The Twentieth Day of January

CHAPTER 9

MacKay walked from the Central Station and crossed the bridge over the canal and turned into Hendrik Kade. The warehouses and shops served the ships’ crews from the Oosterdok, and number 147 was at the side of the chandlery.

The narrow stairs led steeply upwards from the open door and the doors on the first two landings carried business names on typed postcards as if to emphasize their temporary occupation. Right at the top was a solid oak door whose brass-work shone, catching the colour from geraniums in a large clay pot. A small printed card said “M. van Aker—Painter.” He pressed the porcelain bell-push, and waited.

The girl who opened the door was unexpectedly pretty. She was wearing an oversize sweater and blue denims. She half-smiled as she looked at him, as if she were used to men being silenced by her looks. She spoke softly.

“Can I help you?”

“Miss van Aker?”

“Yes.”

“Could I talk to you for a few moments?”

She made to open the door wider, and then hesitated.

“What about?”

“You.”

She laughed softly and opened the door. The studio was large and bare, except for two easels and the paraphernalia of painting. There was a low divan with a wolfskin cover, and a dozen or so unframed paintings on the walls.

The girl stood, one hand on her hip, sipping coffee slowly as she looked at him over the cup.

“I don’t expect you remember me?”

She shook her head, smiling, as if she had heard that opening gambit before. He went on.

“I was in Paris in ’68. My girlfriend was Adèle de Velancourt.”

She put down the cup and folded her brown arms across her chest. A bad sign when you’re asking questions.

“How is Adèle? I saw a piece in Figaro about her. It seemed she was doing well.”

“Yes, she is doing well. Do you remember Andrew Dempsey?”

She laughed. “Show me a girl who didn’t remember him.”

She pointed to a wicker chair. “Do sit down. What’s your name?”

“James MacKay. I was taking French literature at the Sorbonne.”

She nodded but made no comment. She wasn’t refusing to talk but she wasn’t going to help him either. He looked at the questioning, hazel eyes and accepted the unspoken challenge.

“Can we talk about Viktor Kleppe?”

“I wondered what it was going to be. The answer’s no. We can’t.”

She stood up and brushed imaginary specks from her jeans. MacKay sat, and looked up at her face.

“It would be easier if we could talk here.”

“As an alternative to where?”

“The Central police station.”

“Don’t bluff, mister.”

“I’m not bluffing. Perhaps you’d like to phone Inspector van Rijk at Elandsgracht?”

She walked briskly to the telephone and asked the operator to connect her to police headquarters and when a voice said “Polizei-zentraal” she hung up, swinging round to look at him.

“You weren’t bluffing, were you?”

“No.”

“What’s it all about?”

“Are you a member of the Party?”

She sat down, slowly and carefully.

“No. I’m not a member of the Party.”

“But you’ve got connections?”

“Maybe.”

“I want to know why you help Kleppe.”

“I don’t help him. He just shacks up here when he comes on business to Amsterdam.”

“I mean the trips to the Hague for the diamonds.”

Her mouth opened to speak, the shock all too obvious on her face. She swallowed, and then spoke in a whisper.

“How did you find out?”

“Miss van Aker, I think it would be better if you just answered my questions.”

“And then you arrest me. I should see a lawyer.”

“You won’t be allowed any outside contacts until the inquiry is complete.”

“What do you want to know?”

“Why you helped him?”

“Is this to be used in court?”

“If you co-operate fully it’s unlikely to go to court.”

She sighed. “I’ve known Viktor for years. Way back I was a member of the Party. They told me to leave. That I could help more outside. I just passed messages and collected the packages from the Hague.”

“You knew the man who gave you the stuff was KGB?”

“I guessed. They didn’t tell me.”

“You knew that you were committing a serious crime under Dutch law?”

She sighed again. “I suppose so.”

“Did you know Kleppe was KGB?”

It was a shot in the dark and he saw her look towards the window to collect her scattered thoughts. He waited, tense and silent. Her head turned back to look at him.

“You can’t expect me to betray a friend.”

It was answer enough. Enough to let him extend the bluff.

“Where did the messages come from for Kleppe?”

“The embassy in the Hague.”

“What were they about?”

“Just dates for him to come over.”

“How did you pass them on?”

“I phoned him in New York.”

“Who paid you?”

“The Soviet Embassy.”

“How did they pay you. And how much?”

“They bought a painting every month. They paid six hundred guilders each time, in cash.”

“How did you meet Kleppe in the first place?”

“He had an apartment in Paris when I was there. I met him through the Party and eventually I moved into his place.”

“Are you fond of him?”

She shrugged. “I was in those days. I guess it’s just friendship now. He was very important too, in those days. He had a lot of influence.”

“What nationality did you think he was?”

“He had a United States passport.”

“That’s not the same thing, is it?”

“I guess not. I suppose I assumed he was a Russian.”

“Why?”

“The people who came to the apartment were mostly Russians from the embassy in Paris. He always talked Russian with them. At least I assumed it was Russian. And he seemed relaxed with them. They joked and laughed a lot.”

“What did you think his job was?”

“He was a diamond dealer in New York. I think he was very successful.”

“Do you remember when he got Dempsey out of jail?”

“Yes. Andy came back from Le Bourget with Viktor. He was terribly upset. We sat up all night with him, and Viktor calmed him down. He flew back to the States the next morning with Viktor.”

“Have you seen Dempsey since then?”

“No. Never.”

“Has Kleppe talked about him?”

“Not that I can remember.”

“Is there anything else you think you should tell me?”

She shook her head. “No. What will happen to me now?”

“I expect Inspector van Rijk will want to talk to you, but I don’t think they will bring any charges provided you will sign a statement.”

She looked relieved.

“I hope this doesn’t mean problems for Viktor.”

“He had the problems already, Miss van Aker.”

MacKay took a taxi to van Rijk’s office and from there he tried to contact Nolan. When he failed he asked for Morton Harper and gave him details of his interview as guardedly as he could. He asked for Langley’s help in expediting his travel to Oslo. The only civilian flight that day had already left. Harper told him to go straight to Schipol and he would be contacted there.

The airport manager was paging him on the Tannoy as he walked with his bag into the main terminal building. A Hawker Siddeley training Harrier had already landed from Brussels.

He walked out with the RAF Squadron Leader to the side-bay far from the civilian airliners. He sat in the rear seat of the cockpit, his head almost touching the canopy, as the pilot listened to the air-controller clearing a Sabena 747. Then they were cleared for the main runway and ten minutes later they were cleared for take off. He heard them cleared through to the military airfield at Stavanger.

The take off and the steep climb left him shocked, and even at 30,000 feet up the clouds had raced below the aggressive wings at a sickening speed. He held his breath as they tore through the sky; and for the first time in his life he realized what modern warfare was all about. He had seen all the NATO orders-of-battle and those of the Warsaw Pact, and those squadrons of supersonic planes and strategic nuclear weapons had just been numbers on computer printouts, but as the plane carved its trembling strength through the clouds the whole nightmare was suddenly real. The things he normally dealt with had their own element of lonely fear but in this plane, knifing its way across the North Sea he knew the difference between fear and terror. He couldn’t imagine this metal dart ever reducing its speed again so that it could land. He felt like an elderly aunt on the Big Dipper.

They screamed in from the sea to the airstrip on the coast at Stavanger. When he scrambled clumsily out of the aircraft there was the stench of hot metal, burnt oil, and burning rubber.

The vice-consul, a fellow Scot, was waiting for him at the airfield and drove him to a small hotel in the centre of the town. When they were alone in MacKay’s simple bedroom the vice-consul handed over the big brown envelope.

“That’s not the original, of course. But the original is held in the Record Office here and can be made available for inspection.”

“Is it possible to get a copy notarized officially?”

“Certainly. The Registrar can do that himself.”

MacKay’s head still rang from the flight. He waved to the whisky on the bamboo table.

“Would you pour while I read?”

“Of course.”

He tore open the envelope and looked at the large rectangle of photo paper. It was a birth certificate of Viktor Per Kleppe, born 18 May 1938. Father—Per Trygve Kleppe. Born 2 October 1891 at Egersund. Exporter of iodine and seaweed products. Mother —Kirstin Ragna Cappalen. Born 13 May 1917 at Flekkefjord. Housewife.

The second photostat was much smaller. It registered the death of Viktor Per Kleppe, born 18 May 1938. Died 12 January 1942. Cause of death, pneumonia. Medical Registrar, Andreas Vostervoll. Stavanger.

MacKay looked up at the vice-consul.

“Is there a grave? A tombstone?”

“Yes. I checked it personally, as Mr. Magnusson required.”

“Are the parents still alive?”

“Afraid not. The father was killed by the Germans. The mother died in 1950.”

“Can I see the tombstone myself ?”

St. Clair looked at his watch then looked up with pursed lips.

“It’s 10.30pm, old chap. It would mean me contacting the chief of police and the parson at the church.”

“I’m sorry to trouble you but I think we’ll have to do that. Could I possibly have a photograph too?”

“I’ll see what the police can do. You stay on here. I’ll use the manager’s office. Give you some peace.”

It was just after midnight when they stood outside the tall wrought-iron gates of the church. The parson opened them wide, and with his torch swinging ahead of them, led them through the churchyard like an usherette at a cinema.

The three graves were side by side under an elm tree. MacKay bent down and flashed the torch at the tombstones one after the other. As he straightened up he realized that some KGB man must have done that twenty years earlier, so that they could apply for a genuine Norwegian passport. It was all too easy. A passport application with a photostat of a genuine birth certificate of somebody who was dead. And who had died at an age that meant it was unlikely that a passport had ever been applied for. In no country did they take the simple precaution of relating a death certificate to its relevant birth certificate.

An understandably crotchety Registrar was roused from his bed at one am to notarize the photocopies of the birth and death certificates. His curiosity held under control only because of the pressure of the police chief, he waved the papers to speed the drying of the official black ink and handed both documents to MacKay. The vice-consul paid the fee in cash.

At police headquarters MacKay waited for his call to Nolan to come through. It was a public line and insecure, but his news was too urgent to wait for the more secure facilities which could only have been provided in Oslo. He finally got the connection on a line that crackled with static, and surged from loudness to almost complete inaudibility.

“Can you read me, Nolan?”

“Yes, but it’s very faint.”

“Kleppe’s not Norwegian by birth. The passport was applied for with false documents.”

“False what?”

“Documents.”

“Have you got proof?”

“Yes. Notarized documents.”

“Anything else?”

“He’s almost certainly Russian.”

“Any proof ?”

“Only circumstantial. Enough to build on.”

“When do you come back?”

“Depends on transport. And I need to sleep.”

“Need to what?”

“Sleep.”

“Who can I liaise with on transport?”

“British vice-consul, Mr. St. Clair.”

“OK. Hit the sack. I’ll arrange the transport.”

“Cheers.”

“What?”

“Good-bye.”

“Bye.”

They let him sleep until noon, and St. Clair drove him to the airfield. A venerable Trident awaited him, and his travel papers showed that they would land at Glasgow, and he would there transfer to the PanAm plane to New York.

They landed to re-fuel at Goose Bay and there was a message for him. A room had been booked for him at the Barclay where friends would be waiting for him. He stuffed the paper in his pocket, pulled the blanket over his head and went back to sleep.

At Kennedy, one of Nolan’s men was waiting for him and took him straight through immigration without any formalities. The CIA agent was not the talkative type and MacKay sat hunched up in the back seat looking out of the car windows. It was mid-evening and the traffic was heavy as they crossed the bridge, and heavier still as they crawled up Lexington. The driver dropped him under cover at the Waldorf and he took his bag and crossed the road. There was a message from Nolan to go up to his suite.

When he knocked, Nolan answered the door, holding the telephone body in one hand and the receiver crooked on his shoulder. He was talking still, as he pushed the door to with his foot and nodded MacKay to a chair. When Nolan had finished he walked over to sit down opposite MacKay. Without speaking, MacKay handed over the envelope, and Nolan opened it carefully and studied the documents. He looked up at MacKay.

“This is the real nail, Jim. We can pull him any time on this. Excuse me a moment, I must phone immigration.”

Nolan gave the number and details of Kleppe’s passport, and put a stop on its use at all ports and airports. He looked again at the documents as he came back and sat down.

“This is the first piece of evidence we have that would stand up in court. Magnificent.”

“What have you got?”

“Look. Harper wants you to make out your report before I fill you in. He thinks they will have more force if they are done independently. There’s a secretary in the next room if you’d like to dictate it. Do it as it comes, and she’ll do a draft, and then you can hack it around. Is that OK?”

“Sure.”

“Have you eaten?”

“Too much already. It’s early morning down in my guts.”

Nolan laughed, and walked with him to the next room, introduced him to the secretary, and left him.

It was midnight New York time when MacKay signed his final version, the notarized documents stapled to the four typewritten sheets.

Nolan filled him in on the events of the past few days and when he had finished MacKay sat silently for several minutes. Then he leaned back.

“You’ve got Oakes and Haig as sources who could possibly confirm Siwecki’s statement.”

“True, but Harper’s put a block on any further action until he’s taken advice.”

“From whom?”

“From Chief Justice Elliot and Speaker Bethel. You and I are flying to Washington tomorrow, and both of us are seeing Harper. Then all of us are meeting Elliot and Bethel.”

“Won’t they raise hell at me being there?”

“Harper says he’s not going to sweep anything under the carpet. If he did and it came out later, some crafty bastard could pull it apart as a ploy by London. Harper’s view is that it’s too serious to play games.”

“I think he’s right, but when you want me off the lot you just say so.”

“Don’t worry, friend. We will.” He walked over to the TV and turned it on. “I think there’s going to be some sort of statement from Powell.”

The picture came up, and slowly the colour built up.

There were at least forty reporters at the foot of the aircraft steps. TV crews, and the usual foliage of microphones. Powell stood there with his coat collar turned up and the wind tugging at his hair, smiling, as Newman, who was acting as Press Secretary, made one of the crews shift lights so that the handsome face would lose its gauntness. He looked even younger than Kennedy had looked. He was forty in two weeks’ time. It was a crisp, cold night, and there was a fan-heater working from a generator to ease the cold of Powell’s feet. He craned forward to catch the first question.

“I’m sorry I can’t hear you, Mr. Francis.”

“Have you any comment to make on the statement issued today from Bonn regarding US troops in Europe?”

“Yes. I think that the Federal German Chancellor is saying to the American people—remember your commitments in Europe.”

“And what’s your answer, sir?”

“Our commitments remain, but the form of our demonstration of that commitment will not necessarily, in future, be represented by American forces in Europe. They could be sent there when, and if, they are needed.”

There was a moment’s silence, and then a clamour of voices. Powell nodded at a girl reporter in a white fur hat.

“There have been recent comments from the Pentagon indicating that without US troops in Europe, Soviet forces would be at the English Channel in a couple of days. Have you any comment?”

Powell smiled. “Not unless they’re all driving Ferraris. Europe’s a big area, ma’am.”

“Could I have a serious answer, Mr. Powell?”

“Yes, of course. My administration are already preparing an agenda for talks with the Soviet leaders. They are spending billions of roubles on missiles and weapons. We are spending billions of dollars doing the same. There comes a point when this madness has to stop.” He paused. “So far as I am concerned it stops on January twenty.”

“Did you discuss the effect on Californian unemployment of a cut-back in the arms programme while you were in Los Angeles?”

“I certainly did, and I made clear that my administration will give the highest priority to providing alternative work to all those areas of the country affected by these changes.”

“What do you expect the Soviet reaction to be, sir?”

“I guess they’ll start making more freezers and colour TVs.”

“There has been talk of a possible trade and peace pact with the Soviets. What would you say to that?”

“I like trade, Mr. O’Dell, and I like peace. That’s what I’d say.”

“But what would be your first action in response?”

Powell looked down at his feet and stamped them before he looked up. “I guess my first action would be to break open a bottle of champagne.” He looked around. “And now, ladies and gentlemen, I must go. I don’t want to read in the headlines tomorrow that the President-Elect admits that he’s got cold feet.”

There was a ripple of laughter and a barrage of flashes, and Powell turned to walk to the car.

Dempsey walked a few paces behind him. He never ceased to wonder how a man could go from being a diffident candidate for State Governor to an apparently confident President-Elect in the space of a few years. Maybe what they said was true; any man could be President of the United States. Powell reminded him of those old cartoon characters who walked off the edge of the cliff and didn’t fall until they looked down. They just went on walking.

Nolan turned, grim-faced, to MacKay.

“Well, that’s it. That’s the start, and he’s not even in the saddle yet. Thank God he’s said it tonight. Elliot and Bethel ain’t gonna miss the point of that little piece.”

“What do you think the press will make of it?”

“In tomorrow’s headlines they’ll be shit-scared. After they’ve phoned around the grass-roots tomorrow they’ll report widespread popular support. And if Moscow makes a tiny gesture to support him he’s home and dry.”

“They’ll make a gesture, there’s no doubt about that.”

Nolan nodded slowly. “You know we could already be too late.”

“Why?”

“Just look at the scenario. Years of phoney détente. The new President makes the big peace gesture. The Soviets appear to respond. What happens next? Some militant group in CIA, us, say that the President is a traitor. For co-operating with the Soviets. Is that treason, for Christ’s sake? And what if we do nail everything down and the President is impeached and gets thrown out? We go back to the cold war, for God’s sake. Big deal. The public will love that. No wonder Harper wants to play this cool. Jesus, what a can of worms.”

MacKay looked across at the American. He realized that it must be traumatic for a man like Nolan to contemplate what had happened already, let alone what was still to happen.

The American’s stocky body and his open face were made for certainties, and the almost old-fashioned crew-cut with its sprinkling of grey hairs represented experience in a familiar set of political and intelligence parameters, not with this European fantasy of deliberate deviousness. The Americans were used to punch and counter-punch, not this cobweb attack that used the very basis of democracy as the means of its enslavement.

He looked at Nolan as he spoke. “Whatever happens, Pete, the Soviets have lost the ball-game.”

“I’m not so sure, Jimmy. If we have to go all the way and expose the bastard, it’s going to have an effect like the Kennedy assassination and Watergate combined. In spades.” Nolan shook his head. “I can’t explain it, but this thing is different from anything the Soviets have ever tried. It’s kind of sick, in a special sort of way. It makes the Constitution itself look childish and pathetic. The reaction against the Soviets will make Joe McCarthy look like Snow White. It won’t be a cold war. It’ll be a new ice age.”

There was a long silence and then MacKay said softly, “There is an alternative.”

Nolan looked at him intently. “Don’t think I haven’t thought of it, fella. I have.”

“And?”

“Jesus. Who gives the order? And what effect would another assassination have on the public?”

“There are more ways of killing a man than a .45 slug.”

Nolan stood up, shaking his head. Not in disagreement but as if to rid his mind of the problem.

“This is other people’s problem, not ours. Thank God.”

The next day the Washington Post carried a lengthy piece about Powell’s Cabinet-selection interviews, and speculated on the likely recipients of the main offices. It concluded with a quote from Powell himself.

“There will assuredly be substantial cuts in the Defence budget. For too long the United States has been expected to act as fireman for every bush-fire in the world. We have our own bush-fires of inflation and unemployment. There must be adjustments, a sharing of the burden by our friends in Europe, the Middle East, and elsewhere. Let us send abroad the products of our great technology, of our farms, and of our research, not our young men.”

When asked if this meant withdrawing troops from overseas bases the President-Elect had replied, “All options are under consideration.”

The Washington Post editorialized uncertainly.

“All the signs in Washington indicate that the President-Elect intends carrying out many of the major features of his election platform without delay, and many commentators have noted that he will not need the support of the finely balanced Congress to implement these changes, as many of them do not require new legislation. Comment from Europe has been muted but there is little doubt that in London, Bonn and Paris the situation is being watched with intense interest.”