The Bear and the Dragon - Tom Clancy [142]
"So, looks like a routine day in theater?" Mancuso asked, as the briefing wound down.
"Pretty much," General Lahr confirmed.
"What sort of assets do we have tasked to keep an eye on our Chinese friends?"
"Mainly overheads," the J-2 replied. "Weve never had much in the way of human intelligence in the PRC—at least not that I ever heard about."
"Why is that?"
"Well, in simplest terms it would be kind of hard for you or me to disappear into their society, and most of our Asian citizens work for computer-software companies, last time I checked."
"Not many of them in the Navy. How about the Army?"
"Not many, sir. Theyre pretty underrepresented."
"I wonder why."
"Sir, Im an intelligence officer, not a demographer," Lahr pointed out.
"I guess that job is hard enough, Mike. Okay, if anything interesting happens, let me know."
"You bet, sir." Lahr headed out the door, to be replaced by Mancusos J-3 operations officer, who would tell him what all his theater assets were up to this fine day, plus which ships and airplanes were broken and needed fixing.
She hadnt gotten any less attractive, though getting her here had proven difficult. Tanya Bogdanova hadnt avoided anything, but shed been unreachable for several days.
"Youve been busy?" Provalov asked.
"Da, a special client," she said with a nod. "We spent time together in St. Petersburg. I didnt bring my beeper. He dislikes interruptions," she explained, without showing much in the way of remorse.
Provalov could have asked the cost of several days in this womans company, and she would probably have told him, but he decided that he didnt need to know all that badly. She remained a vision, lacking only the white feathery wings to be an angel. Except for the eyes and the heart, of course. The former cold, and the latter nonexistent.
"I have a question," the police lieutenant told her.
"Yes?"
"A name. Do you know it? Klementi Ivanch Suvorov."
Her eyes showed some amusement. "Oh, yes. I know him well." She didnt have to elaborate on what "well" meant.
"What can you tell me about him?"
"What do you wish to know?"
"His address, for starters."
"He lives outside Moscow."
"Under what name?"
"He does not know that I know, but I saw his papers once. Ivan Yurievich Koniev."
"How do you know this?" Provalov asked.
"He was asleep, of course, and I went through his clothes," she replied, as matter-of-factly as if shed told the militia lieutenant where she shopped for bread.
So, he fucked you, and you, in turn, fucked him, Provalov didnt say. "Do you remember his address?"
She shook her head. "No, but its one of the new communities off the outer ring road."
"When did you last see him?"
"It was a week before Gregoriy Filipovich died," she answered at once.
It was then that Provalov had a flash: "Tanya, the night before Gregoriy died, whom did you see?"
"He was a former soldier or something, let me think. Pyotr Alekseyevich … something..
"Amalrik?" Provalov asked, almost coming off his seat.
"Yes, something like that. He had a tattoo on his arm, the Spetsnaz tattoo a lot of them got in Afghanistan. He thought very highly of himself, but he wasnt a very good lover," Tanya added dismissively.
And he never will be, Provalov could have said then, but didnt. "Who set up that, ah, appointment?"
"Oh, that was Klementi Ivanch. He had an arrangement with Gregoriy. They knew each other, evidently for a long time. Gregoriy often made special appointments for Klementis friends."
Suvorov had one or both of his killers fuck the whores belonging to the man they would kill the next day … Whoever Suvorov was, he had an active sense of humor.., or the real target actually had been Sergey Nikolaych. Provalov had just turned up an important piece of information, but it didnt seem to illuminate his criminal case at all. Another fact which only made his job harder, not easier. He was back to the same two possibilities: This Suvorov had contracted the two Spetsnaz soldiers to kill Rasputin, and then had them killed