He smirked at her again. ‘Exactly right!’
Natalia decided to take the risk. She couldn’t be caught out, not like before. ‘That’s not what Shelapin says.’
‘What?’ The change was dramatic. The complacency slipped and Agayans stopped fiddling with his sleeve cuff.
‘Shelapin,’ repeated Natalia. ‘We’ve pulled him in, too, as part of the enquiry. He says you’re an extortionist. He says he’s a businessman, too, and that you’ve tried to terrorize him.’
‘That motherfucker!’ There was a laugh but it was uncertain. ‘He’s head of a Family! You know that!’
‘We don’t have any evidence to prosecute him for anything. Not like we’ve got against you.’
‘You’re setting me up!’
‘I’m just telling you the strength of the case against you.’ There was an irony in that Shelapin probably would give evidence against Agayans: tell any lie they asked him to. Agayans was shaky, so she had to keep up the pressure. From the file Natalia took the sketches of the Arab and the Frenchman described by Yatisyna, sliding them across the table towards the man. ‘Recognize them?’
Agayans glanced briefly at the drawings. ‘No.’
Natalia decided Agayans was still off-balanced by the threat of a rival gang leader testifying against him, which was how she wanted him to be, trying to think of several things at the same time. She’d personally supervised the positioning of the tape segments and restarted the playback at the moment of Yatisyna’s account of his nightclub encounter with both, when he was with Agayans.
The plump man shook his head. ‘I don’t know anyone called Yatisyna. Or a French middleman acting on behalf of an Arab buyer for nuclear components. That’s an illegal trade and I don’t deal in illegal trade. I am a respectable businessman…’
‘… Who travels with men carrying Uzi machine guns…’ Natalia broke in.
‘… Who travels with men carrying Uzi machine guns because there is no such thing as law and order in Moscow and respectable businessmen have to protect themselves,’ he took over from her.
‘That’s not what Shelapin is going to tell the court.’
‘Who’s going to believe that lying bastard?’
‘It’s all part of a convincing case against you. The Federal Prosecutor has done a deal with Yatisyna: no request for the death penalty in return for his testimony against you.’
The man’s head came up, sharply, as if he were physically confronting a challenge. He said, ‘I don’t believe you,’ but he didn’t sound sure.
‘You’ve heard the tape!’ said Natalia. ‘That’s enough for you to get an idea of what’s being put against you.’
‘I’m not going down, not dying, to save others! Or on Shelapin’s lies.’
It wasn’t the collapse she’d wanted but the concession was there. ‘You don’t really have a choice. It’s already been made. Yetisyna is provinciaclass="underline" small time. You’re head of a major Moscow group, part of one of the leading clans. It’s much better for public opinion, here and outside, if the case is brought against you.’
The man smiled, which surprised her. ‘You completely sure about that?’
Natalia didn’t know how to reply. ‘That’s what the prosecutor thinks.’
‘Does he know it was me?’
The question further confused her. ‘Of course he knows.’ Please God don’t let that be the wrong reply!
The smile flicked on and off again. ‘Tell him I shall be extremely annoyed if any charges are brought against me. Tell the Militia people, too: them most of all.’
‘What are you saying?’ demanded Natalia, remembering Yatisyna’s insistence of Agayans’ protective knowledge of corruption. Into her mind, as well, came the Moscow Militia commander’s fatalistic resignation: There is no such thing as law and order in Russia.
‘I’m not saying anything. Not yet. But I will, if this nonsense goes on. You tell people that.’
‘Which people.’
Agayans shook his head. ‘Just people. Those who need to will hear.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘ You don’t need to. I don’t know you.’
It was becoming practically a replay of her interview with Yatisyna. There was certainly nothing to be gained trying to continue the interview. ‘We’ll speak tomorrow.’
‘Maybe,’ said Agayans, as if he were the person in charge, not Natalia.
Natalia nodded for the escorts to take Agayans away, remaining where she was at the table for the tape to rewind. She wanted to listen to it again, like she intended listening to the Shelapin encounter again. Neither had been good, although this had been better than the first, and she needed to be absolutely prepared for the criticism that was inevitable at the later ministerial grouping.
The scream was inhuman, animal-like and very short. For a moment Natalia remained frozen at the desk. Then she burst from the room, going immediately to her right, where she knew the detention cells to be. Several minor corridors led off a main junction. She hesitated, uncertainly, and then saw people running and ran with them, towards an already huddled group, shouting for people to get out of her way.
Yevgennie Arkentevich Agayans lay spreadeagled on his back, one leg tucked beneath the other, gazing sightlessly at the ceiling through the owlish glasses that absurdly had remained perfectly in place. The top must have been broken from the bottle, although she couldn’t see it because the jagged edge that had almost decapitated him was still buried deep in the man’s neck: the bottom half of the bottle was intact and already almost filled with blood from the way it had torn into his carotid artery. As she watched, the pressure became such that the bottle was forced out of Agayans’ throat, splattering them all with blood.
‘You’re making things untenable for me,’ complained Peter Johnson.
‘You’re making things untenable for yourself.’
‘You knew I was going to monitor him,’ insisted Peter Johnson.
‘It went beyond monitoring,’ insisted Dean.
‘I didn’t know the situation at the embassy.’
The Director-General sat for several moments, silently regarding his deputy over his cluttered desk. ‘You knew, even to the wording, of something you thought had been withheld from the ambassador. Bowyer came direct to you, like Fenby came direct to you.’
‘We would have had to mount a defence, if something had been withheld.’
‘You’re saying it was to protect Muffin!’
‘To protect the department.’
There was another accusing silence. ‘You were undermining an operative specifically put into Moscow to justify this department!’
‘Bowyer allowed himself to get caught up in internal embassy politics that I knew nothing about.’
‘I shall formally protest, to the Foreign Office here and to Wilkes, in Moscow, at the blatant deceit of the Head of Chancellery.’
‘That could lead to his dismissaclass="underline" his withdrawal almost certainly.’
‘What was he trying to achieve, against Muffin?’
‘Bowyer grossly misinterpreted my instructions. But I did order the monitoring.’
‘I know where the responsibility lies. He’ll be disciplined but not withdrawn.’
‘You’re asking for my resignation, aren’t you?’ said Johnson.
‘No,’ said Dean, who an hour earlier had chaired the deferred meeting at which it had been agreed to propose the sting operation to Moscow. ‘I want you personally to go to Washington. And I want Fenby’s full support for this new idea. Just as I want your full support. In future I expect both of you to work with me, not against me.’
‘I’m to give him an ultimatum?’ frowned Johnson.
‘Phrase it how you want,’ said the Director-General. ‘But tell him I don’t want the embarrassment of what his well-connected protege did becoming public. And I’m sure he doesn’t.’
‘I see,’ said Johnson, slowly.
‘That’s what I want both of you to do. See things properly in the future.’
Bastard, thought Johnson and Dean knew it. That’s how he wanted the other man to think of him.
‘The Foreign Office hasn’t raised any objection, so we’re going to propose it,’ the Director-General told Charlie, who hadn’t been invited to that morning’s meeting. ‘There’s absolutely no guarantee that Moscow will even contemplate it, of course. In fact I think it extremely unlikely.’