Bomb Grade (25 page)

With flashing lights and flickering needles the only other diversion, Charlie and Kestler were momentarily the objects of curiosity. Although it had minimal practical purpose, Charlie inherently gazed back even more intently, trying to fix faces for later indentification from embassy photographs to advise London who the audience had been.

When the sound did come a lot of people jumped, even though it was what they were waiting for.

‘Sighting!' Popov's voice was very clear, without any distortion, although slightly too loud.

One of the operators made an adjustment.

‘Definite sighting!' A pause. ‘Timed zero one twenty-three.'

Instinctively several people checked their watches. The room hushed into utter silence.

The unreality heightened for Charlie. It was like – it
was
– listening to a radio drama where everything was real but you still had to create your own mental imagery. Charlie's was of blackness: black figures in black forest, then the installation a dazzling blaze of light. A perimeter fence, of course. More likely walled than impermanent wire. But barbed wire somewhere. Maybe control towers. A gate. Large, big enough for large transporters.

Popov's commentary was staccato, pared to essential words solely for their benefit. The detailed conversations between the man and the military units were being separately recorded for transcription later.

‘
Three lorries. No, four. Four lorries and two cars. No lights
.'

Right about blackness, wrong about people: black vehicles in black forest. Moving slowly. Unseen road. Drivers straining for the illumination of the plant. No one talking in the cars or lorries. Silence, like here.

‘
Halted. Lead car going on alone. Mercedes. Driver and one other man
.'

Cautious. Checking security, entry codes.

‘
It's the unmanned gate. Inside unit alerted. Kirov group on standby
.'

Nerves wire-tight. Both sides. Hunters and hunted. Listening, looking. Charlie's hands were wet, squeezed tight.

‘
Gate's opening. Flashlight signal. Convoy moving. Lorries are canvas-covered: indications of men inside, impossible to count how many. Last vehicle is another Mercedes. Four men. Everything going into the complex
.'

End of the outside visual surveillance. How long before the internal changeover? Minutes, according to the planning sessions.

‘
In view of inside unit. Straight to storage depot. Men in each lorry. Sixteen … twenty … twenty-five. Twenty-five including cars. Outside unit closing in. Kirov round-up group launched
.'

Nothing rational now; legs, arms, minds, bodies all automatistic. Value of rehearsal and training. Movement without thought. Macabre dance.

‘
Back-up unit in. Gates sealed. Engagement! Kirov seizure squads meeting resistance. There is shooting! There is shooting
.'

A chair scraped. Hisses for silence. A cough. More hisses. Charlie realized he was breathing shallowly, as lightly as possible.

‘
Engagement inside! Automatic fire! Grenades. Grenade response. Storage facilities penetrated, providing cover. Casualties! There are casualties! Casualties inside the installation and at Kirov
.'

Charlie saw Natalia was tensed towards the flat-voiced, emotionless commentary, her neck corded, hands clasped on her lap. Tensed for her lover. Worried.

‘
Surrender! There is isolated surrender inside the plant! Still resistance. Medics going in. All known Kirov addresses secured. There are casualties. Medics moving in at Kirov
.'

Practically all over. Too quick. After so much time and planning it seemed all too quick. But successful. Casualties were inevitable but the robbery had been prevented. Natalia had eased back in her chair, relieved.

‘
Inside resistance over. Full surrender. Fifteen dead. Some severe casualties. Lev Yatisyna among those detained. Eight dead in Kirov. Some severe casualties
.'

The room was relaxing now. Chairs scraped without hissed protest. People coughed. Began smiling to each other. Nodding. Charlie's feet hurt. His shoulders and neck ached, from the tenseness with which he'd held himself. He stretched up, trying to ease it. Beside him Kestler did the same.

‘
Plant 69 and Kirov targets totally secured. The robbery has been prevented with the seizure of all involved. Timed zero two forty-five
.'

The initial applause was isolated but quickly became overwhelming. The self-congratulatory charade of people scarcely involved degenerated embarrassingly into handshakes and even back-slapping. Natalia stood apart but smiling, nodding effacingly at the personal praise and appearing discomfited having to accept the offered hands. By common consent the room began to empty into the hospitality area. Charlie watched Natalia become intently engrossed in a closed-circuit radioed exchange with Popov: she held the earphone pad to one side of her head and smiled all the time.

‘They did it!' enthused Kestler. ‘Wrapped the whole thing up and tied it in a ribbon! Guess we should celebrate, too.'

‘I guess we should,' agreed Charlie.

Natalia was moving ahead, oblivious to them, but Charlie manoeuvred them closer so they arrived inside the adjoining room virtually together.

‘Congratulations.'

She actually appeared surprised to find him beside her. ‘Thank you.'

Some attendants were standing with already poured champagne. Kestler hurried to get glasses for them, momentarily separated Charlie and Natalia from everyone else and Charlie said, hurriedly, ‘You must understand everything's going to be all right …'

‘No!'

‘Please!'

‘No!'

Kestler bustled back, champagne flutes cradled between entwined hands. ‘It was a first-class operation,' he congratulated, raising his glass.

‘By Colonel Popov,' qualified Natalia.

‘By everyone,' insisted the American.

One of the few women who'd been in the audience came up behind Natalia, familiarly cupping her elbow and smiling apologies to guide Natalia towards a waiting group of officials.

Kestler looked around the developing party, where most were drinking with the traditional Russian throw-away-the-bottle-cap abandon and said, ‘Gonna be a lot of sore heads tomorrow. And why not?'

Charlie, who didn't like the acidity of champagne, moved his tongue over his teeth and decided to change to vodka for the next drink. ‘Why not?' he agreed, disinterestedly. Outsider in the planning and outsider at the party, he decided: his contribution – their contribution – amounted to absolutely fuck all. Late though it was he decided to make up lost ground by calling both Jurgen Balg and Umberto Fiore before they heard from anyone else. They'd imagine they'd frightened him into line, but he didn't give a damn about that. He was keeping doors open for himself, not pushing them ajar for them. As he went towards the bar Charlie saw one of the radio operators whisper briefly to Natalia, who frowned and followed him immediately back to the radio equipment. Charlie kept his attention on the connecting doors as he returned to Kestler with fresh drinks.

Natalia reappeared at the doorway but stayed there, seemingly uncertain. Finally she clapped her hands, calling out in a cracked voice for attention. Haltingly, in disbelief, she said, ‘There's been a robbery … from Kirs … it could be as much as two hundred and fifty kilos.'

She finished, looking directly at Kestler and Charlie, and Charlie guessed the sudden wide-eyed consternation was at her realization, too late, that she shouldn't have made the announcement in front of them.

chapter 18

C
harlie knew their expulsion was only minutes away: the taller of the two known ministry men actually started to move towards them. Charlie was later to decide Fred Astaire never danced a quicker quickstep than the fast-footed verbal performance he staged that night.

‘Use us! Don't exclude us!' A chameleon adapter to the concealment of crowds, Charlie abruptly found himself in the unaccustomed and uncomfortable position of addressing one, not hiding in it. The room was still hushed, people unmoving; even the ministry man stopped, uncertainly. Natalia remained gazing at him.

‘You can't exclude us!' challenged Charlie. ‘From this room and this ministry, of course you can. But we
know
! And we are going to have to act upon what we know, although it isn't sufficient to advise Washington or London properly. If something's gone – however it's gone – then it's going into the West. Where, with proper cooperation, it still might be possible to stop it. For
something
to be done! But not with each of us working separately, no one knowing what the other is doing. The only outcome of that will be chaos …' He still had them! Maybe only just, but there was still complete silence and no one was moving and they were listening to what he was saying. ‘If anything like this quantity of nuclear material has gone, then recovering it or stopping it supersedes any national pride. It's a simple choice: responsibility or irresponsibility …'

For several moments there was a complete hiatus, everyone suspended in a time warp of indecision, a lot of other-way looking for the escape – for
anything
– of higher authority. Charlie's concentration was upon the official he knew and who had started out towards them. The man moved again, finally, but not in their direction but to a crinkle-haired, thick-set man whose slightly bloated bull-necked appearance Charlie had earlier registered for the embassy photograph comparison. The man made a dismissive hand gesture and people moved away to create a confidential cordon for the two to talk.

It was a very brief exchange, with a lot of head movement, the thick-set man for emphasis, the ministry official of acceptance. It was impossible to anticipate anything from the blank-faced approach of the official. ‘You are to wait.' Behind him the room was emptying back into Popov's office, very obviously now at the command of the thick-set figure of authority.

Charlie waited until the door closed firmly upon them – but with an attendant standing guard against it on their side – before going to the bar. He downed two vodkas one after the other, each in a single gulp, and emptied half the third before pausing. It wasn't the booze that made him breathless.

‘Charlie!' said Kestler, in slow-voiced admiration. ‘I don't care what the outcome is, that was fucking marvellous!'

‘If we don't get some sort of entry it was a waste of time.' Two hundred and fifty kilos, he thought; fifty Nagasaki bombs, 2,000,000 dead, millions more maimed.

‘They haven't thrown us out,' reminded the American.

‘Yet.'

‘What the fuck can have happened?'

The younger man was picking up Lyneham's conversational style, thought Charlie. Or maybe his. He shook his head, in matching bewilderment. ‘We
heard
Popov say everything was secured; that nothing had been taken! We got a body count! Everything!'

‘You think they'll try to swing whatever went wrong on to us, after what was said at the planning meeting?' asked the conscience-pricked Kestler.

Charlie took another drink, shrugging. ‘Nothing practical to be gained speculating down that road, until we know what did go wrong.'

Kestler teetered on the edge of admitting to Charlie what the FBI Director had ordered him to do. ‘If this much has gone, the search for scapegoats will be awesome.'

‘Let's wait and see what's happened,' urged Charlie, again. There would be a scapegoat hunt: it was part of the algebraic formula after every cock-up, as enshrined as Archimedes' Principle and the Theory of Relativity. Much more relative, in fact, than anything Einstein ever had in mind. How exposed would Natalia be? He had no way of knowing or even guessing, but she headed the specific department trying to defeat the business and at the moment it looked like that business had just got away with the biggest nuclear heist in history. But she had another friend to go to: someone far more closely involved and able to help than he was. He looked to the American. ‘Let's hope to Christ your satellite picked up something useful.'

Kestler flushed slightly, at having forgotten the one practical thing they had been able to do. ‘You think I should offer it?' he deferred.

‘No!' said Charlie, at once. ‘A robbery from Kirs, after the preparation and force that went into stopping it, would have had to be brilliantly planned. So our chances of picking up any sort of trail in the West isn't good …' Charlie hesitated, jerking his head towards the guarded door. ‘We've got to hope that in their panic they don't realize that. But if they do cooperate, anything your satellite picks up is our ace-in-the-hole to keep us in the game.'

‘So we sit on it whatever they decide tonight?'

‘Sit on it very tightly,' confirmed Charlie. ‘If we are thrown out, it'll be all we've got.'

‘I'll …' started Kestler and then stopped as the linking door opened.

They couldn't see who relayed the message but the inner attendant called, ‘You are asked to go in.'

The room had been virtually cleared. Only six people remained, the two known officials, the man to whom everyone deferred, Natalia and the two radio operators still at their light- and needle-flickering equipment. The official group were assembled around Popov's pushed-aside desk and the thick-set man occupied Popov's chair. The man said at once, ‘I am Viktor Sergeevich Viskov, deputy Interior Minister …' A sideways gesture. ‘General Fedova you already know. Mikhail Grigorevich Vasilyev …' The taller of the two officials straightened slightly. ‘… is my executive assistant. Yuri Petrovich Pan in represents the Foreign Ministry …'

Names for the first time, freely offered: it looked promising, quickly assessed Charlie. And they'd been
asked
to go in.

There was another gesture. ‘Sit down.' Natalia and Panin were already seated; Vasilyev remained standing in the presence of his superior.