The Company: A Novel of the CIA (45 page)

BUDAPEST, TUESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 1956

HANGING FROM A MEAT HOOK EMBEDDED IN THE WALL OF THE refrigerator room, his limbs numb from the cold, Ebby sank into a sleep so shallow he found himself drifting into or out of it with the twitch of an eye. When the lockset on the outside of the door was cranked open, he was wide awake and straining to make out the footfalls of his jailers before they entered the room. He was glad they were finally coming for him; between beatings, he would at least be thawed out by the spotlights in the interrogation chamber. One of the guards grabbed him around the waist and lifted his body while the other, standing on a crate, detached his jacket and shirt from the hook. With his bare feet planted on the icy floor tiles, Ebby raised his elbows so they could grasp him under the armpits and drag him off for another round of questioning. Curiously, the two guards who held him erect did so with unaccustomed gentleness, and Ebby understood that something had changed. The guards steered him, at a pace he set, out of the frigid room and down the corridor to an elevator, which sped him to an upper floor. There he was taken along a carpeted corridor to a heated room with a wooden bed with sheets and a pillow and blankets. Even more astonishingly, the room was equipped with a shaded table lamp that could presumably be switched off at night. There was a flush toilet and a small bathtub at one end, and a window with a slatted shutter on the outside through which Ebby could make out the sounds of traffic.

The honking of a horn in the street below seemed like music to his ears. A short matronly woman with coarse gray hair and a stethoscope dangling from her neck rapped her knuckles against the open door and walked in. Smiling impersonally at Ebby, she began examining him. She listened to his heart and wedged a thermometer under his tongue and (obviously accustomed to dealing with prisoners being questioned by the AVH) checked to see if any of his bruised ribs were broken. Then she set about massaging his limbs to restore circulation to them. Before she departed, she disinfected the welts on his chest and spread a salve on his swollen lid and set out on the table a glass of water and two pills, telling him in sign language that he was to take them before going to sleep. Another woman appeared with clean clothing and a tray of food—there was a bowl of clear broth, a slice of bread, a plate of goulash, even a piece of candy wrapped in cellophane. Ebby drank off the broth, which soothed his raw throat, and managed to get down a little of the goulash. Before stretching out on the bed, he hobbled over to the window and stared at the street through the slats. Judging from the fading light he reckoned it was the end of the afternoon. There weren't many automobiles, but the street was packed with young people calling back and forth to each other as they hurried along in one direction. An open truck filled with students shouting what sounded like slogans and holding aloft large Hungarian flags sped past in the same direction.

Steadying himself on the back of a chair piled high with the clean clothing, switching off the light as he passed the table, Ebby made his way back to the bed. Stripping to the skin, dropping his filthy clothes onto the floor, he slid under the sheets and slowly stretched out his aching limbs as he concentrated, once again, on composing pertinent questions.

Why had the AVH started treating him with kid gloves?

He could assume the State Department people at the Gellert had alerted the embassy when he didn't return to the hotel; that the Company chief of station at the embassy had set off alarm bells in Washington. Would the Company have dared to broach the subject of its missing agent with the KGB? He knew there was an unspoken compact between the two intelligence services; there were exceptions, of course, but normally neither side went around shooting the other's people. Had the AVH—an organization with a reputation for brutality—been operating behind the back of the KGB to root out local troublemakers? Had the KGB read the riot act to the AVH? Was he being fattened up for the kill or would he eventually be traded for one of the KGB's officers who had fallen into American hands? )

And what about the mob of youngsters flowing through the street under his window? Were they hurrying to a soccer match or a Communist rally?

If it was a communist rally, how could he explain the bewildering detail that had hit his eye: the Communist coat-of-arms—the hammer and the sheath of wheat at the center of the white-green-and-red Hungarian flag—had been from the banners held aloft by the students riding in the truck.

In the early hours of the next morning there was a soft knock on Jack's door. A moment later the table lamp flickered on. Ebby struggled into a sitting position and pulled the blanket up to his unshaven chin. A dwarf-like man—Ebby guessed he couldn't be more than five feet tall— who wore a goatee and mustache and dark rimmed eyeglasses on his round face, scraped over a chair. When he sat down his feet barely reached the floor. He snapped open a tin case and offered Ebby a cigarette. When he declined, the visitor selected one for himself, tapped the tobacco down, and thrust it between extraordinarily thick lips. He lit the cigarette and sucked in a lungful of smoke and turned his head away and exhaled. "For purposes of this conversation," he said, turning back, speaking English with what Ebby took to be a Russian accent, "you may call me Vasily. Let me begin by expressing my regret at the—what shall I call it?—the zeal with which some of my Hungarian colleagues questioned you. Still, one has to see their side. Insurrection is brewing in Budapest and across the country. It is understandable that my very nervous Hungarian colleagues would want to quickly learn what instructions you brought to the revolutionist A. Zeik, if only to better anticipate the direction he would be likely to lead the masses. You handled yourself with distinction, Mr. Ebbitt. Although we are adversaries, you and I, I offer you—for what it is worth—my esteem." The Russian cleared his throat in embarrassment. "The English national who was taken into custody the same night as you was not able to withstand the persuasive interrogation techniques of the AVH. So we now know the contents of the message you delivered to A. Zeik."

"I saw the persuasive techniques of the AVH through a window," Ebby noted caustically.

Mr. Ebbitt, your clients—your Germans, as opposed to ours—have used similar or even harsher interrogation techniques to persuade captured agents to divulge their small secrets. You are an experienced intelligence officer. Surely we can agree not to quibble over methods of interrogation."

"Is the woman still alive?"

The Russian sucked pensively on his cigarette. "She is alive and continues to be interrogated," he said finally. "My Hungarian colleagues are hoping with her help, to be able to put their hands on A. Zeik before—"

From somewhere in the city came the crackle of rifle fire; it sounded like firecrackers popping on the Chinese New Year. The Russian laughed benignly. "Before the situation deteriorates into outright conflict, though it appears we are too late. I can tell you that there is unrest in the city. A. Zeik is reported to have read out revolutionary poems to a crowd of students assembled the statue of the Hungarian poet Petofi earlier in the day. Perhaps you heard the rabble of students heading in the direction of the Erzsebet Bridge; the Petofi statue—"

There was a burst of automatic weapon fire from a nearby intersection. Under Ebby's window a car with a loudspeaker on its roof broadcast the national anthem as it sped through the streets. And it suddenly dawned on Ebby why the hammer and sheath of wheat had been cut out from the center of the national flag: the students were in open revolt against Communist rule in Hungary!

"That's not what I'd call unrest, Vasily. There's a revolution under way out there."

A young Hungarian wearing a wrinkled AVH uniform appeared at door and breathlessly reported something in a kind of pidgin Russia. Grinding out the cigarette under his heel, Vasily went over to the wind and, standing on his toes, looked down between the slats of the shutter. He clearly didn't like what he saw.

"Dress quickly, if you please," he ordered. "A mob of students is preparing to assault the building. We will leave by a back entrance."

Ebby threw on clean clothing and, moving stiffly, followed the Russia down four flights of steel steps to a sub-basement garage. The Hungarian who had alerted Vasily moments before, a bony young man with a nervous tic to his eyelids, was hunched behind the wheel of a shiny black Zil limousine, its motor purring. A second Hungarian, a beefy AVH officer with the bars of a captain on his shoulder boards and a machine pistol slung under one arm, slid into the passenger seat. Vasily motioned Ebby into the back of the car and scrambled in beside him. Throwing the car into gear, the driver inched the Zil up a ramp toward the metal door slowly sliding back overhead. When the opening was clear, the driver came down hard on the gas pedal and the Zil leapt out of the garage onto a darkened and deserted side street. At the first intersection he spun the wheel to the right, skidding the Zil on two wheels around the corner. The headlights fell on a mob young people marching toward them with raised banners and placards. Vasily barked an order. The driver jammed on the brakes, then threw the Zil into reverse and started backing up. In the headlights, a young man armed with a rifle could be seen sprinting forward. He dropped to one knee and fired. The right front tire burst and the Zil, pitching wildly from the bullet, slammed back into a lamppost. The AVH officer in the passenger seat flung open his door and, crouching behind it, fired off a clip at the rioters racing toward them. Several figures crumpled to the ground. There was a howl of outrage from the students as they engulfed the Zil. The AVH officer tried desperately to cram another clip into the machine pistol but was downed by two quick rifle shots. The doors of the car were wrenched open and dozens of hands pulled the occupants into the street. The driver, Vasily nd Ebby were dragged across the gutter to a brick wall and thrown against it. Behind him, Ebby could hear rifle bolts driving bullets home. Raising his hands in front of his eyes to shield them from the bullets, he cried into the night, "I am an American. I was their prisoner."

A voice yelled something in Hungarian. In the faint light coming from the street lamps that hadn't been shot out, Ebby could make out the mob parting to let someone through.

And then Arpad Zeik appeared out of the darkness. He was wearing a black leather jacket and a black beret and black leggings, and carried a rifle in his hand. He recognized Ebby and shouted an order. A young man holding a wine bottle with a cloth wick sticking from its throat darted forward and pulled Ebby away from the two Russians. Behind him, the young AVH driver sank onto his knees and started pleading in disjointed phrases for his life. The dwarf-like Vasily, smiling ironically, calmly pulled the cigarette case from the pocket of his jacket and snapped a cigarette between his lips. He struck a match and held the flame to the end of the cigarette but didn't live long enough to light it.

A line of students, formed into an impromptu firing squad, cut down the two men with a ragged volley of rifle fire.

Arpad came up to Ebby. "Elizabet—do you know where she is?" he asked breathlessly. The question came across as half plea, half prayer.

Ebby said he had caught a glimpse of her in prison. He explained that there was an entrance to the sub-basement garage under the prison on a nearby side street. Brandishing the rifle over his head, Arpad shouted for the students to follow him and, gripping Ebby under an arm, headed for the AVH prison. As they approached the garage, they could hear the demonstrators massed around the corner in front of the main entrance chanting slogans as they tried to break through a steel fence. The student who had relieved the machine pistol from the dead AVH officer in the car stepped forward and shot out the lock on the garage door. Eager hands tugged at the metal door and pushed it open overhead. From inside the garage a pistol shot rang out. A girl with long dark hair plaited with strands of colorful ribbon turned to stare with lifeless eyes at Ebby and then collapsed at his feet. The students spilled down the ramp into pitch darkness. Ebby tried to keep up with Arpad but lost him in the melee. Shots reverberated through garage. A Molotov cocktail detonated under a car and the gas tank caught fire and exploded. Flames licked at the concrete ceiling. In the shimmering light, Ebby saw some students herding half a dozen men in disheveled AVH uniforms against a wall. The students stepped back and formed a rough line and Arpad shouted an order. The whine of rifle shots echoed through the garage. The AVH men cowering against each other melted into a heap on the floor.

With Arpad leading the way and Ebby at his heels, the students flooded up the steel staircase and spread out through the building, cutting down any AVH men they discovered, opening cells and liberating prisoners. In a basement toilet, the insurrectionists discovered three AVH women, including the one who looked like a sumo wrestler, hiding in stalls; they pulled them out and forced them into urinals and finished them off with pistol shots through the necks. Ebby pulled Arpad through a heavy double door that separated the administrative offices from the cells. Finding himself in a corridor that seemed familiar, he started throwing bolts and hauling open doors. Behind one door he recognized his own cell with the plank bed and the window high in the wall. At another room he spun a chrome wheel to retract the lockset and swung open a thick door and felt the chill from the refrigerated chamber.

Against one wall, Elizabet was dangling from a meat hook spiked through the collar of a torn shirt, her bare legs twitching in a macabre dance step. Her mouth opened and her lips formed words but the rasps that emerged from the back of her throat were not human. Arpad and Ebby lifted her free of the meat hook and carried her from the room and laid her on the floor. Arpad found a filthy blanket in a corner and drew it over her to hide her nakedness.

Two young men—one Ebby recognized as Matyas, the angry student who had been at the meeting in the Buda safe house—appeared at the ene of the hall, prodding ahead of them the woman doctor with coarse grey hair and an older man with the gold bars of a colonel general on the shoulder boards of his AVH uniform. One of his arms hung limply fr0m his shoulder and he was bleeding from the nose. Ebby told Arpad, "She is a doctor."