• Satellite images identify thousands of Mohammedan fighters assembling in Ulus-Ket in the southern lowlands of Chechnya.
The phone was ringing off the hook. Grigori’s number was flashing red on the digital panel. He threw off his coat, deciding to call back later and risk irritating his host. The place had been cleaned while he was out. He could only guess what the chambermaid had made of all the condoms stuck to the sheets.
When he did reluctantly listen to the messaging service, Grigori’s monotone filled him with dread. It seemed his Russian colleague was on his way over. He would not take no for an answer. It was vital they spoke about security. Tom rolled over on the bedcover. There was something ominous in every syllable Grigori uttered. By the time the Professor had loosened his shirt collar and rinsed his face, the doorbell was already sounding.
Hands still wet, the Englishman played with the lock-chain. Grigori was staring back at him through the crack in the door. ‘It is well that you protect yourself’, the Russian said reassuringly. ‘There are people who will want to disrupt the conference, intimidate speakers, you know the kind of thing!’
‘Certainly!’ Tom reckoned that Grigori was no stranger to strong-arm tactics himself.
‘I thought we could take a drink downstairs?’
Throwing on his jacket, Tom followed Grigori to the lift. They made ground level, stepping out into a lobby full of theatregoers sheltering from sheeting rain. Taking alcove seats in the Borsalino bar, Grigori continued being affable and polite, but Tom sensed a tightness in his movements, as if he was doing his best to hide his anxiety.
‘Traditionalists like us are often misunderstood’, he was saying. ‘Our enemies try to present us as partisans for lost causes, soliloquies for dark movements.’
‘Yes, I have experienced that’, Tom agreed, ‘and damned annoying it is too!’ The Russian liked Tom’s English expressions.
‘Ivan Ilyin, the White’s philosopher manqué, saw this from the outset. His Knightly Way meant religiously rooted state voluntarism. You see, he knew victory could only be achieved through spiritual resistance. For him, the war began in our own hearts.’
‘“This test posed to every Russian soul the same direct question: who are you? By what do you live? What do you serve? What do you love?”’
‘I see you are familiar with Ilyin’s speech in Berlin.’
Tom affirmed with a cursory nod. ‘Russia’s situation, like that of many nation-states, may be as precarious right now as it was in 1923 when Ilyin spoke, but then, as now, there are signs of a stirring of nationalist forces. It often seems darkest before the dawn.’
‘True!’ Grigori was saying as the maitre d’ swept past in a small claret waistcoat. ‘Remember, I told you, we saw this start many years ago. By 1979, I already knew that Islamic fundamentalism spreading out from the Gulf was a major problem. I have friends who served in the Alpha and Zenith Special Forces in Kabul and arrested President Amin Halizullah in the Tajberg Palace.’
‘Didn’t they execute him on the spot?’
‘Only after he was tried by a military tribunal. We were under no illusions. Even then we knew the CIA was funding the Mujahedeen with three billion dollars. And we know who finances the Arab Spring, ISIS, and the insurgents now.’
‘The same people.’
‘Who else? You can use the modern titles like neocons, cosmopolitans, and one-worlders if you want. Or you can call them usurers, Communists, or Bolsheviks. The labels and ideologies do not matter. If you scratch the surface, you find the answer. They use any means, financial or military, often interchangeably, if there is a profit to be had. Now, it suits their purpose to pull the strings of the Muslims. You know, we used to laugh about them. But look at your history books. In just over one hundred years after the death of their Prophet, the Muslims had taken over the Middle East, North Africa, and Spain. An empire larger than that of Augustus Caesar, and gained in half the time.’
‘Well, Osama bin Laden did claim “the dissolution of the Soviet Union goes to God and the Mujahedeen in Afghanistan”.’ Grigori’s eyes lifted to the ceiling in exasperation.
‘And you see parallels with today?’
‘It was the opening shots of the Clash of Civilisations!’
• Descendants of Russian religious schismatics are rounded up in the Bukhtarma Valley and deported by rail to the new border checkpoint at Orenburg;
• Archaeological sites like the Denisova Cave complex are destroyed by Islamic demolition squads seeking to extinguish evidence of the Seima-Turbino migrations, as they offend the Prophet;
• Dog-like domestic canid fossils are broken up by sledge-hammers in the Razboinichya Cave, for being ‘unclean’ in the eyes of God;
• Snow Leopards, Steppe eagles, and the black stork are hunted to near extinction as rumour that extracts from their spinal columns enhance male sexual performance spreads amongst Chinese homeopaths;
• Wild herds of Wisent and Ibex are factory farmed to meet the dietary needs of those migrating west;
• A large part of the inaccessible Ukok Plateau is turned into a restricted military centre, served only by the M52 highway;
• Evidence of the original Pazyry culture, such as the Bronze Age tomb of the fifth-century Scythian Ice Maiden, with elaborate tattoos and silk clothing, are dynamited to ensure no prior claim to ownership of the land is possible.
The bar was half empty, but Grigori was still watchful, eyes sweeping the room, ensuring no one overheard them. Over on the far side of the restaurant, a Negress with mother-of-pearl drop earrings sat at a piano, nicotine-stained fingers tickling blues standards from ivory. A waitress approached.
‘Cappuccino’, Tom asked nonchalantly. Grigori ordered a brandy. The Englishman was willing him to speak, to spit out what he had really come to talk about, noticing how his fingers had played with the paper napkin, twisting it into knots, as they had talked about the old war. Grigori continued with small talk as the waitress returned with their order.
‘Please’, Grigori insisted, gesturing for the receipt.
‘Not on room?’ the girl asked. Grigori looked directly into Tom’s eyes.
‘This is from me!’
At the other end of the bar, American tourists were tucking into pizza and babbling on about Brooklyn. Just for a moment, Tom wished the natives did not have to witness the eccentricities of such gauche Cold War warriors. They had won the peace by default, but were now in sharp decline. Obama’s immigration mandates had all but bankrupted the ‘Land of the Brave’ and turned California into Disneyland for Latinos. Grigori began to speak as Tom ripped open a sachet of brown sugar.
‘You know’, he said, ‘a very handsome poet called Sergei Yesenin slashed his wrists and hung himself in this hotel back in 1925. It is said that his final poem was written with his own blood.’
‘How very melodramatic.’
‘That is Russia for you’, Grigori speculated. ‘Always willing to make the grand gesture.’ Tom saw his opportunity.
‘And tell me what grand gesture would you like me to make?’
‘So quick to the point!’
‘No need to make a song and dance like your poet friend.’
‘This is not British way?’ Grigori was genuinely taken aback, laughing into his balloon glass.
‘It’s my way, let’s forget stereotypes, horosho?’ The Russian agreed, his eyes narrowing.
‘It seems someone in my team has betrayed your whereabouts to the Bloc.’
Tom’s eyes scanned the face of the man before him. ‘Am I safe?’