Romanov Succession Part 23

"Affirmative."

"Jigsaw Three. Read you very well. What's wrong with your engine?"

"Pappy's amusing himself. Keep your receivers open. Eight minutes to descent. Out."

The eight minutes went by too quickly and then he had to put the nose down and it took an effort of will. He had always competed in speed sports in which you could see what you were doing. Now he had to descend blind.

He tried to make light of it: "What if someone's put a mountain in one of those clouds?"

"You've been here before."

"Ulyanov, what's my course?"

"Dead ahead sir."

"You'd better be right."

"Yes sir. I know."

There was a crag somewhere to starboard that spired to nearly 3,000 feet. At least he hoped it was to starboard. He watched the clock. Ten seconds ... five ... Nose down.

The heavy plane mushed down through the weather bank and he couldn't see a thing. Pappy Johnson said, "This stuff may be very close to the ground. You'll have to come in right on the deck. Just be sure you keep your feet inside."

The target zone was a meadow on top of a long ridge. At its highest point it had an elevation of 876 feet above mean sea level. The idea was to attack from exactly 1,000 feet altimeter-124 feet above the ground. In theory it made the targets easy to hit but in practice the ground turbulence made it pure h.e.l.l. Cool air sank into the deeper shadows and warmer air lifted from the pale places. The aircraft bucketed and pitched like a racing car with a flat tire.

Johnson said, "You trying to scramble the eggs I ate this morning? Don't tense up."

"I can't see where I'm going."

"I know. Keep your nose down-keep on the rails."

Felix dragged the back of his hand across his mouth.

Johnson said gently, "I told the old man you were the best in the outfit. Don't make me a liar."

But his aplomb had evaporated and there was no way to regain it. He pressed the Send b.u.t.ton and had to clear his throat before he spoke. "Jigsaw One to Jigsaw Flight. Starting a nine-zero degree right turn. Guide on me if you can."

He switched the set from liaison to intercom. "Pilot to bombardier. We're on the briefed heading. Going down through 2,000 feet. You should be able to see your aiming point any time now."

The plane growled steadily into a sea of matted grey.

Seventeen hundred feet; sixteen hundred. "Prepare to drop practice bombs."

Chujoy's voice crackled at him: "Bomb-bay doors open. Preparing to center P.D.I."

That was the bombsight. At these alt.i.tudes a variation of as little as two feet in alt.i.tude could make a critical difference in the trajectory of the bombs.

Fourteen hundred. Thirteen-fifty. "I'm going to abort!"

"The h.e.l.l you are," Pappy Johnson snapped.

Thirteen hundred. Grey cloud rushed past the windscreen, beading up on the gla.s.s. Twelve-eighty: twelve-sixty ...

Tendrils; it was breaking up....

Twelve-thirty and they were out under it-too low: the ground was right there....

Then his eyes adjusted to the perspective and he fought back the impulse to drag the yoke into his belly. He leveled off at twelve hundred feet. It wasn't raining. Visibility was clear enough now; it was the ceiling that was bad-hanging down within two hundred feet of the ridge....

A stand of trees along the near rim; the open meadow and at the far end of it more trees-highland woods running down the slopes. And he could see the square old cars b.u.mpety-b.u.mping out across the meadow: four of them, their courses diverging a little because there was no one driving them. The men had been tenting there for three weeks now, setting targets for them. They'd turned the toys loose on the meadow and now it was up to the airmen to bomb the moving automobiles before they got across the thousand-foot meadow.

"Twelve hundred feet. We're approaching the I.P," Initial point of the bombardier's run.

Pappy Johnson growled, "Do it good, Chujoy, or you go back by bus."

"Center your P.D.I."

"P.D.I. centered sir."

"Ready to take over.... It's your airplane." Felix took his hands off the yoke and leaned forward to watch.

There was a stir as the bomb racks opened.

"Bombs away."

The string of hundred-pounders left the racks and arched away earthward; he couldn't see them but he knew. The bombardier had mirrors to watch the drop.

They were real bombs with practice warheads designed to create a small explosion-enough to prove where they'd hit even if the bomb bounced away from its point of impact.

"Your aircraft sir."

Felix hauled back on the yoke. "How did it look?"

Chujoy was very dry. "We just blew h.e.l.l out of eight patches of gra.s.s."

Into the clouds and a steep starboard turn. "Making a three-sixty." A full circle to bomb again. "Jigsaw One to Jigsaw Flight-report."

"Jigsaw Two. One hit I think. Seven near-misses."

"Jigsaw Three. No hits sir. Sorry."

Pappy Johnson switched on his throat mike. "This time you misters will get those bombs on target or I'll personally throw you out of these airplanes with no parachutes."

They made five pa.s.ses. The last three were good enough to make Felix beam at Pappy Johnson: on the third go they stopped three out of four motorcars in their tracks with bombs that penetrated clear through to the ground. On the fourth go they hit two out of three. On the fifth the ground echelon sent five cars onto the field and Felix's flight hit four of them.

"The last drop looked pretty good," Johnson admitted into the radio.

"We're out of bombs," Felix announced. "Close up those holes and keep it tight-let's go home for a coffee break."

He put the nose up into the clouds and they swam into the sunlight. "Now all I've got to do is find a place to put this thing down."

"They'll bring you in."

"Jigsaw Tower-this is Jigsaw One. Can you give me a radar fix?"

The answer was a moment coming and he felt his jaw tighten but then the radio spoke cheerfully: "Roger, Jigsaw One. Turn to zero-four-five and fly for eight minutes. Then turn to one-six-zero. We'll keep a fix on you."

Johnson was charging the flare pistol, inserting it in the fuselage tube above his head in case they made a forced landing: a flare would pinpoint them for rescuers.

Down to 1,000 feet now and about six miles to go. Pappy Johnson said drily, "You want the gear down by any chance, Your Highness?"

"What? Oh-yes. Yes."

"Thought you might."

He peered into the soup. There were bangs and rattles in the airframe as the wheels locked down.

"Tower to Jigsaw One. Fly one-five-five."

"Roger. I have the runway in sight." He glanced at Johnson: "Flaps twenty."

"Yeah. Just remember this airplane does not have reversible props."

The ground came up grey and wet. He came in fast-100 knots-and he had to stop the airplane before he ran out of runway so he fishtailed gently and rode his brakes and brought her in fifty yards short of the limit. He pulled off to the side to give the others room to land and when they were down he taxied her over to the hardstands and sliced an index finger across his Adam's apple-the signal to Johnson to cut his engines.

Calhoun was walking over with the chocks when they dropped out of the hatch. "Give us a dollar's worth," Pappy Johnson said, "and a manicure and a good rubdown, Calhoun."

Then Johnson turned and walked Felix toward the Ready Room. "You've got four weeks left to hit the targets every time. Not three out of four, not four out of five. Every time."

"I hope we can."

"You can do it," Johnson said. "You're a good outfit. Better than you think you are."

"Are we?"

"You know you are. You just needed to have someone tell you."

At the dying end of October the three Russian n.o.blemen boarded a trimotor at Barcelona and flew to Lisbon, A hard Atlantic sun burned in the cloudless Portuguese sky but the wind that came off the ocean was cold and whipping; there were whitecaps in the Tagus estuary.

The Peugeot that transported them through Lisbon had hard springs and stank of imbedded fumes of Gauloise tobacco; the driver was a chain-smoking Frenchman badly in need of a shave. The three Russians-Prince Leon Kirov; Count Anatol Markov; Baron Oleg Zimovoi-wore Homburgs and topcoats and their luggage consisted only of overnight cases.

The narrow streets of Lisbon thronged with human flotsam-the refugee overflow of the European war-and here and there a man could be seen walking purposefully, topcoat flying in the sinister wind; these were the ones who had somewhere to go, the black-marketeers and salesmen of information who had descended upon Lisbon in the past year like hungry ants on a dying carca.s.s. Lisbon was the Occident's Macao: the capital of intrigue, a living museum of every phylum and species of human vice and avarice. The crowded architecture was stone and stucco in bleak grey hues; cobblestones glistening with river spray; crumbling buildings five hundred years old that bespoke suspicion, evil, torture, Inquisition. In the pa.s.sages dark automobiles crowded horse carts aside and darted homicidally among the pedestrian fugitives.

Their host's driver slid the Peugeot through the crowds with stolid contempt and presently they were out of Lisbon along the right bank of the estuary; now the speed went up and they were wheeling along the coast road with a rubbery whine, speeding through the fishing villages-Belem, Oeiras, Estoril-finally Cascais.

Count Anatol said, "It is just up to the right now if I recall."

Oleg was instantly suspicious: "You have been here before?"

"It was not always American Emba.s.sy property. At one time it was a villa belonging to the Graf von Schnee. One of the finest private baccarat tables in Europe. Players came from as far away as South America."

"When men have nothing better to do with money than gamble it away...."

Prince Leon cut across him smoothly: "I think we're here."

The villa was on a height in a pastel cl.u.s.ter of genteel residences each of which had its two or three acre garden of semi-tropical vegetation: rubbery greenery, bougainvillaea, palms, grape trees, Bermuda lawns, flowers carefully tended and vividly displayed. A high wall sealed off the property and a man in an olive drab uniform and a white Sam Browne belt came to attention at the gate. The driveway was crushed seash.e.l.ls; it gritted under the tires.

The portico was an arched stucco affair; the villa was high and ma.s.sive with walls of North African tile, predominantly pink-very bright in the sun. Their heels rang on the mosaic floor.

They had proceeded along half the length of the lofty corridor when the wide doors opened at the far end and their host revealed himself. "Welcome, gentlemen. I'm Colonel Buckner."

"It's good of you to come on such short notice." Buckner arranged the seating and saw to their drinks. Then he took a place in the circle of chairs.

It had been the Graf von Schnee's game room and the silent deep carpet remained but the room had been redesigned by its American tenants as a conference chamber; there was a long table beneath the windows but he hadn't wanted the formality of that.

He began with casual inquiries; it was the first time he'd met any of them and he didn't want to reveal the extent of his knowledge about them.

After a decent interval he cleared his throat and leaned forward in his seat with his forearms across his knees. "Very well then. Suppose we start by having me lay out the situation and then we'll discuss it from there. Are there any questions you'd like to ask me before I start?"

There were none; he hadn't expected any. They were smart enough to sound him out first.

He said, "I'm here as the informal representative of the President. I stress the word 'informal.' Nothing I say can be construed to be a binding commitment by my government. We're involved in a clandestine operation-if there's ever a public question about it we're all bound to deny it. Even if your operation succeeds it'll be many years before Washington will be able to admit having had any part in it."

"That's fully understood," said Baron Oleg Zimovoi. "There won't be any embarra.s.sing exposures on our part."

"I'm just trying to explain to you why we'd have to deny it."

Baron Oleg produced a pipe and a pouch.

Buckner said, "Here's where we stand. You're trying to overthrow the Stalin government. You've got tacit approval and a certain amount of secret materiel support from the governments of the United States and Great Britain.

"This thing was pretty chancy from the start. There've always been a lot of ifs in it. I don't know if you realize this but we very nearly lost Russia to the n.a.z.is ten days ago-there was an attempt on Stalin's life."

"We were aware of it," murmured Count Anatol Markov.

Buckner gave him a sharp glance. "Then you know the Kremlin discovered the plot in time to head it off and corral the perpetrators. They're not fools. They're bound to be twice as alert now as they were before that attempt-your chances are getting slimmer all the...."

"Colonel Buckner," Count Anatol said, very cool. "The recent attempt on Stalin's life failed because Stalin was warned in advance."

"By whom?" He had to ask it even though he suddenly felt he knew the answer.

"By us," Anatol told him without hesitation.

Buckner was angry and showed it. "Is it your idea of good faith to keep your allies in the dark on an issue that vital?"

"The issue is no longer vital," Anatol said.

Baron Oleg said, "That attempt failed because we foiled it, Colonel. Stalin will not be given warning of our own attack. And it is rea.s.suring, don't you think, that our partic.i.p.ation in forestalling the German attempt was not discovered by your own intelligence. It leads one to conclude that our security is very tight."