Trinity Factor, page 10
Badim wanted to crawl off to bed somewhere, but he complied, and as he turned around slowly he could feel Runkov’s eyes on him, measuring, searching. But for what?
“You’d be a salesman of some kind, I suppose. You’d have to have a limp, otherwise you’d be in the service.”
Badim sat down again. “The Americans are our allies.”
“So were the Nazis at one time,” Runkov said absently, toying with the glass of vodka in his massive paws. He was silent for a long moment, as if he was deep in thought, and when he finally looked up there was a grim expression in his eyes. “I’m sending you to the United States on a Mokrie Dela.”
“Assassination?” Badim’s distaste was obvious.
Runkov nodded, and suddenly it all fell into place for Badim. The extraordinary message forcing him out of Germany, the question about his German likes and dislikes, and his American idiomatic English. He was going to be sent to the United States to assassinate someone, but with a fail-safe. If he was caught he would be identified as an Abwehr major. A Nazi. Not a Russian. It was ingenious.
But he had nothing against the Americans and he said as much to Runkov.
“Neither do I. They’re an inventive, straightforward people.”
“Then why am I being sent to assassinate someone?”
“Two people, actually,” Runkov said. “And the reason is quite simple. The Americans are too inventive. Left alone they will almost certainly develop a new super weapon that would make things quite impossible for us after the war.”
“The atomic bomb,” Badim said, half to himself. So it was true.
A startled expression had crossed Runkov’s features. “Where did you hear that?” he asked sharply, and Badim looked up.
“I knew the Germans were working on such a weapon without much success, and it was believed the Americans and British were doing research on it as well, but with even less success.”
“The Americans will succeed,” Runkov said. “Left to their own devices.”
“Then why don’t we just steal the secret?”
“We will, but even with that it would take our scientists a long time to catch up. Perhaps too long a time.”
“I’m being sent over to slow the project down. Kill two key men.”
Runkov nodded. “Will you accept the assignment?”
Would he accept the assignment? What an odd question. Badim turned it over in his mind in an attempt to make some sense of it. He had never been asked such a thing in all his life.
From the time he had been an orphan under the care of the State, his life had been very carefully controlled. He had rebelled, certainly, but within a very narrow path, never really straying far from his superiors’ wishes.
He understood intellectually that other people made choices … major decisions about their own lives. But such things had always been a wonderment to him. Duty and honor. He was a product of the State. He did what he was asked to do.
And now, for the first time in a long while, Badim had to wonder if there wasn’t something missing inside of him. Some function of human behavior that he had not been born with, or had never learned.
He understood perfectly well what Runkov was saying to him. After the war, when Germany was being divided up, and when world power was being parceled out, there would have to be a strong place for the Soviet Union. Delaying the American efforts toward building the super weapon was a necessity. He could see that clearly.
But was there another understanding of what Runkov was saying to him that he should be aware of? A feeling suddenly grew strong in him that he was a stranger not only to his own land and people and language, but to himself as well.
He looked up out of his thoughts finally, and nodded, the action almost in self-defense. “Of course,” he said softly.
“Very good,” Runkov replied, and there was a knock at the door. “Come,” he snapped, looking up.
The door opened and Sergeant Doronkin stuck his head in. “The girl is here.”
Runkov got to his feet. “Fine, send her in.” He turned to Badim. “Part of your cover in the United States will be a wife. The girl is here now. Her English is perfect.”
Badim got up and turned as a young woman came through the door, and his mouth fell open.
“Aleksandr Petrovich, I’d like you to meet Jada Natasha Yatsyna,” Runkov said, but Badim barely heard him as he continued to stare at the girl. She was the most extraordinarily pretty woman he had ever seen.
BOOK THREE
SUMMER 1944
12
CAPE COD
Alek Badim paused at the metal-runged ladder that led up from the Control Room into the conning tower and turned toward the captain who had taken them this far. In the dim red battle lights the man’s face was barely visible.
It had been a strained voyage around North Cape from near Murmansk, then across the North Atlantic, rendezvousing with their supply ship for fuel north of the Faerøe Islands. By day they ran deep and silent to escape detection from Allied patrols, as well as other German U-boats. Only by night did they risk coming to the surface to recharge their batteries.
The man and his tiny crew had done a brilliant job bringing them across, and for just a moment Badim was undecided about following all of Runkov’s orders … especially those determining the fate of these fine men.
On the one hand he could see the sense of what Runkov had planned. He understood perfectly well that if the operation fell apart for some reason, the blame would have to be placed on the Germans, and no one else. That was paramount above all else. He had a job to do. A very important job that had the wholehearted support and approval of Marshal Stalin himself.
Yet on the other hand it came down to a question of being a Russian with loyalty to the State, or being totally useless.
All through the winter he had trained with the girl outside Moscow, learning American history and customs, learning engineering and physics in the field of nuclear power, and learning everything there was to know about Groves and Oppenheimer so that he and Jada knew them as well as any mother would know her sons.
Runkov had told him what would have to be done once they reached the eastern coast of the United States, but the knowledge was kept from the girl. She was too soft, too emotional to understand the necessity.
But, he wondered at this moment, as he had all through his training, was he strong enough to accomplish it?
They had come aboard the captured German submarine at Gremikha thirteen days ago, and had sailed within the hour. For the most part, during the crossing, Badim had kept to himself, sharing a bunk in the officers’ quarters with the young first mate. During the man’s off-watch hours, Badim had stayed in the officers’ mess reading from the boat’s supply of German literature, trying to clear his mind for the coming assignment.
Then, earlier this evening, with the tension aboard running higher than it had before, the first mate had come to his cubicle, knocked once on the bulkhead, and shoved back the curtain.
Badim had been lying on his back, fully dressed in his dark trousers, dark turtleneck sweater, and soft-soled shoes, his right arm flung over his eyes. He had taken his arm away and looked up.
“Is it time?” he had asked softly.
The young first mate had nodded, his face garish in the dim red battle lights. “Yes, sir. The captain requests your presence in the Conn. We’ll be taking you off within the hour.”
“Has the woman been informed?”
“Yes, sir,” the mate had said. “She is getting ready.”
Badim had gotten out of his bunk, and had followed the young man forward to the control room, where the captain had nodded up toward the conning tower.
“We’re at periscope depth. Go on up and take a look, see what you think,” the man had said.
Badim sighed deeply and without a word climbed up into the cramped cubicle and raised the periscope, flipping the handles out.
He leaned forward to the eyepieces, and the distant shore leaped out at him in the darkness, ruggedly, the waves breaking on a rocky shoreline. They were about a thousand meters offshore, and to the north at least two or three kilometers, he could just make out the lights of what appeared to be a small village. It would be North Truro, which was directly on Highway 6, a road running the entire length of Cape Cod and all the way back up to Boston.
He studied the patterns of the waves against the rocks, imagining himself and the woman in the rubber dinghy. It would be difficult getting ashore, but not impossible. They would get wet, but that could not be helped.
Leaning his weight against the periscope, his arms draped over the handles, he closed his eyes.
Groves and Oppenheimer. He understood full well now why they had to be assassinated. But the other thing. Was it necessary?
“Absolutely,” he could hear Runkov’s bellow echoing in his ears. “Make no mistake about it, Aleksandr Petrovich, every stage of this project has been carefully worked out. Each must be accomplished to insure success.”
The girl was wide-eyed and innocent. This was a sacred mission to her, the most distasteful aspect of which was Badim himself, whom she could not stand.
“You are crude, cruel, and thoughtless, comrade,” she had told him one month ago when he had shown no remorse over the fact that they were being sent to the United States to kill two men and possibly more.
All through their early training she had been of the belief that Badim also found their assignment distasteful. A necessity of war, with the approval of the government, but a crime, nevertheless.
When he had not agreed with her, when she had finally understood that he was doing nothing more than following orders, apparently with no emotion, she had asked Runkov to take her off the assignment.
The major had refused, of course, and Jada could do nothing else but comply. But she did not have to like it or Badim, and she had told him as much on more than one occasion.
And now he wondered, looking up and then stepping back so that he could lower the periscope, what would she think if she knew the entire story? Would the fact that he felt terrible about what he was going to have to do tonight make any difference to her?
Badim climbed back down to the control room where the captain, first mate, and navigational officer were waiting for him.
“Is it to your liking, comrade?” the captain asked.
“It will do,” Badim replied.
“Then get the woman and stand by at the forward hatch. I’m going to surface only long enough for you to get off with the rubber raft, and then we’re getting out of here.”
Badim stared at the man for a long time. He was forty-five, born in Vladivostok, and had distinguished himself on the Halifax-to-Murmansk lend-lease convoys as one of the few Russian naval officers in the almost exclusively British, American, and Dutch fleet.
The others in the crew were mostly faces without personality. But young. So young. Most of them were in their late teens or early twenties.
Runkov had cautioned him not to think about the crew, but the captain was an able, courageous man, and Badim admired him.
“Good luck,” the man said, and he turned away.
Badim nodded at the first mate and navigational officer, then turned and went aft where Jada was just coming out of her cubicle. She looked sickly in the dim red light, her eyes wide, her wonderfully expressive mouth half parted.
“Are we there?” she asked softly in English.
“Yes,” Badim said. “Get your things and get up to the forward hatch. I’ll be along in a moment.” He started to brush past her in the cramped companionway, but she put out a hand to stop him.
“Whatever differences we’ve had … whatever I’ve said …” she started, but then stopped.
Badim managed a tight smile. “We have a job to do,” he said. “When we are finished with it, we can settle our differences, if there are any.”
“I just wanted to say that I won’t give you any trouble. I’ll do whatever you tell me to do.”
He stared into her eyes for several long moments. She was beautiful, and she had more depth than any other woman he had ever met. But that would have to wait.
“Get your things. I’ll be right with you,” he said, and he went past her and ducked into his own cubicle, where he shoved the heavy curtain across the opening.
For a moment he stood there listening to the sounds of the boat. The drive motors were in neutral, but the generators supplying their electricity hummed, and the air coming through the ventilators made a gentle hushing sound.
It was no good thinking about the crew. There was a good chance they could not make it back home anyway. And even if they could, there was the chance they would be killed in action somewhere. The war was far from over, and many good men would die before it was.
He bent down, reached under his bunk, and fished out the small, American-made, canvas sack he had brought aboard with him, and took it over to the tiny fold-down table under the ship’s intercom.
He pulled out of the sack a screwdriver, a pair of wire strippers, and a small tubular device that looked like a tiny telescope with a single wire sticking out from each end. This he laid gently on the tabletop.
He held his breath for a moment to make sure no one was coming, and then quickly removed the four screws holding the intercom to the wall. The plate came loose and he eased the entire unit out of its slot in the bulkhead, and laid it gently on the desk top without disconnecting any of the wires.
Near the back of the narrow recess in the wall he could see the two plain yellow wires Runkov had told him would be there. Working quickly now, the sweat beginning to form on his forehead, he stripped the insulation off the ends of both wires, then gently picked up the tube and connected it to the circuit.
For a long, sick moment, he thought about what he was about to do. Then he reached out with both hands and sharply telescoped the tube together. There was a soft crunch of broken glass, and inside the device the released acid began eating at a thin plate separating the two wires.
It was a simple acid fuse. In four hours it would connect the explosives that had been packed against the submarine’s fuel tanks and around the torpedo rooms with a series of dry cells.
The explosions would be terrible, Badim thought, as he shoved the tube with its obscene wires farther back into the recess and then screwed the intercom unit back in place.
For days, bits and pieces of the wreckage would wash ashore. Letters with German postmarks, tins of German food, bits and pieces of Reichsnavy uniforms and equipment. There would be no doubt in anyone’s mind that a German submarine had exploded, for some unexplained reason, off the coast of Massachusetts.
The rubber dinghy would be found as well, telling the authorities that one or more German agents had come ashore before the U-boat had exploded. A manhunt would begin. For Germans, not Russians, and certainly not a man with a limp whose wife was young and lovely.
Badim stuffed his tools back in his sack, grabbed his summer-weight navy blue jacket from its hook, and went out into the companionway. He hurried forward into the torpedo room, where Jada was waiting with two crewmen.
“Ready to go, sir?” one of them asked.
Badim nodded, and the young man reached overhead and hit the intercom button. “Ready up here, captain,” he said.
Immediately there was the sound of rushing water being pumped out of the ballast tanks, and the deck tilted slightly back.
Outside he could imagine the bulk of the conning tower rising out of the sea. Would anyone be out there watching this way? Would they know what they were seeing?
One of the crewmen scrambled up the ladder and spun the hatch lock wheel. A moment later some water sloshed down the tunnel, followed by a blast of fresh, cold air.
“Are you ready?” Badim asked Jada, looking at her. She seemed nervous, almost on the verge of collapse, but she nodded.
The other crewman had scrambled up the ladder, and Badim motioned for Jada to go up. A moment later he followed her up the ladder and scrambled onto the deck, which was so low in the water it was nearly awash.
The crewmen had taken a small rubber raft from a waterproof locker and pulled the cords on the CO2 cartridges, which inflated the tiny boat in less than ten seconds, and then shoved it overboard.
They helped Jada aboard the pitching boat, and then Badim.
“Good luck,” one of them said softly, and Badim waved, then unfolded the oars, slipped them in their locks, and started away from the submarine toward the dark shore.
13
WASHINGTON, D.C
Michael Lovelace sat at his desk in his cramped office on the fifth floor of the War Department Building on Virginia Avenue. His coat was draped untidily over the back of his chair and his tie was loose. There were files strewn about the office, and the walls were filled with photographs and charts.
It was shortly after four in the morning and this section of the building was deserted. Groves had left for home around midnight, leaving Lovelace behind to review the latest files Hoover had sent over.
His mouth tasted foul and he had a splitting headache, but beyond that there was a vague uneasiness in his gut. It was the same feeling that he had had on numerous other occasions when the apparent facts of whatever investigation he was on didn’t add up.
On the one hand, Colonel Lansdale was doing as fine a job as possible keeping the lid on the mammoth project. Even the FBI and the people here in the War Department knew only that Groves and the people who worked for him were involved in some sort of secret war project. Nothing else.
But on the other hand, he thought, there were too many apparently insignificant little details that did not add up.
He categorized his thoughts tonight for the tenth time as he reached for a cigarette and lit it. Item. Oppenheimer had been a Communist, and had admitted to General Groves that he had been approached by an old university friend for information about the bomb. Yet Groves had denied his own CIC chief’s recommendation that Oppenheimer be pulled from the project. And Groves had the backing of Roosevelt himself.
