STAY WITH ME.
I’m saying it over and over as I come to. My face is wet with tears. There’s a patch of oil by my feet. I try to move, but I can’t. All I can do is fractionally raise my head.
I’m in some kind of warehouse, tied to a chair. I blink under the lights. When the color kicks in, I see that the oil is blood. My right eye feels like somebody has been using it for target practice. The place is dilapidated, semi-abandoned. I’ve been stripped of my jacket and am shivering uncontrollably. I don’t know how long I’ve been out. I glance through a hole in one of the shit-caked windows. I can see that the snow has stopped falling, but it is still night.
Sitting in front of me on some upturned wooden crates are three of the men I saw on the sidewalk. One of them clutches a wrench; another cradles a pistol. The third smokes while he stares at me.
I hear a car door open and close.
Footsteps.
A shadow falls across the concrete. The hairs lift on the back of my neck. The thug with the cigarette jumps up, but is waved back to his seat.
The Napoleon image in Gapes’s cabin didn’t do Ilitch justice. He’s tall, and workouts – aided by a little surgical intervention – have driven away the pasty pallor of his youth. He has to be sixty-five, but his swarthy complexion makes him look younger. A cashmere coat is draped across his shoulders.
‘What did you want with Sasha?’ His voice, heavily accented, is unexpectedly soft.
‘A book.’
He wags a finger.
The guy with the wrench gets to his feet.
‘Well, of course. Colonel Cain, the ex-personal physician of the President of the United States, just happens to be in town on a book-buying spree.’
I say nothing. The guy with the wrench flexes his fingers around its handle, like a hitter getting the feel of his bat.
‘I have good news for you, Colonel. My employees, as you can see, are only too eager to dispense some summary justice.
‘Some are old enough to remember Sasha extremely well. Under the circumstances, I wouldn’t consider it disloyal if any of them were to tell me that they felt a little angry at being in the presence of the man who killed the woman they once adored.’
‘I didn’t kill her.’
‘We’ll let the FSB be the judge of that. They are very keen to speak with you. Have you ever been to Lefortovo? No, of course you haven’t. This is your first time in Moscow. The basement there used to flood, so I’m told. It doesn’t any longer.
‘It is no business of mine what they do to you there. But I imagine they will be interested in what you and Sasha had to discuss in the former laboratory of my erstwhile father-in-law, M. M. Kalunin. And will want to know, too, why you were keen to make a donation to a Russian Orthodox church in Jerusalem.’
He turns to the guy with the wrench, who takes up position behind me.
‘The United States Secret Service is investigating you,’ I blurt.
‘So? Everything is negotiable. The FSB will wish to talk about this, too. Not that it will help you. The transcript of your discussion with Mr Kantner is already on the desk of the man waiting for you at Lefortovo. I have examined it myself. It clearly points to the fact that your visit here is unofficial. You may even be in breach of the terms of your visa.
‘Things are changing in Russia, as they are in your country. We too have a new president. Our security service, however, still adheres to the old rules. All of this can be discussed over the next few hours. But in two days’ time, nobody is going to miss a doctor, even one as famous as you, who went for a walk in the wrong part of Moscow.’
I hear the scrape of a shoe on the concrete behind me, and brace myself for a blow that doesn’t come. Ilitch turns and walks away.
Somebody grasps my arms and hauls me to my feet.
There’s an unmarked van at the back of the building. A black Audi directly behind it, lights on, engine running.
They drag me across the concrete and throw me in the back of the van.
My face hits the floor. A moment before the doors slam shut, I catch a glimpse of Ilitch clambering into the back of his Mercedes.
We drive for ten miles or so on a road that bends to the right. It’s freezing cold. I curl myself into a ball. The driver takes two more right turns and drives a hundred meters or so before he hits the brakes with such force I slam into the cab wall.
Yells from the front, the crashing of gears.
We fly into reverse.
A horn blares. We skid, hit something solid. Stop.
The driver’s door opens. There’s a shout and two shots.
From behind, a volley of automatic fire, more shouting, two more blasts.
The doors fly open and I’m confronted by a figure in a black balaclava gripping a pump-action shotgun.
He hauls me out. We’re on a main road, in an industrial area. Watery yellow light bleeds from a lone streetlamp. The van has reversed into a bollard. Just behind it, slewed across the road, the black Audi is riddled with bullets.
The guy who’s grabbed me is flanked by another, also masked. They drag me toward one of two gunmetal BMWs parked at the side of the road.
They throw me into the trunk and slam it shut.
We make a fast turn. Thirty seconds later, we’re back at the interchange, and a moment after that, accelerating fast. This time, it’s impossible to know which way we’re going.
After another fifteen minutes, we turn off and drive for about a mile before coming to a stop. I hear the passenger door open.
The lid pops and I catch a glimpse of a three-quarter moon through the branches of a tree and a black-clad figure against it.
I try to get up, but the whole of my right side is numb.
The man says something and pushes me back into the trunk. Throws a blanket over me. Leans forward. There’s something in his hand.
I know that voice.
The needle glints in the moonlight. He pulls up my left sleeve and jabs it into my upper arm.
I’m sinking.
But I know that voice …