Impasse (The Red Gambit Series)

by Gee, Colin

  “My name’s BlueBear.... Lieutenant BlueBear... I’m on the list... here, Captain.”

  A strange silence followed.

  One in which the MP was clearly assessing his next move.

  One in which he realised the precariousness of his position.

  One in which he decided that valiant retreat was the order of the day.

  “Well, hurry up and get yourselves on the ‘plane. The weather’s going to close in shortly and there won’t be any more flights for some time.”

  This time the three shook hands in silence, exchanging smiles and nods, everything having been said on the journey to the airfield.

  BlueBear mounted the steps to the DC3 and turned to wave at his two friends.

  The wave was returned and then they went their separate ways.

  [Charley BlueBear was being flown back to the States to receive his Medal of Honor from the hands of President Truman. As the first Native American to be honoured in the new war, the propaganda value was immense and, as with others before him, BlueBear was to be used to raise the capital with which to grease the wheels of war.]

  2357 hrs, Thursday, 1st November 1945, GRU Commander’s office, Western Europe Headquarters, the Mühlberg, Germany.

  A week had passed and passed quickly.

  There was plenty of work in which to immerse a troubled mind and Nazarbayeva had committed herself fully to the new challenge ahead. The pain of the wound had eased and her recovery was assured.

  Some minor irritations had surfaced, men who had felt they were more qualified than the woman who had pulled the trigger on Pekunin, men who started agitating, whispering, and plotting behind the scenes.

  Nazarbayeva had been put in her new position by events, that was clearly the case, and some wondered whether her obvious ambition either had engineered those events or pushed her into precipitous action. After all, there was no evidence against Old Pekunin.

  ‘Was there?’

  On Stalin’s personal order or, more likely on Beria’s suggestion, NKVD General Dustov had remained at hand, supported by a contingent of his troops.

  The whispering and plotting gradually died away, as did the presence of the two senior GRU officers mainly responsible for it, neither of whom welcomed their transfers to other distant and much cooler climes.

  Poboshkin, newly promoted to Lieutenant Colonel, stood smartly as GRU Major General Tatiana Nazarbayeva opened the repaired office door, her work for the night complete.

  “Good night, Comrade General.”

  She smiled a weary smile to her loyal aide.

  “And to you, Comrade Poboshkin. I wish you every success. Safe journey tomorrow.”

  Nazarbayeva strode over the crisp snow, her thoughts mainly on the special mission that she had entrusted to her Aide.

  Poboshkin reseated himself, anxious to keep on top of the fine details of his first presentation to the GKO, intended for Moscow the following Sunday. But his thoughts also strayed to the mission he had been given by his new General, the reason he was returning to the seat of power two days earlier than needed, a mission that was intended to delve into certain aspects of the life and death of the dearly departed GRU Colonel General Roman Samuilovich Pekunin.

  In her private quarters, Nazarbayeva sat with a glass of water and completed the now ritual examination of her breast wound.

  Satisfied with the healing process, she settled into the leather chair and again commenced the mental exercise that tried to make sense of the past week. Part of that process was to attempt to solve the puzzle box that Pekunin had wanted her to have but, for now, its secrets remained hidden.

  She recalled his words.

  ‘It is my personal gift to you. Use it how you wish. Believe it and believe nothing else.’

  Thus far, it had denied her entry, its inner workings conceived by the most cunning of minds.

  She had felt almost taunted by its presence; so close but yet the contents were so far from her reach.

  At times, her mind had strayed to other options. She had contemplated using her boot as a hammer and once had even picked up the grenade she had found by the river bank that summer’s day, thinking to use its metal case to break the box open.

  She always resisted the temptation of force, although the defiance of the twelve centimetre square box pushed her to the limit.

  ‘Who knows what old Pekunin put inside that could be broken?’

  But tonight, as she relaxed in her chair, a visual memory stirred, one that had remained hidden or forgotten, perhaps obscured by the gravity of the conversation that took place at the time.

  ‘Mudaks! You old devil!’

  Clear as day, the image came. As he talke, Pekunin had shown her the first stages; very deliberately.

  The simple box had few markings and, in any case, each side was the mirror of the others.

  Her mind’s eye recalled the moment, seeing the two thumbs on the leading edge, easing one of the sides across a few millimetres.

  Taking up the box, Nazarbayeva pressed and found nothing but resistance. She tried each facet in turn, the seventh attempt yielding some movement.

  Her memory was hazy and the image now indistinct, so she worked the box, pressing in all directions without reward.

  ‘Think, woman, think!’

  The slightest scuff on the wood shouted at her, its presence almost imperceptible but, in itself, a pointer to stage two.

  Pressing down and right, the next section moved to one side with ease.

  The two stages together brought the third part of the unlocking process to mind and she found the correct panel first time.

  Now she was on her own, without Pekunin’s hand to guide her, but her mind was equal to the logic of the box and the fourth stage fell quickly to her assault.

  Within ten minutes, the box had yielded a small piece of paper.

  The words written on it were simple.

  ‘My loyal Tatiana, I am sorry to burden you. Do what is right for the Rodina and remember that your duty lies to her above all other things, come what may. Please accept my copy of ‘The State and the Revolution’ as a memento. With affection, Roman.’

  Written at a different angle, in a different pen and in a seemingly different hand, almost as if the shred had been ripped from another larger piece, were apparently unconnected words.

  ‘Ref C5-C dated 130644 ref Theft of utensils from 22nd Army Stores’

  The note was directing her towards an old GRU file.

  Ten minutes later, Poboshkin was surprised to see his boss back in the headquarters.

  “Relax, Comrade Poboshkin.”

  “May I assist you, Comrade General?”

  “Not necessary, Comrade. I just want to pick up an old file that I need to remind myself of. I’m still capable of opening a filing cabinet by myself.”

  Her smile disarmed him but he still rallied.

  “Perhaps I can get a clerk to fetch it for you, Comrade General?”

  “No, leave them to their rest. It’s no problem.”

  To mark the end of the exchange, Nazarbayeva moved off quickly towards the archives.

  Given the age of the file, she surprised herself by finding it quickly, strolling past Poboshkin no more than four minutes after she had walked away.

  “Tea, Comrade General?”

  “Excellent idea. I shall be in my office, Comrade.”

  The file was face down on the desk when the orderly brought Tatiana her drink, his presence barely acknowledged by Nazarbayeva, who was sat holding a first edition of ‘The State and the Revolution’, one of Lenin’s most influential works, in one hand, and the photograph it had relinquished in the other.

  The family pictured in it needed no introduction as she had seen a similar larger print on Pekunin’s desk day in, day out; it was the old General’s son and his family.

  Finally alone, she explored the folder and found efficient reporting of a GRU investigation into the thefts from 22nd Army Central Stores. The culprits were pr
obably long dead, transferred to penal mine clearing units.

  Contained within the official paperwork were a few sheets of paper with meaningless sequences of letters and numbers, all in the same hand, a hand she didn’t recognise but instinctively knew to be Pekunin’s disguised.

  Taking a pencil and a fresh sheet of paper, Nazarbayeva selected the first document, arranged Pekunin’s literary bequest in front of her and, with a deep breath to calm her growing worries, opened the book on the page where she had found the photograph and commenced decoding.

  One hour and forty-seven minutes later, Nazarbayeva’s tears slid gently down her face as she finished the last sequence

  She was now in possession of six decoded documents.

  Her first effort had outlined the execution of Pekunin’s family, on Beria’s orders.

  ‘Poor Pekunin.’

  The second had pointed at possible evidence of the betrayal of the Spanish mission that resulted in the death of her son, on Beria and Stalin’s orders.

  ‘If this is true, there will be a reckoning.’

  Sheet three revealed that the premises for going to war with the Allies were either exaggerated or contrived, again on the specific direction of Stalin and Beria.

  ‘So they brought all of this on the Rodina for what?’

  The very thought had left Nazarbayeva cold.

  The fourth revealed Beria for what he was; rapist and sexual predator, listing a few times, dates, places, and names.

  ‘Some people are truly evil.’

  Number five was a personal record of a conversation to which Pekunin had been privy, when Stalin and Beria had agreed the sacrifice of the airborne troopers in the four attempts on the Allied symposiums. Both had apparently acknowledged the lack of real significance but insisted that the missions went ahead regardless of cost, despite the GRU General’s pleas. Beria had apparently produced an informer’s report on a less than complimentary exchange between Makarenko and Erasov, during which their belief in the shortcomings of the political leadership was top of the agenda. In Pekunin’s considered, yet unbelievable estimation, whilst possibly justifiable militarily and psychologically, personal revenge also played a part in the fool’s errands that were the Zilant missions. It also spoke of the exchange in Beria’s office and the GRU General’s belief that Beria found pleasure in Nazarbayeva’s loss.

  ‘Not even the Chekist swine would do that! The Rodina is all-important!’

  Another part of her brain contributed to the silent debate.

  ‘This is Beria, Tatiana. He has no soul, no honour, no decency.’

  She pondered that a moment and found no argument to oppose the little voice.

  ‘He’s capable of anything that preserves his world and keeps his power.’

  Tatiana Nazarbayeva, GRU General, Hero of the Soviet Union, shuddered.

  She moved on, pushing the growing voice back into the recesses of her mind.

  Smallest of all the messages was number six. It was also the most confusing, with no apparent meaning.

  ‘There is nothing like Christmas in Krakow.’

  ‘Except May Day in Moscow.’

  Undoubtedly, Pekunin would not have included it if it were not important, but the purpose of the message was unknown.

  The seventh and final decode contained a few words, albeit powerful ones. They were the names of people that Pekunin had spoken to in the last few weeks, the dates he had approached them, all of them men who knew what was going on in Mother Russia and who, for the most part, according to Pekunin’s brief notations, were prepared to risk all to protect her from the enemy within.

  Nazarbayeva slipped into bed after destroying the decodes and reassembling the GRU file to its original state, the contents of the messages safely kept in her mind.

  The night brought her little sleep or rest as her mind toyed with the awful truths she had been presented with.

  Yet, in spite of the awfulness, personal tragedy even, of some of the messages, she kept returning to the seventh decode and the last entry on the list.

  ‘23/10/45 Molotov - declined.’

  What Tatiana did not, could not, know was that Molotov had acquired a debt when the indiscretions of his nephew Skryabin had fallen under Beria’s gaze before the war commenced. That debt had been discharged, as it was the Foreign Minister that had supplied proof of the last elements of Pekunin’s ‘treachery’, revealing to Beria the details of Pekunin’s approach.

  Her dreams kept her from proper rest, her sharp brain reminding her that by the very act of not revealing the names in the seventh message was, in itself, an act of treason against the state. Waking from her fitful sleep, Tatiana’s brain again presented her with the quandary; the unknown meaning of an entry in the last document.

  ‘15/10/45 VKG -?’

  Her mind worked the possibilities, as it had done since the first moment she read the entry.

  ‘Kuzma Galitskii... no.’

  Her mind clicked into place, throwing up a solution.

  ‘Vladimir Konstantinovich Gorbachev? Where is he now?’

  She woke and wrote the name down and went back to her broken sleep.

  In the morning, Nazarbayeva established that Major General Gorbachev was in command of the 346th Rifle Division, part of the 1st Guards Rifle Corps, the major fighting unit of 22nd Army of the 1st Baltic Front.

  In the mid-afternoon, that information was flamed by one of her aides, who reported that the GRU file on 22nd Army was dated and inaccurate.

  The 346th had seen some modest fighting in September, enough to cause casualties, amongst whom was Gorbachev. His injuries were serious enough to send him back to the Motherland to recover.

  The latest report had the General in the hierarchy of the Moscow Military District.

  The Deputy Commander of Military Training for the MMD, Dmitri Kramarchuk, had been killed in a car accident and the recuperating Gorbachev was immediately put in his place.

  Nazarbayeva checked the dates and found that Gorbachev was in the MMD ranks on the 3rd October.

  His position gave him control over new army formations being put together in and around the capital city, which immediately suggested to Tatiana that she had been right in her assumption and she had her man.

  0400 hrs, Sunday, 4th November 1945, Frontline position, the Jade River, west of Jaderkreuzmoor, Germany.

  “Thank you, Sarnt.”

  Ames accepted the enamel mug and its scalding hot contents as if they were gifts from the Gods.

  “My pleasure, Sah. They Welsh boys’s ok. They’m took a shine to you, by all accounts.”

  Ames took a tentative sip of the strong brew and shrugged, attempting humour to downplay the moment.

  “We’ve spent some quality time together, Sarnt. They’re good lads.”

  Sergeant Gray was a recent arrival with the 83rd Field Regiment, Royal Artillery, yet another of those men who had spent time behind German barbed wire.

  Placing his mug on the snow, he spared a look at his surroundings, the combination of the moon and the steadily falling snow creating a relaxing, almost Christmas-like feeling to the land.

  He pulled out his large pipe and had it loaded in record time.

  The awesome object had already acquired the nickname of ‘The Funnel’, its bowl constantly belching something indescribable that bore scant resemblance to the aromatic products of pipe tobacco.

  Theories abounded, starting with shredded tyre rubber and ending with old unwashed socks.

  The Sergeant quickly checked the radio and found it satisfactory, rewrapping it in the army blanket used to insulate it from the elements.

  His desires kick started by the sound of Gray sucking greedily on the Funnel, Ames was soon puffing on a Woodbine.

  The Artillery officer had acquired a heavy smoking habit since the fighting in and around the Hamburg Rathaus in August, which now neared forty a day, if supplies were sufficient.

  “One of they Welshies was telling me bout ‘Amburg, Sah.
Sounds like ‘er was a right bastard, fair ‘nough.”

  Ames’ eyes softly glazed, as his memories took him back to those few bitter days, fighting with the Royal Welch, the Black Watch, and even those German Paratroopers.

  “To be honest, Sarnt, it was pretty horrible... and we were extremely lucky to get out of it. Many good lads didn’t.”

  His mind presented the awful image of the young Lieutenant Ramsey, thrown into the masonry of the Rathaus by an high-explosive shell with such force that his body adhered to the surface, and only reluctantly relinquished its grip after the main battle was over.

  He shuddered.

  Gray understood, and left the younger man to his memories.

  Both men enjoyed the peace, until the light rattle of the simple warning device forced Gray into action.

  “Chalky, I told yer to watch the cans, you bloody idio...”

  Gray turned his head, just in time to catch the stale breath of a Soviet soldier.

  Ames also turned, alarmed as much by the rapid end to Gray’s words as the sound of an enamel mug falling to the bottom of the foxhole.

  He fumbled for his Sten, finding only another enemy soldier, and then another.

  Cold hands pressed themselves to his face and caught his flailing arms.

  0433 hrs, Sunday, 4th November 1945, Frontline position, the Jade River, west of Jaderkreuzmoor, Germany.

  Lance-Bombardier Chalky White knew he was in trouble, in more than one way. His hands were full of the bacon sandwiches that were to be the breakfast of his officer and Sergeant, but they were now needed to prise his greatcoat away from the snagging barbed wire.

  His efforts were accompanied by the constant rattle of the old tins, all filled with pebbles, noisemakers that danced and announced his every movement.