The Einstein Code

by Tom West

  They read the page of information.

  Sergei: We have few hard facts. Primary source researcher Professor Ian Grady (LSE, 2011) claims Sergei was born Leon Kaminski. DOB: uncertain, 1961–3? Kaminski rose to rank of Major in Red Army (1982–1993). Died in Chechnya, 1993. Name ‘Sergei’ first reported in 1999. Almost nothing known about this figure. Residence and work-base location unknown. Reported to be anti-Putin; Russian mafia connections; international links with oligarchs living in UK, but again, no hard information. Professor Grady’s assessment considered best background profile, i.e. Kaminski faked death in 1993, assumed new identity ‘Sergei’ and disappeared off radar. Much of Grady’s construct relies upon single reported sighting of man who fits rumoured description of Sergei and bearing an aged resemblance to Major Leon Kaminski. See attached long-distance shot at funeral in Rublyovka in 2010.

  Kate scrolled down and they both studied an indistinct photograph of a tall, white-haired man in a long black coat, his facial features fuzzy.

  ‘Not very helpful,’ Lou commented.

  ‘Agreed, but it’s all we or anyone else has, I’m afraid. It’ll be no picnic finding the guy.’

  ‘But presumably, if he wants to do business with us he’ll want to be found.’

  ‘Not necessarily,’ Fleming replied. ‘He may only work through intermediaries such as this “Zero” person.’

  The car pulled off the highway onto a wide street and across a succession of junctions with traffic lights hanging over the road. The car turned right, then left, before pulling up in front of the grand frontage of the five-star Grigovna Zempska Hotel.

  ‘MI6 must be flush,’ Lou quipped.

  ‘Only the best for our specialists,’ Adam Fleming replied as he paid the driver.

  Five minutes later they had signed in at reception and two liveried bellboys were taking their luggage to a service lift. Fleming checked his watch. ‘18.05. Shall we meet for dinner? 19.00?’

  ‘Make it 7.30,’ Kate said. ‘I need some down time.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ Fleming said. ‘7.30 it is.’

  *

  ‘Can’t complain about the view,’ Lou said as he gazed out of the huge bay window of their room.

  Kate was in a steam-filled bathroom, the water running. ‘What was that?’

  ‘The view,’ Lou repeated loudly, half turning back to the room and catching a glimpse of Kate’s naked body as she pulled off her robe in front of the mirror. ‘But actually I prefer the one in here.’ He strode over to the bathroom and held Kate about the waist, kissing her neck.

  ‘Now, now . . . we don’t have time for shenanigans, Dr Bates.’

  ‘Oh, I think we do, Dr Wetherall. Unless of course you don’t want to keep your ex waiting . . . Katie.’

  Kate spun round and frowned at Lou. ‘Katie? You’re not jealous, are you, Dr Bates?’

  Lou grinned. ‘How could I be? You’re here naked in my arms and Fleming is in his room, alone.’

  ‘That’s absolutely right.’ She kissed him, their tongues entwining, a low moan coming from deep in her throat. Lou’s hand wandered up to Kate’s breast and he felt the hard nipple between his thumb and index finger. Between them they pulled Lou’s shirt off as they stumbled into the vast bedroom and fell onto the bed in a tangle of limbs.

  *

  ‘What do you make of Adam turning up out of the blue?’ Lou asked.

  Kate was nestled into him, her head on his shoulder, a single sheet wrapped around them. Propped up on voluminous pillows, they could see through the open curtains that the sky had darkened to a hazy purple, heavy with snow clouds. A glint of neon came from the street below. She propped herself up on one elbow, a look of surprise on her face. ‘You sound very suspicious.’

  Lou shrugged. ‘I dunno, I’ve never trusted spies and spooks. You’ll have to make allowances.’

  She laughed. ‘Oh, come on.’

  ‘All right, you know the guy.’

  ‘Knew him.’

  ‘Knew him. You seem well, pretty chummy. Do you trust him?’

  ‘Adam was always the keen military type – runs in his family. His father and grandfather were both army, same regiment. You know the sort of thing. I imagine moving into MI6 isn’t that strange.’

  ‘What was he like at university?’

  ‘I only knew him in my first year. He was in his final year, PPE at Merton College. We were just friends, in the same crowd for a while.’

  ‘I got the impression he was an old flame.’

  ‘No.’ Kate shook her head. ‘Men! You always jump to the wrong conclusions.’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with it if he was a boyfriend.’

  ‘I know, it’s . . . oh, anyway, why are you suspicious of him?’

  ‘I didn’t say I was, you did.’

  Lou knocked her elbow so she slipped forward and he pulled her on top of him. She wriggled free. ‘I know your game, Lou Bates.’ She slid off the bed and clutched at a robe. He made a grab for her but caught only air.

  ‘I have to get ready,’ Kate giggled and ran for the bathroom, closing and locking the door behind her.

  *

  The dining room of the Grigovna Zempska was the epitome of faded grandeur. The hotel had first opened its doors over a century ago and its website claimed that Tsar Nicholas and his family often dined there. Painted in duck-egg blue, with two massive chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, gilt chairs upholstered in a vibrant dark green, it had old world sophistication stamped all over it.

  ‘I’ve had another email from London,’ Fleming said after ordering a bottle of Chablis for the three of them.

  ‘Sergei is still in?’ Kate asked.

  ‘Seems so. The message was that Zero would make first contact with us.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘No idea.’

  The wine arrived and the waiter poured measures into fine crystal then retreated after depositing the bottle in an ice bucket.

  ‘To our mission,’ Adam said, raising his glass.

  ‘Well, I didn’t expect to be in Moscow this evening,’ Kate commented.

  ‘Life is full of surprises.’ Adam took a sip. ‘I certainly didn’t expect to bump into you a few days ago, Katie. Nor did I expect to meet you, Lou.’ He took another sip. ‘This isn’t half bad. So, tell me, how did you two meet?’

  Kate looked across the table to Lou.

  ‘She’s my boss,’ he said.

  ‘Oh, don’t be daft . . .’

  Fleming nodded. ‘She is definitely the domineering type.’

  ‘Indeed. I have the bruises to prove it.’

  ‘Actually, I like to think it was inevitable that we would meet,’ Kate said. ‘We are both in the same very narrow business. There aren’t many people working in marine archaeology.’

  ‘Not at your level,’ Fleming said, turning from Kate to Lou. ‘You are renowned as the very best in the field.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Lou said as the waiter approached and asked if they were ready to order.

  A moment later, the orders taken, the waiter retreated after topping up their glasses. Fleming ordered a second bottle.

  ‘And you, Adam? Kate tells me you read PPE at Oxford, a couple of years ahead of her.’

  ‘That’s right. I only knew Katie in my final year. A shame really. We met at a party on Divinity Road. You been to Oxford, Lou?’

  ‘I spent one semester there in 2003. I know Divinity Road. I was in a house on Hurst Street a short walk away.’

  ‘Really? I lived in a street off Hurst. Amazing! What a small universe. So, yes, I come from an Oxford/army family: father, grandfather. My great-grandfather fought in the Boer War. I graduated, and of course it was then Sandhurst, but when I finished I didn’t actually want to go into the army. My father died while I was at Merton, and so I didn’t have anyone forcing me. I decided to go through Her Majesty’s recruitment programme. That was, goodness . . . seven years ago now.’

  Kate turned as the waiter approached her chair. He was holdi
ng a bouquet of flowers. The two men looked at him, puzzled.

  ‘Wow!’ was all Kate could manage. ‘Who . . .?’ She took the flowers in both hands.

  ‘Would you like us to keep them in water for you, madam?’

  ‘Yes, that would be . . . they smell fantastic.’ Kate leaned in to sniff the blooms and noticed a card. She grabbed it as the waiter took the flowers away.

  She stared at the small blank envelope. ‘Is this your doing, Lou?’ She beamed at her husband.

  Lou had his hands raised. ‘Not guilty.’

  Kate looked confused, opened the envelope and pulled out a tiny card.

  ‘Who?’ Lou asked.

  Kate handed him the card. It said: ‘FA$HION, Red Square. Midnight.’

  26

  FA$HION was a nightclub a mere hundred yard walk from the hotel.

  Close to midnight, Red Square was still alive with Western tourists and revellers braving temperatures hovering around minus 20 degrees. The domes of St Basil the Blessed were lit up by the street lights and the warm glow of a full moon low to the horizon.

  There was a long line outside FA$HION but Fleming stepped over to an enormous doorman wearing a black suit and bow tie and showed him something inside a credit card-sized leather wallet. The man took the wallet, turned it surreptitiously to one side out of the light and then returned it to Fleming as he waved the three of them in.

  ‘How did you manage that?’ Lou asked.

  Fleming tapped the side of his nose. ‘I couldn’t possibly divulge trade secrets, Lou. But, put it this way, a couple of American banknotes rarely fail in Moscow.’

  The place was packed but thinned a little as they moved further into the club to approach a brightly illuminated dance floor at the centre of seating alcoves spread around the circumference of a vast, circular room.

  The music – heavy trance morphed with classic fifties songs by a rarely glimpsed DJ in a metal cage hanging like a postmodernist chandelier above the middle of the room – pounded so loudly that it felt to Kate like the bass was reverberating inside her chest.

  They made for an empty alcove, a semicircle of shiny pink PVC. A woman who looked more like a catwalk model than the average waitress came over and took their order. Kate glanced at her watch. It was 11.55. She turned her wrist to show Lou and Adam and they nodded. A few minutes later, the waitress returned with a tray containing three brightly coloured cocktails embellished with paper umbrellas and fluorescent straws. She placed them on drinks mats, handed Adam a slip of paper and turned. Adam glanced at the bill. At the foot of the slip, just below the price were the words: ‘Second floor storeroom’. He looked up too late to see where the girl had gone; she had vanished into the pressing huddle of bodies.

  Adam held out the bill for Kate and Lou to see and was out of the alcove in a second. Lou managed to empty half his glass with a single pull on the straw before spinning round as Adam and Kate were sucked into the melange of clubbers.

  Between a pair of alcoves there was a door out to a passageway. Twenty feet along a corridor packed with more revellers, they found a spiral staircase. This ascended to a narrow mezzanine level that allowed for a bird’s eye view of the dance floor and the DJ’s cage a few feet lower than the balcony. From here the crowd looked like exotic fish in a pond, all bright colours and skittish movements. Along the narrow balcony they came to a second door. The word ‘Staff’ was written on it in Russian.

  Beyond the door they were completely alone.

  ‘Christ! I can hear myself think again,’ Adam said, shaking his head. ‘People actually come here voluntarily?’

  ‘It would seem so,’ Lou replied. ‘So, how do we get to the second floor?’ He looked around.

  Adam took the lead as they walked quickly along a worn red carpet following a slight curve. They passed two doors on their right and a third on their left. A few paces on they found a lift, but the control panel close to the doors was key-code operated. An open door next to the lift led to a narrow, closed-in ascending staircase. Lou found a light switch, flicked it on and they could see stairs stretching up to the second floor.

  The door to the storeroom was scratched and discoloured. Adam swung it inwards. Inside, a single bulb hung from the ceiling. Around the walls stood metal racks filled with boxes and metal drums. Leaning against the back wall of shelves was a very thin man. He had bird-like cheekbones and a patch over his left eye.

  ‘Thank you for coming. My name is Zero.’ His English was almost perfect. He extended a hand.

  ‘You have the information?’ Fleming asked.

  ‘Of course, my client is a highly professional individual and a process for the exchange has been organized. I hope it will be to everyone’s satisfaction.’

  ‘A process?’

  ‘We have placed the material on a heavily encrypted website. To activate the site and acquire the first half of what you are buying you must deposit an agreed sum of money into a Swiss bank account. If your people agree that we are genuine, the second half is released to you via a second encrypted site after you deposit the second instalment. Is that clear?’

  Fleming glanced at Kate and Lou, who were studying the man. Zero was perhaps six-two but weighed no more than a hundred and thirty pounds. He had wispy blond hair, a pale, almost cadaverous face, and then there was the patch.

  ‘I’m afraid that will not do,’ Fleming said. ‘We do not work on that basis—’

  ‘Yet we haven’t even begun to discuss figures—’

  ‘And we will need to see a sample of the document, a photocopy will do,’ continued Fleming.

  ‘That is not a basis upon which my boss would work.’

  ‘In that case, I regret it, but you have wasted our time.’ He turned, catching Lou’s eye. Lou and Kate fell in behind him and the three of them strode towards the door out to the corridor. Fleming was through the door and it was closing behind Lou when they heard Zero.

  ‘Very well.’

  Fleming paused for a moment then came back in. Lou and Kate hovered by the door.

  ‘We need to talk numbers,’ Zero said, fixing Fleming with a hard stare.

  ‘Let me offer a working programme,’ the MI6 man suggested. ‘I have my instructions, also.’

  Zero nodded and clasped his hands in front of him and waited.

  ‘I have been authorized to offer Sergei three million pounds sterling. We will need a sample to study first and then we can go along with your rather elaborate system of receiving the document in exchange for the fee.’

  Zero said nothing for several moments, his expression unreadable. For a second, his gaze wandered to Lou and Kate. ‘I can see this is not going to be easy, Mr Fleming. When two parties such as your superior and mine come together and are so far apart in their thinking, it takes great patience and subtlety of mind on both our parts to even begin to reach a satisfactory conclusion.

  ‘Let me be clear. My employer requires thirty-five million dollars for the Kessler Document, which I believe at current exchange rates equates to twenty-two point seven three million sterling, give or take a few thousand.’ He waved a hand nonchalantly.

  ‘Well, that is a pity,’ Fleming replied. ‘I hate to be a bore, but I will have to repeat what I said earlier – it seems you have wasted our time.’ He started to swivel on his heel.

  ‘I’m sure your employers will be very disappointed if you return empty-handed to London, Mr Fleming.’

  ‘They will be disappointed, but they are grown-ups. They’ll get over it.’

  ‘And you do not feel that this historic document, one that offers so much promise and potential is worth more than a trifle like three million pounds?’

  ‘It is not my place to judge, Mr Zero. As I said, I have my instructions.’

  ‘And three million sterling – which is under five million dollars – is your best offer?’

  Adam said nothing. The storeroom was silent save for, far off, the residue of a bass drum beat wafting up from the club two floors below.

>   ‘I need to make a call,’ Zero stated. He slipped past Adam, and Lou opened the door for him.

  ‘Christ!’ Kate exclaimed. ‘You’re not even on the same chapter, let alone the same page.’

  ‘Patience, Katie.’

  After a while the door opened and Zero strode back in.

  ‘Sergei is not best pleased.’

  ‘I’m very sorry to hear that.’

  Zero gave Fleming a cold look. ‘I have been given very precise instructions. We are able to provide you with a copy of a fragment of the document within the hour and we are willing to accept nothing less than ten million pounds sterling which is almost exactly fifteen point six million dollars. Our terms of exchanging information for cash remain the same. I am informed that if this does not meet with your immediate approval, I am to walk out of this room. A car is waiting for me outside.’

  Fleming studied the man’s face, following the lines of his prominent cheekbones, the beak of a nose, the patch. ‘That is acceptable,’ he said. ‘I expect to see you at my hotel in exactly one hour.’

  27

  It had started to snow while they were in the club and by the time they left it was coming down so heavily they had to catch a cab for the hundred yards back to the Grigovna Zempska.

  ‘You plan to trust that guy Zero, Adam?’ Kate asked as the taxi slithered away from the kerb.

  ‘About as far as I could spit a goat. Don’t worry, we have mechanisms in place to make sure we don’t give anyone millions of pounds for nothing.’

  ‘Glad to hear it,’ Lou said. ‘This Sergei guy sounds like a pretty shrewd operator.’

  ‘Without a doubt. We know almost nothing about him, but one thing we are sure about is that he can hold his own with the better-known Russian oligarchs.’

  ‘Probably made his first few hundred million when communism fell and the Soviet state transformed itself,’ Kate remarked.

  ‘Extremely likely.’ Fleming looked out at the driving snow, the slurry splashing as high as the windows as the car made a sharp left, its rear wheels protesting and losing traction on the ice.