“I did,” Kosigan said, “but Dmitri told me he has a better idea. Why don’t you tell him, Dmitri?”
Dogin regarded Shovich as the mobster adjusted himself in his chair. Dogin sensed that Shovich did it just to make him wait. He settled back, crossed his leg, brushed mud from the side of his black boot.
“My people in America tell me that the FBI has gotten very good at ‘counterpunching,’ ” Shovich said. “If we run gambling or drug operations, they merely try to contain us. But if we hit their people, they strike back hard. It keeps the streets from becoming a war zone. Since most of the mobsters are in this for the money, not for politics, they refuse to attack government targets. ”
“Then what do you propose?” Dogin asked.
“An object lesson against a civilian target,” Shovich said.
“To what end?” Dogin asked.
Kosigan answered, “To get America’s undivided attention. When we have it, we tell them that if they leave us alone in Eastern Europe, there will be no further acts of terrorism. And we’ll even turn over the terrorist, so that President Lawrence can look swift and decisive.”
“Of course,” Shovich said, “you will have to reimburse my colleagues in America for the loss of a man. But that will come out of your little treasure trove.”
“Of course,” Kosigan agreed. He reached for the bottle of vodka and regarded Dogin. “As we’ve said all along, Minister, all we need do is hold the U.S. off until the nightly news shows videos of soldiers who have been maimed or killed. The people of the United States will not tolerate American casualties. With the election just months away, President Lawrence will not intervene.
Dogin looked at Shovich. “What kind of civilian target will you strike?”
“I wouldn’t know,” he said with disinterest. “My people live there. Some of them are mercenaries and some of them are patriots. But whoever is picked will know how to strike at the American soul. I’ve left it entirely in their hands.” He smiled humorlessly. “By this time tomorrow, we’ll have seen it on the news.”
“Tomorrow!” Kosigan said. “We are men of action!” He poured vodka in his and Shovich’s cups. “Our friend Nikolai does not drink, so we’ll allow him to toast us with tea.” He raised his cup. “To our alliance. ”
As the men touched the rims of their cups together, Dogin felt a burning in his belly. This was a coup, a second Revolution. It was empire building, and people were going to die. But while he accepted that, he found it difficult to accept Shovich’s casualness. The mobster had moved from the concept of kidnaping to killing as though there was no difference.
Dogin sipped his tea and reminded himself that this unholy marriage was necessary. Every leader made compromises to move forward. Peter the Great changed Russian art and industry with ideas he brought from Europe. German cooperation enabled Lenin to overthrow the Czar and withdraw from World War 1. Stalin consolidated his power by murdering Trotsky as well as hundreds of thousands of others. Yeltsin forged alliances with the black marketeers to keep his economy from collapsing entirely.
Now he was collaborating with a gangster. At least Shovich was a Russian. Better that than going to the United States with hat in hand, begging for money and moral support as Gorbachev and now Zhanin had done. As the others emptied their cups, Dogin avoided Shovich’s eyes. He tried not to think of the means, only the ends. Instead, he envisioned a map on the wall of his office. A map of a grand new Soviet Union.
TEN
Sunday, 8:00 P.M., New York City
After receiving the bagel order from St. Petersburg, Herman Josef had put ten pounds of plastique in a shopping bag. He placed bagels on top of them. Then he walked three blocks to Everything Russian, a shop that sold books, videotapes, and other goods from the homeland. Sixty minutes later, he’d taken another ten pounds of explosives to Mickey’s Pawn Shop of Brighton Beach.
During the day Herman had made fifteen deliveries, bringing a total of 150 pounds of explosives to different locations. He didn’t know if he was being followed, but he assumed that he was. So at each stop he took payment for the deliveries, even bitching audibly on the way back if his tip wasn’t big enough.
When Herman left each site, the explosives were carried by another messenger to the Nicholas Senior Citizens Home, where they were packed into a body bag, taken to the Cherkassov Funeral Home in the St. Marks section of New York City, and loaded into a coffin. The Chaikov family left the procuring of weapons and explosives to the Belnicks. Their expertise was in planning and executing operations.
The Queens-Midtown Tunnel stretches under the East River in New York, from 36th Street between Second and Third avenues. It connects Manhattan Island to the Long Island Expressway in the borough of Queens. The fifty-year-old tunnel is one of the principal arteries from the city, and at any given time its 6,000-foot length is filled with traffic.
At this time on a warm Sunday evening, the tunnel was not being used by commuters. The bright orange lights lit the way for families returning from a day in the city or travelers heading to JFK International or La Guardia Airport.
Tall, white-haired, white-bearded Eival Ekdol rolled down the window of the hearse. He breathed in the oilthick air, air which reminded him of Moscow. He didn’t think about who the people around him were or what they were doing. It didn’t matter. Their deaths were the price of fighting for a new world order.
As he neared the tunnel exit, the Russian native pushed in the cigarette lighter. His left front tire blew, and he guided the swerving hearse to the wall. He ignored the curses of drivers who had to change lanes to avoid hitting him. Americans were always swearing, as though bad things had no right to happen and, moreover, were directed at each of them personally.
Ekdol put on his emergency lights, got out of the hearse, and walked to the tunnel exit. Upon emerging, he took a cellular phone from his pocket and pretended to speak. He continued to speak as he walked toward the tollbooths.
He passed a transit officer, who was sitting in a police car by the booths. The young man asked if he needed help.
“Thank you, no,” said Ekdol in thickly accented English. “I’ve phoned for help.”
“Is it just the tire?” asked the officer.
“No,” Ekdol told him. “The axle.”
“Well, it’s dark in there,” the officer said. “Someone’s gonna hit you. You got flares?”
“No, sir.”
He popped the trunk. “We’d better go put some out.”
Thank you,” said Ekdol. “I’ll join you in a moment. I must phone the bereaved.”
“Yeah,” the officer grinned. “Helluva thing to have funeral with no body.”
“Exactly, sir,” Ekdol said.
The officer got out of the car and went to the trunk. Removing a box of flares, he headed toward the tunnel, whistling.
Still pretending to talk into the phone, Ekdol walked around the tollbooth. Moments later, a Cutlass came through one of the token gates and pulled up beside him. Before getting in, Ekdol pressed the pound sign on the numeric keypad.
As the Cutlass sped off, a yellow fireball erupted from the mouth of the tunnel, sending smoke, chunks of stone, and shards of metal in every direction. Cars just emerging from the tunnel were blown end over end. One cartwheeled over the transit officer and smashed into a van at the tollbooth. Both vehicles blew apart, engulfing the toll booth in flame. Other cars were pounded flat at the entranceway by falling debris, while inside the tunnel there were the muffled sounds of secondary blasts as burning cars exploded. Within moments, the toll plaza was covered with rolling white smoke and a thick, horrific silence.
After several seconds, the silence was broken by the bass-fiddle groan of bending girders and the crack of concrete. A moment later, a quarter mile of expressway and the buildings along it shook as the roof of the tunnel collapsed. The roar of the water was like an ocean gone mad as it poured into the breach. The walls of the tunnel were battered down under the pressure, and shattered pieces were washed through the mouth of the tunnel as the river pushed the cars and fallen stone out of the way. The hiss of extinguished fires was drowned by the surging water as the river flowed outward, along the highway, taking down the few cars and streetlamps that still stood. Steam poured from the broken mouth of the tunnel, rising skyward to mingle with the darker smoke.
As the waters settled and the debris came to a rest, sirens sounded in the distance. Within minutes, police helicopters were racing low along the expressway, videotaping traffic leaving the scene.