When the pilot switched off the engine there was a quality of silence that Suvorin had never experienced before. Always in Moscow there was something to hear, even in the so-called still of night - a bit of traffic, maybe, a neighbour's quarrel. But not here. Here the quiet was absolute, and he loathed it. He found himself talking just to fill it.
'Good work,' he called up to the pilot. 'We made it.'
'You're welcome. By the way, there's a message for you from Moscow. You're to call the colonel before you go. Make any sense.
'Before I go?'
'That's it.
Before I go where?
There wasn't enough room to stand upright. Suvorin had to crouch. Drawn up beside a big hangar he could see a line of bi-planes painted in arctic camouflage.
The door at the back of the plane swung open. The temperature dropped about five degrees. Snowflakes billowed up the fuselage. Suvorin grabbed his attache case and jumped down to the concrete. A technician in a fur hat pointed him towards the hangar. Its heavy sliding door was pulled a quarter open. Waiting in the shadows, next to a couple of jeeps, sheltering from the snow, was a reception committee: three men in MVD uniforms with AK-74 assault rifles, a guy from the militia and, most bizarrely, an elderly lady in thick male clothing, hunched like a vulture, leaning on a stick.
SOMETHING had happened, Suvorin could tell that right away, and whatever it was, it was not good. He knew it when he offered his hand to the senior Interior Ministry soldier -a surly-lipped, bull-necked young man named Major Kretov - and received in reply a salute of just sufficient idleness to imply an insult. And as for Kretov's two men, they never even bothered to acknowledge his arrival. They were too busy unloading a small armoury from the back of one of the jeeps - extra magazines for their AK-74s, pistols, flares and a big old RP46 machine gun with cannisters of belt-fed ammunition and a metal bipod.
'So, what are we expecting here, major?' Suvorin said, in an effort to be friendly. 'A small war?'
'We can discuss it on the way.'
'I'd prefer to discuss it now.
Kretov hesitated. Clearly he would have liked to tell Suvorin to go to hell, but they had the same rank, and besides he hadn't quite got the measure yet of this civilian-soldier in his expensive western clothes. 'Well, quickly then.' He clicked his fingers irritably in the direction of the gangly young militia man. 'Tell him what's happened.'
'And you are?' said Suvorin.
The militia man came to attention. 'Lieutenant Korf, major.'
'So, Korf-'
Lieutenant delivered his report quickly, nervously. Shortly after midday, the Archangel militia had been
notified by Moscow central headquarters that two foreigners were believed tobe in the vicinity of the city, possibly seeking to make contact with a person or persons named Safanov or Safiuiova. He had undertaken the inquiry himself. Only one such citizen had been located: the witness Vavara Safanova -he indicated the old woman - who had been picked up within ninety minutes of receipt of the telex from Moscow. She had confirmed that two foreigners had been to see her and had left her barely an hour earlier.
Suvorin smiled in a kindly way at Vavara Safanova. 'And what were you able to tell them, Comrade Safanova?'
She looked at the ground.
'She told them her daughter was dead,' cut in Kretov, impatiently. 'Died in childbirth, forty-five years ago, having a kid. A boy. Now: can we go? I've got all this out of her already.'
A boy, thought Suvorin. It had to be. A girl wouldn't have mattered. But a boy. An heir -'And the boy lives?'
'Reared in the forest, she says. Like a wolf.' Suvorin turned reluctantly from the silent old woman to the major. 'And Kelso and O'Brian have gone into the forest to find this "wolf", presumably?'
'The/re about three hours ahead of us.' Kretov had a large-scale map spread over the hood of the nearest jeep.
'This is the road,' he said. 'There's no way out except back the way they went, and the snow will hold them up. Don't worry. We'll have them by nightfall.'
'And how do we reach them? Can we use a helicopter?' Kretov winked at one of his men. 'I fear the major from Moscow has not adequately studied our terrain. The taiga is not well supplied with helicopter pads.'
Suvorin tried to stay calm. 'Then we reach them how?'
'By snow plough,' said Kretov, as if it was obvious. 'Four of us can just fit in the cab. Or three, if you prefer not to wet your fancy footwear.'
Again, and with difficulty, Suvorin controlled his temper. 'So what's the plan? We clear a way for them to drive back into town behind us, is that it?'
'If that proves necessary.'
'If that proves necessary,' repeated Suvorin, slowly. Now he was beginning to understand. He gazed into the major's cold grey eyes, then looked at the two MVD men who had finished unloading the jeep. 'So what are you people running nowadays? Death squads, is that it? It's a little bit of South America you've got going up here?'
Kretov began folding up the map. 'We must move out immediately.'
'I need to speak to Moscow.'
'We've already spoken to Moscow.'
'Ineed to speak to Moscow, major, and if you attempt to leave without me, I can assure you that you will spend the next few years building helicopter pads.'
'I don't think so.'
'If it comes to a trial of strength between the SVR and the MVD, be aware of this: the SVR will win every time. Suvorin turned and bowed to Vavara Safanova. 'Thank you for your assistance.' And then, to Korf, who was watching all this, goggle-eyed: 'Take her home, please. You did well.'
'I told them,' said the old woman suddenly. 'I told them nothing good could come of it.'
'That may be true,' said Suvorin. 'All right, lieutenant, off you go. Now,' he said to Kretov, 'where's that fucking telephone?'
O'BRIAN had insisted on shooting another twenty minutes of footage. By sign language he had persuaded the Russian to pack up his relics and then to unpack them again, holding each object up to the camera and explaining what it was. ('His book.' 'His picture. His hair.' Each was dutifully
kissed and arranged on the altar.) Then O'Brian showed him how he wanted him to sit at the table smoking his pipe and to read from Anna Safanova's journal. ('Remember Comrade Stalin's historic words to Gorky: "It is the task of the proletarian state to produce the engineers of human souls..
'Great,' said O'Brian, moving around him with the camera. 'Fantastic. Isn't this fantastic, Fluke?'
'No,' said Kelso, 'it's a bloody circus.'
Ask him a couple of questions, Fluke.'
'I shall not.
'Go on. Just a couple. Ask him what he thinks of the new Russia.'
'No.'
'Two questions and we're out of here. I promise.'
Kelso hesitated. The Russian stared at him, stroking his moustache with the stem of his pipe. His teeth were yellowish and stumpy. The underside of his moustache was wet with saliva.
'My colleague would like to know,' Kelso said, 'if you have heard of the great changes that have taken place in Russia and what you think of them.'
For a moment, he was silent. Then he turned from Kelso and stared directly into the lens.
'One feature of the history of the old Russia,' he began, was the continual beatings she suffered. All beat her for her backwardness. She was beaten because to do sowas profitable' and could be done with impunity. Such is the law of the exploiters - to beat the backward and the weak. It is the jungle law of capitalism. You are backward, you are weak -therefore you are wrong; hence, you can be beaten and enslaved.'
He sat back, sucking on his pipe, his eyes half closed. O'Brian was standing directly behind Kelso, holding the camera, and Kelso felt the pressure of his hand on his shoulder, urging him to ask another question.
'I don't understand,' Kelso said. 'What are you saying? That the new Russia is beaten and enslaved? But surely most people would say the opposite: that however hard life might be, at least they now have freedom?'