The Cardinal of the Kremlin - Tom Clancy [198]
"Doctor, make sure he gets some rest," he said on the way out. There was a car waiting for him.
Vatutin was surprised to see that it was morning. He'd allowed himself to focus too fully these last two days, and he'd thought that it would be nighttime. So much the better, though: he could see the Chairman right now. The really amazing part was that he was actually on a fairly normal schedule. He could go home tonight and get a normal night's sleep, reacquaint himself with wife and family, watch some television. Vatutin smiled to himself. He could also look forward to a promotion, he told himself. After all, he'd broken the man earlier than promised. That ought to make the Chairman happy.
Vatutin caught him between meetings. He found Gerasimov in a pensive mood, staring out his window at the traffic on Dzerzhinskiy Square.
"Comrade Chairman, I have the confession," Vatutin announced. Gerasimov turned.
"Filitov?"
"Why, yes, Comrade Chairman." Vatutin allowed his surprise to show.
Gerasimov smiled after a moment. "Excuse me, Colonel. There is an operational matter on my mind at the moment. You do have his confession?"
"Nothing detailed yet, of course, but he did admit that he was sending secrets to the West, and that he has been doing so for thirty years."
"Thirty years-and all that time we didn't detect it " Gerasimov noted quietly.
"That is correct," Vatutin admitted. "But we have caught him, and we will spend weeks learning all that he has compromised. I think we will find that his placement and operational methods made detection difficult, but we will learn from this, as we have learned from all such cases. In any event, you required the confession and now we have it," the Colonel pointed out.
"Excellent," the Chairman replied. "When will your written report be ready?"
"Tomorrow?" Vatutin asked without thinking. He nearly cringed awaiting the reply. He expected to have his head snapped off, but Gerasimov thought for an infinity of seconds before nodding. "That is sufficient. Thank you, Comrade Colonel. That will be all,"
Vajutin drew himself to attention and saluted before leaving.
Tomorrow? he asked himself in the corridor. After all that, he's willing to wait until tomorrow?
What the hell? It didn't make any sense. But Vatutin had no immediate explanation, either, and he did have a report to file. The Colonel walked to his office, pulled out a lined pad, and started drafting his interrogation report.
"So that's the place?" Ryan asked. "That's it. Used to be they had a toy store right across from it, over there. Called Children's World, would you believe? I suppose somebody finally noticed how crazy that was, and they just moved it. The statue in the middle is Feliks Dzerzhinskiy. That was a cold bloody piece of work-next to him Heinrich Himmler was a boy scout."
"Himmler wasn't as smart," Jack observed. "True enough. Feliks broke at least three attempts to bring Lenin down, and one of them was pretty serious. The full story on that never has gotten out, but you can bet the records are right in there," the driver said. He was an Australian, part of the company contracted to handle perimeter security for the embassy, and a former commando of the Aussie SAS. He never performed any actual espionage activities-at least not for America-but he often played the part, doing strange things. He'd learned to spot and shake tails along the way, and that made the Russians certain that he was CIA or some sort of spook. He made an excellent tour guide, too.
He checked the mirror. "Our friends are still there. You don't expect anything, do you?"
"We'll see."