‘I’m aware of that, Mikhail. But by then the only thing they’ll be able to report back to their masters will be the strength of our support for forming an independent trade union.’
‘Although I have no doubt the men will back you,’ said a fourth voice, ‘no amount of rousing oratory can stop a bullet in its tracks.’ Several of the men nodded gravely.
‘Once I’ve delivered my speech on Saturday,’ said Konstantin, ‘the KGB will be wary of doing anything quite that stupid, because if they did, the men would rise as one, and they’d never be able to squeeze the genie back into the bottle. But Yuri is right,’ he continued. ‘You’re all taking a considerable risk for a cause I’ve long believed in, so if anyone wants to change their mind and leave the group, now is the time to do so.’
‘You won’t find a Judas among us,’ said another voice, as Vladimir stifled a cough. The men all stood as one to acknowledge Karpenko as their leader.
‘Then we’ll meet again on Saturday morning. Until then we must remain silent, and keep our counsel.’
Vladimir’s heart was thumping as the men shook hands with each other, one by one, before leaving the church. He didn’t move until he finally heard the great west door slam shut, and a key turn in the lock. He then scurried back to the vestry, and with the help of a stool, wriggled out of the window, clinging to the ledge before dropping to the ground like a seasoned wrestler. The one discipline where Alexander wasn’t in his class.
Aware that he didn’t have a moment to lose, Vladimir ran in the opposite direction to Mr Karpenko, towards a street that didn’t need a NO ENTRY sign, as only party officials ever considered entering Tereshkova Prospect. He knew exactly where Major Polyakov lived, but wondered if he had the nerve to knock on his door at that time of night. At any time of the day or night, for that matter.
When he reached the street with its leafy trees and neat cobblestone pavement, Vladimir stood and stared at the house, losing his nerve with every second that passed. He finally summoned up enough courage to approach the front door, and was about to knock when it was flung open by a man who didn’t like to be taken by surprise.
‘What do you want, boy?’ the major demanded, grabbing his unwelcome visitor by the ear.
‘I have information,’ said Vladimir, ‘and you told us when you visited our school last year looking for recruits, that information was golden.’
‘This had better be good,’ said Polyakov, who didn’t let go of the boy’s ear as he dragged him inside. He slammed the door behind him. ‘Start talking.’
Vladimir faithfully reported everything he’d overheard in the church. By the time he’d come to the end, the pressure on his ear had been replaced by an arm around his shoulder.
‘Did you recognize anyone other than Karpenko?’ Polyakov asked.
‘No, sir, but he mentioned the names Yuri, Mikhail, and Stepan.’
Polyakov wrote down each name before saying, ‘Are you going to the match on Saturday?’
‘No, sir, it’s sold out, and my father wasn’t able to—’
Like a conjurer, the KGB chief produced a ticket from an inside pocket and handed it to his latest recruit.
*
Konstantin closed the bedroom door quietly, not wanting to wake his wife. He took off his heavy boots, undressed and climbed into bed. If he left early enough in the morning, he wouldn’t have to explain to Elena what he and his disciples had been up to, and even more important, what he had planned for Saturday’s meeting. Better she thought he’d been out drinking, even that there was another woman, than burden her with the truth. He knew she would only try to convince him not to go ahead with the prepared speech.
After all, they didn’t have too bad a life, he could hear her reminding him. They lived in an apartment block that had electricity and running water. She had her job as a cook at the officers’ club, and Alexander was waiting to hear if he’d won a scholarship to the prestigious Foreign Language Institute in Moscow. What more could they ask for?
That one day everyone could take such privileges for granted, Konstantin would have told her.
He lay awake, composing a speech in his mind that he couldn’t risk committing to paper. He rose at five-thirty, and once again took care not to wake his wife. He doused his face in freezing water, but didn’t shave, then dressed in overalls and a rough, open-neck shirt before finally pulling on his well-worn hobnailed boots. He crept out of the bedroom and collected his lunch box from the kitchen: a sausage, a hard-boiled egg, an onion, and two slices of bread and cheese. Only members of the KGB would eat better.
He closed the front door quietly behind him and made his way down the stone stairs before stepping out onto the empty street. He always walked the six kilometres to work, avoiding the overloaded bus that ferried the workers to and from the docks. If he hoped to survive beyond Saturday, he needed to be fit, like a highly trained soldier in the field.
Whenever he passed a fellow worker in the street, Konstantin always acknowledged him with a mock salute. Some returned his salutation, others nodded, while a few, like bad Samaritans, looked the other way. They may as well have had their party numbers tattooed on their foreheads.
Konstantin arrived outside the dock gates an hour later, and clocked on. As works supervisor, he liked to be the first to arrive and the last to leave. He walked along the dockside while he considered his first assignment of the day. A submarine destined for Odessa on the Black Sea had just berthed at dock 11 to refuel and pick up provisions, before continuing on its way, but that wouldn’t be for at least another hour. Only the most trusted men would be allowed anywhere near dock 11 that morning.
Konstantin’s mind drifted back to the previous night’s meeting. Something hadn’t felt quite right, but he couldn’t put a finger on it. Was it someone and not something, he wondered, as a vast crane at the far end of the dock began to lift its heavy load and swing slowly towards the waiting submarine on dock 11.
The operator seated in the crane’s cab had been chosen carefully. He could unload a tank into a ship’s hold with only inches to spare on either side. But not today. Today he was transferring barrels of oil to a submarine that needed to remain submerged for days at a time, but the task also demanded pin-point accuracy. One piece of luck – no wind that morning.
Konstantin tried to concentrate as he went over his speech once again. As long as none of his colleagues opened their mouths, he was confident everything would fall neatly into place. He smiled to himself.
The crane operator was satisfied that he had judged it to an inch. The load was perfectly balanced and still. He waited just one more moment before he eased a long heavy lever gently forward. The large clamp sprang open and three barrels of oil were released. They crashed down onto the dockside. Inch perfect. Konstantin Karpenko had looked up, but it was too late. He was killed instantly. A dreadful accident, for which no one was to blame. The man in the cab knew he had to disappear before the early shift clocked on. He swung the crane’s arm back into place, turned off the engine, climbed out of the cab and began to make his way down the ladder to the ground.
Three fellow workers were waiting for him as he stepped onto the dockside. He smiled at his comrades, not spotting the six-inch serrated blade until it was thrust deep into his stomach and then twisted several times. The other two men held him down until he finally stopped whimpering. They bound his arms and legs together before pushing him over the side of the dock and into the water. He reappeared three times, before finally disappearing below the surface. He hadn’t officially signed on that morning, so it would be some time before anyone noticed he was missing.
*