Bomb Grade (59 page)

He limited the torch, using it only to find the split-pins in the gauge nuts and get the pliers in place. Without being able to see what he was doing when he applied the pressure the pliers kept slipping off, sometimes with a sharp click when the plier teeth snapped together. The handles were slippery, too, where he was sweating, which was nerves, like the sniggering. Twice he had to stop, ducking behind the vehicle and pulling the boot lid down at the shouted departure of people with vehicles nearby. Once a man came out and urinated steamily against the wall and on another occasion he had to stop altogether for several minutes while a woman in a see-through nightdress stood at a window, appearing to look directly at him. She had very hairy armpits.

It must have taken him almost an hour finally to loosen two of the split-pins. There was almost another snigger at the ease with which each notched valve unscrewed. Charlie abandoned the remaining two cylinders, shifting to the second car. It was much more difficult bum-bouncing the lid open. The woman came back to the window and another group departed, halting him. He'd virtually decided to abandon it when the catch finally sprung. Here he tried jamming the tyre iron across the releasing handles and wrenching sharply and again they gave almost immediately. It took Charlie fifteen minutes to release three. Satisfied, he softly pressed the lid shut. Momentarily he paused against the car, forcing the breath into his body to recover until he realized what he was actually leaning against and jerked hurriedly away. There was a shout from the hotel as he went through the side parking area but Charlie kept walking and it didn't come again.

No one noticed his arrival back. On his own floor Charlie did use the bathroom, needing it, and rinsed his face and hands clean.

He listened carefully outside the bedroom door and then again directly inside. Hillary's breathing was undisturbed. Charlie creaked across the room, let his clothes lie where they dropped, and edged into bed. The bed sounded his arrival but it wasn't important any more. He knew he would be cold so he didn't let himself touch her, lying on his back in the darkness.

‘Where have you been?'

Hillary's voice, unfogged by sleep, so surprised him that Charlie physically jumped. ‘Toilet.'

‘Bad bowel problem?'

‘What do you mean?'

‘I heard you leave. Three hours ago.'

‘I couldn't sleep. When downstairs for a drink. Thought I might as well go and check their cars again.'

‘Something I don't think I mentioned about those gauges. From what I've read, the design was updated on the later cylinder models for the secondary protection system to operate if the valves are disturbed. It was only the prototype that was entirely controlled by temperature.'

‘What were the ones we saw in Moscow?'

‘The updated version.'

‘Good.' He had to tell her: partially at least. She'd learn in the end but by then it would all have worked. ‘I'm trying to protect myself.'

‘Protect yourself!'

‘I've got to link Sobelov and Turkel. And then get them with the cylinders. I need a way to get out. Otherwise I'm trapped with them, when the shooting starts.'

‘You didn't know the secondary protection came in automatically?'

‘No,' he admitted.

‘So you were happy to kill people, to give you an escape?'

‘I'm not asking you to approve. Just understand.'

‘It's difficult.'

‘They know what they're carrying. And that it could kill hundreds.'

‘I've never gone for the God-like judgment argument.'

‘It's done.'

‘I guess I knew you were a bastard. But not this much of one.'

Charlie didn't speak.

‘You just damaged the meters? You didn't do anything else?'

‘No,' lied Charlie.

‘You going to stop at Poznan?'

‘No.'

‘I'd like to get back to Berlin and forget about this.'

They left early and reached Berlin by late afternoon. Hillary didn't speak for a lot of the journey and said she wasn't hungry and wanted an early night.

Gunther Schumann was furious and insisted Roh and other agency chiefs were even angrier. ‘We bent rules for you, particularly over that damned Zurich bank account.'

‘The Zurich thing is quite separate: you want it as much as I do,' reminded Charlie, rejecting anger with apparent anger. ‘This is different. We had an agreement. Roh broke it, not me. The other agencies too, probably. You wouldn't have got this far without doing things my way and this might be as far as you do get. The Russians are on their way: I've checked them. And should be at Poznan on time. Anything that goes wrong there or from now on is down to you, OK?' Arrogant son-of-a-bitch, he thought, remembering Hillary's accusation.

Charlie hadn't expected the glad-handing appearance of James Kestler, whose interruption ended the dispute. As annoyed as he still was, Charlie wasn't sure Schumann would go along with their previously arranged, all-working-together explanation that it was a German operation against the Iraqi and Sergei Sobelov, but the German did. Kestler said Jesus H. Christ and it was as lucky as hell Washington had sent him in early and that he wanted to be included, which Charlie and Schumann had also discussed and which had been agreed at Wiesbaden.

‘The Russians, too,' added Charlie.

The Moscow party, headed by Dmitri Fomin, got to Berlin the following day. The Germans had monitored their accommodation, although not intruded, anxious to prevent any disastrous chance recognition with the arriving Mafia group. Because of its location, Charlie had half-expected the Russians to choose the Grand but they didn't: it was still in the former East, a virtual same-mould reproduction on the WaisenStrasse of the Kalisz emporium.

Charlie went there, with Kestler as well as Schumann, in advance of the Russians being officially received by the German Federal Prosecutor, but it was Schumann who disclosed, in as much detail as they knew and for the first time, how they intended ensnaring the Iraqi and the Dolgoprudnaya boss of bosses.

It was only at the very end that Charlie entered the discussion. ‘Having debriefed Raina – and got Turkel's identity through him – I'm convinced Turkel knows the names of the Moscow government officials who set Pizhma up with the old Dolgoprudnaya leadership. Just as I'm convinced Turkel will break, after he's arrested, to try to save himself.'

‘To tell us the Moscow names?' demanded Fomin.

‘Each and every one,' agreed Charlie.

As the meeting broke up Aleksai Popov approached smiling and asked Charlie how Hillary was. Charlie said she was fine and asked after Natalia.

‘Fine,' echoed Popov. ‘The wedding's fixed. We haven't got an apartment like yours, though.'

chapter 37

T
he hostile resentment was general, although focused through Walter Roh, and Charlie thought it time-wasting because they had to use him whether they liked it or not – which they made abundantly clear they didn't – and he refused to be shat on, privately or publicly like Roh was attempting to shit on him. He threw back Roh's attack with the same argument with which he'd rejected Schumann, who seemed to have accepted it. The piratical Schumann was the only one remaining even half-friendly. Charlie impatiently ended the argument by insisting there were more important things than a pointless inquest, which made the resentment even worse. Charlie felt a nudge of support from Hillary, beside him. Throughout the squabble Kestler sat quietly, head following each speaker tennis-fashion. Although the connecting double doors of Schumann's suite had been opened to the next apartment it was still overcrowded, despite which the places for Popov and Gusev were slightly apart from the rest, like his and Kestler's had always been at all the Moscow meetings, which Charlie thought appropriate. The two Russians said nothing either, going from speaker to speaker as intently as Kestler, latecomers anxious to catch up on everything.

Denied any apology by Charlie, the disgruntled Walter Roh had no alternative but to do as Charlie said and go through the agreed planning for the benefit of Kestler and the Russians. He did so never once looking at Charlie, which Charlie dismissed as childish. Instead he began by formally welcoming Kestler, Popov and Gusev and announced Bonn's agreement to all three being present at the arrests.

Roh went on that both Tegel and Schonefeld airports were already totally under the control of civilian and military intelligence, in advance of the arrival of Sobelov and the Iraqi. He identified Turkel from surveillance pictures and said the man had already boarded an incoming flight from Cologne, accompanied by at least ten others, all men. The moment Sobelov and Turkel left their respective arrival terminals an inescapable net would be sealed behind them: both airports would be closed and all major roads and possible waterways out of the city blocked by one centralized telephone call if either man was lost from surveillance for longer than five minutes. At all times at least three out of the total of twenty commando-carrying helicopters would be airborne, at instant readiness for any eventuality, and as soon as Sobelov and Turkel were wherever they expected the plutonium handover to take place, every road in a square half-kilometre area around it would be cut against both vehicles and pedestrians entering or leaving. No cars or pedestrians would be allowed back into the area, to clear it as much as possible because of the content of the cylinders, despite their belief there was no danger of leakage. At that Hillary nodded and said, ‘There's always the possibility of damage, during transit.'

At last Roh looked at Charlie. Equally as important – more important, in fact – as arresting the traffickers was the total recovery of the nuclear components. To minimize to the utmost any risk to innocent people, no seizure would be attempted until the Russians and the Iraqis were with the cylinders. The assault teams would be led to the exchange location in two ways. The BMW cars, still as of 8 a.m. that morning at Frankfurt am der Oder, would be followed by road and air when they moved. Roh made an elaborate gesture towards Charlie: also under intense surveillance would be the intermediary who had to bring Sobelov and Turkel together to complete the deal. Roh added, dismissively, that Charlie would be unprotected, exposed with two separate criminal groups and the nuclear consignment, in the first minutes of the attack: the German assault teams would be warned of his presence but there would inevitably be indiscriminate shooting.

Abruptly all attention was upon Charlie. Popov went sideways to Gusev and muttered something. Kestler said, ‘Surely there's got to be some back-up?'

‘There's never been a bigger or more comprehensive back-up in a criminal investigation in this city,' assured Roh. ‘But nothing can be done
before
, only after.'

‘So what protection does he have?' persisted the American.

‘None,' intruded Charlie, disliking being talked about as if he wasn't there. ‘I'm totally reliant on the quickness and efficiency of the antiterrorist units.' He'd intended it to be sarcastic but it sounded admiring and he wished it hadn't.

‘What about a wire? A weapon at least!' said Kestler.

‘The Iraqis are too cautious,' said Charlie. ‘I can't risk being searched. They've always searched me so far.'

‘These guys will post lookouts!' protested Kestler. ‘We won't be able to hit them without warning!'

‘It's a risk Mr Muffin has taken upon himself,' said Roh. ‘Of course we are prepared for lookouts. They'll be neutralized as quickly as possible. We will still have some element of surprise: and hopefully the advantage of confusion. The exposure shouldn't be more than minutes.'

‘I'll be the one prepared for it. They won't,' said Charlie. ‘There's no cause – and there won't be any time – for them to realize I've led them into a trap.'

‘What if they
do
make the connection?' said Kestler.

‘It's too late to change everything now,' said Charlie.

There was a moment of silence in the room, everyone thinking there should be more to say but no one knowing what it was. The squawk of an army telephone broke the impasse. The operator whispered to Roh who said, ‘Turkel has just landed at Schonefeld. At least three men who disembarked from the Moscow flight at Tegel matched the physical description of Sobelov but we're not sure. And the cars left Frankfurt am der Oder fifteen minutes ago.'

‘I'd better get ready to meet them,' said Charlie.

Popov intercepted him at the door. ‘There's a lot we should have been told. But haven't.'

‘You'll know everything by the end of the day,' promised Charlie.

‘I think it is something we should discuss later with our government representatives,' said Popov, stiffly formal.

‘I think you're right,' agreed Charlie, at once. To the hovering Gusev he said, ‘You'll both be present at the arrests: Russian presence – your presence – will be publicly made known.'

Popov's frown went at Hillary's approach. He smiled and said he hoped to see more of her during their time in Berlin and Hillary said she'd like that. She walked with Charlie to the elevators. While they waited she said, ‘I do understand. No one's being harmed, so it's all right. It just took me a while. I'm sorry.'

‘Thanks,' said Charlie, hating himself.

‘Suddenly it doesn't seem as straightforward as it did at Kalisz, though.'

‘It'll go like clockwork,' said Charlie, sounding more confident than he was. He looked directly at her. ‘Stay out of things. Wait here until I get back, when it's all over.'

‘Make that soon, Charlie, OK?'

There were three other men Charlie didn't recognize with Sergei Sobelov's two regular protectors when the Dolgoprudnaya boss flounced self-importantly into the Kempinski. Charlie moved at once to intercept them because the identification was necessary for the room allocation: two of the supposed reception clerks, both women, were Bundeskriminaiamt officers. Sobelov offered an effusive handshake, gesturing the others to complete the registration and demanded the bar. Charlie chose a table in the centre of the room, for further identification. The net was sealed, he thought: with him inside it. Sobelov's escorts came in and settled themselves at adjacent tables, virtually encircling them: tight inside it, Charlie added to the reflection.