Soviet Specter

by Don Pendleton

  He was still saying a lot without actually saying anything as Bolan carried a moaning Agafonka Ontomanov out the door.

  A still frightened but grateful Luiza Polyakova followed.

  “I’VE GOT TO GET HIM some medical attention,” were Matt Cooper’s first words when Seven walked back into the room at the Red Brick Hotel. “He’s hurt worse than I thought.”

  Seven took in the scene quickly. Polyakova sat in the chair Bolan had occupied earlier in the evening. Bolan stood next to the bed where Ontomanov lay, unconscious. “What happened?” he asked, closing the door behind him.

  “His wrist and collarbone are both broken,” said the big man next to the bed. “He’s in so much pain he can’t keep his mind straight long enough to answer questions, let alone do the rest of what I need him to do.”

  Seven squinted at the bed where the Russian seemed to be sleeping peacefully. “He doesn’t look like he’s in that much pain to me,” he said.

  “That’s because he was making so much noise I had to administer some anesthetic,” said the DOJ man.

  Seven looked closer and saw the new lump on the man’s jaw. It hadn’t been there when Cooper carried the man out of Romeo’s. Already it was beginning to discolor.

  He glanced down at Bolan’s right hand. The knuckles were red.

  Seven laughed under his breath and shook his head. “Yeah, you do break a rule here and there, don’t you?” he said, not expecting any answer. He wondered briefly if he would ever be able to collect the pension that awaited him in a few more months. More than likely he’d be fired before he could retire. And if he kept hanging around with the DOJ agent, there was a good chance he’d even end up in prison himself.

  Seven forced the thoughts from his head. He had never been what in cop parlance was known as a “homesteader”—an officer who always went by the book, kissed ass and was afraid of his own shadow. He was what was known as an “explorer.” A risk taker. Someone who wasn’t afraid to take a chance with his life, and wasn’t above bending or even breaking a few laws himself in order to take down the bad guys.

  “You know a doctor?” Bolan asked as Seven took his still damp sport coat off and let it fall to the floor next to the wall. He took a seat on the edge of the bed. The DEA man knew what kind of doctor his partner meant. In every city in every town in all the world, there was at least one physician who still practiced medicine after his license had been revoked. Some had drinking problems. Others succumbed to one or more of the various drugs over which they had practically free rein. Once in a while, a doctor got caught up in some illegal business deal that involved his practice and the medical board took his or her ticket away. But for whatever the reason, they had to make a living and very few of them chose to sweep buildings or dig ditches. It was to unlicensed doctors such as this that criminals took their injuries. Physicians practicing illegally didn’t report gunshot wounds and other cases of violence to the police.

  “Guy right here in the village,” Seven said, looking up at Bolan. “I busted him a few years ago. Had a Talwin problem and was handing out scrips right and left to support it.”

  “He owe you a favor?”

  Seven shrugged. “We didn’t push it hard. He lost his license but didn’t do any time. I’m sure he could use the money.”

  The big man next to the bed lifted the phone. “Call him,” he said.

  Seven rose and took the receiver. A few minutes later, he had former general practitioner Francis Clarence on the line, and a few minutes after that Clarence was on his way to the hotel. While he was talking on the phone, Seven felt a hand on his belt. Before he could turn, Bolan had pulled his handcuffs from their case and was wrapping one bracelet around Ontomanov’s uninjured left wrist. The big man secured the other end of the cuffs to the bedpost. The Russian slept through it all.

  Hanging up, Seven sat back down on the corner of the bed. Bolan moved over to Polyakova and took her hands again, talking to her in a low voice, telling her what a good job she’d done at Romeo’s, basically calming down the terrified woman. Seven just shook his head in silent awe. He had worked with a lot of good cops in his day, liked to think he was a pretty good law-enforcement officer himself, but he’d never seen anybody who could operate like Matt Cooper. He could be Mother Teresa one second and turn into a timber wolf on methamphetamine the next. He was whatever he needed to be at the moment, and he played every part perfectly. And he was a good man—Seven could tell that. He had no doubt that Cooper was on the right side. What he did doubt, however, was that he was a Justice Department agent. Sure, Jameson had talked to the President of the United States earlier, and he knew Cooper had backing. But the Justice Department? He didn’t think so. The President didn’t give his personal phone numbers out to field agents.

  Bolan and Polyakova were still talking quietly when a soft tapping sounded on the door. Bolan looked up and nodded at him. Seven’s hand dropped automatically to the holstered SIG-Sauer as he walked to the door and looked through the peephole.

  A moment later, Francis Clarence came shuffling through the door carrying a suitcase.

  Clarence had aged badly during the three years since Seven had seen him. What had been distinguished patches of white at the temples had spread until the entire head of hair had become an unhealthy yellow-gray. The flesh around Clarence’s jaws sagged like a basset hound, and his coloring was that of a man with liver cancer. He moved like a stoned zombie, and Seven had no doubt that he was. Stoned, anyway. As to the zombie part, the doctor appeared more to have died and not returned to life than to have turned into a zombie.

  Bolan turned away from Polyakova toward the man on the bed. Seven walked Clarence over to where Ontomanov still slept. There were no introductions.

  “What did you give him to make him sleep?” Clarence asked.

  “He got knocked out,” Bolan said. “Blow to the head.”

  This didn’t seem to surprise the doctor or have any effect whatsoever. He shoved Ontomanov’s legs slightly to the side, set the suitcase down on the bedspread and opened it. Pulling out a hypodermic syringe and a small vial, he drew a colorless liquid into the needle.

  Seven watched, figuring Clarence wanted to make sure his patient didn’t awaken while he worked on him. But as soon as the hypo was full, the doctor quickly rolled up his sleeve and plunged it into his own arm. A look of dreamy satisfaction came over him as he shot the drug into his vein. When he had finished, he tossed the uncovered needle back into the suitcase and said, “There. All ready to begin. Where’s he hurt?”

  Seven shook his head, turned away and simply walked to the table by the window.

  “How long is this going to take?” Bolan asked as Seven dropped into one of the chairs.

  “Broken wrist?” Clarence said, his voice slightly more sluggish than it had been a few seconds before. “Long enough to set. Then I have to make a cast.” He pointed to the suitcase with a wobbly finger. “Set. Brace. I brought one with me.” He closed his eyes for a moment as if in some other world, then opened them again. “But to answer your question, I should have him on his feet and moving in an hour or so. And you’ll have five hundred dollars less in your pocket.”

  Seven watched as Bolan reached inside his pants and came out with a roll of bills the size of a softball. Peeling several off the top, he stepped forward and shoved them into the front breast pocket of Francis Clarence’s threadbare sport coat. “Here’s a thousand,” the big man said. “Make it thirty minutes.”

  JUST BEFORE LEAVING, the raggedly dressed doctor rolled up his sleeve again. Using another vial and needle from the suitcase, he fired himself up once more.

  Bolan had watched the unlicensed physician as he worked on Ontomanov, making sure the man wasn’t too messed up to perform his duty. But Francis Clarence had proven to be one of those addicts who was still competent under the influence, and considering the fact that he might well go into withdrawal without the Talwin, they were probably better off having him work stoned than straight
.

  The Executioner gave Clarence another two hundred dollars for some pain pills that the doctor assured him would balance Ontomanov somewhere between torture and incoherence. The Russian had begun to come around again by the time the neck collar had been fitted, and now Bolan forced two of the pills down his throat before walking the doctor to the door and bidding him farewell.

  The Russian was fully awake by the time Bolan closed the door and returned to the bed.

  The pain pills had kicked in almost immediately, and Ontomanov looked at his wrist handcuffed to the bed. “You will pay with your life for this impertinence,” he growled.

  The Executioner didn’t answer. He simply stopped next to the bed and reached down, grabbing the still drying plaster cast, and shook it back and forth.

  Ontomanov screamed at the top of his lungs.

  The doctor had removed both Ontomanov’s jacket and shirt earlier, and they lay on the bedspread next to him. Bolan grabbed the shirt, wadding it into a ball and stuffing part of it into the Russian’s mouth to silence him. With the jacket he tied the man’s uninjured arm to the opposite bedpost. Moving the hurt limb brought another scream, but it was lost behind the makeshift gag. Ontomanov’s chest heaved up and down as he sucked air in through his nose. Gradually, as the pain in his wrist subsided, he calmed down.

  “Now,” the Executioner said, “are we straight about who’s in charge here?”

  Slowly the Russian nodded.

  “If I take the shirt out of your mouth, are you going to scream again?”

  The question got him a shake of the head.

  Bolan reached out and yanked the shirt away. Ontomanov coughed and shot daggers at the Executioner from his eyes. In a quiet voice, he said, “You are violating my civil rights.”

  “Yes,” Bolan replied, “I most certainly am. And I plan to go right on violating them as long as I have to.”

  “I will sue you,” Ontomanov stated. “I am a naturalized American citizen.”

  “Congratulations,” the soldier said. “But I understand the test isn’t really all that hard.”

  “I will sue you and retire a rich man,” the Russian growled.

  “Ontomanov,” Bolan said wearily, “I suspect you’re already rich by most standards. You’ve gotten that way by selling illegal drugs that poison Americans—your fellow Americans, according to you. You also deal in stolen works of art, and who knows what else.” He paused a moment, then said, “But I’m about to give you a chance to redeem yourself.”

  “Where am I?” Ontomanov demanded. “Who are you?”

  “You’re in a hotel room. And I’m the guy you’re about to help.”

  “I will never help you!” the Russian yelled. “Go ahead! Take me to jail!”

  “It doesn’t seem to be sinking in, Ontomanov,” the Executioner said. “I’m not a cop. And you aren’t going to jail.” He caught a quick glimpse of Johnny Seven in his peripheral vision as he glanced toward the window. The DEA man didn’t look all that surprised. Seven was smart. Bolan had already broken far more rules than any legitimate federal officer could get away with, which the DEA agent had to know meant only one thing.

  He had paired up with a man to whom the rules simply didn’t apply. All that counted was the end result. The innocent had to quit suffering, and the guilty had to paid for the suffering they had already inflicted.

  “What do you mean I will not go to jail?” Ontomanov said, his face beginning to twist into a mask of semiunderstanding.

  Bolan looked back down at him. “What I mean is just what I said. You aren’t going to jail. You may go into the East River before this is all over, but I promise you won’t do a day in jail.”

  “Bah! You are bluffing!” Ontomanov cried out with a sudden resurgence of confidence. “Take me to prison! I will never help you with anything!”

  Bolan jammed the shirt back in the man’s mouth. This time, when he grabbed the cast, he shook it harder. Ontomanov writhed back and forth, up and down, flopping like a fish on the bed. His eyes widened in pain, and a strange sputtering came from his mouth around the shirt.

  The Executioner dropped the arm and allowed him to quiet again. Then, removing the shirt, he said, “Shall we start over?”

  Ontomanov’s eyes were orbs of horror now as it finally sank in that it was no game. He wasn’t in the hands of the police. He was in the hands of a man who, in order to see justice done, could be ruthless. After several moments of silence, he gasped out, “What is it you want me to do?”

  “That’s more like it,” the Executioner said. “First I want you to tell me who you work for.”

  “I work for myself. I am an art—”

  Bolan stuck the shirt back in and shook the cast.

  By the time he removed Ontomanov’s gag, tears had begun rolling down the Russian’s cheek. Bolan ignored them. “Same question, second chance,” he said. “Waste my time again and I’ll go to work on your collarbone. Who do you work for? Who’s behind the shipments you’ve been picking up at Luiza’s shop?”

  “I knew only Rabashka,” Ontomanov said. “The man who was killed. He is the only man I knew.”

  The Executioner reached out slowly, lifting the shirt off the bed and into the air.

  “Wait!” Ontomanov half screamed. “It is true! Rabashka was the only man I have met!” When the Executioner stopped with the shirt in midair, he lowered his voice. “But I have spoken to another man on the phone. This man is above Rabashka. He is…was…Rabashka’s contact.”

  Bolan didn’t stick the shirt back in Ontomanov’s mouth, but he didn’t set it back down on the bed, either. “Go on,” he said.

  “This man has direct contact with Moscow,” Ontomanov stated.

  “Who is he?”

  “I don’t know. I call him Gregor.”

  The shirt moved closer to his mouth and he shouted. “Please! I’m telling you the truth. I don’t know his last name! Or if that is even his real first name!”

  “Is he here in the U.S. or in Moscow?”

  “Here. I think. I can’t be sure.”

  Bolan inched the shirt closer to Ontomanov’s face just to keep his attention. “Who do you know in this drug-and-art smuggling organization?”

  “No one above me,” said Ontomanov, looking nervously at the shirt. “Only the men who work directly for me. Some of them you saw tonight at Romeo’s.” His eyes widened as his mind seemed to race back to the submarine shop. “Are they all dead?”

  “I don’t know,” Bolan said. “And I don’t really care. But that’s the last question you ask me. You want a chance of saving your skin, you answer questions rather than ask them. You understand?”

  Slowly Ontomanov nodded his head.

  Bolan sat silently for a moment, wondering how much of what the Russian was saying was true and how much was the desperate attempt of a man in pain trying to save his own life. Could he really not know any more than he professed to? Maybe not. Polyakova had known very little, and most successful drug-smuggling syndicates were tight-lipped—even within their own organization. But if Ontomanov had never met anyone above him in the criminal organization, how did he get recruited in the first place?

  The Executioner asked the question, afraid he already knew the answer. He was right.

  “Rabashka,” Ontomanov said. Rabashka had recruited him.

  “But you talked with this mystery man, Gregor?” Bolan asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Then you can call him for me.”

  Ontomanov shook his head. “No. I don’t have a phone number for him. He always called me.”

  “Where?”

  “At my apartment.”

  The Executioner turned to face the wall, suppressing a sigh. It was apparent nothing was going to come easily on this mission. On the other hand, it rarely did. This meant he would have to alter the plan he had already constructed in his mind on how to approach the next step of the mission.

  “So there’s no way for you to contact him?” Bolan asked
, hoping against hope that Ontomanov had some other means. Mail drop. E-mail. Anything.

  “No. As I said, he contacts me.”

  Bolan looked past the tears into the man’s eyes. His next question was vital, and he wanted to make sure Ontomanov didn’t lie. “When was the last time you spoke with Gregor?”

  “Yesterday,” Ontomanov said. “Before the plane arrived.”

  Bolan stared hard into the dull gray eyes of the man on the bed. “If that’s the case, how did you know Luiza had been busted?”

  Ontomanov caught the hard stare and grew nervous. “It was all over the news. Everybody in New York knows about it!” he said anxiously.

  Bolan nodded his understanding. It was the explanation he had expected, and unless he read the man wrong, it was the truth. That was why Ontomanov hadn’t been surprised when the woman called him. But it meant one other thing, too.

  “Johnny,” the Executioner said over his shoulder. “Uncuff him.” As the DEA man moved around to the side of the bed, Bolan glanced down at the black sport coat he’d used to tie the cast on Ontomanov’s arm to the bed. He had knotted it tightly, and it might take hours to work out those knots.

  Reaching under his arm, the Executioner drew the Loner knife with his left hand. Ontomanov’s eyelids shot up in surprise as he heard the clicking sound as the steel came out of the sheath. The black blade appeared just inches above his face. But before he could speak, Bolan slashed down across his body, severing the jacket with one clean slice. He grabbed Ontomanov’s good arm and yanked the man to his feet.

  “Where are we going?” the Russian asked. He was confused. Only a second before he had thought his throat was about to be cut and now he was being pushed toward the door.

  “To your apartment.”

  “My apartment? Why?”

  Bolan still had the knife in his left hand and now he grabbed Ontomanov with his right, spinning the man back around to face him. Gently he placed the wickedly curved blade against the man’s throat and said, “Because you’re expecting a phone call.”