Linnear 02 - The Miko (82 page)

Fifteen minutes later, after a long, steaming shower followed by an icy one, he emerged, wreathed in towels. He stripped off the plastic bag used to keep his newly bandaged fingers dry. “I’m glad you’re here, actually.”

“Oh, good,” she said, staring at his hand. “I’ve come as Minck’s messenger girl, really. The focus of our hunt has shifted since your meeting with him last week. Away from Protorov, toward Tenchi.”

Perhaps it was the fatigue that gripped him or else Akiko was still on his mind: how wholly she had become Yukio or some semblance of Yukio that he still held sacrosanct and pristine in his memory. Perhaps it was only his imagination but it was his decided feeling that the kami of his first beloved had somehow taken hold of her lookalike at the end, filling her heart with love and compassion where before there had been only hate and a burning need for revenge. In the end, that might have been foolish of him, but he did not think so. He was too aware of the intertwining of life and death.

In any event, he missed the falseness to her voice that normally he might have picked up. He was not fully attuned to this conversation; his thoughts were elsewhere. Relaxing his overworked muscles he was diffused, without concentration, and therefore vulnerable.

“That’s just as well,” he said, turning away from her to rummage through his dresser for fresh clothes, “because Protorov has ceased to be a threat to anyone.”

“What do you mean?” Tanya said, though she knew very well.

“I mean,” Nicholas said, “that I killed him.” He turned back in time to see the surprise in her eyes when he said, “I’ve also broken Tenchi wide open.”

Tanya felt as if she had been struck by lightning. After Russilov’s terrible news, she had lost much of her hope. With Protorov gone, what chance did they now have for the KGB-GRU summit.

She, too, knew Mironenko. In fact, he had been her first lover. Thus had she brought him into Protorov’s axis. This had been just before her graduation from the academy in the Urals. Mironenko and several other up-and-coming GRU officers had been given a three-day tour of the premises and facilities.

Of all the visitors, Protorov judged Mironenko to be of the most use to him in the future; that had been the reason for extending him an invitation in the first place.

Protorov had sent Tanya into his room at night. She had been sex-starved, the passion of her emotions mingling with her physical needs. The combination had proved irresistible to Mironenko as it would have been for almost any man.

Tanya was his first link with Protorov. After the visit he did not want to give her up and, in fact, their affair lasted through the spring and into the summer.

But summer meant Tanya’s graduation, and because he had another assignment for her, one far more risky, one that only she could perform, Protorov contrived to have Mironenko’s wife become aware of his passion. Chastened, he left Tanya’s side. But, partially because Protorov’s subsequent intervention saved his marriageand his career as welland partially because his own political bent was similar, he moved into Protorov’s camp.

In the meantime, Protorov had moved Tanya out of the academy, allowing her to find her own way into the midst of her brother’s, Mikhail’s dissident apparatus. From his own point of view there was no risk, of course. He knew quite well that Tanya’s heart belonged to her father; that she had seen Mikhail’s behavior as a betrayal to the family. He had had his instructors work on that angle in oblique manners during her schooling.

Mikhail, for his part, was overjoyed to see her. To him it meant that she had matured. It simply was inconceivable to him that she might be a KGB apparatchik.

Now, as hope returned to Tanya, she automatically abandoned her backup plan to kill Nicholas and, reporting back to Minck in Washington, put a bullet through his brain. With Tenchi’s secret safe inside her mind, she would contact Russilov to initiate an escape route for her.

Of course she would not tell him of her discovery. Rather let him think that she was returning to Central a disgrace, having been blown by Linnear. After what had transpired in the safe house in Hokkaido, he’d have no trouble swallowing that.

Then across the frontier, through the Kurile chain, to Mironenko. There was still time to make the summit deadline, and she wished to have no eager ambitious male trying to share her triumph.

No, she alone would address the KGB-GRU summit as Viktor Protorov’s handpicked successor. The coup would take place. The dream had not died after all.

Trying with all her will to control the fluttering she felt in her chest, she said, “The sooner you tell me about it, the sooner I can send a signal to Minck and we can put this to bed once and for all.”

Dressed, Nicholas was counting out money into a new wallet. “Thankfully, no action will be needed on our part. I’m quite sure of that. But it would have been a full-fledged disaster had the Soviets been successful in penetrating it.”

Tanya ground her teeth in anticipation. She could barely contain her anxiety. She moved with him as he walked back into the bathroom to brush his hair, standing just outside the door as he flicked on the hairdryer.

“Tenchi is an apt code name,” he began. “It means ‘heaven and earth.’ Tenchi is, in fact, a super-robot.”

“What?” Tanya cried. “What is this, a science-fiction film?”

“Let me begin at the beginning. Three years ago the Hare Mam, a Japanese tanker loaded with radioactive waste, was lost in a typhoon while crossing the Nemuro Straits between Hokkaido and the southernmost tip of the Kuriles.

“It was a disaster of the greatest magnitude, and one which the Japanese Government, as you can imagine, did not want made public.

“Salvage operations were begun as soon as fair weather returned. The radioactive wastes, as it turned out, had not broken through their sealed containers, and the operation proceeded without a hitch.

“But on the third day, divers using an enormously powerful vacuum pump that must be anchored on the ocean floor discovered that the vibrations of the mechanism had opened up a hairline fissure. Out of it a black, viscous substance had begun to leak.

“They had accidentally discovered oil off the coast of Japan where, it had been determined by a host of geologists, none could exist.

“Excitement rose to a fever pitch as the divers rose with their news and the information was transmitted back to the Prime Minister.

“Oceanographers as well as geologists were sent into the area. What they came back with three weeks later was unimaginable. It looked as if this pocket of fossil oil was set very deep. Also, it was vast. If the government could find a way of extracting it, they might never have to buy a barrel of crude again. Japan would be self-sufficient. It was an answer to many prayers.

“But the thorn was getting it out of the rock. Conventional methods of offshore drilling were useless because of the type of rock and its formation. Besides, they were not all that far from a known ocean fault, and they were terrified that any undue activity in the area might cause a major earthquake.

“And so Tenchi was born. It has eight articulated arms and legs. It can move over any kind of terrain no matter how rough. It can see, hear, even smell. It canand willextract the oil from the bottom of the sea, the first conduit into which billions of barrels of fuel will be pumped on its way up to the surface and a line of waiting tankers via fathoms of pipeline.”

“But why all this secrecy?” Tanya asked. “Surely it could have been developed in the light of day.”

“Perhaps,” Nicholas conceded. “However, the oil reservoir is not only on Japanese soil, though they think it is.”

“What are you saying?” Tanya said, her heart in her throat.

“The Kuriles are a source of dispute between Russia and Japan. You know that, it’s elementary. The real question is, who owns the oil, Japan or Russia? You’ll get two different answers depending on whether you speak to a Japanese or a Russian.” He turned away from the mirror. “Now you see why Protorov was so anxious to penetrate the operation. The Russians could also have been self-sufficient.”

He came out of the bathroom and looked around. But Tanya had already gone.

Moments later he was on his way out to the Shinjuku Suiryu Building, the offices of Sato Petrochemicals, when his phone buzzed. He picked it up. “Yeah?”

“The weather was great in Key West, buddy,” the voice said in his ear, “but the company was lousy.”

“Croaker!” Like air being let out of a balloon. His knees felt weak and he had to sit down. “Lew, it can’t be you!”

“Can, buddy-boy, and is. I’m in the lobby. I didn’t want to give you a heart attack by coming to your door unannounced. Can I come up?”

“I’m just on my way out. I’ll meet you downstairs.” A thousand questions chased each other through his mind. Lew Croaker alive! How was it possible?

“Nah. With what I got, I’d better come on up.”

“Okay. Sure.”

There was a pause. “How you been, anyway?” The voice had

gone gruff.

“Nothing’s the same,” Nicholas said. “But then it never is.” “Hah! Tell me about it. I’ll be right there.”

He was a bit leaner, certainly tanner, his Robert Mitchum face seemingly far more deeply lined. Still, he looked fine to Nicholas.

They embraced like brothers, and this time Croaker did not mind the contact. He was amazed at just how much he had missed his friend.

He pointed. “What’s with the bandages?”

“Later,” Nicholas said. “Now tell me all.”

And Croaker did, from the moment the mysterious car had rammed him off the road in Key West, to Alix Logan’s revelations.

“So Minck sanctioned Angela Didion’s death,” Nicholas said, wonderingly. “It wasn’t Tomkin at all.”

“He only knew about it,” Croaker sneered. “He only let the killers into her apartment. I suppose that absolves him of guilt.”

Nicholas looked at him. He felt a curious ache inside. “I’m sorry he was so weak. He must’ve been thinking of the leak she represented. National security”

“He’s still a murderer in my book,” Croaker cut in. “National security, my ass. Big goddamned deal.”

“I disagree, Lew.”

Croaker rounded on him. “What d’you mean?”

“You know what I mean,” Nicholas said softly. “Why are you here now?”

Croaker thought about that. “National security,” he said at last. It was a sigh of defeat. “I’m sorry, Nick.”

“Forget it, Lew. It only means we can all be suckered in the name of patriotism.”

“Is that what really led Tomkin to let them in?”

Nicholas looked at his friend. “I honestly don’t know.”

“Well, it sure don’t make a bit of difference to Angela. One way or another, she’s still six feet under.”

“You can’t keep torturing yourself over one death, Lew. Be reasonable. You’ve done everything you could. It’s more than anyone else would’ve done. I think Angela’s spirit can rest now.”

Croaker sat down heavily, his head in his hands. “I did nothing. I solved nothing, I’ve gotten nowhere. Just spinning my goddamned wheels in a pile of quicksand. No one’s gonna pay for Angela’s death, not now, not ever.”

Now Nicholas was concerned. “What happened to you down in Key West, my friend? I mean, really.”

Croaker’s voice was muffled. “I don’t know, Nick. Damned if I do.” Nicholas said nothing, and Croaker was forced to go on to rid himself of the oppressive silence. “My life’s come apart. I guess…” He paused, began all over again. “I don’t know what’s happened to the kid who graduated the Academy in the top five percent of his class. Then I had the law in one hand and my service revolver in the other. I knew what to do with them. I knew that I was on the right side and they, the murderers, rapists, addicts, armed robbers, muggers, were on the wrong side.

“That was a long time agoor so it seems. Somewhere in the interim I seem to have lost the facility to determine the perpetrators from the law officers. I thought sure as I’m sitting here that Tomkin killed Angela. I was wrong… or was I? I don’t know anymore. Minck had her killed and I knew I had to confront him. Why, I don’t know. Did I want to murder him myself? Become the ultimate anarchist against the law I’m sworn to uphold: a vigilante? I knew when I stood before him that at least part of me wanted to. Even though I know what kind of a bitch Angela was, even though I know that she couldand you’re right, would have screwed this whole spook deal Minck had cooking with Tomkin. But the end result is that they took a human life; they played God with her. They destroyed, Nick.”

His head came up, and Nicholas winced at the bleakness in those red-rimmed eyes. Perhaps he had been crying… for himself, for one lost soul. “No matter what she was, Nick, she had a right to live. I’m right about that, at least, aren’t I?”

Nicholas put his arm around his friend as together they sat on the edge of the bed. “She had a right to live, Lew.”

Croaker gave a little bark of confused anger. “So instead of taking Minck out myself, I wind up working for him.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Yeah, well you will in a minute, I guarantee you.” Croaker stood up, began to pace back and forth like a caged tiger. He was tense and did not mind showing it. “Reason is, see, this Minck bastard’s sanctioned someone else. It seems that Tanya Vladimova’s a KGB bug planted on him. You ain’t seen her skulking around here lately have you?”

Nicholas’ mind was on fire. There were too many things hitting him at once. “Tanya,” he said, “a Soviet spy? But why didn’t Minck contact me himself?”

Croaker pointed to the phone. “Ever think to get your messages, buddy?”

“Actually, no. I’ve had other things on my mind. I only walked into the hotel a half an hour ago. I ran right into Tanya. She”

“Yeah? Where the hell’s she got to?”

Oh, my God, Nicholas thought. Tenchi! I’ve given her everything I fought so hard to keep from Protorov. Perhaps he’s won after all. But that thought, the knowledge of an almost certain war sparked by the territorial incident, was too terrible to contemplate.

“Come on!” Nicholas cried.

“Where we going?”

“To Hamamatsu-cho.”

When Tanya left Nicholas’ room, she took the fire stairs down the seven floors, not wanting to wait for the elevator or to be seen. In the street she turned north, heading away from the hotel at a rapid pace. She longed to take a taxi but was afraid to leave a trail. In any case, within three blocks she knew that she had made the right choice. Traffic choked the streets and she was far better off on foot, plowing with great power through the crowds like a salmon struggling upstream.