Soul of the Assassin

by Larry Bond

“What’s up with him and the Russian agent? Is he sleeping with her?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Everyone here knows she’s T Rex, but he won’t admit it.”

  “Do you have anything useful to say?”

  “You don’t have to defend him,” said Lauren.

  “I’m not.”

  “OK, Thera. I’m uploading the new keys for the phone encryptions. Use them if you have to use pay phones.”

  Thera got up from the desk and stalked over to the coffeepot. She splashed some of the coffee onto the table, then burned her fingers as she daubed at it with a napkin.

  Aside from her snarky tone, Lauren did have a point. Why didn’t Ferg think Kiska Babev was the assassin? He hadn’t really explained.

  He rarely explained anything, did he? Pretty much he did what he pleased—including sleeping with people he was spying on, like T Rex’s advance “man.”

  God damn him.

  Thera finished cleaning the table and went back to the desk. She’d been gone so long that the screen saver had popped on.

  She set the coffee down and tapped one of the arrow keys. She had to enter a password and use the thumbprint authentication before the screen would clear.

  When she did, she saw that the light was on in Rostislawitch’s room. He was no longer in his bed.

  Thera backed the feed up, hoping to see him going into the bathroom, which was just out of range of the camera. Instead, she saw him get up, take his shoes and coat, and go out of the room.

  “Ferg! We have a problem!” she yelled, switching the feed to look at the other bugs.

  20

  NAPLES, ITALY

  Atha made his way from the train platform through the station, letting the businesspeople and students rush past him. It wasn’t quite five—the train had been about a half hour late—and the station was not entirely awake yet. He walked past a row of gated stores, then found the left luggage room; the sign said that it didn’t open until eight.

  There was no sense waiting at the station. Atha decided he would find some place for breakfast, then conduct a little business by phone. There were many arrangements to be made.

  Atha didn’t think it likely that he’d be followed, but he decided to take a turn around the station just in case. Glancing at the departures board, he realized an Italian military policeman near the ticket counter was staring at him. Atha’s skin was not noticeably darker than that of many native Neapolitans, but somehow the policeman seemed to have identified him as a foreigner. He had his thumbs in his belt, ready to pounce.

  Under other circumstances Atha might have confronted the man, but now he decided his best course was to simply leave without creating a fuss. He spent a few more moments checking the board and consulting his watch, pretending to mentally calculate his time between trains. Then he moved to his right, making sure to keep his gaze well away from the policeman.

  It seemed to work. Atha reached the row of closed stores before turning sharply right, aiming toward the side exit to the station. No one bothered him, and he thought he had escaped notice when two carabinieri suddenly appeared at the side of the archway that led to the exit.

  “Mi scusi, signore. Dove va?” asked the shorter of the two men. His tone was polite, and the accent northern rather than Neapolitan. His hand rested on the butt of a submachine gun slung over his shoulder.

  “Where am I going? I was hoping to find a place for breakfast. My train doesn’t leave for several hours,” replied Atha in Italian.

  “May we see your ticket?”

  “I haven’t bought it yet,” Atha told him. “I thought I’d get something to eat first.”

  “You are going where?” asked the taller policeman.

  “Salerno,” said Atha, sharpening his tone in response to the man’s own gruffness. “Why?”

  “Let us see some identification,” said the first man, still conciliatory.

  “But of course.”

  Atha reached into his pocket and took out his diplomatic passport. The carabinieri examined it, leafing through the pages and then coming back to the cover where his picture was posted. They pretended not to be impressed by the diplomatic stamp, though in theory it meant he should have special treatment—or at least lip service in that direction.

  “There is a train to Palmero in fifteen minutes,” said the taller man.

  “True. But then I would arrive too early. And Palmero—it is not Naples, is it? I would expect to get a better breakfast here.”

  The man chortled, then took Atha’s passport from his partner to check it himself.

  “I wonder where a good place to eat breakfast would be,” said Atha. “A place with fine coffee but not too expensive.”

  “Nowhere in Naples,” said the shorter man good-naturedly. Then the two carabinieri began debating the various merits of a handful of small shops in the immediate area.

  What the hell are they doing?” Rankin said, griping behind a bottle of orange drink as he stood near the newsstand, as far as he could tell the only place open in the station besides the ticket window.

  “The police don’t trust Arabs,” said Hamilton, next to him. “Even though they make up half the city’s population.”

  “He’s Iranian. That’s not Arab.”

  “Even worse.”

  “You sure your driver’s outside?” asked Rankin.

  “Americans take very little on faith, do they?”

  “One of us oughta get out there, in case the police stop us, too.”

  “They won’t stop us,” said Hamilton. “But very well. I’ll go.”

  Rankin put his hand out. “I’ll go.”

  “The driver won’t recognize you.”

  “I’ll figure it out.”

  Hamilton closed his eyes and turned his head downward. It was a gesture of disappointment he had learned from his first master in grade school—appropriate, Hamilton thought, given that he was working with Americans.

  “If we’re going to work together, you’re going to have to trust me,” he said softly.

  “Yeah,” said Rankin, heading toward the door. He gave Guns a slight nod. They’d worked out the plan on the train: Guns would stay in the station, watching the left baggage area, while Rankin and Hamilton followed Atha wherever he went.

  Hamilton took out his mobile phone to call Jared Lloyd, the operative waiting in the car. He described the American, telling Lloyd to pick him up and wait.

  “He’s quite a crank, with a nasty disposition,” added Hamilton. “Never fear—if he gets on our nerves too much, we’ll throw him in the bay.”

  21

  BOLOGNA, ITALY

  “I’m really sorry, Ferg. I spilled the coffee and I wasn’t paying attention,” said Thera as she reran the video captures. “It was only for a minute or two. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” said Ferguson. He hunched over the screen, their shoulders touching. Rostislawitch had gotten out of bed, pulled on his shoes, taken his coat, and left in less than ninety seconds. The video bugs caught him in the hall, and then the lobby going out.

  “He must have been lying in bed awake for a while,” said Ferguson.

  “There were no calls or anything. Maybe he has an appointment to meet someone for breakfast.”

  “Maybe.” Ferguson scratched at the stubble on his chin. “All right. Take the radio and some bugs. You check the little cafés and whatnot to the north; I’ll go south. Take the red moped. It goes with your face.”

  “I’m sorry, Ferg. I know I screwed up.”

  “It’s all right. I doubt he went far. Don’t worry.”

  “I’m really sorry.”

  “Hey, relax. It’s really not that big a deal. We all slip sometimes. OK?”

  She nodded, but somehow his compassion made her feel even worse.

  Rostislawitch pulled his coat closed against the wind, continuing down the narrow street. He’d slept for several hours, but in his restlessness he felt as if he hadn’t gotten any sleep a
t all. He was filled with a nervous energy, unsettled and anxious.

  He was almost glad to feel it, though. It was a positive thing, a rumbling of forces he hadn’t felt in years. It was as if he’d been going through the world with a thick wool blanket over his head, secured there with coils of heavy rope. Now the rope had loosened, and he could see bits of daylight coming through the folds. Maybe, if he kept fighting, he would lose the blanket entirely.

  The weather had been relatively warm in Bologna, at least to someone like Rostislawitch used to Russian winters. But this morning the wind was biting and there was a cold, near-freezing mist. Rostislawitch decided he would find a place to warm up for a while, a place where he could sit and think. The first place that presented itself was a church.

  A small group of parishioners had gathered for the five a.m. mass. Rostislawitch walked inside and sat at a pew at the back of the chapel where the mass was held, not wanting to intrude. His ancestors had been Russian Orthodox and despite the Communists’ prohibition against religions, Rostislawitch had been raised in that tradition and even married in an Orthodox church. But between habit and science, his belief in God had dwindled; he looked at religion now as mostly a quaint relic of a time when people needed to blame the supernatural for things they could not control in their lives. He had not been in a church in many years.

  The Roman Catholic mass seemed plain, almost stripped-down, compared to the Russian Orthodox celebrations Rostislawitch remembered. He watched as the priest moved swiftly about the altar, consecrating the bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus Christ. This part of the mass was common between the two branches of Catholicism, the central mystery that the brother faiths shared. Rostislawitch leaned back in the pew, considering how the two branches had become estranged. It was the story of mankind entirely—from the Bible’s Babel to the present day, small differences becoming a wedge, members of the same family then drifting away, until only the animosities were what was remembered.

  How could you kill a brother?

  That was what his work with the bacteria was aimed at doing. He could rationalize and say that he was trying to prevent deaths, trying to develop a weapon that would guarantee that others would not strike Russia. But at its core his work was aimed at killing many people indiscriminately, no matter what justifications he gave.

  And if it was difficult to defend his work for the government, how much harder then was it to defend what he had planned to do—give the material to Atha?

  There was no defense. Rostislawitch wanted to kill people, and expected it to be used.

  That was the simple truth. He had come to hate his fellow man. And himself.

  It was a terrible, horrible plan, fully intentional, a great sin.

  That was what he had gotten up early to do? To seal the deal? To become a murderer?

  Tears ran down his cheeks.

  Rostislawitch heard rustling nearby. He looked up into the brown face of a young nun, standing in the pew in front of his.

  “Signore, are you well?” she asked in Italian.

  Not quite sure what she was saying, but realizing she was concerned for him, Rosislawitch smiled and stood up.

  “Are you OK?” the nun asked in English.

  “Thank you, Sister, yes,” said Rostislawitch. “I was thinking about my wife.”

  “Is she ill?”

  “Dead.”

  The nun’s face knitted into a concerned frown. “She is with God then,” she said, patting his hand. “I will pray for her.”

  “Thank you.”

  The nun nodded, then turned back toward the altar to pray. The mass was over, and the congregation had dispersed. Rostislawitch bowed his head, as if in prayer, then sidled out of the pew and began walking around the church, contemplating the saints on their pedestals, considering what he must do.

  22

  NAPLES, ITALY

  The strong coffee helped Atha think, and by the time he had finished breakfast he had concocted a plan for getting whatever was in the locker with a minimum of exposure. It was still very early, but the vendors had begun setting up their wares on the streets near the station, and Atha had no trouble finding a good price on a piece of cheap luggage. More difficult was finding a street person whom he could provisionally trust. They were all thieves, of course, hardly a handicap under the circumstances; the difficulty was to find one who might be counted on to return the bag—or whatever was in the locker—to him for a sum approaching what they had agreed on. Atha finally settled on a man in his early twenties who walked with a limp; in the worst case he should be able to chase him down.

  Atha gave the man a small advance and told him to meet him near the train station at precisely nine a.m., then went to a small osteria or restaurant to make some phone calls. His first was to the minister, who had left several messages on his voice mail demanding to know what was going on. Atha called and told him that he was in Naples and not to worry; they would soon have the material as planned.

  “Why are you in Naples?” demanded the minister. “Where is the Russian?”

  “The Russian is not important,” said Atha. “The material is here.”

  “Everything is waiting. You are a day late already.”

  “These things take time. When I obtained—”

  “That’s immaterial. We must move quickly. The timetable is not our own.”

  The barely suppressed rage in the minister’s voice made Atha tremble.

  “I will need to make some new arrangements concerning my transportation. I had originally arranged for a merchant ship—”

  “The arrangements will be made,” said the minister. “You are behind schedule.”

  “Actually, Minister, I said that—”

  “Do not argue. Just get it done!”

  Atha pulled the phone from his head as the receiver was slammed down on the other end.

  Still on the phone?” Rankin asked Hamilton.

  “Bloody hell, he hasn’t left, has he?”

  Rankin folded his arms. “I could have bugged the damn place and we’d know what he’s saying.”

  “We’re not taking risks, Yank. This is my show, remember?”

  Rankin pushed back against the seat. Ferguson might be a jerk, but he sure as hell knew what he was doing, unlike this British bozo.

  “He’s off the phone,” said the driver. “Coming out.”

  Rankin pulled his baseball cap lower on his head, shielding his face as the car pulled out of its space. The Iranian walked out of the store and turned right, heading in the direction of the train station. Traffic had picked up considerably, and within half a block they had lost sight of him.

  “Shit,” said Rankin, banging on the dashboard.

  “Calm down,” said Hamilton. “We know where he’s going.”

  “Do we?” snapped Rankin.

  Someone up ahead began honking their horn. The road ahead, barely two lanes wide, had four cars abreast, all trying to get into an intersection that seemed jammed as well. Traffic came to a complete halt.

  Rankin grabbed the door latch.

  “What are you doing?” asked Hamilton.

  “I’ll follow him. Keep your phone line free.”

  “Americans.” muttered Hamilton as Rankin slammed the door.

  The cars were packed so tightly that it was difficult to get through. Rankin finally decided that the only way he could get to the side was to climb on bumpers, which elicited curses and even more horn blowing. When he reached the sidewalk, he had to duck around a fully loaded garbage Dumpster that smelled as if it hadn’t been emptied since the Second World War.

  He pulled the radio’s earbud up from beneath his shirt collar. “Hey, Guns, you there?”

  “Yeah, I’m here, man.”

  “Atha’s coming your way.”

  “I’m ready.”

  “I’m on foot. Hamilton’s stuck in traffic with Jared.”

  “OK. You get something to eat?”

  “No.”

  �
�I’m sitting in a pastry shop. I can get you something. They have these very nice cheese danish things. Don’t know what they’re called, but they’re killer.”

  “No thanks.”

  “Hey, I see him.”

  “All right. Don’t get too close.”

  Rankin began trotting, ducking around a pair of businessmen who were themselves ducking a vendor selling umbrellas. When Rankin reached the main entrance, a nine-year-old boy stepped in front of him and asked if he wanted his shoes shined. At that moment, someone bumped into Rankin on the right. As he started to duck out of the way, a third man attempted to take Rankin’s wallet.

  Rankin plunged his elbow into the first man’s stomach, then swung his left hand out and grabbed the man trying to take his wallet, throwing him to the ground. The first man took a swing at Rankin, who managed to push him off. Rankin reached for the Beretta at the back of his belt, then stopped, a policeman running through the door of the station.

  “Get the hell away from me,” Rankin told the would-be pickpockets. “Go!”

  But instead of running off, the first man made a run at him, plunging his head into Rankin’s midsection. Rankin smacked the side of the man’s head with his fist, then punched him in the gut with his other hand. The man crumbled to the ground, out of breath.

  The policeman had paused to figure out what was going on. Now he sprang into action, blowing a whistle and unholstering his weapon. Rankin looked for a way to sneak away without having to deal with the authorities, but a police motorcycle had managed to find a way through the traffic jam behind him and was riding up on the sidewalk. He stepped back, watching as the pickpockets began pleading that they were the victims, calling Rankin a brute and saying that he was the one who should be arrested. A plainclothes detective approached Rankin, and asked in Italian what he had seen happen.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t speak Italian,” said Rankin.

  “Non parla Italiano?”

  “I only speak English.”

  “I see. Wait un momenta, please.”

  “I have to get a train.”

  “Un momenta, please,” repeated the man, gesturing to someone on the now-crowded steps. “A moment.”