Fire Hawk (33 page)

Pushkin began to talk. The General listened, poker-faced. When Pushkin had finished Orlov drummed his fingers on his blotter.

‘You know exactly where these Yastreyo technical parts were taken?' he queried warily.

‘No, comrade General. But with the resources you could call on it shouldn't be too—'

‘These suspicions of yours,' he cut in gruffly. ‘Who else have you told about them?'

‘Nobody, General. Only Colonel Komarov.'

‘Your wife knows?'

‘No. I never discuss duty matters with Lena.'

‘Quite correct. Quite correct.'

Elbows on the desk, Orlov leaned forward, pressing his hands together as if in prayer. He touched his finger tips against his lips.

‘And you must
not
discuss it with anybody else. You were quite right to tell me about what you'd uncovered. Absolutely right. You've done your duty, Mikhail Ivanovich. You have upheld the honour of the army of Ukraine. I congratulate you on your determination and your strength. You are personally an honourable man.'

He paused, touching his fingers to his lips again as if he had a caveat to his praise. Then he seemed to think better of it.

‘And you can be assured that I
will
take action as a result of what you've told me. I most certainly will.'

Pushkin allowed himself a smile of relief, a feeling, however, that was to be more short-lived than he could have ever imagined.

‘At this stage, Major, there is nothing more you need to do. But the matter is extremely sensitive. There could be others involved. It would be dangerous to alert them
to what you've uncovered. So it is better you put nothing in writing. Have you by any chance already . . .?'

‘No. I thought it best to speak to you first before writing my formal report.' He glowed with pride that the matter was being treated with such seriousness.

‘Good. Good. In a week or two I may ask you to make a written statement, but do nothing until I tell you. I will contact you directly, in due course. In the meantime I will arrange an immediate transfer for you to another unit.'

Pushkin froze. That hadn't been his plan. To leave the apartment they'd been so lucky to get. To be shunted to some remoter part of the country where they might have to share a
kommunalka
.

‘Comrade General, I don't . . .' he spluttered.

‘But of course. It's impossible for you to remain at Magerov,' Orlov cut in. ‘Regulations – if you make allegations against your commanding officer, you have to be relocated. For your sake and for the sake of Colonel Komarov, whose version of events I must also hear. He may perhaps have an explanation for all this which he may give to
me,
but which he didn't think appropriate for
your
ears. Your relationship with a commander – it has to be based on trust. That trust has broken down, has it not?'

‘Well, yes.'

‘Quite. Now, leave everything to me from this point on. You understand me? You have done your duty, for which the army will undoubtedly show its gratitude in time – assuming your allegations are proven. But you must keep silent from now on. That's the most important thing. Loose talk could destroy the detailed investigation which I shall now have to set in motion. The army needed your voice to reveal this crime. Now it needs your silence so the criminals can be uncovered and dealt with.'

‘Yes, comrade General. I understand. You can rely on me.'

‘I'm sure I can. I'm sure I can.'

The meeting was over. Pushkin stood to leave. General Orlov stood too. The two men were the same height. They shook hands.

‘Goodbye, Mikhail Ivanovich.'

The secretary in the apricot blouse escorted Pushkin from the building.

As he walked slowly back to the railway station, Pushkin felt a great weight gone from his shoulders. He was infused by a new lightness of spirit. The painful delving into his conscience had produced the right result. He'd done his duty and been rewarded by the compliments of the General.

But the feeling of satisfaction was a bitter one. He'd betrayed a friend. For that, he would never be forgiven. By Oleg Andrey'evich Komarov or by himself.

The cloud blowing in off the Black Sea had thickened. The air was warm, almost muggy. No rain now, but Pushkin sensed it might thunder later. Traffic had built up to its end-of-working-day congestion, dilapidated buses vying for space with lines of Volgas and Zhigulis, and the sleeker, newer products from Germany and Japan.

He reached the end of a small park surrounding a statue of Taras Shevchenko, the Ukrainian hero poet, and crossed a broad avenue towards the gothic bulk of the railway station. Halfway across he paused to let a tram pass, its steel mass setting the ground vibrating beneath his feet. He checked his watch. Ten minutes past four. The
elektrychky
to Magerov didn't leave for another hour. He would ring Lena, who would be expecting him home before long.

He crossed the station yard, dodging taxis and private cars depositing passengers laden with overstuffed bags. Up the steps into the booking hall, he felt in his pocket for a telephone token. A line of phones to his right. The
first three he tried didn't work, but with the fourth there was a tone. He dropped in the token and dialled. Lena answered just seconds after the number rang out.

‘Misha?'

He'd not spoken a word but she had already guessed it was him.

‘Yes. I'm in Odess—'

‘Misha! Thank God!' she interrupted, her voice cracking. ‘Misha, Misha . . .'

Pushkin felt ice slide down his spine.

‘What's the matter? What's happened?'

He heard Lena trying to stifle her sobs.

‘Nadya . . .' she gasped.

The ice encased him, freezing his voice.

‘What's happened,' he gulped eventually. ‘
What's happened?
' His voice rose to a shout. A fat woman on the next phone turned to look, her broad peasant face wrinkled with alarm.

‘An accident.' Lena's voice was reedy and thin.

Pushkin's throat cracked dry. The warnings – he'd heard them and ignored them. He felt himself sliding down, down.

BY THE TIME
the delayed
elektrychky
dropped him at Magerov it was getting dark. On the phone Lena had told him little about the incident, except that it had happened while Nadya had been waiting for the bus home from school. The girl was hurt, but all right, she'd said. And Lena was scared. Petrified. Begging him to get home as soon as he could.

Half-walking, half-running from the platform, he propelled himself across the road to the waste ground where he'd left the car. But he couldn't see it. In the spot where he'd left it was an abandoned wreck which some vandal had sprayed with red graffiti. He stopped, staring angrily at the other cars, demanding to know why it was
his
that had been stolen. Then his heart sank. The vandalised machine, he realised, was a Zaporizhzhia. And beneath the red swirls of paint it was the same colour as his car.

It
was
his. The ice ran down his spine again. Devastated by the desecration of his most expensive possession, he examined it from one end to the other. This was no act of random hooliganism. Such things didn't happen in a dump like Magerov.

‘Sons of whores!'

Bitter tears came to his eyes. Tears of indignation and of fear. He glanced round, imagining he was being watched. Then he looked again at his car, touching the red swirls that had defaced it. Hard lacquer. Bone dry.
Done soon after he'd parked there. As a warning. A warning from the criminals who'd murdered driver Reznik and corrupted Oleg Komarov.

The paintwork was ruined but no other damage was visible. He unlocked the door and sat in the driving seat. Paint on the windscreen too, but he could see past it. He started the engine. It worked. So did the lights. He crunched into first and swung the car onto the road, grateful that the dusk would help conceal his shame.

At the gates to the base a guard held up the flat of his hand and shook his head, not recognising the occupant. Pushkin opened the door and leaned out. When the guard saw him he saluted and reached with consternation for Pushkin's papers.

‘
Hooligani
,' Pushkin explained.

‘And the
Militsia
will do nothing, comrade Major,' the guard sympathised, handing Pushkin back his pass. ‘They should round them all up and send them in here.
I'd
soon sort them out.'

Pushkin drove up the short avenue of pollarded plane trees that led to the administration building. At the junction in front of it he turned right, away from the pools of light cast by the few concrete standards that had working bulbs and swung the car onto the dark square of cracked tarmac in front of the officer accommodation blocks.

He switched everything off, then looked up anxiously. Lights were on in both rooms of his flat. Had Nadya been seen by a doctor? At the Magerov base there was only a first-aider. He locked the car door and hurried towards the entrance to the apartments.

Suddenly he heard something. The click of a cigarette lighter to his right. His heart turned over. He felt the presence of death. Had they come for
him
now? Here within the secure perimeter of the base? Another click,
then a small flame visible in the midst of a clump of birch trees that had been planted to mark Independence Day.

‘Misha!' Komarov's voice. ‘Over here.'

No, he thought. The Colonel had every right to want to kill him after what he'd just done in Odessa. He turned, meaning to run for the apartments, but his legs felt rooted. Running away had always been hard for him. He was going to have to confront his Colonel sooner or later, he decided, so he walked over to the trees, bracing himself for whatever might come.

‘Comrade Colonel,' he mumbled awkwardly. ‘What . . . what're you doing here?'

‘Trying to save your life, you idiot,' Komarov hissed. ‘Though God knows why after what you've done in Odessa this afternoon.'

What you've done
. . . He knew already. Knew where he'd been, whom he'd spoken to.

‘You've had me followed,' he accused.

‘Huh!' Komarov exclaimed dismissively. ‘You think I have need for that? You are so naive, Misha.' His voice was saw-edged with emotion. ‘You don't understand, do you? You simply do not understand.'

‘I understand well enough, Oleg Andrey'evich,' Pushkin protested feebly. ‘I understand what's right and what's wrong.'

In the darkness he saw Komarov shake his head with a heavy sadness.

‘Nothing. You understand nothing. I did try to warn you. And now . . .' He gestured first towards Pushkin's vandalised car, then the apartment block. ‘Poor Nadya . . .' When he said her name there was love in his voice. ‘It's entirely your fault, you know. If you had understood what these people are like, what they would do if you got in their way . . .'

‘They?' Pushkin interrupted. ‘Who are
they
exactly?'

‘Men whose power is greater than the state's.'
Komarov sighed. ‘You cannot fight people like that Misha. I tried, but when they want something from you they will never let go.'

‘We can fight them together, Oleg Andrey'evich.'

Komarov grabbed his arms and shook him.

‘Listen, you ignoramus! I will tell you what happened to me, then perhaps you will understand.' He paused as if collecting his thoughts. ‘I was approached by someone . . .'

‘Who? Who are these people?'

‘It is better you don't know. But, if you allow your simple brain to think about it you may guess. The man who came here knows me well. Knows you also. And knows the army's procedures for equipment supply.'

Pushkin frowned. In his confused, anxious state the clue wasn't clear enough for him.

‘Who?'

‘No. You must not ask. Suffice to say he was able to tell me in precise detail what he wanted me to provide for him. He offered a substantial sum in dollars in a foreign bank. But I refused.'

‘Of course! I knew you would.'

‘But I wish I hadn't, Misha, because I would have been in the same position I am now but a lot better off.'

‘What d'you mean?'

‘I mean that when I refused to co-operate voluntarily they forced me.'

‘But how?'

‘Through Vyra.'

‘Your wife? I don't understand.'

‘She was driving the car to Odessa one day. Suddenly the car in front of her stopped dead. She ran into the back of it. The Zhiguli was badly damaged, but that didn't matter. It was the other car – a BMW. Wrecked.'

Pushkin understood. There was no car insurance in Ukraine. Under the law damage must be paid for by the
guilty party. And a car that runs into the back of another is automatically guilty.

‘The BMW owner gave her a choice. Come up with six thousand
hryvna
within a week or he would get the Militsia involved. That means
prison,
Misha. I couldn't let that happen. And six thousand
hryvna
– it would take two years for me to earn so much, and leave nothing for food.'

‘I'm beginning to understand.'

‘The next day the man who'd approached me about the drone came back. If I agreed to co-operate they would forget the debt.'

‘Yes. I knew it must have been something like that. I always believed in you Oleg Andrey'evich.' Then anger rose in him again. ‘But Reznik. That was
murder
!'

‘So let there be no more, Misha,' Komarov pleaded. ‘Let there be no more.'

‘What are you saying?'

‘That you must get away from here, Misha. With Lena. With Nadya. Get away from here tonight.'

‘But General Orlov – he's behind me. I told him you were involved against your will. Told him so this afternoon in Odessa. He will be taking action. He told me so.'