Romanov Succession Part 24

"I'd d.a.m.n well like to know how you got wind of that scheme."

"We have access to channels of information in Germany that are denied to you, I'm sure," Anatol said.

The Russian Count seemed made of ice: no emotion at all in his presentation. Buckner said, "It might be helpful to us all if you'd share those channels."

For the first time Prince Leon spoke. "The time may very well come when it is mutually advantageous for us to do that, Colonel. At the moment however our alliance is fragile as you know. Clearly that makes it important that we retain what few advantages we have. They may prove useful as bargaining points as time goes by-I'm sure you can appreciate that."

"You're very candid."

"I try to be when the reverse would serve no purpose."

"At least you can tell me this much. Who organized that attempt against Stalin?"

He saw them look at one another; Prince Leon nodded his visible a.s.sent and Count Anatol said, "They were White Russians-the followers of the Grand Duke Mikhail. The program had n.a.z.i support."

"Just as yours has Anglo-American support. That's rather cozy-playing both ends against the middle."

"It was hardly like that, Colonel," Baron Oleg said. He pushed his thumb down into the pipe and prepared to strike a match. "If we had been working with them we'd hardly have given away their plan to the Bolsheviks."

Anatol said, "It was a race between their operation and ours. We have put them out of the race-temporarily at least."

"What did they expect to achieve?"

"A German victory. Apparently Hitler offered Mikhail the puppet throne of Russia."

"I see."

Prince Leon said, "I'm sure you did not summon us here to discuss the thwarted attempt on Stalin's life last week."

Oleg sucked at his pipe until he had it going to his satisfaction and then he said. "He asked us here in order to impose a schedule on us."

They were d.a.m.nably irritating: forever a jump ahead of him. He'd underestimated them badly. He said cautiously. "I'm not trying to impose anything on anybody. But history has a way of doing those things for us. I think we've reached the point where we've got no choice but to trust one another-there isn't time for anything else."

Prince Leon said, "In what matters are we to trust one another, Colonel?"

"It's time you let us in on your tactical plan, I think."

"Of course he thinks that," Baron Oleg remarked to Anatol. "He has thought that from the beginning."

Prince Leon said, "The British seem satisfied, Colonel."

"Then perhaps the British have been approached more frankly than we have."

He saw them glance at one another again. He said, "Danilov went to London two weeks ago. Who did he talk to? What did he do there?"

"I'm sure we cannot answer that," Anatol said. "We were not there."

"You're playing a dangerous game."

Baron Oleg took the pipe out of his mouth. "We are fighting for Russia, Colonel. Not for the United States of America. Surely you recognize that our first obligation is not to you."

Buckner willed himself to sit back and cross his legs. "Very well. According to our latest intelligence briefs the Germans have surrounded four entire Red Armies west of Moscow-the Nineteenth, the Twenty-fourth, the Thirtieth and the Thirty-second. Von Bock has them trapped east of Smolensk. Those pockets will be wiped out or captured within five or six days at most. Guderian has the Third and the Thirteenth surrounded. That's six entire armies, gentlemen-the better part of a million troops and G.o.d knows how many tanks and guns. The roads to Moscow will be wide open within a week. Stalin's throwing everything he's got left into the Mozhaisk Line and he's put Zhukov personally in charge of it-but it's only forty miles from the center of Moscow and the way things look right now Zhukov won't be able to hold it for long."

Count Anatol said, "The blizzards of winter will stop them, Colonel. Winter comes in three to four weeks."

"And if the panzers breach the Mozhaisk Line before that?"

"We do not think they will. The German tanks are wallowing in deep mud now-quite often they have been immobilized completely. They are not likely to break Zhukov's lines within a week or two. And those four armies on the Smolensk-Moscow road are still holding their positions, surrounded or not. As long as they remain there the Germans can't advance with their full force."

Prince Leon had a gentle voice. "Colonel, we began this undertaking with the understanding that it would be done within one hundred days. We expect to be in operation well within that time limit."

"The limit has been shortened," Buckner said flatly. "Hitler has moved faster than we had any reason to expect. We credited the Russian army with more fighting ability than it's demonstrated."

"No," Leon said softly. "It was not their ability you depended on-it was their will to fight. The elimination of Stalin-the restoration of their country to its people-will rekindle that spirit."

"I'm not sure we have time for that any more."

Leon's face told him nothing. It was nearly expressionless: remote, courteous, attentive. "I'm not certain I understand your position, Colonel. What is it you wish us to do-abandon the enterprise?"

"No. I'm asking you to accelerate it. To convince Danilov he hasn't got as much time as he thought he had."

Baron Oleg said, "There are certain things you can't rush, Colonel. You can't expect to make nine women pregnant in order to get a baby in one month. Nor can you execute a plan like ours with half-trained and half-equipped troops. There is no point starting the operation unless it has every possible advantage-the odds are poor enough as it is."

Buckner shook his head. "It's your choice, gentlemen. Speed it up or cancel it. There's no third course."

Count Anatol said, "That is an ultimatum, is it?"

"I'm not dictating it. The facts are."

"No," Prince Leon said. "It is not the facts, Colonel, it is your interpretation of them. One has the impression your President has developed-what is your expression-cold feet? The n.a.z.is have not moved very much faster than we antic.i.p.ated. They are approximately where we expected them to be by autumn-nearer Moscow than they were before but not yet at the gates of the city. We expected Zhukov to blunt their drive and he did so. We expected the rains to slow their tanks and they have done so. We now expect winter to stall the German advance and while no one can promise it there is a good likelihood it will do so. No, Colonel. The facts in Europe have not changed. It is only the facts in Washington that may have changed."

"What are you implying, Your Highness? That we're trying to back out of our agreement?" He could feel the blood rise to his cheeks. "My country isn't in the habit of reneging on its commitments."

"Oh come now," Baron Oleg said. "You're not in a public forum now-we are not impressed by a show of the flag, Colonel. You will renege on this agreement the moment you feel it is in your interests to do so. You have kept the bargain only because you are convinced it can still be profitable to your interests. And you are trying to increase the odds of success by shortening the schedule."

Anatol said, "And we are trying to convince you that shortening it will do just the opposite-it will reduce the odds of success, don't you see that?"

Oleg sc.r.a.ped ash out of the bowl of his pipe; when he spoke it was to Anatol. "The nearer we come to the day of reckoning the more nervous they become. It may prove intolerable-it may ruin us in the end."

"Then we shall have to calm them down, won't we." Anatol turned to Buckner. "What will it take to soothe you, Colonel?"

He was beet-red to the hairline and knew it. These shrewd b.a.s.t.a.r.ds had been weaned on Machiavelli; they were the hard realists of an old school that went back a thousand years and he hadn't the guns for this and he knew it. But he had his instructions and he had to proceed. "I've told you what it will take. Move it up."

"We can't do that," Prince Leon said in a reasonable way. "The timing is determined by Stalin. When Stalin moves we move. It is that simple, Colonel, and nothing you can do or say will change that."

He watched the Peugeot turn out through the gates and then he turned to the game room and opened the side door to the chamber beyond. A thin man with short hair and a neat grey suit looked up from the wire recorder's rewinding reels.

"Did you get it all?"

"Yes sir."

"For all the d.a.m.n good it'll do us," Buckner growled. "Keep it to yourself, will you? I wouldn't like it bandied about Washington that I let three doddering old playboys make an a.s.s out of me."

"What now, Colonel?"

"The purpose of this little quiz session was to pry Danilov's plan out of them. It didn't work. There's one more thing to try. Pack us up, Hawkes, we're going to England."

PART FIVE:.

November 1941.

The pale disc of the sun was vague in the grey November sky. In the distance beyond the woods he saw the Dakotas going over, vomiting jumpers toward the fifty-foot target circle. Alex watched the jumps as he ran.

The runway was 4,800 feet long and they were running three laps today. Going into the third lap ahead of Solov's company of troops he felt the pull of the stiffened muscle of the bullet-pinked leg.

Breathing to run: let it all out, open the mouth wide, pull in as much as the lungs can hold-and hold it there for three strides; then expel it and do it again. It had taken him two weeks of running to get his wind back but now he had the rhythm and hardly noticed the weight of the combat pack on his shoulders.

It was more of a dogtrot than a run-you didn't sprint for two and a half miles-but they were eating up the ground at a good clip and there weren't any stragglers. Solov ran along at the rear of the column, keeping them bunched up, running the way he walked-with a p.r.o.nounced roll, as if each leg almost collapsed before the other took his weight. Now and then he would yell at them; he began yelling in earnest when they got toward the end of the lap and the company put on a burst of effort and came tumbling off the tarmac onto the gra.s.s around Alex. A good many of them were hardly out of breath.

Solov gathered them in close-order formation and marched them across the runway to where their rifles were stacked in neat pyramids, muzzles skyward. They shouldered their arms and marched quick-time into the woods to the bayonet field and Alex charged with them, roaring in his chest, heaving the deadly spear into the dummies and yanking it out and rushing on to the next.

After bayonet drill the company sprawled on the gra.s.s and Alex went around talking to them individually. "How do you feel, soldier?"

"Very well, sir. Thank you."

He went on. There was a young man-one of the very few who had joined the regiment since the Finland campaigns-sitting on the ground cleaning his bayonet. Alex stopped by him. "Keep your seat, Zurov. How do you like the training?"

"Sometimes it gets a little boring, sir. But I know we need it." Zurov's unformed face did not yet contain the lines that made a whole human being.

"You find the bayonet drill boring?"

"Oh not that, sir. It's rather fun. Bayoneting straw dummies is only playing a harmless game, after all."

Alex nodded and moved on to the next: "Everything all right, soldier?"

Solov came across the gra.s.s toward him, head and shoulders rolling. "They're nearly ready, General."

"Yes, I think they are." Alex turned his shoulder to the others and went on in a lower voice. "You'll have to wash Zurov out."

"Zurov? He's one of the brightest youngsters we've had in years."

"He thinks of bayonet drill as a harmless game, Solov. Those who recognize that are the ones who have trouble facing the real thing-when the time comes to put his knife in a man he'll hesitate."

"Very well sir. I'll have him a.s.signed to orderly duties."

"You've got eight minutes to move them to the hand-to-hand course. Better get them on their feet now."

He walked away from the company in a mild gloom of depression. You had to thank G.o.d there were still men like Zurov-and when it came to the practice of war you had to give them the back of your hand.

Spaight came batting into the hangar office at half-past four. "d.a.m.n good. I only had six jumpers outside the target circle the last go."

"That's six too many, John."

"It's better than last week-and next week will be better than this one."

"It's going to have to be. We're pulling out in twenty-one days."

In the evening Alex watched Major Postsev and Prince Felix rehea.r.s.e the men on Red Army regulations and behavior. One by one the men had to recite their false ident.i.ties, the "friends" they had in the Seventeenth Red Army Division on the Finland border, the official reasons why they were traveling detached duty. It wasn't only to get them in; it was a drill designed to get them out as well-if the operation went sour. It was the only way Alex knew to set it up: he wasn't sending them in unless the back door remained open for them to escape if they had to. There would be tremendous risks for them but at least they had to be given the chance.

At half-past eleven when he left the hangar they were still at it. He walked out through the gate and along to the cottage and let himself in wearily. Corporal Cooper sat in the parlor drinking tea, watching the clock and the warm red tubes of the shortwave transceiver.

Alex went through to the back of the house. Sergei was in the kitchen-standing guard, stiffly zealous of Irina, unwilling to leave her alone in the house with Cooper. It amused Alex a little: she was capable of turning men like Cooper into quivering jelly if it suited her; she was in no danger from that quarter. But it wouldn't do to belittle Sergei's loyalty.

She was curled up asleep. In her hand were the coded notepad sheets for the night's communique. He slipped them carefully out of her grip without waking her and retreated to the front of the house and handed the sheets to Cooper.

"Bit of a long message tonight, in't it sir."

It was long but there wasn't much time left for his conversations with Vlasov. Actually the real danger was at Vlasov's end-it wasn't much risk for Vlasov to receive long communications but it put him in great danger to have to send long ones because they gave Beria's direction-finders more time to zero in on the location of the illicit shortwave broadcaster. For the past six weeks Vlasov had taken the precaution of recording his transmissions on wire and attaching the wire-recorder to the transmitter so that if it were discovered he wouldn't be there at the time. Every third or fourth night-they communicated at those intervals-he had to move the transmitter or set up a new one and his irritability was becoming more and more obvious even through the obstacles of codes and Morse key. Alex had found it necessary to bolster him with encouragements: It will be over soon, that sort of thing.

"Should we get the madame up, sir?"

"No. She's been working around the clock on this. I'll decode the answer myself-it won't be a long one tonight."

It was in fact a very short one. It was not a response to his own broadcast; that would have to wait three days till after Vlasov had decoded Alex's message and encoded his own reply. This was an eighty-second transmission which took Alex forty-five minutes to decode because he wasn't nearly as practiced at it as Irina was. When he had it sorted out on his desk the message had a special importance.

KOLLIN X KOLLIN X FINAL CONSPIRATOR APPREHENDED X INTERROGATIONS HAVE REVEALED MUNICH CONNECTION GERMANS AND RUSSIANS X NETWORK SMASHED X STEEL BEAR DOUBLE STILL MISSING BUT WE ARE IN THE CLEAR X FIELD TRIALS REAFFIRMED FOR FRIDAY FIFTH X HOPE FOR OUR SUCCESS X KOLLIN X CARNEGIE.

The smell of her talc was faint in the room. He fell gently onto the bed and into a sleep as swift as that of a marathon hiker who'd slipped his pack. When he came awake there was a vague recollection of a dream in which Va.s.sily Devenko had been charging at him on horseback at the head of a thousand thundering Tatar Cossacks, their karakul hats bobbing in the dust, Krenk rifles spitting, Va.s.sily's saber flashing in the air.

It was still dark and Irina breathed evenly in sleep. He armed the sweat from his face and lay eyes up in the dark with no idea whether it was one or six in the morning. He saw Va.s.sily at the head of the mess table laughing at something he'd just said to a Polish cavalry major. Va.s.sily was talking about the Polish army and the German army-how Poland would mop up the battlegrounds with German bodies if Hitler were fool enough to attack. It was one of those moments Alex never forgot-a spark that glowed brighter whenever it was touched by the wind of a.s.sociation: the grey rain now beating against the invisible window, a certain taste in the back of his throat that might have been left there by the wine he'd had with supper. Beside him at the officers' mess table a Polish captain had kept shifting the knife and fork at his place, lining them up along various parallels. Alex remembered the captain's eyes: drab and uneasy while Va.s.sily drummed on about squashing the Wehrmacht.

He was a b.l.o.o.d.y fool, he thought. Va.s.sily Devenko the hero of Sebastopol. Well he'd acquitted himself superbly when it called for tenacity and horseback dash: a brave indifference to losses, the cruel Russian battering-ram conception of martial excellence. Va.s.sily the electric, Va.s.sily the magnetic. They'd all have followed him blindly through h.e.l.l: the high handsome face, the white mane, the great thundering voice that called them on to fight and win. But these things were only half of leadership. Va.s.sily's flair and his grand ambitions hadn't been matched by tactical realism and that had been his flaw. In the end he was a b.l.o.o.d.y fool.

Then why the intense feeling that he had to have Va.s.sily's approval?

He still needed that: he needed to have Va.s.sily speak to him in his dreams, he needed to hear Va.s.sily say It's brilliant-you have my admiration. But instead Va.s.sily came pounding at him on horseback lofting his saber with merciless rage.

He turned on his side; he touched her hip and withdrew his hand, still jealous of Va.s.sily, uncertain in the darkness, afraid.

The day had its little crises-a C-47 came in from the chute drop and blew a tire and ground-looped on the runway but it didn't crack up; Calhoun groused about the dwindling supply of spare tires. Then one of the Russian-made 9mm tommy-guns malfunctioned and burst on the target line and the corporal had to be taken to the dispensary to have metal splinters dug out of his hand. One of Solov's men twisted his ankle on the afternoon jump. At four Alex walked down toward the hard-stands to have a look at the high-octane supply; Calhoun groused about that too.

When Alex walked back toward the hangar he saw a dark green car move past on the road beyond the fence. It drew his attention because it moved too slowly. It stopped about eighty yards beyond the gate: the driver got out and lifted the right-hand flap of the engine bonnet to look inside. It was just a bit coincidental having a breakdown right across the road from the fence and the runway. Too far away to get an impression of the driver's face. The car was a Daimler with a long snout and coupe coachwork. The driver's back was hunched; he was reaching into the engine compartment and fiddling but it was quite possible he was looking at the base under his arm. Alex turned his line of march toward the gate.