Cauldron

by Larry Bond

  Although interrogators often revealed much about themselves by the kinds of questions they asked, these were so limited, or so straightforward, that Hradetsky learned little about the man or his group. From his build, his haircut, and some of the expressions he used, the colonel suspected the younger man might be an ex-army officer.

  Abruptly the man closed his lunch pail, stood up, and said, “That’s enough for now. I must report to my superiors.”

  Hradetsky stood also and they strolled casually toward the nearest Metro stop, mingling with the other workers streaming back to their offices. He had questions of his own, but he knew this man would not answer them. Still, he volunteered, “Please tell Kus — ”

  The other man gave him a sharp look, and shushed him sharply.

  Hradetsky corrected himself. “Please tell your superiors that there is not much time.”

  The younger man smiled grimly. “We have been trying to tell you and your kind that for a long time.” Then he seemed to loosen up a little. “If you are what you claim to be, you can be a great help to us, Colonel. Still, a man can say anything and sound sincere. Actions always speak louder than words.”

  He handed Hradetsky a piece of paper with a single name written on it. “Obtain the police file on this person and then come to the Central Etterem Cafeteria in two days’ time. At noon again. Is that sufficient?”

  Momentarily nonplussed, Hradetsky muttered an affirmative.

  “Good.” The man stood still for a moment, watching the crowds pouring down the stairs to the underground subway line. Then he glanced back at Hradetsky. “And be more careful in the future. I followed you all the way from your ministry as easily as a wolf tracking a wounded deer. Next time it might not be someone so friendly.” He showed his teeth at his own small joke.

  Hradetsky flushed but nodded. However obnoxious the younger man’s manner, his warning was valid. He would have to learn the caution so necessary to those living outside the law.

  Two days later, he sat at a table in the packed Central Etterem Cafeteria sipping a cup of strong black espresso. His elbow rested on the same manila envelope, this time containing the police file his contact had requested.

  Hradetsky frowned. Copying the confidential file had proved almost ludicrously easy. An overworked staff and sloppy office procedures saw to that. After all, any ranking police official had routine access to that kind of information. The trick had been to do it without attracting attention or leaving a paper trail.

  Now that he had the file, he had the time to wonder why exactly Kusin’s people wanted it. From what he’d seen, the man they were interested in was a democratic activist — a longtime opponent of both the old communist regime and the current military government. Perhaps they needed to know how closely the police were watching the fellow. Or maybe the opposition already had a copy of this particular file and only wanted to see if he brought them the right one.

  Whatever else it was, this job was certainly a test of his loyalty and resourcefulness. Until he delivered the information they’d asked him for, Kusin and his allies would view him as little more than a big talker. If he delivered the wrong information, they’d write him off as a police plant. And if he’d been caught while trying to get it, they’d have known he wasn’t cut out for covert work.

  Hradetsky stirred restlessly. He felt soiled somehow. He’d spent his life enforcing the law and keeping the peace. Now it seemed almost too easy to break both, even in a good cause.

  Then he shook his head. His own feelings were unimportant in this case. And his first loyalty had to be to Hungary — not to any particular ruling clique. Especially not to a group of generals in French and German pay. Freeing the nation from their incompetent grasp was not a task for the fainthearted. It was time to act.

  The same blond-haired man he’d first met slid into the empty chair across from him. “Good afternoon, Colonel. Do you have what I asked for?”

  Hradetsky shoved the envelope across the table and waited while the man glanced inside it briefly and handed it back. He seemed satisfied.

  “Follow me.”

  Without saying anything more, the younger man got up and left the cafeteria. With Hradetsky in tow, he took a circuitous route through Budapest’s crowded streets — a route that ended at a small apartment building in one of the more fashionable districts.

  They went in through a back entrance, climbed two flights of stairs, and halted in front of an unmarked door. The blond-haired man turned for one last look down the stairs and then knocked three times. When the door opened, he motioned the police colonel through ahead of him.

  Two men were waiting for them in a tastefully furnished living room. One of them, markedly older than the other, stood up and said quietly, “I am Vladimir Kusin.”

  The man in front of Hradetsky was pale and thin, almost anemic. His clothes were shabby, although this appeared to be more from long use than lack of care. Although he was only in his fifties, his hair was snow-white, and a deeply lined face added ten years to his apparent age. A winter spent in prison had clearly been hard on him.

  During Hungary’s brief post-communist flirtation with democratic rule, Kusin had been the elected leader of one of Budapest’s district councils. When the military-dominated Government of National Salvation took power, he’d been jailed for unspecified acts of “agitation.” What that meant, the colonel knew, was that he’d complained too vehemently and too vocally about the new regime’s emergency decrees.

  And even though Kusin was articulate enough to have acquired some following in the Western media, that hadn’t protected him from a trumped-up charge and six months in prison. The generals had only released him when they were sure he was a spent force — a weak and ailing reed unable to challenge their hold on power.

  They had miscalculated.

  Even illness and imprisonment hadn’t stopped him. Kusin’s ability to smuggle out statements on human rights, French and German economic and political influence, and other forbidden topics was one of the reasons Hradetsky had sought him out.

  In the month since Hungary had joined the European Confederation, Kusin had become even more vocal. Pamphlets and underground newspaper articles bearing his signature called for an end to military rule and immediate withdrawal from the Confederation. He was the closest thing to a national leader that Hungary’s growing opposition had.

  Kusin turned toward Hradetsky’s escort. “Any problems?”

  The blond man shook his head. “No, sir. I saw no warning signals, and my boys are still in place.”

  Kusin saw Hradetsky’s puzzled look and explained. “This is Oskar Kiraly, Colonel. He and a few of his friends watch over me.”

  So that was it. The police colonel studied his escort with greater interest. For all practical purposes, Kiraly was Vladimir Kusin’s chief of security. Maybe these people were better organized than he had thought.

  The older man motioned him into an adjacent room — from the look of it a small bedroom temporarily converted into an office and library. Kusin sat down and indicated a second chair for Hradetsky. Kiraly stood behind them, near the door.

  “May I see the file you showed Oskar?”

  Hradetsky gave him the manila envelope, along with a separate packet containing all the documents he’d been given by Bela Silvanus. He nodded toward the photocopied police file. “Aren’t you worried that may be false?”

  Kusin shook his head. “If it is, your future is short, I’m afraid.” His eyes flickered toward Kiraly. Suddenly the colonel’s shoulder blades itched. He forced himself to sit calmly. If they wanted him dead, there wasn’t much he could do about it. The opposition leader scanned the copied file quickly, smiled, and then opened the other envelope.

  Kusin’s white, tufted eyebrows rose as he realized what it contained. “This is fascinating, Colonel Hradetsky. You would make a first-class spy.”

  He winced inwardly, and some of it must have shown on his face, because the older man quickly added, “That is no
t why we need you, though.”

  Kusin leaned back in his chair. “So, Colonel, what is it that you want? Why did you seek me out?” He flicked the pile of reassignment orders and termination lists in his lap. “Only to show me these? Or for something more?”

  Hradetsky sighed, knowing this was a moment of truth — a turning point from would-be reformer to revolutionary. “I started out wanting to stop this man Rehling’s orders, to bring some sanity back to the National Police. Now I don’t think that can happen. Not under this government.”

  “It can’t,” Kusin agreed firmly. “Rehling and the others like him are merely symptoms of a greater illness. These French and German satraps infect our country because the generals believe they need this Confederation’s support to maintain their power. What the soldiers do not seem to realize is that their onetime allies are very rapidly becoming their masters. And our masters as well.”

  “Yes. I understand that.” Hradetsky stifled his impatience. For all his eloquence, Kusin was still a politician. And politicians liked to talk. “But what can we do to stop this?”

  “Beside printing futile complaints, you mean?” The older man laughed softly. “There are a lot of people like you, Colonel, who were willing to accept a Government of National Salvation, but not this supposed European Confederation. We are going to mobilize those newly dissatisfied people. We are going to expand our own organization. Recruiting some of the police officers on this list you gave us will be very useful.”

  Kusin’s voice grew harder, even more determined. “And if the French and the Germans push us too far, we will fight.”

  There was a fire in his eyes and his voice that Hradetsky felt warming his own blood. He wanted to act, not sit here in this study. “Then what do you want me to do?”

  “You are a trained leader, Colonel. An expert in the art of managing men and controlling crowds. We will use that expertise for our own purposes.” Kusin leaned closer to him. “Very soon, we will mass ten thousand people or more for a march on the Parliament building to demand reforms. You are going to help us organize this protest.”

  The opposition leader sat back. His eyes were colder now, fixed on some distant horizon beyond Hradetsky’s view. “And then?” He smiled sadly. “Then we shall see just how far these madmen in Paris and Berlin can be pushed.”

  APRIL 5 — NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL MEETING, SITUATION ROOM, THE WHITE HOUSE

  The news from Europe was grim.

  “Essentially the French and German military buildup along the Polish and Czech borders is continuing, Mr. President. In fact, it may even be accelerating. The whole border area is rapidly becoming a powder keg.” General Reid Galloway, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, stood behind a podium next to a wall-sized video monitor. The fact that America’s top-ranked soldier was delivering this briefing in person emphasized how seriously he viewed the events piling up across the Atlantic. The creases across a normally optimistic, good-humored face were another clear indication.

  Ross Huntington shared the general’s pessimistic view. Outraged by the French-funded oil embargo and the attack on North Star, Poland and the Czech and Slovak republics had broken all diplomatic ties with the European Confederation. And with France stonewalling demands for a full investigation, Britain and Norway had recalled their ambassadors from Paris for “consultation.” Public pressure in the United State was building for similar moves. What had begun as a political and economic crisis was rapidly taking on a military aspect as well. He clenched his left fist repeatedly, hoping it would ease the pressure in his chest.

  Galloway clicked through several images in rapid succession, using a hand-held controller to circle the parts of each image he considered particularly important. Some of the photos he highlighted showed jet aircraft parked out in the open near hardened shelters. Others featured row after row of tanks and other armored vehicles lined up in cleared fields near small villages and larger towns. “As these satellite photos show, EurCon is in the process of moving substantial air and ground forces to new bases in eastern Germany. Significantly, they aren’t making any real effort to hide this redeployment.”

  “Could they?” The President sat forward in his chair.

  Galloway nodded vigorously. “Yes, sir. My EurCon counterparts know the orbital data for every recon satellite we have. If they wanted to, they could be moving this hardware around when we’re blind — and concealing it under camouflage netting or in shelters when we’re not. We’d still pick up signs of movement, but not anywhere near this fast or this easily.”

  “So this is primarily a political maneuver to step up the pressure on the Poles and Czechs — and not a preliminary move toward deliberate military action?”

  “Exactly, Mr. President.” The chairman of the Joint Chiefs keyed the monitor off and raised the room lights to full brightness. “But our allies can’t take that chance, so they’re being forced to respond in kind.

  “Although they’re still worried about Russia, the Poles are more worried about EurCon. So far they’ve deployed four of their nine active-duty divisions along the German frontier, with another two close behind in reserve. And when I talked to General Staron, their Defense Minister, this morning, he informed me that his President is considering reactivating one of their reserve divisions. The Czechs and Slovaks are taking similar steps.”

  Huntington felt the band around his chest tighten even more. This was very bad news. Calling reservists from their civilian jobs back to the colors was always a costly proposition. The fact that the three Eastern European countries were even considering it in a time of great economic hardship indicated just how concerned they were.

  Galloway shook his head somberly. “With tens of thousands of troops on full alert and aircraft flying combat air patrols in close proximity to each other, the place is just one hell of an accident waiting to happen.”

  “Swell.” The President swiveled his chair toward Harris Thurman. “Any recent diplomatic developments I should know about?”

  “No, sir.” The Secretary of State sounded apologetic. “Nobody’s budged so much as an inch.”

  “All right, people. I need your input. What exactly are my options here?” The President tapped the table with his pen. “General? John? Any ideas on your end of things?”

  The Secretary of Defense looked thoughtful. “The Joint Chiefs and I believe we should boost our military aid to Poland and the others even further, Mr. President. By drawing down some of our reserve forces equipment we could — ”

  “Send more tanks?” Thurman looked aghast. “General Galloway is right. The whole region is an armed camp now. How can shipping in more weapons possibly help?”

  Lucier kept his attention locked on the President. “Weapons by themselves don’t provoke wars. Perceptions and intentions are far more important.”

  Huntington nodded to himself. The short, bookish Secretary of Defense was right there. Too many arms control pundits focused only on the hardware side of the equation. By their bizarre set of rules, both Adolf Hitler’s massive program to rearm for conquest and the belated Allied efforts to thwart the Nazi dictator would have been judged equally destabilizing.

  “EurCon evidently views the Poles and the rest as militarily weak, and thus susceptible to military pressure. In turn, they know that much of their equipment is outdated. To make up for that, they’ve had to bring their armed forces to higher and higher states of alert. When you’re outgunned and outnumbered, you must make sure every available tank, plane, and soldier is ready for battle.”

  Lucier looked over his thick, horn-rimmed glasses at the Secretary of State. “Perceived weakness is exacerbating this crisis, Harris. Not strength. So we can accomplish two very important aims by increasing our military aid now. First, we put EurCon’s leaders on notice that we’re calling their bluff. And second, we’ll build Polish and Czech confidence. The more certain they are that they can withstand a sudden EurCon attack, the more likely they are to pull their forces back from the border and r
atchet down their alert state.”

  In the momentary silence that followed, the President sat frowning, evidently still somewhat unsure of which course to follow. He scanned the assembled group. “If I okay this extra military aid, what’s the likely EurCon reaction?”

  “Paris and Berlin will be furious.” Thurman sounded unhappy. “They regard all of Eastern Europe as their own backyard, so they’re bound to regard further arms shipments as a deliberate provocation.”

  The President nodded slowly, still frowning. “But how far will they go, Harris?” He glanced around the table. “Take the worst case. Would EurCon risk a military confrontation over this issue?”

  “Unlikely, sir.” Galloway shook his head. “They’re trying to intimidate the Poles and the rest — not start an open war with us.”

  “EurCon won’t roll over, though,” Huntington warned. “The French and Germans want Poland and the others inside their orbit too badly to give up so easily. We can expect heated protests.” He paused. “Probably coupled with additional covert attacks against us or against our allies.”

  The President and the rest of the NSC nodded. Though they didn’t have enough proof to go public with their suspicions, everybody in the room knew EurCon agents were responsible for the destruction of the LNG tanker and for the murder of an American intelligence officer. Nobody would be particularly surprised by more EurCon sabotage attempts. He looked down the table at the head of the CIA. “What about it, Walt? Can your antiterrorism people handle the threat?”

  “Yes, Mr. President,” Quinn said confidently. “I know there’s no such thing as a leakproof defense, but now that we know what we’re up against, we’ve got a much better chance to thwart any covert operations aimed our way.”

  Galloway backed Quinn up. “Besides the warships we send as escorts, we can put special teams from Delta Force and SEAL Team Six on every freighter and tanker going into the Baltic.” The general’s eyes flashed fire. “And with those guys in place, I’ll guarantee any son-of-a-bitch who tries to plant another limpet mine a short ride to hell.”