"You mean you haven't figured it out yet. Colonel Volanov?"
Emerson did not react at once to the use of the name. Then he stared at Eddie and said slowly, "Ginger told you."
"What did you expect her to do?"
Emerson shot a quick, fierce glance at his daughter standing over them. She returned the look defiantly.
"It's a damn good thing I did," she said. "We'd all be dead if I hadn't." Her eyes were on Silk's congested face. "Eddie, can't you do something for him?"
"Eppy . . . eppy." Silk was making noises deep in his throat. "Eddie, you know, eppy . . . something."
"What is he saying?" Emerson asked.
"He's trying to say epinephrine hydrochloride," Eddie explained. "Georgie isn't very bright, but he knows that much. It's the antidote."
"Eddie, you gotta have some," came the pitiful croak. "You gotta give me some."
"Sure," Eddie said. "But why should I give it to you? You were ready to waste these people."
"That was just a job." Silk's voice was a strangled scream. "I'm just a mechanic, you know that. Eddie, the shot . . . please."
"Don't give him anything." Rusty stood over them, stern and forbidding, staring down with hard eyes. "Let the son of a bitch die."
"You hear that, Georgie? The lady says we should cross you off. That's one tough lady, tougher than I am." Eddie looked at his watch. "Maybe fifteen minutes left. Just enough time to give you the shot and call an ambulance." "Please, Eddie . . ."
"I've got to hear some talking first."
"Anything. Whatever you want."
"Who made the contract for the hit?"
"The DD5."
Silk's words were beginning to slur. Eddie glanced at Emerson to see if he had heard. "Say it again."
"Swan, the DD5. He made the deal himself. Eddie, it's getting cold..."
"You heard?" Eddie asked. Emerson nodded slowly.
"What about backup, Georgie?"
"The shot. I can't move my fingers."
"Come on, come on, you don't work without a backup."
"A two-man team to check out the place. Only if I don't call in."
"When?"
"You've got less than an hour."
Eddie looked at Emerson again, and again received a slow, pained nod of understanding. "Anything else you want to hear?"
"No," said Emerson. "I've heard enough. Maybe too much. My oldest friend just tried to kill me. It's hard to believe."
"Believe it."
"Oh, I do. I have to believe it now." He shook his head, bewildered. "He said he would help. He said he would fix things . . ."
"Oh, he's a great little fixer. He almost fixed you permanently."
"And my wife ..."
"And anybody else who got in the way. From his side of the fence it was the only move to make."
"The only move to make." Emerson seemed intrigued by the words. "Yes, for Edwin. Oh, God! I should have seen that."
"Eddie!" Silk twisted his head violently. He was gasping for air; his face was slick with sweat. "I leveled with you, didn't I? Give me the goddamn shot!"
Eddie leaned over and said into Silk's ear, "Hang in there, Georgie. It won't be long now." "I can 7 see."
Ginger whispered sharply, "Does it have to be this way?"
Above them, Rusty's voice came like a tolling bell, saying, "Let the bastard die."
"You promised me," Silk gasped.
"I lie a lot, Georgie," Eddie said softly, "when I have to deal with people like you."
He moved from a kneeling position to sit on his heels, rocking back and forth. It took only a few more seconds. Silk's mouth suddenly filled with blood. His back arched and his feet drummed on the floor. His neck twitched once, twice, and he was still.
"Is he dead?" asked Rusty.
"Very."
She crossed the room to where Sasha lay bleeding on the floor. She knelt beside him, turning his head gently, then looked up and said, "This one isn't."
The two men stood up and looked at each other over Silk's body. Emerson said, "That wasn't any twenty minutes, not even close."
"I know. That stuff works in seven to ten minutes, at the outside."
"Do you really have the antidote?"
"No," said Eddie, lying again. "That was just to make him talk."
They joined Rusty kneeling beside Sasha's body. Silk's bullet had torn a gash across his forehead and down his left temple. The flap of skin hung loose and his eyes were closed, but he was breathing regularly. Eddie's fingers probed at the wound as he whistled tunelessly through his teeth.
"Typical," he muttered. "Very sloppy, Mr. Silk. That's why you never made the first team."
"How bad is he?" Emerson asked.
"He'll live. You know him?"
Emerson shook his head. "You?"
"I never saw him before, but I can guess who he is. The other side. Soviet protection for the valuable Colonel Volanov." He buried a smile as Emerson winced at the use of the name. "He wasn't very good at it, was he? On the other hand, neither was Georgie." He made a face of mock disapproval. "It's terrible, the quality of work these days. Nobody takes any pride anymore."
"Apparently you do." The two men regarded each other soberly. Emerson broke the brief silence. "What are the chances that he was alone?"
Eddie flipped his hand back and forth. "Hard to say. For all I know, the woods could be filled with them." He grinned wolfishly. "You're caught right in the middle, aren't you? The DD5 wants you dead, and the Reds want you wrapped up and delivered to Moscow. That doesn't leave you much of a choice, does it?"
"Only one choice. I have to run."
"There's always Moscow. You'll stay alive that way."
"I'll never do that," Emerson said. "I've learned to be an American and it means a great deal to me. If they won't let me stay an American, I'm not going to get petulant and play the traitor. I couldn't go back to Moscow and let the other side use me. Never."
"Better dead than Red?" Eddie chuckled.
"Not exactly."
"It doesn't matter," Eddie said. "I know what you mean. But then you have to run."
"Where? There's no airport that's safe."
Where? Eddie sighed. Mexico, of course. No airport necessary. An easy border crossing. A safe house waiting for me - and for them. It's the only place that I can get them to, keep them safe there, and get them ready for another life. So it's going to be Atotonilco after all. All those months of trying to make up my mind, and now a bunch of other people have made it up for me.
Filled with a cold joy at the prospect, he calculated quickly, figuring Washington to Houston in two days of steady driving in the camper, everybody switching off at the wheel, and then a day's layover in Houston while Sam Fusselman, the best in the southwest, cut some new paper for the Emersons: passports, drivers' licenses, and the rest. Then down to Laredo, over the border, and the long drive south; twelve hours in the saddle, through Monterrey, Saltillo, San Luis Potosf, and then cross country on the back roads until we're rolling into Atotonilco with the house perched high on the hill to the right.
"Where?" Emerson prodded urgently.
"I'll tell you once we're on the road. We've got to get out of here. And quick."
"We? Are you dealing yourself in?"
It was a frozen moment. In elapsed time the moment was measured in seconds, but in those few seconds Eddie saw it all before him, and he knew how it all would happen and how it would end. It was a losing battle, an idiot's joust with implacable windmills, for there was no way in the world that Emerson would ever escape the encircling arms that sought him. They were the two longest arms in existence, and if one didn't pluck him and cage him, the other would casually crush him dead. That was how it would happen. There was no other way.
Still, Eddie told himself, he wants to make a run for it, and he's entitled to try. He doesn't have a chance, but he deserves the best odds he can get; and I guess now I know why I never stopped playing with the toys, why I never stopped tinke
ring. There had to be a reason, and here it is. And now I know.
In the final part of that frozen moment he looked at Ginger and saw that all of his fears were written on her face. It was the face that he loved, and it was fine and firm despite the fear, but it was also the face of innocence lost. For all of her assumed sophistication she came from a world where good and evil came in plainly labeled packages, and people truly believed thou shalt not kill. It was a world of such staggering ignorance compared to his that he envied her having it, and it was a sadness to know that she had just lost it and would never have it again. No matter the rights and the wrongs, he had opened the cage and had shown her the beast.
Then the moment was over, time thawed, and he said, "Yeah, I'm in. All the way in."
Emerson said, "You still haven't told me who you are."
"Later. Right now we have to walk out of here, just as we are."
Rusty protested, "We can't just abandon the house." "You can and you have to. Down the hill, into the camper, and off we go."
"We'll need a few minutes to put some things together."
"I'm telling you there's no time."
"But why the camper? We have two cars we can use."
"The camper," Eddie said impatiently, moving toward the door.
Without anyone's having noticed, Ginger had left the couch to sit on the floor beside Sasha. The wad of cloth in her hand was pressed against his open wound. She looked up at Eddie and said with quiet bitterness, "Are you running things now?"
"Somebody has to. I just elected myself." His voice rose angrily. "Goddamn, take it or leave it! I'm moving out."
"We'll take it," said Emerson, crossing swiftly to the wall safe that Pico had opened. He pulled out two thick stacks of currency, two blue passports, and an old, heavy Luger pistol.
"Do you know how to use that antique?" Eddie asked.
Emerson gave him a crooked smile. "I used to. I used to be pretty good. You don't forget those things."
The smile lasted a moment longer; for that moment Eddie saw not the middle-aged man with weary eyes, the worldly lawyer and pater familias, but a trace of the teenage Yuri Volanov, the cream of the NKVD, young, cocky, and capable. Then the smile faded, as if Emerson had remembered something unpleasant, even hurtful. He put the pistol away quickly.
"What about him?" said Ginger, nodding at Sasha. "We can't just leave him like this."
"We're not going to," Eddie said grimly.
It took a moment for the words to sink in, and then Ginger gasped. "No!"
"Get her out of here," Eddie said to her father. "You know we can't leave him alive."
Emerson hesitated, and in that moment Sasha stirred, moving his head against Ginger's arm and smearing it with blood. "Atyets," he said, and the word came out like a groan from his lips. Emerson started visibly at the sound.
"Atyets, zdyes balit."
"Russian?" said Ginger. "What's he saying?"
The words came slowly from her father. "He says it hurts. He's in pain."
"He's in pain." Ginger cradled Sasha's head protectively and stared up at Eddie. "And you want to kill him."
"Ginger . . . look, you don't understand. It has to be this way."
"No, it doesn't," she blazed at him. "There's been enough killing. You've already done it twice tonight. Isn't that enough for you?"
Tensed with anger, she moved her arm, and Sasha opened his eyes. They were glazed and narrowed with strain. He looked up, saw Emerson standing over him, and with great effort, he said, "Paidyom pasmatryet fudbolni match myezhdu kamandami dinama i spartak. OK?" Then his eyes closed and he slumped unconscious again.
"He wants to go to a football game," Emerson said wonderingly. "That's what he said."
"Spartak against Dynamo," said Eddie. "Two good teams. I'm moving out of here in exactly sixty seconds, and I don't care who's coming with me."
Emerson was still wonder-struck by Sasha's words. "He said it like a child, like a little boy. He wanted me to take him to the game."
"Like a little boy," said Ginger, with bitterness. "And you're going to kill him."
Emerson looked at Eddie unhappily. "Maybe she's right."
"She's wrong. Thirty seconds."
"But. . . there's been enough killing."
Rusty said tentatively, "I know we said that you're running things, but this man was trying to help us."
"Eddie, please," Ginger pleaded. "Anything you say, but not this. Please."
Eddie looked up from his watch. His lips were set rigidly. He said to Emerson, "It's a mistake, a bad mistake if we leave him here alive."
Emerson nodded. "If so, it's a mistake I'll have to live with."
"If you're lucky. If you live." He shook his head disgustedly. "All right, let's go."
Without looking to see if the others would follow, he moved quickly across the room and through the door, half running down the hallway. Ginger, Emerson, and Rusty hurried alter him. Outside on the lawn they saw the dim glow of Eddie's flashlight bobbing as he worked his way down to where the camper was parked. They started after him, Ginger leading the way. Rusty stopped to look back at her home. Emerson put his arm around her shoulder and tugged gently.
"Come on," he said. "One day, I promise, we'll come back."
"I don't believe that," she said, shivering, and then she followed him into the darkness.
Operation Backfire
CHAPTER NINE
It came as no surprise to the night officer on duty at the Fun House to receive a call from the backup team operating at the Emerson residence in Princess Falls. He had been expecting the call all evening, for one of the functions of the backup team was the disposal of bodies, and he was prepared to give instructions for the final resting place of the Emerson family. Instead, he was told that the only bodies on the premises were those of Georgie Silk and Pico, and further instructions were requested.
"Jesus, the old man will have a fit," he muttered.
The team leader asked, "What about the stiffs?"
"Bring them in here for the time being. We'll have to figure a place to dump them."
He hung up the telephone and then, despite his reluctance, immediately dialed the number for Edwin Swan at the Hotel Coolidge. His reluctance was justified by Swan's reaction to the news, and when he hung up the telephone a second time, his hands were shaking and there were pinched lines around his eyes and lips.
If the backup team had arrived at the Emerson home as little as fifteen minutes earlier, there would have been three bodies to dispose of instead of two; but Nikolai, after waiting the obligatory twenty minutes for Sasha to check in, had made his own reconnaissance and had found the unconscious, bleeding body on the floor. A quick survey of the house showed him what had happened: two dead strangers, Sasha wounded, and the Emerson family gone. Nikolai was a big man. He had no difficulty in lifting the slightly built Sasha and carrying him down the hill to the car. He then called in the other two team members, dismissed them, and drove quickly, but within the legal speed limit, to the nearest public telephone.
Anya Ignatiev was asleep when the call came in. The hour was still early, but hers was not the sleep of weariness, but of sexual exhaustion. Coming up from sleep, she reached blindly for the telephone, but she could not find it. She opened her eyes. There were two other people in bed with her, two young men lying between her and the bedside table. Groggily, she tried to remember who they were and where she had met them. Their bare, well-formed bodies were slick with sweat. The sight and odors aroused her at once, but the telephone called urgently. She slithered over their bodies to get at the instrument, enjoying the sensation. The men, awakened by the motion, thought that it was playtime again and responded with automatic caresses. Pushing their hands away, she picked up the telephone.
She was wide awake within seconds. She rolled out of the bed, away from the grasping hands, and stood with the receiver pressed to her ear.
After a moment, she asked, "How bad is he?"
Nikolai
answered, "I don't think it's too serious, but he's lost a lot of blood and he needs a doctor quickly."
"Bring him here."
"Not a hospital?"
"No, you fool." Her voice squeaked on the words, and she fought to control herself. "I'll get a doctor from the embassy. Deliver Sasha here at once."
"Nu kharasho. Anything else?"
One of the men in the bed idly ran his hand up the inside of her thigh. Just as idly, she slapped it away. "What about Emerson? Are you sure he's gone?"
"No question about it. The house is empty."
She hung up the telephone and looked down at the two men on the bed. Rejected by her, they were amusing themselves with each other.
"Stop that, you pigs," she said. "You've got five minutes to get dressed and get out of here."
They looked at her in surprise. Earlier in the evening the same routine had stimulated her wildly.
"Out," she said. "I mean it. Five minutes."
They objected, they pleaded, but finally they went. Once they were gone she went to the kitchen, spooned instant coffee into a mug, filled the mug with hot water from the tap, and drank it down in three gulps. Then she went back to the bedroom, opened a recessed section of her desk, and took out a pad of one-time code forms. She sat at the desk with pencil and paper, laboriously composing a message and encoding it in a string of five-digit numbers. At the end of the message she added the uncoded word doctor and then dialed a telephone number. She said only one word into the telephone, but that word was guaranteed to bring her a messenger from the Soviet Embassy within thirty minutes. Only when she replaced the receiver did she realize that she was still naked. She put on a dressing gown and went back to the kitchen to make a proper cup of coffee while she waited for the messenger.
Anya's message, relayed through the cipher desk of the Soviet Embassy, reached Colonel Andrei Petrovich forty- five minutes after it left her home. It was shortly after 6:00 am in Zhukovka then, and the colonel was fast asleep. In accordance with standing instructions he was awakened by his aide, who handed him the decoded message without comment. Petrovich, disheveled and sleepy, sat up to read it, screwing up his eyes against the light. The words came as a series of shocks as painful as physical blows to him.
The Sleeping Spy Page 12
