“Ah, Lavrentiy, there you are. Come! Come in.” Lavrentiy Beria approached Stalin’s desk, a stiff smile planted on his face.
“Sit down, sit down. Please.” Stalin waved an imperious hand in which he held some papers. Beria sat in the chair facing the Vozhd across his desk. The chair, as always, was a few inches shorter than that of his boss; an obvious but useful technique for establishing dominance, which Beria himself employed in his own office. “I have just been reading this report from one of our men in Mexico. I know, I’ve read the details several times and this report contains nothing new, but I do so enjoy the story.”
Stalin, as Beria knew, was referring to the assassination of Leon Trotsky, formerly Stalin’s partner and then his adversary in the Russian leadership battles after Lenin’s death. Trotsky had been killed in the summer by an ice pick in the head, wielded by an agent of Beria’s.
Stalin chuckled then set down the report. “Poskrebyshev behaving himself, is he? No ill manners?”
“No, Comrade Stalin. He is as affable as always. He told me a good joke as I was on my way in.” Poskrebyshev was Stalin’s private secretary and ran his office. The year before, Beria, naturally with his boss’ approval, had ordered the arrest of Poskrebyshev’s wife, Bronislava, for crimes against the state. She was still languishing in the Lubianka, her fate all but sealed.
“Yes, he always has a new joke to tell.” Stalin paused and gazed thoughtfully out of the window, where autumn was already taking a severe toll on the tree leaves in the courtyard. He idly picked up his pipe, which was unlit, and sucked it for a moment before turning his relentless gaze on Beria. “And so, Lavrentiy, we have the gold back now?”
“Yes, indeed, Comrade Stalin. The gold that Grishin found was released by the British authorities to Grishin yesterday. It is in the embassy vault.”
“I hope you and Grishin will take more care about its transport back to us than Grishin did in Spain those few years ago.”
“Of course, Comrade.” Beria could feel the odd bead of perspiration moistening the collar of his tunic.
“And, as I understand it, all the principal criminals in the theft of the gold are now dead?”
“Yes, all.”
Stalin reached for his tobacco pouch and started filling the bowl of his pipe. Beria could not stand the smell of Stalin’s tobacco and his nostrils twitched involuntarily. Stalin lit a match with a flick of his finger and applied the flame. “Anything wrong, Lavrentiy? Not sickening for anything, I hope?”
“No, Comrade. Just had a heavy day. A very busy time, as you know.”
Stalin leaned back in his chair, a deadly twinkle in his eyes, and puffed away. “Busy, yes, busy. You and I are always busy – vigilant as always for the treachery that is ever around us.” Stalin abruptly put his pipe down in an ashtray and his elbows on the desk.
“So, there was Alexander Stanislawicki – Sasha, wasn’t it?”
Beria nodded.
“So, Sasha stole this gold from under our noses at Odessa. There was some mistake in the paperwork for the gold, which he exploited. With the help of his brother Karol, who in fact turned out to be his nephew, and another nephew…” Stalin briefly consulted a folder on his desk. “Kowalski, the gold was transported to Warsaw.”
Beria nodded again.
“Remind me what happened to Sasha after that?”
“Having been attached to the NKVD he fell under suspicion for holding inappropriate Polish nationalist tendencies. He was suspended from his duties and returned to Poland. After the collapse of Poland and our accommodation with Germany, most of the Polish officer corps and intelligentsia were arrested and handed over to us. Sasha was one of those arrested. You will recall that most of those enemies of Russia were liquidated at Katyn in the spring.”