The Falstaff Enigma (27 page)

"Good."

“… I will inform you when we have taken care of all our problems.”

The voice was electronic but still retained the strong vocal ch
aracteristics of Leonid Sorovin. The miracle of this electronic wizardry was not lost on Robert Austin.

They had found Sorovin's hideout easily from the phone number Svetlana had dialed. It brought them to a working class neighborhood just outside Moscow. The area was composed of identical apartment projects built in the
1950s on the ashes of what had been a giant tractor factory destroyed by a German incendiary raid in 1942 – but not until after all of the factory’s machines had been shipped east to the Ural mountains. The killer's safe house was directly in the center of the project, protected by a mass of symmetrical targets.

Yet the killer's unit was asymmetrical. It had a steel door and no windows. It was not an apartment in any real sense of the word. No family could survive in this blockhouse. It had been modified for war, for a private war that Sorovin would now wage against an equally skilled professional.

The most recent battle in this private war had been won only an hour earlier when Borskov entered the basement of the building with a young man whom Austin had not seen before. The man wore the uniform of a State electronics repairman, but he and the colonel obviously had done business before.

The young man found the water pipes emanating from the ancient water heating boilers that must have been salvaged from some old building somewhere in Moscow. Then, to Austin's surprise, the man turned off the cold water. Working quickly, he clamped a valve device to the copper pipe. The clamp encircled the pipe and the man turn
ed a knob that tightened the valve onto the pipe, forcing a hardened steel probe to insert into the copper pipe. When he was done, that new valve looked something like a straight horizontal faucet.

"What’s he doing?" Austin
had asked Borskov.

"It will be
apparent in a minute," Borskov had replied. He had spoken very few words since the discovery of the true magnitude of his wife's betrayal. Now his rage was focused on one target.

The young man reached into his bag and pulled out a coiled tube that resembled a plumber's snake, only much thinner in diameter. He inserted the flexible tube into the pipe via the newly attached valve and turned on the water again. He then pulled out a small tape recorder. Austin began to understand.

The man put on a set of headphones and plugged them into the tape machine. He began inserting the thin tubing into the pipe, inching it upward to the second floor blockhouse unit of Leonid Sorovin.

The man paused and listened several times, in all taking sixteen minutes to find his desired spot.

The listening device worked remarkably well. Now Austin could hear most of what was said in the living room despite a radio playing in the background. The young man had placed it perfectly so that it worked best when Sorovin was on the phone. The analyst could make out every word of the assassin's conversation with the marshal, except that all he heard was a monologue.

"He's going to try to kill you," stated the analyst as quiet fell inside the blockhouse.

“I’m not surprised, since we killed Savitsky. He probably thinks we are about to kill another one of his men. Nikolai will be here soon and then we will go to our new safe house and discuss the near future.”

The relative cold of the past two weeks had finally given way to the rare onslaught of warm Mediterranean winds. The temperature had risen into that range in which young and old alike pull picnic baskets out of their deep closet recesses and head for the banks of the Moskva River, turning Gorky Park into the city's social center.

It was almost noon as Borskov made his way through streets unfamiliar to Austin. The analyst scanned his eyes from one side of the street to the other and noticed hordes of office workers milling on each corner. Most were eating some type of lunch, many were engaged in conversations or street-side chess matches. Occasionally an upturned vodka bottle could be spotted, quickly disappearing into a folded newspaper.

"They are enjoying the weather," said the KGB colonel as he negotiated his way around a stopped bus. "There aren't many days this nice in Moscow."

"Doesn't anybody work around here?" replied Austin mechanically, not thinking about the words he chose.

"People have worked hard for the revolution we have achieved. They have earned some time off to enjoy what they have.”

Austin reacted with a muted laugh. "You sound like a Party schoolboy regurgitating classroom propaganda."

"You seem to forget that I am a loyal communist who is sworn to fight your system."

"Is that an oath taken from conscience or from a yearning for power?"

"You speak with an ease that comes from ignorance. You do not understand what this nation has gone through, what price we have paid. How can you understand the horrors of Tsarist Russia or the loss of twenty million
souls in World War II?"

"Or the execution of millions under Stalin's pogroms? Or the disappearance of how many more into the Gulags?
"

"I dispute your figure of millions, but I will say that Stalin only dealt with those who conspired to restore the imperial dynasty."

"’Dealt with' is a remarkably soft euphemism. The fact is that Stalin killed anyone who remotely threatened him, from imperialists to Jews to gypsies to almost his entire officer corps, and if you don't admit that then you are the one being very naïve." Austin felt warm and noticed for the first time that their car had no air conditioning. He opened his window a little wider.

"Naïve! You call me that when you come from a country where millions live in slums and blacks are oppressed while a few live off the sweat of the many?"

"Have you been to the United States, Colonel?"

"No." Borskov's voice was a little softer.

"Well then, let me tell you in all honesty that the average American has a standard of living that is at least thirty years ahead of the average Soviet citizen. As for oppression and prejudice, look to your own country's treatment of the majority of the population who aren't white Russians.

"Why don’t you admit the true oppression in your own country?" Austin
continued, losing some of the control that was his trademark. "In your country the entire population is deprived of the most basic freedoms that are taken for granted in the West and are unable to pursue their aspirations so that a minute number of  people can enjoy virtually unlimited power. What is the difference between your system now and Medieval Europe?"

"That's ridiculous. First let me say that we are in a transition from an old obsolete order to a new system based on equality and fairness for every person. You speak of your freedoms but where have they gotten you? Yes, we control the news media in this country, but it is necessary to maintain our revolution and keep it free from capitalist propaganda."

"It is necessary because your system cannot stand up against the light of truth. Your people choose the only alternative ever presented, which means they have no choice. In the West, people can hear all sides and they routinely reject communism. The freedoms we enjoy are the foundation of our strength."

Austin suddenly stopped, realizing that he was in a futile argument. How can one argue against someone who has been programmed over a lifetime and has never heard any words of dissent? How can there be any hope of change in a society like the Soviet Union?

Borskov spoke, his words echoing Austin's thoughts. "This is a useless exercise. I know that you will not come to my viewpoint and you cannot expect me to go to yours." The colonel paused long enough to loosen his polyester tie and lift his chin to pull the weighty flesh of his neck out from under his collar. "I respect your position, my friend.” He paused to think about his next words. “I can only add that what you say has not escaped my thoughts nor those of most of my colleagues. I think we all look forward to the day when we will have freedom of speech in this country, but I also think that you could not possibly understand why it is necessary to take the actions we do unless you have lived here all your life."

It was a rare moment of honesty for a man who lived a constant deception and Austin appreciated the trust that had to be present for Borskov to admit such thoughts. The analyst had gained an admiration for this man, one b
ased equally on pity and respect. He saw a man who held an unattainable dream yet had to endlessly justify actions which conflicted with that dream in a country where the building blocks of logic had long been turned upside down.

"I understand," was all Austin could think to say. Any other words would have taken him into the realm of pity, which was something the KGB officer did not deserve.

The two men continued another kilometer before Borskov turned the car down a small service alley. Two cats bolted across the pavement and disappeared behind a trash bin to escape the sudden invasion into their microscopic world. The colonel stopped the car right after passing the bin and stepped out with the engine running. His weight seemed all the greater a burden to him in the afternoon heat. Austin thought the temperature was perfect but realized that it must seem hot to a Muscovite.

On each side of the alley were four-story apartment buildings, not unlike t
he projects they had just left. Borskov pulled open a small garage door – way too small for an American sized sedan – and was soon inside the car again. He pulled into the garage and turned off the engine.

"This is our safe house for the remainder of this little episode," said Borskov, still short of breath from his door opening excursion. "Will you close the door, please?"

The flat was directly above the garage and had a hole in one closet floor that had a wooden ladder down to the garage. The only other door was made of thick oak that was significantly out of place in this part of Moscow. There were only two real rooms, a kitchen/dining room and a bedroom with four bunk beds and a cot folded in the corner. The furniture was sparse, only two wooden bridge tables and about eight old wooden chairs. In one corner of the bedroom was an ancient toilet. Austin thought of Kemp's run-down apartment in Ankara.

"The toilet was added so people don't always have to go down the hall But if you want a shower then you have to go to the restroom on the third floor, which is the only shower in the building," said the colonel as he scanned the apartment with his bug-detecting device. Once he was finished, he walked into the bedroom and turned on a radio. It sat under the only window, which had tape on each pane of glass to make it less sensitive to sound vibrations. "I pay for this place with my own salary so that no one in the KGB knows of its existence, with the exception of Nikolai." Austin remembered what Kemp had told him about his Ankara safe house and the fact that he made sure no one in the CIA knew about it. He began to think that this was just one of the unpublished rules of the game. “If I ever get caught, I'll just say I used it to entertain lady friends. A man in my position is expected to do such things,” continued Borskov with a smile.

A knock on the door. Austin jumped and involuntarily headed for the closet with the passageway to the garage. Borskov motioned for him to be still and pulled out his automatic pistol.

The knock was repeated. Borskov moved to the wall next to the door.

"It's Mikhail Kutuzov here," came the muffled voice of David Margolis from the hallway.

The colonel recognized the voice instantly and unlocked the door. Margolis walked in with two plastic bags full of groceries.

"Well hello, gentlemen," said the Mossad agent, slightly amused at his reception but still apprehensive about how Borskov would treat him.

Greetings were quickly exchanged. Borskov made it clear that he was holding no grudges against the Israeli. All three men seemed relieved to have the tension lifted.

After recounting what had been heard at Sorovin's flat, the men sat down around one of the card tables to discuss what they would do next. David pulled a bottle of Coke out of one bag and handed it to Austin. He then began to heat some water for tea for the colonel and himself.

“Coke in Moscow?” exclaimed Austin as he sipped on the warm soda.

David smiled as he turned around from the stove top. “The Russians may be Communists, but that doesn’t mean they are crazy.” David returned to the table and sat down, his mind back to the issues at hand.

"So Sorovin apparently calls his boss on a regular basis and we know he plans to kill someone called 'blue-five' within three days by way of a flying accident and he wants to kill you,” summed up David as he looked at Borskov. "That doesn't give us a whole lot to go on. What about tracing his next call to his boss?"

"Impossible,” Borskov replied. "Any attempt to tap into his line would be immediately picked up by him. Anyway, I doubt that we could learn anything since it is easy for him to use indirect dialing that would be untraceable, as well as a scrambler that would make whatever we picked up unintelligible. I do not have ready access to code breaking computers."

"Then that leaves us with Leonid Sorovin," David
continued. "Why not grab him and go to the Politburo?"