The Defector Read online

  And so he spent much of that terrible day roaming the upper floors of his beloved King Saul Boulevard, poking his head through doorways, renewing old friendships, making peace with old rivals. There was a pall hanging over the place; it reminded Shamron too much of Vienna. Restless, he requested permission from Amos to go to Ben-Gurion to receive the bodies of Lior and Motti. They were returned to Israel in secret, just as they had served it, with only Shamron and their parents present. He gave them a famous shoulder to cry on but could tell them nothing about how their sons had died. The experience left him deeply shaken, and he returned to King Saul Boulevard feeling abnormally depressed. His mood improved slightly when he entered Room 456C to find Gabriel’s team hard at work. Gabriel, however, was not there. He was on his way to Jerusalem, city of believers.

  . . .

  A STEADY snow was falling as Gabriel pulled into the drive of Mount Herzl Psychiatric Hospital. A sign at the entrance said visiting hours were now over; Gabriel ignored it and went inside. Under an agreement with the hospital’s administration, he was allowed to come whenever he wanted. In fact, he rarely came when the family and friends of other patients were around. Israel, a country of just over five million people, was in many ways an extended family. Even Gabriel, who conducted his affairs in anonymity, found it difficult to go anywhere without bumping into an acquaintance from Bezalel or the army.

  Leah’s doctor was waiting in the lobby. A rotund figure with a rabbinical beard, he updated Gabriel on Leah’s condition as they walked together along a quiet corridor. Gabriel was not surprised to hear it had changed little since his last visit. Leah suffered from a particularly acute combination of psychotic depression and post-traumatic stress syndrome. The bombing in Vienna played ceaselessly in her mind like a loop of videotape. From time to time, she experienced flashes of lucidity, but for the most part she lived only in the past, trapped in a body that no longer functioned, guilt-ridden over her failure to save her son’s life.

  “Does she recognize anyone?”

  “Only Gilah Shamron. She comes once a week. Sometimes more.”

  “Where is she now?”

  “In the recreation room. We’ve closed it so you can see her in private.”

  She was seated in a wheelchair near the window, gazing sight- lessly into the garden where snow was collecting on the limbs of the olive trees. Her hair, once long and black, was short and gray. Her hands, twisted and scarred by fire, were folded in her lap. When Gabriel sat next to her, she seemed not to notice. Then her head turned slowly, and a spark of recognition flickered in her eyes.

  “Is it really you, Gabriel?”

  “Yes, Leah. It’s me.”

  “They said you might be coming. I was afraid you’d forgotten about me.”

  “No, Leah. I’ve never forgotten you. Not for a minute.”

  “You’ve been crying, Gabriel. I can see it in your eyes. Is something wrong?”

  “No, Leah, everything’s fine.”

  She gazed into the garden again. “Look at the snow, Gabriel. Isn’t it . . .”

  She left the thought unfinished. A brief look of horror flashed in her eyes; Gabriel knew she had returned to Vienna. He took hold of her ruined hands and talked. About the painting he was restoring. About the villa where he had been living in Italy. About Gilah and Ari Shamron. Anything but Vienna. Anything but Chiara. Finally, her gaze fell upon him once more. She was back.

  “Is it really you, Gabriel?”

  “Yes, Leah. It’s me.”

  “I was afraid you’d—”

  “Never, Leah.”

  “You look tired.”

  “I’ve been working very hard.”

  “And you’re too thin. Do you want something to eat?”

  “I’m fine, Leah.”

  “How long can you stay, my love?”

  “Not long.”

  “How is your wife?”

  “She’s well, Leah.”

  “Is she pretty?”

  “She’s very pretty.”

  “Are you taking good care of her?”

  His eyes filled with tears. “I’m trying my best.”

  She looked away. “Look at the snow, Gabriel. Isn’t it beautiful?”

  “Yes, Leah, it’s beautiful.”

  “The snow absolves Vienna of its sins. Snow falls on Vienna while the missiles rain on Tel Aviv.” She looked at him again. “Make sure Dani is buckled into his seat tightly. The streets are slippery.”

  “He’s fine, Leah.”

  “Give me a kiss.”

  Gabriel pressed his lips against her scarred cheek.

  Leah whispered, “One last kiss.”

  THERE EXISTS in Tel Aviv and its suburbs a constellation of Office safe flats known as jump sites. They are places where, by doctrine and tradition, operatives spend their final night before departing Israel for missions abroad. Neither Gabriel nor any member of his team bothered to go to their assigned site that night. There wasn’t time. In fact, they worked straight through the night and were so late arriving at Ben-Gurion that El Al officials had to slip them through the usual gauntlet of security procedures. In another break with tradition, the entire team traveled aboard the same aircraft: El Al Flight 315 to London. Only Gabriel had a role to play that evening; he separated from the others at Heathrow and made his way to Cheyne Walk in Chelsea. A few minutes after six, he rounded the corner into Cheyne Gardens and rapped his knuckle twice on the back of an unmarked black van. Graham Seymour opened the door and beckoned him inside. The target was in place. The sword was ready. The night raid was about to begin.

  40

  CHELSEA , LONDON

  IT WAS said of Viktor Orlov that he divided people into two categories: those willing to be used and those too stupid to realize they were being used. There were some who would have added a third: those willing to let Viktor steal their money. He made no secret of the fact he was a predator and a robber baron. Indeed, he wore these labels proudly, along with his ten-thousand-dollar Italian suits and his trademark striped shirts, specially made by a man in Hong Kong. The dramatic collapse of Communism had presented Orlov with the opportunity to earn a great deal of money in a brief period of time, and he had taken it. Orlov rarely apologized for anything, least of all the manner in which he had become rich. “Had I been born an Englishman, my money might have come to me cleanly,” he told a British interviewer shortly after taking up residence in London. “But I was born a Russian. And I earned a Russian fortune.”

  Blessed with a natural facility for numbers, Orlov had been working as a physicist in the Soviet nuclear weapons program when the empire finally collapsed. While most of his colleagues continued to work without pay, Orlov decided to go into business and soon earned a small fortune importing computers, appliances, and other Western goods for the nascent Russian market. But his true riches would come later, after he acquired Russia’s largest steel company and Ruzoil, the Siberian oil giant. Fortune magazine declared Viktor Orlov Russia’s richest man and one of the world’s most influential businessmen. Not bad for a former government physicist who once had to share a communal apartment with two other Soviet families.

  In the rough-and-tumble world of Russia’s robber baron capitalism, a fortune like Orlov’s could also be a dangerous thing. Quickly made, it could vanish in the blink of an eye. And it could make the holder and his family targets of envy and, sometimes, violence. Orlov had survived at least three attempts on his life and was rumored to have ordered several men killed in retaliation. But the greatest threat to his fortune would come not from those who wished to kill him but from the Kremlin. The current Russian president believed men like Orlov had stolen the country’s most valuable assets, and it was his intention to steal them back. Shortly after taking control, he summoned Orlov to the Kremlin and demanded two things: his steel company and Ruzoil. “And keep your nose out of politics,” he added. “Otherwise, I’m going to cut it off.” Orlov agreed to relinquish his steel interests but not his oil company. The
president was not amused. He immediately ordered his prosecutors to open a fraud-and-bribery investigation, and within a week a warrant was issued for Orlov’s arrest. Orlov wisely fled to London. The target of a Russian extradition request, he still maintained nominal control of his shares in Ruzoil, now valued at twelve billion dollars. But they remained legally icebound, beyond the reach of both Orlov and the man who wanted them back, the Russian president.

  Early in Orlov’s exile, the press had hung on his every word. A reliable source of incendiary copy about Kremlin skullduggery, he could fill a room with reporters with an hour’s notice. But the British press had tired of Viktor, just as the British people had grown weary of Russians in general. Few cared what he had to say anymore, and fewer still had the time or patience to sit through one of his lengthy tirades against his archrival, the Russian president. And so it came as no surprise to Gabriel and his team when Orlov readily accepted a request for an interview from one Olga Sukhova, former crusading reporter from Moskovskaya Gazeta, now an exile herself. Due to concerns over her security, she asked to see Orlov in his home and at night. Orlov, a bachelor and relentless womanizer, suggested she come at seven. “And please come alone,” he added before ringing off.

  She did indeed come at seven, though she was hardly alone. A maid took her coat and escorted her to the second-floor study, where Orlov greeted her lavishly in Russian. Gabriel and Graham Seymour, headphones over their ears, listened to the simultaneous translation.

  “It’s so lovely to see you again after all these years, Olga. Can I get you some tea or something stronger?”

  41

  CHELSEA , LONDON

  TEA WOULD be fine, thank you.”

  Orlov could not conceal his disappointment. No doubt he had been hoping to impress Olga with a bottle or two of the Château Pétrus he drank like tap water. He ordered tea and savories from the maid, then watched with obvious satisfaction as Olga pretended to admire the vast office. It was rumored Orlov had been so impressed by his first visit to Buckingham Palace he had instructed his army of interior decorators to re-create its atmosphere at Cheyne Walk. The room, which was three times the size of Olga’s old Moscow apartment, had reportedly been inspired by the queen’s private study.

  As Olga endured a tedious tour, she could not help but reflect upon how different her life was from Viktor’s. Freed from Communism’s yoke, Viktor had gone in search of money while Olga had set out to find truth. She had spent the better part of her career investigating the misdeeds of men like Viktor Orlov and believed such men bore much of the blame for the death of freedom and democracy in her country. Orlov’s greed had helped to create the unique set of circumstances that had allowed the Kremlin to return the country to the authoritarianism of the past. Indeed, were it not for men like Viktor Orlov, the Russian president might still be a low-level functionary in the St. Petersburg city government. Instead, he ruled the world’s largest country with an iron fist and was thought to be one of Europe’s richest men. Richer, even, than Orlov himself.

  The tea arrived. They sat on opposite ends of the long brocade couch, facing a window hung with rich floor-to-ceiling drapery. It might have been possible to see Chelsea Embankment and the Thames had the curtains not been tightly drawn as a precaution against snipers—ironic, since Orlov had spent several million pounds acquiring one of London’s best views. He was wearing a dark blue suit and a shirt with stripes the color of cranberries. One arm was flung along the back of the couch toward Olga, revealing a diamond-and-gold wristwatch of inestimable worth. The other lay along the armrest. He was twirling his spectacles restlessly. Veteran Orlov watchers would have recognized the tic. Orlov was perpetually in motion, even when he was sitting still.

  “Please, Olga. Remind me when it was we last met.”

  Orlov watchers would have recognized this, too. Viktor was not the sort to blurt “I never forget a face.” He actually made a habit of pretending to forget people. It was a negotiating tactic. It said to opponents they were unmemorable. Insignificant. Without merit or consequence. Olga cared little about what Orlov thought of her, so she answered the question honestly. They had met just once, she reminded him. The encounter had taken place in Moscow, shortly before he fled to London.

  “Ah, yes, I remember it now! If I recall, I became very angry at you because you were not interested in some valuable information I had for you.”

  “If I had written the story you wanted me to write, I would have been killed.”

  “The fearless Olga Sukhova was afraid? That never stopped you before. From what I hear, you’re lucky to be alive. The Kremlin never said what happened in that stairwell last summer, but I know the truth. You were investigating Ivan Kharkov, and Ivan tried to silence you. Permanently.”

  Olga made no reply.

  “So you don’t deny that’s what happened?”

  “Your sources have always been impeccable, Viktor.”

  He acknowledged the compliment with a twirl of his eye-wear. “It’s a shame we haven’t had the opportunity to meet again until now. As you might expect, I followed your case with great interest. I tried to find some way of making contact with you after your defection was made public, but you were quite difficult to locate. I asked my friends in British intelligence to pass a message to you, but they refused.”

  “Why didn’t you just ask Grigori where I was?”

  The spectacles went still, just for a few seconds. “I did, but he refused to tell me. I know you two are friends. I suppose he doesn’t want to share you.”

  Olga took note of the tense: I know you two are friends . . . He didn’t seem to know about Grigori’s absence—unless he was lying, which was a distinct possibility. Viktor Orlov was genetically incapable of telling the truth.

  “The old Viktor wouldn’t have bothered to ask Grigori where I was hiding. He would have just had him followed.”

  “Don’t think it didn’t cross my mind.”

  “But you never did?”

  “Follow Grigori?” He shook his head. “The British give my bodyguards a good deal of latitude, but they would never tolerate private surveillance operations. Remember, I am still a Russian citizen. I am also the target of a formal extradition request. I try not to do anything to make my British hosts too angry.”

  “Other than criticize the Kremlin whenever you feel like it.”

  “They can’t expect me to remain mute. When I see injustice, I am compelled to speak. It’s my nature. That’s why Grigori and I get along so well.” He paused, then asked, “How is he, by the way?”

  “Grigori?” She sipped her tea, and said she hadn’t spoken to him for several weeks. “You?”

  “Actually, I had one of my assistants put a call to him the other day. We never heard back. I assume he’s very busy on his book.” Orlov gave her a conspiratorial glance. “Some of my people have been working with Grigori in secret. As you might expect, I want this book to be a big success.”

  “Why am I not surprised, Viktor?”

  “It’s my nature. I enjoy helping others. Which is why I’m so pleased you’re here. Tell me about the story you’re working on. Tell me how I can be of service.”

  “It’s a story about a defector. A defector who disappeared without a trace.”

  “Does the defector have a name?”

  “Grigori Nikolaevich Bulganov.”

  IN THE surveillance van, Graham Seymour removed his headphones and looked at Gabriel.

  “Very nicely played.”

  “She’s good, Graham. Very good.”

  “Can I have her when you’re done?”

  Gabriel raised a finger to his lips. Viktor Orlov was speaking again. They heard a burst of rapid Russian, followed by the voice of the translator.

  “Tell me what you know, Olga. Tell me everything.”

  42

  CHELSEA , LONDON

  ORLOV WAS suddenly in motion in several places at once. The spectacles were twirling, the fingers were drumming on the back of the broca
de couch, and the left eye was twitching anxiously. When he was a child, the twitch had made him the target of merciless teasing and bullying. It had made him burn with hatred, and that hatred had driven him to succeed. Viktor Orlov wanted to beat everyone. And it was all because of the twitch in his left eye.

  “Are you sure he’s missing?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “When did he disappear?”

  “January the tenth. Six-twelve in the evening. On his way to chess.”

  “How do you know this?”

  “I’m Olga Sukhova. I know everything.”

  “Do the British know?”

  “Of course.”

  “What do they think happened?”

  “They believe he redefected. They think he’s now back at Lubyanka telling his superiors everything he learned about your operation while he was working for you.”

  The eye was now blinking involuntarily like the shutter of a high-speed automatic camera.

  “Why didn’t they tell me?”

  “I’m not sure you were their first concern, Viktor. But don’t worry. It’s not true about Grigori. He didn’t redefect. He was kidnapped.” She let it sink in, then added, “By Ivan Kharkov.”

  “How do you know this?”

  “I’m Olga Sukhova.”

  “And you know everything.”

  “Not quite everything. But perhaps you can help me fill in some of the missing pieces. I don’t know the identity of the man Ivan hired to handle the kidnapping. All I know is that this man is very good. He’s a professional.” She paused. “The kind of man you used to hire in Moscow—in the bad old days, Viktor, when you had a problem that just wouldn’t go away.”

  “Be careful, Ms. Sukhova.”

  “I’m always careful. I never had to print a single retraction in all the years I worked for the Gazeta. Not one.”