The Target

by Saul Herzog

  A simple act of hatred.

  And it was during the years of Nazi occupation, while the plan to blot out the city was underway, that the formative events of Chopin’s life occurred.

  Chief among them was the death of his mother.

  In Warsaw, the Nazis engaged in strange and grotesque behaviors, things that were not seen in other cities.

  There was a children’s game at the time the locals called łapanka. It was the same game American children called tag.

  The Germans adapted it for their own purposes, selecting an area of the city at random, an important street, a busy market square, or a train station, and sealing it off with soldiers.

  They then closed in, capturing everyone inside the cordon. If they found Jews, they were shot on the spot, and everyone else, man, woman, or child, regardless of who they were and what they’d been doing in the area, was rounded up and sent to the central train station, where they were herded into cattle cars and transported to Germany for slave labor.

  To the Germans, it was a game. A way of instilling terror. A way of emphasizing the cruelty, the randomness, of the fate of the citizens of Warsaw.

  Chopin was with his mother the day she was captured. She had identity documents, an Ausweis, as the Germans called it, that should have protected her, but no one cared.

  Chopin’s identity card, however, with its German spelling, saved his life. He was returned to the clock factory, where over the coming years, he learned his trade and, piecemeal, the story of his origins came to light.

  When he was old enough, he signed up for the Polish Intelligence Service. They tried to place him in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, but when the Defence Minister heard his story, he had him transferred to the Second Directorate of the General Staff of the Army. From there, he was sent to Moscow for training by the KGB before being dispatched to Berlin.

  He established himself as a clockmaker, and for the next sixty years, while other agents lost faith in the Soviet system and abandoned their posts, Chopin stood firm.

  He remained loyal to the Soviets far longer than anyone could have expected, not because he loved Russia, but because he felt the need to atone for the deeds of his ancestors.

  And he’d been doing it too long.

  He was getting old.

  Soon, his life would be over.

  He still went to work every day, but when he left his apartment, the cold hit him like something sharp. It got into his bones. Into his joints. It was worst in the damp.

  At work, customers were taken aback by his appearance.

  When he spoke with the electrolarynx machine, he frightened some. Disgusted others.

  All were made uneasy.

  He set out from his apartment on this particularly cold January morning in two layers of full-body underwear, well made winter clothing, and a heavy, dark green Tirol-style Loden coat, which he wore almost as a cape, with his arms free and the button on the neck the only one fastened.

  He walked slowly, aided by a wooden cane, to his favorite coffee house on the Kurfürstendamm. The broad avenue, with its rows of trees, reminded him always of Paris.

  He walked past the Kaiser Wilhelm Church, which still stood tall, if less proudly than it had before it was bombed. The church was struck during an air raid on the twenty-third of November, 1943, and what remained now was the part of the spire, entrance hall, altar, and baptistry that survived the bombing. They remained, unrepaired, as a reminder of the war. In the middle of the church, to this day, stood a damaged statue of Christ that had been on the altar the night of the bombing.

  Chopin entered the church and looked up at the statue.

  Next to it was a cross made of nails taken from the roof timbers of Coventry Cathedral, which the Germans had bombed in 1940.

  He didn’t pray. He was not a man who could bring himself to do that.

  He simply stood, leaning on his cane, looking at the broken stone statue.

  He reached into his pocket for some change and put it in the offering box. The box was for church upkeep, and it had been placed there by a group of British former bomber pilots as a sign of goodwill.

  Then he turned to leave. It was time for his coffee. His whipped cream. His pastry.

  The one pleasure he had left.

  He shuffled toward the door just as a man in a long black coat was entering the church.

  Chopin stopped. He recognized the man. They’d never met, but Chopin had seen his picture.

  In a file.

  He’d even assigned him missions.

  He reached back into his coat pocket and pulled out his electrolarynx machine.

  “You’ve come for me at last,” he said, the synthetic voice filling the empty church with a strange, mechanical presence that was out of place.

  Chopin knew nothing of Tatyana’s presence in the city. She hadn’t contacted him in a long time, and even now, she had no intention of drawing him into the risky operation she was engaged in. She’d given his name to Laurel and would have gone to him if she’d escaped Prochnow’s attack, but that hadn’t happened.

  Christoph Prochnow didn’t say a word. He walked up to the old man, pressed his gun against his temple, and pulled the trigger.

  The old man’s body slumped slowly, as if his age and decrepitude slowed even the action of gravity. It formed a crumpled heap on the ground.

  Prochnow looked around the church, then stood over the body, opened his fly, and pissed on the dying Chopin.

  “You betrayed us first,” he said.

  49

  Laurel walked along the Kurfürstendamm until she found the Clockmaker’s shop. When she reached it, she kept walking.

  There was a café across the street with seats and umbrellas outside, and she sat down and ordered a cappuccino.

  She was nervous.

  This was the place Tatyana had told her to come in case of trouble.

  And trouble, there was.

  She sipped her coffee and watched the shop. It was like something from another time, with a rich wooden façade, a painted sign on the window, and warm light spilling from the frosted glass of the door.

  She tried to see inside, but a lace curtain and a display of expensive clocks blocked the view.

  The sign on the door said the shop was open, but no one entered or left in the time she’d been watching.

  In all likelihood, it would be just the proprietor, the Clockmaker himself, who was inside.

  She should have checked in with Roth, he’d been trying to reach her all morning, but she couldn’t face the earful he’d give her for disobeying him. It would be better to call him with good news, hopefully after she’d found Tatyana.

  She felt for her gun, felt the reassurance of its cold, steel grip, then paid for her coffee and got up.

  She crossed the street and pushed open the door of the shop.

  Inside, it was like something from an old Victorian set. The air was musty, laden with the scent of wax polish, pipe smoke, and something that reminded her of a barbershop. The shelves and countertop were made of rich mahogany, polished over decades to a high sheen.

  On the shelves, clocks of every kind ticked, and behind reinforced glass screens, some of the most expensive watches in the world were on display.

  There was no one behind the counter, but there was a curtain leading to a workshop.

  “Hello?” Laurel called.

  And then she felt it, like a sting from a hornet, a sharp, piercing pain in her right calf muscle.

  She swung around to see where it had come from. A hidden contraption had been set up beneath the counter, like a sort of miniature crossbow.

  She looked down at her leg and saw a stainless steel dart, about two inches long, harpooned into her flesh.

  She reached into her coat and pulled out her gun, but as she swung around, lost her balance. She lost her grip on the gun, and it fell to the ground.

  The room spun, and she felt herself falling.

  She hit the ground hard, banging her h
ead painfully.

  Everything began to fade.

  50

  Lance woke up hungover. His mouth was dry. It tasted like an ashtray.

  He’d spent the night in some cheap hotel close to the Russian consulate. He barely remembered checking in.

  He’d slept in his clothes, and there was a woman lying next to him, her skirt still hiked up around her waist where they’d left it the night before.

  He fixed it for her, saving what dignity there was to be saved, and went to the window.

  Outside, a garbage truck was emptying a dumpster.

  It was just after dawn.

  He’d intended to break into the Russian consulate and find out who’d killed Sam. The flight to Montana had been booked by the consulate. The Consul-General, a man named Jacob Kirov, had to know the identity of the passenger.

  In fact, he was probably the one who’d sent him.

  But Kirov wasn’t at the consulate.

  He was in Saint Petersburg.

  Lance lit a cigarette and looked at the woman he’d spent the night with. He wasn’t proud of himself. He doubted she would be either.

  The room was disgusting, one of those cheap, rooming houses that could only be found in a city like New York.

  He vaguely remembered calling Laurel from a bar.

  He couldn’t remember what he’d said to her, but he had no doubt it was humiliating.

  She’d want nothing to do with him now, not after what he’d told her about his past.

  He went into the bathroom. The bathtub had rust stains below the faucets, and he stared at the pattern they made, like piss-colored rivers, toward the drain.

  He showered longer than usual.

  He had no reason to hurry.

  Sam was dead.

  The men responsible for her death would be dead soon.

  Every last one of them.

  And when that was done, what then?

  There would be nothing.

  He could go back to Montana, but it wouldn’t be the same.

  He thought of the cobbler she’d made, then he shut off the water and stepped out of the shower.

  The woman on the bed was stirring to life.

  “Hey, stud,” she said.

  He pulled on his jeans and shirt. He would need some fresh clothes.

  “Do I owe you money?” he said bluntly to the woman.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Sorry.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I…” he stammered.

  “You asked if you owed me money.”

  “I was just checking.”

  “Checking? Checking what?”

  “If…”.

  “If I was a whore? What kind of asshole wakes up in the morning and doesn’t know if the woman he fucked was a whore or not?”

  “Sorry,” Lance said again, putting on his jacket.

  “And now you’re leaving?”

  “I’ve got to go. Last night was amazing.”

  “Fuck you, asshole.”

  He was about to leave the room when he stopped, took out his wallet, and left some cash on the sideboard by the door.

  Just in case.

  A shoe flew by his head and knocked a picture from the wall.

  He left the hotel and walked down eighty-seventh street to the corner of Lexington. There was a pharmacy, and he went inside, bought a toothbrush, deodorant, some soap, a change of underwear, and a fresh white shirt. Then he used the pharmacy’s washroom to change.

  He left the used items in the washroom and went back to the counter to buy aspirin.

  Then he went into a diner across the street and took a booth.

  “Coffee?” the waitress said.

  He nodded and pulled out his phone. He needed to buy a ticket to Saint Petersburg but as he was about to dial, it started ringing.

  It was Roth.

  He looked at the screen, unsure whether or not to answer.

  “What is it, Roth?”

  “Lance,” Roth said, “don’t hang up.”

  “I’m not hanging up,” Lance said.

  “We’re in trouble, Lance.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Tatyana’s missing. I walked her into a trap. I should never have sent her.”

  “Slow down, Roth. You sound like you’re having an anxiety attack.”

  Roth took some deep breaths.

  “Now,” Lance said, “did you just say you sent Tatyana into a trap?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why would you do that?”

  “Because she agreed to go. She knew the risk. She wanted to go?”

  “Where is she?”

  “Berlin. At least, that’s where we sent her.”

  “She won’t stay there long,” Lance said. “They’ll bring her back to Russia for interrogation. It won’t be pretty.”

  “That’s why I need you to go after her.”

  “You sure about that?”

  “Lance, you’re the only one I trust.”

  “And what does Laurel have to say about that?”

  “Laurel’s already there.”

  “What?”

  “She left last night, against my express orders, and now I’ve lost contact with her too.”

  “Roth, you’ve lost both of them?”

  “Lance…”.

  “If anything’s happened to them, Roth, I swear to God.”

  “I know, Lance. That’s why I’m calling you. I need you.”

  “Get a plane ready.”

  51

  Prochnow had always been ambitious. He’d always wanted to rise up the ranks.

  When he told Kirov what he’d achieved, he was certain he’d view him in a new light.

  Not only had he brought in Tatyana Aleksandrova, the highest-level defector Roth had ever managed to turn, but, if the rumors were true, Laurel Everlane was his new protégé. She was single-handedly responsible for a string of recent breaches that had left the GRU reeling.

  Together, they marked a massive blow to Roth’s capabilities, and right at a time when Russia was about to make a major strike at the very heart of the CIA’s mission.

  Next to them, finding out the Clockmaker was involved was merely the icing on the cake.

  Prochnow, with the help of the same GRU team Kirov had before, had brought Laurel to the tunnel beneath the Air Ministry Building where he was keeping Tatyana.

  The GRU men had brought two dollies with them, which made moving the prisoners easier. They were heavy-duty hand-trucks with thick rubber wheels and an L-shaped steel frame.

  The women stood on the steel plate at the bottom of the dolly and could be wheeled around the tunnel with ease.

  Both women were unconscious, heavily drugged, and Tatyana’s gunshot wound would begin to fester soon.

  Prochnow had secured the women to the dollies using strong, plastic ties at their ankles, wrists, knees, and elbows. Around their waists and necks, leather straps held them so tightly against the steel frame that it was impossible for them to twist out of the position he had them in.

  He’d placed the dollies at the top of the metal staircase at the entrance to the room, very close to the edge. The steps were sharp, about thirty of them, and the dollies were balanced so precipitously close to the edge that if either woman struggled or rocked her dolly too much, she would in all likelihood cause them both to fall down the stairs.

  Because they were tied upright and unable to protect themselves from the fall, there was a good chance such a fall would kill them.

  Prochnow wasn’t authorized to kill them, but they didn’t know that.

  He walked up to Tatyana and jabbed a syringe of adrenaline into her neck. She regained consciousness with a gasp for air, and he had to hold her in place to stop her from falling down the steps.

  When she saw where she was, she was confused. She didn’t understand what was happening. She could see down the stairs, she could see that she was balanced precipitously close to the edge of the top step, but
the drugs had disoriented her to the point where she couldn’t remember most of what had happened since her capture.

  Prochnow repeated the process with Laurel, and again, had to hold her steady so that she didn’t knock the entire dolly forward.

  “Now, ladies,” he said when they’d stopped struggling and were aware of the risks of too much movement. “You see where you are, don’t you?”

  “What is this?” Laurel said.

  That was when Tatyana realized for the first time that she was not alone. She strained against the restraint at her neck and could just about see to her side that Laurel was there with her.

  “Laurel?” she gasped.

  “Tatyana,” Laurel said.

  “What happened? How did you get here?”

  Laurel said nothing, and Prochnow tipped them each back on the wheels of the dolly and turned them around so that their backs were to the stairs.

  “I think you’ve both seen what will happen if you squirm and struggle too much,” he said.

  “Who are you?” Laurel said.

  “I’m the man who lured you here, Laurel Everlane.”

  “You don’t know what you’re messing with,” she said.

  He smiled at her, leaning back on the railing of the gangway. He removed a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and lit one.

  “Oh, I understand perfectly well what I’m messing with,” he said. “It’s been almost too simple. I lured you here,” he said, nodding toward Tatyana, “when I killed the cop from Riga, and I lured you here,” he said, nodding to Laurel, “when I caught Tatyana.”

  “So Agata is dead?” Tatyana said.

  “She put up a fight,” Prochnow said, “she certainly gave us a run for our money, but we got her in the end.”

  Prochnow smiled. He couldn’t believe what he had. Not one, but two of Kirov’s most wanted prizes.

  “What are you going to do with us?” Laurel said.

  “Oh,” Prochnow said, pulling his phone from his pocket. “I’m just an underling, really. Just a foot soldier. The real decisions are made by others.”