That was worth a grin around the pipe stem. “Very good, Jack. You’re starting to catch on. Very little they do makes any bloody sense, objectively speaking. However, it isn’t all that hard to predict their behavior. You decide for yourself what the intelligent action is, and then reverse it. Works every time,” Harding laughed.
“But the other thing Sol said that worries me is that people like that who have power in their hands can be dangerous sons-of-bitches. They don’t know when to stop, and they don’t know how to use their power intelligently. I guess that’s how Afghanistan got started.”
“Correct.” Simon nodded seriously. “They are captured by their own ideological illusions, and they can’t see their way clear of it. And the real problem is, they do control a bloody great lot of power.”
“I’m missing something in the equation,” Ryan said.
“We all are, Jack. That’s part of the job.”
It was time to change subjects: “Anything new on the Pope?”
“Nothing yet today. If Basil has anything, I ought to hear about it before lunch. Worried about that?”
Jack nodded soberly. “Yeah. The problem is, if we do see a real threat, what the hell can we do about it? It’s not like we can put a company of Marines around him, is it? Exposed as he is—I mean, he’s in public so much that you can’t protect him.”
“And people like him don’t shrink from danger, do they?”
“I remember when Martin Luther King got whacked. Hell, he knew—he must have known—there were guns out there with his name on them. But he never backed away. It just wasn’t part of his ethos to run and hide. Won’t be any different in Rome, buddy, and every other place he goes.”
“Moving targets are supposed to be harder to hit,” Simon observed halfheartedly.
“Not when you know where he’s moving to a month or two in advance. If KGB decides to put a hit on the guy, damn, I don’t see much we can do about it.”
“Except perhaps to warn him.”
“Great. So he can laugh about it. He probably would, you know. He’s been through Nazis and communists for the past forty years. What the hell is left to scare the guy with?” Ryan paused. “If they decide to do it, who pushes the button?”
“I should think it would have to be voted on by the Politburo itself in plenary session. The political implications are too severe for any one member, however senior, to try something like this on his own authority, and remember how collegial they are—no one moves anywhere by himself, even Andropov, who’s the most independent-minded of the lot.”
“Okay, that’s—what? Fifteen guys have to vote up or down on it. Fifteen mouths, plus staffs and family members to talk to about it. How good are our sources? Will we hear about it?”
“Sensitive question, Jack. I cannot answer that one, I’m afraid.”
“Can’t-can’t or can’t-I’m-not-allowed-to?” Jack asked more pointedly.
“Jack, yes, we have sources of which I am aware, but which I cannot discuss with you.” Harding actually seemed embarrassed to say it.
“Hey, I understand, Simon.” Jack had some of those himself. For instance, he couldn’t even speak the words TALENT KEYHOLE here, for which he was cleared, but which was NOFORN, no talking about this one to a foreigner—even though Simon and certainly Sir Basil knew quite a bit about it. It was so perverse, because it mainly denied information to people who might have made good use of it. If Wall Street acted this way, all of America would be under the poverty line, Jack groused. Either people were trustworthy or they were not. But the game had its rules, and Ryan played by those rules. That was the cost of admittance into this particular club.
“This is bloody good stuff,” Harding said, flipping to page three of Bernie Katz’s debriefing.
“Bernie’s smart,” Ryan confirmed. “That’s why Cathy likes working for him.”
“But he’s an eye doctor, not a psychiatrist, correct?”
“Simon, at that level of medicine, everybody is a little bit of everything. I asked Cathy: The diabetic retinopathy Suslov had is indicative of a major health problem. The diabetes messes up the little blood vessels in the back of the eye, and you can see it when you do an examination. Bernie and his team fixed it partway—you can’t fix it all the way—and gave him back about, oh, seventy-five to eighty percent of his sight, good enough to drive a car in daylight, anyway, but the underlying health problem is a mother. It isn’t just the small blood vessels in the eye, right? He’s got that problem all over his body. Figure Red Mike will croak from, kidney failure or heart disease in the next two years at the outside.”
“Our chaps think he’s got five years or so,” Harding offered.
“Well, I’m not a doc. You can have some people talk to Bernie about it if you want, but everything is right there. Cathy says you can tell a lot about diabetes from looking at the eyeball.”
“Does Suslov know that?”
Ryan shrugged. “That is a good question, Simon. Docs don’t always tell their patients, probably less so over there. Figure Suslov’s being treated by a politically reliable doctor of professorial rank. Here, that would mean a top-drawer guy who really knows his stuff. Over there…?”
Harding nodded. “Correct. He may know his Lenin more than his Pasteur. Did you ever hear about Sergey Korolev, their chief rocket designer? That was a particularly ugly incident. The poor bugger was essentially murdered on the table because two senior surgeons didn’t like each other, and one wouldn’t bail the other out when the boat began to leak badly. It was probably good for the West, but he was a fine engineer, and he was killed by medical incompetence.”
“Anybody pay up for that one?” Ryan asked.
“Oh, no. They were both too politically important, lots of patrons in high places. They’re safe, until they kill one of their friends, and that won’t happen. I’m sure they both have competent young people under them to cover their backsides.”
“You know what they need in Russia? Lawyers. I don’t like ambulance-chasers, but I guess they do keep people on their toes.”
“In any case, no, Suslov probably does not know the gravity of his condition. At least that’s what our medical consultants think. He still drinks his vodka according to HUMINT reports, and that is definitely contra-indicated.” Harding grimaced. “And his replacement will be Alexandrov, every bit as unpleasant a chap as his mentor. I’ll have to see about updating his dossier.” He made a note.
As for Ryan, he turned back to his morning briefing pages before starting on his official project. Greer wanted Ryan to work on a study of management practices in the Soviet armament industry, to see how—and if—that segment of the Soviet economy worked. Ryan and Harding would be cooperating on the study, which would use both British and American data. It was something that suited Ryan’s academic background. It might even get him noticed high up.
THE RETURN MESSAGE came in at 11:32 hours. Fast work in Rome, Zaitzev thought, as he began the decryption. He’d call Colonel Rozhdestvenskiy as soon as he got through it, but it was going to take a while. The captain checked the wall clock. It would delay his lunch, too, but the priority condemned him to some stomach growls. About the only good news was that Colonel Goderenko had started his encipherment sequence at the top of page 285.
MOST SECRET IMMEDIATE AND URGENT
FROM: REZIDENT ROME
To: OFFICE OF CHAIRMAN, Moscow CENTRE
REFERENCE: YOUR OP DISPATCH 15-8-82-666
GETTING CLOSE TO THE PRIEST is NOT DIFFICULT WITHOUT FIXED TIME CONSTRAINTS. GUIDANCE WILL BE NEEDED FOR A FULL EVALUATION OF YOUR REQUEST. PRIEST ENGAGES IN PREDICTABLE PUBLIC AUDIENCES AND APPEARANCES WHICH ARE KNOWN WELL IN ADVANCE. To MAKE USE OF THIS OPPORTUNITY WILL NOT RPT NOT BE EASY DUE TO LARGE CROWDS ATTENDING FUNCTIONS. SECURITY ARRANGEMENTS FOR HIM DIFFICULT TO ASSESS WITHOUT FURTHER GUIDANCE. RECOMMEND AGAINST PHYSICAL ACTION TO BE TAKEN AGAINST PRIEST DUE TO EXPECTED ADVERSE POLITICAL CONSEQUENCES. DIFFICULT TO HIDE ORIGIN OF AN OPERATION AGAINST PRIEST. ENDS.
Well, Zaitzev thought, the rezident didn’t like this idea very much. Would Yuriy Vladimirovich listen to this bit of advice from the field? That, Zaitzev knew, was far above his pay grade. He lifted his phone and dialed.
“Colonel Rozhdestvenskiy,” the brusque voice answered.
“Captain Zaitzev in Communications Central. I have a reply to your six-six-six, Comrade Colonel.”
“On my way,” Rozhdestvenskiy responded.
The colonel was as good as his word, passing through the control point three minutes later. By that time, Zaitzev had returned the cipher book to central storage and slipped the message form, plus the translation, into a brown envelope, which he handed to the colonel.
“Has anyone seen this?” Rozhdestvenskiy asked.
“Certainly not, comrade,” Zaitzev replied.