Tsar

by Ted Bell

  Perpendicular to the podium was a massively long dining table that stretched the entire length of the huge hall. This brilliantly laid table was reserved for the laureates and their immediate families and, of course, the king and queen, their daughter, and the royal family. Here at this table, one would naturally suppose, he would spy his favorite Tsar. The man’s car was outside. Was he inside? He had to be.

  Hawke stepped out of line a moment and, ducking between two trumpeters, leaned out over the balustrade to peer at the crowd below. Spread beneath him was an undulating sea of women in beautiful gowns and sparkling jewelry with gentlemen resplendent in white-tie evening attire, all lit in the warm glow of countless candles. He pulled a cigarette-thin but powerful Zeiss monocular from inside his black cutaway and scanned the guests seated at the royal table from one end to the other, then back up the opposite side.

  Halfway down, on the far side of the table, he saw Anastasia, exquisite in a diamond tiara. She was seated beside her father, who wore a great red sash across his chest and many jeweled decorations. Tsar Ivan was speaking expansively to someone across the table, and his daughter was listening, a smile on her lips. He zoomed in on her lovely face. He wasn’t so sure about that smile. It looked brave, pasted on. His poor darling.

  He was desperate to speak with her. Would she have her mobile at a gala like this? Perhaps not, but worth a try.

  He pulled out his own, saw his message light flashing, and punched in her number, watching her through the monocular as he heard it ringing at the other end. Yes! She reached down to pick up her evening bag and was about to open it, when her father grabbed her wrist, squeezing it cruelly by the look on her face. Bastard.

  She returned the bag to the floor and pasted the smile back on her face. He waited for the tone and then spoke.

  “Darling, I pray you get this soon. I’m here at the banquet. If you look up at the balcony between the trumpet players, you’ll see me smiling down at you. Listen carefully, this is vitally important. I can’t explain now, but it’s imperative that you get away from your father. As quickly as possible! It’s extremely dangerous to be anywhere near him. I wish I could explain more, but I beg you, make any excuse, say you’re ill and have to use the loo, anything, but run at the first opportunity! I love you. We’ll be together soon, and I will explain everything.”

  He shoved the thing back into his pocket. Well, at least it was almost over. Somehow, they’d both survive this night. And when it was over-no time for that now.

  The line was moving quickly, nearing the end, and he stepped back to take his place. The important fellow in front of him was introduced and proceeded down the steps, his wife at his side, her diamond necklace and earrings sparkling in the spotlights. Hawke took his place alone at the head of the staircase and waited, as the spotlights found him.

  The staff came down with a great thump, and then the trumpets sounded a rising series of triumphal notes. A clarion voice rang out, “Your royal majesties, ladies and gentlemen, may I present Lord Alexander Hawke!”

  He couldn’t imagine how the British ambassador had pulled that one off, but he was delighted. The fanfare still ringing in his ears, he put his hands in his trouser pockets and descended the wide steps in a somewhat jaunty fashion, affecting-unsuccessfully, he imagined-a kind of Fred Astaire nonchalance. He wished he could see Anastasia’s face at this moment, as this little performance was meant for her. And her father, of course. He’d have paid a pretty penny to see that face right now.

  The Nobel Committee chairman was at the podium, standing next to the old fellow introducing this year’s winners in Physiology or Medicine. As he spoke, the honorees were making their way from their seats at the royal table back up to the lectern for a short acceptance speech. Along with his invitation, there’d been a copy of the evening’s program in his hotel room, and Alex had carefully studied the order of presentation he’d taped to the bathroom mirror while he dressed. After Medicine, he knew, came Physics, the Tsar’s prize.

  Showtime.

  Instead of proceeding to one of the many hundreds of round guest tables on either side of the lengthy royal one, Hawke remained discreetly on the podium, standing politely to one side with a group of officials as the four winners for Medicine made their brief remarks.

  The Nobel chairman thanked the winners as they left the stage and then said, “And now, your royal majesties, the prize for Physics. I’d like to welcome Sir George Roderick Llewellyn of the British Royal Academy to the podium to present this year’s winner.”

  Hawke walked toward the elderly chairman, who glanced once, then twice, over his shoulder, covering the microphone with his hand so he couldn’t be heard by the huge audience.

  “You’re not Sir George,” he whispered as Hawke drew near.

  “Sorry, no, I’m not at all, am I? Poor old fellow took ill, I’m afraid to say. I’m his replacement. Alex Hawke, British Embassy. How do you do?”

  The lovely old gent, a bit flustered, shook his hand and walked away from the lectern, muttering something angrily in Swedish. He clearly wasn’t accustomed to last-minute changes in schedules on this night of nights.

  Hawke adjusted the microphone upward to suit his height and looked out over the enormous crowd.

  “Before I begin, I’d like to say hello to a few familiar faces I see in the audience this evening. These wonderful and brave people are all survivors of the horrendous hostage crisis aboard the airship Pushkin. Welcome, ladies and gentlemen. I’m glad you’re all here tonight! Would you stand, please, so that we can acknowledge your presence?”

  The crowd erupted into cheers and applause as the rescued laureates and their families got to their feet, many of them with smiles of gratitude for the handsome Englishman who stood at the podium.

  “The Nobel Prize for Physics,” Hawke said in a loud, clear voice, “is presented this year for outstanding achievement in the field of black matter. Black holes, things in the universe so dense that no radiation, no light, can escape. You can’t see it, but you know it’s there. Your royal majesties, ladies and gentlemen, the man we all honor here tonight is no stranger to dark matter. As he makes his way up here to the podium, let me tell you a little bit about this murderous and truly evil human being.”

  The room went dead silent save the sharp intake of a thousand breaths at once. There was suddenly a good deal of murmuring and hand wringing on the podium. This new speaker was clearly deviating from the well-rehearsed script they all held in their hands. There was no mention of “murder” or “evil” in their copies.

  “In addition to his brilliant scientific achievements, Russia’s new Tsar builds prisons. Like the one called Energetika, built, ingeniously, on top of a radioactive nuclear-waste site on a small island off St. Petersburg. Here the Tsar has restored the ancient practice of impalement. For those of you unfamiliar with this medieval torture, the victim is stripped naked and placed on a sharpened stake. The tip of the stake is inserted into the rectum and gradually pierces the body’s internal organs until-”

  Someone, a woman at the royal table, Hawke thought, screamed loudly. She was thrown bodily from her chair as the new Tsar of Russia tried to force his way through the crowd to the stage. A spotlight was immediately swung his way, and Hawke could see the demonic rage in his eyes all the way from his perch on the podium.

  “Sorry for the commotion,” Hawke continued. “As I was saying, the wooden stake perforates the perineum or the rectum itself and takes perhaps a week to kill the victim as it travels upward through the body and-”

  “Stop him!” the Tsar howled, clambering over chairs and shoving aside anyone who got in his way, including the very furious King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden, in his desperate efforts to gain the stage and get at Alex Hawke’s throat, shouting all the while, “Someone stop this fucking madman!”

  “Sorry for these beastly interruptions,” Hawke said, continuing with his conversational tone despite the shouted threats and the imminent arrival of the enraged Tsar
at the podium.

  “In addition to the marvels of impalement, let me touch briefly on our honoree’s invention of the Zeta computer. Hailed as a godsend in Third World countries, the Zeta computers are actually powerful bombs, used just last week to destroy an entire American town. But the Americans are not our honoree’s only target. No, he has shipped countless millions of these cleverly disguised bombs all over the world, creating a worldwide web of death, which he is even now using to threaten his political enemies, forcing them to stand by and watch as his Russian storm troopers sweep into Eastern European countries, the Baltics, East Ukraine, and other sovereign nations in an effort to reclaim these lands for Russia and-”

  Hawke stood his ground as Korsakov clambered up onto the podium and headed straight for the lectern. The man was literally snarling, stringy loops of saliva flying from his open mouth as he crossed the wide stage. Hawke smiled and calmly continued, as if nothing were out of the ordinary.

  “Under this self-proclaimed Tsar, the New Russia will become like the old Soviet Union. A cynical tyranny, a cruel and heartless state, no rule of law, trampling on basic rights and human dignity, expansionist by creed, and-oh, here’s our honoree now-I’d like you all to welcome-”

  Korsakov reached out, ripped the microphone from the lectern, and flung it to the floor in a fury.

  “I will kill you for this!” he said in a low growl, going for Hawke’s throat with his outstretched hands.

  Hawke, still behind the lectern, thought a physical brawl at the Nobel podium would be a bit unseemly, so he pulled the small Walther PPK automatic from his shoulder holster and shoved the muzzle deep under the Tsar’s ribs, aiming straight for the heart.

  “No, sire, I will kill you,” Hawke said in a low voice. “Here. Now. Or we can step outside and settle this matter like gentlemen. Which do you prefer, you murderous bastard?”

  He now shoved the Walther up under the Tsar’s chin, grabbed him by the lapel, and yanked him closer. He was aware of security men edging toward the lectern.

  “I will do it,” Hawke said. “Believe me.”

  “He’s got a gun!” one of the Nobel officials shouted, and the members of the Nobel Committee still on the podium either dove off the stage into the crowd or raced up the staircase between the bewildered trumpeters.

  The Tsar looked into Hawke’s icy blue eyes. The Russian was breathing heavily through flared nostrils, his pupils dilated, his nose only inches away from the hated Englishman’s. He spat full into Hawke’s face. Then he turned and leaped from the podium onto the royal table, sending china and crystal crashing to the stone floor.

  “You will have cause to regret that, sir,” Hawke said to his retreating back. The man was storming the length of the tabletop, slashing flaming candelabras aside with his hands and kicking great urns and tureens of hot soup out of his path toward the main exit at the far end of the table.

  Hawke holstered his Walther, pulled his white handkerchief from the breast pocket of his cutaway, and wiped the Tsar’s saliva from his face. Various security men seemed to be making their way toward him, so he simply dove into the hysterical crowd and resurfaced a hundred yards away, melting into a seething mass of identically dressed men heading for the exits.

  There was utter panic and pandemonium in the hall.

  He was afraid he’d quite ruined the entire evening.

  But after all, some things just couldn’t be helped.

  66

  The Maybach roared out of the car park on two wheels as Hawke raced up to the Saab. Halter was sitting in the passenger seat with the engine running and the driver’s door open. Hawke jumped behind the wheel and fastened his safety belt. Engaging first gear, he slammed the accelerator to the floor, popped the clutch, and fishtailed out into the Avenue Hantverkargatan, taking a right turn just as the Maybach had done. He was hoping for a glimpse of taillights, but the Tsar’s big black automobile had already crossed the large bridge and disappeared.

  “You did it!” Halter said. “You bloody well flushed him out!”

  “Yeah.”

  “Before or after his moment of glory?”

  “I’d say what his moment lacked in glory was more than compensated for by drama.”

  Halter smiled. “Good work.”

  “Damn it,” Hawke said, slamming the wheel with his closed fist. “He’s going to be tough to catch, much less keep up with. A real automobile would have come in handy tonight.”

  “Relax, Alex. I know where he’s going,” Halter said, holding onto the dashboard with one hand, cradling the Beta detonator in his lap with the other.

  “You do?”

  “Yes. I heard him shout at his driver as he was getting into the car. ‘Morto!’ That’s an island out in the Stockholm Archipelago. The Tsar has a summer house there, the only house on the island. It used to belong to King Carl XIV Johan. Built in 1818.”

  “How the hell do you know that?”

  “I’m a professor of history at Cambridge University.”

  “Stefan, please tell me that he was alone when he came out.”

  “No. His daughter Anastasia was with him.”

  “Damn it! I told her to run!”

  “You spoke with her?”

  “No. I left a message on her mobile. Did she seem a willing passenger?”

  “Hardly. She was screaming obscenities, trying to escape from her father, who was holding her by the wrist. Korsakov and his gorilla of a driver were trying to force her into the backseat. It looked as if she banged her head pretty badly on the roof. She slumped to the ground, and they stuffed her into the rear seat. The driver, by the way, had the Tsar’s Beta detonator manacled to his wrist. We’re good to go.”

  Hawke, while relieved that Anastasia had obviously gotten his message, knew what Halter had to be thinking.

  The doomsday clock was ticking, but they still had sufficient time to get away from the civilian population. They could do this as soon as they reached a stretch of deserted road beyond the outskirts of Stockholm. Blow the crazy bastard straight to hell with the Beta detonator up there in the Maybach’s front seat.

  Because both men knew that in little more than one hour, the Tsar intended to murder at least a million innocent people with the push of a button on that machine. Sir David Trulove had informed Halter that Washington would retaliate immediately. At this very moment, there were twelve U.S. Navy Ohio-class submarines on high alert in the Baltic, the Barents Sea, and the North Pacific. Each sub was carrying twenty-two Trident II nuclear missiles bearing up to eight multiple warheads, up to 3.8 megatons apiece.

  MI-6 had recently determined that Russia’s early-warning radar system was vulnerable. A single British or American nuclear missile detonated high in the atmosphere would blind all of the early-warning radars below, rendering them unable to monitor subsequent launches. Russia, seeing a launch, would then be faced with a terrible decision. Wait and see if a Trident missile explodes and blinds its radars, or launch a retaliatory strike immediately. Halter, like Sir David and the man in the White House, had no doubt which way Russia’s new leader would respond.

  World War III.

  Downshifting and sliding around a turn, Hawke felt as if his head were full of angry bees. What the hell was he going to do? His duty was clear, but his heart was a formidable foe. He loved that woman, deeply. She was carrying his child. He had to find a way to save her, even as he averted a world catastrophe by killing her father. He’d find a way. He had to.

  “Bastard,” Hawke said, the horsepower-challenged rattletrap going airborne as he crested the bridge at full speed. The streets of Stockholm were patched with black ice, and unlike his adversary, he didn’t have four-wheel drive. Catching the Maybach was going to require some ingenuity.

  “Which way to this Morto? I still don’t see the bloody Maybach. Are you sure he didn’t turn off on a side street somewhere here in the Gamla Stan?”

  “There’s only one road to the sea, Alex. He’ll be on it, don’t worry.”
<
br />   “As long as you say so, professor.”

  Halter had turned the dim yellow map light on and held the Swedish map across his knees. Unlike Hawke, he didn’t seem to have any trouble reading it.

  “We head due east on this road along the fjord. Route 222, called the Varmodoleden. We follow the mainland coast all the way out to the Baltic Sea. There are literally thousands of islands of various sizes east of here. Most of them with a few houses or villas. Eventually, we’ll come to this little town of Dalaro right on the Baltic proper. I see some dotted lines here. Looks as if there’s a ferry service from there out to Morto.”

  “Good. We take him out at the ferry.”

  “We can’t chance it. Look at the map. I think we can take him out right here. This stretch of road coming up in a few miles is wooded on both sides. No houses for a few miles in any direction.”

  “We can’t take him out in the car, Stefan. Not now.”

  “Of course we can. We have to, Alex, for God’s sake! What are you thinking? Korsakov’s men could have found Kuragin by now, put the whole thing together! If so, this thing in my bloody lap blows at any second!”

  “I need to get him alone, that’s all. I’m sorry.”

  “Alone?”

  Halter looked at him, speechless. Then he understood. The daughter. Of course. Hawke was involved with the Tsar’s daughter. It must have happened in Bermuda. And he had recently been with her at the winter palace. Holy mother of hell, that was a complication he’d not even dreamed of. Well, he had the Beta in his hands. If worst came to worst, he’d just-

  “We’ll do this at the ferry, Stefan. It’s the only way. I’ll get Anastasia out of that car somehow. Don’t worry about how. As soon as she and I are clear, do it. You got that? We don’t touch the father until the daughter is safely outside the kill radius.”

  “Alex, you’re not thinking. What if he beats us to the ferry? Then what?”

  “He won’t.”

  “Alex, listen to me. You, of all people, must know you can’t let your personal feelings enter into a situation of this magnitude. I’m sorry about the girl. It’s obvious you have feelings for her. But if I see us running out of time, I will act. I am going to take him out, no matter what. You understand that, don’t you?”