by Tim Tigner
To further Alex’s mental destabilization, Karpov was making every effort to remove all psychological grounding. He established no routines, except for the lack thereof. He scheduled feedings, beatings, and interrogation sessions to take place at odd intervals and to last different lengths of time. Last night, for example, after one four-hour session, the guards returned Alex to his cell for just twelve minutes before coming to get him again.
The physical tortures Karpov selected for Alex were classics, tried and true. Bastinado, beating the bottoms of his feet, caused blinding pain without leaving marks. As a fringe benefit, this torture also made it very painful to walk, thereby furthering Alex’s sense of helplessness and dashing his hopes of escape. Karpov was pleased to receive a report that before the third session, just the sight of the cane was enough to make Alex whimper. Try and take my girl, will you . . .
Then there was the water torture. Karpov would have dreaded this one himself most of all. To begin with, the guards hung Alex upside down by a rope with his hands bound to his sides. Then, after a random interval, they dropped him headfirst and waist deep into a barrel of icy water. There Alex thrashed about like a fish on a line until he passed out. Then the guards pulled him out, revived him, and did it again. Wash, rinse, repeat . . .
Water torture was a great conditioner. Each dunking was nearly the psychological equivalent of dying, and the headaches it caused were blinding. Yet, like the bastinado, it left no marks when properly administered. Karpov would toss in a few other favorites as the week progressed, but for now it was an acceptable repertoire. He kept a defibrillator on hand just in case.
Excruciating though these torments were, the physical part of the regimen was mundane enough. For the most part, Karpov left it to the guards. The psychological tortures, on the other hand, Karpov conducted personally.
Oddly enough, he felt a connection with Alex, an intuitive understanding of his gestures and moods. Perhaps it was the side effect of a mutual love for the same woman. Perhaps it was the intellectual parity Karpov rarely shared. In any case, that connection facilitated his ability to hone in on Alex’s pressure points.
The unwelcome corollary was the fact that Alex seemed to have the same read on him. From what Karpov could gather, Alex had known someone like him either in Geneva or the Middle East. Karpov had never been to the Middle East. He had spent a summer in Geneva during his Academy years, but that was before Alex was born. It occurred to Karpov that Alex might have cracked during the six-hour warm-up session that preceded their first chat. It was time to find out.
The interrogation suite had a large round room at its center with eight doors around the perimeter. The one Karpov had just walked through opened to the tunnel that connected the KGB offices with the Knyaz command center. Six of the other doors led to holding cells. The seventh was directly across from the entrance. That special door had the international sign for radiation boldly painted on its thick leaden surface and looked as inviting as a coroner’s slab.
As Karpov passed through the interrogation suite, he admired the props: the knives, the cables, and the dunking tank. Medieval was the adjective that leapt to mind, but it was inadequate. The dark art had progressed a lot in six hundred years. He walked to the storage cabinet and selected a revolver.
Karpov opened the leaden door to find Ferris placed as instructed. He was alone in the room, sitting on a special small stool with his arms bound behind. The stool’s tiny surface sloped forward, forcing Ferris to hold himself upright with either his feet, which were in agony from the bastinado, or his hands, which he had to twist painfully against the ropes to gain a hold. Alex did not have the option of falling to the floor, as a taught noose ran from the ceiling down to his neck.
Karpov found it effective to let his prisoners contemplate suicide. It distanced them that much further from their god. Of course, he would not allow Alex to kill himself, but Alex didn’t know that.
Karpov walked over to his prisoner and removed the noose. Alex looked at him with an expression that resembled pity. Where was that coming from? Perhaps Alex really had cracked. Or perhaps that’s just what he wants you to think. Ignore it.
Karpov began with the words that would henceforth start every session: “Perhaps we are meant to talk, Alex, perhaps we are not.” Then he held up the revolver for Alex to see. With some ceremony, he placed a single bullet in the chamber, closed it, and gave the revolver a long spin. When it stopped he nodded with satisfaction, placed the barrel against Alex’s forehead, looked him in the eye, and said, “Remind you of Frank?” Then he pulled the trigger. Click.
There was that look again. Ignore it! “All right, Alex, we talk,” Karpov said, putting deliberate indifference in his voice. He removed the bullet from the gun, placed it back in his pocket, and set the gun down on the floor.
As with everything that took place during a professional interrogation, the Russian roulette served a purpose. Karpov had designed it to shatter any hope Alex might have that he or anything he had to say was particularly important. Of course since Karpov needed Alex alive, there was no gunpowder in the bullet, but Alex didn’t know that either.
The room they were in was a very special one. The sign on the door was for real. This was the anteroom of a radiation chamber. The army had used the machine in the adjacent lead-lined room during the 1950s to conduct experiments on the effects of radiation. Stalin had wanted to know how long his men could continue to fight in a nuclear hot zone, and several hundred political prisoners had given him the answer.
Karpov discovered the machine in 1983, gathering dust in the basement of one of the research centers under his purview. A very different use for the machine had sprung to his mind, and he had it moved to this location beneath a veil of secrecy.
Acting on Karpov’s orders, the guards had seated Alex so he faced the lead-shielded door and its radiation warnings. He wanted his prisoner’s imagination to run wild with the possibilities. It helped set the mood.
He sat down so that his lips were just a couple centimeters from Alex’s ear, and began whispering a story that would convince the Devil himself not to trifle with Vasily Karpov. “We’re ten meters below ground, Alex. Above our heads is an abandoned nuclear power plant. I’m sure you’ve seen it. It is abandoned because people believe that flawed engineering led to the accidental release of dangerous amounts of radiation. The locals also believe that accident caused the death of twenty-five of their own.”
Karpov leaned back in his chair and pulled a cigar from his pocket. He took his time trimming the end, letting Alex’s imagination plow forward before lighting it with a long cedar match. “Have you ever seen a man die from radiation poisoning? It’s not a pretty sight. Kind of like a severe sunburn that runs all the way through the body. It’s horrible to see the macerated skin peeling off on the outside, but worse yet is the realization that the same process is taking place throughout the body, on the inside.”
Karpov could tell by the stillness of the air that he had reached Alex with that image, so he continued. “I’ll let you in on a little secret.” He paused to exhale a long stream of smoke. “There was no accident here. The reactor above our heads had no leak. I used the machine behind that door to create an illusion.” He brushed the smoke aside with a magician’s wave.
Alex whipped his head around to strike at Karpov with a venomous look, but Karpov just smiled back. “You see, I needed to be sure that I would have a place to work in absolute secrecy. Fences and pass codes only go so far if a man is determined to get around them. You proved that yourself just yesterday. The only foolproof way to keep people out is to make them want to keep out. And want to keep out they do. The locals would sooner visit a leper colony than poke around my headquarters.
“Unfortunately even the worst of memories fade, so every year I stoke the legend by disposing of a bothersome chap or two,” he gestured toward the leaded portal, “In most cases, I leave the sc
arecrows in until they’re, shall we say, fully cooked. It takes about twenty minutes. It is the humane thing to do, you see. But those who have particularly offended me . . . well, I leave them al dente.
“Using a file prepared for Stalin, I determined that seven minutes is the optimum exposure for such people. It takes them twelve to twenty-four of the most agonizing hours imaginable to die. Here, I’ve brought along a few photos that I thought might amuse you.” He spread a series of grotesque body shots out on the floor and then stood up and moved aside to leave Alex with nothing but the photos to focus on.
Alex squirmed at the sight of the horrific images. People always did. Karpov paced behind him, continuing in the same, nonchalant monotone. “We immediately take the irradiated trespassers back to the city so they can spend their final hours refreshing the memories of the locals on the dangers of climbing the fence.”
Karpov saw hope flash across Alex’s face, right on cue. “I can see what you’re thinking, Alex, but you’re wrong. There is no chance that you would be able to reveal anything during your final hours. After that much radiation the human mind is not capable of focusing on anything but the pain.” Karpov took a long draw on his cigar. “Are you beginning to see where you could fit into all of this, Alex?”
Karpov sat in his KGB office, enjoying his lunch and reflecting on what he had learned during the three-hour session with Alex. He was concerned that Alex had help inside Russia. The surprising thing was that although Alex admitted to receiving assistance from a man named Andrey Demerko, he truly knew almost nothing about why. Of course, it had not been easy for Alex to convince Karpov of that fact, but in the end Karpov had to accept it. No man would have endured that pressure if the release valve were at his disposal. All Alex had was a name—backed up by the identity papers they had found on him—and a description.
Karpov had run Andrey Demerko’s name through the computers while Alex was unconscious. The result was both startling and concerning. He was the foreign minister’s chief of staff. Why would such a man want to help an American private investigator? Karpov would mull that one over tonight, scotch in hand, before his chessboard.
Karpov knew precious little about Foreign Minister Sugurov. He was the one member of Gorbachev’s cabinet who refused protection from the Guards’ Directorate, preferring instead to use troops from his own alma mater, the army. Enter Demerko. Karpov used to have one of Sugurov’s deputies in his pocket, Leo somebody, but the man had died a few months earlier when a small plane collided with his helicopter, on a Knyaz errand, no less. Karpov had not gotten around to replacing Leo yet. Apparently, that was a bad move. He made a note to plant someone in Sugurov’s camp ASAP.
Chapter 60
LAKE BAIKAL, SIBERIA
Victor was pissed. He had been in a perpetual state of pissedoffness for five days now, ever since the pager ripped him from Elaine’s execution and brought him to this frozen wasteland.
He had come close to blowing off his father and going through with the kill. He had been so psyched up, so excited to see Elaine’s helpless, naked body, to explain the price of betrayal and look into her eyes as she understood what was happening. Ooh, how he had yearned to whisper it all in her ear while she watched her own life ebb away into crimson waters.
He had hesitated there in her closet, torn between that desire and the fear of his father’s wrath. Then he focused on the big picture, realized that this trip to Russia would give him the chance he needed to pick up his Knyaz AG stock, and made the decision.
What was the reward for his obedience? Life in the freezer. He felt the way a TV dinner looked before you zapped it. This doubled his resolve not to be Karpov’s triggerman and potentially forever out in the cold.
As much as he hated to admit it, Victor did understand his father’s logic. Victor’s slipup with Alex had initiated the chain of events that first killed Yarik and now jeopardized the whole Knyaz operation. Of course, part of his father’s choice of action was probably just venting his frustration about not having Yarik around anymore to do this kind of thing, but Victor wasn’t about to bring that up. He was looking forward to venting some of his own frustrations on the Zaitseva woman.
Victor was still stunned at the news that Alex had bested Yarik. Victor would miss the old bulldog. There must be more to the story than what Karpov reported Alex had revealed, but who knows? Of all the secrets to try to conceal during an interrogation, why would you choose that one? Regardless, Victor was glad not to be the only Knyaz member Alex had outmaneuvered.
Although Victor left San Francisco Tuesday night, he had not arrived in Academic City until Thursday afternoon, local time. A lot had happened while he was in flight. Karpov had ordered an intense, systematic search of the whole region for Anna Zaitseva when only one of the two printed copies of Peitho victims was found on Alex. “Find her! Get the list! Bring them both to me, intact!”
Karpov had stationed agents at airports and train stations. He had them set up roadblocks and search hotels. KGB agents had interviewed all Anna’s friends and relatives. Victor knew “interrogated” was probably a more appropriate term, but nonetheless it had produced nothing. Anna and her mother had vanished.
By the time Victor arrived on the scene, most of the agents were standing around scratching their heads, trying to avoid the general’s flaming gaze. Their predicament was a tough one. Siberia was a big region, bigger than the continental United States, and it offered a lot of remote nooks and crannies to hide in. Without discovering a trail, uncovering any clues, or receiving a big break, the search was a hopeless cause—at least in the short term.
Victor brought a fresh mind to the search and grasped the essence of the problem almost immediately. He then took a more deliberate, delicate approach than his predecessors had employed. It wasn’t easy. He felt like Sherlock Holmes working on the heels of the Gestapo. A lot of dust had been kicked up, and the resulting cloud worked to conceal any clues.
Victor proved his genius on the evening of his second day in Siberia, but only to himself. He kept his discovery a secret. He liked to present things fait accompli whenever possible, and especially when his father was involved. It was the only way to avoid being wrong.
The genius was the insight to go through the photo albums at Anna’s mother’s house. The Gestapo had already done this when they ransacked the place, but they were looking for the Peitho list and people to squeeze rather than clues. They had left the photo albums strewn among a pile of books on the floor. Victor noted that most of the latter were in English, and filed that fact away for later reference.
After an hour of relatively thoughtful perusal, Victor had yelled “Bingo!” The KGB soldiers responded with a clueless look. “Guess you guys don’t play that here yet. Give it a couple of years.” They still looked confused, but to hell with them. He had found a cottage, a dacha that appeared and reappeared in photos from different years, even though there was no dacha currently registered to anyone in the Zaitsev family.
Victor knew the Zaitsevs had owned a dacha when Anna’s father was still alive, but had sold it years ago after his death. The KGB had searched it anyway before Victor’s arrival. They had interrogated the whole surrounding village as well. That had proved to be a waste of time. But this was a different dacha.
This dacha was on a large lake, a lake that the locals subsequently claimed could only be Lake Baikal. That was when Victor got an ecology lesson. Although Baikal’s surface area wasn’t anything out of the ordinary in the global sense—each of America’s Great Lakes covered roughly the same geography—Lake Baikal’s depth was extraordinary. Baikal was so deep, they explained, that it held more than a quarter of the world’s fresh water supply. While none of this meant more than a Jeopardy question to Victor, the fact that the geological anomaly gave rise to thousands of species of flora and fauna that didn’t exist anywhere else, was golden. Victor had found his big break.
He rounded
up the appropriate experts. From the position of the sun, the view of the shorelines, and the date stamps on the photos, they were able to determine the region of Baikal where the photos were shot. That gave Victor a grid square on which to focus. Of course, there was no guarantee that Anna had gone to the dacha, and for that reason he did not tell his father of this discovery, but Victor was certain that he would find her there. It was only a matter of time.
Victor, a KGB major by rank, immediately commandeered six two-soldier teams and a helicopter. It took them three hours to fly the seven hundred kilometers southeast to the appropriate section of Lake Baikal. That seemed to take forever. He was anxious to bag his victory, retrieve his shares, and head for the tropics. This was going to be it, he had decided. Once he delivered the girl, he’d make a quick trip back through California to eliminate Elaine and pack a few bags, and then he would vanish. He could manage the remaining sabotage by telephone.
Victor directed the pilot to land in the front yard of the small, centrally located hotel he’d picked out, and then proceeded to appropriate it as their field post. A dozen snowmobiles and a jeep were already waiting, compliments of the local KGB. He quickly assigned each pair of agents a zone to search, gave them photos of the dacha and instructions on what to do when they found it, and let slip the dogs of war.
“When you find the dacha you are not to approach it. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir,” they replied in chorus.
“You are to sit back out of sight and radio for me. I will join you to make the bust personally. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
He knew it could take a while. There were trails rather than roads that connected many of the dachas to civilization, and the snow was deep. Victor paced for an hour, fantasizing about life on Emily Island as he waited for his radio to bring good news. Once he tired of that he sat down to perfect his interrogation strategy.
