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  But that still left me wondering about the identity and intentions of the bozos in the chopper. If they weren’t regular troops, they could only be ex-military or contractors for hire. But what was their purpose?

  I checked the tracker light. It was still there, but on the edge of the system’s ability to hold the signal for much longer. I had to catch up with Tzorekov and fast.

  I took a chance of starting the engine and drove as quietly as I could until I was well out of earshot of the men in the helicopter. When I was far enough up the road I turned on my sidelights and put my foot down. Another mile and I put on the main lights and hit the gas.

  The signal became stronger after thirty minutes, and I figured Tzorekov must have stopped somewhere. The where was soon apparent as I saw a sign for a truck stop up ahead, with a handful of vehicles but not much sign of movement. The lights inside the restaurant were still on, so when I was certain there were no Touaregs sitting in the parking lot out front, I pulled over and went in.

  It was cosy inside, with the windows steamed up and the hiss of wind across the roof. There were only four customers, all men with faces like hammered tent pegs, most of them hunched over their food and looking like they’d been hauled through a hedge. Long distance truckers; too many miles, the wrong kind of food and never enough sleep.

  I ordered take-out coffee and the middle-years lady with a beehive hairdo behind the counter obliged by selling me a vacuum flask with a pretty pink casing to go with it. She kept smiling at me behind her eyelashes all the way through filling it without spilling a drop, which I guessed took some practice. So I paid up and left before she got round to telling me what was really on her mind.

  Back on the road I gradually reeled in the Touareg again to a safe margin and kept them there. As long as the tracker kept doing its thing or Tzorekov didn’t do something radical, like throw in a sudden change of direction, I should be fine.

  Which of course, is exactly what he did. One second he was there, on the road in front, then the signal light went off-road and heading away from me into what looked like big tree, big bear country, with no signs of life.

  I slowed down and checked the phone was working. It was fine. But the tracker light was now away from the main route and still going strong.

  I lowered the window. The map didn’t show a road but that didn’t mean there wasn’t one. As long as I didn’t miss it, I should be able to stay on their trail. The rain had really slacked off now, and the wind with it. It might only be a lull, but it was all the opportunity I was going to get.

  I decided to call Lindsay. ‘I need some help. They’ve gone off-road. Can you ask the team to double-check the signal for me?’

  ‘Copy that, Watchman. Call you back.’

  Even as she was speaking I caught sight of a sign in the headlights. It was a billboard on a wooden frame showing a schematic for a cabin village, the sketches showing hunting, fishing and cross-country skiing facilities. There was also a canoe pinned to a metal rack to show they were close to water. Or maybe they just liked the decoration.

  Whatever. Cabins for weekenders and hunters; an ideal place for a stopover. I called up Lindsay and told her where I was headed, and she confirmed she was running a check.

  I followed a rough metalled road for about two miles, winding deeper into a vast belt of trees while hoping I didn’t meet the Touareg waiting for me. Then I saw another sign telling me I had a hundred metres to go. I switched off the main lights and nosed into a crushed gravel turnaround in front of a wood-framed hut. There were lights on inside but no signs of the Touareg. I parked out front and went inside.

  An old woman with a flat face and long grey hair hanging down past her shoulders looked like she was about ready to close up for the night. But she perked up when she saw me and even gave me a smile. She was chewing on her gums and pointed at three cabins on a large wall-map to show they were vacant. I counted three others that weren’t and decided business must be slow.

  I nodded at a picture of a cabin sitting against a splash of blue and dropped enough cash on the counter for one night. She snatched it up before I could change my mind and looked at me as if I was going to ask for a receipt. I didn’t, which seemed to be right, and she handed me a key and a hand-drawn map showing the way to my cabin. It was about a hundred yards away down a track through a belt of trees, so I thanked her and got back in the car. As I pulled away, the office lights went out and I saw her scuttling away down the road at speed. I hadn’t seen any signs of a house, so I had no idea where she was headed.

  Maybe she was a hobbit.

  Half a minute later the headlights lit up a plain log cabin right out of an old Davy Crockett movie. It had a pitch right on the water’s edge just like the schematic in the office had showed, and a small jetty with a covered boat tied up alongside. The air was heavy with the tang of fish, dried mud and some other stuff I didn’t like to think about, but I hadn’t expected the Ritz. I dumped my stuff on the inside, which was basic, rough-hewn and would appeal mainly to hunters who liked to drink themselves unconscious after a hard day’s killing. Then I checked everything was secure and headed for the door to go on a walkabout.

  ‘Watchman, come in.’ Lindsay’s voice sounded in my earpiece.

  ‘I’m here.’

  ‘We have confirmation. The location is listed as an unofficial hunters’ lodge area. We don’t have any details, but it doesn’t look very big.’

  ‘It’s not,’ I told her. ‘I think I’m going to be picking up some cooties tonight.’

  I heard her laugh and disconnected before she could come back at me. As I stepped outside and closed the door I heard a familiar whup-whup sound drifting across the lake, rising and fading on the wind. The helicopter.

  These guys weren’t giving up.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Arkady Gurov waited until Tzorekov was asleep before stepping outside the cabin and closing the door softly behind him. The old man had barely said a word for the past three hours, other than to talk about how things were changing too fast and complaining about the food, which was tinned stew and potatoes, heated on the small stove. It was unlike him to find fault, but then, the situation they had put themselves in was hardly what they were accustomed to.

  This entire journey was far from ideal for a man of Tzorekov’s years, Gurov knew. They had known from the beginning that this was going to be a difficult mission and might end in disaster, and Gurov had tried more than once to counsel his boss to seek another way of performing the impossible. But, dogged as ever in the way that had made him such a success in the KGB and later, in business, Tzorekov had insisted that the outcome would be for the good of them all.

  Gurov wasn’t so sure, but he trusted his boss with his life. And that trust, he figured, was probably going to be tested to the limit sooner or later.

  He’d first picked up the distant murmur of an engine while making a quick recce around the outside of the cabin shortly after their arrival. A truck on the main road, perhaps, but the trees played tricks with sound. More likely a hunter out late in the woods.

  Tzorekov was inside, heating up the food, and appeared not to have noticed. At first Gurov wasn’t concerned; there were several military facilities in the region, and any night-time movement could be a vehicle on a training exercise or a navigation test. But instinct had made him go back outside a few minutes later on the pretext of getting something from the car, and he’d recognized the sound for what it was: a helicopter. He’d judged it to be about five kilometres away and getting closer.

  He stepped lightly along the jetty, carefully balanced on the balls of his feet. The boards were weather-worn and uneven, some shifting alarmingly in places, and he doubted the owners of this place put much effort into maintenance or repairs. He reached the end of the wooden walkway and stood still, allowing his eyes to become accustomed to the dark and to pick out the lighter tones of the stretch of water before him.

  With stillness came the soft sounds of night creature
s; a fish plopped out on the lake and an owl called some distance away in the trees, echoed by another. A ripple of water was echoed by the hiss of wind in the trees. They were lonely sounds, isolated and natural. But that was all. No engine noise.

  He turned and walked back to the cabin, a sense of unease settling on his shoulders. He was city born and bred, but that made him all the more suspicious of environments he didn’t know, and therefore doubly cautious. He had no reason for suspecting that their presence in the country had become known already, but he was experienced enough to accept that nothing stayed secret for very long, especially when it concerned a man like Tzorekov.

  Before re-entering the cabin he scanned the perimeter one last time, then checked the safety on the semi-automatic. With the benefit of hindsight it seemed pitifully inadequate now; he should have acquired some heavier firepower, although he knew Tzorekov would never have allowed it. He’d had a hard enough time keeping the pistol. But the old man was always open to persuasion, if a good case was made. He hadn’t argued strongly enough and was now stuck with little more than a pea-shooter against … whoever the hell was out there.

  ‘What is it?’ Tzorekov was awake and huddled under a blanket. He looked tired and drained of energy, but still had a glint in his eyes. He’d clearly noticed whatever restless energy Gurov was giving off.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Gurov. ‘The night, mostly, and fish and this shitty weather. How are you feeling?’

  ‘Nothing? For nothing and a bunch of fish you take that gun? Come on, Arkasha, don’t try kidding an old man. You heard something.’

  Gurov felt embarrassed. It wasn’t often that Tzorekov used the diminutive form of his name; usually when they were alone or in family situations. But this was different. This carried a tone of mild reproof.

  ‘I think it was a helicopter,’ he said finally. ‘Sorry. But it’s gone now.’

  ‘Gone? Or you merely stopped hearing it?’

  ‘OK, I stopped hearing it.’ He smiled at the old man’s perceptiveness. At the same time he felt some relief; at least now there would be no point hiding anything. ‘It could be nothing; this area’s full of training camps. Probably some junior pilot on a night-flying exercise, poor sod.’

  ‘Bullshit.’ Tzorekov sat up. ‘They’re out there and we both know it. The bastards know we’re coming – probably know why, too. They’ll do anything to stop us, anything to preserve the status quo.’

  ‘True. But who are “they”?’

  ‘Fuck, who cares? The Siloviki … the Ozero Cooperative … the imbeciles who want to take us right back to the days of the Soviet … or the jumped-up dictators who think they can run this bloody country and the surrounding states better than Putin or anybody else. We’re hardly short of candidates.’ He stared at the stove as Gurov made tea. ‘Personally, I put my money on a mix of all the above.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘There’s a new group I’ve been hearing about; formed by breakaways unhappy with the pace of things. They’re made up of politicos, military and intelligence people and call themselves the Wise Men. Can you believe that? As if they alone hold the only valid answers. What arrogant pricks!’

  ‘Do you know any of them?’ Gurov asked. He had never broached this topic with Tzorekov before, if only because it wasn’t on his radar and because there was precious little he could do about it. As long as they both stayed outside Russia, outlaws in all but name, they were disconnected, involved only by association and history, like so many others who had put themselves out of reach.

  ‘I know one of them.’ Tzorekov nodded abruptly, and slapped a heavily-veined hand on the bed. ‘Victor Simoyan, the tub of lard. He’s got ambition and he’s greedy. I’ve been studying him from a distance.’ He looked up as Gurov handed him a mug of tea. ‘You know what a kingmaker is, Arkasha?’

  ‘Of course. Not that we have them here in Russia.’

  ‘You’re wrong, my friend. We do – and Simoyan is one of them. He won’t try to run anything himself because he hasn’t the talent and he knows he’d get fucked eventually by his so-called friends. But he knows people who want to do it and that’s our big problem: people like him don’t stop to consider the wider implications – what the Americans are fond of calling the bigger picture. Simoyan and his type will blunder us into a new age of warfare because they’re too greedy, too stupid and lack the vision to see where it will lead us.’ He sipped his tea. When he spoke again, his voice was soft, almost saddened. ‘That is why, my friend, we must do this thing. We have to try to make a difference. This planet cannot withstand another big war.’

  Gurov said nothing. But it wasn’t Tzorekov’s words that silenced him. In the momentary silence as the old man drank his tea, he thought he’d heard the sound of an engine. He walked over to the small window looking out over the lake. He couldn’t see anything out there in the dark, but he didn’t need to. They were there; he could sense it.

  ‘Did you really,’ he said casually, ‘tell the British what we were doing? Or the Americans?’

  Tzorekov seemed surprised by the question. ‘I had to. It was important that they knew – that somebody knew, in case …’

  ‘In case what – we disappear?’

  ‘Yes. What we are doing, I’ve said it before, is vitally important. Somebody has to try this. I’ve achieved much in my life, Arkasha, but it will be meaningless if it all comes down to knowing what is happening but standing by and doing nothing. There are too many who stand by and do nothing and … I don’t want to be one of them.’

  ‘Did you expect them to help us? Is that why you told them?’

  ‘How would they? Anything they do would be seen as an act of aggression and used against us. It would be worse than useless. No, we’re in this alone. The best the Americans or British can do is stand on the sidelines and watch. And pray.’

  ‘Well, let’s hope they’ve got a direct line for the praying bit, then,’ Gurov said easily. ‘Talking of lines, when do we expect to hear from Valentin?’

  ‘Who knows? Soon, I hope. He knows we’re here and waiting – and he knows how important this is.’

  Gurov nodded. The sooner the better in his opinion. If his instincts were right, it wasn’t a big war that might be their first and only problem, but a much smaller one landing right here on their doorstep.

  Later, as he put his head down and waited for sleep, Gurov wondered if they should be moving from here. If Tzorekov was right and a team was already searching, they could be in the gravest danger. But was that realistic in an area as remote as this? And was running too soon and at night any less dangerous than staying until daylight?

  TWENTY-FIVE

  I checked out the other three occupied cabins. They were spaced out randomly through the trees, all fronting on the water and with their own jetty. The first two were dark, with off-roaders outside and piles of boots and other wet-weather gear strung from hooks under the roof overhang. One of the cabins had a detachable outboard motor chained to the veranda posts and a five-gallon jerry can standing a few feet away. I sniffed at the lid. Gasoline.

  The Touareg was parked alongside number three, and like the others had its own wooden jetty. A wisp of smoke was coming from the cabin’s stove-pipe chimney and a yellow light showed through the window.

  I heard a vague rumble of voices coming from inside, and stayed back in case Gurov was feeling jumpy or had put out motion detectors. If he was in full protective mode I didn’t want to tangle with him, much less try explaining what I was doing here; as far as he and Tzorekov were concerned, I didn’t exist.

  I ducked under the tail of the Touareg and ran my hand around, hoping to feel the second tracker device. But it was a no-go; whoever had managed to put it there must have found a good place to hide it, and I didn’t dare shine a light to find out where.

  As I slipped out from underneath, I could still hear the helicopter, the sound alternately fading and rising as the wind shifted. It sounded louder close to the ground than it did when I stoo
d up, and I figured the sound was being transmitted across the surface of the lake.

  I doubled back to my cabin and collected the night scope, then headed off round the shore towards the sound of the rotors, which was now fading. But it was the fade of a dying engine, not distance, and I guessed they’d found somewhere to land.

  There was a track of sorts through the trees, and although overgrown and littered with brushwood, was close enough to the water to keep my bearings and clear enough to keep up a fast pace. I used the night scope to avoid obstacles and stopped every few yards to check the way ahead. I didn’t think anybody would have made it out this far yet, but running into opposition at this stage would put a real kink in my plans to remain invisible.

  After fifteen minutes I sensed another shift in the wind, bringing with it the smell of aviation fuel. Then I saw a flash of light about a hundred yards away; there for a second, then gone. I stopped and focused the scope, and through the tangle of foliage picked out the curved shape of the helicopter fuselage. It had come down in a clearing close to the water, and when I swivelled the scope, I saw a long jetty pushing out into the lake with a number of small shapes tied up alongside covered in tarpaulins.

  Movement. I sank down, slow and easy. If these guys knew what they were doing, they wouldn’t fight their way through the woods the way I’d just had to do; they’d jump in one of the boats and take the easy route.

  I wormed my way forward until I could see more clearly. There were four, no five, men gathered next to the clamshell door to the main cabin. They were probably discussing tactics.

  So where was number six?

  Then I saw him. It was the big guy I’d seen earlier, and he was walking back from the water’s edge. He called to the others and waved an arm towards the boats. They split up, one man and the crew members staying by the helicopter and two joining the big man at the jetty, where they began to check out the boats. They were unlikely to find one with an engine, but they wouldn’t need one; instinct told me these guys would be adept on the water with oars and muscle-power, where they could make a silent approach.