The Romanov Conspiracy (51 page)

“We’re on the same side now. Get used to it. The girl, and quickly. I want to soften her up before I carry out a full interrogation tomorrow.” Kazan grinned. “Don’t fret, I won’t leave a mark on her.”

“The parents will be concerned. I don’t want them panicking. My job is to keep them on an even keel until we’re ready to carry out the execution.”

“Tell them we just need to ask the girl some routine questions. Don’t make a big fuss about it. Use all your charm. You’re good at that, Yurovsky.”

The
komendant
grunted, buttoned his tunic, and called out to one of the guards, “Fetch Anastasia Romanov.”

The man hurried off.

Kazan followed the
komendant
into his office and strode over to the wall map. “Our spy’s gone quiet but I’m convinced he’s still out there. I’m having more checkpoints set up within a five-hundred-yard radius of here.”

“Your problem, not mine. Where do you want to interrogate her?”

Kazan cracked his knuckles. “The basement will do. It’s suitably dark and dingy. The perfect setting to frighten the life out of her.”

“You can use one of the rooms I’ve cleared out. But you’ll have your work cut out for you. She’s a resourceful young woman, Kazan. Not the kind who scares easily.”

“We’ll see about that.”

75

MOSCOW

It started to rain heavily as Andrev came round a bend.

He saw the roadblock ahead in the distance and eased into the curb. He wore the driver’s goggles and he pulled them up.

Lydia said, alarmed, “That’s the second roadblock we’ve seen in the last ten minutes.”

Andrev considered. “I doubt Yakov’s had time to throw up checkpoints all over Moscow. My guess is they’re just routine.”

He smiled down at her, nodding to the Nagant and the Mauser lying at her feet in the sidecar. “That was quite a performance back there.”

“You can thank my Kentucky upbringing.” As the rain fell harder, Lydia rummaged around in the sidecar, found an olive-colored oilskin cape, unfolded it, and covered herself as best she could. “What now?

“There’s a turn a mile or so back that’ll take us onto a minor road out of Moscow. We’ll try our chances there.”

He went to pull down the goggles but suddenly he looked ready to crumple, as if there were a terrible weight on his shoulders.

Lydia put a hand on his arm. “You want to go back, don’t you? To make sure Nina and Sergey haven’t come to any harm?”

He tried to keep his voice steady with some difficulty. “It’s an agony not knowing.”

“You can’t do any more, Uri. Surely Yakov won’t hurt them.”

“If he does I’ll kill him.”

THE KREMLIN

Yakov entered the same impressive anterooms as before.

The guard took his firearm, then knocked on the floor-to-ceiling doors and gestured for him to enter.

Trotsky was standing by the window, immersed in his own thoughts, a glass of what looked like water in one hand as he stared out at the drenching rain. He turned, and his sullen dark eyes drilled into Yakov. “Step forward. Don’t stand there like a fool.”

Yakov obeyed. He noticed that the door at the other end of the room was open. In an adjoining office, Lenin was standing by his desk reading a letter. When he saw Yakov, he eyed him with a cold stare, walked over to the door, and kicked it shut.

As the door slammed, Trotsky sipped from his glass and began to slowly circle Yakov.

Without warning, he flung the contents of his glass in Yakov’s face.

“I don’t employ fools, Yakov. But it seems in your case I may have committed an error. You greatly disappointed me.”

Yakov silently wiped a hand over his drenched face.

“Out with it. What happened? How did Andrev and the woman escape?”

Yakov explained.

Trotsky let out a deep sigh, his mouth tightening with extreme displeasure. “You’ve failed in your duty, Yakov. How will you rectify the situation?”

“I’m having checkpoints set up all over the city. All hotels in Moscow and every barracks will be given a description of Andrev and the woman.”

Trotsky slammed his glass on the desk, strolled over to a wall map of Moscow, and studied it. “You seem to forget that if anyone can escape a dragnet, it’s your shrewd friend Andrev. My gut feeling is you’re wasting your time and stretching our troops thin trying to find him in Moscow.”

“If we have no luck in the coming hours, I’ll travel directly to Ekaterinburg. That has to be Andrev’s destination.”

“Good, we’re thinking alike. What about his former wife and son?”

“I have them in custody.”

Trotsky almost spat his reply. “They must pay the price of his folly. I want it done tonight. Have them transported to the harshest prison camp you can find. Take care of it, Yakov. Fail me again and I’ll take it personally.”

76

One of the guards led Anastasia down the stairs. She wore a cotton dressing gown over her nightdress, her hair around her shoulders.

The guards escorted her along the hallway until they entered a small, airless room with patterned yellow wallpaper. A single lightbulb was on overhead, casting a faint glow about the dim chamber, with only a small, round table and two bentwood chairs. Another pair of double doors was set in the far wall.

Suddenly the door behind her banged shut and the guard was gone.

“I’m Inspector Viktor Kazan of the Cheka. Sit down,” a voice said hoarsely.

A bald-headed man stepped out of the shadows, causing her heart to skip.

He wore black clothes, a sinister air about him. Several fingers of his left hand were bandaged. He indicated one of two chairs next to the table. “I said sit.”

“I prefer to stand.”

He grabbed hold of her arm and pushed her into a chair with considerable force. “And I told you to sit. Your formal interrogation will take place tomorrow. But for now, I just want a chat.”

“My … my parents are concerned that I’m being questioned.”

“Too bad.” He unfolded a page from his pocket and laid it on the table. “Tell me the truth about the note.”

“What truth? What are you talking about?”

Suddenly Kazan’s fist slammed down hard on the table, the noise booming about the room, his mouth twisting. “No games. I’m a harsher man than
komendant
. If I have to break bones to get the truth out of you, I will. Do we understand each other?”

Anastasia didn’t reply but fear ignited in her eyes.

“I asked you a question.”

Her lips quivered. She looked faintly overwhelmed, a nervous seventeen-year-old faced with the threatening presence of a brutish thug, but there was no mistaking the resolve in her voice. “You—you’re a callous, cruel man.”

Kazan struck her a blow across the side of her skull with his palm. The slap rang around the chamber. Her head jolted sideways but before she could cry out, Kazan slammed a hand over her mouth. “Call out or make another sound and I’ll hit you even harder.”

She struggled fiercely but Kazan kept his hand firmly in place and leaned in close. “Nod if you understand.”

Anastasia stopped struggling. She nodded.

Kazan took his hand away.

She stared up at him in shocked disbelief, and for a moment she looked not like a young woman but a child in distress, and it took her to the brink of tears. “How … how dare you …”

Kazan grabbed her by the hair, thoroughly enjoying himself. “Listen to me, you little witch. I could beat you to within an inch of your life and not leave a scratch on you. Tell me the truth about the note, or there will be serious repercussions for all your family. Out with it, before I lose my temper and this turns nasty.”

Sorg moved along the white-tiled passageway, holding the lamp high. Condensation dripped from the walls and he stepped over puddles. Twenty yards farther on he was faced with a dead end—a brick wall.

He knelt and felt the cement between the bricks pointing—as Markov said, it had been removed and the bricks loosened. He thought he heard faint voices.

They seemed to come from beyond the wall. He considered a moment, wondering if he should go any farther, then he carefully removed over a dozen bricks, revealing a hole big enough to crawl through.

He crawled past the hole and found himself in a dusty storeroom. Stacked around the bare walls were ancient wicker chairs and a broken
display cabinet, its glass shattered. The far wall was covered with a crisscross of planks nailed into a wooden door frame. He crawled over, his nerves taut as piano wire.

Underneath the nailed planks was a pair of double doors. Muted sounds came from behind them. Sorg dimmed his lamp to the barest flicker, then stood and placed it on the ground behind him.

Light filtered through a crack between the doors. He peered through. A room lay beyond. He could hardly believe his eyes.

Anastasia.

For a moment he could barely breathe, his stomach knotting with excitement, and then his heart felt like ice.

She sat at a table, her face lit by the wash of an electric light. Kazan stood over her. On the table was a slip of paper.

Suddenly Kazan’s fist slammed down hard on the table, the noise booming about the chamber.

“I asked you a question.”

“You—you’re a callous, cruel man.”

Anastasia’s voice was filled with confidence, but there was no mistaking the emotion. What happened next filled Sorg with fury. Kazan slapped Anastasia hard across the side of her head, and the noise rang around the chamber.

Her head jerked sideways and she nearly cried out, but Kazan forced a hand over her mouth, cutting off her scream. He seemed to be strangling her as she struggled fiercely.

Sorg felt helpless.

“Call out or make another sound and I’ll hit you even harder.”

Anastasia stopped struggling and Kazan slowly took his hand away.

She muttered something inaudible and the next thing Sorg knew, Kazan grabbed her savagely by the hair. His voice came in snatches.

“Listen to me, you little witch … I could beat you to within an inch of your life … Tell me the truth about the note … Out with it …”

Sorg’s chest pounded.
The note
. So that was it—
What have I done?
It was his fault Kazan was interrogating Anastasia. Guilt devoured him, his frustrated rage like molten lava.

What can I do
? Break down the door and kill Kazan? He felt for the
Toledo steel pen in his pocket. That was what he wanted to do. What he felt he
ought
to do.

But that would give the game away.

He saw Kazan twist her hair even tighter and heard Anastasia stifle a scream.

Sorg put an arm over his eyes and stepped back, unable to look, the image too painful.

As he did so he knocked over the lamp behind him.

Its light flared a second before it smashed on the ground, the glass shattering, and then the lamp rolled away. The metallic noise echoed loudly throughout the passageway. Sorg’s nerves jangled like an electric bell.

A second later the lamplight extinguished and the storeroom plunged into total darkness.