The thunder of a thousand feet filled the frosty air.
“Now, if you can stop stomping your feet and chattering your teeth, you can throw President Karpov out of the Kremlin!”
Overwhelmed by Tretiak’s manifest logic, the crowd stomped even louder.
Simon Templar did not remain in Red Square long enough to enjoy the conclusion of Tretiak’s speech, but he watched it replayed on the first-class video screen aboard his British Airway’s flight to London.
The in-flight recap of international news featured a disturbing montage of Russian unrest, frozen bodies being removed from buildings. President Karpov ducking rocks and bottles, and a point-counterpoint exchange between Ivan Tretiak and Russia’s elected democratic leader.
“How can NATO talk so boldly of expansion to the East?” asked Tretiak from the front steps of his elaborate Moscow mansion. “They must have a secret understanding with Mr. Karpov. Whereas it is we Russians who should be expanding — rebuilding our great Soviet empire, by force if necessary.”
“If Mr. Tretiak persists in accusing me of collusion with the West,” countered President Karpov from his Kremlin office, “he must produce proof of his scurrilous claim — documents, correspondence, hard evidence. If he cannot, then I demand that he stop the demagoguery and call off the dogs!”
The broadcast completed, other passengers then tilted back their seats, pulled little blue blankets up under their chins, and availed themselves of tight black eyeshades. The elegant young man in the luxuriously tailored suit, however, sat idly swinging a gold chain with an antique locket in front of his face. It was as if he were trying to relax by hypnosis.
The well-tended matron sitting across from him couldn’t resist initiating conversation.
“For a special someone?”
He handed her the locket, offering an inviting smile to go with it.
“Ah, cloisonné,” she said coyly, “made by Byzantine monks, I suppose. My husband says that men only buy their wives jewelry when they’re cheating... so I say... cheat, cheat, cheat!”
They both laughed as if her remark was a joke rather than a blatant invitation.
“I’m Irena.”
Templar admired her warmly before speaking in an authentic Central American accent.
“Martin. Martin de Porres. I was named for a Panamanian saint who could instill new life by the laying on of hands.”
“Really?”
3
Scotland Yard was the name given to the first headquarters building of London’s police force in 1829 because the rear entrance of the building was on the site of a 12th-century palace used for visiting Scottish royalty.
The headquarters was moved in 1890, again in 1967, and was now officially New Scotland Yard, although most people continued calling it by its original name.
Scotland Yard maintained criminal records for the entire United Kingdom and had a Special Branch, akin to the Secret Service. It also maintained close links with Interpol.
The Yard was famed for its detectives, including the portly, phlegmatic investigator known for his demeanor of perpetual boredom — Chief Inspector Claude Eustace Teal.
Inspector Teal came from a long line of short detectives with boring features. He joined the force in his early twenties, pounded a beat like any young copper, and earned a reputation for plodding efficiency, if nothing else.
But there was something else. Perhaps because of the plodding, perhaps due to dedication. Inspector Teal always got his man. Hence, his promotion to chief inspector.
Teal had none of the theoretical scientific training in criminology with which the new graduates of the Police College were pumped to offensive overflowing, but he had a background of thirty years’ hard-won experience.
The droopy-eyed detective’s reputation was the stuff of legend. Any criminal learning Teal was on his trail cringed at the prospect of certain incarceration — any criminal, that is, except one.
As a general rule. Inspector Teal was not concerned with matters of international diplomacy. The squabbles of world leaders, in-fighting of revolutionaries, and tiffs between terrorists were seldom issues of professional concern unless such misbehavior took place within the confines of London.
He was always willing to offer complete cooperation to Interpol, or any other such agency, when directed to do so by his superiors. He was especially prone to add an extra measure of dedication when personally prompted by Sir Hamilton Dorn of Special Branch, or the commissioner of Scotland Yard himself.
It was precisely such a situation that found Inspector Teal standing in the commissioner’s office, clasping a bowler hat over his protruding stomach.
“Have you been following this Russian situation. Teal?”
“I watch the news,” replied the detective. “Seems they’re having a spot of trouble.”
The commissioner plucked at his mustache.
“A spot of trouble, indeed. Sit down.”
Teal sat.
“I don’t need to tell you that Her Majesty’s government is, in the most official manner, supportive of President Karpov’s democratic reforms. The situation there is unstable at best, and should Tretiak and his October Party take over...”
He let the sentence hang before tossing several surveillance photos across the desk.
“MI5 has been watching Tretiak like a hawk, and it seems there was a rather daring and very peculiar robbery at Tretiak Industries — and the M-O is all too familiar. They think it’s your boy.”
The expression “your boy” was one Teal had grown to resent. It signified a particularly aggravating individual whom Teal had, without success, been intent on capturing for more than eighteen months.
“I wish you wouldn’t use that expression, sir,” said Teal wearily. “The name on his file is The Saint.”
“That’s why they think he’s your boy,” continued Teal’s superior. “He identified himself as Saint somebody or other when Tretiak’s security tried to nail him.”
“He always does that,” added Teal, “and then he escapes.”
“Of course,” confirmed the commissioner, “he always escapes, he always uses cutting-edge technology, he always...”
Teal didn’t need to hear the rest. He knew it by heart. There was only one uncaptured criminal in the world who fit the description being delineated point by point.
The dour detective examined the photographs of a heavily disguised Simon Templar racing down the halls of Tretiak Industries. He placed the photos on the commissioner’s desk and began rotating his hat between his fingers.
“And what did our Saint make off with this time?”
“Some fancy microchip, but that’s not the point. British Intelligence believes he’s operating out of the U.K., and I don’t mind telling you that we’re suddenly under a great deal of pressure to bring him in so Special Branch can” — he pulled harder on the mustache — “have a word with him.”
“A word with him, sir?” Teal looked bored, but he was keenly interested.
The commissioner leaned back and continued pulling. A small bare patch was beginning to manifest itself above his lip.
“As long as he was stealing diamonds, paintings, corporate secrets, and other such nonsense, it was a different matter—”
“Excuse me,” Teal interrupted, “what’s different now?”
“Politics, Teal. It’s one thing to lift an authentic Van Gogh from a Netherlands museum, but quite another to rob that crackpot Ivan Tretiak himself, right in Tretiak’s own building, right in the heart of Moscow. That means your boy has been in contact with prominent players in this Russian situation. What he knows, who he knows, could be of significant value to British Intelligence.”