The Moscow Affair

by Nancy Boyarsky

  Nicole went to the front desk to check out Gina’s story about the passports. The purser was busy sorting name tags with little Russian flags on them.

  “I’m going to use the shuttle to see Moscow today,” she said. “Can I have my passport?”

  “Sorry, madam. The police make us—” he paused to summon up the right word ”—withhold passports. I give you special ID card so you can leave ship. If anyone stop you, you show card.” He opened the safe where the passports were stowed and, after digging around, pulled out a stack of cards bound together with a rubber band. He handed one to her.

  She looked at it. It was printed in Cyrillic and didn’t seem to be personalized in any way. “What does it say?”

  “Say police let you go ashore only if you stay with tour guide from Queen of Volga.”

  “But there is no guide. We have a free day.”

  The manager looked puzzled; she could tell he didn’t understand. She tried again. “There is no tour today. Each person goes to a different museum or on a walk. We won’t stay in one group.” She showed him the list that Boris handed out the night before.

  “No worry. Card Is good ID for Moscow.”

  As he closed the safe, she gave one last longing look at the stack of passports inside. “But this doesn’t have my name on it. If the police stop me, how will they know who I am?”

  He waved away her concern. “You rich tourist. Nobody stop you. Only problem if you try to buy ticket and leave Moscow.”

  “I see,” she said. And she did. She had to trust that her handlers would have a quick means of providing her with a duplicate passport or come up with a plan to get her out of Russia that didn’t involve a commercial airline.

  Chapter Five

  Once again, Nicole arrived at the bus to find most of the usual A-deck crowd already on board. The passengers seemed to be looking forward to exploring Moscow on their own, and a sense of excitement filled the air. Her targets were present. As usual, none—except for those who’d coupled off—were sitting together.

  The seats were full except for the one Kat was saving for her. Of all the people Nicole least wanted to sit with, it was Kat. But Kat, unaware of Nicole’s discovery, was in a chatty, upbeat mood—or at least pretending to be.

  “Hey, you,” she said as Nicole took her seat. “You’re looking especially pretty today. What’s in the bag?”

  “An extra layer of clothes.” Nicole did her best to sound as if everything was fine, but it wasn’t easy. Kat’s pretense of being friendly, even affectionate, was pretty transparent. Nicole wondered why she hadn’t spotted it earlier. “It turned cold yesterday afternoon,” she went on. “I want to be prepared.”

  “The notice on the bulletin board said it’s going to be warmer today—fourteen degrees Celsius.”

  “That’s—what?— the high fifties? Still pretty chilly for an Angeleno.” Nicole gave a little shiver. In truth, her tote held a change of clothes that she planned to use to disguise herself. But first, she had to get away from Kat.

  As the bus headed toward central Moscow, Boris walked down the aisle handing out more copies of the tourist destination list he’d distributed the night before. When he returned to the front of the bus, he picked up the microphone.

  “We’re stopping at the same lot near Red Square where we parked before. There will be bus service for passengers who want to return to the ship at 11:00 a.m. and every hour until 3:00.” He spent the rest of the ride answering questions about the destinations noted on the sheet.

  Instead of listening, Nicole was thinking about the quickest way to get off the bus and disappear. If she was to change in time to pick up the trail of her targets, she’d have to be quick about it.

  They entered the huge parking lot filled with tour buses and waited their turn to pull into a parking space. Kat was still reading the tour sheet, her lips moving slightly.

  “What do you want to see?” she said.

  “I’m not sure.” Nicole was poised to get up and dash to the front of the bus as soon as it parked.

  Kat pointed to an item on the list. “This looks interesting, an underground bunker built to shelter Stalin in a nuclear attack. It says here it’s packed with gas masks and cold war paraphernalia.”

  “Sure. Let’s do that. Does it say how to get there?”

  “It has the metro stop, but no directions from there.”

  “After we missed the bus that day, we know we can’t trust the map on our cell phones.” The bus had stopped, and Nicole was already on her feet. “Ask Boris for directions. Meanwhile, I need to dash to the loo.” She pointed vaguely across the square. “I’ll be right back.”

  Nicole apologized as she pushed her way by passengers who were trying to move into the aisle. When she got off, she could see Kat and her targets still on board, stuck in a major jam-up. Boris was stationed by the driver, where people stopped to ask him questions before they got off. Nicole had her next moves planned. She hurried around the bus and entered the space between two parked tour buses that had already emptied out. Hidden between the two vehicles, she pulled jeans on over her slim black pants. She took off her jacket, replacing it with a gray hoody, which she zipped all the way up. She swept her hair into a ponytail, covered it with a baseball cap, and pulled the hoody up over that. To this she added oversized black sunglasses. She squeezed her purse and jacket into the tote bag.

  All this took no more than a few minutes. When she reemerged, she took a broad detour around her bus. Most of the passengers were congregated nearby, still waiting for directions or consulting guidebooks. Kat was slowly turning around, looking mystified as she surveyed their surroundings. Nicole could tell she was searching for her. For an uncomfortable moment, Kat stared right at her but failed to recognize her.

  With some dismay, Nicole saw that her targets had left the bus and were nowhere in sight. She ran to the lot’s exit and spotted them a good distance ahead. They entered Red Square, walking fast as if they were late for an appointment. Each member of the group was moving independently, pretending they didn’t know each other. David Wynn was no longer on his walker and easily kept up with the others. Nicole ran into the square, then slowed when she was a reasonable distance behind them.

  The construction projects had progressed substantially since the day before, suggesting that work had continued through the night. The bleachers were all but completed. It was clear that a large grandstand would sit in front of Lenin’s tomb, which was now closed to the public. Some kind of heavy blue drapery covered the sides of the grandstand and bleachers. Russian flags—each with the distinctive white, blue, and red horizontal stripes—flew overhead.

  Maintaining their distance from each other, Nicole’s group had reached the grandstand. Even though tourists were still allowed to move about freely inside the square, guards were stationed in front of the new structures to make sure no one got too close. These guards were armed with assault rifles.

  Nicole took refuge nearby, behind the kiosk of a vendor selling souvenirs, mainly refrigerator magnets decorated with photos of Russian landmarks and small figurines of St. Basil’s Cathedral and Lenin lying in state. From here, she had a good view of her targets. They were wandering around in front of the grandstand, pretending to snap photos with their phones. They looked like any other tourists overwhelmed by a huge and impressive landmark.

  At that moment, someone called Nicole’s name. She looked around. Kat was about twenty feet away, but she wasn’t looking at Nicole. She seemed to be following someone else, a petite blonde wearing a jacket similar to the one Nicole had taken off and stuffed into her tote bag. Nicole stepped back into the shadows of the workers’ portable toilets. There, she waited until Kat passed—still on the trail of Nicole’s doppelganger. Only then did Nicole resume her position behind the kiosk.

  In the brief time she’d been gone—no more than a minute or so—her targets were no longer in sight. Holding her phone up, as if she was looking to find the right spot for a selfie, she
walked in one direction, then the other. Finally, she spotted Tyler Brandt. He was just turning into a walkway between the last bleacher and an ornate brick building facing the square. A guard standing nearby either didn’t see him pass or deliberately ignored him.

  Nicole hurried toward the spot where he’d turned and tried to follow him. As she drew near, the guard stepped forward and blocked her path. He shouted something in Russian that clearly meant “Get out!”

  She backed off to put some distance between herself and the guard, then ducked behind another kiosk to keep watch. Before long, four workmen came out of the brick building’s lower floor. They were pushing a large pallet of what appeared to be building materials covered with a canvas tarp. The guard stepped aside to let them pass. Like the other workers in the square, the men were dressed in tan jumpsuits with orange safety vests and red helmets. It took Nicole only a moment to recognize them as the male contingent of the group she was following—Lucien Collins, James Bartel, Tyler Brandt, and David Wynn.

  She followed them back to the grandstand where they parked the pallet and pulled the tarp aside. It was filled with what looked like cinder blocks. Brandt leaned forward and picked up two armloads. Wynn punched him in the shoulder and said something. The young man quickly put them back on the pallet. Then, after looking around, he lifted two of the blocks feigning great effort, as if they were extremely heavy. The other men each took two. They all headed for the side of the grandstand, where draped blue canvas covered the entrance to the space beneath.

  Approaching the nearest guard, Wynn carefully put his blocks on the ground, took a paper from his pocket, and held it out. The guard read it with close attention before handing it back. He gave a little salute and lifted the canvas to admit them to the space beneath the grandstand. The men passed inside and went back for more blocks. Once they’d hauled all of them under the stand, they remained there for a good three-quarters of an hour before reemerging to roll the empty pallet back the way they’d come.

  As Nicole followed them, she wondered what the blocks they’d left off were made of. Cinderblocks were quite heavy. But the light weight of these—demonstrated by the way Tyler Brandt first lifted them—suggested they were made from a different material than the real thing. Someone could have used a 3D printer to create the blocks out of drugs or some kind of explosive material. Then it came to her. Her fellow passengers might be planning to sabotage the parade—maybe even blow it up. If she was right, hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people would lose their lives. She couldn’t let that happen.

  In terms of Russia’s power structure, the stakes were extremely high. RT News had said that the Kremlin’s highest dignitaries, including Putin himself, were going to attend. He’d be sitting at this very grandstand.

  How had Wynn obtained a pass to bring building materials into the structure? Judging by the guard’s response—the little salute—the document must have appeared official, handed down from someone high in government.

  The four men she’d been watching rolled the empty pallet back into the building from which they’d emerged. Once again, the guard ignored them.

  She waited a good while before the men came out of the building again. The guard glanced at them briefly, then looked the other way. Her targets had changed into their street clothes and were now heading back the way they’d come. They weren’t making as much effort to keep their distance, although they still weren’t talking or interacting in any way. She waited until they passed before she started following them. They were headed across the square to the GUM mall.

  Once they reached the mall, the three women of the group—Sheila Drysdale, Mary Haworth, and Gina DeSoto—joined them with hugs and pats on the back. Greetings over, they went into the mall and filed into what looked like an expensive restaurant. A sign in front, written in both Russian and English, advertised caviar and vodka. Nicole watched through the window as the maître d’ seated them in a large rear booth. Nicole settled at a table outside the entrance where she could watch through the window.

  A waiter dressed in a suit and tie came out of the restaurant to hand her a menu. Below the Cyrillic description of each dish were English, French, and German translations. When she asked for a pot of tea, he cleared his throat and pointed to a note at the bottom of the menu. It stated that any order required a minimum of 1500 rubles. She got out her cell and typed the amount into her currency converter. 1500 rubles was twenty-one dollars—not too outrageous. She scanned the menu before ordering blinis with caviar and sour cream. She wasn’t hungry, but what did it matter? She just wanted a place to sit until the group left. While the waiter went to get her food, she dictated an urgent message through her watch, describing what she’d just witnessed and the perpetrators’ current location. For the first time, there was no double flash to confirm her message had gone through. She sent it again with the same result. Was it possible she was sitting in an area where it couldn’t connect with the satellite? All she could do was wait and try again later.

  Meanwhile, she had to wait here and see where her charges went next. She took off her baseball cap, tucking it into her bag and pulling out a brightly colored scarf, which she draped over her hair and secured in back, hijab style. She hoped this would change her appearance enough to allow her to continue being invisible, just another tourist among thousands. So far, she was sure they hadn’t noticed her.

  The waiter brought her order. She nibbled at the blinis. They were quite good, and she regretted eating such a big breakfast on the ship. She’d helped herself to pancakes with all the trimmings and was still full. She kept her eye on the group while she sat for an hour, then most of another. They were ordering more drinks when it occurred to her that they might not be going anywhere soon. They were in there celebrating whatever they’d accomplished that morning.

  Just then, the waiter approached her with the bill. “I’m sorry, madam. You must place another order if you want to stay. Customers will be here soon for the mid-day meal.”

  With a sigh, Nicole picked up the menu again. She still wasn’t hungry, and the choices were fairly limited—different varieties of caviar with the blinis. That was it. She ordered the same thing again and asked for a fresh pot of tea. The waiter raised his eyebrows at her barely touched plate before picking it up and hurrying off.

  Looking in the window, she noticed with a start that the group had left the booth and was moving toward the door. She retrieved her purse from the tote bag. Fishing out her wallet, she located four 1,000-ruble notes. This added up to what she owed for the two orders plus an overly generous—and undeserved—tip, but she didn’t have time to flag down the waiter and wait for change. She placed the money on the table and used her water glass to anchor the bills against the breeze.

  After her targets came out, she waited perhaps twenty seconds before she got up to follow them. She’d barely passed the front of the restaurant when her waiter came barreling after her. “Madam, madam,” he shouted. “You forgot to settle your bill, and you must pay for the second order, even if you leave before it’s ready.”

  She pointed to the bills on the table. He scooped them up and went back inside. Her targets were headed for a shop down the road, which turned out to be a liquor store. She waited a few doors down until they came out carrying several full shopping bags. They walked quickly, cutting across the square. Nicole had to run to keep them in sight until she realized they were returning to the parking lot where they’d all started out that morning. She checked her watch. It was now 11:40. The bus was supposed to leave on the hour, which would be 12:00. This gave her just enough time to readjust her appearance so she’d look like she did when they’d first arrived. She quickly changed, then went back to wait with the others. When the bus departed, the only passengers were Nicole and her targets. Except for those who were pretending to be couples, they were sitting apart, pretending not to know each other.

  By the time they arrived at the ship, lunch hour had passed. Nicole stopped by the snack bar to pick
up a sandwich. Egg salad was the only choice left, which made her regret the blinis she’d left on her plate at the restaurant. She unlocked the door to her suite and headed for the table to put down her purse. At that moment, someone grabbed her from behind and clamped a hand over her mouth. She jammed her elbow into his middle, and he let out an oof sound.

  “Don’t scream,” he whispered in her ear. “I’m your handler. My name is Chet Antonovich. Sorry about this. I had to be sure you didn’t alert other passengers that you have an unannounced guest. Nod if you understand, and I’ll let go.”

  She nodded. He released her and stepped away. She turned around to get a look at him. He was tall, six feet three or six four with sandy hair, a full beard, and wide-spaced blue eyes. He appeared to be extremely fit. He was dressed in a black zip-front jumpsuit with the ship’s logo on the pocket, an outfit he’d no doubt nicked from wherever they stored uniforms for the maintenance crew. Because of his height, his pantlegs were several inches short.

  “Your watch is malfunctioning.” His accent was decidedly British. “We received a few words of a message you sent at 10:53 today, but we couldn’t hear the rest, nor were we able to reach you to ask you to message us again. We gathered it was important. I’m here to find out what it was.”

  Nicole gestured toward the couch. “Let’s sit down.” Once they were seated, she told him all that had happened since she began following her targets that morning: the pallet of phony cinder blocks and the time the men had spent loading them under the grandstand, remaining there for the better part of an hour. She also described the group’s jubilant celebration when they left Red Square.

  “I think they planted explosives under the grandstand,” Nicole said. “Ian Davies, the man who sent me here, told me not to involve the police even if my target group did something illegal. But it seems to me we have no choice. We have to report this to the Russian authorities. We can’t just stand by while hundreds or thousands of people die in an explosion we could have prevented.”