In the Name of a Killer (9 page)

‘Which means they despise our investigatory capacity!’ Gugin broke in. After the organization’s most recent problems, it was going to be important to distance the KGB from any dangerous criticism.

It was difficult for Danilov to hold a thought but again he wondered why the KGB officer had not by now announced KGB control. ‘What’s the official response going to be?’

‘Mainly political,’ Lapinsk disclosed. ‘The Minister is waiting for the meeting with the ambassador.’

Danilov looked pointedly at Gugin. ‘There is some technical help I would appreciate from here.’

Gugin returned the attention in apparent surprise, in reality wondering if this was going to show him the way. ‘What?’

Danilov leaned forward, offering a slip of paper upon which he’d copied Ann Harris’s telephone number. ‘Would there have been any monitor?’

Gugin stared steadily back at the detective for several moments. ‘I won’t know, until I check. We could never admit it.’

‘I don’t want to admit it. I want access to numbers she might have called. If the man she slept with isn’t her killer at least he might know why she got out of bed to walk around Moscow in the middle of the night.’

‘It would be extremely useful,’ encouraged Lapinsk.

‘I’ll inquire,’ promised Gugin. But think and plan first, he decided: there probably would have been a monitor, upon somebody so well connected politically. This really could be the way.

The reply confused Danilov. Now they were openly inviting KGB involvement and still the man wasn’t making the control demands there should have been. ‘I’d like something else.’

‘What?’

‘File photographs of Ann Harris. I’d like to see who she circulated with, socially.’

‘She might not have been targeted. If anything came up, during, say, a normal embassy event it might have been retained.’

‘She was related to a prominent American politician!’ Danilov pointed out. By now he was totally confused by Gugin’s practically acquiescent attitude: it wasn’t right.

‘I’ll check that, too.’ Gugin was sure of an advantage now. It could be very good.

‘That would be extremely helpful.’

‘I’m sure it will be,’ said Gugin, amusing himself. He amused himself further with the obvious surprise of the other two men when he terminated his presence by abruptly announcing he had other meetings for which he was already late. He was anxious, in fact, to consult with others back in Lubyanka.

When they were alone Lapinsk said: ‘How are you going to take this forward?’

‘Routinely. Pavin’s setting up the checks on the mental institutions. It’s going to tie up a lot of personnel: possibly mean other cases will have to be put aside.’

‘That’s unimportant!’ declared the Director at once, anxious again. ‘There is only one priority. This case. Everyone’s frightened. The Foreign Ministry – and the Interior – are terrified of overseas newspaper and magazine stories of monsters and madmen roaming Moscow’s streets.’

‘There is one,’ said Danilov, unhelpfully. He jerked his head in the direction of the door through which Gugin had left. ‘I don’t understand what the Cheka are doing. Or rather, not doing!’

‘Neither did I, at first,’ Lapinsk confessed. ‘Then I sat through a half-hour lecture from the Foreign Minister and his advisers about the pitfalls and the Cheka attitude became entirely clear. They’ll cooperate in what we’ve asked: it makes them look willing participants. But they’re always going to be on the outside, free from any responsibility. They can’t afford or risk any more censure, can they?’

The explanation was still hardly an expression of confidence in either him or the Militia, Danilov recognized. ‘So it begins and ends with us? With me?’ Wasn’t that what he’d wanted? Already determined to fight for?

‘The KGB have far more expertise at political and diplomatic manoeuvre than we have. They’ve always needed it more.’

‘Are there any special instructions?’ And was he going to regret his own ambition, he asked himself. He hoped not.

‘Find who did it, as soon as possible,’ said Lapinsk.

‘I hardly need to be told that.’ The Director’s fatuous reply showed the strain under which the man believed himself to be.

‘You
do
need to be told to be careful in diplomatic situations. You went too far, entering the apartment. Think more, before you move. Otherwise there’ll be mistakes. And we can’t afford mistakes, any more than what used to be the KGB.’

‘I won’t have gone too far, if it helps me find who did it.’

‘Don’t argue with me about this, Dimitri Ivanovich! There isn’t going to be any glory in this investigation. Just problems.’

‘I’ll try not to offend.’ Danilov could see through the window that it was already dark outside. He tried to remember what Olga had told him she was doing tonight but couldn’t, only that she was going out. So there wouldn’t be any food in the apartment. And he hadn’t eaten at midday.

‘You can call upon whatever facilities you want,’ offered the Director. ‘Everything’s got
top
priority. I want morning and afternoon briefing: I’m going to be getting queries constantly.’ The man paused. ‘I’m frightened there’s going to be another one.’

‘There obviously will be, unless we’re lucky. And I don’t really know what I mean by being lucky,’ admitted Danilov, with aching resignation. It wasn’t until he was struggling against the crowd at the metro station that he realized one of the facilities he could probably demand was a permanent police vehicle. He’d have to remember, tomorrow.

Olga had not left him anything to eat. Danilov poured the Stolichnaya he had denied himself in the long ago early hours of that morning and carried it to the bedroom. He only drank half before falling asleep. His last conscious thought was to hope that Lapinsk was wrong and that there would be a lot of personal glory if he carried out an impeccable investigation and made an arrest.

The world’s press had a story of a predicted American Presidential candidate – already a well-known politician – connected with a murder in Russia.

The coverage was staggering.

The demand for press conferences and interviews and information was overwhelming, bewildering Russian ministries which believed they already understood the needs of the Western news media, but in fact knew them not at all. The sideways shuffle was as automatic as it was instinctive.

The responding discussion was held at the Foreign Ministry. It was attended by a deputy official of the Interior Ministry and the Federal Prosecutor. General Leonid Lapinsk obviously represented the Militia. The Foreign Ministry delegate lectured on the political importance. The Interior Ministry deputy insisted upon the need for a quick resolution. With weight of authority, both ministries argued that the statement should come from the Federal Prosecutor, a thin, skin-sagged lawyer named Nikolai Smolin. The Prosecutor tried to spread responsibility, summoning Lapinsk the following morning to judge – and for the man to be enmeshed in – the communique. It said the Russian authorities deeply regretted a foul crime. Every effort and every available officer had been assigned to the investigation, for which there was every expectation of a quick conclusion. All information and developments would be made available to the media, as they arose.

‘Well?’ demanded Smolin. He had a croaking, dry-throated way of talking.

‘It seems to cover what they have been asking,’ said the mediaraw Lapinsk.

‘I’m sure it will satisfy them,’ smiled Smolin.

It didn’t, of course.

Another one soon. More buttons. More hair. Leave a trail: like a paper-chase. Had to taunt: to dare. Different coloured buttons than the reds and the green and the brown. Had to get this pattern right. Maybe try for red again, after all. Just a different shade. Difficult, of course: dangerous, trying to choose. Always the risk of attracting attention. Never sure what the colours truly were, in the dark, unless you were dangerously close. Had to be very close – risk the danger – to ensure it was a woman. Do it soon: quite soon. Important not to begin to like it, though. It would be madness, to like it. Wasn’t mad. That was the most brilliant part of it all: that he wasn’t mad. Only he knew that, though. Brilliant.

Chapter Seven

William Cowley attracted attention – which for a law officer was sometimes a disadvantage – because he returned it, intently. He was a large man, both tall and heavy-shouldered, the build of the college football player he had once been, long ago. But unlike many men of such size he did not try to come down to the stature of smaller people but walked purposefully and upright and invariably concentrated absolutely upon the person to whom he was talking. It was a natural confidence, often mistaken for conceit, which
was
a mistake, because William Cowley was not a conceited man. He was a very realistic, pragmatic man. A sad one, too.

Both secretaries started to rise eagerly when he entered the Director’s suite: the younger, a corn-and-milk-fed blonde, won the race. Cowley answered the smile but politely, without any come-on flirtation: another reform, to go with all the rest. Cowley identified himself and the girl said Mr Fletcher was waiting. Fletcher was the Director’s personal assistant. The man emerged unsmiling from an inner office and said: ‘Thank you for coming,’ as if there had been a choice. Then he added: ‘The Director’s waiting.’

Ross’s fifth-floor office was at the corner of Pennsylvania Avenue looking up towards the Capitol. The walls were hung solely with large, official photographs of the present and past Presidents and past FBI Directors. Cowley wondered where Ross’s photograph would hang, when the man left office; there didn’t appear to be any space left. There was a predictable furled American flag in one corner, behind the desk at which Ross sat. The carelessly fat man in the crumpled suit didn’t rise or move his face in any greeting. He nodded thanks to Fletcher, for the escort duty, and nodded again to Cowley, to be seated.

‘Senator Burden’s niece has been murdered in Moscow,’ announced the FBI Director, without any preamble. ‘For all the reasons that don’t need me to explain, we’re trying to get into the situation.’

Imagining his guidance was being sought, as an acknowledged before-and-after-the-changes Russian expert, he said: ‘I could probably come up with something in a day or two.’ Andrews was going to be as busy as hell: something with a fall-out like this would be a bastard.

‘Already decided,’ said the Director, briskly. ‘We’re offering technical expertise. The sophistication of Russian criminal investigation will be light years behind ours.’

‘Will they go for that?’

‘Depends how it’s argued. It isn’t going to be easy, from what’s happened so far.’

‘What
has
happened?’

So this was the forthright directness referred to in Cowley’s last personnel assessment, a trait which seemed to upset some people here on Pennsylvania Avenue. Ross, who rarely for a legal man preferred one word to a wrapped-up sentence, didn’t find it offensive. ‘The investigation is under the jurisdiction of the People’s Militia: that’s controlled by the Interior Ministry. There’ve been official complaints of arrogance and undiplomatic behaviour.’

‘Providing them laboratory room here isn’t going to give us much of an in.’

‘Which is why we’ve got to maximize it, if we get the chance,’ the Director insisted. There was a pause. ‘And which is why I want you to go.’

‘Me!’

‘You’ve got Russian,’ said the Director, itemizing the qualifications. ‘You’ve got overseas embassy experience. You’re up to date with every investigatory technique, from the courses at Quantico. And before your promotion to the Russian desk, you were the senior inspector here …’

‘But …’ broke in Cowley, intending to point out the gap of three years since his last in-field investigation experience.

‘I’m aware of the personal complication,’ Ross broke in, misunderstanding the interruption. ‘That’s why I’m seeing you personally. I want your complete assurance.’

‘Why not Andrews himself? It’s his field office.’

Ross nodded. ‘And he’s more than competent enough to handle it: we accept that. But if we admit to an in-field agent it will be official confirmation of an FBI station at the Moscow embassy, which we don’t want. Presidential ban, in fact. He’s already accredited as a cultural secretary, so the Russians would know the scientific offer was just our way of getting in. And he’s due for relocation, although that, of course, can be postponed for as long as you decide. His function will be to assist, within the embassy.’

How could the Director talk glibly of being aware of personal complications and make a suggestion like this? Cowley didn’t consider there were any remaining personal difficulties about the break-up: there were still cards at Christmas and birthdays and once a year a digest of events in their lives, over the preceding twelve months. But this was professional: an intrusion into the job to which Andrews had always been committed to the exclusion of every other consideration. He’d obviously see the murder of Ann Harris as his investigation, even unofficially at this stage. It
was
his investigation, by right if not by political and diplomatic choice. Now – if they got in as the Director was hoping to get in – it was about to be peremptorily taken away. And by the man who had been Pauline’s first husband, thus completing the confused circle where it was going to be hard, for Andrews at least, to separate what was personal and what was professional. Maybe for himself, too. He said: ‘If we do get involved, I’d like you to brief Andrews fully by cable why it’s being done this way. And why I’m the person being sent in.’