Kings of Many Castles

by Brian Freemantle

  “I’d like to include my forensic people,” said Kayley.

  Zenin’s hesitation was momentary. “Of course. I think that would be a good idea.”

  The American smiled to find battery power on his cell phone within the confines of the court. The staccato conversation with the embassy incident room was very quick.

  “I want every guard officer assembled,” Zenin told the major. As the uniformed squad began filing back into the court Zenin said, “Who called out ‘No’?”

  “Alive he might have given us something. Dead he can’t,” said Charlie.

  “A gun …” stumbled the militiaman who’d shot the assassin. “He had a gun … in his hand … I thought he was going to fire again … .”

  “You behaved totally correctly,” reassured Zenin. “I’ll approve a commendation.” He looked around the assembled officers. “How the hell did an armed man get into the court!”

  There was no reply.

  “I asked a question!” demanded Zenin.

  “He had authority. A shield,” said a man half-hidden at the rear of the group.

  “Come forward. Say that again,” ordered Zenin.

  The officer was young, his face still actually pimpled with youth. “He had a shield. Authority.”

  “What shield!”

  “Federtnaia Sluhba Bezopasnosti.”

  “Search the body!”

  It was Olga who instantly stooped, not repelled by the gore and careless of her formal militia dress uniform getting blood-smeared. It was an expert body search. She lifted the jacket pockets open with a pen tip, more easily for her fingers to go inside with the minimum of displacement. She found the FSB shield in the left side pocket. The congealing blood made it difficult to get the jacket away from the body. She found the wallet in the inside, right pockets, using the pen to flick it open. The photograph was official, the man front facing according to regulations, his name neatly printed beneath it.

  “Boris Sergeevich Davidov,” she read out, unnecessarily.

  “Knew he had to be around somewhere,” said Kayley.

  Air Force One was just clearing Russian air space when the news was patched through from the embassy, relayed by the American lawyers.

  Anandale said, “I was right! It is Dallas, November 1963. Oswald kills Kennedy, Ruby kills Oswald, Ruby dies … .”

  “And no one ever finds out what it was all about,” said Wendall North, finishing the historical comparison.

  There was a babbled surge when they emerged from the court. John Kayley was swallowed up by the waiting American attorneys and Charlie once more found Anne by using Arkadi Noskov as a marker visible above all the rest.

  Charlie identified Davidov as the killer and said, “Don’t ask me where that leaves us because I don’t know.” Don’t know, don’t know, don’t know, he thought. It was a constant mocking chant.

  “Bendall’s dead?” queried the Russian lawyer.

  Charlie thought Noskov would have been able to see into the dock as he’d passed. “Very dead.” Charlie’s ears had cleared completely but they ached.

  “I want formally to place on the court record-and publicly announce—the absolute proof of Bendall’s defense to murder,” declared Noskov. “Left as it is the prosecution have an assumption of guilt.”

  “Does it matter now?”

  “That’s how it will be left on file,” said Anne. “We know—and can prove-he didn’t do it so the consideration is natural justice.”

  “You’re the lawyers,” said Charlie. Justice, natural or otherwise, scarcely seemed to fit any of his most pressing considerations. Natalia would hardly be able officially to conclude her enquiry now, although with Davidov dead he couldn’t see how it could be taken any further: how anything could be taken any further. Which was, of course, the intention. The intention? Or Natalia’s intention? It seemed very easy-automatic even—for the suspicion to be part of every thought now.

  “I can’t professionally act,” Anne reminded Noskov.

  The Russian nodded, understanding her point. “I’ll call you later.”

  In the embassy car, Anne said, “I know you told me not to ask where this leaves us but where does this leave us?”

  “Beaten,” said Charlie.

  “That sounded personal.”

  “It is.”

  “With Bendall dead—and with the Russians determined that Vera’s death was suicide—there’s nothing more officially for me to do; everything’s down to the Russians,” Anne pointed out. She hesitated. “Isn’t it all over for you, too, Charlie?”

  “I don’t like being beaten.”

  “Come on, Charlie!”

  “I missed something. Two more people are dead.”

  “We went through it all,” she said.

  “Not properly. I’m going to do it again and again until I find what it is.”

  Charlie insisted that Richard Brooking’s demand for an immediate meeting at Protocnyj pereulok could only concern legal matters, which Anne could easily handle by herself, nodding in agreement when she called him a bastard, and actually locked the door of his office against any interruption. He’d been right about the court television, although he hadn’t expected it to be made available so quickly or to every Moscow television channel. It was even on CNN, which used the new footage as an excuse to rerun—sometimes side by side on a split screen-their film of the presidential shooting. Charlie’s initial, total concentration was on the courtroom film, feeling an odd discomfort as his own very clear and visible part of it. He saw himself flinch at the first explosion, his head swivelling between the dock and the gunman. Davidov’s shooting was very quick and accurate, the bucking of his hands the clearer definition between the two shots than the noise itself, which virtually merged into one sound. There didn’t appear to be any separate impact, either, Bendall’s head simply disappearing in one burst. Charlie was turned towards Davidov, facing the camera, when he shouted, able clearly to see his lips form the word, his memory was of calling “No” only once but there were two separate utterances before Davidov was shot by the militiaman.

  At that moment CNN split their transmission again between the two films, running the courtroom killing of Davidov against the camera pod struggle between Bendall and the NTV cameraman, Vladimir Sakov, for possession of the sniper’s rifle.

  And at that moment the awarenesses engulfed Charlie. He was physically chilled, although the shiver was more in frustration at what he’d missed for so long than from the feeling of coldness.

  His internal telephone momentarily distracted him but Charlie ignored it, strained forward for a repeat of the comparison between the two films, sure that he was right, sure that he’d seen things properly for the first time-had most certainly for the first time seen what was most important but which he’d consistently overlookedand allowed the scourging personal annoyance. It had been there all the time, like a banner in the breeze, and he’d missed it and it didn’t matter that everyone else had missed it as well: what mattered was that it had taken him so long-too long-and too much still remained unexplained. The rerun began and Charlie looked now at what he knew there was to see, the annoyed chill of belated awareness changing to a warmth of satisfaction as it unarguably showed on the screen. And then he remembered how, momentarily deaf, he’d had to understand what people had said in the court in the initial minutes after the shooting and saw something else he should have recognized. But hadn’t.

  London had the film. It would only take an hour, two, three at the outside. The photographic evaluation shouldn’t take any longer. But with an addition, Charlie thought, as his problem with Vasili Gregorovich Isakov finally slotted into its long overdue place. Charlie snatched up the internal telephone on its third demand, talking over Richard Brooking’s demand that he come at once to the chancellery. He would, Charlie promised, when he’d finished liaising with London, which at that moment had the higher priority. He depressed the receiver, to disconnect the protesting diplomat, but left the handset off
its cradle to prevent the man intruding a fourth time.

  Charlie had the FBI-collected photographs of Vasili Isakov before him for the next rerun-determined against any wrong or misconstrued assumption—and afterwards, quite positive, he gave himself thirty minutes to compose the fax to London to ensure there could be no misunderstanding about what he wanted.

  Richard Brooking was tightlipped, white with fury, when Charlie eventually reached the man’s office. Anne Abbott sat quite relaxed on the other side of the desk. Brooking said, “You were specifically told to report to me the moment you entered the embassy.”

  “I’m not permitted to report operationally to you, to avoid any awkward diplomatic crossover,” reminded Charlie. “I report to London, which is what I’ve been doing.”

  “About what?” insisted Brooking.

  “Hasn’t Anne told you?”

  Brooking’s face became a mask. “I meant what, precisely, have you discussed with London.”

  “Getting everything ass about face for far too long,” admitted Charlie. “But now I think we’re on the right track.” Track was the apposite word, decided Charlie. He still needed a hard, metalled road, preferably stretched out in front in an uninterrupted straight line.

  The assembled men sat quietly around the communal table, the identical photographs and transcripts in front of them. Before each place was a photo-analysist’s magnifying glass but only Jocelyn Hamilton had found the need to use it. He kept it in his hand when he looked up and said, “It’s a great pity it took so long to discover.”

  “We’ve each of us had it here, practically from day one,” said Patrick Pacey. “A great pity that you didn’t pick it up for us and saved everyone a lot of time.”

  “I think it’s a brilliant deduction of Charlie’s,” said Sir Rupert Dean, coming in as a buffer between the two other men. “Everything he suggested has been confirmed.”

  “We’re in an even more jurisdictional quagmire than we were before,” warned Jeremy Simpson, the legal advisor. “I’ll need definitive guidance, of course, but with Bendall dead-and the case against him dying with him—I don’t see we’ve any legal claim to remain associated with the investigation.”

  The director-general gestured with the Arkadi Noskov’s news agency statement of George Bendall’s bullet caliber defense to murder. “There’s still an unsolved case of conspiracy. I would have thought we have every justification to remain involved, despite Bendall’s death. We don’t even know if there are other Britons involved.”

  “I don’t want to know, if there are!” said Patrick Pacey.

  No one laughed. Simpson made his own gesture to the material in front of him. “Charlie’s only got one lead and it’s Russian. He hasn’t got the authority to pursue it. And as he points out in today’s messages, there’s a high mortality rate among people who become identified.”

  “I propose that Muffin is positively ordered to do nothing—to take no further part in the investigation, even if he’s permitted to do so-until we have the necessary jurisdictional guidance,” said the deputy director. “Of course the court episode is deplorable but objectively it’s the least difficult outcome there could have been for us. Things should be allowed to settle, not be stirred up.”

  “As cynical as that is, I think it may well be the government attitude,” said Pacey, uncomfortable at politically having to side with a man with whom he almost invariably disagreed and whom he did not personally like.

  “It’s Charlie’s breakthrough,” protested Dean. “I’d like to let him run with it. We still don’t know what the hell it’s all about. Our primary remit is to forewarn the government against the unexpected. We can’t do that putting Charlie on hold.”

  “It’s my advice-and my political opinion—that we should,” urged Pacey. “Particularly with the legal uncertainty. We should at least wait until that’s clarified.”

  “All right,” agreed the director-general, reluctantly.

  “And let’s not give Muffin any excuse for intentionally misunderstanding,” said Hamilton.

  Charlie didn’t misunderstood but he discarded the do-nothing instruction after the first reading, intent upon the technical evaluation which confirmed everything he’d asked to be checked. He hesitated, unsure which call to make first, finally deciding upon Natalia’s personal answering machine at Lesnaya. She’d be able to guess just how much there was to do, after what had happened, he dictated. He didn’t know how late he was going to be but it would probably be a good idea to eat without him and if he was very late to go on to bed.

  To Anne Abbott Charlie said, “You want to hear just how ass about face it all was?”

  “I’ve got Islay malt at the apartment. I checked with the embassy commissary to find out what you preferred.”

  “What about a video player?”

  “State of the art.”

  “Thirty minutes,” accepted Charlie. There was nothing wrong—nothing he should feel guilty about-in his having a drink while he talked these new developments through. And Anne was the most obvious person to do that with, the lawyer who knew every facet of the investigation.

  “I could have postponed moving in,” said Olga.

  “Everything’s organized and under control,” insisted Zenin. “There was no need. I want to find out what sort of wife I’m going to have.”

  “Apart from my clothes there’s not a lot more to bring.”

  “The important thing is that you’re here,” said Zenin.

  23

  After what seemed to be an eternity of constantly not knowing, Charlie knew this was very definitely wrong; knew that despite every snatched-at justification—and there were official and legal justifications for his choosing Anne with whom to discuss the analyses—it should have all been kept strictly professional, which was how they’d agreed by her rules things should be restored after their return from London. So why had he changed the rules, hinting a situation that shouldn’t arise, certainly not in the insular claustrophobia of an embassy in which everyone knew before it lowered its hind leg when a mouse peed? Self-flattery? he wondered, answering his own question with another: Anne being interested in him while Natalia wasn’t? Not good enough by a million miles, Charlie rejected at once: juvenile, an even worse self-accusation. Or, alternatively, the arrogance that had been the life raft to keep him afloat for so long? Closer but still not sufficient. Adventure happened, as it had with him and Anne, to be taken and enjoyed but as no more than that, a shared adventure to end when it ended, as unexpected adventures always did. Or should do.

  So why was he threading his way through the lesser-used passages between the functioning embassy and its residential compound, until this moment so determinedly avoided that it took all his concentration to negotiate? A lawyer’s question, although hardly appropriate: never ask a question—even to yourself-to which you don’t know the answer. Back—responding to Kayley’s earlier question—to square one. Don’t ask, don’t get a reply you don’t want. Go, for the moment, with the flow: wherever it goes. He was copping out, Charlie honestly acknowledged at last; hoping for something without being the provable instigator.

  Anne was barefoot, in a sheer beige silk and cashmere sweater beneath which she obviously wasn’t wearing a bra and jeans, and which didn’t betray a panty-line, either. The Islay malt, properly offered without either ice or water, was alongside the Stolichnaya, which did have an ice bucket, on a low table between matching piece of leather furniture too large correctly to be described as easy chairs but just slightly too small to be miniature settees. The apartment was pastel-shaded modern, grays and blues, which was hardly a choice considering its newness, and the curtains were drawn back for the ships’ marker river illumination and the lights of unseen traffic necklacing Tapaca nabereznaja beyond.

  Anne said, “You pour for yourself, I’ll pour for me. Sorry I couldn’t manage Liberace’s piano; you didn’t give me time to ship it over.”

  As he generously served himself Charlie said, “It
wouldn’t have gone with the decor, too much glitter.”

  “Do you want to eat? I could fix something with the miracle of microwave.”

  “That’s not why I’m here.”

  Anne hesitated. “The foreplay’s been tantalizing. Shall we get to the point of whatever you are here for?”

  Now it was Charlie’s turn to pause. He decided against picking up on the sharpness. Holding up the cassette as he crossed to Anne’s VCR, Charlie announced, “The entire film of the presidential shooting. Don’t look at anything but the struggle between Bendall and Sakov.” He was defending himself against his oversight, Charlie recognized, and wanting to impress her, at the same time. “And here’s this morning’s: the very moment that Bendall, then Davidov was shot … .”

  “We’ve watched so much so often that there’s nothing more to see,” dismissed Anne.

  “Which was my problem—our problem,” admitted Charlie. He passed her a transcript. “I’ll play the White House shooting again and this time follow it with what Bendall and Sakov are yelling at each other, which I’ve had London extract verbatim with Russian-speaking lip readers …”

  “What!”

  “Watch.”

  “Jesus!” exclaimed Anne, staring down at the paper in advance of the film being run. “You’re …”

  “Watch,” repeated Charlie, taking up the commentary. “They’re on the camera platform. They’re fighting, for possession of the rifle: Sakov’s preventing Bendall shooting again, fire at anybody. That’s what we all thought. But he wasn’t doing that at all. Read what Bendall’s saying. ‘Stop shoving … . Got to get away, you cunt … ! You know I’ve got to get away … . ! They’re waiting for me … . ! Stop pushing … shoving me … . ! Too near the edge … . ! Can’t hold on … Stop!’ But that’s what Bendall was doing—holding on to prevent himself being thrown over the edge …”