Tundra (26 page)

Squinting, Haglund said, ‘Maybe.’

‘Pull up.’ Purkiss drew on his face protection and dropped down from the cab once more. The cold hit him anew, knocking the breath out of him momentarily. He picked his way across the rough ground, taking care not to turn his ankles over. As he approached the strip of ground, he saw he’d been right.

He stood on the lip of a ravine, a ragged scar in the tundra some twenty metres across. Lowering himself to a crouch, he crept closer. The ground sloped gently before suddenly dropping into blackness. Purkiss could see the other side descend and disappear, the bottom of the crevasse invisible.

He scrabbled about until he found a large rock loose enough to be prised out of the ground, and rolled it towards the edge. It bounced off the side with an audible crack, but any further noise it made on the way down was snatched away by the keening wind.

No good.

One of the pieces of equipment Purkiss had salvaged from the hangar back at the station was a flare gun. He unclipped it from the holster at his side and reached out as far as he dared, aiming the gun downwards into the ravine.

He fired.

The brilliant orange and yellow flash a few seconds later made Purkiss think he was staring into a pit of hell. He closed his eyes, the image imprinted on his retinas. He’d seen what he needed.

A few yards further along from Purkiss, the walls of the ravine approached one another so closely there couldn’t have been more than six feet between them. A truck the size of the Ural would get jammed there.

Purkiss made his way back to the truck. He opened the passenger door and climbed halfway up.

‘This’ll do,’ he said. Haglund cut the engine and jumped down himself. He jogged over to the edge of the ravine to inspect it himself, while Purkiss went round to the back of the Ural and opened the doors.

Avner and Budian cringed away. Clement peered out intently.

‘What the hell’s going on?’ Avner cried. ‘Will you just tell –’

‘Cover up and get out,’ said Purkiss. ‘Change of plan.’

They stood, huddled and shuddering, while Purkiss and Haglund began to unload the essentials from the back of the truck. The three snowmobiles, the rifles and spare magazines. Haglund opened a small box and handed out compasses to each of them.

Avner stared at his, uncomprehending. ‘What?’

As he worked, Purkiss said, ‘We’re jettisoning the truck. It’ll create a diversion, at least for a while. And the sleds will be faster.’

Budian let out a low sound, half sigh, half moan. Avner grabbed at Purkiss’s arm.

‘Jesus Christ, are you nuts? We’re only halfway there.’

‘And that’s about as far as we’ll get, if we carry on in the truck.’ Purkiss waved a hand. ‘Look around you.’ He turned to face them all. ‘Okay. Gunnar and I will each take one of the two-seater snowmobiles, Efraim and Oleksandra riding with us. Patricia, you know how to ride one of these?’

‘Yes.’

‘Good. You’re in the single seater. We move in convoy, Gunnar in front, me at the back, Patricia in between. The wind and the snow will most likely cover the tracks but it’s worth maximising our odds. Gunnar will navigate, but he’s given you compasses in case for some reason we get separated. Gunnar, give them the co-ordinates.’

Haglund did so, repeating them twice.

Purkiss continued, ‘We’ve room for two rifles. Efraim and Oleksandra, you’ll have to carry them.’ He glanced around, uncertain whether everything he’d said had registered, but impatient to get moving.

Haglund started heading back to the cab of the truck. Purkiss hurried after him. ‘Hold on. I’ll do it.’

‘No.’

‘This is my idea,’ said Purkiss. ‘I’m the one who ought to carry the risk.’

Haglund swung up behind the wheel. ‘Wrong,’ he said. ‘You’re the one who’s going to get us out of this alive, if anyone is. We can’t afford to lose you.’

Purkiss watched the truck start its slow rumble towards the ravine. It picked up speed as it approached, and for a terrible moment Purkiss thought Haglund had misjudged the distance and was going to go straight over the edge. But he slowed as the Ural reached the lip of the precipice.

Now
, thought Purkiss.

The driver’s door swung open as the truck began its final forward tilt. Haglund leaped and hit the ground hard and rolled.

With a grinding of metal chassis against rock, the truck toppled over.

The impact as it hit the place where the ravine walls came close to touching was almost palpable through the ground beneath Purkiss’s feet. Haglund was up and scrambling away when the fuel tank blew.

The black and orange bloom was followed by the thump of the blast, muffled by the walls of the crevasse. Shrapnel spun upwards, riding the cloud that billowed over the edge.

An explosion was good. It increased the chances of their pursuers finding the remains of the truck. Purkiss waited for Haglund to reach them.

‘Let’s get moving,’ he said.

F
our of them came for Lenilko this time, not two, and unlike before there was no politeness for the sake of appearances. They led him through the office suite, past the scattering of cowering staff, past Anna’s white, terrified face, and all but shoved him into the elevator.

He recognised them as Rokva’s men, and was vaguely surprised. He’d been expecting a visit from people answerable to the Director of the FSB himself. But the elevator opened on Rokva’s floor.

Once again he was ushered into his boss’s office; once again, the two men were left alone. This time, Rokva didn’t treat him affably. The Director remained behind his desk while Lenilko was not offered a seat.

‘Normally I would open,’ said Rokva, his voice quiet and cold as a snake’s hiss, ‘with an accusation. But we’re past that, aren’t we? You know precisely why you’re here. So perhaps we can start with your explanation.’

Lenilko noticed something suddenly, something he’d been distantly conscious of but hadn’t identified to himself. Since the banging on his office door, through the march upstairs and the arrival in Rokva’s office, he hadn’t felt afraid.

He wondered what that meant. Did a man before a firing squad as the executioners raised their weapons, or a man on the gallows as the noose was slipped around his neck, experience the same thing? A last-minute suffusion of courage, the psyche’s mechanism for protecting itself when all hope was lost?

He became aware Rokva was waiting for a reply. ‘My explanation, sir.’

‘You heard me.’

‘With respect, Director, I have already given my explanation. My reasons for taking the action I did were never a secret to you. I believed this was an operation best conducted by the Directorate of Special Operations. By
us
. Everything I’ve done has been with that belief in mind.’

‘Including directly disobeying me.’

‘If you refer to your instruction to hand over control of the operation to Counter-Terrorism, then again, with respect, sir, I must point out that the six hours are not yet -’

‘Do not play games with me.’
The fury in Rokva’s eyes was so black that Lenilko thought for an instant he was going to be shot dead, right there in the office by the Director himself. ‘You
know
the order you violated. I told you the Englishman, Purkiss, was not to be harmed under any circumstances.
Any
circumstances. Now I learn that you instructed an Army general to send in
Spetsnaz
operatives to terminate every person at Yarkovsky Station. Including, of course, Purkiss. Not only that, but you persuaded our President to sanction this action. You cannot have told him Purkiss was at the station, because there’s no way he would have given his approval for the assault.’ Up until then, Rokva had been leaning across the desk, his small hands folded. Now he sat back, dwarfed by the antique high-backed chair. ‘Disobeying your superior is nothing,
nothing
, compared with misleading your President into authorising action you know he will afterwards bitterly regret.’

With the rapturous force of a religious conversion, Lenilko understood. His unnerving lack of fear wasn’t because he had nothing more to lose. It was because some part of his unconscious had realised there he had a way out of this. And when he started to speak, it was as if he’d rehearsed the words, like an actor, until his delivery was pitch perfect.

‘You’ve got a problem, sir.’

Rokva all but recoiled. ‘What did you say?’

‘You’ve got a problem, Director Rokva, sir.’

The quietness was entirely gone from Rokva’s voice. It cracked across the desk like a whip. ‘Remember who you’re talking to, Lenilko.’

‘You’ve all but fired me already, sir. Which means that I can no longer be accused of insubordination, because I don’t work for you any more. Rudeness, yes, possibly, but not insubordination.’

Rokva’s eyes shifted to the door behind Lenilko. For the first time Lenilko felt a thrill of alarm. If the Director decided to call his men in and have Lenilko hauled away, he’d miss his opportunity.

Quickly he said, ‘Your problem is John Purkiss. Once it emerges that you connived at my operation while knowing full well that Purkiss, the untouchable, was at Yarkovsky Station, and while knowing his life was under threat, and while keeping his presence there a secret from not only the Director of the FSB but the President himself... your position won’t be much better than mine, to be honest. You may not face charges of treason, as I’m assuming I will, but at the very least you’ll be kicked out of your job in disgrace, and your career will be at an end. Not to mention the humiliation your family will be put through.’

Lenilko was astonished at his own boldness, his arrogance, but in a detached way, as if he was observing himself as a character in a film.

Rokva remained standing, the rage in his face undiminished. But he was listening.

‘I know a way to protect us both,’ Lenilko went on. ‘To ensure that we both emerge intact.  A lot depends on whether or not General Tsarev’s men secure the Tupolev and prevent the removal of the warheads. If they fail, we’re doomed, you and I. But probably so is everybody in Moscow. If, however, they succeed, it’s a different matter. I’ll accept some censure, for having acted in an unorthodox and unauthorised manner. You’ll keep your position. Everyone will be happy.’

An element of calculation had crept into Rokva’s features.

Lenilko continued: ‘We have to erase all traces of Purkiss. Destroy all evidence of his having been associated with Yarkovsky Station in any way. Get rid of the documentation authorising his alias, John Farmer, to visit the station. Delete his image wherever it occurs, on copies of his passport, in surveillance footage from airports, et cetera. And, of course, Purkiss himself must be eliminated. Along with everybody else associated with him.’

Rokva spoke flatly. ‘British Intelligence will know what has happened.’

‘They’ll know, but they won’t be able to prove anything. We’ll deny any knowledge of Purkiss’s involvement in this. Even – and I say this with full awareness of the implications – even our President must not know about it.’

Rokva leaned his elbows on the desk. He was no longer looking at Lenilko; instead his narrowed gaze was on some distant point, not in space but in time.

He said: ‘General Tsarev has ordered his men to apprehend the fugitives, not to kill them. I do not have the clout with him to instruct him to change those orders.’

‘Then you have to persuade the Director of the FSB himself to speak to Tsarev. Yes, I know this means involving the Director. But it’s in his interests, too, that Purkiss’s involvement is covered up. He is ultimately responsible for what goes on in his organisation. If Purkiss’s presence at Yarkovsky Station, he’ll either have to admit he didn’t know about it, which makes him look incompetent, or be forced to  concede that he looked the other way while Purkiss was under threat.’

Rokva stood up. He walked to the tall window at the end of the office, like Lenilko’s overlooking the square. He stood there with his hands behind his back.

Thirty seconds ticked by. Lenilko felt poised on a tightrope.

Abruptly Rokva turned. ‘Get out. Go back to work.’

‘You accept my suggestion?’

‘Yes.’ Rokva was reaching for the phone on his desk. ‘But your involvement in this particular operation is over. Understood? You stay away from it from now on.’

‘Yes, sir.’

Lenilko strode out of the office, past the waiting men who stared after him. He couldn’t see their faces but he imagined the looks of puzzlement. He rode the elevator downstairs, reentered his own office suite, crossed towards his door. His face was grave throughout.

Nobody approached him, except Anna. She sidled up and whispered: ‘Mr Lenilko?’

He turned to her, his fingers on the door handle.

‘Is everything...?’ she managed.

He allowed the tiniest smile to quirk the corner of his mouth. ‘Yes, Anna,’ he said. ‘Everything is just fine.’

T
he GAZ Vodnik lumbered across the tundra, its massive tyres chewing up the snow and the frozen soil as though deriving sustenance from the rough ground.

Captain Aleksandrov sat beside the driver, his tense face scanning the darkness ahead, his hand on the phone in his lap, ready to lift and activate it the moment he felt the first vibration. On the dashboard, the satellite navigation system charted their progress, the destination of Saburov-Kennedy Station a red full stop at the end. He hoped they wouldn’t reach it, because it would mean they’d failed.

An hour had passed since the Mi-26 had lifted into the sky and he’d watched Nikitin and seven more of his men disappear towards the
Nekropolis
. General Tsarev had left it to Aleksandrov to decide how to divide the force. Aleksandrov had unhesitatingly despatched the bulk of his troops to the
Nekropolis
. They would be dealing with an unspecified number of enemy, who might have an entire arsenal at their disposal. Aleksandrov, on the other hand, was pursuing at most five or six fugitives, most if not all of them civilians, research scientists, whose armaments were likely to comprise nothing more than handguns and non-military rifles.