Red Sparrow (3 page)

But the handler at a snake farm inevitably is bitten unless he exercises great care. Today’s Kremlin was suits and ties, press secretaries, smiling summit meetings, but anyone who had been around for any length of time knew that nothing had changed since Stalin, really. Friendship? Loyalty? Patronage? A misstep, an operational or diplomatic failure, or, worst of all, embarrassing the president, would bring the
burya,
the tempest, from which there would be no shelter. Vanya shook his head.
Chert vozmi
. Shit. This Nash episode was exactly what he didn’t need.

“Could surveillance have been more poorly managed?” Egorov raged. He was generally given to mild theatrics in front of his subordinates. “It’s obvious this little prick Nash met with a source last night. How could he have been out of pocket for more than twelve hours? What was surveillance doing in that district in the first place?”

“It appears they were looking for Chechens doing drug deals. God knows what the FSB is doing these days,” said Zyuganov. “That district, it’s a shithole down there.”

“And what about the crash in the alley? What was that?”

“It’s not clear. They claim the team thought they had cornered a Chechen and believed he was armed. I doubt it. They may have gotten excited in the chase.”

“
Kolkhozniki
. Peasants could do it better. I’ll have the director mention it to the president next Monday. We cannot have foreign diplomats harmed on the streets, even if they are meeting with Russian traitors,” said Egorov with a snort. “The FBI will start mugging our officers in Georgetown if this happens again.”

“I will pass the word too, at my level, General. The surveillance teams will get the message, especially, if I may suggest, if some time at
katorga
could be arranged.”

Egorov looked at his CI chief blankly, noting that he used the czarist name for gulag with wet-lipped relish. Jesus. Alexei Zyuganov was short and dark, with a fry-pan-flat face and prominent ears. Tent-peg teeth and a perpetual smirk completed the Lubyanka look. Still, Zyuganov was thorough, a malevolent minion who had his uses.

“We can criticize the FSB, but I tell you this, this American is meeting someone important. And those idiots just missed him, I’m sure of it.” Egorov threw the report on his desk. “So, can you guess what your job is going to be from this point onward?” He paused. “Find. Out. Who. It. Is.” Each word was punctuated with a tap on Egorov’s desk with a thick index finger. “I want that traitor’s head in a wicker basket.”

“I’ll make it a priority,” said Zyuganov, knowing that without more to go on, or without a specific lead from a mole inside the CIA, or without a break on the street, they would have to wait. In the meantime he could begin a few investigations, conduct an interrogation, just for art’s sake.

Egorov looked again at the surveillance report, a futile piece of work. The only confirmed fact was the identification of Nathaniel Nash at the Embassy gate. No sighting or description of anyone else. The driver of one of the surveillance cars (a photo of him with a sticking plaster over his left eye was included in the report, as if to justify the incident in the alley) positively identified Nash, as did the militiaman at the US Embassy compound entrance.

This could turn sweet or sour,
thought Egorov. A splashy spy case solved to his credit while mortifying the Americans, or an embarrassing debacle displeasing the Kremlin and Egorov’s testosterone-fueled patron, resulting in the sudden end of his career. Depending on the president’s ire, this could
include a bunk next to that ruined oligarch Khodorkovsky in Segezha Prison Colony Number Nine.

Morbidly contemplating the potential opportunities while recognizing the political consequences, Egorov that morning had called for and read Nate’s
liternoye delo,
the operational file:
Young, active, disciplined, good Russian. Behaves himself regarding women and alcohol. No drugs. Diligent in cover position in the Embassy Economic Section. Effective while on the street, does not telegraph his operational intent.
Egorov grunted.
Molokosos
. Whippersnapper. He looked up at his KR chief.

The hairs growing out of Zyuganov’s brain tingled and he sensed that he had to show more enthusiasm. First Deputy Director Egorov might not be a street operator, but he was a well-known species in the SVR zoo, a politically ambitious bureaucrat.

“Mr. Deputy Director, the key to finding the bastard who is selling our secrets is to focus on this young Yankee
geroy,
this hero. Put three teams on him. Wrap him in onionskins. Twenty-four hours a day. Order—better yet, ask—FSB to increase coverage, let them rattle around behind him, then put our own teams out at the margins. Give him a look, then take it away. See if he’s re-casing meeting sites. There will be another meeting in three to six months, that’s certain.”

Egorov liked the bit about onionskins, he would repeat it to the Director later today.

“All right, get started, let me know what your plans are so I can brief the director on our strategy,” said Egorov, dismissing the chief with a wave.

Brief the director on
our
strategy,
thought Zyuganov as he left the office.

The US Embassy compound in Moscow is located northwest of Yasenevo, in the Presnensky District near the Kremlin and a sweeping bend in the Moskva River. Late that afternoon, another unpleasant conversation transpired in the office of the CIA Chief of Station, Gordon Gondorf. Much like the Line KR chief who had not been invited to sit down, Nate stood in front of Gondorf’s desk. His knee throbbed from the day before.

If Egorov’s imposing bulk made him look like a circus strongman, Gondorf’s small frame and pinched features made him look like a whippet in
a circus dog act. Only about five feet six, Gondorf had thinning hair, pig’s eyes set too close together, and tiny feet. What he lacked in stature he amply made up for in venom. He trusted no one, and was unaware of the irony that he himself instilled trust in no one. Gondorf (“Gondork” behind his back) lived in a secret hell known only to a certain type of senior intelligence officer: He was in over his head.

“I read your ops report about the run last night,” said Gondorf. “Based on your write-up, I suppose you think the outcome was satisfactory?” Gondorf’s voice was flat and he spoke slowly, waveringly. Nate’s gut flipped in anticipation of the impending confrontation.
Stand your ground.

“If you mean do I think the agent is safe, yes,” said Nate. He knew where Gondorf was going with this but left him to get there on his own.

“You almost got the Agency’s most prolific and important asset arrested last night. Your meeting was busted by surveillance, for Christ’s sake.”

Nate tamped down building anger. “I ran a twelve-hour SDR yesterday. The very SDR you approved. I confirmed my status. I was black when I got to the site, and so was MARBLE,” said Nate.

“How do you explain the surveillance, then?” said Gondorf. “You can’t possibly think it was random surveillance in the area. Tell me you don’t think that.” Gondorf’s voice dripped with sarcasm.

“That’s exactly what it was. There is no way they were searching for me, that bullshit in the alley, they weren’t following me from the start, no way. It was random and they reacted, no attempt to be discreet. MARBLE got away clean.” Nate registered that Gondorf wasn’t even concerned about the attempted wall smear. A different chief would have been in the ambassador’s office, raising hell, demanding the Embassy file a protest.

Switching barrels, Gondorf said, “Nonsense. The whole thing was a disaster. How could you have directed him to go down into the Metro? That’s a mousetrap. You ignored procedure when you pawed him to change his overcoat. He is supposed to do that himself. You know that! What if he’s fluorescing under a light wand right now?”

“I made the determination and the decision. I thought changing his profile and getting him out of the area was the priority. MARBLE’s a pro, he’ll know to get rid of the coat and cane. We can send him a message, I’ll verify with him at our next meeting,” said Nate. It was agony to argue this way, especially with a chief who didn’t know the street.

“There’s not going to be a next meeting. At least not with you. You’re too hot now. They ID’d you a dozen times last night, your Econ cover is gone, you’ll have half the surveillance directorate in Moscow on your ass from now on,” said Gondorf. He was visibly relishing the moment.

“They always knew this cover position. I always had coverage, you know that. I still can meet assets,” said Nate, leaning against a chair. Gondorf had a dummy hand grenade mounted on a wooden base on his desk. The plaque on it read
COMPLAINT DEPARTMENT. PULL PIN FOR FASTER SERVICE.

“No, I don’t believe you can meet agents. You’re now a shit magnet,” said Gondorf.

“If they put that many resources on me we can bankrupt them,” argued Nate. “I can drain their manpower by driving all over town for the next six months. And the more coverage I get, the better we’ll be able to manipulate them.”
Stand your ground.

Gondorf was unimpressed and unconvinced. This young case officer stud represented too much of a risk to him personally. Gondorf had his sights set on one of the big component jobs in Headquarters next year when he returned to Washington. It wasn’t worth the risk. “Nash, I’m recommending that your tour in Moscow be curtailed. You’re too hot and the opposition will be looking for a way to pick you off, catch your agents.” He looked up. “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure you get a good follow-on assignment.”

Nate was shocked. Even a first-tour officer knew a short-of-tour expulsion submitted by a COS—whatever the reason—could derail a career. He also was sure that Gondorf would use back channels to hint that Nate had fucked up. Nate’s unofficial reputation, his “hall file,” would take a hit, it would affect his promotions and future assignments. The old feeling of standing in black quicksand started coming back.

Nate knew the truth: He had saved MARBLE last night with quick and correct action. He looked down at Gondorf’s impassive face. They both knew what was happening and why. So to Nate there didn’t seem to be any point not to finish the conversation with a flourish. “Gondorf, you’re a gutless pussy who’s terrified of the street. You’re fucking me to avoid your responsibility. It’s been an education serving in your Station.”

As he left the office, Nate noted that the absence of a screaming tirade from his chief was indeed the measure of the man.

Kicked out of Station short of tour. Not as bad as getting an agent killed, stealing official funds, or fabricating reports, but still a disaster. How it would affect future assignments, promotions, Nate couldn’t tell, but the news would get around the minute the cable from Gondorf hit Headquarters. Some of his classmates from training were already on their second tours, making their bones. Rumor had it that one of them already had been offered a chief’s job in a small Station. The additional months of training for Moscow had put Nate behind the curve, and now this.

Even as he told himself not to fixate, Nate fretted. He had always been told to keep up, of the necessity of not falling behind, of the absolute requirement to win. He grew up in the genteel southern equivalent of a cage match where generations of Nashes had been raised in the Palladian family mansion on the bluffs along the south shore of the James. Nate’s grandfather and his father after him, respectively founder and reigning partner of Nash, Waryng, and Royall in Richmond, had sat in green-shaded studies, and sucked their teeth, and shot their cuffs. They had nodded approval as Nate’s brothers, one implausible with Julius Caesar curls, the other sweating and outrageous in a gamine comb-over, wrestled in their suits on the carpet, and learned just enough of the law, and married chesty belles who stopped talking when the men came into the room, blue eyes searching for approval.

But what y’all suppose we do about young Nate? they had asked one another. Graduated from Johns Hopkins with a degree in Russian literature, Nate sought refuge in the spiritual, ascetic world of Gogol, Chekhov, Turgenev, a world that brick-paved Richmond could not invade. His brothers howled and his father thought it a waste. It was expected that he would attend a law school—he was preapproved for acceptance at Richmond—and eventually fill a junior partner’s chair at the firm. The graduate degree in Russian from faraway Middlebury was therefore a problem, and the subsequent application to the CIA a family crisis.

“I believe you’ll find the life of a civil servant less than fulfilling,” his father had said. “I frankly cannot see you happy in that bureaucracy.” Nate’s father had known past directors. His brothers were less circumspect in their criticism. During a particularly riotous holiday meal, they started a family
pool to predict how long Nate would last in the CIA. The high field was three or fewer years.

His application to the Central Intelligence Agency had nothing to do with escaping the suspenders and cuff links, with the crushing absoluteness of Richmond, or with the inevitability of the colonnaded mansion overlooking the river. It had nothing to do with patriotism either, really, though Nate was as patriotic as the next person. It had everything to do with the hammer in his chest when he at ten years of age
made himself
walk along the ledge of the mansion three floors up, level with the hawks over the river, to beat down the dread, to confront the raptors of fear and failure. It was about the strain between him and his father and grandfather and omnivore brothers, raucously demanding compliance from him while practicing none themselves.