The First Billion (25 page)

Cate.

What the hell are you doing here?

31

General Kirov, some mail.”

Major General Leonid Kirov glanced up from his work to see Levchenko, the department’s newest probationer, advancing across his office, a small parcel wrapped in brown wax paper in one hand.

“From Belgium,” Levchenko announced. He was whey-faced and chubby, more boy than man, and he was wearing the kind of sharp blue Italian suit that passed for a uniform these days among rising members of the service.

“Belgium, eh?” Kirov covered the timetables, bus schedules, and flight itineraries he had been studying, then stood and accepted the package. “What could it be, then? Chocolate? Some Flemish lace?”

He, too, was wearing a blue suit, but its boxy cut, worn serge, and frayed sleeves identified it as a trophy of Soviet tailoring. Still, the creases were razor-sharp and the jacket spotless and wrinkle-free, the result of habit, discipline, and his grandmother’s three-kilo iron.

Turning the package over, he checked the franking. The postmark revealed it to have been mailed from Amsterdam the first of May, six weeks earlier. Amsterdam was, of course, in Holland, not Belgium, but he didn’t feel like burdening Levchenko with the information. The caliber of probationers being what it was, Kirov supposed he should be grateful the fool hadn’t thought Amsterdam in Africa.

“Sign here, General.”

As Leonid Kirov scribbled his signature on the clipboard, he could not help but feel bitter and shortchanged. Twenty years earlier, the nation’s top graduates had clamored to join the KGB. To say one worked for the
komitet
gave one a prestige no amount of money could buy. No more. Enterprise, not espionage, had become the career of choice among tomorrow’s leaders. Money was what mattered. The crème de la crème of Moscow University and its brethren was not impressed by a starting salary of $150 a month. Waiters at the Marriott Grand Hotel on Tverskaya Ulitsa earned more.

A last look at the deliveries prompted a sigh of disgust. Only two other names were listed on the delivery sheet. One was his own, dated two weeks earlier, signifying receipt of a reconditioned toner cartridge he’d purchased with his own money. Handing back the clipboard, he grunted his thanks. “You may go.”

Levchenko gave a flaccid salute and exited the office, slamming the door behind him. Instead of firing off a rebuke, Kirov merely sighed with disgust. Very soon all this would change. Men like Levchenko would be shown the door. Fresh toner cartridges would be found in every laser printer. The Service would cast off its dusty veils and reclaim its proud birthright. And in his new mood of cautious optimism, Leonid Kirov decided the Service wasn’t dead. It was just sleeping.

With a few crisp strokes, he gathered the paperwork for his upcoming trip, slipped it into his briefcase, then tucked the briefcase under his desk. Then he patted his breast pocket. The plane ticket was there. Sunday, 11 A.M. Novastar Flight 44. Moscow to Perm. A top-secret trip to the Arctic Circle.

Only then did Kirov’s eyes return to the glossy brown parcel.

“Lapis,”
he whispered. Finally!

Lapis was the work name of an agent he had inserted into Philips, the Dutch electronics behemoth, three years earlier. In early May, Lapis had called in a state of high excitement. He had managed to photograph documents relating to a new eavesdropping technology Philips was developing for the Dutch Intelligence Service. Within Philips, the project was graded “eyes only,” and its timely exploitation would allow his department to hack into the Dutch spy service’s mainframe and read its take as if it were their own. Six weeks later, the film had arrived. Kirov couldn’t help but shake his head. Gone were the days of the diplomatic pouch and emergency couriers. There was no cash in the budget for private jets or even economy-class tickets on KLM. As for commercial courier service, Federal Express had canceled its account two years back on grounds of nonpayment. These days, the Service sent and received its mail through the Russian post, like anyone else.

Six weeks!

A gentle shake of the package caused a small hard object to carom inside its folds. It was the film, no question. And despite his dismay, he felt a current of excitement rattle his bones. This was work, he told himself. This was the Service. Running an agent instead of worrying about copiers and toner cartridges.

Leonid Kirov had spent his entire career with the
komitet
. His postings had ranged from Brazil in the sixties to Hong Kong in the seventies, and finally to Washington, D.C., in the last tumultuous years of the regime. His specialty, then as now, was industrial espionage, and in his position as chief of FAPSI he oversaw all espionage measures implemented to advance the country’s scientific and technological capabilities.

Outside, a warm sun shone down on the white birch forest that surrounded the office complex. Kirov had always enjoyed the view, finding calm and serenity in the leafy environs. Unfortunately, he could no longer see many of the trees. Dirt an inch thick coated the windows. The window washers had left with Gorbachev. Closing the blinds, he stretched on tiptoes to turn on the electric fan. He would have preferred to open the window, but that was not an option. The “empire at Yasenevo,” as some of the intelligence service’s detractors called the twin office blocks situated on the outskirts of Moscow, had been constructed in the late 1970s, a prefabricated concrete jigsaw puzzle once a marvel of the Brezhnev era. Soon after its completion, the foundation had mysteriously settled, leaving Kirov’s tower “whiff skew,” warping the steel superstructure and rendering the windows impossible to open.

Kirov benignly dismissed the shortcomings. He would gladly trade the second-rate power unable to pay its own postage for the fiercesome Soviet State responsible for the frozen windows.

Opening the top drawer, he rummaged for a letter opener. The sound of the tape’s being ripped off the wax paper was like a scream in an abandoned church. He upended the package, and a neat black cartridge tumbled onto his desk. Pinching the cartridge between his fingers, he read the ASA number, and below it, written in Lapis’s neat script, the actual film speed used in taking the photographs. He scribbled both figures on the corner of the newspaper. Post-its, notepads, and unruled paper were rationed commodities. A moment later he was out of his office, attacking the hallway with the no-nonsense gait of a man half his age.

At seven o’clock on a Friday evening, the building was deserted. Spying had become a nine-to-five job. Walking through the fusty corridors was like touring a ghost town. Doors to many of the offices were open. A glance inside revealed chairs tipped forward onto desks, as per regulations, carpets rolled up, occupants long gone. Some had been let go. Most had fled to the private sector, modern-day defectors.

Four flights of stairs took him to the eighth floor and photo processing. Elevators were out of service over the weekend. Power was supplied by the department’s own generators, and the lifts consumed too much electricity. The chief was quick to point out that oil was priced for export and paid for in dollars.

Ah, oil, he mused. In the end, everything always comes back to oil.

He thought of the detailed model of the pump station locked in the old briefing room. He would permit himself a last look while the film was drying.

The lab was open and, like the rest of the building, unoccupied. Kirov flicked on the lights and set to work developing Lapis’s film. He was happy to find the necessary chemicals in abundant supply, less so to discover only two pieces of photo paper remaining. He would use one as a proof sheet, the second for any “gems” Lapis might have turned up. There was no use being upset, he decided, reminding himself that a year ago the lab had been out of paper for three months. This was simply the result of democratization—proof positive that unfettered capitalism had no place in modern Russia.

Over the past ten years, the KGB had withered like a rose starved of water. Thirty foreign residences had been closed, staff cut by 80 percent. Typically, a foreign residency could count on a minimum of sixteen officers. Officers were assigned a particular duty, a specific “line” to manage. The PR Line officer was responsible for political, economic, and military affairs. The KR Line officer oversaw counterintelligence. The Line X officer was in charge of collecting scientific intelligence. Other officers took care of signals intelligence, harassed Soviet émigrés in the area, and kept a watchful eye on the local Soviet colony. These days a foreign residency could count itself lucky to have two officers to fulfill all these functions.

Not only had the KGB shrunk, but it had been divided into four separate and self-governing entities. The SBP, or Presidential Security Service, handled the protection of the president. The Border Guards manned the frontiers. The FSB, or Federal Security Service, made up of branches of the
komitet
that had once repressed internal political dissent, dealt exclusively with domestic police matters. And the FIS, or Foreign Intelligence Service, carried on the job of the First Chief Directorate—namely, the gathering of intelligence designed to further Soviet foreign policy goals and the implementation of a broad range of “active measures,” such as disinformation, murder, and the support of international terrorism with the goal of destabilizing the country’s enemies.

Kirov could not say with any precision how large the KGB’s budget had been in its glory days. Twenty billion dollars? Thirty billion? Fifty? At its height, the KGB and its operatives had numbered in the millions. He knew, however, the size of the
komitet
’s current fiscal operating budget to the penny: $33 million. Less than the combined annual salaries of a Formula 1 race car driver and a top-flight American baseball player.

Kirov bit back a covetous smile. In a matter of hours, the figure would multiply thirtyfold.

It had been his idea.

A way to get the monkey off your back, he’d told Konstantin three months earlier. A way to be free of the state’s meddling. The writing was on the wall. The oligarchs were no longer to be tolerated. Look at Gusinsky and Berezovsky and all the others. Forced to trade their assets for their freedom. The favor of the state was capricious, he’d argued. It could be withdrawn as easily as it could be given.

Now it was Konstantin’s turn in the hot seat. Everyone knew he’d been stealing from Novastar. Thievery was the oligarchs’ acknowledged modus operandi. How long did he think he could keep Baranov at bay?

“What can I do?” Konstantin had asked over lunch at his lavish offices on the Novy Arbat on a squalid March day.

“Same as you’ve done before. Buy your way out.”

“Impossible. Baranov’s beyond reproach. Besides, I don’t have the money.”

“But you will.”

“You’re talking about Mercury?” Konstantin asked warily. “Impossible. The money’s spoken for. We’ve got to upgrade our systems, build out the infrastructure to handle our future customer load. Routers, switches, servers, firewalls. We’re almost there. I’m not the jackal you all think I am. Mercury’s for real.”

“Of course it is,” Leonid soothed. “No one doubts your ambitions or your skills. Selling a piece of your television network to Murdoch was a coup. They still speak of it at the office. Still, younger brother, the offering
is
for two billion dollars.”

“Two billion. Hardly buys you a laptop and a modem these days.”

“You’re exaggerating. Spend it the right way and two billion could buy you much, much more. You’ll have plenty of time to ‘upgrade Mercury’s infrastructure’ later. Right now, I’d be more worried about my freedom. Difficult to upgrade anything from Lefortovo. No DSL there.”

Konstantin’s hand began to shake. “Is there something you know? Something you’re not telling me?”

Leonid hesitated for precisely the right amount of time. “Of course not. I’m only talking common sense. You are not invulnerable. A contribution to our well-being—to our
rebirth,
if you will—could not be ignored.”

“And you can guarantee this?” Konstantin pushed away his plate and thrust his monk’s head across the table. “How?”

“The Service is not without friends. Some in very high places, I needn’t remind you.”

“How much?”

“Half.”

“Half?” Kirov uttered the word with utter contempt. “Half? You’re crazy. And you call me the greedy one.”

“The first billion is ours,” said Leonid, firmly, as if the decision had already been made. “The second is yours to use as you see fit. Who couldn’t call you a patriot?”

“And you could guarantee that my operations remain untouched?”

When Leonid nodded, Konstantin withdrew into himself, eyes glowering at everything and nothing, one hand folded on top of the other in a pose of practiced contemplation. Finally, his head rose and he fixed Leonid with his intense, steadfast gaze.

“It’s a deal,” he said. “The first billion is yours.”

Two keys existed to the briefing room. Kirov kept one. The other resided in a certain office in the Kremlin. Unlocking the door, he moved inside and turned on the lights. A halogen spot illuminated an angular white mountain atop a table in the center of the room. Kirov approached reverently, a pilgrim to his shrine. Slowly, with due respect, he removed the sheet, folded it, and laid it on a chair.

As always, the first sight took his breath away. The attention to detail was spectacular. The green and yellow decals with the BP logo; the small diamond-shaped warning signs reading “Danger: Flammable.” Every valve turned. The miniature doors really opened. The engineers had taken an industrial complex half a mile long and a quarter of a mile wide and shrunk it down so it fit inside a conference room. It was all there: the oil reservoirs—paint chipped, metal rusting; the power plant; the pump station; the dormitories and administration buildings.

Even the terrain was accurately reproduced, noted Kirov as he circled the table. The target rested on a wide, flat expanse of concrete in the midst of a verdant meadow. Drifts of snow ranged from five to fifty feet in height, depending on the time of year. They’d built a life-size mock-up of it in Severnaya, on the southern rim of the Arctic Circle.