The Silenced (31 page)

“Okay. So why was he there?”

She pointed first at the Ghost, then at the straight-haired boy who looked like him.

“Are they brothers?” Quinn asked.

Petra shook her head. “Not brothers. Not even related. Palavin was born in Moscow, and was actually twenty-three when this was taken. All we know about the other one is that he was born in London, but lived most of his life in Hong Kong. If we knew his name, we wouldn’t have been looking for you.”

“Why not?”

“Because in 1988, the Ghost,” she said, her finger hovering over the wavy-haired youth on the right, “became this man.” She moved her finger to his doppelgänger.

“HOW DID PALAVIN STEAL SOMEONE ELSE’S IDENTITY?”
Quinn asked.

Petra looked back at the photograph. “The look-alike came to the attention of Kabulov in the early 1960s through a KGB agent named Glinka working in Hong Kong,” she said. “Glinka had met Palavin on a previous trip to Moscow, and noticed the resemblance between the two men.”

Quinn nodded.

“Kabulov was always looking for infiltration opportunities,” she went on. “He investigated, and agreed with Glinka. He arranged for Palavin to be transferred to Hong Kong and to be assigned as Russian youth advisor to the Young Leninists. Palavin’s real job, though, was to get close to the young man, get to know him and his habits.”

“So the Ghost could eventually assume the other man’s identity,” Quinn said.

“Exactly,” she said, nodding. “It was Kabulov’s ultimate plan, the piece that would be the crown jewel of his career. In his mind, once the Ghost had become the Englishman, he would return to the U.K. and begin a rapidly advancing career within the British government.”

“But things didn’t work out that way,” Quinn said, making an educated guess.

“No. Kabulov became involved in a series of failures, and was eventually declared an enemy of the party, and disposed of. Palavin, on the other hand, had been smart. He had taken a position in Moscow while waiting for the day Kabulov would decide it was time for him to become the Englishman. It was a job that obviously fed the sadist inside him. He became an internal security officer based out of Lubyanka Prison, and built his reputation within the party. He was able to use that to shield himself from Kabulov’s downfall.”

“If Kabulov died, what happened to his plan?” Quinn asked.

“It died with him. The only one who knew about the Englishman other than the Ghost was Glinka, and he had become a loyal member of the Ghost’s inner circle. For Palavin, assuming the Englishman’s identity transitioned from being a potential career as a British mole to a potential escape valve, just in case things went south for him like they had for Kabulov. It was perfect. If things
did
go bad, here was a new identity with a real-life history.”

“So he just left his look-alike in Hong Kong? Hoping he’d be around if ever needed?”

She smiled without humor. “Palavin was smarter than that. He recruited the Englishman, telling him he would be an agent for the Soviet Union, with Palavin as his handler, of course. Only he wasn’t an agent for anyone but the Ghost. It was a way to put the man on ice for as long as needed. Palavin would send him here and there, carrying packages that the man was told were top secret messages, or keeping tabs on people who really had no intelligence value at all. Palavin thought of everything, even setting him up with a woman who he probably thought cared about him. It wasn’t long before the Ghost controlled him completely.

“Palavin continued his work in Moscow, honing his craft and becoming a master at extracting confessions. A KGB star. Most of those he interviewed never saw the outside of Lubyanka again. Their voices silenced, never to be heard by the people who loved them again.” She paused. “If you had been working for him, Mr. Quinn, you would have been kept very busy.”

Quinn ignored the comment. “What drove him to take on the Englishman’s identity?”

“By the late eighties, he realized the Soviet Union was heading for disaster. We all did. Only he had a way out, and decided to take advantage of it before it all crashed down. With the body count he’d amassed, he had to know if he stayed his own life would be in danger.

“In 1988, he ordered his double to return to London. It was the first time the Englishman had been in the U.K. since he’d been a child, and what family he had there, he’d lost contact with long ago. The important thing for Palavin was that the U.K. Border Agency recorded the Englishman’s entry back into the country from Hong Kong.”

She fell silent.

“And then?” Quinn asked.

“Palavin killed him, and
became
him. At that point, Nikolai Palavin disappeared.” She paused. “Like a ghost.”

“How do you know all this?”

Petra exchanged a look with Mikhail. He started to say something in Russian, but then stopped, and said in English, “What will it hurt?”

She nodded in agreement, then turned back to Quinn. “A man named Dombrovski brought us together. Mikhail, myself, and the others back in Moscow who have helped us, we all suffered at the hands of the Ghost. Some of us were victims who survived his interrogations. But most of us lost relatives and loved ones to his methods.” She looked at her partner. “Mikhail’s brother, tortured then killed. Kolya, our friend who died in Maine, lost his parents. Others in our group, too, lost brothers, sisters, whole families. All taken from us, silenced by the Ghost.”

Mikhail took up the story. “Dombrovski had been a KGB doctor, but he had made the mistake of helping one of Palavin’s victims. The Ghost then tortured him, keeping him from death only because he was KGB. Though several years in a labor camp in Norilsk probably felt like death. When Dombrovski returned to Moscow, he found that his wife and his son were dead. More victims of the Ghost. But at the time, the only thing he could do was remember. It wasn’t until the Soviet Union dissolved that he saw his chance. He tried to locate Palavin to bring him to justice, but it was too late. Palavin had disappeared.”

“Obviously, your friend didn’t let that stop him,” Quinn said.

“Of course not,” Petra said. “Dombrovski knew he needed help, so he reached out to other victims and family members. He made sure those of us who were most dedicated got the best training possible. Mikhail and myself spent over two years learning what we could from a former army intelligence officer who had lost a cousin to the Ghost. But all the training wasn’t getting us any closer to finding Palavin. For years there was no trace of him. Some thought that he was dead. But not Dombrovski, and not me. Then, seven weeks ago, we finally caught a break. Dombrovski learned Glinka was still alive and living in Moscow. He’s the one who told us what had happened to the Ghost. And he’s the one who told us about the picture.”

“I thought you said he was loyal to Palavin.”

“He was, even to the end. But we … 
encouraged
him to be helpful. He told us most of the names of the Young Leninists. But he never gave up the Englishman’s name.”

“So you used the same tactics that the Ghost used?”

“No,” she said, her teeth clenched. “The Ghost tortured for no reason. We are trying to bring justice to the dead.”

“Distinction noted,” Quinn said.

She waved him off like it didn’t matter. “We set out to try and find one of the others in the photo Glinka had identified, hoping they could give us the name of Palavin’s twin. But we had barely left Moscow when Palavin learned of Glinka’s betrayal, then used his contacts to track Dombrovski down.” She fell silent.

“His people forced Dombrovski to tell them about you. Am I right?” Quinn asked.

She looked at him, her eyes hard. “Dombrovski was old, frail. But he told them nothing of us!”

“How do you know that? You weren’t in the room.”

Mikhail sat forward. “You are right. We weren’t there. That’s why we had taken the precautions Dombrovski himself had trained us to use when we set out on our mission, including using multiple IDs as we traveled. We didn’t realize it, but that was a potential weak point. You see, Dombrovski knew who created them for us. He could have given Palavin that information. Yes, he told the Ghost’s men we were out here looking for him, but he didn’t give them the name of who had provided us with our documents. If he had, we wouldn’t be here talking to you now. Dombrovski kept that secret to the end.”

“So not knowing exactly who you were, Palavin starting eliminating the others from the photograph?”

“Unfortunately for us, yes,” Petra said. “Don’t you see? You’re our last hope. Do you know the name of the Englishman? Do you have some way of getting ahold of him?”

Quinn stared at her for a moment, then stood up without saying anything. He put the group photo in his pocket and crossed over to Orlando.

“Please,” Petra said. “We’ve told you everything. We’re so close. Just a little help is all we ask.”

“Why not go to the Russian government? Get them to help you?”

“Our government has more than its share of old KGB still in it,” she scoffed. “His old comrades would block any attempt to bring him home. Even if they didn’t, the government would not want him back, because of the embarrassment he could cause. Many in our country have moved on. They’d rather forget the past than deal with it. Mikhail and I and the others who have helped us knew long ago if we wanted justice we would have to obtain it on our own.”

Quinn frowned to himself. “Give us a moment,” he told Petra, then motioned for Orlando to follow him to the edge of the entryway.

“I think she’s telling the truth,” Orlando said.

“Yeah, I think so, too,” he said, then glanced at the bathroom. “Keep an eye on things out here for a few minutes.”

She smiled. “Be my pleasure.”

As Quinn stepped over to the bathroom door, Petra spoke up again. “Do you know how to reach the Ghost? Are you going to help us? Please, tell me.”

He grabbed the handle of the door. “I’ll let you know in a minute.”

Annabel’s eyes grew wide as Quinn stepped into the bathroom. He flipped on the light and pulled the door closed behind him.

She was sitting on the toilet, her mouth gagged, her hands and feet tied.

“Hope you didn’t think we forgot about you,” he said.

He turned on the water and filled one of the glasses on the counter. When he was done, he set it down and stepped over to the MI6 agent.

“I’m going to take the gag off,” he said. “If you utter one syllable that is not an answer to one of my questions, I guarantee you will regret it. Is that clear?”

She nodded.

“I’m deadly serious. Any slip and you will never see the outside of this room again.” She nodded again.

He reached behind her head and untied the gag. She coughed as it fell from her mouth. Quinn picked up the glass of water and held it in front of her.

“Take a sip.”

Her first attempt ended in another fit of coughing. The second time, she managed to get some down.

“Better?” he asked after a moment.

“Yes,” she said, her voice strained. “People are going to be looking for me. You should let me go now.”

“That’s a slip, Annabel. I’ll let this first one go, but that’s it. Are we clear?”

She took a breath. “Yes.”

He set the glass down on the sink and crouched in front of her. “I believe you played me.”

Her brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”

He pulled out his phone and accessed the picture of him at the Grand Hyatt. “Recognize it? It’s from the last time we met.”

She looked at the phone, then back at Quinn, confused.

“Didn’t expect me to see this, did you?” He smiled. “You took it, then sent it to someone who is trying to harm someone I love.”

“I didn’t … I … I …”

Quinn raised the gag so she could see it. “You’re very close to that second offense.”

She fell silent.

“You took this photo.”

“Yes.”

“Who did you send it to?”

“My office.”

“Okay, we can go with that for a moment. Who did they send it to?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know.”

Quinn moved the gag toward her mouth.

“I’m telling the truth,” she said quickly. “I don’t know. I didn’t realize they’d sent it to anyone.”

Quinn pulled the photo Petra had showed him out of his pocket, unfolded it, then held it out so Annabel could see.

Her reaction was uncensored surprise.

“I take it you’ve seen this before,” he said. He then accessed the headshot of Palavin on his phone and held it up for her to see. “And I know you remember this photo. If I remember correctly, you said you were told this man might show up at the meeting I was having with Wills, but you didn’t know who he was.” He paused, but she remained silent. “That was a lie, wasn’t it? You did know him.” He paused. “He looks a hell of a lot like an older version of this kid, don’t you think?” He used the phone to point to the young Palavin in the group shot.