Then came an event unlooked for in the history, when a man named Volkov secretly plotted the demise of Denikin, and seized control of the White movement. The chaos that caused allowed the Reds to consolidate their gains, and eventually drive the Whites from the Ukraine. They fled south, into the Caucasus, and east of the Volga into the provinces of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and the region around the Caspian Basin. There the White movement, nearly extinguished, was revitalized by Ivan Volkov, eventually posing a threat strong enough to again begin driving north and east. They took Orenburg, making it the center of their government, and pushed on through Ufa to reach the Volga.
Kirov, now rising to the top of the Bolshevik movement, stopped them there, controlling Volgograd, and most of the Kuban region, where the lines of battle shifted back and forth with each new offensive mounted by either side. Volkov tried to take Volgograd three times, and cities like Saratov and Samara as well, but could only get the last. Kirov stubbornly held the White armies at bay, defending the line of the Volga, and made it a point to keep strong pressure on Volkov’s armies in the Caucasus. It was not just for the oil there, but for the fact that the lower Caucasus, the Terek Region and Baku, were all places where young Sergei Kirov had begun his revolutionary career, and he wanted them back again.
Volkov took and held Astrakhan, but Kirov held Volgograd, and he would continue to hold it throughout the long, never-ending civil war with Volkov that kept Russia divided into the late 1930s. Then war came in 1939, and the Germans came shortly thereafter. Volkov was quick to see his opportunity, and allied himself with Nazi Germany, elated to see the Wehrmacht slowly consuming his long time enemy. Then, in late 1942, the White Armies finally linked up with the Germans on the lower Don, cutting off Kirov’s forces in the Kuban, and threatening the city he had defended so tenaciously over the decades against Volkov—Volgograd.
Zhukov had pleaded with Kirov to get those armies out of the Caucasus, but he had refused. Zhukov had told him that Volgograd was useless from a military standpoint now, and certainly from an economic one if the last rail line into the place were ever to be cut, but that did not matter. Kirov ordered the city held, and four Soviet armies were committed there to try and stop the whirlwind German advance under General Manstein and the SS Commander Felix Steiner. They delayed it a good long while, but in the end, those SS troops broke through. Eventually, only Shumilov’s 66th and Chuikov’s 62nd were still on the line to defend the city, and there was great danger that they might soon be cut off and face annihilation.
If they die, thought Kirov, then all those years of my struggle in the south die with them. Zhukov doesn’t understand that, but there’s more at stake there than brick and mortar. It’s my roots there, the roots of the revolution itself, the symbol of the entire struggle I’ve fought with Volkov over the years. Volgograd must be held. We must not lose it. I won’t hear Volkov clucking on Radio Orenburg that he’s taken it. I won’t!
Then he remembered that day in 1908, the day the red sky came in the northeast, and the sun rose twice. He remembered Ilanskiy, and everything Fedorov had said and done there. Only this time, there was an extra twist to those memories that had never been there before. This time he remembered that last conversation with Fedorov, the look in the man’s eyes, the desperation and fear that seemed to be kindled there, and the despair. He remembered how he lunged, impulsively, to stay the other man’s hand when he put that gun to his head, one good man at his core trying to save another.
He did save Fedorov, and in more ways than he could know just then. In saving him, he also saved a good deal more. Fedorov would live, with a scar on his chin to remind him of that moment. And Fedorov would take Tyrenkov’s offer and board Abakan that night, with Troyak, and all his men—save one—Gennadi Orlov.
That was going to matter a great deal in the days ahead, for Orlov had been a stone in Fedorov’s shoe for some time. With Tyrenkov’s network to help him, Fedorov hoped he could quickly tie off that loose thread in the loom of these events, but Orlov was Orlov, and anything could happen when he was involved.
As for Troyak, he kept thinking and thinking about the things Fedorov had told him, and about that trek up the strange stairway that made truth of his assertions. They were back in 1942, or so it seemed, but Troyak was not quite the same man that began this mission. He was different. He was thinking more now, and he was remembering, and so was someone else that night.
Berzin’s own network would also pick up hints and bits of the strange doings at Ilanskiy. He came in to make his evening intelligence report to Sergei Kirov, scratching his bristly haired head.
“It looks like they found those men that went missing on Karpov’s airship,” he said, reporting the latest information he had from a man he infiltrated into Tyrenkov’s security forces.
“Did they?” said Kirov, staring out on the city of Leningrad from his office chair, lost in the darkness, for no light would burn after dark.
“It’s very strange,” said Berzin. “They were apprehended right inside that damn railway inn at Ilanskiy, up on the second floor.”
A light kindled in Kirov’s eyes, and there was just the hint of a smile tugging at the corner of his lips. “And the airship? The Irkutsk?”
“It still hasn’t been found,” said Berzin. “And damn if that isn’t odd. How do you hide a thing that size? Where could it possibly be, seeing as though the men who made off with it have already been found? This Captain Symenko was once Orlov’s man. Do you think he might have defected with that ship to Orenburg?”
“No,” said Kirov. “No, I don’t think so. Don’t worry about the airship, Grishin. It is of no further concern.”
“Karpov won’t like that. He lost the Angara a few weeks back to a German airship.”
“Did he? Then send him Archangelsk. It’s just been sitting up there for months and months patrolling the Kara Sea. Winter is coming, and there won’t be much for it to see or do. I’ll want a letter delivered with it, for Karpov’s eyes only.”
“Very good sir. As you wish.”
Sergei Kirov leaned back in his chair, rocking very slowly, and raised a small glass of vodka to his lips. He would make a direct request to the Siberians, asking that if Anton Fedorov were to be found, he should be treated with utmost leniency, and respect. Then he closed his eyes, and summoned up the memory of that day, so long ago it seemed now, when he had left the bench in the depot where he spent a cold uncomfortable night, and let his curiosity get the better of him. He could still see that airship burning as it fell from the sky, the Irkutsk, as he now reckoned it to be. It was as clear in his mind as if it had happened only yesterday….
Part VI
Allies
“There is only one thing worse than fighting with allies, and that is fighting without them.”
Chapter 16
Rommel had a taste for the clean salt spray of the sea. Turn now, he thought. You haven’t the fuel to push on east, nor do you really want to go there. Yes, you told von Thoma that you had to demonstrate that option, but it cannot be done. Now is the time, and this is the place. Turn now.