by Stuart Woods
Helder agreed that navigating the channel submerged should pose little problem.
Majorov continued. “Emerging here, you will turn in a southwesterly direction again, still following the main channel, past the town of Brevik, on your starboard hand, to a point here,
in the body of water called the Lilla Vartan. Here you will deploy your cargo.”
Helder felt a little shiver. Majorov’s finger rested on a spot no more than five kilometers from the center of Stockholm.
“Then,” said Majorov, “you will return to the mother sub by the same route. She is to wait for you exactly twenty-four hours, since that is the outer limit of both your batteries’ running time and your oxygen supply. If you have not returned by that time, you will be presumed to have abandoned or to be casualties. As you can see, the total distance you must travel is only twelve kilometers, and at your standard operational speed of three knots, that distance would consume less than three hours of running time, so you would seem to have a very comfortable safety margin. However, that margin would presume an entirely uneventful passage, and that is very unlikely.”
Majorov rose and began to pace as he talked. “Since the Whiskey-on-the-rocks incident in 1981, the Swedes have been rapidly improving their sub-hunting capabilities. In ‘eighty-one, when they had four of our minisubs penned up in the archipelago, all four escaped, but you must remember that they are better now than then. You must be prepared for the worst conditions, and you must—I repeat, you must—complete the deployment of the buoy, no matter what happens. This buoy is absolutely vital to the success of our mission, and it is one of a kind; there is no backup equipment, no chance of a second mission if you fail. Should this buoy not be correctly deployed, the lives of hundreds, perhaps thousands of the cream of the Soviet military will be placed in the greatest jeopardy.”
He paused, turned and looked directly at Helder and Sokolov. “That said, you should know that there is one possibility even worse than not deploying the buoy; that is if either of you should fall into Swedish hands. If, for any reason, you should have to abandon the minisub, each of you has a carefully prepared legend, and you will have further instructions which will make it possible for you to make your way to Finland, whence you will be transported back to Malibu. Should you find yourselves on the beach, you are to separate at once. Your legends have been based on traveling alone. You have each already been issued a handgun, and before your departure you will be issued two clips of ammunition and other aids for survival. The supposition is that, should you find yourself in a situation where you might use up two clips of ammunition, you will be unlikely to need more. You will also be issued with—how shall I put it?—aids for non-survival.” Majorov shook his head. “No, euphemisms will not suffice in this situation. Let me put it to you bluntly. Should you find yourself in Swedish hands, you must take your own lives. If either of you has any doubts of your ability to perform that task, I must know now.” He raised his eyebrows.
“No doubts, Colonel,” Sokolov said, immediately.
“None whatever,” echoed Helder. But he was damned if he’d kill himself. He was going to survive this mission, one way or another.
“Good,” said Majorov. “Now there is just one more thing. I am pleased to tell you that work on the buoy has been completed. It will arrive at Malibu tomorrow, and Sokolov, you will immediately be certain that there are no mating problems between the grapplers on the minisub and the receptacles on the buoy.”
“Yes, Colonel,” Sokolov replied.
Helder was about to ask whether there could be practice with the actual buoy, when Majorov interrupted him.
“We have good weather for the next three days, the met office tells me,” he said. “You have worked hard in the past days, and you have proved yourselves ready. You go tomorrow night.”
Helder’s heart stopped. They weren’t ready. He hadn’t even been able yet to bring up the matter of further enlarging the diving planes, and he was very uncertain of Sokolov, whether she was going to hold herself together underwater. But he stopped himself from protesting. He could see that, whether or not he and Sokolov and the minisub were ready, Majorov was ready. He glanced at Sokolov. She, for once, was speechless. Helder forced himself to speak up. “Good, sir. We are ready.”
“Fine, fine,” Majorov said, rubbing his hands. “You are dismissed, now. Get a good night’s rest, and take the morning off. The buoy will be in the sub pens by fourteen hundred hours.”
Helder and Sokolov got up and started for the submarine’s main hatch.
“Oh, Helder,” Majorov said, seemingly as an afterthought, “stay for a moment; there’s a personal matter I’d like to discuss with you.”
“Of course, sir,” Helder said.
Majorov waited until Sokolov and the skipper had left the wardroom before speaking. “Helder, there is one further task which you may have to perform.” His face was expressionless. “Sweden, unlike the United States, competed in the 1980 Moscow Olympics, and the games received full press and television coverage in that country. Therefore, Sokolov’s face is too well known in Sweden for her to be allowed ashore there. If you should have to abandon the minisub, you are to see that she does not leave the submarine. Do you understand? In those circumstances you are to kill her.”
There was only a moment’s hesitation before Helder replied. He wondered if he could do it. There had been times on every training exercise when he would have liked to kill Sokolov. But could he do it if the moment came? Could he become a coldblooded assassin? He would have to think about that. In the meantime, though, he could leave Majorov with no doubts about his resolve. “Yes, Colonel, I understand completely,” he said.
17
RULE gaped at the handsome man in the dinner jacket, trying to get her groggy mind into gear.
“Hi, remember me?” Will Lee asked.
Oh, God, she had a dinner date, a celebration, no less. In the midst of her depression she had forgotten. She was about to speak when two things stopped her; the ring of the telephone and the sight of the man who had been following her, now sauntering past her house on the opposite side of the street. She grabbed Will by the wrist and dragged him into the house. The telephone rang again. “Just a minute, Will,” she said, grabbing for the phone. “Hello.”
“Can I interest you in an impromptu dinner with a beat-up old spy?” Ed Rawls drawled. “I tried to get you at the office, but you’d already left.
Rule hadn’t been expecting this, but her mind was suddenly clear, and she didn’t hesitate. “Oh, yes, Ed, I’d love to have dinner with you tonight.” She caught a glimpse of Will’s face, which had twisted into an astonished frown, and waved an impatient hand to keep him from speaking. “Just tell me when and where.” Her mind was racing.
“Well, I’ve taken a little place in Georgetown. It’s no palace, but there’s a grill out back. Why don’t I do you a steak?”
“Sounds great,” she replied, scribbling down the address. “You’re only a few blocks from me. What time?”
“Soon as you like. Dress sloppy.”
“I’ll be there in twenty minutes,” she said. She hung up and turned to Will, throwing up her hands in a defensive gesture. “Now wait a minute, I know this seems crazy, I know we had a dinner date …”
“A celebration, as I recall,” he said, dryly. “Tell me, what were we celebrating when we still had a date? And who the hell is Ed?”
She took his face in her hands. “Look, I know I’ve screwed up your evening and all, but my reason for celebrating turned out to be more of a reason for a wake, and the guy who just called is an old friend on the covert side who may be the only person in the world who can help me fix it. Please understand, please. My whole career is in the wringer right now, and I’ve got to get it out.”
His face dissolved into a resigned smile. “Okay, sure. I’ll take a rain check. Is this something to do with Majorov?”
“It’s everything to do with Majorov, and I wish I could explain it all to you, but I can
’t right now. I’ve got to get over there and persuade this guy to help me, and I’m not at all sure he will when he finds out what I want from him.”
“Is there anything I can do to help?”
She thought for a moment. “Yes. Spend the evening here, watch TV, or read, or something. I may be able to get back early, but don’t count on it. If I’m not back by, say, eleven, then go home, and I’ll call you tomorrow. Okay?”
He shrugged. “Sure, I’ve got nothing better to do. Is there anything to eat in the house?”
“A freezer full of stuff, and there’s some fairly old chicken in the fridge. I’m not sure it’s edible.”
“I’ll make do. You get going.”
“Right.” She freshened her makeup in the hall mirror, grabbed her purse, started for the door, then stopped. The goon, as she had come to think of him, was out there in the street, and she didn’t want him following her to Ed’s. She went out her back door, through the ill-tended garden, pulled a plank off the fence that separated her garden from her neighbor’s, and squeezed through. She walked through a carefully groomed garden to some French doors at the back of the neighboring house and rapped on the glass. An elderly man watching TV inside started, then came and opened the door.
“I’m Katharine Rule,” she said to the stranger, “I live just behind you, and I didn’t want to leave my house by the front door. There’s this man who’s been bothering me lately, you see, and I’d like to avoid him. Would you mind very much if I got to the street through your house?
“Why no,” the man said, baffled but courtly, “please come in.” He led her through his house and let her out the front door.
“Thank you so much,” she said, waving.
“Not at all,” he replied. “Any time. It’s been quite a while since a pretty girl tapped at my window,” he called after her.
It took less than ten minutes to make her way to Ed Rawls’s place, a basement apartment on P Street. She rang the bell, and Rawls answered the door in old khakis and a golf shirt. He kissed her on the cheek. “Come on in. It’s not much; I just got it this week.” He showed her quickly around the three-room flat, furnished in what looked like hand-me-downs from the owner upstairs. “It’s a short let, until Betty can get down here and do some house hunting. I’ll bet you want a drink.”
“I’d kill for a bourbon on the rocks. You coming back to Langley, Ed?”
He nodded. “That’s not for publication, though, not yet. I’m not due to start for a few days. Come on out back.” He led her to a small terrace behind the house and installed her in a deck chair with her drink.
It was pleasant outside; there was still a lot of evening light at this time of year, but the heat of the day had waned. Bees buzzed about a garden as unkempt as her own. “I shouldn’t ask, Ed, but what’s the job?”
“Oh, it’s okay; it’s above the line. Assistant Deputy director for Operations.”
“That’s terrific, Ed! Hell, you ought to be DDO, and everybody knows it.”
Rawls laughed. “Now, now, pull your claws back in. I won’t mind working for Simon. He and I have always understood each other. I’ve known him even longer than you have, you know, though maybe not as well.”
“I’m sorry, Ed, I didn’t mean to make a compliment an attack on Simon. I know you wouldn’t be getting this job if he didn’t want you, and you owe him your loyalty.”
Rawls shrugged. “Anyway, I’ll be off the street, now. I’m getting too old for that stuff, anyway, and Betty is sure as hell glad to come back to D.C. and unpack. We reckon to ride it out here until retirement.”
“I guess she’s tired of following you all over the world by now; I’d be glad to get back to the States if I were in her shoes.”
“Oh, we’ve been back for a couple of years. I’ve had an assignment that’s kept me in the East for a while. We’ve been in New York, took a place in the Village, and I got home on weekends. It was like being young again; we lived in the Village for a few months right after we were married.”
“Malakhov must have been an interesting assignment,” Rule said, and watched the surprise register on his face. Georgi Malakhov was the highest-ranking KGB officer ever to defect to the United States, a major general who had run their New York/UN station for four years, with a cover as a Deputy director General of the United Nations. His defection had caused a major rift in US-Soviet relations and had been one of the biggest intelligence coups for the CIA since its founding.
Rawls shrugged. “It was absorbing work,” he said, “and it kept me in the States. It was a nice assignment to go out of field work on.”
“I’ve been reading the digests. Fascinating. We’re updating files every day with that material. You ought to be very proud. It’s that sort of work that really gives an analyst something to get his teeth into.”
“It fell into my lap, really. Malakhov asked for me.”
“No kidding, why?”
“We knew each other slightly when I was in the Stockholm station. He was station head in the Soviet embassy there, and we never made him. Thought he was first secretary, like his billing said. Betty and I once shared a table with him and his wife at a dinner at the royal palace. We both liked both of them, but, apart from bumping into him at a couple of diplomatic cocktail parties, we never really saw anything of them. Soviet diplomats don’t mix much, as you know.”
“What happened after that?”
“Nothing. Nothing for what, eight years? Then I’m station head in Belgrade, and I get this priority cable to get my ass to New York, pronto. Hell, I thought I’d screwed up and they were looking for my head. They met me at Kennedy, took me to a safe house in Manhattan, and told me Malakhov had approached our UN Ambassador at a cocktail party and said he wanted to defect. Langley and the president said, sure, great, then they told him he was going to have to work both sides of the street for a while, first. They had him, of course; he had no choice. He said he’d do it, but he wanted me to run him and nobody else. Stood his ground, too; wouldn’t make a move until I was there in the flesh. I could’ve kissed him. I ran him for nearly a year, until Moscow Central started to get suspicious and he had to bail out. It was natural for me to debrief him.”
“Christ, what a career break.”
“You know it, babe. I reckoned I’d gone about as far as I was going to go in this man’s service, you should excuse the expression, then, wham! Lightning strikes old Rawls, and here he is about to traipse into the executive suite at Langley.” He chuckled loudly. “Tell you what; it’s sure going to make one hell of a difference in my retirement pay. Bette’s already talking houses in the Bahamas.”
“That’s terrific, Ed,” Rule laughed. “And it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.”
“Thank you, sweetheart.” Rawls turned the steaks. “I was proud of you when I heard you’d got the Soviet Office.”
“I got your note, Ed; thanks.”
“There’s hope for all of us when they start giving the younger officers some real responsibility. You like the job?”
Rule smiled. “There are moments when I’d like a bit more action, when I wish I’d never left the covert side, but I love it, really.”
Rawls studied the steaks carefully. “You going to be able to hang onto it?”
Rule sat up straight. “You heard about this afternoon?”
“Heard about it?” he snorted. “I was there!”
“In the meeting with Nixon, Simon, and the director?”
He nodded. “I walked in at the height of the whole thing. I tried to back out, but they waved me on in. I didn’t hear what your report said, but I heard the director’s reaction. He was pretty hot.” He forked the steaks onto plates, dished up a salad, and put the food on the table. “Come and get it.”
Rule dragged up a chair as he poured the wine. “Alan didn’t give me a blow by blow, but I got the gist of it, I think. They’ve slapped an exclusion order on me for satshots of Scandinavia—at least I hope that’s the extent of it.
Rawls nodded. “I was there when the director did that. Scandinavia is as far as it goes. He wouldn’t hang a general exclusion order on an office head; he’d just dump you someplace cold.”
Rule sipped the wine Rawls poured. “Yeah, Nixon drew that particular picture for me. He mentioned oncampus recruiting.”
Rawls leaned back and laughed heartily. “Yeah, that’d be just the sort of thing, wouldn’t it?”
“Ed, is the director as big a jerk as he seems to be?”
“Probably. But directors come and go, and when the president goes, he does, too. He won’t stand a change of administrations, let alone parties. I reckon he’ll be a cross I’ll have to bear for a while, but Simon will do most of the bearing.” Rawls took a deep draft of the wine. “I think Simon would like that job,” he said, “and if the president’s successor opts for a professional instead of a crony like the present director, I reckon he’d have a shot at it.”
“Oh, yes,” Rule said, “Simon would love that.” She had never really thought that he might get it, until now, and the idea rattled her. “And you’d get ops, wouldn’t you?”
“Who can say? If Simon likes me as his deputy, then maybe.” Rawls washed down some steak with more wine. “Question is, what’s going to happen to you, Kate? Are you going to prosper in the Agency with your ex-husband as Director of Central Intelligence?”
Rule shrugged. “To tell you the truth, Ed, I’m a lot more worried about the next few weeks than the next few years. Something’s going on in Scandinavia, and …”
Rawls stopped her with an upraised hand. “Hold it right there, Kate. I don’t want to hear a rump view of world events right at the moment. I drew you a picture of where things are going and who’s going to be there. If I hear about this, I want to hear about it through channels.”
Rule blushed. “You’re right; I didn’t mean to try to make an end run. It’s just that I’m in a lot of trouble right now, and in the dark, and I’ve been denied work time and access to information on something that I’ve got a very strong gut feeling about.”
