Edge of Eternity (24 page)

Filipov said desperately: “Can we rely on this information?”

Dimka looked at him. “What's your opinion of the KGB, comrade?”

Filipov shut up.

Dimka got to his feet. “I'm sorry to draw this meeting to a premature close,” he said. “But I think the first secretary needs to see this right away.” He left the building.

He followed a path through the pine forest to Khrushchev's white stucco villa. Inside, it was strikingly furnished with white curtains and furniture made of timber bleached like driftwood. He wondered who
had picked such a radically contemporary style: certainly not the peasant Khrushchev, who, if he noticed decor at all, would probably have preferred velvet upholstery and flower-patterned carpets.

Dimka found the leader on the upstairs balcony that looked over the bay. Khrushchev was holding a pair of powerful Komz binoculars.

Dimka was not nervous. Khrushchev had taken a liking to him, he knew. The boss was pleased with the way he stood up to the other aides. “I thought you would want to see this report right away,” Dimka said. “Operation Mongoose—”

“I just read it,” Khrushchev interrupted. He handed the binoculars to Dimka. “Look over there,” he said, pointing across the water toward Turkey.

Dimka put the binoculars to his eyes.

“American nuclear missiles,” said Khrushchev. “Aimed at my dacha!”

Dimka could not see any missiles. He could not see Turkey, which was one hundred fifty miles away in that direction. But he knew that this characteristically theatrical gesture by Khrushchev was essentially right. In Turkey the USA had deployed Jupiter missiles, obsolete but certainly not harmless: Dimka had this information from his uncle Volodya in Red Army Intelligence.

Dimka was not sure what to do. Should he pretend he could see the missiles through the binoculars? But Khrushchev must know he could not.

Khrushchev solved the problem by snatching the binoculars back. “And do you know what I'm going to do?” he said.

“Please tell me.”

“I'm going to let Kennedy know how it feels. I will deploy nuclear missiles in Cuba—aimed at
his
dacha!”

Dimka was speechless. He had not been expecting this. And he could not see it as a good idea. He agreed with his boss in wanting more military aid for Cuba, and he had been battling the Defense Ministry over that issue—but now Khrushchev was going too far. “Nuclear missiles?” he repeated, trying to gain time to think.

“Exactly!” Khrushchev pointed to the KGB report on Operation Mongoose that Dimka was still clutching. “And that will convince the Politburo to support me. Poisoned cigars. Ha!”

“Our official line has been that we will not deploy nuclear weapons
in Cuba,” Dimka said, in the manner of one who presents incidental information, rather than in an argumentative tone. “We have given the Americans that reassurance several times, and publicly.”

Khrushchev grinned with impish delight. “Then Kennedy will be all the more surprised!”

Khrushchev scared Dimka in this mood. The first secretary was not a fool, but he was a gambler. If this scheme went wrong it could lead to a diplomatic humiliation that might bring about Khrushchev's downfall as leader—and, by way of collateral damage, end Dimka's career. Worse, it might provoke the American invasion of Cuba that it was intended to prevent—and his beloved sister was in Cuba. There was even a chance that it would spark the nuclear war that would end capitalism, Communism, and quite possibly the human race.

On the other hand, Dimka could not help feeling excited. What a tremendous blow would be struck against the rich, smug Kennedy boys, against the global bully that was the United States, and against the whole capitalist-imperialist power bloc. If the gamble paid off, what a triumph it would be for the USSR and Khrushchev.

What should he do? He switched to practical mode and strained to think of ways to reduce the apocalyptic risks of the scheme. “We could start by signing a peace treaty with Cuba,” he said. “The Americans could hardly object to that without admitting that they were planning to attack a poor Third World country.” Khrushchev looked unenthusiastic but said nothing, so Dimka went on. “Then we could step up the supply of conventional weapons. Again it would be awkward for Kennedy to protest: why shouldn't a country buy guns for its army? Finally we could send the missiles—”

“No,” said Khrushchev abruptly. He never liked gradualism, Dimka reflected. “This is what we'll do,” Khrushchev went on. “We'll ship the missiles secretly. We'll put them in boxes labeled ‘drainage pipes,' anything. Even the ships' captains won't know what's inside. We'll send our artillerymen over to Cuba to assemble the launchers. The Americans won't have any idea what we're up to.”

Dimka felt a little sick, with both fear and exhilaration. It would be extraordinarily difficult to keep such a big project secret, even in the Soviet Union. Thousands of men would be involved in crating the
weapons, sending them by train to the ports, opening them in Cuba, and deploying them. Was it even possible to keep them all quiet?

However, he said nothing.

Khrushchev went on: “And then, when the weapons are launch-ready, we'll make an announcement. It will be a fait accompli—the Americans will be helpless to do anything about it.”

It was just the kind of grand dramatic gesture Khrushchev loved, and Dimka realized he would never talk him out of it. He said cautiously: “I wonder how President Kennedy will react to such an announcement.”

Khrushchev made a scornful noise. “He's a boy—inexperienced, timid, weak.”

“Of course,” said Dimka, though he feared Khrushchev might be underestimating the young president. “But they have midterm elections on November sixth. If we revealed the missiles during the campaign, Kennedy would come under heavy pressure to do something drastic, to avoid humiliation at the polls.”

“Then you have to keep the secret until November sixth.”

Dimka said: “Who does?”

“You do. I'm putting you in charge of this project. You'll be my liaison with the Defense Ministry, who will have to carry it out. It will be your job to make sure they don't let the secret leak before we're ready.”

Dimka was shocked enough to blurt out: “Why me?”

“You hate that prick Filipov. Therefore I can trust you to ride him hard.”

Dimka was too aghast to wonder how Khrushchev knew he hated Filipov. The army was being given a near-impossible task—and Dimka would get the blame if it went wrong. This was a catastrophe.

But he knew better than to say so. “Thank you, Nikita Sergeyevich,” he said formally. “You can rely on me.”

T
he GAZ-13 limousine was called a Seagull because of its streamlined American-style rear wings. It could reach one hundred miles per hour, just, although it was uncomfortable at such speeds on Soviet roads. It was available in two-tone burgundy and cream with whitewall tires, but Dimka's was black.

He sat in the back as it drove onto the quayside at Sevastopol, Ukraine. The town stood on the tip of the Crimean Peninsula, where it poked out into the Black Sea. Twenty years ago it had been flattened by German bombing and artillery fire. After the war it had been rebuilt as a cheerful seaside resort with Mediterranean balconies and Venetian arches.

Dimka got out and looked at the ship moored at the dock, a timber freighter with oversize hatches designed to take tree trunks. Under the hot summer sun, stevedores were loading skis and clearly labeled cartons of cold-weather clothing, to give the impression that the ship was headed to the frozen north. Dimka had devised the deliberately misleading code name Operation Anadyr, after a town in Siberia.

A second Seagull pulled onto the dock and parked behind Dimka's. Four men in Red Army Intelligence uniforms got out and stood waiting for his instructions.

A railway line ran alongside the dock, and a massive gantry straddled the line, positioned to shift cargo directly from railcar to ship. Dimka looked at his wristwatch. “The fucking train should be here by now.”

Dimka was wound up tight. He had never been so tense in all his life. He had not even known what stress was until he started this project.

The senior Red Army man was a colonel called Pankov. Despite his rank, he addressed Dimka with formal respect. “You want me to make a call, Dmitri Ilich?”

A second officer, Lieutenant Meyer, said: “I think it's coming.”

Dimka looked along the track. In the distance he could see, approaching slowly, a line of low-slung open railcars loaded with long wooden crates.

Dimka said: “Why does everyone think it's all right to be fifteen fucking minutes late?”

Dimka was worried about spies. He had visited the chief of the local KGB station and reviewed his list of suspected people in the area. They were all dissidents: poets, priests, painters of abstract art, and Jews who wanted to go to Israel—typical Soviet malcontents, about as threatening as a cycling club. Dimka had them all arrested anyway, but not one looked dangerous. Almost certainly there were real CIA agents in Sevastopol, but the KGB did not know who they were.

A man in captain's uniform came from the ship across the gangway and addressed Pankov. “Are you in charge here, Colonel?”

Pankov inclined his head toward Dimka.

The captain became less deferential. “My ship can't go to Siberia,” he said.

“Your destination is classified information,” Dimka said. “Do not speak of it.” In Dimka's pocket was a sealed envelope that the captain was to open after he had sailed from the Black Sea into the Mediterranean. At that point he would learn he was going to Cuba.

“I need cold-weather lubricating oil, antifreeze, deicing equipment—”

Dimka said: “Shut the fuck up.”

“But I have to protest. Siberian conditions—”

Dimka said to Lieutenant Meyer: “Punch him in the mouth.”

Meyer was a big man and he hit hard. The captain fell back, his lips bleeding.

Dimka said: “Go back aboard your ship, wait for orders, and keep your stupid mouth shut.”

The captain left, and the men on the quay turned their attention back to the approaching train.

Operation Anadyr was huge. The approaching train was the first of nineteen similar, all required to bring just this first missile regiment to Sevastopol. Altogether, Dimka was sending fifty thousand men and two hundred thirty thousand tons of equipment to Cuba. He had a fleet of eighty-five ships.

He still did not see how he was to keep the whole thing secret.

Many of the men in authority in the Soviet Union were careless, lazy, drunk, and just plain stupid. They misunderstood their instructions, they forgot, they approached challenging tasks halfheartedly and then gave up, and sometimes they just decided they knew better. Reasoning with them was useless; charm was worse. Being nice to them made them think you were a fool who could be ignored.

The train inched alongside the ship, its steel-on-steel brakes squealing. Each purpose-built railcar carried just one wooden crate eighty feet long and nine feet square. A crane operator mounted the gantry and entered its control cabin. Stevedores leaped onto the railcars and began readying the crates for loading. A company of soldiers had traveled with the train, and now they began to help the stevedores. Dimka was relieved to see that the missile regiment flashes had been removed from their uniforms, in accordance with his instructions.

A man in a civilian suit jumped down off a car, and Dimka was irritated to see that it was Yevgeny Filipov, his opposite number at the Defense Ministry. Filipov approached Pankov, as the captain had, but Pankov said: “Comrade Dvorkin is in command here.”

Filipov shrugged. “Just a few minutes late,” he said with a satisfied air. “We were delayed—”

Dimka noticed something. “Oh, no,” he said. “Fuck it.”

Filipov said: “Something wrong?”

Dimka stamped his foot on the concrete quay. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

“What is it?”

Dimka looked at him in fury. “Who's in charge on the train?”

“Colonel Kats is with us.”

“Bring the dumb bastard here to me right away.”

Filipov did not like to do Dimka's bidding, but he could hardly refuse such a request, and he went away.

Pankov looked an inquiry at Dimka.

Dimka said with weary rage: “Do you see what is stenciled on the side of each crate?”

Pankov nodded. “It's an army code number.”

“Exactly,” Dimka said bitterly. “It means: ‘R-12 ballistic missile.'”

“Oh, shit,” said Pankov.

Dimka shook his head in impotent fury. “Torture is too good for some people.”

He had feared that sooner or later he would have a showdown with the army, and on balance it suited him to have it now, over the very first shipment. And he was prepared for it.

Filipov returned with a colonel and a major. The senior man said: “Good morning, comrades. I'm Colonel Kats. Slight delay, but otherwise everything is going smoothly—”

“No, it's not, you dimwitted prick,” said Dimka.

Kats was incredulous. “What did you say?”

Filipov said: “Look here, Dvorkin, you can't talk to an army officer like that.”

Dimka ignored Filipov and spoke to Kats. “You have endangered the security of this entire operation by your disobedience. Your orders were to paint over the army numbers on the crates. You were provided with new stencils reading ‘Construction-Grade Plastic Pipe.' You were to paint new markings on all the crates.”

Kats said indignantly: “There wasn't time.”

Filipov said: “Be reasonable, Dvorkin.”

Dimka suspected Filipov might be happy for the secret to leak, for then Khrushchev would be discredited and might even fall from power.

Dimka pointed south, out to sea. “There is a NATO country just one hundred and fifty miles in that direction, Kats, you fucking idiot. Don't you know that the Americans have spies? And that they send them to places such as Sevastopol, which is a naval base and a major Soviet port?”

“The markings are in code—”

“In code? What is your brain made of, dog shit? What training do you imagine is given to capitalist-imperialist spies? They are taught to recognize uniform badges—such as the missile regiment flash you are wearing on your collar, also against orders—as well as other military insignia and equipment markings. You stupid turd, every traitor and CIA informant in Europe can read the army code on these crates.”

Kats tried standing on his dignity. “Who do you think you are?” he said. “Don't you dare speak to me like that. I've got children older than you.”

“You are relieved of your command,” said Dimka.

“Don't be ridiculous.”

“Show him, please.”

Colonel Pankov took a sheet of paper from his pocket and handed it to Kats.

Dimka said: “As you see from the document, I have the necessary authority.”

Filipov's jaw was hanging open, Dimka saw.

Dimka said to Kats: “You are under arrest as a traitor. Go with these men.”

Lieutenant Meyer and another of Pankov's group smoothly positioned themselves either side of Kats, took his arms, and marched him to the limousine.

Filipov recovered his wits. “Dvorkin, for God's sake—”

“If you can't say anything helpful, shut your fucking mouth,” Dimka said to him. He turned to the missile regiment major, who had not said a word so far. “Are you Kats's second-in-command?”

The man looked terrified. “Yes, comrade. Major Spektor at your service.”

“You are now in command.”

“Thank you.”

“Take this train away. North of here is a large complex of train sheds. Arrange with the railway management to stop there for twelve hours while you repaint the crates. Bring the train back here tomorrow.”

“Yes, comrade.”

“Colonel Kats is going to a labor camp in Siberia for the rest of his life, which will not be very long. So, Major Spektor, don't make a mistake.”

“I won't.”

Dimka got into his limousine. As he drove away, he passed Filipov standing on the quay, looking as if he was not sure what had just happened.

•   •   •

Tanya Dvorkin stood on the dock at Mariel, on Cuba's north coast, twenty-five miles from Havana, where a narrow inlet opened into a
huge natural harbor hidden among hills. She looked anxiously at a Soviet ship moored at a concrete pier. Parked on the pier was a Soviet ZIL-130 truck pulling an eighty-foot trailer. A crane was lifting a long wooden crate from the ship's hold and moving it through the air, with painful slowness, toward the truck. The crate was marked in Russian:
CONSTRUCTION-GRADE PLASTIC PIPE.

She saw all this by floodlights. The ships had to be unloaded at night, by order of her brother. All other shipping had been cleared out of the harbor. Patrol boats had closed the inlet. Frogmen searched the waters around the ship to guard against an underwater threat. Dimka's name was mentioned in tones of fear: his word was law and his wrath terrible to behold, they said.

Tanya was writing articles for TASS that told how the Soviet Union was helping Cuba, and how grateful the Cuban people were for the friendship of their ally on the far side of the globe. But she reserved the real truth for the coded cables she sent, via the KGB's telegraph system, to Dimka in the Kremlin. And now Dimka had given her the unofficial task of making sure his instructions were carried out without fail. That was why she was anxious.

With Tanya was General Paz Oliva, the most beautiful man she had ever met.

Paz was breathtakingly attractive: tall and strong and a little scary, until he smiled and spoke in a soft bass voice that made her think of the strings of a cello being caressed by a bow. He was in his thirties: most of Castro's military men were young. With his dark skin and soft curls he looked more Negro than Hispanic. He was a poster boy for Castro's policy of racial equality, such a contrast with Kennedy's.

Tanya loved Cuba, but it had taken a while. She missed Vasili more than she had expected. She realized how fond she was of him, even though they had never been lovers. She worried about him in his Siberian labor camp, hungry and cold. The campaign for which he had been punished—publicizing the illness of Ustin Bodian, the opera singer—had been successful, sort of: Bodian had been released from prison, though he had died soon afterward in a Moscow hospital. Vasili would find the irony telling.

Some things she could not get used to. She still put on a coat to go
out, although the weather was never cold. She got bored with beans and rice and, to her surprise, found herself longing for a bowl of kasha with sour cream. After endless days of hot summer sun, she sometimes hoped for a downpour to freshen the streets.

Cuban peasants were as poor as Soviet peasants, but they seemed happier, perhaps because of the weather. And eventually the Cuban people's irrepressible joie de vivre bewitched Tanya. She smoked cigars and drank rum with tuKola
,
the local substitute for Coke. She loved to dance with Paz to the irresistibly sexy rhythms of the traditional music they called
trova.
Castro had closed most of the nightclubs, but no one could prevent Cubans playing guitars, and the musicians had moved to small bars called
casas de la trova
.

But she worried for the Cuban people. They had defied their giant neighbor, the United States, only ninety miles away across the Straits of Florida, and she knew that one day they might be punished. When she thought about it, Tanya felt like the crocodile bird, bravely perched between the open jaws of the great beast, pecking food from a row of teeth like broken knives.

Was the Cubans' defiance worth the price? Only time would tell. Tanya was pessimistic about the prospects for reforming Communism, but some of the things Castro had done were admirable. In 1961, the Year of Education, ten thousand students had flocked to the countryside to teach farmers to read, a heroic crusade to wipe out illiteracy in one campaign. The first sentence in the primer was “The peasants work in the cooperative,” but so what? People who could read were better equipped to recognize government propaganda for what it was.

Castro was no Bolshevik. He scorned orthodoxy and restlessly sought out new ideas. That was why he annoyed the Kremlin. But he was no democrat either. Tanya had been saddened when he had announced that the revolution had made elections unnecessary. And there was one area in which he had imitated the Soviet Union slavishly: with advice from the KGB he had created a ruthlessly efficient secret police force to stamp out dissent.