

‘Things that happened when I was at the United Nations,’ started out Levin.

‘What things?’ It was the first time the long-haired man had spoken: Crookshank had an oddly high-pitched voice.

‘There was a KGB man, here in Washington…’

‘… Name?’ broke in Crookshank, pencil ready.

‘Shelenkov,’ identified Levin, as he had been instructed all those months ago, in Moscow. At that moment he was more alert than at any time since the interview began and was aware of the look of recognition that passed between Myers and Norris.

‘What do you know about him?’ said Norris.

‘He was ranked number three at the rezidentura… regarded as a good operator.’

‘How was he involved with you at the United Nations?’ asked Myers.

‘That’s it,’ said Levin, intentionally obtuse. ‘He wasn’t.’

‘I’m not following this,’ protested the CIA lawyer.

‘There is occasional liaison, between the embassy here and the UN mission,’ said Levin. ‘Just very occasional. There was a standing instruction, which could not be ignored, that Shelenkov should never, under whatever circumstances, be involved in any contact.’

‘Why not?’ asked Norris.

‘For the risk of being compromised, in something else.’

‘Something else?’ It was Crookshank who asked the question.

‘It was understood that Shelenkov was completely seconded to just one job: that he could be considered for no other operation.’

‘Understood by whom?’ demanded Myers.

‘Everyone in New York.’

‘The mission in New York were told this?’

Levin shook his head, conscious of the trap. ‘That is not the way intelligence is conducted… not KGB intelligence, anyway. Individual operations are boxed, agents working quite separately and unknown to each other.’

‘So how was it understood?’ said Myers.

Levin allowed the impression of slight irritation. ‘Because of the hands-off order. A KGB officer is never… well, rarely… allowed the luxury of just one assignment. There are always several ongoing.’

‘If Shelenkov were so removed from everything, how do you know he was not active in several, ongoing operations?’ said Norris. ‘You explained yourself a few moments ago that the very principle of espionage is limiting the knowledge of operations.’

‘People talk,’ said Levin. ‘Other agents in the Washington embassy said he was removed from any normal, day-to-day functioning. Actually complained at the extra work load it imposed upon them.’ To convey the impression of strain, which he was genuinely feeling, Levin looked in the direction of the coffee and Proctor took the hint and moved to refill his cup.

‘We’re dealing with disgruntled gossip?’ said Crook-shank with a lawyer’s dogmatism.

Levin shook his head. ‘With good reason for their being disgruntled,’ he said, in insistence of his own. ‘You must believe me when I say it’s unheard of for anyone in a rezidentura to be allowed to operate like that, without good reason.’

‘Gossip,’ said Crookshank dismissively.

Concern moved through Levin at the thought that in his keenness to protract the interview over a period, to impress them sufficiently, he might be risking the panel rejecting what he was saying. Before he could speak, Myers picked up: ‘What sort of good reason?’

‘An exceptional source,’ said Levin simply.

‘You think Shelenkov had such a source?’ said Norris.

‘I know he did.’

‘Know!’ The demand came simultaneously from Myers and Norris.

‘There are three ways of transmitting to Dzerzhinsky Square,’ recounted Levin. ‘The first is electronically, from the embassy. Secondly there is the diplomatic bag. Moscow are suspicious of both. Anything electrical can be intercepted, monitored…’ He paused, looking sideways at Proctor. ‘And the diplomatic bag is not regarded as being completely safe: there have been tests and from them we know that the FBI open them, although they are supposed to be protected by international agreement…’

‘What’s the third way?’ intruded the lawyer impatiently.

Levin did not respond at once, staring across the intervening table and realizing that of the three, this longhaired man was the one he had to convince. He said: ‘Personal courier. It’s practice for people personally to transport things… encoded and concealed in microdots or hidden in some way. This was always the way that Shelenkov’s material was moved to Moscow.’

‘How do you know, if he were kept so separate from you?’ said Crookshank.

‘I was told, by people in Washington…’

‘… Gossip again,’ interrupted the lawyer.

‘Fact,’ rejected Levin, prepared. ‘On occasions the courier was from the United Nations. Always it was to move what Shelenkov had.’

‘Who was the courier at the United Nations?’ The question came from Bowden but the CIA group showed no annoyance at the questioning being taken away from them.

‘Vadim Alekseevich Dolya,’ identified Levin, the lie already prepared, knowing from Bowden’s disclosure in Connecticut of Dolya’s withdrawal to the Soviet Union that he could not be challenged.

‘Let’s accept for a moment that Shelenkov did have an exceptional source and that Dzerzhinsky Square were prepared to operate in the unusual way you’ve described,’ explored Norris. ‘You haven’t so far given us any indication why that source should be CIA.’

‘Moscow identify the CIA by the same name by which you call yourselves,’ disclosed Levin. ‘The Company…’ He smiled apologetically. ‘It amuses them, I think. On every occasion when material was carried through UN personnel, Shelenkov used that phrase. “Company business” or “Secrets from the Company”.’

‘You told us he was regarded as a good operative,’ reminded Myers. ‘Number three in the rezidentura, you said. A good operative would not have been as indiscreet as that.’

Levin appeared to hesitate, before responding. ‘Shelenkov had a problem,’ he said. ‘He drank too much. The story that filtered back to us at the UN was that Moscow specifically moved him because they were frightened by his indiscretions: that he might reveal his source, through carelessness.’

‘You’re saying that he used the expression about the Company when he was drunk?’

‘Yes.’ It was all coming out more quickly than intended and they’d missed something upon which Levin had expected them – wanted them – to pick up. He shifted laboriously in his chair, to give the impression of discomfort.

‘UN personnel?’ said Crookshank.

Levin was sure he concealed his relief. ‘I am sorry?’ he encouraged.

‘A while back you identified…’ The lawyer paused, consulting the legal pad. ‘… Someone called Vadim Dolya as the courier. Then you used an expression about UN personnel, as if more than one man were involved.’

‘There were,’ said Levin. He spoke simply, as if surprised at Crookshank’s confusion, glad it was this man who had initiated the questioning.

This isn’t coming easily, is it, Mr Levin?’ demanded the lawyer.

‘I have promised to help,’ reminded the Russian. ‘I am responding as best I can to what I am asked, how I am asked it. I do not have a prepared statement: there was no way I could anticipate what you were going to ask me, apart perhaps from the first, obvious question.’

‘I’m sure my colleague was not trying to sound critical,’ said Myers, soothing again. ‘It’s all going to come out in time.’

From the look that Crookshank gave the unkempt man it was clear he had very much intended to sound critical, but Levin only gave that impression passing thought. He was more intent upon what Myers had said, indicating further sessions: at last! Levin thought, further relieved.

‘Did you ever have any direct contact with Shelenkov?’ asked Norris.

‘Yes,’ said Levin, conscious once more of the looks that went between the three men he was facing.

‘Maybe you’d better describe the system, so that this stops coming out like we’re pulling teeth,’ said Crookshank.

‘As I thought I’d already made clear, the primary consideration was to avoid Shelenkov’s activities being compromised in any way. Which meant, naturally, the use of cut-outs.’

‘You acted as a cut-out?’ pressed Norris.

‘Yes.’

‘How often?’

Levin hesitated, seeming to give the question consideration. ‘Maybe three or four times.’

‘You know the importance of what we’re asking!’ erupted Crookshank at once. ‘So how many times was it? Three? Or four?’

‘Four,’ said Levin.

‘How?’

‘Dolya was the courier to Moscow. So the break had to be between him and Shelenkov, minimizing the risk of any connection if the FBI targeted either of them,’ recounted Levin. ‘I had to travel down here from New York, on some pretext, make the pick-up and then transfer it to Dolya in the complete security of our mission when I got back.’

‘Did you ever know what you were carrying?’ said Myers.

‘Of course not.’

‘ How did you carry?’

‘Once a specification catalogue, about a tractor… the sort of thing always available at agricultural shows,’ said Levin. ‘Twice sealed letters. The last time it was a holiday postcard.’

‘Microdots,’ said Norris, a remark more to himself than anyone else in the room. ‘Somewhere on material absolutely ordinary and unremarkable in itself.’

Levin was about to respond, confirming the man’s guess, but Proctor spoke across him. ‘I’m curious, Yevgennie,’ said the FBI man. ‘How come you never told me any of this before?’

The Russian was grateful there had been so much preparation before he left the Soviet Union. Turning to the man who had acted as his control, Levin said: ‘Don’t you remember what I said, the day I asked to come across?’

‘Remind me,’ urged Proctor.

‘Insurance,’ said Levin. ‘I regarded it as my insurance, to ensure my acceptance by you.’

‘I think we’ve got a lot to talk about,’ said Myers. ‘That this has only been the start: the absolute start.’

The satisfaction flowed through Levin. He said: ‘I believe there is much to talk about, certainly.’

‘Enough for today,’ concluded Myers. ‘There is more than enough for us to think about.’

And check, guessed Levin.

The CIA committee remained in the room after the others left for the return flight to Connecticut, momentarily unspeaking. Then Myers said: ‘Well?’

‘Looks good enough to me,’ said Norris.

‘I’m not sure the presentation is properly disjointed,’ disputed the lawyer, whose early career had included courtroom cross examination.

‘What the hell’s that mean?’ demanded Myers, who’d found some difficulty curbing his language during the encounter with the Russian.

‘There were occasions when I thought he responded in a rehearsed manner.’

‘He would have rehearsed some responses, wouldn’t he?’ said Norris. ‘He knew what he was here for.’

‘He said he didn’t have a prepared statement,’ reminded the lawyer.

‘He would have anticipated some things… thought them through,’ insisted the Soviet expert.

‘We’ve obviously got to take it further,’ judged Myers. ‘It’s too soon to make an assessment one way or the other yet.’

‘What if he’s a plant?’ demanded Crookshank.

‘We’ve checked out Kapalet in Paris,’ said Norris. ‘We know he’s one hundred per cent and we got Shelenkov’s name from him, first.’

‘And through Kapalet we might still have some sort of link to Shelenkov,’ said Myers. ‘Levin would look pretty kosher if we managed to get confirmation of the courier system, wouldn’t he?’

‘ If we could get confirmation,’ agreed Crookshank reluctantly.

Alexandr Bogaty tapped and patted all the expert evidence assembled at the scene of Malik’s killing into an orderly pile and replaced it on the desk in front of him, nodding at what he’d spent three hours reading and digesting. He had not had any doubt, from his initial impression, but this was positive confirmation that once having been knocked down, the man had been intentionally run over a second time by the reversing vehicle. The medical evidence was the most positive, two separate points of impact, the first which had broken Malik’s back; the second when the car had come back and gone over the chest, crushing the chest wall. And the photographs were corroboration of what Bogaty had discerned that night: no brake marks which there should have been, just before the collision, but heavily bloodstained tyre impressions showing the reversing pattern. Bogaty looked to the specimen envelopes, separate from the reports. The paint scrapings – fawn – by themselves would have proved the vehicle to be a Lada saloon, but there was additional corroboration from the recovered headlamp glass, practically enough to recreate the entire light assembly.

Bogaty sighed, regretting it was all being taken away from him. How many garages would that arrogant prick of a KGB colonel have checked out, by now? He was surprised the demand had not come for the evidence that lay on the desk in front of him. Perhaps, reflected Bogaty, he was being infantile in withholding it until the request was made. But what the hell? They were arrogant. All of them. So they could wait.

The sigh of regret was more heartfelt the second time, as Bogaty stood to leave his office. Not straight home, he decided. A drink or two on the way, partially to numb himself against Lydia.