The Rocket Man (23 page)

Katie felt that she couldn't bear it; she thought she might be in for a long session of Slavic gloom, and she was now acutely aware that Bob and Anna would be expecting her back. The thought of seeing them, in the warmth of their own home, seemed suddenly attractive. She said, ‘Well, I am not particularly fond of suffering. At least I don't actually suffer much with Bob.' She got to her feet. ‘I'd better get back. You can always telephone me, if you want to see me. You will do, won't you?'

‘Yes, all right.' Then he said, ‘Take care, won't you? Watch out –'

‘Watch out for what?'

‘For … never mind.'

He made no move to follow her as she walked away. She left him lighting up a cigarette. She turned back to look at him as she closed the door and thought that never in her life had she seen anyone who looked so miserable.

And Dmitry sat at the table, smoking cigarette after cigarette, dimly aware of the KGB man in a raincoat sitting in the far corner. He was afraid to leave and walk out into the darkness; it was as if he expected that at any moment the sky might fall onto his head.

B
ut then: nothing happened.

Dmitry went to work, came home, tried to sleep. There was nothing he could do. Nihal had gone to Stockholm after all; there was silence from Katie. He felt completely deserted. He thought that if he sat tight and did nothing, perhaps the whole situation would somehow go away, resolve itself. It was impossible to go on living in this state of crisis for long.

On Wednesday morning Panini rang Dmitry. He said, ‘You know, it occurred to me: we had a batch of tapes we had to pull off the machine when we were doing the back-ups. They've been sitting here for several weeks, since the beginning of January. It happens every so often, we get a faulty batch that don't record well. I was about to send them back when I remembered these were about the time you were interested in – some changes you had lost or something. Do you want me to see if I can get that file for you?'

Dmitry said, ‘Hang on, I'll come down.' He didn't want to talk on the phone. He hurried down to Panini's office.

Panini, his shirtsleeves rolled up, gulping down a cup of coffee at once as if he had no time to savour it, made it clear from his attitude that he was being unusually helpful and expected gratitude. He said, ‘It's not a big deal. There may be nothing, of course, it was only a thought. I can check it out if you want me to.'

‘No, why not?' said Dmitry. ‘Have a look for me.'

‘Okay, I'll try and get it done for you in the next day or two.'

Dmitry returned upstairs. He didn't expect anything to come of it; he dismissed it from his mind. He went into his office and gathered up some papers; he had a meeting at eleven. Hilde was on the phone. He could hear her saying, ‘He's just going to a meeting. No, he'll be here this afternoon. I'll be gone by then, but you could try. Can I take your name so he can call you back?'

Dmitry mouthed at her, ‘Who is it?'

Hilde put the phone down. ‘He didn't say… just said he'll call you back.'

‘Look,' said Dmitry, shortly, ‘You are not to go giving unknown people details of my movements. Next time make sure you get their name. Was it an internal or an external call?'

‘Internal.' Hilde looked pained; she sat down at her desk. She was clearly beginning to find Dmitry impossible. She was still sulky later on that afternoon when she put some letters on his desk for him to sign. ‘I'm going now,' she said, ‘Is that all right?' It wasn't quite five o'clock.

‘Yes, that's fine.' Dmitry was expecting Boris at half past five. Half an hour to kill. The phone rang; somebody wanted some information. He answered the question and put the phone down; almost instantly it rang again. He picked it up; it was Katie. Her voice sounded timid, hesitant.

‘I'm in the building. I thought I could come up and talk to you. Are you busy? Can I come and see you now?'

Dmitry hesitated. He didn't know what to say; he didn't see how he could give a flat ‘No.' He said, ‘I can see you, but I am rather busy. There's someone coming to see me shortly.'

Katie said, angry, distressed, ‘I don't want to see you if you can only squeeze me in for five minutes. I want to talk to you properly.'

He softened at once; after all, none of this was her fault. ‘Then come. It's all right; I'll make time.' He could always ask Boris to wait. He hung up; he tapped his fingers on the pile of papers on his desk; he was nervous about seeing Katie. He could tell from the tone of her voice that there were going to be tears and remonstrations, and he didn't know how he could cope with them just now. And then – he was not sure whether it was his imagination – he thought he heard a very faint movement in Hilde's room, a slight metallic sound. He wondered whether he should get up and investigate it, but realised he was afraid to. He shifted his weight slightly forward in his chair and reached his hand out towards the phone.

The door opened, a man stepped into the room and shut it behind him in one quick movement. For an instant the man hesitated, perhaps because the main lights in the office were turned off and Dmitry was in shadow, illuminated only by the faint blue glow from the computer screen and the light of the desk-lamp. Then he lifted a gun with casual grace, bringing it up to aim at Dmitry's head. He wasted no time, he clearly did not intend to hang about. But Dmitry did a most unexpected thing. The moment the assassin entered the room, in the split second before he saw the gun, Dmitry knew he had come to kill him; it was something about the way that the assassin looked right through him, as if he had already ceased to exist. Most men would have frozen, ducked, or drawn backwards, and the assassin would have been prepared for any of these responses; but Dmitry suddenly stood up.

The first bullet caught him full in the chest as he rose, and not the head; he staggered back against the window, his right arm flung up in front of his face to shield his eyes from the horror of what was happening. The assassin gave him not an instant's grace before he fired again, two shots close together into the broad target of his chest. Dmitry collapsed behind the desk, falling hard on his back, one arm flung out. The assassin crossed the room and knelt down by his head, putting out his hand to loosen the tie and feel for the pulse in his neck.

The delicate touch of the fingers brought Dmitry out of shock; he thought for an instant someone had come to help him. He opened his eyes and took a deep, gasping breath. He and the assassin looked straight into one another's eyes for a second. Probably the assassin had no doubt in his mind that his target was dying, that most likely he only had a few minutes to live, but he would have wanted to be sure; he turned Dmitry's head away and transferred the gun back to his right hand to execute him with a shot to the base of the skull.

There was a sharp knock on the door and the handle turned. The assassin spun round and aimed the gun, backing away; as a figure stepped forward into the doorway he fired, twice. Dmitry was only dimly aware of what was happening but he saw the assassin toss his gun on top of the body by the door, take off his gloves and throw them down and then, without another glance at his victims, go out, closing the door behind him.

Dmitry lay on his back on the floor as he had fallen. One thought filled his head with unbearable clarity: ‘I have been killed.' This thought did not seem to upset him; it just seemed strange; it surprised him that he could still think at all. He had been expecting one shot, then oblivion; when he heard the muffled shots he could not understand what was going on. But now something else was happening to him. He had begun to feel pain. It hurt him dreadfully to breathe; no matter how hard he tried, there did not seem to be enough air. He would have liked to have stopped, but he had no choice, he had to go on struggling.

A shudder went through him. He was cold; it was as if the angel of death had come and perched on his shoulder. He coughed involuntarily and swallowed a throatful of warm blood. He felt sick, but still detached, almost curious; he thought, so this is what it feels like to die. Then the telephone on his desk rang. It rang four times and was silent. The familiar sound seemed to bring him back to reality for a moment; he thought, if I could reach it, I could call for help. He raised his arm and started to try to roll onto his side but a pain so violent and terrible seized him that he nearly fainted.

Then he thought, Katie, Katie will come. Or Boris. Unless he has killed one of them; oh God, perhaps he has killed Katie. He turned his head and saw between the legs of the desk, lying in the half darkness by the door, the figure of a man and a dark stain of blood spreading over the carpet. Then he thought, it was Katie on the phone. She is not coming. If only I could breathe properly; if I could just get some air, if I could get to the phone…

Katie took the lift up to the twentieth floor. She was agitated; she didn't know what she was going to say to Dmitry, she thought perhaps it was a mistake to go and see him at all. As she stepped out of the lift she passed a man in a grey suit. She was vaguely aware that someone had stepped in as she got out, but she paid no attention to him; she hurried along the corridor and paused outside Dmitry's room; she knocked, there was no reply, she knocked again. Then she opened the door.

The first thing she saw was the dead man lying face-down on the floor, his head covered with blood, and the gun lying next to him. She was stunned, but she neither screamed nor ran away; she knew as soon as she saw him that this was not Dmitry. Then where was he? She looked up and saw a hand emerging from behind the desk. Very slowly, as if dreaming, she walked across the room, round the desk, and saw him spread out on the floor, his skin very pale and blood soaking into his shirt. She stood for an instant frozen with terror; she thought at first that he must also be dead; then she saw and heard that he was breathing.

‘Oh, no,' she said, ‘No, no,' and he turned his head towards her. His lips moved, she heard him whisper, ‘Help me,' and then, ‘Can't breathe'; she saw fear and pain in his eyes, but she did not know what to do; she was afraid to touch him, afraid to see the damage that was done, afraid he would die or somehow fall apart in her hands. Seized with panic, she started to shout and scream for help, then, coming to her senses, scrambled to the telephone on the desk and dialled the emergency number for the UN medical service which was in the building.

A woman with an American accent answered immediately. Katie said, amazed that she could speak clearly, ‘Room 2075, please come quickly, somebody has been shot.' The voice on the phone said, astonished, ‘Shot?' and she half shouted, ‘Please, hurry, just come, I'm going to call an ambulance.'

‘Where has he been hit?' asked the voice, calm, insistent. ‘I don't know,' she said, ‘In the chest, in the lung, just please come quickly.' She slammed down the phone and then lifted the receiver again, dialled for an outside line, and then the emergency number. This time it took longer to get through; she asked for an ambulance and was clear-headed enough to tell them they could drive right up to the main concourse and stop at the revolving doors near the ‘A' tower on the left. While she was talking she heard a man come to the door, exclaim with horror and then run off down the corridor. For the second time she hung up and then, her hands shaking, she turned back to Dmitry.