The Rybinsk Deception (17 page)

S
HRIVER WAS SEATED
in a booth facing the open door of the diner. He wasn’t alone. His companion was Jüri Yegorov, the ex-marine who had been hunting Coburn down, and who on three occasions in the last three weeks had tried to have him killed.

In Hari’s photographs of Yegorov disembarking from the
Pishan
in Singapore, and in the smaller photo of him that had been attached to his application form for the US Marine Corps, his Russian ancestry had not been apparent. In person it was. His face was unnaturally pale, and his eyes and his features were those of a man not given to smiling and who had practised concealing his emotions. He also looked a good deal younger than he did in the photos.

The same could not be said of the brigadier. In his television appearances, Shriver had benefited from make-up that had hidden the liver spots on his cheeks and on the backs of his hands. In real life he looked his age. The silver-grey hair that on camera had added to his presence was thinning badly at his temples, and he had blotches on his face, giving Coburn the impression that his stars had been earned not in combat, but from behind a desk.

Unlike Yegorov whose face had remained expressionless at the sight of Coburn and O’Halloran, Shriver was making no attempt to disguise his contempt.

Instead of standing up or bothering to introduce himself, he stayed sitting, holding a thick white envelope and waiting for his visitors to join him in the booth before he spoke.

‘This won’t take long,’ he said. ‘Before we start, should you be
foolish enough to pretend you don’t know what this is about, you should see this.’ Opening his envelope he took out a photograph and slid it across the table.

The photo showed a partly melted and distorted fragment of a propane cylinder, at the side of which lay a twisted section of one of the braided hoses Coburn had used to feed gas into the munitions store.

‘The picture was taken at first light this morning,’ Shriver said. ‘It prompted me to make some phone calls – which is how I obtained a description of two men who yesterday bought propane cylinders from the sporting-goods store in John Day. The owner of the store is a family friend who was able to supply the name on the credit card that had been used to make the purchase. Once I had a name, of course, finding out where you’re staying was equally straightforward.’

Coburn was smarting, knowing how stupid they’d been, and at the same time irritated by Shriver’s attitude and tone of voice.

O’Halloran was more interested in recovering lost ground. ‘You need to remember who you’re talking to,’ he said. ‘I’m sure you know who I work for, and in case you’ve forgotten, Coburn works for the International Marine Bureau in London. So, seeing as how it was you who wanted to see us, why don’t you cut out the crap. Whatever it is you have to say, let’s hear it.’

‘If that’s what you want.’ Taking more photographs from the envelope, Shriver placed them face down on the table in front of him. ‘I have no idea what it is you think you may have learned,’ he said. ‘But since you insist in meddling in affairs that are not of your concern, this is a warning. After the explosion in Mr Coburn’s Singapore apartment, I hadn’t expected a warning to be necessary, but the last twenty-four hours have put a rather different complexion on things, haven’t they?’ He selected two of the photos and handed them to O’Halloran. ‘In the interests of protecting the FAL from just this kind of interference, I went to the trouble of obtaining those some time ago. You should study them with care.’

Coburn had seen one of the pictures before. It had been in a frame, standing on a bookcase in O’Halloran’s Maryland apartment – a snapshot of the American holding his children on his knees. The other photo had been taken more recently. The children were two or three
years older, playing together in a garden somewhere while they were being watched over by a slim African-American woman who, Coburn presumed, was O’Halloran’s wife or ex-wife.

The American’s body language was giving him away. He was doing his best to stay calm, but gripping the photos hard enough to have creased them, and willing himself not to reply.

So he wouldn’t have to, Coburn answered for him. ‘You listen to me, Shriver,’ he said. ‘You’ve taken out insurance against the wrong guy. I haven’t got any kids, and I don’t have a wife. That means I don’t have to give a shit who you are, or how much influence you think you have in Washington. I know what your agenda is, so make all the threats you want. Whichever way you look at it, you’re fucked.’

Shriver’s expression remained the same. ‘Have you finished?’ he said.

‘No, I haven’t. I was at Fauzdarhat when your sick friend here ran down those Bangladeshi kids in the shipyard. I was on board the
Pishan
when his men opened fire and started dropping hand grenades over the side. And I was at the village in the Panjang estuary when he handed out my photo to a bunch of fishermen and half-stoned pirates who’d been told they could make a quick twenty thousand ringgit for one night’s work. He might’ve got away with it in Bangladesh and Indonesia, but he’s not there now, is he? And you’re not either. Try the same kind of stunt in the US and I’ll make sure you, Yegorov and your precious FAL end up in shit so deep you’ll never get out of it.’

‘I see.’ Shriver produced a further two photos. ‘Before you go on, perhaps you should look at those.’

‘What are they?’

‘Satellite images of the village you mentioned. The detail they show is quite surprising, don’t you think?’

It was an understatement. So good was the resolution that Coburn could identify individual huts, see the intersection of drainage ditches and pick out shadows of radio aerials on the shipping containers. Out in the estuary, the number of launches and the position of the
Selina
told him roughly when the shots had been taken, and by looking at the length and direction of the shadows he was even able to make a guess at the time of day.

‘Where did these come from?’ he asked.

‘Since my influence in Washington is of no interest to you, I won’t bother to answer that. What I can do is show you a sworn affidavit that Mr Yegorov was able to obtain from the Captain of the
Pishan
– the freighter you attempted to raid on the night of July 7th. I’m sure you remember him.’

‘Celestino,’ Coburn said. ‘Juan Celestino.’

‘He’s been most helpful. Would you care to see his statement?’

‘Not particularly. What does it say?’

‘It says that during the raid, after members of your boarding-party started complaining about the difficulty of off-loading the zinc ingots, Captain Celestino overheard several of the men discussing whether travelling so far from their base on the Panjang river was a worthwhile way for them to fund their fight against the Indonesian Government.’ Shriver paused. ‘Understandably, the captain reached the same conclusion that anybody else would have done – that his ship had been boarded not by pirates, but by terrorists who’d come from what he could only assume was some kind of training camp in the Panjang estuary.’

‘Like the village in this satellite picture,’ Coburn said slowly.

‘Precisely.’ Shriver placed his hands on the envelope. ‘In the event of the Indonesian Government being given this information, I think you’d agree they’d find it of the greatest concern – especially now al-Qaeda are known to be moving in to Sumatra and attacks by Aceh insurgents have started up again in the region.’

At the mention of terrorism, Yegorov elected to offer an opinion. ‘You understand what that could mean, don’t you?’ he said.

‘Yeah, I understand.’ A knot in Coburn’s stomach had got worse.

Yegorov swept his hand low over the table. ‘If the Indonesians ask for US help, think F16,’ he said. ‘Single aircraft, single pass – twenty millimetre cannons, cluster bombs and napalm. After that, all you’re gonna find is ash.’

Shriver looked at Coburn. ‘Easy way for you to finish your job for the International Marine Bureau, I suppose,’ he said. ‘I’m sure they’d welcome one less rats’ nest of pirates in the Malacca Strait. But, of course, you and Mr O’Halloran must make that decision for yourselves.’ He stood up. ‘While you’re doing so, there are numerous attractions around Canyon City for you to visit. If you like to fish,
you’ll find good spots further down the river.’ Without taking the trouble to say goodbye he turned to go. ‘You may keep the photos. I can’t say this has been a pleasure, but then I didn’t expect it to be.’

Yegorov was slower to leave the booth, deliberately knocking into Coburn’s shoulder on his way out into the street where he made a point of spitting into the gutter.

The gesture had been as empty as it was feeble. It was also a mistake.

Coburn had been imagining what an airstrike on the village would be like. Now though, angered by Yegorov’s smugness, he was thinking more widely, balancing the consequences of an airstrike against the consequences of him doing nothing to save the
Sandpiper
.

Had the stakes really become that high, he wondered? To protect the village, was he really prepared to walk away, when by doing so he’d be condemning the crew of the minehunter to a missile attack off the coast of South Korea?

Or was he going to carry on – somehow or other finding a way to warn the Commander of the
Sandpiper
, and at the same time making sure Hari would be ready to organize an evacuation?

Before he could begin to choose, he needed to sift through what he knew and what he didn’t, he decided. That the captain of the
Pishan
had been coerced into writing the affidavit was obvious enough. But how damning would it be in the hands of the Indonesians? Would they think to verify its accuracy, or find out why it had been written in the first place? And if they didn’t, would their reaction be as swift and as lethal as Yegorov had suggested it would be?

Asking O’Halloran what he thought was not an option. The American was still clutching the photos of his twins, wearing an expression of deep concern.

‘I told you,’ he said. ‘I told you before you started out on this stupid fucking witch hunt.’

‘Told me what?’

‘That you’re way out of your depth.’

‘We,’ Coburn said. ‘You didn’t have to come. I don’t remember talking you into it. Give me those.’ He took away the photos. ‘Look, Shriver’s full of shit. He knows that hurting your family won’t do him any good. It’s just an easy way for him to get you off his back.’

‘And an easy way for him to get you off his back is to threaten to wipe out that pirate village of yours. Shriver thinks you care about what happens to it. I think you do, too. It’s about time you told me why that is.’

‘It’s hard to explain.’ Coburn wasn’t much in the mood to try. ‘You need to have been there, or stayed there for a while.’

‘Like you?’

‘You don’t understand. The guys who get paid to go out on raids aren’t your everyday doped-up drug smugglers and white slavers. They’re not allowed anywhere near drugs. Sure, they run down ships at night, but there are a hell of a lot nastier ways than that of making a living. They have wives, they have children, and they’re better off than three-quarters of the people you’ll ever meet in that part of the world. It’s not the kind of place you think it is.’

‘OK.’ O’Halloran was waiting. ‘I’m still listening.’

‘That’s it. What else do you want to know?’

‘I want to know if Heather Cameron’s there – that girl who was living on the beach in Fauzdarhat.’

Coburn hesitated for a moment. ‘How did you find out?’

‘Lucky guess. Have you been sleeping with her?’

‘Once – one night. That’s not the reason why I care about the village. If things go bad, the guy who runs it has enough boats to get the families out in half an hour. All I’d need to do is call him.’ Coburn stood up and put the car-keys on the table. ‘You drive.’

‘To where?’

‘I don’t mind. Down to the river – anywhere quiet where we can think straight and sort out the mess we’re in.’

If sorting out the mess they were in was going to be as simple as finding a quiet enough place to do it, Coburn would have been happy to put off his thinking until they reached the river. As it was, because he spent the drive searching for an answer to their problems, by the time they’d found somewhere suitable to park, he’d decided the only solution that stood a chance of working was of such high risk he’d never persuade O’Halloran to consider it.

T
WO DAYS AGO
during their drive along the track to the clearing, once in a while stretches of the John Day river had been visible through the trees, but not until now had Coburn appreciated the true wildness of the countryside.

O’Halloran had parked the Chrysler between two pickups at the end of a well-formed dirt road providing access for fishermen and a starting point for trampers who wanted to follow a signposted trail that led north from the parking area.

Here, the river was wider and shallower than it was upstream where it flowed out of an enormous channel carved through what looked like ancient lava rocks, while some distance downstream where the water was swirling around a half-a-dozen car-sized boulders, Coburn could see rapids.

Together with the scent of resin coming from the Douglas firs he could smell the river – the smell of fresh clear water that had travelled through the canyons to lose its energy and bubble over the stony bottom at his feet.

To obtain a better view of the rapids he stepped out on to a flat-topped rock, nearly overbalancing and getting his shoes wet, but not caring, welcoming the warmth of the sun on his face while he endeavoured to make sense of the journey that had brought him here and tried to decide whether or not this is where it ought to stop.

If he was to continue, he was almost certain it would have to be by himself. Since they’d left the diner in John Day, O’Halloran had said little, unwilling to share any more of his thoughts and driving so
carelessly he’d nearly run over a teenage girl on a pedestrian crossing at the edge of town.

Standing at the water’s edge with his hands in his pockets, the American looked as though he was waiting for Coburn to state his position before declaring his own.

‘Take another step and you’ll get really wet,’ he said.

‘I know.’ Coburn turned round. ‘What did you make of Yegorov?’

O’Halloran shrugged. ‘Probably not somebody you’d want to mess with unless you had a bigger stick than him, but I wouldn’t pick him as being too smart. He’s just Shriver’s hard man. If he’s told to go to Bangladesh, that’s where he goes. If Shriver’s told him to go to Korea, maybe that’s where he’ll be off to next.’

Coburn had been wondering about it. ‘My guess is he’s been there before,’ he said. ‘You don’t organize an attack on a US warship without a whole lot of forward planning, and he can’t hope to highjack a North Korean patrol boat all by himself. He needs to have recruited locals who he already has in place waiting to help him.’

‘Assuming it’s Yegorov who’ll be handling the attack.’

‘He retrieved that stuff off the
Rybinsk
,’ Coburn said. ‘And he was behind what happened on the
Pishan
and the attack on the village. Why wouldn’t he handle this?’

O’Halloran shrugged again. ‘I don’t give a rat’s arse who’s going to launch the missiles. If you want to worry about it, go ahead. It’s not my problem.’

‘Yes, it is,’ Coburn said. ‘When you get out of bed and look at the front page of your morning paper on August 10th, the first thing you’re going to see is a picture of what’s left of the
Sandpiper
. All day at work you’ll be hearing people talking about what happened, and that night when you get home and turn on your TV, Shriver will be on CNN accusing the US Administration of being soft on North Korea. You’ll feel OK about that, will you?’

‘Better than I’d feel if something happened to my kids.’ O’Halloran took his hands out of his pockets. ‘And better than you’d feel if the Indonesians dropped napalm on your girlfriend in Sumatra.’

‘It’s not going to happen. If you don’t want to help me stop it, I’ll stop it by myself.’

‘Good luck trying. Are you going to spend all day standing on that rock?’

‘No.’ Coburn stepped back on to the drier pebbles. ‘Do one more thing for me.’

‘Depends what it is.’

‘Tell me why this won’t work. Imagine that somehow or other I get the commander of the
Sandpiper
to look at the stuff on your computer. Sure, he won’t know how genuine it is, and he won’t know whether to believe it, but what it will do is make him real careful.’

‘OK.’ O’Halloran started to say something else, but changed his mind.

‘Now imagine it’s the night of August 9th,’ Coburn said. ‘The commander’s already jumpy when he sees what he’s pretty damn sure is a North Korean patrol boat on his radar, and a minute later he receives a radio message telling him to change course.’

‘Which puts him between a rock and a hard place.’

‘Right. He’s not on the wrong side of the Demarkation Line, and the Koreans haven’t fired any warning shots, so what are his choices? Change course and hope like hell nothing happens? Or does he preempt an attack he’s half expecting and blow the patrol boat out of the water? According to the data sheet, Osprey minehunters are armed with two 12.7 millimetre machine-guns. A couple of five-second bursts from those and the patrol boat’s going to be matchwood, and no one’ll be left alive on board to launch the missiles.’

O’Halloran was frowning. ‘I can’t see a US Navy Commander opening fire without some kind of direct provocation,’ he said. ‘It depends on his rules of engagement, but he’d have to think hard about using his guns when his only justification is a draft press release that’s been given to him by somebody he doesn’t know.’

‘That’s what I thought too.’ Coburn picked up a stone and skipped it out across the shallows. ‘So how about this? A couple of seconds after the captain of the patrol boat has used his radio, he runs into trouble. Somewhere below his waterline, explosions rip through his hull so he can’t launch his missiles, and before he knows it, he’s on fire and sinking. Maybe he’s been unlucky and rubbed up against one of those mines the
Sandpiper
was looking for. How does that sound?’

‘It sounds like a load of crap. Collect up every mine you can find floating in the Yellow Sea and have the
Sandpiper
drop them off, and you’d still have about as much chance of the patrol boat hitting one at the right time as you or I do of growing wings.’

‘I didn’t say it has to be a mine,’ Coburn said. ‘It could be anything. What if one of the missiles malfunctioned while the crew were arming it?’

By now, O’Halloran should have been looking more interested, but he wasn’t. ‘Are you telling me you can arrange for an accident to happen?’ he said.

‘If I can, it screws Shriver and the FAL for good, doesn’t it? The commander of the
Sandpiper
gets Brownie points for rescuing the crew of a sinking boat, and he catches Yegorov trying to pass himself off as a North Korean naval captain. If Yegorov can’t explain why he was doing that, or if he won’t talk, you can bet your life the men he’s paid to help him will.’

‘Neat idea.’ O’Halloran remained indifferent. ‘Needs work, though, wouldn’t you say?’

Coburn ignored the sarcasm. ‘I’m asking your opinion,’ he said.

‘I don’t have one. If you’re crazy enough to go all the way to Korea to see if you can get Commander Ritchie on side and set up your clever accident, that’s your business.’

‘Don’t you want to know what the set up is?’

‘Probably better if I don’t. Tell me when you get back. If you don’t get back, I’ll read about it in my morning paper.’

‘So you’re not interested in going with me?’

‘Why would I be? I don’t have the time or the money. I’ve already been away from the office for five days. If I don’t show up there soon, people will start asking questions.’

In case the issue of money was real, rather than a convenient excuse, Coburn made one last effort.

‘Look,’ he said. ‘I’m not trying to twist your arm, but you work for the US Government, I don’t. Ritchie is going to take more notice of you than he ever is of me. If cash is a problem I can cover it.’

‘Backhanders from selling ships’ manifests to that guy who runs the village?’

‘Sort of. Why don’t you call your office and tell them you’re taking more time off, then you can phone your ex-wife, or whoever she is and tell her she needs to take your kids out of town for a while? If you do that, will you think about what I’ve said?’

‘I already have.’ O’Halloran started walking back to the car. ‘And I’ve already told you what I think.’

Having spent half the afternoon and the evening by himself, Coburn had stopped trying to rationalize a decision that seemed less and less sensible the longer he thought about it.

Earlier, while he’d been standing on the rock in the river outlining his intentions to O’Halloran, he’d attempted to sound positive. But with each hour that had passed since then, an increasing number of doubts had crept into his mind, undermining his confidence in an idea that he knew would never work without the involvement of other people.

Where O’Halloran had disappeared to was a mystery. Within half an hour of them arriving back at the motel, the American had said he was going for a drive and had yet to return from wherever it was he’d gone.

As long as he hadn’t gone to confront Shriver alone, Coburn thought. Was it possible he could be that stupid – believing that some kind of fresh initiative would change anything? Or because of the threat to his family, had he pulled out altogether?

To hell with him, Coburn decided. When the only practical way of destroying the FAL was to play Shriver at his own game, and when the one chance of doing that was only eleven days away, it was time he stopped worrying about O’Halloran and started worrying about Hari and the village.

For the last hour he’d been putting off telephoning Heather, knowing she’d expect him to explain everything, and preferring not to imagine what Hari’s reaction to his proposal was likely to be.

When he finally decided to make the call, it was Indiri who answered, sounding embarrassed until Heather took the phone from her and said hello.

‘Chasing porcupines again?’ Coburn said.

‘No.’ She laughed. ‘I was putting a bandage on Hari’s finger. He cut it while he was sharpening a bamboo spear – you know, the kind that are used to catch those funny-looking fish that come round the jetty at night when the moon and tide are right. His finger didn’t need bandaging, but I didn’t say so.’

‘Is he still there? If he is I need to talk to him. That’s why I’m calling.’

‘Oh. I thought you’d want to talk to me.’

‘I do,’ Coburn said. ‘It’s just that I need to ask him a favour.’

‘Tell me what it is and I’ll ask him for you.’

‘It’s too complicated and I don’t want to explain it twice. I’ll make him promise to tell you afterwards. Is that OK?’

‘No it’s not. I want to know where you are and why you’re there. Or are you still worried about satellite phones not being secure enough?’

‘I’m still worried, but the way things have turned out I don’t have much choice. I’m in Oregon, but if I can talk Hari into helping me, in two or three days’ time I’ll be in South Korea.’

‘Why? What on earth for? Why are you going there?’

‘Long story. Ask Hari after I’ve spoken to him. He hasn’t changed his mind about not going on that raid, has he?’

‘No. He says it’s not worth the trouble. Why do you want to know?’

‘Fuel,’ Coburn said. ‘I thought he might have used it up filling the tanks on the launches.’

‘Well, he hasn’t.’ She was beginning to sound put out. ‘If you don’t tell me what’s going on, I’ll hang up.’

‘Then you’ll never know what’s happening, will you? Come on, you’re using up your battery. Let me talk to Hari.’

‘Don’t you have anything nice to say to me?’

He thought for a moment. ‘Last night was the first night I haven’t had a dream about you. Will that do?’

‘If I believed you it would. I’ll pretend it’s true, though, then you can say what you want to say to Hari. Here he is.’

‘David, my friend.’ Hari sounded particularly cheerful. ‘Miss Cameron has just told me you are in the US state of Oregon, but soon will travel to South Korea. Can this be so?’

‘It depends. Has Heather told you anything else?’

‘I understand you discover it was not the US Government who sends the radioactive material to Bangladesh on the
Rybinsk
, but that is all I know. Miss Cameron has said that when you call her from Maryland you considered it unwise to reveal who was responsible. You wish to tell me now?’

‘It’s a US-based outfit called the Free America League,’ Coburn said. ‘Remember that guy you had photographed getting off the
Pishan
? He works for them. His name’s Yegorov. I met him today.’

‘I see. So to prevent you making trouble for the Free America League they send this man you call Yegorov to kill you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then now you have found him, you know what you must do.’

‘There’s a bit more to it than that,’ Coburn said. ‘The only way to fix up Yegorov and the Free America League is by pointing the Americans in the right direction so they trip over the truth themselves. Until that happens, they won’t have any reason to stamp out the FAL, and I can’t see anybody else doing it.’

‘But you can show the Americans what it is they must trip over, I think. This is why you go to South Korea?’

‘Yep. On the 9th of next month, the FAL will be attacking a US Navy ship that’s minding its own business in the Yellow Sea south of the Korean Maritime Demarkation Line. But it’ll look as though the attack has come from a North Korean patrol boat. That way the Pyongyang Government is going to be made to take the blame.’

‘Ah. Of course.’ Hari didn’t sound surprised. ‘The deception is the same which is used to blame North Korea for the
Rybinsk
disaster which you told me about.’

‘Except this time it’s not going to work.’ Coburn began to explain why, preventing Hari from interrupting until he’d finished outlining his plan and described the part the
Selina
would have to play.

Hari took his time to absorb the implications. ‘For the
Selina
to make such a voyage is not possible in the time,’ he said. ‘From Sumatra to the Yellow Sea is too far.’

‘No it’s not.’ Coburn had worked it out. ‘As long as you’re underway in the next day or two you can make it. You’ve got those new MTU engines, long-range tanks, and if you store as many forty-four gallon
drums of diesel as you can get down below you’ll be able to go a fair distance without having to call in anywhere to refuel. I’ll pay for the diesel if you want.’