The Talbot Odyssey (4 page)

The other man was one of those slicky boys: swept-back hair, a suit that looked like Stanley’s old First Holy Communion outfit, and dark glasses. The guy looked tough, though. Probably a killer, Stanley thought. A man from SMERSH.

The two men were babbling on in Russian, and Stanley could make out the word
Amerikanski
over and over again. He shifted his body slightly, pulled open his field bag and brought out a Minolta Pocket Autopak 470 camera. He framed his subjects and got off three quick shots. He returned his equipment to the bag and waited until they were a full minute out of sight before he got into a sprinting position. He listened. Everything was quiet.

Stanley dashed across an open piece of ground, covering about fifty yards in less than six seconds. He dove into a small, weed-clogged depression and lay still. He felt very exposed, but there was no other concealment around. He looked for listening bugs but couldn’t see any, although he thought this should be an obvious place for one. As his respect for the Russians’ security lessened, his cockiness grew. Well, he thought, maybe their security
was
good. They just hadn’t reckoned on Stanley Kuchik.

Stanley had been awed by his Uncle Steve’s stories about his escape-and-evasion course in Panama, and he had given Stanley his old field manuals on infiltration, recon patrols, and outdoor survival. Stanley had taken to it very naturally, when he’d practiced in the woods near his house, as though some feral instinct had been awakened by the pictures of men creeping through the bush.

He peered over the rim of the depression. The Russkies showed no signs of going inside yet. He didn’t think they would. It was still warm and pleasant. He’d have to proceed right under their noses.

Stanley knew that today was a Russian holiday. The Russians from the UN would be all over the place soon. He’d already spotted about a dozen walking around the gardens, plus the ones on the terrace. He’d planned this for some time . . . M-day minus six, M-day minus five . . . but now he thought he might have been foolhardy. Nuts, actually.

At least he hadn’t spotted any kids. Sometimes the Russkies brought their kids with them. The kids could be a pain because they ran wild in the woods and fields. When they weren’t around, he’d heard, they went to some kind of camp a few miles away, called Pioneer Camp, which was like a Boy Scout or Girl Scout camp. But he bet that instead of doing camp things, they learned how to spy.

Stanley thought about that for a while, then remembered his mission. He crept forward toward the open end of a drainage culvert where it stuck out below the steep drop in the lawn. The earth stank here and was covered with swamp grass and bulrushes. This was the farthest he’d ever come on the Russian property.

Stanley hesitated, then raised himslf up to the open culvert. He squeezed headfirst into the slimy clay and began crawling upgrade. He knew none of the other kids in the junior class could fit in the pipe. Being small had a lot of advantages.

As he got closer to the house, he saw that some weeping willow roots had found their way between the pipe joints. He used them to pull his way through at first, but at one point the roots were so thick he had to cut them away with his K-Bar. He heard chirping ahead and saw little red eyes looking back at him. He struck the pipe with the knife’s pommel and growled, “Beat it! Go away!” His heart was pounding and his mouth was sticky.

Stanley remained motionless and took stock. He had less than three inches on either side of his shoulders, and although he was not claustrophobic, he was beginning to get nervous. What if he got stuck? The fetid air was making him nauseous, and the total darkness was giving him the creeps. He felt oppressively confined and had the sudden urge to stand, break free, run in the open air. Sweat covered his body and he began shaking. He thought about going back but didn’t think he could get through those roots feetfirst. “Well, jerk, you can’t stay here.”

He resumed his crawl until he reached a juncture of several pipes. The air was better here and he took a long breath. He looked up into a vertical shaft that ran about twenty feet to the surface. There was a metal grating at the top, and he could see the first evening stars twinkling in the sky. “Piece of cake.”

He knelt on one knee and unclipped his flashlight from his web belt, turned it on, and pointed it up the shaft. He saw the first iron rung leading to the surface. He replaced his flashlight, took a long breath, and began the ascent, hand over hand, until he reached the metal grate. He pushed up on it and it scraped noisily across the concrete rim. He listened for a few seconds, then stuck his head up and looked around. A white flagpole rose up from the ground not ten feet away. There he spotted what he was after: the dark red flag of the USSR.

The flagpole was surrounded by a circular hedgerow about four feet high. He was concealed within the plantings, unless someone was looking down from an upstairs window. He scanned the second-story windows and the third-story gables, but could see nothing. He hoisted himself out of the shaft and low-crawled through the trailing pachysandra until he reached the base of the flagpole, then rolled over on his back. He drew his K-Bar knife and took a long breath. He listened.

He heard music coming through the partly opened French doors leading out to the terrace. Pretty bad music, he thought irrelevantly. The night was fairly still, though, and he wondered if they would hear the flag falling as the rope slipped through the pulleys. He put the knife to the halyard, but hesitated. Maybe he would just get the hell out of there. But then he looked up at the red flag with the yellow hammer and sickle, and the five-pointed star, snapping in a brief gust of wind, and he knew he couldn’t go back without it.

Suddenly there was a noise like a rifle shot, and he almost lost control of his bladder. He lay in the damp pachysandra, waiting. Overhead there was another loud report, and a shower of sparks—red, white, and blue—rained down. More rockets began bursting overhead, and Stanley laughed softly. Crazy old Van Dorn, giving it to the Russkies again. And he had no doubt where all the Russian eyes were turned. He sliced easily through the halyard and the weight of the flag pulled the severed rope through its pulleys.

The flag floated down slowly at first, then grew larger as he stared up at it. It settled over his entire body. It was made of some sort of lightweight bunting. He’d expected something heavier. The flag also smelled funny. Still, he had it.

Stanley lost no time. He cut the flag loose, twisted it tightly into a rope and tied it securely around his waist. He slipped through a space on the blind side of the hedge, away from the terrace, then raised himself into a sprinting stance, ready to run like hell across the lawn. Then the floodlights came on. “Oh, Christ!”

Even though the first rule of patrolling was
never
to go back the same way you came in, Stanley turned and slowly crawled back to the open storm drain. He quickly lowered himself down, pulling the grate cover back into place. “Okay . . . okay . . . you got lucky. . . .”

Halfway down the vertical shaft he heard a voice yell down to him, “Stop! Halt! We shoot.” A powerful light beam shone down the shaft. Stanley dropped the last ten feet and hit the muddy bottom of the shaft. He ducked quickly into a culvert opening headfirst as he heard the grate being lifted. “Holy Mary . . .” He realized he was in the culvert that led toward the mansion. He had no choice but to keep moving.

The traffic on Dosoris Lane was snarled, and with good reason, thought Karl Roth. There was an international incident brewing and everyone wanted to see it, or take part in it. He edged his old panel truck up a few feet, then spoke with a trace of a Middle-European accent. “We will be late.”

Maggie Roth, his wife, glanced into the back of the van. “I hope the food doesn’t spoil.” She too had an accent, which her American neighbors found charmingly British, but which to Londoners was identifiable as Wapping Lane Jewish.

Karl Roth nodded. “It is hot for May the first.” The panel truck’s engine-temperature gauge began to climb. “Damn it. Where do all these cars come from?”

Maggie Roth replied, “They are the cars of the exploited working class, Karl. Coming from the tennis courts, the golf club, and the yacht club.” She laughed. “Also, Van Dorn is having another spite party.”

Karl Roth frowned, then said, “Androv sent word that he has a surprise for us.”

She laughed again, but without humor. “He could surprise us by paying his bloody bills on time, couldn’t he?”

Roth smiled nervously. “Please be civil to him. He has asked us to stay for a drink. This is a big celebration for them.”

She grumbled, “He could have asked us to stay for the whole party. Instead, we go through the servants’ entrance like beggars and stand in the kitchen helping with the food. Classless society my foot.”

Roth let out a breath of exasperation. “It would be noted by the FBI if we stayed too long.”

“They’ve already noted
your
comings and goings. They’re bloody well on to something, I’ll tell you.”

He snapped, “Don’t say that! Do not mention anything to Androv.”

“Don’t worry on that account. Do you think I want to end up like Carpins—?”

“Quiet!”

The van moved up a few more feet. Suddenly a rocket arched into the gathering dusk and exploded in a red, white, and blue shower of sparks that lit up the purple sky. Several people along the road cheered and auto horns began honking.

Roth sneered. “More provocation. That came from Van Dorn’s estate—that reactionary swine.”

“
He
pays his bills,” remarked Maggie Roth. “And why didn’t we get the job on his party, Karl? We could have handled both. Van Dorn likes you. You’re so bloody obsequious toward him. Yes, Mr. Von Dorn, no, Mr. Von Dorn. It’s
Van
Dorn anyway, Karl. Maybe he’s wise to the fact that you snoop around when you go there. Or maybe he just thinks you’re popping one of the maids.” She laughed. “If he knew what you really were . . .”

Karl Roth let out another sigh of exasperation.
Maggie must
watch herself,
he thought. The van moved ahead a few more feet. Angry shouting could be heard now up the road. Police cars were parked on the right shoulder, and on the left he could see the huge ornate wrought-iron gates of the Russian estate. People with picket signs were blocking the entrance and the police were trying to keep order.

From his high vantage point Roth could see several limousines trying to get into the gate entrance. The police were stopping each one and checking licenses and registrations. Roth said, “More harassment.”

“Where’s our registration? I don’t want a bloody ticket.
We
don’t have diplomatic immunity.”

“There. In the glove compartment. My God, what a mess!”

Another rocket arched high into the air and exploded with a loud report. Maggie Roth tittered. “Mr. Van Dorn is aiming them to explode over the Russians.”

“Why do you find that amusing?”

“But it is. Don’t you think so?”

“No.”

She stayed silent for some time, then said, “Do you realize we’ve delivered them enough food over the past six months to last out a long siege?”

He didn’t reply.

She added, “And all that canned stuff and dried stuff. Those bastards only buy the best—the freshest—now they want tins, dry foods. . . . Well, Karl, what’s it all about, then?”

Again he didn’t reply.

Her tone was sharp. “Bloody beggars are planning World War Three, that’s what they’re about. Well, Glen Cove is safe, isn’t it, Karl? They wouldn’t drop a bomb on their own people, would they—”

“Shut up!”

She retreated into a moody silence, then mumbled, “I hope the damned mayonnaise has spoiled and they all get food poisoning.”

Stanley Kuchik lay on his back in the upward-curving culvert, his arms above his head and his head bowed under an immovable metal grate. Tears formed in his eyes. “Stupid . . . moron . . . Stanley, you asshole. . .”

He looked up at the grate, all that separated him from the cellar of the mansion. He thought about trying to go back, but if he got caught somewhere below, he’d die there and rot and his stink would be awful and they’d call a plumber who would use a Roto-Rooter and . . .
ugh!

He knew that the Russians would be waiting for him where the culvert opened into the bulrushes, but after a while they’d figure out that he’d gone this way instead. They’d be down here soon and yank him out and shoot him. “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. . . .” In anger and frustration he balled his hands into fists and beat against the grate, tears running freely down his face as he sobbed.

He heard something that sounded like a sharp clink, and stopped. Tentatively he pushed against the grate and it lifted. He cocked his arms and pushed up like a shot-putter, throwing the heavy grate into the air with a strength he didn’t know he had. The grate crashed to the concrete floor a few feet away.

Before the adrenaline gave way to the paralyzing muscle fatigue he felt, Stanley grabbed the sides of the opening, pulling and kicking at the same time, heaving himself up and out of the hole, then tumbling onto the floor.

He lay there on the cold concrete for several seconds, breathing heavily, feeling his muscles flutter and his body shake. He drew a deep breath and stood unsteadily. “Well, that wasn’t so bad.”

Stanley brushed himself, straightened his clothes, and checked his gear. Everything was in place including the tightly girthed flag.

He looked quickly around. He was in the boiler room. Three huge furnaces stood across the room along with three hot-water tanks and oil tanks.

He opened a crudely made wooden door and passed into an unlit room. He found an overhead pull chain and turned on a single light bulb. He looked around. Stacks and stacks of boxes filled with canned foods lined the walls and formed aisles in the immense space. “Christ, they could feed an army.”

He turned on his flashlight and walked through the storage space, reading the familiar brand names until he came to a door. He listened, but could hear nothing. He opened the door and entered a room filled top to bottom with steel file cabinets. He selected one at random and pulled open a drawer, shining his light on the file tabs marked with Cyrillic lettering. He extracted a sheaf of papers and stared at the top one. “Crazy goddamned language
. .
.” He stuffed the entire sheaf into his field bag and continued walking.