The Istanbul Decision

by Nick Carter

  Carter needed maneuvering room, but in the narrow kitchen there wasn't any. He'd already stepped into a blind alley of cabinets and refrigeration units, and as Shurin pulled himself to his feet, his massive body blocked the only avenue of escape.

  Shurin saw mat he had his quarry trapped, and his thick lips parted in a leer as he came forward, closing the gap on Carter.

  Carter retreated, his hands groping desperately for something to throw. They lit upon a rack of heavy iron skillets. He unhooked the first in line and slung it. It landed with a dull metallic ring against Shurin's upraised arms and thudded to the floor. Carter followed with a second, third, and fourth skillet, eventually emptying the entire rack. All of them bounced harmlessly off Shurin the way Carter remembered bullets used to bounce off Superman.

  Carter was running out of options. The waiters and cooks all looked on, too dumbfounded to do anything. Then Carter felt the cold steel of the cooler door against his back and knew he'd backpedaled as far as he could. He'd have to stand and fight.

  Shurin waded in the way a rude man might enter a crowded room, arms out in front of him, face turned slightly to one side as Carter continued to rain punches on him, although by this time the blows were losing some of their conviction.

  When he got close, Shurin stooped down until he and Carter were nose to nose, then he wrapped his arms around the smaller man like a big Russian bear. The great vise of muscle and sinew began to squeeze shut. A sickening crunch erupted from Carter's rib cage and it became impossible to breathe.

  Carter looked wildly around for help, but there was nothing the other men could do but stand and gape.

  Then a burst of pain went off like an alarm in the middle of his back. The Russian was wedging his thumbs between two vertebrae. Another few seconds and he'd split them, snapping Carter's back like a chicken bone.

  Quickly Carter shook his sleeve, and Hugo slipped into his hand. Then blindly he thrust the stiletto into the big man's left side, like Ahab jabbing his harpoon into the whale, again and again, searching for the heart.

  Shurin stumbled back against an open spice rack, sending jars and cans flying in all directions, but he righted himself almost immediately, never losing his grip.

  At first Carter's desperation and the enormous pain prevented him from concentrating, and his knife blows went wild. He hit the stomach, the side, the bicep, the back, but nothing he did would release the steellike pincers in which he'd gotten caught. He desperately needed one deep breath. Then by sheer willpower he brought himself under control. He ran the blade point down the xylophone of the man's rib cage, found the soft section even through his clothes, stood the knife on point, and jammed it in with the heel of his hand.

  The arms suddenly released like fingers around something hot, and Carter slumped to the floor, gasping.

  Shurin tottered back against the counter, his back and side soaked in blood. He managed to get the knife blade out, looked at it dumbly, then he pitched forward like a fallen tree, headfirst onto the floor.

  When he fell it was as though an orchestra had reached a great crashing crescendo. After the last echo died, the audience of cooks and waiters suddenly sprang to life.

  "Man Dieu! Monsieur, we did not think you would live," exclaimed the assistant chef as they ran to help Carter up.

  Carter staggered to his feet, holding on to a cabinet with one hand and grasping his side with the other. Air rushed into his lungs like a hot gas, causing agonizing pain. Every rib felt broken.

  He pointed to the body. "Get him out of here," he croaked hoarsely. "Throw him off the train."

  One of the waiters folded Shurin's thick arms across his chest; then with the help of three others, he dragged him out the back door by his trouser cuffs.

  "Where's my gun?" asked Carter. The assistant chef fetched it from the front of the car and handed it to him. Carter stuffed it back in his holster. "Nothing's happened here. If anybody asks, Shurin is gone. Same goes for me. I'm in one of the parlor cars in back. Someone is going to have to clean up all this blood."

  "We'll take care of it, monsieur. But monsieur — you don't look well. Your face is pale. Please, sit down and rest. The assistant chef tried to take his arm.

  "I'll be all right," said Carter, pulling away. "I've got unfinished business up front." Hobbling with pain, he went out the door into the narrow passageway at the car's rear. The assistant chef followed anxiously. In the passageway Carter pulled open the half door and with a great deal of difficulty managed to mount himself on its edge with one foot outside the train.

  "Isn't this a bit foolhardy in your condition?" asked the chef.

  "Don't worry about me! "

  "Very well, monsieur."

  "And remember, if they question you, you didn't see this, and you and your men know nothing about Shurin's whereabouts. These Russian guards sometimes have funny ideas about revenge."

  "Yes, monsieur."

  Carter pulled himself onto the ladder and began climbing. The rain and overcast had broken up, and the moonlight clearly lit the Alps towering around him. A valley stretched out below for a dizzying distance.

  When he reached the top he lay down flat on his back, gasping. He hadn't intended to try this until later when everyone was asleep, but Shurin had forced his hand. He had to make his move now before the man was missed.

  He pulled himself to his feet, ran a few yards along the roof of the car, then stopped, unable to go any further. His ribs were on fire. Every movement was torture. It felt as though the giant's arms were still around him. And yet he had to go on.

  He reached the end of the dining car and jumped to the salon car. He landed badly, trying to roll to absorb the shock and rolling right on his rib cage. He lay for several seconds, fighting to stay conscious in spite of the enormous swell of pain from his sides. Finally it began to subside, and he was able to sit up and pull himself into a crouching position.

  He clambered across the top of the club car, but this time, instead of jumping, he tried to step onto the salon car. Unfortunately, the cars were swaying at an opposite rhythm, and as he stood with one foot on either car, the movement threatened to topple him backward off the mountainside. For a moment it looked as though he'd made a fatal error, but he managed to grab hold of the small wheel that operated the car's manual brake and pull himself on board.

  Both vent holes, fore and aft, were clearly visible in the car's roof. Carter wondered which would be the most advantageous for his entrance. He would have to take one guard out with his first shot, which meant with the other it would probably degenerate into a gun battle. If he chose the near vent, there might be time for the guard in the club car to get in and catch him in a crossfire. The next car up was a sleeping car, and according to his information there was no guard in this, so he opted for the far vent.

  He made his way across the car's roof as stealthily as he could, lifted the lid on the vent, and peeked in. No one was there. He crouched to get a better angle. Kobelev sat in a swivel chair in a booth by the bar, looking directly at him, a revolver to Cynthia's temple. Instinctively Carter drew back — and the back of his head hit the hard metal of a gun barrel.

  "Won't you come in, Mr. Carter?" shouted Kobelev from the car below. "We've been expecting you."

  Eight

  Tatiana Kobelev reached across the narrow bed table and picked a card off the pile. A triumphant grin lit her face. "Gin!" she announced, laying her cards out.

  The old nurse sighed and threw down her hand. She started to say something, then apparently thought better of it, and resignedly began to gather the cards into a deck.

  "I think I like this American game," Tatiana said.

  "It's more run when you don't cheat," the old nurse said sourly.

  "I do not cheat! How dare you accuse me of cheating?"

  "The proof is right here," said the nurse, coming around to the bed and fumbling beneath the blanket next to Tatiana. Tatiana tried to stop her, but the old woman managed to grab the queen of hea
rts and hold it up to her. "You see? You picked up two cards on the last turn and stashed the extra here. Do you think I'm a fool?"

  "No! I think you are a peasant strumpet and a whore!" Tatiana shouted at the top of her voice.

  The old woman's eyes narrowed and her face trembled with anger. Suddenly she lashed out and slapped the Russian girl's cheek.

  "Whore! Whore! Whore!" the girl chanted.

  A Marine stuck his head in at the door. "Everything all right in here, Lieutenant Dilsey?"

  The old nurse sighed. "Missy here's just feeling her oats, is all."

  "Why don't you come out of there for a while, ma'am? Give yourself a break. You remember what happened to Lieutenant Green."

  "Sergeant, I don't have to be reminded what happened to the girl's previous nurse. I have no intention of letting this young lady get under my skin like that. Besides, she is not supposed to be left without supervision."

  "I know that, ma'am, but a few minutes won't hurt. You haven't had a break from this for over a week."

  "Two weeks."

  "Exactly, ma'am."

  "All right. My replacement will be here shortly anyway. And you're certainly not going anywhere, are you, dearie?"

  Tatiana stared up at her sullenly, pure hate in her eyes.

  The old woman stared back unflinchingly, then turned and left, locking the door behind her.

  The room fell suddenly silent, except for the rush of air in the heating vent. For a moment Tatiana looked around, savoring her solitude. She'd been left to herself precious few times since coming to this awful place, and when one of these rare moments chanced to happen, it was not to be squandered wantonly.

  She threw off the blanket, swung her feet out, and let herself down on the floor. Then using the bed table and the edge of the mattress for support, she pushed herself upright. She let go of the table and bed, and for one wavering, unsteady moment, was alone on the floor. Then she lost her balance and had to grab the bed to keep from falling.

  Yes, she was doing nicely. With a few minutes' practice, the simple movements of walking and standing would come back to her. The exercises at night were paying off. The muscles were strong; they'd simply forgotten what to do.

  She inched her way toward the foot of the bed. She would have to be careful. If Dilsey or the soldier saw her standing, the dancing would end, as the old saying went.

  When she reached the end of the bed, she tore off the plastic cap from the top of a leg, moistened her finger, and pulled up an object that had been suspended in the hollow of the leg by a slender thread of bed linen. The object glinted in the light: a surgeon's scalpel, an instrument so sharp the mere weight of it would lacerate skin.

  She held it by its thread and spun it, watching the sunlight flash on its blade. She'd stolen it from a careless doctor during one of the endless examinations. "Cough! Cough louder!" he'd said as she pulled it from the instrument tray. Then he d touched her breast in a most undoctorlike way, and it had taken all her self-control to keep from plunging it into his heart right then and there. But instead she gritted her teeth and slid the knife discreetly under her pillow.

  This would be the tool of her vengeance, she thought, watching the scalpel spin. With it she would set into motion events that would free her from this confinement and bring about the death of Nick Carter, a consummation she wanted more than anything else in the world. Soon, she told herself. The time is almost at hand.

  The Americans had already parried. This she knew. How she knew was a combination of intuition and tradecraft, although which predominated was impossible to say. Her father had taught her the tricks of the agent's art — the suspicious turn of mind, the secretiveness, the prodigious powers of deduction, the constant alertness and attention to detail — at such a young age and engrained them in her so thoroughly, tradecraft and intuition had become indistinguishable in her thinking.

  Three weeks ago she'd fallen asleep reading in bed and two hours had passed of which she was completely unaware. This was highly unusual. She'd always been a light sleeper, given to restless dreams, some of them so vivid they'd caused her mother a great deal of concern when Tatiana was a child.

  But this was a dreamless sleep, and when she'd awakened she tasted something bitter on her lips, and her skin was achingly dry except beneath one earlobe. There was wax. Conclusion? Her food had been drugged, and while she was unconscious a wax impression had been made of her face. There could be only one reason: they were making a double of her to fool her father.

  Whether or not this operation had succeeded, she had no idea. Daily she searched the faces of everyone around her for some clue, but their expressions revealed nothing. They were too stupid to be told, she concluded. And yet she lost sleep each night wondering if she'd unwittingly become the instrument of her father's destruction.

  The time is coming soon, she thought as the scalpel slowed. Soon she would be strong enough, and already the agony of not knowing was driving her into frenzies at night. Soon her own restlessness would force her to break out at any cost.

  The door lock clicked, and the sound pierced Tatiana's body, bringing it rigid and alert. She was standing! For the sake of Lenin! They mustn't see her!

  She hobbled to the head of the bed and tried to climb in, holding on to the bed table for support. But the table's casters shot out underneath, and it crashed to the floor — reading lamp, cards, water pitcher, everything. She scrambled under the covers just as the door flew open.

  "What's going on in here?" asked Lieutenant Dilsey, staring down at the overturned table.

  "I pushed it," Tatiana answered. "I was lonely. I don't like being ignored."

  Dilsey's eyes went from Tatiana to the table, a dim suspicion beginning to dawn in them.

  Tatiana looked down and to her horror noticed she'd left the cap off the bedpost. She still had the scalpel in her hand underneath the covers.

  Dilsey picked up the table with some difficulty, then she rolled it back and forth across a small patch of floor, testing it. "These things don't fall over all that easy," she said thoughtfully. "You must have given it quite a shove."

  "I was angry," said Tatiana sullenly. "I am still angry."

  "You know something, Little Miss High and Mighty," said Dilsey coming closer and leaning down to the girl s face, "Bernie Green swore up and down you could walk, and I told her I thought she was crazy. 'Bernie, I said, 'you've just let that girl get to you. She can't walk. But you know, I'm beginning to wonder if maybe Bernie wasn't right."

  Tatiana's fear at having been startled now turned into anger. This, coupled with the resentment she'd harbored for weeks against this woman and the one they called Green, quickly proved too much for her restraint. With a lightning motion, she pulled out her hand with the scalpel set firmly in her fist and slashed the old woman's face, splitting the eyebrow, the eye, the nose, and opening a long slash in the cheek.

  So quick was this movement and so fluid — and the scalpel so sharp — that Dilsey was not even fully aware of what had happened. She pulled back with a look of amazement, holding her hands out in front of her and examining the blood that was now rushing in a torrent from her face, down her neck, and dripping onto the floor. Slowly, as she realized what she was looking at, her mouth parted and she screamed a soundless scream.

  In a flash Tatiana threw back the covers and jumped out of bed. She was still weak, but she managed to gel behind the terrified Dilsey and loop an arm around her throat. "Not a sound, you silly bitch!" she hissed in the nurse's ear, holding the scalpel against the old woman's jugular. "One scream and I'll cut your head off!"

  Dilsey was still looking at the blood dripping from her hands. She tasted its saltiness in her mouth. A whimper started deep in her throat, and her hands began to shake.

  "Stop whining like a dog!" whispered Tatiana. Her legs were tiring. She was going to have to do this quickly. "Call the sergeant! Call him!"

  "Sergeant," Dilsey said, her voice more a plea than a command. The door didn
't open. "Sergeant!" she shouted in desperation.

  The door unlocked and the sergeant came in. His eyes widened when he saw the nurse. "Holy…what the…" he stammered.

  "Throw down your rifle or I'll kill her!" Tatiana said.

  The sergeant's rifle clattered to the floor.

  "Now — slowly — hand me your service revolver."

  He undid the flap of his holster and held the gun out butt first, his eyes riveted on Tatiana.

  Tatiana shoved the old woman toward the door until she was close enough to grab the gun. Dilsey offered little resistance. Once she had it. Tatiana quickly changed hands, flinging the scalpel across the room and putting the gun to Dilsey s head.

  "If you don't do exactly as I say, I am going to kill this silly woman, is that clear?" asked Tatiana evenly.

  The sergeant nodded, backing up to let the two women out the door.

  "I m going to the Soviet embassy in Washington. I need a car and a driver. Run. Tell your superiors what has happened. Tell them to have a car waiting at the front door to the hospital. Tell them if they don't, they will scrape this woman's insides from the corridor wall. Run, pig, run!"

  The sergeant hesitated only a split second, then turned, ran up the hall, and disappeared through a set of double doors.

  "Now tell me the way out of here, bitch," she hissed, turning to the old woman. "And no tricks. If you try to trick me, I'll kill you."

  She pushed Dilsey forward, still holding her by the neck, the gun barrel pressed against the back of her head. As they shuffled along, Tatiana half pushed and half leaned on Dilsey for support. It was only Dilsey's momentary confusion and pain that prevented her from realizing she was practically carrying the younger woman out of the hospital.

  Word spread quickly, and along the corridors nurses, doctors, patients, and MP's stopped to stare at them as they passed, the number of onlookers steadily increasing until they reached the front lobby, which was filled with military police, guns drawn.