Spy Who Read Latin: And Other Stories

by Edward D. Hoch

  “You’ve forgotten me already?” Rand asked. “After only ten hours?”

  “Mr. Rand! What brings you to the zoo at night? And who is that with you?”

  “My name is Taz,” the Russian said softly.

  “You really must excuse me. I’m getting my crocodile settled in his new quarters.”

  “We don’t want the crocodile,” Rand said. “We want the coffin he came in.”

  “The coffin! It’s out on the truck. But why do you want it?”

  “Because, Dr. Nobea, six big men had to struggle to get that coffin on board. A full-grown Philippine crocodile weighs less than an average person, and you said this one wasn’t yet fullgrown. I want what’s hidden in the bottom of that coffin.”

  “There’s nothing,” she said, but her eyes darted with fright.

  “No Customs man would search further after you showed him the crocodile, would he? And no Customs man would question the total weight of the coffin, at least not when it arrived in the care of Professor Nobea of Tokyo University. Which brings us to the question: what happened to the real Professor Nobea?”

  Yota’s mouth twisted. “I am Nobea.”

  Rand shook his head. “Shoju Etan was doing a series of articles on the Tokyo zoo, which included research in Moscow. He must have known about the crocodile-mating project. He must have met the real Nobea. That was why Shoju Etan had to die, wasn’t it? Not because of Gordon Belgrave’s confession, but because of Shoju’s zoo articles. Not because the newspaperman might recognize you on the plane, but because he wouldn’t recognize you! When that coffin was opened at Customs and you identified yourself as Dr. Nobea, Shoju would have been there to call you a liar.”

  “The first attempt on Shoju was made at his office,” Taz objected. “How would they know that soon whether he would be on the same flight?”

  “Shoju wrote in his Belgrave story that he’d be returning to Moscow this week, and there’s only one flight from Tokyo to Moscow each week. Yota knew he’d be on that plane, and so he had to die. When they failed to kill him earlier, they had to do it before the plane landed. I had a tip when Yota admitted using a false name early in the flight. There was no reason for it—except to keep her assumed identity a secret from Shoju till he was dead.”

  There was a sound behind them, and Rand saw Dr. Hardan in the doorway. He was wearing a black raincoat and he held a Llama automatic in his hand. A spare in his baggage, of course. All experienced assassins carry two.

  Yota screamed something in Chinese and leaped to the side of the crocodile pond. Taz turned, his reactions just a bit too slow, and saw the assassin’s gun trained on him. Rand had only a second to consider the alternatives. Then he fired through the pocket of his jacket and caught Hardan in the chest.

  “You were armed,” Taz muttered, recovering himself enough to get a firm grip on the woman.

  “No one searched me,” Rand replied with a smile. “I always visit Russians with a gun in my pocket.” He walked over and nudged the body on the concrete floor. “This is Dr. Hardan, or if you prefer, Sivas, late Turkish assassin. Funny, Lanning said he even looked like one. The CIA can’t be all bad.”

  “What is in the bottom of the coffin?” Taz asked.

  “Something Chinese agents were anxious to smuggle into Moscow. You take it from there.”

  “I will, my friend,” Taz said.

  The following morning a Russian military transport was waiting at Moscow airport. Rand and Taz watched while Mrs. Belgrave led her husband to the plane, and then Rand said, “Thanks for the transportation. It saves us a wait.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Rand.” The Russian seemed in good spirits.

  “The coffin?”

  “It’s not my department, but I understand it’s very critical. Pieces of metal, and much wiring. The more melodramatic of our people suspect they may be components of a small Chinese atomic bomb.”

  Rand whistled. “You’d better watch out for the rest of it.”

  “We will.” Taz paused. “And Rand, if you ever decide to accept my offer—”

  “Don’t count on it. In this business we all end up poor. There’s no beating the system, Taz.” He remembered Lanning’s complaint about his low pay, and saw the CIA man walking toward them. “I’d better go now.”

  The Russian nodded and waved as they parted. Then Rand fell into step with Lanning and they walked to the waiting jet. “You did a good job, Rand,” the American observed. “We just heard from Tokyo that they’ve located the real Dr. Nobea. She was drugged but unharmed.”

  “It was a good job,” Rand agreed. “I helped Taz and I freed Belgrave. Sorry you couldn’t get the plan for the SUM missile while we were at it.”

  Lanning started up the steps of the plane, then turned back toward Rand with a little smile. “What makes you think we didn’t get it?” he whispered.

  The Spy Who Collected Lapel Pins

  HE WAS NOT AN old man, but the years had not dealt kindly with Comrade Taz. As he walked across the field toward the lights of the distant farmhouse, he could feel the ache in his right leg coming back again. It was a war injury from his youth, 30 years ago, when he’d shown a fleeting moment of courage in front of a German tank on the outskirts of Berlin.

  During all those years in Moscow, heading up Section Six of the KGB, he had hardly thought of the old war injury. It gave him no trouble, and he walked without a noticeable limp. It was only now, in retirement to a collective farm an hour’s drive from Moscow, that the ache and the limp had reoccurred. It was the life, his sturdy wife Lara insisted. His legs were made for walking on paved sidewalks, not trudging across newly plowed fields.

  As he neared the farmhouse, he was surprised to see a black government staff car pulled in off the road. In this collective, made up entirely of former government employees, one rarely was visited by the bureaucracy. He entered the kitchen door with just a bit of apprehension, to find Lara conversing with two men in overcoats who gave the impression of having just arrived.

  Taz knew one of them—Colonel Tunic, a grizzled old man who’d been his immediate superior during the Cold War days. The other, a younger official who carried himself with an air of newly acquired authority, was a stranger to him.

  “Comrade Taz!” Tunic greeted him, throwing out both arms in an affectionate bear hug. “You look well. Retirement must agree with you.”

  “Lara says farm work is bad on my legs. How are things back in Moscow?”

  “Good, good.” He gave a rueful smile, “Détente, you know.” Remembering the other man, he turned to introduce him. “Comrade Taz, this is Stepan Vronsky, a specialist in international matters.”

  The two men shook hands, and Taz wondered what Vronsky’s true function was. He wondered especially what had brought these men out here to see him. “You look cold,” he told them. “Take off your coats and have some vodka.”

  “I could never live in the country,” Stepan Vronsky said. “The wind is so cold!”

  Taz smiled. “One becomes used to it. Lara, bring us some glasses, will you?”

  When they were seated around the rough oak kitchen table, which Lara had thoughtfully covered with a piece of flowered oilcloth, Colonel Tunic said, “We miss you in Moscow. You retired too soon.”

  Taz merely shrugged. “Cipher experts of my sort have been replaced by machines. Diplomats and machines.”

  “Sometimes there is still need for one,” Vronsky said. Taz turned to study his face and saw only the pale reflection of the Russian winter with its sunless days.

  “We miss you,” Colonel Tunic repeated. “And now we need you. The government wishes you to come out of retirement for one final assignment to the west.”

  The words fell like thunder on Taz’s ears. He’d been expecting it, certainly, ever since he saw the long black car pulled up before his house. But to hear it now was still a shock. “What sort of assignment?” he asked quietly.

  “Some material must be taken to Switzerland. It’s in your line—microd
ots.”

  Taz snorted. “A diplomatic courier could get it through for you, as you well know.”

  “That’s only part of it. There’s something else.” Tunic shifted in his chair. “An old friend of yours is involved.”

  “Who would that be?”

  “Remember Jeffery Rand, the head of Britain’s Double-C?”

  “Of course.”

  Vronsky spoke again. “You should welcome an opportunity to confront an old enemy one more time.”

  “Rand is not my enemy,” Taz replied. “We were two professional men doing our jobs.”

  “Nevertheless, he is on the other side.”

  “Yes,” Taz admitted. “Just what do you have in mind?”

  “You are familiar with the Nobel Prize recipient, Kolia Komarov?”

  “Certainly.” Despite nominal press censorship, almost everyone in the Soviet Union must have been aware of the Komarov case. A powerful novelist in the tradition of Turgenev, his choice as the Nobel laureate last fall had stirred up all the old fires in Russian literary circles. Though Komarov had written harshly of past Soviet governments, the men in the Kremlin did not want another Pasternak or Solzhenitsyn case on their hands. They had allowed Komarov to leave Moscow to accept the award in Stockholm. In his acceptance speech he announced to the startled world his defection from Russia.

  “Then you know he’s living in Switzerland now. And you also know he was forced to leave several of his manuscripts behind when he fled.”

  “Yes.”

  “Komarov still has a great many friends here. Recently his wife—who fled with him to Switzerland—contacted a cousin. Arrangements were made to smuggle his manuscripts out of the country. The cousin, a loyal Party member, came to us.” Vronsky smiled slightly, proud of his accomplishment. “Specifically, to me.”

  “I see.” Taz took a sip of his vodka. “And where do I fit in?”

  Colonel Tunic took over the story. Despite the difference in their ages and bearing, Tunic and Vronsky might have been partners in a traveling comedy act. Taz thought about this and chuckled inwardly. He wondered why he had never laughed at Tunic during all their years together in Moscow.

  “The manuscript material has been reduced to microdots,” Tunic said. “With your experience in the field, and especially your experience with Rand, you are the natural choice to deliver it.”

  “Rand would hardly believe I was performing an act contrary to Soviet policy. He knows I am loyal. And you have not yet told me how Rand figures in all this.”

  “Rand will be involved when you get him involved. You make contact with him and arrange a meeting in Geneva. He’ll come, of course. You explain that you have always been a great admirer of Kolia Komarov’s writing, and for this reason you have smuggled his manuscript out of Russia, in microdot form. You ask Rand’s help in getting you through the guards to visit Komarov. He does so, the microdots prove to be useless, and the British are discredited in Komarov’s eyes.”

  “A trick,” Vronsky chortled. “A hoax!” The thought seemed to please him.

  “Is this the way we wage war now?” Taz asked distastefully.

  “We wage it any way we can.”

  “You don’t need me for it,” Taz decided with a wave of his hand, as if chasing away a pesky fly.

  “We need you for Rand.”

  “He is not even British Intelligence. He is only one man, like myself.”

  Colonel Tunic shifted uneasily. “There is more to it, Comrade. We cannot tell you everything at this point, but you must trust us.”

  Lara came back into the kitchen. Taz saw her eyes catch his, but he couldn’t read the message there. Perhaps it was only a reflection of his own misgivings.

  With the coming of winter London had settled beneath a dreary mantle of mist, reminding Rand of his annual promise to move to the south of France. This morning especially was one of low dark clouds that blotted out the sun. From his wide window overlooking the muddy Thames he could see only the bare outlines of the city—the new high-rise apartments, the dome of St. Paul’s that was Christopher Wren’s supreme achievement. Everything else was a somber gray blur.

  He was halfway through the morning’s routine of reports and mail when Parkinson entered. “We’ve got something unusual here, sir.”

  “On the Syrian matter?”

  “No, it’s a message we intercepted in the old cipher the Russians used when Taz was in charge. I haven’t seen it in years.”

  “Odd.”

  “Odder still, the message seems addressed to you.”

  Rand took the sheet of lined intercept paper that Parkinson held out. Rand, it read, you may see your old friend from Paris at the Hotel de Ville in Geneva on Monday next.

  “What do you make of it, sir?”

  “I don’t quite know.” The message had been sent by a route that Taz must have known the British would intercept.

  But Taz was in retirement.

  Or was he?

  Later that day Rand phoned Hastings and told him he would be out of the country for a couple of days the following week. There was a matter in Geneva that needed checking into.

  He’d always found Geneva to be a beautiful city, situated as it was at the point where the Rhone River exited from its brief journey across Lake Leman. There were lovely little parks running along both sides of the river at the point of exit, with jetties leaping out from either shore and beacons to guide the traveler.

  The Hotel de Ville was in another of the city’s parks, a half mile from the water. It faces the University and the Monument of the Reformation, both flanking the Promenade des Bastions which ran through the center of the park. Rand had checked in just after three, and was considering whether the park or the shore would make the more pleasing stroll while he waited for contact.

  As it turned out, the decision was made for him.

  “Message for you, sir,” the clerk called as he was crossing the lobby toward the street.

  “For me?”

  “You are Mr. Rand?”

  “That’s right.” He opened the folded piece of paper and read: Your old friend awaits you by the Jetty of the Spring Tides.

  Rand smiled slightly and slipped the note into his pocket.

  The Jetty of the Spring Tides was the one closest to the hotel, on the south bank of the river. He reached it after a twenty-minute walk that reminded him again of the city’s charms.

  At first he didn’t recognize the iron-haired man with the beard who occupied a bench near the jetty. He’d almost gone by when a half-remembered voice said, “The lake is enchanting here, with the mountains in the background.”

  “Taz!”

  “Are you surprised?”

  Rand sat down beside him. “Not really, I suppose. You are the only one who would have used that old cipher.”

  “I’m glad you came. I didn’t know if—”

  “What is it? I’d heard you retired to a farm outside Moscow.”

  Taz smiled, and Rand caught the glint of a gold tooth he hadn’t noticed on their previous meetings. Perhaps Taz had never smiled then. “A collective—a special one for loyal government employees like myself. It would bear little resemblance to your farms in England.”

  “What brings you to Geneva?”

  “I have come out of retirement. The indispensable man.” He said it with a slight smile.

  “That’s bad news for Concealed Communications.”

  “Not so bad, really. Our cipher section is fully automated now—rotor-type cipher machines, one-time pads produced by machine, even electronic voice scramblers. They hardly need a man at all.”

  “And yet you’ve come back.”

  Taz shrugged. “A simple courier mission.” He took out one of the familiar long Russian cigarettes and lit it. “But tell me about yourself, Rand. Any thought of retirement?”

  “Maybe,” he admitted. “I’m getting married soon.”

  “Married?”

  Rand smiled at Taz’s surprise. Hastings had bee
n surprised too. “You may have heard of her—Leila Gaad, from Egypt. She’s been living and teaching in England since last summer.”

  “Oh, yes. You shared some adventures with her, I believe, back in the days when we were active in her country.”

  “Right.”

  “Does she want you to retire?”

  Rand nodded. “And I’m thinking seriously about it. All this détente is bad for the budget. Besides, with you retired, the fun’s gone out of it.”

  Taz nodded, stroking his beard. “We can leave it for the younger men.”

  “Even your writer, Kolia Komarov, has retired—at least from Russia.”

  Taz seemed to tense a bit at his words. “Why do you mention Komarov?”

  “Oh, come now! We’ve sparred at long distance for too many years not to know each other fairly well. At the moment the only thing of interest to the Russians in Geneva is Kolia Komarov.”

  “You are correct, of course,” Taz admitted readily. “I make no secret of it. In fact, since you have guessed the purpose of my mission, perhaps you can even assist me with it.”

  The whole thing was coming too easily. Rand felt as if he was being drawn into something that had been carefully orchestrated by Moscow. “How can I do that?” he asked.

  “As you know, Komarov and his wife fled while in Sweden to accept his Nobel Prize. They fled without his precious manuscripts and notes. In recent weeks attempts have been made to smuggle these papers out of Russia.”

  “A difficult job. I understand they’d fill a large filing cabinet.”

  “That is correct.”

  “Where do you fit in?”

  “Here,” he answered simply. He opened an attaché case on the bench by his side and removed a stiff leather-covered folder. “My znachki collection!”

  The Russian opened the folder to reveal a felt surface bedecked with dozens of colorful souvenir lapel pins and covered with a protective sheet of plastic. The collecting of such pins, Rand knew, was a popular hobby in the Soviet Union. Virtually every organization in the country minted the little emblems, which were bought and traded with relish.