by Jack Higgins
The man at the microphone said, “I know I can be bad, but this is ridiculous.”
Levin called, “Max, you’re looking good. How about the piano? ‘A Foggy Day in London Town.’ You know how I love all those old numbers. Let’s all cheer for Fred Astaire. The Yanks are our friends now.”
He sat down with Ashimov and Greta; the three minders stood against the wall.
Max Zubin shook his head and, waving at the audience, said, “The GRU, my friends, what do you expect? My master calls and I obey.”
He went to the piano at the back of the stage, a baby grand. A drummer and a double bass player were already there, and Zubin sat down and started a driving, complex version of “Foggy Day” that wouldn’t have been out of place in any great piano bar in London or New York.
Levin called the headwaiter over. “Vodka, on the house, and don’t forget the boys behind me.”
“It is my pleasure, Captain.”
“And a little beluga on toast, the way I like it.”
“Of course.”
There was a roar of applause as Zubin finished and Levin stood up, clapping. “Marvelous,” he called. “More.”
Zubin moved into “Night and Day” and waiters appeared hurriedly with glasses of vodka on a tray, each glass in a larger glass with crushed ice, one waiter handing them out to the security guards, the other to the party at the table, the third distributing the beluga caviar.
As they started on the feast Ashimov said, “You live well, my friend.”
“I could be dead tomorrow, that’s what I learned in Afghanistan and Chechnya.” He crunched toast and savored the beluga.
“Wonderful, isn’t it?” Greta said, as she followed suit.
“It was in the Chechen capital I got a taste for it. We took the Grand Hotel in a firefight – a very bloody firefight. Found the beluga in the icebox behind the bar in the main kitchen. A few of us survived that fight. Not many. The Twenty-first Independent Parachute Company, made up of anyone they could reach out and grab. We were wolfing that caviar down when we heard the piano start to play in the anteroom. We went out to see what was going on and there he was, an infantry captain named Max Zubin.”
“And what was he playing?” Greta asked.
“ ‘As Time Goes By.’ I swear to God, just like in Casablanca. You know the old movie? I’ve seen it in American, and I’ve seen it dubbed with Bogart speaking Russian and it’s just as fantastic.” He stood up, applauded and called, “Max, let’s do the Grand in Chechnya, in memory of the Twenty-first and all those guys we left. Let’s do ‘As Time Goes By.’ ”
He sat down, snapped his fingers for another vodka and ate some more toast and caviar, somehow managing to hum the tune at the same time.
“An enthusiast,” Ashimov told Greta.
“The crowd seems to like it.”
And indeed they did, large sections singing along, some in English, others in Russian. Zubin finished on a high. People cheered, stood up and clapped. He waved to everyone, nodded to the double bass player, who put his instrument down and took over the piano, then came down from the stage, shaking hands on the way, and sat down at the spare seat at the table.
Levin smiled. “You haven’t lost your touch.” He handed him a vodka, which Zubin swallowed in one gulp, then reached for another. “Why are you being so nice to me, Igor?”
Levin said, “Let’s put it this way. The beard suits you, but it’s time to take it off again.”
“Christ, no,” Max Zubin groaned. “Not that.”
“I’m afraid so. Surely you remember Major Ashimov from Paris? I’ll let him explain.”
The Zubin apartment was a time capsule from another age. Even the maid was aging and could have been out of a Chekhov play. The interior was more thirties than anything else, with a grand piano covered by photos of the great and the good in silver frames.
Levin, Ashimov and Greta were admitted by the maid, who viewed them all suspiciously.
“Is my mother at home, Sonia?” Zubin asked.
“Where else would she be? She is preparing to go to bed.”
“I’d like a word.”
“What a ridiculous time to call. I’ll tell her you’re here.”
She went out and he lit a cigarette. “You must excuse Sonia. She’s a failed actress who became my mother’s dresser.”
Greta moved to the piano and examined the photos. Zubin sat at it and started to play “Falling in Love Again.”
“Marlene Dietrich’s national anthem,” Greta told him.
“You’ll find her and my mother amongst the photos there.”
Greta was working her way through and picked one up. “My God, this is her with Laurence Olivier.”
“In London, where we did The Three Sisters,” a voice interrupted. “I made the mistake of coming back.”
And there she was in the flesh, wearing a silk robe, her hair tied back, powerful and thrilling in spite of her age.
Ashimov stepped forward. “You look like some great warrior queen.”
“Don’t try flattery, Major. I remember you well from that affair in Paris. So, you need my son again?”
“I’m afraid so.”
She turned to Greta. “And who’s this one?”
“Major Greta Novikova of GRU.”
“Typecasting, but good bone structure.”
Greta couldn’t think of a thing to say. Bella did a surprising thing. As Sonia came in with the ritual glasses of vodka on a tray, the old actress patted Igor Levin on the cheek.
“He looks in on me from time to time, this one. A nice boy in spite of himself.”
Levin took her hand and kissed it. “No man could have a greater compliment.”
They all took their vodka. “So, this is State business?”
“Direct from Putin himself.”
“Well, to hell with him and to hell with the lot of you. Where are you taking him?”
“Station Gorky in Siberia,” Levin said.
“For a while only. You’ll see him again soon,” Ashimov said.
“And I’m supposed to believe that?” She turned to Zubin. “You’ll have to get rid of the beard. A pity. It suits you.” She turned to Levin. “Can I have him for tonight?”
“Where would he go?” Levin smiled. “His escort will be downstairs.”
“I thought so. All right, the rest of you can get out. I’d like some time with my son.”
Which they did, there was not much else to say. She turned to Zubin, who was still playing, and raised her glass to Sonia, who came over with the vodka bottle.
“If it wasn’t for me, you could make a run for it.”
“Things are as they are, Mama, so running is out of the question.”
“You’re a good son, Max, always were. So it’s the same old thing as Paris?”
“No, I think this is rather more important. They’ve shown me a warrant from Putin.”
“Then God help us.” She swallowed her vodka down and tossed the glass into the fireplace.
Onward from Moscow, the Falcon rose to forty thousand feet and moved on into the night, while Levin slept and Greta and Ashimov talked in low voices.
“What’s the story on the boy wonder there?” she asked.
“His father was an infantry colonel, a military attaché at the London Embassy, his mother was English. Igor spent a couple of years at a posh public school in Westminster, London. He should have gone to university, but he’s a strange one, marches to his own drummer. He went home on holiday and just decided to join the army without even consulting his father, who couldn’t do anything about it because it would have looked bad.”
“Some KGB time was mentioned, the paratroopers and now GRU,” she said.
“Yes. He became a war hero, decorated twice. The thing that singled him out for a commission was when he took out a Chechnyan general.”
“As a sniper?”
“It was more complicated than that. He’s something of an actor, and made a very convincing Chechnyan.
Worked himself close in, slit the man’s throat and walked off laughing.”
“My God.”
“That’s the thing. He really doesn’t care. Not about anything. His father was involved with Belov in the old days, so when the money started pouring in, he got his share. Ten million sterling, that kind of money. He was killed in a car crash with his wife the other year, which left Igor very well fixed and all nicely stashed away in London.”
“So Levin could be on the Riviera. Champagne, girls, a yacht? Why not?”
“He reminds me of Sean Dillon in a way,” Ashimov said. “Dillon is also well fixed in the money department. You could ask why he continues to live the life he does.”
He poured Greta a glass of champagne while she thought about it. “A kind of madness?” she asked. “A need to live on the dangerous edge?”
“You could have a point.”
“Well, if that means comparing him with Dillon, he must be mad. When I was involved with Dillon in Iraq, he seemed to be enjoying the whole business.”
Igor Levin stirred and said, “It’s very simple. Life can be so boring.” He tilted up his seat. “If you’ve finished talking about me, I’d like a glass of the old bubbles there.”
Ashimov said, “Ah, you’re awake, are you? Well, first things first. I’m going to need you, Igor, so I have something for you. When Billy Salter shot me at Drumore, my life was saved by a personal gift from Belov, a nylon-and-titanium vest. Even stops a forty-five. Fits nicely under your shirt.” He took a package from his briefcase. “My gift to you.”
Levin put it on the seat beside him. “Frightfully good of you, old boy, but I’d still appreciate some champagne.”
He spoke in an impeccable English public school accent.
Greta poured him a glass. “They’ll love you at the Reform Club.”
“I should damn well hope so.” He sipped some of the champagne. “I must say, Dillon sounds rather like the twin I never had. I can’t wait to meet him.”
“You won’t have to wait long,” Ashimov said. “After stopping at Drumore, we’re off to London for you to take up your new duties.”
“Where I may be received with less than enthusiasm.”
“Not when the Ambassador sees your warrant from Putin.”
“Oh, good, I’m to have that, am I?”
He still spoke in that English upper-class accent. Ashimov opened a briefcase, took out a file and passed it across.
“Here’s everything you need to know on Dillon, Ferguson, Roper and the Salters. These people are bad news, my friend, as bad as you’ve ever known.”
Levin flicked the file and it opened by chance at a printout about Bernstein. He went through it quickly. “What a woman. This is an incredible record.”
“Well, don’t fall in love with her. She’s the first one to go.”
“A nice Jewish girl, and you forget – my father was Jewish.”
“Your mother was Christian,” Ashimov said. “You can only be a Jew through your mother.”
“An academic argument. All those wonderful genes. They never go away. If I was religious, I’d say it was a blessing from God. Personally, I’m rather proud of it.”
“Good for you. Now read the file and see what you’re getting into. I’ll fill you in on the IRA side of things later.”
“As you say.”
Levin settled back with the file, while Ashimov poured Greta some more champagne and used his satellite phone to contact Liam Bell. He found him at Drumore Place.
“It’s me,” he said. “How are you?”
“Fine. We’ve moved in, got things arranged. No trouble from the villagers. Life, shall we say, is back to normal. What about you?”
“Well, I’ve a target for you, during the coming weeks.”
“And what would that be?”
“Sean Dillon, Ferguson and company.”
“Jesus! A tall order.”
“We’ll discuss it in detail when I’m there. However, I’m going to need someone from your side of the coin. A hit man who’ll do the job, no questions asked, no argument, no sentimentality.”
“What you mean is you’re looking for the original cold-blooded bastard.”
“No, that’s you,” Ashimov told him. “What I’m looking for is a reasonable facsimile. I know the Peace Process is supposed to have brought an end to the glorious cause of Irish unity, but I believe you do have sleepers in London. Young men and women in good suits who work in the stock exchange…”
“And hanker after the romance of the struggle,” Bell said. “You might be surprised by how many of those there are. What would you be offering?”
“Oh, to you, a big payday. Funds for the organization, of course, not for the personal bank account in Spain. What you pay for him or, indeed, her to eradicate someone for me is your business.”
“Would you be involved?”
“Not personally. I’ll be staying there for a while with Major Novikova. I’m bringing a young colleague from Moscow who’ll handle the London end. He’ll work out of the London Embassy. The target is legitimate from your point of view. A high-ranking Special Branch officer who’s put more of your friends inside the last few years than she’s had hot dinners.”
“It’ll be a pleasure,” Bell said. “I’ve got ideas right away. Leave it with me.”
“We’ll see you soon.”
Levin looked up. “Dillon really is quite something. Now I’m really looking forward to meeting him.”
“Make sure it isn’t your last meeting,” Ashimov told him, and poured another glass of champagne.
LONDON
4
When Igor Levin flew from Ireland to London, it was in a Belov International jet and Liam Bell flew with him, under a false identity. Levin didn’t approach the Embassy, not then. He stayed in an indifferent hotel in Kensington next door to Bell, waited patiently while the man from Dublin made his arrangements with Mary Killane and Dermot Fitzgerald, and then, after the outcome, delivered Fitzgerald to Heathrow for the flight to Ibiza.
He wasn’t impressed. In his opinion the whole business had been badly handled. The Killane girl, for example. Anyone with half a brain would find it too much a coincidence that she, the last person to treat the Bernstein woman, had been murdered so soon afterward and so close to the hospital.
Perhaps things were done differently in Belfast. Maybe the IRA had employed such fear, such power, that they thought they could get away with anything. Or maybe they were just used to getting away with anything.
“Never mind, Igor,” he mused, after delivering Bell to the airfield for his return flight. “You’re just the hired help.”
He’d already rented a Mercedes, but now, taking advantage of his wealth, he moved into a suite at the Dorchester Hotel overlooking Hyde Park.
“Only the best, Igor,” he said, and drove down to the Embassy of the Russian Federation situated in Kensington Palace Gardens. There was a snag at first, when he discovered the Ambassador was in Paris, but a further inquiry revealed that the senior commercial attaché, Colonel Boris Luhzkov, in reality Head of Station for the GRU, was lunching in the pub across the High Street. Levin went out the main gates, waited for a break in the traffic, then crossed the road.
Luhzkov was in a window seat on his own devouring shepherd’s pie, a half-empty glass of red wine before him. Levin got two more and went across. He put one of the glasses on the table.
“You always like two.”
Luhzkov looked astonished. “My God, Igor, it is you. I had a message from Moscow this morning. It said you were joining my staff.”
“Not quite true, old son. In a way, it’s you who are joining my staff.”
“What on earth do you mean?”
Levin took the envelope from his inside pocket, extracted the Putin warrant and passed it over. “Read that.”
He sat down and lit a cigarette. When Luhzkov handed it back, his hand shook. “For God’s sake, you’d better not lose it. But what does it mean, Igor?�
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“That I’m on a special assignment for the President himself. I need a front, so I’m to be a commercial attaché. Any quarrel with that?”
“Of course not.”
“For the moment, I need an office and all that goes with it. I won’t need an Embassy car, I’ve hired a Mercedes, and I don’t need housing – I’m staying at the Dorchester. It’s nice to be back, isn’t it, Boris, and what better place for a Russian intelligence officer to stay than the best hotel in London?”
Luhzkov had totally capitulated. “Anything you say, Igor.”
“Good. The shepherd’s pie looks delicious. I think I’ll have some,” and Levin turned and waved to a waitress.
Later, when the necessary office had been provided, he worked his way through GRU’s computer records, cross-referencing them with the file Ashimov had provided him. Ferguson, Dillon, the Salters. Names, computer printouts, addresses. He even checked on Bell’s past and that of his men whom he’d met at Drumore. An unsavory bunch, no finesse. On the other hand, Bell must have had something going for him to have become Chief of Staff of one of the most notorious organizations in the world.
Dillon was a totally different article; his exploits spoke for themselves. The thing that impressed Levin the most was that in all those years with the IRA, the police and secret intelligence hadn’t touched him once. Levin was lost in admiration.
Even the Salters surprised him. They were far from the usual run of gangsters. Harry Salter’s aging face spoke for itself, and Billy’s deeds were remarkable. Men who didn’t give a damn, the Salters and Dillon.
“Just like me,” Levin said softly.
Hannah Bernstein filled him with a strange kind of regret when he read her file again and looked at her photo. She’d been a remarkable woman – you had to be to make Superintendent rank in Special Branch. An Oxford psychologist and yet she’d killed more than once. And the Jewish background. It made him feel uncomfortable and he knew why that was.
Her death, of course, had had nothing to do with him. She’d been close to death anyway, thanks to Ashimov. The drug the nurse had used might not even have been necessary. Ashimov had killed her, really.
