Quiller Meridian

'Because I need information.' there were lights flashing ahead of us and I watched them. 'I need information about General Velichko and the other two.'

In a moment she said, 'Is this for a story?'

'A what? No.'

'You told me you're a journalist.'

A whole circus of militia patrols along there, half a mile away, some kind of road block. I didn't tell the driver to take a side street because he'd wonder why, and if anyone along there saw us running for cover they'd send out a patrol to cut us off and ask questions and the only papers I had on me were in the name of Shokin, Viktor Sergei.

'Yes,' I told Tanya, 'I'm an investigative journalist with political interests.'

'I don't know very much,' she said, 'about the generals.'

But enough to want one of them killed. 'What was Velichko talking about,' I asked her, 'when you had dinner with him on the train?'

'He was telling me,' she said with contempt, 'about his heroic deeds in the war with Afghanistan.'

'Nothing else?'

'No.' I heard something in her voice, and when I looked at her I saw she was frightened because of the lights up there.

'Don't worry,' I told her,' there's probably been an accident.' there were still three stationary patrol cars ahead of us and I leaned forward and got a hundred-rouble note from my wallet and held it out to the driver. 'I should have asked you before — this is the smallest I've got, do you have enough change?'

He broke off his singing and turned his head. 'Not for a hundred, no.'

'Well look, hang on to this and we'll work something out later.'

He hesitated, then took the note. 'If you say so.'

I sat back again. It had been simple routine: we might need him as a friend. 'Is that a road block up there?'

'Looks like it. They're always cluttering up the streets one way or another, don't give us no peace, we're fair game, see, taxi drivers, when they want to pick on someone.'

I felt Tanya's hand on me. 'Can't we turn off somewhere?'

'No. It's too late for that.'

Her eyes were still frightened, and there was something I'd been trying not to think about: this woman had exposed herself to tremendous risk when she'd set up the general for assassination, but she might have got away with it if my name hadn't been next to hers in the hotel registry. The militia would still be on the watch for the woman they'd seen in the headlights but she might have been able to get back to the hotel and go quietly to bed: the concierge wouldn't have faced a barrage of questions if Viktor Shokin, wanted for murder, hadn't followed Tanya Rusakova to the Vladekino.

They were a quarter of a mile away now, the flashing lights, and the driver began slowing. I leaned forward again and spoke into his ear. 'What's your name, my friend?'

'Nikki.'

'Listen, Nikki. She's not my wife, as a matter of fact. This is a pickup, and I could get into a lot of trouble, you know what I mean?' He was holding his head turned to listen, and gave a nod. 'So what about just keeping mum, Nikki, if those buggers ask you any questions? I mean forget about our car breaking down and everything — all you know is that we got into this cab and I just asked you to drive us around a little, how does that sound?'

He began slapping the rim of the wheel softly with his gloved hand, and said in a moment, 'Nothing about going to the airport?'

'Nothing about that.' He was still slowing, his head turned a little but his eyes on the street and the flashing lights. I told him again: 'We just got in and I asked you to drive us around a little. Nothing else.' He gave it some more thought, but there wasn't time for that. 'And you keep the change, Nikki, all right?'

He jerked his head round another inch and then nodded.

'Fair enough.'

There were things he still didn't understand, but those were the ones I'd paid for.

'You're a good friend, Nikki,' I told him, and sat back again and looked at Tanya, gave her the briefing:' this is the story — yours, mine and the driver's.' I went through it twice and she said she understood.

Then I saw the flashing baton ahead of us and we began sliding across the packed snow as the militiaman directed Nikki into a side street, shouting something about a detour, and I saw a whole mess of telephone posts and wires blocking the street behind him with the snow piled in a massive drift after the storm, and when I looked at Tanya she was sitting with her head back against the upholstery and her eyes closed and tears of relief streaming on her face as we throttled up again and the flickering light from the patrol cars faded against the buildings.

'Can I look at your phone book?'

He was still half-asleep, a boy in a rumpled uniform, the collar unbuttoned. I'd woken him when we'd come into the hotel. It was a mile from the airport, as far as it was safe to go.

I found the number and gave the boy some money and asked him to let me use the phone on his desk. Tanya was sitting in the corner of the foyer watching me, and I wondered what would happen if I turned my back for a moment, whether she'd slip out of the hotel and go her own way even though I'd told her that she was in danger, that I wanted to help her, that she had to stay with me for her brother's sake. She hadn't asked me what I'd meant by that, but she would. The number wasn't ringing: there was just a click, then silence.

I dialled for an operator.

'This number is private?' she asked me.

'No. It's the Hotel Karasevo.'

He's at the Hotel Karasevo, Matthews had told me when I'd phoned London this evening. Ask for T. K. Trencher.

Ferris.

There are times when you can get through half a mission, more than that, even the whole thing, without needing to call on your director in the field for help. This wasn't one of them. There was a meter running, like my good friend Nikki's out there in the cab, ticking away the time: it couldn't be long before we opened the wrong door, Tanya and I, turned the wrong comer and ran straight into the militia. We had to get off the streets. 'Did you say the Hotel Karasevo?'

The woman sounded as if I'd woken her up at the switchboard, as I'd woken the boy here: it was past midnight now.

'Yes.'

I watched the street through the windows, saw Nikki sitting there in his cab with his head back and his mouth moving, presumably in song. If I could pick up another taxi I'd tell him he was free, that we'd decided to put up here for the night. Fresh horses, break the scent.

'The lines are down,' the operator said. 'You cannot call the Hotel Karasevo.' she sounded pleased.

'Try again,' I told her.

Shocked silence, and then,'The lines are down, didn't you hear me? The snow has brought down the lines in that area.'

'How long has the hotel been cut off? This is Colonel Mashakov, Novosibirsk Militia Headquarters.'

There was another silence.' there has been no communication by telephone, Colonel, since seven o'clock this evening. I regret that the Novosibirsk Telecommunications Utility was unable to disperse the snowstorm, Colonel, before it could damage our system. But we shall try harder in future, in the name of the new demokratizatsiya!'

The boy behind the desk had buttoned the collar of his uniform and pushed his fingers through his hair, was watching Tanya from the corner of his eye, seeing a plaything for his manly lusts.

'To your knowledge,' I said to the woman on the telephone, 'are there men working on the lines?'

She used her silences with skill, measuring them for their effect.' But you may be assured, Colonel, that we have men working on the lines. We do not expect, at the Novosibirsk Telecommunications Utility, the lines to restore themselves unaided to their former efficiency.'

I put the phone down and spoke to the boy in uniform, tearing him from his licentious dreams. 'Can I get a taxi from here?'