Kings of Many Castles

by Brian Freemantle

  “How long will he be confined to a wheelchair?” pressed Olga.

  “The problem is the conflicting injuries,” said Badim. “His shoulder isn’t strong enough to support his weight on crutches and he can’t use his fractured leg unsupported.”

  “So how long?” insisted Zenin.

  “Several weeks; three at least,” said the surgeon.

  “But he’s recovering well?”

  “Very well,” said Badim, although doubtfully, knowing there was a point to the questioning.

  “And he understands what’s being said to him?” demanded Zenin, of the psychiatrist.

  “I believe so,” said Agayan.

  “So there’s no reason why he shouldn’t be arraigned in court, in a wheelchair—appear in public and be formally charged?”

  Badim looked uncertainly to the psychiatrist and then back to Zenin. “No medical reason,” allowed the doctor.

  “The public don’t know what’s going on,” Zenin said to Olga. “So it’s the militia who are getting all the media criticism for the investigation making no progress. I’m going to move for a court appearance.”

  The British Airways flight began its descent over Moscow’s flat, firdotted western plain towards Sheremet’yevo and obediently Charlie and Anne secured their seat belts.

  “It’s been a trip of discovery,” declared Anne. Her legal briefing had been as Jeremy Simpson anticipated but she was excited at the drama of the defense to murder.

  “In all sorts of ways,” agreed Charlie.

  The wheels snatched at the ground and they were pushed back in their seats by the reverse thrust of the engines.

  “Thanks for showing me Liberace’s piano.”

  “It’s a must on every cultural visit.”

  “Readjustment of friendship now that we’re back on home territory?” she suggested.

  “It might be an idea.”

  “Let’s see.”

  The impatient embassy chauffeur on the arrival concourse said Charlie was to contact Donald Morrison as quickly as possible, so Charlie used the car phone.

  Morrison said, “President Yudkin died an hour ago.”

  18

  The death of Lev Maksimovich Yudkin ratcheted up by varying degrees the pressure upon everyone and marked the beginning—although at the time unrealized—of eventual awareness of a few of them.

  Sir Michael Parnell personally, unavoidably, reinvolved himself and was waiting with Richard Brooking when Charlie and Anne Abbott reached the embassy. The premature relief of both diplomats to their overeager, overinterpretative acceptance of the ballistics information was abruptly tempered by Anne’s explanation that there still appeared a prima facie case of conspiracy against George Bendall. That explanation stretched to a detailed summary of accusations possible under Russian law up to and including terrorism, which, like conspiracy to murder, carried the death penalty. She hoped to be able to give them better guidance the following day, after her initial meeting with the Russian lawyer engaged to lead Bendall’s defence.

  Charlie used the same need-to-bring-myself-up-to-date escape finally to end the empty encounter, which he did with a hopefully self-benefiting assurance to both knicker-wetting—or perhaps more distastefully knicker-fouling—diplomats that he would alert them to anything professionally relevant. Charlie had actually left the embassy and was making his way past the zoo before he realized that in their totally consuming objectivity he and Anne had parted in the embassy as professionals, making personally disassociated arrangements for the following day, and not as lovers who had explored every sexual depth and height together.

  It was at about the same time of the still unembarrassed return that Charlie remembered, too, he hadn’t followed up his embassy arrival message on Natalia’s personal Lesnaya answering machine that he was finally on his way home and by then there wasn’t any oint in calling. She was at the mansion apartment when he got there. She looked tired, positively careworn, the skirt of her suit creased from several day’s wear. It was still water-pocked from bathing Sasha and her hair was straggled. For the first time Charlie was conscious that although there wasn’t any gray Natalia’s once lustrous auburn hair was fading.

  She gestured towards herself and said, “I expected you to call again. Tell me you were on your way.”

  “I was … it was a heavy meeting … you look wonderful.”

  “I’ve had a heavy day, too. Sasha’s asleep. I didn’t tell her you were coming home in case you were delayed. She’s missed you.” It came out like a read-from-a-card statement.

  “What about you?” demanded Charlie.

  “What about you?” returned Natalia, in an echo.

  “Do you have to ask that?” Bastard, he accused himself.

  “It was your question.”

  “Yes I missed you. And worried about you. And missed and worried about Sasha, as well.” Double—treble—bastard.

  “I’m glad you’re back.”

  “This is for you.” It was a diamond bar brooch he’d bought from the don’t-forget jeweller’s shop in the Dorchester foyer.

  She stared into the box for several moments. “It’s lovely. And thank you. But I told you not to.”

  “I’ll leave Sasha’s beside her bed, to be there when she wakes up.” As he positioned the ribbon-tied package Charlie saw an identical doll already perched on the edge of Sasha’s toy box, one eye collapsed in what looked like a wink. “I forgot. It was from the last trip, wasn’t it? Shit!”

  Natalia, who’d come into the bedroom with him, said, “We can say it’s a sister.”

  “Or that her father is an idiot!” To what-or involving whom—did that excoriation apply?

  “It’s a sister,” insisted Natalia. Why was he so on edge?

  The awkwardness between them wasn’t entirely of his making, Charlie tried to assure himself. There was an over-politeness, two people who didn’t know the other very well each anxiously waiting for the other’s lead. He said, “We didn’t kiss hello.”

  “No we didn’t, did we?” she agreed. She sounded uninterested.

  When they did kiss that was polite, too. Dutiful. Back in the main room he went through the familiar drink making ritual and as he handed Natalia her wine he said, “You’ll have more to talk about than me.”

  She did and it was thirty minutes and another drink later before she finished, ending with the decision to arraign Bendall in open court.

  “You’ve got the monkey, not the organ grinders!” protested Charlie.

  “I don’t know what that means.”

  “We haven’t got the real assassins, just their performer.”

  “It’s publicly—politically—necessary now that the president has died.”

  “Who’s pushed for it to be so quick?”

  “The militia, initially. Now the Kremlin’s taken over.”

  “We know it wasn’t Bendall’s bullet that killed Yudkin,” reminded Charlie, urgently. “In fact it doesn’t look as if Bendall shot anybody.”

  “Doesn’t look like it to whom?” demanded Natalia.

  She listened to Charlie’s account as intently as he’d listened to hers. When he finished she said, “I see what you mean.”

  “Then make others see!” urged Charlie. “It’s going to be a show trial, like the show trials of the 1930s! But this time not just the outside world but Russia will recognize the staging, recognize that the people responsible aren’t going to be accused. Politically it’ll be a disaster!”

  “Yes it will be,” Natalia agreed, in further understanding.

  “Argue against it!” insisted Charlie.

  “It’s not a decision in which I’m personally involved, have any part of.”

  “You’re at the very center of everything!”

  “Except this.”

  “You’ve got the ear of people! The Federal Prosecutor and Yuri Trishin, for Christ’s sake! Who can be more involved that those two!”

  “Maybe it needs rethinking,” Natalia conc
eded.

  “You told me Okulov backed you when you confronted Karelin,” further reminded Charlie. “That strength—his confidence—will be known now wherever it’s necessary to be spread. An empty trial, which this will be, will make Okulov look ridiculous.”

  “It’s an independent legal decision.”

  “Bollocks!” rejected Charlie. “It’ll be twisted by Okulov’s opponents to be his decision, in his eagerness properly to take over as president.”

  Natalia offered her glass, to be refilled again. As Charlie was doing it she said, “We’re talking politics, Russian politics at that. I thought our job—your job particularly-was to solve a crime.”

  “Okulov backed you against the FSB. I don’t—we don’t—want Okulov displaced.”

  Natalia was silent for several minutes. “I hadn’t thought that far forward.”

  “Now we have.”

  “You have. I’ll make the point.”

  “As strongly as you can,” encouraged Charlie.

  “As strongly as I can,” promised Natalia.

  They prepared dinner together—starting with the Beluga he’d bought at the airport—and halfway through Charlie realized that the polite reservation had gone. That night though, when he reached out for her, Natalia had turned her back. He changed the gesture into arranging the covering more closely around her before turning, sleeplessly, on to his back. Somewhere he’d professionally missed something, he decided, something that he was sure, even though he didn’t know what or where it could be, was important. Vital even. Then he wondered what Anne was doing and wished he hadn’t.

  Arkadi Semenovich Noskov was a huge man, both in height and girth and made to look even bigger by the full, unclipped beard like a black canopy over his chest. The bass profundo voice rumble from low within the barrel chest and Charlie thought the man would have better occupied one of the opera stages Natalia had tried so unsuccessfully to convince him he should enjoy than a courtroom. Charlie hoped that in the theater Noskov had chosen he wouldn’t be called upon to sing too many tragedian lament, although the performance in which Charlie had so far featured that day weren’t encouraging Charlie’s biggest frustration was not being able to disclose the Russian intention to arraign George Bendall, which made largely pointless this first conference with the lawyer. Charlie’s dissatisfaction was compounded by the outcome of every telephone call he’d so far made, in attempted anticipation of the meeting.

  The first had been to the incident room and after outlining the British ballistic opinion he said, “The rifle—and the bullets—aren’t any longer at the American embassy. They were withdrawn-physically removed by Olga Melnik—when the militia walked out of the cooperation arrangements. Our ballistics experts will only provide a definitive opinion—testify if called upon to do so-if they can scientifically examine Bendall’s weapon.”

  “And it’s not usual for the prosecution to make physical evidence available for defense analyses, either,” rumbled Noskov. “I’m surprised they did, in the first place.” He looked directly at Anne. “And you know from your consultations in London that it’s unlikely they’ll limit themselves to one charge.”

  “Which brings us back to mental impairment,” said Anne.

  It was Charlie’s cue to recount his London meeting with the Home Office psychiatrist, which he concluded with a forewarning from another of his unproductive calls. “I’ve tried to speak to Olga Melnik but was told she’s unavailable. I’ve left messages, telling her we’re going to the hospital.”

  “We’ve been officially told we won’t be able to interview Bendall alone,” reminded Anne.

  “They’re making simultaneous recordings,” Noskov pointed out. “We’d hardly gain anything by being by ourselves with the man.”

  “Do we have Russian psychiatrists available?” asked Anne.

  The huge man nodded. “But I want to see Bendall by myselfwith just you two—first. I want to gain my own impression before getting theirs.”

  Charlie half expected Olga Melnik to be waiting for them at the Burdenko Hospital, but she wasn’t. There was no attempted body search by the foyer protection squad but they insisted upon examining the briefcases that Noskov and Anne carried. Only Guerguen Agayan waited beyond the cordon.

  At Bendall’s ward Noskov said to the obviously alerted second group, “Two of you stay. The rest get out, to make room.”

  “I’ll stay, too,” insisted the psychiatrist. “I don’t want another collapse.”

  Charlie was impressed by the lawyer’s unchallenged command. Even with only two guards and the doctor remaining, Noskov’s size meant the room was crowded, as the embassy car had been bringing them, Anne squashed into a corner of the rear seat with Charlie gratefully relegated to the front, beside the driver.

  From the moment of their entering the solitary ward Charlie’s concentration upon George Bendall was absolute, registering the man’s consciousness of everything around him, instantly isolating the intentness with which Bendall’s eyes followed the initial chairshuffling uncertainty of accommodating themselves in the confined space. Charlie was very aware of how close to him Anne had to sit; he had to learn across her, physically touching, positioning the tape recorder carefully away from the already operating Russian equipment.

  “Remember me, Georgi?” invited Charlie. Noskov had agreed during their cramped drive that Charlie should try to follow the London psychiatrist’s direction.

  Bendall didn’t respond, his attention entirely upon the gargantuan Russian lawyer.

  “It’s good to see you out of bed,” said Charlie, who hadn’t imagined the man would have been fit enough to be put into a chair. The injured shoulder didn’t look to be wrapped so heavily and without the head bandages the fair hair flopped, greasily.

  Bendall continued to look unwaveringly at the bearded Russian.

  Charlie said, “You’ve given us a hell of a lot of work, Georgi. And we’re getting nowhere. You really planned everything very well, didn’t you?” The attention faltered, briefly, Bendall’s eyes flickering towards Charlie who went on, “I don’t just mean us, the British. Everyone else, too. America. Russia. You’re really leading us by the nose.”

  Bendall finally looked properly towards Charlie, a smile twitching at the corners of his mouth. The wailing hum was almost inaudible.

  Charlie said, “I don’t know what we’re going to do. Admit we’re beaten, I guess.”

  The dirge grew stronger. Noskov shifted, creaking his overburdened chair.

  Charlie said, “You knew you could do it, didn’t you Georgi? Beat us?”

  “Course I did.”

  “That’s what everyone’s going to recognize, how much better than anyone else you’ve been.”

  “I know.”

  “I wonder if that KGB guy will realize it; the one who talked to you with your father that time?”

  Bendall frowned but said nothing.

  “You remember that time?”

  “Wasn’t frightened.”

  “I’m sure you weren’t, not someone capable of doing what you’ve done now.”

  “Wouldn’t do what they wanted, when I got in the army.”

  Charlie thought he heard Anne’s intake of breath. “What was that, Georgi? What did they want you to do?”

  “Doesn’t matter, not now.”

  “It would have mattered to them, if you refused.”

  “Thought they had me, but they didn’t.”

  “Why would they think that, because of your father?”

  “No!” rejected Bendall, loud voiced. “Didn’t need him! Never needed him!”

  “Always your own man,” flattered Charlie. Could he chance it? “They helped you get in the army, though?”

  “Didn’t become their man because of it. Not like my father. Taught them a lesson.”

  This could be the opening of the gate, thought Charlie, hopefully. If the KGB had got Bendall into the army he would have had a Control. “They must have been pissed off at that, made lif
e difficult. Had people argue with you, try to persuade you?”

  “Tried. Didn’t work.”

  “He must have got into a lot of trouble, the man who tried to persuade you?”

  “Took him away.”

  The lead, at last! “There was a man who came to see you, like they came to see your father?”

  “Yes.”

  “A soldier, like you. I bet he wasn’t as good as you with a rifle?”

  Bendall smiled at the continued blandishments. “Wasn’t a marksman.”

  Charlie breathed in deeply. “What was his name, Georgi?”

  “Don’t remember.”

  The reply was too quick but it would be wrong to press, to risk the gates closing. The Control would have joined Bendall’s unit around the same time as Bendall was installed, giving them a date from which the name could be deduced from the man’s withdrawal.

  “I suppose you had to use all the skills you learned in the army to set your White House operation up? It must have taken a lot of time, a lot of planning?”

  “Clever.”

  “Certainly that. You’re going to be very famous. They’re going to know Georgi Gugin. There’ll be books written.”

  Bendall’s eyes moved back to the lawyer, who was sitting with his head slumped, beard flowing over his chest. Part of the preparation was for Noskov to remain unidentified. Charlie said, “No, that’s not right. There won’t be books.”

  The remark brought Bendall back to him, frowning. “Yes there will.”

  Charlie shook his head. “Not the way you’ve organized it. There’s not enough known for anyone to write a book, a book needs all the facts and information. We do know about Vasili Gregorovich, though; know that he was killed, drugged and left to die in front of the train. I really don’t understand that. Vasili Gregorovich Isakov was your friend: your special friend. Why did he have to be murdered? Wasn’t he doing things properly, obeying orders?”

  Bendall’s uninjured arm began to twitch, violently, and Charlie tensed for another uncontrolled outburst. Agayan came forward, too. Bendall said, “The bastard killed him.” The voice was uneven, snagging the words.