Trinity factor, p.4
Trinity Factor, page 4
It was just eight o’clock on a Saturday morning when Mahoney stopped Greene and Sampson at the door to the parlor. Jada and the others were already inside, waiting to begin.
Mahoney was tired from the seven-day-a-week routine, and he missed Marge, but he was troubled. And before he left he wanted to straighten it out. So far he had contributed very little to the woman’s interrogation.
“What’s on board for this morning?” he asked the two men.
Greene sighed tiredly. “Mop up a few details, I guess, and then we’re going to split. Shouldn’t take more than an hour or so.”
“You two did a good job.”
Greene shrugged. “She was easy. Cooperative. Wasn’t much really, except asking the right questions at the right time.”
“How about next week?”
“The FBI is coming on Tuesday, from what we were told. They’ll be handling local details—Soviet agent infiltration to the States, as well as operations mostly out of Washington. When they’re done they’ll be handling her new identity.”
“I’d like some time with her,” Mahoney said.
“Be our guest,” Greene said. “Anything specific in mind?”
“She’s holding something back.”
Greene and Sampson looked at each other. “We thought so, too. But we’ve got everything we need. If she’s holding anything back, it must be some specific operational detail, or perhaps the name of someone she wants to protect for personal reasons. It’ll come out sooner or later.”
Sampson reached out for the doorknob, but Mahoney stopped him. “No one has asked her why she defected.”
Again both men shrugged. “She’s sick,” Sampson said. “She wanted to end her days in a little more comfort than she could get at home.”
“Sick?” Mahoney asked.
“We got the medical report a couple of days ago … just didn’t think to show it to you.”
“What is it?”
“Leukemia,” Sampson said. “With treatment she has a couple of years at the outside.”
“I see,” Mahoney said, and he was beginning to understand.
They went inside, sat down, and without preamble began the morning session.
Over the four weeks he had been here, Mahoney had come to respect Jada as a woman of obvious intelligence. Once upon a time she had been a beautiful woman, and the classic lines of her face and body were still there. Mahoney had supposed she had merely aged badly, but now looking at her he could definitely see the ravages of the cancer eating at her body, and he felt sorry for her.
But beyond that he was certain now that something else was bothering her. Whatever it was probably held the key to the reason she defected.
They had gotten everything they needed from her—Greene and Sampson had been correct in that. She had provided them with everything from the KGB’s organizational chart, so far as an officer of her rank could be expected to know it, to the complete structure and operational details of her own department, and the KGB’s plans in the event of another war between the Arabs and Israelis. She had also promised to go over the details of KGB operations in the continental United States with the FBI, although she admitted that was an area she knew very little about.
And yet she had never made it clear why she was defecting. That bothered Mahoney, because he was sure there was a good reason. He had come to understand that the woman had never done anything in her life without good reason.
The others finished about ten o’clock, and Greene and Sampson both stood at last and stretched.
“Thank you, Colonel Yatsyna, for your cooperation,” Greene said, looking down at her.
She managed a slight smile.
“Within a few weeks we’ll have all of this in document form, and you’ll have to review it all, and initial each page. We’ll also ask you to sign a cover statement as well.”
“I understand,” Jada said, looking up at the two men. Her voice was soft, her English as good as anyone’s in the room. She got slowly to her feet. “I would assume then that I have the weekend free until the FBI comes?”
Greene nodded toward Mahoney, who was seated at the opposite end of the table from her. The technicians were packing up their gear, and Kopinski was at the door ready to leave. He stopped and looked back.
“Mr. Mahoney has a few questions for you, I believe.”
Jada turned to look at him, the gentle smile still on her lips.
One of the technicians looked up. “Would you like the equipment running, Mr. Mahoney?”
Mahoney stood up. “It’s not necessary,” he said to them, but he was looking directly at Jada. “Would you care to take a walk? It’s a beautiful morning.”
“By all means,” she said. “I haven’t been outside for a couple of weeks now.”
“Do you want us to stick around, Wallace?” Kopinski asked, still by the door.
“I don’t think it’s necessary,” Mahoney said. He had come around the table and taken Jada’s arm, and together they went out the door, down the corridor, and out the back way.
The morning was bright, the sun warm, and the trees had already begun to turn their autumnal colors. A gentle breeze blew from the south, bringing with it the pleasant smell of the countryside, as well as the sea.
There were bridle paths throughout the fifty acres, and they headed slowly down one of them, and within a few minutes they were out of sight of the house.
“How far are we from the ocean?” she asked. They had left the house and started down the path in silence. This was the first either of them had spoken.
“Five or six miles,” Mahoney said. He had stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets. “Do you mind if I smoke?”
“Not at all,” she said.
He took out a large cigar, unwrapped it, wet it with his tongue, and lit it. She watched the process with a smile.
“Your wife must hate those things,” she said.
Mahoney laughed. “With a passion, but she never says a thing.”
“You’re fortunate to have such an understanding mate.”
“How about you?” Mahoney asked. “Did you leave anyone behind?”
She looked away, an expression of pain in her eyes. “There was someone once …” she started to say, but then she cut it off.
They were several hundred yards down the path. The birds were singing, and a couple of squirrels were playing around the bole of a tree. Mahoney stopped, reached out and gently turned Jada around so that they were facing each other.
“You came here looking for something,” he said softly. “Or someone. What is it?”
Her eyes were misting over, but she said nothing.
“You must know you are dying of leukemia.”
She nodded.
“For your long service to the Komitet, you would have been given at least an apartment in Moscow. Perhaps even a dacha in the country. But you did not want to be alone, you’ve told us. Surely you are more alone here than at home. So you came over because you were looking for something. What?”
She didn’t answer him at first; instead she turned and watched the squirrels playing for a long while. When she finally looked back there was an expression of infinite weariness and definite sadness in her eyes.
“How long have you been married, Mr. Mahoney?” she asked softly.
The question surprised him, but he answered, “Forty-one years.”
“To the same woman?”
Mahoney nodded.
“Do you have children? Grandchildren?”
The bitterness Mahoney had suppressed for the last two years rose to the surface from deep within himself. “I had two sons. One of them is married, with children. The other one … Michael … was murdered by your people two years ago.”
Jada reached out and touched his arm. “I’m sorry,” she said genuinely. “I’m truly sorry for you. But it must have been very difficult for your wife. It must still be difficult.”
“I’m not touched by your concern, comrade,” Mahoney said, accenting the title.
“I need your understanding, Mr. Mahoney.”
“You’ve dedicated your life to an organization that killed my son,” Mahoney said harshly.
Jada was shaking her head. “No,” she said. “I dedicated my life to a man who was killed thirty-five years ago in Operation Potsdam.”
“Then why—” Mahoney started to say, but he stopped in mid-sentence. “Operation Potsdam?”
“It wasn’t called that at the time, of course. It only had a code number. But it ended during the Potsdam Conference.” There was a distant look now in her eyes. I … we were here in this country from late in 1943 until mid-1945, when I returned to Moscow.”
“There were many Soviet operations in this country during the war,” Mahoney said. “What was yours?”
“It had to do with your development of the atomic bomb, and the ending of the war. We wanted your efforts to be unsuccessful.”
Mahoney tried to recall what little he knew about the atomic bomb project. At the time he had been working in Europe as an army intelligence officer. “You worked with Klaus Fuchs and David Greenglass?”
“There were others as well. Many others. But no, we didn’t actually work with them. They were merely our sources. We were not here to spy. We were here to stop the project. Or at least to significantly delay it.”
“I knew nothing about it,” Mahoney said.
She smiled. “Very few people know anything about it. We kept our secret well, although there was one man who nearly stopped us.”
“Is that why you came over? Is that what you’ve been holding back?”
Again Jada nodded. “And I will tell you the entire story, and what it means, if you will do me one favor. It will be a propaganda victory for your government.”
Mahoney started to protest. She, of course, had had nothing to do with the death of his son two years ago. Nevertheless, she was KGB. He did not deal with the enemy. And thirty-five years had gone by since the first atomic bomb had been tested. Whatever it was she had done during the war didn’t really matter any longer.
“Please,” Jada said. “It can do no harm. You’re aware of the fact I am dying. Treat this as a request from a dying old woman.”
“Goddammit,” Mahoney swore, and he looked away. “What is it? What do you want?”
“I want to go to Trinity, the site of the first atomic bomb test. It’s south of Albuquerque, New Mexico. I want to go there and see it with my own eyes. And then I will tell you the entire story. Will you … can you do that for me?”
Mahoney turned back to look at her. She was an extraordinary woman, and whatever the ultimate reason was for her defection to the United States, complying with her request could do no harm. She had cooperated with them, and back in Langley they would be terming this an intelligence coup.
“Yes,” he said to her at last. “I’ll take you down there.”
“Thank God,” she said, and it struck Mahoney odd that a Soviet intelligence officer would use such a phrase.
5
WHITE SANDS MISSILE RANGE, NEW MEXICO
Mahoney managed to make all the arrangements over the weekend, despite McBundy’s protests. The FBI was going to be hopping mad that they could not begin their interrogation on Tuesday as planned, and the job of soothing ruffled feathers was going to fall on the shoulders of the Missions and Operations chief.
In the end, however, McBundy had come around. There were not many people in the Company who would refuse any reasonable request from Mahoney. He had kept a low profile over the death of his son, which at the time could have made spectacular headlines, and that kind of loyalty deserved a certain amount of latitude.
They flew to Albuquerque on Monday, where they stayed at the Holiday Inn. The next morning they rented a car and drove the seventy-five miles south along the interstate through Socorro, turning off the main highway onto a secondary road and crossing the Rio Grande at the small town of San Antonio.
The day was hot, in the mid-nineties Fahrenheit, and the rugged mountains all around them faded into vague blue masses in the hazy distance. They were at the extreme northern edge of the White Sands Missile Range, and entrance to the rugged test area was from a narrow, blacktopped road that came off the highway and led to a small station called Stallion Range Gate.
At the guardhouse, Mahoney showed his identification to an old man wearing a wide Stetson hat, cowboy boots, and a western shirt and jeans. A military .45 automatic was strapped to his hip.
“Mr. Bryant, the Public Information Officer, is expecting you, sir,” the old man said. He pointed down the road. “He’ll be waiting at administration—it’s the low building on the right by the trees.”
Mahoney nodded his thanks and drove slowly to the building. Several cars and army vehicles were parked in a small lot, and a tall, thin civilian was leaning up against a military station wagon, smoking a cigarette.
When they pulled into the parking lot, he flipped his cigarette away and came over to them.
“Mr. Mahoney?” he said.
“Yes,” Mahoney said, getting out of the car. “You’re Jim Bryant?”
“Yes, sir,” Bryant said. “Welcome to White Sands Missile Range.” He glanced through the car window at Jada, who had not moved. She was staring through the rear window at the mountains to the east. “They didn’t tell me very much. What exactly is it you wanted to see?”
“The atomic bomb site,” Mahoney said. “How far is it from here?”
“About twenty miles,” Bryant said. “We can go in my car or yours, it doesn’t matter. But we’re going to have to be out of there in about three hours. They’ve scheduled an air-to-air strike over that area.”
“That should be plenty of time,” Mahoney said. He turned and looked at Jada, who had not taken her eyes from the mountains. “We’ll take my car. You can ride in the backseat.”
“Yes, sir,” Bryant said. He went to his own car and from inside took out a walkie-talkie, then came back and climbed into the backseat. Mahoney slipped behind the wheel, pulled out of the parking lot, and headed south along the narrow blacktopped road.
Jada had turned forward in her seat and was holding her body rigid, almost as if she was bracing for a crash. For a moment Mahoney was sure she was goint to collapse, but as they drove across the desert she maintained her posture, and held her silence.
Several minutes later Bryant leaned forward. “There’s a road to the left coming up. Take it,” he said.
A hundred yards later they came to the road that led directly east, toward the wall of mountains.
“This is still an active testing range?” Mahoney asked, looking at Bryant in the rearview mirror. The young man looked very much like his son Michael, and it gave him an odd feeling.
“Yes, sir,” Bryant said.
“Where is Mockingbird Pass?” Jada asked, her voice hoarse and cracked with much emotion.
“Ma’am?” Bryant said.
She turned to look at him. “Mockingbird Pass. Where is it?”
Bryant pointed to the southwest, and Jada followed his direction to where there was a low spot in the mountains.
“How far is that from ground zero?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” Bryant said, hesitating. “Twelve, maybe fifteen miles.”
They came to a small concrete bunker just off the road, and a few hundred yards later the road ended at a T by a high, wire-mesh fence.
“Ground zero,” Bryant said. “Take a right.”
The road led around the fence to a gate, where Mahoney stopped the car. Bryant jumped out, unlocked the gate, swung it open, and then came back to the car, but he did not get in. “Through the gate about three hundred yards is ground zero. The fenced-in area roughly marks the original crater.”
“Are you coming in with us?” Mahoney asked.
“No, sir,” Bryant said. “One of the security people will be along shortly, and I’m going back to Stallion Gate with him. I’ll return in a couple of hours.”
“Fine,” Mahoney said, and he proceeded through the gate along a narrow sand road, and they both saw it at the same time. Jada snapped forward in her seat with a gasp.
A tall, black stone obelisk rose from a cement pad in the middle of the fenced-in area, marking the exact spot of the test.
Mahoney stopped the ear and they both got out, slowly walked to the marker, and Jada stared at it for a long time. There was a cathedrallike silence here on the floor of the desert. And the mountains, which Bryant had told them were nearly fifteen miles away, seemed ominously large, as if they were no more than a hundred yards distant.
There were tears in Jada’s eyes when she finally looked up at Mahoney, and her complexion was ashen. “He’s here,” she said. “I can feel it.”
There was a wooden reviewing stand where tourists came once a year to visit the site, and Mahoney took Jada by the shoulders and led her over to it. They sat down on the steps.
“Do you want to tell me now?” he asked gently.
“Oh, God …” she said, her breath coming in ragged gasps. “Alek … my Alek.”
After a long time she began to speak.
BOOK TWO
1943
6
LONDON
It was nearly midnight and the cold drizzle that had fallen all evening showed no signs of letting up soon. A chill wind blew up from the River Thames, bringing with it a myriad of smells and impressions—diesel fuel, rotting wood, cordage, and, over all, the effluvia of a city of 8 million inhabitants.
From somewhere distant, too, the smell of cordite wafted in on a chance breeze from this evening’s Luftwaffe raid, and in the distance the sounds of sirens—ambulances and fire engines—drifted over the patter of rain in the streets.
Sergeant Michael Lovelace shifted his weight from one foot to the other where he stood just within the doorway of a pottery shop in Soho, on London’s West End. He was a small, seedy-looking little man, but he had great patience. He had been watching the front entrance to a Greek restaurant across the street for more than an hour, and he was beginning to wonder if the man he had followed here had slipped out the rear door.
