by Robert Moss
‘Easy,’ he murmured.
When the duty officer came back, he was more respectful.
‘General Vlassov is expecting you, sir.’ He motioned for the guards to stand aside, and climbed up onto the side of the jeep to escort them in person to a parking area around the side of the GRU buildings, at the edge of the runway.
*
Alone at Marshal Zotov’s desk, Sasha wondered how many people were awake in Moscow at that hour of the morning. Since he had pulled the trigger and killed Topchy, he had felt a tremendous sense of release, bordering on elation. There was no longer room for doubts. Wherever it might lead him, his course was set. He could no more turn back to his previous existence than the bullet he had fired could reenter the barrel of the gun.
Still, there were questions that troubled him. Why had Topchy come for him in the middle of the night, suicidally sure of his ground? Surely Topchy would never have acted alone. Who had authorized his arrest? Why had Nikolsky, Topchy’s confidant, failed to warn him? Had he been betrayed?
A snatch from one of Vissotsky’s songs, Nikolsky’s favorite, ran through his head and wouldn’t leave him, like an itch that he couldn’t reach. ‘Why is it the bird, never the bullet, that is stopped in full flight?’
And he had guessed the answer to the first question. He saw the sly look on Topchy’s face, and then he saw himself with Elaine in the parking lot near the Visotny Dom when, crazy and tearful, she had taken both of their lives into her hands. Topchy had found out about the girl.
He stared at the phones on the Marshal’s desk. Should he call her hotel? But the call almost certainly would be monitored. And what if she wasn’t there? What could he accomplish? If he knew Topchy, the KGB would be holding her somewhere, as witness — and perhaps as hostage — in Lefortovo, or Butyrki, maybe in the bowels of the Lubyanka itself. If the girl was in danger, she was beyond his help — for now. In a few hours, they would rise or fall together.
In the meantime, there were practical things to attend to.
*
It was Kolya Vlassov who had explained things to General Luzhin. Until the previous day, Luzhin had been the deputy chief of the GRU, the top career army man in the service. As of today, he was acting head of the service, with Kolya as his chief of operations.
Like Sasha, Kolya had advanced to the rank of major-general. Unlike Sasha, he had stayed in military intelligence for nearly his entire career, although tanks had been his early and enduring love and he had managed a short stint with an armored division. After getting kicked out of West Africa, Kolya had spent most of his time at headquarters, which had done no harm to his career at all. He had served his term in Afghanistan, like the others in Sasha’s inner circle, apart from Feliks, and it had shaped him, as it had shaped them all. Sasha took to meeting him for the occasional drink or dinner en famille; after all, he had Kolya to thank for his marriage, and therefore his relationship with the Marshal. More from what was left unspoken than from what was said, he realized that Kolya was one of them, and that Kolya, as a senior and well-connected officer at the Aquarium, could be extraordinarily useful. Kolya was invited to Bangladesh for the first time only a few days before the coup. Not only did he pledge instant support; he helped to refine all their plans. For one thing, he pointed out that Luzhin, Sasha’s old boss in New York, remained a fervent admirer of the Marshal and was at daggers drawn with the chief of his service, who had been imported from the KGB in keeping with the Soviet tradition of divide and rule. For another, he stressed the fact that the Aquarium had remarkable potential as an operations center in Moscow. The Khodinsk airfield was the best guarded and most secret in the whole region. There was even a metro line that ran straight from the front door of the Aquarium under the Kremlin.
‘Leave it to me,’ Kolya said when Zaytsev asked how many men he would need to seize control of the Aquarium. ‘General Luzhin will make everything possible for us. All I need is an order signed by the Marshal. Luzhin will enjoy carrying it out, I can assure you of that.’
Kolya had another bright idea. The elderly commandant of the Tank Academy was another admirer of the Marshal’s. He had served with Zotov in the Battle of Kursk. A ‘personal’ message from the Marshal could work wonders in that quarter too.
Nobody was wasted. Pauk, the waiter from the beer-bar Zhiguli — Nikolsky’s friend — had joined the Spetsnaz team assigned to take charge of the Central Telephone Exchange on Gorky Street, near the sand-colored mass of the Ministry of Interior. Pauk was looking forward enormously to lording it over those bitches who had given him hell when he was a junior engineer. It promised to be even more fun than fixing the bills at the Zhiguli.
Other squads were assigned to the state broadcasting center and the major airports, and were already converging on their targets, ready to swing into action at the prearranged time. There weren’t enough of them to control everything. But if the first stages of the operation went according to plan, they wouldn’t need to.
*
Nobody walked in the park opposite the Central Committee building; it was a place where everyone kept off the grass. The ground rose quite steeply between Serova Passage, at the foot of the hill, and Old Square, at the top. The solitary drunk who was attempting the climb was reduced, more than once, to scrambling on hands and knees. As he reached the top, his feet, dragging through the dry leaves, made the sound of stiff brown paper being shredded. He took a pull on a bottle of some unidentifiable stuff, samorgon perhaps — cheaper than vodka and more lethal — and marched unsteadily toward the square, where there seemed to be more police about than usual, diverting traffic, milling around the entrances to the Central Committee building. The drunk collared a militiaman who was patrolling the sidewalk, where there was reserved parking for some of the higher-ups. Many of the spaces had already been claimed by black Chaikas.
‘Iz gorla budesh,’ the drunk proposed to the militiaman. ‘Take a swig.’ The militiaman grinned and wagged a finger at him.
‘Tell me, chief,’ said the drunk. ‘Why are the bosses here so early? Is it true that they’re going to lock up all the Jews?’
The militiaman laughed and shooed him away. It was nearly 8:00 A. M., and the last of the long line of Zils snaked through the General Secretary’s gate into the L-shaped courtyard inside the Central Committee building. This was the most exclusive parking lot in the city. The sentries at the gate — tough Kremlin Guards in militia uniform — only admitted Zils, the Rolls-Royces of official Moscow.
Gussein Askyerov’s limousine was the last to arrive. The Prime Minister’s normally bland, shiny face was as gray as that of the drunk in the park, who had now subsided into an ugly, liquid cough that made it sound as if his whole insides were stirring. Askyerov rubbed the loose flesh under his chin as if his collar were choking him. His restless eyes darted everywhere, noting the tight squad of Kremlin Guards deployed near the General Secretary’s private entrance, the personal security men in sombre civilian suits hovering around the official cars. He was alarmed that Topchy had still not reported back. Almost an hour before he had ordered one of his closest aides to track Topchy down. There had been no word since then; it was as if Moscow had swallowed both of them up. Askyerov had called the Lubyanka a second time, only to be told that Topchy had not come back and his aide had not arrived. Askyerov still lacked the proofs he had been promised, the material that would bury Marshal Zotov as a pawn of the CIA. It had occurred to him that Topchy could be playing a double game, that he might even have warned the Marshal.
But what could Zotov do? the Prime Minister asked himself as he got out of his Zil. He felt calmer now, enclosed by the sturdy walls of the Central Committee.
He quickened his stride to overtake a stocky man with cropped hair the color and texture of lint who was approaching the General Secretary’s entrance. He called out, and Serdyuk paused to let him catch up.
‘Any news?’ Askyerov asked the Defense Minister in an urgent whisper. ‘Any unauthorized military movements
?’
‘Relax.’ Serdyuk took his arm. ‘Everything is as it should be. I checked with Moscow Military District myself.’
‘What about the Guards? What about the Kantemirov division?’ Askyerov had a particular suspicion of this celebrated tank division, part of the Moscow garrison.
‘Confined to barracks, on full alert,’ the Defense Minister reassured him.
‘And the Caucasian divisions?’
‘The advance units’ — Serdyuk consulted his watch, a gold-plated Rolex — ‘should be landing about now. The rest will be here by mid afternoon. Don’t worry. Nobody’s going to fight. Moscow belongs to us.’
On the second floor, instead of entering the meeting room through the antechamber, like the other officials, Askyerov and Serdyuk passed through an outer office into the private sanctum of the General Secretary. They lingered there for a moment while Askyerov tried for a third time to reach Topchy. This time, there was no answer on the direct line. Sitting there in the General Secretary’s chair, behind the big desk topped with green felt, Askyerov felt uncomfortable. He picked up the cream-colored phone, the Kremlevka line. He wanted to call the Armenian, the link between himself and Topchy. Maybe the Armenian would know what had happened. Askyerov dialed all four digits before he realized that the Kremlevka line was dead.
‘What is it?’ Serdyuk asked, seeing the Prime Minister’s mouth tighten.
‘Here. Try it yourself.’ Askyerov passed him the receiver.
It was inexplicable. The Kremlevka line was operated round the clock by KGB technicians for the benefit of the top circle of the nomenklatura, those who rated four-digit telephone numbers as well as Zils.
The two men in the General Secretary’s office looked at each other. ‘Get Chetverikov in here,’ Askyerov ordered the Defense Minister. ‘Don’t mention this to anyone.’
‘What’s happening?’ the KGB chief demanded when he came in with Serdyuk. ‘Everyone’s waiting in there.’
‘Including Marshal Zotov?’
‘Including Zotov. Though he looks more asleep than awake.’ Askyerov grunted. Zotov’s presence was a good sign. For a moment, when he discovered that the Kremlevka line wasn’t working, the Prime Minister had experienced the strangest, most unsettling premonition that the Marshal had found out his plan and had already launched a preemptive strike. It was absurd, of course. In the Soviet Union, the military were bound hand and foot. Zotov couldn’t possibly have forgotten what had happened to some of his predecessors who had developed bonapartist tendencies — to the illustrious, self-important Zhukov, given the boot while he was out of town on a junket in Yugoslavia, to Biryuzov, blown sky-high in his plane a few years later. Anyway, the Prime Minister reasoned, if Marshal Zotov was hatching a plot of his own, he couldn’t possibly be fool enough to deliver himself up as a hostage by attending the Politburo meeting that particular morning.
‘Find out what’s happened,’ the Prime Minister ordered Chetverikov, who called his deputy at home on a white phone reserved for family and personal calls. Within five minutes, the KGB general called back with some story about a technical malfunction. He promised it would be corrected within the hour.
‘Well?’ the Defense Minister prodded Askyerov. ‘What are we waiting for? Let’s get it over with.’
Askyerov’s enemies had complained, more than a few times, that the man could smell danger. Intuition, nothing else, had stopped him from attending a meeting in Baku where cutthroats hired by one of the black market operators he had been milking were lying in wait for him. Now, though he reasoned that there was no cause for fear — not with Zotov sitting there in the Central Committee room, surrounded by Party officials who would vote as Askyerov instructed, and armed men who would fire on his orders — wordless, unreasoning instinct held him back, like a cobweb across his face.
Since he could not explain this to Serdyuk and Chetverikov, he said, ‘I’m not sure that we’re ready. That evidence that I mentioned to you, on Zotov. I don’t have it yet.’
‘Evidence, fuck your mother,’ Chetverikov snorted. ‘Make your move, then we’ll see about evidence later on. For now’ — he jutted his shoulder out toward the door leading to the meeting room — ‘you own the people in there. But if you delay — well, I won’t vouch for later. Zotov is definitely up to something, but he thinks he has a whole week to play with him. You can’t risk giving him time, not even a single day. Break him now.’
Serdyuk was nodding vigorously.
Askyerov sighed and went into the General Secretary’s private bathroom. When he came out, he said, ‘I’m ready.’
Twenty-six men were already seated around the long, polished wooden table in the center of the meeting room. There was a portrait of Lenin over the General Secretary’s door, through which Askyerov and his companions made their entrance. Over to the left was a table for assistants, with a battery of phones in various colors, and a second table for a pair of girl stenographers. Behind were tall windows overlooking Kuybishev Street, with heavy brown-and-gold drapes. Up to the level of Askyerov’s eyebrows, the walls of the Committee room were paneled with pale wood; the paint higher up matched almost perfectly. Chairs had been placed around the walls to accommodate some of the less senior officials, men who belonged neither to the Politburo nor the Secretariat nor the top level of the cabinet or the high command. Askyerov meant to show that the decisions taken here commanded broad support.
He took his place, to the right of the empty chair that belonged to the General Secretary, and opened the rust-colored leather folder in front of him.
The glare from the ceiling, where four big white glass lampshades were suspended like inverted mushrooms, was not flattering to the men around the main table. Askyerov scanned their faces — faces like cracked ice, faces like pillows squashed and pummeled out of shape through many sleepless nights, faces of weary, cynical survivors. Even Galayev, a stripling by comparison with most of them, looked older than his years. Romanov’s color was a startling orange that morning; he had been overdoing his fake tan. Few of the men in that room liked Askyerov, but many had reason to fear him. Some had been caught in his sticky web of favors, accepting opulent gifts that had never been reciprocated. Others were scared by what General Chetverikov’s dossiers might contain. The minority who had kept their noses clean might well have been daunted by the combination of power represented by the two men seated close to Askyerov: the Defense Minister and the Chairman of the KGB.
The Prime Minister’s eyes flickered across to Marshal Zotov, who was sitting almost directly opposite, his eyelids shut, his hands folded over his expansive belly as if he had nodded off. He looked as harmless as an old sheepdog dozing in the sun. But Askyerov wasn’t deceived. Zotov was the one man in the room who could break the spell.
‘I have just come from the General Secretary,’ Askyerov began. ‘I regret to have to report that his condition is terminal. It’s only a matter of days. In his wisdom, out of his great love for our country, the General Secretary has dictated his political testament, which I propose to read to you now. He has asked me to convey to you that its contents are merely suggestions for our consideration. His concern is for continuity in these dangerous times we are going through. With your permission.’
He paused, to see whether anyone would dare to object. No one did. There was a slight rumble from the Marshal, and his eyelids opened a fraction. Then he hauled himself upright and consulted his watch.
Don’t worry, Askyerov addressed him mentally. It will be over for you soon enough. It had been necessary, of course, to interpret the General Secretary’s wishes somewhat freely in the document he was about to read. The man had deteriorated sadly in recent weeks. He couldn’t even control his bladder. But the signature at the bottom was real, all right.
*
The first brigade of Askyerov’s ‘wild divisions’ was flown in from the Caucasus on board Antonov transport planes. To the pilots’ surprise, Moscow air control diverted them to the Khodinsk airfield. The ram
ps were lowered, and the men began to disembark. Most of them were still milling around while their officers tried to get them sorted out into platoons and companies, when half a dozen tanks emerged from the cover of the buildings around the airfield. They were an odd assortment, of different vintages. They were demonstration models, borrowed from the one army institution that was permitted to keep tanks permanently stationed within the perimeters of the capital: the Moscow Tank Academy.
But the effect, as they flanked the thin line of troops advancing on the Caucasian brigade from front and back, was sufficiently dramatic.
Kolya Vlassov came riding up in an armored car and called for the brigade commander to come forward.
‘You are relieved of your duties on the orders of the Chief of Staff,’ he announced curtly. ‘You will instruct your men to lay down their weapons.’
As he spoke, the tanks lowered their guns to head height.
The Caucasian troops, whose orders to advance on Moscow had been a mystery to them from the start, had no fight in them. They piled their rifles in stacks and sat around talking and swapping cigarettes, until they were herded away into nearby warehouses.
The main force from the Caucasus was intercepted at a railhead forty miles south of Moscow by men of the iosth Airborne, who also had precise instructions signed by the Chief of Staff. They, too, were disarmed. They were informed that their divisions had been disbanded, and were allowed to go home on the same trains that had carried them north — except for the officers, who were placed under arrest.
